The Corpse That Digs Graves

Zhang Yao was found in the classroom the next morning, tied to the chair. He was conscious, physically intact, and absolutely silent. He refused to answer any questions from police or hospital staff about what had happened or who had done it. He sat in the hospital bed and stared at the wall.

That night, he was found dead in his room. The cause of death, the report would later say, was cardiac arrest. He was forty-one years old and had no prior history of heart problems.

With Zhang Yao gone, there were two left: Hui Nan and Zhu Hua.

They met in the corridor the morning after Zhang Yao's death. Zhu Hua had gone thin over the preceding weeks; the skin around her eyes was dark. She looked at Hui Nan and said without preamble: "We're the last ones."

"Yes," Hui Nan said.

"What do we do?"

Hui Nan had been thinking about this since the night she had spent in the school office. She had thought about running — going somewhere far, changing her name, disappearing. She had also thought about waiting, which had worked so well for all the others. Neither option seemed promising.

"I want to go to White Stone Mountain," she said.

Zhu Hua looked at her. "The graveyard?"

"Zhai Jia followed someone there. She said she found a coffin. And the graveyard is where all of this started — where Fang Chuchua was buried fifteen years ago."

"You think the answer is up there."

"I think whoever is behind this has been using that mountain. The delivery man led Zhai Jia there deliberately. That's not random — it means something is happening there. Someone is living up there, or hiding something there."

Zhu Hua was quiet for a moment. Then: "When?"

"Tonight. After dark."

"All right."

They arranged to meet at the base of the mountain path at ten. Hui Nan went through the rest of the school day in a mechanical state — teaching her classes, eating lunch, marking papers. She noticed, sometime in the afternoon, that Principal Chen Daipeng seemed to be watching her. When she looked directly at him he looked away, but when she turned back to her work she could feel his gaze return.

She said nothing about it to Zhu Hua when they met that evening. The mountain path was narrow and badly lit; they had brought flashlights. The air smelled of pine resin and cold damp earth. Behind them, far below, the lights of the city were a pale smear against the sky.

They climbed in silence.

Neither of them had thought to watch whether anyone was following.