In the forty-third year of Wanli, 1615 A.D., the fourth day of the fifth month, dusk. At night in the Forbidden City, the moonlight is like water, and the city is prosperous, prosperous and rich. On this day, in the Ciqing Palace of the Forbidden City, a man named Zhang Cha appeared sneakily at the gate of the palace with a wooden stick in his hand.
Ciqing Palace, located in the north of the three gates of the Forbidden City's Donghua Gate, is the residence of Zhu Changluo, the prince of the Ming Dynasty. A few years ago, I had the pleasure of visiting the Forbidden City and found that the Ciqing Palace had disappeared without a trace, probably because of the war and other reasons.
The Qing Dynasty royal family built the three southern houses where the elder brothers lived on the basis of Ciqing Palace. Time flies, the grass and trees are withered, and the magnificent palace of the past is now no longer available.
But according to common sense, the prince's dormitory should be heavily guarded. Just like the organs and units we are familiar with today, there must be a person in charge of guarding at the door, there is no guard, there is security, there is no security, there are guards, there are no guards, and there must be an old man in the communication room.
In any case, it is difficult for ordinary people to break into a palace like this. But the strange thing is that today's Ciqing Palace is negligent in taking precautions, not to mention the guards, and even the palace maids and eunuchs can't see any of them.
This man named Zhang Cha took advantage of the twilight, the light and shadow were blurred, tiptoed through the door and entered, and he actually entered the Ciqing Palace smoothly.
Zhang Cha broke into Ciqing Palace) Ciqing Palace is quiet and silent, blue bricks and white tiles, tree-lined paths, pond water pavilions, willow forest water pavilions, it is particularly beautiful. Zhang Cha walked on the road and could clearly hear his footsteps.
Although Ciqing Palace was well guarded, there were always omissions, and several eunuchs and palace maids saw him on the bluestone road. Zhang Cha was wearing coarse cloth**, wearing a square scarf, and stepping on cloth shoes, no different from ordinary people, the eunuchs and palace maids were surprised by the appearance of strangers in Ciqing Palace, some of them scolded him, and some even wanted to grab him.
However, Zhang Cha is not an easy person to deal with, and he holds the murder weapon in his hand - an elm stick. Several eunuchs gathered around him, trying to catch him, but Zhang Cha suddenly burst out, picked up a wooden stick and hit him.
The mouth of the wooden stick bowl is thick, and it makes a dull "bang" sound when it comes into contact with the flesh. Several eunuchs who were beaten knew that they were not opponents, and scattered one after another, but more eunuchs rushed to hear the news, hand in hand, heart to heart, formed a circle, seven hands and eight feet, and it took a long time to send Zhang Cha**, and then twisted him to the inner palace to be punished.
The strangeness of Zhang Cha's image is vividly expressed in the "Attack Case" among the three major cases of the late Ming Dynasty. He broke into the prince's palace with a wooden stick, wounding many people, and perhaps even trying to hurt the prince.
However, such a shocking case did not seem to cause much of a stir at the time. The first person in charge of interrogating Zhang Cha was Liu Tingyuan, the imperial historian who was in charge of inspecting the imperial city.
According to the process, he pressed Zhang Cha under the hall and asked him about his name, gender, age, place of origin, and whether he had a criminal history in turn. However, Zhang Cha seemed to be a little delirious, and the donkey's lips were not right for the horse's mouth when answering the question.
Liu Tingyuan was unable to obtain any useful information from him, so he handed him over to the Criminal Department for processing. The Criminal Department is a more professional case trial agency in the Ming Dynasty, which is in charge of the law and criminal law, and is subject to the policy of repeating the ban.
Although the legal institutions of the Ming Dynasty were not single, and the judicial power was not centralized, the Criminal Department, the Metropolitan Procuratorate, the Dali Temple, the Jinyiwei, and the East and West Factory systems all had their own responsibilities, but from the historical information of the Ming Dynasty, the Criminal Department was the director of the Metropolitan Procuratorate and the Dali Temple, and it was a relatively comprehensive legal department.
Why did Zhang Cha break into the palace?The neighbor bullied, and he wanted to sue the royal court. The criminal department interrogated, and the confession was far-fetched. The Criminal Department believes that Zhang Cha is not honest and needs to be interrogated more strictly.
The palace complained, the firewood was burned, and there was nothing to do with the two.
Wang Zhiyu's art of interrogation has left a deep mark on history. During this interrogation, he demonstrated his unique skills, including complex verbal confrontations, exquisite acting skills, and advanced psychological knowledge.
However, his way is quite peculiar. He just withheld Zhangcha's food at night and threatened him with hunger if he didn't tell the truth.
As a result, Zhang Cha immediately confessed his second confession, proving the truth that "people are iron, rice is steel, and if you don't eat a meal, you really can't stand it". The event is recorded in "The Beginning of the Dial": "You hit it first.
Bump into two, kill one, kill, I have the power to save you. The old man gave him a jujube stick and led him into the palace gate through the back gate. This confession was roughly the same as the first one, but Zhang Cha said that he did not come because of the firewood stack, but because he met two old eunuchs outside the palace.
The two old eunuchs promised him heavy profits, gave him wooden sticks, and then took him into Ciqing Palace, so that he could beat people when he saw them, and even more so when he met people in yellow clothes. The old eunuch patted his chest and promised that no matter how many people he had a relationship with in Ciqing Palace, they would keep him safe.
But Zhang Cha refused to name and hold the names and positions of the two eunuchs. After listening to this confession, Wang Zhiyu's eyes lit up, because he knew that the real secret had been discovered by him.
In Ciqing Palace, who dares to wear yellow clothes? This man in yellow is, of course, the future Mingguang Sect Zhu Changluo. And the two old eunuchs who let Zhang Cha ** must be behind the ** or the promoter.
As the case progressed, the ** of the criminal department realized that this was a big case of conspiracy to assassinate the prince. This case reached the ears of Mingshenzong Zhu Yijun, even if he was lazy, he was extremely concerned about this case, and personally assigned Lu Menglong, a foreigner, to interrogate Zhang Cha again, hoping to find out what was behind the scenes.
Lu Menglong was born as a Jinshi in the Wanli period, the head of the Criminal Department and a member of the Foreign Lang, and was a torture expert in the Ming Dynasty. He exerted all kinds of pressure on Zhang Cha in prison, and finally got the names of the two old eunuchs from his mouth.
When Zhang Cha's confession was sent to the Wanli Emperor's bookcase, the emperor was suddenly stunned. The two eunuchs who instructed Zhang Cha** were Pang Bao and Liu Cheng, who were not small people in the Forbidden City, but cronies of the emperor's favorite concubine Zheng.
At this time, the Wanli Emperor began to brainstorm: the Zheng family had a son named Fuwang Zhu Changxun, and the crown prince Zhu Changluo was born to another young wife, Concubine Gong.
Although he had an empress, he had no sons, so the throne could only be passed to his concubines.
Zhu Changluo is the eldest son of Emperor Wanli, Zhu Changxun is the third son, according to the patriarchal inheritance system, Zhu Changluo should be the first heir. However, Emperor Wanli favored Concubine Zheng, and she had always been partial to the Fu King Zhu Changxun, and often blew the wind in the emperor's ears.
At the same time, Concubine Zheng has also been putting pressure on the emperor, hoping that he can give up Zhu Changluo and make Zhu Changxun the prince. However, the ministers in the court did not accept this proposal, and after several years of hard work, the emperor could not change this result, and finally could only appoint Zhu Changluo as the crown prince.
Concubine Zheng's wish was disappointed, and she was full of resentment towards the crown prince Zhu Changluo. Nowadays, some people want to ** the crown prince, and the driving force behind it is Zheng Guifei's cronies. This shows that Zheng Guifei instructed her cronies to try to get rid of the crown prince Zhu Changluo.
However, for this incident, Emperor Wanli does not seem to care about the cause and effect, and only handles it according to the procedure.
Zheng Guifei image) Zheng Guifei was originally a palace maid and her status was not high, and her son Zhu Changluo was also treated coldly by the emperor while she was favored.
In addition, the entire Ming Dynasty knew that the emperor was very fond of Concubine Zheng Guifei, and it could even be said that he was very fond of him. As long as Concubine Zheng opened her mouth, the emperor would try his best to meet her request, no matter how big the matter, he would try his best to do it.
Therefore, when Zheng Guifei was suspected of being the first suspect in the murder case, the emperor's first thought was how to favor her instead of dealing with her seriously. Concubine Zheng knew that her suspicion would be difficult to clear, so she ran to the emperor and cried, hoping that the emperor would make decisions for her.
However, the emperor, who loved his wife, could not help her, because the facts of the crime were clear and the evidence was conclusive. In the end, the emperor told her that she would only be exempt from punishment if she received forgiveness from the victims.
So, Concubine Zheng had to find Zhu Changluo in a low voice and ask for his forgiveness.
Mingshenzong Zhu Yijun Portrait) In order to take into account the overall situation, the crown prince Zhu Changluo was reluctant to delve into the matter, and at the same time hoped to leave a good impression on Emperor Wanli. Therefore, he quickly stated that the case was only related to Zhang Cha and hoped that the matter would be resolved as soon as possible.
As a result, Zhang Cha, who was still waiting for dinner in the prison of the Criminal Department, was pushed to the guillotine, and his body was divided into two parts. Before he died, Zhang Cha said indignantly: "We planned this matter together, and now the matter is exposed, but all the responsibility is put on me alone, there are so many big people in the court, and no one can see clearly that there are other behind-the-scenes people in this matter." ”
However, Zhang Cha didn't know that these big people didn't understand, but they didn't dare to intervene out of fear. They sensed with their keen political instincts that the emperor did not want to expand the case, and that executing Zhang Cha would be the best outcome for everyone.
Soon after, in order to prevent the situation from escalating again, the Wanli Emperor ordered the execution of two other parties, the eunuchs Pang Bao and Liu Cheng, and ordered the burning of the sticks that Zhang Cha used to beat people.
All human and physical evidence was destroyed, and the matter became an unsolved case. In this strange case of conspiracy, the alternation of the prince and the imperial power has become the key point, and around the power struggle in the deep palace, the complex emotions between the monarch and the minister, father and son, and even husband and wife constitute this sunset scene.
The Forbidden City still stands there, the view at dusk is still beautiful, the smoke is vast, the sunset is molten gold, and it seems that nothing has changed, but it seems that everything has changed.