“What happened to the weapon?” Hirata asked.
“I have it here.”
From the ledger, the priest took a paper-wrapped package. Hirata opened this and found a short dagger with a tapering, sharply pointed steel blade, the haft wrapped in black cotton cord. It was the sort of cheap weapon used by commoners, easily hidden beneath clothing or under the bed… and sold everywhere.
“I’ll keep this,” Hirata said, rewrapping the dagger and tucking it under his sash, though he had minimal hope of tracing the owner. “Were there any witnesses?”
“The people nearby were all looking in the other direction, at the acrobats. Lady Harume had become separated from her companions and was very upset. Either she saw nothing, or fright made her forget. Vendors down the street noticed a man in a dark cloak and hood running away.”
Hirata’s heart gave a thump of excitement. The attacker had worn the same disguise as Choyei’s killer!
“Unfortunately, no one got a good look at the culprit, and he escaped,” the priest said.
“How?” This surprised Hirata. The Asakusa security force usually maintained order and subdued troublemakers with admirable efficiency. “Didn’t anyone chase after him?”
“Yes, but the incident occurred on Forty-six Thousand Day,” the priest reminded Hirata.
Hirata nodded in glum comprehension. A visit to the temple on this summer holiday equalled forty-six thousand visits on ordinary days, incurring the equivalent in blessings. The precinct would have been jammed with pilgrims. Additional stalls selling Chinese lantern plants, whose fruit warded off the plague, would have hindered the pursuit, while the confusion allowed the would-be assassin to flee. Sighing, Hirata gazed up at the overshadowing bulk of the temple’s main hall, the tiered roofs of the two pagodas. He envisioned the shrines, gardens, cemeteries, other temples, and secondary marketplace within Asakusa Kannon’s precinct; the roads leading through the surrounding rice fields; the ferry landing and the river. There were countless places for a criminal to hide, and just as many avenues for escape. Lady Harume’s attacker had chosen both time and place well.
“Do you have any other information?” Hirata asked without much hope.
“Just the names of everyone in the Edo Castle party. I gathered the women and their escorts at the temple and took statements from them, according to routine procedure.”
He held out the ledger, and from the list of Harume’s fifty-three companions, one entry leapt out at Hirata: Lady Ichiteru. A sick feeling engulfed his stomach. Pointing to his erstwhile lover’s name, he said, “What did she tell you?”
The priest turned pages and found the statement. “Ichiteru said she was having tea alone down the street when she heard Lady Harume scream. She claimed not to know anything about the attack, or who might have been responsible.”
But Ichiteru was a liar with no alibi. When Harume survived, had Ichiteru resorted to poison? However, Hirata didn’t want to prove her guilt, not even for the sake of closing the case, or the satisfaction of seeing Ichiteru punished. The prospect of success and revenge lost appeal when he imagined living the rest of his life knowing he’d been tricked by a murderer.
“Let me see that list again.” Finding Lieutenant Kushida noted there, Hirata experienced great relief. Kushida fit the assassin’s general description. The dagger wasn’t his preferred weapon, but he might have chosen it because it was more easily concealed than a spear. “What was Kushida’s story?”
“He was so distraught over his failure to protect Lady Harume that I couldn’t determine his whereabouts during the attack,” said the priest.
“Had anyone else seen him?”
“No. They’d split up to escort various ladies around the precinct. Everyone assumed Kushida was with a different group.” The priest frowned. “I know the lieutenant from my days at Edo Castle. I had no reason to believe he was a suspect in the attack, or that he would become a fugitive from the law. Otherwise I would have tried to trace his movements. I’m sorry to be of so little help.”
“Not at all,” Hirata said. “You’ve told me what I wanted to know.”
He was convinced that the same man had flung the dagger at Lady Harume, poisoned her, and silenced Choyei. Lieutenant Kushida had had plenty of opportunity to commit the crimes, and no alibis. Hirata foresaw his triumphant return into Sano’s good graces and his own self respect.
All he had to do was find Lieutenant Kushida.
33
In the daimyo district, a party of soldiers escorting a lone palanquin halted outside the gate bearing a double-swan crest. The commander announced, “The wife of the shogun’s sōsakan-sama wishes to call on Lord Miyagi.”
One of the Miyagi guards said, “Please wait while I inform the daimyo that he has a visitor.”
Inside the palanquin, Reiko trembled with happy excitement. Her detective career had truly begun. Earlier this morning, she’d talked to Eri, who had promised to arrange a meeting with Lady Ichiteru later. Now came her first chance to match wits with a murder suspect. How she hoped that Lord Miyagi was the killer, so she could have the triumph of proving it! As she waited, Reiko fidgeted with a box of sweets she’d brought as a courtesy gift to the Miyagi. Circumstance had provided her the perfect excuse to call on them. She could probe for dark secrets, and Lord Miyagi would never suspect her true purpose. Though Reiko tried to settle down and concentrate on the task ahead, a smile kept breaking out on her face, and not only because she’d achieved her dream.
Her first night with Sano had added new dimension to life. Despite the soreness between her legs, love had given her an exhilarating sense of physical and spiritual well-being. The world seemed full of tempting challenges, and Reiko felt ready to take on all of them. Impatiently she peered out of the palanquin at the Miyagi’s gate.
Finally a manservant emerged. “Lord and Lady Miyagi will receive Lady Sano in the garden,” he said.
Clutching her gift box, Reiko alit from the palanquin. She told her entourage to wait outside, then followed the servant into the daimyo’s estate. In the enclosure formed by the retainers’ barracks, only two samurai sat in the guardroom. An inner courtyard surrounded a mansion with half-timbered walls and tile roof. A lone guard stood by the entry porch. The place was eerily deserted. Sano had warned Reiko to expect this, and now her heart began to race with anticipation. Surely Lord Miyagi’s abnormal manner of living indicated a shady character. Was she going to meet the murderer of Lady Harume?
Reiko followed her escort through another gate, into the private garden. Pines stood like grotesque monsters, their trunks and limbs artificially contorted, the foliage pruned to emphasize their twisted postures. The ornamental boulders were thick, phallic pillars with rounded heads. From a cluster of shrubs rose the black statue of a many-armed hermaphroditic deity whose hands touched its naked breasts and erection. This morning Sano had briefed Reiko on the Miyagi’s strange household, but mere words hadn’t prepared her for the reality. Sexual initiation had expanded her senses, making her keenly aware of her surroundings. The garden’s atmosphere was curiously hushed. Sunlight, filtered through the deformed trees, cast deep shadows. Reiko’s nostrils flared at the putrid taint of rot in the air.
A pretty young woman raked neat parallel lines into a bed of white sand. Another tossed crumbs to orange carp in the pond. In the pavilion, an older woman with a plain, severe face sat and sewed. A middle-aged man, dressed in a faded blue cotton coat, knelt by a flower bed, ladling something out of a wooden bucket.