The Hell Screen - [Sugawara Akitada 02]

by I. J. Parker

  “Welcome, welcome, my lord!” cried the monk, taking the bridle of Akitada’s horse. “Have you heard the news? There really was a murder the night you visited.”

  Akitada dismounted. “Yes. That is why I am here. The police in the capital have the suspect in custody, but there are some aspects of the story that trouble me and I thought I would come and take another look.”

  “Then I have won my wager!” cried the monk happily, tying Akitada’s horse to a post.

  “Wager?”

  “I bet my friend that you would return. Oh, my lord, I hope you will forgive the impertinence, but after I spoke to you, I looked up your name in the visitors’ book. Then it came to me that you must be the same Sugawara who solved all those murders not many years ago.”

  Akitada was astonished. “But how could you know about that? I have been in the far north for many years.”

  “I have a cousin, my lord, who is a schoolteacher. He was one of your students when you taught at the university and told me all about those university murders. His name is Ushimatsu.”

  Ushimatsu. Akitada instantly recalled the backward, shy, middle-aged student, the butt of his classmates’ jokes, who had humbly and cheerfully persisted in his studies. He smiled at the memory. “How is Mr. Ushimatsu?”

  “Oh, very well. He teaches at a country school and has a wife and two little sons by now. He says he owes it all to you.”

  Akitada was embarrassed. “Not at all. He was a very hardworking student who would have succeeded in any case. I am very glad to hear he is doing so well. Please give him my regards next time you see him.”

  “Thank you, my lord, I will.” The gatekeeper rubbed his hands. “Now, what may I show you?”

  “The service courtyard and the visitors’ quarters, I think. But are you at liberty to do so?”

  They had climbed the steps to the gate. Inside the gatekeeper’s office, Akitada could see a young novice sweeping the floor with a straw broom. Somewhere a bell was ringing, its sound clear and high in the still cold air.

  The gatekeeper rubbed his hands eagerly, “I am completely at your service, my lord. It’s too early for visitors. Just a moment.” He put his head in the door of his office and gave the novice instructions, then returned to Akitada’s side. “Ready, my lord! By the way, my name is Eikan.”

  Akitada thanked him, relieved that he did not have to visit the abbot again to explain his purpose for the present visit. It had been bad enough last time, when he had used the temple to get out of the rain as if it were a roadside hostel. This time his reason for coming was even more dubious. He could claim neither official standing nor that he was acting on Nagaoka’s behalf.

  Fortunately, his companion seemed to find nothing wrong in his curiosity. As they crossed the graveled courtyards of the public section of the temple, he told Akitada, “After the murder was discovered, I went back myself to look at the service yard where you thought you heard the woman screaming, but there was nothing to see. Still, you will have a better-trained eye for such things. I suppose not even the smallest drop of blood on a pebble would escape your attention?”

  “I doubt we shall find any blood. It rained hard that day, and by nighttime the ground was still soaked with water.” Akitada did not mention that the murdered woman had been strangled before her face was mutilated. Strangulation rarely left traces apart from signs of struggle, and those would long since have been obliterated by the passage of monks and the incessant raking of gravel.

  They passed through the covered galleries and reached a plain wooden door. Eikan opened it, and they stepped down into a courtyard, surrounded on three sides by low, plaster-walled buildings with thatched roofs and on the fourth by the gallery they had just left. A grayish column of smoke rose from a chimney of the central building. Long rows of firewood were stacked against its wall, and wooden kegs against the building on the right. In the middle of the courtyard stood a well, surrounded by a waist-high wall of darkened wood on a platform of large stones. A wooden bucket hung over it suspended from a winch.

  “The kitchen yard,” said Eikan. “The building across from us is the monastery kitchen. To the right are the pantry and bathhouse, and to the left a storehouse for religious objects and statues. You may have passed through it on your way to your room.”

  “Yes”—Akitada nodded—”yes, of course. I remember now. I was very tired, but you are quite right. My room must have been back that way. We passed through such a building. I recall being startled by a life-sized statue of a demon king.” He turned to gauge distance and direction. “Now that I see it in the daylight, I am more than ever convinced that it was near here, or in this service area, that a woman screamed in the middle of the night.”

  Eikan shook his head dubiously. “There is no one here at night. The last hot meal is prepared at midday. We have midnight prayers and have to be up before sunrise for meditation. The bells remind us of our duties. Perhaps the scream came from the other side, the visitors’ quarters? If, as you say, you were very tired, you might have been drowsy and confused.”

  “No. I am quite certain the sound came from here. And a murderer would hardly be deterred by a ‘no admittance’ sign. Neither, for that matter, would drunken youngsters bent on mischief.”

  “Ah, you are thinking of the actors.” Eikan nodded. “It is possible. Do you suspect one of them of having killed the lady?”

  “No. At this time I am merely wondering if someone might have seen or heard something unusual.” Akitada wondered again if Nagaoka could be the murderer, either by committing the crime himself or by hiring a killer. The police had checked the names of all the visitors that night, but Nagaoka would hardly have signed in under his own name.

  The door to the storehouse suddenly opened and a figure in monkish garb hurried out with a pail. He was walking to the well. There was something familiar and unpleasant about him. After a moment Akitada recognized the eccentric painter Noami. He had fortunately not seen them and began to lower the creaking bucket into the well.

  Akitada said urgently, “Come! I have seen enough here. Let us go to the visitors’ quarters now.”

  But the creaking had attracted his companion’s attention. He cried, “Oh, what luck! Noami is here today. You must meet the famous painter who is working on our hell screen.” Paying no attention to Akitada’s gestures, he shouted across the courtyard, “Master Noami? A moment of your time. Here’s someone you must meet.”

  The painter turned slowly to peer at them, then approached. He scowled when he recognized Akitada.

  “Lord Sugawara,” said Eikan, looking from one to the other, “this is Noami. Noami, this is the famous lord who solves all the crimes in the capital. Imagine, he has come here to investigate.

  Noami’s small, sharp eyes flicked from the monk to Akitada and back. “I have had the honor already,” he said in his strange, high voice, shrinking into his patched and stained robe.

  “Really?” cried Eikan. “Oh, that’s right. You did spend the same night here, Noami. I had forgotten. Your comings and goings are so irregular.”

  “What do you mean, ‘irregular’?” snapped the painter. “I am not a member of this monastery and consequently free to go as I please. Now, if you will excuse me, my lord, I have work to do.” He turned and went back to fill his pail from the well bucket. Picking it up, he trotted to the storehouse without another word or glance, went in, and slammed the door behind him.

  “Oh, dear,” said Eikan apologetically. “So rude! He is peculiar, but the most gifted artist of this century.”

  Akitada looked after the man thoughtfully and said, “The century is not over yet, and I cannot admire the gory scenes he seems to excel in.”

  “Oh, you have seen the hell screen. Yes, it makes me shudder, too, but that is after all the purpose. It is said that if we can just save one soul from sinful living by impressing him or her with the sufferings of their afterlife, it has served its purpose.”

  “I expect so,” said Akitada,
and turned to leave, but at the gallery he paused and looked back. “You said Noami spent the night of the murder here. Where does he sleep?”

  “Sometimes in the room where he works, sometimes in one of the empty monks’ cells. He used to be a monk, you know.”

  “Used to be? Did he renounce his vows, or was he dismissed for improprieties?”

  Eikan spread his hands. “Nobody seems to know, my lord.” He grinned suddenly. “And believe me, we have tried to find out. Though I shouldn’t say it, life has a certain sameness to it day after day in a monastery. You have no idea how interested everybody is in the murder. The abbot has already assigned three penitential meditations to stop such worldly concerns. For those we stay up all night, kneeling on the hard floor, our backs straight as pine trees. If we drowse off or slouch, we are struck with a bamboo cane by the hall steward. But even that has not stopped the young monks from whispering about it.”

  “Under those circumstances I feel guilty asking your help.”

  They looked at each other. Then Eikan said, “Not at all, my lord. It is my duty to aid in the investigation.” They smiled at each other in complete understanding.

  The accommodations for lay visitors to the temple were in the southeastern corner of the temple grounds. Akitada’s own room, thanks to his rank and the abbot’s hospitality, had been in the monastery proper.

  They entered the visitors’ courtyard through a small gate. The buildings of the quadrangle resembled monks’ cells. A rectangular courtyard with a few pine trees was enclosed by one-storied buildings, two long wings to either side and a shorter one closing off the end. Many doors led to rooms accessible from a veranda which passed around the quadrangle. Every six doors or so, steps led down to the courtyard, where two young monks were busy with chores.

  Eikan turned to the right and they walked along the veranda until he stopped before one of the doors.

  “This is the room which was given to Mrs. Nagaoka’s brother-in-law,” he told Akitada.

  The door was not latched, and he merely pushed it open on an empty room. It literally held nothing, not so much as a clothes chest. The bare space was only ten feet deep and wide, perhaps to fit the monastic ideal of the ten-foot-square hermit’s hut, and had a floor of plain boards. The rough wooden walls, decorated with the scribbles or drawings of generations of pilgrims, had only two openings, the door and one small window in the back wall. As accommodation it was hardly luxurious.

  “Have they removed the furnishings?” asked Akitada, astonished.

  “No. All the rooms are like this. Bedding and a lamp are provided if there are guests. On cold nights also a brazier of coals. And, of course, water and a simple vegetarian meal. All of those things, except for the brazier, were left for the gentleman.” Eikan paused, clearing his throat meaningfully. “He did not make any use of them.”

  “Oh?” Akitada noted a coy expression on Eikan’s face.

  “It is one of those facts, my lord, which has filled the younger monks’ minds with conjectures of a worldly nature and imposed the penitential meditations on them.” Eikan winked with a straight face.

  Akitada almost laughed aloud. He was beginning to like his companion. “You are suggesting that the lady’s brother-in-law joined her in her quarters soon after their arrival. What about his luggage?”

  “Oh, he left that behind, money and all.”

  Akitada’s brows shot up. “All but his sword,” he murmured thoughtfully.

  “Ah,” cried Eikan, rubbing his hands. “I follow your thinking, my lord. You believe that he had already made up his mind to murder the poor lady and proceeded immediately to her room, taking his sword along?”

  “That is one explanation.”

  “But that means that he was not bent on seducing his brother’s wife, as most of us have assumed. He did not kill her because she spurned his advances?”

  “It would seem unlikely that he would take his sword on an errand of love.”

  “A brilliant deduction, my lord.” Eikan eyed Akitada with admiration. “I am willing to wager that the police have not thought of that. They kept asking if anyone had noticed improper behavior between the two.”

  Not being in Kobe’s confidence, Akitada could not pursue the subject. He asked instead, “Who discovered the crime?”

  “One of the novices. His name is Ancho. The novices are assigned to cleaning duties in the guest quarters. Ancho and Sosei had the duty that week. I made a note of it and questioned Ancho after I discovered your identity, my lord, just in case you should return and ask me this question.”

  Akitada thanked him gravely.

  “It is a pleasure to be of service. In any case, Ancho and Sosei started their duties after the morning lecture. That is well after the hour of the dragon, when most guests have risen and are at their devotions or have departed. Ancho knocked at the lady’s door, and when there was no answer, he assumed the room was empty and used his special key. He was horrified to find the bloody corpse of a woman and the lifeless body of a man. Being young, he went screaming for help. Sosei came from another room and looked. He, too, ran, but he had the sense to get a senior monk from the monastery. Ancho, confused, stayed in the courtyard within sight of the room. He saw a few guests gathering to peer into the room until some of the senior monks arrived. It was only then that someone noticed the man was alive and merely in a drunken stupor. They tied him up, and the prior sent for the capital police.”

  “Did the man sleep through all this commotion?”

  “It took the police several hours to get here. He woke up in the meantime and had to be restrained. The monks got more ropes and sat on him when he got violent. The police felt it proved his guilt.”

  Akitada had no trouble picturing the scene. Nagaoka’s brother, Kojiro, woken up by a rude shaking, and, while still dazed with the aftereffects of drink, tied up by a group of monks, would have panicked. He nodded and said, “I think I should like to see that room next.”

  They walked along the veranda to the short wing of cells.

  “This is where the women stay,” Eikan said. “The male actors occupied rooms across from this wing. It seemed better to separate them. The mind is supposed to be pure when preparing for worship.”

  Akitada grunted somewhat disrespectfully. Eikan ignored it and threw open another door on a room identical to the last one. Akitada stepped in and looked around. The floorboards had been scrubbed, of course, and there would not have been much blood in any case. Finding nothing out of the ordinary, he turned his attention to the door. There was a latch on the inside which could be lifted from the outside only by a special key inserted through a small hole. Akitada asked, “Who has keys for this lock?”

  “There are only two. They are kept in the guest prefect’s office. Only the novices assigned to cleaning duties carry them. They are issued keys on the morning of their duties by the work supervisor, and they return them to him when they are done. Empty rooms generally are not locked.”

  “I see. Do you suppose I could have a word with this Ancho?”

  “Nothing easier. He’s outside.”

  They stepped out onto the veranda, and looked toward a young monk who was raking the gravel at the end of the courtyard.

  Eikan put his hands to his mouth and shouted, “Ancho.” The young monk dropped his bamboo rake and came running.

  “Ancho,” said Eikan, “this is the great lord I mentioned to you. He has come to investigate the murder and has a few questions for you.”

  Ancho’s rosy cheeks, flushed by the cold air or his labors, paled a little and he cast a fearful look toward the open door. “I don’t know,” he said nervously. “Master Genno has forbidden us to think about such things. It is very difficult, but I have endeavored to obey.”

  “Never mind,” said Eikan. “This is a special situation. You know His Reverence has told us to cooperate fully with the authorities.”

  Seeing the young man’s uneasiness, Akitada said soothingly, “I will be as quick as I ca
n. I am sure you must find all this upsetting.”

  Ancho nodded gratefully. He looked like a bright youngster, not much more than eighteen, Akitada guessed.

  “Well, then, Ancho, are you certain that the door to this room was locked when you came to clean the room?”

  “Yes. When there was no answer to my knocking, I pushed against it. Usually the guests leave the door unlatched when they leave. I knocked again, and when there was again no answer, I inserted my key and tripped the latch.”

  “May I see the key, please?”

  Ancho exchanged a glance with Eikan—who nodded firmly—and handed over a thin metal gadget he carried tied to the rope around his waist.

  The key was peculiarly shaped, and Akitada saw immediately that it was made especially for this kind of latch. He inserted it into the hole and heard the small click as the latch moved. A slight twist released it again. Satisfied that only an expert thief, and one who had come prepared, would be able to unlock the door without this special key, Akitada returned it to the young monk.