The Snow Kimono (37 page)

Hideo could see Sachiko in this beautiful house. With its vast terrace, its view
over the city. He could see her exploring its beautiful garden, which stretched endlessly
up the mountain.
He could see her reading the books in Mr Ikeda’s beautiful library.
Being driven down to her lessons in Mr Ikeda’s gleaming new car, with her own personal
driver, her future assured.

As for Katsuo, Sachiko, the girl he had almost not bothered going to see, had indeed
turned into a beautiful young woman. Who, from the moment her father left her with
him, reminded him of Mariko almost more than he could bear. Apart from her face,
her translucent pale eyes, she also had the same clear, bell-like laugh, so light
it seemed to float on air. When he first heard it coming from the garden again, his
heart had skipped a beat. He thought Mariko had returned to him.

And then there was Sachiko’s scar. Something he could never have foreseen. Or hoped
for. On
her
shoulder blade.

Mariko’s scar, that tiny island-like map embossed on her skin, had, in the end, come
to obsess him. It was the thing he looked for first. The thing he reached for. It
was the first thing his eyes fell to whenever she turned away from him. It had been
what he had missed most when he was with someone else. What he longed for. That nobody
else had. This tiny flaw. Until Sachiko came to him.

No, much had changed in three months. He had already begun to love this girl whom
fate had delivered him. His heart had begun to heal. It was as if he had been given
a second chance. And he was not about to let her go. Not this time. He had made that
mistake once before.

Hideo, Hideo, he said, his tone conciliatory, I understand how you must feel. He
stopped, as if to consider what he was
about to say. I know what it means not to
be able to live without someone. He paused for his words to take effect. Give me
some time to think about what you have said. Perhaps there is a solution that neither
of us has considered. One that would satisfy us both. When do you return home?

Tomorrow, he said.

As soon as that?

Katsuo raised the arched fingers of both hands to his chin.

I’m not sure that that gives me enough time, he said, to think about what would be
best for both of us.

How much time do you need?

Katsuo waited.

A week, Hideo. If I let you know then, one way or another, what my decision is, would
you be agreeable to that?

For the first time since Hideo had arrived at Katsuo’s, a faint shadow of hope registered
on his face.

And you give me your word that you will not disappear, as you have done in the past?
You will not take Sachiko with you?

You have my word, Hideo. As a man of honour, I will not disappear. Sachiko and I
will be here.

All right then, he said. I will wait.

Thank you, Hideo.

The two men stood.

Can I get my driver to take you back to town? Katsuo said.

Yes, thank you, Katsuo-san. I would be grateful.

Katsuo went to the phone. Picked it up. Spoke into it.
Then he led Hideo out into
the foyer. Ume was already waiting there for him. She bowed to him.

Mr Yamaguchi, she said.

So, Hideo, Katsuo said. It’s all arranged. Ume will attend to you.

He opened the door, inclined his head. Reached out to shake Hideo’s hand.

Until we meet again, Hideo, he said.

Until we meet again, Katsuo-san.

Ume held out her hand for Hideo to precede her. Katsuo watched Hideo step into the
darkness outside. Then he reached for the door and closed it softly behind him.

After Hideo left him, Katsuo sat for some time in the semidarkness of the long room.
Then he went out onto the terrace and stood at the balustrade. Forty-five minutes
later, when he saw the car headlights returning through the trees, when he saw the
car turn into the driveway and stop at the gates, he went back into the long room,
got his coat, and went downstairs.

He was waiting for the car as it emerged onto the forecourt. He was seating himself
comfortably in the soft upholstery even before the car had rolled to a stop.

Ishiguro’s, he said. And he pulled the door closed after him.

Chapter 41

DARKNESS slips into the valleys. Hideo is returning from his evening walk. The air
is cold; there is no one else on the path.

On the other side of the river, the lights of the inn beckon. The ghost of the parked
bus is just visible through the trees.

Hideo is thinking about what Katsuo said to him the night before. Perhaps there
is
another way. Perhaps all is not yet lost.

A solitary figure stands huddled in the middle of the bridge. Leaning on the rail.
Smoking. The tip of his cigarette glows brighter. Then the butt is flicked spinning
into the abyss—a tiny catherine wheel arcing into the darkness. A bat zigzags down
after it. The lingering smell of burning tobacco faintly familiar.

It happens quickly. When he reaches the centre of the bridge, the figure steps purposefully
away from the railing and stands in front of him, blocking his way.

Hideo.

Did he wait long enough? Did Hideo see his face? Was ‘Katsuo’ the last word on the
tip of his tongue?

Death is swift. Two brutal blows to the skull. An ancient samurai club in Katsuo’s
hand. The first, a slanting blow from above, so violent it severs the top of Hideo’s
earlobe. The other, a side blow, hits him even as he is crumbling, unconscious, to
the ground.

The old man’s body is lighter than Katsuo imagined. He holds him briefly over the
rail. Lets go. There is no splash. Just one dull thud.

Has he done enough? He leans over the side of the bridge. Grasps the rail. He can
hear the river. But he cannot see it. The world below is only darkness. Presumed.
He stands still, listening. The lights of the inn glinting through the trees alarmingly
close. No human voice comes to him. No cry.

The swirling waters will not remove Hideo Yamaguchi. His pale old-man’s body will
not be trapped forever beneath a submerged tree root as he had hoped. Katsuo has
miscalculated. Hideo’s body bounces once, skids to the water’s edge, stops. Life
is already abandoning him. A thin red stain weeps into the river bank. His disordered
brain is no longer able to piece together the fractured truth. There will be no final
accounting. No protest. No time to ask why? Just the darkness growing.

Katsuo is already making his way back to the inn. He does not look back. If he had,
he would have seen the owl swoop
down out of the shadows. Swift, intent, it glides
silently just centimetres above the wooden treads. It lands, its black clawed feet
outstretched, its great wings beating soundlessly. It sits motionless in the centre
of the bridge. Its eyes serious in its white, dahlia-perfect face. A perfect, perfect
thing.

The owl watches Katsuo’s retreating form. The intermittent pinpoint glow of another
cigarette. Katsuo has almost reached the inn. He is oblivious. Soon he will be back
in the safety of his room.

The owl turns back to what it has come for. It hops stiff-legged towards something
lying in the shadows. Something pale, curved. Something as thick as a child’s finger.
A caterpillar, perhaps. Except that this caterpillar does not move. Does not try
to escape. The great bird looks down. Pauses. Then snatches up the piece of severed
ear in its beak. It beats it against the wooden cross beam, hard, making sure it
is properly dead. Then it stops.

Katsuo steps up onto the lit verandah. The owl turns to watch him once again. They
are connected now, by what it has retrieved.

Who knows what small detail it sees. The hand that reaches for the door is spattered
with blood.

The bird crouches, hops up onto the wooden foot rail. The piece of severed flesh
still in its beak. Takes one last look. Then leans into the abyss and is gone.

In the crisp morning light, on the bridge, the chattering school children. Half-walking,
half-skipping. Holding hands. Unsuspecting.

One small cry and twenty small heads are at the railing. Looking down. Hushed. Fingers
pointing. Quickly sifting doubts. It
is
a man. His body strangely twisted. The water
licking at his cheek. Then they are running.

Chapter 42

THE photographs are black and white.

Why don’t you leave it with me? he had said to Mrs Yamaguchi. The diary. I will
have a look at it and get back to you.

After she had left, Omura sat back in his chair. He had not intended to start reading
immediately.

Why, then, did he open it? And once it was open, why did he glance down and see the
name Katsuo floating so prominently within its black morass?

She had called it a diary. But it wasn’t, not really. It was a mere twenty pages.
Stapled together. Handwritten. The writing tightly packed. Twenty pages!

Twenty pages. Fifteen minutes was all it took. And now, in that time, how the world
had changed. A caterpillar turned into a butterfly in less. But this? How monstrous
was this? Surely it took longer than that.

He spoke into the phone.

When he came out of his office, he had the diary in his hands. He did not look at
Mrs Akimoto as he left.

Now he was standing in the court archives. Between the endless airless shelves. A
file lay skewed on the shelf above his head. A box of forensic photographs, ticket
stubs, a half-pack of cigarettes, a pearl hairpin, leaned against his chest.

Two of the photographs, those taken from the bridge, are slightly out of focus. Hideo’s
body is in the bottom right-hand corner. His legs face one way, as though he is running
on his side, his arms the other. His right hand is in the water.

Three more photographs, from different angles, show Hideo’s head. One is grotesquely
sharp. Omura’s throat constricts. His hand begins to shake. Hideo’s open eyes look
down in disbelief at the stain leading to the water’s edge. A discoloured dark wisp
still circulates in the water, as if his blood is still flowing. Perhaps his life
has not yet fully left him. There may still be hope. A clump of matted hair. Half
an earlobe is missing. What’s left is pale, unearthly, incomprehensible. An ant is
sampling its still-moist edge. Another is on its way to tell their friends of this
good fortune.

Then there are the X-rays. He holds one up to the light. The primitive shadowed skull
always faintly shocking. Two longitudinal fractures. Like the broken hulls of two
broken boats. Transparent. Strangely beautiful. He takes his glasses off. Rubs his
nose. Squints. An uneven line circumnavigates Hideo’s skull, connecting the two hulls.
Tadashi thinks of someone tapping at the side of an egg with a spoon. As fragile
as that.

Another X-ray. This one of Hideo’s neck. One vertebra shattered, dislocated. Marked
C2 in blue. Hideo had hit the ground head-first.

He calls her.

But I’ve been there, to Akiyama, Mrs Yamaguchi says. The long-distance line crackles.
Her voice sounds metallic. To the footbridge. It’s impossible. There
are
no rocks.