3

August 17, 1946

Tokyo, 90°, fine

I itch and I scratch. Gari-gari. I have not slept again. I have not closed my eyes. My eyes tired and sore. The early morning sun coming through the window now, illuminating the dust and the stains of her room, the sound of the hammering trailing in with the light –

Ton-ton. Ton-ton. Ton-ton. Ton-ton. Ton-ton …

I sit up on the futon. I look at my watch –

Chiku-taku. Chiku-taku. I am late –

Idiot! Idiot! Idiot! Idiot! Idiot!

I get up from the futon. I itch and I scratch. Gari-gari. I put on my shirt and my trousers. Gari-gari. I go over to the genkan. Gari-gari. I lace up my boots. Gari-gari …

I curse. I curse. I curse …

I turn to say goodbye –

But she does not move, her back to the door, her face to the wall, to the paper, the stains –

I curse myself…

I close her door and I run down the corridor. Down the stairs and out the building. Out of the shadows, into the light. The light so bright this morning, the shadows so dark, bleaching and staining the city in whites and blacks. The white concrete hulks, the black empty windows. The white sidewalks and roads, the black telegraph poles and trees. The white sheets of metal, the black mountains of rubble. The white leaves, the black weeds. The white eyes and the black skin of the Losers, the white stars and the black uniforms of the Victors –

Ton-ton. Ton-ton. Ton-ton. Ton-ton. Ton-ton …

No colours today. No colours on this moon.

*

Detective Fujita is at his borrowed desk in our borrowed room. Fujita does not look up. Ishida is pouring the tea. Fujita is going through his jacket pockets. Nishi and Kimura are repairing their notebooks, rolling up thin pieces of waste paper into tight threads to bind together the coarse rough paper on which they take their notes. Fujita takes an envelope out of his inside jacket pocket. The others waking up, yawning and stretching, coughing and scratching. Fujita has not slept. The windows are open but the room is still hot and stinks of stale breath and sweat. Fujita glances at his watch. They drink their tea and start to grumble. Fujita writes a name on the front of the envelope. They want cigarettes but the next ration is not until Monday and today is Saturday. Fujita puts the envelope back in his inside jacket pocket. They want breakfast but the next meal will be cold zōsui again. Now he looks up. Detective Fujita looks up at me –

I wait for him to speak but he says nothing. Now I stand up at my desk. I bow to everyone and I say, ‘Good morning, Room #2.’

They all stand. They bow. They say, ‘Good morning.’

I tell them, ‘This morning I will accompany Inspector Kai of Room #1 to the Keiō University Hospital for the autopsies. In my absence, Detective Fujita will be in charge of the continuing search of the crime scene. The identification of the second body will not be easy and so the smallest scrap of evidence may prove crucial, so I would ask you all to be as diligent as possible in your search.’

‘We will be as diligent as possible,’ they reply.

I bow to them again. They bow to me –

Everyone but Detective Fujita.

*

Back out into the light, back out to the shadows. Into the white and into the black. Into the dirt and into the dust. The hot walk up to Tokyo Metropolitan Police Headquarters. The morning meeting –

I knock on the door to the chief’s office. I open it. I apologize. I bow. I take my seat at the table; Chief Kita at the head; Adachi and Kanehara to his right; Kai and me on the left; the same people, the same place, the same time and the same two conversations –

Purges and reforms. Reforms and purges …

Last year seven thousand, eight hundred and ninety-one policemen voluntarily gave up their jobs, three thousand, seven hundred and sixty-nine left due to illness or injury, one thousand, six hundred and forty-nine died and two thousand, eight hundred and fifty-six police officers were purged and fired –

‘Now they want to issue a further Purge Directive,’ Kanehara is saying. ‘We have few enough men as it is and, if they carry out this purge, there’ll be no one left at all…’

‘That’s why they are promising better working conditions,’ says Adachi. ‘To recruit new men…’

Reforms and purges. Purges and reforms …

From this coming Monday new regulations are to be put into practice; uniforms are presently working an average of thirteen hours a day over three shifts. The Victors have decreed they will now work an average of eight hours a day over three shifts; on the first shift they will work from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m., on the second shift from 5 p.m. to 9 a.m., then the third shift on the third day will be a day off –

‘But there aren’t the numbers for these shifts,’ says Kanehara. ‘There aren’t the men yet to cover these kinds of hours…’

‘And we all know their answer to that,’ says Adachi. ‘Transfer seven hundred of our Metropolitan Police Board officers back onto local patrol duties to cover the shortfall…’

‘It’s our own fault,’ says Kanehara. ‘We asked them for better conditions; better hours, better holidays, better benefits, better pensions and better salaries. We asked them so we could recruit better men and keep the good men we had. We asked them and this is their answer, this is what they do…’

‘They just keep purging the leadership,’ says Adachi. ‘And transferring the men we have…’

‘We ask and we ask,’ says Kanehara. ‘And they promise us this and they promise us that…’

‘That’s all they do…’

The same people, the same place, the same time and the same two conversations every day, meeting after meeting until there is a knock on the door, until there is an interruption –

‘Excuse me,’ mumbles the uniform –

‘What is it?’ barks Chief Kita –

‘Keiō Hospital are ready, sir.’

*

There has been another accident on one of the streetcars, a mother and her child killed. The system is suspended and so Inspector Kai and I get off our bus and walk the rest of the way. The route takes us through the old parks and the gardens of Moto-Akasaka –

The sound of crows, the sound of crows …

Here too the light is so bright that the green leaves shine white against the black trunks of the trees, though much of this area was untouched by the bombs, just like the Imperial Palace and its grounds, and now these grand houses and former palaces of Moto-Akasaka are homes and offices to the Victors and their families –

‘They still hunt round here,’ Kai tells me.

‘Hunt?’ I ask. ‘Who still hunts here?’

‘The nobility and the Americans.’

‘They go hunting together?’

‘Yes,’ says Kai. ‘I heard that members of our nobility entertain the American top brass with falcons. Even MacArthur…’

‘The Americans don’t trust the nobility with guns, then?’

‘They take the Americans cormorant fishing too.’

‘I’d like to eat ayu now,’ I tell him. ‘Even ayu caught by Americans. I can taste it now, washed down with sake.’

Kai laughs. ‘I’d even eat the cormorant.’

Two hills to the north of us stand the former War Ministry buildings at Ichigaya, the large three-storey pillbox that was once the headquarters of the Imperial Army but which since May has been the site of the International Military Tribunal for the Far East –

A different kind of hunt. A different kind of sport.

*

The Keiō University Hospital is at Shinanomachi, in the Yotsuya district of Tokyo. The main building is scarred but standing, the approaches and grounds scorched or overgrown. The sick or lost wander in and out, back and forth. There are queues out of the gates. Policemen on the doors. Inside the plaster is peeling from the walls and the linoleum torn from the floorboards. The corridors are crowded with the dying and the dead, the waiting and the grieving –

I don’t want to remember. I don’t want to remember …

I step over or around them and try not to breathe in –

I hate hospitals. I hate hospitals. I hate hospitals …

The air thick with screams and sobs, death and disease, DDT and disinfectant. The only drugs are aspirin and Mercurochrome, the only bandages grey and bloody. The gurneys lined up against the walls, limbs fallen loose from their sides. Remains of meals and scraps of food standing, stinking in cardboard boxes and battered tins under beds of coarse blankets and soiled sheets –

But in the half-light I can’t forget…

I try not to stare, to just walk on –

I have spent too long here …

Through the waiting rooms and down the long corridors, past the consulting rooms and the operating theatres, the surgeries and the wards, to the Chief Medical Officer –

The Chief Medical Officer is either eighty or ninety years old, his face grey and sunken, his eyes black and empty. He is wearing an unpressed morning coat and a pair of striped trousers, both two sizes too big for him, smelling of mothballs –

‘You’re late,’ he says.

Inspector Kai and I bow deeply to him. Inspector Kai and I apologize repeatedly to him –

The Chief Medical Officer shakes his head and says, ‘I have to make an important report to the Public Health and Welfare Section. I don’t want to be late…’

‘We are really very sorry,’ I tell him again. ‘But there was an accident on one of the streetcars…’

‘More work,’ he groans –

‘They’re dead,’ I say –

‘Who are dead?’

‘The mother and her child,’ I tell him. ‘The mother and her child who fell from the running board of the streetcar…’

He hands us two files from the pile on his desk. He says, ‘You know the way.’

Each with our file, reading as we walk down another long corridor towards the elevator. There are the mothers sat here. Five of the mothers here, looking for their missing daughters –

Five mothers whose descriptions of their missing daughters most closely resemble the two bodies found in Shiba Park. Five mothers praying they do not find them here …

‘What do they want now?’ spits Kai. ‘We told them to wait until tomorrow. They shouldn’t be here…’

I have skimmed the evidence and statements in the files. I have seen the hopes and fears in their eyes. I say, ‘Let them look.’

‘They can wait,’ says Kai. ‘Until after the autopsies…’

‘Why not just let these five look? It might help us…’

‘Why?’ he says. ‘They’ll either be lucky or late.’

‘Let them look before the autopsy,’ I say again.

‘No.’

‘What if it was your daughter that was missing?’ I ask him. ‘Would you want to see her after an autopsy?’

Inspector Kai stops in the corridor now. Inspector Kai says, ‘My daughter is dead. My daughter burned to death in an air-raid shelter. My daughter had no autopsy…’

Now I shut up. Now I remember. Now it’s too late. Now I say, ‘I am sorry. I’m really sorry…’

But Kai is away from me now and away from the five mothers, already half-way down the corridor. Down the narrow corridor to the service elevator. To push the elevator button. To wait. To watch the elevator doors open. To step inside. For me to follow him. To push another button. To watch the elevator doors close –

There are no electric light bulbs in here, for the sake of economy one of the orderlies tells us, and so we ride down in an elevator so dark that I cannot see my hand before my face –

I think about her all the time …

I cannot see the body on the gurney beside me. The body on the gurney parked up against my leg. The body that smells –

That smells of fruit, that smells of rotten apricots …

The elevator stops. The elevator doors open –

The light returns. The half-light. The basement not much brighter than the elevator. Half-things move in the half-light. People and insects drawn like magnets towards the few naked bulbs there are. Half-things. The people working in their shirtsleeves or their undershirts; the insects feasting on their sweat and their skin, their flesh and their bone. In the half-light. This labyrinth of corridors and rooms. Here where the dead come. The tiled walls of sinks, of drains. Where the dead live. The written warnings of cuts, of punctures. Here in the half-light. The orderlies washing and rinsing their hands and their forearms, again and again. Here. Down here …

The autopsy room is along the corridor to the right, beyond the mortuary. There are slippers waiting for our feet, the room itself back beyond a set of glass doors, bomb tape still upon the glass –

She is coming now. She is coming …

Dr. Nakadate is waiting for us outside the autopsy room, before the glass doors, before the tape. Nakadate is finishing his cigarette, smoking it right down to the stub –

A familiar face, a familiar place …

Dr. Nakadate glances up at us. He greets us with a smile. ‘Good morning, detectives.’

‘Good morning,’ we reply. ‘We are very sorry we are late.’

‘There are no clocks down here,’ says Dr. Nakadate –

He puts out his cigarette and opens the glass doors to the autopsy room where five junior medical examiners in grubby grey laboratory coats are already gathered round the three autopsy tables and two smaller dissecting tables; the three autopsy tables which stand on the concrete floor in the centre of the room, three elongated octagonal tables made of white marble and of German design, slanted for drainage with raised edges to prevent leakage –

I itch and I scratch. Gari-gari …

She is coming …

The glass doors open again. The first body is brought in from the mortuary under a grey sheet on old wheels. The grey sheet is removed. The body lifted from the gurney –

In the half-light, she is here …

The naked body of the first woman lain out on the table –

Here where half-things move in the half-light …

Her body seems longer, paler. Eyes open, mouth ajar –

‘And I am here because of you,’ she says …

Her sex is noted. Her age estimated at eighteen –

‘Here where there is pain…’

Her weight is taken. Her height measured –

Here in the half-light …

Dr. Nakadate puts on a stained surgical gown and a pair of rubber gloves. The orderlies raise the body. The orderlies place a rubber body block beneath it. Her breasts and chest rise upwards, her arms and neck fall backwards –

I turn away now.

‘There is still no name?’ asks the doctor. ‘No identification?’

I glance over at Inspector Kai and I say, ‘No names yet.’

‘Then this is Number One. The next is Number Two.’

I nod. I take out my pencil. I lick its tip.

Nakadate begins his gross observations on the exterior condition of the first body, one of his assistants noting down everything he says on the chalkboard on the wall, another writing in a large hospital notebook, the observations in German and Latin –

Mumbled evocations. Muttered incantations …

‘Irises are black, corneas clouded,’ intones the doctor. ‘Haemorrhaging in the surfaces…’

I look up again –

She is watching the doctor, watching him work …

‘Removal of a piece of material from the neck reveals a ligature mark – to be known as Ligature A – below the mandible…’

She is staring up at the fabric he holds …

‘Minor abrasions present in the area of Ligature A but the lack of haemorrhage suggests Ligature A is post-mortem…’

She opens and closes her eyes …

‘Heavy bruising on the neck is of a pattern that suggests an attempt was made to throttle the victim…’

She swallows now as …

‘In the same area as the bruising on the neck, a second ligature mark is present – to be known as Ligature B – which encircles the neck, crossing the anterior midline of the neck just below the laryngeal prominence…’

As she remembers …

‘The skin of the anterior neck above and below Ligature B shows petechial haemorrhaging…’

Her own death …

‘The absence of abrasions here is consistent with the use of a softer ligature…’

‘Like a haramaki?’ asks Kai.

Dr. Nakadate looks up from her neck. He nods. ‘Yes, like a haramaki, Inspector Kai.’

Kai looks across at me. I open my mouth to start to speak. To ask him again. Inspector Kai shakes his head. I stop –

Dr. Nakadate has moved down her body to her genital area. ‘There is evidence of forced sexual activity here…’

Here there is pain. Pain is here …

‘Pre- or post-mortem?’ I ask him –

‘I am here because of you…’

Dr. Nakadate looks across her body at me. He holds up a finger. ‘One moment please, inspector.’

Her cheeks blush, her eyes close …

‘Possibly both,’ he says –

Here is pain. Pain is here …

Dr. Nakadate and his assistants now minutely examine every part of her skin, every nail and every hair, every tooth and every orifice, every spot and every blemish –

‘Are there any distinguishing features for identification, doctor?’ I ask him. ‘Anything…’

‘Yes,’ he says. ‘There is evidence of a small whitlow scar on her left thumb…’

I look over again at Inspector Kai. Kai making his own notes. I cough. I clear my throat. I start to speak again, to say, ‘Then maybe we should let the mothers see the body now, Inspector Kai?’

Dr. Nakadate stops his observations. He looks up –

‘No,’ says Inspector Kai again.

‘But with this scar,’ I say. ‘And the haramaki, the five darned holes in the haramaki …’

‘No,’ says Kai.

‘I believe positive identification is now possible…’

‘No.’

‘But we’re wasting time…’

‘Room #1 has been assigned to this body…’

‘Yes,’ I say. ‘But…’

‘And Room #2 the next body.’

‘But obviously, until this body has been identified, I can’t…’

‘Then I believe I am in charge of this case, detective.’

‘Yes, but…’

‘But what, detective?’ asks Inspector Kai.

‘Nothing.’

‘Dr. Nakadate,’ says Kai now. ‘I am sorry if we have disturbed your work. Please continue with the autopsy.’

Dr. Nakadate picks up a scalpel from the tray. Metal on metal. Dr. Nakadate inserts the scalpel into her chest cavity. Metal through skin. Dr. Nakadate cuts a Y-shaped line down through the centre of her body, from the front of each shoulder down beneath each breast, around her navel to her pubic bone. Metal through flesh to bone …

She crosses her arms. She grasps her own shoulders …

The skin, the muscles and the soft tissues of her chest wall are now peeled back and away, the chest flap pulled upward towards her face, the ribcage and the lower neck left exposed –

She turns and gazes across at me …

Her body is open. Her blood flowing –

‘I am here because of you…’

Black/white light. In/out knife –

‘Here because of you…’

Hack away. Cut away. Piece by piece –

To weigh. Measure for measure –

Here where there is pain …

Dr. Nakadate removes her stomach and an assistant opens it up at one of the smaller dissecting tables, inspecting its contents as another assistant slices her liver and the smell of gastric acid –

That stench of gastric acid fills the room –

Her ribcage is opened up now –

Here where there is pain …

Her heart taken out –

Here.

Finally, the rubber body block is placed beneath her head. Now Dr. Nakadate opens her scalp –

I close my eyes again –

Black/white light. The scalp of my wife. In/out knife. The scalp of my daughter. Hack away/cut away. My son …

I open my eyes –

Here …

Her head is slumped back while her eyes stare upward, fixed in one last cold gaze at the cracked ceiling of the autopsy room, her spinal cord cut and her brain removed –

Measure for measure…

Piece by piece…

To record …

Inspector Kai has closed his notebook. He has put away his pencil, taken out a cigarette. The detective has finished his work –

Her suffering recorded. Her misery noted …

Dr. Nakadate is washing his gloves in a metal bowl. The water red, his gown black. The doctor has finished his work –

The doctor’s assistants beginning to stitch –

Her suffering. Her misery …

I watch them work. I watch her –

Her breaking…

‘Preliminary conclusions, doctor?’ asks Inspector Kai –

‘I would estimate the time of death as being somewhere between ten and eleven days ago,’ says the doctor. ‘And the cause of death as asphyxia due to ligature strangulation.’

‘Thank you very much, doctor,’ says Inspector Kai. ‘I look forward to reading your full report.’

‘You’re welcome.’

Inspector Kai turns to me. ‘I’m going back to Atago now.’

‘What about the second body?’ I ask him. ‘You’re not going to stay for the autopsy. There might be…’

‘That’s your case,’ says Kai. ‘It’s mostly bones anyway. There will be nothing to see.’

I turn back to the autopsy table. Back to her. The stitching complete, her body is being lifted onto the gurney. The grey sheet is placed back over her body once more. The glass doors are opened and she is wheeled out of the autopsy room back to the mortuary –

The marble table washed down with a bucket of water –

I swallow bile. I swallow bile. I swallow …

Her blood running away in rivers.

*

I sit in the corridor between the autopsy room and the mortuary. I itch and I scratch. Gari-gari. I wait for Dr. Nakadate to drink his tea and smoke his cigarette. I itch and I scratch. Gari-gari. I wait for the orderlies to finish cleaning up the autopsy room. I itch and I scratch. Gari-gari. I wait for them to bring in the second body. I itch and I scratch. Gari-gari. I wait for the second autopsy to begin –

Itching and scratching. Itching and scratching –

My autopsy, my body. My body, my autopsy …

The bomb tape still upon the glass.

*

The second body is on a blanket on a stretcher on a gurney. The second body is mostly bones and clothes. Two orderlies take two corners of the blanket each to lift the bones and clothes off the stretcher and the gurney and place them on the autopsy table. The blanket is then removed from under the clothes and bones.

Dr. Nakadate has put back on the same stained surgical gown and the same rubber gloves and again begins the gross external examination with the measurements and the estimates, one assistant at the chalkboard on the wall, another one writing in the hospital notebook; the facts and the figures and the educated guesses; first in German and Latin, then in our native tongue –

The mumbled evocations. The muttered incantations …

‘The body is that of a young female, a young female once again aged approximately eighteen years…’

The same age, the same sex …

The clothes are now carefully removed from the bones –

Knives and scissors through buttons and threads –

First the yellow and dark-blue striped pinafore dress, next the white half-sleeved chemise, then the white canvas shoes with their red rubber soles, and finally the dyed-pink socks –

There are no undergarments on her –

The same sex, the same place …

I say, ‘Underwear was found near the scene.’

‘Have it sent here,’ says one of the assistants. ‘It may still be possible to compare its age to the age of these clothes and also to search for matching threads or fibres.’

I lick the tip of my pencil –

I make a note and then I ask, ‘What about time of death?’

Dr. Nakadate shakes his head. ‘With the heat and humidity this summer, with the insects and vermin that found her first, it’s difficult to be precise but I’d estimate about three to four weeks…’

I lick the tip of my pencil again. I make another note –

Three, four weeks; twentieth to the twenty-seventh of July …

Dr. Nakadate places his gloved fingers around the neck bones and the jawbone. Dr. Nakadate looks up at me. Dr. Nakadate sticks out his lower lip, nods to himself and then says, ‘The hyoid bone at the base of the tongue is fractured, as are the thyroid and cricoid cartilages, all of which were seen on Body Number One…’

The same place, the same crime …

‘This girl was strangled?’

‘More likely throttled.’

‘The same person?’

Dr. Nakadate nods. ‘And we’ve both seen this before, detective. Remember?’

*

Back out into the light. I curse. I curse. I curse. I don’t want to remember. I don’t want to remember. The heat on the street. I sweat. I sweat. I sweat. Keep it simple, keep it simple; two bodies, one murderer; one case, Kai’s case. The streetcar never comes or the streetcar is full. I itch. I itch. I itch. I don’t want to remember. I don’t want to remember. The trains always late, the trains always full. I scratch. I scratch. I scratch. Fuck Nakadate, hide the link, and bury the connection. Back down through Moto-Akasaka and along the side of the river. I run. I run. I run. I don’t want to remember. I don’t want to remember. Through the doors of Headquarters. I pant. I pant. I pant. Hear nothing, see nothing, say nothing. Up the stairs to the First Investigative Division and the door to the chief’s office. I knock. I knock. I knock. Remember nothing. Remember nothing. Nothing…

I step into the chief’s office. I apologize. I bow –

No Adachi. No Kanehara. No Kai. Just me …

‘Please sit down,’ he says. ‘You look hot…’

I bow and I apologize again. I sit down –

He hands me some tea. ‘Drink…’

I take the tea. I thank him –

‘It’s always hot in this city,’ says Chief Kita. ‘I hate it, this city heat. I have bought a little land, you know? Near Atami. I’ve started to cultivate it. Look…’

Chief Kita holds out his hands across his desk. There are calluses on these hands –

‘These are real calluses,’ he says. ‘From the land. Because the land is important. The land keeps us alive. The land keeps us close to the people…’

Chief Kita has lost both his sons; one dead in China, one missing in Siberia…

I nod. I agree with him. I put down the tea –

‘How was Nakadate?’ asks the chief –

‘Dr. Nakadate thinks that both bodies found in Shiba Park were probably murdered by the same person.’

‘Does he really?’ says Chief Kita. ‘Now do you think that makes things easier or more difficult for us?’

‘I would hope it makes things easier,’ I say. ‘There surely needs to be only one investigation now…’

I stop speaking. It’s too late –

I curse! I curse! I curse!

The chief looks across his desk at me. He tuts. He smiles –

I curse myself! I curse myself! I curse myself!

‘I just don’t think there’s any need for two…’

The chief has one finger raised now –

I curse myself! I curse myself!

‘I am sorry,’ I say. ‘I don’t mean…’

The chief sighs. The chief shakes his head. The chief asks, ‘Why don’t you want this case, inspector?’

‘It’s not that I don’t want it,’ I tell him. ‘It’s just that I –’

‘You want to transfer? To transfer to Room #6?’

‘Yes,’ I say and then, ‘But it’s not just that…’

‘You know Kanehara and Adachi think I am too soft with you? They think I indulge you when I should reprimand you?’

I bow my head. I apologize –

‘And I know they are right,’ he says. ‘But I knew your father and your father was a good friend to me and so I have obligations to his memory and thus to his son…’

I apologize again –

‘And in times such as these,’ he continues, ‘I believe honouring one’s obligations is more important than anything else, that by honouring our obligations we will be able to survive these times and rebuild our country…’

I glance up at the scroll on the wall behind his desk, that blood-flecked scroll on which is written, ‘It is time to reveal the true essence of the nation.’

‘Now is not the time to forget our obligations,’ he says. ‘They are who we are.’

‘I am very sorry,’ I tell him. ‘I have made unreasonable demands on you…’

‘Your eyes are red,’ says the chief. ‘Be careful how you go.’

*

The day is still unbearably hot and I need a drink. I need a meal and I need a cigarette. I take a different route back to Shiba Park through one of the many makeshift markets where street vendors have set up their stalls and stands with their straw mats and reed screens. They squat in what shade there is and shout out their wares, their faces red and their tempers short, fans in their hands and towels on their heads, the men might be women and the women might be men –

But there is drink here. Food and cigarettes –

Here among the shrieks of the vendors and the clatter of their plates, as open-mouthed customers stagger from stall to stall staring with bloodshot eyes at the goods and the food, clutching their crumpled old notes and misshapen bellies –

Drink and food and cigarettes –

I watch a vendor slap putrid sardines on a corrugated grill. I smell the oil on the metal and I listen as the hungry come running with their notes and their bellies –

I can’t eat this food.

I turn away. I keep walking. I come to a woman who is selling rice-balls, each one wrapped in a thin piece of seaweed –

‘Three yen,’ says the woman. ‘Polished rice…’

But there are ten or twenty flies on each rice-ball, the seaweed torn and the rice old. I turn away from the stall and stare up and down the marketplace, looking and listening out for drink or cigarettes –

I watch the man on the next stand but one. I watch him sell candies and sweets from a kerosene drum. I watch him reach inside that metal drum and also bring out packs of American cigarettes –

I walk over to the stand. ‘How much for just one pack?’

‘Don’t know what you’re talking about,’ says the man –

The man wears an undershirt, shorts and army boots –

‘Please?’ I ask him. ‘How much for just a pack…?’

The man stares at me and says, ‘One hundred yen.’

‘How about two packs for one hundred yen?’

The man laughs. ‘Get lost, you bum…’

I look around. I take out my police notebook. I hold it in front of me so that he can see it but no one else. I say, ‘Four packs.’

‘Say what?’ says the man. ‘You’re joking…’

I shake my head. I say again, ‘Four packs.’

The man sighs. The man reaches down inside the kerosene drum. The man brings out four packs of Lucky Strike –

‘There you are, officer,’ he says.

I take the cigarettes. I turn –

‘Stop! Put that back now you thieving little bastard…’

I turn back. The woman at the rice-ball stall has a young boy by his wrist. The boy has a rice-ball in his hand –

I have seen this boy somewhere before …

The young boy is caked black in rags and filth which the heat and his sweat have stuck one to the other, the dirt to the cloth, the cloth to his skin, his face and hands covered in blisters and boils which weep fresh pus in the market sun –

I have seen this boy before …

‘Let go,’ the woman shouts –

But the boy will not let go and he leans in towards her and bites down into her hand and the woman jumps back in pain as she pushes the young boy away –

Back into me –

Banzai!

Biting into the rice-ball as he falls, swallowing it whole as he goes, the boy sends me sprawling back into a stall and onto the ground but before I can hold him, before I can stand, the boy is up and away, into the crowd which now stands and stares down at me –

Among them the man in the undershirt, the shorts and the army boots who shakes his head and says, ‘The thieving bastard.’

*

My trousers are coated in dust. My back aches from the fall. It is 4 p.m. now. I find some of my team sat on the slopes of Shiba Park; Hattori, Takeda, Sanada and Shimoda slumped in the shade with their hats in their hands, swatting at flies and mosquitoes. They struggle to their feet as they see me approach, bowing and apologizing, making their excuses and their reports. I give them cigarettes. I don’t care. I’m not listening. I’m looking for the others. For Detective Fujita –

Hattori, Takeda, Sanada and Shimoda scratch their skulls and suck in air, they shake their heads and say, ‘Detective Fujita was here before. He was definitely here before. But now he’s not…’

‘How about Nishi? Kimura? Ishida?’ I ask them –

Hattori, Takeda, Sanada and Shimoda peer into the sun and shield their eyes, they point up the hill and say, ‘Detectives Nishi and Kimura went up there with the woodcutter…’

‘And where’s Ishida?’ I ask them –

Now Hattori, Takeda, Sanada and Shimoda have a think before they say, ‘With Detective Fujita.’

I turn to go, to walk away, but turn instead to face Adachi –

‘Hard at work as usual,’ says Chief Inspector Adachi –

I bow. I apologize. I make my excuses. My report –

But Adachi doesn’t care. He’s not listening. Adachi is not looking for the others. He’s looking for Detective Fujita –

No one is who they say they are …

I scratch my skull and suck in air. I shake my head and I say, ‘Detective Fujita has gone back to Atago police station, sir.’

*

Back at Atago, one hour later, and Chief Inspector Adachi is staring at me. No Fujita. The First Team, the Second Team and all the uniforms from the other stations are gathered in the First Team’s room at Atago. Adachi is staring at me. No Fujita. I am stood up at the front of the room beside Adachi, Kanehara and Kai, the four of us facing the First Team, the Second Team and the uniforms. But Adachi’s eyes are turned to the side and fixed on me –

No Fujita. No Fujita. No Fujita. No Fujita …

‘Attention!’ shouts the sergeant –

‘Bow!’ he shouts. ‘At ease!’

Everyone stands at ease now or sits down except Inspector Kai and me. Kai has a piece of paper in his hand; Kai reads out the findings from Dr. Nakadate’s preliminary autopsy report on the first body; the physical description of the victim and her estimated age, the time of her death and the cause of her death. But I am not listening. I am looking for the face of Detective Fujita in the faces at the back and sides of this room –

‘Inspector Minami!’ says Adachi again. ‘If you wouldn’t mind giving us your report…’

I bow. I apologize. I begin to read aloud the findings of the preliminary autopsy report on the second body; the physical description of the victim and her estimated age, the time of her death and the cause of her death. But I am not listening to my own words. I am still looking for the face of Fujita in the faces at the back and sides of this room, still looking for Fujita when I see Ishida –

‘Attention!’ shouts the sergeant again –

Ishida here, his face to the floor …

‘Bow!’ the sergeant shouts –

His back bent …

‘Dismissed!’

He runs …

I run.

*

Down the Atago stairs, through the uniforms, to the doors, but I am too late. Too late. Too late. Too late. The hand on my arm. I jump. I jump. I jump. I spin round but it’s not Ishida. Not Fujita –

The desk sergeant asks, ‘Did you speak to Detective Fujita?’

‘No,’ I tell him. ‘Where is Detective Fujita?’

‘Hayashi of the Minpo paper…’

‘What about him?’ I ask –

‘He was here…’

‘When?’

‘This afternoon,’ says the sergeant. ‘Hayashi was looking for you, but you were up at Keiō, so he asked to see Detective Fujita…’

‘And was Detective Fujita here?’

‘Yes,’ says the desk sergeant. ‘He was waiting to see you too, kept asking me what time you were due back from Keiō…’

‘And so when did you last see Detective Fujita?’

‘I haven’t seen him since he met Hayashi…’

‘When?’ I ask him. ‘When was that?’

‘It must have been about 3 p.m….’

‘Where? Where did they meet?’

‘They were here first,’ says the sergeant. ‘In reception, but then they stepped outside and…’

‘And what?’ I ask –

‘And I haven’t seen Detective Fujita since he stepped outside with Mr. Hayashi.’

*

Past the pots and the pans, the kettles and the cans. Down the alleys and the lanes, the shadows and the arches. Up the stairs and through the doors. I kneel down on his tatami mats. I bow. I say, ‘I’m sorry.’

Senju Akira selects a new toothpick. Senju slips it between his teeth and chews. He spins his new electric fan my way and says, ‘You always smell of corpses, always stink of death, detective.’

I say again, ‘I’m sorry. I’m very, very sorry…’

‘They tell me you’ve got yourself another dead body,’ says Senju. ‘They tell me you’re all camped out at Atago police station.’

I say, ‘Yes. Two young women were found in Shiba Park.’

‘Were these two young women prostitutes?’ he asks.

I say, ‘Maybe not. We haven’t identified them yet.’

‘It’s no wonder you smell like shit then, is it?’ he laughs. ‘They work you hard, don’t they? How many hours a day is it?’

I tell him, ‘Twenty-four on a murder investigation.’

‘Twenty-four hours?’ he laughs again. ‘That’s nearly as many as I work, detective! But at least I work for me and at least I get well paid and at least my kids get to eat and my mistresses get to wear silk stockings and I don’t smell of fucking corpses…’

Now Senju Akira stops laughing. Now Senju spits out his toothpick. Now he says, ‘So tell me, officer, how many detectives have they got working on these two dead girls?’

I tell him, ‘About twenty detectives.’

‘Twenty? For two dead whores?’

I start to say, ‘I don’t know…’

‘So tell me this, detective, how many men then have you got out there looking for the killer of my boss? For the real killer? For the man who paid Nodera to pull the trigger? How many, detective?’

I bow. I apologize. I tell him, ‘It’s not my decision…’

‘So what use are you to me? What use, detective?’

I bow again. I start to say again, ‘I’m sorry…’

‘Shut up!’ shouts Senju and he gets to his feet and he says, ‘Let’s take a walk, just you and me, detective.’

I stand up. I follow him. Down his stairs. To his two goons –

In their pale suits, their patterned shirts and their shades …

The two goons and us stepping out into the market –

His market; the Shimbashi New Life Market …

Each stall-keeper bowing and thanking Senju as he ambles past them, past the fresh sardines and second-hand suits, past the coffee and the silk, each stall offering him free this and free that, bowing and thanking him as he acknowledges them all with an imperial nod or a military salute, these people on their knees, bowing and thanking him, on their worn-out knees at his leather-shod feet –

Emperor Senju, Banzai! Emperor Senju, Banzai! Banzai!

Then he turns to me and asks, ‘You got a name for me?’

‘I’m sorry. I’m very sorry,’ I say. I bow my head –

‘So why do you come around here, detective?’

‘I’m sorry,’ I say again. ‘I’m very sorry…’

‘Stop apologizing,’ says Senju. ‘And start looking around you, looking where you are. This is a market, officer, where people come to buy and sell. This is the future –

‘This is the New Japan!’

‘Yes,’ I agree. ‘Yes.’

‘Yes?’ laughs Senju. ‘But you’ve got nothing to sell and no money to buy, detective.’

‘I’m sorry,’ I say again. ‘I’m very sorry.’

‘You’re the past, Detective Inspector Minami,’ he laughs again. ‘With your stench of death and your one hundred yen a month, your shrieking kids and your starving mistress…’

I bow my head.

Now Senju stops at a kakigōri stall. Senju asks for two strawberry flavoured cups. The stall-owner bows. The owner hands them to Senju. He thanks Senju again and again –

Senju hands one of the cups to me –

I bow. I apologize. I thank him –

I curse him. I curse him …

‘What is it you really want?’ he asks me. ‘More money, is that what you need, detective?’

I shake my head. I apologize again. Then finally I tell him, ‘Please, I really need some Calmotin.’

‘Calmotin?’ laughs Senju. ‘Why would you want to sleep? I wouldn’t want your dreams…’

‘Please,’ I beg him again. ‘I really need some Calmotin.’

Senju stops laughing. ‘And I really need some names.’

Fujita. Hayashi. Fujita. Hayashi. Fujita. Hayashi …

‘You give me a name and I’ll give you your Calmotin.’

‘But how much can you get me?’ I ask him. ‘I really need as much as you can give me. Please…’

‘Don’t worry,’ laughs Senju again. ‘You give me a name and you need never wake again.’

‘Thank you,’ I say, over and over. ‘Thank you. Thank you.’

‘Red apple to my lips, blue sky silently watching…’

‘But don’t dare come back here without a name.’

Hayashi. Fujita. Hayashi. Fujita. Hayashi …

‘Thank you,’ I say again. ‘Thank you.’

‘Or I promise you, you won’t wake again.’

*

From Shimbashi to Atago. Up the stairs to the office –

No Fujita. No Fujita. No Fujita …

But Ishida is here; Ishida with his head down on his desk –

I shake him. I pull his hair. I whisper, ‘Where’s Detective Fujita? Quickly! Come on! Where is he? Tell me! Quickly!’

Ishida shakes his head. Ishida starts to apologize –

I shake him again. I slap him. I hiss, ‘Tell me!’

Ishida apologizes and apologizes –

Bodies stir. Bodies wake …

I push him away –

I run again.

*

From Atago back through Shimbashi. From Shimbashi through Ginza. Through Ginza to Hatchōbori. The city getting darker and darker, the lights fewer and fewer. Through Hatchōbori and across the Kameshima River. Across the Kameshima River to Shinkawa. Through Shinkawa and across the Eitaibashi Bridge. The city getting flatter and flatter, the buildings getting fewer and fewer. Across the Eitaibashi Bridge into Monzen-nakachō. Monzen-nakachō up to Fukagawa, the dark burnt field where Fukagawa once stood –

Air raid! Air raid! Here comes an air raid!

The endless burnt field where now stands but a lone chimney here, a lone chimney there; the bathhouses and the factories but rubble and dust. Red! Red! Incendiary bomb! The hull of a hospital, the shell of a school, the rest is all ash and weeds. Run! Run! Get a mattress and sand! An endless field of ash and weeds –

Air raid! Air raid! Here comes an air raid!

This is where Fujita’s house once stood –

Black! Black! Here come the bombs!

His house gone. His family gone –

Cover your ears! Close your eyes!

Fujita has nothing left to lose –

I stand before the ruins of his home, before the scorched stone steps and the charred tree stump, panting and sweating, itching and itching, and now I begin to weep as a gust of wind raises the thick, brown dust that covers the lot where his house once stood and bangs the loose sheets of iron on the neighbouring shacks, drowning out the sound of my sobs, of my scream –

Get off your knees!