Zhen found the Registry storage index in a cabinet marked for old seizures. She laid the freight ticket beside the book and checked each number twice. The entry belonged to a batch of supplements taken six months earlier and held for inspection.
“The destruction certificate says every crate was destroyed,” she said. “But the count here is one higher than the signed count on the certificate.”
“Could the missing crate have been opened for testing?” Yan asked.
“It could have,” Zhen said. “The record does not say. The inspection log lists one opened sample, but it does not say that the missing count refers to it. I need the physical ledger before I can reconcile them.”
Gu checked the destruction certificate. “The clerk signed the total, not each crate number.”
“Exactly,” Zhen said. “That can be a simple counting error. It can also hide a movement the certificate failed to record. The ledger may answer it; until then we keep both possibilities open.” I’m not going to call a missing count a theft.”
She requested the warehouse’s physical ledger, which could show who moved the crates after the inspection. The key was with a records officer whose shift started the next day.
