Free The Investigation by Jung-myung Lee

there and they were left alone, it’s the best place to plot something. And surveillance
over there is lax, because the wing is remote and has thick double-layer walls.’
    Hasegawa raised his eyebrows. ‘How did you know they dug a tunnel?’
    ‘The solitary wing is in the path of a strong mountain wind. The guard there said the wind carries dirt and piles it under the walls. In each solitary cell there’s a small barred
window. Each time the wind blew they’d toss the dirt they dug out through it to get rid of the evidence. The piles of dirt and sand weren’t really from the mountain. The prisoners had
dug it up.’
    ‘And how did you know that the tunnel was under the latrine?’
    ‘It’s the only place we don’t inspect. Even if the cell was searched, nobody would look there. A filthy place is safe from prying eyes.’
    By now, Maeda had regained his confidence. ‘Sir, the murder of the guard and the escape attempt are not separate incidents. We will catch these barbarians and punish them
accordingly.’ He turned to me, encouraging me to explain.
    I continued in a louder voice to chase away my fears: ‘The prisoners harboured deep animosity towards Sugiyama’s excessive violence. He had focused his surveillance on a few people.
Prisoner 331 was one of them. Sugiyama discovered his escape plot, so 331 got rid of him.’
    ‘So this 331 is the murderer?’ Hasegawa asked.
    ‘That’s still only a hypothesis. We’ll have to interrogate him and get him to confess.’
    Hasegawa gripped the hilt of his sword. ‘Well, what are you waiting for? Hurry up! Get him to spill!’

THE RECONSTRUCTION OF DEATH
    The floor of the interrogation room was soaked through. One side of the room was filled with pincers large and small, bars, chains and sharp tools. On the other side were a
cement tub filled with water, a rack and a wooden stool. The smell of rusted metal and blood permeated the stale air. Prisoner 331 was naked, tied to the crossbeam with his arms outstretched. Blood
trickled down from his swelling eye, and his ankles were scabbed, rubbed raw by his shackles. A guard, wearing rubber gloves up to his elbows, repeatedly threw water on him. The guard smiled,
flashing his yellow teeth. But the guard was no different from the man he had broken. He must be a father who embraced his young son when he returned home, a gentle husband who fixed a broken shelf
in the kitchen, a friendly neighbour who was now beating a helpless man to a bloody pulp.
    ‘Good luck,’ he said to me as he fastened the buttons on his coat. ‘I loosened him up, so he should start talking soon.’ He went up the stairs to leave.
    It was a common manoeuvre: the prisoner would be relieved at the departure of the brutal guard and would tell his replacement everything. My role was to appear at the appropriate time and write
the report. After the other guard left, I undid the pulley block attached to the crossbeam and Prisoner 331 collapsed on the floor like a pile of sand. I dragged him to a chair and seated him, and
he squinted, slowly focusing his swollen eyes on me. I draped his uniform on his shoulders. His eyes betrayed complicated feelings.
    I opened the report file and sharpened my stubby pencil. ‘331! How long have you been digging that underground tunnel?’ I knew I wouldn’t get an answer. He had withstood
twenty-four hours of beatings so far. I got up, shovelled some peat into the furnace and lit it. The light from the weak fire danced on his blood-soaked face.
    ‘It’s all over,’ 331 moaned, his voice hoarse. ‘All that’s left for me is death. I guess all I can do is confess. I might as well tell you.’
    ‘And why would you tell me, when you didn’t open your mouth while you were being beaten to a pulp?’
    ‘You figured it out. You read the solitary-wing log and found out that I’m a regular in solitary. Nobody even imagined what was going on, but you deduced what I was doing in there. I
think you’ll