Zhang Shutong bent over and looked beneath his feet once again.
It was completely empty under the seat.
He distinctly remembered that when he took the popcorn container earlier, he had casually tucked the bag under the seat closest to the aisle.
He turned on his phone flash. At a time like this, he couldn't care less about basic etiquette as he swept the light across the entire aisle. To think of it optimistically, perhaps it had been kicked somewhere else by the surging crowd... but that was practically impossible. The bag had been placed tightly against the seat; normally, anyone walking up and down the aisle wouldn't brush against that spot unless—
There was a thief.
And in just that short span of time, the person had stolen the bag and slipped away.
Zhang Shutong felt his buzz vanish instantly, and a layer of cold sweat broke out on his back. He turned off the light and slapped his hand over his forehead.
How could he have let the bag get stolen right under his nose?
"Hey, stop watching for a second." Zhang Shutong sat up straight.
"Hmm?" Gu Qiumian was staring intently at the front. The theater had already gone dark, and lines of light and shadow flickered across the screen, occasionally illuminating people's faces. It looked spectacular, but it was actually still the commercial break.
Her voice sounded thoroughly lazy:
"Put it on silent for me."
Under normal circumstances, Zhang Shutong might have pondered whether drunk people found commercials fascinating to watch, but right now, he hurriedly reported:
"I think I lost your bag."
Even though the situation was urgent, his tone weakened by a fraction.
This wasn't like the thermos from before; this was a limited-edition luxury bag. The bag alone cost five figures, not to mention the items inside.
As he spoke, Zhang Shutong kept his eyes fixed on the theater entrance. Setting aside how they would find the thief, at the very least, they had to ensure the person was still inside the auditorium.
"What's wrong?"
The surroundings were noisy, filled with the murmurs of adults and the laughter of children. Gu Qiumian turned her head, looking as if she hadn't heard clearly, and asked for confirmation.
"I said, your bag was stolen."
"Huh?"
Gu Qiumian froze. She blinked dazedled at first, and then her pretty face tightened into a stern expression.
Zhang... Shutong could roughly guess her reaction. Such an expensive bag had been stolen, and more importantly, it had vanished right out of his hands. Although it was only for an instant, and although it was stolen—leaving plenty of room for excuses—the fact remained that he had failed to look after it properly.
Sure enough, Gu Qiumian's eyes widened bit by bit, and her slender eyebrows shot up. Zhang Shutong knew this was the preamble to an outburst. He deserved a thorough scolding anyway, so he steeled himself and was just about to apologize—
"Someone dares to steal our things?" the young miss said angrily.
She sounded like a lion whose territory had been violated.
Fine. She truly was drunk.
But even if she was drunk, Zhang Shutong couldn't afford to be out of it.
His line of thought instantly cleared up, as if his long-idle brain had suddenly received a signal to resume operations. Zhang Shutong first glanced back. The rows of audience members behind them hadn't noticed this minor anomaly; almost everyone was staring at the screen, and not a single person was even checking their phone to reply to messages.
He dialed Gu Qiumian's phone number. The best outcome would naturally be the phone ringing, but the surroundings were too loud, and the phone was muffled inside the bag. Even when the call automatically timed out, he couldn't detect the slightest trace of it.
Gu Qiumian also turned her head around:
"Who is it?"
"I'm looking for them." He let out a breath, closed his eyes, and opened them again. "I'll have Qingyi and the others keep watch here. Let's go find the theater staff..."
But before he could finish his sentence, Gu Qiumian grabbed him in a firm grip:
"Come with me to find their manager!"
She carried herself with the full prestige of a young miss, leaving Zhang Shutong briefly dazed. It looked so much like a child who had lost something being hauled along by an adult to demand answers. He stopped talking and merely reached out quickly to pat Ruoping on the shoulder, before sending a message in the group chat.
The commercials hadn't ended yet; a car commercial was playing, and a male voice reading "Dongfeng Nissan: People, Cars, Life..." reverberated around their ears. Vibrant, multicolored light beamed from the projector, and as the music reached a crescendo, even the floorboards seemed to vibrate. The equipment in this theater truly was excellent, but Zhang Shutong was wondering whether their actions would alert the enemy—
The answer was inevitably yes. But even if they pretended not to notice, the other party would still be watching them from the shadows.
That was why he had instructed his best friends to focus on observing whether anyone was rifling through a bag.
The two ducked their torsos down as they exited their seats. Along the way, Zhang Shutong discreetly observed Gu Qiumian's expression, terrified that she might cry. The good news was that she wasn't crying, nor did her mouth pout in the slightest; the bad news was that she similarly remained silent.
In the darkness, her eyes gleamed brightly. Zhang Shutong didn't know if the aftereffects of that bottle of red wine were too strong; while he was incredibly anxious, she looked as though she hadn't fully processed what had happened yet.
They quickly exited the theater doors, and a flood of light met their faces. There happened to be a staff member standing right outside. Zhang Shutong hurriedly recounted the stolen bag incident, asking if the person had seen anyone walk out—
This was also his primary concern; he feared the thief had run off immediately within those few minutes. The staff member was still caught in a state of shock, presumably trying to imagine what a five-figure bag meant. After reacting for a moment, the person shook his head quickly and said no. Losing something so expensive was a major incident anywhere.
Zhang Shutong let out a sigh of relief first, then turned to Gu Qiumian:
"Is there any cash in your bag?"
In the year 2012, cash payments were still the norm in daily life. Furthermore, for a young miss like Gu Qiumian, having her bag stolen in a public space wasn't unheard of.
"Yes."
"A lot?"
"Not much," she tried hard to recall. "Less than five thousand."
"Five thousand is not much?" Before Zhang Shutong could speak, the staff member beside them had already opened his mouth wide.
"Where is the security monitoring room?" Zhang Shutong asked directly.
To his surprise, the person stammered:
"It shouldn't be open today. Look..."
Saying this, he pointed at a nearby construction sign:
"On the fifth of this month, the central air conditioning over by Theater 5 leaked a bit, causing some short circuits. Doesn't the sign at the entrance say renovations are underway? Our cinema is quite old. In fact, it's not just that one; some circuits for Theater 6 are designed together on the same line, which just happens to be the one for the security cameras..."
Hearing this, Zhang Shutong's heart sank. Originally, he felt this matter was merely a bit of a buzzkill but not difficult to resolve; even if the island lacked security cameras, the city proper was bound to have them. Who could have guessed they would happen to run into circuit renovations.
The complexity of the situation instantly climbed a tier.
He thought with a headache that this employee had probably not been here long; as he spoke, he started to look flustered. In the end, it was only under Zhang Shutong's reminder that the person ran off to find the manager.
Zhang Shutong watched him walk away.
The lobby fell silent like this. He pulled the theater door open a crack, observing the movements inside while dialing 110, instinctively calculating how long it would take for the police to arrive on the scene. Half an hour at the absolute maximum. At this moment, Gu Qiumian let out an "Oh."
"This is bad, this is bad!" She stamped her foot.
"What's wrong?" Zhang Shutong's heart sank again. Could there be something even more valuable in the bag?
"Then wasn't my phone stolen too!" Gu Qiumian said anxiously.
Zhang Shutong opened his mouth soundlessly.
"Manager Wang, another bag was stolen! It's Theater 6 again, and the security cameras aren't open!"
The staff member, Xiao Wei, pushed open the office door, too anxious to even bother knocking.
"Dammit, again?"
The fat man addressed as Manager Wang was currently playing Zuma on his computer. Hearing this, he froze first, and then cursed, "What's the situation with the customer? What did they lose? Speak clearly... Also, which theater did it happen in, and did they call the police? Forget it, lead me over to take a look first. Tell me as we walk..."
The two walked briskly out of the office. Xiao Wei recalled:
"From what I can see, they look like students from the city proper—a young couple. What was lost was a bag..."
"Students?" Manager Wang let out a sigh of relief upon hearing this.
A similar incident had occurred at the cinema earlier this month. The person who lost her bag was a woman in her forties; that kind of customer was the most difficult to deal with. True to form, she had only discovered her bag was stolen when the movie ended, by which time the thief had long run far away. The woman had come to cause a scene at the cinema for three consecutive days, nearly ripping the ceiling down.
"Students are fine, students are fine. Just don't let them stand at the theater entrance. What if all these people see them? In a bit, go to the front counter to grab some snacks and drinks; coaxing the young girl well will resolve half of this matter..."
"But they said the stolen bag is worth twenty thousand yuan..."
"How much?" Manager Wang froze again.
"Twenty thousand, and there's five thousand in cash inside the bag..." Xiao Wei said weakly.
"What kind of student carries a twenty-thousand-yuan bag? They're bluffing you, right?" Having seen plenty of these things, Manager Wang knew people would intentionally exaggerate the lost amount. Otherwise, if you lost a two-hundred-yuan bag, what if the police didn't even file a case file?
Not to mention five thousand in cash. He thought to himself, Do you know how thick that is? It's not a thin stack of paper. Manager Wang knitted his brows, pondering whether there was foul play involved, when Xiao Wei added:
"That boy also said to have us pause the movie first and clear the auditorium. The thief hasn't left yet, so it'll be easy to find them."
"How is that possible." Manager Wang refused flatly, "Who stops a movie halfway through to call the audience out? If all these people find out, how are we supposed to do business in the future? How will I explain it to the owner? Do you know how much reputational damage that will cause? This kind of thing absolutely has to follow protocol—call the police first, and at most we keep watch at the entrance to make a registration. Everything waits until the police arrive..."
"But that male student said there is five thousand yuan in cash. While the commercials haven't ended yet, it's best to look right now. If we wait until the movie lets out, the thief might have already split the cash up secretly. By then, even a body search will be useless!"
Xiao Wei recalled the boy's analysis, actually feeling it made a lot of sense.
The bag, phone, and other items were easy to handle—they just needed the owner to identify them—but everyone carried cash on them. Even if the bag was discovered inside the auditorium, if the thief pulled out a portion of the cash in advance, it couldn't be recovered.
Time was of the essence; waiting until the police arrived really would be too late. Even if they searched every audience member in this show one by one and found a lot of cash, the person could completely claim they had brought that much cash to begin with.
Xiao Wei relayed the other party's analysis to the manager, but the manager said irritably upon hearing it:
"I know that's the logic. The problem is whether this five thousand in cash actually exists or not. Matters aren't as simple as you think. What if it's not that amount? If it doesn't match up in the end and they blame us, what do we do?
"How can you be so naive, actually expecting to find it back? Everyone just takes a silent loss. If the social security is poor, what can we do about it? Alright, keep your mouth shut in a bit."
As he spoke, the silhouettes of those two students appeared within his line of vision. A smile replaced the expression on Manager Wang's fat face. He muttered in his heart that looking at it this way, the most difficult one to deal with was actually that boy, while the girl was easy to handle—likely the type who lost her presence of mind as soon as an incident occurred.
"Hello, classmates—"
Manager Wang waved from a distance. The top priority was to wait for the police to come over and let them deal with the headache:
"I'm deeply sorry about your matter, and the cinema attaches great importance to it as well. How about we do this—I'll go report to the higher-ups, and we'll go rest in the office for a bit. Straining ourselves out here isn't a solution either, right..."
Before his words could finish, the girl turned her face around.
Manager Wang suddenly blinked, a breath of air getting caught in his chest. It was winter, and the central air conditioning emitted a humming sound, blowing warm air relentlessly.
Yet Manager Wang felt his back thoroughly soaked through with cold sweat:
"M-Miss Gu?"
"How many minutes has Shutong been out?" Du Kang opened his eyes wide, trying hard to look ahead.
"Three minutes or so. Actually, you can just check whether the commercials have finished or not." Qingyi put away his phone.
"How did the bag suddenly get lost?" Ruoping let out a sigh. Ever since seeing the message in the group chat, she had been calling Gu Qiumian, but the other side always showed no answer first. "How long have we been seated? Has it even been two minutes?"
"It happened to be right next to the aisle. It was snatched away in the blink of an eye. Plus, Shutong drank too much today and is light-headed; to be honest, he can't really be blamed." Qingyi was very loyal.
The three of them were currently leaning against the railing below the aisle. The auditorium had nine rows of seats in total, and each person watched three rows—the division of labor was quite clear.
But after watching for a long while, they couldn't determine who the suspect was.
For instance, a woman had opened her bag, but she merely slipped her phone inside.
For instance, a man had also executed a similar movement, but his daughter sat right beside him—it turned out the man was retrieving water for his daughter.
And for instance, a child... forget it, better to eliminate them directly.
"What do you guys think we should do if we can't find it in a bit?" Du Kang munched loudly on his popcorn.
"Don't jinx it," Ruoping also grabbed a handful. "Wouldn't it be fine to just check the security cameras directly?"
"I know, I know." Du Kang nodded his head like a chick pecking at grain. "I'm just afraid that in case it really isn't found, what if Gu Qiumian gets angry? Do you guys remember the matter with the scarf back then? Wouldn't Shutong face terrible consequences?"
"It's impossible not to find it," Qingyi said slowly. "Even if the cameras can't capture it, we just wait until the auditorium is cleared. Everyone lines up to go out, and we check them one by one. The bag is so large that it can't be hidden on a person's body, and the thief won't dare to walk out holding it directly either. I estimate the worst-case scenario is that the bag is discovered in a certain position, but the items inside are missing."
"Let's hope Gu Qiumian brought less cash. No wonder Shutong had us keep watch. The problem is it takes over two hours for the movie to end, so this is troublesome..."
After Du Kang finished speaking, he glanced at the screen. A green dragon logo leaped onto it, but at that moment, the screen suddenly went dark. The lights overhead turned on, the shift between brightness and darkness making everyone blink in discomfort, and a fat man walked inside.
The other party held a megaphone in his hand, shouting while wiping his sweat:
"Dear audience members, I am the manager of the cinema. A theft has just occurred inside Theater 6, and the amount involved is a full twenty thousand yuan. For the sake of everyone's property safety, I hope you will be understanding and cooperate with the cinema's work. The movie broadcast will resume shortly..."
"Oh, they actually came so quickly?"
Du Kang was surprised at first, and then became excited:
"Then things are simple. I want to see which bastard has such quick hands!"
Qingyi merely patted his shoulder:
"Keep a close watch, don't relax. Right now happens to be the most chaotic moment."
Sure enough, exactly as he said, the crowd fell silent for a split second, and then immediately grew boisterous.
The manager's words triggered a minor panic. Most people instinctively checked their own items, and their worries vanished without realizing it.
That manager was clever too, guiding everyone's attention toward "property safety." It was in order to ferret out the potential thief that he had created such a massive disturbance.
Yet despite this, some people realized what was happening, and discussions began to ring out:
"Twenty thousand... what kind of thing is worth that much money?"
"No, are you kidding me? Who pauses a movie right in the middle of broadcasting?"
"Your cinema might as well close down. How many times has this happened? How come other cinemas don't have this many thieves?"
"Exactly! If you keep making a mess like this, who will come to your place anymore?"
The manager could only pretend he hadn't heard. He quickly shot a glance toward the entrance. Aside from Xiao Wei, three other staff members had also been called over.
The four searched along the seats. For a time, people held their breath, and the nine rows of seats were quickly finished being inspected. Even the audience members checked one another.
Yet no one discovered the presence of the bag.
"Did you guys miss anything?" Manager Wang asked.
"No," Xiao Wei said in a low voice. "Maybe it was kicked beneath a seat. This is troublesome..."
"Are you guys done yet? Did you find it or not?" someone asked from their seat again.
Manager Wang gritted his teeth. In for a penny, in for a pound, he continued to repeat the request for everyone to leave the venue in an orderly fashion to cooperate with the inspection.
Since he refused to budge on his end, those who were complaining had no choice either. With the control of operations in the cinema's hands—they had stopped it right there—everyone couldn't possibly just hang around and wait.
Someone compromised:
"Hurry up and resolve it. I want to see who it is..."
"Yeah, let's go, let's go. I still have things to do tonight..."
The crowd began to leave the venue sparsely, and the frozen expression on Manager Wang's face finally relaxed a fraction.
He ushered a few staff members out again.
One was responsible for offering apologies and handing out freshly brought mineral water, while two were responsible for inspecting the customers' items. Strictly speaking, this was against protocol—the cinema had no authority to conduct body searches on customers—but fortunately, the lost bag was very large and couldn't be hidden at all, so a simple glance would suffice.
Xiao Wei finally found a free moment and asked in a low voice:
"Manager, didn't you say to wait for the police to come over..."
"Change of plans," Manager Wang interrupted. "I communicated with that guest and confirmed that the loss of five thousand in cash is factual. Naturally, we must first ensure the property safety of our audience."
As he spoke, he shot another glance toward the entrance. A boy was leading a girl inside against the flow of people.
Manager Wang's gaze lingered on the girl for a split second, thinking to himself, You understand a damn thing! I still want to keep working here!
When they met up with their best friends, the theater was already one-third empty.
Zhang Shutong asked:
"How is it? Did you see any anomalies?"
"It's difficult. If the bag was placed by a person's feet and they reached down to rifle through things, you couldn't see anything wrong at all." Qingyi shook his head. "But fortunately, that manager came in time."
Zhang Shutong had more or less anticipated this answer. As things stood now, all the preparations that could be made had been made, and the response had been prompt enough; perhaps subsequent events truly had to rely on an element of luck.
Very soon, the auditorium was cleared.
The fat manager led the staff along the rows of seats to begin their search.
The result was reasonably successful. Very quickly, he pulled a bag from the fourth row—the exact white bag Gu Qiumian had lost. A look of joy broke out on the man's face, and he rushed down a few steps, carefully handing the bag into Gu Qiumian's hands:
"Check it over first. Is anything missing?"
Zhang Shutong hurriedly leaned over. He counted the cash first; there was less than two thousand yuan.
He knitted his brows.
They were still too late.
Gu Qiumian said the cash was less than five thousand, so by a conservative estimate, at least half of it had been secured by the thief.
Seeing this, the manager's expression also turned a bit unsightly—not only because of the money, but also because complaining voices had begun to ring out outside once more.
Zhang Shutong understood that being able to achieve this much was already pushing the limits for the cinema; how else could they look for it next? As he gazed at the dense crowd outside the auditorium, he was just beginning to feel a headache.
Gu Qiumian also spoke coldly:
"It's not just the money. My phone was taken out by him too."