Read Novel Full Chapter 213: One Counter
Chapter 213: One Counter
She laid the two sheets side by side on the table, turned sideways so the grid lines met line for line.
On the left was the printout of the for-sale sheet, the address cell circled in red. On the right was the photocopy of the broadband relocation request form, its corners curled—the same page she'd copied before. Tang Guo's original was still sealed in its plastic sleeve, tucked beneath her own plastic document folder.
"Name." Her pen rested on the first cell. "One cell on the sheet. The first line on the form."
"Phone." The second cell. "The exact number she canceled on the twenty-fourth. Not one digit off."
"Address."
The cell on the sheet read: 118 Minsheng Road, Building 3, Unit 302. The form had two fields: old installation address and new installation address. The first held the building Tang Guo had lived in before moving. The second was the 118 Minsheng Road address.
"This paper has two addresses," He Xiufen said, standing behind her with a tea mug. "The sheet they were selling had one."
"There's one more in the private messages."
"What."
"The date." She said, "May twenty-third."
He Xiufen slid her reading glasses down and leaned over the form's rightmost column—scheduled appointment date: May twenty-third.
Five cells, read top to bottom: account name, contact number, old installation address, new installation address, scheduled appointment date.
"Five cells, one sheet." He Xiufen said, "All the things you just counted—name, phone, two addresses, a date—all in these five cells."
"Three on the sheet, one in the private messages."
"Four together. What's the fifth?"
Shen Zhixia flipped the form over. The back was blank. The old installation address—Tang Guo's previous residence—was nowhere on the for-sale sheet, nowhere in the group chat, nowhere in those three dated private messages.
"The old address is online," she said. "But only someone who actually handled this form could put the old address, the new address, and the date all in one place."
He Xiufen said nothing. She pulled the form over and held it up to the window, studying the bottom right corner. A stamp sat there, dark red, the characters squeezed into two lines:
Installation Agent · Chengdong Minsheng Road · 07.
"This stamp." He Xiufen said, "Her relocation was processed at that little shop on Minsheng Road?"
"Handled in person at the shop. The installer who came out said the work order belongs to this area."
"So that outlet took it."
Shen Zhixia copied the stamp into her notebook, then held it to the light. Beneath the red mark was a line of even smaller text—the outlet code, five digits.
"If you're going to put this stamp on paper, here's how you write it." He Xiufen pushed the form back. "The acceptance form bears a seal reading 'Installation Agent · Chengdong Minsheng Road · 07' at its signature block. 'The stamp was made here'—that's your claim. 'Bears a seal'—that's what's on the paper."
"The difference is the four words 'was made here.'"
"The difference is whether those four words can be questioned." He Xiufen said, "You write 'the stamp was made here,' and they answer 'the agent's point is just an agent's point,' and you have to back down. You write 'bears,' and they can't back down—they can only bring the paper and compare."
"Five cells on one sheet." She repeated it. "Who handles this whole sheet at once?"
"The one who takes the work order. The one who comes to install. The one who files it."
"Three hands." He Xiufen held up three fingers. "The intake hand types the cells into the system. The installer's hand carries the form out. The filing hand puts it away. Which hand the buyer's copy slipped from—you don't know yet. What you know is that these five things fit together, and they all fit this one sheet."
[Thud. Three handlers, one form. Paper passes through whose hands, information passes through whose hands.]
"That sheet went for fifteen hundred," Shen Zhixia said. "The seller doesn't deal with broadband installation."
"He's got someone above him." He Xiufen adjusted her glasses. "The seller's standing at the counter too. The one who supplies him—that's the source. Work orders, waybills, installation forms—they sort by category, box them up."
"I want to go check out that Minsheng Road outlet."
"Don't." He Xiufen nudged the two sheets toward the center of the table. "They already told you—the moment you go asking, that drawer empties by nightfall."
"Then how do I make it surface?"
"Let it walk on its own." He Xiufen said, "Paper only counts as yours when it walks into your hand. You knock on the door, and there's no paper behind it."
She picked up her phone and sent a line to that unsaved number: Bottom right corner of the relocation form bears a stamp: Installation Agent · Chengdong Minsheng Road · 07.
A reply came back: The number on it belongs to the counter. Numbers can change. Counters don't move.
* * *
At a little past one in the afternoon on June thirtieth, she took her notebook to the Minsheng Road Police Station.
The officer flipped through the register behind the window until he reached her entry.
"The 07 line," he said. "It was merged with two others and sent up last night."
"Sent up where?"
"Upward." He tapped the corner of the page where the words "Pending Verification" sat. "I only keep records here. Someone else does the checking."
"Can I submit supplementary materials? Get this outlet included?"
"Write down where it needs to go. I'll send it."
"What about the telecom operator? This outlet processes forms for them."
The officer glanced at her, pulled a sheet of paper from the drawer, and let her see only the top inch.
"The letter went out," he said. "They replied that this outlet's work order system was suspended once last week."
"What does 'suspended once' mean?"
"I don't know." The officer slid the paper back into the drawer. "I didn't ask one extra word. If you're writing it down, write: 'According to the operator's reply letter, the agent outlet's work order system was suspended once.' Just that sentence. Don't add anything."
"How long was it down?"
"They didn't say." He tucked his pen behind his ear. "You write 'pending verification.'"
She copied the sentence into her notebook and added two characters at the end: pending verification.
"One more thing," the officer said. "That number you logged before—the one selling the watches. The money doesn't go to a card in his name. It goes through a corporate account."
Her pen stopped.
"Which corporate account?"
"The letter's still on the way," he said. "I'll tell you when it comes back."
"What about Tang Guo's new number?" she asked. "Still clean?"
"Tell her not to reply to anything with it." The officer closed the register. "Reply once, and that's one more door opened."
* * *
That evening, a new email appeared on the station's old computer.
It came from the platform's legal department, with a formal subject line: Supplementary Disclosure Materials on the Online Infringement Case. Three attachments, each one larger than the last.
The first: registration information for six reposting accounts. Six accounts, three registered phone numbers. Two of them were created two days apart, and the "frequent login location" field listed the same city for both. A line was appended at the bottom: one account's registered phone number matched the business cooperation number on her printout exactly.
The second: placement details for those three orders. The payment account field read: Jiangzhou Dingchang Culture Media Co., Ltd. Three links hung in the placement targets. She recognized the three names attached to those links.
The third was the thinnest—just one sentence: The accounts involved in the above orders and Tang Guo's account exhibit the same keyword clustering.
[Thud. Selling the list—money through one corporate account. Buying plays—money through Dingchang's account. Whether they're the same, the paper doesn't say yet.]
He Xiufen took off her glasses and came over.
"Now you can draw it," she said.
Shen Zhixia opened her booklet to the middle page and drew three lines.
Top line: Money—Dingchang's corporate account, used to buy plays, three transactions, paid by the company.
Middle line: Work—Xingyao, six reposting accounts, job posts, paid per post, matrix distribution.
Bottom line, three characters: Who sold it.
After writing, she started a new line below it and left it blank.
"What's the blank line for?"
"Work orders," she said. "Outlets like 07—there's more than one."
"Right." He Xiufen put the lid on her tea mug. "The seller has bags, but he didn't print them. There's another layer above him—collecting work orders, collecting waybills, collecting installation forms, boxed by category. You don't even know that layer's name."
"It's beyond this page."
"It's above this page." He Xiufen said, "Nail down the lower lines first. When that upper layer pokes its head out, it'll have to do it on its own."
She flipped the checklist page to the bottom. The last line was copied from yesterday: Jiangzhou Xinghe Culture Media Co., Ltd., established June twentieth.
The first four digits of the bag number were also 0620.
"Same day." She laid the two lines side by side. "The day the bag came out, and the day this company opened."
He Xiufen leaned over and studied them for a moment, then tapped her finger between the two lines.
"Write 'same day,'" she said. "Don't write 'therefore.' Same day can be coincidence, or it can be a date someone chose. Right now, all you can write is 'same.'"
She copied it down. When she finished, her pen hovered over the word "therefore," then pulled back. It never landed.
A little past eight, her phone rang. A call forwarded from the landline—the station.
"The corporate account came back," the officer said. "Two transactions went to that number you reported. One settled—fifteen hundred. The other's hanging, unpaid."
"What's the pending one?"
"The subject line says a bag name, four characters." The officer paused. "I won't read it out to you. Just note: there's a bag, not settled."
"How much?"
"More than fifteen hundred," he said. "A lot more."
She stood by the window, phone in hand. Someone hauled a cart through the alley below, its wheel clanking over a manhole cover.
"'Not settled'—does that mean the buyer hasn't paid?"
"Means I don't know," the officer said. "All I know is the money hasn't arrived. In their line, it's pay first, open first—no money, no bag."
"Then who's it waiting for?"
"For someone to pay up," the officer said.
She hung up and went back to her desk, adding five characters to the blank space at the bottom of her checklist: One bag, not settled.
He Xiufen poked her head out from the kitchen doorway.
"Who called?"
"The station," she said. "There's a transaction hanging on the books. Not settled."
He Xiufen's hands stopped mid-wipe.
"A seller doesn't keep his own merchandise off the market," she said. "If it's hanging, the buyer hasn't paid."
"Why hasn't the buyer paid?"
"The money has to come from someone else first." He Xiufen dried her hands on her apron. "Whoever's buying this bag—it's going to cost more than Xingyao's price."
* * *
She got home close to nine. Tang Guo was in the living room, lifting the livestream light out of its box, wiping the lens, not plugging it in.
"What happened?" she asked. "You stood there on the phone for ages."
"There's a transaction on the books. Not settled."
"Waiting for who?"
"For someone who hasn't shown their face yet." Shen Zhixia closed her notebook, the five characters pressed beneath its cover. "Pay first, open first—money arrives, the bag opens. The one who pays is the real buyer behind it all."
Tang Guo looked at her, didn't ask more, and put the light back in the box.