by Nick Tanner
‘Possibly.'
‘Possibly - sir!'
‘Possibly, sir! Gomenasai!'
Sakamoto continued to stare into the eyes of the young woman. She seemed keen enough but equally he could see that she was completely wet behind the ears. Probably why Saito had kept her on the filing!
'Okay Junsa. That will be all but er... If anything does crop up concerning the Yakuza you'll be sure to tell me. Anything concerning them needs to go across my desk. You understand?'
'I understand, sir.'
'Good. I'm glad we had this little chat. Oh… and you might want to pass onto Inspector Saito that I suspect that we’ll have this case wrapped up fairly soon. I’m very confident of that – and it won’t involve any crackpot theories involving the Yoshihara! Of that you can be assured.’
‘Yes, sir!’
‘It was good to have met you.'
He left immediately leaving Junsa Saito experiencing a dead chill bristle the hairs on her back. It was a very unpleasant sensation indeed.
She also felt that Inspector Sakamoto had the look of a very smug man – a very smug man indeed!
46 - In which Inspector Saito circles and dives and where Watanabe wriggles and escapes.
Tuesday 4th January 5:10pm
Rather than returning to Yokohama Sergeant Mori and Inspector Saito had decided to take some early refreshment before trying once more to interview Watanabe. This time they opted for the more formal approach, had telephoned that they would be arriving and that they expected Watanabe to be present.
On coming face to face with Watanabe for the first time Mori immediately noticed that he was not as tall as he’d expected but there was something in his bearing that suggested a man of influence and this wasn’t just on account of the expensive suit. Even before he’d opened his mouth, like the spread of scented air, the room around them suddenly appeared to be filled with his confident charisma. Mori couldn’t tell if he’d bestowed this charisma upon Watanabe or if he genuinely possessed it, but be that as it may, he couldn’t help but be impressed. He found himself just wanting to agree with whatever he suggested.
Inspector Saito was more certain and less subordinate in his analysis. He hadn’t failed to notice Watanabe pulling nervously at his fingers as he’d entered the room and the warm welcome and overly polite introductions were sure signs that he was attempting to hide an unwelcome truth.
‘I’m not sure how I can help you.’ Watanabe had begun, smiling graciously.
‘We beg to differ,’ replied Inspector Saito bowing deeply, ‘and we appreciate you sparing the time to see us. I’m sure you must be very busy.’
‘Well, yes, I am actually-’
‘But none-the-less we’d appreciate your help with our enquiries. There are a few delicate matters that we need to tidy up and we’re hoping you can help.’
‘I’ll do everything I can. Are you in any pain by the way?’ Watanabe pointed towards Saito’s nose.
‘This, yes, well, yes, I’m fine thank you,’ mumbled Saito becoming irritated that whenever he met someone new it was invariably the first thing they now asked him.
‘I’ll do what I can to help,’ said Watanabe again, but this time with vacillation written undeniably within.
Mori had been quick to alter his initial opinion of Watanabe and once the ‘spray’ of charisma had settled quickly into the carpet he’d considered Watanabe’s approach to be altogether overly-supercilious. Whatever apprehensive feelings he might have experienced in the outer office had now happily abandoned him. He didn’t want to jump the gun but he now viewed Watanabe in the same light that he viewed every other suspect and so it was with his own feelings of superior contempt that he settled himself into the seat he’d been offered – contempt that was multiplied when he looked down on the smart suit, the plush office and the type of man who no-doubt waltzed through life assuming that everyone would bow and scrape before them and that somehow the rule of law didn’t apply to them due to their lofty status.
‘I understand that you’ve been under some pressure, recently,’ began Inspector Saito.
Watanabe couldn’t avoid his eye flinching. ‘I beg your pardon?’
‘Scandals in the paper-’
‘W-what’s that got to do with anything? Is it relevant to your investigation?’ This time Watanabe couldn’t avoid his reply being tinged with irritation.
Saito smiled. ‘Not particularly. I suspect politics is an unforgiving business. And I suppose nagging journalists and nagging police Inspectors don’t help.’
‘Politics is an unforgiving business Inspector. You are quite right and I for one don’t appreciate it when what I genuinely want to achieve, for the good of the country, is derailed by irrelevant and inaccurate reporting in the press and equally so by staff who fail to work for the good of the faction. Kinjo knew that, too.’
‘Kinjo?’
‘My X-Chief of staff! I had to sack him over his affair.’
‘His affair?’
‘I thought you’d said that you’d read the papers Inspector?’
‘Well-’
‘The opposition are always quick to pick at any scab and at any weakness and it’s my business as leader of my faction to ensure that we avoid such issues – actually it was Kinjo’s job, too, which is why he had to go… On a personal level I am of course both disappointed and devastated but it doesn’t do to let one’s feelings dominate one’s thinking, does it?’
‘Quite,’ agreed Saito looking at his feet. ‘But getting on to the real matter at hand… We’re here to clarify what you know about two visitors that we believe came here last Thursday evening – Ozawa Kenji san and Yamada Eri san, from Niigata Kyubin.’
‘I have many visitors, Inspector, what of them?’
‘Yamada Eri was murdered not long after leaving this office.’
‘Ah yes. Yes, very sad. And what has that got to do with me?’
'You can confirm that they were here?'
Reluctantly, it seemed, Watanabe agreed.
‘I’d like you to tell me what happened at that meeting and what time Yamada san left here?’
‘I hardly think that’s relevant.’
‘That’s for me to decide, if you don’t mind,’ replied Saito with some severity. ‘Usually it’s the seemingly minor or irrelevant details in a case that often end up in unlocking the door.’
Watanabe appeared to be hardly mollified but condescended to answer the question all the same. ‘If I recall there isn’t much to say. We had a brief discussion. Ozawa san was keen to donate to our political fund for which I was grateful. We discussed his business – logistics, I understand and aside from exchanging a few pleasantries, that was the long and the short of it. In a busy day it was a meeting of minor significance, in fact I was quite irritated with Kinjo san for setting it up in the first place.’
‘And what time did the meeting conclude?’
‘Around seven twenty, I think.’
‘You can’t be more precise?’
‘I’m afraid not. I wasn’t really watching the time that closely. At eight o’clock, however, I was at a session in the Diet – the vote on the Self-defence Forces. You’ll have heard about that, of course.’
‘Of course!’
Inspector Saito was not entirely disappointed at what he was hearing, he had almost anticipated it, but still, he had hoped for a little more to go on. If Watanabe was secure within the Diet building with hundreds being able to vouch for his presence then he was most surely not their man. It didn’t explain the absence of the security camera footage, so Saito attempted to go down that path.
‘I couldn’t tell you,’ answered Watanabe to the question of the missing footage. ‘You’ll need to talk to the security guards, I’m afraid. I don’t have anything to do with them.’
‘But you agree it looks suspicious.’
‘Indeed I do and now that you’ve brought this to my attention I too, will have to carry out my own investigation.’
‘
But you agree it looks suspicious. It looks entirely like someone might have something to hide.’
‘I would have to agree.’
‘And that person could be you!’ Saito looked him straight in the eye.’
‘Except I have nothing to hide, Inspector – as I’ve just told you.’
‘Quite.’ Saito pressed his hands together and rubbed them up and down. ‘One last thing, sir, if you don’t mind? Given that you’ve got nothing to hide.’
‘Sure, no problem, but then, I’m afraid you’ll have to go,’ Watanabe smiled courteously in their direction. ‘I have an important meeting in a moment.’
‘I’ll be direct then, sir. Did you have sex with Yamada Eri san last Thursday night?’
Watanabe almost spat out the water he was drinking.
‘I beg your pardon?’
‘I think you heard me, sir.’
‘I’ve had enough of your impertinence Inspector.’ Watanabe turned unexpectedly sharply on Saito. ‘Now I’ve answered your questions as honestly as I can and what I have said is all I can recall. I don’t know what kind of job you think I do Inspector but it doesn’t involve the kind of activity that seems to revolve around your sordid little mind.’
‘She had sex with someone that evening and we believe it to be you!’ replied Saito firmly, refusing to relent his ground.
‘I’d like you to leave now.’
‘Not just sex – but rough sex – rape!’
‘I-’
‘The sort of act that a politician in an unforgiving business, with media and opposition keen to pick at any scab and any weakness might want to ensure remained a secret and who might also want to ensure that any evidence of would be quickly disposed of. Now how does that sound?’
‘It sounds quite preposterous!’
‘Does it?’
‘And anyway-’
‘Yes?’
‘Just assuming that I did have sex with that woman, which I deny by the way, before you start thinking… Just assuming I did, firstly I see no crime in that activity and secondly as I’ve already told you after concluding the meeting with Ozawa I left here to attend the session in the Diet. I had nothing what-so-ever to do with that poor woman’s murder. Now, I will ask you to leave Inspector before I lose my temper and before I contact your superiors with stories of your unnecessary harassment. Is that clear?’
‘Might I remind you that rape is a crime, sir.’
‘Thank you Inspector – good bye.’
Inspector Saito could think of nothing more he could say and so exited through the door that had been opened by Watanabe. It was an unsatisfactory end to the interview. Whether he liked it or not he was back to square one, added to which he was sure that he’d be frog-marched in front of the Chief Super, or suits of an even higher order, and be made to explain his assertions – assertions that now appeared to be groundless – at least as far as murder was concerned.
He said nothing as he stood in the elevator on the way down and Mori knew better than to disturb him. He was as equally despondent as his superior.
They walked quickly through the foyer, ignoring the vacant and tear stained face of Miyazaki san as they went.
It was only when they were outside the building that they heard the sound of hurrying steps behind them. They turned and saw the flushed and eager face of a man.
‘Inspector,’ he shouted. ‘I’ve something you ought to know.’
‘Really… and who are you exactly?’
‘I’m Mitsui – I’m a staff member of the Watanabe faction, well I was until this afternoon.’
‘A staff member?’
‘That’s right.’
Inspector Saito turned in his tracks. ‘And are you able to account for Watanabe san’s movements?’
‘Usually.’
'And to your knowledge do you know if Watanabe would have been at a Diet session late last Thursday?'
'I doubt it, sir.'
'You seem pretty sure.'
'I'm almost certain. I tried to locate him at the Diet building myself but I couldn't find him anywhere.'
'Really?'
'Really!'
‘Listen! We might have some work for you,’ said Saito smiling and putting his arm around Mitsui. ‘Perhaps we need to find a convenient bar to hear more of your story.’
It was always good to have a man on the inside.
47 - In which the final clinching piece of evidence is discovered
Tuesday 4th January 5:43pm
It had been a painstaking job to work through the now numerous plastic bags containing samples of Hideki Yamada’s clothing and it seemed, at least to forensic scientist Satoshi Otsuba, that the faster he worked the larger the pile became. Be that as it may he persevered with his task working as steadily and methodically as he could.
The clinical environment of the lab was a sealed environment but not just in terms of biology and chemistry. Little of what went on in the investigations was ever transmitted to the forensic team. They remained therefore quite literally objective, dictated solely by what the pure science was telling them.
Otsuba san opened up what he hoped would be the last bag containing one of Hideki Yamada’s ties. At a first glance it appeared different to the others he’d been handling. For one thing the tie appeared to be of a different quality. Most of the others, if not all of the others had been of a quite fine silk, purchased from a variety of high-class concessions. The tie he now had in his hand, at first touch, felt to be of a lot lower quality. It also appeared stretched and taught whereas the others had lain quite flat.
It was with a keener interest therefore that he examined the tie a lot more closely and could see quite clearly that at its centre was a definite area of trauma to the material. Breathing harder now he first scanned over it with his magnifying glass and then with a lot more precision with his microscope.
Fifteen minutes later he was quite readily able to confirm that the tie had been used to knot a stone within it – at its centre, and that more conclusively than that, the same tie had traces of skin quite clearly upon its surface.
Without doubt this was the murder weapon that Inspector Sakamoto and his team had been searching tirelessly for.
48 - In which a phone call precipitates some traditional action in the samurai mould
Tuesday 4th January 10:43pm
Kenta Fujiwara stood unbalanced, tottering to and fro, with his shirt removed, attempting to admire his back tattoo in the mirror behind him. It wasn’t something he did often nor out of vanity, but more out of an act of dogged reassurance. Usually this was a simple act of merely turning his head, but saturated in alcohol he drunkenly swayed like a tree in a typhoon.
In complete contrast to the sakazuki-goto the tattooing had been excruciating – a near mutilation, as tradition had dictated that it be carried out with a bamboo needle, something that was at least five times as painful as any tattoo gun. The work had taken a number of years and dozens of sessions to complete but to have his back adorned with a master's work was more than enough to earn the respect of his peers.
That’s what he had hoped.
His red, swollen eyes traced the intricacies of the dragon motif getting lost in the mottled colours of the dark blue and green. In times of doubt scanning his tattoo in such a way assisted in reminding him of the hard work he had put in and his commitment to the cause, but he desperately needed to re-discover that commitment – quickly, and he so urgently needed to regain the respect of his peers. Like rice slipping through a hole in the sack then down cracks in the floor, both commitment and respect were scattering fast.
The plans that he’d had were reaping scant reward. Rumi Park was still missing and as for the other woman… and Junko Iida… well… he no longer wanted to think about it.
The brash ringing tone of his mobile phone cut through his troubled thoughts.
‘Moshi Moshi’
‘Fujiwara?’
‘Yes.’
‘You’re required at Headq
uarters.’
‘What? Now?’
‘Ima! Immediately.’
The phone went dead.
Twenty-five minutes later he cautiously entered the spacious and well appointed office building in central Yokohama, branch office of the Yoshihara Yakuza.
Unlike other criminal organisations that tended to hide in the dark, the Yoshihara Yakuza were open about their existence and their business and had offices open to the public, complete with signs out front proclaiming their name and membership lists made available for scrutiny.