My childhood friend is in her mature, sophisticated form again today. - Chapter 82

When we went downstairs, Ah You was grooming Ah Hua. Ah Hua was lying on the coffee table, her tail dangling and swaying back and forth, making gurgling sounds in her throat. The comb in Ah You’s hand was very fine, with narrow teeth. As soon as he combed her, Ah Hua squinted her eyes, and the tip of her tail curved into a hook.

A-Zuo was behind the counter, with a coastline map printed out last night spread out in front of him. Several points were circled in red pen on the map, along with some coordinates and brief notes written in pencil. Cheng Ran was sitting on the sofa, with a tablet and a stack of nautical charts spread out on the coffee table in front of him. He looked up at Lin Jiqiu and said, “Good morning.”

“Good morning.” Lin Jiqiu walked to the sofa and sat down.

“Last night I recalculated the distribution of those points.” Cheng Ran turned the tablet around to show him. “Point number seven is the starting point, and then there is a transfer point every certain distance, all the way to the tin shed we found yesterday. If you straighten this line, it extends roughly three hundred kilometers south along the coastline.”

“Where is that ship?”

“The ship is also on this line. It departed from point seven, sailed south along the coastline, stopped at those transshipment points along the way to unload and load cargo, and finally disappeared on that section of coastline we haven’t been to yet.” Cheng Ran paused for a moment, “If we sail a little further south along the coastline, we should be able to find the place where that ship docked during the day.”

Lin Jiqiu looked at the map on his tablet. The red dots resembled a string of beads, connected by an invisible thread. Point seven, at the northernmost point, was the first place he had found. Then came the small bay, then the river mouth town, then the gray buildings, then the white distribution center, then the tin shed, and further south were two more locations he hadn’t personally visited, only seeing them on Cheng Ran’s map. They were all within two kilometers of the coastline, and the distance between each one was within a reasonable range.

“That ship wasn’t a single vessel. It was a fleet,” Lin Jiqiu said. “It traveled back and forth between different points, responsible for transporting supplies from the coastline to a certain place and then bringing other things back. Those transfer points were its stops and also part of the entire chain.”

“Moreover, if it has been running back and forth on this line for a long time, its crew should be very familiar with every point on this line.”

“They know where every point is, when to stop, and when to move on.”

After Ah You finished combing Ah Hua’s fur, he put the comb on the corner of the coffee table, stood up and went to the kitchen. He added water to the pot on the stove and turned the fire down a bit.

Lin Jiqiu sat on the sofa for a while, then looked up from the map and onto the street outside the window. The flower shop wasn’t open yet, and the proprietress was carrying flowerpots to the entrance. A row of pothos plants was placed on the steps, neatly arranged. The lights in the café were on, and the staff were moving chairs out of the house and arranging them under the awning at the entrance, like setting up a stage set that didn’t need to be seen.

“Chengran, if we can find the land entrance to the new base, we can go in first to check the situation before deciding whether to go to sea.”

“But if the land entrance to the new base is blocked, we can only approach it from the sea.”

“Then let’s approach from the sea. Let’s observe first, and then decide what to do.”

Cheng Ran nodded. “Then for the next stretch of coastal highway, we’ll continue south until the sea route and the highway fork.”

“We’ll decide on the direction once we get to that point.”

Lin Jiqiu picked up his teacup and took a sip. The tea had gone cold, but the astringency remained. He put down the cup, stood up, and walked to the window, looking at the sunlight on the street. Ayou peeked out from the kitchen, saw his back, didn’t say anything, and went back to continue cooking.

It was afternoon. Sunlight streamed obliquely into the living room, casting long shadows of the stack of nautical charts on the coffee table, each sheet edged with a pale golden sheen. Lin Jiqiu sat on the sofa for a while, not looking at the maps. A freshly brewed cup of tea sat on the small table in front of him; he picked it up, took a sip, and put it down again. Cheng Ran sat beside him, a tablet on his lap, organizing the coordinates he had found that morning into a file. Ayou chopped vegetables in the kitchen, the rhythmic sounds suggesting he was preparing a dinner that didn’t need to be served immediately; the knife blade fell evenly and steadily across the cutting board.

Zhao Yuanshan’s call came at just the right time.

Lin Jiqiu heard his phone vibrate in his pocket, took it out and glanced at it. The screen displayed an unfamiliar number, but he recognized the last few digits. He answered it.

“It’s me.” Zhao Yuanshan’s voice was a little tense. “I remembered something else later. There’s someone I know still staying at point seven.”

“who?”

“An old engineer. His surname is Xu. He joined the Tiangong Division seven or eight years before me. I saw him a few times at the deep survey station. Later he was transferred and I heard he went to point number seven. His wife passed away and his children are in another city. He lives there alone. He doesn’t participate in the specific operations of material transfer, but he knows what those transfer points are doing.”

Is he willing to speak?

“He’s unwilling. But if you can find him, he can tell you how those points work.”

Zhao Yuanshan gave Lin Jiqiu an address—an old town near point seven, with a main street in the town, and at the end of the street, a small gray building where Xu Gong lived on the second floor.

“Don’t tell me who sent you to him; he’ll decide for himself whether or not to tell you. If he doesn’t want to tell you, don’t force him.”

Lin Jiqiu hung up the phone and looked at the screen indicating that the call had ended.

“Zhao Yuanshan?” Cheng Ran asked.

“He provided information about an old engineer, saying that the man knew how the transfer point worked and lived in the old town near point seven.”

“You’re going to see him?”

“go.”

The next morning, Lin Jiqiu and Cheng Ran set off. A Zuo drove north along the coastal highway for a while, then turned onto a side road. The side road led to an old town. The town wasn’t large; most of the houses along the street were two or three stories high, their paint faded, revealing the underlying brickwork in some places. There weren’t many pedestrians on the street. A few elderly people sat in front of a grocery store, basking in the sun, speaking softly, as if afraid of disturbing something.

A-Zuo parked the car at the street corner. Lin Jiqiu got out of the car, walked to the end of the street, and found the small gray building. The building was not tall, only two stories high, with gray paint on the exterior walls. The doors and windows were closed, and the curtains were half-drawn. He went upstairs, walked to the door on the second floor, stood for a while, and then knocked.

The door opened a crack. An elderly man with gray hair glanced at him through the crack, his gaze calm, as if he had known someone would come.

“Who are you?”

“Zhao Yuanshan sent me.”

The old man was silent for a few seconds, then opened the door a crack. “Come in.”

Lin Jiqiu went inside. The room was small, the furniture was old, and there were several potted plants on the windowsill, their leaves somewhat wilted. The old man gestured for him to sit down, and then sat down in the chair opposite him.

“Zhao Yuanshan sent you to find me. What’s the matter?” the old man asked.

“I want to know exactly what those transit points do. Not the list of supplies, but the relationships between them.”

The old man looked at him without saying a word. The room was quiet for a few seconds, then the sounds of the street came from outside the window: a child running and laughing through the crack in the window, which quickly faded away.

“Those transfer points are chains,” the old man finally said. “Each segment of the chain is different. Some are responsible for transporting goods, some for storage, and some for sorting. But all the chains lead to the same place.”

“where?”

The old man shook his head. “I only know it’s in the south. Very far. In a place inaccessible by land.”

He stood up, walked to the window, and turned his back to Lin Jiqiu. “If you want to find that place, you can’t go by land.”

“By sea?”

“By sea.”

Lin Jiqiu didn’t press further, nodded, and stood up. “Thank you.”

The old man neither turned around nor answered.

Lin Jiqiu walked out of the small building and returned to his car. Cheng Ran glanced at him. “What did he say?”

“He confirmed that those transit points formed a complete chain. The chain ended in the south, in a place inaccessible by land. The only way was by sea.”

“That direction is getting narrower and narrower.”

“It’s narrower, but it’s not closed yet.”

When they returned to the office, it was already getting dark. Ah-you was wiping the counter when he saw them come back. He said, “The food is ready. I’ll go get it.” He turned and went into the kitchen, his footsteps echoing on the tiled floor, followed by the clatter of dishes.

Lin Jiqiu sat on the sofa for a long time, neither reading nor checking his phone, nor speaking to Cheng Ran. He simply sat there, watching the sky outside the window gradually darken. The streetlights were already on, forming a string of orange-yellow halos that stretched along the street. Those lights didn’t go out as darkness fell; instead, they spread out even more clearly in the twilight. He looked at those lights, not thinking about anything, just watching them light up, feeling as if they had always been there, extending from one end of the street to the unseen end, like the street itself.

Ah You brought the dishes to the table, set out the bowls and chopsticks, then went back to get the soup. Ah Hua jumped onto the sofa, approached him, rubbed against his arm, curled up beside him, and put her tail on his wrist. He scratched Ah Hua’s chin, but Ah Hua didn’t move. She just rested her chin on the edge of his palm, squinted her eyes, and made a gurgling sound in her throat like the softest engine noise in the room.

Then he stood up, walked to the window, and stood there for a while. He looked at the streetlights. He looked at the distant gray-blue night sky and the lights still shining from the windows, as if the whole street was breathing peacefully, no one was rushing, and no one was waiting for dawn. He thought of those transfer points. In the night, they too breathed along the coastline. One end connected to the land, the other to the unseen deep sea. If he traveled south, all the way to a place inaccessible by land, he would find the end of that line, find where those white boxes were finally delivered, find what Tengu Tsukasa truly wanted to hide. The cargo ship’s trajectory would form a dotted line on the nautical chart, pointing to an anchor point that had never been marked. On that day, he would stand on the ship’s railing, looking at the sea, knowing he had come a long way. But that moment hadn’t arrived yet. There was still a long way to go.

He turned and walked back to the coffee table, picked up the nautical chart, glanced at the unmarked southernmost area, and put it down again. Tomorrow, he’d continue south. Along the coastline. Until the sea route and the road branched off.