Chapter 160: Searching for Someone

Chapter One Hundred Sixty
Searching for Someone

Old Kohler seemed rather afraid of the other woman’s fierceness and unconsciously retreated a step.

“Liv, this is a detective. He wants—he wants to help you search for Daisy.”

Liv’s face, marked by wrinkles and peeling skin, turned toward Klein. She said coldly, “We have already called the police.”

She was perhaps only in her thirties, but outwardly, she already looked close to fifty.

Klein glanced around the room, where many pieces of wet clothing hung everywhere. He vaguely remembered that when he had come last time, there had been a thirteen- or fourteen-year-old girl here. She had carefully held a simple, crude homemade iron, handling washed and dried but wrinkled clothes. Her hands had many burn marks.

She is the “lost” Daisy…

Klein looked back at the laundrywoman Liv and said in a tone devoid of emotion, “Do you believe the East Borough police will truly devote themselves to finding Daisy?

“Can you be certain that the people who caused Daisy to ‘get lost’ will not turn their attention to your family next?

“Do you want to lose another daughter after already losing one?”

Those cruel yet piercing words entered the laundrywoman Liv’s ears. The coldness on her face broke down bit by bit. Her mouth opened, but she failed to say anything, and the corners of her eyes gradually reddened.

She abruptly lowered her head and muttered in pain and despair, “I have no money…”

The room suddenly quieted. Even the sobbing girl stopped making a sound.

Klein pressed his lips together and exhaled soundlessly.

“I occasionally do volunteer work, purely to help others. Heh, it has been a long time since I last did it. Please give me that chance.”

“Volunteer work?” Liv lifted her head, chewing over the word.

Klein nodded slightly.

“This commission will be free. No, not completely free. Kind acts bring me great satisfaction.

“In any case, you no longer have any other options. Why not try?”

Liv was silent for a while. She raised a hand, wrinkled and swollen from long immersion in water, and wiped her eyes. In a low voice, she said, “Detective, you—you truly are a kindhearted, good gentleman…”

Her voice suddenly choked.

“…This is what happened. At noon the day before yesterday, Freja took Daisy with her to return a batch of washed clothes. It was just outside the East Borough, and they needed to go across several streets.

“To hurry back for lunch, Freja chose a quiet alley. But after just one careless moment, she found that Daisy, who had been following behind, was gone.

“She went back along the same route looking for her, but never found her. And Daisy never came home.

“Freja, where was it at the time?”

The girl called Freja had already stood up, her eyes red and swollen.

Sobbing softly, she said, “It was—it was Broken Axe Lane, detective. Will Daisy be all right?”

“She should be,” Klein answered without much expression.

He looked around a few times, then asked, “Do you have anything Daisy often carried with her? I can borrow a police dog. It has an excellent sense of smell and can follow the scent left behind by the target all the way to them.”

“…No.” After thinking, the laundrywoman Liv said with a sorrowful expression.

Freja began crying again, feeling as though everything had once more reached a dead end.

Suddenly, she blinked.

“There is—there is one thing.

“Daisy’s word booklet!”

“Word booklet?” Old Kohler asked from the side.

Liv sniffed.

“I had Freja and Daisy attend the free school at night. I can keep washing clothes forever, but they—they cannot remain like this forever.”

This madam truly is a good mother…

Klein could not help sighing inwardly.

Free schools were nighttime schools established by the three major Churches or certain charity organizations. Classes ran from eight to ten in the evening, and no fees were charged. They even provided writing tools and a certain amount of paper free of charge. They were aimed at literacy, at most touching on a little religious knowledge as well. Old Neil had once worked for several years as a teacher at the Evernight Goddess’s free school, and Klein had heard a few things about them from him.

Because very few people volunteered to teach at free schools, a unique teaching model had formed there. The teacher arrived early, first gathered several of the students with the best progress and taught them the day’s content. Those students then became responsible for teaching different classes, while the teacher patrolled back and forth, correcting mistakes. This was called the monitorial system.

Corresponding to the free schools were free organizations such as technical workers’ lecture halls. These were among the few channels that the truly poor could access to escape their own class.

Unfortunately, there were far too few such organizations. A cup of water against a cartload of burning firewood. It was hard for them to have a truly substantial effect.

At that moment, Freja added through sobs, “Daisy loves studying. The teacher has already chosen her to be the monitor for her class. She puts the pages where she has copied words together. Every day, she sleeps with them under her pillow, hugging them, then wakes up early to go outside onto the street and recite them by the morning light. She was always regretting—regretting that there are no streetlamps nearby…”

As she spoke, Freja rushed back to the bunk bed and took out a stack of wrinkled paper from under a tattered pillow.

Because it had long been kept in a damp environment, the words copied on those pages had already begun to blur in places.

The edges of the paper had even become worn, as though someone had flipped through them over and over for a long time.

“Detective, can—can this work?” Freja held the unbound so-called word booklet in both hands and passed it to Klein, looking at him with pleading eyes.

“It can,” Klein answered very simply.

He was not comforting Freja. Although items like this were not carried on the person, they had long stayed beside the target and held the target’s intense convictions. They were excellent materials for locating someone through dowsing.

He casually flipped through the word booklet and said, “Then I will begin acting. The earlier we find Daisy, the better.”

Unable to find more words to describe how they felt, Liv and Freja could only watch Klein and Old Kohler leave while repeatedly saying, “Thank you,” “Thank you, detective,” and “Thank you, kind gentleman,” again and again.

After leaving the apartment, Klein turned his head slightly toward Old Kohler.

“Recently, keep an eye on the unemployed female textile workers, especially those who have neither found new work nor become street girls. Pay particular attention to the ones no one knows where they went…

“Be careful yourself. Ask little and listen more. If you do this well, there will be a bonus.”

“All right!” Old Kohler nodded heavily.

He did not leave immediately. After hesitating, he asked in a tone full of expectation, “Detective, you will definitely be able to find Daisy, right?”

“I can only say that I will do my best.” Klein gave no guarantee.

Old Kohler sighed and smiled bitterly.

“I lost my own children, so this is the sort of thing I least want to see…”

He waved a hand and headed toward another street.

Klein, meanwhile, left the area neither quickly nor slowly. On the way, he wrapped Daisy’s “word booklet” around the head of his cane and, without drawing attention, completed a “dowsing rod search.”

There is a result. Northwest… For now, I cannot confirm whether it is being interfered with or misled…

He lowered his head, looked at the direction in which the cane was about to fall, and reached out to support it.

Following the revelation, Klein left the East Borough and hired a rental carriage.

More than half an hour later, after adjusting directions several times, the carriage stopped on Iris Street in Cherwood Borough, close to the West Borough. It stopped before a house with vast lawns, wide gardens, a small fountain square, and marble statues.

Inside the carriage, Klein’s cane had already fallen. It pointed straight there!

Through the window, Klein saw patrolling guards inside the iron-bar gate, as well as evil dogs with their tongues lolling.

Security there was quite strict.

More importantly, even without using divination, relying only on spiritual intuition, he could tell that no small danger was hidden within!

What is this place? How did Daisy’s disappearance get entangled with somewhere so dangerous?

Klein pondered for several seconds, then instructed the coachman to continue forward.

The coachman answered with some surprise, “Sir, are you not here to visit Mr. Capim?”

Capim? Klein felt that name was extremely familiar.

Smiling, he asked in return, “Why do you think so?”

“People often come out of the East Borough and take my carriage here. Heh-heh, this is the home of the wealthy Mr. Capim,” the coachman answered casually.

East Borough… Capim… Wealthy man…

Klein suddenly remembered who that Capim was.

In many rumors, he was the bloody-handed leader of a criminal syndicate, connected to many cases of innocent young girls disappearing.

In reality, he was a wealthy man acquainted with many important figures.

Klein said nothing more. He leaned back against the carriage wall and half closed his eyes.

The carriage slowly advanced. That luxurious villa slipped backward and disappeared from the glass window.

…

Inside a small compartment of a café.

Fors had already learned that the old man opposite her was named Lawrence Nord. He came from Constant City in Midsea County and was a public-school teacher.

He did not know that Madam Anlisa’s husband had died, so he also does not know that Madam Anlisa inherited the legacy and became a Beyonder. He would have even less reason to imagine that Madam Anlisa would leave her relics to me… Could he also be a Beyonder? Does he possess divination abilities?

Fors drank a mouthful of Fermo coffee and organized her words.

“I was once a doctor at the nearby Joseph Clinic, and Madam Anlisa often came for treatment. By then, her husband, Mr. Laubero, had already passed away…

“…I would occasionally talk with her and help her with a few matters. For example…

“So, at the end, she made a will leaving her savings and cash to me, while donating her jewelry, books, furniture, and other belongings to charity organizations. The law firm she designated supervised the execution.”

Everything Fors said was true, but it was not the whole truth.

Lawrence pinched his forehead.

“What a regret. I cannot understand why Anlisa never contacted me during those years.”

“She never mentioned your name. She vaguely seemed dissatisfied with Mr. Laubero’s relatives,” Fors answered frankly.

Lawrence fell silent for a moment before saying, “Thank you for telling me this. It has helped me understand certain things.

“Right. Where were Laubero and Anlisa buried?”

“Green Cemetery.” Fors took out a pocket watch from her bag and glanced at it. “Mr. Lawrence, I have something else to attend to. I should leave.”

Lawrence did not stop her. He rose and saw her off.

After sitting down again, he rubbed his temples in distress and silently muttered to himself, “Laubero passed away, and he left no children. I do not know where Anlisa put his Beyonder characteristic… Richard died at the hands of the Aurora Order… Sam simply does not want to contact us, does not want to bear the responsibility of the surname…

“Will the Abraham family truly just slowly perish like this?”