I am not sure what Shizuko was thinking, but letting go of my hand she suddenly put both hands around my neck, smiled that Mona Lisa smile that revealed her eye teeth, and exclaimed ‘I’m scared.’ Next, she pressed her cheek against my cheek and then her lips against my lips. After a while like that, her lips left mine and next she began to tickle my ear skilfully with her forefinger as she drew closer to my lobe and whispered rhythmically much as if sweetly singing a lullaby.
‘I’m so disappointed that we have lost precious time with this frightening talk. My darling, can you not feel the fire burning within my lips? Don’t you hear the drumming within my breast? Hold me, my dear. Hold me.’
But I continued speaking regardless, ‘Just a little longer. There’s not much more. Just bear with me and hear me out. I came here today because I really wanted to discuss things with you. Now, as to the temporal correspondence. I remember well that Shundei’s name suddenly disappeared from the magazines at the end of last year. You say that it was also at the end of last year that Oyamada came back from overseas, right? I ask myself why these two things coincide so neatly. Is it just coincidence? What do you think?’
Before I had finished speaking, Shizuko brought the riding whip from the corner of the room, pressed it into my right hand, stripped off her clothes, and fell forward on to the bed. Only her face looked back at me from under the smooth naked shoulder.
‘What of it? What of it?’ she babbled wildly. ‘Now, whip me! Whip me!’ she screamed, moving the upper half of her body like a wave.
A mouse-coloured sky showed through the storehouse’s small window. My head thrummed as something like distant thunder, perhaps the sound of a train, mixed in with the ringing in my ears. I grew uneasy when I thought that it also sounded like the drumming of an evil army marching down from the sky. Perhaps it was the weather and the peculiar atmosphere inside the storeroom that made us both mad. Looking back on it, I realize that we were not of sound mind. Gazing down on her pale, sweaty body writhing on its side, I continued tenaciously with my reasoning.
‘One the one hand, it is as clear as day that Ōe Shundei is involved in this case. But on the other hand, the might of Japan’s constabulary has been unable to ascertain the whereabouts of a famous novelist after two full months and it seems that he has vanished without a trace.
‘It terrifies me even to think of it. The strange part is that this is not a nightmare. Why does he not attempt to kill Oyamada Shizuko? He has suddenly stopped writing those threatening letters. What ninja technique did he use to sneak into Oyamada’s study? And then he was able to open that locked book cabinet…
‘I could not help but recall a certain person – Hirayama Hideko, the female detective fiction author. Everyone thinks the author is a woman, including many writers and journalists. Apparently love letters arrive daily at Hideko’s house from admiring readers. But the truth is Hideko is a man. In fact, he is an established government official.
‘All writers of detective fiction are peculiar, including Shundei, Hirayama Hideko, and myself. That is what happens when a man pretends to be a woman and bizarre tastes gather force. One author used to dress up as a woman and hang around Asakusa at night. He even played at being in love with another man.’
I continued to babble crazily as if in a trance. My face was covered in sweat that coursed unpleasantly into my mouth.
‘Alright Shizuko. Listen closely. Is there some fault in my reasoning? Where is the centre of the circle traced by Shundei’s addresses? Please look at the map. It is your house: Yama no Shuku, in Asakusa. All the addresses are within ten minutes of your home.
‘Why did Shundei go into hiding at the same time your husband died? It’s because you have stopped attending tea-ceremony and music classes. Do you understand? While Oyamada was away, you used to attend tea-ceremony and music classes every day from the afternoon into the evening.
‘Who was it that set things up perfectly and led me to make my conclusions? It was you! It was you who lay in wait for me at the museum and thereafter manipulated me at your will.
‘You would easily have been able to add the little phrases to the diaries and put the other evidence in Oyamada’s book cabinet as well as to drop the button in the attic. This is what I have been able to deduce. Is there any other way to think about it? Now, what do you say? Please answer me.’
Crying out, ‘I can’t bear this. It’s too much!’ the naked Shizuko clung to me. She pressed her cheek against my collared shirt and began to cry so hard that I could feel the warm tears on my skin.
‘Why do you cry? Why have you been trying to stop me from proceeding with my deductions? Surely you would want to hear me if it were a matter of life or death for you. That alone makes me suspect you. Listen to me. I have not finished yet.
‘Why did Ōe Shundei’s wife wear glasses? Why the gold teeth and the poultice for tooth pain? And the Western hair style and round face? Is that not exactly the same disguise used in “Panorama Country”? In this story Shundei describes the essentials for disguising a Japanese person’s appearance – altering the hairstyle, wearing spectacles, plumping out contours – and in “The Copper Penny” he writes about covering a healthy tooth with a gold-plated outer bought from a gewgaw stall.
‘You have easily recognizable eye teeth. To hide them, you wore gold-plated outer covers. You have a large mole on your right cheek and to disguise that you applied the poultice. And it would be easy to make your oval face look rounder by doing your hair in a Western style. This is how you transformed yourself into Shundei’s wife.
‘Yesterday I let Honda catch a glimpse of you to confirm with him whether you resembled Shundei’s wife. What do you know – he said you would look exactly like her if your marumage was changed to a Western hair style and you wore glasses and gold teeth. Come on now, let’s have it all out. I have grasped everything completely. Do you intend to keep deceiving me?’
I shook Shizuko off. She fell heavily on the bed, burst into tears, and would not answer no matter how long I waited. I was quite agitated and without thinking I raised the riding whip and lashed her naked back. Take that, and that, I thought as, losing control, I lashed and lashed. Gradually the redness spread on her pale skin until a wormlike wound stained with scarlet blood took shape. She lay there at my feet in the same lewd pose as always, with her hands and feet writhing and her body undulating. Then, in the final light breath of one about to faint, she whispered in a small voice ‘Hirata, Hirata.’
Gradually the redness spread on her pale skin until
a wormlike wound stained with scarlet blood took shape.
‘Hirata? So you are still trying to deceive me? If you transformed yourself into Shundei’s wife, would you have me believe that a separate person called Shundei actually exists? You know he does not. He is a fictional character. To cover that up, you pretended to be his wife and met the magazine journalists and everyone else. And you changed addresses so many times. But as there were some people who would not be convinced by a completely imaginary character, you hired a vagrant from Asakusa Park and had him sleep in that room. It is not that Shundei transformed himself into the man in the clown’s outfit – the man in the clown’s outfit transformed himself into Shundei.’
Shizuko remained silent as death on the bed. Only the livid wound on her back writhed as if alive as she breathed. She remained quiet and my agitation gradually abated.
‘Shizuko, I did not mean to do such a terrible thing to you. I should have spoken more quietly, but you tried so hard to avoid listening to what I had to say and you sought to cover up with such coquettish behaviour that I am afraid I lost control. Please forgive me. Now, it’s alright for you not to say anything because I will try to outline everything you did in order. If I make a mistake, be sure to say something and let me know, won’t you?’
Then I explained my reasoning in a way that would be easy to understand.
‘You are blessed with uncommon sagacity and literary talent for a woman. I saw that very clearly just from reading the letters you wrote. It was entirely plausible that you should have wanted to write detective fiction under a nom de plume, and a man’s name at that. However, your stories were exceptionally well received. Then, at exactly the same time as your name started to become famous, Oyamada went overseas for two years. To ease your loneliness and to satisfy your bizarre proclivities you came up with the fearful trick of one person playing three roles. You wrote a novel called ‘One Person, Two Roles,’ but you went one step further and conceived of one person playing three roles.
‘You rented a house in Negishi under the name of Hirata Ichirō. The earlier addresses in Ikebukuro and Kikui were only set up for receiving mail. Inventing “misanthropy” and “trips” to hide Hirata from view, you used disguise to transform yourself into his wife and completely took over as his agent in discussions related to his drafts. Thus, when these were being written, you became Hirata–Ōe Shundei and met the magazine journalists; when renting a house, you became Mrs Hirata; and at the Oyamada household in Yama no Shuku, you were Mrs Oyamada. In this way then, one person played three roles.
‘For that reason, you needed to be away from the house and so nearly every day you would go out for the whole afternoon saying that you were off to practise the tea-ceremony or music. The one body was used to play Mrs Oyamada for half the day and Mrs Hirata for the other half. Somewhere far away would not do because you needed time to disguise yourself by arranging your hair and changing your clothes. Accordingly, when you changed addresses you selected a location about ten minutes by car in a radius centred on Yama no Shuku.
‘As I am also a student of the bizarre, I understand your feeling well. For while this was a very burdensome labour, there could hardly be another game in this world as amusing as this.
‘I recall now that a critic reviewing Shundei’s works once said that they are full to an almost unpleasant degree with suspicion that only a woman could possess. As I remember, the critic said it was much as if a beast in the shadows were writhing in the darkness. That critic was telling the truth, don’t you think?
‘Two years passed quickly and Oyamada came home. You were no longer able to play three roles. Accordingly, Ōe Shundei then disappeared and there were no particular suspicions because everyone knew of Shundei’s extreme aversion to the company of other people.
‘But why did you decide to commit that awful crime? As a man, I cannot understand well what you felt, but texts on the psychology of perversion indicate that women with a tendency to hysteria often send threatening letters to themselves. There are numerous cases of this both in Japan and overseas.
‘There is a desire to attract pity from others even by scaring oneself. I am sure this is your case.
‘Receiving threatening letters from a famous male novelist who is actually you – what a wonderful idea!
‘At the same time, you began to feel dissatisfied with your aging husband. You clung to the hard to relinquish desires that you had experienced in that life of perverted freedom. Or it might be closer to the mark to say that for a long time crime and murder had held an inexpressible attraction for you, just as in Shundei’s stories. And then there is Shundei, the fictional personage who disappears without a trace. By casting suspicion on him you can be safe forever and in addition you rid yourself of an unpleasant husband and inherit a vast legacy that will enable you to live out the rest of your life as you please.
‘But that was not enough to satisfy you. To be completely safe, you decided to put in place a double line of defence. And I was the person you chose. I was always criticizing Shundei’s works, so you decided to control me like a puppet in order to wreak your revenge. You must have been highly amused when I showed you my personal statement. Deceiving me was no trouble at all, was it? All it took was the ornamental glove button, the diaries, Shin Seinen, and “Games in the Attic.”
‘But as you note in your novels, criminals always make some silly little mistake. You picked up the button from Oyamada’s glove and used it as a vital piece of evidence, but you did not find out when it had fallen off. You had no idea that the gloves had been given to the taxi driver a long time before. What a silly little slip. As to Oyamada’s fatal wound, I think it was as I earlier reasoned – with one difference. Oyamada was not peeping through the window. You pushed him out of the window, perhaps in the midst of some amorous romp (which is why he was wearing that wig).
‘Alright Shizuko, were there any faults in my deduction? Please answer something. See if you can pick a hole in my reasoning. Come on then Shizuko.’
Shizuko was quite inert, so I placed my hand on her shoulder and shook her gently. Whether shame and remorse prevented her from looking up I do not know, but she did not move or say anything.
Having said everything I wanted to say, and stood there in a disappointed daze. The woman who had been my matchless love until yesterday was now collapsed in front of me fully exposed as the pernicious beast in the shadows. Gazing fixedly at her, at some point my eyes began to burn.
‘Well I am leaving now,’ I said, coming back to my senses. ‘Think about it carefully later and please choose the correct course. Thanks to you, I have over the past month been able to glimpse a world of amorous foolishness that I have never experienced before. Even now, I find it hard to leave you when I think of it. But my good conscience will not allow me to continue my relationship with you like this. Goodbye.’
I left a heartfelt kiss on the weal on Shizuko’s back and shortly after I left the ghostly house that had been the scene of our passionate romps. It seemed as if the sky was even lower and that the temperature had climbed further. Although my body was drenched in an unpleasant sweat, my teeth chattered as I wandered along as if I had lost my wits.
I learned that Shizuko had committed suicide in the evening of the following day.
She drowned herself in the Sumida River, perhaps by leaping from the second storey of the Western section of the home, just like Oyamada Rokurō. How awful a thing is fate. A passenger found her body floating by that steamer landing under Azumabashi bridge, presumably because it followed the river’s current.
A newspaper journalist who knew nothing about it all added at the end of his article, ‘Perhaps Mrs Oyamada came to her awful end at the hands of the same criminal who killed Oyamada Rokurō.’
Reading this article, I felt profoundly sad thinking of the pitiful death of my former lover, but then Shizuko’s death seemed to me an entirely natural outcome for it was indeed appropriate that she should confess her terrible crime. I believed this for about a month.
However, finally the intensity of my imaginings began to gradually subside and as it did an awful doubt entered my head.
I had not heard Shizuko herself utter a single word of confession. Even though all the evidence was lined up, the interpretation of this evidence was all of my construction. There was no immovable certainty such as in the equation ‘two plus two equals four.’ Once I had put together my flimsy deductions based solely on the word of the taxi driver and the evidence from the house cleaner, did I not interpret the evidence in a way that was opposite to the truth? I could not deny that the same things could be accounted for by another piece of deductive reasoning.
The truth is that when I challenged Shizuko in the storehouse’s second floor, I had at first no intention of going that far. I intended to quietly state my reasons and listen to her defence. But half way through, something in her attitude led me into wicked conjecture and all of a sudden I was making assertions in such an unpleasant way. Finally, even though I tried to make sure several times, she kept her silence and I convinced myself that this proved her guilt. Was this simply me convincing myself?
Certainly, Shizuko committed suicide. (Though was it really suicide? Was she murdered! If so, who was the killer? How terrifying!) But even if
she killed herself, does that prove her guilt? There may have been another reason. Perhaps the unforgiving heart of a woman led her to suddenly perceive the vanity of life when I challenged her with my suspicions in that way and she realized there was no means of justifying herself to this person whom she thought she could rely on.
If so, I was clearly her murderer, even if I did not directly lay a hand on her. I mentioned the possibility of murder above, and what else could this be?
Nevertheless, if I am only to be suspected for the death of one woman, I can endure it. But this unfortunate proclivity of mine to fantasy suggests a much more horrifying thought.
Clearly, she loved me. You must consider the feelings of a woman who is doubted by the one she loves and accused of being a fiendish criminal. Did she decide to kill herself precisely because she loved me and was saddened by the persistent suspicions of her lover?
This would apply even if my fearful deductions were correct. Why then did she decide to murder her husband of so many years? Would the thought of liberty or the inheritance have the power to turn a woman into a murderer? Surely it was love. And surely I was the object of her love.
Ah! Such terrifying suspicions. What should I do? Whether she was a murderer or not, I killed this pitiful woman who loved me so much. I could not escape from my accursed petty moralizing. Is there anything in this world as powerful and beautiful as love? Perhaps I had utterly destroyed this clear, beautiful love with the obstinate heart of a moralist.
The Black Lizard and Beast In the Shadows Page 24
