Chapter 108: Xiong Tianlin

  Xiong Tianlin, male, 64 years old. Ancestral home: Xiguang Province, a small border town of Luolin City. Moved to Lianjiazhuang ten years ago and was hired as a gatekeeper by the crematorium in the same year until now.

  This is all the information about Xiong Tianlin that can be found in the household registration data of Song Weili's police station in Lianjiazhuang. Song Weili kept flipping through Xiong Tianlin's household registration, and his mind couldn't help but wonder at the blank columns for relatives.

  "How could someone come all the way from Xiguang Province and go straight to the crematorium, staying for ten years?"

  Song Weili had already privately inquired about Xiong Tianlin's neighbors in Lianjiazhuang, and never saw any relatives or friends visiting him. The only time someone came to the door was when Xiong Tianlin fell ill at home, and the crematorium sent people to take him to the hospital. Xiong Tianlin did not have a mobile phone, nor was there a landline in his home. If it were really Xiong Tianlin, how would he contact the outside world?

  Through investigation of the public telephones near Lianjiazhuang, it was found that after Yu Xiaopeng made a call, there were no international long-distance calls to foreign countries. It was just the phone in the gatehouse of the crematorium, which Song Weili had also investigated, and that phone did not even have an international long-distance service.

  Song Weili, who had been searching around without a clear goal, came to the crematorium again. He found the director of the crematorium and asked carefully:

  "How did Xiong Tianlin end up at the crematorium ten years ago?"

  "You should ask Old Liu from the personnel department about this matter, I wasn't here at that time."

  Old Liu was called into the director's office and after listening to Song Weili's intention, he immediately said:

  "I still remember this thing. Ten years ago, the original gatekeeper Old Hou was old and had reached retirement age, so the factory decided to find someone to replace him. It's not easy to recruit people for a crematorium like other companies. At that time, Old Hou took the initiative to recommend someone to us, who is now Xiong Tianlin."

  "Old Hou, where is Old Hou from?"

  "Listening to the accent, it should be close to Xiong Tianlin's place, but Old Hou has been a worker at the factory since its construction, and his family had long settled in the city. So, in the unit's registration records, it was always recorded that Old Hou is a local."

  "Is Old Hou's file still here?"

  "Lao Hou has officially retired, so his file is at the Municipal Labor Bureau."

  "What is Lao Hou's full name?"

  Hou Jinggui.

  With a name and being a retired employee of the crematorium, Song Weili, who had just left the crematorium, quickly obtained all the information about Hou Jingkui.

  Ancestral home: Luolin City, Xiguang Province. Hou Jingkui and Xiong Tianlin are from the same place. When Hou Jingkui first came to the provincial capital, he was single, over 30 years old, and met Xu Cuixia, a divorcee, through introduction. They got married and lived together for over a decade without having children. Later, they adopted an orphan from the civil affairs department. Xu Cuixia passed away due to illness in the 16th year of their marriage, leaving Hou Jingkui to raise their adopted son, Hou Jin, alone. He raised him until he grew up, found work, got married and had children. Now, Hou Jingkui is still alive but does not live with his adopted son Hou Jin. Instead, after retiring, he returned to his hometown in Xiguang Province shortly after.

  At the case analysis meeting in the bureau, after linking up all the clues obtained by various parties, Director Li Naiyu finally gave the order:

  "Continue the phone survey around the incinerator, focusing on Xiong Tianlin and Hou Jingkui. First, check if there is any connection between the two. If the person answering the phone is Xiong Tianlin, it's not ruled out that Xiong Tianlin might have passed on the content of the call through Hou Jingkui."

  "Director Li, if we can't find anything from Xiong Tianlin, do you want to go to Luo Lin and investigate Hou Jingkui's situation, such as his recent call records?"

  "It's a good suggestion. You bring people and rush to Luoling immediately, try to investigate Hou Jinggui's case clearly. I will take care of things here personally."

  When Song Weili led his men to Luo Lin, Li Naiyu led his men again to secretly investigate Xiangjiazhuang's life trajectory during this period. When one of Xiong Tianlin's neighbors told Li Naiyu and his men:

  "Normally, Old Bear would arrive home in the morning, but over the past few days, I seem to have seen him returning only at dusk."

  "Which specific day was it? Do you still remember?"

  The neighbor thought for a moment and told Li Naiyu a date, which was surprisingly the day after Yu Xiaopeng's phone call.

  "You're definitely not mistaken?"

  "It should be right, I've been on a bad streak lately, always losing at cards, but that one time I won, so I remember it more clearly."

  Li Naiwen knew about Xiong Tianlin's work schedule, which was usually morning shifts, and 24 hours later, or a day and night later, he would be off duty and return home the next morning. If Xiong Tianlin returned in the evening that day, where did he go and what did he do? With such doubts, the first thing to do after returning to the bureau was to collect all surveillance videos from around the crematorium that could reveal Xiong Tianlin's whereabouts that day.

  According to Xiong Tianlin's image in the video, tracking him step by step, it was found that after Xiong Tianlin got off work that day, he went directly to the long-distance bus station and then couldn't be tracked anymore.

  Immediately send someone to the long-distance bus station. Since buying a car ticket does not have real-name registration, it is impossible to investigate whether Xiong Tianlin has taken a long-distance bus to leave the city. Although you can find the driver who departed during that time period for identification, after so many days have passed, the passenger flow at the station is large, and almost no one can identify him.

  While it was impossible to find out about Xiong Tianlin's whereabouts in the provincial city of Li Naiyuan, Song Weili called from Luolin to report:

  "Lin Bureau, we've checked Hou Jingkui's call records. His phone calls are very simple, mostly local numbers, with only two from outside the area. One is from the provincial capital, and this number has been called relatively frequently, so it should be related to Hou Jin. The other one is a number from Linyin City below. The time coincides with the second day after Yu Xiaopeng's midnight call, which shouldn't be a coincidence. Moreover, this phone number only appeared once in Hou Jingkui's call records for the past three months."

  "Alright, you stay there and keep an eye on Hou Jingrui, wait for further instructions."

  Put down the phone, Li Naiyu immediately led his men to rush to Linyin City and found the public phone that had called Hou Jingkui before. Seeing that it was also a public phone by the roadside, Li Naiyu thought of searching for nearby cameras immediately. Unfortunately, there wasn't a single camera within 200 meters around this public phone booth.

  As a result, Li Naiyu's suspicion of Xiong Tianlin deepened. Rushing to the Lin Yin City Public Security Bureau, with their cooperation, they retrieved video footage from around the long-distance bus station in Lin Yin City that day. After much effort, they finally found Xiong Tianlin's figure. At this point, Li Naiyu was almost certain that the person who answered Yu Xiaopeng's midnight call was indeed Xiong Tianlin. After receiving Yu Xiaopeng's call, Xiong Tianlin's first action after work was to rush to Lin Yin City, more than 70 kilometers away from the provincial capital, to call Hou Jingkui and report on the situation.

  From the fact that Xiong Tianlin was able to find a public phone without surveillance cameras around, it can be inferred that he should be very familiar with the situation here. However, from the video footage, after Xiong Tianlin left the long-distance bus station, he almost didn't hesitate and went straight to the street where the telephone booth was located, apparently knowing the place in advance. Was it Xiong Tianlin who came to investigate beforehand, or did someone tell him? With doubts, Li Naiyuan returned to the provincial city and went to Zhenjiazhuang again, as well as the crematorium to investigate Xiong Tianlin's living habits. The situations provided by both places were similar, Xiong Tianlin rarely went out, except for the crematorium and Zhenjiazhuang, even buying rice and vegetables were done nearby, it seemed that no one had seen Xiong Tianlin going to the city to stroll around.

  Li Naiwen immediately called Song Weili, who was far away in Luoying.

  "Xiao Song, investigate Hou Jingkui's whereabouts again, especially before receiving that call from Linyin City, has he ever been on a long trip."

  "Director Li, what does it mean? Was that phone call really from Xiong Tianlin?"

  "Yes, it has been confirmed in the surveillance video of Linyin City. The second thing that needs to be confirmed now is who chose a phone booth with no surveillance video around for Xiong Tianlin in Linyin City."

  "Alright, I understand."

  As Luo Lin is over 2,000 kilometers away from Linyin City, and considering the low possibility of Hou Jingrui taking a bus, Song Weili led his team directly to Luo Lin Train Station. With the assistance of railway police, they searched for any ticket purchasing records of Hou Jingrui in recent times.

  They searched until the beginning of the year, just before Spring Festival, and indeed found that Hou Jingrui had bought a train ticket from Luolin to the provincial capital.

  After receiving the news from Song Weili, Li Naiyuan felt that when Hou Jingrui came to the provincial city at that time, did he spend the Spring Festival in the foster son Hou Jin's home in the provincial city? Without disturbing the Houjin family, they just asked around from the neighbors and all the neighbors consistently proved that during the Spring Festival, there were no outsiders visiting the Houjin family, only their three-member family.

  Li Naiwen dialed Song Weili's phone number again.

  "Little Song, when did Hou Jinggui leave Luolin before Spring Festival and what time did he come back?"

  "Director Li, I couldn't find out the exact time when Hou Jingkui returned. However, from his neighbor, it was heard that Hou Jingkui didn't return for Chinese New Year. The neighbor recalled that Hou Jingkui only went back after the 15th of the first lunar month, saying he went to spend the new year with his adopted son Hou Jin."

  "Hou Jingkui was obviously lying, and Hou Jin's neighbor has confirmed that during the Spring Festival, no outsiders came to Hou Jin's home, only their family of three."

  "Director Li, I understand. I'll start from Luo Lin and investigate Hou Jinggui's route and whereabouts after he returned last year."

  "Alright, I'll bring people from Linyin City to investigate. It's estimated that Hou Jingkui is the one who provided the public phone location to Xiong Tianlin."

  It wasn't long before Li Naiyu and Song Weili met in Linyin City. After investigation, it was found that Hou Jingkui spent the Spring Festival in a five-star hotel in Linyin City, with a total consumption of over 34,000 yuan for 23 days.

  This number gave Li Naiwen and others a fright.

  Not to mention that Hou Jingrui is just an ordinary retired worker, even if it's a director like Li Naiyu, more than 34,000, which is almost equal to Li Naiyu's salary for three or four months, how can he afford to spend it in a hotel?