Occupied City
Page 15
The police base their belief (a) that the culprit was familiar with medicine and epidemic prevention and (b) that he was someone who knew the district and the bank well on the following two factors:
Dysentery cases had been reported in the district recently.
The criminal wore the armband of the Tokyo Metropolitan sanitation bureau and did not arouse any suspicion among the 16 who drank the poison.
Investigation headquarters have been established at the Mejiro police station.
The names of the victims of the mass poison slaughter have been ascertained as follows:
Dead:— Watanabe Yoshiyasu, 43, chief treasurer; Shirai Shoichi, 28; Kato Teruko, 16; Uchida Yuko, 22; Takeuchi Sutejiro, 48, messenger; Nishimura Hidehiko, 38; Akiyama Miyako, 22; Takizawa Tatsuo, 46, messenger; his wife, Takizawa Ryuko, 51; Takizawa’s son, Yoshihiro, 7; Takizawa’s daughter, Takako, 18; and Sawada Yoshio, 21.
Those in critical condition: – Yoshida Takejiro, 42, assistant manager; Akusawa Yoshiko, 18; Murata Masako, 21; and Tanaka Norikazu, 28.
The first of the two bottles that the culprit induced his victims to drink is ascertained to have contained potassium cyanide.
The armband he wore is believed to have been one issued at the time of the recent flood disaster to students, hospitals, ward offices, and volunteer workers.
The crime is believed to have been planned by several persons in conjunction with the culprit who appeared at the bank.
Four persons who figured in a similar attempt made previously at the Nakai branch of the Mitsubishi Bank are believed to have some connection with the Teikoku Bank case.
The latest check shows that from ¥110,000 to ¥120,000 of the bank’s money are missing.
Doctor Suspected
TOKYO, Jan. 28 – Police suspicion in the Teikoku Bank mass murder case has fallen on a certain middle-aged doctor living within the jurisdiction of the Mejiro police station who fits the description given by Miss Murata Masako, one of the survivors, it is learned.
Linked With Case?
TOKYO, Jan. 28 – A man committed suicide with potassium cyanide at a hotel not far from the Shiinamachi branch of the Teikoku Bank early this morning.
As the poison taken by the suicide is the same as that which killed the bank employees, the Mejiro police station is investigating whether he is connected with the mass murder case.
The suicide, who registered as Yokobe Kunio, a company official at Komagawa-mura, Iruma-gun, Saitama prefecture, put up at the Kiraku Inn at 2156 Shiina-machi 5-chōme, Toshima-ku, yesterday at about 9.30 p.m. and took the potassium cyanide today at about 6 a.m.
He was wearing a grey sweater, khaki coat, black serge trousers and black overcoat. In his wallet was only about ¥100.
His hair was not cropped.
In the Fictional City, this city of millions, millions will buy my newspaper, millions will buy my stories.
IN THE FICTIONAL CITY, I am back in the Seibo Hospital, back wearing a stolen white coat, back pretending to be a doctor –
Pretending, impersonating, deceiving…
Back beside her bed, her eyes closed, her hand in mine, I am whispering, ‘Can you hear me, Miss Murata…?’
There is sweat on her brow, in her hair, shadows on her cheeks, round her eyes. Her mouth opens and then closes, her fingers tighten and then loosen. She is dreaming, dreaming bad dreams –
‘Miss Murata, I can help you. Please believe me …’
Her eyes are open now but still not close, she is struggling to get back, back to this room, this white room in this hospital –
‘I can help you,’ I tell her. ‘You can trust me …’
Her fingers turn in my hand, tighten around my own, as she looks at me now and asks, ‘Who are you? Are you a doctor?’
‘No, this white coat is just so I could talk to you. That’s all. I just want to talk to you. I just want to help you …’
‘But why?’ she says. ‘Who are you?’
In the Fictional City, in the Seibo Hospital, in my stolen coat, I say, ‘My name is Takeuchi Riichi. I’m a journalist.’
‘You’re a journalist?’ she laughs. ‘Not a doctor?’
‘No,’ I smile. ‘A journalist, with the Yomiuri.’
She turns her face away from me now, not laughing any more. I let go of her hand. I want to apologize. She stares at the white wall, tears on her pillow. I stand up. I want to explain …
‘Get away from me!’ she cries.
IN THE FICTIONAL CITY, a telephone rings, a voice whispers, along wires, down cables, with another time, another place –
Down another alley, in another room, through the shadows, past the stares, in another chair, another man –
A man with an envelope.
I open the envelope. I read the letter. I take out my wallet. I hand him the cash and I say, ‘I hope you didn’t write it yourself.’
The man counts the cash. The man puts it in his jacket pocket. The man smiles and says, ‘What difference would it make?’
IN THE FICTIONAL CITY, with an envelope and a letter on my desk, an editor and a deadline on my back, I write another story:
SINISTER NOTE RECEIVED IN PUZZLING BANK CASE
Reward for Capture Now ¥80,000; Police Still Baffled
Painfully slow progress was being made in the Teikoku Bank ‘Poison Holdup’ case as police officers continued to be enmeshed in difficulties because of the lack of tangible evidence.
Rewards for the capture of the diabolical killer of 12 bank employees rose to ¥80,000 and one silver cup.
A sinister letter was received on January 29 by the manager of the Shiina branch of the Teikoku Bank. Signed ‘Yamaguchi Jiro’, the alias used on the day of the diabolical crime, the letter said in part: ‘I am sorry I caused quite a disturbance the other day. I let Murata Masako (the girl who crawled into the streets to seek help) live because I have some use for her later. In due time, I shall pay her a visit… At first I had an unpleasant feeling watching so many people writhe and squirm in agony but later I didn’t mind at all…’
Police are investigating to see whether it really came from the poisoner or from some callous citizen with a dubious sense of humour.
Meanwhile, the description of the man who claimed the cheque stolen from the scene of the crime failed to tally with that of the poisoner.
Police officials, however, expressed gratification for public cooperation in the manhunt and said that scores of letters and phone calls are being received daily at the search headquarters.
In the Fictional City, so many letters and so many calls, so many stories and so many tales, so many doubts and so many, many questions.
IN THE FICTIONAL CITY, in the Seibo Hospital, there is sweat on her brow, in her hair again, shadows on her cheeks, round her eyes again. Her mouth opening and then closing, her fingers tightening and then loosening. She is dreaming, dreaming bad dreams again –
‘Help me,’ she says in her dreams. ‘Please help me …’
In this white room, her hand in mine, I say, ‘I can help you. Please believe me. I can make that dream go away …’
Pretending, impersonating, deceiving…
She opens her eyes. She stares into me. She squeezes my hand. She whispers, ‘How can you help me?’
‘I can save you,’ I tell her –
Pretending, not pretending…
‘Until yesterday,’ she says, ‘I thought a cup was a cup. Until then, a table was a table. I thought the war was over. I knew we had lost. I knew we had surrendered. I knew we were now occupied.
‘But I thought the war was over. I thought a cup was still a cup. That medicine was medicine. I thought my friend was my friend, a colleague was a colleague. A doctor, a doctor.
‘But the war is not over. A cup is not a cup. Medicine is not medicine. A friend not a friend, a colleague not a colleague. For a colleague here yesterday, sat in the seat at the counter beside me, that colleague is not here today. Because a doctor is not a doctor.
‘A doctor is a murderer. A killer.
‘Because the war is not over.
‘The war is never over.’
‘I know,’ I say, pretending to pretend, in my stolen white coat, not pretending to pretend, beside her hospital bed, squeezing her hand and telling her again, ‘I know, I know.’
‘I was still going through that day’s thirty deposits when the killer arrived,’ she says. ‘I didn’t see what time it was when he entered, but business had closed as usual at 3 p.m., and I had then immediately begun to count up the deposits. The thirty deposits would have taken me no longer than ten minutes which means the killer must have arrived sometime between 3 p.m. and 3.10 p.m.
‘When the killer began to distribute the poison, I looked him in his face. I will never forget that face. I would know it anywhere.’
‘I know,’ I say again, and again, ‘I know, I know.’
‘I am a survivor,’ she says, still staring into me, deeper and deeper, still squeezing my hand, tighter and tighter. ‘But of course I know only through luck have I survived so many friends. But night after night, in dream after dream, I hear these friends saying of me: “Those who survive are stronger.” And I hate myself …’
Again and again, she says, ‘I hate myself.’
And again, again I say, ‘I know …’
Pretending, not pretending…
‘But I will help you.’
IN THE FICTIONAL CITY, I walk down the long, long table to my editor’s desk at the head of the long, long table and I stand before him and I say, ‘I’m very sorry to disturb you, Boss …’
‘Ah, Takeuchi,’ smiles Ono. ‘Just the man I wanted to see. Liked that piece on the “Sinister Note” very much. Very much.’
‘Well, actually, that was what I wanted to talk to you about. I’m not sure it’s entirely legitimate. So I was thinking maybe you could hold it back for now while I checked into it a bit more …?’
‘Too late for doubts,’ laughs Ono, tapping his watch. ‘It’s already been set and the presses are rolling.’
‘I see,’ I say.
‘I’ve told you before,’ he tells me again. ‘You worry too much. In our business, there’s no time for doubts, no time for procrastination. Don’t get me wrong, I admire your integrity. But in our business we’ve got to go with our guts, run with our hunches, and your gut, your hunch, was to run with this. So forget it now, and get after the next one. After all, not like you made it up yourself, is it?’
IN THE FICTIONAL CITY, it is Wednesday 4 February, and I am standing outside the Seibo Hospital with all the other reporters and all the photographers. In the Fictional City, we are watching the survivors leave the hospital, watching them bow and thank the nurses and the doctors, their arms full of presents, full of flowers. In the Fictional City, all the other reporters are shouting out –
‘Mr Yoshida! Mr Tanaka! Miss Akuzawa …
‘Miss Murata! Over here, Miss Murata …’
Her eyes searching through the shouts of all the reporters, searching through the flashes of all the photographers –
‘Miss Murata! Over here, Miss Murata …’
Her lips smiling through the shouts and through the flashes, her eyes searching, lost and not smiling –
‘She’s beautiful, isn’t she?’ says Matsuda, the photographer from the Yomiuri. ‘She’ll be on every front page tomorrow …’
And now the police are leading her away through the crowds, taking her away to their car, with her arms full of presents, full of flowers, and I am walking away among all the other reporters and the photographers, with our heads full of stories, full of fictions –
‘Lucky she’s so good-looking,’ laughs Matsuda, tapping his camera, winking at me. ‘Sell more papers for us …’
In the Fictional City, back at my desk in the Yomiuri building, I stare at Matsuda’s photographs and I write another story:
POISON SURVIVORS LEAVE HOSPITAL
Happy over their narrow escape with death, the four lucky survivors of the Teikoku Bank ‘Poison Holdup’ case were discharged as fully recovered from the Seibo Hospital, Wednesday. Shown as they received presents from congratulating friends are: (Left to right) Acting Manager Yoshida Takejiro, 44, Miss Murata Masako, 22, and Tanaka Norikazu, 20. They revisited the scene of the crime to reconstruct what had taken place for the police investigators. The first inkling of the tragedy was made known when the attention of passers-by was attracted by the beautiful Miss Murata who, despite her rapidly failing consciousness, had bravely managed to drag her agonized body into the street.
I stop writing. I start reading. I stop reading–
‘I know only through luck have I survived so many friends… But night after night, in dream after dream, I hear these friends saying of me: “Those who survive are stronger.”
‘And I hate myself. I hate myself…’
I stand up. I put on my coat.
IN THE FICTIONAL CITY, it is night again, night again as I walk her streets, as I hear her stories, from Nihonbashi up to Hongo, from Hongō and onto Kasuga-dōri, along Kasuga-dōri then down Shinobazu-dōri, down Shinobazu-dōri and onto Mejiro-dōri, along Mejiro-dōri onto Yamate-dōri, Yamate-dōri to Shiinamachi –
But I do not go to the scene of the crime, I go to her house, Murata Masako’s house. In this Fictional City, in its long, long night, I stand across the street from her house. Is she awake? Her house is dark. Or is she sleeping? The lights off. Dreaming? The curtains closed. Dreaming that dream again?
‘And I hate myself. I hate
The footsteps in the shadows, the grip on my shoulder, the voice at my back, ‘Who are you? What are you doing here?’
I try to turn, the grip too tight –
‘Don’t move, just talk!’
‘I’m a journalist,’ I say. ‘From the Yomiuri.’
The hand inside my coat, inside my jacket, my pocket now my wallet. The grip relaxed, a torchlight on –
I spin round, shove him in his chest, snatch back my wallet and now say, ‘Who are you?’
The man smiles, the man before me, in his hat and in his cape, and he bellows, ‘I am Shimizu Kogorō, Occult-Tantei. Head of the Nagasaki branch of the Mejiro Security Association …’
Across the street, her house is no longer dark, the lights on and the curtains open, a face at the window –
Her face at the window, afraid.
IN THE FICTIONAL CITY, in a dancehall on the Ginza, with its heavy drapes and broken ventilation, its bad perfume and cheap pomade, through the cigarette smoke on the sticky floor, young men in zoot suits and aloha shirts are cheek-to-cheek with the hostesses and their cracked faces, their acne-scars, dancing to a swing band in the reflecting lights, in this dancehall on the Ginza, in this Fictional City, I am waiting for a character, waiting for their story, looking at the door and fiddling with my watch, but tonight he does not show, tonight he stands me up, no character, no story, not tonight, but here in the cigarette smoke, tonight in the reflecting lights, I open my notebook and I read through my pencil-marks, for there is always a character, always a story somewhere in the Fictional City.
IN THE FICTIONAL CITY, a new day, a new story, another story for another day; there is always another day, there is always another story in the Fictional City:
NEIGHBOURHOOD INVESTIGATIVE HQ
A local organization named Mejiro Chian Kyōkai Nagasaki Shibu has founded a ‘Civil Investigative Headquarters’ because ‘the locals will be upset unless the [Teigin] case is solved quickly,’ said the Chief of the HQ, Mr Shimizu.
The HQ is located in the office of the Nagasaki Shrine, and their investigation is mostly focused on the killer’s tracks. They summon those who had been in the vicinity of the crime scene, and who had hurried to rescue the victims, as well as local children who may have also witnessed the crime. Shimizu and his team plan to gather up all these testimonies and give their reports to Mejiro Police Station.
Each member of the Interview Team runs a separate district
of the neighbourhood and witnesses are summoned to the Nagasaki Shrine HQ, even in the night, to be questioned by these amateur cops. For now, Chief Shimizu ignores his own business and devotes himself entirely to the investigation, twenty four hours a day. ‘I take 5 or 6 Hiropon injections per day but, what-the-heck, I’ll do beyond my best till we get him,’ said Mr Shimizu, and he will not disband the HQ until the killer is caught.
However, one local housewife complained, ‘I really wish the killer would be caught very soon, or he [Mr Shimizu] will be back to ask us for another donation to his association!’
In the Fictional City, I put my head down on my desk, I close my eyes, and I pretend to sleep.
IN THE FICTIONAL CITY, I knock on her door and I try to open it, but her door is locked and so I knock again, and I wait –
‘Who is it?’ she says from behind the door.
‘It’s Takeuchi,’ I say. ‘From the Yomiuri.’
‘What do you want?’
‘Well, I just wondered if you’d come for a coffee with me.’
‘Why?’ she asks.
‘Well, actually I don’t know,’ I say. ‘I suppose I just wanted to see you, to see how you are, not for a story. Just…’
The lock turns now. The door opens –
Miss Murata Masako stares at me –
I ask, ‘Do you remember me?’
‘Yes,’ she says. ‘I remember you, Takeuchi Riichi of the Yomiuri, in your white coat, pretending to be a doctor.’
I bow and I say, ‘I’m sorry about that.’
‘So you want to take me for coffee as an apology, is that it?’
I smile and I say, ‘Well, maybe. Yes …’
‘OK, then,’ she says and, in the genkan to her house, she reaches for her coat and puts it on, then steps out of a pair of sandals and into a pair of shoes, and finally she ties a scarf around her face, over her hair, and says, ‘Come on, then.’