The Devotion of Suspect X

TWELVE

Yasuko walked into the hotel tea lounge, and a man wearing a dark green jacket beckoned to her from the back. It was Kudo.

About a third of the tables in the place were filled. There were some couples, but most of the patrons were businessmen in expensive suits, leaning toward each other as they discussed their deals. Yasuko made her way across the room, her face slightly downcast.

“Sorry to call you out here so suddenly,” Kudo said. He was smiling. “Would you like something to drink?”

The waitress came over, and Yasuko ordered a milk tea.

“Is something wrong?” she asked.

“No, nothing so serious,” he replied, lifting his coffee cup to his lips, but before drinking he said, “A detective came to my place yesterday.”

Yasuko’s eyes opened wide. “They found you…”

“Did you tell them about me?”

“I’m sorry. They came right after I had dinner with you the other day, and they kept asking me questions about where I’d been and with whom. I thought they’d be even more suspicious if I didn’t say anything—”

Kudo waved a hand dismissively. “No need to apologize. I don’t blame you at all. If we’re ever going to meet like normal people, the police should know about us. In fact, I think it’s a good thing you told them.”

“Really?” Yasuko looked up at him.

He nodded. “Just know that they’ll be keeping a close watch on us, so be ready for that. You know, I was followed on my way here.”

“Followed?”

“I didn’t notice it at first, but it became pretty obvious the more I drove. There was a car behind me the whole way from Hikari. They even followed me into the parking lot of this hotel. I don’t think I was imagining things.”

Kudo talked as if this was nothing special, but Yasuko’s eyes were frozen on him. “And? Where’d they go?”

“Who knows?” He shrugged. “They were too far away for me to see a face, and they were gone before I knew it. To tell the truth, I’ve been watching everyone in here since I arrived, but I haven’t noticed anyone particularly suspicious. Of course, they could be watching in a way that I wouldn’t notice. Still, I think they might have left.”

Yasuko looked around at the other people in the tea room. Everyone seemed perfectly normal.

“So you’re a suspect now?”

“I think they’ve come up with a scenario in which you were the leader in some plot to kill Togashi, with me your willing accomplice. The detective yesterday was very up front about wanting an alibi from me.”

The waitress arrived with the milk tea. While she was standing at the table, Yasuko cast her eyes around the room a second time.

“If they’re still watching us now, won’t they suspect something if they see you meeting with me like this?”

“What? No problem. Like I said, I want this—us—to be out in the open. Trying to hide it would make us look even more suspicious. We were never the kind to sneak around in any case.” Kudo leaned back on his sofa seat and spread his arms as if to demonstrate that he didn’t care who saw him. Then he took a long sip from his coffee cup.

Yasuko reached for her own teacup. “Well, I’m happy to hear you say that, but I don’t want to be the cause of any trouble for you, Kudo. It’s just not right. I think, maybe, we shouldn’t meet for a while. Just until things calm down.”

“I figured you’d say something like that,” Kudo said, setting down his cup and leaning forward. “That’s why I wanted you to come here today. I knew you’d hear about the detective coming to my place sooner or later, and I didn’t want you to worry about it. Frankly, I’m not worried about it at all. I told you they asked about my alibi. Luckily, I was with someone else at the time, and if they decide to pursue it, there are records to prove it. The detectives will lose their interest in me eventually.”

“Well, I hope so, for your sake.”

“Look,” Kudo said, “what I’m more worried about is you. They’ll figure out I wasn’t an accomplice sooner or later. But that doesn’t mean they’ll stop treating you like a suspect. It makes me downright depressed to think about how pushy they’re going to get with you.”

“Well, there’s no helping that. After all, Togashi was looking for me at the time.”

“There is that, isn’t there? What the hell did he want with you? Even dead, that guy is still a pain in the ass.” Kudo grimaced. Then his eyes turned back to Yasuko. “You really didn’t have anything to do with it, right? Don’t get me wrong. I’m not doubting you. I’m just saying if you had any contact with Togashi at all, it’s safe to tell me about it, and it might help.”

Yasuko returned Kudo’s look, noticing his fine features. So this is why he suddenly wanted to meet. He did suspect her, if only a little.

She smiled faintly. “Don’t worry. I had nothing to do with him, really.”

“That’s what I thought. Still, it’s nice to hear it from your mouth.” Kudo nodded and looked at his watch. “Well, since you’re here, how about dinner? I know a great yakitori place.”

“I’m sorry. I can’t tonight. I didn’t tell Misato I’d be out.”

“Oh, right. Well, I don’t want to make things difficult for you, then.” Kudo grabbed the check and stood. “Shall we?”

While he was paying, Yasuko took another look around. No one in the tea lounge looked even remotely like a detective.

She felt bad admitting it to herself, but while Kudo remained under suspicion, she felt easier about getting together with him. After all, the more the police suspected him, the further from the truth they were. But that seemed bound to change. In any case, she wasn’t sure she should let her relationship with Kudo continue to progress as quickly as it had. She wasn’t afraid of becoming intimate—she wanted it, in fact. But she was afraid that doing so would upset the tenuous balance of her life. Ishigami’s masklike face flitted across her mind.

“I’ll give you a lift,” Kudo said after paying the bill.

“It’s all right. I’ll take the train.”

“No, let me give you a ride.”

“Really, it’s okay. I need to do some shopping.”

“Hmph,” Kudo grumbled, but in the end he saw her off cheerily. “All right, well, I’ll see you later, then. It’s all right if I give you a ring?”

“Of course, and thanks for the tea.” Yasuko returned his smile before walking away.

She was at a crosswalk making for Shinagawa Station when her cell phone began to ring. Still walking, Yasuko pulled out her phone and looked at the display. It was Sayoko at Benten-tei.

“Yes?”

“Hey, Yasuko? It’s Sayoko. Can you talk?” There was a strange tension in her voice.

“Sure, what’s wrong?”

“I just wanted to tell you that the detectives dropped by again after you left today. They were asking some strange questions. I thought you should know.”

Gripping her cell phone tightly, Yasuko closed her eyes. Those policemen were at it again, weaving a spiderweb around her wherever she went.

“What do you mean, ‘strange’?” she asked uneasily.

“They were asking about that guy. The high school teacher? What was his name again? Ishigami?”

Yasuko almost dropped the phone. “What about him?” Her voice was trembling.

“Well, they said they’d heard there was someone who came to buy our lunches just to see you, and they wanted to know who he was and what he did. I think they might have heard something from Kudo.”

“Kudo?”

Yasuko couldn’t imagine how this had anything to do with him.

“Yasuko, I think I might’ve said something to him once … and he must’ve told that to the police.”

Now it made sense to Yasuko. The detectives had talked to Kudo, heard about Ishigami, then gone to Benten-tei to corroborate what he told them.

“And what did you say, Sayoko?”

“Well, I didn’t want to raise any suspicions by hiding it, so I told them the truth. I told them he was a schoolteacher who lived next to you. But that we had just been guessing about his reasons for coming. It’s not like he told us anything.”

Yasuko’s mouth was dry. So the police had finally found Ishigami. Had it been Kudo who put them on the trail? Or was there some other reason they were watching him?

“Hello? Yasuko?”

“Yeah, sorry.”

“Anyway, that’s what I told them. I hope that was okay? I didn’t do anything wrong, did I?”

She had, but that was the last thing Yasuko could admit.

“No, not at all. I can’t see how it would be a problem. He’s certainly got nothing to do with all this.”

“That’s what I thought. I just wanted you to know that the detectives had come back.”

“Right, thanks.”

Yasuko hung up. Her stomach churned; she wanted to throw up.

She felt sick and queasy all the way back to her apartment. She stopped to do some shopping at a supermarket on the way, but couldn’t even remember what she had bought by the time she made it home.

Ishigami was at his computer when he heard the door of the next apartment open and close. There were three photos up on his screen: two of Kudo, and one of Yasuko as she went into the hotel. He had wanted to get a shot of the two of them together, but he’d been worried that Kudo would spot him; and if Yasuko had happened to see him, too, there would have been a scene. So he had let his better judgment prevail and kept his distance.

Ishigami imagined the worst-case scenario. He’d need these photos then, for sure. He just hoped it never came to that.

He glanced at the clock on his desk before standing. It was almost eight o’clock in the evening. Yasuko and Kudo hadn’t been together for very long. He couldn’t help but make note of how that fact put him at ease.

Telephone card in his pocket, the mathematician left his apartment and walked down the street as usual, taking a careful look around to make sure he wasn’t being watched.

He thought about the detective, Kusanagi. It was strange. Even when Kusanagi had come asking about Yasuko, Ishigami had gotten the feeling that the man was really there because he wanted to know about Manabu Yukawa. What sort of connection did they have? It was hard for Ishigami to plan his next move without knowing whether or not he was a suspect yet.

He called Yasuko’s cell from the now familiar public phone. She picked up on the third ring.

“It’s me,” Ishigami said. “Is now a good time?”

“Yes.”

“Anything happen today?” He wanted to know what she had talked about with Kudo, but couldn’t find a way to ask the question. If he hadn’t tailed the man, he never would have known they’d met at all.

“Er, actually…” she began.

“Actually what? What happened?” He imagined Kudo filling her head with all kinds of crazy ideas.

“The detectives, they came back to Benten-tei. And, well, they were asking about you.”

“About me? How?” Ishigami swallowed.

“Well, it’s kind of a long story, but some of the people at the shop have been talking about you since before all this began. Sorry, I don’t want to say anything to make you angry…”

What was making Ishigami angry was the roundabout way she was giving him the information. She would be no good at mathematics, he could tell.

“I promise not to get angry. Please just tell me as bluntly as possible. What were they saying about me?” Ishigami waited, ready to hear something unflattering about his looks or demeanor.

“Well—I’ve denied it all along, you understand—but some of the people at the shop think that you come there to buy lunches just so you can see me.”

“What?” For a moment, Ishigami’s mind went blank.

“I’m sorry. They thought it was funny, like a joke. That’s how they talk about things. They really don’t mean any harm by it. I don’t even think they seriously believe it themselves,” Yasuko said, vainly attempting to do some damage control.

But Ishigami barely registered half of what she said. He was wondering how someone else had noticed—someone other than Yasuko.

They were right, of course. He did go to the shop every day just to see her. And he realized that unconsciously he had expected her to notice how he felt. Still, it made his entire body hot with shame to think that someone else, a third party, had noticed first. How they must have laughed to see an ugly man like him head over heels for a beautiful woman like her.

“I’m sorry. You’re angry, aren’t you?” Yasuko asked.

Ishigami hurriedly cleared his throat. “No, no … What did the detectives do, exactly?”

“Like I said, they heard that rumor, and so they came to the shop asking who this person—you—were, and the person at the shop gave them your name.”

“I see,” Ishigami said, still burning. “And where do you think the detectives heard that rumor?”

“I … I’m not sure.”

“Is that all they wanted to know?”

“I think so. That’s all I heard.”

Receiver gripped tightly in his hand, Ishigami nodded. This was no time for indecision. He didn’t know how it had happened, but it was clear the police were gradually setting their sights on him. He had to think of an appropriate response.

“Is your daughter there?” he asked.

“Misato? Yes, why?”

“Can I speak with her a moment?”

“Sure, of course.”

Ishigami closed his eyes. He focused all of his energies on divining what detective Kusanagi was planning, what action he would take, what he would do next. Yet, in the middle of his thoughts, there he found the face of Manabu Yukawa. What was the physicist’s role in all this?

“Hello?” came a young girl’s voice over the line.

“It’s Ishigami,” he told her. “Misato … you said you talked about the movie with your friend on the twelfth? Mika was her name, right?”

“Yes. And I told the detectives that, too.”

“Right, so you said. I was wondering about your other friend—Haruka, was it?”

“That’s right. Haruka Tamaoka.”

“You told her about the movie, too, right? Did you talk about it more than that one time?”

“No, just the once. Well, maybe a little.”

“You didn’t tell the detectives about her, right?”

“No, only about Mika. You told me I shouldn’t mention Haruka, so I didn’t.”

“That’s right. But I think it might be time to talk to them about her now.”

Ishigami glanced around the park, making sure no one was nearby, before giving Misato detailed instructions on what she was to do.

Gray smoke was rising from an empty plot next to the university tennis courts. Kusanagi arrived to find Yukawa in a lab coat with the sleeves rolled up, using a long stick to poke at something inside an oil drum. The smoke was coming from the drum.

Yukawa heard his footsteps approaching and looked up. “It seems I have a stalker.”

“Detectives like stalking suspicious people.”

“So I’m suspicious now, am I?” Yukawa asked, a glimmer in his eye. “Do I detect a bold new direction from our stoic hero? It’s just that kind of flexibility you’ll need to rise in this world, you know.”

“Whatever you say, Galileo,” said Kusanagi sarcastically. “Don’t you want to know why I suspect you?”

“I don’t need to ask. People always suspect scientists of being up to no good.” He gave the contents of the oil drum another prod.

“What are you burning there?”

“Nothing much. Some old reports and materials I no longer needed. Can’t really trust a shredder to do the job.” Yukawa picked up a nearby bucket and poured water into the drum. There was a sizzling sound, and the smoke became thicker and turned white.

“I’ve got some questions for you. As a detective, this time.”

“You really are onto something, aren’t you?” Yukawa checked to make sure that the fire was out; then, bucket in one hand, he began to walk away.

Kusanagi followed. “I dropped by Benten-tei after talking to you yesterday. Heard something very interesting there. Don’t you want to know?”

“Not really.”

“I’ll tell you anyway. Seems like your friend Ishigami has a thing for Yasuko Hanaoka.”

Yukawa stopped in the middle of a loping stride. He turned his head and shot a piercing look over his shoulder at the detective. “Someone at the shop tell you that?”

“Something like that. An interesting idea occurred to me while I was talking to you, and I wanted to check at Benten-tei to see if I was right. Theories and logic are all very well, but intuition’s one of the best weapons in a detective’s arsenal.”

“And?” Yukawa turned around to face him. “How does it affect your investigation now that you know he ‘had a thing’ for your prime suspect?”

“Don’t pretend you don’t know what it means. I know you’ve been trying to hide the fact that you have suspected Ishigami of being Yasuko’s conspirator for some time now.”

“I don’t recall trying to hide anything.”

“Anyway, I found out why you suspected him without your help. We’re going to keep a close eye on him now. Which is why I’m here. I know we decided to part ways yesterday, but I’d like to offer you a peace treaty. In exchange for information from us, I want you to tell me what you’ve found. Not a bad deal, you have to agree.”

“You overestimate my value. I haven’t found out anything. It’s all conjecture.”

“Then tell me what you’re conjecturing,” Kusanagi said, staring at his friend, holding his gaze.

Yukawa looked away first and then resumed walking. “Back to the lab first.”

Back in Laboratory 13, Kusanagi sat down at a table with some mysterious scorch marks on it. Yukawa placed two mugs on the tabletop. It would have been hard to say which mug was filthier.

The physicist mixed some coffee, then followed it with an immediate question. “If Ishigami was a conspirator, what role do you think he played?”

“What, I have to talk first?”

“You’re the one who offered the peace treaty.” Yukawa sat down in a chair, absentmindedly stirring his drink.

“Fine. I haven’t told my boss about Ishigami at all, so this is just my thinking—but if the murder did take place somewhere other than our crime scene, Ishigami must’ve carried the body.”

“Oh? But I thought you were against the whole body transportation scenario.”

“I said all bets were off if she had an accomplice. I still think it was probably Yasuko Hanaoka that did the deed. She might have had help from Ishigami, but she was definitely there.”

“You sound pretty sure of yourself.”

“Well, if Ishigami was the one who killed him and carried the body, he’s no conspirator. That would make him the murderer, probably working alone. No matter how big a crush he had on her, I can’t imagine he’d go that far. Also, if he killed Togashi on his own and then Yasuko turned him in, it would all be over now. So she must have borne some of the risk, too.”

“What if Ishigami killed him, but they both helped dispose of the body?”

“I won’t say that’s not a possibility, but the likelihood is pretty low. Yasuko Hanaoka’s movie theater alibi is shaky, but her alibi after that is pretty sound. If she timed it just right, she could have committed the murder and still made her alibi, but she wouldn’t have had time to do that and dispose of a body.”

“What part of her alibi exactly have you not been able to confirm?”

“The time between 7:00 and 9:10 when she says she was watching a movie. The ramen shop and the karaoke place after that all checked out. That, and she did go into the movie theater at least once. We found half of a ticket stub there with her and her daughter’s fingerprints.”

“So you think it was during that two hours and ten minutes that she and Ishigami murdered her ex-husband?”

“They might also have disposed of the body then. But, considering travel time, she must’ve left the scene before Ishigami did.”

“And where did the murder take place?”

“I don’t know that. Except it was probably Yasuko who called Togashi there.”

Yukawa sipped his coffee without a word. He wrinkled his brow bemusedly, as if unconvinced by his friend’s explanation.

“Got something to say?”

“Not particularly.”

“Well if you do, have out with it,” Kusanagi said. “I’ve told you what I think, so now it’s your turn.”

Yukawa sighed. “He didn’t use a car.”

“Huh?”

“I said, Ishigami didn’t use a car. He would need one to carry a corpse, right? Since he doesn’t have a car, he would’ve had to get get one from somewhere. I don’t think he has the means to procure a car in such a way that he would leave no trace behind. Not many law-abiding citizens do.”

“We’ll be checking all of the rental agencies, of course.”

“Good luck with that. I can guarantee you won’t find anything.”

Kusanagi glared at the physicist, but Yukawa seemed unconcerned.

“All I’m saying is that if the murder happened somewhere other than the place where the body was found, then it was probably Ishigami who carried it there. There’s still a good possibility that the murder did take place at our crime scene. If two of them were involved, anything is possible.”

“So,” Yukawa said, lifting the cup of coffee up to his lips, “you think the two of them killed Togashi, caved in his face, burned off his fingerprints, stripped his clothes and burned them, and then walked away?”

“Like I said, they might have left at different times.” Kusanagi looked down at his cup of instant coffee and suppressed a small shudder. “Yasuko would’ve had to reach the movie theater by the time the movie ended, at least.”

“And according to your theory, the victim rode that bicycle to the crime scene?”

“I guess so, yes.”

“Which would mean that Ishigami had forgotten to wipe it for fingerprints. You really think Ishigami would have made such a simple mistake? Ishigami the Buddha?”

“Even geniuses make mistakes.”

Yukawa slowly shook his head. “Not that one.”

“Okay, then why do you think he left those prints on the bicycle?”

“That’s what I’ve been wondering,” Yukawa said, crossing his arms. “I haven’t come to a conclusion yet.”

“Maybe you’re overthinking this. That guy might be a genius mathematician, but he’s certainly a novice murderer.”

“They’re the same thing,” Yukawa stated simply. “Murder probably comes even easier to him.”

Now Kusanagi shook his head. Examining the stains on his mug, he said, “in any case, we’re keeping an eye on him. If we proceed on the assumption that there was a male conspirator, it broadens the range of our investigation considerably.”

“If this new theory of yours is correct, it means the crime was carried out in a rather slipshod manner. We have the fingerprints left on the bicycle, the half-burned clothes—all evidence of carelessness. My question is, do you think this crime was planned from the beginning? Or did it happen more spontaneously?”

“Well—” Kusanagi began. He glanced at Yukawa’s calm, intent face, and hesitated for a moment before continuing. “It could’ve been spontaneous, sure. For instance, what if Yasuko called Togashi up to talk with him about something, and Ishigami came along as a sort of bodyguard? The discussion got heated, and the two of them ended up killing Togashi. Something like that.”

“But that doesn’t fit with the movie theater story at all,” Yukawa observed. “If they were just getting together to talk, why prepare an alibi? Even an insufficient alibi like hers?”

“So you think it was planned? That Yasuko and Ishigami told him to come someplace and then ambushed him?”

“That’s hard to imagine.”

“Well, great. So what do you think happened, then?” Kusanagi asked sourly.

“If Ishigami planned the whole thing from the start, it wouldn’t be half as full of holes as it is now.”

“Fine, but how does that help—” Kusanagi broke off abruptly as his cell began to ring. “Hang on a second.” He answered the phone.

A moment later he was engaged in a hurried sotto voce conversation. He pulled out a pad and scribbled a few notes before hanging up.

“That was my partner, Kishitani,” he told Kusanagi. “I’ve received some very important news concerning Yasuko’s daughter. It turns out one of Misato’s classmates just gave a very interesting testimony.”

“What’s that?”

“Apparently, at lunch on the day of the murder, this classmate of hers heard from Misato that she was going out to the movies with her mother that night.”

“Really?”

“Kishitani confirmed it. It looks solid. Which means that Yasuko had already decided to go to the movies by lunchtime that day at the latest.” Kusanagi nodded to the physicist. “Maybe I was right to think this was premeditated.”

In response, Yukawa shook his head, his eyes dead serious. “Impossible.”