Laura Joh Rowland - Sano Ichiro 07 - Pillow Book of Lady Wisteria

by Pillow Book of Lady Wisteria(lit)

  He climbed out of the tub, and as Reiko draped a cloth around him, she rejected her notion. It was surely a product of the distrust instilled in her by the Black Lotus. Whatever secret Sano was keeping from her, that couldn't be it.

  "Let's go to bed and try to sleep for what's left of the night," Sano said. "In the morning, Hirata will question Fujio while I go to Edo Morgue and see what Dr. Ito's examination of the corpse can tell us. What we learn might help me persuade the shogun to let the investigation go on."

  His face was haggard with exhaustion. "Or it might not."

  21

  The village of Imado, home to various Yoshiwara merchants and workers, lay across rice fields and marshes from the pleasure quarter. It contained a few streets of houses, shops, inns, and teahouses. Upon arriving in Imado with two detectives, Hirata proceeded to one of several villas on the outskirts, built by wealthy brothel owners.

  A thatched roof spread over the interconnecting wooden structures that comprised Fujio's house; a stone wall enclosed the surrounding garden and courtyard. Beyond the wall stretched fallow brown earth dotted with farmers' cottages. Gauzy bands of white cloud streaked the pale blue sky. Sunlight brightened a chill, blustery morning as Hirata and the detectives dismounted outside Fujio's gate and walked into the courtyard.

  When Hirata knocked on the door, a boy answered. Hirata said, "We're here to see Fujio."

  Eventually, the hokan came to the door, yawning. His handsome face was puffy, his hair mussed. He wore a blue-and-red checked dressing gown, and reeked of liquor and tobacco smoke. His bloodshot eyes blinked in puzzlement at Hirata; but he smiled and bowed gallantly.

  "Sorry for my miserable appearance," he said, "but I was out late last night. What can I do for you, masters?"

  Hirata introduced himself, then said, "I need to talk to you. May we come in?"

  "If this is about what happened to Lord Mitsuyoshi, I've already told the sosakan-sama everything I know." Fujio rubbed his temples and winced. "Merciful gods, what a headache! I really shouldn't drink while I perform."

  "It's about your house in the hills," said Hirata.

  Dismay cleared the sleepiness from the hokan's face. "Uh," said Fujio. He took a step backward and bumped into two women who appeared in the entryway behind him. One was young, pretty, and pregnant, the other middle-aged and scowling.

  "Who are those men?" the younger woman asked Fujio in a shrill, petulant voice. "What do they want?"

  "It's none of your business," Fujio told her with obvious irritation.

  "How can you be so rude to let your guests stand outside?" the older woman chastised him. "Invite them in."

  Fujio rolled his eyes. "My wife and her mother," he explained to Hirata. "Could we please talk somewhere else?"

  Hirata agreed. Fujio went to dress, and returned wearing a brown cloak and kimono over wide, striped trousers. He and Hirata walked down the lane toward the village, while the detectives trailed them. Ducks huddled in a ditch alongside the lane; in the distance, a peasant drove oxen across the sere landscape.

  "My wife and in-laws don't know I own the house, and I don't want them to know. I bought it years ago, as a summer retreat." Fujio eyed Hirata. "You married?"

  "No," Hirata said. After reading Lord Niu's letter yesterday, he doubted he ever would be, unless he accepted his father's choice of a bride. But he couldn't give up on finding some way to make peace between the two clans so he could wed Midori.

  "Well, when you do marry, you'll understand that having a wife can really tie you down," Fujio said. "Especially if you live with her parents. A fellow needs a place where he can have a little privacy."

  "And the company of lady friends?" Hirata said.

  Fujio cracked a mischievous grin. "Well, yes. That house comes in handy for entertaining my female admirers. But I'd be ruined if my father-in-law ever learned that I was unfaithful to his daughter. He would throw me out. Besides, he owns the Great Miura brothel and has a lot of influence in Yoshiwara. I would never get any work there again."

  Was this the only reason Fujio wanted to keep the house a secret? Hirata said, "Tell me about the woman you've been keeping in the house."

  "What?" Fujio halted. "Nobody's there now. I only use the place in the summer." The daze from his hangover dissipated; he looked puzzled but sober. "Say, how did you find out about my house, anyway?"

  "The sosakan-sama got a letter," Hirata said. "We went there last night and found a dead woman in your bed."

  A cloud of breath puffed out of Fujio's mouth, but no sound emerged. His surprise seemed genuine, though Hirata knew Fujio was an entertainer and skilled at dramatics.

  ". A dead woman? In my house?" After a few more stammers, Fujio recovered enough composure to say, "Who was it?"

  "We don't know. Her head had been cut off and removed from the premises," Hirata said, closely watching Fujio. "But she was dressed in what appear to be Lady Wisteria's clothes."

  "Wisteria? Merciful gods." Fujio staggered backward, as if physically shaken by the news. "What was she doing there?"

  "You tell me."

  "Wait." The hokan raised his hands palm-up. "If you think I killed Wisteria, you've got it all wrong. I don't know how she got in my."

  A look of comprehension sharpened his eyes. "But I can guess. When we were lovers, I told her about my house. She must have remembered, and gone there because she knew it would be empty. She did it without my knowledge or permission. I had nothing to do with her dying."

  He could be telling the truth, Hirata thought-or improvising an explanation to protect himself.

  "Tell me everything you did from the time Lord Mitsuyoshi's murder was discovered, up to last night," Hirata said.

  The hokan pondered with intense concentration, clearly recognizing his need to demonstrate that he'd been nowhere near his secret house. "I was performing in the Owariya when Momoko ran into the party screaming that Lord Mitsuyoshi was dead. The Yoshiwara gate was shut, and before it opened in the morning, the police came and locked everyone in the quarter. When they let us go, I went home."

  "What did you do there?" Hirata said.

  "I had dinner with my family," Fujio said, "then went to sleep." He added with pointed emphasis, "I was in bed all night, beside my wife."

  Hirata intended to check this story with the hokan's wife and in-laws, although they might confirm what Fujio said whether it was true or not, to protect him. "And in the morning?"

  "I went to Yoshiwara. There wasn't much going on, so I sat around the teahouses, drinking and playing cards with friends."

  "Were you with them the whole time?" Hirata said.

  "Not every moment, but I was never out of their sight long enough to go to the hills." Yet Fujio slowed his speech, as if he saw danger looming ahead in his tale. "That night I performed at a party. The sosakan-sama met me there. After we talked, I entertained the guests until dawn. Then..."

  From a distance echoed the ring of an axe, chopping wood. "Then what?" Hirata prompted, eager because they'd reached a critical time period. This morning he'd learned that Fujio had managed to shake the detectives assigned to watch him, and he'd been out of their sight from dawn until afternoon of that day, when they'd caught up with him in Yoshiwara.

  "I visited a friend," Fujio said reluctantly. "I was with. my friend until yesterday afternoon, when I went back to Yoshiwara to perform."

  "Who is this friend?"

  "A woman." Despite the cold, Fujio's face was slick with sweat. "I can't tell her name. She's the wife of a patron." He shook his head, deploring his own rakish behavior. "How do I get myself into these things?"

  "If you want me to believe you were with this woman, she must verify what you've told me," Hirata said.

  "But I can't let her," Fujio protested. "Her husband is a prominent samurai. He has a bad temper. If he finds out about us, he'll kill me."

  Tokugawa law permitted a samurai to kill a peasant and escape punishment. Fujio seemed caught between the threat of his mi
stress's husband on one side and execution for murder on the other. The story sounded credible to Hirata, who began to doubt that Fujio had killed the woman. Fujio was clever; if he'd committed the crime, wouldn't he have invented a better alibi? Furthermore, Hirata's examination of the crime scene last night argued that Fujio could be innocent.

  There was no evidence that Fujio had been in the house recently. The woman could have gone there by herself. Hirata even wondered whether she'd been hiding there at all. The stove and braziers had contained no sign of recent fire, the only food in the house was some old dried fruit, and the privy didn't smell as if anyone had used it lately. The woman could have been taken there and immediately killed-by someone who wanted to frame Fujio.

  Yet perhaps Fujio was guilty, but hadn't expected the body to be found, and therefore had thought he wouldn't need an alibi. The story about a secret mistress might have been the best he could do when caught off guard.

  "I think you went to see Wisteria at your house yesterday," Hirata said. "Maybe she didn't like being alone, in the cold, and she complained. Maybe you were desperate because you had nowhere else to put her. There was an argument. Things got out of control. You killed her."

  "That never happened." Fujio shifted his stance, planting his feet firmly on the ground.

  "Or maybe you intended to kill her all along," Hirata said, "because she saw you kill Lord Mitsuyoshi."

  "Treasury Minister Nitta did it." Triumph tinged Fujio's declaration. "I heard the news."

  "You killed Wisteria before you knew Nitta was convicted," Hirata guessed. "You were afraid she would tell the police that you're the killer, and you couldn't let her live."

  "I didn't kill Lord Mitsuyoshi," Fujio said hotly. "And I didn't kill Wisteria. Someone put her body in my house to make it look like I killed her!"

  In Fujio's eyes dawned the realization that this was exactly how it looked-and how a magistrate who tried him for the murder would interpret the crime scene. A visible current of panic tautened his slim figure. Hirata sprang forward to grab Fujio, at the same instant that the hokan turned and bolted across the rice fields.

  "Hey! Come back here!" Launching himself in pursuit, Hirata called to the detectives: "Stop him!"

  Fujio stumbled over dirt clods, his garments flapping, legs and arms pumping furiously. Hirata panted as he labored to catch up. But soon Fujio's pace slowed; fatigue hobbled his gait. Hirata closed the distance between them and lunged, seizing Fujio around the waist.

  The hokan fell forward and slammed to the ground. Hirata landed with a thud on top of him. Fujio lay limp and wheezing.

  "You're under arrest," Hirata said.

  After the treasury minister had died with his guilt or innocence undetermined, Hirata couldn't risk allowing one of Sano's only two other suspects to escape. And even if Fujio proved not to have killed the shogun's heir, he was still the primary suspect in the murder of the woman at his house.

  "Silly habit of mine, running away when I'm sure to get caught," Fujio said, managing a wry laugh. "But this time it was worth a try."

  Although Sano usually traveled with an entourage to assist him and uphold the dignity of his rank, Edo Jail was a place he preferred to go alone.

  Edo Jail, a fortified dungeon surrounded by deteriorating stone walls and watchtowers, reigned over the slums of northeast Nihonbashi. Inside, jailers tortured confessions out of prisoners, and convicted criminals awaited execution. The jail also housed Edo Morgue, which received the bodies of citizens who perished from natural disasters or unnatural causes. There Dr. Ito, morgue custodian, often lent his medical expertise to Sano's investigations. Because the examination of corpses and any other procedures associated with foreign science were illegal, Sano wanted as few people as possible to know about his visits to Edo Jail.

  Dr. Ito met him at the door of the morgue, a low building with flaking plaster walls. "What a pleasure to see you," Dr. Ito said.

  In his seventies, he had white hair like a snowfall above his wise, lined face and wore the dark blue coat of a physician. Years ago he'd been caught practicing forbidden foreign science, which he'd learned through illicit channels from Dutch traders. The bakufu had forgone the usual sentence of exile and condemned him to work for the rest of his life in Edo Morgue. There Dr. Ito had continued his scientific experiments, ignored by the authorities.

  "However, I might have wished for a better occasion than another violent death," he said.

  "I, too," Sano said. "I wouldn't ask you to examine another body now if I had any choice."

  The Black Lotus disaster had taken its toll on Dr. Ito even though he hadn't been at the temple that night, when over seven hundred people had died. Their bodies had been taken directly to a mass funeral outside town, but many nuns and priests had died from injuries or committed suicide in jail, and Dr. Ito had prepared their corpses for cremation. His horror at the Black Lotus carnage had put a halt to his work-the one solace that made his imprisonment bearable-and the spiritual pollution from so many deaths had weakened his health.

  Dr. Ito smiled reassuringly and gestured for Sano to enter the morgue. "Justice for a murder victim takes precedence over personal feelings."

  Inside the morgue, a large room held stone troughs used for washing the dead, cabinets containing tools, a podium stacked with papers and books, and three waist-high tables. Upon one table lay a figure draped by a white cloth. Beside this stood Dr. Ito's assistant, Mura, a man of some fifty years, who had bushy gray hair and an angular, intelligent face.

  "We're ready to begin, Mura-san," said Dr. Ito.

  Mura was an eta, one of the outcast class from which came the wardens, torturers, corpse handlers, and executioners of Edo Jail. The eta's hereditary link with death-related occupations such as butchering and leather tanning rendered them spiritually contaminated. Most citizens shunned them, but Dr. Ito had befriended Mura, who performed all the physical work for Dr. Ito's studies.

  As Sano went to stand near the table, he battled an impulse to run away. He'd not yet recovered from the horror and nausea he'd experienced upon finding the body. He dreaded examining the corpse of a woman he'd known intimately.

  Mura peeled off the white cloth from the corpse, beginning at the feet. The rigidity of death had passed, and the woman lay flat on her back, limbs straight. Her feet were bare, their skin a bluish white; dirt and cuts marked the soles. As her clothes came into view, Sano observed red-brown splotches on the kimono's purple and green floral pattern. The woman's fingernails were broken and crusted with dried blood. Mura uncovered her top half, exposing the hideous mutilation where her head should have been. The sweet odor of rotting meat struck Sano; his stomach lurched.

  "Where did you find her?" Dr. Ito asked.

  Sano related the details of the murder investigation, explained how he'd discovered the body, and described the scene.

  "Was there blood around the body?" Dr. Ito said.

  An indelible picture of the room haunted Sano's mind. "Not much. Some spatters on the floor, the wall, the futon, and the mosquito net."

  He knew Reiko was worried about him, and he'd wished to act normal in front of her last night, but all his energy had gone toward keeping sickness and emotion at bay. Closing himself off from Reiko would drive them farther apart, but he couldn't explain the murder's extreme effect on him without telling her what would make matters worse.

  "To determine exactly what happened, we must view the rest of her." Dr. Ito gestured to Mura.

  The eta fetched a knife and cut the kimono off the woman. He removed the white under-kimono, exposing her naked body. It was an ugly patchwork of huge red and purple bruises that had erupted under the pale skin on her abdomen, breasts, and ribcage. Smaller bruises blotched her neck, arms, and thighs. Sano inhaled sharply through his teeth; Dr. Ito murmured in dismay, and even the stoic Mura looked shaken.

  "Please turn her on her side, Mura-san," said Dr. Ito.

  Mura obeyed, and they silently viewed the bruised back and but
tocks. Then Dr. Ito walked around the table, his expression pitying as he studied the corpse. "This brutality indicates a male rather than a female attacker, because it required considerable strength. Those bruises were made by fists. The small ones on the arms and neck are fingerprints."

  "She fought back," Sano said, observing the woman's hands. "Her fingernails are broken and bloody because she clawed her attacker."

  In his mind he saw the blood on the floor and walls, smeared with two sets of handprints and footprints, one large, one small-the victim's and the killer's. If this was Wisteria, what responsibility did he bear for her death?

  "Note these dark, deep bruises along her back. After she fell, he kicked and trampled her," Dr. Ito said. "She probably died from the rupture of internal organs."