Murder in the Crooked House

SCENE 1 The Salon

The detectives left the library and came down to the salon. Eiko was the first to spot them. She addressed the room in her distinctive, perfectly enunciated tones.

“Attention, everyone! Here they are! Our guests from the police have joined us, dinner’s ready so let’s sit down. Tonight we’re going to be treated to the wonderful flavours of the north.”

The meal was as delicious as Eiko had promised. Snow crab, scallops au gratin, salmon sautéed in butter, something called kenchin-style steamed squid—all specialities of the Hokkaido region. Inspector Okuma and Chief Inspector Ushikoshi were both Hokkaido born and raised, but were seeing most of these dishes for the first time. They had a sense that this was traditional Hokkaido fare, but hadn’t the faintest idea where in Hokkaido people might eat food like this every day.

When dinner was over, Eiko got briskly to her feet and strode over to the grand piano in the corner of the salon. The next moment, Chopin’s “Revolutionary Étude” reverberated through the room, almost like a challenge to the blizzard outside. The guests exchanged looks as if to say, What’s going on? And then as one they turned to look in the direction of the piano.

Out of all of Chopin’s works, this intense piece was Eiko’s favourite. If she were to choose something to listen to, there were other pieces that she liked just as well (except for “Chanson de l’adieu”, which for some reason she couldn’t stand), but when she wanted to play, it was his “Revolutionary Étude” or his “Héroïque” that she preferred.

Her fingers struck the keys fiercely, and when this tour de force was over, the enthusiasm of the applause that followed must have rivalled that for Chopin’s own performance of his piece. An encore was begged for. Caught up in the moment, having enjoyed such a delicious meal, the detectives felt they ought to add their polite applause to the crowd.

Eiko turned to her audience and smiled, then began softly to play one of the nocturnes. As she played, she lifted her head and looked outside. The blizzard had grown stronger, the wind had begun to howl and was rattling the large window with the flakes of snow brushing the glass as they fell.

Eiko felt as if everything were a prop especially prepared for her. This snowstorm, these gracious and cultivated guests, even the murder—she felt as if the gods had furnished her with all of these as a tribute to her own beauty. Beautiful people should enjoy the privilege of seeing others grovel in their presence. She felt that even the chairs and the doors should yield to her.

At the end of her second piece, she stood without closing the lid, and after waiting for the applause to die down, she addressed the room.

“It’s a little early to be closing the lid on this keyboard. Who’d like to be next?”

Kumi Aikura felt as if someone had just stabbed her in the stomach. Eiko’s intentions had just become clear to her.

“It shouldn’t be difficult to follow such an amateur performance,” Eiko continued.

Of course, the truth was that Eiko had purposely chosen her best piece, and her performance had been flawless. She pretended to be trying to persuade Sasaki, Togai and others to volunteer to play, but in fact she was steadily stalking a different prey.

It was a terrifying scene. The wolf was casually circling the flock of sheep, waiting to pounce on the petrified lamb. This performance was as impressive as the one that had just finished,

“Oh, here’s someone who surely must be an accomplished pianist!” she cried, as if the thought had just occurred to her. “I’ve always wanted to chance to sit in this salon and listen to someone else play my piano. How about it, Ms Aikura?”

With the howling blizzard as a backdrop, the audience was on tenterhooks to see how this scene would play out.

From the way Kumi Aikura had turned pale and was looking back and forth between Eiko and her sugar daddy, it was clear to everyone that she wasn’t a pianist. When she finally spoke, her voice was barely audible.

“I’m sorry, I don’t play.”

No one had ever heard Kumi sound like this before. Eiko, however, didn’t seem satisfied yet with her victory. She remained standing in front of Kumi.

“This lass is not the type for all that. Always so busy studying she never had time to learn the piano. Forgive her, Ms Hamamoto.”

At last, Kikuoka had come to Kumi’s rescue. She sat looking at the floor in misery.

“Let’s hear some more of your playing, Ms Hamamoto,” called Kikuoka in his raspy walrus voice, and Michio Kanai quickly saw his opportunity to earn himself a few points.

“Ms Hamamoto, your skill on the piano is superb. I would love to hear some more.”

Eiko eventually relented, and returned to the piano to play another piece. Again, with the exception of Kumi Aikura, the audience’s reaction was ecstatic.

When everyone had drunk their tea, the robust-looking policeman that Inspector Okuma had called from the Wakkanai Police Station turned up at the Ice Floe Mansion, a layer of snow adorning his peaked cap. He was introduced to everyone as Constable Anan.

Eiko suggested that Constable Anan and Inspector Okuma spend the night in Room 12. Togai, the current occupant, looked up in surprise.

“Togai, you can move to Room 8 and share with Yoshihiko,” said Eiko.

Togai and Sasaki both wondered why Eiko didn’t put them together in Room 13, which was larger than Room 8. They each privately decided it was because she knew that they were rivals for her affections, and thought it best to keep them apart. She was always so thoughtful! But if that were the case, then surely she should have moved Sasaki to Room 8? Room 13, where he’d spent the previous night, was so much more spacious than Room 12, and would therefore have been much better suited to lodging the two policemen. It must be because Sasaki’s exams were coming up soon. Letting him keep his own room would give him time to study.

Eiko’s decision was in fact somewhat self-serving. She believed in ensuring her suitors were as successful in their careers as possible. In that way she could have the choice of men who in the future would be a doctor or a lawyer or a Tokyo University professor, or at the very least, some kind of famous person.

“Chief Inspector Ushikoshi, Sergeant Ozaki, the room next to Mr Kikuoka’s in the basement is currently unoccupied. Please take that tonight. I’ll have it prepared for you right away.”

“Much obliged.”

Chief Inspector Ushikoshi expressed thanks on behalf of all four officers.

“I don’t suppose you’ve brought any sleepwear?”

“No, we haven’t. But please don’t go to any trouble.”

“We do have several spare sets of pyjamas, but I don’t think we have enough for all four of you.”

“Oh, please don’t worry about anything like that. Compared to the pancake-thin futons we get at the police station, it’ll be heaven.”

“Anyway, we have toothbrushes for everyone.”

Okuma privately thought that this was about the same as a night in prison. Even criminals got a toothbrush.

“So sorry to trouble you.”

“No, not at all. You are keeping us safe, after all.”

“We’ll do our best.”

As he brought his second cup of black coffee to his lips, Kozaburo Hamamoto struck up conversation with Eikichi Kikuoka. Kikuoka’s personal terror of developing diabetes meant that he also took his coffee black and sugar free.

Kikuoka had been staring out of the window as if dumbfounded. The glass was covered in drops of condensation; beyond it snowflakes were whirling like deadly splinters.

Up here in northern Hokkaido, there was at least one night of extreme weather each winter. It was a blessed relief to be inside with the double windows keeping you warm on such a night as this.

“How do you like our blizzards up here in the north?” asked Kozaburo.

“What?… Oh, it’s amazing. I’ve never seen anything like this before, such a powerful storm. It feels as if the whole house is shaking.”

“Does it remind you of anything?”

“What do you mean?”

“Never mind. We’re just a single house in the middle of a huge, empty plain. Someone once said that the constructions of man are just molehills to Mother Nature, powerless against her.”

“Very true, very true.”

“Doesn’t it remind you of the war?”

“Where did that come from?”

“Ah, it just brought back some memories for me, that’s all.”

“The war… there are no good memories… But this is the first time we’ve had a night like this while I’ve been visiting. There was nothing like this back in the summer. It’s like a typhoon.”

“Maybe it’s Ueda’s revenge.”

“What the…? Lay off the jokes, please. Tonight’s going to be hard enough to get to sleep as it is. That noise and all that’s happened… I ought to be tired but all this is stopping me from sleeping.”

At this point, Kanai opened his mouth and said something that was sure to get him a pay cut.

“I wouldn’t be surprised if Ueda’s ghost turned up by your bedside, saying ‘Sir, should I fetch the car?’”

Kikuoka’s face turned red with rage.

“Don’t… Don’t talk such utter crap! You idiot! What are you thinking?”

“Mr Kikuoka?” interrupted Kozaburo.

“What?”

“I’d just like to ask you, do you still have any of those sleeping pills I gave you?”

“Huh? Yes, I’ve got a couple left.”

“All right, then. That’s fine. You’ll take some tonight, then?”

“Yes, I suppose so. You know, I was just thinking it might be a good idea.”

“Right. I can always go and get some more from Sasaki. And I really think you ought to take two. I don’t think a single pill is going to do it on a night like this.”

“Yes, you’re right. Anyway, I think I’d better get to bed as soon as possible. This storm is getting heavy.”

“I think that’s a good idea. For a couple of old men like us. And I think you ought to be very careful to lock up your room—don’t forget your door. After all, they do say there’s a murderer on the loose in the house.”

“You don’t say!”

Kikuoka laughed heartily as if he found it amusing, but it was clear that he was actually quite nervous.

“Hey, you never know. If I were a bloodthirsty killer, I’d be after you, Mr Kikuoka!”

This time Kikuoka positively roared. He was trying to seem amused, but there was sweat visible on his forehead.

At that moment, Chief Inspector Ushikoshi came over to Kozaburo and asked to speak to him for a moment.

“Yes, of course!” replied Kozaburo, still in high spirits.

He glanced over to see the other three police officers huddled together at a corner of the dining table, discussing something in hushed tones.

Seeing Kozaburo turn away to talk to Ushikoshi, Kikuoka decided to talk to Kumi instead.

“Hey, Kumi, does your bed have an electric blanket?”

But his secretary appeared to be in an unusually foul mood.

“Yes.”

She still had the same wide-eyed expression as always, but tonight her catlike eyes were not turned on her sugar daddy. She was sulking about something.

“Didn’t you find… Well… that it wasn’t all it’s cracked up to be?”

“No,” she said curtly. The implication was, And neither are you.

“You know, it’s the first time in my life I’ve slept under an electric blanket. But it wasn’t quite enough. I can’t criticize the heat it gives off but… Was there a duvet in your room too?”

“Yes.”

“Where? I mean, where did you find it?”

“In the wardrobe.”

“What kind of duvet?”

“A down one.”

“In my room there didn’t seem to be anything like that. Guess it’s because it’s not really supposed to be a bedroom. The bed’s so narrow that if you turn over you end up on the floor. The cushions are nothing to complain about though. Have you seen it? Hey? It’s like this chair but with the sitting part pulled way out like this… Well, it’s a sort of couch, I guess, but there’s like a backrest on the end. Odd sort of a thing, really.”

“Oh?”

Kumi’s responses were so brief that even Kikuoka noticed the change in his lover.

“What’s the matter with you?”

“Nothing.”

“Obviously, it’s not nothing. You’re in a really crabby mood.”

“Am I?”

“Yes, you are.”

Anyone observing this exchange would realize that Kikuoka was capable of speaking in a low voice after all.

“Let’s go and talk in my room. I was just about to go to bed anyway. Look, I’ll say goodnight and head downstairs. You wait a bit and then casually follow. We’d better look over my schedule.”

Kikuoka got up. From the far corner of the table, Okuma spotted his move and came over to speak to him.

“Ah, excuse me, Mr Kikuoka, if you’re off to bed, please make sure you lock up your room properly. Don’t forget the door. After all that’s happened, you can’t be too careful.”

SCENE 2 Room 14, Eikichi Kikuoka’s Bedroom

“I can’t take it any more! I want to go home. I told you I didn’t want to come. I can’t put up with it a moment longer.”

Kumi Aikura was sitting on Kikuoka’s lap, pouting.

“What are you talking about? You know that nobody can leave right now. After what happened we’re under house arrest. What on earth is wrong?”

Right now Kikuoka was displaying an expression of utter Zen Buddhist calm, one that none of his employees had ever even glimpsed (except once in 1975 when the company’s gross income had suddenly doubled).

“You know how I feel, don’t you? You’re so mean!”

This scene had repeated itself over the decades and not once had the women’s lines changed. Why did this never go out of fashion?

Kumi lightly punched Kikuoka right where he sported what he believed to be a fine crop of chest hair. This required some level of skill. The punch shouldn’t be too hard or too gentle. Kumi didn’t realize there were genuine tears in her eyes. Tonight had been so incredibly mortifying. Heaven had happened to send her the most effective tool to get what she wanted.

“You are awful!”

She buried her face in her hands.

“I can’t understand what you’re saying if you cry like that. Come on, love, what’s made you so unhappy? Huh? Was it Eiko?”

Kumi nodded, her face dripping tears.

“Poor thing. You’re such a sensitive soul, Kumi. I’m afraid if you’re going to survive in this world, you just have to get used to stuff like that.”

Believe it or not, his words came from the heart.

Kumi nodded again charmingly.

“But you know I really love that about you—you’re so sensitive, it’s cute how naïve you are.”

Kikuoka put his arms around Kumi and hugged her tight—a gesture that he hoped made him seem like her dashing protector—and brought his lips to hers. But if anyone had happened to be watching, the view would have seemed more like a massive bear devouring its prey from the head down.

“Stop it!” said Kumi, pushing his chin away. “I am so not in the mood for that!”

There was an uncomfortable silence.

“I told you I didn’t want to come, and now Ueda’s been killed! And I never imagined there could be such a bitch as that woman. That’s why I wanted you to go alone, Daddy—”

“I told you not to call me Daddy!”

Daddy was angry. If he didn’t put a stop to it right away, one day she might say it in front of an employee.

“I’m sorry.”

Kumi looked crestfallen.

“It’s not that I don’t want to take a lovely trip with you to a snowy place. I was looking forward to going away together so much. But I never imagined I’d meet such a horrible woman. It was such a shock.”

“Ah, that one—she’s not like a woman at all.”

“Right? I’ve never met anyone like her before.”

“But what do you expect? She’s the daughter of the kind of nutty old man who would build a weird place like this just for fun. You know she’s got to be a bit touched in the head. The crazy daughter. If you take everything she says seriously, then you’re going to end up driving yourself mad.”

“But I—”

“Society has rules. They say we’re all equal but there’s still social status. You can fight against it all you like, there’s nothing you can do to change it. And so when somebody bullies you, you can always turn and look over your shoulder, and there’ll be someone standing right behind you, ready to be bullied too, so you just start beating on them. This world is the domain of the powerful. Just keep on bullying those weaker than yourself. That’s why I have my minions, so I can treat them however I want. In this life there’s no pleasure without pain. You can’t let yourself be the loser.”

From Kikuoka’s mouth these words were very convincing.

“It’s common sense.”

“Yes, but—”

“What is it with young people these days? Always questioning everything. It’s all ‘But… But… But…’ They’re all wishy-washy, can’t make a decision. I just don’t get what they’re thinking, all these airhead types. Just be a man! Go for it! God put sheep on this earth to feed the wolves. Unwind, relax, enjoy life by bullying your minions; it builds up your strength. That’s what we pay them for!”

“Be a man? But what about me? Who am I supposed to bully?”

“Well, you could start with that brown-noser, Kanai.”

“He’s got that wife. I’d be too afraid.”

“Afraid? Of Kanai’s wife? What are you on about? If she says anything to you, I’ll get her husband to start drafting his letter of resignation.”

“But when I think that I’ll have to come face to face with Eiko again tomorrow…”

“You can ignore her. Just nod your head and pretend she’s a turnip or something. You’ve seen me. I bow and scrape to Hamamoto, but while I’m doing it I’m thinking ‘What a moron’. He’s valuable to me in my business, so I kowtow to him. That’s the way of the world.”

“I understand. So then, when we leave this place, how about taking a little trip to Sapporo City? If you buy me something nice, I’m sure it’ll put me in a better mood.”

This was rather a leap of logic, but President Kikuoka nodded effusively.

“Let’s do it. Visit Sapporo and get something for my Kumi. Anything you like!”

“Really? Wonderful!”

Kumi put one arm around Kikuoka’s thick neck and gently pressed her lips to his. It seemed she was in the mood after all.

“Well now, Kumi, you are adorable. You and that crazy Eiko are like chalk and cheese.”

“Hey! Don’t compare me to her.”

“You’re right,” he chuckled. “Probably best not to.”

Right then there was a knock at the door. Kumi leapt from Kikuoka’s lap with lightning speed, and Kikuoka grabbed for a patently dull-looking business magazine. Both displayed impressive speed and agility. Right on the third knock, the door burst open with such force that the visitor must have put all their weight behind it.

The door of Room 14 had been fitted with a much more elaborate lock than most of the other rooms in the main building, but despite his being there with his secretary, it wasn’t Kikuoka’s company office, and accordingly he hadn’t locked the door behind him.

Eiko had realized quite a while earlier that Kumi wasn’t in the salon or up in Room 1, and had a very good idea where she might find her. Ms Hamamoto had the strict idea in her head that no one should behave in a morally corrupt manner in her house (she never stopped to consider that technically this was her father’s house).

Therefore as she opened the door, her eyes went straight to the bed. However, its sole occupant was Kikuoka, sitting upright, deeply absorbed in a business magazine. Kumi was standing by the wall, apparently fascinated by a painting of a yacht.

The magazine wasn’t upside-down as such, but Kikuoka couldn’t be finding it easy to read. He’d previously let slip that he couldn’t see any letters close up without his reading glasses, and he didn’t appear to be wearing them right now.

Kikuoka looked up from his magazine as if he had just now noticed Eiko (although it made no sense that he wouldn’t have looked up the moment the door opened).

“Oh, Ms Hamamoto!” he said cordially, giving himself away by being anxious to speak before she did. “We’ve just been sorting out my schedule. Lots of things to do.”

There wasn’t a single document or appointment diary on the table, the company president was busy reading a magazine and his secretary was staring at a painting on the wall. There was no indication that anyone was doing any scheduling.

“I was just stopping by to see if you needed anything,” said Eiko.

“Need anything? Oh, no. How could anyone be dissatisfied with a wonderful room like this? And it’s my second time here.”

“Yes, but some of our guests are here for the first time.”

“What? Oh, I see! This young lady. Oh, don’t worry. I’ve explained everything she needs to know.”

“Have you plenty of hot water?” Eiko asked.

“Hot water? Yes, I believe so.”

“And how was it in Room 1?” she said, turning to Kumi.

“What? Oh, me?”

“There’s no one else here from Room 1.”

“There was hot water.”

“Good. So is your meeting done?”

“It’s over.”

“Then please don’t let me stop you from getting to bed. You can go to sleep anytime—in Room 1.”

Kumi was speechless.

“Kumi, I was just saying, wasn’t I, that you ought to go to bed early… I’m sorry, Ms Hamamoto, she’s afraid of sleeping alone now after that incident. You know how she saw a strange man at her window last night, you can imagine how scared she must be. She’s still so young, so very childlike.”

Kikuoka laughed.

Eiko didn’t appreciate this explanation at all. However young Kumi might be, she was only about the same age as Eiko herself—maybe there was a year between them at most.

“So you needed your father to read you a bedtime story?”

Kumi turned and glared at Eiko. But she was only able to hold it for a few moments before suddenly dashing for the doorway, slipping past the mistress of the house and scurrying off down the corridor, footsteps echoing behind her. Eiko smiled sweetly.

“If she’s got that much energy, then she’ll be fine sleeping alone.”

She left the room, closing the door behind her.

SCENE 3 Room 9, Mr and Mrs Kanai’s Bedroom

“Hey, Hatsue, come and see! The blizzard’s getting heavier, and I think I can just about make out something that looks like an ice floe.”

They’d left behind the busy salon and come up to their quiet room on the north side of the house, but now the sound of the wind and the rattling of the window frame seemed much louder than before. It was a full-on blizzard. And all of a sudden, Michio Kanai’s usual demeanour had changed. He seemed to have developed a backbone.

“Now this is what you call a snowstorm! It’s really desolate. We’ve come all the way to the farthest north point—the Okhotsk Sea. How about that? Face to face with the wildest that Mother Nature can bring. This is awesome. Makes you feel like a real man.”

He continued to peer out of the window.

“The view from this room is great. Doesn’t matter if it’s clear or snowing. I think it’ll be even better tomorrow morning. Can’t wait… Hey, aren’t you going to look?”

His wife had flopped down on the bed and just answered in a tone that said she couldn’t be bothered,

“I don’t want to see.”

“Are you sleepy already?”

Hatsue didn’t reply. It wasn’t that she was especially sleepy.

“I don’t know—that Ueda,” he went on. “Somehow now that he’s been killed I can’t help feeling that he was a decent bloke—you know. When he was alive, I always found him kind of awkward—a bit slow on the uptake…”

Kanai had completely misunderstood the reason for his wife’s depressed mood.

“I’m going to make sure the room’s tightly closed, because there could be a stone-cold killer in this house right now, hiding there in the midst of everyone. This has turned into a right dangerous mess. We wouldn’t have come if we’d known all this was going to happen. But I do think we need to take care. Those detectives kept repeating ‘lock up’ and ‘secure your room’. We should be careful too. Did you lock the door?”

“I just can’t stand that woman. She gets worse every time I see her.”

Hatsue’s comment took her husband completely by surprise. He was struck dumb for a moment, but his expression quickly became irritated. If Eiko had been there in the room, in one evening alone she would have seen a whole variety of faces of Michio Kanai she’d never seen before.

“What now? You’re not starting that again, are you?… Oh! You mean the director’s new squeeze? No one can ever stand his secretaries.”

Hatsue looked amazed.

“I’m not talking about his little piece of arm candy. I’m talking about that bitch, Eiko!”

“Huh?”

“Who does she think she is, calling me fat? She doesn’t have all that great a figure herself. What the hell is her problem?”

“Are you talking about what she said yesterday? Don’t be stupid, that wasn’t what she said at all.”

“That’s exactly what she meant! Didn’t you get it? That’s why everyone calls you a fool. Stand up for yourself. Can’t you see everyone’s laughing at you? They call you the limp celery.”

“What are you talking about?”

“How can you not see it? Acting all moonstruck, going around simpering, Ms Hamamoto, your skill on the piano is superb! I would love to hear some more! Why are you trying to worm your way into the affections of such a child? You’re an executive. Top management. Behave like it! You’re making me ashamed.”

“I am behaving like it.”

“You’re not! The only time you’re not smiling like a fool is when you’re with me. And then you do nothing but find fault. At home you’re always in a foul mood but when you’re out in public, you’re always sucking up to people. Try putting yourself in my shoes. She sees me as the wife of a man like that and that’s why she treats me that way. That’s what’s really happening, isn’t it?”

“That’s just the salaryman’s lot. Sometimes that stuff is unavoidable.”

“It’s not just sometimes. That’s why I’m bringing it up!”

“And who do you think you owe it all to—that you even have the opportunity to complain like this? There are wives all over Japan stuck in public housing, never able to go out anywhere, go travelling. But you can call yourself an executive’s wife now, you’ve got your own house, and a car to drive yourself wherever you want. Who do you owe all that to?”

“Am I supposed to say that I owe it all to your bowing and scraping and fawning over everybody?”

“Exactly!”

“Really, now?”

“Well, how else do you expect me to have got where I am?”

“Have you heard what that old lech, Kikuoka, and his slut secretary call you? It’ll open your eyes.”

“What does the wilting old chrysanthemum call me?”

“He calls you ‘that brown-noser, Kanai’.”

“Everybody says that kind of thing behind people’s backs. It’s not a bad price to pay for a generous annual bonus.”

“But people are bothered by the way you suck up to the old walrus. There’s no way I’d be caught doing that.”

“You think it’s fun for me? The only way I’ve ever been able to stand it is by thinking of my wife and children. I’m doing it with clenched teeth. You should be thanking me. You’ve no right to complain at all. Or perhaps I shouldn’t have brought you? Eh?”

“Oh, no, I wanted to come. I think that I’ve earned the right to visit nice places with you from time to time, to eat good food. Usually you’re the only one who gets to do this fun stuff.”

“Now you think I’m having fun? Don’t contradict yourself! You just said that I’m humouring the old pervert. You can’t just turn it around and say whatever you like. You’ve got a nerve, woman!”

“It’s that Eiko and Kumi who are ruining the whole thing for us. Why did I come? I don’t understand it. Kumi’s a complete airhead. And she treats you like her own employee.”

“Are you kidding? You’re really imagining things now.”

“I’m not imagining anything!”

“She actually has her good points. She has quite a good heart.”

Hatsue’s mouth fell open.

“What did you say?”

“What now?”

“You are absolutely beyond hope. You have no idea how she sees you, do you?”

“And you really do overthink things.”

“Are you saying that I think too much?”

“Yes. You’re too suspicious. You can’t go through life being that way. You’ve got to toughen up.”

“You call sucking up to Kikuoka, and being bossed around by his mistress being tough?”

“I sure do. A weaker man would never be able to kowtow to someone all day long. I’m tough enough to do it.”

“Ugh. I’ve heard enough.”

“I don’t have any respect for the Chrysanthemum. He’s just got a good head on him for making money, and so I’ve plenty to gain by sticking by him. Most of the time I feel like killing him; in fact last night I had a dream where I split his bald head open and a bunch of petals came showering down. It felt really good.”

“What about Kumi?”

“Kumi? She wasn’t in the dream. Only Kikuoka. I told him to get down on his knees and beg for mercy. I laughed as I picked up an axe and cracked his—”

The story was interrupted by a knock at the door.

“Yes?” called Hatsue automatically. Her husband was still lost in the pleasant memories of his dream. But when he pulled himself together and went to open the door, there stood the object of his tale, the man whose head he had cracked open with an axe just the previous night.

Michio Kanai was so thrown off balance that he couldn’t bring himself to speak. Hatsue came to the rescue by immediately adopting a very convincing meek demeanour.

“Oh, good evening, Mr Kikuoka, sir. Please come in. You’ll find that this room has quite a wonderful view.”

“Sounds like the two of you are having a very lively conversation,” said Kikuoka as he came in.

“Er… yes, well… the view from here is really splendid. And it is all thanks to you, sir. I feel incredibly lucky to have the chance to take this break in such a relaxing place. We both do.”

“Yes, yes. Well, there’s no outdoor view from my room—it’s a bit boring to tell the truth. No complaints about the decor though. Is it really coming down out there?”

“Yes, still the same, isn’t it, dear? A major snowstorm.”

“Yes, really. The same as ever. Still a blizzard out there, Mr Kikuoka.”

Kikuoka looked around the room.

“Wow, this is a deluxe room, isn’t it? Such a dramatic view! It’s a little dark now to be able to see it properly, but I imagine the view tomorrow morning’ll be amazing. Makes me wish I could change rooms with you.”

“Oh, would you like us to switch with you?”

“Eh? What? Oh, no, seems old Hamamoto personally chose that other room for me. Think I’ll just pop up here tomorrow morning and take a look.”

“Please do,” said Hatsue. “You’re welcome anytime. It’s kind of dull here with just the two of us. My husband really is the most unsociable type. Not a thing to say for himself.”

“Ho, ho! That’s a bit harsh, isn’t it? Ha! But I suppose it’s true,” said Michio.

“Hang on! Is that drift ice? That white thing in the distance?”

“Where? Ah, yes, sir. You’re quite right. They say that on a fine day you can see as far as Sakhalin from here.”

“I’m just asking about drift ice.”

“Ah, yes, of course. Yes, it’s an ice floe.”

“There are ice floes visible out there. Ms Hamamoto was kind enough to tell us earlier,” added Hatsue.

“I see. Well, I think it’s about time I was getting to bed. It’s not good for the body to stay up late. If I end up with diabetes from partying into the night, then half the fun of life will be over.”

Kikuoka laughed.

“Diabetes?… Oh, you’re joking? Diabetes? But, sir, you’re so young…” Michio Kanai forced himself to laugh. “You think you might get diabetes! Oh, that’s a good one!”

“I’m not joking at all. You ought to be careful too. You get diabetes and you’ll never be able to satisfy your wife again.”

And with another roar of laughter, he punched Michio playfully in the shoulder a few times, and left the room. The executive husband and wife waited to hear his footsteps going down the stairs, and then exchanged a sour look. The reason was that just two weeks earlier sugar had been found in Michio Kanai’s urine. Since then he’d been using a special sweetener for diabetics which was an extremely unpleasant substitute for the real thing. Only someone who had been forced to try it could understand just how unpleasant it was.

“It just makes me want to cry. How come a fat old lecher like him doesn’t get diabetes and a skinny, clean-living man like you ends up a diabetic? He deserves to get it! Then he wouldn’t be able to sleep around so much! Life really isn’t fair.”

“Shut up! Let’s just go to sleep.”

“You can sleep by yourself. I’ll go and sleep in the bath or somewhere.”

“Do what you like!”

“When I think how tomorrow we’re going to have to sit through that irritating cow’s piano recital again, I get too angry to sleep. I don’t know why she can’t just shut the hell up.”

Right then, there was another knock at the door. Hatsue was panting like a wild beast from the effort of spitting out so much invective, but when she saw who was at the door, her voice instantly took on the sweetness of a teenage girl’s.

“Oh, hello, Ms Hamamoto! What can we do for you?”

“I was just doing the rounds of all the rooms to check that there’s nothing you need. I wondered if you had any questions about anything.”

“No, there’s nothing at all we could possibly want,” said Michio. “This is such a wonderful room. And as it’s my second visit, I don’t think there’s anything we need to ask you.”

“Is there enough hot water?”

“Yes, plenty, thank you.”

“I’m glad to hear it. I just wanted to make sure.”

“Thank you so much for inviting us to such a lovely party,” said Hatsue. “And your piano recital was such a treat!”

“Yes, Ms Hamamoto, you’re a truly gifted player. Have you been studying long?”

Michio Kanai’s face wore its usual plastered smile.

“Yes, I suppose it has been a rather long time. I started taking lessons when I was four. But I’m really not a very good player. I’m rather embarrassed that my performance was so poor.”

“Not at all. It was absolutely delightful,” simpered Hatsue. “This husband of mine has nothing interesting about him at all. He’s like a limp stick of celery. Unless we come for a little holiday like this, we never get to do anything fun at all.”

“Hey, Hatsue, that’s not true! But I really hope you’ll play for us again tomorrow, Ms Hamamoto.”

“Yes, please!”

“Ah, I’m so sorry. Tomorrow my father plans to play everybody something from his record collection.”

“You’re so talented, Ms Hamamoto! I wish I’d taken the piano when I was a girl. I was just saying the same thing to my husband.”

“Oh, don’t. You’re embarrassing me. Anyway, if there’s anything I can do for you, anything you need, don’t hesitate to ask Hayakawa and he’ll come and let me know.”

“Thank you. We will.”

“Well, then, be sure to lock up properly. Goodnight.”

“Yes, we will. Thank you for everything. Goodnight!”

SCENE 4 Back in the Salon

Kumi Aikura wasn’t in the mood to be all by herself in Room 1, so instead she made her way back to the salon and hung around there.

Apart from Kikuoka, the Kanais and, of course, Eiko, everyone was still there. And it wasn’t long before the west-side door opened and Eiko returned from her visit to Room 9.

Mr and Mrs Kanai and Kikuoka seemed to be the only ones concerned about getting an early night for their health. Like Kumi, the others seemed more worried about being alone on this stormy night.

The police detectives, on the other hand, didn’t seem too bothered.

“Ahh! I’m getting sleepy,” said Okuma, stretching. “Didn’t get much sleep last night. Work and all.”

And with that excuse, he got to his feet. Eiko noticed and called Chikako Hayakawa to show him to his room.

The Inspector left for Room 12 and Chikako soon returned to the salon. But that was the only change. No one else from the crowd made any move to head off to bed. Mr and Mrs Hayakawa and Kajiwara could hardly leave before the guests, so they took three of the chairs and seated themselves inconspicuously in the doorway between the salon and the kitchen.

The clock turned 10. The salon had no television, so that normally by this time of night it would be deserted. Eiko went over to the stereo and put on Colin Davis conducting The Rite of Spring.

Togai and Yoshihiko were sitting together at the dinner table. Sasaki was opposite, reading one of his medical textbooks.

“Hey, Yoshihiko,” said Togai. “You know the flower bed, was that a design from a catalogue or something that could be ordered?”

“Nah, I don’t think so. Uncle Kozaburo drew the sketch himself, and called in a landscape gardener to do it.”

“So he designed it himself?”

“That’s what I heard. And when they started landscaping it, he was there for the whole thing, giving directions and stuff.”

“Wow.”

“But that’s only what I heard from my cousin, Eiko.”

“What are you two talking about?”

Eiko came over and took the chair next to Yoshihiko.

“That flower bed.”

“Oh, that.”

She didn’t seem very interested in the topic.

“It’s always a big thing when Daddy has the idea for a design. It’s all, ‘fetch me this, get me that’. You know that he’s an artist at heart. He never really wanted to be the president of Hama Diesel. What he really enjoys doing is listening to Wagner while he paints.”

“Does he really demand that people bring him all kinds of things?” asked Togai.

“He’s quite the autocrat, Uncle Kozaburo,” said Yoshihiko.

“It’s because he’s such an artist. Back then he insisted on drawing all his sketches on aluminium foil. He sent me off to Kajiwara to borrow rolls of it.”

“Aluminium foil? That’s what he drew on?”

“So it seems. And after borrowing it, he never gave it back. Kajiwara told me that he needed it for his cooking, so I told Daddy to take what he needed and to give the rest back, that he was wasting it. But he just told me to go and buy more. So I had to go down to the village to stock up.”

“Wow.”

This time Sasaki was the one to react.

Constable Anan carefully placed his cap on the dining table, adjusted his expression and seated himself at the very far corner. He was immediately accosted by Kumi.

“Constable?”

“Yes?”

Anan kept his face rigidly facing forward.

“Constable Anan, isn’t it? That’s rather unusual. Is it a local Hokkaido name?”

Kumi waited for a reply, but none came. She had just given up and decided to go and try the billiard table, when Anan suddenly spoke up.

“My father’s from Hiroshima. My grandmother was from Okinawa.”

“Do you have a girlfriend?”

Kumi seemed determined to make the constable uncomfortable.

“I’m sorry, but I’m unable to answer that kind of question.”

Ignoring his obvious reluctance, Kumi grabbed Anan by the arm and began to pull him from his chair.

“How about a game of billiards?”

“I’m, er… I’m sorry but that’s not possible. I’m afraid I didn’t come here to play billiards.”

But Kumi was not that easily discouraged.

“It’ll be fine. You’ll still be doing your job while you’re playing. You’re supposed to be protecting us, right? Come on, if you haven’t played before I can teach you.”

Chief Inspector Ushikoshi was deep in conversation with Kozaburo Hamamoto, but that didn’t stop him from throwing glances in the direction of the billiard table, where he saw the junior officer start up a game with a young woman.

Eventually Togai and Yoshihiko got up and looked ready to head off to bed. They went over to Kozaburo as if to say goodnight, but for some reason he signalled to them to stay. Then Kozaburo and Ushikoshi both got up, Kozaburo called Eiko over and the five of them headed to the billiard table.

Anan, who by now was enthusiastically potting balls, noticed his boss coming in his direction and quickly stood to attention. Kozaburo smiled and urged him to continue.

Back at the dining table, Sergeant Ozaki was getting bored. He got up, threw a scornful glance towards Constable Anan at the billiard table and whispered in Chief Inspector Ushikoshi’s ear that he was going to retire for the night.

Eiko spotted the interaction and sent Chikako Hayakawa to show the Sergeant to his room. When Chikako returned, she went straight back to her seat next to her husband and the chef.

Kozaburo Hamamoto was in a cheerful mood, enthusiastically demonstrating different shots to the beginner, Anan. Chief Inspector Ushikoshi found himself surprised and impressed by the older man’s skills, but when asked if he’d like to play, he quickly demurred. Like Anan, he had never played before either.

Kozaburo turned next to Eiko and Yoshihiko.

“Constable Anan here seems to have some talent. I’m counting on you two to give him some proper coaching. “Mr Anan, I don’t mind if you’d like to keep playing all night. There are no other houses nearby, and knowing you are here all night staying awake makes me feel safer. I’ll look forward tomorrow to seeing how much improvement you’ve made. And if you’re up to it, I’ll challenge you to a game. But if you come face to face with the killer, please take a break from practising.

“Yoshihiko, Eiko, teach him well. I have a feeling this man has it in him to become quite a player after only one night of practice. And it might be a good idea for you to stay close to a policeman on a night like this one.”

For his part, Ushikoshi hadn’t seen anything in Anan that suggested he might be a billiard genius, so he found Kozaburo’s suggestion rather surprising.

“Now then, Chief Inspector, would you care to visit my room? I think it would be a great chance to get to know each other. I have a rather good bottle of cognac in there. I’m not keeping it to share with some celebrity visitor; I’d much prefer to drink it with someone I can get along with. But more than anything I’m feeling a bit vulnerable tonight, one night after someone was murdered in my house. I think that cognac will taste even better tonight if I’m drinking it with a police officer.”

“I don’t mind if I do.”

Togai, left alone at his side of the table, moved over to sit next to Sasaki. Perhaps he didn’t feel like heading back to his room alone, or maybe he just wanted the companionship.

Kozaburo was about to climb the stairs from the salon, when he suddenly stopped at the first step. He seemed to have changed his mind.

“Chief Inspector, I’d forgotten. There’s something I need to say to Mr Kikuoka. I wonder if he’s already asleep. I’m sorry to bother you, but would you mind coming with me for a moment?”

“No problem.”

The two men crossed back through the salon, and this time headed down the stairs to the basement. They stopped at the door of Room 14.

“If he’s already sleeping I feel bad about waking him…” murmured Kozaburo, knocking gently on Room 14’s door. There was no reply.

“Mr Kikuoka? It’s me, Hamamoto. Are you asleep?” he called softly. The noise of the blizzard echoed faintly in the basement corridor.

“No answer. He must already be asleep.”

Kozaburo tried turning the doorknob, but the door was locked from the inside.

“Let’s go. He’s asleep.”

“Are you sure it’s okay?” asked Ushikoshi.

“It doesn’t matter. It can wait till tomorrow.”

The two men went back upstairs. Kozaburo went to speak to the Hayakawas.

“It’s going to get very cold tonight. Please turn the heat up.”

Then Kozaburo and Ushikoshi climbed the east wing staircase. After a while, the sound of feet crossing the drawbridge mingled with the noise of the blizzard.

Kumi Aikura was not at all happy that Eiko had joined the game of billiards. As soon as Kozaburo left the game, she decided it was time to head up to her own room.

Now the occupants of the salon were down to eight: at the dinner table were Togai, looking at the sketch he had made of the flower bed, and Sasaki, reading a medical textbook. At the billiard table were Eiko, Yoshihiko and Constable Anan; and near the door to the kitchen, Mr and Mrs Hayakawa and Haruo Kajiwara.

SCENE 5 Kozaburo’s Room in the Tower

“This house is so strange and magnificent at the same time. This is another great room.” (See Fig. 6.)

“It’s just right for an old man like me to kill time. I can dabble in my sinful pleasures. I sit here asking myself why I built such a whimsical thing, and suddenly a whole day goes by… But you’re fed up with this place, aren’t you?”

“It’s one surprise after another. They’re never-ending. Hold on, is the floor of this circular room crooked too?”

“Yes, this tower is built to resemble the Leaning Tower of Pisa. My plan started out to build this tower on a slant. The Leaning Tower of Pisa leans at an angle of about 5.5 degrees. This tower was built to lean at the exact same angle.”

“Wow.”

“I’m going to prepare some snacks for us. Could you excuse me a minute?”

“Sure, sure. No problem. Is there a kitchen or something through there?”

“Well, it’s not quite what you’d call a kitchen. There’s a sink and a refrigerator and a stove. Take a look if you’d like.”

“Yes, I would. This is the first time I’ve visited such an unusual building. I’m sure it’ll be useful for reference purposes…”

Kozaburo opened the door to the kitchen area and turned on the light. Ushikoshi peered in.

“Wow. There are so many windows in here too! Do they go all the way around?”

“Yes, this room has nine windows and one door, covering its whole circumference. Four of them are in the kitchen.”

“I see. The view must be excellent.”

“It is a very good view. It’s dark so you can’t see anything right now, but in the morning you can see the sea on one side. You know, you’d be welcome to stay the night here. The early morning view is the best. You won’t miss it if you spend the night. How about it? I was going to admit it to you eventually after a few glasses of brandy but I’m a little scared. I’ve come all the way up here to Hokkaido but I’ve still managed to make an enemy. If there’s a killer hiding away here somewhere, it’d be safe to say he’s likely to have me in his sights next. It’d be reassuring to think that there was a police officer in the same room all night.”

“Fine with me. But is there anywhere for me to sleep? I can only see one bed.”

“Yes, right here, under this…”

Kozaburo reached down under his own bed and pulled something out.

“See, it’s a mini version of my bed. You pull it out like a drawer.”

He took the cushions off one of the sofas and arranged them on the bed.

“Because it needs to slide under the other bed, this one doesn’t have a mattress on it.”

“Ha, another surprise. It’s all very well thought out.”

The two men sat on the sofa and drank Louis XIII cognac. The wind seemed to grow louder, drowning out the sound of the ice clinking in their glasses.

“Couldn’t a strong wind like tonight’s blow over a tower that leans as far as this one?”

Kozaburo chuckled.

“It’ll be fine.”

“And the main building too?”

Kozaburo laughed a little harder.

“Fine, fine!”

“Okay, then, but if this mansion does collapse, at least the hidden killer’ll be trapped underneath it.”

This time Ushikoshi laughed at his own joke.

“And if the killer is out there in the snow, he’s probably frozen solid by now,” added Kozaburo.

“Yes, he would be. He’d probably need a drop of this brandy to warm him up. Is this Louis XIII? I’ve heard people talk about it, but I’ve never even seen it in real life, let alone drunk it. It’s really quite fine.”

“It doesn’t give you a hangover. Anyway, Chief Inspector, can you tell me whether you’ve got a possible suspect in mind for the murder?”

“Ah, so that’s what you want to know, is it? In mind… Someone in mind… Well, I guess I’ll have to confess to you that we don’t. We’re really quite stumped. It’s a bizarre case. I’ve never heard of another murder where a scream was heard a full thirty minutes after the victim was killed.”

“And the corpse appeared to be dancing.”

“That’s right. And the suspect seems to be a non-existent, bearded, swarthy sleepwalker with burn scars on his cheeks. It’s like something out of a horror movie. There’s nothing the police can do here.”

“After murdering a man, he flew through the air and peeped in through a young woman’s bedroom window… May I ask you some questions about that?”

“Yes. I’ll answer to the best of my ability.”

“Why did the murderer take my doll outside, break it into pieces and scatter it in the snow?”

“Um, well, I think that was a kind of smokescreen. At first sight, it seems to have some important meaning, but it was really done just to mislead us. I don’t believe it had any more significance than that.”

“And why was Ueda in that strange position?”

“That wasn’t at all significant. The dead bodies of murder victims often end up like that—in weird contortions from the agony of death.”

“What was that round mark on the floor by the small of Ueda’s back?”

“It got there by chance. While he was writhing in agony, his fingers just happened to touch the floor.”

“The stakes that Sasaki says he saw in the garden, stuck in the snow?”

“Ah, yes, about that… If those stakes had something to do with Mr Ueda’s death, then I’m sure that the killer suffers from some sort of psychosis. When it comes to criminals, especially murderers—and this is something difficult for lay people to understand—they often need to perform some kind of ritual before committing their crime. There are too many examples of this to count. There was once a burglar for whom wearing women’s stockings was some kind of good luck ritual for him. He said that if he left the house with women’s stockings on, then his next break-in would always go well. So that’s what we believe the stakes were about. Some kind of good luck ritual.”

“Hmm. Then who was the man who looked into Ms Aikura’s bedroom—the one with the burn scars on his face?”

“There’s no one fitting that description here in the house or in the neighbourhood, right? Nobody in the village has seen anyone like that either. So obviously—”

“Ms Aikura must have been dreaming. But do you really think so? The scream, the lack of footprints… it’s not a straightforward case at all, is it? And you can’t find any motive at all?”

“That’s really the problem. Trying to narrow down the occupants of this mansion to one suspect, well, no matter how difficult it may be, we will get there eventually. But whoever we pick, it always comes back to motive. Not one of the people in this house had a motive for murder. This is the toughest part of the whole thing for us police. But we have Tokyo Headquarters on the job and I’m confident they’re eventually going to come up with something we couldn’t possibly have found by ourselves.”

“I hope so. If you don’t mind my asking, Mr Ushikoshi, if I may call you that, have you been a detective long?”

“About twenty years.”

“I’ve heard that veteran detectives like yourself tend to have very strong intuition when it comes to spotting a criminal. Is there somebody in this case who you’ve got a hunch about?”

“Unfortunately not. But I think it’s going to turn out to be someone quite unexpected… By the way, do you definitely want me to spend the night here?”

“If you could, that would be great.”

“In that case, I need to inform Ozaki. I’m sure he’ll have left the door to our room unlocked for me. I’d better go and check in with him.”

“No need. I’ll just call someone. If I press this button, a bell rings in the salon and the Hayakawas’ room. Chikako will come and we’ll ask her to let Sergeant Ozaki know. She’ll be here right away.”

Minutes later, Chikako Hayakawa appeared, brushing the snow from her head. Kozaburo asked her to let Sergeant Ozaki in Room 15 know that Ushikoshi would stay the night in the tower, and asked her who was still up. Chikako responded that everyone was still awake.

“Wait about thirty more minutes, then feel free to go to bed,” said Kozaburo.

Ushikoshi glanced at the wall clock and saw it was 10.44 p.m.

A couple of minutes after Chikako had left, Eiko appeared at the door.

“Oh, Eiko! What brings you up here?”

“I’m thinking of going to bed soon. I’m really tired.”

“Ah, I see.”

“I was hoping you’d put the bridge up if Chief Inspector Ushikoshi plans to sleep here. The people in the salon are getting cold.”

“Ah, yes, of course. Who’s still there now?”

“Sasaki and Togai. Yoshihiko’s playing billiards with the policeman. And then there’s the Hayakawas and Kajiwara.”

“Do any of them look ready to go to bed?”

“No, not yet. Sasaki and Togai are watching the billiard game.”

“Has Ms Aikura gone up to her room already, then?”

“Her? A long time ago.”

“Got it. Well, you’d better get some sleep.”

Kozaburo saw his daughter out, closed the door and returned to the sofa. He took a sip of his cognac.

“Ah, the ice has all gone.”

His voice was strangely subdued.

“It’s a brutal night, isn’t it? Let’s put on some music. I only have a cassette tape player up here though.”

On the bedside table there was a desktop-sized stereo.

“My daughter always says she hates this one.”

The piano piece that began to play was a tune that Ushikoshi recognized, but he couldn’t put a name to it. He knew that if it was something familiar even to him, then it must be famous, which of course made him hesitate to ask the title. He really didn’t want to show himself up too much. It wouldn’t be good for the future of the investigation.

“I enjoy operas and symphonies and other more grandiose stuff too, but piano compositions are my favourite type of classical music. How about you, Chief Inspector? Do you like to listen to music? What kind do you like?”

“Ah… I, er…”

Ushikoshi shook his head apologetically.

“I’m not musical at all. Can’t sing, I’m tone-deaf. All Beethoven sounds the same to me.”

“I see…”

Kozaburo sounded a little sad to find that this wasn’t a topic the two men could discuss.

“I’ll go and get some more ice.”

He picked up the ice bucket and went into the kitchen.

Ushikoshi heard the sound of the refrigerator door being opened. Kozaburo hadn’t quite shut the kitchen door behind him and Ushikoshi could see Kozaburo through the opening as he moved backwards and forwards in the kitchen.

“This a real blizzard!” said Kozaburo, raising his voice.

“Sure is!” called Ushikoshi in response. The piano music continued, but the blizzard outside was about the same volume. The door from the kitchen opened and Kozaburo reappeared with a full ice bucket. He sat on the bed and dropped some cubes into Ushikoshi’s glass.

“Thank you,” said Ushikoshi, studying Kozaburo’s face. “Is something the matter? You don’t seem very well.”

Kozaburo smiled a little.

“I’m not very good on stormy nights… Anyway, let’s keep drinking until we’ve used up all the ice. Are you up to keeping me company?”

As Kozaburo spoke, the antique wall clock struck eleven.

SCENE 6 The Salon

It was some while later that Kozaburo realized that he’d forgotten about the drawbridge. He and Ushikoshi hurried out into the snowstorm and pulled the chain that raised the bridge, becoming so chilled in the process that it took several more drinks to warm them up again. It was just after midnight by the time the two men got to sleep.

The next morning, in anticipation of the view from the tower, they woke up well before 8. The wind had completely dropped and the sky was no longer full of swirling snowflakes. However, there was no blue sky to be seen; the drift ice sat on a desolate sea under a gloomy sky. There was just one brighter, white cloud over to the east, concealing the morning sun.

But for those used to living in a northern climate, this view was as impressive as any other. It looked as if someone had taken a vast white sheet and placed it on top of the sea, hiding the water completely. How much labour would that have taken to achieve? To Mother Nature it was a breeze.

They lowered the drawbridge. As they were crossing, Ushikoshi noticed a vertical line of metal rungs embedded in the main building wall ahead of them. He guessed it was a kind of ladder for use by someone needing to climb up to the roof of the building.

They arrived in the salon just after 9.00 a.m. Perhaps because most people had stayed up so late the previous night, the only person already awake was Michio Kanai. He was sitting alone at the dining table. The three house-staff members seemed to be in the kitchen, but the rest of the guests must still have been asleep.

The three men greeted each other, and Kanai went back to the newspaper he’d been reading, while Kozaburo went over to the fireplace and took a seat in his favourite rocking chair. Ushikoshi also sat down in a nearby chair.

The firewood burned and the smoke was sucked up by the massive funnel of a chimney. The glass of the windows was all fogged up. It was a perfectly normal morning in the Ice Floe Mansion.

Nevertheless, Chief Inspector Ushikoshi had an uncomfortable feeling. And he soon realized why. Because Sergeant Ozaki and Inspector Okuma had not got up yet. He’d just begun to wonder about this when the salon door burst open and Ozaki and Okuma themselves hurried in.

“I’m sorry, I was a bit tired.” said Ozaki. “Is there anything to report?” he continued, pulling up a chair to the dining table. Ushikoshi got up from his chair by the fire and went over to the table.

“So far so good. But it’s still early yet. Nothing to report.”

“S’pose not.” Okuma sounded half asleep still.

“I’m sorry, sir, I couldn’t get to sleep with the noise of the wind,” said Ozaki.

“What happened to Anan?”

“He was playing all night, so I don’t expect he’ll be getting up any time soon,” said Okuma.

The next to come down was Hatsue Kanai, then Eiko, followed closely by Kumi Aikura. But more than an hour later the rest of the party still hadn’t shown up.

Everyone was drinking hot tea as they waited.

“What shall we do? Should I go and wake them?” Eiko asked Kozaburo.

“No, let them sleep.”

Just then there was the sound of a car coming up the hill, followed by a young man’s voice calling from the front entrance hall.

“Excuse me? Hello?”

“Just a minute!”

Eiko went out to see who was there. A moment later she let out a shriek that had the three police officers start after her, but she immediately reappeared with an enormous bunch of irises.

“Did you order these, Dad?”

“I did. Winter is so dreary without any flowers. I had them flown in.”

“Dad, you’re the best!”

Behind her was the sound of the car going back down the hill. Eiko laid the irises gently on the table.

“You and Chikako divide them up and put some in here and everyone’s rooms. There should be a vase in every room. If there isn’t, I know we’ve got a few extra around somewhere. I know we have enough.”

“Thank you, Daddy. Let’s do it right away. Auntie! Auntie!”

The guests volunteered to go and fetch the vases from each of their rooms. Right about the time the flowers had been divided up, Sasaki and Togai finally appeared, but went right back out again to fetch the vases from their rooms.

At that point it was almost 11.00 a.m. Eiko took some of the flowers and went to wake Yoshihiko. That was when Constable Anan finally turned up.

At 11.50 a.m. everyone was assembled in the salon except Eikichi Kikuoka. No one had considered disturbing a company president from his sleep. But now that they thought about it, it was strange that he wasn’t already up. He’d gone to bed early the night before. It had been around 9 o’clock when he’d left the salon. He’d stopped by the Kanais’ room after that, but he must have been back in his own room by 9.30. For him to still be asleep past 11 the next morning…

“Strange…” mumbled Kanai. “Perhaps he’s not feeling well?”

“Should we go and check on him?” said Kumi. “But then again he might be in a bad mood if we wake him up.”

“I hope he hasn’t been—” said Okuma, stopping himself. “I reckon it’s safer if we do wake him up.”

“All right, then, let’s take him some flowers,” said Kozaburo. “Eiko, pass me that vase.”

“But this one belongs in the salon.”

“It doesn’t matter. This room’ll be just fine without flowers… Thanks. Shall we all go and check on him?”

Everyone made their way down to Room 14 in the basement. Kozaburo knocked on the door.

“Mr Kikuoka? It’s Hamamoto.”

Chief Inspector Ushikoshi had an attack of déjà vu. Last night he had participated in the exact same scene, except that at that time Kozaburo had called his name with less urgency.

“He’s not waking up.” Kozaburo turned to Kumi. “You try, dear. He might respond better to a woman’s voice.”

But the result was the same. Everyone exchanged looks, but Ushikoshi’s face turned completely white.

“Mr Kikuoka! Mr Kikuoka!”

He began to bang violently on the door.

“What the hell? Come on!”

The detective’s panicked tone made everyone’s stomach drop.

“Can I break it down?”

“Yes, but…”

Kozaburo hesitated a moment. This was his beloved study after all.

“From up there, can’t you see inside a little bit?”

Sasaki was pointing to the ventilation hole high up in the wall. But there weren’t any tables or chairs or anything that could be used to stand on.

“Ozaki, wasn’t there something in your room?” said Ushikoshi, but Ozaki was ahead of him. He ran into Room 15 and came back with the bedside table, then placed it directly under the vent and clambered up.

“It’s no good. I’m too low to see anything.”

“The stepladder!” shouted Kozaburo. “Kajiwara, isn’t there a ladder in the outside shed? Run and get it!”

Time crawled by as they waited for Kajiwara to get back with the ladder. When he did, he set it up and climbed to the top.

“What the…”

“Is he dead?”

“Has he been killed?”

The police officers were anxious for news.

“No. Mr Kikuoka isn’t in his bed. But there’s something on the bed that looks like blood.”

“What? Where is he?”

“I can’t see. Not from here. I can only see the area around the bed.”

“Let’s break it down.”

Ushikoshi was not going to wait for permission this time. He and Okuma threw themselves against the door.

“I don’t mind, but this door is particularly sturdy. And the lock is custom-made. It’s not going to break that easily. And I’m afraid there isn’t a duplicate key.”

What Kozaburo said seemed to be true. Even with Constable Anan joining the other two, the weight of three men slamming against it, the door didn’t budge.

“The axe!” shouted Kozaburo. “Kajiwara, go back to the shed. There’s an axe in there, right?”

Kajiwara shot off.

When he returned with the axe, Anan told everyone to get out of the way, and held them back with outstretched arms. Okuma lifted the axe. It was clear to everyone that this was not the first time this man had chopped wood. Soon woodchips and splinters were flying, and a crack opened in the door.

“No, not that spot. It won’t work.”

Kozaburo stepped forward from the group of onlookers.

“Here, here and here. Hit it in those three spots.”

Kozaburo indicated spots at the top, bottom and the very middle of the door. Okuma looked dubious.

“You’ll see when you break it.”

Okuma managed to make three holes, then tried to stick his hand inside. Ushikoshi pulled out a white handkerchief and offered it to Okuma, who wrapped it around his hand.

“Near the top and the bottom of the door are two bolts that you have to turn to lock or release. Reach in and turn them. The upper bolt will swing downwards. The lower one will lift upwards.”

Because it was so hard to picture, the instructions were difficult to follow, and it took Okuma a long time.

When the bolts were finally undone, the police officers all tried to rush in at once, but the door hit something and got stuck. Ozaki pushed on it with all his strength, and it opened far enough to reveal something that looked like a sofa stuck behind the door. Weirdly, it was the base of the sofa that was visible from the outside—in other words, it had been tipped over on its back. Ozaki stuck a leg through the gap and tried to kick it away.

“Don’t be so rough!” said Ushikoshi. “You’ll disturb the crime scene. Just get the door open.”

When the door finally opened, the semicircle of onlookers gasped. It wasn’t only the sofa; the coffee table was overturned too. Beyond that lay the bulky, pyjama-clad form of Eikichi Kikuoka. There were clear signs that he’d fought, but now he lay face down, a knife protruding from the right side of his back.

“Mr Kikuoka!” cried Kozaburo.

“Mr President!” This from Kanai.

“Daddy!” blurted Kumi.

The police officers all hurried in.

“Damn it!”

The voice came from directly behind them. As Ozaki turned to look there was a smashing noise, and the flower vase was suddenly in pieces on the floor.

“Damn, damn! I’m sorry.”

Kozaburo had attempted to follow the police into the room and had tripped on the upturned sofa.

The irises lay scattered over Kikuoka’s ample body.

“I’m really terribly sorry. Shall I pick them up?”

“Never mind. It’s fine. We’ll do it. Please stay back. Ozaki, pick up the flowers.”

Ushikoshi surveyed the crime scene. (See Fig. 7.) There was a lot of blood—a little on the bed sheets, some more on the electric blanket that had slipped off and was now on the floor, and much more on the Persian rug that decorated the parquet floor.

The bed was bolted to the floor so it hadn’t moved from its original spot. The only furniture that had been moved was the sofa and the coffee table, and both of these had been tipped on their side. At first glance there didn’t seem to be anything else out of place or broken. There was a gas fire in the fireplace, but it wasn’t on, and the stopcock was closed.

Ushikoshi examined the knife in Kikuoka’s back. Two things surprised him; first, that the knife was stuck very deeply in, right up to the handle. It must have been plunged in there with all the killer’s might. But more surprising was that the knife was identical to the one that had killed Ueda—a hunting knife with a piece of white string tied to the handle. The victim’s pyjamas were soaked in blood, but the string was completely clean.

The knife was in the right side of Kikuoka’s back so it had missed his heart.

“He’s dead,” said Ozaki.

This meant that he must have died of blood loss. Ushikoshi looked back at the door.

“That’s impossible!”

The words had slipped out. But how could it be?…

It was the most solid door he had ever seen. Looking at it now from the inside, he realized that it had been made as sturdy as anyone could wish. The door itself was made of thick oak, and its lock was completely different from the simple one on Ueda’s door. There were three separate locking systems. It was as well constructed as a vault.

The first lock was a button in the centre of the doorknob that you pushed in, the same type as on all the doors in the mansion. The other two were quite a tour de force. On the upper section and lower sections of the door, there were two bolts installed, with metal cylinders that were at least three centimetres in diameter. Each one required turning 180 degrees until they dropped into place. No matter how adept somebody might be, there was no way the locks could be manipulated from outside the room. And the door frame was just as sturdily constructed—there was not a millimetre of space on any side.

Ushikoshi couldn’t comprehend how the room had got in such disorder and a knife had been plunged into the victim’s back. However, he decided to feign complete calm.

“Ozaki, please escort everyone to the salon. Anan, call the station.”

“What to do about these pieces of vase?” asked Okuma.

“Just pick them up and chuck ’em away.”

Along with my own reputation, thought Ushikoshi morosely.

Another team of around a dozen police officers swarmed up the hill, and the mansion became a hive of activity again. Ushikoshi felt steadily more defeated by the moment. What kind of bloodthirsty monster was responsible for this? Four police officers had spent the night in the house. Could the killer not have shown some restraint? Why did he have to escalate to serial murder? And why the locked-room scenario? It wasn’t as if either of the deaths could have been suicide. You’d have to be crazy to think it. In Kikuoka’s case the knife was in his back, no less!

He’d been publicly humiliated. And this wasn’t going to be easily forgiven. He’d completely miscalculated, made wrong assumptions. As a police officer he shouldn’t have dismissed the possibility that it would turn into a serial murder. He was going to have to start over from the beginning.

That evening he got the time of death from forensics—11 p.m. or within thirty minutes either side.

“Let’s get on with the questioning.”

Ushikoshi addressed the surviving guests, hosts and house staff in the salon.

“Last night between 10.30 and 11.30, what was each of you doing, and where?”

Instantly, Sasaki spoke up.

“We were still in the salon. That police officer was with us.”

“Who is ‘we’?”

“Togai and me. And Yoshihiko. And then Mr and Mrs Hayakawa and Mr Kajiwara. Six of us.”

“I see. Until what time?”

“Past 2 in the morning. I looked at the clock and saw it was already 2 a.m., so we all hurried off to bed.”

“All six of you?”

“No.”

It was Chikako Hayakawa who spoke.

“Actually, we went to bed around 11.30.”

“‘We’ being you and your husband?”

“And me too,” said Kajiwara.

“So you are saying that all three of you passed by the door of Room 14 around 11.30 last night?”

“No. We don’t go that way. After you go down the stairs, you turn the opposite way to get to our rooms.”

“Hmm. And you didn’t notice any strange noises or figures in the vicinity of Room 14?”

“Well, the wind was so loud.”

“True…”

Ushikoshi decided that it was a close call, but timewise, he could probably exclude the three staff members from the list of suspects. However, it was very significant that three people had passed close by the door of Room 14 around 11.30. The killer must have already done the deed and left by then.

“So the other three of you were in the salon until 2 a.m.?”

“That’s correct. With Constable Anan.”

“Anan, is that right?”

“Yes, it is.”

So Sasaki, Togai and Yoshihiko could safely be excluded too. Kozaburo Hamamoto had spent the evening with Ushikoshi himself, so he could be counted out completely.

“Mr Hayakawa, did you lock up completely last night?”

“I did it around 5 yesterday evening. After the first murder, figured we couldn’t be too careful.”

“Hmm.”

That confirmed that somewhere in this house was a homicidal maniac. In other words, the killer was sitting there right before his eyes, one of these eleven people. He’d already ruled out seven of them. That left Eiko Hamamoto, Kumi Aikura, and Michio and Hatsue Kanai. Four suspects, and most of them women!

“Ms Eiko Hamamoto and Ms Kumi Aikura, where were you?”

“I was in my room.”

“Me too.”

“In other words, neither of you has an alibi?”

The two women turned a little pale.

“But…”

Kumi seemed to be working something out in her head.

“To get from Room 1 to Room 14, you’d have to go through the salon. The police constable and the others were all in there.”

“That’s right. That goes for me too. There’s absolutely no way to get to Room 14. That room is in the basement, and has no windows. Even if we’d taken an outdoor route, there’s no way in.”

“I see.”

“Just a… Hang on there!”

Michio Kanai was in a state of panic.

“Does that mean that we’re suspects? I was in Room 9 the whole time. My wife can attest to it!”

“Well, in the case of a husband and wife—”

“No, no… Listen! I’m the one most affected by this murder. And therefore my wife too. Mr Kikuoka’s death is the severest blow to us both. I hate to put it this way, but I’m going to have to say it. At the company, I’ve always been a Kikuoka supporter, among all the company factions. I’ve been his follower, if you like, for fifteen years or so. It’s been thanks to Mr Kikuoka that I’ve got where I am. You can investigate me all you like. Go ahead! But my future without the president is bleak. I can’t even imagine what it’ll be like for me tomorrow now. There was no reason for me to kill him. I have no motive whatsoever. In fact if anyone had tried to kill Mr Kikuoka, I would have had to do everything I could to protect him. For my own sake. There’s no way I could have killed him. Apart from anything, look at me! I’m a wimp. Do you see this feeble body winning a face-off against that man? It wasn’t me. No way. And for all the exact same reasons, it wasn’t my wife either.”

Ushikoshi sighed. This man was quite a talker when cornered. That said, what Kanai claimed was most probably true. And therefore, yet again, there were no suspects. It was incredibly frustrating.

“Mr Hamamoto, would you mind letting us use your library again? We need to have another meeting.”

“Oh, of course. You’re most welcome to use it.”

“Thank you. Come on!”

Ushikoshi hurried his men out of the salon.

SCENE 7 The Library

“Never known anything like this damned case!” said Inspector Okuma. “What the heck is going on? Has the cause of death been confirmed yet?”

“Yes, it has,” said Sergeant Ozaki. “Forensics says it was the knife in his back. They detected some sleep medication in his system too, but nothing like a lethal dose.”

“What is going on in this cursed house?”

“They’ve gone over Room 14 but they haven’t been able to find anything. No hidden doors, secret cabinets, nothing like that. Same as Room 10.”

“What about the ceiling?” asked Ushikoshi.

“Same goes for that too. Just an ordinary ceiling. If we looked inside the walls and above the ceiling, we might find something, but we don’t need to go that far just yet. There’s plenty else they need to do first.”

Okuma decided to throw in his two pence worth.

“I reckon they need to check that ceiling out more carefully. It’s that string. Why was it attached to the knife? Everyone in this house besides the Kanai couple has an alibi for around 11 p.m. But the Kanais have no motive. If the killer is one of the people who slept in this house last night, it’s starting to get a bit like a murder mystery novel. Someone planned this trick ahead of time, so that right around 11 o’clock a knife would plunge itself into Kikuoka’s back. That’s the only explanation. Don’t you agree?”

“Hmm. I suppose we have to agree that that is a possibility,” said Ushikoshi.

“Right, eh? And so if you think that, the ceiling’s gotta be fishy. Because of that string. What if they hung the knife from the ceiling so that it fell onto the bed at 11 o’clock?”

“But we’ve checked the ceiling,” said Ozaki. “It’s made of perfectly normal boards. We’ve knocked all over every inch of it, and there are no gaps, no places where it’s been disturbed. No sign of any kind of trick. And besides, as for that theory… Well, I can I think of at least two reasons why it would be impossible. The first is the height of the ceiling. That knife was buried in Kikuoka’s back right up to the hilt. If it had been hanging from the ceiling and then dropped, there is no way it would have gone in so deeply. In fact it’s not even clear that it would have inflicted a wound at all. A knife dropping from ceiling height might have been painful, but probably no more than a bee sting. It would have just barely touched him and then fallen sideways.

“Then could the killer have dropped it from a higher place? Well, you were sleeping in the room above, Inspector Okuma. To have a knife pierce so deeply, it would have to be dropped from at least one more storey up. But then we still don’t know whether it would have gone in so far. But at the very least the fact remains that the killer couldn’t have dropped it from inside Room 14. He would at least have to have dropped it from above the floor of Room 12.”

“Huh? Yes, I guess you’re right.”

“The other reason it wouldn’t work is the blanket,” Ozaki continued. “The knife would have had to pierce him through an electric blanket. And then it wouldn’t have been in his back. It would have been in his chest.”

“But what if he slept on his stomach?”

“Yes, he might.”

“I know that this is too simple, but it’s all I can come up with… Somewhere in this house there is one more person, someone that none of us has seen. That’s all it could be. No matter how you look at it, not one of those eleven people could be considered a suspect.”

“But is that possible?” asked Ushikoshi. “We’ve already searched that spare room where no one’s staying. Surely no one’s harbouring a killer in their room?”

“Well, we can’t really say.”

“Hmm. For now, while we have them all gathered here, we should perform a thorough search of all the rooms in the house. But I don’t—”

“No, I reckon you’re right,” said Okuma. “Likely a house like this has some secret space that a person could hide in. I say we should focus on that. That could be how it’s being done. In a weird messed-up place like this, I’ll wager you there’s some trick built in.”

“So what you’re saying,” Ozaki interjected, “is that we have to consider that the owners of this place—in other words, Kozaburo Hamamoto and his daughter, Eiko—must have been in on the plan. But when we consider motive, the Hamamotos, together with Sasaki and Togai, have to be excluded off the bat. They had no connection at all with Kazuya Ueda. And obviously Eikichi Kikuoka is counted out now.

“According to the data when we were researching Ueda, Kozaburo Hamamoto and Eikichi Kikuoka don’t go back all that far. They weren’t childhood buddies or anything like that. They met when they each became presidents of their respective companies. It was through work that their relationship began, specifically when Kikuoka Bearings had dealings with Hama Diesel.

“That all began fourteen or fifteen years ago, but it doesn’t seem that the two men were ever particularly close. Their companies didn’t seem to have any friction in their dealings either. Hamamoto and Kikuoka have met fewer than ten times in their lives. Kikuoka had only become Hamamoto’s house guest very recently—only since Hamamoto built this holiday home. It certainly doesn’t seem that they had the kind of relationship that might lead to murder.”

“And they’re not from the same part of Japan?”

“No, completely different. Hamamoto’s from Tokyo, Kikuoka from the Kansai region. All of their employees told the Tokyo police that until their companies became successful, the two men had never met.”

“Eiko had never met Kikuoka either, I assume?”

“Definitely not. Before this visit, Eiko had only ever met Kikuoka last summer when he came to stay.”

“Hmm.”

“Others have confirmed that Kikuoka only visited this house on those two occasions. Sasaki, Togai, Yoshihiko Hamamoto and Haruo Kajiwara—they all say the same thing, that this was the second time they had met Kikuoka. However you look at it, there really wasn’t enough time for any kind of feud to have developed between them and Eikichi Kikuoka.”

“Yes, common sense would suggest that all the people you’ve named should be excluded as suspects.”

“Yes, as far as motive is concerned.”

“And yet, in all the cases we’ve ever handled, there has never been such thing as a motiveless crime, except for those committed by some sort of pervert or psychopath,” Ushikoshi pointed out.

“That’s right.”

“Grudges, theft, jealousy, sudden rage, sexual urges, money… all kinds of petty reasons like these.”

“And of the names you didn’t mention, there’s the secretary and the protégé and his wife. But there’s also the housekeeper couple, the Hayakawas. How about them?” asked Ushikoshi hopefully.

“Until yesterday we knew nothing about them, but now we’ve found something. We received new information today. Tokyo HQ told us that Mr and Mrs Hayakawa had a daughter around twenty. That daughter met Kikuoka here when he was visiting last summer.”

“Aha!”

Immediately, Ushikoshi and Okuma’s eyes lit up.

“On the curvy side, fair-skinned and rather attractive according to reports. I don’t have access to a photo of her though. If you’d like one I think we can ask the Hayakawas.”

“Got it. And then?”

“The daughter used to work at a bar called Himiko in Asakusabashi in Taito Ward, Tokyo. In August of this year, she came up here for a visit. Kikuoka probably showed an interest in her—apparently, he was an infamous womanizer. Everyone says that about him.”

“Was Kikuoka still single?”

“Far from it. He has a wife and two children—a high school-aged son and a daughter in middle school.”

“Really? He had plenty of energy, then, that one.”

“Kikuoka, although he seemed an open-minded, generous type, also had a rather underhand side to him. It seems that if anyone ever showed him ingratitude at work, he would seem to laugh it off, but later he’d always be sure to get his revenge.”

“Again, the hard life of the lowly employee.”

“With Yoshie, the Hayakawas’ daughter, the same kind of thing happened. Here in front of her parents he didn’t show even a hint of interest, but when he got back to Tokyo, seems he kept showing up at her bar.

“Himiko is one of those places that young people like to hang out. Kind of modern but not too expensive. There are just two people working there—the mama-san and Yoshie. So it was this kind of place that the president of Kikuoka Bearings began to turn up at daily. Was a bit awkward, really.”

“Old lechers with money and status are the worst.”

“That one believed deeply in spending money on women, they say.”

“Quite a philosophy.”

“So it seems. He was kind of a reckless spender. That relationship with Yoshie went on for quite some time, until Kikuoka suddenly stopped coming to the bar.”

“Hmm.”

“By the way, according to the mama-san of Himiko, he’d promised to buy Yoshie an apartment and a sports car but he never did. She was pretty pissed off with him.”

“Very interesting.”

“The mama-san says that Yoshie used to get excited about all the presents he was going to buy her, and so after he disappeared she got very depressed. Anyway, Yoshie got dumped, and her phone calls to Kikuoka were never answered. If she ever did manage to get a hold of him, he claimed that he had never made her any promises.”

“So what did she do?”

“She attempted suicide.”

“What? She died?”

“No. She didn’t succeed. She took sleeping pills, but she was found and had her stomach pumped. I think there was a strong element of revenge against Kikuoka in it. And, according to the mama-san, she probably felt ashamed of having talked about everything so openly too.”

“Well, you could say they’re both at fault in their own way, I suppose. And how are things now?”

“She had recovered quite well, and was getting out and about again, but then at the beginning of last month she was killed in a traffic accident.”

“So she did die!”

“It really was just a traffic accident and had absolutely nothing to do with Eikichi Kikuoka, but the Hayakawas blame Kikuoka for it. They say he killed her.”

“Well, they would… She was their only child… And does Mr Hamamoto know about all this?”

“I’m pretty sure he does. Well, he must know that the Hayakawas’ only daughter died in a traffic accident, surely.”

“So, Kikuoka just nonchalantly decides to turn up at the house where Kohei and Chikako Hayakawa live?”

“He was personally invited by the esteemed president of Hama Diesel. He couldn’t refuse.”

“How terribly unfortunate for him!” said Ushikoshi with heavy sarcasm. “I get it. Kohei and Chikako Hayakawa had a motive for murdering Eikichi Kikuoka. Yesterday they kept it quiet, didn’t they? But what about Ueda?”

“Now that’s still as strange as ever. The Hayakawas had absolutely no reason to kill Kazuya Ueda. The only contact they ever had with him was the couple of times he came to the house.”

“Hmm. So they had a motive to kill Kikuoka, but none to kill Ueda. That is strange… And to make matters worse, the only two people with a motive to kill Kikuoka have an ironclad alibi.

“Well, never mind that for now. How about the next married couple? Is there any news about a possible motive for Michio and Hatsue Kanai to kill Kikuoka?”

“Actually there is. And it’s straight out of a gossip magazine.”

“Oh?”

“It seems to be true that Michio Kanai was a huge supporter and member of Kikuoka’s faction at work. He’s been sucking up to Kikuoka for just shy of the past twenty years. And it worked. He’s really come up in the world. It’s all exactly as Kanai said himself in his big speech just now. Everything’s pretty much confirmed to be true. The problem is his wife.”

“The wife?…”

Ozaki was enjoying leaving the others hanging on his words. He paused to take a cigarette and light it.

“It was Kikuoka who set Kanai up with Hatsue around twenty years ago. But before that, Hatsue Kanai used to be Kikuoka’s lover.”

“Again!”

“The playboy!” said Okuma, with a hint of grudging admiration.

“He’s just that type, I guess.”

“I take my hat off to him,” added Ushikoshi, rather sarcastically. “Well, did Kanai have any idea about this?”

“That’s still unclear. On the surface it seems that he knew nothing, but he might have had his suspicions.”

“But even if he did suspect something, would that be a strong enough reason to murder someone?”

“Difficult to say for sure, but probably not. As far as Kanai is concerned, losing his employer means he’s nothing any more. Company Executive Kanai only existed because of President Kikuoka. So I’m saying that even if Kanai had realized about his wife’s past with Kikuoka, it was something that happened a long time ago. If he’d ever attacked Kikuoka, it’d be fair to say he’d lose everything.

“If for some reason, he had been desperate to kill him, if there had been something festering in him that was forcing him to do it, how would he have gone about it? Well, it would be more sensible for him to have got in first with members of the opposing faction or factions at the company. He’d need to protect his position after the death of his patron. But there’s no evidence at all that he did anything like that.”

“So he was Kikuoka’s bootlicker right to the end?”

“Seems so.”

“I see.”

“To me it makes no sense to think of Kanai having a motive to kill Kikuoka.”

“How about his wife?”

“Ah, the wife… I don’t think she could have done something like that.”

“How about Kanai’s relationship with Ueda?”

“Just as we discovered from the earlier investigation, there was no particular relationship between the two. As for motive, I think it’s impossible to find one.”

“Then let’s take a look at Kumi Aikura.”

“It’s no secret at the company that she was Kikuoka’s lover. But as far as Kumi’s concerned, she relied on his being there… It really wouldn’t be a great idea to kill him. Even if she had some kind of motive that we don’t know about, it would make sense to squeeze as much out of him as she possibly could for now, then pick the moment right when he was about to leave her. But at the time he was murdered, Kikuoka was still totally infatuated with her.”

“So this thing with Yoshie Hayakawa, he was two-timing her with Kumi?”

“Yeah. It looks like it.”

“Nice behaviour.”

“What a charmer!”

“And yet, let’s imagine there were some particular circumstances that we don’t know about, and Kumi managed to get herself hired as Kikuoka’s secretary with the sole purpose of murdering him?”

“I don’t think it’s possible. She’s from Akita Prefecture. Growing up, neither she nor her parents ever left the area. Kikuoka never visited Akita in his life.”

“Huh. Got it. To sum up, the only people with a motive to kill Kikuoka seem to be Mr and Mrs Hayakawa. And there is absolutely no one with a motive to kill Kazuya Ueda. That’s it? And on top of that, we have another one of those cursed locked-room mysteries. Inspector Okuma, what’s your opinion of all this?”

“I’ve never seen anything like it. This case is downright bonkers. Some dirty old man gets murdered in a locked room with no way of it being done from the outside, and there’s no goddamn suspects with any motive. And the only ones who might have done it were in the salon with one of our officers at the very time!

“I reckon there’s only one thing for it—we’ll have to rip out all the wall and ceiling boards in Room 14. May be some sort of secret passageway behind them. That fireplace is fishy if you ask me. I’ll bet you’ll find a secret passage back there. Follow the passageway and there’ll be a secret room, and that’ll be where you’ll find the twelfth person in this case—a little person or a dwarf or something—someone who’s been hiding very quietly this whole time… I’m not kidding. This has to be it. If he was a little person he could hide in narrow spaces—you know—and move around through secret passageways.”

“That fireplace is just decorative. You can’t light a real fire in there. There’s just a gas heater in it. So there’s no chimney or flue, no open hole above it. We’ve knocked on all the boards around it, we’ve tried all the seams and joints—there doesn’t seem to be anything suspicious at all about it.”

“So tell me what you’re thinking, Chief Inspector,” said Okuma.

Ushikoshi just gave his customary “Hmm…” He turned to his junior officer.

“Ozaki? What about you?”

“I think we have to look at everything logically.”

“I totally agree.”

“There have been two murders, in two separate locked rooms. Or to put it another way, the suspect set up the two rooms for the murders. In the case of Room 10, for reasons unknown, he tied a cord around the murdered Ueda’s wrist, and added string to the shot-put on the floor. In Room 14, he fought with Kikuoka, knocking over the sofa and the coffee table, so in both crime scenes there was clear evidence that the murderer had been inside the room. I think we have to take it that both crime scenes were constructed after the murder had been committed.”

“Fine, but is that really possible?”

“But both of the scenes had the doors properly locked. Room 14 in particular, had those bolts and a knob with a locking button—a very complicated and difficult locking system. There was no crack or gap anyway in the door—Room 14’s was very well constructed. There wasn’t the hint of an opening in the top, bottom or either side. There was that heavy door frame on all sides.

“Which leaves us with that twenty-centimetre-square ventilation hole, high up in the wall. I think the murderer must have somehow manipulated the scene via a piece of string or something run through that hole. But it’s pure conjecture. There were no signs that anything had been secured to the wall anywhere around the hole. No pins had been stuck in the wall or around the door and there was nothing that looked like a pin that had come loose and fallen on the floor. I searched pretty thoroughly. In other words, there’s no forensic evidence left behind that proves they used that method.”

“Huh.”

“I think it may be possible that the sofa and coffee table being knocked over had something to do with a locked-room trick.”

“I wonder. And then there’s the question: why use this locked room at all in the first place? There’s no one dumb enough to wonder whether a knife in the back might be suicide.”

“You’re right. But let’s imagine for now that the sofa and table were somehow instrumental in the locked-room trick. By knocking over both pieces of furniture, somehow a cord was pulled and the bolts on the door were unlocked. You’d need to use a really strong piece of cord to do that, and then the cord would have to be retrieved from the ventilation hole. You told us, didn’t you, Chief Inspector, that you knocked on the door of Room 14 last night?”

“Well, technically it was Mr Hamamoto who knocked.”

“What time was that?”

“Around 10.30.”

“At that time was there any string or anything hanging from the ventilation hole?”

“No. In fact, when there was no reply, I glanced up at the vent. There was nothing there.”

“No, probably not. At that point, Kikuoka was still alive and sleeping. And yet about thirty minutes later he was dead. And at 11.30 the three members of staff passed quite close by on their way to their rooms. None of them looked towards the air vent specifically, but it makes sense that by that time the cord had already been removed.

“We already found out that the ventilation hole is so high up in the wall that you can barely see into the room, even standing on a bedside table, so unless the killer used a step stool or a ladder, there must have been a long piece of cord hanging from the vent. And with people passing so close by, even if they didn’t go right by the door, it would have been impossible to leave it like that without it being noticed.”

“So what you’re saying is that the murder was committed very quickly and done by about 11.10 p.m.”

“Yes, that’s right, but it just happens that the household staff went down to the basement at 11.30. It doesn’t always happen that way—it was pure coincidence. Because normally they’d be going to bed much earlier than that. If the killer hadn’t been careful, he could easily have been seen pulling the string. That’s the flaw in that plan.

“If I were the killer I’d have done the deed much, much earlier. The later it became, the more likely the staff would have been coming down to the basement.”

“Right. It would make sense to have committed the murder and removed all traces by the time I was at the door of Room 14.”

“Yes, but the time of death can’t be moved from around 11 o’clock. So with that in mind, we can narrow it down to who could physically have been there. Who among our suspects could have visited Room 14 at that time, unseen by anyone? Only the occupants of Room 9.”

“That may be true… But I’m not convinced about the 11 o’clock time frame. It makes the whole plan much too risky. Don’t you think?”

“Well, I wouldn’t think of attempting it, but then again I’ve never thought about murdering anybody either.”

“There is an alternative possibility that we could consider. A clever trick that gets the knife in Kikuoka’s back by 11 o’clock. If the suspect can pull off a stunt like that, he’s free to play a leisurely game of billiards with a police constable, or relax over a drink with the head detective on the case.”

“Yes, I’ve been thinking about that too,” said Okuma. “But it would be really difficult to set up a murder in a locked room with a piece of string. I mean if Room 14 was already set up ahead of time, well, you couldn’t even have walked into the room.”

Ozaki resumed his commentary.

“Room 14 itself had nothing particularly special about it. There’s nothing there that lends itself to setting up a murder from outside the room. On the writing desk in the corner there was nothing but a pot of ink, a pen and a paperweight; the bookcase didn’t seem to have been touched at all. Mr Hamamoto says that the books all seem to be in place. To the right of the fireplace there’s a built-in wardrobe, but there’s nothing strange inside it. The door was closed.

“If anything’s unusual about the room, it’s the number of chairs. There’s the desk chair, which was in its usual place, pushed under the desk. Then a rocking chair in front of the fire which was also more or less in its normal position. Then the set of sofa and two armchairs. Without even counting the bed, which is a kind of converted chair too, that makes a total of five different seats. I suppose some sort of trick could be set up by using all of them. But the two armchairs hadn’t been moved much either.

“Anyway, the important thing is that no one could get in there besides Kikuoka himself. There was no spare key for Room 14. I don’t know whether they’d lost it, never had one made in the first place, or that Hamamoto was too neurotic to allow there to be more than one key for his personal study, but it has been confirmed that there was definitely only the one. And last night, Kikuoka had it. This morning our men retrieved it from the pocket of his jacket which he’d thrown off.”

“So he left the key lying around in his room. What if he’d accidentally pushed the locking button on the inside of the doorknob and gone out, closing the door? That would’ve caused a bit of a problem, wouldn’t it?”

“No, that would have been okay. If you push the button in first and then close the door, it doesn’t work. The button pops back out and the door doesn’t lock.”

“I see.”

“Anyway, we were told that while Kikuoka was staying here, he always made sure to lock the door from the outside every time he left his room. It seems he left his money in there. The Hayakawas and several others have attested to that.”

“All right. So there’s no way that anyone could have got into the room before the murder?”

“No, no way. All the other rooms had two keys. The Hayakawas would show the guests to their room and hand them one of the keys. The duplicates are with Eiko Hamamoto. Room 14 was the exception, so I guess they decided to put the richest bloke in there.”

“Huh,” said Okuma, sounding deflated.

“It’s not something I’m going to admit to in front of all those folks in the salon, but I’m on the point of throwing in the towel on this whole thing. Just like you said yourself, Inspector Okuma, there is no killer. There is no murderer among those eleven people out there.”

“Hmm…”

“It’s the same as the last case,” said Ozaki. “There’s plenty about the Ueda killing that we’ve put on the back burner. We still haven’t worked out why there were no footprints in the snow. That locked room had the simplest of locks on it, it could have been manipulated somehow, but the snow outside the door was completely undisturbed. By any of the entrances or exits to and from the main building, or anywhere around the house, even on the steps up to Room 10, there was nothing. As long as everyone is telling the truth, and Sasaki isn’t lying either, the ground that they crossed to get to the scene of the crime was all covered in pure virgin snow. That’s the first problem.

“And then the two stakes in the ground that Sasaki had seen the night before. Not to mention that disgusting-looking Golem doll… And then…oh, yes, that’s right, Chief Inspector Ushikoshi, Ueda was murdered on the night of the 25th. How about the daytime of the 25th? We said we were going to check whether the doll was really in Room 3 earlier that day. Did we?”

“It was. Mr Hamamoto says he definitely saw it sitting there during the daytime.”

“I see. So the suspect took it from the room shortly before committing the crime… Hang on! Just wait a minute while I go next door to check on the doll.”

The doll had already been returned to its place in the Tengu Room. Ozaki leapt to his feet and ran out of the library. Okuma took the opportunity to offer a few words of his own.

“Me, I don’t think anyone got into Room 10 by way of that door facing the outside. But the ventilation hole was facing inwards towards the rest of the house. Someone got up to no good with that open hole, I’ll warrant.”

“But it was way up high in the wall.”

“Well, the only other explanation is that the bugger must have got in using some secret passageway, or some other trick like—”

“Chief!”

Ozaki was back.

“The doll’s right hand—there’s string wrapped around it.”

“What?”

“Come and see!”

The three detectives rushed out of the library and over to the interior-facing window of the Tengu Room. The Golem doll was sitting just under the window, leaning back against the wall, and as Ozaki had said, wrapped around its right wrist was a piece of white string.

“This stinks,” said Ushikoshi. “Let’s go back. I’m not falling for this kind of bullshit.”

“The suspect must have done this.”

“They must have. Right after forensics returned it to the house. Someone’s playing silly buggers with us.”

They went back to their seats in the library.

“Getting back to the matter of the footprints, if they were made to disappear by some sort of clever ruse, I don’t think it would mean very much. Since for Kikuoka’s murder it’s almost one hundred per cent certain that the killer is inside the house. If, back at the time of Ueda’s murder, the killer had already planned to kill Kikuoka next, he might as well have left the footprints to cast suspicion on an outsider for the crime.”

“Perhaps… Well, never mind. So in that case, where are we?”

“We’re back to assuming that there were never any footprints in the first place, and that the killer used some kind of trick to commit the murder from inside the house—”

“That’s what I’ve been saying all along!” said Okuma loudly.

“But how does that doll fit in with things? Did it fly through the air under its own power and land out there in the snow? It’s not possible. And even though we’re quite sure that someone in this house is responsible for these murders, there would still have been a surprising amount we could have learnt from footprints. For example, whether they were made by a man’s or a woman’s shoe. The stride can also tell us their height and their gender. If the length of the stride seems to indicate it’s a woman, but the shoes are definitely a man’s, then we could suspect a woman deliberately wearing a man’s shoes. It would still have been safer to get rid of the footprints. As much as possible, anyway.”

There was a knock at the door.

“Yes?”

Taken off guard, the three detectives all answered at once. The door opened very slowly to reveal a very nervous-looking Kohei Hayakawa.

“Um… Sorry to disturb you, but lunch is almost ready.”

“Ah. Is it? Thanks.”

Hayakawa started to close the door again.

“Mr Hayakawa? Did Kikuoka’s death bring you some relief?”

Ushikoshi was as blunt in tone as he was in words. Hayakawa’s eyes widened and his face turned ashen. His hand gripped the doorknob.

“Why are you asking me a question like that? You think I had any connection with—”

“Mr Hayakawa, please don’t underestimate the police. We’ve looked into the business with your daughter, Yoshie. Tokyo police know that you attended your daughter’s funeral in Tokyo.”

Hayakawa’s shoulders slumped.

“Please, take a seat.”

“No, thank you. I’d rather stay standing… I don’t have anything to tell you.”

“He told you to sit!” yelled Ozaki.

Hayakawa shuffled towards the detectives and sat down.

“Last time we spoke, you sat in that very chair and deliberately hid the truth from us. Now we can forgive that just the once, but if you try lying to us again, I have to tell you we won’t be able to let it go.”

“Inspector, I don’t mean to hide anything from you. I wasn’t hiding anything back then either. I wanted to tell you. The words were right there on the tip of my tongue. But even though Mr Kikuoka is dead now, at that time it was Mr Ueda who had been killed. I thought bringing up that story would have seemed suspicious…”

“And how about today? Now it’s Kikuoka who’s dead!”

“And you suspect me? How on earth could I have done it? It’s true that when my daughter died I hated Mr Kikuoka for it. My wife too—we lost our only child. I’m not denying it. But I couldn’t kill him, no matter how much I might have thought about it. I was in the entranceway between the salon and the kitchen. And besides I’m not permitted to go into the rooms.”

Ushikoshi stared Hayakawa straight in the eyes, as if he were trying to see through a keyhole into his mind. There was a long silence.

“So while Mr Kikuoka was still in the salon, you didn’t go into his room at all?”

“Certainly not! Ms Hamamoto has specifically told us not to go into the rooms when we have guests staying, but anyway, with that room, there isn’t even a key. There’s no way to get in.”

“Hmm. I have another question for you. This morning Mr Kajiwara went out to the storage shed to fetch an axe and a stepladder. Isn’t that storage shed kept locked?”

“It is kept locked.”

“But this morning I didn’t see him taking a key.”

“You have to put in the right numbers. It’s one of those whatchama—”

“You mean a combination padlock?”

“Right.”

“Does everyone know the combination?”

“Everyone who lives in this house does. Do you want to know it?”

“No, no. That’s fine. We’ll ask you if we need it. So you’re saying that the guests didn’t have the combination, but Mr and Ms Hamamoto, Mr Kajiwara, you and your wife did?”

“That’s right.”

“Nobody else at all would know it?”

“No. Nobody.”

“I understand. Thank you, that’s all for now. Please let our hosts know that we’ll be down for lunch in about thirty minutes.”

Hayakawa was out of the seat in an instant, a look of relief on his face. As the door closed behind him, Ozaki turned to his boss.

“That old man could have killed Ueda.”

“Yeah. The fact that he doesn’t have a motive is the fatal weakness in that theory.”

Ushikoshi sounded as if he were only half joking.

“But it would be physically possible. If the husband and wife had colluded, it would have been easier. Anyway, someone working as a butler probably knows the ins and outs of the house far better than the master of the house.”

“As for motive, how about this? They planned to kill Kikuoka, but Ueda was his bodyguard, so they had to get rid of him first.”

“That’s pretty feeble. If that was their motive, then the same night they did Ueda in was also the perfect opportunity to knock off Kikuoka too. If Ueda was a bodyguard, there was only one of him, and he was miles away from his employer, stuck in some sort of storeroom that could only be accessed from the outside. They had the perfect conditions to murder Kikuoka. The suspect wouldn’t have hesitated to kill Kikuoka, and only Kikuoka.

“After all, Ueda was still young, he had the physical strength of an ex-Self-Defence Forces soldier. Kikuoka was much older, and quite overweight. Even Hayakawa might have stood a chance against him. There was absolutely no need to kill Ueda.”

“But Ueda knew about the business with Yoshie Hayakawa. He could have caused trouble afterwards for the Hayakawas. Maybe they killed him to silence him.”

“I suppose it’s possible. But then wouldn’t the Kanais and Kumi Aikura be even more of a problem? For sure Kikuoka wasn’t particularly chatty with Ueda. He probably hadn’t ever brought up the topic of Yoshie Hayakawa with him.”

“Probably not.”

“Even if the Hayakawas did it, I still don’t understand the locked room situation in Room 14. And anyway, at the time of death the two of them were definitely still in the salon. There’s nothing we can do about that. So for now we just have to throw the whole problem of motive to the winds, and narrow it down to whoever could physically have been the murderer.”

“Yes, I suppose so… Which means…”

“Which means Mr and Mrs Kanai. And if we’re going to stretch the point, Kumi and Eiko too.”

“Eiko?”

“That’s the problem we’re faced with. We have to look at absolutely every possibility.”

“But how was Kikuoka killed? Even if we try to narrow down the list of suspects, have you got even a rough idea of how it was done?”

“I think I might have.”

“How?”

The two men turned to stare at Ushikoshi. Ozaki seemed eager to hear his boss’s theory, but Okuma looked extremely dubious.

“I think we have to agree that the door was completely impenetrable. I don’t believe that by using a piece of string, both of those bolts could be turned and the button in the doorknob pushed. I just don’t think all that is possible.”

“But you don’t think the victim opened the door himself?”

“No, I don’t. Which means that room—being in the basement and having no windows, and a door that doesn’t open—leaves us with the ventilation hole.”

“That twenty-centimetre-square hole?”

“The very same. I’m convinced that Kikuoka was stabbed through that hole.”

“But how?”

“The vent is right above the bed. The killer must have attached the knife to the end of a long stick or pole to make a kind of spear and stuck it through the vent.”

“Aha! But they would have needed something at least two metres long,” Ozaki pointed out. “And the problem with something that length is that would be too long to fit across the corridor space—it’d hit the opposite wall. And then it would be a real pain to carry around. If they kept it in their room it would definitely be noticed, but even before that, how could they get it into the house?”

“I’ve already thought of that. It must have been one of those collapsible fishing rods.”

“Aha! I see.”

“A fishing rod could be extended to just the right length to reach into the room,” explained Ushikoshi. He sounded rather proud of himself.

“Huh. But would a knife inserted that way really stay in the victim’s body? The knife would have to be securely tied to the rod, wouldn’t it?”

“It would. And that’s the significance of the piece of string that was attached to the knife. But I still haven’t quite figured out how it worked. It must have been a clever plan. That part I think we’ll have to hear from the killer themselves—after we’ve arrested them.”

“So you’re saying that Room 10’s murder was carried out the same way?”

“Ah, now that I’m not sure about.”

“There was nothing in that basement corridor that could have been used to stand on. I mean that’s why I brought a bedside table from the next room. But even when I stood on that I was still way too low to see into the room. A coffee table would be even lower. All the bedside tables in all the rooms in the house are the same height.”

“Yes. That is a problem… Perhaps you could put one of them on top of the other?”

“On that slanting floor? In any other house you might be able to manage it… And anyway, there’s only one table in each room. And then there’s the skill it would take to climb up on two tables on top of each other. It’d be unstable.”

“Maybe two people could manage together, one climbing on the other’s shoulders. There must be many ways it could be done. But that’s why I was asking Hayakawa just now about the key to the outdoor shed. I was thinking about that stepladder.”

“This house has only three ways in and out, and all of them are connected to the salon. If anyone went out to the shed they’d have been seen by everyone in the salon. To get outside, you could possibly climb out through the window on the landing of the staircase from Room 1, but then there’s nowhere to get back in. If you came back in through the same window, you’d have to go through the salon to get to Room 14 in the basement. So there’s no point in climbing out in the first place.”

“I’m beginning to believe that everyone in the salon was in on the plot.”

“What, Anan too? You think my police constable was mixed up in this?” chuckled Okuma. “But seriously, ask anyone who was there, and they’re going to say that they didn’t happen to notice anyone resembling a house painter casually passing through the salon with a stepladder tucked under his arm.”

Suddenly Ushikoshi had a thought.

Maybe there was one other way it could have been done. Only the occupants of the ground floor would be able to get in and out of their window. That meant either Sasaki or Togai. Those two had definitely been in the salon at the time of Kikuoka’s murder, but Eiko and Kumi weren’t. Either of those two could have climbed out of the window on the east staircase landing—

“How about a rifle or some other kind of modified gun?”

Ushikoshi’s thought process was rudely interrupted by Okuma’s own musings.

“Some kind of gun that could shoot the knife using a spring mechanism, or elastic. They’d have needed string for that kind of trick—”

“But we’re still stuck on the problem of the stepladder,” said Ozaki. “And how the sofa and coffee table in Room 14 got overturned. Plus, we can’t ignore the signs of a struggle. The killer was definitely inside Room 10.”

Ushikoshi glanced at his watch.

“Yes, we’ve been ignoring that aspect. I think we need to search everyone’s room again. Let’s focus on Mr and Mrs Kanai, Eiko and Kumi. Search for a fishing rod or some kind of pole longer than two metres, or some kind of modified gun or rifle. Also look out for something that could be used as a kind of collapsible stand or step stool. All of those kinds of things.

“Of course we don’t have a warrant, so we’ll need each person’s consent. I’m sure the young students will be happy to let us take a look. And I think with so many people, everyone will probably give in and consent in the end. We’ve still got officers here, haven’t we? Let’s split the task up between them and Anan, preferably all working simultaneously. Let’s not leave out the empty rooms either. And it’s possible that someone’s dumped it out of the window. I want the snow around the whole house thoroughly examined—a wide enough perimeter in case the killer threw it. Oh, and the fireplace too. It’s possible that the killer might have burnt the evidence in the hearth in the salon. Better check just in case.

“Right, let’s get down to the salon. We’ll announce the searches to everyone after lunch. We’ll be careful to ask as politely as possible. Don’t want to go offending the gentry.”

When lunch was over, Ushikoshi and Okuma made their way back to the library in silence, sat down in the exact same chairs as before and watched the sun gradually sink in the sky. They had the feeling that they might be forced to watch the sun again tomorrow, and the day after that too. Neither man felt much like talking.

It wasn’t that he didn’t hear the door open, but Chief Inspector Ushikoshi didn’t feel inclined to turn his head around until he heard his name spoken. His hopes were riding on this result. He could barely look Sergeant Ozaki in the eyes.

“What happened?”

“We searched every room in the house. And every person too. There were no women police officers available, so we’ll probably be fielding complaints from the female contingent.”

Ozaki’s speech was a little more sluggish than usual.

“I see. And?”

“We found absolutely nothing. Nobody was hiding a fishing rod; there isn’t one in the whole house. No long poles either. The billiard cues are about the longest thing here. And of course we didn’t come across any modified firearms.

“There was no evidence that anything had been burnt in the fireplace besides regular firewood. We combed the ground around the house to a distance farther than an Olympic javelin champion could have thrown, but found nothing.

“There are no stools or stepladders. Just like Room 14, in Kajiwara’s and the Hayakawas’ rooms there are desks—well, not as fancy as that one—but they were both so large and solid that it would have been extremely difficult to move them anywhere. And their height wasn’t that much more than the bedside tables—barely another twenty centimetres.

“Then I thought that perhaps the long object we were looking for might be a javelin, so we went to check the sports equipment in Room 10. But there was no javelin in there. There were pairs of skis and ski poles in there, and in the storage shed we found a long-handled shovel, a hoe, spade, broom—all those kinds of tools. But to bring those into the house would be just the same situation as with the stepladder. We give up.”

“I’m so sorry. But I guess I kind of expected it,” said Ushikoshi with a sigh. “Do you have any other ideas?”

“As a matter of fact,” said Ozaki, “I did come up with something.”

“All right, tell me more.”

“I wondered about a frozen rope. Whether it could be used like a long pole.”

“Clever! And what did you discover?”

“Nobody had any rope, but there was some in the storage shed.”

Ushikoshi began to think furiously.

“You know that could be an important point. Some kind of long pole… Something inside this house that is long. Maybe something that is always there right in front of our eyes. Something that takes just a little bit of fixing up and suddenly you’ve got a long pole—something like that. Is there anything in that display room next door?”

“We searched it thoroughly, but a stick or a pole—”

“There has to be something somewhere. If there isn’t, it means the suspect would have had to get in and out through the door, and then somehow lock it behind him… Something that you can disassemble and end up with a long pole… I don’t think the bannister on the staircase is removable… the firewood… Did they tie several pieces together with string to make it longer?… No, not possible. Damn it! Are you sure there’s nothing at all in the next room?”

“Nothing. But why don’t you take a look for yourself?”

“I’ll do that.”

“There is one thing—the doll, Golem; its hands are constructed in a curved shape as if it were gripping something. I thought the knife could have fitted into one of its hands. I gave it a try.”

“What? You’re quite the detective, aren’t you? Talk about an overdeveloped sense of curiosity! And, what did you find?”

“A perfect fit. Like putting a dummy into a baby’s hand.”

“Ha! Well, you certainly have an eye for the ghoulish. But no matter how you look at it, it has to be a coincidence, no?”

“Yeah, I guess so.”

“But so much in this case has gone wrong or drawn a blank, the lack of alibi for the Kanais in Room 9 seems to be the only thing left that we can be sure of. At least that is not going to turn out to be a let-down, is it?”

Ushikoshi sounded as if he were trying to console himself. The three detectives lapsed into silence.

“Sorry? Ozaki, do you want to say something?”

Ushikoshi had noticed the junior detective fidgeting.

“Well, sir, the thing is, I’ve kept quiet about it up till now…”

“What is it?”

“It’s a difficult thing to admit, but last night after I left the salon to go to bed, I just couldn’t get it out of my head that the only people who had already gone to bed besides Okuma and myself were Kikuoka and the Kanais, and I began to wonder if they might be up to something while everyone else was still in the salon. So I went to each of their rooms and just under the doorknob, I used some hair oil to stick a hair across the space between the door and the wall. If the door was opened, the hair would get pulled off. I’m sorry that it wasn’t a very mature thing to do. I’m a bit embarrassed—”

“What are you talking about? It was inspired! Did you do the same with any of the other rooms?”

“I didn’t do any of the rooms where there was no way to come out except through the salon. I limited it to the rooms where you could get out without being seen. As for the other people staying in the west wing—Sasaki, Togai and the house staff—I planned to do the same with their doors, but they stayed up so late that I’m afraid I fell asleep before I could do it.”

“What time did you stick the hair on those doors?”

“Right after I told you that I was going to bed. So around a quarter past or twenty past 10.”

“Hm. And then?”

“I woke up once and went to check on those two rooms.”

“And what did you find?”

“The hair on Kikuoka’s door had come off. The door must have been opened at some point. But the one on the Kanais’ door…”

“Was?…”

“…Still there.”

“What?”

“The door hadn’t been opened.”

Ushikoshi looked down at floor. He seemed to be biting his lip. Then he raised his head and glared at Ozaki.

“Congratulations. You’ve just destroyed the last shred of hope in this case. Now I truly give up.”

SCENE 8 The Salon

The morning of the 28th of December dawned without further incident. It was a very minor victory for the detectives. Nothing had happened in the night, but they could hardly claim it was because of their presence…

The increasingly bitter occupants of the Ice Floe Mansion had begun to notice that the expert detectives with their airs didn’t seem to know any more about what was going on than they did. Of the three nights they had spent in the mansion since the evening of the Christmas party, there had been a murder committed on two, one of which the killer had impudently pulled off right under the noses of several police officers. And the bitter truth for these experts was that, beginning with the time of death, fingerprints and all the usual clues, all they’d managed to confirm was that there was absolutely nothing to go on.

Finally, the sun went down on what seemed to the guests a very long day, and to the detectives much too short. It was evening and both parties were called for dinner. They sat themselves without much enthusiasm around a table laden with the usual lavish food.

As the guests joined them, conversation began to dry up, which seemed to bother Kozaburo Hamamoto. He tried to keep up a jovial front, but everyone felt the absence of the gravelly voiced man with his exaggerated compliments.

“I’m so sorry that what was supposed to be a fun Christmas holiday has turned into something so dreadful,” said Kozaburo, after dinner was over. “I feel truly responsible,”

“No, please don’t feel that way, Mr President,” said Kanai from the next seat. “You have absolutely nothing to feel responsible for.”

“It’s true, Daddy. You really shouldn’t say things like that.”

Eiko’s normally shrill voice came out closer to a shriek. This was followed by a few moments of silence. It was Chief Inspector Ushikoshi who decided to pick up the conversation.

“We’re the ones who should accept responsibility.”

There was resignation in his voice. But Kozaburo continued speaking.

“There is one thing I am determined to avoid, and that is any kind of secret whispering among us about the identity of the killer. If amateurs like us get started on trying to solve these crimes, then the relationships between us will be destroyed.

“That said, the police do seem to be having a lot of trouble solving the crime, and we really do all hope for a swift conclusion to this awful matter. Is there no one here who has noticed something, or has some kind of wisdom that they can share with these detectives?”

Hearing this, the three detectives’ expressions turned sour and their body language became defensive. Perhaps it was the detectives’ behaviour, but nobody in the room took Kozaburo up on the idea. He decided a few more words might be appropriate.

“Sasaki, you’re usually very talented at solving this sort of riddle.”

“Well, I have come up with a few ideas.”

He’d clearly been waiting for this moment.

“How about it, gentlemen?” said Kozaburo.

“We’d like to hear them,” said Ushikoshi, without much enthusiasm.

“Well, first of all, the locked room in the murder of Kazuya Ueda, I think I can solve that mystery. It was the shot-put.”

There was no reaction from the detectives.

“That shot-put had string wrapped around it, with a wooden tag attached. The string had been extended, probably by the killer, and clearly for the purpose of creating that locked room. The latch—the type that moved up and down like a railway crossing gate—was propped up with that tag, stuck to the latch with Sellotape. Then the shot-put at the other end of the string was placed on the floor by the door, and when the killer closed the door behind him, because of the sloping floors in this mansion, the shot-put rolled away until the string was pulled tight and the wooden tag peeled away. And then of course the latch dropped and the door was locked.”

“Ah, of course!” said Kanai. Togai looked as if he had just swallowed something nasty. The detectives nodded wordlessly.

“Well, Sasaki, do you have anything else for us?” asked Kozaburo.

“I do have something, but I haven’t thought it all the way through yet. It’s the other locked room, Mr Kikuoka’s room. I don’t think it’s completely impossible to achieve, because it wasn’t really a completely locked room. There’s a hole for ventilation—small, but still an open space. The killer could have stabbed him with the knife, then balanced the coffee table on top of the sofa, securing it with a cord, and then attached it somehow to the en suite bathroom knob, and out through the vent hole. Then he’d have let it go from the corridor, and the table would fall off the sofa so that one of its legs pushed the button on the inside of the door—”

“Obviously, we’d already thought of that,” snapped Ozaki. “But there are no marks anywhere on the door frame or in the wall where a pin or staple or anything was used. And that method would require a huge amount of cord. There’s no kind of rope or cord like that anywhere in this house, or in anyone’s possession.

“What’s more, the suspect had absolutely no idea when the Hayakawas might come down to the basement. To set up a trick like that would take more than five minutes; probably ten. And anyway, the way you just described it includes setting three different locks. It would take even longer than that for sure.”

Sasaki didn’t respond. And this time the silence was much more uncomfortable than before. Kozaburo decided to try to break the tension.

“Eiko, let’s listen to some music. Put a record on.”

Eiko got up and soon the gloomy air of the salon was filled with the sound of Wagner’s Lohengrin.

SCENE 9 The Tengu Room

By the afternoon of the 29th of December, the residents of the Ice Floe Mansion were sprawled around the salon, listless. It felt like the waiting room for condemned prisoners. Today’s sense of fatigue had been created by the previous days’ excess of nervous tension and fear. But boredom too was setting in.

Seeing the atmosphere in the room, Kozaburo proposed showing the Kanais and Kumi his collection of mechanical dolls and automata that he’d brought back from Europe. He’d already shown them to Michio Kanai and Kikuoka back in the summer, but Hatsue and Kumi were yet to see them. He’d intended to invite them to view everything much earlier, but all the fuss had distracted him from his plan.

Kozaburo had a lot of Western dolls in his collection, and he imagined that they would interest Kumi. Eiko and Yoshihiko were tired of seeing everything, so they chose to stay behind in the salon. This meant that Togai also decided to stay. Sasaki was interested in antiques, so although he’d also seen everything several times already, he decided to tag along.

A few days previously when Kumi had been on her way to be interviewed in the library, she had glanced through the window of the Tengu Room. It had given her a bad vibe, but today she reluctantly agreed to go anyway, ignoring the vaguely bad premonition she had as they set out.

Kozaburo Hamamoto, along with Michio and Hatsue Kanai, Kumi Aikura and Sasaki took the west stairs up to the door of the Tengu Room. As she had done the previous time, Kumi looked in through the window, the only one in the house that overlooked an interior corridor rather than the exterior. It was a huge window, giving a view of the whole room.

The window stretched all the way from the south wall corner to about 1.5 metres shy of the doorway, a total width of about 2 metres. It could be slid open about 30 centimetres from either the left or right side, leaving either or both sides open. That’s how all the glass doors of the cabinets in this room were usually slid open too.

Kozaburo got out a key and opened the door, revealing that no matter how much of an impression you could get of the room by viewing it through the window, it wasn’t until you stood inside that you could really take in the spectacle. First of all, right by the doorway stood a life-sized clown. It had a cheerful smiling face, but a rather depressing, musty smell.

There were all kinds of other dolls in the room, both large and small, all a little threadbare. They had aged, and looked almost on the point of death, but their youthful expressions were still intact. Their grimy faces with their peeling paint seemed to Kumi to be concealing some kind of vague madness. Either standing or sprawling in a chair, each one smiled faintly with some kind of unfathomable emotion. They were suspiciously quiet, looking like something you’d see in the waiting room of a psychiatric hospital in your worst nightmare.

As if their flesh had gradually been stripped away over time, the paint of their faces had peeled and scabbed over, exposing a little of the craziness inside. The part that had decayed the most were the smiles on their red, peeling lips. By now they didn’t even seem to be smiling any longer—these dolls had the most enigmatic look of pure evil. Their smiles had the power to send an instant chill through anyone who looked at them. Decomposition—that was the perfect word for it. The smile that had been on the faces of these cherished dolls had transmuted, decomposed. There was no better way of putting it.

A deep-seated grudge. They’d been brought into the world by the whimsy of human beings, but then not permitted to die for a thousand years. If the same thing were inflicted on our bodies, the same look of madness would appear on our faces too. Ever in search of revenge, our madness would grow in intensity, fed by the grudge we harboured.

Kumi let out a small but genuine scream. However, it was nothing compared to the residents of this room whose mouths were permanently poised on the edge of a scream.

The south and east walls were completely red with Tengu masks, with their huge long noses and fiery eyes that glowered at the room’s doll occupants. It seemed to the guests that the Tengus’ job was to stifle the screams of the dolls.

Hearing Kumi scream seemed to put Kozaburo in a cheerful mood.

“Well, this place is as amazing as ever,” said Michio Kanai, and Hatsue nodded with great enthusiasm. But this kind of small talk felt out of place in the heavy atmosphere of the room.

“I’ve always wanted to set up a museum, but I was always so busy with work. In the end, this display room is all I was ever able to put together.”

“It’s already a museum,” said Kanai.

Kozaburo gave a little laugh.

“Well, this is, anyway.”

He opened one of the glass cases and took out a small figurine, about fifty centimetres tall, of a boy sitting in a chair. The chair had a little desk attached to it, and the boy had a pen in his right hand; his left rested on the desk. He had a sweet expression on his face, and this figurine lacked the visible wear and tear of the other dolls.

“He’s so cute!” said Kumi.

“It’s a clockwork doll, or automaton, known as The Writer. It was made in the late eighteenth century. I heard about it and went to great pains to get hold of it.”

The assembled guests made various admiring sounds.

“Did it get its name because it can actually write words?” asked Kumi, sounding a little scared.

“Of course. I think it can still manage to write its own name. Would you like to see?”

Before Kumi had a chance to respond, Kozaburo tore off a sheet from a memo pad and slipped it under the doll’s left hand. Winding the spring in the doll’s back, he gave its right hand a gentle nudge. The doll’s right hand began to make awkward, jerky movements which started to leave marks on the memo paper. There was a small clacking sound that must have been the grinding of the cogs inside.

Kumi was relieved to find the movements delightful rather than menacing. Even the occasional change in pressure of the doll’s left hand on the paper was charmingly realistic.

“That’s adorable! But at the same time a little bit scary.”

Truth be told, everyone present was feeling slightly relieved. No one had been sure what to expect.

The doll was only able to write a tiny bit. It came to an abrupt halt with both hands just above the desk. Kozaburo removed the paper and showed it to Kumi.

“Well, it’s over two hundred years old, so it’s not surprising it’s not as good as it used to be. Can you make out the letters M, A, R, K? This boy’s name is Marko so he almost got his full name down.”

“Signing autographs, just like a celebrity!” said Kumi.

“Yeah, I’m sure there’ve been plenty of celebrities who couldn’t write more than their own name,” said Kozaburo with a grin. “Apparently he used to be able to write much more, but this is his whole repertoire now. I guess he must have forgotten his alphabet.”

“His eyesight’s probably failing with age, if he’s really two hundred years old.”

“That’s a good one,” said Kozaburo. “Maybe I’m the same way. But at least I’ve given him a ballpoint pen to use. The pen he used to have was much harder to write with.”

“How wonderful! If you don’t mind my asking, is it worth a lot of money?” said Hatsue.

“I don’t think you can put a price on it. It’s something that could easily belong in the British Museum. If you’re asking me how much I paid for it, I’m afraid I can’t answer that. I wouldn’t like to shock you with my total lack of common sense.”

“Ah!” said her husband.

“But if we’re talking money, this piece here was even more expensive. This is The Dulcimer Player.”

“Did it come with that desk?”

“It did. The mechanics are hidden inside.”

The Dulcimer Player was a noblewoman in a dress with a long skirt, seated in front of what looked like a miniature grand piano. Both were attached to the top of a beautiful mahogany desk. The doll itself wasn’t particularly large, probably no more than about thirty centimetres.

Kozaburo must have operated some sort of hidden device, because all of a sudden the noblewoman’s hands began to move and music filled the room.

“She’s not really playing, is she?” said Sasaki.

“No. That would be too complicated to design. I suppose you could think of this as a very elaborate music box. A music box with a doll attached. It’s the same principle.”

“But the music isn’t that tinkling sound you get with a music box,” Sasaki pointed out. “It’s much more rounded and mellow than that—there’re not only high notes but low ones too.”

“Yes, it sounds more like bells to me,” said Kumi.

“Probably because the box itself is so large. And unlike the little boy, Marko, she has quite a wide repertoire. About the number of tunes on one side of a long-playing record.”

“Really?”

“Yes, it’s a masterpiece from the French rococo period. And this one here is German-made from the fifteenth century. It’s called Clock with Nativity Scene.”

Kozaburo showed them an elaborate metal clock in the shape of a castle. On the top was the Tower of Babel, and the T-shaped pendulum hung from a spherical rendition of the cosmos with the baby Jesus at its centre.

“And this one is Goddess Hunting Deer. The deer, the dogs and the horse all move.

“This one is The Gardener. Unfortunately, he doesn’t sprinkle water from that watering can any more.

“And over here we have a tabletop water fountain made for a nobleman in the fourteenth century. This one doesn’t spout water any more either.

“In medieval Europe these kinds of magical playthings were popping up all over the place. These new marvellous mechanisms came about and changed people’s view of magic. It was fun to surprise people. For many long years that role was taken by witchcraft and sorcery. And then finally, these kind of automata were invented and took over the role. The worship of machinery, perhaps you could say. There was a trend for people to design machines that were copies of things found in nature. And so witchcraft and machinery for quite a while were synonymous. It was a transition period. Of course these were meant to be toys, something to play with, but that is only obvious when looked at from the standpoint of our modernday science.”

“You don’t have any Japanese artefacts,” Sasaki pointed out.

“That’s right. Nothing besides the Tengu masks.”

“What about Japanese karakuri dolls? Are they poorly made?”

“Not at all. There’s the famous Tea Server and all the dolls that were made up in Hida Takayama. The inventor Hiraga Gennai and especially Giemon, the pseudonym of Tanaka Hisashige, were responsible for making the most sophisticated automata. It’s just they’re impossible to get hold of. The reason is that in Japan they have very few metal parts. Long ago the cogs were made from wood, and the springs from whalebone, and after a hundred years they’d be worn out. Even if you could get hold of one, it’d be a replica, a copy. But even those replicas are almost impossible to get your hands on.”

“Are there any blueprints still in existence?”

“Yes, there are a few. Without the blueprints no one could have made those replicas. But they’re only drawings, really.

“On the whole, Japanese craftsmen didn’t tend to leave blueprints behind. They wanted to keep the art of making karakuri dolls their own secret. It wasn’t a problem of poor technique at all. I really question this aspect of Japanese people’s behaviour. For example, back in the Edo Era, there was apparently a rather splendid karakuri doll—a child playing the fife and drum. It could blow on a small flute and play the drum at the same time. Neither the original nor the blueprints have survived. So I’ve been complaining to the engineers of many countries: if you develop a new product or technology, please record the process in minute detail and leave it for future generations. It should be your legacy to the future.”

“What a good story!” said Michio Kanai. “I also heard that karakuri craftsmen were looked down on in Japan. Is that true?”

“I think it is. Japanese automata were considered to be nothing more than toys, purely for amusement. Unlike in the West, where they were developed further into clocks and mechanical objects, and eventually computers.”

For a while the guests wandered around the room, each taking in the collection at their own speed. Kumi was drawn back to the letter-writing boy and the noblewoman at her dulcimer; Michio Kanai and Kozaburo strolled together, while Hatsue Kanai headed off by herself at a much faster pace and soon found herself in the far corner of the room in front of a single doll. She was suddenly overcome with paralysing terror. The secret fear that she had felt as she entered the room was instantly revived. Or rather the unearthly feelings that had been slowly growing on her since she set foot in this room now all seemed to be embodied in this one antique figure.

Hatsue had always believed she had some kind of psychic powers. Even her husband admitted that she had some sort of special ability. And now, looking at this doll, she felt it giving off some sort of unusual presence.

It was Golem, the life-sized doll. She’d seen it before as a body lying in the snow, and again when it had been put back together in the salon, but this was the first time she had seen its face. It had huge eyes, a moustache and beard, and sat on the floor, just to the right of the Tengu-covered south wall, leaning against the west wall, under the window onto the corridor, both of its legs splayed out in front.

Its body was made of wood; also its hands and feet. Its head was probably wooden too, but although its face was carved in fine detail, and its hands and feet painted, the torso was made of rough, unfinished timber.

Hatsue guessed that the doll had once worn clothes. This seemed to be borne out by the way the arms from the wrists down were realistically depicted, and the feet were made to look as if they were wearing shoes; in other words, the parts of the doll that would not have been covered by clothing. On closer inspection, both hands were curled as if they had been holding a thin stick or pole at some point in the past. Right now, though, they were empty.

The whole of the doll gave off a ghostly aura, but the strongest sensation came from its head, that face. Its expression revealed a more extreme madness than that of the other Western dolls in the room, and the smile on its lips was closer to a sneer. Hatsue could understand a craftsman wanting to make cute dolls, but why would anyone think of making this giant of a man with its creepy smile?

She realized that her husband and Kozaburo were standing behind her. Bolstered by their presence, she leant towards Golem to examine his face more closely.

His skin was a little dark, like an Arab’s maybe, she thought. But the tip of his nose gleamed whitish. The paint on his cheeks had started to peel away like the shell of a hard-boiled egg. He looked as if he had suffered severe burns or frostbite. But his smile seemed to say that he wasn’t bothered at all by any of this. Apparently, the damage was painless.

“Ah, yes, this is the first time you’ve met this one,” said Kozaburo.

“Yes, er… Go—something wasn’t it?”

“Golem.”

“Yes, that’s it. Why does he have that name?”

“Everyone in the shop where I bought him used to call him that. So I just kept calling him by the same name.”

“He has such a hideous face. I was just wondering what he was staring at with that sneer. It’s kind of frightening.”

“Do you think so?”

“There’s nothing cute about him at all. Not like that doll that could sign its name. Why on earth did they make something with a grinning face like this?”

“Maybe the craftsmen those days believed that all dolls had to have a smile on their face?”

Hatsue said nothing.

“When I come here alone at night and see him sitting there in the darkness, grinning to himself, sometimes even I get the creeps.”

“He’s horrible.”

“He has feelings, you know.”

“He really does seem to,” said Sasaki as he joined the others. “He’s always staring at something that human beings can’t see. And he has that smile of satisfaction on his face. It makes me want to follow his stare, find what it is he’s watching.”

“Is that how you feel? It’s what I thought one time, right after this room was constructed but was still empty. He was the first thing I brought in, and I sat him down. He was staring at the wall behind me and I was sure there must be a fly or a wasp or something that had landed there. He has such a strong presence. He’s a peculiar looking doll, isn’t he? As if he’s got some secret plot he’s hatching, but his expression gives nothing away. I think that’s the brilliance of whoever made him.”

“Why did they make him so huge?”

“Well, he’s human-sized. He was probably attached to a kind of horizontal bar like a gymnast, and part of a circus act originally. Or a kind of amusement park. If you look closely at his hands there are small holes in the palms. I think that’s where he was attached to the bar. All of the joints in his legs and arms have the same range of movements as a human body’s. I’m guessing he used to do a giant swing on the horizontal bar. His body is just a chunk of wood, though, with no kind of special features.”

“It must have been quite a sight—a life-sized doll performing like that.”

“Yes, quite a draw, I’m guessing.”

“And why is he called Golem? Does it have any meaning?” asked Hatsue.

“Wasn’t ‘golem’ a word for a kind of automaton that appeared in a story or something?” said Sasaki. “He was forced to carry a jar filled with water for eternity. I’ve got this image that he used to move like a robot… Or maybe that was something else.”

“A golem is a man-made creature in Jewish folklore that looks like a human being. Seems the original concept of a golem was mentioned in Psalm 139:16. For generations it was believed that leading figures of the Jewish faith possessed the ability to create golems. There’s supposed to be a passage that describes how Abraham, together with Noah’s son Shem created a great number of them, and led them into Palestine.”

“So golems have been around for thousands of years? Since the Old Testament?”

“That was their origin. But they aren’t widely known. I’ve done a little research into their history. The golem stories came back to life around 1600 in Prague.”

“Prague?”

“That’s right. At the beginning of the seventeenth century, Prague was a bright centre of learning and culture. It has been referred to as the City of a Thousand Wonders and Countless Terrors. The main areas of study that it was known for were astrology, alchemy and magic; in other words, it became a flourishing centre for mysticism and the occult. The mystics and thinkers and magicians who had proclaimed that they could perform all kinds of miracles were drawn to the city in droves. And that was the environment in which golems were reincarnated. This was because Prague also had the largest Jewish population in Europe—a large ghetto community. A golem was as much part of the Jewish teachings as Yahweh. For their persecuted community, he was a ferocious protector. With superhuman strength he was considered to be invincible. There was no figure of authority, no weapon with the power to defeat him. The Jewish people had been nomadic, had suffered, and been persecuted since ancient times. Yahweh and golems were created out of imagination and hope. Well, that’s the way I’m going to explain it. Yahweh is God, but a golem is a kind of man-made being or automaton that only an ascetic holy man or wise man has the power to create. Kabbalah is a branch of the Jewish religion that believes in mysticism and magic, and its practitioners studied how to become great enough to create a golem.

“Then in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, the character of a golem began to turn up in essays published in France and Germany. A rabbi by the name of Hasid and the French mystic, Gaon, left behind written descriptions of how to form a golem from clay and water. They included precise details of required incantations and rituals. It was the secret formula that since the time of Abraham no one but the highest-ranking holy men had been privy to. And now it had finally been written down. The Golem of Prague was based on the golem of these essays.”

“So the practice of creating golems in Prague came from its status as a centre of learning and from it having a Jewish community?”

“That and from the persecution of those Jews. Prague was also a centre of persecution.”

“Who were the persecutors?”

“The Christians, obviously. That was why the Jewish community needed golems. They were constantly in danger. The first maker of a golem was believed to be Rabbi Loew ben Bezalel, a leader of the Jewish community. He is said to have taken clay from the banks of the Vltava River that runs through Prague to create his golem. There have been many pieces of folklore and stories about this handed down, and even, much later, a black-and-white silent film, and they all say approximately the same thing: the rabbi created the golem out of clay while reciting some kind of incantation.”

“So there’s a film about it?”

“Many films in fact. It was from these that the story of the Golem of Prague became well known. The German film-maker, the genius Paul Wegener, made three different films about golems.”

“What kind of films?”

“All sorts. I’ve kind of forgotten which was which, but in one a rabbi brings his home-made golem to the royal court at the request of the king. This rabbi uses magic to create a kind of film about the history of the hardships and perpetual nomadism of the Jewish people, and shows it to the king. But right at that moment the court jester tells an ill-timed joke, and all the nobles and dancing girls fall about laughing. The Jewish God is furious and with a thunderous roar begins to tear down the palace. In exchange for a vow to end the persecution of the Jewish people, the rabbi instructs his golem to save the king’s and the courtiers’ lives.”

“Wow.”

“Another film starts the same way with a rabbi creating a golem, but unfortunately, he wasn’t a very skilled holy man yet, and he’s unable to control the golem he produces. It ends up being way larger than he intended, and its head breaks through the roof of his home. So he tries to destroy it.”

“How does he do that?”

“The secret Kabbalah ritual involves writing the word emet on the golem’s forehead in the Hebrew alphabet. Otherwise it won’t move. If you remove one of the letters, equivalent to the ‘e’ from the word, it spells met, which means ‘death’, and makes the golem return to the earth from which it came.”

“Huh.”

“In the Jewish faith, words and letters have spiritual power. And so the important ritual and incantation for bringing a golem to life revolved around the letters written on its forehead. The rabbi ordered the golem to tie his shoelaces for him, and when the golem knelt down before the rabbi, he quickly erased the letter ‘e’ from his forehead. Cracks immediately began to appear in the golem’s body and it crumbled to the ground.”

“Wow.”

“This golem here is made from wood, but if you look very carefully, you’ll see very tiny Hebrew lettering on his forehead. It says emet.”

“Does it? So if this golem starts moving, I should get rid of this letter here?”

“That’d do it.”

“I’ve read a story about golems somewhere before,” said Sasaki.

“Oh? What kind of story?”

“The well in some village dries up and the villagers have nothing to drink. They order a golem to go and fetch them a jar of water from a river far away. The loyal, hard-working golem obeys, and the next day, and the day after that, he goes back and forth between the river and the well, refilling the well with the river water. Eventually the well begins to overflow with all the water he’s brought, and the village is flooded. The houses begin to disappear under the water but nobody can stop the golem. They don’t know the right spell to make him stop. And that’s the story.”

“Terrifying,” said Hatsue Kanai.

“Automata are unable to be flexible, to adapt to circumstances. That’s their fatal defect. It comes across to human beings as a kind of insanity, and incites fear. Do you think dolls have the same tendency to inspire fear?” asked Kozaburo.

“That’s probably true. Isn’t it like the fear of nuclear warfare? Human beings press the button but once the weapon has begun to deploy, there’s nothing they can do about it any more. They can beg all they like but their words are useless. The expressionless face of a doll or an automaton is similar.”

Kozaburo looked impressed and nodded vigorously.

“You make a good point, Sasaki. Very well put.

“By the way, this doll originally had the perfectly ordinary name of Jack. He’s Gymnastic Jack. It just so happened that the old man who ran the second-hand shop in Prague where I bought him told me that on stormy nights he goes out by himself to find wells, rivers or any other place where there’s water.”

“Ugh!”

“And he said that on the morning following a storm, Jack’s mouth is always wet.”

“Ha! That’s ridiculous!”

“There were always signs that he’d been drinking water. After that, the shopkeeper gave him the nickname Golem.”

“It’s just a made-up story, right?”

“No, I saw it with my own eyes.”

“What?”

“One morning I looked at his face and there were drops of water trickling down from the edge of his lips.”

“Honestly?”

“Honest to God. But I thought nothing of it. It was just condensation. It happens a lot, doesn’t it—like glass getting misted up—that a face can get beads of sweat on it? It had trickled down and followed the line of his lips.”

“Oh, okay.”

“Yes, well that’s how I managed to explain the phenomenon.”

The guests began to laugh, but were stopped by a piercing scream behind them. Everyone jumped in surprise, then turned to see Kumi, her face drained of colour, collapse to her knees. The men rushed to support her.

Kumi was pointing at Golem.

“That’s him! That’s the man who was looking in my window!”

SCENE 10 The Salon

In the end, this new piece of information did very little to advance the investigation. As always, the detectives were overly cautious; for the rest of the day they refused to believe Kumi’s story. It wasn’t until the morning of the 30th that they reluctantly admitted that it could be true. To them the story was beyond the bounds of common sense, but eventually after struggling with the idea for half a day, they found a loophole that made the outrageous possible—namely, that some person or persons unknown had used the doll to frighten or intimidate Kumi. This was the three detectives’ classic modus operandi. But of course the moment they began to consider who, or for what reason, or why Kumi specifically had been the victim, they immediately hit a wall.

They found it difficult to imagine that the perpetrator had been trying to kill Kumi. She hadn’t suffered any harm in the days since. In fact, Golem had appeared around the time a completely different victim, Ueda, had been murdered.

It was even less likely that the murderer had thought scaring Kumi would make it easier to kill Ueda. Kumi had reported seeing Golem a full thirty minutes after he had been murdered.

And then there was the sound of a man screaming. What was that? Golem was found in pieces in the snow near Room 10, so had he been taken to pieces after being used to frighten Kumi?

The detectives spent the whole morning on a sofa in the corner of the salon, looking utterly perplexed. Okuma lowered his voice so that the guests at the dinner table couldn’t hear.

“I’ve said it many times, but I’ve had enough of this bizarre case. I want to step down from the investigating team, get out of here as fast as I can. It feels like they’re taking the piss.”

Ushikoshi dropped his voice too.

“Same here. Some kind of madman killed Ueda, then hoisted up a doll to terrify the living daylights out of Kumi Aikura, then pulled it apart and tossed it in the snow. I don’t want anything to do with the kind of psycho who would do something like that.”

“Kumi Aikura’s room, number 1, is right above Room 3, the room where the doll was kept,” Sergeant Ozaki pointed out.

“True, but there’s no window below hers on that side. The south wall of the Tengu Room has no window.”

“The sequence of events that you gave just now, Chief Inspector, does it make any sense?”

“How could it? Personally, I’ve given up on making any sense out of it.”

“There is one way to bring together all of the unknown parts of this riddle and make something of it,” said Okuma.

“And what’s that?”

“It was the doll. It did everything—killed Ueda and Kikuoka too. And then that night after doing Ueda in, it flew up into the air and on a whim decided to peep in through Kumi’s window. But it got a bit carried away, and its body fell to bits, causing it to roar in pain.”

Okuma’s comment was met with complete silence. Although everyone knew it was inappropriate and childish, no one felt like telling him off. On the contrary, they felt that somewhere in the fairy tale there was a grain of truth.

Okuma, for his part, thought better of it, and decided to suggest a more reasonable theory.

“Let’s forget about the wild version for now and get back to the problem of Kikuoka’s locked room. The knife was stuck into his body, like this, right?”

“That’s right,” said Ozaki. “The knife entered from diagonally above, on a downward trajectory. So we can assume the killer held it high in the air and then brought it down with force on the victim like this. The knife entered his body at a slight diagonal angle.”

“We’re thinking the killer stood behind him and stabbed him?”

“Yes, that’s what I think. Alternatively, that the victim was bending forward slightly. That could have made it easier for the suspect to stab him.”

“What you’re saying, Ozaki, is that you think that it’s likely the victim wasn’t sleeping when he was stabbed, but that he was up and about in his room?”

“Well, I don’t have enough evidence to reach a conclusion about that, but yes, I think he was hunched over. If he’d been stabbed while sleeping, he would have to have been lying on his front. And besides, if he had been lying down, it would have been more likely the knife was stuck in at a lower angle.”

“If you’re standing over someone sleeping like that on their front, you might bring down the arm with the knife from straight above and then it would end up perpendicular to the body.”

“Well, I suppose so.”

“And if Kikuoka was awake and moving around, there’s something I don’t understand,” said Ushikoshi. “At around 10.30, or maybe more like 10.25, Kozaburo Hamamoto knocked on the door of Room 14. I know he did because I was right there with him. It was a relatively gentle knock, but there was no response from Kikuoka. If he’d still been awake he would have answered. His time of death was about thirty minutes after that, so he couldn’t already have been dead at that point. He must have been asleep.

“But then, if what you say is right, thirty minutes later the victim woke up again and let his murderer into the room. So how did the killer manage to wake Kikuoka? Was there any different way of waking him from the one that Kozaburo Hamamoto tried? All he could have done was to knock on the door. There’s really no other way. That night, Inspector Okuma was sleeping in the room above, and Haruo Kajiwara next door. The killer couldn’t have shouted or made any other kind of noise. So how did he manage to wake Kikuoka? Or perhaps Kikuoka was just pretending to be asleep when Hamamoto knocked.”

“Okay, then, so d’you still think the killer stuck a stick though that air vent?” said Okuma.

Perhaps it was the snide tone, but Ushikoshi pulled a face. He was fed up with all the puzzles.

“Hey, if Ozaki’s right with his theory that the victim was stabbed when he was standing upright, can’t we work out the suspect’s height from the angle of the knife?” said Okuma.

“That kind of thing is surprisingly difficult. It doesn’t work like it does in mystery novels. Like we said before, the victim might have been bending down. Still, it could be said that the knife is in a fairly high position. I think we could probably rule out a very short person. That’s about as much as we can say at this point. In which case, we can probably eliminate the women—except for Eiko who’s over 170 centimetres tall.”

“There goes the dwarf theory.”

“What the hell?” snapped Ushikoshi.

In an instant, the atmosphere between the guardians of the peace turned threatening.

“Well, anyway,” said Ozaki hurriedly, in an attempt to break the tension, “the bigger problem is that the knife was stuck in the right side of his back.”

“Because the heart isn’t on the right,” continued Ushikoshi. “Maybe the killer was in a hurry?”

“Maybe he didn’t feel like stabbing him in the heart,” said Okuma. “You never know with folks.”

“Actually, I was talking about whether he was right- or left-handed.”

But no matter how much Ozaki tried to revive the discussion, the other two had completely clammed up.

Abruptly, Ushikoshi got up from the sofa.

“I’ve had enough! I give up! I just don’t get it. There’ll probably be another crime committed by the time we finish talking about it. I’m going back to the station and I’m going to ask Tokyo for help. You okay with that? Any objections? At this point we’re just going to have to swallow our pride.”

Everyone fell silent as Ushikoshi briskly marched out of the salon.

“I s’pose it always was too much for us to handle alone, this confounded case,” said Okuma.

Ozaki was the only one who looked disappointed.

The three detectives hadn’t exactly been incompetent, but their years of experience were proving useless in solving this particular case.

Outside, not a single snowflake fluttered by the window. It was a gloomy, heavy morning. The rest of the residents of the mansion sat at a distance from the three police officers in the corner, holding their own private discussion. Sasaki muttered something.

“However you look at it, the detectives are the criminals here.”

It was the afternoon when Ushikoshi returned to the Ice Floe Mansion.

“How did it go? Ozaki asked.

“They were quite disapproving, to tell the truth.”

“What?”

“I mean they really want us to forget about saving face and agree to accept help in doing everything we can to solve this. Superintendent Nakamura, who I met when I was in Tokyo for the Yuzo Akawata case, is someone I can get along with. I explained our case in great detail and he agreed it was a very strange one, and if the killer really was one of the people here in the house, then there was no need to be in too much of a hurry.

“And I think he’s got a point. If we can eventually work out who the killer is, then that’s enough. I think we have to acknowledge our failings up to now, and realize that the most important thing at this moment is to make absolutely sure that no more murders are committed.”

“Right.”

“Anyway, I don’t know about the city, but this kind of case never happens out here in the countryside. Even if it’s rare, at least they’re a little more used to weird stuff like this up in Tokyo.”

“But, Chief, this does reflect on our standing. We really shouldn’t give up too easily. We’ll manage to sort it out somehow. Isn’t this admitting that we are powerless?”

“Yes, it is. But have you managed to solve it yet, Ozaki?”

“Well, no, but—”

“Anyway, if Tokyo sends someone to help us, then we’ll still be working the case, but staying in the background. Surely it’s good to get help? It’s all about protecting people’s lives. That takes priority over our reputation.”

“But are there likely to be any more murders?”

“As we haven’t a clue about the motive, I can’t answer that for sure. But I think there will be.”

“You do?”

“And when I said that to Tokyo, they said together we could all work out the best way to deal with it. They said they had an idea about it.”

“What do they have in mind?”

“I’m not sure, but they said they’d get in touch later.”

“And how are they going to do that?”

“By telegram, apparently.”

“Ugh. Now that gives me a very bad feeling. I can’t help picturing some kind of Sherlock Holmes clone turning up with a pipe in his mouth. I can’t stand that type.”

“Ha ha. If there’d been a detective as famous as that in Tokyo, I’d have definitely requested his presence up here. If there was anyone remotely like that…”