by Kotaro Isaka
Miura laughed. "But the fact that they're huge could work against them, give you an edge."
"How so?"
"What you have to do is get your hands on this double. If you can find him, and expose him—on TV would be best—you'd be on the way to clearing your name. Just the sight of a second you would convince most people that something fishy was going on. You'd get them thinking about it, plant a seed of doubt in the minds of all those people who've already pegged you as the killer. Doubt—that's your tactic."
"I think they must have used plastic surgery," Aoyagi said.
"Naturally. One of the best surgeons is right here in Sendai."
"How do you know about him?" Rinka was one thing, but why should a serial killer follow the ratings for cosmetic surgeons?
"You think I really look like this? I used to be a lot better looking! But the point is, there's a double of you out there somewhere, and your best bet is to smoke him out into the open."
"But how do I do that?" Aoyagi was beginning to see the merit in his suggestion. "How do 1 find him?"
THE INCIDENT
"I'll ask around," Miura said.
"You?"
"Set a thief to catch a thief, as they say. Anyway, I've got some contacts. But the first thing to realize is that they're not going to leave a guy who looks exactly like you wandering loose in the city. If somebody caught him, it'd be pretty awkward. On the other hand, they may still have a use for him at some point, so I doubt they've moved him too far out of town. I'd say chances are good he's cooling his heels somewhere nearby."
"Like a pinch hitter waiting to get in the game."
"Exactly. So I'll ask around, see if I can find out where they've stashed your twin. I'll get in touch when I know more."
"And I'll try to stay out of harm's way while you're looking."
"I've got another suggestion: find a big parking lot—at a shopping mall or a game center—drop the seat back, and get some rest. It's easy and fairly safe."
"Except for one small problem. 1 don't have a car."
"I think I can help you there, too—that's the other thing I wanted to tell you. About that car you were trying to start in the vacant lot."
Aoyagi gulped. "How do you know about that?"
"Well, you might say I've been shadowing you."
"Shadowing me?"
"Sorry, another shock," Miura said. "But I just had to see whether you were going to be able to mail yourself out of town. It was a nice idea. So I've been keeping an eye on you."
"From where?" he blurted out, looking around frantically. He'd been as careful as possible the whole time, and it gave him a creepy feeling to realize someone had been able to follow him anyway.
He craned his neck above the grass and scanned the area, convinced .Miura was still watching him. On this side of the river was the gentle slope of the man-made embankment he had walked along after leaving the cover of the bridge. On the (Aher, a rougher clift dro|)|)ing to the water. But no one in sight (ui either l)ank.
"Now keej) your head down. Don't get all jumj)y," Miura laughed. It was inijxjssible to tell whether he was actually watching or just guessing how Aoyagi would react. "The way you dodged all those polite back there vwis pretty cool," he went on. "So naturally 1 wanted to see where you'd go next.
REMOTE CONTROL
I have to admit you surprised me when you ducked into those bushes. How'd you know there was a car in there?" Aoyagi glanced around again. "Relax," Miura said almost immediately. "Anyway, 1 was sorry to see you get out and trudge off back to the river like a disappointed kid."
"The battery's dead," Aoyagi said.
"But that's where you're wrong," he told him. "After you left, someone else came along." This seemed so improbable to Aoyagi that he said nothing for a moment. "Someone else found the car and did a few repairs—changed the battery, in fact. So Tm guessing it should run now."
"Changed the battery?" he repeated. "Who?"
"1 assumed it was a friend of yours."
"Of mine? Who?"
"I'd like to know myself. I can imagine how you must feel right now— enemies everywhere you look, like you're playing an endless Away Game. But you should realize that anyone who puts themselves on your team is taking a helluva risk."
"On my team?"
"Maybe we're just cheerleaders," Miura laughed. "Still, I don't like the idea of involving a little girl, not one as cute as that."
"What little girl?" Aoyagi said, but at that moment the call ended.
A large brown bird—a kite perhaps—was circling over the opposite bank of the river. It flew in a lazy arc, watching silently from overhead. After looking up at it for a moment, he spun around and headed back the way he had come. He walked for a few steps but soon was almost running.
Though he knew it was unlikely that the car had miraculously been repaired in the time it had taken him to walk to the river and back, he had no other plans, nothing more pressing to do. The narrow path at the back of the lot sloped gently upward, but to him it felt like a climb. In the dense grass the yellow paint was barely visible. Clutching his pack, he forced his way in and reached his hand into the wheel well. The key was still there. Settled in the driver's seat, he put the key in the ignition.
Then he sat up and took a deep breath. Would it work?
With his foot still on the brake, he willed it to start. He may have even said it aloud. "Start!"
THE INCIDENT
At first he wasn't sure what was happening. Something shook beneath his foot, followed by a deep growling sound. The engine had come to life, groaning as if about to turn over. It hadn't started, but it was no longer dead. The gas in the tank was old—might even have gone bad or was at least less volatile. But it might start with a little coaxing. He took a deep breath and turned the key again. This time the groaning lasted longer, like the grumbling of someone unwilling to get out of bed. "Start, damn it!" he muttered, and as he did so there was a trembling under his legs and the steering wheel in his hands began to vibrate. His mind went blank with excitement. In the rearview mirror, he could see a cloud of exhaust.
He sat there for a moment, gripping the wheel, his foot hard on the brake. T hen he reached out to adjust the mirror, but froze at the sight of his own reflection. It wasn't the look of exhaustion that startled him—he could have expected that—as much as the streaks of tears on his cheeks. He suddenly wondered what Morita would have thought of a man who could cry over a car starting.
The face in the mirror was so completely miserable it was almost funny: he felt he was about to watch himself dissolve into a puddle. So he stepped on the clutch and started to put the car in first, but then remembered the note he'd left behind the visor, which had outlived its purpose if he was going to drive away. As he was about to stuff it in his pocket, something made him stop and smooth it out again. His heart skipped a beat. On the wrinkled paper, next to his note—/ mu innocent. Masaliarii Anyas ’!—someone had written one more line; 1 thought so.
He looked down at it for some time, then closed his eyes. He wasn't trying to figure out whether he recognized the handwriting or what the line really meant. He was overwhelmed. T he engine purred in front of him, as if reminding him it was time to go. "1 thought so," he said aloud, savoring the words.
He put the car in gear, released the handbrake, and plowed his way out ol the weeds—only t(j find himselt brushing close by an old man, bent almost dfmble, wIkj was ap|)arently out tor a walk when the car came hurtling out ot the undergrcjwth. T he man backed away in horror, then tell awkwardly onto the grass behind him. Aoyagi lelt bad about giving him such a bight, but it didn't stoj) him trom making a hard turn onto the street and stomping on the gas. I he car rattled and groaneil but failed to |)ick up speed. T he tin*s
REMOTE CONTROL
were badly underinttated and wobbly from years of neglect, which made him worry that it was bound to attract attention.
He found it difficult to steer, and was afraid of hitting someone as he
weaved along. The side windows were clouded over, the windshield only slightly better. A shadow appeared at the edge of his vision and he veered away—an RV passing. Straightening up in his lane, he drove on.
He remembered a self-service gas station he had noticed in his driving days. He could fill the tank there and add air to the tires, and he wouldn't have to talk to anyone. The dim prospect he'd had as he wandered along the bank of the river had been replaced by a much more vivid picture now.
Haruko Higuchi
"We did it. Mommy!" Nanami bounced on the seat next to her as the engine turned over and a cloud of exhaust belched from the tailpipe.
"We certainly did!" said Haruko, gripping the wheel. Then she cut the engine.
"Aren't we going anywhere?" said Nanami. "Why did we make it go?"
"That's a good question. I'm not sure myself."
"Is someone coming to drive it?"
Haruko laughed. She had no idea whether Aoyagi would remember this old car, much less whether he would be able to get here if he did. "I don't know," she said. "But if someone did come, it would be sad if it didn't work."
She took the key out of the ignition. She couldn't imagine the police officer was still waiting for them, but if he was, the last thing she wanted was to have him come poking around in the bushes and find the car. "Let's go," she told Nanami. Just then she noticed a slip of paper sticking out of the visor above her. She pulled it down and unfolded it. / mu iuuoceut. Masaharu Aoyagi. The handwriting was so familiar. She fished around in her bag for a pen. / thought so, she added. When had he written this? She was worried now that they had come too late.
THE INCIDENT
With Nanami in tow, she made her way back to lier car. She half expected to see a police car waiting there, but other than a little traffic passing by, the road was empty. The sky was still fiat and cloudless, as though a sheet of blue paper had been pasted overhead.
"Excuse me," said a voice behind her, making her nearly jump out of her skin. She turned to find—a bov or a vouth or a small man?—she couldn't tell. He had a high forehead and was wearing a black parka, and smiling tentatively. His hands gripped the handlebars of a fancy-looking bike with narrow tires.
"Yes?" she said. As she answered, she felt almost certain that there was no connection between the police and this fellow; in fact, he seemed the exact opposite of anything she associated with people in authority.
"I'm sorry, 1 was just wondering . . ." He pursed his lips and fiddled with his glasses.
"What?"
"What you were doing just now ... in there?" He pointed toward the bushes.
"My daughter needed to go to the bathroom," she said, stroking Nanami's head. "It was a bit of an emergency."
"Oh, Tm sorry. I didn't mean to pry," he said.
Haruko smiled and started walking toward her car. "Come on, Nanami," she said.
"Is that your bike?" Nanami asked, looking up at the little man.
"Sort of," he said.
Haruko felt there was something odd about him. "CT)me on, Nanami," she said again, a little more urgently. She opened the rear door. Her daughter waved goodbye.
On the way home she realized she no longer had any doubt at all about Aoyagi's innocence. It was enough to see the note in his handwriting.
"The car has hj be our little secret," she said. But when she glanced in the mirror, she could see that Nanami was already asleep.
As she drove u|) to their huilding, she noticed a car parketl near the entrance—just a normal sedan, hut she had a hatl leeling the moment she saw it. She parked in the lot next to the huilding aiul was heading lor the door with Nanami asleep in her arms when a mati in a suit approached her.
REMOTE CONTROL
"Not another coincidence/' she said, as she searched in her bag for her kevs.
"I've been waiting for you," Mamoru Kondo said, bowing slightly. The sun was behind him and she couldn't see the expression on his face. He took a step closer and glanced down at Nanami.
"You could have called if you had more questions."
"I wasn't sure you'd answer," he said. Kondo's range of emotions was obviously quite narrow, but she could tell he seemed more stern than he had when he'd found her at the side of the road. "I need you to tell me the truth," he said. "Has Masaharu Aoyagi contacted you?"
"No, he hasn't. Tm afraid you're wasting your time following me around." They stared at each other for several seconds, as if waiting to see who would blink first. He studied her face, observing every detail, and she looked right back, standing her ground as best she could. She was worried he would sense how nervous she felt—a feeling that seemed to grow the longer she looked at his expressionless face.
Eventually he broke the silence, though there was no hint he had backed down. "Please contact me whenever you make a move," he said.
Make a move? Could he be more vague? But in her eagerness to get away, she promised him she would, like a girl scout taking an oath. Then she went inside, sensing his eyes on her back until she disappeared into the elevator. As she was opening the door to their apartment, Nanami jumped down from her arms. She had apparently been awake for some time. "That man is creepy," she said.
Haruko turned and looked beyond the railing at the blue sky, thinking about Aoyagi. He was somewhere out there, and he was in a lot of trouble.
Masaharu Aoyagi
This thing's in a lot of trouble, Aoyagi thought as he gripped the wheel. Still, it was moving—not bad for a car that hadn't been driven for years.
He found the self-service gas station right where he thought it would be.
THE INCIDENT
There was an attendant there, but if you didn't need any specialized service, you were left to fill the tank on your own. And in one corner was an air pump, just as he had remembered. Given the long period of neglect in the weeds, the tires seemed to be in relatively good shape, and once he had attached the nozzle, they reintlated in no time. Aoyagi topped off the gas tank and then used a hose to spray the worst of the dirt off the car. Even so, it could hardly be called clean, but it was in better shape than when he had barreled out of the bushes. Soon he was back on the road again.
He knew the engine could give out at any point. It seemed to run well enough when he had his foot on the gas, but every time he had to slow down or downshift or stop for a red light, he was afraid it would quit on him altogether. If he stalled in the middle of traffic, that would be the end of him.
He pulled into the parking lot of a shopping mall just off the beltway in Izumi Ward. A dirty old yellow car was not exactly common in Sendai, where most cars were the latest model and spotless, but neither would it automatically attract attention. Furthermore, for the time being at least, the chances were good that the police were not aware that he had taken to the road.
A man with signal flags was waving drivers into the vast lot. Aoyagi kept his face down as he took his ticket, then wove his way through the rows of cars to an open space in Section 3. He sat back and turned off the engine— not knowing if it would ever start again. So he tested it by switching it on, then turned it off a second time.
Unfastening his seatbelt, he let the seat drop back. He was much less visible now. fhs hand reached into the backpack and found one of the energy bars. He ripped open the wraj)per and started chewing, though he didn't feel jiarticularly hungry.
After pulling up the antenna on the game unit cum miniature TV, he turned it (ui, fiddled with the sound for a moment, and then watchetl the screen, nu^re or less resigned to seeing himselt appear on it. You again.-’ he thcjught. Yes, again. Two-year-old pictures from his adventure with Kinka, and the footage by the river with his look-alike Hying the helicopter.
"A man resembling Masaharu Aoyagi has been spotted fleeing from < convenience store in Wakabayashi Ward after stealing a loaf of bread."
"A man thought to be Masaharu Aoyagi was spotted in from of the pier for tourist boats to Matsushima beach."
REMOTE CONTROL
"A
number of witnesses report seeing a man resembling Masaharu Aoyagi running near the beach at Nobiru."
Neat trick, he tliouglit—I seem to be everywhere at once. He wanted to laugh, not because he felt relieved but because he'd grown numb to all feeling. It occurred to him that all these sightings might actually be helpful in concealing his real location, like a smoke screen of sorts. But then he wondered whether this disinformation might be part of a larger strategy the police were developing. Maybe they were trying to lull him into a sense of security, to encourage him to drop his guard by putting out a stream of false reports. It wasn't out of the question—but was anything beyond question anymore, except perhaps the possibility of resuming a normal life without coming to harm?
He felt the urge to pee, but at first he decided to ignore it. Eventually, however, this proved impossible as his bladder seemed to swell from minute to minute. Still, now that he was settled in the reassuring shelter of the car, the idea of venturing outside was pretty unattractive. So why not just take care of things right here? It was an old heap anyway, the year and owner long since forgotten. So what would prevent him from slipping into the back seat and quietly solving the problem? Okay, it would stink, but it would hardly stop him from driving the car when the time came to leave.
But when his hand reached for his zipper he stopped. It wasn't so much that he couldn't piss in a car as knowing that as soon as he started he wouldn't be able to stand the sight of himself doing something like that. He glanced around to make sure no one was coming, shouldered his pack, opened the door, and headed for the mall.
As he stood at the urinal, a young man appeared to his right. At the same time, a man in a suit came up to his left. The one on the right glanced at Aoyagi, while the man on the left took a quick look in his direction, too. The looks were casual enough, but Aoyagi tensed up. He wanted to get away, but his bladder seemed bottomless.
He peered down intently, feeling his heart beat quickly. When he was done at last, he moved over to the sink, ran the water for a few seconds, then left the bathroom as quickly as he could, flicking drops off his hands.