Malice (11 page)

She must have picked up on my hesitation because she went on, “If you're thinking about how long we were married—not very long, I admit—allow me to point out that before I was his wife, I was his editor.”

I already knew this. Rie had worked at one of Hidaka's publishers, which was how they'd met in the first place.

“When I was his editor, we spoke at great length about the novels he might write in the future. In the end, I was the editor for only one of his books, but it's a novel that never would've existed without our discussions. I don't see how Nonoguchi could've been involved at all.”

“Which novel was this?”

“
Sea Ghost
. It was published last year.”

It wasn't one I'd read, so I asked one of the detectives with me if he knew anything about it. In our investigation, many of my fellow detectives had become experts on Kunihiko Hidaka's work.

His response was intriguing.
Sea Ghost
was one of the novels lacking a counterpart in Osamu Nonoguchi's notes and disks.

Nor was
Sea Ghost
alone in this. All of the novels Mr. Hidaka had published in the first three years of his career appeared to be originals. Even after that point, nearly half of his books had no counterparts in Nonoguchi's apartment. This made sense if we assumed that Mr. Hidaka continued some of his own writing, even while using Mr. Nonoguchi as a ghostwriter for other works.

If that assumption was correct, then even if there was a work that, as Rie Hidaka claimed, “never would've existed without our discussions,” it didn't disprove my theory.

I tried a new angle to see if Rie had any idea what might drive Osamu Nonoguchi to kill her husband.

She said, “I've been thinking about it ever since he was arrested, but I just don't know. To be honest, I still can't believe he did it. They were such good friends. I don't think I ever saw them fight or argue. I worry that this might all be some horrible mistake.”

I believe she was sincere. Nothing in her manner suggested this was just a performance for our benefit. I asked a few minor follow-up questions, then I thanked her for her time.

As we were getting ready to leave, Rie Hidaka handed me a book with a gray jacket, speckled as though with gold dust—a copy of
Sea Ghost
. I think what she had in mind was that I read it and then stop doubting her late husband's talent.

I began reading it that night, recalling that Osamu Nonoguchi had recommended this very book to me when I asked him if Kunihiko Hidaka had ever written a mystery. I wondered if there was a deeper meaning behind Nonoguchi's choice of book. Was he suggesting I read a Hidaka novel that he had nothing to do with?

Sea Ghost
was the story of a man of advanced years and his young wife. The man was a painter, the wife his model. The painter began to suspect that his wife was cheating on him, a typical theme for the genre. However, the wife had two distinct personalities, and the real action kicks off when the husband discovers her secret. One of her personalities is his loyal wife who seems to love him from the bottom of her heart. The other personality has a lover, and it becomes clear this personality is plotting with her lover to kill the painter. As the painter agonizes over whether he should bring her to a hospital for treatment, he finds a memo on his desk:

“Who will the drugs kill? Me? Or her?”

The memo had been left by his wife's “other” personality, and the message was clear: even if treatment could fix her multiple-personality disorder, there was no guarantee that the personality who loved him would be the one that remained.

Deeply troubled, the painter begins having nightmares. In these dreams, his wife comes into the room with an angelic smile on her face and opens the bedroom window, through which a man enters. As the intruder lifts a knife to attack the painter, the intruder's face changes to become that of the wife—at which point the painter wakes in a cold sweat.

In the end, a real attempt is made on his life, and defending himself, the painter accidentally stabs his wife. She dies in his arms, but the way she looks at him makes him believe that, just before the end, her personality shifted back to that of the good wife. So, did he kill the angel or the demon? The painter is doomed never to know.

That's the general outline, though I'm sure a more discerning reader might have come away with a higher-level interpretation. Themes such as lust in old age, and ugliness in the heart of an artist, were probably there for the taking if one read between the lines, but I was never much for literature in school. Nor am I particularly qualified to pass judgment on the quality of the writing itself. That said, with all due respect to Rie Hidaka, in my opinion it wasn't a very good book.

*   *   *

Let's consider the careers of the two men: killer and victim.

Kunihiko Hidaka joined a private high school attached to a university and climbed up that ladder into the university's Department of Literature and Philosophy. After getting a degree, he worked first at an advertising company, then at a publisher. Roughly ten years ago, a short story he'd written won a small literary magazine's new-author award. This started his career as a novelist. For the next two years, none of his books sold all that well, but the book he published in the fourth year,
An Unburning Flame,
won a major award for literature. This began his march toward being a famous author.

Osamu Nonoguchi went to a different private high school from Hidaka's and, after taking a year off, began studying in the literature department of a national university. His major was in Japanese literature. He got his teaching credentials and after graduation took a job at a public middle school. He worked at three schools before he retired from teaching earlier this year. The school where we worked together was the second of those three.

Nonoguchi made his own authorial debut three years ago with a short story published in a biannual children's magazine. To date, he hasn't yet published a novel.

Though they took different paths, according to Osamu Nonoguchi, the two met again about seven years ago. He claims to have seen Hidaka's name in a newspaper and reached out to reconnect with his old friend.

I believe this is the truth because roughly half a year after they supposedly reconnected, Hidaka won the literature prize for
An Unburning Flame,
which is the first of his books with a version found in Nonoguchi's manuscripts. It seems safe to assume that Hidaka's reunion with Nonoguchi brought a change in his fortunes.

I went to speak to the editor of
An Unburning Flame
. A short fellow by the name of Mimura, he was currently serving as the chief editor of a literary magazine.

I asked him if he could imagine Kunihiko Hidaka writing
An Unburning Flame
based on what he had written before.

Before he answered my question, Mr. Mimura had one of his own: “Are you investigating that ridiculous ghostwriter theory that's been making the rounds?”

Clearly, Mr. Mimura wasn't a fan of my theory. Nor did his company have anything to gain by besmirching Kunihiko Hidaka's work, even after his death.

“I wouldn't call it a theory, there's not enough evidence to call it that. I just need to make sure we have all the facts straight.”

“Well, it seems like a waste of time to follow up on baseless rumors, but you don't need me to tell you how to do your job.” Then he answered my question: “When you get right down to it,
An Unburning Flame
was a turning point for Mr. Hidaka. He showed tremendous growth as a writer in that novel. Some might say he transformed overnight.”

“Would you say it was considerably better than what he had written before?”

“It was, but for me—and this is critical—it wasn't all that unexpected. Hidaka was always a powerful writer. But his earlier work was always a little too rough at the edges, and he lost readers because of it. They couldn't grasp the message through the noise, if you follow. However,
An Unburning Flame
was very streamlined. Have you read it?”

“I did. It was good.”

“I agree. In fact, I think it's his best work.”

It was the story of a salaryman who, enchanted by the beauty of the fireworks he sees while on a business trip, changes professions and becomes a fireworks maker. The story was good, but the descriptions of the fireworks in particular were well done, I thought.

“And he wrote that novel all in one go. It wasn't serialized?”

“That's correct.”

“Did you talk about the work before he started writing it?”

“Of course. We do that with every author.”

“What did you talk about with Mr. Hidaka at that time?”

“We discussed the plot a little. We also talked theme, story, and his main character.”

“Did you make all of the big decisions together, then?”

“No. Naturally that's left to Mr. Hidaka to do by himself. He's the author, after all. I just help him talk through his ideas and offer my opinions.”

“Was it Mr. Hidaka's idea to have the main character become a fireworks maker?”

“Of course.”

“What did you think when you heard that?”

“You mean did I like it?”

“Did it seem like his kind of idea?”

“Not particularly, but it certainly wasn't a surprise, either. He's not the first person to write about fireworks makers.”

“Would you say that there was anything in the final book that was the direct result of your advice, Mr. Mimura?”

“Nothing big. I looked at the finished manuscript and pointed out a few things, sure, but it was up to him to decide how to fix them.”

“One last question. If Mr. Hidaka had rewritten someone else's work using his own words and expressions, do you think you could tell by reading it?”

Mr. Mimura thought a while before answering, “Honestly, no. Word usage and turns of phrase are the best way to tell who the writer is, so, no, I suppose not.”

But he didn't neglect to add, “Detective,
An Unburning Flame
is without a doubt Mr. Hidaka's work. We met several times during its writing, and he was truly struggling with it. Sometimes I thought he might have a breakdown altogether. If he was using someone else's novel as a basis, I doubt he would have had to struggle quite so much.”

I refrained from venturing an opinion on this and instead thanked him and left. However, I had already worked out a rebuttal in my mind. Namely, that while it was difficult when times were hard to pretend to be happy, doing the reverse was relatively simple. Nothing he'd said shook my confidence in my ghostwriter theory.

*   *   *

When one man kills another, often a woman is involved. However, we hadn't yet looked deeply into the possibility of there being a woman in Osamu Nonoguchi's life. The feeling in the department was that it wasn't one of “those kind of murders.” Or maybe it was just the impression we had of Mr. Nonoguchi himself. He wasn't unattractive, but it was hard to picture the woman who would choose him.

However, our instincts were wrong. He had had a special relationship with at least one woman. The investigation team that performed the follow-up search of his apartment found the first evidence of this, three clues.

The first was an apron with a checkered pattern and a feminine design, found neatly ironed and folded in one of Osamu Nonoguchi's dressers. Our working theory is that a woman who occasionally visited would wear it when she cleaned up around the apartment or perhaps cooked meals.

The second clue was a gold necklace, still in its case, and neatly wrapped. The necklace came from a famous jewelry store. It looked like a present waiting to be given.

The third clue was a filled-out questionnaire, folded neatly and placed in the same box as the wrapped necklace. The questionnaire came from a travel agency and concerned a trip to Okinawa Mr. Nonoguchi had apparently been planning. The date at the top of the questionnaire was May 10, seven years ago. The trip was planned for July 30, neatly coinciding with a teacher's summer break. However, since the questionnaire had never been turned in, it seemed that the trip never happened.

At issue were the names of the travelers: Osamu Nonoguchi, and right next to that, a Hatsuko Nonoguchi, age twenty-nine.

We looked into it, and no one with that name ever existed. At least, not among Osamu Nonoguchi's relatives. Our assumption is that Hatsuko Nonoguchi was an alias, and Osamu was intending to take a trip to Okinawa with a woman pretending to be his wife.

From this we can assume the following: at the very least, seven years ago, Osamu Nonoguchi was in a close relationship with a woman, and though the current status of that relationship was unknown, he still had feelings for her—enough that he kept the relics of their relationship close at hand.

I asked the chief for permission to investigate further. I had no idea whether Hatsuko was connected to our case; however, seven years ago was the year before Kunihiko Hidaka broke out with
An Unburning Flame
. I felt that, were I able to meet the woman Nonoguchi was with at the time, I might learn something of value about what was going on then.

I first tried asking the man himself. He sat up halfway in his hospital bed when I told him we'd found the apron, the necklace, and the travel documents.

“Could you please tell us whom the apron belongs to, to whom you intended to give the necklace, and with whom you were planning on going to Okinawa?”

Unlike my previous questions, these clearly troubled him. “What does that have to do with your case? I realize I'm a murderer, and I have to pay for my crimes, but does that mean I have to divulge private matters that have nothing to do with my crime?”

“I'm not telling you to make it public knowledge. You only have to tell me. If we find that this has nothing to do with the murder, I won't ask you about it again, nor will the media hear about it. I can guarantee that we won't bother the woman.”