Fateful Consequences: A Guardian Story

Zhao Yunlan groaned.  Being woken by the harsh ring of his cellphone was starting to become a regular occurrence, and a most unwelcome one at that.

This time it was Zhu Hong.  He decided he would give her a pass considering how eager he was to hear what she had to say.

"Methanol poisoning."  A woman after his own heart, she got straight to the point.  "Ingested rather than injected.  Most likely to be the whisky I would say, but the people in the lab will confirm it.  That would be the best way of disguising the drug anyway.  We didn't find a huge amount in his system, but what was there was more than enough to kill him, particularly when you consider his previous alcohol abuse."

"Any chance at all of it being accidental?"  Yunlan already knew the answer but had to ask.

"Extremely slim.  Methanol does appear in lethal doses in alcohol produced cheaply in backstreet distilleries, India being the most recent case in point.  But here?  In expensive whisky?  I would say not.  Particularly if no other cases are reported.  Could be suicide I suppose, but I doubt it, given the note."

"Okay."  He rubbed the sleep from his eyes.  "Time of death?"

"Between 2am and 4am."

It matched up with what the wife had told them about the victim's drinking habits.

"Thanks.  I'll be at the SCD in an hour.  Call me there if you get anything else."  Yunlan hung up and dragged himself out of bed.

***

Shen Wei stared blankly at the kettle.  It had boiled several minutes ago, but he had made no move to prepare his tea.

It was Saturday, and he had absolutely no idea what to do with the time.  It was silly really.  A few weeks ago, he would have been in exactly the same position.  However, since Zhao Yunlan entered his world he had started to expect, well, more from his life.

He shook his head, trying to shift his brain into gear.  He supposed he could do some more research into poisoned Chinese emperors, but it was going to be virtually impossible to narrow it down sufficiently without further information from Yunlan and his team.

He looked outside.  It was a nice day.  Suddenly, going for a walk seemed like a good idea.  He would have been more mindful of the police chief's warnings about taking unnecessary risks, but he had walked home last night, albeit at a blistering pace, and seen nothing that had made him feel suspicious or unsafe.  He would wait an hour before leaving though, just in case Yunlan called with an update.

Exactly sixty minutes later, Shen Wei closed his apartment building door and ventured out into the bright sunshine.  For good or ill, no one had called on his expertise that morning.  He turned in the direction of the local park, and it did not take long before he was walking through the wrought iron gates.  At this time of year, the leaves on the trees were just starting to turn beautiful shades of gold and orange.  Of the people he knew, most preferred spring, when the blossom trees were in bloom.  But Wei had always been drawn to the warm shades of autumn.

He sat down for a while on his favourite bench, which was in a quiet area overlooking a small pond surrounded by trees and shrubs whose branches swayed gently in the light breeze.  As he looked at the vibrant colours dancing like flames, he was reminded of the clue the murderer had left at the scene the day before.  "He deserved to go up in flames".  It was a strange choice of words.  Very specific.  If the killer was talking about the man going to hell, he would have imagined it would say "go down in flames" instead.  Following that reasoning, it was more likely that it was an actual reference to fire.

Fire and poison.  That would certainly help narrow things down.

After strolling for more than an hour through the winding pathways, Shen Wei finally left the park and made his way back home, his mind refreshed.