“I discussed with Old Frank what to do with you after we caught you—either use drugs to make you even crazier, or make you disappear completely. And you? You’ve been tailing me for so long, have you ever thought about one thing?”

Matthew Mitchell slowly raised the hand gripping Copper Skull, the veins bulging at his temples. “Have you ever thought about what you’d do when you’re actually standing in front of someone who’s killed two people and plans to kill you too?”

Halfway through his sentence, Matthew Mitchell viciously smashed down Bronze Head.

What to do? Matthew Mitchell never got to say those words.

Fiona Bennett’s right hand, clutching her chest, pulled a small object from her jacket’s inner pocket. During this time, she had practiced this move thousands of times, both from memory and from Gabriel Adams’s apparition. Bend the knees, left hand guarding in front, right hand thrusting out! She gripped her fist tightly, and the blade of the spring knife snapped out. She used all her strength to stab forward. But after all, she hadn’t fully recovered, the effects of the drugs still lingered, and her movements were inevitably a bit slow.

Matthew Mitchell dodged backward.

But suddenly, the foot he stepped back with was grabbed by a hand. That hand, belonging to Frank Bishop, didn’t have much strength, but it was enough to throw Matthew Mitchell off balance. In an instant, the blade pierced his chest.

Bronze Head fell, grazing Fiona Bennett’s left arm before hitting the ground, and Matthew Mitchell collapsed backward.

His eyes widened as he reached for the knife in his chest, blood gushing through his fingers.

Fiona Bennett knew she had struck his heart.

Matthew Mitchell opened his mouth, letting out a low, mournful wail. He convulsed, his glasses askew on his forehead. He couldn’t accept this outcome; his pupils struggled to emit the last light of life, filled with disbelief. After a moment, he finally realized his fate, realized that everything, including his life, was about to end.

He began to cry, wailing in despair, though he could no longer make much sound.

Fiona Bennett looked at her own hand—this trembling hand hadn’t a drop of blood on it. She picked up a medicine bottle from the sofa, which had fallen out of Matthew Mitchell’s bag when he was searching for his phone. She unscrewed the cap, poured a handful into her palm, and swallowed them.

At that moment, she heard Matthew Mitchell stop his wailing and, in a low, hoarse, desperate voice, begin calling her name.

As if he’d remembered something at the last moment, something he had to tell her.

Fiona Bennett walked over and stood in front of him, watching him struggle so hard to call her name in his final moments. After a while, Fiona Bennett finally bent down.

“She wouldn’t die that quickly,” Matthew Mitchell said haltingly.

Then Fiona Bennett realized Matthew Mitchell was talking about “thallium.”

“Thallium doesn’t act that fast. Susan Wright came into contact with the corpse, skin contact, poisoning, complications, but it wouldn’t kill her that quickly. She couldn’t have died so soon. Someone else must have acted too—not just me, someone else did something with me.”

“Who was it?” Fiona Bennett asked.

At that moment, a long, drawn-out ship’s horn sounded. It came from the river, riding the setting sun, echoing among the ruins. It lingered among the broken sculptures around the riverside platform, reverberated in the silent gazes within the tin-roofed house, buzzing, refusing to fade.

When the horn finally died away, Matthew Mitchell still had a trace of struggle left.

Fiona Bennett lowered her ear to his lips.

“Who was it?” she asked again.

“I don’t know either,” Matthew Mitchell uttered his final words.

5

The Qingming Festival of 2007 was a sunny day, a world apart from the cold, gloomy morning two weeks earlier when Fiona Bennett left the psychiatric hospital.

In the riverside murder case of last December, the police found an excessive amount of venlafaxine in Fiona Bennett’s system that day. This antidepressant, if taken in excess, can push a patient to the opposite extreme of depression—mania—in a short time. According to the testimony of Dr. Adams from the mental health center who prescribed the drug, Fiona Bennett, who had been his long-term patient, not only suffered from depression but was also likely schizophrenic. Frank Bishop and Mr. AdamsMrs. Adams also provided supporting evidence. Based on this, the prosecution no longer debated whether Fiona Bennett had used excessive force in self-defense, and directly determined that she was not criminally responsible due to lack of capacity during the incident.

While in detention, Fiona Bennett met several times with Officer Leonard Carter (the Smoker), the officer in charge of the Gabriel Adams case. He never treated her kindly; in this case, he had actually been beaten to the punch by a psychiatric patient, resulting in the suspect’s death. As for the suspicious death of Susan Wright uncovered by the Gabriel Adams case, the police spoke with Adrian Wright once, but, respecting the wishes of the deceased’s family, did not reopen the investigation.

At the request of immediate family member Frank Bishop, Fiona Bennett was released from the psychiatric hospital after a short period of treatment.

When she walked out the hospital gates, Fiona Bennett said to Frank Bishop, there’s still one thing left, and then we’ll be even. Frank Bishop replied, you’re a psychiatric patient now, you can’t file for divorce by agreement, don’t make me have to sue you for divorce, can we put this off for now? Fiona Bennett was silent for a long time, then said, let’s just live apart for a while. Frank Bishop agreed.

Frank Bishop told Fiona Bennett something else: this year marks the tenth anniversary of Susan Wright’s death, and William Williams suggested that the classmates hold a memorial for her during Qingming. Everyone had already agreed. Before this, the news that Matthew Mitchell had been confirmed as the one who poisoned Susan Wright was already known to everyone in Sponsored Training Program.

Fiona Bennett was a bit surprised and asked, “Is everyone going? Do they all know about what happened with Susan Wright’s sister and mother?”

“Except for William Williams and me, the other classmates don’t know about Susan Wright’s… past,” Frank Bishop replied.

“So, will you go?” Frank Bishop asked Fiona Bennett.

“Why not?”

All the classmates from Sponsored Training Program worked at the hospital, and were key staff in their departments, so it was usually hard for them to get time off, let alone all on the same day. But on April 5th, they all managed it. Adrian Wright also came; he placed a bouquet of white flowers at the grave, but no offerings, no incense. He looked at each member of Sponsored Training Program as if they were strangers.

People stood scattered around, not in any formation; except for Frank Bishop and Fiona Bennett, no two people stood together.

William Williams went first, lit three sticks of incense, bowed, and placed them before the grave. He stared at the tombstone for a while, perhaps speaking silently in his heart, then squatted down, took out a stack of letters, and burned them in the brazier.

Fiona Bennett watched the flames in the brazier and decided to go second. She picked up the wooden board lying under the tree and, under everyone’s gaze, walked to Susan Wright’s grave. She placed one end of the board into the brazier, and the flames licked up the wood, illuminating the mysterious symbols. The board crackled and popped, but it was a long and difficult process to get it to burn; by the time all the paper in the brazier was gone, the board stubbornly remained mostly intact. Wisps of gray smoke rose from the bottom, the mottled wood surface was blackened, and most of the evil talismans written on it remained. Fiona Bennett leaned the board against the grave. She had wanted this thing to disappear from the world, but it seemed that Susan Wright on the other side didn’t want to see it again. She looked at the photo of Susan Wright, felt she should say something, but really had nothing to say.

Each person who approached the grave would look at Susan Wright’s photo for a while, perhaps speaking to her in their hearts. They would also glance at the smoke-shrouded wooden board.

Were they trying to recognize the marks they’d left back then? Fiona Bennett wondered.

No one shed tears.

This was the first formal memorial Sponsored Training Program had held for Susan Wright. But surely, Susan Wright wouldn’t have liked such a memorial. Fiona Bennett looked at those pale, haggard faces, studying them very carefully, hoping to draw some conclusion from the slightest change in expression. But she saw nothing; she just had a feeling that after each person returned from the grave, they seemed a little lighter.

Fiona Bennett thought the memorial would end quietly like this, but then a group of monks arrived. The leader wore a kasaya, palms pressed together, solemn and dignified. They formed a circle around the grave and began chanting the Great Compassion Mantra.

Fiona Bennett glanced at Adrian Wright, who looked surprised, as did William Williams. Frank Bishop met her eyes, thought for a moment, and asked her quietly,

“Do you want me to find out who arranged the ritual?”

Who was it that so wanted to soothe Susan Wright’s soul?

The Buddhist chanting rose like flames, sweeping away many intangible things from the world. In the sunlit cemetery, everything felt vast and distant.

“No need,” Fiona Bennett shook her head gently. “I… don’t care anymore.”

She picked up her heavy backpack from under the tree and walked out of the cemetery. After a few steps, she heard a commotion behind her, turned to look, and saw that the once smoke-shrouded wooden board was now ablaze with fierce flames.

Fushou Garden in Qingpu and the place where Susan Wright was buried were in opposite directions in Shanghai. By the time Fiona Bennett arrived at Fushou Garden, it was past four in the afternoon. The people who had come to pay their respects were leaving; Fiona Bennett walked against the flow, went deep inside, and sat cross-legged before Gabriel Adams’s grave.

“I’ve come to see you,” she said with a smile.

Before the grave were offerings of qingtuan, sponge cake, oranges, bananas, and lilies. Gabriel Adams’s parents had already visited earlier.