by I. J. Parker
Her maid gasped and turned pale.
Her mistress tried again. “No. If this is really the murder weapon, then Shigeyori must have taken it without my knowledge. Oh, how horrible.” She whimpered.
Akitada was suddenly very angry. He rose and moved the screen, so he could look at her. She hid her face with her sleeve. He snapped, “Don’t waste our time. We know what happened. You tried to get Shigeyori to do it, but he could not bring himself to kill another human being, and so you had to do it yourself. Shigeyori committed suicide in jail so he would not have to tell the police about you. He loved you, but you only saw him as a convenient tool to rid yourself of your father.”
She had become very still, but when she lowered her arm, her eyes flashed. “Shigeyori was a coward and a weakling. I suspected it, but he was handsome and he was the only man who ever came close to me. My father denied me a normal life because he liked the way I ran his household for him. Far from my using Shigeyori, he used me. He killed my father to get his hands on my wealth.”
“I’m afraid Shigeyori could not have done it.. As angry as your father was with him, he would never have turned his back on him.” Akitada turned to the elderly maid, who was weeping. “You’re Lady Otoku’s nurse, aren’t you?” The woman nodded, brushing away tears. “What happened to the young maid who was here the first time I called?”
Her mistress answered—too quickly. “She went to visit her family.”
“In a time of mourning?” Akitada shook his head. “I think you sent her away.” He read the answer in the nurse’s face and drove the point home, “She knew you had paid your father a visit that morning, didn’t she? Or did you get his blood on your gown when you stood behind him and drove your dagger into his back?”
“No!” Lady Otoku jumped up and stamped her foot. “How dare you talk to me like this in a house of death? Leave us this instant.”
Kobe was beginning to look uneasy, but Akitada remained firm. “It’s over, Lady Otoku. That maid will be brought back, and she will testify. And so will your father’s mistress. I have no doubt your father discussed his plans for his unborn child and for your future with her.”
He saw her eyes widen. Before he could stop her, she darted forward to snatch up the dagger. Placing its tip to her throat, she cried, “Don’t come near me.”
The purpose of the dagger was known to all high-born women. They would use it to end their lives when dishonor threatened. And a woman with the determination of Lady Otoku did not hesitate for a moment.
• • •
The following morning, Akitada went to his study to get Mr. Hakata’s gold. He intended to return it with the explanation that the police had solved the case.
When he opened the door, he disturbed a bird that had flown in from the garden. For a moment, it fluttered wildly about the room with a clatter of wings, then it escaped through the open doors. Akitada only caught an indistinct glimpse of its dark shape and of something red flitting through the air before it was gone. On the desk lay the package with the gold, but the red silk braid was gone.
Bemused, Akitada walked out on his veranda and looked up into the trees. There was a slight movement on one of the branches. A feathered thief, he thought and remembered his lost rank ribbons. It was so easy to misplace blame. Up there, no doubt, a magpie nest was luxuriously lined in red and green silk brocade.
The trouble was that human beings were neither as infallible nor as fortunate as the immortals. There had not been a magic bridge for Shigeyori and Lady Otoku.
In this final story, Akitada is fifty—older but not necessarily wiser. Now it is his former rival, Kobe, who doubts a prisoner’s guilt, while Akitada pursues the case more out of boredom than concern for a fellow human being. Over the years, he has become set in his ways and is less inclined to self-examination. But in the end, his understanding of human nature and his innate desire to get to the bottom of a puzzle save him from making a bad mistake.
Welcoming the Paddy God
Heian-Kyo (Kyoto), 1039; during the Ever-Growing Month (April).
THE two gentlemen met by accident as they crossed Nijo Avenue on a sunny morning of the third month of the year. They bowed, eyeing each other with cautious smiles.
“Kobe?” murmured the tall thin man. He wore costly court attire and had a touch of gray at the temples. “What an unexpected pleasure! I hope you are in good health?”
“Thank you, Excellency,” boomed the white-bearded official, “and you and your family also, I hope?”
They moved aside to let traffic pass. Polite preliminaries allowed them to test the waters, before flinging themselves into the more dangerous currents of discussing crime. The thin nobleman, Sugawara Akitada, had risen from obscurity in the Ministry of Justice to high office in the imperial administration because he had a knack for solving difficult criminal cases and smoothing over politically explosive incidents. Superintendent Kobe of the Metropolitan Police had moved up quickly and held his post by patient and stubborn plodding. Their paths had crossed often, usually to their mutual frustration, though they had eventually surprised each other into cooperation and friendship.
Friendly relations established, Akitada asked, “Any interesting cases?”
Kobe hesitated only briefly. “One. A monk in the Western Prison. A particularly repulsive crime—robbery and murder. The man has confessed, but the evidence has disappeared into thin air.”
Akitada raised his brows. “If he confessed, surely your job is done.”
“Yes, but …” Kobe fidgeted, looking uncomfortable. “You know I like things neat. It’s not just that we cannot account for the silver. Something else is not quite right. Something about that confession and the man himself.”
Akitada was intrigued by Kobe’s uncharacteristic diffidence. “Do you suspect an accomplice? What does the prisoner say?”
Kobe threw up his hands in disgust. “Just that he’s guilty. No details. He doesn’t know what happened.” Pause. “Would you have time to talk to the man? I would like your opinion.”
Time hung heavy on Akitada’s hands at the moment. He was between assignments and bored with the enforced leisure. Besides, there was the novelty of being asked by Kobe. “Well …” he said, pretending hesitation.
“I was just on my way to the prison,” Kobe urged. “Would you care to come along? As a favor?”
Akitada accepted.
The capital had an eastern and western half, each with its own administrative system. The western half had begun to decline a century earlier until large parts of it were inhabited mostly by the poor, the outcasts, and criminal gangs. Being jailed in the Western Prison usually meant that the prisoner and his crime were of the lowest type. Most officials in Kobe’s position would have washed their hands of a confessed killer of no standing, glad to rid the capital of one of its vermin. But Kobe had always had a conscience.
“Tell me about the case,” Akitada said as they walked along Nijo under the pale new leaves of the willows in front of the Imperial Palace.
The crime, or crimes, it appeared, had taken place in Higa, a village near the capital. A peasant had returned late one night from a trip to the market and found both his daughter and his money box gone. He shouted for his daughter and searched the property for his silver. Finally a noise alerted him to an abandoned well. He saw a large, bloodied monk climbing out of it. The monk seemed shaken and claimed to have fallen into the well. After he left, the farmer inspected the well and discovered at its bottom his young daughter’s corpse. She lay covered with blood and with her clothes disarranged. Next to her was the empty money box. The horrified farmer called for his neighbors. Together they brought up the dead girl whose neck was bruised and broken. It looked as though she had been raped and strangled. A short time later, the local constables found the monk down by the river, washing the blood off himself. Although he was a very large man, they overcame him and threw him in a cell.
“Hmm,” said Akitada. “It wouldn’t be the first time a
monk forgot his vows. Theirs is an unnatural life. The crime sounds straightforward enough.”
Kobe scowled. “Oh, he confessed to all charges, even rape, but wait till you hear.”
• • •
The prisoner was the most repulsive creature Akitada had ever seen. A huge man, he squatted toadlike on some stinking straw in the corner of the cell, shackled at the ankles and wrists. He looked perfectly capable of the most heinous crimes. His fleshy face was swollen and a sickly yellow color where it was not covered with purple bruises and brown scabs; his body seemed bloated rather than fat, and he was dressed in filthy rags. When they entered, he raised bulging, bloodshot eyes to them. His thick lower lip drooped dejectedly, letting a thin line of saliva seep down his stubble-covered chin. He looked like a dangerous half-wit, Akitada thought and wondered if Kobe’s trouble was that his prisoner was mentally deficient. The government was reluctant to counter-sign execution orders for such people.
But the monk disabused him of this notion immediately. “Good day to you, Superintendent,” he greeted Kobe, his voice hoarse but educated. “Please forgive my rudeness, but it’s difficult to bow. I seem to be unable to move very much, and I’m afraid I can’t invite you to sit on this floor.”
“Never mind that, Ennin,” Kobe said. “His lordship here would like to hear your story.”
The ugly creature rolled its eyes to Akitada and nodded a greeting. “If you wish, but there’s little to tell,” he said apologetically.
Missing teeth, a split lip, and assorted scabs and bruises suggested that he had been beaten severely. His dirty rags were actually a very old, stained, and faded monk’s robe which had once been black, and the stubble-covered skull had been shaven.
Even to someone with Akitada’s cynical views on Buddhism, it seemed extraordinary that a monk should be accused of such a collection of crimes. On this occasion, he had broken the monastic vows of poverty, of celibacy, and of nonviolence. The man must be an animal.
The blood-shot eyes studied Akitada also, and the monk smiled. The smile lit up the grotesque, animalistic features and superimposed an emotion so incongruously human that Akitada drew in his breath.
“The problem is,” the monk said, “that I don’t remember what I did precisely, though, of course, I can see now that I must have done it. I’m quite horrified. She was such a pretty young girl, and so kind. I don’t remember touching her, but I could see that I had.” To Akitada’s astonishment, the man blushed and lowered his eyes. “She was partially … nude, and there was blood on her. Though perhaps that was mine. I seemed to have cut my head. But what was much worse, I must have strangled her afterwards. I suppose she fought me, but I have very strong hands.” He held them out for Akitada to see: huge, dirty paws with long, broken fingernails. “There was a lot of blood on my hands and robe when I woke. The farmer said I robbed him of some silver, but I don’t remember that either, though I must have done it, for his money box was right there in the well beside me.” He paused, waiting for Akitada to comment.
Akitada had listened in astonishment. “What were you doing at the farm? Did you know the farmer and his daughter?”
The monk averted his eyes again. “Not to say ‘know.’ I had spoken to them when I stopped for alms. The young woman was always very kind and generous, but her father’s a tightwad. He caught her giving me food and was so angry he tried to beat her with a broom. I stopped him, but he called me names. I’m afraid I shouted also. It was not pleasant.”
“What’s wrong with your memory?” Akitada asked.
The monk hung his head. “It’s the wine,” he confessed. “I’m not supposed to drink, but I’m weak. Sometimes people give me a few coins instead of food and I buy wine.”
“Yes,” put in Kobe, “he was still half drunk when they brought him in. Stank of wine, in fact. No doubt he celebrated with the stolen silver.”
“I’m very sorry,” murmured the big monk. “I cannot seem to help myself. I wish I could be more precise about what happened. It’s such a dreadful thing to have done. She was kind to me, and so pretty I …” He colored to his ears and looked down at his huge hands. “Most women don’t like me,” he said sadly. Akitada and Kobe exchanged a glance.
Kobe said, “So you went back later, when she was alone, to have your way with her and found she didn’t like you either. That made you angry again, didn’t it, and you attacked and killed her. Then you stole their silver for good measure.”
The monk nodded. “I don’t remember, but yes, it must be so.”
Kobe snapped, “You keep saying ‘It must be so.’ It was so, wasn’t it?”
The monk raised tired eyes to him. “If you say so.”
“Heavens, man,” shouted Kobe, “either admit it or defend yourself. This is a capital charge.”
The monk smiled sadly. “Dying is easy, Superintendent,” he said. “Living is hard.”
• • •
Later, in Kobe’s office, Akitada remarked, “Perhaps he confessed so readily because he was beaten. The marks are still all over his body, and from the way he sat and moved, I think your men must have broken some ribs.”
Kobe was frustrated and his temper flared. “Don’t accuse me of using torture. We found him this way after the local men got through with him. Seems one of them had been fond of the girl.”
“Oh. Sorry.” Akitada sighed. “Well, perhaps he expects more of the same if he changes his story. Strange, he practically admitted lusting after her. You would expect him to deny raping her, especially when confronted by the victim’s bloodthirsty boyfriend.”
“Didn’t I tell you? The coroner said she wasn’t raped, though someone tried to. I expect she fought him off. She had some bruises, and he had a lot of cuts and scratches on his face and scalp.”
“I see. It’s possible that he was too drunk to remember. When will he be brought before a judge?”
“In a day or so.”
“So soon? But there’s no time to do anything. He will be found guilty and condemned to death before we’ve had time to cast about for additional evidence.”
“I know. I suppose I had hoped that you would have one of your brilliant flashes
of insight.”
Akitada looked for sarcasm in Kobe’s face but failed. “You do me too much honor, my friend,” he said and sat down. “Well, let’s see what we have. This Ennin had been in the habit of begging food at the farm. The pretty farmer’s daughter gave readily enough, but shortly before the murder the farmer discovered this and abused both verbally and physically. Ennin admits he got angry. Perhaps he was angry enough for revenge.”
“Perhaps.”
“We can assume that Ennin knew the farmer was going to market and would not return until late. He got drunk, then went back to the farm, tried to rape the girl, killed her instead, and took the money box with enough silver to keep him in wine for the foreseeable future. Is that the way you see it?”
This time Kobe looked uncertain. “Yes, I suppose it could have happened that way. But what did he do with the twenty pieces of silver that were in the box? The farmer caught him trying to climb out of the well. And there was no silver on him when they found him by the river.”
“He had time to hide it or pass it to a friend. Has it occurred to you that his claim of sudden memory loss is a little too convenient? He may be protecting someone.”
“We searched everywhere and questioned everyone in the village. There was no accomplice. They know Ennin well and say he’s a loner. He’s a mendicant monk who moved into the village a month ago, sleeping in stables or storehouses at night and begging his food during the day. He doesn’t have any friends or associates. He’s not a likable man.” Kobe paused. “That’s why I want to be certain. Do you understand?”
Akitada nodded. He, too, felt guilty about his aversion to the man. “There’s another possibility. He could have committed the theft earlier in the day when the girl was at work in the paddies, then tossed the box into the well and hid the silver
somewhere. Later he got drunk to celebrate his wealth and went back for the girl. Drunkenness would explain his having tumbled into the well with the girl and also account for his sudden memory loss.”
Kobe nodded slowly. “Yes. That makes sense. We have only his word for when he went to the farm. And he was quick enough to wash her blood off himself after the farmer saw him.”
Akitada rose. “Right. That must be it, then.” He added, almost regretfully, “The simplest explanation is usually the right one.”
• • •
The following morning was particularly warm and pleasant. There was the scent of fresh leaves on the gentle breeze, and birds sang in all the trees. Akitada decided his horse needed exercise.
The road to Higa village was not particularly scenic, but yellow kerria blossomed in the hedges, and bluebells nodded in the grass. Higa was in a valley where a small river provided water for rice paddies. In its center a handful of modest buildings gathered like a flock of brown sparrows about a few grains of millet. On the hillside, among the pale springtime green of trees, rose the pagoda of a temple. Akitada rode along the river into the village and found that a small hostel and a Shinto shrine were the principal buildings. All around, to the foot of the forested hills on either side, stretched the rice paddies like a flowered quilt, fallow now, but covered with blossoming weeds. Already farmers were busy mending dikes and turning over the rich black earth. Soon river water would be diverted into the trenches and flood the fields in time for planting the new rice.