The Sixth Candle –

The Stories of a Journalist

The city is a story, so many tales for her to tell, so many chronicles for me to chronicle. For the city is a chronicle, a journal, in black and white, and I am its chronicler, its journalist, in hat and coat. A thousand stories for every day, every night; never one city, but a thousand cities – heaven for some, hell for others. And for every story there are two sides, two sides at least, for the city is always, already a fiction, this city made of paper, this city made of print –

IN THE FICTIONAL CITY, I am Takeuchi Riichi, Homicide Reporter for the Yomiuri Shimbun. Every day, every night, I walk the city and I hear the city, her streets and her stories. I catch her stories and I collect her stories, to pin and mount them, on paper and in print, to display and exhibit, in black and white –

Monday 26 January 1948 …

In the Fictional City, this story starts like every story, with a siren, and then another, and another, another ambulance siren.

In the late winter afternoon, I am standing around a stove in the press office of the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Board with all the other homicide reporters, my rivals from the Mainichi, the Asahi, and all the other newspapers, and we are listening to the sirens, waiting for a statement. But no one comes down from upstairs, no detective with a statement from the MPB, and so we ignore the sirens, warming our hands as we wait for a story –

A sniff of a story …

In the Fictional City, the tap on my shoulder, the word in my ear; ‘A moment of your time,’ whispers Shiratō Sakari. Shiratō is the Public Health reporter for the Yomiuri. Shiratō doesn’t often come down to Police HQ. Shiratō leads me out into the corridor.

‘You heard all those sirens, the ambulances?’ he asks. ‘Well, they’re all heading up to the Shiinamachi branch of the Teikoku Bank in Toshima-ku. Biggest case of food poisoning in years.’

‘Food poisoning? When? How many?’

‘The whole bank, at least ten people, about an hour ago. Loads of police up there, all saying nothing for now, but it’s a big, big story. And we can get the scoop …’

The face out of the door, the shout down the corridor; ‘Takeuchi, telephone!’

‘Wait here,’ I tell Shiratō, and I go back into the press office, the rival eyes of all the other reporters watching me as I shrug and I sigh, pick up the telephone and say, ‘Hello, Takeuchi here.’

‘I know everyone in the room is watching you,’ says Ono, my editor at the Yomiuri. ‘So just answer yes or no.’

‘OK,’ I say.

‘Did you hear those ambulances about an hour ago?’

‘Yes.’

‘Has there been any statement from the MPB about where they were going, about what’s happening?’

‘No.’

‘Have you spoken with anyone about them?’

‘Yes.’

‘Shiratō?’

‘Yes.’

‘He told you it was a big case of food poisoning at the Teikoku Bank in Shiinamachi?’

‘Yes.’

‘He still with you?’

‘Yes.’

‘Good, keep him there. I’ve sent Tomizawa up to Shiinamachi and he’s going to phone back all the details to you because I want you to write this. So you stay put because this is not food poisoning. This is mass murder and robbery, ten dead at least, and the bank’s takings stolen, so get writing the story now. Fill in the details with Tomizawa later. You understand what I’ve said?’

‘Yes … Er no.’

‘Quickly,’ says Ono. ‘Which is it?’

‘Yes. Maybe,’ I start to say, but Ono’s gone, the line dead. I replace the receiver gently. I turn around as casually as I can but I know I will have fooled no one; the rival eyes of all the other reporters still watching me. I fake a yawn but they are shaking their heads. I walk as slowly as I can towards the door but still they are shaking their heads and now, as I open the door, as I step outside, back into the corridor, the rival hands of all the other reporters are reaching for the telephones, their rival fingers dialling their editors –

‘What was all that about?’ asks Shiratō.

‘It was the boss. He says it’s not food poisoning. He says it’s mass murder. Robbery. Ten dead, at least. The takings gone.’

‘How does he know? Who’s he been talking to?’

‘Well, it’ll be one of his usual hunches, won’t it?’ I wink. ‘And, as usual, he’ll be right, won’t he? So he wants us to stay here and to start work.’

‘Work?’

‘Yeah,’ I laugh. ‘Work …’

In the Fictional City, at my desk in the press office, I begin to write the story:

MASS MURDER IN SHIINAMACHI –

Ten Workers of Teikoku Bank Slain In Broad Daylight – Robbery Behind Killing?

TOKYO, Jan. 26 – Ten were killed and (XX) others are in critical condition as a result of the attempted robbery and poisoning of the entire staff of the Shiinamachi branch of the Teikoku Bank at Nagasaki-chō, Toshima-ku, Tokyo by a (gang of) cold-blooded criminal(s) who apparently tried to snatch away heaps of bank notes in broad daylight on the afternoon of January 26.

The sensational ‘poison bank holdup’ case was perpetrated about X o’clock Monday afternoon shortly after the bank had closed for business for the day when a man (men) entered the building.

In no time the bank turned into a veritable death chamber with all the victims writhing in agony. When the relief party arrived at the scene, 10 of the victims had already died. XX others were rushed to the XX hospital and remain in a critical condition.

According to the police, who are strictly keeping away outsiders in an effort to find a clue, XXXXXXXXX.

An intensive police search is being conducted across the city for the bank robber(s).

‘Takeuchi? It’s Tomizawa.’

‘Where are you?’

‘Shiinamachi.’

‘What’s going on? What have you got?’

‘There’s still been no statement from the MPB?’

‘No,’ I say, turning the pages of my notebook, licking the tip of my pencil. ‘So give me everything you’ve got.’

‘Well, it’s not food poisoning. It’s murder. Murder by poisoning. Ten dead for now. Six taken to the Seibo Hospital.’

‘Have you got a chronology for me?’

‘Locals found a young woman who works in the bank crawling around in the street outside at about 4 o’clock …’

‘Name? Age?’

‘No name yet, but early twenties.’

‘OK. Go on …’

‘Apparently she was trying to get to the local liquor store to telephone for ambulances and the police, so one local woman ran to the liquor store to call for the ambulances and police while another local stayed with the young woman who was losing consciousness, meanwhile other locals rushed up the road and into the bank …’

‘Great,’ I say. ‘What did they find? What did they see?’

‘A death chamber,’ says Tomizawa. ‘Bodies lying everywhere. In the corridors, on the floor, in the bathroom. A line of corpses by the sink. All of them with their eyes still open. Their mouths running with blood and vomit…’

‘Fantastic,’ I say. ‘Go on …’

‘Some of them were still alive …’

‘Any of them talking?’

‘No,’ says Tomizawa. ‘Coughing, spitting, losing consciousness. And then the police and the ambulances arrived.’

‘The locals say how many were alive?’

‘Six, but two were very bad.’

‘Have you been inside?’

‘Yes. When I got there it was still chaos, so I flashed my wallet, making out I was a detective, and I was in there for about ten minutes before they realized and threw me out.’

‘So go on, what did you see?’

‘Well, the bodies were still there, and there were loads of police, but there was a strange calmness, yeah calmness. All the desks were just as you’d imagine them, with ledgers and papers spread out. Stacks of cash on the desks as well…’

‘Stacks of cash?’

‘Yeah, just sitting there, untouched. A tray of cups as well. It was just as if it was a normal working day in a normal bank. Apart from the bodies and all the police, the police drawing chalk marks around the bodies, their photographers taking their pictures. There were even some of the locals in there, trying to tidy up …’

‘And the police? What were they saying?’

‘Well, you know the police. Not much. Muttering about it being food poisoning, not murder. And then of course they twigged who I was and they threw me out…’

‘So the cops, they don’t think it’s murder? Is that what you’re saying? They still think it’s food poisoning?’

‘Not any more,’ says Tomizawa. ‘Back outside, I was stood among the crowd – massive crowd by now – finding out what I could, when the Big Boys from the MPB arrived. Minute they got inside the bank, they threw out all the locals. But some of those locals had heard the detectives saying it was mass murder and that the bank was a crime scene and it had to be protected …’

‘You know what made them change their minds?’

‘Well, one of the uniforms who’d been inside the bank and was then sent outside to keep people away, I asked him what was going on, and he said one of the victims up at the hospital, she was talking and had told them some kind of doctor had come to the bank and given them some kind of medicine for dysentery, that they’d all drunk this medicine and that was when they’d all collapsed. No mention of food, only a doctor and some medicine.’

‘Just the one man, not a gang?’

‘Far as I know, just the one.’

‘Description?’

‘Not yet.’

‘Right then,’ I tell Tomizawa. ‘You stay where you are. I’m going to finish off the piece for the Boss and then head up to the hospital. Call us in a couple of hours …’

I replace the receiver. I turn around. The rival eyes of all the other reporters are no longer watching me, their rival ears already at the other phones, their rival fingers already writing in their notebooks, every other reporter either listening or writing –

In the Fictional City, I go back to my desk in the press office. I re-write the story:

MASS MURDER IN SHIINAMACHI –

Ten Workers of Teikoku Bank Slain In Broad Daylight – Robbery Behind Killing?

TOKYO, Jan. 26 – Ten were killed and 6 others are in critical condition as a result of the attempted robbery and poisoning of the entire staff of the Shiinamachi branch of the Teikoku Bank at Nagasaki-chō, Toshima-ku, Tokyo by a cold-blooded criminal who apparently tried to snatch away heaps of bank notes in broad daylight on the afternoon of January 26.

The sensational ‘poison bank holdup’ case was perpetrated about 4 o’clock Monday afternoon shortly after the bank had closed for business for the day when a man entered the building posing as a health official. The fiendish doctor told the entire staff to drink a dysentery preventative medicine.

In no time the bank turned into a veritable death chamber with all the victims writhing in agony. When the relief party arrived at the scene, 10 of the victims had already died. 6 others were rushed to the Seibo Hospital in the neighbourhood and remain in a critical condition.

According to the police, who are strictly keeping away outsiders in an effort to find a clue, an intensive search is now being conducted across the city for the bank robber.

   I stop writing. I file the story. I get my hat and my coat. I tell Shiratō to wait where he is, that I’m going to the Seibo Hospital, and I’ll be back in a couple of hours.

IN THE FICTIONAL CITY, in the Seibo Hospital, I am wearing a stolen white coat, I am pretending to be a doctor –

Pretending, impersonating, deceiving…

I smile at the policeman. I open the door. I step inside the room. She is alone in the room, lying in the only bed, her eyes closed. I walk to the end of the bed. I read the name above her head –

I write it down in my notebook:

Murata Masako …

I sit down in a chair beside the bed. I see her hand on top of the blankets. I sit forward in the chair beside the bed. I reach for her hand on the blankets. I hold her hand. I lean towards her face. I whisper in her ear, ‘Miss Murata, Miss Murata …’

I see her swallow in her sleep –

‘Can you hear me, Miss Murata …?’

I see her eyelids flicker –

‘Can you tell me what happened to you, Miss Murata?’

I see her eyes opening. I see her looking at me now –

‘Can you tell me what happened to you in the bank?’

Now her body starts to tremble. Her mouth begins to open – ’

Get away!’ she shouts. ‘Get away from me!’

I let go of her hand. I stand up. I want to apologize. I want to explain. But I turn away. And I walk away –

‘Get away! Get away from me!’

Out of the room. The hospital.

IN THE FICTIONAL CITY, I walk her streets and I hear her stories, telephones ringing and voices whispering, along the wires and down the cables, a telephone and a voice with a time and with a place –

An hour later, I turn a corner off the main street, and I walk down an alley of pawnshops and mahjong parlours. Half-way down the alleyway, I push open a frosted-glass door. A bell above the door rings and five pairs of eyes glance up from the shadows of the dark and narrow room. I walk through these shadows, past their glances that are now stares, and I sit down on a sofa at the back of the room. Across a large porcelain brazier, a man is sitting opposite me, reading a newspaper, my newspaper –

The Yomiuri…

The man slowly folds up the newspaper. He takes off his glasses. He puts the glasses in the breast pocket of his jacket. He sits forward in his chair. He stretches out his hands over the edge of the brazier. He looks up at me and he says, ‘I hope you brought your wallet with you?’

IN THE FICTIONAL CITY, the MPB have made a statement, and then another, and another, and so I write a story, and then another, and another:

WIDE MANHUNT ON FOR POISON KILLER; INVESTIGATORS WORK ON DESCRIPTION GIVEN BY 4 MASS MURDER SURVIVORS

Slayer Believed Familiar With Medicines; Assisted By Several Accomplices?

TOKYO, Jan. 28 – With the above description of the culprit given by the four survivors as the chief clue, the Metropolitan Police Board, mobilizing its most experienced criminal investigators, is on the search for the perpetrators of one of the coldest-blooded crimes of modern times.

The search is on for the man who, as reported yesterday, posed as a health inspector and induced 16 persons at the Shiinamachi branch of the Teikoku Bank to take poison, killing 12 of them.

The police base their belief (a) that the culprit was familiar with medicine and epidemic prevention and (b) that he was someone who knew the district and the bank well on the following two factors:

1. Dysentery cases had been reported in the district recently.

2. The criminal wore the armband of the Tokyo Metropolitan sanitation bureau and did not arouse any suspicion among the 16 who drank the poison.

Investigation headquarters have been established at the Mejiro police station.

The names of the victims of the mass poison slaughter have been ascertained as follows:

Dead:— Watanabe Yoshiyasu, 43, chief treasurer; Shirai Shoichi, 28; Kato Teruko, 16; Uchida Yuko, 22; Takeuchi Sutejiro, 48, messenger; Nishimura Hidehiko, 38; Akiyama Miyako, 22; Takizawa Tatsuo, 46, messenger; his wife, Takizawa Ryuko, 51; Takizawa’s son, Yoshihiro, 7; Takizawa’s daughter, Takako, 18; and Sawada Yoshio, 21.

Those in critical condition: – Yoshida Takejiro, 42, assistant manager; Akusawa Yoshiko, 18; Murata Masako, 21; and Tanaka Norikazu, 28.

The first of the two bottles that the culprit induced his victims to drink is ascertained to have contained potassium cyanide.

The armband he wore is believed to have been one issued at the time of the recent flood disaster to students, hospitals, ward offices, and volunteer workers.

The crime is believed to have been planned by several persons in conjunction with the culprit who appeared at the bank.

Four persons who figured in a similar attempt made previously at the Nakai branch of the Mitsubishi Bank are believed to have some connection with the Teikoku Bank case.

The latest check shows that from ¥110,000 to ¥120,000 of the bank’s money are missing.

Doctor Suspected

TOKYO, Jan. 28 – Police suspicion in the Teikoku Bank mass murder case has fallen on a certain middle-aged doctor living within the jurisdiction of the Mejiro police station who fits the description given by Miss Murata Masako, one of the survivors, it is learned.

Linked With Case?

TOKYO, Jan. 28 – A man committed suicide with potassium cyanide at a hotel not far from the Shiinamachi branch of the Teikoku Bank early this morning.

As the poison taken by the suicide is the same as that which killed the bank employees, the Mejiro police station is investigating whether he is connected with the mass murder case.

The suicide, who registered as Yokobe Kunio, a company official at Komagawa-mura, Iruma-gun, Saitama prefecture, put up at the Kiraku Inn at 2156 Shiina-machi 5-chōme, Toshima-ku, yesterday at about 9.30 p.m. and took the potassium cyanide today at about 6 a.m.

He was wearing a grey sweater, khaki coat, black serge trousers and black overcoat. In his wallet was only about ¥100.

His hair was not cropped.

   In the Fictional City, this city of millions, millions will buy my newspaper, millions will buy my stories.

IN THE FICTIONAL CITY, I am back in the Seibo Hospital, back wearing a stolen white coat, back pretending to be a doctor –

Pretending, impersonating, deceiving…

Back beside her bed, her eyes closed, her hand in mine, I am whispering, ‘Can you hear me, Miss Murata…?’

There is sweat on her brow, in her hair, shadows on her cheeks, round her eyes. Her mouth opens and then closes, her fingers tighten and then loosen. She is dreaming, dreaming bad dreams –

‘Miss Murata, I can help you. Please believe me …’

Her eyes are open now but still not close, she is struggling to get back, back to this room, this white room in this hospital –

‘I can help you,’ I tell her. ‘You can trust me …’

Her fingers turn in my hand, tighten around my own, as she looks at me now and asks, ‘Who are you? Are you a doctor?’

‘No, this white coat is just so I could talk to you. That’s all. I just want to talk to you. I just want to help you …’

‘But why?’ she says. ‘Who are you?’

In the Fictional City, in the Seibo Hospital, in my stolen coat, I say, ‘My name is Takeuchi Riichi. I’m a journalist.’

‘You’re a journalist?’ she laughs. ‘Not a doctor?’

‘No,’ I smile. ‘A journalist, with the Yomiuri.’

She turns her face away from me now, not laughing any more. I let go of her hand. I want to apologize. She stares at the white wall, tears on her pillow. I stand up. I want to explain …

‘Get away from me!’ she cries.

IN THE FICTIONAL CITY, a telephone rings, a voice whispers, along wires, down cables, with another time, another place –

Down another alley, in another room, through the shadows, past the stares, in another chair, another man –

A man with an envelope.

I open the envelope. I read the letter. I take out my wallet. I hand him the cash and I say, ‘I hope you didn’t write it yourself.’

The man counts the cash. The man puts it in his jacket pocket. The man smiles and says, ‘What difference would it make?’

IN THE FICTIONAL CITY, with an envelope and a letter on my desk, an editor and a deadline on my back, I write another story:

SINISTER NOTE RECEIVED IN PUZZLING BANK CASE

Reward for Capture Now ¥80,000; Police Still Baffled

Painfully slow progress was being made in the Teikoku Bank ‘Poison Holdup’ case as police officers continued to be enmeshed in difficulties because of the lack of tangible evidence.

Rewards for the capture of the diabolical killer of 12 bank employees rose to ¥80,000 and one silver cup.

A sinister letter was received on January 29 by the manager of the Shiina branch of the Teikoku Bank. Signed ‘Yamaguchi Jiro’, the alias used on the day of the diabolical crime, the letter said in part: ‘I am sorry I caused quite a disturbance the other day. I let Murata Masako (the girl who crawled into the streets to seek help) live because I have some use for her later. In due time, I shall pay her a visit… At first I had an unpleasant feeling watching so many people writhe and squirm in agony but later I didn’t mind at all…’

Police are investigating to see whether it really came from the poisoner or from some callous citizen with a dubious sense of humour.

Meanwhile, the description of the man who claimed the cheque stolen from the scene of the crime failed to tally with that of the poisoner.

Police officials, however, expressed gratification for public cooperation in the manhunt and said that scores of letters and phone calls are being received daily at the search headquarters.

   In the Fictional City, so many letters and so many calls, so many stories and so many tales, so many doubts and so many, many questions.

IN THE FICTIONAL CITY, in the Seibo Hospital, there is sweat on her brow, in her hair again, shadows on her cheeks, round her eyes again. Her mouth opening and then closing, her fingers tightening and then loosening. She is dreaming, dreaming bad dreams again –

‘Help me,’ she says in her dreams. ‘Please help me …’

In this white room, her hand in mine, I say, ‘I can help you. Please believe me. I can make that dream go away …’

Pretending, impersonating, deceiving…

She opens her eyes. She stares into me. She squeezes my hand. She whispers, ‘How can you help me?’

‘I can save you,’ I tell her –

Pretending, not pretending…

‘Until yesterday,’ she says, ‘I thought a cup was a cup. Until then, a table was a table. I thought the war was over. I knew we had lost. I knew we had surrendered. I knew we were now occupied.

‘But I thought the war was over. I thought a cup was still a cup. That medicine was medicine. I thought my friend was my friend, a colleague was a colleague. A doctor, a doctor.

‘But the war is not over. A cup is not a cup. Medicine is not medicine. A friend not a friend, a colleague not a colleague. For a colleague here yesterday, sat in the seat at the counter beside me, that colleague is not here today. Because a doctor is not a doctor.

‘A doctor is a murderer. A killer.

‘Because the war is not over.

‘The war is never over.’

‘I know,’ I say, pretending to pretend, in my stolen white coat, not pretending to pretend, beside her hospital bed, squeezing her hand and telling her again, ‘I know, I know.’

‘I was still going through that day’s thirty deposits when the killer arrived,’ she says. ‘I didn’t see what time it was when he entered, but business had closed as usual at 3 p.m., and I had then immediately begun to count up the deposits. The thirty deposits would have taken me no longer than ten minutes which means the killer must have arrived sometime between 3 p.m. and 3.10 p.m.

‘When the killer began to distribute the poison, I looked him in his face. I will never forget that face. I would know it anywhere.’

‘I know,’ I say again, and again, ‘I know, I know.’

‘I am a survivor,’ she says, still staring into me, deeper and deeper, still squeezing my hand, tighter and tighter. ‘But of course I know only through luck have I survived so many friends. But night after night, in dream after dream, I hear these friends saying of me: “Those who survive are stronger.” And I hate myself …’

Again and again, she says, ‘I hate myself.’

And again, again I say, ‘I know …’

Pretending, not pretending…

‘But I will help you.’

IN THE FICTIONAL CITY, I walk down the long, long table to my editor’s desk at the head of the long, long table and I stand before him and I say, ‘I’m very sorry to disturb you, Boss …’

‘Ah, Takeuchi,’ smiles Ono. ‘Just the man I wanted to see. Liked that piece on the “Sinister Note” very much. Very much.’

‘Well, actually, that was what I wanted to talk to you about. I’m not sure it’s entirely legitimate. So I was thinking maybe you could hold it back for now while I checked into it a bit more …?’

‘Too late for doubts,’ laughs Ono, tapping his watch. ‘It’s already been set and the presses are rolling.’

‘I see,’ I say.

‘I’ve told you before,’ he tells me again. ‘You worry too much. In our business, there’s no time for doubts, no time for procrastination. Don’t get me wrong, I admire your integrity. But in our business we’ve got to go with our guts, run with our hunches, and your gut, your hunch, was to run with this. So forget it now, and get after the next one. After all, not like you made it up yourself, is it?’

IN THE FICTIONAL CITY, it is Wednesday 4 February, and I am standing outside the Seibo Hospital with all the other reporters and all the photographers. In the Fictional City, we are watching the survivors leave the hospital, watching them bow and thank the nurses and the doctors, their arms full of presents, full of flowers. In the Fictional City, all the other reporters are shouting out –

‘Mr Yoshida! Mr Tanaka! Miss Akuzawa …

‘Miss Murata! Over here, Miss Murata …’

Her eyes searching through the shouts of all the reporters, searching through the flashes of all the photographers –

‘Miss Murata! Over here, Miss Murata …’

Her lips smiling through the shouts and through the flashes, her eyes searching, lost and not smiling –

‘She’s beautiful, isn’t she?’ says Matsuda, the photographer from the Yomiuri. ‘She’ll be on every front page tomorrow …’

And now the police are leading her away through the crowds, taking her away to their car, with her arms full of presents, full of flowers, and I am walking away among all the other reporters and the photographers, with our heads full of stories, full of fictions –

‘Lucky she’s so good-looking,’ laughs Matsuda, tapping his camera, winking at me. ‘Sell more papers for us …’

In the Fictional City, back at my desk in the Yomiuri building, I stare at Matsuda’s photographs and I write another story:

POISON SURVIVORS LEAVE HOSPITAL

Happy over their narrow escape with death, the four lucky survivors of the Teikoku Bank ‘Poison Holdup’ case were discharged as fully recovered from the Seibo Hospital, Wednesday. Shown as they received presents from congratulating friends are: (Left to right) Acting Manager Yoshida Takejiro, 44, Miss Murata Masako, 22, and Tanaka Norikazu, 20. They revisited the scene of the crime to reconstruct what had taken place for the police investigators. The first inkling of the tragedy was made known when the attention of passers-by was attracted by the beautiful Miss Murata who, despite her rapidly failing consciousness, had bravely managed to drag her agonized body into the street.

IN THE FICTIONAL CITY, it is night again, night again as I walk her streets, as I hear her stories, from Nihonbashi up to Hongo, from Hongō and onto Kasuga-dōri, along Kasuga-dōri then down Shinobazu-dōri, down Shinobazu-dōri and onto Mejiro-dōri, along Mejiro-dōri onto Yamate-dōri, Yamate-dōri to Shiinamachi –

But I do not go to the scene of the crime, I go to her house, Murata Masako’s house. In this Fictional City, in its long, long night, I stand across the street from her house. Is she awake? Her house is dark. Or is she sleeping? The lights off. Dreaming? The curtains closed. Dreaming that dream again?

‘And I hate myself. I hate

The footsteps in the shadows, the grip on my shoulder, the voice at my back, ‘Who are you? What are you doing here?’

I try to turn, the grip too tight –

‘Don’t move, just talk!’

‘I’m a journalist,’ I say. ‘From the Yomiuri.’

The hand inside my coat, inside my jacket, my pocket now my wallet. The grip relaxed, a torchlight on –

I spin round, shove him in his chest, snatch back my wallet and now say, ‘Who are you?’

The man smiles, the man before me, in his hat and in his cape, and he bellows, ‘I am Shimizu Kogorō, Occult-Tantei. Head of the Nagasaki branch of the Mejiro Security Association …’

Across the street, her house is no longer dark, the lights on and the curtains open, a face at the window –

Her face at the window, afraid.

IN THE FICTIONAL CITY, in a dancehall on the Ginza, with its heavy drapes and broken ventilation, its bad perfume and cheap pomade, through the cigarette smoke on the sticky floor, young men in zoot suits and aloha shirts are cheek-to-cheek with the hostesses and their cracked faces, their acne-scars, dancing to a swing band in the reflecting lights, in this dancehall on the Ginza, in this Fictional City, I am waiting for a character, waiting for their story, looking at the door and fiddling with my watch, but tonight he does not show, tonight he stands me up, no character, no story, not tonight, but here in the cigarette smoke, tonight in the reflecting lights, I open my notebook and I read through my pencil-marks, for there is always a character, always a story somewhere in the Fictional City.

IN THE FICTIONAL CITY, a new day, a new story, another story for another day; there is always another day, there is always another story in the Fictional City:

NEIGHBOURHOOD INVESTIGATIVE HQ

A local organization named Mejiro Chian Kyōkai Nagasaki Shibu has founded a ‘Civil Investigative Headquarters’ because ‘the locals will be upset unless the [Teigin] case is solved quickly,’ said the Chief of the HQ, Mr Shimizu.

The HQ is located in the office of the Nagasaki Shrine, and their investigation is mostly focused on the killer’s tracks. They summon those who had been in the vicinity of the crime scene, and who had hurried to rescue the victims, as well as local children who may have also witnessed the crime. Shimizu and his team plan to gather up all these testimonies and give their reports to Mejiro Police Station.

Each member of the Interview Team runs a separate district of the neighbourhood and witnesses are summoned to the Nagasaki Shrine HQ, even in the night, to be questioned by these amateur cops. For now, Chief Shimizu ignores his own business and devotes himself entirely to the investigation, twenty four hours a day. ‘I take 5 or 6 Hiropon injections per day but, what-the-heck, I’ll do beyond my best till we get him,’ said Mr Shimizu, and he will not disband the HQ until the killer is caught.

However, one local housewife complained, ‘I really wish the killer would be caught very soon, or he [Mr Shimizu] will be back to ask us for another donation to his association!’

   In the Fictional City, I put my head down on my desk, I close my eyes, and I pretend to sleep.

IN THE FICTIONAL CITY, I knock on her door and I try to open it, but her door is locked and so I knock again, and I wait –

‘Who is it?’ she says from behind the door.

‘It’s Takeuchi,’ I say. ‘From the Yomiuri.’

‘What do you want?’

‘Well, I just wondered if you’d come for a coffee with me.’

‘Why?’ she asks.

‘Well, actually I don’t know,’ I say. ‘I suppose I just wanted to see you, to see how you are, not for a story. Just…’

The lock turns now. The door opens –

Miss Murata Masako stares at me –

I ask, ‘Do you remember me?’

‘Yes,’ she says. ‘I remember you, Takeuchi Riichi of the Yomiuri, in your white coat, pretending to be a doctor.’

I bow and I say, ‘I’m sorry about that.’

‘So you want to take me for coffee as an apology, is that it?’

I smile and I say, ‘Well, maybe. Yes …’

‘OK, then,’ she says and, in the genkan to her house, she reaches for her coat and puts it on, then steps out of a pair of sandals and into a pair of shoes, and finally she ties a scarf around her face, over her hair, and says, ‘Come on, then.’

In the Fictional City, we walk in silence through the streets of Shiinamachi, in silence through the mud and the sleet, in silence to a coffee shop by the station. We open the door to the coffee shop and we step inside, the coffee shop filled with customers and conversation, and we sit down at a table and she takes off her scarf. Now the conversations stop and the customers stare, and she looks down at the table, at the sugar bowl and the ashtray, and she says, ‘I’m sorry. I want to go home.’

IN THE FICTIONAL CITY, he walks through the cigarette smoke, across the sticky floor, and he sits down and he says, ‘Sorry about the other night. I tried to call you, but you’d already left the office.’

‘It doesn’t matter,’ I say. ‘Forget it. You’re here now. So what have you got for me, Detective?’

‘Well, it’s not something you can probably print, not for now, but I think it’s something you should know. What they’re not saying in their statements is that there’s a growing feeling among many of the detectives that this case is connected with the Tokumu Kikan and their operations in Occupied China during the war. There are rumours of similar cases to the Teigin case that occurred in Shanghai during the war, that the culprit is ex-Tokumu Kikan, with experience handling medicines and civilians, and that’s who we should be looking for. On the other hand, there are some detectives, particularly the older guys, who think all these rumours are just a distraction, that it’s nothing to do with Tokumu Kikan and Occupied China. So there are almost two rival lines of inquiry now. But, as I say, what I’m telling you is nothing you can print, but there’s also nothing to stop you looking into the China connection, is there?’

IN THE FICTIONAL CITY, I have walked her streets, I have heard her stories, her stories of old soldiers, her stories of new poisons –

In the Fictional City, her stories in my notebook.

Now I take these stories from my notebook and I write them out. I write them out in letters. In letters, on grids –

TEIGIN POLICE CHASE POISON SCHOOL LEAD

SCAP Assistance Sought In Hunt For Mass Murderer

TOKYO – Police investigating the Teikoku Bank ‘Poison Holdup’ case are now actively pursuing two new lines of inquiry in their frantic efforts to catch the cold-blooded fiend responsible for the diabolical poison-murders.

Senior detectives have requested the assistance of the SCAP Public Safety Division in locating a Lieutenant Hornet and a Lieutenant Parker, both names being used by the mass killer and associated with typhus disinfecting teams in the Tokyo area.

Witnesses at the Ebara branch of the Yasuda Bank reported the suspect as saying, ‘I came here with Lieutenant Parker in a jeep because a new typhus case happened in the vicinity.’ While at the Shiinamachi branch of the Teikoku Bank, the same individual is reported as saying, ‘I came here because there have been many dysentery cases in the area. Lieutenant Hornet will be here soon.’

Police believe Lieutenant Hornet to have been associated with the Toshima Team in the Ōji and Katsushika Wards, while Lieutenant Parker was associated with the Ebara Disinfecting Team.

Investigators have requested that the Public Safety Division of SCAP provide any information, names and addresses of Japanese individuals either connected with or having knowledge of the disinfecting work done by either of the above lieutenants, particularly interpreters or individuals who speak English.

Meanwhile, police are also checking a new lead concerning ex-personnel of the former Japanese Imperial Chemical Laboratory in Tsudanuma, Chiba-ken.

It is known that experiments were conducted at the Tsudanuma Laboratory with prussic acid as a poison. Police believe that the modus operandi of the Teikoku Bank ‘Poison Holdup’ case and the use of prussic poison by the criminal are very similar to the training developed by Tsudanuma Arsenal.

   In the Fictional City, I stop writing and I read what I have written. These letters in their grids. I stop reading. Now I get up from my desk, and I walk down the long, long table to my editor’s desk –

‘Ah, Takeuchi,’ smiles Ono. ‘What have you got for me today? Something meaty, I hope, something juicy …’

I hand him the paper. I say, ‘I think so.’

Ono sits back in his chair. He adjusts his glasses. He starts to read, nodding, nodding, nodding and now smiling, he says, ‘Great!’

‘Thanks,’ I say. ‘They’re denying it, of course …’

‘Of course,’ says Ono. ‘But that’s their problem. Not yours.’

IN THE FICTIONAL CITY, in the genkan to her house, she looks at the bunch of flowers in my hand, and she asks, ‘Why?’

‘The other day,’ I say. ‘It was a mistake. The coffee shop. I didn’t think. All those people. It was a bad idea …’

‘It wasn’t your fault,’ she says.

I hold out the flowers. I say, ‘Please. They are for you …’

She bows. She takes the flowers. She says, ‘Thank you.’

The door to her house closes now, locked again.

IN THE FICTIONAL CITY, among the stained-suits and the bad-skins, beneath the swing band and the reflecting lights, he hisses, ‘I was taking a big risk telling you the things I did, showing the documents I did. A big, big risk. And what for? For nothing. I read your so-called newspaper every day and every day I see nothing. Nothing about the SCAP connection, nothing about the Tsudanuma Arsenal. So it seems to me I took a big, big risk for nothing …’

‘Not exactly nothing,’ I tell him. ‘Yes, you took a risk, but you also took my cash. I paid you …’

‘Not enough. Not enough for the risk I took. So I want to know what’s happening, why I took a risk for nothing …’

‘I wrote the story,’ I tell him. ‘I gave it to my boss, he read it in front of me and he liked it, liked it very much …’

‘So where is it then, this story of yours, this story your editor says he liked, liked so very much?’

‘I don’t know,’ I say.

He stands up. He says, ‘Well, find out. Or you can forget about any more help, any more stories from me.’

IN THE FICTIONAL CITY, I stand before my editor’s desk at the head of the long, long table and I say, ‘Excuse me, Boss …’

‘Takeuchi,’ mutters Ono, not smiling. ‘What is it?’

‘Well, I’m sorry to disturb you,’ I say. ‘But I was wondering what had happened to that piece I wrote on the Poison School? You’d seemed very happy with it, you’d said you liked it, but…’

‘Yes,’ nods Ono. ‘I did like it. Very much …’

‘Thank you,’ I say. ‘But it hasn’t run yet…’

‘Not yet,’ says Ono. ‘Not been the time, not yet. Thought we’d wait and see if there was any statement from the MPB first. Maybe then get some quotes from them, flesh it out.’

‘I see,’ I say.

‘I’ve told you before,’ he tells me again. ‘In our business, you have to choose your time, pick your moment carefully. Don’t get me wrong, I like the story, like it very much and I’ll run it, I will. But in our business, there’s always a right time, always a wrong time to run a story. But that’s my job, my worry, not yours. So you just leave it with me, forget about it now, now you’ve done your bit, and you just get after the next one. Because there’s always a next one, isn’t there? Always another story, out there somewhere …’

IN THE FICTIONAL CITY, in a restaurant far from Shiinamachi, far from the scene of the crime, I ask her, ‘How is work? It must feel strange being back there at the bank now, after everything …’

‘Are you asking me as a reporter,’ she whispers, ‘or as a … As a what? What are you? Who are you, Mr Takeuchi?’

I look down at the table, the glass jar of toothpicks, the white bottle of soy sauce, and I say, ‘A friend, I hope …’

‘Then thank you,’ says Murata Masako. ‘I hope so, too.’

IN THE FICTIONAL CITY, a telephone rings, a voice whispers, along the wires, down the cables, with a time and with a place –

Down an alley, in a room, another room of shadows, another room of stares, another man hands me another envelope –

I open the envelope. I read its contents:

I stop reading. I put the document back in its envelope. I hand him back the envelope. I take out my wallet. I hand him the cash.

The man counts the cash. The man puts it in his jacket pocket. The man smiles and says, ‘Didn’t think you’d like it, but thought you should see it. Explains a lot doesn’t it?’

IN THE FICTIONAL CITY, days pass and stories pass; days of snow, days of wind, days of rain and days of sun, stories of food poisoning, stories of strikes, stories of cabinets resigning and stories of cabinets forming, the end of Katayama and the beginning of Ashida, as winter turns to spring, spring to summer, the sky falling and the temperature rising, as censorship turns to coercion, coercion to complicity in the Fictional City, where days pass and stories pass, days and stories passing in complicity and in columns until Sunday 22 August 1948, and a story, a story not in my paper, not in the Yomiuri –

A story in our rival paper, in the Mainichi:

Teikoku Bank Poison Robbery Suspect Arrested in Otaru

OTARU, Aug. 22 – A well-known water-colour artist residing at Shinkinaimachi, Otaru City, Hokkaido, yesterday morning was arrested by detectives of the Metropolitan Police Board as a highly important suspect in the Teikoku Bank ‘mass poison murder’ case.

The arrival of the Tokyo detectives specifically for the purpose of arresting Hirasawa Sadamichi, 57, and taking him to Tokyo for questioning has given strong reason for believing that the police may finally have nabbed the long-sought-for Teikoku Bank criminal.

It is understood that Hirasawa previously had been listed by the manhunt headquarters in Tokyo as a likely suspect.

The arrested man was reported closely to fit the description of the diabolic Teikoku Bank murderer.

On April 16, last year, Hirasawa is said to have secured a name-card from Dr Matsui Shigeru, Welfare Ministry employee, when he met the doctor aboard an Aomori-Hokkaido ferryboat.

He is suspected of having used the name-card in holding-up the Teikoku Bank on January 26, this year. It is known that Hirasawa left Yokohama for Otaru aboard the Hikawa Maru on February 10, this year, shortly after the Teikoku Bank case.

Furthermore, suspicion has been heightened against the suspect by information obtained by the police that he transmitted a sum of ¥80,000 to his wife Masako, 55. Besides, the letter once sent to him by his wife said: ‘Please don’t do such a bad thing again.’

Hirasawa is well known in Tokyo art circles as a member of a water-colour artists’ association. He is said to have presented his paintings to the Bunten Art Exhibition numerous times.

   In the Fictional City, I run down the long, long, long, long table to my editor’s desk, the Mainichi in my hand –

‘Just the man I wanted to see,’ says Ono. ‘Though that’s not the story I wanted to see, least not in that paper!’

I say, ‘We’ve been scooped …’

‘No time for tears now,’ sighs Ono, tapping his watch. ‘This suspect, this Hirasawa, he’ll be arriving at Ueno Station first thing tomorrow morning and I want you there with your girlfriend …’

I start to say, ‘She’s not my girlfriend …’

‘No time for denials now,’ laughs Ono. ‘You’ve got a busy day and night ahead of you, a lot of ground to make up. Before that train pulls into Ueno Station, I want an interview with this Hirasawa’s wife. Here’s her address …’

I take the address from him and I ask, ‘How did they get all that information, the Mainichi? Who are they talking to and why are they not talking to us? We’ve sat back, done what we’ve been told, played the game, been good little boys. It’s not fair …’

‘I’ve told you before,’ he tells me again. ‘You think too much. In our business, there’s no time for thoughts, no time for theories. In our business, we’ve just got to get on and get after the next story. And your next story is Hirasawa Masako …’

The next story, the next story …

In the Fictional City, I’m expecting the worst; expecting crowds of reporters and their photographers outside Number 32, 2-chōme, Miyazono-dōri, Nakano-ku, the wife and children of Hirasawa Sadamichi already in hiding or already waiting at the Mejiro Police Station, waiting for the arrival of Hirasawa Sadamichi. But in the Fictional City, there are no reporters and their photographers outside Number 32, 2-chōme, Miyazono-dōri, Nakano-ku, just a woman tending to some flowers, some poppies –

‘Excuse me,’ I say. ‘Are you Hirasawa Masako?’

The woman looks up from the flowers, the poppies, and wipes her face on a towel and says, ‘Yes. Can I help you?’

‘My name is Takeuchi Riichi,’ I tell her. ‘I’m a journalist for the Yomiuri newspaper. I was wondering if I could talk to you about your husband, Hirasawa Sadamichi? Please?’

‘My husband?’ she says. ‘Why?’

‘Well, I’m very sorry to tell you that he’s been arrested …’

‘Arrested?’ she says. ‘What’s he been arrested for?’

‘The Teikoku Bank murder case.’

‘What?’ she laughs. ‘Don’t be ridiculous …’

But now another car is pulling up outside Number 32, 2-chōme, Miyazono-dōri, Nakano-ku, another journalist jumping out of the car, another journalist shouting ‘Mrs Hirasawa? Please …’

I say, ‘I’m afraid it’s true. But I think we should go inside, if you don’t mind. Then I’ll tell you everything I know …’

The wife of Hirasawa Sadamichi is still laughing, but she is nodding now, ushering me up her path and into her house, calling her daughter out of their kitchen as I turn back now, closing their front door in the face of the other journalist with an, ‘Excuse me …’

‘They’ve arrested Father,’ Mrs Hirasawa is telling her daughter. ‘For the Teikoku Bank murders!’

‘What? Father?’ says her daughter, looking at me, then at her mother, and now she is laughing, too –

‘It must be a joke …’

Laughing but looking at the front door to their house, listening to the banging on the door, the tapping on the window –

‘A joke…’

In the Fictional City, back in my office, back at my desk, I am writing another story:

Wife Refutes Charge

Tokyo, Aug. 23 – Mrs Hirasawa Masako, wife of the latest Teikoku Bank ‘poison holdup case’ suspect, yesterday denied as ‘ridiculous’ reports that her husband was the long-sought diabolic criminal on being interviewed at her residence in Nakano here.

Mrs Hirasawa said that her husband left Tokyo for Otaru, Hokkaido, on February 10 for the purpose of paying a visit to his ailing brother.

She said that whereas her husband’s age and greying hair may fit the description of the wanted man, it was unbelievable that he committed such a diabolic crime.

Mrs Hirasawa added that there was no reason for her husband to commit such a crime to obtain money, as her three daughters were earning a total of ¥15,000 monthly, which is quite enough to support them.

She hoped that the survivors of the Teikoku Bank murder case swiftly would be given an opportunity to see her husband, as she was confident that their judgment would clear her husband of all suspicion.

IN THE FICTIONAL CITY, it is not yet dawn but it is already hot as I knock on her door. Again and again I knock on her door, banging and banging, until she says from behind the door, ‘Who is it?’

‘It’s me,’ I say. ‘Takeuchi.’

‘What do you want?’

‘The police have arrested a man in Otaru,’ I tell her. ‘The police believe this is the man. The train bringing him to Tokyo will arrive at Ueno at 5 a.m. I’ve got a car to take you to Ueno.’

‘Why?’ she asks.

‘Well, I thought you’d want to see him,’ I say. ‘To see if it really is him, really is the man you saw that day …’

‘Wait then,’ she says now and I wait, I wait in the street outside her house. Is she afraid? Her house still dark. Or is she excited? The lights still off. Hoping? The curtains still closed–

Praying it is that man, that man again?

The door opens now. Miss Murata Masako stares at me. Murata Masako says, ‘Are you here as a reporter or as a friend?’

‘Both,’ I say. ‘But mainly as a friend, I hope.’

‘I hope so, too,’ says Murata Masako. ‘Come on, then.’

In the Fictional City, we sit in silence in the back of the Yomiuri car, in silence as she stares out of the window at the city, the city rising, in silence as we are driven through the heat, the heat rising, in silence until we arrive at Ueno Station, at Ueno Station where she turns to me and whispers, ‘In due time, in due time …’

‘Pardon?’ I ask. ‘What did you say?’

‘Nothing,’ she says and now she gets out of the car in front of the station, out of the car and into the crowds, the crowds that have come in their thousands, in their thousands to see this man, this man who the crowds believe murdered her co-workers and her friends –

This man who tried to murder her, to kill her –

Now she grabs my hand suddenly and she holds my hand tightly as I push and I shove through the crowds, the crowds in their thousands who are pushing and shoving to catch a glimpse, a glimpse of this man, this man called Hirasawa Sadamichi –

This man who tried to murder her –

But the train is late, the train delayed, and the crowd is growing and growing, pushing and shoving, and now the train has arrived, the train is here, and the crowd are pushing and shoving, harder and harder, and I am holding her in front of me, my hands on her waist, tighter and tighter, pushing her forward, raising her up, higher and higher, hoping and praying she’ll see him, hoping and praying she’ll see him and say that this is the man, this is the man who murdered her co-workers –

This man who –

‘I can’t see,’ she whispers. ‘I can’t see him …’

IN THE FICTIONAL CITY, in the dancehall on the Ginza, with its sticky suits and sweaty faces, its jungle rhythms and deafening shoes, in this Fictional City, I am shouting, shouting over the drums and the feet, ‘I thought you were my man-on-the-inside, my man-in-the-know, but I’m the last-man-to-know, I’ve been scooped …’

He shrugs. He says, ‘Everyone’s in the dark. Not just me, not just you. They kept the rest of us chasing suspects with military backgrounds, with medical backgrounds, telling us to forget about the name-cards, giving it to Robbery, moving Robbery out of HQ …’

‘But they told us not to write about the military men, the medical men; told us to keep it out of our papers,’ I say. ‘And look where that’s got us? Duped and scooped …’

He laughs, ‘You think you guys, your paper, are the only ones who get censored? Wake up! This is an Occupied Country. They can do what they want. It’s a set-up …’

‘He’s innocent?’

He sighs, ‘Course he is. But they’re desperate. They followed the name-cards and this is where it’s led them. But there are seventeen name-cards which have not been traced, that are unaccounted for. This guy is just one of seventeen and the moment the survivors set eyes on him, that’ll be that…’

‘That’ll be what?’

He laughs again, ‘The end of their case. The survivors won’t be able to identify him and then they’ll have to let him go …’

‘You think so?’

He winks at me now and says, ‘I know so. All of us do, all of us except Ikki and his name-card team. It’s all circumstantial…’

‘But off-the-record, they’re telling us they’re 100 per cent certain. That’s why they’ve gone so public with his arrest…’

‘And, of course, you believe everything you hear,’ he laughs. ‘Everything they tell you. Well, you just watch …’

IN THE FICTIONAL CITY, I write a story, half-a-story:

Well-Known Artist Held As Poison Holdup Suspect

The latest Teikoku Bank ‘mass murder’ suspect arrested in Otaru, Hokkaido, arrived at Heno Station yesterday morning under the custody of seven policemen.

The suspect, Hirasawa Sadamichi, 57, spent most of the trip from Hokkaido hiding under a blanket as crowds gathered at every major railway station along the route to get a glimpse of the man suspected of the ‘poison holdup’ which resulted in the death of 12 bank employees.

Metropolitan police authorities, however, warned that it was too early to jump to premature conclusions and said that Hirasawa’s connection with the case would most likely be cleared up within 48 hours.

Hirasawa is a well-known water-colour artist and left for Hokkaido soon after the Teigin mass murder.

Police said there was only circumstantial evidence against him. He was slated to be interviewed by the survivors of the mass murder.

Bearing a close resemblance to the murderer, Hirasawa had been under suspicion before but was released for lack of evidence. His testimony concerning the name-card he admitted receiving from Dr Matsui Shigeru differed from that given by the latter.

Mrs Hirasawa Masako, wife of the suspect, yesterday denied as ‘ridiculous’ the reports that her husband was the long-sought mass murderer. While the general description may fit that of the wanted man, she said that it was unbelievable that he should commit such a diabolic crime.

   In the Fictional City, this city of millions, millions will read my newspaper, millions will half-read my half-a-story, and then some of these people will form mobs and these mobs will attack the house of Mrs Hirasawa and her daughters, with sticks and with stones, Mrs Hirasawa and her daughters in hiding now, now and for ever in the Fictional City.

IN THE FICTIONAL CITY, in a restaurant far from Shiinamachi, far from the scene of the crime, I look up from the table, the glass jar of toothpicks, the white bottle of soy sauce, and I ask her, ‘So what happened? Did you see Hirasawa? Was Hirasawa the man who …’

‘They took me to the Sakuradamon Police Station,’ she says. ‘And they took me into an interrogation room, and this man, this Hirasawa Sadamichi looked up from the table at me and I stared back at him, looked him in his face, hoping and praying that I had seen his face before, that this was the man who had murdered my colleagues and my friends, the man who had tried to kill me …’

‘And was it?’ I ask her. ‘Was it him?’

‘When the killer began to distribute the poison,’ she whispers, ‘I looked him in his face. I will never forget that face.’

‘I know,’ I say.

‘I would know it anywhere.’

‘I know,’ I say again. ‘And was his face that face?’

‘No,’ she says, shaking her head. ‘It was not the face I saw that day. The face I saw that day was round. Very round, like an egg. This man Hirasawa has a square face. Very square, like a box. He’s also too old. He’s not that man. Hirasawa is not the killer.’

I look back down at the table, the glass jar of toothpicks, the white bottle of soy sauce, and I say, ‘I’m sorry.’

‘Me too,’ she says. ‘Me too.’

IN THE FICTIONAL CITY, a telephone rings again, a voice speaks, along the wires again, down the cables, with a time and with a place –

Down an alley, in a room, another room of shadows, another room of stares, a man I know is sitting with a man I don’t –

The man I know gestures at the man I don’t and he says, ‘This gentleman here works for the Free People’s Rights League and this gentleman has something for you, don’t you?’

The man hands me an envelope.

I open it. I start to read –

The man I know says, ‘You don’t need to read it all now. It’s for you. You can keep it. But, as you can see, the document details the many ways in which the arrest of Hirasawa violated his civil rights under our new constitution …’

I put the document back in its envelope. I take out my wallet. I take out my cash. The man I know points to the man I don’t –

He smiles and he says, ‘Give it to him. Not me.’

The man I don’t know, this man from the Free People’s Rights League, counts my cash. The man puts it in his jacket pocket. This man smiles now and says, ‘Thank you.’

In this Fictional City, this city of inclement weather, this city of demonstrations, the man I know says, ‘But don’t forget, everything’s a set-up …’

IN THE FICTIONAL CITY, I write a new story for a new day:

Mass Murder Suspect Cleared; Police Baffled; Suspect’s Arrest Raises Civil Rights Issue

Horizaki Shigeki of the First Criminal Investigative Section of the Metropolitan Police Board yesterday expressed the hope of releasing Hirasawa Sadamichi from custody sometime the same evening. Officials of the Tokyo Procurators Office said after cross-examining Hirasawa that two major points still need to be cleared up relative to Hirasawa’s action at the time of the crime and subsequently. The first was said to be Hirasawa’s alibi as to what he was doing on January 26, the date of the crime. The other puzzling point, they said, was the suspect’s construction of a new home and the fact that he possessed ¥45,000 in cash at home, which he alleges to have borrowed from a friend.

—

The seven-month-old question as to who perpetrated the diabolic Teikoku Bank ‘poison holdup case’ remained a baffling mystery today following the clearance of Hirasawa Sadamichi from suspicion as being the long-sought criminal.

Hopes entertained by police authorities, especially Inspector Ikki, who made the arrest and went so far as saying that Hirasawa’s guilt was ‘100 per cent certain’, fell dismally flat Monday evening when 11 persons who saw the Teigin criminal could find no resemblance in the much-publicized latest suspect.

Although the ‘screening’ was conducted under a tense atmosphere and all who saw Hirasawa were given ample time to make up their minds, not a single person charged the water-colour artist as being the Teikoku Bank criminal.

Six of them, in fact, were certain that he was not the man who committed the diabolic crime.

Hirasawa was the fourth important suspect directly questioned by the Metropolitan Police Board in connection with the Teikoku Bank ‘poison holdup case’.

—

Meanwhile, Government and police authorities appear destined to face sharp criticism from numerous public organizations on the charge of failing to safeguard basic civil rights in the event investigations should clear latest Teigin suspect Hirasawa Sadamichi of all association with the Teikoku Bank ‘poison holdup case’.

Lessening of suspicion against Hirasawa has switched public attention to the issue of basic civil rights concerning police action and the indignities to which the latest suspect was subjected.

Already, two civic organizations – the Tokyo Bar Association and the Free People’s Rights League – are reported to be preparing a campaign of protest against Government authorities for their action against Hirasawa in the event the latter should be freed of all suspicion.

Both of these bodies favour the institution of legal action against the Government on behalf of Hirasawa to obtain payment of damages or a formal apology from authorities for their failure to uphold basic civil rights in the latest case.

In this connection, Attorney General Suzuki Yoshio admitted that the incident involving Hirasawa’s arrest may enmesh the Government in a suit for payment of damages on the charge of failure to safeguard basic civil rights.

The Attorney General said he personally felt that officials associated in the manhunt possessed ample suspicion for carrying out the arrest but it had been ‘imprudent’ for them to have prematurely disclosed their action.

He said, moreover, that there appeared justification in criticism levelled against the remark by Police Inspector Ikki that he was ‘100 per cent certain’ that Hirasawa was the criminal who perpetrated the Teikoku Bank case. Authorities of the Metropolitan Police Board, on the other hand, defended their action relative to Hirasawa. They stressed that they had secured enough incriminating information to arrest Hirasawa, although they felt that Police Inspector Ikki had gone ‘a bit too far’ in making a flat personal statement of his view. But Tanaka Eiichi, Inspector-General of the Police, also pointed out that police had done no wrong in handcuffing Hirasawa in the course of bringing him to Tokyo from Otaru. He said that such a measure was duly provided in police regulations in such instances.

   I look up from the paper. I turn around from my desk, my editor standing over my shoulder, and I say, ‘What’s wrong?’

‘Hirasawa’s just tried to kill himself …’

IN THE FICTIONAL CITY, in the genkan to her house, she takes her hand from her mouth and she asks, ‘Why? What happened?’

‘Apparently Hirasawa had a piece of glass on him,’ I tell her. ‘And sometime this afternoon he tried to sever the artery of his left wrist with the piece of glass and with the point of a pen …’

‘Is he all right?’ she asks. ‘Will he survive?’

‘Yes,’ I tell her. ‘Luckily, Hirasawa wasn’t alone at the time. There were other prisoners in the cell with him and so they raised the alarm. Doctors were quickly in the cell and they were able to bandage his artery before there was any great loss of blood. So he’ll live.’

‘Why?’ she asks again. ‘It’s not him. He’s innocent?’

‘I don’t know,’ I say. ‘But I’m going to find out…’

IN THE FICTIONAL CITY, down an alley off the main street, on the sofa at the back of the room, I say, ‘I thought Hirasawa was in the clear. I thought they were going to release him …’

‘I told you it was a set-up.’

‘And so this is all part of the set-up, is it?’ I ask. ‘The suicide attempt, keeping him locked up like this?’

‘They won’t give up,’ he says. ‘Especially not now, not now there’s all this talk of his civil rights, of suits and of damages. They’ll find other crimes, other crimes to investigate, other crimes to detain him on. They’ll never give up …’

IN THE FICTIONAL CITY, they don’t give up, they never give up:

4 FRAUD VICTIMS IDENTIFY ARTIST

Police to Indict Suspect in Teikoku Bank Case on Four Charges

TOKYO, Sept. 2 – Hirasawa Sadamichi, 56, well-known water-colour artist, who is now held at the Metropolitan Police Board as a suspect in the Teikoku Bank mass poisoning murders, is expected to be indicted in a few days on charges of absconding with a deposit book issued by the Marunouchi branch of the Mitsubishi Bank and committing three abortive attempts fraudulently to secure money with it.

The discovery that the latest Teigin suspect had been engaged in such unlawful practices was bared by Prosecutor Takagi of the Tokyo district prosecutor’s office as a sequel to further intensive police investigations into Hirasawa’s past activities.

The four persons said to be victims of his acts have identified him and this has brought hope to the long-harassed police that these cases may lead to the murder case. For it appears that there was some extremely pressing need for Hirasawa to obtain at least ¥100,000 and thus might have made him desperate enough not to stop at murder. Another point about these charges is that they invariably have to do with banks.

The police still cannot say as yet whether they believe Hirasawa to be the Teikoku Bank murderer but the attempted swindles, with one connected with a branch of the Teikoku Bank, place him under the case will be continued with heavy suspicion. Investigation on Hirasawa held on the four charges.

HIRASAWA HELD ON FRAUD CHARGE

Authorities Still Pinning High Hopes of Linking Artist with Bank Case

TOKYO, Sept. 5 – The Tokyo District Public Procurator’s Office Friday prosecuted Hirasawa Sadamichi, water-colour artist and the latest suspect in the Teikoku Bank holdup-murder case, for falsification of private documents and fraud to which he has confessed, as the period for its investigation of the man as a Teigin murder suspect expired.

The procuratorial authorities, who are said to be 80 per cent confident that Hirasawa is the Teigin murderer, will continue to investigate his suspected crime after his prosecution for other crimes, it was learned.

The Yomiuri has also learned that the procuratorial authorities have decided to have the handwriting endorsing a cheque, the only clue to the bank murderer, studied by experts to determine whether the handwriting is not that of Hirasawa.

A number of people who saw the bank murderer have had a look at Hirasawa but most of them are not sure that he is the murderer.

On Friday Hirasawa had his hair cropped before a photograph was taken of him. Three officers in charge of the case were dumb-struck at the sight of Hirasawa with his hair cut. They said that the man now answered the description of the murderer.

Is Hirasawa Culprit In Teigin Murder Case?

Is Hirasawa Sadamichi the actual culprit who perpetrated the diabolic Teikoku Bank mass poisoning murder?

On the left is the hypothetical drawing of the murderer made immediately after the murders on the basis of the description given by the eye-witness survivors.

On the right is a photo just taken at the special investigation room of the Metropolitan Police Board of Hirasawa with his hair cropped close.

PAST ACTIVITIES OF ARTIST BARED

Teigin Suspect Found to Have Made Big Deposits Under Assumed Names

TOKYO, Sept. 9 – Police efforts to trace the source of a large amount of questionable money acquired by Hirasawa Sadamichi have led to a fresh exposure that the latest Teigin suspect deposited a sum of ¥80,000 with the Hongoku-cho branch of the Bank of Tokyo three days after the Teikoku Bank ‘poison holdup case’.

The latest discovery showed thereby that the water-colour artist, who is known to have had no steady income about that time, opened two deposits under assumed names shortly following the Teigin crime.

Meanwhile, handwriting experts studying Hirasawa’s handwriting with that on a money order which is believed to have been used by the Teigin criminal, said that there was some likeness between them but declined to give a decisive answer pending a further check-up.

A fresh slant relative to Hirasawa’s suspected use of potassium cyanide in the Teikoku Bank case was also offered to the police on Monday when a conference of scientific experts clarified that the Teigin criminal did not have to possess expert knowledge in the use of the poison. This has stirred police to make a renewed effort to trace how and where Hirasawa may have possibly obtained the poison.

POISON SEEN USED IN MIXING COLOURS

Presence of Cyanide in Tempera May Pin Teigin Suspect

TOKYO, Sept. 14 – Police who have been trying hard to establish whether latest Teigin suspect Hirasawa Sadamichi ever possessed or knew anything about potassium cyanide are now believed to have unearthed positive evidence that the 57-year-old artist had frequently used the lethal poison in mixing colour for his tempera paintings.

Investigators working on the case are said to have found that Hirasawa frequently used potassium cyanide with copper materials and coins to produce light green colour for his tempera paintings. He is said to have neutralized green colour obtained from such a mixing with the white of eggs.

Furthermore, in producing light green colour, Hirasawa is reported to have used a small syringe similar to the one which the Teigin criminal is said to have used in perpetrating the diabolic crime.

Police efforts to ferret out conclusive evidence that Hirasawa committed the diabolic ‘poison holdup case’ have now entered the fourth week of investigation with the question of Hirasawa’s guilt still unsolved.

However, in the course of these past investigations, investigators have uncovered a wealth of other circumstantial and puzzling information, strengthening suspicion against Hirasawa in the Teigin case and proving that Hirasawa, at any rate, has been guilty of numerous cases of fraud.

HIRASAWA FACES ABORTION CHARGE

Teikoku Bank Suspect Is Alleged to Have Used Drugs in Treatment

TOKYO, Sept. 15 – Police authorities investigating latest Teikoku Bank suspect Hirasawa Sadamichi have come across information that the latter personally administered illegal abortion to more than 10 women, the Yomiuri learned.

This information is said to have been tendered to the police by a certain artist and another unnamed person, both of whom are well-acquainted with Hirasawa. The artist friend is alleged to have revealed that Hirasawa personally brought about more than 10 cases of abortion in Hokkaido by claiming knowledge of a method for inducing abortion through physical pressure. The other person is reported to have told the police that Hirasawa induced abortion by the use of drugs.

Should these allegations prove true, Hirasawa is liable to further indictment on the charge of violating medical practice.

Furthermore, it is said Hirasawa’s alleged use of drugs may lead to shedding important light on his believed employment of potassium cyanide in the Teigin case.

TEIGIN MURDER CASE

New Poison Angle Found; Will It Finally Lead To Hirasawa?

TOKYO, Sept. 20 – Police authorities who have been striving for some time without success to definitely link latest Teigin suspect Hirasawa Sadamichi with the Teikoku Bank case are reported to have turned up a new poison angle involving the daughter of his mistress.

It has become known that Hirasawa obtained some potassium cyanide from Miss Kamata Michiko, 25-year-old daughter of his mistress, shortly after the end of the war.

Miss Kamata is said to have told the police that this came about through her acquisition of some potassium cyanide while working as a typist for a firm in Tokyo during the war and shortly thereafter.

About this time, she said that Hirasawa frequently came to see her mother and is believed to have walked off with her potassium cyanide after she had shown it to him.

Meanwhile, authorities were said to be investigating other phases of the poisoning case, such as Hirasawa’s possible acquisition of potassium cyanide while working as a member of the special painting material research centre of the Kisarazu airfield during the war.

POLICE CLARIFY HIRASAWA CASE

Declare Teigin Suspect Is On The Point Of Making Vital Confession

TOKYO, Sept. 26 – Teigin suspect Hirasawa Sadamichi is believed to have been driven to the verge of making a vital confession at any time as a sequel to renewed, detailed police questioning relative to fresh incriminating evidence that has turned up concerning his possession of a large amount of questionable money shortly following the Teikoku Bank ‘poison holdup case’.

Chief Fujita of the Detective Section, Metropolitan Police Board, commenting on the progress of the latest investigation, said that it may lead the 57-year-old artist finally to come forth with a vital confession.

‘At any rate, the investigation has reached a highly important stage,’ he said, adding that if such a confession should be made the press would speedily be informed.

MURDERER OF 12 CONFESSES CRIME

Hirasawa Admits He Administered Poison to Bank Workers; ‘I Confessed My Guilt On Own Free Will,’ Says Hirasawa; Family Stands By Him

IN THE FICTIONAL CITY, again and again I knock on her door, until she says from behind the door, ‘Who is it?’

‘It’s me,’ I say. ‘It’s Takeuchi.’

‘What do you want?’

‘He’s confessed,’ I tell her. ‘Hirasawa has confessed!’

The lock turns. The door opens. Murata Masako stares at me. Murata Masako says, ‘But it wasn’t him. I know it wasn’t him.’

‘But it was him,’ I tell her. ‘He’s confessed everything, says he made the unsuccessful attempts to poison and rob the employees at Ebara and Nakai, that he did what he did at the Teikoku Bank for money, that he needed the money for his tempera paintings and for family reasons, and that it was him and him alone …’

‘I don’t believe it,’ she says. ‘I can’t.’

‘Well, you should and you must…’

‘Why?’ she asks. ‘Why must I?’

I step forward into her genkan. I take her hand in mine. I say, ‘Because it means it’s over, it’s finished now. You don’t have to be afraid any more, you can forget it, forget him. You can move on now, you can start a new life. We can start…’

‘We?’ she laughs. ‘We? Us?’

‘Yes,’ I say. ‘Together …’

‘Are you asking me to marry you?’ she whispers.

‘Yes,’ I say. ‘I’m asking you to marry me.’

‘As a reporter,’ she says. ‘Or as a …’

‘As a man,’ I say. ‘I’m going to quit my job …’

‘You’re going to quit your job? Really?’

‘You don’t believe me?’ I ask her.

In the Fictional City, in the genkan to her house, Miss Murata Masako stares at me, Miss Murata Masako stares at me and says, ‘I don’t know what to believe any more …’

‘Believe me,’ I say. ‘Please …’

‘I’m not sure I can …’

‘Then pretend,’ I say. ‘Let’s both pretend …’

IN THE FICTIONAL CITY, I walk her streets and I hear her stories, but I’ve had enough of her streets and enough of her stories, her telephones and her voices, her wires and her cables, her alleyways and her back rooms, all her times and all her places –

‘I just want to know who did it…’

The man slowly folds up the newspaper. He takes off his glasses. He puts the glasses in the breast pocket of his jacket. He sits forward in his chair. He looks up at me and he says, ‘But why?’

‘For me,’ I say. ‘Not for a story, not for the paper.’

The man smiles and says, ‘What difference would it make? They’ve got their man and you’ve got your story …’

‘I don’t want any more stories,’ I tell him.

The man laughs, ‘No more stories? Bit late for that, isn’t it?’

‘Yes,’ I say. ‘But no more stories, please …’

IN THE FICTIONAL CITY, I stand before my editor’s desk –

‘Ah, Takeuchi,’ says Ono. ‘You still here?’

‘Well, not for much longer,’ I say. ‘But I just wanted to say goodbye and also to thank you for all you have done for me.’

‘So you’ve not changed your mind, then?’ asks Ono. ‘Never too late to change your mind, you know …’

‘No,’ I say.

‘Well then, I’m sorry to lose you,’ says Ono. ‘I had high hopes for you, very high hopes for you.’

‘Thank you,’ I say.

‘No, don’t thank me,’ says Ono. ‘It’s probably all for the best. I always told you, in this business there’s no room for doubters, no room for quitters. Don’t get me wrong, I thought you had potential, thought you had a future. But if this business is not for you, it’s not for you. So what is for you? What now, what next, Takeuchi?’

‘The Japan Advertising and Telegraph Service.’

‘Advertising?’ laughs Ono now.

‘Yes,’ I say. ‘Copywriting.’

‘Well, I hope you’ve got a good imagination …’

IN THE FICTIONAL CITY, it is November 1948, and the headlines on today’s newspaper, my old newspaper, all the newspapers read:

TOJO AND 6 OTHERS ARE SENTENCED TO HANG; 16 DRAW LIFE; SHIGEMITSU GIVEN 7 YEARS; ACCUSED GUILTY ON 1 TO 8 COUNTS

In a hotel room full of journalists and policemen, of survivors and witnesses, we are sitting side by side on a stage in our wedding costumes, Masako with her eyes closed, tight –

In the Fictional City, I whisper –

‘Let’s pretend …’

IN THE FICTIONAL CITY, let’s pretend that an innocent man is guilty, that he deserves to be convicted and sentenced to death, and that the police conducted a proper and thorough investigation, let’s pretend that the Government and GHQ did not conspire to pervert the course of justice, that the newspapers and their reporters were not complicit in their stories, and that everything we read is true –

In this city made of paper, this city made of print –

In this Fictional City, let’s pretend …

Beneath the Black Gate, in its upper chamber, among the flurries and the flakes, the paper flurries of paper flakes, these black and white flurries of news-paper flakes, this former Master of Insincerities, former Master of Lies, he looks up from the damp floor of the occult circle and now he whispers, ‘Let’s pretend that this city is not a story, not a fiction, not made of paper, not made of print…

‘Let’s pretend that we are not just your stories, not just your fictions, that we are not made of paper, not made of print…

‘Let’s pretend all your papers are now a finished manuscript, that your manuscript is now a book, a book called –

‘Teigin Monogatari…

‘Let’s pretend that this book has come, this book not a fiction, and that this book absolves the innocent and accuses the guilty …

‘Let’s pretend that this book ends the whole mystery, that this book solves the whole case, that this book solves the crime …

‘This crime and all crimes, all mysteries …

‘All stories, all fictions now ended …

‘Let’s pretend, sweet writer …

‘Let’s pretend …’

Now he closes his eyes and begins to count, to count out loud, ‘I say one, I say two, I say three, I say four, I say five, and I say six.’

And now the journalist opens his eyes and stares at the candle before him, the sixth candle. But now the journalist shakes his head.

He leans forward on his knees, on the damp floor, in the occult circle, leans forward towards the sixth candle.

Now the journalist blows out the candle –

The sixth candle.

In the half-light, you are alone again, in the upper chamber of the Black Gate, in the occult circle of now-six candles,

and in their half-light, alone again,

you half-whisper, you half-beg,

‘Let’s pretend, please …’

That all these words are not just the sum of their absences, that you, you are not the sum of your absences;

that a man is not what he lacks,

this city, this country,

not what they lack,

this world –

‘Lacks?’ laughs a voice now, the Black Gate spinning, spinning and spinning. ‘Lacks what? Look outside this window, Mister Writer. Look at the height of those buildings, those skyscrapers. Look at those people down below, in their suits and in their cars. Not on their hands, not on their knees –

‘They lack for nothing. Nothing!

‘Because of me! Me! Me!’

The six candles gone, the occult circle gone, the upper chamber gone, the Black Gate gone, and now you are standing in an enormous room, on thick carpet, high above the city,

THE FUTURE CITY rising, here, now –

‘But I am everything you hate,’ laughs the man beside you, his hand on your shoulder, fingers in your flesh and nails in your bones. ‘For I am the future, your future! Now …