Salvation of a Saint

TWENTY-ONE

‘When she asked me why I was asking those questions, I had no idea what to tell her. What could I say when even I didn’t understand them?’ Utsumi picked up her coffee cup. ‘You know, they tell us to always have a clear goal in mind when questioning someone.’ She had brought the results from her latest round of questioning to share with Yukawa in his laboratory.

‘Well, that’s an excellent policy, most of the time,’ Yukawa said, looking up from her report. ‘But what we’re trying to do here is to determine whether or not an extremely unusual, unprecedented crime has taken place. Determining the existence or nonexistence of something extraordinary is never a straightforward task, and those who set themselves to do it are often overly swayed by their preconceived notions. You’ve heard of the physicist René-Prosper Blondlot – wait, no, of course you haven’t heard of him.’

‘I haven’t.’

‘He was a French researcher active in the latter half of the nineteenth century. Blondlot announced the discovery of a new kind of radiation late in his career. These “N-rays”, as he termed them, had the effect of making electrical sparks appear brighter. It was hailed as an epoch-making discovery, and sent the whole physics world into a tizzy. However, in the end, N-rays were shown not to exist after all. No matter how much researchers from other countries tried, no one could duplicate the results or increase the sparks’ brightness.’

‘So it was a sham?’

‘Not a sham, exactly. Because Blondlot himself believed in the N-rays’ existence until the day he died.’

‘How does that work?’

‘Well, for one thing, Blondlot was judging the brightness of the electrical sparks by his own eyes alone. That was the origin of his error. The increase in brightness due to the supposed application of N-rays wasn’t an actual effect, but nonetheless he saw it – simply because he desired to see it.’

‘That seems like a pretty blatant mistake for a respected physicist to make.’

‘I told you that story to illustrate the inherent danger of preconceptions. Which is why I sent you to that interview without any background information. As a result, you were able to give me extremely objective information.’ Yukawa returned his eyes to the report.

‘So, what’s the verdict? Are we still dealing with an imaginary solution?’

Yukawa just stared at the paper in his hand. A deep wrinkle formed between his eyebrows. ‘Several bottles in the fridge, huh?’ he said, half to himself.

‘I thought that was strange, too,’ Utsumi said. ‘Mrs Mashiba told us that she never let their stock of bottles run out. But on the day after she went to her parents’ house, they were down to one bottle. What do you think it means?’

Yukawa crossed his arms and closed his eyes.

‘Professor?’ she said, half afraid he’d fallen asleep.

‘Impossible,’ came the physicist’s reply.

‘What’s impossible?’

‘It just couldn’t be, and yet …’ Yukawa took off his glasses, pressed his fingertips to his eyelids, and said nothing more.