Chapter Seven: Mother and Son

“Please don’t worry just yet,” Ning Shuyi said, signaling for him to calm down. “Things have come to this point. No matter what is said now, the facts cannot be changed. Let’s talk it through and try to solve the problem as soon as possible so your life can get back on track.”

“Yes, yes, exactly! The faster you handle it, the less it affects us! Go ahead and ask whatever you need. As long as it’s within my ability, I’ll definitely cooperate!” The landlord hurriedly agreed as soon as he heard that.

“Who did you rent the house to?” Ning Shuyi asked.

The body was still wrapped in a thick layer of concrete and had not yet been unearthed, so identifying it was even more impossible. They could only start by seeing whether the landlord could provide any clues.

“I rented the place to a mother and her son. The woman was in her fifties or sixties, and her son was probably in his early thirties,” the landlord replied at once. “They’d been living in that house for a solid five or six years!

“I didn’t actually have that much contact with them. The first time I rented it out, I put up an ad downstairs. They saw it, called me, and since I wasn’t asking for much rent, they rented it without hesitation.

“As for the rent, my original terms were one month’s deposit and six months paid in advance. If they were short on cash, and they seemed fairly reliable, I’d also be open to negotiating one month’s deposit and three months’ rent.

“But once this mother and son came along, they were very straightforward. They said they didn’t like landlords coming by all the time to poke around and disturb them, so they were willing to pay the rent annually.

“Of course I wasn’t going to refuse a deal like that. Getting a year’s rent all at once meant I could just put it in a fixed deposit or something. They didn’t want me coming and going to bother them, and I didn’t want the trouble either.

“So renting to them was really worry-free for me. They lived there for years, and every year before the due date—before I’d even said anything—they’d already transfer the next year’s rent to me from the bank.

“Just a few days ago I was even talking to my wife about how renting a place really comes down to fate. Tenants like the mother and son in our house, so easy and trouble-free, are the kind you can’t just go out and find if you want them!

“And now look at this! How did it suddenly turn into a murder case? I’d almost rather they’d been the sort of troublemakers who stripped the place bare and sold off all the fixtures. At least then I could spend some money replacing everything and still rent the place out normally!

“But now it’s ruined! Even I feel uneasy thinking about it, let alone renting it out to anyone else!”

“How many times did you meet the two of them? What did they do for a living?” Huo Yan asked.

The landlord shook his head. “Not many times. I only saw them when they first rented the place. Once in the middle I called her son because he told me the bathroom heater had broken. He took it down and threw it away, and called to let me know.

“I told him if it was thrown away, so be it. It was an old relic anyway. Who still uses that thing these days? I said I’d buy a new fan-heater when I had time and come install it for him. But he said no need—he’d already bought one and put it in himself.

“He was just worried that he’d taken down my old fixture and thrown it away without telling me, and that I might be upset later, so he made sure to let me know. He didn’t even ask me to pay for the new heater he installed himself.

“After that, they always paid the rent on time. If anything in the house broke and needed replacing, they never relied on us. They never asked us to take care of anything. I only exchanged a few WeChat messages with that son, usually just to confirm whenever something in the house had been changed or replaced.”

The landlord gave a wry smile and sighed. “Only now do I realize that tenants can be too worry-free for their own good. Otherwise why would I be standing here not knowing what else I can tell you about them?”

As Ning Shuyi listened, one detail the landlord had mentioned kept turning over in her mind.

“Did you just say that every year, the tenant arranged the rent remittance to you through the bank? Are you certain it was a remittance, not a transfer?” Ning Shuyi asked for confirmation after the landlord finished speaking.

In W City’s rental market, even an older house of moderate size, despite its relatively low rent because of location and living conditions, would still cost twenty to thirty thousand a year at the very least.

Electronic payments were so advanced now that hardly anyone used cash in daily life. Whether it was an interbank transfer or a transfer through a payment app, it was all extremely convenient. The words “bank remittance” had become rare.

Given the landlord’s age, Ning Shuyi needed to confirm that he was not confusing the concept with a simple transfer.

“Yes, a remittance!” the landlord said firmly, nodding. “That’s right! Every time rent was due, it was always that son of theirs who went to the bank and handled a cash remittance for me!

“At first I found it a little strange, so I asked whether he thought I was in my fifties and wouldn’t know how to use the payment apps young people use.

“He said no—it was his mother who gave him cash and insisted he go to the bank to make a cash remittance.

“I figured that woman was older than I am, so maybe she wasn’t quick to accept new things and was always worried about being cheated online or something. So she insisted the boy do it her old-fashioned way.

“In any case, since the son didn’t mind the trouble, what could I, the one collecting the money, say about it, right?”

“So from the very beginning, the household was just the mother and son, no one else, correct?”

“Yes, just the mother and son!” the landlord nodded. “When I first rented the place to them, I met them a few times.

“I heard the woman’s husband passed away years ago, leaving just the two of them.

“She didn’t seem to have any kind of job either. She was probably just a homemaker, taking care of the house and cooking for her son.

“The son worked outside the home and seemed pretty busy. A few times when he contacted me about replacing something, I’d reply to his messages, but it would take him quite a while before he got back to me, saying he was busy with work or something.”

“How was the relationship between the mother and son?” Ning Shuyi asked again.

“Pretty good,” the landlord answered without hesitation. Then he seemed to feel that saying it like that was a little too imprecise, so he hurriedly corrected himself. “What it was really like, I can’t say for sure. But when I went to hand over the keys to them, my impression was that the two of them got along very well.

“That old lady couldn’t stop praising her son whenever she mentioned him. As for the son, he didn’t talk much, but he seemed steady and down-to-earth, the sort of young man who felt honest and dependable.”

“Do you have photocopies of their ID cards?” Huo Yan asked.

The landlord suddenly slapped his thigh. “No wonder I felt like I’d forgotten something the whole way here while rushing over from work! The contract and the ID copies!”