Criminal Master System Ch.21.1

Chapter 21.1: The Two Traffickers

Chief Wu wasted no time. The moment he made up his mind, he set off.

The old man was just as decisive. As soon as he heard that someone could draw the traffickers’ faces, he urged Hu Wei to take him there immediately, constantly telling him to pedal faster along the way.

By the time the two arrived at Dragon King Temple, the sun had already begun to dip toward the western horizon. Jiang Xia was carving the second wax printing plate.

In truth, even if she finished carving this plate, printing another portrait from it wouldn’t be much faster than waiting for the printing factory. It wasn’t really necessary.

But waiting for news was agonizing.

Even Captain Tan couldn’t stop pacing circles around the courtyard, checking his watch every minute. Jiang Xia was even more restless. Rather than sit there worrying, she’d rather keep herself occupied with something.

The parents of the missing children had each taken a portrait and gone off to search along the roads. The only people left in the temple were the old Taoist priest and Jiang Xia.

With no outsiders around, Tan Bingyi no longer bothered pretending to stay calm. Frowning deeply, he gripped his walkie-talkie and repeatedly called out.

The radio was filled with static, and every reply took an unbearably long time to come through, making Captain Tan’s anxiety practically radiate from him.

Standing beneath a tree, he smacked himself on the head in frustration, trying to force himself to calm down.

“It’s almost four o’clock already! How have we still not found a single lead?”

Just as he was nursing a headache, Hu Wei came riding into the courtyard on his Flying Pigeon bicycle, carrying an old man in his fifties or sixties on the back.

He slammed on the brakes, planted one foot on the ground, and shouted at the top of his lungs,

“Jiang Xia! Chief Wu found a witness who saw the traffickers!”

“You found a witness?!”

Jiang Xia sprang to her feet, crossed the courtyard in a few quick strides, and asked urgently, “Did he get a good look at what the traffickers looked like? What exactly happened?”

“He got a clear look at the woman.”

Hu Wei quickly explained, “There were two traffickers in total. They stopped by this old man’s house asking for water, and he happened to see the child with them. Coincidentally, we were thirsty too and stopped at his place for a drink. Chief Wu casually showed him the portrait you drew and asked if he’d seen anyone like that—and that’s when he recognized them.”

Just thinking about it sent a chill down Hu Wei’s spine.

If Chief Wu hadn’t asked that question on a whim, who knew how much longer they would have wasted before uncovering this lead?

Hu Wei paused before adding with a sigh, “You have no idea. The female trafficker actually changed into a blue outfit along the way. She’d dr*gged the child unconscious, put a straw hat on him, and carried him in her arms. You couldn’t even see the kid’s face. Who would’ve been able to find them like that?”

Good grief.

Jiang Xia clicked her tongue in disbelief.

Being able to get her hands on sedatives and knowing to change clothes midway through the crime—this wasn’t the work of an ordinary child trafficker. She must have been doing this for years to have become so experienced.

For all they knew, she might have trafficked well over a hundred children.

“They’ve got a strong sense of counter-surveillance,” Tan Bingyi remarked as he hurried over. Frowning slightly, he turned his attention to the old man. As the elderly man climbed off the bicycle, Tan reached out to steady him and asked, “You’re the eyewitness, correct?”

“That’s right.”

The old man stepped down from the rear seat and let out a sigh.

“I’m getting old. I’m not as sharp as I used to be. The way that child was sleeping wasn’t normal, but I didn’t think much of it. I just let them go.”

“When you first asked me, I didn’t remember. Sigh… If only I’d stopped them back then.”

The traffickers were experienced, and their disguises must have been convincing. It was perfectly understandable that the old man hadn’t realized anything at the time. Now that he knew the truth, though, the more he thought back on it, the more suspicious everything seemed.

“There are plenty of women carrying sleeping children around. They were only at my place long enough to ask for a drink of water. Who would’ve recognized them for what they were?”

“It’s not your fault,” Jiang Xia comforted him. “Besides, you would’ve been facing two traffickers by yourself. That could’ve been dangerous. If something had happened to you, things would’ve been even worse.”

“Hah, young lady, don’t underestimate me.” The old man puffed out his chest, clearly unhappy at being underestimated. “Just two of them? I could’ve pinned them down in no time.”

He spread two fingers in the shape of a gun and added proudly, “And even if I couldn’t, I’ve got one of these at home.”

Jiang Xia froze for a second before realizing what he meant.

Holy crap—a gun!

Wait… was the era really this wild? An ordinary old man could just casually have a firearm at home?

Seeing that Tan Bingyi’s expression didn’t change in the slightest, while Hu Wei nodded repeatedly as though this were perfectly normal, Jiang Xia silently swallowed.

With complete sincerity, she praised the old man.

“You’re amazing, sir.”

“Not as amazing as you, young lady.”

The old man shook his head and looked Jiang Xia up and down.

“You’re the one who can draw portraits of traffickers? At your age? You really can’t judge a person by appearances!”

“It’s nothing special.”

Jiang Xia was already thinking about drawing the trafficker’s portrait, but this case was very different from the previous ones—it would be much more difficult.

After all, parents saw their own children every day. They remembered their features clearly and could describe them in detail. Once she finished a portrait, they could immediately confirm whether it was accurate.

A trafficker, however, was another matter entirely. The old man had only caught a few glances of the woman. It would be difficult for him to remember her appearance perfectly, and the less precise his description was, the harder it would be to draw—and to verify—the likeness.

Putting an end to the mutual compliments, Jiang Xia’s expression turned serious.

“Time is short, so let’s get started on the portrait. I’ll draw based on your description. Sir, how much do you remember about the trafficker’s appearance?”

“I didn’t get a good look at the man, but I remember the woman clearly.”

The old man patted his chest confidently.

“Don’t let my age fool you. I was the captain of the local militia when I was young. I even caught enemy spies back then. If that woman stood in front of me again, I’d recognize her at a glance!”

That was the best news they could have hoped for.

Without another word, Jiang Xia led the old man into the temple’s main hall and sat him down to begin the sketch.

True to his claim of having once been a militia captain, he had clearly received some training. Rather than speaking vaguely, he described the woman’s facial features in precise, descriptive terms. As soon as he spoke, Jiang Xia knew exactly how to translate his words into lines on paper.

With the experience of drawing the three missing children’s portraits already under her belt, Jiang Xia worked with much greater confidence this time. She refined the details according to the old man’s descriptions, and before long, the woman’s portrait took shape on the page.

The old man stared at the drawing in amazement, clicking his tongue repeatedly.

“It’s exactly the same! It’s the spitting image of her!”

Jiang Xia finally set down her pencil.

Only then did the patiently waiting Tan Bingyi get a chance to speak.

“Xiao Jiang, forget about carving the woodblock for now. Even if you send the portrait to the printing factory, they’ll still have to carve the plate before they can print it. By the time we get the copies back, it’ll be the middle of the night. Just draw it directly onto a wax stencil instead. It’ll be much faster, and a hundred or so copies should be more than enough.”

“Looks like we think alike, Captain Tan.”

Without pausing, Jiang Xia used a craft knife to trim the paper, then began sketching the outline onto the wax stencil using the completed portrait as a reference. As she worked, she continued,

“But Captain Tan, I don’t think we should keep chasing after the traffickers anymore.”

“Oh?”

Tan Bingyi had been thinking about how to make the best use of the hundred portraits. Hearing Jiang Xia’s comment, he raised an eyebrow.

“What are you thinking?”

“I’m worried about something.”

Now that she had a reference portrait, copying it onto the stencil required very little thought. Jiang Xia multitasked with ease, drawing while organizing her thoughts aloud.

“At this point, the children’s portraits should be almost ready. They won’t be long before they’re distributed to every checkpoint. Once the traffickers realize that, they’ll definitely know they’re being hunted and will probably try to leave as quickly as possible.”

“The question is… will they take the children with them?”

“The best-case scenario is that they panic, leave the children somewhere conspicuous, and slip away on their own.

“But they’ve already spent quite a bit on food, lodging, and travel while they were here. I doubt they’ll be willing to walk away empty-handed. Once they confirm that we’re only searching with the children’s portraits, they’re very likely to hide the children inside containers and smuggle them out.”

“Of course, we could also search every sack, basket, and other container carried by travelers at the checkpoints.”

She paused briefly before continuing.

“But if we do that, there’s an even worse possibility. The traffickers could hide the containers with the children somewhere secluded, then cross the checkpoint by themselves. By the time…”

Jiang Xia didn’t finish the sentence, but Tan Bingyi understood exactly what she meant.

The three children were still unconscious from the dr*g. They couldn’t cry for help. If they were trapped inside a container for several hours, they could very well suffocate to death.

“That’s… that’s unbelievably heartless!”

Hu Wei, who had been listening nearby, stared in shock.

“At the very least, they should leave the kids somewhere people can see them! If the children die, wouldn’t that make their crimes even worse?”

“Since when have child traffickers had a conscience?”

Jiang Xia replied grimly.

“If they left the children somewhere obvious, someone might discover them almost immediately after they walked away. They wouldn’t get very far before the authorities were on their trail.”

Tan Bingyi drew in a slow breath.

In the past, they had never had portraits of missing children. Without that advantage, it had never occurred to him that traffickers might hide the children inside containers and stash them somewhere out of sight.

But the moment Jiang Xia mentioned it, he was already seventy or eighty percent convinced.

Those beasts had already been willing to stuff children into bamboo baskets. What was stopping them from going one step further?

The problem was, that made the situation much trickier.

As long as the traffickers still had the children, it was like kidnappers holding hostages—they had to proceed with extreme caution.

If they searched every container, they risked forcing the traffickers to abandon the children in some hidden place.

If they didn’t search the containers, they’d be letting the traffickers slip away.

How could they arrest the pair while ensuring the children’s safety?

After a moment of thought, Tan Bingyi muttered,

“Now that we have the woman’s portrait… if we stop searching bags…”

“That won’t work either.”

Jiang Xia shook her head.

“We only know what one of the traffickers looks like. These two have an extremely strong sense of counter-surveillance. They might spot from a long distance that we’re looking for a woman. Then she could have the man take the children away while she waits for the right moment to circle around and escape through another route. By then, not only would we fail to catch them, we might lose the children as well.”

She nodded slightly.

As expected of a criminal investigation captain who’s constantly out in the field. His thinking was incredibly fast. With just a small hint, he’d already grasped the problem.

Listening from the side, Hu Wei’s head was starting to ache.

“So searching bags won’t work, and checking people won’t work either. Then how are we supposed to catch them?”

If they hadn’t obtained the trafficker’s portrait, Jiang Xia would have preferred to search every bag despite the risks. At least that way, the children would still be somewhere within the local area. The printing factory would soon have the children’s portraits ready, and once they were distributed throughout the streets, the public could search the area inch by inch. There would still be a good chance of finding them.

But the risk was simply too great.

Now that they had the woman’s portrait, they didn’t have to resort to such drastic measures. They could afford to be more cautious.

“We absolutely have to catch them,” Jiang Xia said. “But we need to do it cleverly, not by brute force.”

She looked at Tan Bingyi.

“I have an idea.”

Tan Bingyi met her gaze.

“Let’s hear it.”

“These two traffickers have a very strong sense of counter-surveillance. They’ll almost certainly move before my portrait reaches the checkpoints. So we need to be one step ahead of them—we need to intercept them at their destination.”

Jiang Xia continued drawing as she spoke, though her pencil moved a little more slowly.

“We haven’t seen any cargo trucks on the roads around Dragon King Temple. And now we’ve confirmed they’ve already entered the city. That means they aren’t truck drivers doing this on the side—they don’t have their own transportation.”

“If they want to get out of the city quickly, their only real options are the train station or the long-distance bus station.”

“They’re traveling with three children, so splitting up would only complicate things. As long as we don’t search bags, they’ll most likely stay together. We should concentrate our forces at those two locations.”

“For example, we can station uniformed officers inside to watch for the children, and assign a few plainclothes officers to look specifically for the traffickers.”

“We can also give a few copies of the portrait to the ticket clerks. They can keep the picture behind the ticket window where customers can’t see it. But the traffickers have to buy tickets if they want to leave. As long as the woman comes up to the counter, we can arrest her on the spot.”

At that, Jiang Xia paused before adding,

“But we can’t put all our eggs in one basket. We also can’t stop tracking them.”

She turned to Hu Wei.

“Hu Wei, take this portrait to Chief Wu right away. Go back along the route and keep asking around. If you find anyone who got a good look at the other trafficker, bring them here immediately. I’ll do my best to draw his portrait as well. Once we have both of them, catching them will be much easier.”

“The only problem is that, until then, we’ll only have one portrait. So let’s avoid tipping them off. Have officers with good memories study the portrait until they’ve memorized it, then station them at the checkpoints. Don’t search bags. But if they spot a man and a woman matching the description, traveling together with a large amount of luggage, detain them immediately.”

A full-scale search, attacking the problem from every angle.

She refused to believe the traffickers could escape all of that.

After listening to her plan, Tan Bingyi looked at Jiang Xia in surprise.

Her thinking was remarkably organized. This was exactly the kind of operational plan an experienced detective would come up with.

No wonder Chen Dong kept recommending her.

She really was a natural for criminal investigations.

“That’s a good plan.”

Tan Bingyi quickly analyzed it and, after confirming that the overall strategy was sound with only a few minor details needing adjustment, made the decision on the spot.

“I’ll report this to Captain Duan immediately and have him redeploy our forces.”

The police could handle the bus station themselves, but the railway system was another matter. The railway police operated independently with their own jurisdiction. As the captain of a local criminal investigation unit, Tan had no authority to command them. He would have to ask his superiors to coordinate first.

…

Municipal Public Security Bureau, Criminal Investigation Division Captain’s Office

The entire office was thick with cigarette smoke.

Captain Duan Guoqiang sat with a cigarette between the fingers of his right hand while holding the telephone receiver to his ear with his left. The longer he listened, the harder it became to suppress the smile spreading across his face.

After waiting all this time, they finally had some good news.

Listening to the proposed arrest plan from the other end of the line, he nodded repeatedly.

“Mm. Mm. Good. That’s a solid plan. The only thing is, we have to be careful when casting the net. We need to get it in place quickly, or the fish will slip away.”

“You don’t need to worry about the printing factory anymore. I’ll coordinate that. I’ll have the traffic police ride motorcycles over there right now. There’s no need to wait an hour. As soon as they print the first hundred copies, have them distributed immediately.”

“Your side has only two tasks now. First, get the trafficker’s portrait to the train station and the bus station as fast as possible. Second, take Jiang Xia and get the other trafficker’s portrait drawn as quickly as you can. It has to be fast—we’re racing against the traffickers now.”

“All right, get moving.”

With that, Duan Guoqiang promptly hung up. Without wasting a second, he dialed the railway police.

“Hello, it’s me. Yes, it’s about that case again. We’ve got more than just the children’s portraits now—we’ve also confirmed the appearance of one of the traffickers. We don’t have many copies yet, but I have an idea. It’s best if we don’t alert them and scare them off…”

As the calls went out, the city’s police force sprang into action once more.

Carrying the portraits in their hands, officers fanned out across the city like countless strands of thread, gradually weaving an enormous net that would, they hoped, capture the child traffickers.

However, as the prey caught in that net, Sister Fang sensed danger in the air long before the trap had been fully woven.

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