Ring

by Kōji Suzuki

  Were these two inexplicable sudden deaths indeed the only ones that had occurred at 11 p.m. on September 5th?

  If not-that is, if there had been other, similar, incidents-then the chances of them being a coincidence were practically nil. Asakawa decided to take a look at the newspapers from early September. Part of his job was reading the newspaper meticulously. But in his case, he usually read only the headlines in the local news section, so there was more than just a chance that there was something he'd missed. He had a feeling there had been. He had the feeling that about a month ago, in the corner of a page in the local news section, he'd seen an odd headline. It had been a small article, on the lower left-hand page… All he remembered was where it had appeared. He remembered reading the headline and thinking, hey, but then someone from the desk had called to him, and he'd gotten so distracted by work that he never actually read the article.

  With the buoyancy of a child on a treasure hunt, Asakawa began his search with the morning edition from September 6th. He was certain he'd find a clue. Reading month-old newspapers in the gloomy archives was giving him a sort of psychological uplift he never got from interviewing a philistine. Asakawa was much more cut out for this kind of thing than for running around on the beat dealing with people of all sorts.

  The September 7th evening edition-that's where the article was, in just the position he'd remembered it being. Squeezed into a corner by news of a shipwreck that had claimed 34 lives, the article took up even less space than he'd recalled. No wonder he had overlooked it. Asakawa took off his silver-rimmed glasses, buried his face in the newspaper, - and pored over the article.

  YOUNG COUPLE DEAD OF UNNATURAL CAUSES IN RENTAL CAR

  At 6:15 a.m. on the 7th, a young man and woman were found dead in the front seats of a car on a vacant lot in Ashina, Yokosuka, along a prefec-tural road. The bodies were discovered by a truck driver who happened to pass by and who then reported the case to the Yokosuka police precinct.

  From the car registration they were identified as a preparatory school student from Shibuya, Tokyo (age 19), and a private girls' high school student from Isogo, Yokohama (age 17). The car had been rented from an agency in Shibuya two evenings previously by the preparatory school student.

  At the time of discovery, the car was locked with the key in the ignition. The estimated time of death was sometime between late night on the 5th and the predawn hours of the 6th. Since the windows were rolled up, it is thought that the couple fell asleep and asphyxiated, but the possibility that they had taken an overdose of drugs in order to commit a love suicide has not been ruled out. The exact cause of death has not been determined. As of yet there is no suspicion of homicide.

  This was all there was to the article, but Asakawa felt like he had a bite. First of all, the girl who died was seventeen and attended a private girls' school in Yokohama, just like his niece Tomoko. The guy who rented the car was nineteen and a prep school student, just like the kid who died in front of Shinagawa Station. The estimated time of death was virtually identical. Cause of death unknown, too.

  There had to be some connection among these four deaths. It couldn't take too long to establish definitive commonalities. After all, Asakawa was on the inside of a major news-gathering organization-he wasn't lacking for sources of information. He made a copy of the article and headed back to the editorial office. He felt like he'd just struck gold, and his pace quickened of its own accord. He could barely wait for the elevator.

  The Yokosuka City Hall press club. Yoshino was sitting at his desk, his pen scurrying across a sheet of manuscript paper. As long as the expressway wasn't crowded, you could make it here from the main office in Tokyo in an hour. Asakawa came up behind Yoshino and called his name.

  "Hey, Yoshino."

  He hadn't seen Yoshino in a year and a half.

  "Huh? Hey, Asakawa. What brings you down to Yokosuka? Here, have a seat."

  Yoshino pulled up a chair toward the desk and urged Asakawa to sit. Yoshino hadn't shaved, and it gave him a seedy look, but he could be surprisingly considerate toward others.

  "You keeping busy?"

  "You could say that."

  Yoshino and Asakawa had known each other when Asakawa was still in the local-news department, which Yoshino had entered three years ahead of him. Yoshino was thirty-five now.

  "I called the Yokosuka office. That's how I learned you were here."

  "Why? You need me for something?"

  Asakawa handed him the copy he'd made of the article. Yoshino stared at it for an extraordinarily long time. Since he'd written the article himself, he should have been able to remember what it said just by looking at it. As it was, he sat there concentrating all his nerves on it, hand frozen halfway through the motion of putting a peanut in his mouth. It was as if he were chewing it: recalling what he'd written and digesting it.

  "What about it?" Yoshino had assumed a serious expression.

  "Nothing special. I just wanted to find out more details."

  Yoshino stood up. "All right. Let's go next door and talk over a cup of tea or something."

  "Do you have time for this right now? Are you sure I'm not interrupting?"

  "Not a problem. This is more interesting than what I was doing."

  There was a little cafe right next to City Hall where you could get coffee for two hundred yen a cup. Yoshino sat down and immediately turned to the counter and called out, "Two coffees." Then, turning back to Asakawa, he hunched over, leaning close. "Okay, look, I've been on the local beat for 12 years now. I've seen a lot of things. But. Never have I come across anything as downright odd as this."

  Yoshino paused for a sip of water, then continued. "Now, Asakawa. This has got to be a fair trade of information. Why is someone from the main office looking into this?"

  Asakawa wasn't ready to tip his hand. He wanted to keep the scoop for himself. If an expert like Yoshino caught wind of it, in a heartbeat he'd chase and nab the prize for himself. Asakawa promptly came up with a lie.

  "No" special reason. My niece was a friend of the dead girl, and she keeps badgering me for information-you know, about the incident. So as long as I was down here…"

  It was a poor lie. He thought he saw Yoshino's eyes flash with suspicion, and he shrank back, unnerved.

  "Really?"

  "Yeah, well, she's a high school student, fight? It's bad enough that her friend's dead, but then there are the circumstances. She just keeps bugging me about it. I'm begging you. Give me details."

  "So, what do you want to know?"

  "Did they ever decide on the cause of death?"

  Yoshino shook his head. "Basically, they're saying their hearts just stopped all of a sudden. They have no idea why."

  "How about the murder angle? Strangulation, for example."

  "Impossible. No bruise marks on the neck."

  "Drugs?"

  "No traces in the autopsy."

  "In other words, the case hasn't been solved."

  "Shit, no. No solving to be done. It isn't a murder-it's not even an incident, really. They died of some illness, or from some kind of accident, and that's all there is to it. Period. There's not even an investigation."

  It was a blunt way of putting it. Yoshino leaned back in his chair.

  "So why haven't they released the names of the deceased?"

  'They're minors. Plus, there's the suspicion that it was a love suicide."

  At this point Yoshino suddenly smiled, as if he'd just remembered something, and he leaned forward again.

  "You know, the guy? He had his jeans and his briefs down around his knees. The girl, too-her panties were pulled down to her knees."

  "So, you mean it was coitus interruptusl"

  "I didn't say they were doing it. They were just getting ready to do it. They were just getting ready to have a little fun and, bam! That's when it happened," Yoshino clapped his hands together for effect.

  "When what happened?"

  Yoshino was telling his story for maximum
effect.

  "Okay, Asakawa, level with me. You've got something. I mean, something that connects with this case. Right?"

  Asakawa didn't reply.

  "I can keep a secret. I won't steal your scoop, either. It's just that I'm interested in this."

  Asakawa still remained silent.

  "Are you gonna keep me hanging here in suspense?"

  Should I tell … ? But I can't. I mustn 't say anything yet. But lies aren 't working…

  "Sorry, Yoshino. Could you wait just a little longer? I can't tell you quite yet. But I will in two or three days. I promise."

  Disappointment clouded Yoshino's face. "If you say so, pal…"

  Asakawa gave him a pleading look, urging him to continue his story.

  "Well, we've got to assume that something happened. A guy and a gal suffocate just when they're getting ready to do it? That's not even funny. I guess it's possible that they'd taken poison earlier and it had only taken effect just then, but there were no traces. Sure, there are poisons that leave no trace, but you can't figure on a couple of students getting their hands on something like that."

  Yoshino thought of the place where the car had been found. He'd actually gone there himself and still had a clear impression. The car was parked on an overgrown piece of vacant land in a little ravine just off the unpaved prefectural road that led from Ashina to Mt Okusu. Cars coming up the road could just catch the reflection of its taillights as they passed. It wasn't hard to imagine why the prep school kid, who'd been driving, had chosen this place to park in. After nightfall hardly any cars used this road, and with the thick growth of trees providing cover, it made for a perfect hideaway for a penniless young couple.

  "Then, you've got the guy with his head jammed up against the steering wheel and the side window. Meanwhile, the girl's got her head buried between the passenger seat and the door. That's how they died. I saw them being taken out of the car, with my own eyes. Each body came tumbling out the moment the doors were opened. It's like at the moment of death some sort of force had been pushing them from the inside, didn't stop when they died but kept pushing for thirty hours or so until the investigators opened the doors, and then burst out. Now, are you with me here? This car was a two-door, one of those where you can't lock the doors with the key still inside. And the key was in the ignition, but the doors… well, you catch my drift. The car was completely sealed. It's hard to imagine that any force from the outside could have affected them. And what kind of expression do you suppose they had on their dead faces? They were both scared shitless. Faces contorted with terror."

  Yoshino paused to catch his breath. There was a loud gulping sound. It wasn't clear which of them had swallowed his saliva.

  "Think about it. Suppose, just for the hell of it, that some fearsome beast had come out of the woods. They'd have been scared, and they would have huddled close to each other. Even if he hadn't, the girl would absolutely have clung to him. After all, they were lovers. But instead, their backs were pressed up against the doors, as if they were trying to get as far away from each other as they could."

  Yoshino threw up his hands in a gesture of surrender. "Beats the hell out of me."

  If it hadn't been for the shipwreck in the waters off Yokosuka, the article might have been given more space. And if it had, there would have been a lot of readers who would have enjoyed trying to solve the puzzle, playing detective. But. •… But. A consensus had spread, an atmosphere, among the investigators and everybody else who had been at the scene. They all thought more or less the same thing, and all of them were on the verge of blurting it out, but nobody actually did. That kind of consensus. Even though it was completely impossible for two young people to die of heart attacks at exactly the same moment, even though none of them really believed it, everybody told themselves the medical lie that it had happened just like that. It wasn't that people refrained from saying anything out of fear of being laughed at for being unscientific. It was that they felt they'd be drawing unto themselves some unimaginable horror by admitting it. It was more convenient to indulge in the scientific explanation, no matter how unconvincing it was.

  A chill ran up Asakawa's spine and Yoshino's simultaneously. Unsurprisingly, they were both thinking the same thing. The silence only confirmed the premonition which was welling up in each man's breast. It's not over-it's only just started. No matter how much scientific knowledge they fill themselves with, on a very basic level, people believe in the existence of something that the laws of science can't explain.

  "When they were discovered… where were their hands?" Asakawa suddenly asked.

  "On their heads. Or, well, it was more like they were covering their faces with their hands."

  "Were they by any chance pulling at their hair, like this?" Asakawa tugged at his own hair to demonstrate.

  "Eh?"

  "In other words, were they tearing at their heads, or pulling out their hair, or anything like that?"

  "No. I don't think so."

  "I see. Could I get their names and addresses, Yoshino?"

  "Sure. But don't forget your promise."

  Asakawa smiled and nodded, and Yoshino got up. As he stood the table swayed and their coffee spilled into their saucers. Yoshino hadn't even touched his.

  5

  Asakawa kept investigating the four victims' backgrounds whenever he had a free minute, but had so much work to do that he wasn't getting as far as he'd hoped. Before he knew it a week had passed, it was a new month, and both August's rain-soaked humidity and September's summery heat became distant memories pushed aside by the signs of deepening autumn. Nothing happened for a while. He'd been making a point of reading every inch of the local-news pages, but without coming across anything remotely similar. Or was it just that something horrible was advancing, slowly but surely, where Asakawa couldn't see? But the more time elapsed, the more inclined he was to think that the four deaths were just coincidences, unconnected in any way. He hadn't seen Yoshino since then, either. He had probably forgotten the whole thing, too. If he hadn't, he would have contacted Asakawa by now.

  Whenever his passion for the case showed signs of waning, Asakawa would take four cards out from his pocket and be reminded once again that it couldn't have been a coincidence. On the cards he'd written the deceased's names, addresses, and other pertinent information, and on the remaining space he planned to record their activities during the months of August and September, their upbringing, and anything else his research turned up.

  CARD 1:

  TOMOKO OISHI

  Date of birth: 10/21/72

  Keisei School for Girls, senior, age 17

  Address: 1-7 Motomachi, Honmoku, Naka Ward,

  Yokohama Approx. 11 pm, Sept. 5: dies in kitchen on first floor of home, parents away. Cause of death sudden heart failure

  .

  CARD 2:

  SHUICHI IWATA

  Date of birth: 5/26/71

  Eishin Preparatory Academy, first year, age 19

  Address: 1-5-23 Nishi Nakanobu, Shinagawa Ward, Tokyo

  10:54 pm, Sept. 5: falls over and dies at intersection in front of Shinagawa Sta. Cause of death cardiac infarction.

  CARD 3:

  HARUKO TSUJI

  Date of birth: 1/12/73

  Keisei School for Girls, senior, age 17

  Address: 5-19 Mori, Isogo Ward, Yokohama

  Late night, Sept. 5 (or early next morning): dies in car off pref. road at foot of Mt Okusu. Cause of death sudden heart failure.

  CARD 4:

  TAKEHIKO NOMI

  Date of birth: 12/4/70

  Eishin Preparatory Academy, second year, age 19

  Address: 1-10-4 Uehara, Shibuya Ward, Tokyo

  Late night, Sept. 5 (or early next morning): dies w/Haruko Tsuji in car at foot of Mt Okusu. Cause of death sudden heart failure.

  Tomoko Oishi and Haruko Tsuji went to the same high school and were friends; Shuichi Iwata and Takehiko Nomi studied at the same prep school and were friends: this much
had been clear prior to legwork, which indeed confirmed it. And from the simple fact that Tsuji and Nomi had gone for a drive together on Mt Okusu in Yokosuka on the night of September 5th, it was obvious that they were, if not quite lovers, at least fooling around. When he'd asked her friends, he'd heard the rumor that Tsuji had been dating a prep school guy from Tokyo. However, Asakawa still didn't know when or how they'd met. Naturally, he suspected that Oishi and Iwata were going out, too, but he couldn't find anything to back this up. It was equally possible that Oishi and Iwata had never even seen each other. In which case, what was there to link these four? They seemed far too closely related for this unknown being to have picked them totally at random. Maybe there was some secret that only the four of them knew, and they'd been killed for it… Asakawa tried out a more scientific explanation with himself: perhaps the four of them had been in the same place at the same time, and all four had been infected with a virus that attacks the heart.

  Hey, now. Asakawa shook his head as he walked. A virus that causes sudden heart failure? Come on.

  He climbed the stairs, muttering to himself, a virus, a virus. Indeed, he should start out with attempts at scientific explanation. Well, suppose there was a virus that caused heart attacks. At least it was a little more realistic than imagining that something supernatural was behind it all; it seemed less likely to get him laughed at. Even if such a virus hadn't yet been discovered on earth, maybe it had just recently fallen to earth inside a meteor. Or maybe it had been developed as a biological weapon and had somehow escaped. You couldn't rule out the possibility. Sure. He'd try thinking of it as a kind of virus for a while. Not that this would satisfy all his doubts. Why had they all died with looks of astonishment on their faces? Why had Tsuji and Nomi died on opposite sides of that small car, as if they were trying to get away from each other? Why hadn't the autopsies revealed anything? The possibility of an escaped germ weapon could at least answer the third question. There would have been a gag order.