Beneath the Truth/Chapter 3

Japanese: https://ncode.syosetu.com/n6185ha/4/

Chinese: https://wangyidiwurenge.lofter.com/post/1fce5dfa\_1cc4b28d1

The novelist is still remembering why he was not smarter when the girl across the wooden table interrupted his thinking:

"So you didn’t even think about believing it after you received the urgent letter used as a trap, and it just so happened that you were the only one who left early in this invitation. The best thing is that the Mélodis Manor lost an oil painting, you were naturally wanted by those policemen, right?"

She reached out to the table and stared at him with her whole body. The words buzzed in his head like a ball of cotton in his ears to listen to those sounds. He hugged his head with his fingers crossed and slid down slowly. His hair was very oily, his face was very oily, and his eyes were so painful that he avoided the light of the candle. The sleepless irritability made him too lazy to tell what the person in front of him was saying. ——Anyway, there was no extraordinary mistake, so he just hummed and nodded in agreement.

"Okay, well, I see--so where is the painting you stole?"

"I have said so many times that I really didn't steal the painting!" The novelist stood up suddenly and patted the table. The knuckles were pressed white against the table, and the girl clearly saw the red blood in his eyeballs and the sloppy ones. Oil enlarges the wrinkles on the face. The voice of his words increased a few degrees, and then it seemed to be painful, he let go of his hand and sat down again, and his voice returned to its original depression. "I also expect the earl to help me push those novels out. How could it be possible to steal his stuff? When the police came to arrest me, I jumped out of the window because I didn't have any contacts, and I couldn't get out after I got in. I only have your business card, I really have no other way..."

He was almost at the limit. He managed to dodge the police search. He only found this place with his previous impressions of places and suitcases over five walls. The effort to pat the table just now was too heavy. He closed his eyes and felt someone there. Going around his ears and reaching into his brain, it was messed up, leaving only a comet belt in front of him and the enlarged buzzing sound after the ear canal was blocked. He closed his eyes and supported the table with his hands, and slowly slid towards The backrest so that he wouldn't suddenly fall on the table so embarrassed. He couldn't hear what the girl said, and when he opened his eyes again, the girl put on a slightly worried expression. She coughed twice into the room, but there was no sound through the door.

The novelist's hand dropped and couldn't lift it up. He tried his best to organize the language and only said quietly, "I have no reason to steal the earl's painting." There was no light on the ceiling, he opened his eyes, and the girl stared at the closed door, but didn't mean to walk over.

"Please help me, I really don't have anyone I can think of... Or is this so-called detective agency also trying to send me into the trap of the police station?" He spit out a long speech after he finished his last sentence. Sigh, it's going to dawn in a while, will he drive himself out? Will he be taken away by the police? He thought of the rent and the suit jacket that has not yet been returned, the manuscripts-Forget it, what's the use of these.

"Let him in."

His eyes lit up, the girl opened the door and pulled him into the room, and he sat up straight from the seat. "Just now..."

"A routine confirmation," the girl blinked at him. "We receive dozens of letters of request every day. Who has the time to help one by one? Once these time-sensitive things are out of date, they can only be thrown into the fireplace as fuel up."

He didn't want to bother with the girl's eyes of mischievous success. There was a small light bulb on the tabletop of the room in front of him, and the other two portable kerosene lamps were burning. The whole room was filled with warmth. He certainly liked the one in front of him more than the cold desktop just now.

"Come in and see the way, don’t step on the needle." The voice is not loud, and there is no fluctuating intonation. Enough for the novelist to bring up some spirits, retract his feet and look down--a ball of paper; a paper with a dart stuck in it; darts with white lines; there are more darts on the desk that is spacious enough for one person to fully stretch his arms to sleep.; red lines are connected between the darts on the board, and each dart is inserted with a photo or piece of paper, the words are written in swashes on the paper. The novelist took off his shoes and found a free place to tiptoe all the way to his seat.The girl trots back to his chair, holds the shoulder of the person opposite him and turns it over. The man was wearing a hat and pulled the brim down a bit when facing the girl.

"See, I said he didn't lie, so this time I won the bet. So I will be the one who picks the next case."

"I never said to bet on this with you-forget it, whatever." He took off his hat, and the novelist saw that he was also a young man, probably five or six years older than the girl. He put his hat aside casually, and the woolen coat on the hanger behind him was still full of color, and he could see the master's meticulous care. He put his hands casually on the armrests and stared at him.

"Ahem, now that the characters are all here, let me make a simple prologue first." The girl opened her arms to speak, and then faced the novelist and stretched out a hand to the detective's position. The novelist saw that the corners of the man's lips were raised a little, and even gave him an apologetic smile, then lowered his head and rubbed his temple with one hand. The novelist replied with an expression that he knew what would happen next—a close partner, maybe he was regretting that he had just taken off his hat, and he thought of the spirit.

"Welcome to the city's number one gold-medal detective agency, Orpheus detective agency is here for you-re-introduction, I am the detective Lady Truth. This is my super-powerful boss, the great detective Mr. Inference . We accepted your commission—what a fascinating truth! We will make sure to dig it out without leaving any scum."

The so-called office culture in the imagination of the girl. The novelist used to be absolutely disdainful of such a play-by-play setting, but now he is asking for others and can only listen to it patiently. When Mr. Inference raised his head again, he returned to his stagnant expression. The novelist felt that he was examining himself. It was another feeling of a rat locked in by a cobra, which he had briefly experienced with the earl. The room became deadly silent, and the feeling of being climbed up by some cold-blooded animal along the neck was even worse.

"Your eyes wandered between the two of us just now, and you seem to like to observe others."

"Sorry! My habit, what I need to write a novel..."

"There’s no need to apologize," he saw the novelist's eyes start to trance again, "I have no right to inquire about your professional habits."

"I didn't mean to be negligent. You are willing to help me. I am really happy." The novelist's tone had an overwhelming sense of depression. "I'm really sorry, but when I thought that Lord Earl might not read my works again, My words may no longer be seen by others, so I just..."

He didn't like the expression that others showed in front of him, suggesting that everything was over before everything started. He bowed his head and said the name-DM. He knocked on the table with a dart and said: "DM, if you think he will hate you because of it, you are wrong. He is stingy with a little bit of emotion, whether it is others or himself-I mean, he don’t care what you think at all, so you don’t have to—"

His elbow was hit. "'Inference', this is not used to comfort people at all!"

There is nothing to say again.

Before the eyebrows of Mr. Inference did not wrinkle into a handful of pickles, the novelist proposed to ask him questions as soon as possible to facilitate the further deduction of the latter two.

"Inference" glanced at the "Truth", picked up the dart just now with one hand and gently pressed the tip, then looked back at the novelist. "The general process of the matter has just been confirmed outside with 'Truth', and I won't talk too much. The specific evidence will wait until tomorrow when we go to the Merlot Manor. There are still three questions."

Lady Truth then said:

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"One, what did you observe about the emotional lines of the characters in the Mélodis Manor;

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second, what is the content in your suitcase;

third, you said that you feel familiar with the family crest of the Merlot family? , Then please remember as much as possible, where are you familiar with, have you seen it? Of course, the third question is not anxious, you can think about it slowly."

"The first question, I saw in the manor that the playwright Jonathan and one of the maids named Ruth have confirmed their romantic relationship, or they may be pursuing them. Jonathan and auctioneer Richard have an emotional dispute, but I don’t know what happened between Ruth and the two of them. In addition, I observed that another maid, Daisy, had secretly seen the Earl several times before, and another servant said that she had a crush on Jonathan, which I didn't confirm."

"The second question, you can check now," the novelist opened his suitcase and pushed to Lady Truth.

"The third question..." He tried to recall all the symbols that he had seen before, company, food brand, and finally he said: "I'm pretty sure I haven't seen it in the recent period of time. This badge is for me It feels more like it was carved on a certain part of my body, or a part of my soul. As for the more distant days, I really have no impression. If I think of anything, I must tell you the first time."

"Done checking, the manuscripts inside are all the content of the novel, the suitcase has no extra layers, and there are no other items between the manuscripts." Before Lady Truth stood up, she did not forget to buckle the suitcase and push it back. The novelist saw that she was holding it. He doesn't know when an extra book will come out. The pages that have been turned over are written with words, which are as indistinct as the ones on the wooden board, but they are not the same type of swash. He thought this might be the previous case.

"Do you have anything else to ask?"

"No, go back to rest and see you at Merlot Manor in two hours."

"Hey? Wait a minute, don't you really plan to ask more questions?"

"I am not going to be a defense lawyer for you, unless you are willing to pay this sum of money again."

Lady Truth didn't know where it conjured a glass of warm milk and handed it to the novelist, beckoning him to stop talking, and they are solely responsible for the rest. "Don't worry, you paid the money from two detectives.'Truth and Inference' are naturally obliged to dig into the ins and outs of this matter."

This sounds even less reassuring-the novelist dare not say it, and he wants to sleep even more after drinking a full cup of hot milk. Lady Truth asked him to rest on a sofa where the window was invisible, and closed the door by himself, condensing the voices of the two people in the room. Mr. Inference picked up a business card-the one Lady Truth found in the suitcase-folded in half and bounced it into the trash can.

"DM again."

"It's good, Lord Earl is always so lively around-this drama is too real! Isn't it more exciting than the old script we've seen on stage before? What a precious opportunity we can participate in in person!"

The answer to the question was recorded in Lady Truth's notebook, and she tied a rope between the darts on the wall, making the whole net a little messier. The tone of her speech is still exaggerated, but her voice is much lower. Mr. Inference ignored her narrator's nonsense, took her notebook and looked at it for a while, then pasted a handy paper under the novelist's photo, and after writing a few lines, he said: "There is a spread in Eastern countries over there. There is a proverb, "When the snipe and the clam grapple, it is the fisherman who profits." It means that the two sides of the snipe and clam can't fight, and both lose and lose, and finally let the third fisherman take advantage. We also have a similar saying, "Two dogs fight for a bone, and a third runs away with it."

"Pfft, did you hear from Mr. White? Now the only problem is that these three dogs have to have their own names, so I think about it, just call Tony, Jefferson and Benjamin."

Mr. Inference laughed, "Don't you like to bet, this time we bet it."

"Guess the identity? Who are Tony, Jefferson, and Benjamin? Then of course I bet—"

"This time we will bet on whether the gathering of the two fighting dogs is accidental or inevitable."

*(First Chapter.) | (Previous: Chapter 2.) | (Next: Chapter 4.)*