The Devotion Of Suspect X (8 page)

“I don’t mean to repeat myself, but remember, there’s no need to make an act of it. She just needs to answer the questions they ask as mechanically as possible.”

“Yes, I told her that.”

“Did you show the police your ticket stubs?”

“No, I didn’t. You told me I didn’t have to show them unless they asked for them specifically.”

“Then that’s fine. By the way, where did you put the stubs?”

“In a kitchen drawer.”

“Put them inside the theater pamphlet. Nobody goes out of their way to store ticket stubs. They might suspect something if you have them in your drawer.”

“Okay, I’ll take them out.”

“By the way…” Ishigami swallowed. He tightened his grip on the receiver. “The owners at Benten-tei … do they know about me going there to buy my lunch?”

“What…?” Yasuko asked, momentarily taken aback.

“What I’m asking is, do the people who run the store where you work know that your neighbor comes there frequently to buy lunches? This is rather important, so please be honest.”

“Well, yes, actually. The owners were saying they were happy you were such a reliable regular.”

“And they know that I’m your neighbor?”

“Yes … is that bad?”

“No, I’ll worry about that. You just do as we discussed. All right?”

“Yes.”

“Right,” Ishigami said, turning to set down the receiver.

“Oh, um, Mr. Ishigami?” Yasuko’s voice came softly.

“Yes?”

“Thank you. Thank you for everything. We’re in your debt.”

“No…” Ishigami paused. “Don’t mention it,” he said, and he hung up the phone.

When Yasuko said “Thank you,” he had felt a tingle rush through his body. Now his face was flushed, and he welcomed the night breeze on his skin. He was even sweating a little.

Ishigami headed home, elated. But his high didn’t last long when he remembered what she had said about Benten-tei.

He realized that he had made a mistake when talking to the detectives. When they asked how well he knew Yasuko, he had only told them that they said hello when they chanced to meet. He should also have told them about the lunchbox shop.

“Did you confirm Yasuko Hanaoka’s alibi?”

Mamiya had called Kusanagi and Kishitani over to his desk. He was clipping his nails.

“The karaoke box checked out,” Kusanagi reported. “The person at the desk there knew her face. And they were in the book, from nine forty for an hour and a half.”

“What about before that?”

“Considering the time, they probably caught the seven o’clock show at the theater. It ended at nine ten. If they went to eat ramen after that, their story holds,” Kusanagi said, looking over his notes.

“I didn’t ask if their story held, I asked if you checked it out.”

Kusanagi closed his notebook. His shoulders sagged. “Just the karaoke box.”

“You call that doing your job, Detective?” Mamiya asked, glaring up at him.

“C’mon, Chief. You know it’s almost impossible to check out alibis in theaters and ramen shops.”

One ear listening to Kusanagi, Mamiya pulled out a business card and threw it on the desk. The card read “Club Marian.” It gave an address in Kinshicho.

“What’s that?”

“The place where Ms. Yasuko used to work. Togashi dropped in there on the fifth of March.”

“Five days before he was murdered.”

“Apparently, he was asking about Yasuko. Anyway, I think that’s more than enough for even you to figure out what I’m getting at.” Mamiya pointed to the door behind the two detectives. “I want you to go and check out that alibi, every bit of it. If anything doesn’t fit, I want you to go back and talk to this Yasuko again.”

A small pole about thirty centimeters long stuck up from a square box on the lab table. There was a ring, only a few centimeters across, encircling the base of the pole. The strange item would have looked a bit like a carnival ring-toss game were it not for the cord snaking out of the side of the box and the single toggle switch on top.

“What the heck’s this?” Kusanagi muttered, bending down to stare at the device.

“I wouldn’t touch that if I were you,” warned Kishitani beside him.

“Nah, I’m sure it’s fine. If this thing were dangerous, he never would’ve left it lying out here like this.” Kusanagi flicked the switch. The moment he did so, the ring around the pole began to float upward.

Kusanagi gaped. The ring was hovering in midair, wobbling slightly.

“Try pushing the ring down,” came a voice from behind him.

Kusanagi looked around as Yukawa walked into the room, a file folder cradled in his arms.

“Welcome back. Class?” Kusanagi asked as he turned back to the floating ring. Reaching out gingerly, he tried to push it down with his fingertips. A second later he yanked back his hand. “Yowch! That thing’s hot!”

“It’s true, I’m not in the habit of leaving dangerous objects lying about. I do, however, assume a basic knowledge of physics.” Yukawa strolled over to the table and flicked off the switch. “This device is only high school–level physics, as a matter of fact.”

“Well, I didn’t take physics in high school,” Kusanagi said, blowing on his fingertips. Kishitani laughed immoderately.

“Who’s your friend?” Yukawa asked with a raised eyebrow.

The smile vanished from Kishitani’s face and he bowed curtly. “Kishitani. I work with Detective Kusanagi. I’ve heard a lot about you, Professor. You’ve helped us out with a lot of cases, haven’t you? They call you Detective Galileo down at the station.”

Yukawa frowned and waved his hand. “Don’t call me that. I don’t help out because I enjoy it, you know. I just couldn’t bear listening to Detective Kusanagi’s faulty attempts at reasoning on a certain occasion, and I made the mistake of correcting him. I’d be wary of spending too much time with him, if I were you. You might catch whatever he has that’s hardened his brain into a rock.”

Kishitani guffawed, earning him a glare from his superior.

“You laugh too much,” Kusanagi grumbled. “Besides,” he said, turning to Yukawa, “you know you enjoy trying to solve our cases.”

“What’s there to enjoy? Do you know how much valuable research time I’ve squandered on your account? I certainly hope you haven’t brought me another of your annoying, so-called ‘unsolvable’ puzzles today?”

“No, you’re off the hook for now. We just happened to be in the area, so we dropped in.”

“Ah, that’s a relief.” Yukawa walked over to a nearby sink, filled a kettle with water, and set it on a gas burner—the start of his usual instant coffee ritual. “So, did you resolve the murder along the Old Edogawa River?” he asked, measuring coffee powder into a cup.

“How did you know we were working on that case?”

“Simple deduction. It was on the news the same night you took a call while in my lab. And from the look on your face, I would further deduce that the investigation isn’t going so well.”

Kusanagi gestured dismissively. “Oh, I wouldn’t say it’s going all that badly. We have a few suspects now. It’s just getting started.”

“Oh? Suspects?” Yukawa asked over his shoulder, not sounding particularly interested.

“Actually,” Kishitani chipped in, “I don’t think we’re heading in the right direction, myself.”

Yukawa lifted an eyebrow at him. “You object to the direction the investigation is taking?”

“Well, I wouldn’t call it an objection…”

“I’d prefer you didn’t call it anything,” Kusanagi said with a scowl.

“Sorry, sir.”

“Why apologize?” Yukawa asked, clearly starting to enjoy himself. “You follow orders, yet you have your own opinion—sounds perfectly reasonable to me. Proper, even. Without people to question the status quo, how can we ever hope to arrive at truly rational decisions?”

“Nah, that’s not why he’s against the investigation,” Kusanagi said with a sigh. “He just wants to be a knight in shining armor.”

“What? That’s not why—” Kishitani began.

“It’s okay, you can admit it. You sympathize with the single mother and her daughter. Truth be told, I wish they weren’t suspects myself.”

“Sounds complicated,” Yukawa said, smirking as watched the two detectives’ faces.

“Nothing complicated about it. The man who was killed used to be married, and apparently he’d been searching for his ex-wife just before it happened. So, we had to check out her alibi, that’s all.”

“And she has an alibi?”

“That’s the rub.” Kusanagi scratched his head.

“Oh? You’re not sounding so sure yourself, anymore,” Yukawa laughed as he headed for the kettle. Steam was rising from its spout. “Can I interest you gentlemen in some coffee?”

“Please,” Kishitani said, nodding eagerly.

“I’ll pass,” Kusanagi frowned. “See, there’s something about the alibi that doesn’t feel right.”

“Well,
I
don’t think they’re lying.”

“On the basis of what? We haven’t finished checking out their story yet.”

“But didn’t you just tell the chief that it was impossible to confirm alibis at ramen shops and movie theaters?”

“I didn’t say it was impossible. I just said it was
almost
impossible.”

“Ah,” Yukawa joined in as he arrived with two coffees in hand. “So these women, the suspects, claim they were seeing a movie at the time of the crime?” He handed one of the cups to Kishitani.

“Thanks,” Kishitani said, nodding. Then his eyes went wide as he noticed the layers of grime on the cup’s rim. Kusanagi stifled a laugh.

“If the movie’s their alibi, that would seem hard to corroborate.” Yukawa seated himself in a chair.

“But they went out to karaoke afterward. And we have an affidavit from one of the staff there,” Kishitani said, a bit too stridently.

“Which doesn’t mean we can just ignore the movie theater. They could have committed the crime and then gone out for karaoke,” Kusanagi pointed out.

“But the Hanaokas went to the movies at seven or eight o’clock. I can’t imagine any place so deserted at that time of night that they could have just killed someone there. And they didn’t just kill him, they stripped him bare.”

“I agree, but you have to consider all the possibilities before you go writing them off as innocent.”
Not to mention you have to satisfy that stickler Mamiya,
Kusanagi added to himself.

“So, I gather from your discussion that you were able to ascertain the time of the murder?” Yukawa asked.

“The autopsy put the estimated time of death after six P.M. on the tenth,” Kishitani said.

“Great. Why not go ahead and divulge every last detail about the case?” Kusanagi grumbled.

“But I thought Professor Yukawa was assisting the department?”

“Only when there’s some bizarre mystery in need of unraveling. There’s no need to go outside our people for help with this case.”

“I am a mere civilian, yes. But please don’t forget my ongoing contribution to the effort. I provide you with a place to shoot the breeze.” Yukawa took a long sip of his instant coffee.

“I hear you. You want us to leave.” Kusanagi stood up from his chair.

“No, wait,” Yukawa said. “About these suspects … Could they
prove
they had been to the movies?”

“They seemed to know the story well enough. Of course, that doesn’t tell us when they went.”

“Did they have ticket stubs?”

Kusanagi looked back at Yukawa. Their eyes met. “They did.”

“Oh? And where were these stubs?” The rims of Yukawa’s glasses sparkled in the sunlight coming through the window.

Kusanagi snorted. “I know what you’re getting at. Who holds onto ticket stubs, right? Believe me, even I would have found it suspicious if Yasuko Hanaoka had pulled them out of her kitchen drawer and produced them immediately.”

“So they weren’t someplace in particular, then?”

“At first she said she’d thrown them away. But when she pulled out the movie program she’d bought at the theater, the stubs were inside.”

“Ah, the movie program to the rescue. It’s believable enough.” Yukawa crossed his arms. “And the date on the tickets matched the date of the murder?”

“Of course. But that doesn’t necessarily mean anything. They could have bought tickets but never gone inside, or fished those stubs out of the trash.”

“Regardless, it means that the suspects went to the theater—or near it, at least.”

“We had the same thought. So we’ve been canvassing the area since this morning, looking for someone who might have seen them. Unfortunately the girl who was taking tickets that night had today off, so we had to go all the way to her house to interview her. Which was near here, so I decided to visit.”

“And the ticket girl told you absolutely nothing of value, I see,” Yukawa said with a chuckle, noting the dour look on Kusanagi’s face.

“The tenth was a few days ago, and she can’t be expected to remember the faces of everyone who comes to the theater. Not that I’m disappointed. I didn’t expect anything to come of it in the first place. And I see we’ve taken up enough of the
assistant
professor’s time. We’ll be on our way.” Kusanagi clapped Kishitani on the back, making him cough up a swig of coffee, and headed for the door.

“Hang in there, Detective,” Yukawa called after Kusanagi. “If this suspect of yours is the true killer, you could be in for a rough time.”

Kusanagi turned around again. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Like I just said, a common criminal wouldn’t think to put ticket stubs procured for an alibi in such a credible place. If we assume that the tickets really were bought to establish an alibi, that she put them in the pamphlet expecting you to come and ask her for them, I’d say that makes her an adversary to be feared.” The smile died from Yukawa’s eyes as he spoke.

Kusanagi nodded, mulling over the warning. “Yeah, I’ll keep that in mind.” He said good-bye again and once more started to leave. But just before he put his hand on the doorknob, he remembered something and turned around a third time. “You know, one of your classmates lives next door to the suspect. He would have been an upperclassman when you were starting out.”

“Upperclassman?” Yukawa echoed, lifting an eyebrow.

“Guy by the name of Ishigami. Teaches high school math. He graduated from Imperial University. Probably from your department, too.”