The Killing Time

by The Killing Time (retail) (epub)

  He levered himself up from the floor, sitting upright with his back to the wall. He was already panting, the exertion of simple movement exhausting him. Why was he so tired?

  The bucket was full to the brim with a clear liquid. He licked his chapped lips with a dry tongue. Could he drink the liquid? Was it water? Or something else?

  He shuffled across to the bucket and leant over.

  No smell. It looked clean.

  He licked his lips once more. The ache of thirst seared though his body. He shifted onto his knees and bent over the bucket, plunging his face into the clear liquid. The coolness washed over his skin. He sucked in a mouthful through his parched lips, and swallowed.

  It was water.

  He lapped up more and more of it, like a dog who hadn’t drunk for a week. The water stung his chapped lips but he didn’t care. He could feel it washing through his body, reviving his exhausted limbs.

  He would never moan or complain again. His father was right. When you had nothing, the simplest pleasure became a luxury.

  He lifted his face out of the bucket, letting the water drip onto his body. Must keep some. Perhaps there will be no more.

  It was then that he noticed the Chinese characters scratched into the dirty plaster above the bucket.

  The words were the same as in Japanese kanji, and they filled him with dread.

  Who had scratched Save me on the wall?

  50

  The car had a large dent in the side where the driver’s door and the back door joined.

  ‘Another car must have hit them at speed, sir.’

  ‘That much is obvious, Strachan.’

  They were in a small alley off Avenue Joffre, the car parked in a lay-by. Tanaka had directed them here after the meeting with Colonel Ihanaga. He hadn’t said a word for the whole journey as Strachan drove, staring out of the window and ignoring the two detectives.

  As they examined the car, Tanaka stood to one side, his arms folded across his chest.

  Danilov bent over to look through the window. ‘The killer must have been close when he shot the driver. See here.’ He pointed with a pencil taken from his top pocket. ‘Gunpowder residue on the glass.’

  He stepped back one foot from the car, forming a gun shape with his right hand and sighting down his fingers at the driver’s seat. ‘Not a tall man, our killer. He shot the driver once through the forehead.’

  ‘He could have bent down, sir.’

  ‘And shoot so accurately? Not likely, Strachan, particularly if he was walking.’

  ‘One of the gang is short, sir. The teacher told us.’

  ‘The colonel also said a man with a scar took his son.’

  ‘Shall I get the fingerprint boys to dust the glass and the door ledge? He may have touched it as he fired.’

  ‘Many people have touched this car since the attack, but do it, we may get lucky.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  Danilov walked round to the front of the car, looking at the bonnet and staring through the windscreen. He pointed to the two thin metal poles standing out from the front bumpers. ‘I presume Japanese flags were flying from these?’

  Tanaka nodded. ‘The colonel is proud to display the flag of the emperor on his car.’

  ‘But they were removed after the accident?’

  ‘Of course, otherwise they might have been stolen.’

  ‘Or defaced,’ Danilov added.

  Tanaka remained silent.

  Danilov bent down and checked the front tyres before continuing to the passenger side and staring through the rear door.

  ‘The boy was sitting in the back?’ He directed his question at Tanaka.

  ‘He is the son of a colonel; of course he sat in the rear seat.’

  Clothes were still scattered all over the back of the car. The small size of the military uniform gave it a playful, almost whimsical feeling. Like something from the Tchaikovsky ballet The Nutcracker. The bag in which they had once been neatly packed lay open and useless on the floor.

  ‘The kidnapper must have grabbed the boy after opening this door. Get the technicians to check here too.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  Danilov noticed blood spatters on the uniform. ‘The boy must have picked up his uniform after it fell on the floor. What sort of boy worries about his uniform when he has just been in an accident?’ he said under his breath.

  ‘The son of a soldier,’ answered Tanaka

  Danilov began rolling a cigarette. ‘We’re finished here. Can you show us the accident scene?’

  Tanaka didn’t answer, but walked down the alley towards the main road.

  Danilov was joined by Strachan. ‘Not a happy man, sir.’

  ‘He probably thinks this is a waste of time, but we know better.’

  It was one of Danilov’s beliefs that understanding the scene of a crime was key to solving the crime itself. None of the other detectives in the squad, except Strachan, shared this view.

  They reached the main road. Tanaka pointed to a spot just past the junction where another alley joined the road. ‘The kidnapper’s car came out of this alley and crashed into the colonel’s.’

  ‘What did the witnesses say?’

  ‘Not a lot. By the time we arrived, most had disappeared.’

  ‘Didn’t the French police question people?’

  ‘Apparently not, Inspector. We were able to speak to a few people living nearby, but they were uncommunicative, surly.’

  Danilov had no need to point out the reason to Tanaka.

  They were standing at the corner of Avenue Joffre and Rue Cardinal Mercier. Danilov spun slowly through 360 degrees. Tall buildings overlooked the accident; somebody must have seen it happen. In addition, pedestrians crowded onto the pavement, most window-shopping, a few actually buying. Why had nobody been questioned?

  ‘An open place to carry out a kidnapping. It’s almost as if the gang wanted people to see the crime.’

  Tanaka folded his arms across his chest. ‘And yet there were no witnesses.’

  ‘Oh, everybody saw and understood what was happening.’ Danilov shrugged his shoulders in a gesture betraying his Russian origins, ‘But nobody witnessed anything.’

  ‘Did the French Sûreté question anybody?’ asked Strachan.

  ‘Not that I know,’ replied Tanaka. ‘By the time I reached here, the car had been moved to the side of the road, the traffic flowing past it as if nothing had happened.’

  ‘Get on to the French police, Strachan. Find out what they know.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  Across the road, a blind beggar, complete with red enamel collecting box, matching red cap and white cane, stared at Danilov, then began to collect his things and hurried away.

  ‘Come with me, Strachan.’

  Danilov stepped off the kerb into the road, his hand held out in front of him, palm pointing towards the onrushing cars. The nearest one jammed on its brakes and screeched to a halt, stopping inches away from the inspector. ‘Keep the cars away, will you? I need to check something.’

  Strachan held up both hands, trying to remember all the traffic signals he had learnt at police training school. The other lanes screeched to a halt as Danilov walked across the road slowly, his eyes looking down at the surface.

  Strachan kept his hands aloft, walking across the front of the cars, stopping them from edging forward. A smug smile had appeared on Tanaka’s face.

  Danilov continued to look down at the road, apparently searching for something.

  The traffic began to honk loudly, creating an orchestra of motor horns; the high-pitched squeak of the Ford Model Ts, the moan of the Renaults and the bellow of the Packards combined to make a modern rhapsody of impatience.

  The young detective sergeant glanced over his shoulder. ‘I don’t think I can hold them back much longer, sir.’

  ‘I’ve finished now.’

  As Strachan lowered his hands, the traffic raced past him, eager to get on with its business. The inspector sauntered of
f the road, cars passing within inches of his thin body.

  ‘What was all that about, Inspector?’ asked Tanaka, still smiling.

  ‘There are no tyre marks on the street. The kidnappers’ car made no attempt to brake.’

  Tanaka snorted. ‘Of course it didn’t. It was trying to crash into the colonel’s car.’

  Danilov ran his fingers through his thinning hair. ‘Was the usual driver behind the wheel?’

  ‘Corporal Mamuchi, same as always; the boy liked him.’

  ‘And was this the usual route taken by the car on its way to school?’

  Tanaka’s mouth opened slightly and he paused before finally answering. ‘No, it wasn’t. We changed the route to avoid the roadblocks set up by the British. We didn’t want to inconvenience the colonel’s son.’

  ‘And when did you make these changes?’

  ‘After the eighteenth. After the monk… What are you getting at, Inspector?’

  Danilov turned and pointed to the traffic. ‘Look how busy it is. Yet the kidnapper’s car came straight out of the alley and into the side of the colonel’s car without stopping or braking.’

  ‘So? As I said, they wanted to hit his car.’

  ‘That’s exactly the point. The kidnappers knew the route and the time the car would arrive here. They were waiting for it.’

  51

  The light was still on when he woke up.

  He shook his head and shifted the position of his hands, turning onto his front. His arms were aching from the shoulder down. A constant dull throb.

  How long had he been asleep?

  He stared up at the bare bulb and instantly looked away as the light seared his eyes. He remembered the last time he was awake. Drinking desperately from the bucket, trying to salve the thirst consuming his body. Half an hour later feeling the inevitable pain in his bladder; trying to hold it in as long as he could before finally giving up and shuffling over to the corner; the blessed relief as the warm liquid trickled down his leg onto the floor.

  He could see and smell the piss now. It was still there in the corner, shining in the light. A thin stream had trickled toward the centre of the room before meeting an indentation in the rough surface of the floor and pooling there, unable to go any further.

  Would his father be ashamed of him?

  Was he not strong enough?

  For the first time, a sob racked his thin body. The colonel must be looking for him by now. He would have found the wreck of the car, discovered the dead body of Corporal Mamuchi. He will know I am missing and the Chinese man took me.

  Would his father save him?

  He looked across at the characters etched into the plaster on the wall.

  Save me.

  Who had written it? Were they saved? What happened to them?

  He shifted position again, scanning the walls for any more messages.

  Nothing.

  Just the single message above the bucket.

  His mouth was dry. He tried to swallow but couldn’t. There was no saliva there.

  Why was he so thirsty?

  And then he felt the first pangs of hunger. When had he last eaten? He remembered sitting down with Tanaka for breakfast, leaving the fish and rice in his bowl and rushing off to school with Corporal Manuchi. How he wished he had finished his meal. Would they ever feed him?

  As if they could read his mind, he heard a noise outside the door of the cell. A faint sound like something wooden being scraped across the back of the door. This was followed by the clunk of wood being laid against the wall. Then the door slowly began to open and the man with the scar appeared.

  ‘I hope our guest slept well,’ he said in bad Japanese.

  Ryuchi didn’t answer.

  The man wrinkled his nostrils. ‘I see you’ve pissed yourself. Couldn’t hold it in, huh? Don’t worry, you won’t notice the smell after a while. Here’s a bucket if you feel the need again.’ He threw another wooden bucket into the cell; it landed at Ryuchi’s feet. ‘Don’t miss, though. I’m not going to clean up after you.’

  Ryuchi noticed two other men in the background. A small one, almost like a dwarf, and another, young, a lopsided leer smeared across his face.

  ‘Who are you? What do you want with me? When my father—’

  ‘When your father finds us, he will have us killed,’ the man with the scar interrupted, chuckling to himself. ‘But he’s not going to find us, little tiger. He’s never going to find us.’

  The young one stepped into the cell and placed a bowl of rice with some chunks of pork on the floor in front of Ryuchi, leaving a pair of chopsticks on the dirty ground next to the bowl.

  The aroma of rice and the rich, oily fattiness of the pork made his mouth water.

  The man with the scar pulled out a small knife with a curved blade and held it in front of the boy’s eyes. ‘See this. I bought it off a French sailor down in the docks. Twelve I was. It cost me three dollars.’ He chuckled again. ‘Well, it cost me three dollars for five minutes, because that’s how long the sailor kept my money before I slit his throat.’ He turned the blade so it caught the light from the bare bulb. ‘Easy to keep sharp. Slides into flesh as effortlessly as a man slides into a woman, with twice the pleasure. Look at it carefully, boy. You give me any trouble and you will taste the beauty of its touch. Do you understand me?’

  Ryuchi stared at the curved blade, his eyes transfixed by the light as it shone off the sharp edge.

  ‘I said do you understand me, boy.’

  Ryuchi nodded once.

  The knife moved with the speed of light, arching over his head and down to his back. Ryuchi expected to feel the sharp pain as it entered his body and pierced his kidneys.

  Instead there was a tug and his hands drifted apart, the cord no longer binding them tightly. A twinge of pain shot through his shoulders as they were released. He brought his hands around in front of him, rubbing them together, desperately trying to put feeling back into the dead fingers. It was a strange sensation: he could see his hands touching and rubbing each other but he could feel nothing. It was as if a stranger’s hands were twisting and weaving in front of him. Nothing to do with him or his body.

  ‘Don’t worry, boy, give them ten minutes and they’ll be back to normal. You’re lucky. I kept one man tied tighter than you for two months. When we let him go, they had to cut his hands off. Turned out well for him in the end, though: made a living as a beggar. You can still see him down on Peking Road in his spot outside the Jardine Matheson offices. I often drop a few coins into his box. He always says thank you.’

  The man folded the knife back into its clasp and put it in his right-hand pocket. ‘We’ll leave you now to eat in peace.’ He looked around the cell. ‘Enjoy yourself in our luxurious hotel suite, and don’t do anything I wouldn’t do.’

  He laughed at his own joke and ushered the other two men out of the cell, closing the door behind him. Ryuchi heard the same sound of wood against wood, followed by footsteps slowly receding into the distance.

  He was alone again.

  All alone.

  The chopsticks lay next to the bowl of rice and fatty pork. Looking at the two pieces of bamboo, Ryuchi smiled.

  At last, he had a weapon.

  52

  ‘What are you suggesting, Danilov?’

  ‘I’m not suggesting anything. If the route was changed, somebody must have informed the kidnappers. Who knew the route?’

  Captain Tanaka eyed Danilov like he was something he had found on the bottom of his highly polished shoes. ‘Myself, Colonel Ihanaga and, obviously, Corporal Mamuchi.’

  ‘And now the corporal is dead. Dead men tell no tales.’

  ‘Are you saying a Japanese soldier betrayed his country to some Chinese bandit?’

  ‘It looks that way.’

  Tanaka looked at his watch. ‘I believe we are finished here, Inspector. May I remind you the boy has been missing for five hours already.’

  Danilov took another look at the scene. The car
s still rushed past in a haze of exhaust. The hawkers still shouted the excellence of their wares. A group of old men were slamming their mah-jong tiles onto a table. The blind beggar had vanished.

  ‘I am acutely aware that time has passed.’ He looked up at the surrounding buildings. ‘It’s too late to question these people and we don’t have the resources. I doubt if anyone will admit to being a witness to a kidnapping involving a Japanese car.’

  The Japanese officer sniffed. ‘Personally, I would take a company of marines and raze the place to the ground, shooting every tenth person until somebody talked.’

  ‘The Japanese way of investigating a crime?’

  ‘I must admit it is rather brutal, but extremely effective, Inspector. You should try it.’

  Danilov’s mind immediately flashed back to the pogroms of 1905 against the Jews. Whole villages burnt out, people slaughtered, crops destroyed, lives devastated. All because somebody had to be blamed for defeat in a war against the very people with whom he was now working. ‘Such brutality only breeds brutality. A detective must gain the trust of people before they will talk to him.’

  ‘We can never trust these people.’

  ‘It doesn’t surprise me. Trust requires people to respect each other.’

  ‘Do you require my services any more, Inspector? Or would you prefer I stay so you can lecture me?’

  ‘No, we have finished here.’

  ‘Please contact me this evening. I must keep the colonel informed of your progress.’ He paused for a moment, stroking his thin moustache. ‘Or lack of it.’

  ‘I will call you as soon as I have any news.’

  Tanaka saluted and walked away to where a car was waiting, blocking the traffic.

  ‘A right piece of work, Inspector.’

  ‘A soldier, Strachan, with a soldier’s turn of mind. They always make the worst policemen.’

  ‘What next, sir?’

  Danilov glanced across to where the blind man had been standing, a choice begging spot now empty.

  ‘We need to see an old friend.’

  53

  ‘I was wondering when you’d show up, Inspector Danilov.’