Fuminori Nakamura - Evil and the Mask

In the end I came to the conclusion that I wouldn’t kill him, but rather leave him to die. How about locking him up in that secret underground room? By moving some heavy furniture on top of the hatch when he was inside, for example, or tampering with the door so that it couldn’t be opened from the inside. I turned over many possibilities in my mind. Then I could throw in a handful of death caps. When he got hungry enough he’d eat them, even knowing they were poisonous, either out of a will to live or to take his own life to avoid starvation. Down there he couldn’t get quick treatment. If it happened like that, if he was ever found it would look like Father had gone to the hidden basement room and killed himself. If I estimated when he would be dead and repaired the door and removed the furniture from the hatch, no one would know that he’d been imprisoned there. And even if he didn’t eat the mushrooms, since he couldn’t get out he would eventually starve to death. If his body was discovered later, surely it would be treated as a bizarre, mysterious death? At least there would be no evidence pointing to me.

This method had other advantages as well. Father often left the estate without telling the servants or anyone else where he was going. Sometimes he stayed away for up to a month. The staff was scared of him and would welcome his absence. No one would worry about him, assuming that he was up to his usual tricks, and it would be at least a couple of months before anyone started asking questions. By that time he would already be dead, either through lack of food or by his own hand. As long as I cleared away all traces of my handiwork, I’d be home free. And on top of that, there was high turnover among the servants, so not one of them knew there was another room beneath the vast cellar. Ever since one of the maids stole some old jewelry from a cupboard in the basement many years ago, they had been forbidden to set foot down there. The housekeeper Tanabe might have known about it, but something had happened and she’d left and found another job.

Lately Father had got into the habit of visiting the underground room about once a month. He went alone in the middle of the night, without a servant to accompany him. What he did there I didn’t know, but he had told Kaori that next month he would take her somewhere. Probably he meant this room, I thought.

One problem was what I’d do if, for example, he had an appointment with someone from his company two days after he died. When he didn’t show up they’d contact the house. Then they’d learn that he had vanished and the police would be called. They’d search the house and garden in case he’d collapsed somewhere. If they decided to check the basement as well, I’d be in trouble. I decided to take extra steps to make doubly sure.

After he was safely confined, I would leave the window in his room on the ground floor closed but unlocked. Then I’d go out the back door wearing adult-sized shoes, leave footprints from the end of the gravel path and climb in the window. I’d leave a little bit of dirt behind on the carpet, not too much, and go out the window again. Next I’d put on a different pair of shoes and repeat the process, sometimes retracing my steps. Hopefully they’d think that several men had been in the room. I’d also leave all the drawers of Father’s desk shut, but empty one of them, so it would look out of place. Basically, my plan was to plant some subtle clues, things that wouldn’t be too obvious but would be noticed once they started to look closely.

There were some shadowy figures lurking behind my father. He had some influence with several people with yakuza connections. His disappearance would be strange but somehow typical of him. Maybe he had surprised some burglars, who killed him, went through his papers and took the body away with them so it wouldn’t be discovered right away. Or perhaps they had intended to kill him from the outset, and for some reason wanted to delay discovery. Certainly no one would suspect his thirteen-year-old son of locking him in an underground room, because at school I was regarded as a bright, cheerful boy. At least, I thought I was.

WEARING THICK RUBBER gloves, I picked five brown death caps on the hill, put them in a case and sealed it. I took the train all the way to Mie and bought two large pairs of mass-produced sports shoes. While my father was out I went into the cellar and studied the mechanics of the knob on the door to the secret room. It was the common lever type, with a handle that you pushed down to open. That meant that if I put a piece of furniture or something under the handle on the outside so it couldn’t move, the door wouldn’t open. Perhaps I could make it look like some of the furniture on the stairs had somehow tipped over and obstructed the door entirely by chance. Among the junk stored down there I found the remains of a broken air-conditioner that was exactly the right height. When I tilted it forwards from the steps, it fit so snugly under the lever I could hardly believe it. It blocked the handle completely, so no matter how much you shoved or pounded, the door wouldn’t open. And if I placed a cloth over the hatch at the top of the stairs as camouflage and dragged a piece of furniture on top of it, there was no way it could be opened from below. I planned to scatter tires and old plywood around the furniture. No one would ever think there was another flight of stairs beneath it.

I made my preparations, rehearsed the process several times, and then kept my ears open. The next time my father went to the cellar, that would be D-Day. But one night, after waiting for several days, I heard Kaori’s bedroom door open.

If Father summoned her before I killed him, she would have to go to his room. Foolishly, I had overlooked this vital fact. In my nervousness about committing the murder, my judgment had deteriorated markedly. I didn’t know what I was going to do, but I left my room, rushed along the corridor after her.

“You don’t have to go!” I called.

“But …”

Her back and shoulders were unnaturally stiff.

“You don’t have to. From now on if he calls for you, tell me first.”

Taking a deep breath, I headed towards his room. Maybe all my schemes were about to come tumbling down. I was too panicked to come up with a better plan. If the game was up, I might as well kill him now. That’s how I felt in my desperation, and my fear prevented me from thinking clearly. Many thoughts raced through my mind. Uppermost among them was that nobody could punish me, because I was only thirteen. Surely the old man would die if I strangled him. Any method would do. If he was gone, all my problems would be solved. Confused, unprepared and gasping for air, I knocked on his door.

Even when he saw that it was me and not Kaori, his expression didn’t change. The light over the bed was on and he was reclining in his dressing gown, sipping whiskey. Glancing at me and then looking away in disgust, he raised his glass to his dark red lips. My heart was thumping and I could hardly breathe.

“I’ve got something to ask you. I’m sorry, but could you please raise my allowance?”

My voice quavered as I uttered this ridiculous request. Father turned back to me as though he knew exactly what was going on. I didn’t care. I was beside myself, but even in my turmoil I knew I was going to kill him. It didn’t matter how. I would conquer him. As for what to do afterwards, I’d cross that bridge when I came to it. What happened next would depend on what he said, I repeated to myself.

“Fallen for her, have you? The girl?”