“What makes you think it might be murder? Couldn’t she have died naturally?” I asked.
“Watch out, Taro, you’ll damage yourself! Rei-san is very close to the police.” Yuki pressed her raspberry-glossed lips together in disapproval. I remembered Japanese citizens were sometimes wary about the police. After World War II, many former military officers were absorbed into the police. There was a hard and secretive edge to the organization, and some recent corruption charges hadn’t improved things much.
“I was drafted to do the translations. I had no choice in it,” I smiled at Yuki to put her at ease.
“You were wonderful, sugar. Like those translators on TV.” Mrs. Chapman patted my knee.
“It must be murder because of Mrs. Nakamura’s state. I saw when I followed the husband outside. No clothes! Obscene.” Taro looked more excited than upset, I noted.
“What do the ladies think? They are experts because of the many murders in America!” Yuki said.
“I heard every family has a gun inside the house. True?” Taro’s eyes glittered.
“Well, we certainly do have a right to bear arms. Out in the country—” Mrs. Chapman began.
“Not all of us have guns,” I interrupted. Lately, almost everyone I met wanted to know whether I packed a .45. Sometimes it was really embarrassing to be an American.
“Just because someone’s powerful doesn’t mean he’s innocent. Look at all the political scandals in Japan. Bribery, corruption, blackmail…”
“This is serious business. The police returned to the minshuku this morning. I think there’s every chance the death could be foul play.” Taro held up his empty teacup to the waitress, who languidly came to refill it.
“Why didn’t they move us out to search for evidence? It just doesn’t make sense,” I said.
“Mrs. Nakamura surely killed herself. She seemed plenty unhappy at dinner.” Mrs. Chapman gave me a significant glance.
“You have been spending time with Glendinning-san, haven’t you? Surely he knows more than the rest of us,” Yuki coaxed.
“Do tell.” Mrs. Chapman appeared to be salivating, even though her plate was clean.
“He’s pretty close-mouthed. He wants to be loyal to the company, I guess.” I decided to keep quiet about Hugh’s anguish the day before.
“Aha. Very Japanese. He must be getting along well within the ranks!” Taro slurped down the remains of his tea.
“Rei-san, I’ve been thinking maybe he has some interest in you,” Yuki chimed in. “He kept speaking to you at New Year’s Eve dinner.”
I shook my head violently, not liking the conversation’s turn.
“Perhaps you prefer a Japanese or another konketsujin?” Yuki’s expression turned calculating. “How old are you, anyway? If you wait too long, you’ll be Christmas Cake.”
“I’m past that,” I said, making a face. Single women were called all kinds of things—“unsold goods,” “old miss” or, like Yuki was saying, “Christmas cake.” The whipped-cream-and-strawberry confection was full price right up to December twenty-fifth but couldn’t be sold the day after, just like no man in his right mind was supposed to want a girl older than twenty-five.
“Career women marry later,” Taro consoled me. “Yuki was twenty-eight.”
“Baka!” Yuki cursed. But from the way her husband grinned, I could tell how lucky he thought he was.
Taro and Yuki made love that afternoon. Their door was shut for the four hours between the time we all arrived home and dinner was served. They came down sleepy-looking and all smiles to join me at the hearth where I was showing Mrs. Chapman the antique box I’d bought on New Year’s Day. When Mrs. Yogetsu called us to dinner, she looked at it, too.
“This is not from Shiroyama.” Her voice was almost triumphant.
“Where, then?” I challenged. She could have been right, but it infuriated me, with my master’s degree in Asian art history, to be shown up like this.
“I think a place like Hakone. Yes, that type of wood inlay is popular there. Someone must have found it as a souvenir, and brought it here. Now it’s for sale in Shiroyama because tourists buy anything.”
“What’s she saying? Is it valuable or fake?” Mrs. Chapman had become impatient listening to the Japanese.
“Neither. She just thinks it was not made locally. If I could open it up there might be a clue, since something’s rattling around inside.”
“Let me try. I’ll need something sharp.” Taro began prying at the box.
Mrs. Chapman pulled a bobby pin out of her fluffy orange halo and Taro set to work. I looked away, unable to stand seeing my treasure broken.
“Here you go.” He handed the box back to me. “You look first, in case it’s something deadly!”
I lifted the lid and found an inch-long polished piece of blue-and-white porcelain. I passed it around and everyone agreed it had to be a hashi-oki a small ornamental piece used to place chopsticks on while dining.
“I don’t think it’s very old because it’s decorated with acrylic paint,” I told them. “But the box might be. Look at its paper lining.”
“Old newspaper. May I borrow this to study?” Taro looked really excited.
“Sure,” I said, handing it over but tucking the chopstick rest in a scrap of paper to put away upstairs. Worthless as it might be, I could use it as tableware at home.
“Where is Glendinning-san?” Yuki was starting to sound like a broken record.
I didn’t speak up, so Mrs. Yogetsu did. “The press conference for the autopsy took place at police headquarters this afternoon. All the men from Sendai were there.”
“The autopsy! What do you think the coroner’s finding was?” Taro looked like an electric bulb had been switched on underneath his skin.
“Mr. Yamamoto says it’s suicide,” Mrs. Chapman interrupted. “Something about money. In my opinion, the woman probably couldn’t handle life with that wretched man anymore. It’s just like my cousin, Maureen, whose husband couldn’t keep his pants on. Poor gal spent twenty years depressed and drinking. One day she just decided to leave the life and washed down some sleeping pills with half a bottle of white Zinfandel wine…”
“A sad story, but not Setsuko’s.” Hugh Glendinning spoke from where he stood in the doorway with Yamamoto. Both were dressed formally in dark suits: Yamamoto’s the one from New Year’s Eve and Hugh’s a wide-shouldered charcoal wool worn with a crisp white shirt and a Sulka tie.
“Eavesdropper!” Mrs. Chapman was furious to have been shut up.
“Sorry. I was wrong—I am a poor conversationalist,” Taro apologized.
“Gossip is only to be expected, living in the fish-bowl that this place is.” Hugh glanced at me and sat down, Yamamoto shadowing his movements. “For your information, the coroner ruled it an accident. It’s believed that Mrs. Nakamura lost consciousness and froze to death.”
“It couldn’t be,” I said under my breath.
“It’s official,” Hugh said crisply.
None of us had the nerve to ask more questions. The easy traveler’s rapport that had developed between us on the first night was gone. There were two camps now—Sendai and the rest of us.
After dinner the Ikedas and I drifted into the sitting room to watch a televised performance of Beethoven’s Ninth, the quintessential Japanese holiday concert. Taro and Yuki smiled and hummed along. I shut my eyes until the news came on at ten, with a feature on the Shiroyama press conference regarding Setsuko Nakamura’s murder. Listening carefully, I realized Hugh had told us exactly what was available for public consumption. No more, and no less.
When I went up to bed an hour later, Hugh surprised me in the hallway.
“I need a word with you,” he said.
“Okay.” I leaned against the wall outside my room, glad Taro and Yuki were out of earshot.
“What the hell have you been telling people about Setsuko?”
“What is this, the Scottish inquisition?” The nervousness I’d tried to su
bdue all day flared.
“Oh, come on,” he chided me. “You were giving them all an earful about possibilities of suicide and murder. I thought that was between us.”
“People thought up those things on their own. Besides, why do you care? As you said, the uncertainties surrounding her death have been solved.”
“Nothing’s been solved. Just a lot of bows made and sayonaras said before Nakamura hopped the four-thirty limited express to make funeral arrangements. As I’d expected.”
This was the first time since the divorce comment he had said anything remotely suspicious of Nakamura.
“What can you do about it?” I whispered. “You’re in an impossible position.”
“But you aren’t.” He looked steadily at me. “You’re a naturally nosy person and you pass for Japanese. With your language and looks you can ask questions that I can’t.”
“Hah. You don’t know the trouble that looking like this causes,” I said, thinking of the many rude discussions about my ethnicity I’d endured.
“I do know. That’s why I tried to buy you lunch yesterday.” As I started telling him I was immune to his blather, he touched a finger to my lips. A spark flew, and we both jumped back.
“You can help me. You’re already doing it, just with no sense of discretion.”
“I don’t want to.” I felt belligerent. Setsuko Nakamura had eaten out of his hand, and I saw where it had gotten her. Death in the snow, a quick write-off by the coroner.
“Why don’t we talk about it again tomorrow? Just sleep on it.” He leaned down, bringing his face so close I could practically inhale him. Sensing he was slightly off balance, I ducked under his arm.
“You’re violating my space,” I hissed. “Good night.”
Safely inside my room, I collapsed. Doing anything with Hugh Glendinning was a very bad idea. It would be one thing to assist out of the goodness of my heart, but the fact was I had disliked Setsuko Nakamura. My initial passion to learn about her background was for my own self-preservation. Now that I was out of harm’s way, any passion I felt had a different origin.
This was a dangerous trajectory, the worst since Shin Hatsuda, the ponytailed painter who had swept me off my feet at a party in Harajuku. Shin’s crime had been departing ten months ago with half my art books and more of my self esteem; Hugh Glendinning could reap even more damage. I don’t do gaijin, I once said to Karen when she wanted to fix me up with a blue-eyed investment banker. It was not why I’d traveled halfway around the world.
I pulled off my sweater, belatedly remembering the window exposing me to the street. I grabbed my yukata around my shoulders and turned, finding the screen in place after all. I was losing my mind. I snapped off the light and burrowed into the chilly futon.
I had been dreaming about being on my high school debate team, lined up to go on stage with my teammates: Mr. Nakamura, Mr. Yamamoto, Mrs. Chapman, and Hugh. Standing at the podium in her ivory Chanel dress, Setsuko Nakamura was ready to lead us. She opened her mouth to say something. Then she pulled out a perfume atomizer and started spraying the audience with a noxious chemical scent.
I awakened in blackness. A burnt odor filled my nose: gas, strong enough that I was choking. I pulled myself out of the blankets and began crawling to the heater. There was no flame, but I could feel with my hand that the control switch was rigged between on and off. I tried turning it, but it wouldn’t budge.
Oh, God. The personal prayer I hadn’t been able to think of on New Year’s Eve came to me now. I needed to get out. I pulled myself along on my stomach toward the thin wedge of light shining under the door.
I had locked the door before bed. Now the knob wouldn’t turn at all; some force held it tight. I pounded and tried to call out, but couldn’t manage more than a cough. Feeling along the wall for the switch to the fluorescent overhead light, I flipped it with no effect. My energy spent, I curled up on the floor for a minute, trying to calm myself. As my hand stretched up once again to try the door, it suddenly opened. I fell gasping into the lighted hallway and onto a pair of large, Argyle-covered feet.
7
“What are you doing in there? The smell!” Hugh coughed.
I sucked in the hall’s fresh, frigid air for a minute before croaking, “Gas leak.”
He swept past me into the bedroom, and I heard first a tearing sound of the shji paper screen and then the window slamming open. The next sound was of the heater’s tubing being yanked from the wall. He came back and half-dragged me across the hall and into his room.
From my place on his futon, the shadowy room seemed to spin in a cool while light flowing from a laptop computer on the tea table.
“Don’t be sick, I beg you.” I heard him pouring liquid, and he put a glass to my lips.
“That smell,” I said before sucking down the most delicious glass of water I’d ever had.
“A harmless hydrocarbon mixed in with the natural gas. It’s there to warn you, thank God for it.” Hugh coughed again and drank straight from the thermos.
“Someone rigged the heater,” I said after I’d regained my normal breathing. “And my light wouldn’t turn on, and the door was locked!”
“My overhead light’s not working either, so it’s probably a tripped fuse.” Hugh sounded thoughtful.
“Why were you outside my room in the middle of the night? What time is it?”
“It’s just after midnight. I’ve been awake, working. A few minutes ago I heard a pounding sound which made me think either the Ikedas were having an awfully good time or someone was meeting his maker.”
We both jumped at a new sound, three sharp knocks on the door. Before Hugh could move, the door was thrown open by Mr. Yamamoto, whose eyes widened at the sight of me sprawled on the futon.
“Excuse me for intruding, but I heard something—I was worried—”
“Rei had a wee accident, left her heater halfway on, and woke up to a bad smell,” Hugh said. “We’re airing the room. In the meantime, she’ll rest here.”
I started to shake my head, but Hugh camouflaged that by laying his hand heavily on my hair. “She’s feeling a bit grim, but it’s nothing serious.”
“I smelled gas when I came down the hall,” said Yamamoto. “It is very dangerous and also difficult for foreigners to understand.”
“Yes, you always tell me that,” Hugh was trying to close the door, but Yamamoto stayed squarely in the way. “My heater’s on now, but I promise to extinguish it when I go to sleep.”
“That’s a good idea, I am very glad Miss Shimura is safe. Do you wish me to wake the innkeepers and see if another room can be found for her? Or if it is more convenient, she can have my room and I will sleep with you, Hugh-san.”
“Are you kidding?” Hugh’s low chuckle was full of innuendo. “Do me a favor and keep things quiet. I’ll see you in the morning.”
“You had no right to say that,” I protested when Yamamoto was gone and Hugh began shaking a second futon out of the closet. “This is Japan. I’m supposed to be an innocent flower, especially when I’m traveling alone.”
“Stay where you are. You’ll have your own bed, but you shouldn’t be alone tonight.” Hugh tucked the blankets around me tightly, as if to prevent escape. “We’ll talk more about what happened tomorrow.”
I closed my eyes. I didn’t trust him one hundred percent, but I didn’t want to go back to my room. Like him or not, he was the closest thing I had to an ally.
“Do you mind if I stay on the computer a while longer? I have some work…”
I was relieved he would remain awake, but I couldn’t muster the energy to say it. Instead, I sighed, pulled the blanket over my head, and drifted into a thick, restless sleep.
When I awoke, I felt unusually warm. Hugh sat cross-legged before the small tea table, still tapping at his computer. The shji screen was pulled away from the window to reveal the sun dappling snowy mountains. It was a perfect morning.
“Didn’t you sleep?” I squinted at him, a vision
in a fresh white shirt and charcoal trousers.
“I slept from two to seven. And don’t worry, the heater wasn’t on all night. Just since I’ve been awake.”
I sat up, hugging the quilt to me. “Would you bring me a yukata?”
“There’s an extra in the closet.” Hugh didn’t seem willing to get it, so I slunk out of bed and got it.
“That’s what American girls wear to bed? Hardly feminine, but on you it’s okay.”
“This is Japanese thermal underwear, and it’s perfectly normal and practical in this weather. Why are you so dressed up?” I challenged.
“Strategy meeting at the Alpenhof. Yamamoto booked a conference room so we can troubleshoot with the guys who came up from Sendai.”
“If you’ve got so much work, you should just go back to Tokyo. What are you doing?” When I knelt behind him, he instantly switched screens to a boring menu, which made me wonder what he wanted to hide.
“Nice, hmm? One of Sendai’s products in development.”
“It looks about the same as the Toshiba I have at work.”
“There’s something quite visibly different about it, though. Can you tell?”
I looked over the computer and shrugged.
“It’s not plugged in,” Hugh said triumphantly. “That’s how I kept working last night when the power was gone.”
“Well, they all can run on batteries, right?”
“Not for more than a few hours. You can safely work on this for up to sixty hours, and the battery holds a charge for two years.”
“Wow!” I wouldn’t mind something like that for myself.
“It’s an advanced lithium ion battery called the Eterna, and it is still in development.” He stopped, then laughed. “Look how I’m opening up, sharing trade secrets even. And you say I’m not frank with you!”
“Who designed it?”
“A brilliant young engineer from Bombay. He was glad for the cash, and now we’ve got exclusive rights. None of the market leaders can touch it.”
“That’s too bad,” I mused. “Your engineer would have done better if he were able to sell it to more companies. And in turn, society would have benefited. Everyone could share the technology.”
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