Justice System: I Litigate for the Whole City

Chapter 97 : The Purpose Column

Zhou Yu was already standing at the bottom of the stairs when the door curtain had only been lifted halfway.

Gray jacket, old briefcase, the corners worn pale. He didnʼt rush up. Instead he looked up at the wooden staircase first, as if running through what heʼd say once he got upstairs, one more time on the way. August 26th, 7:50 a.m.

He Xiufen was at the stove, lifting noodles out, and gave him a once-over from head to foot. ”Youʼre here.”

”Director He.” Zhou Yu said. ”Is Shen Zhixia around?”

”Upstairs copying down dates.” He Xiufen cracked an egg into the pan, set the bowl of noodles on the little square table at the foot of the stairs. ”Eaten?”

”Ate on the way.”

”Then sit down and watch me eat.”

Zhou Yu didnʼt sit. He Xiufen didnʼt wait for him either; she took her bowl and headed up first, her slippers thumping against the wood, and turned halfway up to call down, ”Come up. Donʼt just stand at the bottom of the stairs like a debt collector.”

The upstairs room wasnʼt large: one long table, two rows of metal file cabinets, and on the wall an old whiteboard that had been wiped too many times, one corner still holding the tail end of half a line. Beneath the glass pad on the desk lay a layer of cut paper strips; the top one had been pressed in the night before, with only a single date written on it — the 30th.

Shen Zhixia stood up and closed the hardcover notebook. Two things lay open on the table: a printed photo of a courier waybill and a written statement with a red fingerprint on it.

”What you didnʼt say on the phone yesterday, youʼre planning to say in person today,” she said.

”I couldnʼt say all of it over the phone.” Zhou Yu sat down across the long table, his briefcase on his knees, unopened. ”There are two things I need, and I have to see them in person before I can explain.”

”Which two?”

”The name on the money, and the man who said the words.” Zhou Yu said. ”The name determines what crime it is. The man determines who we find.”

He Xiufen pushed a cup of tea toward him, the tea leaves settled at the bottom. ”First tell me what youʼre going to do with them.”

”Let me first tell you what I canʼt do.” Zhou Yu took the cup but didnʼt drink. ”Iʼm a procurator at the district Procuratorate. I canʼt open a case for the Public Security Bureau, and I canʼt arrest anyone on your behalf. There are two things I can do: one, organize what you have into a workable lead, transfer it to the Economic Crimes Investigation Unit, and push for a preliminary inquiry; two, if they should open a case and donʼt, our office formally demands they explain why. If both succeed, three things follow — case filing, freezing accounts, border control alert. As long as the person hasnʼt left the country, the money still has a road home.”

”And if they donʼt succeed?” Shen Zhixia asked.

”If they donʼt, then this is a tip-off letter.” Zhou Yu said. ”Iʼve seen plenty of tip-off letters. In the end they all go into an archive box, and dust settles on the box.”

Shen Zhixia pushed the notebook half a step toward him. ”If you submit it, someone will ask where the material came from.”

”Thatʼll be the first question.” Zhou Yu said. ”And I can answer it clearly — a delivery worker carrying his own goods, standing by the door, overheard a few words and reported them to a lawyer; the lawyer wrote it into a statement, signed it, and put a fingerprint on it; the material came to me. Every link in that chain is real.”

”And if someone asks you why a procurator from a district office is sticking his nose into whatʼs supposed to be a civil matter and pushing it toward criminal?”

”That question I wonʼt answer.” He said. ”Iʼll only state that the material is genuine.”

Downstairs, someone called out ”Two bowls, extra chili,” and a spatula clanged against the wok.

”So the name is essential,” Shen Zhixia said.

”The route is essential too.” Zhou Yu rotated the cup half a turn. ”The name and the route are two ends of the same thing. Which account the money went into, which account it left from, at which step it got split up, and under what designation it left the country — if we canʼt lay out that entire path, we freeze the wrong account, and the money keeps moving through a different one, and we wonʼt catch it at all. One thousand forty-two households, one hundred five transactions. Whether the label pasted on the money says ʼservice feeʼ or ʼconsulting fee,ʼ it all matches in the books, and none of it holds up under a transaction-by-transaction review.”

He tilted his chin toward the waybill photo on the table. ”The receiving entity printed on it is a company name. Under the company name thereʼs a phone number, and under the phone number there should be a purpose. Thatʼs the name.”

[Thud. Civil cases want money; criminal cases want people. Both roads need a name first.]

Shen Zhixia opened her notebook and wrote two characters on the first line: The Name.

At 9:20, the stairs thumped again — Shi Lei, habitually taking them two at a time. He came in, set a paper bag on the corner of the table: delivery note stubs, the edges curled, the paper still bearing the imprint of the ballpoint pen from the warehouse.

”Jie.” He spotted Zhou Yu and stopped short. ”This is...”

”Donʼt ask who he is,” He Xiufen said. ”Just tell him what you saw.”

”Same as yesterday? Say it again today?”

”Not one word more, not one word less.” He Xiufen said. ”Say it again in front of him.”

So Shi Lei repeated the three sentences, even slower than the day before: ”The certificationʼs complete. Before next Tuesday, that sum has to go out. First send the small one — test the waters.”

”Where did you hear this?” Zhou Yu asked.

”By the elevator, sixth-floor corridor.” Shi Lei leaned forward. ”The man had a hard-shell bag in one hand. I was standing with my back to them. I heard exactly those three sentences, not a word missed. I tell time by my hearing — I signed the delivery slip and went downstairs, less than five minutes from start to finish.”

”The door was open?”

”Open. Three photocopiers running at once inside.” Shi Lei gestured. ”I didnʼt go in. I wheeled the goods up to the door and had him sign.”

”When was the photo taken?”

Shi Lei handed over his phone: on the screen was the waybill, the receiving entity printed with a line reading ”Jiangzhou Hongkun Investment Management Co., Ltd.,” a string of numbers beneath it, a signature in the receipt column, the characters squeezed together.

”Next Tuesday.” Shen Zhixia circled those three words in her notebook, then looked up. ”Iʼm pressing it back to the 30th.”

”Why press it?”

”Month-end. On the 31st, banks only reconcile; they donʼt process transfers. If the money has to land before month-end, there are only those two days it can move.” She said. ”Better to guard early than late.”

Zhou Yu nodded. ”Then Iʼll set my defenses for the 30th.”

He Xiufen slid the statement over. ”This one you fingerprinted yesterday. Todayʼs part gets written on a separate sheet: which shipment the photo was taken on, what time, and what your hands were doing. Write what you did, not what you guessed.”

”I didnʼt go through anyoneʼs things.” Shi Lei lowered his head and took the pen. ”That waybill was stuck on the box. When I picked the box up, it was facing me.”

”That part has to go on paper.” Zhou Yu said. ”If a photo goes into a case file, you have to be able to explain how it was obtained. You made a delivery and happened to photograph a label stuck on a box — thatʼs acceptable. If you flipped open documents on someoneʼs desk and photographed those, it canʼt go in.”

[Thud. A waybill only proves something came back. What that something is — it doesnʼt say.]

Shi Lei finished writing, signed, pressed his fingerprint — hard, a perfect round print.

”Iʼm not taking the sixth-floor jobs anymore.” He wiped his hand on his pant leg.

”Iʼll amend that.” He Xiufen said. ”You deliver what youʼre assigned to deliver. Thatʼs your livelihood. No one can ask you to break your own rice bowl for our sake. Three rules: donʼt go inside, donʼt touch papers, donʼt ask questions uninvited. If you hear something, come back and tell us. If you donʼt, say you didnʼt.”

”What if theyʼre talking in the corridor and I overhear?”

”Heard it, come back and tell your sister.” He Xiufen said. ”Donʼt pull out your phone and aim it at their door crack.”

”Are you scared?” she asked.

Shi Lei wiped his hand on his pant leg again. ”Iʼve worked that building for a year. They know my face better than they know their own staff. Scared or not, Iʼll still go.” He thought for a moment. ”The only thing Iʼm afraid of is — one day they stop letting me deliver, and then I canʼt see anything anymore.”

”If they wonʼt let you deliver, you come back.” He Xiufen said. ”If this line breaks, we find another one. The people canʼt break.”

Zhou Yu moved his hand off the briefcase. ”Let me be completely frank. That basket of civil cases you have — once the criminal case opens, they may be stayed.”

Shen Zhixia looked up.

”There are places where criminal and civil run in parallel. More often, the stay happens.” Zhou Yu said. ”Once the cases are transferred over, when the hearing happens and when restitution comes arenʼt up to us.”

”A stay isnʼt just three days or five.” Shen Zhixia said. ”Of those one thousand forty-two households, some people put their last two months of rent into it. The case goes into a drawer — their lives donʼt.”

”I know.” Zhou Yu said. ”Thatʼs why I didnʼt bring a single piece of paper for you to sign today.”

”A thousand forty-two households canʼt wait.” He Xiufen set her chopsticks on the rim of the bowl. ”At that hearing on August 12th, the presiding judge gave the bank ten days to produce the originals and the approval records. They produced them. What they produced — you and I both know. Iʼm going to the Case Filing Division today to ask about the evidence cross-examination schedule. Even if it takes all day, Iʼll get a date. Iʼm not withdrawing the housing case, not consolidating it, not stopping it. Freezing the money is faster than a judgment — but even if itʼs frozen, I wonʼt sign a single ʼthis settles itʼ on anyoneʼs behalf.”

”Iʼm not asking you to let go.” Zhou Yu said. ”Today Iʼm only doing half the job — the freezing half.”

”Two legs walking.” He Xiufen said. ”Neither one kneels.”

She pulled out a blank sheet of paper and wrote four lines on the table. When she finished, she turned the paper around.

Shi Lei — sixth floor; keep delivering as assigned; note only what happens outside the door.

Tang Guo — twenty-seven households with key handover at month-end; list with door-lock photos and dates.

Shen Zhixia — Hongkun Investmentʼs background: who opened it, when, business scope, address, phone; where money leaves from, and to which step it travels.

He Xiufen — ask about the schedule at the Case Filing Division; add yesterdayʼs three sentences to the police report as a lead.

She wrote one more line: ”Twenty-seven households are all squeezed into those last two days of the month. The moneyʼs final gap is at month-end too. Both are packed into a single week. Whichever moves first, we block that one first.”

”Public business registration information — search it however you like. Two rules.” Zhou Yu looked at the last line. ”First, none of you may use our officeʼs or my name to request materials from any company. Whoever does that, I take this lead back as-is. Second —”

”Donʼt go to that building alone.” Shen Zhixia finished for him.

”Right.”

He drank the last mouthful of tea and put the paper bag and the written statement into his briefcase. At the top of the stairs he stopped, glanced back at the cut paper strips under the glass desk pad, and didnʼt ask what they were. He Xiufen turned over the kraft paper envelope at the corner of the table, slipped it spine-down into a drawer, and closed the drawer very quietly.

Before he went down, He Xiufen reheated that morningʼs bowl of noodles — egg still in it — and handed it to Zhou Yu. This time he didnʼt refuse. He stood at the foot of the stairs and ate, set the bowl back on the little square table, and said thanks. Once heʼd turned the corner out of the lane, He Xiufen took the bowl back and set it on the stove. ”If someone from the Procuratorate will eat my noodles, this thing is real.”

Shi Lei headed downstairs after that, going to get his minibus. Tang Guo sent a ten-second voice message in the group chat, street noise thick in the background: ”Jie, Iʼve gone through twenty of the twenty-seven households. Seven are out of town; Iʼll call tonight to confirm. Iʼm checking each move-in date one by one. No guessing.”

Shen Zhixia replied with four words: ”Go by the dates.”

She sat down, took out her phone, and sent Lu Jibai a line: ”Procurator Zhou came by. He wants two things: the name on the money, and the man who said the words.”

After sending it, she set the phone face-down on the table, got up to wash a cup, dried it, and put it back. When she sat down again, the screen was lit — four words.

The nameʼs on the form.

She read those four words twice. The form. There was no ”name” column on a business registration form, and certainly none on a company sign. She thought of that room at the Chengdong Branch: the glass partition, the machine that printed the vouchers, the stacks of slips pressed under the counter — the thickest stack was the outgoing remittances.

When money leaves Jiangzhou, whatever itʼs called, someone has to write a name for it on a form: purpose. The name isnʼt on the sign. Itʼs in the purpose field of that cross-border remittance application.

The form is in the bank. To get that form, you still have to find the person who signed it.

She flipped her notebook to the page marked ”Before the 30th” and added a line after it: The name — that column on the form.

When she finished, she lifted a corner of the glass pad and nudged the strip of paper that only read ”the 30th” half an inch further underneath.

Downstairs the pot was boiling again, and the smell of scallion oil drifted up the stairs.