Throwing it open, he burst into the hallway and looked at the number on the door.
As expected, between the 3, the 0, and the 4, he saw two faint marks. From the look of them, they appeared to be "+" signs.
Someone had made a point of erasing these two marks, but for some reason they hadn't been completely removed. Still, if one didn't look closely, the marks could easily be overlooked.
Just as he had thought. Someone had been controlling Meng Fanzhe.
Seven hours later, Fang Mu and Tai Wei were sitting together in the room.
Tai Wei washed his hands in the washbasin and patted the dust off his body.
"Hypnotized?" he said.
"Yes, I think that's a definite possibility."
"Are you saying that everything Meng Fanzhe did that night was the result of hypnosis? Including writing the plus signs between the three-one-three on your door, and then trying to kill you? Can it really be that powerful?"
"A person can be hypnotized into doing various simple things, but getting them to kill one person in particular is probably outside the realm of possibility." Seeing the puzzled look on Tai Wei's face, Fang Mu clarified: "Meng Fanzhe did not intentionally write the plus signs on my door, nor was his attempt to kill me premeditated. Do you remember how he paused briefly while he was following me that night?"
Frowning, Tai Wei thought back. "Yeah, I do remember something like that happening. He stopped for a little while when he was in the hallway. And you know what? I think it was right outside the door to this room."
"That's right. Now take a look at this."
After leading Tai Wei out into the hallway, Fang Mu pointed at the light marks on his door number.
Tai Wei stared at them, dumbstruck. "My God," he mumbled to himself. "At the time we just looked at your room number. We didn't pay any attention to this one."
"This shows that Meng Fanzhe did not purposefully choose me for his target. Instead, he was merely instructed to search the hallway for the number seven." Fang Mu pointed down either end of the hall. "Right here we have rooms three-hundred-one to three-twenty. Three-twenty-one is the bathroom and three-twenty-two and up are all in a separate section behind a locked door, so he couldn't get to them. Therefore, the only room numbers that could form seven were three-hundred-four and three-thirteen."
"So when he tried to kill you, was that also a result of the hypnosis?"
"At first I was really puzzled by this, too, because like I said, hypnotizing someone into killing a target should be just about impossible. Then I saw the names carved under the bed."
Tai Wei frowned. "What's that supposed to mean?"
"Just wait a minute; first I'm going to give you a simple explanation of what hypnosis is, " Fang Mu decided. "Hypnosis is mainly about causing neurological, biological, and physiological changes through psychological suggestion. For example, hypnosis can be used to cure anxiety and depression and eliminate phobias. It is an extremely complex process and often requires that the hypnotist use various kinds of suggestive signals to help his subject enter a hypnotized state."
"Oh, this stuff I already know," Tai Wei said. "There's a Japanese movie called Hypnosis in which the suggestive signal was something like the sound of metal striking metal."
"Right. Now there's also something called post-hypnotic suggestion. This is when the hypnotist provides his subject with a signal that can still cause him to react even when he is no longer hypnotized. For this post-hypnotic suggestion to remain effective, the subject must have a tremendous amount of trust in his hypnotist and must subconsciously recognize the authority of this signal. From what I know, Meng Fanzhe was someone with a vulnerable psyche, making it very easy for him to become psychologically dependent on other people. In other words, he was an ideal candidate for post-hypnotic suggestion. From that night on, I always suspected that Meng Fanzhe had received this sort of post-hypnotic suggestion therapy, but I could never figure out what the signal was. That was, until I discovered the names."
"Are you saying that those names were the suggestive signal?"
"Correct. Meng Fanzhe had a secret that nobody knew about. He was scared of roll call," Fang Mu said. "Most likely nothing else was impressed as deeply on his mind than his own name. At some point he must have gone to see the killer — in his role as the so-called doctor — for psychotherapy. The killer probably then used Meng Fanzhe's fear of roll call to turn his name into a post-hypnotic suggestive signal. There was one time before that night when I spoke to Meng Fanzhe in the bathroom and discovered that when I said his name, he would undergo a very unusual emotional reaction. Then on the night when he tried to kill me, I initially said a few words to him and he barely even responded; but as soon as I called out his name, he suddenly attacked."
"Hey, I just thought of something," said Tai Wei, his face lighting up. "You remember that night in the city bureau, when we were trying to interrogate Meng Fanzhe? At first he didn't respond at all to any of our questions, but then when one of our interrogators said his name, he went absolutely crazy."
"Exactly. I'm thinking that the killer designed the suggestive signal so that when Meng Fanzhe heard his name, he would attack whoever said it."
For a moment Tai Was lost in thought. He pointed under bed. "So then what was the point of him repeatedly carving his name into the bed board?"
Fang Mu thought about this. "In the days before the incident, Meng Fanzhe had probably begun to realize that something wasn't quite right with his mental state. He once told me that he would often forget where he had been or what he had done, and couldn't remember how a bunch of strange things had appeared in his room — meaning all the evidence you guys found. I'm guessing the killer had also hypnotized him into bringing this stuff back. As a result, I believe he had started to become frightened of himself, and especially of his name. And when people are frightened, they will often choose to hide. The space under this bed," he said, patting the bed board beneath him, "was most likely his hiding place. The thing is, he was probably also pretty dissatisfied with how everything was going. Previously, with the help of this doctor, he had nearly overcome the psychological dysfunction relating to his name. So he forced himself to write his name over and over on the bed board, hoping to convince himself that he wasn't scared of it after all."
Fang Mu paused, and then said quietly, "At that point he must have had a very complex relationship with the doctor, doubting him and depending on him at the same time. That's why he wrote his mom the letter."
In a flash, Fang Mu could almost hear the sound of someone under the bed: breathing rapidly, crying softly, and scratching something out onto the bed board, all the while mumbling indistinctly: "Meng Fanzhe, Meng Fanzhe, Meng Fanzhe…"
Fang Mu clenched his fists.
Frowning, Tai Wei smoked a cigarette and said nothing.
Fang Mu watched him. "How about it? You think this evidence will convince the bureau to reopen the case?"
"I'm afraid it will be very difficult." Tai Wei paused to think for a moment. "First, you were the only person to know about that letter and the GR written on the windowpane. Second, because it seems superficial that the sixth and seventh crimes have already been committed, it would be very tough for the bureau to accept that, in fact, the sixth-lane murder was the killer's actual completion of his sixth crime. And besides, as you well know, the bureau is still firmly of the opinion that you should not be participating in the investigation. So no matter what you say, it's unlikely anyone will believe it."
A dejected look crossed Fang Mu's face.
Seeing his expression, Tai Wei couldn't help but feel for the kid. He patted him on the shoulder.
"Anyway," he said, "did you find anything in that textbook excerpt?"