Tominaga Noriko …
‘It was never Abe Yoshiko,’ whispers Murota Hideki now. ‘It was always her, always Noriko, but it was always a secret and it always would have been had my luck not run out. But then again, my luck had already begun to run out before I even met Noriko…’
‘It was always a secret … It was always a secret …’
‘I suppose it’s funny, really, in a way, I survived the whole of the war and then, on the very morning of the surrender, the very last day of the whole of the war, my luck finally ran out…’
‘My luck finally ran out… finally ran out…’
‘Towards the end of the war, that very month in fact, I had been transferred to the Shinagawa police station and so that was where I was working when, early that morning of the fifteenth of August last year, some boiler-man comes in saying he’s discovered the naked body of a woman in an air-raid shelter…’
Miyazaki Mitsuko. Miyazaki Mitsuko …
‘And so that was my first piece of bad luck, being at Shinagawa that morning when this man comes in, because now I and an Officer Uchida are sent up there to get the details and to wait for your mob to arrive from Headquarters…’
I have seen this man before …
‘But it turns out the air-raid shelter is on naval property and so the case belongs to the Kempeitai. It’s not your business. Not our business. The Kempeitai take the case…’
Eyes I have met before …
‘Me and Officer Uchida were sent back down to Shinagawa police station to request an ambulance and that was that. Finished. Never heard anything more about it and never expected to. Case closed, as far as I was concerned…’
Now Murota Hideki points at Tominaga Noriko and says, ‘Then I met her this last winter, on my beat. She’s got no one and she’s got nothing. I feel sorry for her and yes, I fancy her. I find her a place in Ōimachi. I give her money and I give her food –
‘I take care of her and yes, I sleep with her…’
Murota Hideki looks over at Tominaga Noriko now and says, ‘We both had nothing and now we have something.’
She haunts me here. She haunts me now …
Now Murota Hideki shakes his head. Murota Hideki sighs, ‘But then two months ago, when this friend of hers, this Abe Yoshiko, was murdered, and in a similar manner and in a similar place to that body in Shinagawa last year, that was when I made my first mistake and that was when my luck finally ran out for good…’
‘My luck finally ran out for good … finally…’
‘I tried to be a policeman. I tried to help. I was at the Mita police station by then but I went across to Takanawa, where the Abe team was based, and I asked to see the officer in charge…’
‘Who is unfortunately no longer with us …’
‘I met this officer, man called Chief Inspector Mori, and I told him about the body in the air-raid shelter at Shinagawa. Chief Inspector Mori thanked me and, again, I thought that was that. I’d done what I could. I’d tried to help. Finished. And I never expected to hear anything more about it. Case closed again for me…’
Case closed … case closed … case closed …
‘But then, the very next day, this Chief Inspector Mori is down at the Mita police station, to question me …’
I don’t want to remember …
‘Can I remember any further details? Can I remember who was working with me at Shinagawa on that day? Can I remember the two detectives who were sent out from Headquarters? Can I remember the names of the officers from the Kempeitai? The witnesses? And so on and so on and so on…’
But in the half-light …
‘All I can tell him though is what I told him the day before, same as I just told you, but that’s when I should have known, that’s when I should have guessed…’
I can’t forget…
‘Because no sooner is Mori gone than some other Metro detective is down at Mita to see me, hauling me back up to HQ, telling me I’ve been a bad cop, that he’s heard all about me, screwing pan-pan girls on my beat, like I’m the only cop in the city who’s ever had a whore on his beat, like he hasn’t got better things to do than chase after me, but he’s relentless, this detective, he never gives up, asking me to confess to this, to confess to that, asking me for the name of my girl, for Noriko’s name, and now I get the picture –
‘He is here to punish me. He is here to warn me –
‘And I don’t know why I ever thought it would work, or why I ever thought it was a good idea, but there’s no way I’m ever going to give him Noriko’s name, so I tell him I was seeing Abe, that I fucked her but I never killed her, and guess what…?
‘He bought it, believed it was Abe –
‘And so they fired me –
‘For conduct unbecoming a police officer, but I didn’t care because they didn’t know about Noriko and that meant she was safe. Safe. Ten days later, I read that this Chief Inspector Mori has been purged by the SCAP and gone insane. Mad. Then I knew I’d made the right decision, knew I’d made the right choice…’
The Matsuzawa Hospital for the Insane …
‘Until today. Until you turned up…’
‘My luck finally ran out…’
‘I knew we should have run, we should have gone as far away as we could from here …,’ and now Murota Hideki’s words trail off, trail off back into the shadows, back into the shadows behind the shabby curtain, behind the shabby curtain that partitions this shabby room, the shadows from the light and the light from the shadows –
The voices from the echoes and the truth from the lies …
This shabby curtain, this shabby country –
‘Are you satisfied now, detective?’ asks Murota Hideki. ‘Are you happy now? Have you heard and seen enough now? Heard enough about me and seen enough of her, have you now, officer?’
‘No,’ I tell him. ‘I want the name of the detective.’
‘Why do you want that?’ he laughs. ‘What for?’
‘Tell me his name,’ I say. ‘And then I’m gone.’
Murota spits, ‘Said his name was Adachi…’
‘Are you satisfied now, detective?’
‘For what that’s worth,’ laughs Murota now. ‘Because no one is ever who they say they are…’
Here in the half-light …
‘Not these days…’
I have nothing more to ask them. My skin is red. Nothing more to say to them. My skin is raw. I pick up my hat. My hand aches. I get up from their low table in their shabby room. My body sweats. In this shabby house, in this shabby city, in this shabby country –
In this place of defeat. In this place of capitulation …
‘You be careful out there, detective,’ Murota Hideki tells me. ‘And you remember my face and remember what happened to me. And remember the name of Chief Inspector Mori and you remember what happened to him. You remember us both now, detective…’
This place of surrender. This place of occupation …
‘I’ll remember you,’ I say. I turn to Tominaga –
In this place of ghosts, this place of ghosts …
I turn to Tominaga Noriko and I say, ‘Thank you, miss.’
And she thanks me back and then she bows her head –
In her yellow and dark-blue striped pinafore dress …