The Fine Art of Invisible Detection

by Robert Goddard

  ‘I will do that.’

  ‘Good.’

  ‘Still, this could be … a complication.’

  ‘Potentially, yes.’ Kodaka drained his glass and refilled it. Wada had so far taken only the tiniest sip of her whisky. ‘But our efforts for the moment should be confined to identifying Peter Evans.’

  ‘A copy of his photograph would be helpful.’

  ‘I agree.’

  ‘I will try to access the archives of the newspaper in which the advertisement appeared.’

  Kodaka squinted at the notes he’d made while talking to Mrs Takenaga. He had to turn the desk lamp on before he could decipher them. His whisky glistened like gold in the pool of light it cast. ‘The London Evening Standard,’ he read. ‘May, 1992.’

  ‘I will start straight away.’

  ‘Leave it until tomorrow, Wada. A tired mind finds nothing.’

  ‘When shall I fly to London?’

  ‘When you like.’

  ‘I will book for Monday morning if I can.’

  ‘I may have more information for you by then. Tomorrow I go to Fukuoka. Takenaga-san gave me the name and address of the tour party member who sent her mother the group photograph. If the lady is still living …’

  ‘It is a long time ago.’

  ‘And it is a long way to go. But I might learn much. I will be back in time to manage the office while you are away.’

  Wada paused to think about that, then said, ‘Please leave most things as they are.’

  Kodaka smiled. ‘Of course.’

  On her long subway journey home that night, Wada found herself thinking about the Nishizaki connection in the case more and more. There’d been something in Kodaka’s tone of voice when he spoke of him that suggested he knew a little more about Nishizaki than he was willing to disclose. He often kept information to himself and there were things he did Wada was happy to know nothing about. For that matter, there were innumerable cases he’d handled before Wada started working for him that might for all she knew have involved Nishizaki. Sokaiya were a specialty of Kodaka’s. And Mrs Takenaga had alleged that Nishizaki had once been sokaiya himself. Wada didn’t feel entirely certain she was being told all she needed to know. Which, rather to her surprise, she found more intriguing than disturbing.

  At her small apartment, she consumed a frugal supper and then, ignoring Kodaka’s advice, immediately went online to see if there was an accessible digital archive for the London Evening Standard.

  The result was frustrating. It seemed she could view copies dating from 1892, but 1992 was a different matter. Physical copies of papers could be inspected at the national newspaper archive, but that wasn’t in or even near London. She abandoned the effort and moved on to more straightforward matters, starting with the booking of a flight. She found a seat on an eleven o’clock Monday morning departure, with flexible return dates. Next she booked herself a room for four nights at the Envoy Hotel, chosen because it was the hotel where, according to Mrs Takenaga, the tour party had been staying at the time of Shitaro Masafumi’s death back in 1977. Now she was set.

  Normally a sound sleeper, Wada woke several times that night and eventually rose early but by no means refreshed. Meditating, which she tried to do every morning, proved almost impossible. She decided to go in to the office.

  She’d been planning to spend a few hours there anyway, albeit later in the day, to clear a few administrative tasks she’d otherwise have attended to in the week ahead. Peace reigned in Nihonbashi on a Saturday morning in spring. Birds skittered and chirped in flight. The air seemed to sparkle. Now she was up and doing something, she felt calmer, more in charge of herself.

  The lobby of the office building was quiet, the porter behind the desk registering surprise at her arrival with the merest twitch of his eyebrows. She smiled and said good morning. He returned the greeting.

  Then, as she approached the lift, there was a ping, the doors slid open and Kazuto Kodaka stepped out.

  It was at once obvious to Wada he hadn’t expected to see her. There was a flinch of dismay before he reordered his expression. ‘Wada,’ he said. ‘Back so soon?’

  ‘I have rather a lot to attend to.’

  ‘Ah yes.’ Kodaka was wearing a light raincoat over his workaday suit and was carrying a small travelling bag as well as a bulging shoulder bag. ‘Of course.’

  ‘Did you forget something?’

  ‘My notebook.’ He patted his jacket pocket. ‘It was stupid of me to leave it here.’ It was also unlike him.

  ‘When is your train?’

  ‘I am on the nine ten Nozomi.’ He glanced at the clock behind the reception desk. ‘There is time.’ He seemed suddenly to relax. ‘Will you walk with me to the station? We can talk on the way.’

  Tokyo Station was an easy walk from their office, easier than usual, in fact, so early on a Saturday morning. They moved at an expeditious clip past the towering headquarters of assorted Japanese financial institutions. Wada suddenly realized she didn’t actually know where the Nishizaki Corporation’s HQ was situated. It could be just round the next corner for all she knew.

  Kodaka seemed to read her thoughts. ‘Nishizaki’s head office is in Ginza,’ he said. ‘More places to entertain clients, I guess.’

  ‘Have you ever handled a case involving Nishizaki before, Kodaka-san?’

  ‘Maybe this case does not involve him.’

  ‘Maybe.’

  ‘And maybe I have not answered your question. Is that what you are thinking?’

  ‘I had no luck with the photograph.’

  ‘You have already tried?’

  ‘Waiting would not have helped.’

  ‘You have booked your flight also?’

  ‘JAL, Monday morning. As we discussed.’

  ‘And the Envoy Hotel?’

  ‘I have a room there.’

  ‘Much will have changed in forty-two years. I am not sure staying at the same hotel will tell you anything.’

  ‘I have to stay somewhere.’

  ‘You have a brother in New York, I think you told me once.’

  ‘Yes.’ Haruto was, if anything, more of a disappointment to their mother than she was. At least she’d been married. Haruto had never even managed that. ‘He is with Nomura Securities.’

  ‘When did you last see him?’

  At their father’s funeral was the answer. But she preferred to be less specific. ‘Three years ago.’

  ‘Too long. You should arrange a visit.’

  ‘Perhaps when we are less busy.’

  ‘Ah yes.’ Kodaka looked up at the sky as they waited to cross the next street. Wada looked as well. Whether she saw what Kodaka saw she couldn’t have said. ‘I wonder when that will be.’

  No more was said about Nishizaki. Kodaka’s silence on the subject hung between them, not as an awkwardness so much as a suspended question.

  Tokyo Station was already busy with weekend travellers. Wada and Kodaka were two inconspicuous figures in the bustle. Kodaka squinted up at the Shinkanzen information board for news of his train.

  ‘On time,’ said Wada. ‘Platform sixteen.’

  Kodaka smiled. ‘Thank you.’

  ‘I wish you a successful trip.’

  ‘You also. Proceed carefully with Caldwell. Give him nothing. We need information. We do not need to give him information.’

  ‘That may be difficult.’

  ‘Regarding Nishizaki …’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘There have always been rumours about sokaiya connections. It could explain his ability to predict so accurately whether a company had a prosperous future ahead of it or not. There are other, darker rumours also. But that is often so with successful people. Rivals tend to attribute their success to … underhand methods. Some cases I have handled … bore his shadow. I do not know how else to put it. Implications of Nishizaki Corporation personnel being involved in the background. But never the foreground. Nothing I could ever tie down. Still, if this is another such case …
caution is required. You understand?’

  ‘I am always cautious.’

  Kodaka nodded. ‘So you are. That is why I employ you.’ He glanced up the stairs towards the platforms. ‘I must go, Wada. Keep in regular contact, yes?’

  ‘I will.’

  The hint of a bow. And Kodaka was gone, hurrying towards the stairs.

  Halfway up them, he turned and gave her a chopped little farewell wave. She couldn’t be sure if he was smiling or not. But she was as she raised her hand in response. Even though she wasn’t certain there was actually anything to smile about.

  Wada returned to the office, turning over in her mind the question of what it was Kodaka had taken with him. She dismissed the idea that he really had forgotten his notebook. No, he’d come in to collect something quite specific, possibly connected to Hiroji Nishizaki. She’d certainly been intending to look through the cabinets where he kept the files of closed cases to see if there was something relevant in one of them. But now she rather suspected there was no point in making the effort.

  She decided to try even so. Kodaka was a poor manager of paperwork. But she found nothing about Nishizaki.

  For that, of course, there was an obvious explanation.

  Kodaka had removed it.

  FOUR

  KATE HAD LEFT for her tuscan holiday, but nick did not have the rest of the weekend to himself. Hearing from Kate that he’d be alone, April asked him over for Sunday lunch.

  This was no ordinary Sunday lunch. It was the first of the traditional boozy gatherings of her and Caro’s friends since Caro’s death and as such an important milestone in April’s recovery from the loss of the woman she’d loved and lived with all of Nick’s life.

  Growing up with two mothers and no father was rarer in Nick’s childhood than it had subsequently become. To him it was just normality, of course, though some of the other boys at his school hadn’t seen it that way. But Caro and April had never mollycoddled him. In fact, April used to joke that if there wasn’t a father in his life at least there was a father figure – her. Looking back from the perspective of early middle age at the often chaotic nature of family life chez Caro and April, Nick couldn’t help being surprised by how they’d somehow managed to be passably good parents.

  Many of the friends who would be at the lunch party were fellow veterans of the Greenham Common women-only anti-cruise missile protests of the 1980s. In Nick’s childhood, Caro and April had virtually taken turns being arrested for trying to scale the fence at the RAF base. He supposed he should have been grateful one of them always stayed home to look after him.

  Feminism, pacifism and socialism, augmented in many cases by vegetarianism and more recently veganism, were the elements that bound this now ageing sisterhood together. Nick was tolerated despite being a man, an unapologetic meat-eater and a floating voter largely because of sentimental memories of him as a little boy. One of the protests had involved hanging photographs of the women’s children on the fence and, as one of those children, Nick enjoyed a special status.

  It was a fine morning, so Nick decided to walk. He headed up through Greenwich Park, stopped for coffee in Blackheath, then ambled on south-west through Lewisham. As he approached Caro and April’s house – just April’s now, of course – he wondered, not for the first time, how they’d managed to handle money so badly over the years that they’d drifted steadily down the London property ladder, from a gabled semi in Dulwich that was the site of his earliest memories to a large but comfortless house not quite far enough west of the centre of Catford to be called Forest Hill. ‘Because money was never our thing,’ Caro would have told him. And there was certainly no disputing that.

  When he arrived, the party was already underway. April, who’d lost weight during Caro’s illness, was beginning to put some back on. She was more like the April Nick always pictured in his mind’s eye: fleshy, flush-cheeked and sparkling-eyed, with short blonde-grey hair and a ready grin. The colour in her cheeks was partly due, he suspected, to the amount of gin she’d already drunk.

  ‘God, Nicky,’ she confided as they hugged, ‘I had a good cry this morning thinking about times like this in the past when Caro was the life and soul of the party. But it’s onwards and upwards, so have a drink, socialize and stay cheerful. That’s an order, OK?’

  Nick grabbed a bottle of beer and started circulating among the guests, most of whom he’d known for years. They were mostly in their sixties, politically committed Baby Boomers horrified by Brexit and global warming who tended to live in more select neighbourhoods themselves but heaped praise on Caro and April for choosing – as if it had been a choice – to settle somewhere ‘authentic’. Teaching in the private sector, as Nick did, meant he always had to endure a certain amount of sarcasm. But at least he taught art, which somehow excused a lot.

  Most people had taken their drinks out into the garden, where the fitful sunshine made it just warm enough to stand around. Glancing back at the house while he listened smilingly to several old friends of his mother as they chatted about themselves and their children, he saw April tasting a dish that was simmering away in the kitchen. She was with Nan, a younger woman Nick had already been fleetingly introduced to. Something in their body language – he couldn’t have said exactly what – made him think they could be more than just friends. He was surprised to realize he was neither horrified nor delighted by the thought. April had every right to seek happiness wherever she could find it. But it was another milestone measuring the passage of time since Caro’s death. And it was a sobering one in its way.

  The afternoon went well. The wine flowed and the world was set to rights in bittersweet debates that somehow failed to identify the secret foe who’d frustrated their high hopes for a better future. They were good people. They thought good things. And Nick liked them, most of all because they brought him as close to his mother, who thought and spoke and believed as they did, as he was ever going to get now she was gone.

  When the party broke up, April encouraged Nick to linger. Over coffee and brandy, she soon began to talk about Caro and Nick saw a chance to ask about Martin Caldwell.

  ‘Do you remember exactly when you first met Caro?’

  ‘You must have asked me that before, Nicky. What did I say?’

  He smiled. ‘I’m not sure.’

  And she smiled too. ‘Probably because I’m not sure either. But meet we did, I’m glad to say.’

  ‘Before you lived in the same house?’

  ‘Definitely. One of the reasons I moved in there was to be close to Caro and persuade her she wanted to be close to me.’

  ‘I was speaking to Martin Caldwell after the funeral. He lived there too, didn’t he?’

  ‘Marty? Yeah. What did he tell you?’ Was there something more than natural curiosity to the question? Nick wasn’t sure. April wasn’t always the open book she claimed to be.

  ‘He didn’t say much about it.’

  ‘Marty never really fitted in. Too … tightly buttoned. Always a bit of a loner. I’m not sure he’s ever been really happy. The last few times I’ve seen him, I’ve got the impression he’s … adrift. There’s no one in his life. Never has been, as far as I know. And he’s retired now, of course, so he doesn’t see many people from day to day. It’s not a good way to end up.’

  ‘How many people lived in the house?’

  ‘Oh, six or seven. It was difficult to keep track with all the boyfriends and girlfriends who came and went.’

  To avoid giving the impression he was obsessed with Caldwell, Nick threw in another name he’d heard mentioned. ‘Miranda Cushing was one of your co-tenants as well, wasn’t she?’

  ‘Yeah. But that was before she set her sights on higher things.’ Those higher things had eventually taken Miranda Cushing into Parliament, where she’d outraged Caro and April by voting in favour of the Iraq invasion. Tony Blair had rewarded her with a junior ministerial post and later a peerage. Caro and April had rewarded her with withering accusations of treachery and
warmongering. Nick had never met the woman, but he’d certainly heard a lot about her, whether he wanted to or not.

  ‘And Marty? Was he a good friend of … my father?’

  April started with surprise. ‘Christ, Nicky, it’s a lot of years since you mentioned him.’

  ‘I know. But I’m an orphan now. It makes you think.’

  ‘Only a child can be an orphan. Besides, luckily for you, you’ve still got me. And I’m not going anywhere any time soon. So come over here and give me a hug.’

  And so, Nick didn’t fail to notice, another question was dodged.

  Half an hour later, as Nick was preparing to leave, he decided to chance one last enquiry about Martin Caldwell. ‘There was something he said to me after the funeral that I can’t quite remember. About the house you all lived in in Exeter. He still lives in the city, doesn’t he?’

  ‘Yeah.’ April seemed to debate with herself whether to expand on the point, then decided to go for it. ‘The daft bugger doesn’t just live in Exeter, Nicky. He lives in the house we all shared. Well, in a flat in it, anyway. The same fucking house. Can you believe it?’

  That was it. That was what Caldwell had slipped into their brief conversation. ‘Maybe he wants to be reminded of his student past.’

  ‘If you ask me, he wants to live in his student past. Which is plain unhealthy.’

  ‘You think so?’

  ‘We all have to move with the current, Nicky. That’s what living is. And that’s what I’m trying to do, as best I can.’

  He put his arm round her shoulder. ‘Today went well, April. Caro would be proud of you.’

  Tears welled in her eyes. ‘She’d be proud of you too. She always was.’ She thumbed the tears away and gave him a stern look. ‘You’re not going to mope while Kate’s away, are you?’