Salvation of a Saint (23 page)

‘Ah,’ Kishitani said, as he typed on the computer. ‘Looks like another dead end, Detective. This isn’t her.’

‘How do you know?’

‘Because it’s a him. Look at the artist’s profile.’

Kusanagi stared at the screen and frowned.

‘Guess we should’ve asked ahead of time,’ Kishitani said. ‘I guess guys draw cute designs, too.’

‘Yeah, I assumed it was a girl myself,’ Kusanagi said, scratching his head.

‘Excuse me,’ Ms Yamamoto said, inserting herself into the conversation. ‘Is there some problem with the artist being a man?’

‘No, it has to do with our investigation,’ Kusanagi explained. ‘We’re looking for someone who might provide us with the lead we need to close the case – and that someone had to be a woman.’

‘By “case”, you
are
talking about Mr Mashiba’s murder, yes?’

‘Of course.’

‘And the Internet anime has something to do with that?’

‘I can’t go into the details, but suffice to say that if the creator of the anime were a woman, it might have had something to do with Mr Mashiba’s death … but since this gentleman is clearly not a woman …’ Kusanagi sighed and looked over at his partner. ‘I think we’re done here for today.’

‘Yep,’ Kishitani agreed, his shoulders sagging.

Ms Yamamoto saw them to the front door, where Kusanagi turned and thanked her. ‘Sorry to interrupt your day – and apologies in advance if we need to come back for anything.’

‘Not at all. You’re welcome anytime,’ she said, a curious look on her face, one markedly different from her cold demeanour when they first arrived.

The detectives started to walk away; but they had only taken a couple of steps when Ms Yamamoto called after them. ‘Detective?’

Kusanagi looked around. ‘Yes?’

She trotted over to them and whispered, ‘There’s a lounge on the first floor of the building – could you wait there for just a moment? There is something I wanted to talk to you about, but not here.’

‘Does this concern the case?’

‘I’m not sure. It has to do with the beetroot alien, actually. About the creator.’

Kusanagi and Kishitani exchanged glances. ‘Of course.’

‘I’ll be down as soon as I can,’ she told them, then disappeared back inside the office.

The lounge on the first floor was spacious. Kusanagi drank coffee and glared at the no smoking sign on the wall.

‘What do you think she wants to talk to us about?’ Kishitani asked.

‘Who knows? I can’t imagine some amateur illustrator – a guy – having anything to do with anything, but we’ll see.’

Ms Yamamoto arrived quickly. She glanced around before holding up an envelope about half the size of a standard sheet of paper.

‘Sorry to keep you waiting,’ she said, sitting down across from them. The waitress came over but Ms Yamamoto waved her off.

Clearly not planning on staying long,
Kusanagi thought. ‘What did you want to talk to us about?’

She looked around again, then leaned forward. ‘You have to understand, I really can’t have this released to the public. If for some reason you have to let it out … please don’t tell anyone you heard it from me.’

Kusanagi peered at her intently. He wanted to tell her that whether or not it became public knowledge depended on the nature of the information, but he also didn’t want to jeopardize their chances of hearing about a possible lead. So he kept quiet. It wouldn’t be his first time breaking a promise, and he would cross that bridge when he came to it.

He nodded. ‘Okay, the word stays here.’

Ms Yamamoto wet her lips. ‘That beetroot alien you were looking at before? Well, the designer
was
a woman.’

‘Huh?’ Kusanagi said, his eyes widening. ‘Really?’ He straightened in his chair. This might actually be something worth hearing.

‘Yes. For various reasons, we had to lie on the web page.’

Kishitani nodded, beginning to take notes. ‘That’s not so unusual. People’s names, ages, and genders are often falsified online.’

‘Was the bit about him being a teacher also not true?’ Kusanagi asked.

‘No – or rather, the teacher we have featured on our site does actually exist. He was the one writing the blog. But someone else designed the character. She had nothing to do with him at all.’

Wrinkles formed between Kusanagi’s eyebrows, and he rested his elbows on the table. ‘So why all the subterfuge?’

Ms Yamamoto hesitated before saying, ‘Actually, everything was prearranged.’

‘Can you elaborate?’

‘The story I gave you before, about the alien becoming popular on the teacher’s blog, and us making an anime – in fact, it happened the other way around. We planned on producing a character-driven Internet anime first, and as part of our PR strategy, we decided to start the character out on a private blog. Then we started doing things online, search engine optimization and the like, to make sure people saw the blog. Once the character started gaining popularity, we
published the story that we had contracted with the blogger to make our show.’

Kusanagi crossed his arms and grunted. ‘Sounds like an awful lot of trouble to go through, if you ask me.’

‘People online respond better to things that seem organic. It was our CEO’s idea.’

Kishitani looked over towards Kusanagi and nodded. ‘She’s right. Everyone likes it when something created by a nobody goes viral like that.’

‘So ultimately,’ Kusanagi said, ‘the designer was one of your employees?’

‘No. We started with a search of relatively unknown manga artists and illustrators. Then we had them submit ideas for character designs, and we picked one we liked: the beetroot alien you saw. We wrote up a nondisclosure agreement with the designer, to keep it a secret, and we had her draw some illustrations to put on our teacher’s blog. She did all the initial work, though we switched to another artist about halfway through. I’m sure it’s obvious by now, but we were also paying the teacher to write his blog.’

‘Quite the show,’ Kusanagi muttered. ‘You weren’t kidding when you said everything had been prearranged.’

‘It takes a real strategy to introduce a new character these days,’ Ms Yamamoto said with a light laugh. ‘Not that ours worked very well.’

‘So who was this illustrator you ended up using?’

‘A children’s book illustrator, originally. She’s had a few
books published,’ Ms Yamamoto said, producing a slim volume from the envelope on her lap.

Kusanagi took the book and examined it. It was titled
It Can Rain Tomorrow
, and it apparently chronicled the adventures of a teruterubozu – a diminutive tissue-paper ghost created by children wishing for good weather. The illustrator’s name was listed as Sumire Ucho –
Violet Butterfly,
Kusanagi thought.
If that’s not a pen name, I don’t know what is
.

‘Is this illustrator still connected with your company?’

‘No, not since she made those first illustrations. The company holds all the rights to the character.’

‘Did you ever meet her personally?’

‘I didn’t, I’m afraid. Like I said, we had to keep her existence a secret. Only the CEO and a few other people ever saw her. The contract talks and everything were handled directly by the CEO.’

‘By Mr Mashiba?’

‘Yes. I think he was the beetroot alien’s biggest fan,’ Ms Yamamoto said, staring at the detective.

Kusanagi let his eyes drop back down to the book. There was a little ‘About the Author’ section, but no mention of her real name or age.

Still, it was clear that this woman fitted the bill. Kusanagi lifted the book in one hand. ‘Do you mind if I borrow this?’

‘Not at all,’ the receptionist replied, glancing at her watch. ‘I should be getting back. I’ve told you everything I know. I hope it helps.’

‘Tremendously. Thank you,’ Kusanagi said, inclining his head.

Once she had left, Kusanagi handed the book to his partner. ‘Give the publisher a ring, would you?’

‘Think she’s the one?’

‘There’s a chance. At the very least, we know there was something between this illustrator and Yoshitaka Mashiba.’

‘You sound confident.’

‘It was the look on Ms Yamamoto’s face that sold me. She suspected before today that something was up between those two.’

‘Then why do you think she didn’t say anything before now? The officers we sent to the company earlier asked everybody for information about Mr Mashiba’s female friends.’

‘Maybe she was too unsure to say anything at the time. We didn’t exactly ask her to tell us about the ex-CEO’s lovers, either. We just asked about the illustrator, and she put two and two together, and realized there was something to her hunch.’

‘Interesting. I’m sorry I called her a robot.’

‘You can make up for it by getting on the phone with that publisher now.’

Kishitani pulled out his mobile phone and stepped out of the lounge, book tucked under his arm. Kusanagi watched him make the call in the building lobby. He drank his coffee. It had gone completely cold.

Kishitani returned, a glum look on his face.

‘Couldn’t get hold of anybody?’

‘No, I did.’

‘But they’d never heard of Ms Ucho?’

‘No, they had.’

‘So what’s with the long face?’

Kishitani opened his notebook. ‘Her real name is Junko Tsukui. This book here was published four years ago. It’s out of print now.’

‘You get a number for her?’

‘She doesn’t have a number.’ Kishitani looked up from his notebook. ‘She’s dead.’

‘What? When?’

‘Two years ago, at her home. She committed suicide.’

Utsumi was at the Meguro Police Station writing a report when Kusanagi and Kishitani marched into the room, familiar scowls on their faces.

‘The old man go home already?’ Kusanagi asked when he saw her.

‘No, I think the chief’s over in Investigations.’

Kusanagi left without another word, leaving Kishitani behind.

‘Looks like he’s in a bad mood,’ Utsumi said.

Kishitani shrugged. ‘We finally managed to track down Yoshitaka Mashiba’s old flame.’

‘Really? Isn’t that a good thing?’

‘Well, we hit a little snag when we went to follow up.’ He dropped into a folding chair and related the story of the beetroot alien and its illustrator to a surprised Utsumi. ‘We ended up going to the publisher,’ he concluded, ‘and we got a photograph of her to show to that waitress at the tea café,
who confirmed her as Yoshitaka’s ex-girlfriend. Which nicely wraps up that chapter, and leaves Kusanagi’s former-lover theory dead in the water.’

‘No wonder he’s grumpy.’

‘I’m a little disappointed myself,’ Kishitani said. ‘We do the run-around all day only to end up with this. Talk about exhausting.’ He yawned and stretched.

Just then Utsumi’s phone rang. It was Yukawa.

‘Hello again,’ she said into the receiver. ‘Didn’t I just talk to you earlier today?’

‘Where are you now?’ Yukawa asked.

‘Meguro station, why?’

‘I’ve been thinking about things, and realized I need you. Can you meet?’

‘Again? Sure, no problem. But what’s up?’

‘I’ll tell you when I see you. You pick the place,’ Yukawa said. He sounded uncharacteristically excited.

‘Okay, well, I could just go to the university—’

‘No, I’ve already left. I’m headed towards you, actually. Just pick a place somewhere in between.’

She gave him the name of a nearby twenty-four-hour restaurant, and he hung up. Utsumi placed her half-written report in her bag and grabbed her jacket.

‘Was that Galileo?’ Kishitani asked.

‘Yes. He said he needed to talk to me about something.’

‘I hope he figures out the poisoning trick so we can solve this case and go home. Take notes, if you don’t mind. Sometimes his explanations can be a little dense.’

‘I know,’ Utsumi said as she headed out of the room.

She was drinking tea when Yukawa hurried into the restaurant. He sat down across from her and ordered a hot chocolate.

‘No coffee?’

‘No, the two cups earlier were enough,’ Yukawa said, with a slight frown. ‘Sorry for dragging you out like this.’

‘It’s not a problem. So what’s this about?’

‘Right …’ He glanced down at the table once before looking back up at her. ‘First, I need to know if you still suspect Mrs Mashiba.’

‘Huh? Well, yes, I do. I suspect her.’

‘Right,’ Yukawa said again, reaching inside his jacket to pull out a folded piece of paper. He placed it on the table. ‘Read this.’

Utsumi picked up the paper, unfolded it, and began to read, her eyes narrowing. ‘What is this?’

‘Something I want you to look into. In detail.’

‘And this will solve the mystery?’

Yukawa blinked and gave a little sigh. ‘No, probably not. But this will at least prove it’s unsolvable. Think of it as a kind of way to cover the bases.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘After you left my laboratory today, I started thinking. If we hypothesize that Mrs Mashiba poisoned the coffee, then the question is: How did she do it? The answer is: I have no idea. My conclusion was that this is a problem without a solution – save one.’

‘Save one? So there
is
a solution.’

‘Yes, but it’s an imaginary solution.’

‘You lost me.’

‘An imaginary solution is one that, while theoretically possible, is
practically
impossible. There appears to be only one method by which a wife in Hokkaido can poison her husband in Tokyo. However, the chances that she pulled it off are infinitely close to zero. You see? The trick
is
doable, but pulling it off isn’t.’

Utsumi shook her head. ‘I’m not sure I do see, actually. So this homework you’ve given me is to prove that the trick is impossible? Why?’

‘Sometimes it’s as important to prove there is no answer to a question as it is to answer it.’

‘Except I’m looking for answers, Professor. I’d much rather be getting to the truth of what happened than engaging in theoretical exercises, if you don’t mind. That’s my job.’

Yukawa fell silent. His hot chocolate arrived. After a moment he lifted the cup and took a sip. ‘Of course,’ he muttered at last. ‘You’re right.’