The Silent Image
Detective Lauren Vance, despite her heavy workload, still came to my apartment on weekends to pore over the clues we had.
She brought a large bag of tea leaves and brewed a pot.
It looked familiar. She said: Fats gave it to me.
I kneaded my forehead with my palm. lately, I'd been suspicious of everything.
She said: You seem a lot darker lately.
I said: Probably just haven't been sleeping well.
She said: Hey, don't move.
She brushed aside the messy hair on my forehead and studied my left eye intently.
She said: That's strange...
My heart lurched.
She said: There are so many blood vessels in your left eye.
I pulled away and said: I told you, I haven't been sleeping well.
She said: Let me take you to the hospital.
I said: It'll be fine after tomorrow.
Just then, my cat leapt onto the table and stepped on a paper bag, sending a stack of photographs sliding out. Gratefully, I picked up the cat and went to prepare its food.
Lauren flipped through the photographs. Behind me, she said: Serena was so cute when she was little.
I didn't reply.
truth was, I was grateful to Lauren for being willing to investigate this with me. But I didn't know if I told her the truth about my left eye, she would treat it as evidence—or suspect I was having a delusional episode and recommend I see a psychiatrist.
Even if she believed me, what about her superiors? Would they believe her?
She was the only connection I had to the authorities right now. I didn't want to lose her so easily.
Lauren had brought some materials about Six Degrees of Separation.
She held the documents, clicking her tongue in wonder: It actually makes a lot of sense.
I said: Hmm?
She said: I'm not very social, but I still have over two hundred contacts on my phone. Forget the sixth power—even the third power, through just three people, I could reach eight million people. Our city only has about eight million people total.
I said: That math isn't quite right. You have to factor in overlap among mutual friends. The sixth power must be meant to offset the effect of redundancy.
She let out a long "Oh," picked up a pen, bit her fingernail, and started taking notes on her notepad.
I remembered she didn't have the nail-biting habit when she was interrogating Dr. Ashmore. She must be pretty relaxed now.
I patted my forehead.
The biggest remaining question was how Dr. Ashmore had killed Serena.
I said to Lauren: Have you considered other applications of Six Degrees of Separation?
She looked at me blankly.
I said: Using six people to locate a fugitive.
Her eyes lit up. She said: Good idea.
Then she paused and said: That's basically just following the trail, though. The police have been doing that forever. Nothing new.
I said: The power of Six Degrees of Separation lies in how inconspicuous it is. In other words—what if you used it to commit murder? The method leaves no trace, and evidence practically doesn't exist. Like the verbal provocations those five people directed at Serena.
She hesitated for a moment, then said: That seems unlikely... there are too many uncontrollable factors. Besides, people aren't that fragile.
That day, I thought about it for a long time, only to reluctantly concede that Lauren was right. Even if this so-called Six Degrees Murder was valid, I had no way of proving from among so many uncontrollable factors that Dr. Ashmore had deliberately committed murder.
His lawyer would only need to say: Please prove that Dr. Ashmore's psychological counseling of those five people was done with ulterior motives.
And I would be rendered speechless.
I slapped my forehead.
Lauren seemed to take pity on me. She said: We've come this far. If you really have other leads, bring them out. I don't care whether the method is legal or not—I'm willing to trust you this time.
I fell silent, remembering how in those photographs, the scenes I saw were always silent.
When it came to leads about Dr. Ashmore, if anything had been overlooked, it was those images. Silent images. I had no way of knowing what else he had done to Serena beyond the abuse.
Even if it was torture, I had to go deeper.
I asked Lauren: Can you read lips?
She scratched her head. Uh... no.
I gave a bitter smile.
She stood up, slapped her thigh, made a fist, and said: It's just lip-reading. Give me a week and I'll learn it.
I said: I'll be waiting, Officer Vance.
She gathered her things and put on her shoes at the entrance.
When she opened the door, her back to me, she said: Ian Ashford, stop keeping things from me.
For reasons I couldn't quite name, she seemed a little angry.
---
When Lauren wasn't around, I often sat alone in the apartment, gazing out at the sea of lights beyond the balcony.
Doing nothing. Just sitting there.
Holding the cat, stroking its fur, listening to its soft purring.
Sometimes a night breeze would drift in, stirring the wind chimes by the shattered sliding door. The cool air reminded me that summer was almost here.
Actually, Serena and I had promised to take a trip to the beach together this summer.
What a shame.
I gradually developed a new habit—looking at those photographs. I would light a cigarette, hold it between my lips, and view them with my blackened left eye.
Her fragile body dragged again and again, blows and collisions that almost seemed to produce sound.
She clenched her jaw and never made a sound.
I would sit there, reaching out blankly, wanting to hold her.
But I couldn't sever those white lines, and I couldn't protect her. I could only watch her endure despair in a dimension beyond reality.
The last photograph in the stack was the one I looked at the most.
She wore a winter coat, standing beneath an old tree covered in snow.
Before that, in an empty corner, she had been beaten until she doubled over.
He said a few words to her. She shook her head and said something with resolute eyes.
He stopped.
After that, she left the old tree and came to the café. The fireplace was burning inside, and she asked me if I would marry her.
Of course I would.
That day in the café, she cried like a newborn baby.
But in the end, even her rebirth was destroyed by the killer.
I looked at those photographs and thought: Serena, I will make him pay.
---