Death by Choice

^{Chapter 6} WEDNESDAY

In the morning, an old woman came in to fold away the bedding. Both Kita and Shinobu were naked. The memory of the embrace that had lasted through till dawn still clung languidly about their bodies. They hastily donned bathrobes, and together set off for the bathhouse again. Kita’s arms, chest and neck gave off the faint lingering scent of Shinobu; the sensation of holding her still registered in the palms of his hands and on his belly. When they had first met at the hotel, she had seemed to him nothing but an intricate, life-sized wax doll, but now he knew the warmth of her flesh and the rhythm of her breath. Suddenly, he was no longer sure whether he was abducting her, or whether he was in love. Perhaps abduction was actually one form of love. After all, you do hear of cases where the kidnapper and his hostage fall for each other. And apparently, a law of nature dictates that the hostage will not condemn her kidnapper. In the beginning, she’ll watch him carefully in order to protect herself, but before long an attraction begins, and both begin to care for each other. Then, when the criminal is arrested, his victim will declare that he behaved in exemplary fashion. She’s the only one who can treat his crime lightly. This is why a kidnapper is wise to anticipate what will happen after he’s arrested, and be as polite and hospitable as possible to his victim.

Needless to say, Kita felt absolutely no animosity towards his own “victim.” He was a very lucky abductor. He had money. And he was pretty well loved by his captive.

There in the bathhouse with the morning sun streaming in, he made a bet with Shinobu on the question of whether those businessmen who sold her off would come up with the ransom money by the allotted time.

Kita put fifty thousand yen on them doing so, and Shinobu bet the same amount that they wouldn’t.

“If they haven’t paid those three thousand Yukichi Fukuzawas by noon, it means you’ll get killed, you know.”

“But I’ll get fifty thousand yen, won’t I? And if they do pay up on time, I may lose fifty thousand but I’ll be thirty million the richer, after all. I don’t stand to lose whichever way the dice rolls.”

“So you plan to pocket your own ransom money, eh?”

“Let’s split it. You’ll be able to live in clover for a while.”

“I’m going to die on Friday, remember.”

“Postpone it a while.”

“No way. Look, let me tell you something, honey. I’m not going to get myself caught by the police. I wouldn’t be able to kill myself on Friday if I did.”

“That’s sly. And I’ve just fallen for you, too.”

“That’s great to hear, but this is something I’ve made up my mind about.”

“I swear you’ll change your mind if you stay with me.”

“Hmm, I wonder.”

“Jesus won’t let you do it.”

“I’m a Buddhist, so I don’t care. I’m not saying I don’t like Jesus, mind.”

Shinobu sighed, and sank into the hot water.

After they’d eaten breakfast back in their room, Kita telephoned the boss again.

“Have you got those Yukichi Fukuzawas together?”

“Not yet. I don’t have a hope of making it by noon. Where are you right now, Fukuzawa?”

“I’m at the Showa Base in the South Pole.”

“Don’t get smart with me. I’m assuming Shinobu’s safe?”

“I’ve popped her in the hot water and she’s boiling nicely.”

“Stop the kidding. Put her on the phone.”

“Sure. And in return, you put on the detective who’s listening in through his headphones there beside you.”

“I haven’t told the cops.”

“Oh yeah? So who’s the guy there in your room frowning and holding his breath, hey? I can see him all the way from the South Pole. Quick, put him on.”

Another man took the receiver, mumbling something. “Is that the police?” asked Kita.

“No,” the other replied in a trembling voice.

“So who are you?”

The other guy seemed in agony. “No one,” he said.

“Well then, go top yourself.”

Kita put down the receiver. Over at the hotel shop, Shinobu was busy buying up fancy horse oil, pickled plums, and sweet rice cakes.

“I didn’t get quite enough sleep,” Kita announced. “Let’s go sleep some more.”

He urged her back to the room with him, where he flung himself down on the matting.

“It’s great weather. Let’s head out for a picnic in a while,” said Shinobu, twining her fingers through his hair. Outside the window, the leaves on the mountainside were playing softly in the sunlight. From where they gazed at the scene, it looked as if a huge green fish was swimming through the air. Through the open window wafted a scent of mineral waters from the hot springs mixed with the aroma of plants, which ruffled the opening of Shinobu’s bathrobe over her breasts, and tickled Kita’s neck.

“Wouldn’t it be nice if the next world was as good as this,” Kita muttered with a yawn.

“All you have to do is stay here like this, you know,” said Shinobu.

“I’d love to. But hey, everyone heaves themselves to their feet when the time comes, you know. Hey ho, they think, back to boring old everyday reality, eh? This is the best experience I’ve ever had, being here like this with you. I really believe that. And that’s because I’ve decided to kill myself on Friday, see. I don’t have to go back to boring old reality. It feels just great.”

“I’m so happy for you,” murmured Shinobu, sitting beside him gazing out at the landscape through half-closed eyes.

“Eh?” said Kita, surprised.

“I really envy you, going to die the day after tomorrow. Aren’t you scared of dying?”

“Nope.”

“Do you feel hopeless?”

“Nope.”

“So why are you going to kill yourself?”

“I’ve come to the end of my life.”

“And who says so?”

“I dunno. God, I guess.”

“How do you know?”

“I don’t. Why did I get the urge to die?”

“I read the Bible to you, didn’t I?”

“Yeah, and thanks to you I’m not scared to die any more.”

“It’s cowardly to kill yourself. You’re running away.”

“You’re right.”

“You make me want to die too, Kita. I’m scared.”

“There’s nothing to be scared of if you die with me.”

“No.” Shinobu spoke firmly, and peered into Kita’s relaxed face, her brow furrowed. Kita smiled benignly at her, with the air of having already severed all ties with this world. She felt she’d seen this expression somewhere before. Yes that was it – it was just like the face of the dead Yutaka Ozaki.

She got abruptly to her feet, and heaved a deep sigh. This was worrying, really worrying. She really did feel the urge to die with him. What would happen if instead of convincing him not to kill himself, she was lured into the trap herself?

Just past noon, Kita and Shinobu called a cab and left the hotel for the nearest town. They left their bags in the relatively deserted restaurant of the little hot springs town, and Kita made his fourth threatening phone call from the telephone box outside. It was not the boss but some other man who came on the line this time.

“Have you got those three thousand Yukichi Fukuzawas ready now?”

“Thirty million’s a big ask. We’ve got seventeen million. Wouldn’t this do?”

“You’re tryin’ to talk me down?”

“We’re just a small business. This is all we can manage. Shinobu’s a precious star, she supports our office. Send her back unharmed, we beg you. Her mother’s in hospital from the shock. We want to set her mind at rest as soon as possible. Come on, let’s compromise. Make it seventeen million.”

“Shinobu’d be pretty sad if she knew you guys were tryin’ to beat down her price. If that’s what you want, I have a plan.”

“Don’t hurt her please. Her fans all over Japan would be devastated.”

“I’m loath to kill her myself. There’s heaps of others I’d rather kill than her. No, I was anticipating that you mightn’t come up with the ransom money, see, so I’ve got another plan. Shinobu’s had some experience providing ‘comfort’ to some pretty famous politicians and high level bureaucrats. I’ll get her to tell the story in public. Here, listen to what she’s got to say.”

Kita beckoned Shinobu to the telephone box, and handed her the receiver. Watching Kita’s face, she began to talk in an unhappy voice.

“Help me please! I don’t want to die yet! Don’t make him angry.”

“Shinobu, have you spilled the beans about your relationship with those Congressmen?”

“I had to. He had a knife to my face, and he ordered me to tell everything, so I talked about it all. He’s got it on tape, and he’s going to send it to the television stations!”

“Shinobu, where are you right now?”

“He’ll cut my ears off if I tell you.”

“Goddamn the guy for causing all this trouble! Put him back on.”

The man on the other end of the line clicked his tongue in vexation, then his voice turned intimidating as he said to Kita, “I’m onto you, buster. You’re the guy who paid a hundred thousand to have a drink with Shinobu that night. I recognize your goddamn stupid voice. You’ve made a big mistake, you bastard. I hope you know what you’ve let yourself in for.”

Kita was strangely calm in the face of this exposure of his identity. He answered with the same calm tone he’d spoken with till now.

“Congratulations. You uncovered me, you crook. I’m not Yukichi Fukuzawa after all. I’m Ono no Imoko,” he went on, giving the name of a famous bureaucrat in the court of ancient Japan.

“Whaddaya mean, you’re Imoko? Hey Kita, don’t mess with us buster. You’ll be dead tomorrow.”

“No, it’s the day after I’m going to die. If you want to kill me you’d better hurry.”

“Don’t push your luck!”

“Pay up that thirty million. Get those stupid Congressmen to foot some of it. That should bring it up to twenty-eight million or so. You can borrow the remaining couple of million from a loan shark.”

“OK. We’ll get the full amount ready. Come and get it.”

“There’s no time to go do that. Donate the lot to the International Red Cross for helping poor sick kids.”

“What?”

“The International Red Cross, you idiot. Donate thirty million to them in the name of Shinobu Yoimachi. I’ll check whether you’ve really done it or not.”

“What crazy nonsense is this? Are you in your right mind?”

“I’ll let the newspapers and television stations know. You don’t need to keep this thing a secret any longer.”

Kita put down the receiver and left the telephone box in high spirits. Now this abduction was really getting into gear at last.

Shinobu stared hard at him. She looked scared.

“They’re going to pay the ransom. So I win the bet.” Kita smiled at her, but she still seemed dazed.

They went back to the restaurant and ordered beer, grilled fish, and slices of raw devil’s tongue, while he plotted their next move. For some reason, Shinobu seemed displeased. She sat there with lips pursed, chin propped on hands, looking sulky.

“You really hate losing the bet that much?” Kita said teasingly. But at this, her eyes filmed with tears. “What’s up? This is weird.”

“Yeah, it sure is. Why do I have to get killed?”

“What’re you talking about?” said Kita, grabbing her hand. “I’m not really going to kill you!”

She squeezed his hand tight. “No, no, not you. They’re the ones who’ll kill me. I know exactly what they’re thinking,” she went on. “There’s no way they’re really going to pay that money. It won’t matter a damn to them if I die. They actually want you to kill me, Kita.”

“But why?”

“They want to shut me up, that’s why. They’ll be running round frantically working on the press right now, making sure that even if I spill the beans about the politicians it won’t get in the news. I know too much, see. It’s better if I’m out of the way. They’ll be bringing in the gangsters, who’ll finish me off and set it up so it looks like I’ve been killed by my abductor.”

“Hmm, I wonder. Anyway, let’s do what we can. We can’t quit now in the middle of the job, after all. I’ve been a plain old Mr Nice Guy till now, you know. The only thing I was good at was sacrificing myself for others, just like my old man. I’ve only got two days more to live. The final gesture I want to make is to act completely willful in some way. It’s asking a lot to want to involve you in this too, but please stick with me just a bit longer Shinobu.”

“I was the one who asked you to abduct me as a joke, but I never thought you’d throw yourself into it quite like this…”

“You’ve gotta promise to keep it an absolute secret. Don’t ever tell anyone I did it for fun, will you. This was a forced abduction, right? It wasn’t a put-up job. Don’t tell the truth to a soul. Promise me.”

Shinobu nodded, overwhelmed by the earnest tone of entreaty in Kita’s voice.

“You won’t get killed, don’t worry. I’ve been planning how to make sure you’re safe ever since last night. Just leave things to me.”

Shinobu nodded over and over, wiping her eyes with the napkin.

“You’re on the stage, aren’t you?” said the old woman who brought them their plate of devil’s tongue. Her gaze shifted from Shinobu to Kita and back again. Maybe their conversation had the look or sound of a play to her.

“Would there be a bank near here?” asked Kita.

The old lady drew a map on the table with her finger. “You turn left at the second set of lights, there’s a pachinko parlour here, and the bank’s right next door.” She added the observation that it was maybe not the best idea having the bank so close to the pachinko parlour.

Kita needed to withdraw the getaway money, but before he did so he stepped into the phone box with the plan of giving the news-starved media the information about the abduction of a star. He dialled Information for the number that would put him onto the press section head of one of the television stations. Then he rang and left a message.

“I’ve abducted Shinobu Yoimachi, and told her production company they have to donate the thirty million yen ransom money to the International Red Cross. Put this on your afternoon gossip show and the seven o’clock news. I’ll make a public announcement at three this afternoon.”

The person on the other end was evidently a professional, trained to deal with whatever message came through in the same businesslike way. “An abduction, right?” he said perfectly coolly, repeating to check facts. “Shinobu Yoimachi, you say?” “Thirty million yen.” “Three pm.” Well the message seemed to have got through, at least.

This was Kita’s plan. If he made the abduction public through the media, it would at any rate mean that those gangster businessmen wouldn’t so easily be able to shut Shinobu up. On the other hand, of course, it would make the abductor’s escape extremely difficult. For a start, the victim was a star known and loved in living rooms throughout the nation. If she was seized from the living room screens and seen walking about in the street, a patrol car would be onto her right away. Their only hope was to hole up somewhere where no one would see them. Kita had the vague idea of moving on to Niigata. He didn’t have any particular hiding place in mind, but he’d been there two years earlier, so he had a sense of the place. All he needed was not to get caught before Friday. On Friday he’d free Shinobu and let her loose on the media reporters. Then she could stand there live in front of the cameras and spill the beans about how she’d had to keep the wicked doings of the Congressmen a secret to save her own skin. This would then provide a chance for this star on the way out to leave her old identity behind and reinvent herself as the much-lauded heroine who pitted herself against social evils.

“Right, I’ll get our getaway money out of the bank and then we’re off to Niigata.” They left the restaurant, Kita’s arm around her shoulder, and called in at the bank.

“I need to buy some clothes and disguise myself,” Shinobu announced. Kita’s bank balance should by now hold the money he was owed for selling his organs. But when he slipped his cash card into the machine, he was confronted with something unexpected. The machine refused to accept his card. Even if the organ money wasn’t there, he should still have five hundred thousand left in his account.

“How much have you got, Shinobu?”

“About five thousand I think.”

“Any credit card? Any cash card?”

“All I’ve brought is the Bible. I left everything in the car. What’s the problem? Isn’t there any money?”

Kita had the gut feeling that this was the doing of Heita Yashiro. He knew Kita’s bank account number, so he could fix things so the cash card was invalid. He didn’t want Kita getting away, that was it. Yashiro had dealings with those gangster businessmen, and he’d probably already sent someone to finish Kita off. After all, he’d boasted that he could arrange things with an assassin for five hundred thousand yen, hadn’t he?

A professional would consider a mere five hundred thousand an insult. In fact, Yashiro was driving a hard deal.

“You haven’t notched up a real murder yet, so this is all you’re worth. It includes expenses, by the way.”

Yashiro didn’t have a high opinion of the guy. He tossed him an envelope with a down payment of two hundred fifty thousand. The man tucked it away in the pocket of his dark blue suit, and launched into a complaint about the paradoxical ways of the world.

“In this profession, no sooner do you get a name for doing the job than you’re finished.” It wasn’t worth the game, he declared. He’d probably end up spending his retirement quietly awaiting execution. And if he made a hash of things, he’d die on the job.

“You just do it for a bit of extra on the side, though. I wouldn’t normally even bother asking an assassin who’d never killed anyone, you know.”

“Every assassin’s had a first assignment. Every job’s got to start somewhere. But I’ve spent years studying the art, and gaining knowledge and skill.”

“So all you’re lacking is experience, eh? That’s too bad. Oh well, you can have all the pride you want, just so long as you’re cheap.”

There was a few seconds silence while the contract killer simply stood gaping, then he closed his eyes and started to laugh. Yashiro laughed with him, watching him carefully as he did so. Finally the killer sighed and grew quiet. He drew a deep breath through his nose, and declared shrilly, “This money’s way too little, whatever you say. Too little to buy my skills, too little to buy the other guy’s life.”

“Don’t you worry about the other guy. Kita’s life is already paid for. And things are fixed so he pays you your reward as well.”

The killer looked unhappy. “Does this guy want to get himself killed or something?”

“Well he wants to die, let’s put it that way. This Friday, actually. Don’t ask me why.”

“You don’t need a reason to kill yourself,” said the killer. Still, he didn’t quite get it. Why should he have to kill a guy who’d do the job himself? He could throw in the job he’d undertaken and save the fellow, but it wasn’t the task of an assassin to save someone who wanted to kill himself.

“So my client’s going to get me to do something pointless, eh?”

“Just forget about the client, OK?” Yashiro said softly, his voice low and threatening. “It’s not just a matter of killing him. You seem to have a wide repertoire in the field. That’s why I’m employing you. Well in Kita’s case I want an accident, right? He mustn’t be allowed to kill himself, and he mustn’t die in anything crime-related. You got set it up so it’s clearly an accident, get it? And an accident that leaves his corneas and organs intact. Can you do that?”

A smile hovered on the killer’s face as he replied, “If the guy cooperates, I can extract his organs and deliver them, sure, but it’ll cost more.”

“Oh yeah, that reminds me, didn’t you work in a hospital or something? Surgery, wasn’t it?”

“That’s right. I still do.”

“So your regular occupation’s saving lives, and on the side you’re in the business of taking them, eh? I guess it comes down to a way of balancing things out for yourself.”

The killer seemed dazed and remained silent for a moment, then he recovered with a laugh. “It’s all the same in the end,” he said.

Yashiro had been introduced to this killer through a gangster associate he played golf with. Apparently a younger member of the gang hadn’t had the guts to lop off the tip of his little finger for a misdemeanour as the rules required, so he’d gone along to the hospital and asked the surgeon if there was a way he could get the job done with anaesthetic so it wouldn’t hurt. The surgeon was only too happy to oblige, and promptly did the job that day in his lunch hour. He popped the severed piece of finger into a plastic bag in a saline salt solution, and handed it over to the young gangster like a goldfish in a bag, and even gave him a prescription for painkillers. The gangster froze the piece of finger and took it along and proffered to his boss together with his apology, and there he assumed the matter would end. But word got out that he’d actually had a surgeon do the job for him, and he was ordered to go off and do it all over again. Back he went to the surgeon with his bit of finger, and asked to have it put back on again. The surgeon didn’t so much as blink. He set to and performed a swift and meticulous operation, and there was the fingertip, beautifully reunited with its finger.

But the boss ordered the young gangster to sever his finger again while the stitches were still in the wound. When the man turned up at the surgery for the third time to get his finger stub attended to, the surgeon exploded. He demanded to know the name and address of the boss who’d put him to all this trouble for nothing, then he went right round there personally and gave him a piece of his mind.

“You got complaints about my surgical skills? You’d better learn more respect for the medical profession or else, my friend. I could come along and steal your organs in the night while you’re sleeping, you know!”

The surgeon stared down the gangster boss, gimlet-eyed. His underlings began to move in to eject this insolent fellow, but the boss had other ideas. A flash of intuition had told him that he could use this man. He soothed him with a polite apology about the severed finger episode, and added a hefty payment for all the fruitless trouble he’d been put to.

There was a fuss at the hospital over the fact that the surgeon had helped a gangster fulfil his obligations. The result was that he was removed from his post for unprofessional behaviour, and that was the end of his medical career. But the gangster boss had taken a fancy to him. He found him a new place in another hospital, and in effect he was kept under the wing of the gang as its pet surgeon. Most of his work these days was in the line of extracting bullets and looking after wounded patients who couldn’t reveal their identities in public.

Yashiro was aware of all this, but he hadn’t heard why this surgeon had added part-time murderer to his profession. It just takes a slight rerouting of the neurons for a surgeon to become a killer, of course, but the patients at their hospital have no idea. This man at least had conscience enough to perform the job outside the hospital.

To cut a long story short, the surgeon took on the job of assassinating Kita for five hundred thousand yen. Even if he did get the remaining half of his pay after Kita had met his accident according to instructions, plus an extra hundred thousand, it would still not be enough in his opinion. Sure, it was the going rate for a professional Filipino killer, but this guy came with a guarantee from Yashiro’s gangster friend, so he could be trusted. Yashiro calculated that if Kita could have an accident that didn’t involve much physical damage, he’d get a tidy thirteen million in his own pocket: a million commission for selling the cornea and organ set to a waiting transplant patient, plus twelve million for being Kita’s insurance beneficiary. He’d done a deal with Miss Koikawa behind Kita’s back, which made Kita a paper employee of his company with the company head as beneficiary, and made thirty per cent of proceeds payable to the insurance agent (Miss Koikawa). Yashiro was taking meticulous care that Kita’s death should not go unrewarded.

Kita was apparently of the same opinion. Therefore, when Yashiro had heard from the studio boss that Shinobu had been kidnapped, he’d decided he had to hasten matters with the killer. Once the police got mixed up in the story, the killer would have a harder job, his plans for the insurance money would go awry, and the price of the victim’s organs would go down. Whatever Kita’s motives for this abduction might be, Yashiro wasn’t going to sit back quietly and watch his own profits go up in smoke.

In order to limit Kita’s movements, Yashiro cancelled his cash card and credit card. Meanwhile, the studio boss planned to use the abduction to give Yoimachi all the publicity he could. He also used his connections with the Finance Minister who’d paid for use of Shinobu, and thereby managed to get onto the bank’s online records and find out where he’d been trying to withdraw money. Then he set about controlling things by hastily selling the story of the abduction to the media, arranging to provide them with video footage and photographs from her debut as a star until now, and even gathered comments from family and friends.

Impelled not so much by the half a million yen reward as by an inextricable combination of Yashiro, who was intent on making a profit from Kita’s death, and the studio boss, who was intent on wringing money out of Shinobu’s abduction, the killer found himself to his own bewilderment mingling with the passengers on the northbound bullet train. At his feet lay a Boston bag containing the seven essential tools of his trade. Kita and Shinobu were apparently headed for Niigata. He knew that Kita had tried to withdraw money from a regional bank in a hot springs town in Gunma, and that he was hoping to escape somewhere and cover his tracks. The killer put in a telephone call to the station nearest the bank, and asked if anyone had seen Yoimachi Shinobu. Yes, one of the young station employees at Jomo Kogen had seen the nationally famous star apparently as happy as could be. Few people passed through the station, so the fellow’s memory would be reliable. Apparently the man with her had on a backpack, and was humming some unfamiliar tune. The two had taken the northbound bullet train.

Kita and Shinobu arrived at Niigata Station at two in the afternoon. After buying a change of clothes and a pair of sunglasses for Shinobu in the shopping mall of the station building, and some stomach and eye medicine for himself, Kita had only thirty thousand yen left in his wallet. Once they’d run through it, that would be that. But since all was due to be over on Friday anyway, things were going to plan. There was nothing to be scared of.

Shinobu emerged from the changing room in a shiny dress printed with tiny carnations, and crossed her white ankles in a pretty pose for him. “How do I look?” The faint brown birthmark on the outside of her left calf was clearly visible. Kita had discovered it the night before, and felt it added something new to Shinobu’s list of charms. This short black dress with its carnation print would be more photogenic than the torn jeans and shirt that revealed her belly button, he thought. He had Shinobu promise to reveal to the media that her abductor had bought her this dress. Shinobu said the round yellow sunglasses were to hide her tears.

At three, they boarded the bus for Niigata Port. Shinobu had declared she wanted to look at the sea.

Kita had been on the same bus two years earlier, but the ride felt quite different this time. Back then he’d been a travelling salesman in the health field, intent on cultivating his outlets, an expression on his face that was quite unrelated to his feelings and the same words constantly in his mouth. Sure, that had been one way of sustaining life, but he hadn’t felt there was much life in him to sustain. The company had a motto to the effect that an employee who was selling health had to be healthy himself, but in fact Kita was a burned out wreck at the end of every day. That had been back when health products actually sold. Egg oil, turtle extract, royal jelly, chlorophyll juice, immune system boosters, multivitamins, slimming oils, seaweed soap – this all-purpose health product company had handled them all. Health was no exception to the rules of season and fashion. The company employees were the monitors of early signs of trends; they anticipated what was going to be next, and went around promoting its health benefits to the public.

Two years ago, Kita had been in Niigata Port trying to sell turtle extract and multi-vitamins to the fishermen and crew of a Russian boat, but they weren’t having any of it. As long as they lived on the sea, they were plenty healthy enough, they told him. So Kita gave up selling health, with the result that his spirits markedly improved, and he regained his own health.

They arrived at the bus terminal. The sunlight bouncing off the white concrete was dazzling. They set off along the quayside, a warm salty breeze playing on their cheeks. Soon it would be time for Kita to telephone the television station again and make his announcement. They went into the ferry terminus, and located a public telephone. The ferry wouldn’t be in for quite a while, and there were only a couple of people in the waiting room. The ticket office was closed.

“I’d love to go there,” Shinobu said, pointing to a poster for Sado Island, but it seemed to Kita that they shouldn’t try an island. There’d be nowhere to go if they were cornered. He shook his head.

“I want to be on a boat,” Shinobu said in response. “Even a fishing boat’s OK.”

“I guess we won’t get a good night’s sleep tonight even if we’re on land,” he said.

“So let’s run away to sea.”

“Would there be a boat that would take us on board? I mean, you’re a star and I’m a kidnapper. We’d have to make sure it all went according to plan.”

Kita winked at Shinobu, picked up the receiver, and dialled the number of the television station. “I’m Shinobu Yoimachi’s abductor,” he said. “Put me onto the head of the news section.”

“S-s-s-sure, one moment,” mumbled the receptionist. Please hold, someone will be with you shortly, a recorded female voice repeated, before being replaced by a resonant baritone.

“Hullo, this is Yamanouchi from the SM television News Section. We received your message. You’re with Shinobu Yoimachi now, right?”

“Correct.”

“Why did you kidnap her?”

“I want to help children suffering from serious illnesses.”

“You say you’ve demanded that the thirty million in ransom money be donated to the International Red Cross, right?”

“That’s right. I have a few other demands as well, actually. Here goes, OK? Get rid of the American military bases in Okinawa, and scrap the Japan–U.S. Security Treaty. Resignation of all Cabinet members. An end to the death penalty. A mandatory retirement system for all members of the National Diet. A ban on those “golden parachutes” for retired government officials in private sector employment. Support Tibetan independence. And drop those stupid variety programs and gossip shows on TV.” Kita was reeling the list off the top of his head as he went on. His idea was to estimate Shinobu’s life at the highest possible value, though the effect was a little like praying at one of those shrines that offer lots of benefits for a mere coin or two at the altar.

You could hear the wry smile behind the voice as Yamanouchi replied, “These are demands to the Japanese government, are they? I have to tell you there’s no one in this country who could possibly fulfil them. What are you going to do about it?”

“I’m not expecting them to be fulfilled. But I want you to at least report the kidnapper’s demands verbatim to your listeners. If you don’t want to see her killed, you must report them all fully. All will be revealed on Friday. Shinobu will tell you herself, if she’s still alive then. I want you guys in the news media to put pressure on her studio manager to pay up that thirty million to the Red Cross. And while you’re at it, you must give a lesson to all those useless politicians. You’ll not only be saving Shinobu Yoimachi, but for once in your life you’ll be doing something for the sake of the world. This abduction is my own way of calling for justice. What I’m hoping is that it will set off a wave of Justice Terrorism. I want people to come clean about the secrets of the business or office they work in, and make a clean breast of all their nefarious doings. Terrorists of conscience throughout the nation, now is your hour! Here ends the declaration of Shinobu Yoimachi’s abductor.”

Kita put down the receiver, took a deep breath, and turned his mind to discussing with Shinobu where they should go to hole up.

“You sure made a lot of demands there. You’re a real pro, Kita.”

Kita had never received such praise in his life; in fact he’d been told the exact opposite when he worked as a salesman. Seemed like people really could change if they wanted to. Of course the level of responsibility was different when you were selling a life than when you were just selling health products. His working life had been devoid of responsibility until now, so it was only natural that he’d never improved. He’d been skilled at shutting up and listening to others, with the result that another of his skills was passively conforming to others’ expectations of him. Now he realized this old self had suddenly evolved. It felt pretty good.

“I’d say they know we’re in Niigata by now. That saleswoman in the shop where you bought the dress realized who you were.”

“Am I a millstone for you? Do I stand out?”

“That’s why we’ve got to hide somewhere, see. The police may already be on the move.”

“Well maybe, but this town feels pretty sleepy. It just doesn’t seem like the sort of place where anything would happen.”

“We’re the ones who’d be the event. If a patrol car sees us, we’re done for.”

“Really? It’s making me drowsy.”

The port had a lethargic air. The sound of a distant steam whistle drifted in like a yawn, while the two wandered along indecisively. Shinobu peeped into the deserted kiosk, and began idly looking for chocolate nibbles to buy. Kita bought himself a sports paper and a can of barley tea, put some eye drops in his eyes, and settled down on a bench with the idea of waiting for a good idea to present itself.

“Couldn’t we escape onto some boat?” Shinobu was perched on Kita’s knee, chewing gum.

A hotel would make them too visible. Abductors often holed up in a vacant house or some derelict building, but that was in the movies. They had no time to go searching around for the perfect ruin. They could just keep on the move, but they didn’t have the money for that. Finally, they settled on hiding on a boat. What kind? wondered Kita, and the moment he did so he recalled the face of the Russian he’d tried to sell health products to a few years earlier.

If they could get refuge on a Russian ship in port, he thought, neither the police nor the gangsters would get to them before Friday. The only problem was, would the ship take them? He’d heard the Russian Embassy was surprisingly unhelpful to refugees. Luckily, though, a Russian ship was not an embassy. It would all work out if they negotiated with the ship’s captain, he decided.

He approached two Russians as they got off the bus, huge paper bags clutched in both hands, and addressed them in English. Were they going back to their ship? Da, da, they nodded. Two faces, one like a grotesque kewpie doll and the other with great blubbery lips, ogled Shinobu as they spoke. Kita smiled back. He’d like to speak to the captain, so would they mind introducing him? Captain? The one with the gleaming lips pointed at the grumpy kewpie. Ah, you’re the captain? Kita asked. Da. Ya. Captain replied the kewpie. It seemed his English wasn’t too good. The thick-lipped one translated for him, rolling his r’s, while Kita dedicated himself to the task of negotiating, mouthing his English syllables with a heavy Japanese accent.

“My name is Minami. I’m a director of a television station. This is Mizuho, a reporter. We are making a travel program about Niigata. We would like to include your ship in our footage. Therefore, could you please show us your ship?”

The two had a few exchanges in Russian together, while Kita waited, wondering if his request had got through. Then the thick-lipped one turned to him and said How much can you pay? Sure enough, it was going to need money. How much do you want? he asked. Fifty thousand, came the outrageous answer. Kita looked resigned, shook his head, and turned as if to go.

OK, said Lips, forty plus a can of caviar. Forget it, muttered Kita. Lips came down another ten thousand. If you put us up on board for tonight, we’ll make it thirty thousand, Kita offered. You want to stay? Lips winced and looked dubious.

“You see, we want to cover the everyday life of Russian sailors,” Kita laboriously explained. “We want to know how you spend time while you’re in port, what you eat, what you talk about.”

Lips nodded to each thing Kita said, but he looked as if he couldn’t fathom just why they wanted to do this. He asked if the woman would come too. Yes, said Kita, she was eager to spend time on the ship as well. At this, Kewpie grinned broadly. Khorosho, he said, and reached for Kita’s hand to shake on the deal. It seemed negotiations had reached a happy conclusion.

They were taken on board the five hundred ton freighter Pugachov. On the deck they found two second-hand Japanese cars, tied up with wire rather like Gulliver in Lilliput. There was also a pile of second-hand refrigerators, television sets, and the kind of bicycles that could have been abandoned at railway stations. It looked like a street on special trash-collection day.

They were introduced to each crew member in turn. Nicolai, Sasha, Misha, Alyosha, Kosta…it was quite an array of faces. Each was passing the time in his own chosen way. Some were playing chess, some exchanging cups of vodka, others reading, playing the guitar or sleeping. Shinobu smiled sweetly at them all in a rather bewildered fashion.

Then they were shown into the captain’s cabin, where they raised welcoming vodka glasses with Kewpie, and ate the proffered fatty salted pork on black bread.

They were given two empty bunks, one above the other. A young crewman brought them some damp sheets and mouldy-smelling blankets, and informed them that dinner was at six.

“We’ve managed to find a hidey-hole, haven’t we?” murmured Shinobu, gazing out at the sea through the round porthole in their room.

“Mind you, we’re not absolutely safe even here.”

“Let’s hope all goes well.”

“I’ll go off into the town after dinner and take a look at things,” Kita said. “I won’t stand out if I’m alone.”

Yawning irrepressibly, Kita lay down on the narrow bunk. Shinobu snuggled in beside him. She poked a finger into his nose and chin, and murmured sulkily, “You’re going to leave me on this ship all alone? What will you do if I get raped?” She rolled up his shirt and began to stroke his ribs.

“Stop it, that tickles.”

“What’ll you do, Kita? If the ship leaves while you’re away, I really will be kidnapped.”

“Don’t worry. I don’t think Captain Kewpie’s a bad fellow.”

“How do you know? He might be part of a mafia gang for all we know. All the crew look like mafia members, don’t you think?”

“Do the mafia collect junk like that?”

“They’d be carrying guns. Tokarevs or Kalashnikovs, I’d say.”

“You want one? Shall I inquire for you?”

“I don’t want to kill and I don’t want to get killed.”

“What if you had to choose?”

“I’d kill. What about you?”

“I’d die.”

“Not fair!”

“Look, I promise I’ll be back, right? All I’m going to do is just check that the abduction’s been reported in the media, and see if the money’s gone to the Red Cross yet.”

Shinobu pouted, and nodded unwillingly.

Six o’clock came, and the entire crew gathered in the ship’s dining room. Shinobu was somewhat relieved to discover that there were two Russian women among the crew. She and Kita were invited to the captain’s table as the evening’s guests, where they were re-introduced to the other members, and raised vodka glasses together.

For dinner, they were given a tomato and cucumber salad with hamburgers. There were also canapés of salmon roe on buttered black bread. As they sat there surrounded by a sea of Russian language, laughter, and hummed song, the two of them amused themselves by coming up with nicknames for each of the crew. The captain was “Valkewpin.” The translator was “Lipsikov.” A man who sang in a hoarse voice became “Tomwaitsky,” while the woman who served the meal was “Chubbinya.” The man who’d been working on one of the rescued refrigerators was “Siberian Electrics,” the glitzy six-foot woman was “Glitzerina,” a huge two hundred twenty-pound man called Misha became “Fatsikov,” and so on. Every time one of them came up with another name they’d laugh, and after a while a young crewman who spoke English asked with undisguised curiosity what they were talking about.

“We were wondering whether you have any Tokarevs or Kalashnikovs,” joked Kita, emboldened by the vodka.

“Yakuza?” somebody asked.

“We’re not yakuza. We fight the yakuza.”

“Polis?”

“No, we’re not the police either.”

“So what are you?” Fatsikov asked.

In his rudimentary English, Kita spelled it out. “I love her. She loves me.” This proved a hit. Gorika! cried Tomwaitsky, and everyone sang out the same word in response. Kiss! Lipsikov commanded. Apparently gorika meant “bitter,” and lovers had to kiss in order to make the vodka sweet. Not really following all this, the two were made to blushingly kiss.

Siberian Electrics came over to Kita and earnestly began to explain that Tokarevs were no good. “Makarovs are much better. Tokarevs are made in China so they’re cheap, but most of them are poorly made. Kalashnikovs also depend on whether they’re made in Russia or China. The Russian ones use fat bullets and are very destructive. If you want to buy a gun, buy a Makarov. Makarovs aim well.”

“How much does one cost?” asked Kita, and was told fifty thousand yen. But you could get one for five thousand in Vladivostok. A Tokarev cost one thousand.

A pistol suicide wasn’t a bad idea, Kita thought. It was nice and straightforward. But he didn’t have the money.

When darkness had descended, Kita left the ship to go take a look at the town. Shinobu asked him to bring her back an ice cream.

Kita took a taxi into the central shopping district, where he found a closed electric goods shop that had left the televisions running in the window. Every set, large and small, was tuned to the baseball. Two other men paused in the middle of the arcade as Kita had done, and stood with heads twisted, watching the match. A little girl just learning to walk came tottering out onto the pavement, pursued by her worried father. Kita felt he’d seen the same thing happen somewhere before. No doubt this little scene had also been played out yesterday and would be played out tomorrow, in other shopping arcades in other towns, repeated again and again without anyone ever noticing.

The little girl about a year old looked up into Kita’s face. Kita smiled back, with a sudden sense that he’d come across this particular child before. This man’s going to die the day after tomorrow, Kita told her silently. You’re going to go right on living for a long time. You live well, won’t you? Even if one day here or there doesn’t make much difference to you, with your long life to come. Then he walked off.

He stepped into a telephone booth, and called the merchant of death. “Hey man, where are you?” Yashiro said casually when he heard Kita’s voice.

“Give me back my money. I’m in a fix.”

“You want some money? I’ll send it through. You’re in Niigata, right? Where are you hiding out? Is Shinobu OK? You’ve finally stuck your neck out, haven’t you? It’s do or die. I admire you. Have you seen the TV news? You’re a fantastic promoter. You’ve made Shinobu a star overnight.”

“That doesn’t benefit me one bit.”

“Shinobu’s got the main part tonight. No one knows you’re the kidnapper yet. I’ll bet you’re holed up somewhere out of sight with her, eh? You won’t be out wandering the streets together, that’s for sure.”

“Her production manager sussed that it was me.”

“Don’t you worry. That guy’s tight-lipped. He won’t breathe a word to the media or the police. The abductor’s a mystery man. No one knows the name Yoshio Kita. As long as you’re alone, you’re just another passerby to everyone. I may call it an abduction, but to everyone else it’s just some drunk’s joke.”

“Give me back my money. And keep your nose out of my business from now on.”

“I haven’t stolen your money. There’d be trouble if you escaped abroad, see, so I’ve put a hold on your bank account, that’s all. I know a doctor who lives in Niigata, so I’ll send money to him. I’ll give you his number and you can contact him. You’ll be OK with two hundred thousand, won’t you?”

Yashiro dictated the doctor’s cell phone number. Kita wrote it on his hand, and asked his name. Yashiro gave him the name of a gangster boss he knew well.

“Give him a call in half an hour. He won’t just help with the money, he’ll be able to do other things for you too.”

Kita’s ball pen added the name Kiyoshi Okochi to his palm.

A little after three in the afternoon, the image of Shinobu Yoimachi had appeared via terrestrial broadcast signal in the living rooms of the nation. Even her suicide wouldn’t have brought her such quality attention – once it’s over, the only thing left is to sigh and move on, after all. But in this case there was the cliffhanger over whether she’d be rescued or killed, and the thrilled audience was on tenterhooks.

The woman who appeared on the screen at the same time every afternoon spoke to the audience with the same expression as always.

“The singer Shinobu Yoimachi has been kidnapped by an unidentified man, and her whereabouts are unknown. At a little after eleven last night, the head of Ms Yoimachi’s production studio received a telephone call at his home from a man purporting to be the kidnapper, demanding payment of thirty million yen ransom. The man demanded that the money be paid in the form of a donation to the International Red Cross, and that details of the kidnapping be broadcast on all key stations. The production manager has complied with the demand and donated the money as requested, out of fears for the safety of Ms Yoimachi. The kidnapper has also contacted SM Television and announced other demands directed at the government, including the abolition of United States military bases on Okinawa, mass resignation of Cabinet members, and abolition of the death penalty.”

At this point, the recording of Kita’s conversation with the head of the SM News Section was aired. A forensic psychologist had been invited onto the program, and he now set about attempting a plausible psychoanalysis of the kidnapper’s motives, based on the slender evidence available.

“We know that abduction has a low success rate. This is because of the considerable risk to the kidnapper at the time of handover of the ransom money. Police involved with the case consider the safety of the victim to be paramount and ask for media restraint in reporting the incident, but in this case media reports are being made on the demand of the kidnapper. He admits that his demands to the government are unlikely to be met, but has chosen to voice them regardless. I believe his demand that the ransom be donated rather than given to him is a form of ‘crime for kicks,’ with the aim of taking his revenge against society. There may well be a perverted idolization of Ms Yoimachi behind his actions as well. One thing’s certain, this is a form of abduction never seen before.”

His expression remained stern, as if to fend off any difficult questions from his audience. He was followed by a slideshow of Shinobu back in her heyday. There she was as a new star not long after her debut; then she was singing her hit song ‘Italian George’; she ran along a beach in a bikini, her breasts swinging seductively; she appeared in the movie Tetsuko’s Room; “Oh I’m just so into the Bible these days,” she announced radiantly… the star that everyone had begun to forget was reborn before their eyes from the array of images.

Being now in the red having been forced to donate thirty million yen, the production manager was desperately trying to recoup his losses by selling Shinobu as hard as he could. As luck would have it, it was a slow news day – nothing big had happened, and no one famous had died. They had the audience’s full attention.

Both the name and whereabouts of the abductor were in fact known, but they were being suppressed in an attempt to deprive him of the kicks he was assumed to be seeking. The doctor who’d been set up to kill Kita had decided he must first separate him from Shinobu before his name became known to the world – in other words, his task was to kidnap the kidnapper. As for Shinobu, no doubt someone else would take care of her. Whether she was dead or alive was immaterial.

But the assassin had just received a call from Yashiro informing him that he was about to be saved the trouble of kidnapping Kita after all. It seemed that Kita was now strapped for cash, and making his way right now towards where the killer was waiting. Could Kita possibly have some inkling of what was going on? Surely this was some kind of trap – it seemed too good to be true. Yashiro wasn’t to be trusted, no matter how much money he was paying out. The assassin found himself feeling almost sorry for Kita’s good-natured trust in others.

Five minutes before the appointed hour, Kita appeared in the hotel lobby. He cast a quick glance around from under his brows, spied the doctor, and approached him, hunched and tentative. “Are you Mr Okochi?” he asked.

The doctor was already familiar with Kita’s face from a Polaroid photograph. “Do sit down,” he said, indicating the nearby sofa. He checked the face carefully again.

“I do apologize for the trouble you’ve been put to, doctor. I can’t use my cash card, you see.” Sweat dripped down Kita’s nose. It was the sort of face that would leave absolutely no impression at first glance, thought the doctor. They were a good match for each other in being utterly unmemorable. These days, you saw this kind of face everywhere. It was only natural that Americans and Europeans should think of the Japanese as clones. Anyone not used to seeing the Japanese could well mistake Kita and himself for each other.

“You’re in Niigata on business?” asked the doctor, in the tone he reserved for chatting to patients.

“Yes, I sell health products.” Kita planned to stick to lies that were unlikely to be exposed.

“You’ve seen the news?” The doctor wanted to have a bit of fun by watching Kita’s reaction. But Kita didn’t blink.

“The abduction? I’m a fan of Shinobu Yoimachi’s, you know.”

“What can the guy be thinking, to do a thing like that?”

“He’s probably not thinking at all.” Kita spoke with a careful smile in response to the doctor’s shifting strategy.

“Where d’you think they are?”

“Somewhere out of sight, I guess. Some flat in the suburbs maybe.”

“Or on a park bench.” The doctor tried to gauge Kita’s expression as he spoke, but Kita managed to maintain a straight face.

“You’re on the kidnapper’s side?” Kita asked.

“I’d like to rescue the guy.”

Kita gave two short laughs at this. Only someone who didn’t want to be rescued would laugh like that. Patients who laughed before they were taken in for surgery often died, he found. The doctor glanced at Kita’s face again, and told himself that this fellow was set on dying.

He put the two hundred thousand yen from the down payment for his assassination job into an envelope and held it out for Kita. “Thank you, you’ve saved my bacon,” Kita said, head bowed. Then he let out a deep breath.

“Where are you off to now?”

Kita replied that he was going to buy an ice cream and head back to where he was staying, and out he went. The doctor picked up his heavy Boston bag and set off, taking care not to be noticed as he kept his eyes on Kita’s back.

A light rain had begun to fall, dulling the evening street lights to grey, blurring the buildings, neon signs and passersby, dimming the sight of everything. Kita strode quickly through the shopping arcade, then dropped in to a convenience store and bought two ice creams and a mountain of cup noodles. He must be on his way to the hiding place where Shinobu was waiting. He hailed a taxi. So did the doctor.

Kita was headed towards a Russian ship. He showed no signs of noticing what was behind him. Then, when he belatedly noticed the doctor emerging from the taxi, he executed a ninety-degree turn and began to walk away from the ship in the direction of the ferry terminal. The doctor strolled casually along in the same direction. Kita made to go into the terminal building, but then realized it was dark and locked. The doctor silently approached. He came to a halt when he was close enough for them to see each other’s faces.

“What do you want?” Kita’s voice trembled, and his Adam’s apple jumped in his throat from the tension. The doctor kept his eyes on it like a shark.

“Nothing,” he muttered.

“You followed me here, didn’t you? What else would you be doing in a place like this?”

The doctor lowered his Boston bag to the concrete terrace, and drew a deep breath through his nose. Kita braced himself and raised both arms to protect himself from the anticipated blow, but the doctor simply stood there blankly in front of him. After a long silence, he spoke.

“Your ice creams will melt.”

“I got them to pack them in dry ice, so they’ll survive for a bit. Well, since there’s nothing you want, I guess I’ll be going. “

“You’d be wise not to go back to the ship.”

The tone was full of certainty. Kita gulped, unable to move. So the guy knew that he and Shinobu were holed up on the Russian ship?

“Yashiro sent you after me, didn’t he. What did he tell you to do with me?”

“He said to save you.”

“So what are you going to do, Mr Okochi?”

“My name isn’t Okochi.”

“Well, then who are you? Why are you here?”

The doctor made no reply, and Kita found himself drawn into the silence, unable to figure it out. He had the feeling something unfortunate would happen if he ignored the doctor and tried to go back to the ship. And he was worried about what was in that Boston bag. The doctor was attuned to Kita’s eyes as they flickered over the bag.

“Want to see inside?” He picked the bag up, and slowly unzipped it.

One look at the bag’s contents and it would become clear who this fellow was, thought Kita. Maybe it contained some horribly cruel instruments of torture. He felt a sudden thrill of terror.

“You bought that ice cream for Shinobu Yoimachi?” the doctor whispered.

A shocking thought occurred to Kita. “Have you killed Shinobu?”

The doctor took from the bag a long, thin metal rod, put one end to his mouth, and blew into it. The next moment, Kita felt a sudden pain in his calf, as though a needle had pierced it.

“Did you think I had Shinobu’s head in this bag?”

A needle with a capsule attached had pierced Kita’s leg. The doctor packed the blowgun back into his bag. “Just the right size for a head,” he murmured. Then he hoisted the bag again, and set off towards the Russian ship.

Astonished, Kita now at last understood that this man was a killer. He pulled the needle out and held it. “What have you done?” he yelled.

“I think you know,” the killer responded. “You’ll be able to die the day after tomorrow. If you don’t like the idea, though, come with me. I’ll give you an injection to reverse the poison. I’ll be waiting right here, so you go on back to the ship now, give Shinobu the ice cream, and say your goodbyes. This is the end of the abduction story. I’ll inform the police. You’ll oblige me by disappearing.”

“Why is this happening?”

“Because you trusted that fellow Yashiro. Whatever happens, you get to die. The only difference is, whose rules do you die by?”

Kita would have liked nothing better than to be able to turn the clock back to last Friday again. He didn’t recall having opened Pandora’s box. His idea had simply been to have some modest fun with his desires, then die quietly and anonymously. Pandora’s box had sprung open quite unasked, unleashing merchants of death into a feeding frenzy on some poor fellow who only wanted to die by choice. All they wanted was to make money out of some fool prepared to sell his life over to them. The day of his death was almost upon him. Kita longed to have just one day of complete freedom before he died.

Did he have no choice but to submit to the doctor’s coercions? Or should he play out the abduction act to the end? The doctor was right. Whichever choice he made, he’d end up dead. The fact was, the only freedom of choice available to him now was his method of dying.

At any rate, he’d deliver the ice cream. He set off toward the waiting ship, and summoned the crew with a cry of “Hey, Bolshoi Ballet!” The gangplank was up, so he couldn’t get back on board unaided. A few moments later, a torch shone down onto his face. Dark figures moved about, and the gangplank was lowered. When Kita arrived on deck, Siberian Electrics was there to greet him, grinning from ear to ear. He immediately began to press Kita to buy a Makarov. Kita shook his head.

“I saw on TV. You need Makarov, of course. Fifty thousand!” said Siberian Electric, and out came a hand like a baseball mitt. Well, thought Kita, it might be wise to have a pistol, just to stop the doctor having his way. There was nothing to prevent him shooting himself, after all. OK, he thought, I’ll buy it, and he tapped Siberian Electric on the shoulder.

Siberian Electric beamed with pleasure, and gripped his hand to shake on the deal. “Yes, yes. The Captain say he want a word with you. Your lover’s in his room. I bring Makarov later.” So saying, he took Kita by the arm and led him to the captain’s cabin.

Shinobu was playing poker with Valkewpin and Lipsikov. She looked up and saw Kita and the ice creams. “Welcome back,” she said, then added with innocent pride, “I’ve won ten thousand! Isn’t that great?”

“Sounds like these guys have discovered about the abduction,” said Kita. “I don’t like the look of things. Look at Valkewpin’s face there. He’s grinning away even though he’s lost. I’d say he plans to make money out of us.”

Sure enough, Valkewpin began to negotiate a deal. They’d had no idea they were sheltering a kidnapper. They were in a quandary. They had to maintain good relations with the police, for the sake of Russia’s trade with Japan. But they understood his position too, of course. Both parties should be able to profit from the situation. The question was, should they report him, or protect him? They couldn’t make up their minds. What was his opinion?

“I didn’t think you Russians would watch Japanese television,” Kita sighed, while beside him Shinobu spat out, “They’re despicable! Let’s get off this ship right now.” She tugged at Kita’s sleeve. But they were faced with a gang of people who didn’t seem likely to let them get away so generously.

“What’s your proposal for protecting us?” Kita asked.

Well, replied Valkewpin, the ship was due to leave tomorrow, so they couldn’t shelter them much longer. Why not just pretend they’d never met? Of course, they would need some hush money… Kita waited for him to continue. They’d had to pay these guys thirty thousand to come on board. How much would it cost to get off again? The answer was a shocking one hundred fifty thousand yen!

“No way,” Kita shot back. “This is pointless. Look, just go ahead and tell the police.”

The price immediately came down to a hundred thousand.

In the end they agreed on one hundred fifty to cover the hush money as well as the cost of their board, plus a Makarov and three hundred grams of caviar. A loaf of black bread and three bottles of vodka were thrown in free of charge. They divided the goods between Kita’s backpack and a carrier bag, and climbed off the ship together, licking their ice creams.

The doctor was waiting in the darkness of the wharf, hands clasped behind his back. “You said those goodbyes?” he asked.

Shinobu cowered behind Kita. “Who’s this?” she asked, warily sizing him up.

“This is where we have to part, Shinobu. This man’s a killer, and he’s injected me with poison. If I don’t do as he says, he’ll kill me any way he likes. So this is the end of our kidnap act. Go back to Tokyo now and leave me here.”

Shinobu glared up at him. “I’m coming with you,” she declared. Kita wavered. It would be next to impossible to escape, and whatever they did from now on the killer would be with them. If they didn’t part now, they were doomed to a much more difficult parting later. But he wouldn’t be around by then, he decided, so there was nothing to lose by giving in to the impulse of the moment and going with his instincts. Besides, he’d just got himself a very handy little instrument.

“Right. We’ll go it together.” Kita put his arm around her shoulders, and they set off walking towards the streetlights in the distance. Behind them trudged the killer, lugging his heavy bag.

“Kita, that guy still seems to want us,” Shinobu said worriedly.

Kita quickened his pace. “Ignore him. He’ll disappear before long.”

The killer seemed upset at being spurned like this. He addressed Kita’s back. “You’ll die if I don’t inject you with an antidote to that poison, you know.”

“Fine by me. I’m sick of worrying about it all. Just leave me alone.”

The killer drew a deep breath through his nose, squatted down, and began to remove something from his bag. A round box emerged. Kita drew out the pistol from the bag that had contained the ice creams, and pointed it at the doctor, who froze for a moment still half-squatting, then went on rummaging in his bag, his eyes on Kita.

“Give the bag here,” said Kita.

“You wouldn’t know which of these is the antidote,” the doctor muttered.

“Just give me the bag.”

“I’m afraid I must refuse. I have an obligation to save your life.”

“Make up your mind. Are you a murderer, or a doctor?”

“Both. I may have been a murderer just now, but right now I’m a doctor. You two can’t get away, you realize. As soon as you get out into the light, everyone’ll be after you. You’re on stage wherever you go now.”

Kita wavered again. Everything the doctor said was true, and it was getting on his nerves.

“Go on Kita, kill him. This guy’s shot you full of poison, after all. Why not get your own back by shooting him full of lead?”

There was no way for either of them to know if the pistol Kita was holding was real. He couldn’t trust Siberian Electrics and Valkewpin, Kita told himself. It could well be a toy, for all he knew. Meanwhile, the doctor looked perfectly happy to have a bullet put through him.

“I didn’t have a chance to test this thing,” said Kita, shifting his aim to the Boston bag and putting his finger on the trigger.

The doctor put his hands in the air. “It doesn’t have a silencer,” he argued lamely. “There’ll be a big bang that’ll bring the police running. Don’t do it.”

OK, thought Kita, I’ll use that dense loaf of black Russian bread for silencing it. He pulled out the bread and held it to the end of the gun.

“You’re really going to kill him, Kita? Wow! You’re going to kill a killer! Don’t do it. OK, I tried to stop you. I give up.”

“Fine. Killers need to get a taste of what it’s like to be on the receiving end.”

The doctor was kneeling on the ground, his mouth half open, gazing at Kita.

“How does it feel, eh?”

The doctor didn’t answer, but simply gazed out to sea. He may have been betting on Kita not pulling the trigger, and simply waiting to see which way things went. Or he may have been recalling a previous experience like this.

“Got any final words?”

The doctor seemed to have grown tired of kneeling, for he sank to the ground and crossed his legs. Then he drew a breath in through his nose, closed his eyes, and began to chuckle.

“Come on, then, shoot. I’ve already killed you, so now it’s your turn.” He sounded utterly calm – his voice didn’t so much as quiver.

“I’m not dead yet.”

“I may be the first to die, but you were the first to get killed. Do you know a guy called George Markov? He was a Bulgarian exile who was assassinated with the tip of an umbrella used as a bacterial syringe. He died twenty-four hours after his thigh was injected by the umbrella tip at a railway station. Well, you’ve got a germ called purulent streptococcus in your bloodstream. You’re going to die of septicaemia like Markov did. You’re as good as dead, see. But there’s a way to save you. There’s still time.”

“I don’t believe this talk about germs. I bet that was just Vitamin C you injected me with. If you want to save yourself you’d better come clean.”

“You’re the one who needs to save yourself. Mind you, I can understand why you’re not inclined to trust doctors. We could be friends, you and me. We’re in the same boat.”

“What? You’re saying you want to die too?”

“I just have a vague yearning to die. Just like all the others out there, except you.”

“I have the same yearning, you know.”

“But you’re being impelled by something you can’t control, aren’t you? There’s nothing like that in my case. That’s why I go on living like this. But I’m beginning to change my mind because of you. I’d like you to hang around. Just in case you happen to decide not to die, if nothing else.”

Shinobu tugged at Kita’s sleeve. “What’s this freak going on about?” she said, glaring at the doctor with undisguised disgust.

“Oh well, I’ll just have to kidnap him too,” Kita announced. Shinobu shrieked in horror. She had still been planning on continuing her one-on-one date with Kita. The doctor seemed to concur with Kita’s plan, however, for he held out his heavy Boston bag. Kita put his pistol into it, handed Shinobu the carrier bag containing the caviar, vodka and bread, and together they set off to hail a taxi. The doctor followed a few paces behind, avoiding treading on their shadows.

“Let’s take the taxi straight to my hotel and pick up my rented car,” he said. “After that you can go wherever the fancy takes you.”

They took the doctor’s suggestion, and all three piled into the rented car. The first thing Kita did was accept an injection of the antidote, which brought to a halt the proliferation of the streptococcus in his system.

Kita couldn’t detect any recent physical change. If anything, he felt better than usual. Perhaps that “streptococcus” really had been vitamin C, he thought. They decided to head back to Tokyo. The doctor drove, while Shinobu and Kita sat in the back seat, taking it in turns to doze. They enjoyed a round of Russian-style vodka toasts celebrating the success of the abduction, with the caviar and black bread as side dish. Still, it was a little difficult to decide who was the abductor and who the victim at this point. The TV news had claimed that the kidnapper’s identity was still unknown, and there was much talk of desperate fears for the safety of the victim. What liars the media were!

“What it comes down to, Kita, is that you’ve kidnapped me and a killer.” Shinobu was toying with the pistol, shifting it from hand to hand to feel its weight, in a way that made both the killer and Kita nervous. In this situation, whoever held the pistol got to be the kidnapper. As for the assassin, he could only be seen as having blown it big-time – far from kidnapping the kidnapper, he’d actually saved the life of the man he should have murdered.

“Don’t let that thing off in here,” he said. “The bullet will ricochet and could hit anyone.” He was a cautious man. She only had to start feeling a bit high from the vodka and she could get very trigger-happy, he thought. Even Shinobu, who had no desire to die, could just idly pull the trigger the way she might flip the ‘on’ switch on the karaoke mike. If the bullet hit the driver in the back of the head, the car would crash and in seconds the three of them would be caviar-smeared corpses. She was the last person who should be holding the gun.

Kita felt the same way, and the stress of it kept him awake and alert till dawn. He could feel a pleasant tingling sensation in his thighs. He wouldn’t mind if he dropped dead the next minute right there on the highway, he thought, and with this the tingle grew. The car could burst apart, his guts could be ripped open and his bones pulverized, but it seemed to him he wouldn’t register any pain. The only sensation that would remain would be this tingle in his thighs.

“Go faster!” he ordered, though the speedometer was already registering eighty miles an hour.

“You suddenly remembered an urgent appointment, or something?”

“Do people feel a tingling when they’re about to die?”

“I’ve no idea.” The doctor was concentrating on driving, now ten miles an hour faster. Actually, Kita thought, your whole body feels kind of tingly when you’re driving at high speeds like this. It was the same when you jumped from someplace high. Speed and falling… both were natural associates of death.

Kita had a sudden urge to experiment. He asked Shinobu to press the mouth of the pistol against his temple. The tingle in his thighs responded slightly to the touch of the barrel, warm from Shinobu’s hands.

“Put your finger on the trigger.”

“This is dangerous.”

“Go on, just do it.”

Shinobu’s pale finger slipped through the ring that circled the trigger. The tingling sensation spread from his thighs up his back, then spread slowly to between his legs. This must be the pleasant feeling that accompanies death, he thought. Eureka!

“Dr Killer, you ought to write a paper on this. Do some research on the link between death and tingling.”

“You really feel it that much, huh?”

“You bet I do.”

“You’re bringing me out in a cold sweat,” said Shinobu, slipping the Makarov back into the carrier bag.

Only twenty-four hours remained until the decreed time of Kita’s death.

As they passed the “Tokyo Thirty Miles” sign, Kita recalled the face of Yashiro, the first to have leapt out of the Pandora’s box. Suddenly he was filled with hatred for this man who’d dogged his footsteps this past week, meddled continually, and tried to buy his life. The nausea in his belly wasn’t all due to the caviar and vodka, he thought. Yashiro was also to blame. OK, he decided, he’d follow the yakuza rule. It was payback time.

“Dr Killer, it was Yashiro who sent you after me, wasn’t it? How much did he give you for the job?”

“Five hundred thousand.”

“That’s pretty cheap. If I pay you the same, would you undertake to kill him?”

“OK.”

“And could you make it straightforward, please? No bringing him back to life after you’ve killed him.”

There was a short pause before the doctor spoke. “One must commit sin to atone for sin.”

At this, Shinobu swallowed a yawn and remarked, “Seems to me this guy goes about things in a pretty funny way. He’s a doctor but he kills people. There’s a contradiction here.”

“No, it’s Yashiro who’s full of contradictions. Kita would’ve died just the same if I’d left him alone. But that would make my duty as killer meaningless, see? That’s why I killed you. I fulfilled my duty, then my duty as doctor took over, and I saved you. There’s no contradiction in that. I’ve atoned for my sin.”

“OK. If that’s how you do things, that’s fine by me. But there’s no contradiction in what I’m asking you to do, is there? All I’m asking is that you kill Yashiro.”

“If that is what you wish…”

Kita’s idea was that if Yashiro was dead, he could at least get back to the way he felt last Friday. Right, he decided, for this one day I’m going to live free.

“I might get you to do something for me too,” Shinobu mused. With a wink to Kita, she asked the killer for his cell phone number. Business was suddenly booming for him, it seemed.