The Last Train (Detective Hiroshi Series Book 1)

by Michael Pronko

“Four different languages total.”

  “And none of them connect.”

  They slipped into an intimate quiet.

  “Any chance of saving your relationship?” Sanae asked.

  “None whatsoever,” said Hiroshi, and they laughed again, exhaling loudly in unison.

  “Me, neither. Now, it’s all down to money.” Sanae giggled.

  They both slurped the last little pools of foam at the bottom of their cups.

  “What are you going to do in the States?”

  “Getting Yukari into college is first. Maybe I’ll also take a few courses.”

  “What kind of courses?”

  “I only finished two years of school—and barely that.”

  “You learned English.”

  “That was easy.”

  “And the other language? Of the heart.”

  “I’m still studying that one. I’m learning a lot from Yukari.”

  Hiroshi hummed deep in his throat.

  Sanae swished her cup around, trying to get the foam to liquefy for one more sip.

  “Listen, I’ve got to get back to work,” he said, checking his cell phone. “Uh oh, urgent text message. Several, actually.”

  “Yukari will be happy to know we talked. She’s been pestering me to call you.”

  “I’m glad you did.”

  Sanae snatched the check, insisting on paying and holding the check behind her back as they argued good-naturedly over who would pay.

  It was the first time he had gone out with a woman since Linda. The other night didn’t count, not only because he was too drunk to remember it, but because he’d felt more alone afterwards.

  They climbed the narrow, twisting stairs back to the shopping arcade, Hiroshi watching the back-and-forth of her hips right at eye level from a few steps below, her thighs and hips twisting deliciously in her tight jeans.

  At the top of the stairs, his phone rang again. “I really have to go,” he said, tamping down the text messages from Sakaguchi and Akiko with his thumb.

  Sanae took her umbrella from the stand.

  Hiroshi searched the umbrellas in the stand. “Mine’s gone!”

  “Was it an expensive one?”

  “No, cheap convenience store one.”

  Sanae laughed and said, “Why don’t you just take someone else’s?”

  “I can’t do that.”

  “Stealing umbrellas is an accepted Tokyo custom,” she laughed. “Even for detectives.”

  “I can’t do that,” he said, laughing and again ruffling through the umbrellas.

  “Well, here, take mine. I have to go shopping anyway.”

  “I’m just going to the station.”

  “My contribution to the anti-crime effort.”

  Hiroshi turned the designer umbrella over in his hands awkwardly, “I’ll return it.”

  “Please do.”

  She stepped forward and gave him an American hug, which he returned—his favorite American custom—and after looking in each other’s eyes again, they walked off in opposite directions.

  Chapter 27

  Hiroshi saw Sakaguchi from the end of the hospital hallway, his round, human girth a sharp contrast with the pushcarts, supply trays, and medical equipment along the white walls. Ueno, the other sumo wrestler from the outing to Shibuya, sat in a chair at the far end of the hall.

  Hiroshi walked down the long hall wondering which room he was in. The intensive care ward was quiet. Waiting families slumped in chairs inside the rooms, nurses walking briskly back and forth. Small shaded windows opened into each of the rooms.

  “You’re back in homicide?” he asked Sakaguchi.

  Sakaguchi nodded, yes. “Enough of those chikan perverts.”

  “So?” Hiroshi nodded toward the hospital room.

  “He’s in pretty bad shape,” said Sakaguchi, his bass voice a whisper. “He was stable enough for me to talk with him for a minute, but he needs surgery for swelling or fluid or something on his brain.”

  “Where did they find him?” Hiroshi asked.

  “Right below the bridge near Ebisu station. Hit the electric wires on the way down. Burned him, but bounced him to the side of the tracks. Ueno got there just after the ambulance. Thought we had another one.”

  “He was luckier than the others.”

  “Drugged with the same thing they found in that foreigner…”

  “Steve?”

  “Foreigner’s names all sound alike.”

  “What time did it happen?”

  “First train, about four-thirty this morning.”

  A nurse came out to the supply cart. Hiroshi asked her, “Can we talk to him?”

  “We need to get him prepped,” she said, looking through the cart and making notes on a clipboard chart.

  “He may have valuable information,” Hiroshi said.

  “He’s sleeping, so you will have to wait until he comes out of surgery.”

  “It’s urgent.”

  “This is a hospital, not an interrogation room,” she snapped, looking up from the supply cart.

  Sakaguchi looked around her into the room.

  “It might save someone’s life,” Hiroshi said.

  “I’ll ask the doctor.” She folded the chart closed and walked off shaking her head.

  “You made more headway than I did,” Sakaguchi whispered.

  Hiroshi and Sakaguchi walked down to where Ueno was sitting in a chair at the end of the hall. There wasn’t much to say.

  At the other end of the hallway, a tall woman with long hair, wearing a white mask over the lower half of her face, got off the elevator and peered into the first room on the floor. Hiroshi pulled Sakaguchi into an open door. Ueno let his head droop to appear to be asleep in the chair.

  “Do you think that’s her?” Hiroshi whispered.

  Sakaguchi nodded his head, maybe.

  “Coming to finish her work?”

  “Let’s wait and see what she does. Peek out.”

  Hiroshi peeked out for a second to see her looking into the rooms one by one. She carried a big, heavy bag. “If she heard he was still alive…”

  “…we might catch her in the act.”

  When she found Shibuya’s room, she slipped inside without a sound.

  Sakaguchi and Hiroshi took off toward the room she went in, scrambling around the supply carts. Ueno followed them at a trot.

  Sakaguchi got into the room first and pinned her against the wall with both arms behind her back.

  On the bed, wrapped in bandages and full of IVs, his arm in a sling and both legs elevated, Takayuki Shibuya, the punk they beat up outside the game arcade and took for a ride, was very much awake.

  Sakaguchi levered his full weight against the masked woman, but she brought her thick platform shoe down hard on top of his foot. He yanked his foot back and cursed, but did not let go.

  Hiroshi pulled the heavy bag from her shoulder, as Ueno grabbed her right arm. She swung her elbow free, catching Ueno in the ribs. He huffed, but held on.

  She raked the sole of her platform shoes down Ueno’s shin and stomped on his foot. He yowled and Hiroshi reached in and pushed her neck tight against the wall.

  She pushed again for a weak point to wriggle out an arm or leg to strike again, but they held her tight. She kept struggling, so they pushed her harder against the wall.

  “Quit moving or we’ll really take you down,” Hiroshi shouted.

  “Leave her alone,” Shibuya shouted from the bed. “Stop! Please stop!”

  Hearing his voice, she stopped squirming and let herself go slack.

  Hiroshi and Ueno loosened their grips, but Sakaguchi held one arm behind her as she turned around.

  She was pretty and young with silver-flecked eyelashes and multi-colored fingernails that matched the indigo blue of her one-piece tube dress. Her hair fell over her dark-tanned face and tears dripped from her eyes onto a blue bird tattoo swooping across her small, firm breast.

  “That’s my girlfriend!” Shibuya
choked out, his voice garbled as if he bit his tongue.

  “Your what?” Hiroshi said.

  “My girlfriend,” he said, in a rasping voice. “She’s not the one who did this.”

  Hiroshi looked at the girl’s face and frowned. Ueno released her and stepped back. As soon as he did, she went to Shibuya and settled her head onto his chest.

  “Ouch!” he squirmed and she pulled up and put her hand on his cheek, lightly stroking the bandages that framed his face.

  “How old is this girl?” Sakaguchi demanded.

  “Old enough,” Shibuya answered, his voice thick and slow. She kissed his forehead. He shifted his arm cast, and took her hand in his. Swollen, red-purple bruises covered his thin arm, bony shoulder, and face.

  A nurse and a doctor rushed into the room. “What’s going on in here?” the nurse demanded.

  “You’re not supposed to be in here,” the doctor said.

  “It’s OK,” said Hiroshi.

  “Who’s this?” demanded the nurse. “It’s not visiting hours.”

  “She’s with me,” Shibuya gurgled.

  Hiroshi turned to the doctor. “We need to talk with this guy now. Other lives are at stake.”

  The doctor said, “He should have gotten his anesthetic by now. He needs to have the pressure relieved in his skull. Right away.” He checked his watch.

  The nurse checked the tubes and wires going into and out of Shibuya. Yellowish fluid leaked through his bandages. She scowled and stomped out.

  The anesthetist came and pulled back in surprise at so many people in the room. The doctor waved him in and pushed the detectives and the girl into the hall.

  “What’s your name?” Hiroshi asked the girl.

  “My name’s Arisa Nagatani.”

  “Where do you live?”

  She nodded toward Shibuya.

  “With him? Where do your parents live?”

  “My parents kicked me out.”

  “What high school do you go to?”

  “I haven’t been to school in a year,” she answered. The tears welled, washing eyelash sparkles down her tan cheek.

  “How old are you?” Sakaguchi asked the girl.

  “Seventeen,” she said, wiping her nose and dabbing her eyes.

  “Should we call juvenile?” Sakaguchi asked.

  Hiroshi sighed, “There’s no law about visiting hospitals.”

  Sakaguchi had enough. He took the girl by the arm back to Shibuya’s bedside.

  The doctor and anesthetist started to protest, but Shibuya pushed the girl right next to Shibuya. “Tell us what happened or we call juvenile.”

  Arisa reached for Shibuya’s hand and held it tight.

  The anesthetist said, “You’ve only got a minute or two before he’s totally out.”

  “Were you at the David Lounge last night?” Hiroshi asked Shibuya.

  Shibuya’s eyes opened wide, but were glassy and distant. Shibuya gestured and grunted, “yes.”

  “You took the wrong date home? Or you just slipped off the bridge?” Hiroshi demanded.

  “Bridge?” Shibuya spoke in jagged tones.

  “The one you dropped from onto the train tracks.”

  Shibuya shook his head, drifting off. His lip was split and it was an effort to use his mouth.

  “Who were you with? You must remember that.”

  Shibuya turned to Arisa. “She was following me. I had to go with her.”

  Arisa nodded and put the back of her hand to her dripping nose and said, “It doesn’t matter. As long as you’re OK.”

  “Who was it?” Hiroshi insisted.

  “A woman named Michiko.”

  “Michiko what?”

  “Suzuki.”

  “Is that the woman you said you owed money to?”

  “Yes.”

  “You worked together.”

  “I was her manager.”

  “And now?”

  Shibuya closed his eyes.

  The doctor intervened, “That’s enough. He’s going for surgery.”

  Shibuya breathed in and woke back up a little. As he opened his mouth, Hiroshi could see a couple of teeth missing and his tongue had a dark-red gash. Hiroshi had to lean down to hear him mumble, “She was gone for a year. Came back. Cherry blossom season. Wouldn’t say anything. She looked haunted.”

  The doctor tried to stop any more questions and Sakaguchi tried to move the girl toward the door, but she clung to Shibuya’s hand and the railing.

  Shibuya coughed and started again. “She needed a place to store money. Phone, cards, bank accounts.”

  “And you got those for her?”

  Shibuya nodded, yes.

  “What do you remember?” Hiroshi asked.

  “Dancing.”

  “With her? At the David Lounge?”

  Shibuya nodded, yes, in drugged surprise.

  “What time was that?” Hiroshi asked.

  Shibuya shrugged. “There’s a photographer and an accountant.” His voice grew cracked and faint.

  Hiroshi leaned down. “Where do we find her?”

  “I don’t know. They don’t know either.”

  “Where’s her family?”

  “Kawasaki. Factory area.”

  “How do we find it?”

  Shibuya mumbled faintly, “She’s leaving, or left.”

  “Leaving?”

  “If she finds out I’m still alive—” he said as his eyes shut. They didn’t flitter back open again.

  Two nurses came in and shooed everyone into the hallway.

  “He’ll make good bait,” Sakaguchi said.

  “If he makes it through the surgery,” Hiroshi said.

  “Even if he doesn’t,” Sakaguchi said.

  Arisa wiped the sparkles and mascara washing down her face and looked at the detectives standing next to her in the antiseptic corridor, her knees unsteady on her high platform shoes.

  When they rolled Shibuya out of the room on the gurney, they paused for a second as Arisa grabbed at her boyfriend’s hand and leaned over him, tears pouring down.

  Hiroshi pulled her away and they stood watching Shibuya being rolled off toward the operating rooms.

  Arisa took a few steps after him, her tall figure slender and delicate in the empty frame of the quiet corridor. Then, with her head hanging down, she started to weep, slowly collapsing into a crouch so low her hair spilled around her onto the floor.

  Chapter 28

  Akiko shouted when Hiroshi and Sakaguchi walked into the office. “You know what I had to listen to this morning?”

  “Coffee?” Hiroshi headed straight for the coffee machine.

  “I haven’t had time for a cup all morning. Too busy fending off everyone asking for you,” Akiko said, coming around the side of her desk.

  Sakaguchi said, “Just tea. Sumo habit.”

  Akiko growled.

  The coffee grinder rasped loudly, drawing her out. Hiroshi kept his finger on the switch and turned an ear to Akiko, showing he couldn’t hear.

  She tried to talk over the grinder with a hand on her hip, the other hand waving a thick folder.

  “Done?” Akiko asked after the grinding stopped.

  Hiroshi nodded.

  Sakaguchi looked back and forth.

  Akiko waved the file again. “You know who stopped by?”

  “To my office? No one ever has before,” Hiroshi said, as the water started to boil.

  “Three people. The head of homicide, a representative from the Railway Technical Research Institute—whatever that is—and a bureaucrat from the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport, and Tourism,” Akiko said. “You know what kind of people they are?”

  “Insistent, powerful.”

  “Bullying, irritating,” Sakaguchi added.

  “And angry, at you and Takamatsu,” Akiko said.

  “No word from him?” Sakaguchi asked.

  “Nothing,” Akiko said, her voice polite in answer to Sakaguchi. She raised her voice at Hiroshi. “I made e
laborate excuses and apologized again and again.”

  “Your keigo polite Japanese is better than mine anyway,” Hiroshi said.

  “It probably is, but that’s not the point.”

  “What is the point? They want this solved quickly and quietly.” Hiroshi checked on the coffee. The boiling water gurgled and trickled through the coffee grounds. “Murder’s noisier than embezzlement.”

  “I don’t think they care about that. They just want to be sure not to scare commuters. If the trains seem dangerous—”

  “The trains are dangerous. Obviously.”

  “They do not want trains to appear to be deadly weapons,” she said.

  Hiroshi continued, “Forty million people a day ride the trains and subways in Tokyo.”

  Sakaguchi interrupted. “And very few die. It’s a good record.”

  “The international element is what has them spooked.”

  “Because he was American?”

  “Because several were foreigners.” Akiko waved the folder in front of him.

  “Several?” Sakaguchi asked.

  Hiroshi took the folder from her and opened it.

  “I’ll go get Sakaguchi some tea,” Akiko said. “I don’t mind getting it for him.”

  She walked out, but then stuck her head back in the door. “Oh, and by the way, a representative from the American embassy will be stopping by with the chief of homicide in a half hour or so.” She waltzed off to get tea.

  Hiroshi looked at his watch and then at Sakaguchi. “We better get out of here before they arrive.”

  “Maybe I’m not so glad to be off chikan duty,” Sakaguchi said. “It’s all so cut and dried over there.”

  Hiroshi flipped through the folder, and closed it with a sigh.

  “Anything?”

  “Accidents or murder, hard to say,” Hiroshi said. “At least we know her name,”

  “We know a name,” Sakaguchi said.

  “Yesterday, I found out the drivers of the trains are not the real drivers. They use each other’s names to divide overtime pay.”

  “We used to do that in the Osaka police force, too,” Sakaguchi said.

  “The woman might also have killed at least one Japanese,” Hiroshi said. “I talked with the widow of a man named Wakayama who had ties to Bentley and Associates. He had lots of investments in land, always with timing that was a little bit too good.”

  Hiroshi poured a cup of coffee for himself and for Akiko.