The Kizuna Coast: A Rei Shimura Mystery (Rei Shimura Mysteries Book 11) (32 page)

U
sing my phone’s camera, I shot a quick, close picture. I wanted to take another shot at enough distance to make it apparent the bloodstained step was part of Mr. Morioka’s staircase.

The door’s jingling bells made me think Akira must have returned. I could only imagine his reaction when I told him whose blood marked the stairs.

“Hey, Akira!” I put the phone in my pocket and began hurrying down to meet him. But as I reached the halfway point, I stopped.

It was Daigo Morioka. At first, he gave me the kind of surprised, professional smile one might give a customer. As he saw past my new hairstyle and city clothing, though, that smile dropped.

Acknowledging his recognition, I made a slight half bow. The plan had changed. I needed to evacuate without alerting him that I’d figured out who he really was.

“You are alone.”   He said. He was dressed ruggedly, in work pants, a down jacket, boots and gloves.

“I’m here with my husband.” I put emphasis on the word, trying to make him believe I wasn’t in the auction house alone. But my predicament was obvious. If I’d been on the ground floor, I could have rushed for the door. But because Mr. Morioka was blocking the foot of the stairs, there was no way out.

Mr. Morioka narrowed his eyes, looking at me skeptically. “Why are you back? You found the Kimuras’ lacquer.”

“How did you hear that?”

“Ishida-san rang me with the good news.” As he spoke, his gaze shifted to the toolbox near his feet. He bent down, rummaged for a moment, and then came up holding a large hammer.

“You left Mayumi’s backpack where it could be noticed. What a kind gesture.”

I couldn’t take my eyes off the hammer. Morioka was a quick thinker who wasn’t afraid to act violently when he had the opportunity. How clever of him to go after me with a hammer already marked with Akira’s fingerprints.

“Kindness?” He made a snorting sound. “After Ishida gave me the details of every piece, I realized his knowledge and communication about these goods to other dealers would make the lacquer impossible to sell. And then, there was the problem of you.”

“Yes. Because you worried about me, you tampered with my mobile phone.”

“A precaution. From the moment you started asking questions, I knew you could be troublesome. You should have just taken Ishida back to Tokyo.”

I shrugged, trying to appear calm. “That was not his wish.”

“I never realized the connection between them. The stupid girl I’d met in Tokyo phoned me two weeks before, saying she wanted to take back the lacquer. I couldn’t, of course; it was going to be a high point of the event.”

“It meant a lot of money,” I added, looking at his flushed face.

“Money that nobody’s getting now,” he grumbled. “What a vulgar, noisy kid; she ruined everything.”

“Actually, the tsunami ruined everything. And when the sirens blew and she wanted shelter, I don’t know how you could have turned her away.”

“She tried to drag in a bunch of town teenagers with her. Lots could be stolen with urchins like that lingering on my third floor.”

“Did you know those kids died?” I stared at him, and from the way his eyes dropped for a moment, it seemed he might feel guilty. “When the tsunami siren rang, you knew that if Mayumi perished, you’d have the lacquer collection to yourself, if you could get it upstairs in time.”

A jingling arose near the door. Someone was coming; hope surged within me.

“Excuse me, mail delivery,” a cheerful male voice called out.

“Help,” I shouted, but the clanging bells from the door closing drowned out my voice. Mr. Morioka picked up the hammer and advanced up the first step toward me.

“You shouldn’t have called out like that.”

The moment had come. I pulled out my phone and punched in 110. Glancing down, it was clear to me that the cell network wasn’t working. But he didn’t know. I said, “Soon, they’ll be on their way. And you’ll have a second murder charge.”

“Don’t you understand that there was no murder? I had to push her away from the door. That’s all I did.”

“You hit the front of her head. Maybe with the same piece of wood you threatened me and Mr. Ishida with, when we surprised you the first time.”

From the tightness of his expression, I guessed I was right. “She fell down. I don’t know any of the other events. I had one minute to lock that door and get to the third floor. I was shocked to open my door after the waters went down and see that she’d stayed. All I did was move her to a place where she could be collected.”

“So you got rid of her.”

“Later that night, I rolled her into a carpet that I carried to the butcher shop on the next street. So much was going on that nobody gave me a second look.”

I reconsidered my earlier thoughts about escape. If I ran into his second-floor apartment, I could lock the door behind me. I remembered a landline phone on the desk. If the line wasn’t functioning, I could raise the window and call out for help to the street.

I made a snap decision. The stairs creaked horribly as I swung around and began running up. At the second-floor entrance, I found the door was locked fast. Damn it. Even if I’d had my tools with me, I would not have had time.

Mr. Morioka was chuckling as he now mounted the stairs at a leisurely pace.

“Forget it,” I yelled, sounding tougher than I felt. “You can’t get out a body out with all the volunteers around.”

“Work stops in the evenings, doesn’t it? You know the volunteers’ schedule.”

Mr. Morioka surged toward me, filling my view. When we were a foot apart, he raised the hammer. As it traveled fast down toward my forehead, I ducked and punched out with braced arms against his belly. He lost his balance, and in an instant, he tripped backward down the stairs.

At the bottom, he lay moaning, his hands cradling his head. I made my way down, my entire body shaking. I leapt over his body, not wanting to risk him catching me by the ankle.

There was no need to do anything more with him. All I wanted was to get out of the dark auction house and into the light.

Across the street, the Tanuki Carpentry van had reappeared. Michael was sitting on the rear bumper. He was drinking a canned coffee with Akira. Seeing the two strong men chatting over their petite cans of coffee—while I’d almost had my brain bashed—was damn annoying.

“Oh, there you are!” Michael greeted me happily. “We were hoping you’d turn up. I didn’t know if your phone was on silent mode, or if the cell network is down again.”

I shook my head at him. I didn’t know where to begin.

“Rei, what is it?” Michael’s voice shifted an octave.

“You are clueless,” I exploded. “Morioka murdered Mayumi! I was in there, and he trapped me on the stairs and was coming at me with a hammer. I just barely got away, and now I think I might have killed him!”

In that instant, Michael grabbed me to him. I felt his heart pounding against mine.

“Rei, I’m so sorry. I had my suspicions, but I can’t believe you were alone with him—”

“Well, if you want to see the results, he’s lying at the foot of the stairs.”

“What’s wrong?” Akira cut in, as if sensing the rapid-fire English passing between us meant a major problem.

“Please contact the police,” I said to him in Japanese. “My phone didn’t work.”

“I’ll call these guys in to help.” Michael jogged off toward a group of Japanese soldiers shoveling mud.

Akira dialed the police and then handed me the phone. When I’d finished explaining to the dispatcher about the need for both police and an ambulance, I hung up and told Akira about how Daigo Morioka had killed Mayumi. Before I was quite finished, he was running for the building, his face red with anger.

“Don’t kill him,” I called out, following him. “He’s already down!”

But when we opened the front door and looked at the place where Mr. Morioka had been, it was empty.

“He’s gone,” I explained, not wanting to believe it. “How could he get away so fast?”

“The back door,” Akira said. “I brought in the carpet that way—”

As he crossed the floor in swift strides, I followed, hoping we weren’t in for some kind of a hammer-throwing, horror-movie surprise.

But Mr. Morioka hadn’t the strength for that. He was lying halfway between the inside of the building and the outdoors, his head close to a puddle of vomit. His face was as pinched as a pickled plum.

The skin around one of his eyes had swollen, giving the impression it would soon be black-and-blue. The unbruised eye glared at me. “I should have killed you, too.”

“You took Mayumi.” Akira ground out the words. The rage on his face made me shiver.

“I didn’t take her anywhere,” Morioka moaned.

“You told me—”

“He doesn’t need to say anything. Look at that.” Akira kicked at the edge of Mr. Morioka’s boot, so the underside showed. It was rubber, with diagonal tread.

“Too much has happened,” Morioka muttered.

Michael and the soldiers arrived at a run. In seconds, they’d surrounded the immobilized criminal. And to my relief, Akira stepped back.

“That bitch hurt me,” Morioka whimpered, raising an arm to point at me. “Some bones must be broken.”

“Actually, I called to make sure you have police and medical attention.” I could not keep the sarcasm out of my voice.

As the police came through the door, the bells jangled hard. I slipped my hand into Michael’s, thinking that Mr. Morioka was right about one thing.

Far too much had happened.

It was time to close the investigation; to let the water wash away Daigo Morioka to his final destination.

O
n our last day in Tohoku, the sun shone. Michael and I had an early breakfast of granola bars, followed by group calisthenics. Then we all put on gloves and got to work cleaning up the business district.

“I wasn’t sure of your strengths before,” Mr. Yano said with a smile. “I did not know what you Americans could do. But after yesterday’s events, I have confidence.”

Ironically, I was tasked with moving furniture stuck in the street and then cleaning it off enough that residents could come through and make claims. Within this category were many antique pieces most likely from Takara Auction House. Nobody wanted to bother with saving anything from that particular business.

The story of Mr. Morioka’s savagery had spread through the town. I wasn’t sure whether it was soldiers or volunteers or the Rikyos who told, but soon everyone understood that the boys who’d been on the playground had died only because the auction house owner had refused them admittance to the upper floor of his building. And Mayumi’s effort to help the boys was described with one word:
kizuna.

“I always knew that girl had good within her,” Akira’s mother said. She’d come in the truck with Akira to bring carrot muffins for the volunteers.“I’ve been thinking of making a doll for the Kimuras that would look just like Mayumi. Do you think that would be all right?”

“That’s a lovely idea.”

Mrs. Rikyo continued, “But I’m not sure if the doll should have
blue
hair.”

“Her parents treasure the memory of her at this age.” I reached into my wallet and pulled out the photograph of young Mayumi with braids.

Mrs. Rikyo nodded. “Yes! That is a good picture. She even reminds me a little of my daughter. But a school uniform… isn’t that a bit plain?”

“You could ask her parents if they still have any of her childhood dresses for you to cut from,” I suggested.

“Or some old kimono silk,” Mrs. Rikyo said. “Surely they’ve saved what she wore to a childhood shrine ceremony. Most
kimekomi
dolls wear kimono.”

Akira had been listening quietly, but now he spoke: “The doll should have clothing with the buttons she made.”

“Yes,” Mrs. Rikyo agreed, after a pause. “I will make a coat to go over the kimono. Do you know about those kimono coats, Shimura-san? They are called
michiyuki.
”

I put the photograph in Akira’s hands. “Why don’t you keep this? You can make a copy for your mother’s use. I have another for Mr. Ishida.”

Akira bent his head. I ached for him, as well as for Glock. She, too, had loved Mayumi. I would give her the artist’s notebook.

Michael came around the corner from Mr. Yano’s office. He waved at me.

“What is it?” I asked.

“I heard the police arrived. They want to talk to you.”

“Oh.” I expected this would happen, sooner or later. Mr. Morioka had been taken to the hospital. His fate was still up in the air—as was mine, if he decided to press assault charges against me.

“I’ll be there, too,” Michael’s voice was reassuring. “And it turns out one of the mud-shovelers is a lawyer, so he volunteered to support you as well.”

“That’s probably a good idea, based on my past experiences with Japanese cops.”

“I’ll back you,” Akira said, folding arms across his chest. “I overheard what he said to you about killing when I came upon him yesterday. And he wore those boots to the hospital, didn’t he?”

“Well, surely the old evidence of the tracks in the butcher shop is gone by now—”

“Of course it isn’t!” Akira said. “I shoveled out the mud in the butcher shop, except for that area, and put cones around so no one else would step there.”

Michael gave Akira a thumbs-up. “Are you sure you want to stay in the construction field? There are quite a lot of career possibilities for someone who thinks the way that you do.”

Akira put his hand on his mother’s arm. “I left my family once. It was a mistake. And the work I do here will nail this town together.”

As he finished speaking, his mother smiled. “Akira has our permission to visit you in Hawaii. Maybe, all of us will take a holiday after this is finished.”

“Akira, you’re a really great guy. One of these days… ” I almost added, “
you’ll find a wonderful young woman who deserves you,”
but I held off, knowing the statement would only make him think of Mayumi. So I finished with: “One of these days, we’ll be back to see you and your revitalized town.”

Michael and I barely had the time to clean up with wet wipes and knock the mud off our work boots before meeting the police in Mr. Yano’s office. Fujita-san, the volunteer lawyer Michael had recruited, had engaged in a preliminary conversation with the police. Mr. Fujita had already reassured me that I wasn’t going to be charged with assault. Mr. Fujita hinted that Morioka was already a person of interest to the Tokyo police.

“It will be interesting to hear what they say to us,” he whispered to me as the three of us went in and took the usual chairs around a classroom table.

The senior police official, a long-faced man named Kodama, had come from a larger Tohoku town not hit by the tsunami. The other man was a regular constable who introduced himself as Constable Ota. This was the same young policeman I’d approached earlier. At that time, he’d said no coroner was available to perform an autopsy. Now he was attentively taking notes on everything being said.

“Thank you for coming. Tea?” Sgt. Kodama began the meeting as any businessman might, although I wondered where his tea-making office lady could possibly be. In the next moment, I saw Constable Ota had a little tray containing half a dozen UCC brand cans of green tea. Quite practical.

“Earlier this morning, I spoke with Ishida-san in Tokyo,” Sgt. Kodama said. “Apparently he had gathered some information from TADA, the Tokyo Antiques Dealers Association.”

“Oh, yes. He was working on that.” I wondered when Mr. Ishida had contacted the Sugihama police. I’d called my mentor the previous evening to explain all that had happened. It had been hard to tell the story, because it meant telling Mr. Ishida that he really had heard Mayumi’s voice calling out in distress. He’d rung off rather quickly.

“A knowledgable antiques dealer from TADA told Ishida-san that Morioka was fencing antiques gathered by gangsters. These thugs strong-armed elderly people who couldn’t repay their children’s debts into giving up jewelry and antiques. The Tokyo police came to the shop and questioned Morioka. Apparently frightened by the investigation, Morioka closed his shop and moved to Tohoku, where nobody knew his reputation.”

“Ishida-san thought he might also have chosen Tohoku because he believed there were a lot of people here who might be persuaded to sell old country furniture—but there really isn’t that much old furniture in people’s homes anymore,” Sgt. Kodama continued. “So, because Morioka couldn’t create a strong base of antiques shoppers within the Tohoku community, he decided to make the business an auction house to attract dealers from around Japan and overseas.”

“Excuse me, but was there a reason that the Tokyo police didn’t press charges after visiting him at the shop?” Michael asked politely in Japanese.

“Oh. Your Japanese is very good,” Constable Ota said.

Sgt. Kodama shot the junior policeman a look and then answered Michael. “I have asked Tokyo about it. They couldn’t charge him because it could not be proven that he knew the provenance of his wares. I think it’s also likely the original owners were too frightened to ever admit that
yakuza
were the ones who’d taken their antiques.”

“Did you ask Morioka anything specifically about the
yakuza
?” I asked.

Sgt. Kodama nodded. Yes. He confessed the name of the person who introduced him to Mayumi and also several other names of people who’d provided suspicious goods that he sold. Apparently you made a blind date with one of them at a place called Summer Grass?”

“Not knowingly! The guy tried to get me to leave in his car, and I just barely got away. He gave me a false name, I think—”

“Does the name Hashimoto Asao sound familiar?”

“Yes,” I said. Poor Eri. With a client like that, no wonder she was so surly toward the male gender.

Mr. Fujita cleared his throat. “Officers, the fencing of goods is not a very serious criminal charge, is it? I worry that Morioka could receive a wrist-slap, although he’s very likely responsible for one woman’s death and assault with homicidal intent on my client.”

“Yes, fencing does not carry a long term,” Sgt. Kodama said with a sigh. “In this case, he didn’t commit any kind of crime because he gave up the backpack containing lacquerware to be found by the volunteers.”

“But he killed Mayumi.” I felt something sharp in my left hand and realized that I’d crushed my coffee can. “His original intention was to have her out of the way so he could sell the lacquer and keep all the profits. He said all this, just before he came at me with the hammer.”

“It’s complicated,” Sgt. Kodama said. “You are saying that he confessed this, but he maintains that he didn’t know anyone was still on the other side of the second-floor door he’d locked as a proper precaution against the tsunami. It is one person’s word against another’s.”

“He says the death was accidental.” Michael surprised me by speaking up in Japanese. “But the medical report suggests violence, doesn’t it? And he didn’t leave the body where he discovered it. Strange, isn’t it?”

“Morioka won’t admit to moving the girl’s body,” Sgt. Kodama said. “Just as he denies killing her.”

“What about the x-ray showing the blow to the head?” I demanded.

“Could be a blow, could be a fall,” Sgt. Kodama said.

“Excuse me again, officers, but since you were good enough to consult Ishida-san, I recommend you ask Rikyo Akira what he knows. After all, Morioka contacted his father about a rush job carpeting the stairs.” Michael’s voice was quiet and pleasant; he was a good counterpoint to me.

“The Rikyo family is well known in this community,” Constable Ota said, writing down the name and circling it. “Tanuki Carpentry is leading the rebuilding movement.”

“I understand that Japan’s new trial system gives family and community members a voice in the courtroom,” Michael said. “What an excellent idea!”

“Constable, please call the Rikyos. Mr. and Mrs. Hendricks, good luck with your return to Tokyo and Hawaii. We will contact you by telephone in the unlikely case you’re needed for any more information.”

I breathed deeply, allowing myself to work through my perpetual frustration at how agile some people were at saying no without needing to use that word. And now I could guess why Daigo Morioka had been so forthcoming about the
yakuza
friend’s name. The louder he squealed, the more lenient the law would be.

Sgt. Kodama swiftly drew the interview to a close. While the men were still gathering up their papers, I strode out of the office and then the volunteer shelter. I stood on a bluff, looking down toward the water. That horrible, homicidal water that was no longer a threat to anyone.

Michael joined me about ten minutes later. “Not entirely reassuring, was it?”

“I can’t believe Mr. Morioka will get away with this crap
again
.”

“I’m sorry. Perhaps they are waiting to see what the National Police will want to do with him, given his
yakuza
connections.”

I exhaled hard and stared at the ocean. “I suppose that after Morioka gets out of the hospital, he can just get into witness protection.”

“That’s doubtful,” Michael said. “Japanese society is too closed for people to move easily into new communities with false identities. With an organized crime grudge against him, Morioka will spend the rest of his life looking over his shoulder in fear. That’s one of the most psychologically unsettling punishments anyone could suffer.”

Perhaps he was right. The tsunami had turned so much upside down. When I thought about all that had happened, the police’s reluctance to put a criminal in jail was just another form of collateral damage. Mayumi was just one death among hundreds not yet tallied in the small community.

“You see the big picture,” I said to Michael. “You were much more civil with those cops than I was. Now I understand why you like intercultural negotation.”

“The secret is not showing emotion on the outside, no matter how strongly you feel. And remember, there’s no resolution yet. Akira has evidence to bring to light.”

Michael took my hand and squeezed it. I felt the strength flowing from him. And suddenly I understood that although hidden fault lines lay deep below the surfaces of our lives, these lines were only cracks—not canyons. And just like the people of Tohoku, we had a strong enough foundation to keep going.