Murder in the Crooked House

by Soji Shimada

  These were the four topics I brought up in my conversation with Ushikoshi. I didn’t tell him, but there was one more outrageous theory going through my mind about the locked rooms. In the cases of Room 14 and Room 13, in particular, a murder seemed to have been ruled out. So instead, was it somehow possible that the victims had seen something through the hole in the wall, something that had terrified them enough to stick a knife in themselves—some kind of projected image—or perhaps they might even have heard a sound…

  But this theory seemed hardly possible. The walls of the rooms had been torn apart and searched. There were no film projectors or speakers concealed inside. In fact, there was no kind of electronic or computerized device anywhere in the house.

  On the 3rd of January, a team of five or six workmen arrived to fix the mess that the detectives had made of the walls and ceilings. The door of Room 10 had already been mended, but now the doors of 13 and 14 were also restored. This meant that Kiyoshi and I were finally permitted to move out of Room 10 and into Room 13.

  It was almost midday on the 3rd. Uniformed police officers arrived with Golem’s head. The forensics lab had apparently completed their analysis. Kiyoshi took delivery of the head and carried it up to Room 3 to reunite it with its body. He even replaced the cowboy hat.

  Okuma and Ushikoshi were anxious to hear the reports of the latest forensic investigations, but there was no good news. The hunting knives, the string, the cord were nothing special. Any of them could have been purchased at any shop anywhere in the country.

  By the afternoon of the 3rd, the weather suddenly took a turn for the worse and heavy snow began to fall. By 2 p.m. it was so dark and gloomy inside the house that it felt like evening. Another blizzard was surely on its way. The murder mystery that was playing out at the eccentric mansion on the northern tip of Japan appeared to be heading towards its climactic scene.

  Before we reach the climax, I should record two things. One is that around sunset on the 3rd, Kumi Aikura insisted that she could hear the sound of someone breathing somewhere in the ceiling of her room. And a half-crazed Hatsue Kanai reported seeing the vague outline of a dead body standing outside in the swirling snow.

  Both of these occurrences could be explained the same way—the occupants of the Ice Floe Mansion had reached the limits of their terror and their patience.

  And now a report of a more obviously tangible kind. At dinner on the evening of the 3rd, a very disturbing thing happened. From the beginning, everyone who gathered at the dining table looked a little green around the gills. No one had any appetite at all. The women left their knives and forks untouched on the table and sat there listening to the sound of the raging storm. Eiko placed her left hand over the right of Togai, her neighbour, and said quietly, “I’m scared.” Togai gently reached across and covered her left hand with his own.

  Including the four police officers, all of the surviving occupants of the house were in attendance. But then a small puff of white smoke floated into the room from the direction of the staircase. Kiyoshi was the first to notice it.

  “There’s a fire!” he shouted.

  The police all dropped their forks and rushed up the stairs. Kozaburo, fearing for his precious collection, followed right behind.

  In the end, the fire was extinguished before it could develop into anything serious. The source was Eiko’s bed in Room 2 which had been sprinkled with paraffin and set alight. But as always, no one had any idea why or by whom this fire had been set. I have already said it, but absolutely everybody had been sitting at the dining table when it happened.

  At this point, everyone was convinced that besides the regular occupants there was someone else in the mansion. Some person or some other mysterious entity with homicidal intentions was clearly lurking. But no matter how many times they searched, the police continued to come up with nothing.

  On this particular occasion, however, Room 2 hadn’t been locked, nor had the window on the east staircase landing, so for once this strange case of arson wasn’t in the realm of the impossible. But the who and the why still required a great deal of thought.

  The storm grabbed hold of the window frames and shook them with all its might and the noise resounded through the mansion. The dozen or so helpless humans cowered in fear inside.

  Everything was in place for the final act.

  Before we get to that final act, there is one more thing I should write down. Perhaps the reader is already familiar with it, but those of you who are hearing this phrase for the first time might be confused. However, this writer cannot resist including these famous words.

  CHALLENGE TO THE READER

  The clues are all there. Can you solve this case?

  FINAL ACT

  Mysterious being, crouching there in the dark of night, stand up and shine the light of truth so that I might know the answer.

  SCENE 1

  The Ground Floor Landing of the West Wing Staircase, or By the Door of Room 12

  Yoshihiko Hamamoto came down the stairs from Room 8, his bedroom.

  Chief Inspector Ushikoshi was with Kiyoshi in Room 13 discussing something or other, but everyone else was in the salon. The wind was howling outside, and just like the night that Kikuoka was murdered, no one was in a hurry to go to their own room. If Yoshihiko looked straight ahead of him as he descended the stairs from Room 3 on the middle floor, all there was before him was a huge towering wall like a barricade. This was in fact the walls of Room 10 and Room 12, one above the other.

  Because there were no windows or other openings in the wall besides the door to Room 12 down at the bottom, the wall was sheer and felt oppressive. There were of course the two ventilation holes, one for each room, and lined up vertically, but that was all. The lighting on the staircase was rather dim.

  Yoshihiko had almost reached the ground floor when for some reason he glanced up. The vent to Room 10, the room in which Kazuya Ueda had been murdered, was way above him in the wall, facing the open space above the staircase.

  Yoshihiko had no idea why he had happened to look up at the hole at this moment, but at the same time, he hadn’t just glanced up for no particular reason. He was standing right alongside this great cliff of a wall, and turned his gaze upwards. He caught his breath. Way above his head, a small square-shaped light had just gone out. The after-image stayed imprinted in Yoshihiko’s retinas.

  He found himself frozen to the spot. For a moment it felt as if the wind, which had an eerie way of echoing in his head, had come blowing into the interior of the house and was now dancing wildly around the high ceiling space above.

  He had the illusion that he was standing alone in the wilderness. The howls and screams of the wind became the moaning of the ghosts of all the people who had died in this house. Well, not only those three, but a whole multitude of spirits. All the souls who had been here in this northern land forever.

  He came back to himself. And now he realized what he had seen. It was a reality that was hard to fathom. He knew that he ought to call someone right away, because as nobody was using Room 10 any more, there was no reason for anyone to be in there. Mitarai and Chief Inspector Ushikoshi were in Room 13 and everyone else in the salon. So why had there been a light shining from the vent in Room 10? He had definitely seen it. There was something or someone in there.

  He ran to the salon and flung open the door.

  “Could somebody come?” he shouted.

  Everyone turned to look, and most jumped to their feet. Kozaburo, Eiko, Mr and Mrs Kanai, Togai, Kumi Aikura, Mr and Mrs Hayakawa, Kajiwara; also Inspector Okuma, Sergeant Ozaki and Constable Anan and myself—all of us moved towards Yoshihiko. He checked quickly—yes, everyone was there besides Mitarai and Ushikoshi.

  “What’s up?” asked Ozaki.

  “This way!”

  Yoshihiko led everyone to the foot of the stairs and pointed up at the wall.

  “I could see light coming from that vent in Room 10.”

  There was general commotion.
/>   “No way!” said Okuma.

  “What’s going on?”

  Ushikoshi and Kiyoshi had heard the commotion and came out into the corridor.

  “Chief, were either of you in Room 10 just now?” asked Ozaki.

  “Room 10?”

  Ushikoshi was clearly surprised by the question.

  “Why? No. We were both in Room 13 the whole time.”

  It was clear from his tone and facial expression that he was telling the truth.

  “Seems there was light coming from that ventilation hole just now.”

  “Impossible! All sixteen of us are standing here right now,” said Ushikoshi.

  “It was just for a moment. I’m sure I saw it—a light going out.”

  “Has some sort of animal got in this damned house?” said Okuma. “An orang-utan or something?”

  “You mean like ‘The Murders in the Rue Morgue’?” said Kozaburo.

  Everyone looked dubious. But then the normally taciturn Kajiwara spoke up.

  “Er, actually…”

  “What? Go on.”

  “The refrigerator… well, it seems there’s some ham missing.”

  “Ham?”

  More than a few people repeated the word.

  “Yes. Some ham and a little bit of bread—”

  “Has this happened before?” asked Okuma.

  “Um, I don’t think so… Well, I don’t think it has…”

  “You don’t think?”

  “I’m not really sure. I’m sorry.”

  There were a few moments of heavy silence.

  “Anyway, let’s go and check it out, Room 10,” said Ozaki. “There’s no point in just standing around here.”

  “No point in checking either,” said Kiyoshi, without enthusiasm. “There’ll be nothing there.”

  Nevertheless, the police set out into the snow. Kiyoshi and I, the women, Kozaburo, as well as Kanai and Yoshihiko stayed where we were. After a while, a light came on behind the ventilation hole.

  “Yes, that’s it! That’s the light I saw!” cried Yoshihiko.

  But of course, the search was fruitless yet again. According to Ozaki’s report, the padlock was still on the door; in fact there was even fresh snow covering it, and the room itself was freezing cold inside with no signs of life. He concluded that Yoshihiko had seen some sort of illusion.

  “How about the spare key to the padlock?” asked Ozaki.

  “I’ve got it,” said Hayakawa. “I haven’t lent it to anyone else. But I did leave the padlock itself by the entrance to the kitchen for a while.”

  “You mean while guests were staying in the room?”

  “Yes, that’s right.”

  Just in case, the detectives proceeded to search the main building of the house, the garden shed and Kozaburo’s room at the top of the tower one more time. But there was nothing unusual anywhere.

  “I don’t get it. What could have made that light?”

  The detectives had drawn their usual blank.

  About an hour after that incident, the door from the salon opened and Hatsue Kanai came out. She made her way towards the west wing stairs with the intention of fetching something from her room.

  The wind was getting louder. As she climbed the stairs, Hatsue happened to glance over the banister down to the basement corridor. She normally bragged about having psychic powers, and what happened next might well have been because of her special abilities.

  The basement corridor was poorly lit, and looking down felt like lifting a tombstone and peering down into a crypt. In one corner Hatsue could see a faint light, which gradually took on a human form.

  All of the living human beings were currently in the salon. Hatsue knew because she had just left them there.

  A numbing terror took hold of her, and her gaze fixed on the form as if held there by a powerful magnetic force. It was the hazy figure of a person (or what appeared to be a person) who made no sound, not even so much as the slight rustle of paper that falls to the floor, as it glided along the corridor. It was heading towards Room 14, where Kikuoka had been murdered, as if headed for a meeting of all the spirits of the house.

  As if by some prearranged signal, the door to Room 14 opened, and the glowing figure continued inside. Right at that moment, it turned its head to the side. And the head continued to turn until it faced backwards, and Hatsue caught a glimpse of its face. For a moment her eyes and those of the mysterious being met. That face! It was definitely the smirking face of the Golem doll!

  Hatsue felt her hair begin to stand on end and her whole body turned to goose pimples. She realized that she was screaming, but the voice didn’t seem like her own. Like the raging storm outside it went on and on, as if propelled by a will that wasn’t hers, gushing forth. Eventually out of fatigue and exhaustion, she fell into a faint. Her screams became distant to her own ears until finally they were merely an echo on a distant mountain.

  The next thing Hatsue knew was that she was in her husband’s arms and surrounded by anxious faces. It seemed that not much time had passed. Everyone was there. Her husband’s normally feeble arms had for once proved sturdy.

  For the next few minutes, Hatsue answered the questions thrown at her by the bystanders, and explained the terrifying scene she had just witnessed. In her own mind she felt that she was describing everything clearly, but it seemed that nobody around her could grasp what she was saying.

  How can they all be so useless? she was cursing inside. That’s it, I’ve had enough of this house of horrors, as she babbled on like a deranged lunatic.

  “Bring her some water!” somebody shouted. She didn’t want anything like that, but when it arrived and she put the glass to her lips, the sensation of the water on her throat was strangely soothing.

  “Do you want to lie down on the sofa in the salon?” her husband asked, his voice full of concern. She nodded weakly.

  However, as soon as she was safely on the sofa and began to explain again exactly what she had just seen, infuriatingly her husband returned to his usual obstinate, petty bureaucratic self.

  “Dolls can’t walk.”

  No one was surprised that this was Michio Kanai’s opinion.

  “You must have dreamt it.”

  And as she feared, this was his final conclusion.

  “Those stairs aren’t normal,” she insisted. “There’s something there!”

  “There’s definitely something wrong with you,” continued her husband, ignoring her protests.

  “Now, now,” said the detectives, quickly inserting themselves between husband and wife. They suggested checking on the doll in Room 3 and the status of Room 14 right away, but it was clear from their attitudes that they didn’t believe a word of Hatsue’s story either.

  Kozaburo opened the door to Room 3, and Ozaki flipped the light switch. Golem was sitting in his usual spot, leaning against the window-side wall, just by the south Tengu mask wall.

  Ozaki marched briskly up to the feet of the doll.

  “Was this the face you saw?”

  Hatsue, who was hovering in the doorway, couldn’t bring herself to look at the doll. And anyway, there was no need for her to look.

  “There is absolutely no doubt about it. It was him!”

  “Please take a close look. Was it definitely this face?”

  There was an almost sarcastic smile on Ozaki’s face.

  “Absolutely, definitely!”

  “But the doll is right here.”

  “Don’t ask me how that’s possible!”

  “Was it wearing that hat and those clothes?” asked Ushikoshi.

  “Huh… I’m not sure about that. But it was that face. That sneering, grinning, creepy face. But now that you mention it… I don’t think he was wearing that hat.”

  “He didn’t have the hat on?”

  “No, I can’t say. I don’t remember that clearly.”

  “That’s what I’m saying. There’s something wrong with you,” said Kanai again.

  “You can sh
ut up!” said Hatsue. “After going through what I’ve just been through, anybody would forget the minor details!”

  The detectives didn’t interrupt. She had a point. But nobody had a clue what they ought to say next. That is, except for my friend.

  “Well, I told you all so!”

  Kiyoshi was absolutely elated. Ozaki and the other detectives immediately rolled their eyes.

  “He’s the killer. He looks like a doll, but he’s been deceiving us all. He’s been perfectly capable of walking around by himself all this time. If he undoes his joints, he can get in and out through tiny openings. And he can kill without feeling remorse. He’s a brutal murderer. You were about to check Room 14, weren’t you? Go ahead. And when we get there, I’m going to tell you the whole story, all about his evil deeds. Officers, it’s better not to touch him, if you value your lives.”

  Oozing confidence, Kiyoshi turned to face the detectives.

  “Mr Kajiwara, you were just about to pour some tea, weren’t you? Please get Mr Hayakawa to help you to bring it to Room 14. I think that will be the ideal location for the big reveal.”

  SCENE 2

  Room 14

  The clock on the wall of Room 14 showed exactly midnight. Kajiwara and Hayakawa had brought trays of tea and were currently circulating and making sure that everyone was served.

  Kiyoshi grabbed two cups from the tray and handed one to me. He politely offered the other to Eiko beside him, after quickly grabbing a saucer and placing her cup on it first. Then he finally served himself. His behaviour was rather untypically gallant.