Chapter 21: The Lost Su Mu

  Liu Handong knew that this was a dog that had run out of the dog meat shop, having narrowly escaped death and still being frightened. However, he still believed in humanity. He squatted down to stroke the dog's head, slowly untying the iron wire that bound its mouth, saying: "Dog, hurry back home."

  Get up and continue urinating, after finishing urinating, return to the road, start the motorcycle and are about to move forward, hear movement behind, turn back to see that dog actually followed.

  Liu Handong turned the throttle, and the motorcycle sped away. Through the rearview mirror, he saw the dog limping along behind him, its shadow growing fainter and fainter, seemingly letting out a whimper.

  "Sorry, I can barely support myself, let alone take care of you." Liu Handong muttered to himself as he continued driving his motorcycle. He drove out for dozens of meters before suddenly slamming on the brakes and turning the bike around to head back.

  "Get in the car," Liu Handong said.

  A scene that left Liu Handong speechless appeared, the dog surprisingly understood human language, stood up on its hind legs, made a gesture of gratitude with its front legs, and then jumped onto the carriage, sitting properly.

  "It's quite considerate of human nature." Liu Handong got back on his motorcycle and headed back to Tiehua Street. As he pushed the bike into the courtyard, Zhang Dasao poked her head out from the second-floor balcony and said: "Dadong is back, come to my room for a bit."

  Liu Handong went upstairs, and the dog still followed closely behind. On the second floor, in Zhang Dajie's house, there was a big bowl of dumplings on the table, as well as several pairs of socks and shorts.

  "Haven't eaten yet, have you? Big sister left you some dumplings and these socks and pants, they're all unsellable, take them to wear." Zhang big sister is a rural woman, enthusiastic and straightforward, seeing the big dog behind Liu Handong, she clicked her tongue and said: "You picked up this dog? It weighs dozens of kilograms, why not sell it to the dog meat restaurant, two yuan per kilogram?"

  The dog seemed to understand her words and let out a low whine from its throat, shrinking down to the ground.

  "This dog is from a dog meat restaurant, how can we send it back? It's a life after all."

  "Right, you hurry up and go rest now, you've been tired for half a day already."

  Liu Handong held a dumpling and went up to the fourth floor, ate two, saw the dog looking at himself pitifully, so he picked one up and threw it over. The dog cleverly caught it, swallowed it in one mouthful, licked its tongue and looked greedily at the dumplings in the bowl.

  He tossed it another one, the dog swallowed it in one gulp. Liu Handong estimated that this bowl was not enough for it to gnaw on, so he thought for a moment and took out the last bit of pocket money from his body and said: "I'll go downstairs to buy something, don't steal food."

  After finishing speaking, went downstairs to the small supermarket across the street and bought a pack of miscellaneous brand sausage, came back and saw that the dog was sitting honestly, not missing a single dumpling.

  "It really listens." Liu Handong opened the package and fed the dog sausages. The dog ate with relish.

  "Let's give you a name, how about Wang Cai?"

  Wangcai grumbled twice, seemingly protesting this tacky new name.

  ……

  Song Shuang is going crazy, Keke is lost!

  Coco is a Scottish Shepherd dog, who was brought up after weaning and is extremely humanized. In some sense, it's like a member of the Song family. But in just one minute out of sight, the dog disappeared in broad daylight and has been missing for over 24 hours now.

  Song Shuang reported the case in a timely manner after failing to find it, but at first, the police from the local police station just perfunctorily told her that losing a dog was not something they would handle, and since missing persons couldn't even be found, where would they have the manpower to help ordinary people find dogs.

  Song Jianfeng had always taught his daughter that when outside, she must not use her family background to get things done. Song Shuang had never advertised her family background either, but this time she really had no choice. She took out the entrance and exit permit of the Provincial Public Security Department's residential compound and told the police that her father was the director of the Provincial Public Security Department, and that the dog was a gift from her father.

  Things have become serious, and the entire police station immediately sprang into action. They retrieved the surveillance footage from the Dou Gou Street district for investigation, but still had nothing to show for it. Dogs are different from humans and can easily hide; if the dog thief hid them in a car, there would be no way to detect them.

  The director comforted Song Shuang and promised to do his best to investigate, then arranged for a police car to send her home.

  After returning home, Song Shuang mobilized the friends of the Small Animal Protection Association to search for markets throughout the city, because Keke was a purebred Samoyed with a high price tag, and if she had been taken by dog thieves, she should have been sold in the market.

  Still worried, Song Shuang called his father again and asked him to intervene.

  It turned out that Song Jianfeng severely criticized his daughter, scolding her for wasting police resources to find the dog. After a good scolding, Song Shuang cried with tears streaming down her face. She was already 21 years old and could understand her father's methods. Her father was a veteran of the criminal police force and had strong professional skills, but he was somewhat lacking in political savvy. How many pairs of eyes were watching him? If someone exposed that the daughter of the Public Security Bureau chief had mobilized so many public resources to find her own dog, who knows how much trouble it would cause?

  So Song Shuang decided to find it herself, and she dialed Wang Xing's phone number.

  "Double, double, looking for me with something?" Wang Xing's bright voice came over, making Song Shuang's nose sour again: "Uncle Wang, Keke is lost."

  "Cocoa is gone, when did it happen? Has the police been informed?" Wang Xing's voice immediately became serious.

  "Called for help but it's useless, I think I'll ask Uncle Wang to help me find Keke."

  "Is there a GPS chip in the collar?"

  "Haven't even had time to unpack."

  "That's a bother, alright, you send me Coco's photo and I'll get started on finding her right away."

  Put down the phone, Wang Xing paced back and forth in the office, finding a person is easy, but finding a dog isn't simple, the beast can't speak, besides, usually when children are kidnapped there's a buyer, but when dogs get lost they might be skinned and eaten, even if found it would be useless.

  The phone rang again suddenly, it was a Beijing number, Wang Xing answered it, and it turned out to be Song Jianfeng calling.

  "Wang Xing, our dog at home is lost and Keke is very sad. Can you help find it?" Song Jianfeng's voice was somewhat tired.

  "Yes, I have accepted the commission from both of them."

  "Do your best and be mindful of the consequences." Song Jianfeng hung up the phone.

  Wang Xing received a photo from Song Shuang on his mobile phone, and it was a Scottish Shepherd dog with beautiful fur color. Anyone with normal thinking would not sell it to make dog meat soup.

  Still take this city's pet market as the main investigation.

  ……

  There were still some alcohol swabs and iodine at home, Liu Handong helped Wangcai deal with the wound. This dog was extremely intelligent and knew its new owner's intentions. Although it was very painful, it lay quietly without moving. Its body had multiple wounds, stained with mud, blood, and dirt, with skin and flesh exposed, shocking to see. Liu Handong carefully cleaned them up, applied iodine, and busied himself for an hour before finishing.

  Liu Handong found another cracked bowl for Wang Cai to use as a water basin, poured some water into it, and then lay down on the bed, saying: "Go to sleep, tomorrow I'll take you back home."

  Wangcai excitedly barked once and it understood.

  The next morning, Liu Handong felt someone licking his face in a daze, and when he woke up with a start, Wangcai was staring at him with big eyes. He scrambled to get up and looked at his phone, which read 5 o'clock.

  "Wang Cai, you're too impatient." Liu Handong got out of bed, put on his clothes and shoes, washed up, and went out for a morning run. Wang Cai wagged its tail and limped along behind him, one man and one dog jogging slowly down the empty street. Suddenly, Wang Cai let out a whimper and stopped in its tracks. Liu Handong looked ahead to see that they were right in front of the dog meat restaurant, the air still thick with the smell of blood. For Wang Cai, this was the eighteenth level of hell.

  "Go back." Liu Handong said, walking back with the dog, bought two meat buns, all of which went into Wangcai's dog belly. He patted his body and found only two one-yuan coins left, not even enough to buy a newspaper.

  The owner of a roadside newsstand is stacking up the newly arrived morning papers, on which the eighth page has a notice seeking a lost dog, offering a reward of 10,000 yuan to find a Samoyed named Coco.

  There is a photo in the newspaper, a beautiful sheepdog with gorgeous fur, which doesn't look like Wangcai at all, who was covered from head to toe with iodine.

  The sky brightened, and people going to work or school increased. Liu Handong brought Wangcai back to No. 108 and ran into Bao Zujin's daughter coming out. This girl was dressed very hot, with a cigarette in her mouth early in the morning. Seeing Wangcai, she couldn't help but light up her eyes, squat down to tease the dog, revealing a long white waist and buttocks, vaguely visible thong underwear.

  "This dog is a Samoyed, very expensive, where did you get it?" The hot girl looked at Liu Handong and knew he was the tenant on the fourth floor of their building.

  "It was picked up." Liu Handong said.

  "Buy me out for 300 yuan." The hot girl made a gesture of taking out her purse.

  "Not for sale." Liu Handong said.

  "Is this dog stolen by you?" The spicy girl stood up, flicked the cigarette ash, and looked at Liu Handong with a sideways glance.

  "It was picked up." Liu Handong repeated a sentence.

  Another robust young man came out of the courtyard, he was the son of the landlady, the elder brother of the spicy girl, his height was a bit higher than Liu Handong's, at least 1.88 meters, with a strong back and waist.

  "Brother, what do you think of this dog? It's so cool." The hot girl said.

  The burly young man said: "A mangy dog, what's the point."

  The chick said: "You don't get it! This is a famous dog, I bought him for 300 bucks and he still won't sell."

  The burly young man looked at Liu Handong: "Three hundred yuan is enough, how much do you want?"

  Liu Handong still said: "Not for sale."

  The burly young man stared at Liu Handong, speechless. The hot girl smoked as if nothing was wrong, waiting for her brother to explode.

  Liu Handong calmly looked at the other party, the landlord's son was very fierce and had a strong physique, his fighting skills should be excellent, and it was necessary to quickly resolve the fight with such a person, one move to defeat the enemy, but in this way, Tiehua Street would not be able to live anymore, because the opponent would either die or be injured.

  Wangcai felt threatened and retreated behind Liu Handong with a whimper.

  After a while, the burly young man lost his energy and said, "You win." He walked to the garage door of his house, pushed out a Kawasaki highway racing motorcycle, and the hot girl climbed up, put on her helmet, and gave Liu Handong the middle finger: "Go die!"

  Liu Handong smiled and waved his hand, taking Wangcai upstairs, saying: "Wangcai, your performance just now was not brave at all, not like a man. You won't eat lunch today."

  Wangcai let out two loud wails in protest.

  On the congested Tiegu Street, Kawasaki 400 was moving slowly. A young girl leaned on her brother's back and asked, "Brother, why don't you beat him up?"

  A burly man said, "This kid is not to be trifled with. Didn't you hear what mom said? Half a month ago, our family had an incident, guns were fired and several people died. Now we can't even rent out the house."

  "What did he do?"

  The road ahead cleared up, the burly man didn't respond, he revved the throttle and the motorcycle roared away.

  ……

  The Public Security Bureau's residential area, Song Shuang did not sleep all night, sitting in front of the computer to pay attention to local forums and Weibo. She mobilized a large number of classmates to help her find the dog. Posts were also posted on local pet forums, and Weibo was forwarded thousands of times. The newspaper also published a lost dog notice, and even offered a high price of 10,000 yuan, but so far there is still no news.

  Three boxes of tissues were used up, Song Shuang's eyes were swollen from crying, and she didn't have the heart to go to school. Keke was not only her pet but also her good friend. Thinking about all the moments they spent together, Song Shuang felt extremely sad and heartbroken: "Keke, Mom will definitely find you back."