Ton-ton. Ton-ton …
*
I am back in the toilets of Atago police station. I have vomited again. Black bile again. I stand over the sink. I spit. I wipe my mouth. I turn on the tap. I wash my face. Now I look up into that mirror again –
I don’t want to remember. I don’t want to remember …
Ishida is waiting for me beside our banner –
‘Did you find Hayashi Jo?’ I ask him –
‘No,’ says Ishida. ‘He’s resigned.’
‘When did Hayashi resign?’
‘Late yesterday evening.’
‘Where is he now?’
‘No one knows.’
‘Good work,’ I tell him. ‘Dismissed.’
I wait until Ishida has stepped into our borrowed office and then I run back to the toilets. I vomit again. Brown bile. I walk over to the sink. I spit again. I wipe my mouth. I turn on the tap. I wash my face again. Now I stare into that mirror –
I don’t want to remember …
No Hayashi. No Fujita –
You can tell which are the men from Room #1 and which are the men from Room #2 by the looks on their faces. No Fujita. The anticipation on the faces of Room #1, the resignation on the faces of Room #2. No Fujita. Room #1 have a name for their suspect. No Fujita. Room #2 still have no name for their victim. No Fujita. Detectives Hattori, Takeda, Sanada and Shimoda are sat at the very back of the room. No Fujita. Detectives Nishi, Kimura and Ishida sat at the front. No Fujita. None of the men from the Second Team are smiling in anticipation of an arrest as they listen to Inspector Kai –
‘But the mother and sisters had already identified her haramaki by its five darned holes and given us details of the whitlow scar on her left thumb, so she was then formally identified by her mother as Midorikawa Ryuko, aged seventeen of Meguro Ward…’
Inspector Kai updating Room #1 and Room #2 about the identification of the body, about the life of the victim, about the name of the suspect and the plan for his arrest at noon tomorrow. The uniforms from Atago, Meguro and Mita have not been invited this evening. This meeting is just for detectives; detectives only –
‘And our two teams of detectives in Shibuya have just reported that the suspect left for his shift as usual at 5:30 p.m. tonight and then arrived at the laundry before 6 p.m….’
I am stood next to Inspector Kai at the front of the room beside Inspectors Kanehara and Adachi –
I am cursing Inspector Kai…
‘Naturally the detectives from Room #2 will also be able to question the suspect Kodaira about the second body found at Shiba Park and to which we hope he will also provide an identity and a confession and thus spare the blushes of Room #2 again…’
There is laughter from one half of the room –
There is resentment from the other half –
‘I’m just joking,’ laughs Kai. ‘We’re all comrades now.’
There is more laughter and more jeering, fists on desktops and boots on floorboards, backs slapped and hair ruffled –
In anticipation, in excitement –
‘Attention!’ shouts Kai –
Their fists by their sides, their boots together now …
‘Bow!’ he shouts –
Backs straight and hair flat…
‘Dismissed!’
They file out…
And I run out of the meeting room and down the stairs to vomit in the toilets. I vomit in the toilets of Atago police station a third time. Yellow bile. I spit. I turn on the tap again. I wash my face. I look up into that mirror again. I stare into that mirror –
I can’t forget. In the half-light, I can’t forget…
Adachi is waiting for me outside the toilets –
‘We’ve both seen this before, detective…’
Adachi grabs my arm. ‘Where’s Fujita?’
‘Did you find that file, inspector?’
‘I sent him to the Salon Matsu in Kanda,’ I lie but I don’t ask him why; why Adachi wants Fujita. I don’t ask him why because I turn back into the toilets. Back to vomit. Grey bile. Back to the sink. Back to the tap. Back to the mirror –
In the half-light …
Adachi is gone but Nishi and Kimura are waiting for me in the corridor. They are hot and they are dirty. They know I have forgotten about them. They are tired and they are angry –
‘There are no records of a Takahashi of Zōshigaya,’ says Nishi. ‘Because there are no records of anyone because all their records were lost when their ward office burnt down…’
‘But did you go to the address in Zōshigaya?’
Kimura nods and Nishi says, ‘Yes.’
I ask them both, ‘And…?’
‘It’s cinders,’ says Nishi.
I ask, ‘Have either of you seen Detective Fujita today?’
Kimura shakes his head and Nishi says, ‘No.’
‘Right then,’ I say and I take out the envelope from my pocket and hand them the piece of newspaper. ‘Find out which paper this advertisement is from and the date it was run. Then, last thing tonight, before they pull this man in tomorrow, you two are coming with me to Kanda to help me wake up the ladies of the Salon Matsu.’
Kimura nods. Nishi nods. They both bow. They both turn to leave. I wait until they’ve gone and then I run back to the toilets of Atago police station to vomit in the toilets –
But this time I do not vomit –
Nothing comes up.
*
Everything is falling into place. Back to Shimbashi to give Senju the name. Everything is turning out fine. Back to Shimbashi to get some Calmotin. Falling into place. Back through the pots and the pans, through the knives and the spoons. Turning out fine. Back through the suits and the sardines, the tinned fruit and old army boots –
‘Red apple to my lips, blue sky silently watching…’
But tonight there are many more pale-suited goons out here, many more patterned shirts and American sunglasses in the alleys and the lanes, in the shadows and the arches –
Trains screaming overhead…
Eight goons tonight at the foot of the stairs that lead up to his office, their legs apart and their hands in jackets, with twitches in their cheeks and pinpricks for pupils –
In the half-light …
His office door is closed, his office lights out tonight –
I straighten my jacket. I ask them, ‘Is the boss in?’
‘And who the fuck are you?’ asks one of them –
I tell him, ‘Inspector Minami of Metro HQ.’
This goon tells that goon to go up the stairs and so that goon goes up the stairs and taps on the door to the office and then that goon comes back down the stairs and whispers in the ear of this goon and so now this goon says, ‘You’re to wait, Minami of Metro HQ.’
No dice tonight. No calls of odd, even and play …
Now the door to the office opens. A foreigner, an American, a Victor, comes down the stairs. At the foot of the stairs, this man turns to me and says, ‘Good evening, inspector…’
‘Good evening, sir,’ I reply.
The foreigner, this American, this Victor, he winks at me now and Senju’s goons all laugh along –
‘Up you go now, Minami of Metro HQ,’ says one of the goons as the Victor disappears –