Chapter 1

I had a criminal record, involuntary manslaughter.

I was also big, burly, and fierce-looking, so everyone in town was afraid of me.

So my scrap recycling business was pretty mediocre.

It did not make much money, but it kept me from starving, so I was just living.

The few surprises I had were finding unexpectedly valuable things in the scrap, like rings and necklaces, and I kept all of them on the iron cabinet in my bedroom.

Until two years ago, when I met that little girl who sold “copper.”

The copper was fake, and anyone could tell at a glance.

But the little girl’s thinness was real.

It was the kind of thinness that came from not having enough to eat and being malnourished, where a gust of wind would press her old school uniform inward and reveal her shriveled frame, and her messy hair was yellow like dry grass.

Copper it was, then.

If I refused to buy it or exposed her, she would definitely be scared into tears.

That would be annoying as hell.

Besides, it was only fifty dollars, and that little extra money would not make my life better, while losing it would not make my life worse.

When I handed the money over, I saw the little girl’s hand shaking.

There was also bright yellow paint on her hand.

Then she took it, turned around, and ran off quickly without saying thank you.

But it did not matter.

For some reason, I did not drink that night and still slept very well, and when I woke up, there was even a smile on my face.

When Grace, who drove a taxi, came over to drink, her eyes went wide. “What’s up with you? Did you find gold again?”

Without thinking, I said, “I found copper.”

The jewelry I kept on the iron cabinet was replaced by pieces of iron stained with yellow paint.

In more than seven hundred days, I saved up more than a hundred pieces, weighing the iron cabinet down until it looked like it might collapse.

I thought that if the little girl came again, I would have to weld together a new cabinet.

But after the new cabinet was welded, I still did not see her.

At first, I said it was raining heavily, so maybe she had been delayed.

When the rain stopped, I said she was probably sick, and she would come once she got better.

In the blink of an eye, a month passed.

The police came and said they needed me to cooperate in the investigation of a missing girl.

When I entered the police station, I thought of the days I had spent in prison, and my legs went a little weak.

Then I thought of the heavy pieces of iron on the cabinet and straightened my back.

“Ethan Carter, do you know a thirteen-year-old girl named Lily Moore?”

I said, “I know a girl who is just over ten, but I don’t know her name.”

The police took out a portrait. “Is this her?”

I recognized her at once and nodded.

That was the first time I heard her name.

Then I learned that she had gone missing.

In that instant, it felt like my heart had been grabbed hard by someone.

Her only family was her elderly grandmother, who had already been in poor health, and now she had cried herself blind, saying her granddaughter was very good and would never stay away from home all day no matter what happened.

I thought Lily had probably gotten into trouble.

The town was remote and poor, and in past years people had gone missing every year, while human traffickers were caught batch after batch, but those heartless monsters could never all be caught.

After learning that Lily came to me every week and sold me a painted piece of iron as copper, the police slammed a fist on the table and questioned me coldly.

“Ethan Carter, can’t you tell copper from iron? Why did you pay a high price to buy Lily’s iron as copper?”

“Tell the truth, what was your purpose?”

I thought for a moment and said.

“I had no purpose, I just wanted to help that girl.”

The police did not believe me.

But I had already served my time, and I was no longer a murderer.