Chapter 9: The Deceased’s Clothes
Jayad, surprisingly, said with a look of joy, “Then thank you very much. This is exactly what we need right now.”
Inside the cave were some scraps, like old iron pots, broken porcelain bowls, and a few cotton quilts. Heaven knows how many hands these junk items had passed through, and they were used by the dead. I couldn’t accept it physically.
“Uh, you’re welcome. Just remember to make your offerings on time,” Bartholomew said happily, as if pleased with his generosity, and added a reminder.
I figured I knew why this boss welcomed Jayad to settle here. It was probably because Jayad had been making offerings to him for months, which earned him the guaranteed right to live here.
As an outsider who voluntarily offered protection fees, the treatment he received was Bartholomew’s superficial generosity and kindness, but it was still much better than MacDuff’s attitude.
MacDuff treated all the children as his own possessions, meaning everything the children owned was also their own. Therefore, he collected everything, and then resorted to beatings and scolding. They couldn’t eat enough or wear warm clothes. The difference was that vast, no wonder Jayad wanted to escape.
But then I thought about it. If that was the case, Jayad, while satisfying MacDuff, could also make offerings to Bartholomew for protection, and even, as Jayad said, he had managed to accumulate some food.
It seemed his thieving ability had been underestimated by MacDuff, or perhaps Jayad had actually been improving all along, but MacDuff didn’t understand at all. That was the extent of his capabilities; he couldn’t even understand his own cash cow.
“Well, I won’t disturb you any longer. I wish you a happy first night here,” Bartholomew said meaningfully and turned to leave.
“Wait a moment, this corpse…” I managed to say with difficulty, my voice weak. But the problem was, Bartholomew wouldn’t even take the corpse, would he leave this corpse room to us?
“Ah? You can talk? You never said anything before, I thought you were mute. Are you asking about the cause of death of that unlucky fellow? I don’t know either. It seems he just died inexplicably while warming himself by the fire.” Bartholomew completely misunderstood me.
“These things happen often. Eating poisonous food, getting sick, dying from exhaustion in the factory, fighting, anyway, people die every day, it’s not strange. Perhaps if you come tomorrow, Jayad, even better rooms might be available.”
I could see a bit of this. The deceased had a purple-blue face and cherry-red lips. Combined with the burnt charcoal disk in the middle of the cave, it was likely carbon monoxide poisoning. It’s not good to have a fire in a confined space. What would these poor people know about such knowledge? This poor wretch just died inexplicably.
Jayad smiled, “No need for new rooms, I’m very satisfied here. I’ll handle this corpse, no need to trouble the boss.”
He quickly changed his address to “boss,” indicating he had decided to stay here. Bartholomew nodded at this and left without another word.
Jayad immediately placed me on a flat spot and then busied himself with tidying up the corpse with practiced efficiency. With a hint of a smile I hadn’t seen before, he began to strip the corpse’s clothes with swift movements.
“What, what are you doing?” I couldn’t help but feel a little scared. Although the corpse hadn’t decomposed after only one day, I already felt a primal aversion. But seeing how he rummaged through the corpse, so skillful, it was definitely not the first time he had done this.
“These clothes are pretty good. Oh, and there are a few copper coins left here. Profitable, profitable! Bartholomew is certainly generous, unlike that scoundrel MacDuff. I really made the right decision coming here,” Jayad said ecstatically, neatly folding the clothes he had stripped from the dead man and placing them beside him.
“Are you going to keep the dead man’s clothes?” I asked, astonished. Isn’t that disrespectful to the dead? Besides, can you even wear clothes that the dead have worn?
“Of course, this way Parul will have new clothes, at least to keep out some of the cold. Be happy,” Jayad said. By now, he had stripped the deceased completely, taking everything valuable or not valuable from his body.
He even searched in places like fingers and ears for earrings or rings, regardless of the fact that this obvious pauper would likely have nothing like that.
“What? You want me to wear clothes that a dead person has worn? No, I don’t want to!” I said with extreme resistance, clutching the tattered rags and blankets I was wearing.
“But, Parul, you’re already sick. If you don’t keep warm, you might freeze to death!” Jayad said to me with some agitation, as if my reaction and attitude had doused his earlier joy with cold water.
“Even so… I still don’t want to!” I understood his intention, but even so, I absolutely would not wear dead people’s clothes. I really couldn’t accept it. “Please, Jayad, quickly throw these clothes away, along with that poor deceased person.”
He frowned, but he didn’t throw the clothes away. However, he still listened to me and dealt with the corpse first. He was just a youth, and this corpse was likely an adult, yet he could drag it with little effort.
Besides the fact that the deceased was also emaciated and light, another reason was that he wasn’t squeamish at all; he could directly hug the corpse and drag it out.
At this moment, a question suddenly occurred to me: a youth dragging a corpse, even if he could drag it, how far could he drag it? He couldn’t possibly drag it up the stairs, could he?
And even if he could drag it to the river channel, if someone saw him, they would assume he was a murderer, right? He would definitely be caught.
But it turned out I was overthinking. While I was worrying, I saw him drag the corpse directly to the riverbank, throw it down, and the corpse fell directly into the river channel, only splashing a little water.
“Ah! You, you just threw him down like that?!” I asked again in surprise, not expecting him to dispose of the corpse like this, just throwing it away.
“Of course, that’s how it’s done. Back when I was with MacDuff, they disposed of corpses like this too. They would naturally float out of the city with the river water,” Jayad said nonchalantly, as if what he had just thrown away wasn’t a corpse but a bag of garbage.
“But if that’s the case, won’t the river channel be full of corpses? How will the water be drinkable?” I said with some concern. This was definitely not something Jayad did alone; everyone did it this way, which was why he found it so commonplace.
“Ah, someone will handle it. There are professional corpse collectors, those wearing black robes. I heard some people make a living by collecting corpses. I heard some people pay a high price for corpses, but unfortunately, I don’t have connections in this line of work. Perhaps I’ll ask about it another day?”
Jayad looked expectant, as if he wouldn’t mind switching careers to corpse collection if the price was right.
