by Susan Barker
I listened helplessly as sunny laughter and footsteps neared the door. The door opened. It was Miss Yamamoto and Miss Hatta, their smiling entrance quickly eclipsed by shock.
‘Mr Sato!’
Miss Hatta sprang towards me, knocking a stack of ledgers to the floor. ‘Mr Sato! Are you OK?’ She crouched down in her peach twinset and blouse, eyes aglow with drama and excitement.
Miss Yamamoto ran over to hoist up the window blinds. Daylight lent no clarity to the chaos.
‘Mr Sato!’ Miss Hatta cried, giving my shoulders a little shake. ‘Say something. You’re scaring me!’
‘It looks like we have been burgled,’ Miss Yamamoto said. ‘Maybe I should call the police.’
Miss Yamamoto’s assumption that we had been burgled gave me a shameful idea: that I could pretend the office was in this condition before I arrived. How dark the workings of my mind! I decided to nip temptation in the bud immediately. ‘We have not been burgled,’ I said. ‘I came here yesterday to do some overtime.’
Miss Hatta’s jaw lost all means of support. She turned to Miss Yamamoto, who had pressed a hand to her mouth.
Was she distressed by my discovery of her illicit dealings? Or by the damage inflicted upon the filing system in the name of overtime? I could not tell. But I was not going to take any chances. ‘I must go and speak to Head Office at once,’ I said, the authority of my tone somewhat undermined by the mess surrounding me. ‘It is very urgent. Money has been embezzled from the accounts.’
‘No!’ Miss Hatta gasped. ‘Which accounts?’
Unable to name any specific account I said: ‘Evidence will be found.’
‘Perhaps I should call the company nurse,’ Miss Yamamoto whispered. ‘Mr Sato looks unwell.’
‘Really!’ I protested. ‘I am not in need of a nurse. Please both just go about your business as usual.’
The girls watched as I gripped the corner of Matsuyama-san’s desk and tried to pull myself upright. The third attempt was met with success, but accompanied by an animal moan as agony flared in my lower back. Standing afforded me a clearer view of the pandemonium. With a sinking heart I realized that the clean-up operation would take up the best part of a day. The floor shifted in a dizzy montage of files and I remembered that my only sustenance since Mariko’s birthday dinner had been several litres of strong black coffee. All at once the floor gave way and Miss Hatta swooped in, catching me by the shoulders.
‘Quick, call the company nurse. He is unwell.’
‘No, really, I am quite all right . . .’
But Miss Yamamoto had already gone.
Miss Hatta sat me down in a chair and fetched me a glass of water from the tap. Her eyes roamed over the chaos of files in bewilderment. I rose from the chair, insisting that I would commence putting the office to rights, but Miss Hatta begged me to sit down again. Embarrassed, I stroked the thistledown growth of beard on my chin. My jacket and slacks were rumpled, and my mouth tasted like one of the many sodden coffee filters I had thrown in the waste-paper basket.
‘I must go to Head Office,’ I told Miss Hatta. ‘I must speak to them urgently.’
‘Oh, Mr Sato, perhaps you should wait here until the company nurse comes. You look so ill,’ she tentatively advised me.
In the end, Head Office saved me the trouble of making the trip up to their plushly carpeted headquarters by coming to me. A breathless Miss Yamamoto rushed back in, having summoned not only Nurse Hisako, but, horror of horrors, Deputy Senior Managerial Supervisor Murakami and Chief Supervisor Sanjo. In my two decades of loyal service at Daiwa Trading, Chief Sanjo has only appeared before me on a handful of occasions. That he had journeyed all the way down from the eighteenth floor, in violation of his near-mythological status, meant this was a very serious matter indeed. Murakami-san entered the room with a civil nod, then let out a low whistle as he took stock of the inversion of normalcy. I made no secret of my displeasure to see him and did not return his nod. Chief Sanjo remained in the doorway, impassive as a cliff face. I was certain that Murakami-san had already poisoned his mind against me.
Only Nurse Hisako in her crisp white uniform spoke: ‘Hello, Mr Sato. I hear you’re not feeling very well today.’ She came and placed a cool hand on my forehead before taking my pulse.
Taro the graduate trainee materialized, peeping impishly over the Chief Supervisor’s shoulder. Heaven knows why today of all days the wretched boy had to be punctual. When he asked what was going on Miss Yamamoto gave him a quickly whispered account.
‘Whoah!’ he cried. ‘Nervous breakdown!’
Nurse Hisako lowered my wrist with a maternal smile. ‘Mr Sato, your heart rate is very quick and irregular,’ she said. ‘You are overtired and need some rest.’
Murakami-san smiled at me in an impartial, management-seminar-taught way. ‘Section Chief Sato,’ he said, ‘how about taking the rest of the day off?’
I opened my mouth in outraged protest. I had much to do. I had to tell Chief Sanjo all that Mariko had told me. I still had the 1989–1991 accounts to investigate.
‘If you don’t mind, Chief Supervisor Sanjo,’ I said, rising to my feet, ‘I would like to speak to you privately . . .’
Chief Supervisor Sanjo silenced me with a stern and powerful glance. ‘Assistant Murakami,’ he said, ‘please see to it that Section Chief Sato is escorted from the premises. He must see a doctor and have a full medical examination. Then he will come and see me in my office at nine on Friday morning, with the doctor’s report.’
He turned to Miss Yamamoto. ‘Call him a taxi, please,’ he said. ‘Tell the taxi firm to bill Daiwa Trading.’
And then the Chief walked away, leaving us in a silence that heaved with discomfort.
As the car-park barrier rose to let the taxi depart I looked back at the building. All of my colleagues were assembled at the office window, staring sombrely down into the car park. Anyone would have thought that I was being taken away in a hearse, not in the back of a Kwik Kab. The fever of humiliation upon me, I wondered how I would ever regain their trust and respect. Why in all those hours of searching had I uncovered nothing? Not even a rogue decimal point? Despite the deficit of evidence, I was determined that Head Office should hear Mariko’s testimony. As the taxi dawdled through the rush-hour traffic, I devised a plan. I would go home, shower and shave, and change into my smartest suit. Then Mariko would accompany me to Head Office, where she would tell them how Murakami-san had paid her to distract me from his misconduct. Though officially suspended until Friday, I was certain Chief Sanjo would perform a volte-face on the matter when he learnt the truth. Then, once this ghastly state of affairs had been resolved, I intended to go back to Osaka General Infirmary to see Mrs Tanaka. I hated to put the company above my comatose neighbour, but desire for vindication consumed my heart. I decided that the second I got home I would call the hospital to enquire after her progress.
As the taxi negotiated the narrow streets of Osaka Bay, my palms and chest prickled, as if I were the plaything of an invisible acupuncturist. In the midst of all the greater calamities I was still nervous of my reunion with Mariko, whom I had not seen since the failed seduction attempt of Saturday night. I reminded myself that the manipulative seductress who cornered me in the spare room had not been the real Mariko, but a role she had been financially coerced into. I thought it an act of deplorable exploitation, and anger derailed my fear.
The taxi pulled up outside our house. As I climbed out and slammed the door, I noticed that all our curtains were drawn, which I thought odd, as Mariko is not one to laze about in bed. I hurried to the front door, worried she had fallen ill again. The hallway was very dim, and smelt of musk and crushed petals, as though a bottle of fragrance had been smashed not far away.
‘Mariko?’ I called.
The house was silent in reply. As I went to the stairs the hallway mirror caught my eye. It had been vandalized with lipstick, a bold and flagrant shade I have never known you or Mariko to wear. Written in the lipstick
was a message: You did not listen to your wife.
I shuddered in offence. Then I began to wipe furiously at the lipstick with the sleeve of my summer jacket, not caring about the long-term damage to the fabric. I wiped until the characters had been smeared into illegibility. Beneath the message an arrow pointed to the stairs. One of my workshirts hung in the stairway, hooked on the upper banister rail by a coat hanger. I pulled it down at once. On the back of the shirt she had written: I will tell them what you did to me.
I threw down the ruined shirt. What had I done to her? Nothing more than provide her with refuge during her bereavement. A second arrow urged me up the stairs. Docile servant of the lipstick commands, I followed. Marking the door of the spare room, belligerent as a banner at a political demonstration, were the words: This is your punishment for ignoring your wife.
Choked with fury, I ran over and hurled open the door. The cello was in the middle of the room. It lay slaughtered on its back, a large hammer lodged in its side. It had been clawed, dented and brutalized. The tuning pegs were broken, the bridge collapsed, and loose strings mangled and curled. The neck had been totally severed from the body, leading me to suspect that Mariko had lifted the instrument over her head and slammed it to the tatami. Never again would the cello produce another note. What hatred lay behind this vandalism? Mariko had even gone to the trouble of snapping the bow in two. I sank to my knees, mourning the demise of this thing of wood and carpentry. A make-up counter’s worth of lipstick obliterated the walls. The boldest message stretched from one end of the room to the other: I will tell them you raped me.
I physically reeled. Why threaten me so? To discourage me from reporting her crime to the police? Vicious lies and vulgarisms were scrawled elsewhere. I could not bear to read them, for each one found a new way to pierce my heart. Down on my knees, I pulled the dead cello into my arms, trying to reattach the neck to the body. Broken wood caught on the polyester of my slacks. I turned the cello over. A large cavity had been beaten into its back. Armed with only lipstick and a hammer, Mariko had laid waste to the spare room. On the skirting board she had scribbled: Seen the family shrine yet?
I put the cello on the floor and ran down the stairs.
Mariko had smashed a bottle of ink and splashed it over the shrine. She had broken the glass in every photo frame and had used a chopstick to scratch out our parents’ eyes. Our mothers had inky beards and our fathers had been transformed into monsters, horned and fanged. Only your photograph had been left untouched, save for a message written along the bottom: Your neglect made me kill myself.
I choked back my sobs. It was silly of me to get so upset, I know. But I couldn’t help it. Why? What had we ever done to her? Above the desecrated shrine, finger-painted in blue ink, was one final message: Still have your job, Mr Sato?
Oh, what a fool I have been. For I honestly do not know.
I swept up the shards of glass into the dustpan and threw away the photographs Mariko had spoilt. I did not have the energy or courage to tackle the rest of the damage. Instead I ate a piece of toast, showered, and changed into a clean pullover and casual slacks. Then I took the portable TV out from the cupboard under the stairs and caught the bus to the hospital. Mrs Tanaka’s condition has not improved, but she is stable and Dr Ono is very optimistic. Naoko has taken time off work to camp by her aunt’s bedside, and was nattering away when I got there, as if her stream of conversation had been unbroken since I left on Sunday morning. In her involuntary sleep Mrs Tanaka was sallow and serene. Both aunt and niece had identical bruises under their eyes, as though they had taken it in turn to punch each other while the nurses weren’t looking. Preoccupied by her aunt, Naoko did not think to ask why I was not at work, or why I had not kept my promise to return on Sunday. Instead she smiled and clapped her hands at the sight of the portable TV and insisted that we set it up so Mrs Tanaka would be able to listen to her favourite lunch-time serial, The Lives and Loves of the Lift Girls.
I stayed at the hospital until nightfall. I considered staying overnight, but thought it wrong to use the comatose Mrs Tanaka as an excuse to avoid the house. I mustn’t allow Mariko to scare me away. Tomorrow will be a day of spring cleaning. I will go round with a scrubbing brush and remove all evil defamation from our walls. I will also put your butchered cello out for collection and call the locksmith to change the locks on our front door.
I went back to the spare room earlier. The atmosphere seemed charged with the memory of violence. To see the cello lying there, broken and vulnerable, made me very unhappy. I went to the linen cupboard and took out an old red silk kimono. Then I laid the kimono over the dismembered cello, to bequeath it a small amount of dignity.
So many upsets plague my heart tonight. Flashbacks from the office this morning detonate cluster bombs of shame. I will just have to accept with good grace whatever disciplinary action is levelled at me, and work like a demon to earn back the respect of my co-workers. Climbing Fuji in ballet slippers seems an easier feat at present.
Still have your job, Mr Sato? How cleverly Mariko devised my downfall. How cunningly she duped me. Each layer of deception peels away to reveal another beneath. How far do they go? Had her father really passed away? Did she really dream of our beach in Okinawa? What baffles me most is, when I checked your jewellery box, nothing had been taken. And no money either, not even the loose change on the sideboard. Why would she do what she did if there was no financial reward? I had nothing else to offer her. Nothing at all.
II
Wonderful news! Mrs Tanaka has woken from her coma. As I arrived at her ward this morning carrying a bag of fresh fruit, Naoko beckoned to me from the doorway of Mrs Tanaka’s private room. I feared the worst until an ecstatic smile broke across her face. She flung her arms round me in happy abandon, jumping up and down and nearly knocking the spectacles off my nose.
‘Oh, Mr Sato! Auntie woke up last night! Come and see! She is sitting up in bed and she can move her head and everything.’
All the bananas and pears I was carrying fell to the floor when I saw her. Mrs Tanaka was indeed sitting up and watching Good Morning, Japan, a throne of pillows supporting her back. She gave me a friendly nod, as though we had just bumped into each other collecting the mail.
‘Mrs Tanaka! You woke up!’ I cried, superfluously.
It was truly astounding. Just the day before, Mrs Tanaka had been completely unconscious, and now, less than twenty-four hours later, she was sitting up and watching a light news item about a kindergarten sumo wrestling tournament.
‘How are you feeling?’ I asked. ‘Is your head sore?’
‘Auntie cannot communicate yet,’ Naoko said. ‘The doctor says she is still in shock and it will take a while for her voice to return.’
Smiling, I chased about after my fallen fruit, then pulled up a chair beside the bed. Naoko and I spent the morning fussing over Mrs Tanaka and laughing in happy disbelief. Mrs Tanaka did not partake in our astonishment. When Naoko praised her ability to feed herself semolina pudding at lunch-time, she put her spoon back down with a withering look.
After Mrs Tanaka had finished her lunch of nutritious semi-solids, Naoko’s housemate Tomoko came to visit with Mr Tanaka in his wheelchair. Mr Tanaka had been spruced up especially, his white hair combed and neatly parted. A large bouquet of roses sat on his lap and made him sneeze as he was wheeled into the room. He nodded at his wife and presented her with the flowers, depositing them on her lunch tray. Then he settled back in his chair to watch a documentary programme on the dangers of financial pyramid schemes. Tomoko laughed and told us that he had been asking after his wife all morning, assuring us he was quite lost without her. Naoko and I laughed too, agreeing that this was most certainly the case. It was the first time I had met Naoko’s travelagent housemate. Tomoko was a big girl, though one would hesitate to call her fat. The extra weight rather became her and was complimented by her fetching mop of corkscrew curls. She wore aggressive leather boots and one of those black trouser suits in
vogue with young career women. She was very talkative, as overweight people often are, and told me that Naoko had spoken highly of me. This surprised me, as I did not think I had made much of an impression on her.
As the weather was fine Naoko suggested that we find a wheelchair for Mrs Tanaka and take her out for some fresh air in the hospital gardens. With the nurse’s permission we bundled Mrs Tanaka up in a couple of blankets and wheeled her into the hospital quadrangle. We made for a very orderly expedition. Naoko acted as pacemaker, pushing Mrs Tanaka’s wheelchair, and I walked alongside them, holding the metal drip stand, careful to maintain the slack between the drip and Mrs Tanaka’s wrist. Tomoko and Mr Tanaka trundled at the rear. The hospital quadrangle was small and well maintained. Two stone paths dissected the lawn, which was bordered by shrubs and flowerbeds. An ornamental bird-bath marked the centre, and round the edges patients sat on benches. Supervised by a nurse in gardening boots, youngsters from the children’s ward sat on the grass with sketch pads and a tin of coloured pencils, drawing the daisies.
‘Isn’t this nice, Auntie!’ Naoko exclaimed. ‘Such lovely weather.’
Actually, at that point the sky was rather overcast, but nothing would dampen Naoko’s good mood. Because the grass was bumpy and might capsize the drip stand, our little procession moved slowly up and down the stone paths.