[Forwarded] Short Story 'The Strange Kidnapping Case'

Time: 2013-03-12 12:32 Source: "New Story" Author: Yangguang Maizi\The Strange Ransom\January 6, 6 PM, the Public Security Bureau suddenly received a call from Mr. Wang, CEO of Tengda Real Estate, reporting that his daughter Wang Ning'er had not returned home from school and was likely kidnapped. A note left by the kidnappers was found in the mailbox at the doorstep.\Captain Liu of the criminal investigation team hurriedly took several criminal police officers to Mr. Wang's residence. Captain Liu picked up the note, which had a line of small text: "Prepare 100 yuan ransom, call 110 for police." Liu noticed a foul smell on the note and couldn't help but frown.\Mr. Wang said, "How could a ransom be only 100 yuan? There must be something behind this." He thought carefully before reporting it. However, after a night passed, the kidnappers had not called Mr. Wang to inform him of the ransom collection location.\On the morning of the 7th, the school leadership issued a notice to all parents, announcing the establishment of a Parent Committee to assist the school in implementing safety education for students. To select suitable parents, the school held a small test for parents at the 2 PM parent meeting. It didn't take long, and all the parents submitted their tests.\In fact, the small test was just a strategy by Captain Liu. He wanted to start with the school. The test included the characters from the note, and by using computer technology to extract and analyze these characters, it would essentially help identify the kidnapper.\Sure enough, early on the 8th, Captain Liu pinpointed the father of Wang Liangliang, a classmate of Wang Ning'er. His handwriting closely matched the handwriting on the note. The school reported that Wang Liangliang lived with his father, staying at relatives' home. The reason the child could attend this key elementary school was because higher-level authorities had contacted the school. The police decided to raid Wang Liangliang's home.\When they arrived, they found Wang Liangliang's house in a single-story home in a neighborhood on the west side of the school. When Captain Liu and his assistants rushed in, they were stunned: the room was cluttered, and a man was sitting on the bed with a silly grin, showing no resistance when caught.\The Strange Kidnapper\Captain Liu was still puzzled when he noticed a foul smell. On the table was a pile of medicines, which smelled the same as the note—the note had apparently absorbed the scent from the medicine in the man's pocket. Next to the medicine was a psychiatric evaluation certificate from a mental hospital bearing the man's name: Wang Lin. Captain Liu could not have imagined that the kidnapper was him.Three months ago, a news report on the city TV station said that because he tried to stop the demolition, Wang Lin brought gasoline intending to go down with the demolition workers, but he was later taken by the relevant authorities to a psychiatric hospital, diagnosed with a mild mental disorder, and confined there. Later, after Liu and his team heard that the demolition work was completed, the hospital leadership said Wang Lin's condition had improved significantly and released him. When Wang Lin returned home, he found his house in ruins, so his relatives placed him and his son in a small flat in their community. At every parent-teacher meeting, Wang Lin insisted on attending. Although a bit eccentric, he loved his child and never caused trouble. The school was aware of their situation and had been taking care of Liangliang in various ways.

Liu and his team took Wang Lin to the police station, hoping he could reveal Wang Ninger's whereabouts. Wang Lin spoke in fragments, hitting here and there, but Liu managed to understand the general meaning: his son was constantly bullied by a girl named Wang Ninger, and once during a field trip, Wang Ninger even had classmates lock Liangliang in a broken wooden cabinet in an abandoned shed. That day, when he went to pick up his son from school, he saw Wang Ninger sitting on the grass listening to an MP3 player, so he kidnapped her.

Wang Liangliang stayed by his father's side, looking down and silently acknowledging the bullying he experienced at school. Wang Lin chuckled foolishly and said that unless 100 yuan ransom was paid, he wouldn't say where Wang Ninger was locked up. Wang's father quickly took out 100 yuan. After Wang Lin received the money, he whispered: 'I also... locked her in that shed's cabinet. Haha!'

Immediately, Liu and his team contacted the school, confirmed the location of that field trip and the small shed, and rushed over with Wang's father. However, when they opened the cabinet, they were stunned—Wang Ninger was nowhere to be found, only an MP3! Besides a series of messy footprints on the scene, there was nothing else. Wang's father confirmed that the MP3 belonged to his daughter.

Liu then asked Wang's father to recall if he had any recent enemies, perhaps someone would re-kidnap Wang Ninger to achieve objectives in business that were otherwise unattainable. After careful thought, Wang's father said that Lingyun Real Estate was his biggest competitor. Recently, because of the plot of land in the western suburbs—the same area where Wang Lin's family home was—he was confident about winning the bid, leaving Lingyun Real Estate at a disadvantage.

At this moment, the forensic expert informed Liu: the MP3 had no fingerprints, and the footprints at the scene were size 43, while Wang Lin wore size 40 shoes.That night, Wang Liangliang did not dare to stay at home by himself, so he slept at the police station with his father. Because Wang Lin had an official psychiatric evaluation, Officer Liu, in his opinion regarding Wang Lin's handling, believed that Wang Lin was in the midst of a psychotic episode when he kidnapped Wang Ninger, and his actions were beyond his control, so he should not bear criminal responsibility. Thus, three days later, on the 11th, Wang Lin was released, and Officer Liu sent the father and son back home.

Shortly afterward, Mr. Wang suddenly called Officer Liu, saying that a second letter from the kidnapper had arrived in the mailbox. When Officer Liu arrived, he found that this time the writing was done with a brush, and a strand of hair was included in the paper: That madman had forgotten to write the character for 'ten thousand.' He instructed to put the money in an iron box and throw it into the old well by the river in the western suburb; if the police were alerted, next time it wouldn't be hair, but one of Ninger's hands.

Mr. Wang decided to deliver the ransom. To avoid suspicion, at 5 a.m. he prepared the iron box containing a million in cash, drove to the western suburb, and threw the box into the old well. After hearing the 'plop' as the box hit the water, Mr. Wang drove away. Officer Liu, meanwhile, had people secretly lying in wait near the well, patiently waiting for the ransom to be retrieved.

Unexpected Incident
By noon the next day, no one had retrieved the box. Mr. Wang called Officer Liu again, saying the thug had sent a second letter: still in brush writing, asking him to search the cabinet for his daughter.

Fearing it was a trap, Officer Liu instructed four assistants to continue monitoring the old well while he and two colleagues went to an abandoned wooden house to meet with Mr. Wu. When they arrived at the small wooden house, they indeed found Ninger lying in the cabinet. They untied her, and Ninger clung to her father's waist, crying. Once Wang Ninger calmed down, she hoarsely recounted her ordeal: 'That afternoon after school, I was listening to music on the playground when someone covered my head from behind and dragged me into a wooden cabinet. Only the following afternoon did someone come; I couldn't see how many people there were. They took off my MP3 and moved me to a closed, damp room. My hands and feet were tied behind my back the entire time. When the kidnappers left, they tore off the tape from my mouth and put a large amount of food near it. I had been hungry for nearly a day. After eating a little, I started yelling for help, but no one responded. After yelling for a long time, my voice went hoarse. So I ate, slept, and repeated—sleeping and then eating again.'One time, I was awakened by a 'plop' sound. I heard someone next to me take a few steps to get something, and then they pulled me outside, down until I was locked in this cabinet again. I didn't know how long I had been confined. Anyway, someone came to deliver food; I also didn't know if it was a man or a woman, because they never spoke to me.\After listening, Captain Liu quickly sent people to retrieve the iron box. In the end, nothing was recovered, but the technician who went down reported finding a hole about 60 centimeters in diameter on one side, 20 centimeters above the water level of the well.\Captain Liu went down the well and entered the hole, seeing a small space of less than two cubic meters, very well sealed. On the other side connecting to that space, there was still a cave. When Captain Liu followed the cave and emerged above ground, he found himself in a dense reed patch not far from the old well.\Captain Liu hoped to find some traces at the cave entrance, but besides a pile of dirt, there was nothing.\Dad's Trash Bag\The next afternoon after Wang Lin returned home from the police station, he wrote a letter and began taking out the trash. Liangliang, who had no afternoon class, went to throw the trash and suddenly saw a letter on the table that said, 'Oh, by the way, Dad, I already helped you mail that letter yesterday.'\Wang Lin knew that his son had delivered the second letter. During the day, his son went to class; at night, he stayed at the police station sleeping with him. So Wang Lin carefully told his son to make sure he mailed the letter that was in the drawer at home. His son went back and did just that. The next day, Wang Lin was taken home by Captain Liu, and the second letter also arrived at Mr. Wang's residence.\After his son fell asleep, Wang Lin muttered to himself, 'Son, they bully your dad, but they can't let their kids bully you again! I was forced into a desperate situation; they deliberately had me diagnosed as mentally ill to lock me up for the relocation work, so I had no choice but to go along with it, pretending to be mentally ill and planning this strategy. This 1 million will be enough for your education!' After saying that, he went to mail the third letter he wrote in the afternoon.\Liangliang had no idea that in the trash he threw away there was a pair of size 43 shoes and a broken brush he had picked up. But his father had cut these items into pieces, and Liangliang never saw them. The calluses on his father's hands had grown thicker. He had spent more than two months digging a long tunnel…