Justice System: I Litigate for the Whole City

Chapter 68 : One Character Off

June 17, 2:00 PM. No. 188 Wenchang Road was a six-story old commercial building. The first-floor lobby held two faded advertising boards, and half the elevator buttons were worn blank.

The registered address printed under the ”Party A” column on the contract pointed here: Room 412, fourth floor.

The hallway smelled of cold instant noodles mixed with printer-paper ink. At the far end, Tang Guo stopped first.

”This is it?”

Shen Zhixia didnʼt answer. She looked at the door first.

Glass double doors, with a roll-up shutter on the outside stuck halfway down, leaving a gap about a foot wide at the bottom—just enough for someone to duck through. The handles had been wrapped twice with a piece of wire, twisted loosely, not locked.

Through the gap she could see inside: a dozen or so cardboard boxes stacked against the wall, all their tape seals cut open, some empty, some still stuffed with things; an overturned water-cooler bottle on the floor, spout pointing up; every drawer of the front desk pulled open. A sign had once hung on the wall—torn down now, leaving four screw holes and a ring of smudged adhesive. Three empty mineral-water bottles sat on the windowsill. Someone had been here in the last few days and left them behind.

An A4 sheet was taped to the shutter with four strips of clear tape, one corner lifting in the breeze. It was printed:

”Due to operational difficulties, the company is suspending all new acquisitions and lease signings. Arrangements for current tenants will be announced separately. We apologize for any inconvenience.”

The signature was the full company name—identical, character for character, to the name under ”Party A” on Tang Guoʼs contract. Below it, a date: June 12. Below that, a phone number.

She photographed it first. Two steps back, a wide shot framing the door, the shutter, and the sheet together; then close up, margins clear, not a single character cropped. Tang Guo stood behind her holding a phone as a light.

”Suspending new acquisitions,” Tang Guo read aloud. ”Funny how it doesnʼt say suspending rent collection.”

”The rent collection stopped long ago on its own.” Shen Zhixia pointed at the date. ”Posted on the twelfth. The landlordʼs last payment arrived March nineteenth.”

She dialed the number on the notice. It rang once, cut off, and a flat female voice recited: the number you have dialed is out of service. She hung up and redialed—same message. The third time she recorded it, then photographed the number on the notice.

”What about the property stewardʼs number?” Shen Zhixia asked.

Tang Guo tapped at her phone. ”Sent another message. Avatarʼs still that gray silhouette.”

A hand truck came down the hall, loaded with black garbage bags. The man pushing it looked about sixty, in gray-blue work clothes, a ring of keys on his belt.

”Another one,” he said, parking the cart against the wall. ”Since last week, Iʼve seen seven or eight batches of people like you.”

”Youʼre the buildingʼs maintenance man?”

”Fourth and fifth floors are mine.” He flipped through his keys. ”Nameʼs Cao. If youʼre asking where they moved to, I donʼt know. If I did, I wouldnʼt still be owed my forty-eight hundred.”

”Forty-eight hundred.”

”Property fees, two months.” Old Cao said. ”Rent owed goes to the landlords—not my business to track.”

”When did they move out?”

”Last Thursday, at night.” He thought for a moment. ”Two box trucks, backed up to the middle entrance. They hauled stuff down trip after trip until past eleven. Held up my shift.”

”Did they get everything out?”

”No.” He tilted his chin at the gap. ”Left the place full.”

”Howʼd the door end up like that?”

”The lock broke ages ago. The wireʼs their own doing.” He said, ”Their spare keyʼs still with me. Never turned in.”

”What about this paper on the shutter?”

”They didnʼt put it up.” Old Cao answered quickly. ”Day after they left, a man came up wearing a cap. Stuck it on and went straight downstairs. Didnʼt say a word.”

”How old, man or woman?”

”Couldnʼt tell.”

Shen Zhixia noted everything down line by line: June 17, Room 412, shutter half-down; property fees owed two months; last Thursday night, two box trucks cleared out; spare key never returned; notice posted by someone after they left. Finished, she crouched down, held her phone to the gap, and took two horizontal shots of the interior.

As she pushed the lens inward, she spotted a printed form still taped to the lower half of the wall inside, sideways, corners curled. She zoomed in slowly. She could only make out two characters in the header: ”overdue.” Bottom right, a date: May 31.

”Youʼre not going in?” Tang Guo asked.

”Not today.”

”The doorʼs not even locked,” Old Cao said. ”If you want in, I wonʼt stop you.”

”Anything I took from inside, I couldnʼt prove where it came from.” She said, ”If I shoot from the doorway, I can.”

On the floor at the gap, a sheet of paper lay curled. She zoomed in: a stack of unhanded-out flyers, the top one printed with a couple pulling suitcases, and a red line across the bottom—First month plus deposit, annual payment takes twenty-four hundred off.

[Thud. The notice says theyʼve stopped acquiring units. It doesnʼt say anything about refunds.]

The elevator chimed. Two people got out, a man and a woman. They stopped at the door, read the notice, then leaned against the wall.

Then the elevator chimed again. The hallway was narrow; with more people, even turning meant going sideways, so they formed a line along the wall.

A woman in her thirties clutched a kraft-paper envelope, the edge of a contract sticking out. She rented in Minʼan Li Building No. 3, quarterly payments of sixty-three hundred. Water cut off last Wednesday, power the day before yesterday. Sheʼd been heating water in a pot and pouring it into a basin to bathe.

A man in his fifties said his son rented in Xinghua Community, annual payment of twenty-four thousand, also on a loan. The landlord had changed the locks last week. His sonʼs luggage was still piled in the property storage room.

Two recent graduates shared a room, paid a half-year upfront—twelve thousand. The shorter one said: theyʼd charged her electricity through their mini program—deposit a hundred, deduct a charge. Last Wednesday the mini program wouldnʼt open. The next morning, the power was off.

”So what about the money I loaded this month?” she asked.

Shen Zhixia wrote in her notebook: Mini program, deposit 100, deduct per charge; inaccessible since June 11.

A middle-aged food-delivery rider said he couldnʼt read. The property steward had pointed at where to sign. All he remembered was twenty-two hundred deducted from his account every month.

”Do you have a copy of your contract?”

”The steward said itʼs all in the system.” He scratched the back of his neck. ”I never downloaded anything.”

”Are you a lawyer?” the woman with the envelope asked.

”Trainee lawyer,” she said. ”Our firm is handling cases like this. Iʼm along for the field work.”

”Do you charge?”

”Not today,” she said. ”When thereʼs a fee, itʼll be written on a piece of paper. You read it, you nod, then itʼs charged.”

Jiang Bo was the last to arrive. Twenty-eight, auto-shop uniform rolled to his forearms, black grease packed under his nails. He rented in Xincheng Garden Building No. 1, annual payment of twenty-four thousand, also on a loan. Water off the morning before last, power off yesterday. Everything in his fridge had thawed.

”One at a time.” Shen Zhixia crouched by the fire hydrant and spread her notebook across her knees. ”Names first.”

She asked and wrote, line by line: which community, which building, which unit; monthly rent, how many months paid at once, paid by QR code or loan; what day the water stopped, what day the power stopped; whether the landlord had changed the locks, whether belongings were still inside; which numbers theyʼd dialed, how many times anyone had answered.

At Jiang Boʼs turn, she asked one more question: ”That loan of yours—who was it paid to?”

”The bank sent it directly. I never saw the money.” Jiang Bo said, ”The only thing on my phone is the repayment date. The twenty-first. Two thousand.”

”The twenty-first.”

”A day before me,” Tang Guo said from beside him. She crouched down and took a girlʼs phone, showing her how to swipe to the page with the merchantʼs full name. ”Swipe left. Here—this is called the merchantʼs full name. Not that short name.”

”Stop standing around,” the man in his fifties suddenly spoke up. ”The group chatʼs been saying it for ages—the money was transferred out long ago. I heard it was two months ago.”

”Which group?”

”Our buildingʼs tenant group. Over a hundred people.” He said, ”First time I went to their office, two people were still sitting inside. Second time, the door was locked.”

”Who runs the group?”

”A girl who moved out. She left Jiangzhou ages ago.”

”ʼTransferred out two months ago.ʼ” Shen Zhixia repeated the phrase. ”Says who?”

”Everyone says it.”

”Everyone says it, but no one can say who they heard it from.” She capped her pen. ”I wonʼt write that down.”

”Iʼve got something.” Jiang Bo pulled out his phone and turned the screen toward her. ”Downstairs I heard you talking about payees, so I poked around. Might be nothing.”

A WeChat Pay transaction. March 16, two thousand yuan, payment note reading ”deposit.” The payee line held a string of small text: Jiangzhou Youzhu Information Technology Co., Ltd.

”Had you ever looked at this field before?”

”No,” Jiang Bo said. ”Who checks that when theyʼre paying? The steward holds out a QR code, you scan it, done.”

Tang Guo opened her own phone. May 9, a two-thousand-yuan charge, payment note reading ”deposit · Minsheng Road Building 5, Unit 502.” The payee field: four characters—Youyu Apartments.

The two screens sat side by side in the hallway, white light on two faces.

”One character off,” Tang Guo said.

[Thud. The payee column doesnʼt use that name.]

Shen Zhixia copied both names into her notebook, leaving a blank line between them.

Someone in the hallway asked: ”Can we get the money back?”

She stood up and looked down the row of faces.

”I donʼt know,” she said. ”Today Iʼll do one thing—write down what each of you is owed. Once itʼs written down, itʼs not just something people say. Itʼs a piece of paper.”

”And one more thing.” She pointed at the notice under the shutter. ”If anyone has the landlordʼs contact info, give it to me. The rent the landlords didnʼt get—that moneyʼs owed to them too.”

Tang Guo stood in the crowd without speaking. Only after a while did she remember she was still holding the livestream light. She raised a hand and clicked it off.

”Sis.” She pulled her to the stairwell, voice dropped to a whisper. ”Can I post now?”

Shen Zhixia glanced back at the hallway. Someone was flipping through a contract, someone was on the phone, Jiang Bo was helping a girl screenshot her bills into her photo album one by one.

”Not today.”

”Theyʼre already gone.”

”The people are gone, and the money too.” She said, ”You post now, tomorrow thereʼll be a hundred people standing in this hallway. Iʼve got one hand and one notebook. I canʼt write that fast.”

”Then when?”

”Tomorrow morning, Iʼll find out whoʼs behind each of these names.” She said, ”Once I have that clear, then we post. When we do, Iʼll give you something to say—something that checks out. Donʼt make anything up yourself.”

Tang Guo hitched her bag up and didnʼt argue. The hand holding the light hung empty, her thumb rubbing against the casing twice.

Wind came through a gap in the window, lifting a corner of the notice and pressing it back down. Old Cao passed with his cart, not stopping this time.

Shen Zhixia flipped to the last page of her notebook and added a line under the two names: Tomorrow morning, check business registrations.

Done, she tapped the pen cap against her knee twice.

”What if you canʼt find anything?” Tang Guo asked.

”Then I still have to look.” She stood up. ”Right now I donʼt even know how many names this company has.”

The elevator chimed again. Two more people stepped out—one pulling a suitcase, the other clutching a sheaf of papers.