Fuminori Nakamura - Evil and the Mask

“About that …”

The detective returned to the couch with two cans of coffee.

“The organization that was investigating Ms. Kaori, it was a company after all. A corporation in the munitions industry.”

“Munitions? Why?”

My throat was dry. I poured the coffee into my cup.

“After the war the Japanese government banned all arms exports. This company deals with overseas arms manufacturers and acts as a broker for weapons imports and exports in other countries. It’s a legitimate company, but it’s hard to find out much about it. The man who was following Ms. Kaori often visits the building where the company’s got their office. It’s in Roppongi.”

He handed me a photo of a building.

“The company register?”

“I’ve got hold of a list of the directors. We’re still investigating.”

I glanced at the paper he gave me. I didn’t recognize any of the names.

“I don’t understand this at all.”

“Shall I look into Ms. Kaori’s past?”

He was studying me.

“Yes, please. Start with her work history rather than her friendships.”

“Okay.”

His suit was slightly worn. I knew it helped him blend into his surroundings, but he was quite good-looking and it seemed a waste that he didn’t wear something a little more stylish.

“I’m making trouble for you,” I said. “One problem after another.”

He smiled slightly.

“And you’re paying us accordingly. Anyway, we don’t like doing a half-assed job.”

“Thank you. I’m worried about Aida, so we won’t meet as often. Call my cell phone and put any recordings from Konishi in the post. Just to be on the safe side. Email leaves a trail.”

“Understood. We’ll use a different sender’s name every time, so please check all your mail.”

I realized that even though his clothes and belongings were scruffy, they were all cleaner than they appeared. His carelessly tousled hair was always messy in the same way and the wrinkles in his suit were always in the same places. I saw that his unremarkable black bag was perfectly polished. Such excessive cleanliness struck me as kind of lonely. I finished my coffee and used the room phone to call a cab.

WE DROVE FOR a while and I got out when I saw Ueno Park. Konishi called and told me that she’d mailed a photo of Kaori and her. She said jokingly that usually she was cool towards people she was checking up on, but that she’d come to like Kaori, perhaps because they were about the same age, and it was quite difficult.

“And another thing,” she continued in a low voice. “I can’t work out what she wants from life. It feels like she doesn’t really have any big dreams. She said when she was younger she wanted to be a nurse, but …”

I thought about that. She’d probably have made a good nurse.

“Thank you. Please keep going.”

I hung up and looked around me. I couldn’t exactly remember why I’d gotten out in such a crowded place. From a vending machine I bought a coffee and drank it as I walked. An elderly couple was out for a stroll, a mother pushing a baby buggy. A child holding a balloon was smiling proudly. A gang of guys, probably university students, was joking around in loud voices. A beautiful woman was walking along, ignoring her surroundings, eyes fixed on her cell phone. A group of kids with schoolbags. An old man chatting cheerfully on his phone. Surprisingly, he was holding the latest model.

Happiness is a fortress.

That’s what my father had said before I locked him up, before I killed him. A young couple, junior high school students, came walking towards me. The boy was striding earnestly and the girl was pretty. When she teased him about something he blushed and got angry. Maybe she didn’t know how seriously teenage boys take themselves, how important they think they are. I grinned.

Father hadn’t been begging for his life. He didn’t blame me, saying I was murdering him to preserve my self-contained life with Kaori. He knew exactly what would happen to me after I killed him. But I had no desire to destroy this happy scene around me now. Having said that, faced with this mass of other people’s happiness, I didn’t feel like giving them my blessing either. I was just walking. Wondering if in this huge park there were any other murderers. And if there were, did it bother them?

When I looked back at the high school couple they were holding hands. I watched them expressionlessly. I started having impure thoughts, and left the park and hailed a taxi. Maybe my sudden arousal was their fault? Probably not, I decided. It made no difference if I kept on walking or went home to bed alone. It made no difference if I threw the can of coffee I was holding at someone or if I didn’t. It didn’t matter if I was horny or if I wasn’t. Nothing mattered.

I WENT INTO d’Alfaro, where I’d met Yajima. I didn’t have any particular reason for choosing that place, but if Aida learned that I hadn’t been back there since Yajima’s death he might get suspicious. I sat at the battered counter and ordered a gin and tonic. As before, the bar was noisy and full of foreigners.

A small hole had been punched in the wall, and I felt like it was watching me. It seemed to be imploring me to peer though it, so I turned away and looked at a woman approaching my seat. Something stirred inside me. I watched her casually. She glanced at me briefly and then sat down next to me. There was a half-finished cocktail of some kind on the bar in front of her. I figured she must have been sitting there before I arrived and had just got up to go to the toilet.

“Excuse me,” I said, looking at her face.

Her eyes were large, with dark rings underneath, and her full lips were curled up slightly.

“I’ve got a hundred thousand yen here. Let’s get a room.”

“Huh?” She stared at me, the smile frozen on her face. She was wearing a short denim skirt and a black, long-sleeved T-shirt that showed the lines of her body.

“Are you some kind of freak?” she asked.

“Are you on your own?”

“Yes, but … What the hell?”

“So I’m saying I’ve got a hundred thousand yen, let’s find a hotel. If that’s not enough, let’s make it two hundred.”

After gazing at me for a bit longer, she burst out laughing.

“Seriously? Wow! That’s the first time anyone’s said anything like that to me. What are you up to? Are you crazy?”

“No?”

“Hold on a sec. Let me get this straight.”

Still laughing, she finished her drink and ordered another in a loud voice. She was probably only a bit younger than I was. Suddenly I realized that I’d seen her in here before.

“Hey, the other day you were passed out at that table over there, and a black guy was trying to put his arms around you.”

She looked me in the face.

“Yeah, that’s right. That was a close call. I was sound asleep. He almost dragged me to that back room. I don’t like foreigners. They’re big.”

“Big?”

“Their dicks. And they’re bent.”

She was watching me seriously.

“Really bent! Like they’re alive. As bent as Kuwata’s curve ball.”

“Kuwata?”

“Used to play for the Giants. You must know him.”

I nodded.

“Me, I’m a Hanshin Tigers fan,” she continued. “My ex-ex-boyfriend was a Tigers fan and I ended up becoming one too. Now if you were a Hanshin fan as well, I wouldn’t mind getting a room.”

“You don’t go off with a stranger for a stupid reason like that!”

“Hey, you invited me, remember?”

She laughed again. The people at the table behind us laughed too, but obviously not at the same thing.

“So you come to bars like this, hunt out girls who look like they might let you into their pants and start hitting on them? Do you do this often?”