The Kizuna Coast: A Rei Shimura Mystery (Rei Shimura Mysteries Book 11) (31 page)

After his words, I felt like all the other sounds in the room had faded. “How old was the girl?”

“She was maybe a little older than us. I hadn’t seen her before. She probably came from out of town.”

“Was her hair blue?”

“Um—it was a distance, so I couldn’t see clearly. I don’t think it was black—it was something weird. Do you know her?”

“A little bit. Can you remember which direction that girl went when she came back out of the auction house? Was anyone with her?”

“I really don’t know.” He lay still, and I sensed how hard he was thinking. “I didn’t see her come out. I remember my friends, because they came back to the jungle gym and climbed up. We were all getting nervous.”

Mr. Ishida had believed that she left the building for good. Masa was saying otherwise. What was the truth?

“Masa-kun, did you see two men hanging around the shop at all? One man, any man? Someone who didn’t run away, but lingered?”

“No. All those auction people drove away right after the earthquake happened, but before the wave.”

“That makes sense.” I put my fingertips on my temples. My head was aching, very likely because I’d become faint from hunger—and this strange new information.

“Are you feeling all right, Shimura-san?” Mrs. Haneda asked from her chair near her husband’s bed.

“I’m getting a headache. I’d better find some aspirin and have a snack. What time will the minibus leave?”’

“We still have thirty minutes. Do you want Miki to help you?” Mrs. Haneda looked concerned.

“No, thanks. I’d rather take care of myself. I’ll meet you in the hospital driveway when it’s time to go. Goodbye, Masa-kun. Thank you for teling me all that information. I wish you a continuing great recovery—and to you as well, Haneda-san. It could be fun for your family to stay a while in Yokohama. I like that town a lot.”

“Are you sure you’re all right alone?” Mrs. Haneda called after me, but I was moving too fast to answer.

B
ack on the main floor, I went to the seating area where I’d met with my cousin and took out my phone to ring Michael. His voice recording sounded distant and formal. I guessed he couldn’t answer because he was in the midst of moving the boats.

Just for the record, I left a detailed message starting with Tom’s information about Mayumi’s injuries, and then Masa’s thought that Mayumi had gone in—but not out of—the Takara Auction House. I said that I would be returning soon with the minibus.

As I hung up, I realized the headache had intensified. I needed to eat. Through the hospital’s clear glass windows, I saw the red and yellow signage of McDonald’s. I wasn’t a usual customer, but what else would be instantly available?

I hurried across the street to purchase “Mega Potato,” a pound of fried shoestring potatoes, plus a vanilla shake. As bad as it all sounded, I felt the shakiness drain from me. This was the power of fast food. I resolved not to criticize Michael so much for his McDonald’s habit. I had forgotten about aspirin, but had just enough time to throw away the meal’s paper wrappings, wipe my hands, and get back to the minibus that had returned to the hospital driveway.

“Did you have a bath?” I asked Miki as we boarded. Her hair was sopping wet, and she smelled like soap.

“A shower. We all took turns in the shower of Otoochan’s hospital bathroom. The nurses allowed it, even though we aren’t staying there.”

“Kizuna,”
I said.

“What?”

It felt odd to explain a Japanese word to a Japanese child. But it had only been spoken widely since the tsunami. “
Kizuna
means connection: the help people give each other, especially when there’s serious trouble. Remember when you gave me the rice balls for breakfast? Ishida-san and I wouldn’t have had anything to eat that morning if it wasn’t for your
kizuna.
”

I thought of Akira and his father rebuilding houses and shops. And of Michael, sending boats run aground back to the sea. But above all, I was remembering Mayumi, who had tried to save not just herself and Mr. Ishida, but some unknown teenage boys on a jungle gym.

“Oh, I understand now,” Miki said. “It’s like my aunt and uncle wanting us to stay with them in Yokohama. But I’d rather live here.”

“Sugihama’s wonderful. Yokohama is also a good town with a lot of fun things. I stayed there every summer with my relatives when I was a little girl.”

“Yes, that Shimura-sensei who’s your cousin told us. The problem is that if we go so far away… how will Butter know where to find us?”

I thought of saying they could have a new dog, but that would be like telling a mother that having a new child would help her work through losing the old one. “Everyone is looking for Butter. His name is on his collar. Either he will be found here or he’s found another family who’ve welcomed him. He could have swum to their house.”

“He knows how to swim—but I don’t want to, anymore. It was cruel of the ocean to kill people and take away our houses.”

“I can understand your feeling.” I realized that, since coming, I’d been unable to look at the ocean due to resentment—and fear. I hoped this feeling would fade, because I was eventually headed back to my own coastal home.

As we drew closer to Sugihama, the bus began making familiar, uncomfortable detours around gigantic objects in its path. The bus passed the corner of the street with the auction house, butcher shop, and some other unopened businesses. But the grocery and hardware stores had noren curtains hanging outside and their lights on. This was a great sign. Some of the bus riders, in fact, called out polite requests for the bus driver to please stop for a moment so they could get out and speak to the shop owners and perhaps buy some necessities.

Once the driver stopped, I decided to disembark, as well. I still needed aspirin, and I wanted to visit the nearby street where the girls had said they’d found Mayumi’s backpack. I also needed to ascertain whether the Takara Auction House door was in clear view of the jungle gym where Masa had perched. I figured that I could be finished in about a half hour and walk the mile back to the shelter.

I explained my plan to the Hanedas, promising I’d see them at dinner. Then I joined the line to get off.

I hurried ahead of the shoppers, passing the butcher’s shop and aiming for the Family Mart. Although the convenience shop was still closed, it was brightly lit within, revealing a group of people scrubbing and shoveling. Outdoors, on the side of the shop, a small rubble pile lay. This was the place where the girls had found Mayumi’s backpack. A young woman wearing denim overalls and long, thick rubber gloves was examining each piece from the big pile before placing it onto a new pile. I saw piles for photographs, sodden books and papers, toys, and kitchenware.

I greeted the woman and asked if she’d let me sort through some of the piles.

“Wouldn’t you rather come back when you’re dressed to work?” She looked skeptically at my outfit.

“Yesterday some girls found a backpack belonging to a young woman called Kimura Mayumi. I’ve returned to look around because the pack didn’t contain Mayumi’s cell phone. I thought there might be a chance it was in another place.”

“We have a section of phones, but almost all of them are broken because of their hours underwater. Do you know the phone’s make and model?”

“I believe it’s a later model iPhone inside a case featuring the cartoon character Totoro.”

“Better put some gloves on. And please roll up the sleeves of your nice cardigan.”

I put on rubber gloves and began examining mobile phones. So many different brands of phone, and even one Totoro case, although it was yellow and housed a Samsung. I kept picking up phones, the gloves growing grimier from all that I touched. I was looking for a clean phone, because it had probably been with Mayumi all along. And the only reason it hadn’t been in the backpack—or on Mayumi’s body—was because someone had separated it from her.

After I was done, I said goodbye to the woman, who promised to send the phone over to the volunteer shelter in care of Mr. Yano, should it be found. I felt too grubby to go into the Family Mart for aspirin, so I walked back the way I’d come on the busy shopping street.

I stopped in my tracks when I saw the Tanuki Carpentry truck right by Takara Auction House. Akira was unloading a long, plastic-wrapped roll. At the sight of me, he nodded.

I came up to him and spoke in a low, apologetic tone. “Hello, Akira-kun. I’m sorry for not coming over yesterday evening.”

“It’s okay.” His half smile told me he understood.

“What are you working on here?”

Morioka-san wants new carpeting installed into his place. He offered a good price if we could do it now.”

“So you can do carpeting as well as carpentry? Is there anything you can’t do?”

“This will be my first time doing carpet.” He sighed. “There’s a lot of important rebuilding work to do around town, so it’s a little inconvenient. And those stairs weren’t carpeted before, so I’ll have to remove trim from the sides and do other things to prepare. But before I forget to say it—Michael-san is looking for you.”

“Really! So he’s returned from overseeing the boats?”

“Yes. I gave him a ride back to headquarters after the tow left. Those boats are going to a harbor about thirty miles west from here. You should call him. He was concerned that you hadn’t come back from the hospital along with the others.”

“I tried to call him earlier. I’ll do it again.”

“Michael-san told me some children found Mayumi’s family’s lacquer collection. That’s really good news for the family, isn’t it?”

“Yes, and not just because they had a valuable collection returned,” I added, when I saw his cynical expression. “They opened a whole conversation about Mayumi that was really nice.”

“Was anything else inside her backpack?”

“Unfortunately, nothing. The phone and wallet were either lost or removed.”

“Removed,” Akira said with a grimace. “I still think someone killed her.”

“Perhaps you’re right,” I admitted. “A doctor who ran a few x-rays on her body said the upper front of her skull was crushed, and her shoulder was dislocated.”

“Really!” Akira’s eyes flared with emotion. “But
who
would do that to her? Who could hate like that?”

“Maybe the answer is in her missing phone. I’d like to stop by the playground next to the auction house. She was seen going in by one of the boys on the jungle gym.”

“That must be Masa-kun,” Akira said. “He’s the younger brother of one of my school friends, just starting high school.”

“Yes, it is. How observant do you think he is? Some kids that age exaggerate things—”

“Not Masa-kun. He’s a good kid, and smart. What did he say about Mayumi?”

“Masa said Mayumi was on the street and tried to encourage all the boys to come up with her inside the auction house to take shelter. Masa stayed outside—I guess he was the group’s leading daredevil—but the others went in with her. Masa says his friends came out but wasn’t sure if he saw Mayumi do that.”

“But if she’d been with Ishida-san and Morioka-san, she would have survived.” Akira gave a long, low whistle. “Of course, there’s a back door. It’s where I went in earlier today when I had to measure. Maybe that’s the exit she took.”

I said goodbye and walked over to the opposite side of the street, continuing down the block to the playground. Mud had been shoveled and sawdust laid down to give children a path to the swing set and other equipment. Two young boys and a girl were on the swings, laughing and pumping their legs as they soared.

Like many jungle gyms, this one was a dome of criss-crossing iron bars, with the top of the structure about twelve feet off the ground. It had also been scrubbed clean. Climbing up carefully, I found a clear view of the view of the auction house from one direction and the ocean from the other. Would Masa really have stayed facing the auction house?

No. He’d already told me about watching the coast, camera-phone at the ready.

As I turned away from the water to look back at Takara Auction House, I noted the dark water line close to the top of the first-floor windows. This water line showed the height the wave had reached. I remembered how thick the mud was on the ground floor and the depressing sight of so many antiques drenched in dirt. My boots had been heavy with mud; I’d had to remove them before going upstairs.

I saw again those steps made of cedar, the local tree that gave Sugihama its name. They were wide stairs, suitable for at least three or four people to climb at the same time, which made sense for a place that had been designed as a kindergarten.

Was I correctly remembering the staircase? I stared hard at the building, and then began climbing down.

Seconds later, I’d jogged the short distance to the shop. Akira’s truck was no longer parked outside. I guessed that he’d dropped off the carpeting roll and moved on to do something else.

More than ever, I needed to speak with Mr. Morioka about whether he’d seen Mayumi and the boys run in and out of the shop. If he were not in, I’d take a quick look at the stairs to satisfy my curiosity about the strange thoughts that were percolating.

A jingle of antique cowbells announced my entrance as I opened the door. Mr. Morioka had improvised a historic alarm. I stood in the auction house threshold, glancing around the well-lit room. A roll of gray carpet stood like a fat, woolly pillar at the bottom of the wide staircase. A thin sheet of paper lay atop a big toolbox next to the carpet. Glancing down, I saw that the cost of the carpet was about $4,000, with labor $3,000. I’d thought contractor prices in Hawaii were high, until I saw this.

The letterhead said TANUKI CARPENTRY, and Mr. Rikyo’s signature and
inkan
stamp were at the bottom of the page. Mr. Morioka had also signed and marked with his own
inkan.
Forest and high knoll were the characters for his first name. Every time I saw
kanji
characters I recognized, I felt a brief surge of competency. His first name was even easier: the
kanji
for “big” followed by the kanji for “myself.” Read aloud, it started out “Dai.”

Daigo.
This was the older gangster-type Mayumi had met in Tokyo.

All this time, I’d thought Daigo was someone who’d fenced to a dealer: a gangster middleman to unethical dealers. But now it seemed the other way around. He was a bona fide antiques dealer with mob connections. And since Mayumi hadn’t known this, he would have been able to collect double commissions from her on the lacquer.

It was a lot to ponder. However, I couldn’t forget what I’d been thinking about while staring at the building’s exterior. I turned on the flashlight function of my phone and approached the stairs, sweeping the bright yellow light over the cedar stairs.

The center of each step was a slightly lighter, worn shade than the edges: evidence of all the foot traffic from the kindergarten years. Although the entire staircase had been scrubbed, the bottom ten steps were still discolored from the days that mud had lingered; and the plaster on the wall near these steps was also stained.

The top half of the staircase had never been flooded. It was unmarked, excepting two steps marked by several rusty, reddish brown blots. The previous times I’d been here, I’d had too much on my mind to notice any particular marks on stairs. But I didn’t hurry today.

During my years buying and selling antiques, I’d seen all manner of stains on wood. But never blood.