Dai An successfully completed her mission and couldn't wait to find Jian Jing to report.
The little princess was about to have dessert.
There were more than one meal served on the long international flight.
The flight attendants thanked her for stepping up. The quantity of the meal exceeded the original allowance, with lovely cakes, steaming hot coffee, and all kinds of flavored nut ice cream.
The two chatted while eating and discussed the case.
Dai An opened her notebook and reported concisely as if at a big company meeting: "I've already asked the deceased's secretary, interpreter, nanny, and obtained the following information..."
Jian Jing choked and quickly said, "Relax, no need to read the report." She also complained about Kang Mu Cheng, "I'm not like President Kang, I don't like omitting information."
Kang Mu Cheng next to her heard it and glanced over: "What?"
"Nothing." She turned her head, "Speak slowly, eat a cookie first."
After Dai An ate a chocolate cookie and drank some fruit juice, her thoughts became clearer: "First I chatted with the secretary for a while. At the beginning she was unwilling to say much and chatted randomly with me. Later she was willing to blurt out a few words of truth."
As a secretary, you definitely have to keep your mouth shut and reveal your boss's affairs everywhere - do you still want to get by? But on the other hand, there is a wall between bosses and employees. Among employees there is an even greater common discourse.
Complaining about overtime, complaining about bosses, complaining about bosses' mistresses... Immediately be able to resonate.
Dai An talked about her taking long flights and still having to do reading comprehension. She slowly lowered the other party's defenses. Then she pretended to reveal secrets and said things were very troublesome. It’d be best to solve the case as soon as possible to avoid everyone getting into trouble together.
After tricking for a while, she finally got to the point.
According to the secretary, last night President Che attended a wine party, seemingly wanting to bring in new investments to dilute President Meng's shares in the company to weaken his right to speak.
This morning at 10 o'clock, President Che went to the company for a meeting. He had a bit of a cold and specifically asked the secretary to buy medicine for him. After lunch, he took cold medicine and the symptoms seemed to have alleviated a lot.
But while waiting at the airport lounge, the air conditioning was blowing hard. His cold symptoms worsened again. Afraid of transmitting it to the child, he specifically changed seats.
Jian Jing made a pause gesture: "The deceased went to the company today too?"
"Yes." Due to her profession, Dai An was very keen about scheduling arrangements and said, "He went to the company at 10am, and even chaired the regular meeting as usual. At 12 noon he had lunch, and left for the airport at 1:30pm."
Jian Jing said, "President Meng and President Bao went to the meeting too?"
"Yes, but I heard that when President Meng learned about President Che's social activity last night, he was very unhappy. He left halfway through the meeting, causing an ugly scene. The people below were worried that the two shareholders would split up. "
"Then what?"
"The deceased went straight to the airport to meet his family. President Bao picked up his wife and daughter first and arrived a little later than him. President Meng left the company and came here directly."
Dai An looked at her notes and reported the times accurately: "President Meng arrived at the airport around 1:30pm. Che's wife and children around 1:45pm. The time of the deceased was most accurate, 2:05 pm. President Bao and his family were the latest, arriving at 2:15 pm."
Jian Jing couldn’t help but praise: “You secretaries are so capable.”
Dai An smiled humbly: “Just part of the job. There are chat records on WeChat too so there’s no particular need to remember.”
“This is very important.” Jian Jing nodded, then asked, “What about the nanny and interpreter?”
Dai An said: “The nanny said a lot of gossip about Mrs. Bao.”
Jian Jing was very interested: “What did she say?”
“She said Mrs. Bao was a vixen who only knew how to flirt with men all day long and rarely took care of the children. She had never seen such a mother.” Dai An lowered her voice, “She also said that President Bao had probably cheated.”
Jian Jing: “How did she know?”
“I asked the same.” Dai An said, “The nanny said that after giving birth, President Bao was a little dissatisfied with his wife, cold and hot, but in the last six months he had become particularly affectionate again.”
She counted with her fingers: “Mrs. Bao had her eye on an dress that was already sold out domestically. While on a business trip, President Bao ran to several second-hand stores before finally finding it. Whatever Japanese rice balls she liked, I guess dango, on her birthday he chartered a plane to Japan to buy several boxes. And this afternoon, even though they could just come by themselves, President Bao went home specially to pick them up and took care of the child all the way without complaining about his wife anymore...”
Jian Jing: “Tsk.”
“When a man suddenly becomes attentive, he must be feeling guilty. What else could he feel guilty for? Cheating of course!” Dai An stated the nanny’s conclusion, admiring as well, “No wonder Mrs. Bao knew.”
Jian Jing was overjoyed and quickly ate two bites of cake to suppress it.
“What about the interpreter?” She handed Dai An a sandwich to prompt the next part. “Did he say anything?”
“He works for a travel company and isn’t familiar with the three families. But he arrived at the airport the earliest at 1pm.” Dai An said softly, “When I asked him, he hesitated a bit, seeming to know something but didn’t dare say. After a long while he mumbled that he seemed to have overheard someone making a phone call.”
Jian Jing: “President Meng?”
“Should be. He said it was around 1:30pm up or down.” Dai An’s expression gradually became solemn, “He said the tone of that person on the phone call was awful. What he said was also inappropriate - something like ‘dare to set me up, I must make him look good’, ‘thinks he’s a big shot but it’s not like things can’t run without him’ and so on.”
Jian Jing nodded: “That should be President Meng. Knowing the deceased's actions last night, he must have been very angry.”
Dai An carefully asked: “This is very strange. If he was so angry, why did he still go to the airport? Unless he had to for some reason—but they’re going on vacation!”
“You make sense.” Jian Jing fell into contemplation.
Dai An wanted to say something but hesitated: “Teacher Jian...”
“Hmm?”
“The milk was poured after 7pm. Why don't you check who went to the bathroom after the meal?” Dai An was puzzled, “Wouldn’t that quickly narrow down the suspects?”
But Jian Jing asked instead: “Have you seen Detective In The Cloud?”
Dai An embarrassedly smiled: “I’ve only seen the show.”
“It’s the same. The discovered murder method isn’t necessarily the real murder method.” Jian Jing said. “It’s hard to determine the time of cyanide poisoning. In just 2-3 minutes it can cause death. 10-30 minutes also happens. Even longer it can be a few hours.”
Dai An choked.
“Unless the real weapon could be found, checking the timeline is meaningless.” Jian Jing sighed, “The current situation is that anyone could be the killer, whether they left their seat or not.”
Dai An struggled hard to think of something: “Then what should we do?”
Jian Jing put down her dessert spoon and leaned back, pondering: “If the cause of death was that glass of milk, everything would be simple. But that doesn't explain why the poisoning happened on the plane.”
An airplane is a special enclosed environment, arguably more enclosed than a locked room on the ground.
Poisoning someone on a plane immediately allows authorities to lock down the range of suspects and makes it inconvenient to destroy evidence. Even if forced to do so (for example, this was the only time to get close to the deceased), slower acting poison should have been chosen, to process evidence after getting off the plane.
But if it wasn’t the milk, why go to so much trouble?
“Ah, looks like I’ll have to ask another round.” Jian Jing stretched lazily and got up to work, “Let’s go Dai An. Let’s ask them a few more questions. With some luck, the truth will be right before our eyes.”
Dai An: Really? I don’t believe it.
She didn’t see any dawn at all.
But at any time and place, going against the boss is never beneficial. She obediently followed to see just what the little princess was going to do.
Jian Jing called the deceased’s entourage and three flight attendants to the cabin to start a public questioning.
“You should all know that Che Maocai has died on the plane.” Jian Jing skipped meaningless pleasantries and cut straight to the point. “And I have reason to suspect the murderer is among you.”
Mrs. Bao smiled gently: “Is that so? How surprising, just like a detective novel.”
"You're right, this murder case is so dramatic. The high altitude is an absolute closed room, no need to consider any external factors, the murderer has nowhere to escape," Jian Jing said. "Now what I can tell you is that the victim died of cyanide poisoning, so I need to know what the victim ate today."
She made a gesture and pointed at the female model: "You go first. What did he eat when he got up in the morning?"
Under public scrutiny, the female model instinctively shrank back, but soon justified herself arrogantly with her chest held high, "Nothing, drank a glass of water."
"Okay, then he went to the company." Jian Jing looked at the secretary, "What did he eat?"
The secretary carefully recalled: "I bought coffee and sandwiches for President Che as usual, but he didn't eat much. Then he asked me to buy cold medicine, uh, does water count?"
"Yes, anything else?"
The secretary racked her brains: "President Che would usually eat quit-smoking candy. I don't know if he ate any today."
President Bao said: "He did, I saw it when we were in the meeting."
"After the meeting, did you guys eat lunch?"
The secretary nodded: "The company ordered meals, and several bosses ate together, but President Che seemed to have poor appetite and didn't eat much. In the afternoon, I made him a cup of tea."
Jian Jing looked at President Bao: "You were also in the company. Do you remember what else he ate?"
President Bao frowned and thought hard for a while, then shook his head: "I didn't notice."
"Then what about after arriving at the airport?" Jian Jing turned to Mrs. Che.
As an omnipotent wife, Mrs. Che actually remembered it clearly: "Half a bowl of noodles, a glass of water, but he felt uncomfortable after eating them and threw up everything. I said his gastrointestinal disease relapsed, and starving for a while would make him better. So he didn't eat anything else."
Jian Jing asked: "Does he like drinking milk?"
Mrs. Che nodded and explained: "When he was a child and got sick, my mother-in-law liked to give him warm milk to drink. So every time he had gastrointestinal discomfort, he liked to drink this, although it wasn't very good for the stomach either."
"I see." Jian Jing looked around, "Anything else to add?"
No one answered.
Jian Jing looked at President Meng: "Did you notice anything?"
President Meng said: "We had a fight in the company and didn't even talk to each other afterwards."
"Speaking of which," Jian Jing seemed to have just remembered, "since you quarreled with him, why did you still go on vacation together?"
President Meng sneered: "Why should I cancel my own schedule just for him? He was playing tricks on me, not that I made a move on him. Being in the same place but minding our own business would be just fine, right?"
"I see. I thought you were going to expose some secret of his as a tight slap on his face." Jian Jing smiled without probing further. Instead, she said, "Second question, what time did each of you leave your seat today?"
She called their names: "Let's start by seat order, Mrs Che?"
Mrs. Che: "After getting on the plane, I went to the restroom once, then went to the galley to make milk, then took my kid to the toilet, after lunch, I touched up my make up, so four times total."
President Meng: "Went to the toilet before dinner, that's it."
Jian Jing: "What time?"
President Meng: "Don't remember, anyway it was before they served dinner."
President Bao: "I took my kid to the toilet when the plane just stabilized, and went again after waking up from a nap."
Jian Jing: "Remember the time?"
President Bao: "Around eight o'clock I think. The screen showed 11 more hours of flight."
Mrs. Bao: "I went to the restroom when Mrs. Che was making milk. After lunch I put on a facial mask for about 15 minutes, then went to the restroom to wash it off."
The victim's secretary: "I went to the restroom before dinner."
Translator: "Went to the restroom after the plane stabilized, walked around at the back of the cabin after dinner."
The Baos' nanny was very nervous: "I left my seat many times. The child ran around and I had to follow her. Oh we went to the economy cabin side, and didn't come back until before dinner."
The flight attendant testified: "We did see her with the child."
Jian Jing nodded slowly with a smile: "Very well, thank you everyone for your cooperation. I already know who the murderer is now."
