How to Stop the Villain from Going Crazy
Translator: Fuyu
Chapter 48 - It felt like being pricked with needles, with thorns. He couldn't move. (1)
Fine, she didn't need to see.
Bo Li thought; anyways, your mask would be taken off by Christine in the end.
Erik didn't allow her to open her eyes until there was practically nothing left of the portrait.
Bo Li looked at Boyd's corpse and had a headache.
Although Boyd and Trique's deaths fit their crimes - the former made his living by murdering deformed people and the latter specialized in defrauding money and s*x - the police didn't know about their crimes.
Would Erik get arrested? Would that group of fake psychics report Erik to the police?
How was she going to exonerate him?
At this time, she heard footsteps outside the parlor.
Bo Li trembled. She thought the police had arrived. She quickly thought of an excuse to show Erik's innocence, but it turned out to be Mrs. Merlin.
Mrs. Merlin was holding a lamp. She expressionlessly looked at Boyd's corpse, and then she glanced at Trique's head on the chandelier. She indifferently said, "They're finally dead."
She looked at Bo Li and Erik. "You don't have to keep waiting. The police won't come. Trique is in the business of dealing with deformed people and has already bribed the police. No matter what happens here, the police won't intervene."
Bo Li: "... Why are you so calm?"
"Because they're both bad people," Mrs. Merlin coldly said, "They deceived my lady into lending them this house, then they committed terrible crimes here. I told my lady many times that Boyd isn't a good person, but she refused to believe that his ability to communicate with ghosts is fake."
"Why?" Bo Li asked.
"Because my lady has seen a real ghost," Mrs. Merlin replied.
Bo Li slightly furrowed her brow. "A real ghost?"
However, she couldn't persuade Mrs. Merlin to say any further on the subject.
Erik didn't say anything from beginning to end. When Mrs. Merlin asked them to leave, he carried Trique's decapitated head in one hand and grabbed Boyd's collar with his other hand and prepared to leave like that.
Bo Li almost couldn't look at him. Just as she was about to persuade him to put those two things down, he calmly said, "They're criminals. There are bounties for their heads."
Bo Li: "..." She couldn't believe that the protagonist of a horror movie was teaching her how the law worked!
"Bounties?"
Before Erik replied, Mrs. Merlin impatiently said, "Have you not been to the post office or the train station? There are wanted posters for them, dead or alive, 50 dollars each. I was planning on keeping their bodies and turning them in for spending money. Since you want them, then take them. Please leave immediately. I have to start cleaning the floor."
Bo Li quickly put the pieces together. So, the reason why Trique was so desperate to get Erik wasn't because he wanted to make him into a specimen or add him to his spectacular exhibit. He wanted Erik to protect him.
At this time in the US, the westward movement hadn't ended yet. There was a serious shortage of police force, so anyone could become a bounty hunter.
Trique must have been overcome by panic after being pursued several times by bounty hunters. The bribed New Orleans police couldn't help him, so he turned his attention to Erik.
In the end, not only did he fail to get Erik's protection, he also met his demise under the Punjab lasso.
Before leaving, Bo Li asked Mrs. Merlin, "You said that Trique is in the business of dealing with deformed people. Do you know where he's keeping those people?"
Mrs. Merlin scoffed, "Why? Do you want to make them into specimens too?"
"No," Bo Li patiently explained, "I want to hire them. I want to give them decent work."
"Decent work?" Mrs. Merlin retorted, "How decent? Are you going to have them stand on the stage like monkeys and wait for spectators to throw money at them? Or are you going to send them to the hospital to have their deformities examined?"
Bo Li was asking for her help, so she wasn't angry at these accusations. Her tone was gentle and calm as she answered, "You misunderstand my intentions. I want to hire them as real actors, so that they can move the audience with their stories, acting, and personal charm and gain applause and attention that way, rather than relying on their unusual appearances."
"Why should I believe your lies?" Mrs. Merlin asked.
Bo Li's eyes flickered over to Erik. She lowered her eyelashes and softly answered, "I'm not saying this to win you over your trust. It's because I promised someone… that I would show him that sympathy is merely a form of privilege. Deformed people can become the most outstanding actors by playing on other people's feelings of fake superiority."
As soon as she finished saying that, Erik's eyes fell on her.
Did she go too far with her acting? His recent gaze had been extremely cold like a sharp blade that was ready to cut her open for judgment at any time.
She could only say that his personality was becoming even more bizarre.
In the past, she could gain favorability by complimenting him. But now, when she said good things about him, it would cause him stress.
Unexpectedly, her words failed to win Erik's favor, but Mrs. Merlin's expression softened.
She looked Bo Li over several times and said, "You look like a hooligan, but speak like a well-educated young lady.
Bo Li: "...I'm not a hooligan."
As she said this, she kept wondering how she could possibly look like a hooligan.
However, in Mrs. Merlin's eyes, this young woman, who wore a wide-brimmed hat, a shirt and pants, had a charming and elegant appearance with such bright eyes. The brilliance in her eyes didn't diminish at the sight of a decapitated head and corpse.
Only hooligans, swindlers, and unfettered women would have such a spirit. The spirit of a rich, young lady, like her lady's, would only be worn down and swallowed up by affairs of the house and turned into stagnant water.
Mrs. Merlin indifferently said, "Your words sound very nice. It's a pity that I still don't believe you. Leave."
Bo Li didn't pester her.
She felt that Mrs. Merlin's attitude had softened. She planned on coming back in a few days to continue working on her and find out where Trique was hiding the deformed people.
In addition, Bo Li wanted to know what exactly was the ghost that the lady of the house had seen. However, that seemed to be Mrs. Merlin's taboo, so she could only wait till later to talk about it.
Right before she was about to walk out of the house, she turned to look at the lady in the house's portrait.
Was it just her imagination? She had an inexplicable feeling of incongruity when she looked at the portrait as if there was something in the portrait that shouldn't be there.
Just as she was about to carefully examine the painting, Mrs. Merlin came out and expressionlessly looked at her.
Bo Li didn't want to offend her. She gave a curtsy that looked out-of-place and turned to leave.
Carrying the decapitated head and the corpse, Erik calmly followed her.
That sight was too creepy. Bo Li didn't dare to look at him.
After leaving the house, Erik tossed the remains of Trique and Boyd into the carriage with an apathetic expression. It was Trique's luxurious carriage.
Bo Li had once wanted Trique's carriage, but after seeing that image, she no longer wanted it.
After doing that, he sat in the driver's bench and picked up the reins.
Bo Li was worried that he would leave her behind and was about to scramble onto the driver's bench.
The next moment, he took off his black glove, tossed it to the side, and stretched his hand towards her.
Perhaps, he didn't even notice it himself. This was his first time extending his hand, his bare hand, to her.
Bo Li was startled by that thought. She would have never described hands as bare before. She must have been influenced by his secretive attitude about his body.
However, once she had that idea, she couldn't suppress it.
Even in the dark night, his fingers still looked exceptionally good. His fingers were slender and distinct like pure white jade throughout with slightly raised greenish-blue veins.
They were too beautiful. It felt blasphemous to directly look at them.
Her gaze stayed on his hand for too long. Her gaze felt like a brush that kept going back and forth between his joints to his veins, to his wrists, and finally, the thin tight muscles in his arm.
He almost couldn't bear it. He ordered in a cold voice, "Come up."
Bo Li returned to her senses, took his hand, and climbed into the driver's bench.
Silence.
The smell of blood kept drifting towards them from inside the carriage.
Bo Li felt like she had a nosebleed all night. Everything smelled like blood.
The streets were covered by fog in the wee hours. The air was cold and damp. The sound of the wheels going through the mud echoed. The ground was covered by messy tracks left during the day.
There were more homeless people than she had imagined. The dead of night hadn't been that long ago, but the streets weren't empty. There were many people chatting, staring off into space, or sleeping on the sides of the streets.
There were already people that had gotten up and were spitting while washing up. A woman came out with a chamber pot and dumped it out on the street without a care.
Bo Li suddenly felt terribly lonely.
She had traveled to foreign countries alone before, but it was different this time. She felt like her soul had been imprisoned. Even though she had been tricked once, she still wanted to find out more once she heard Mrs. Merlin mentioned a ghost.
Suddenly, the carriage made a sharp turn.
Erik's driving had been smooth until now, but this time, she almost fell off the bench.
Had he forgotten that she was sitting next to him? To prevent him from forgetting her presence, she tossed her homesickness to the back of her mind and tightly hugged his arm. She didn't want to fall off the carriage and break her neck.