The Silent Dead (24 page)

It was Lieutenant Katsumata with his four goons in tow, come to crash the party. Reiko wasn't surprised. He was hardly the type to sit passively in the main meeting room when Reiko and her whole team were somewhere else. She didn't know how he'd tracked her down, but Katsumata would have looked behind every door in the police station including the supply closet to find them. Reiko had never meant to play hide-and-seek with him. That would be lowering herself to his level.

“No one's doing anything behind your back. There's an issue I need to flag up before the main meeting got started. For the good of the overall investigation.”

“Yeah? Well, you won't mind if we join you then?”

“Feel free.”

Katsumata sauntered in and threw himself into the chair next to Captain Imaizumi. His squad members stood in a neat row behind him. Katsumata leaned over to Imaizumi.

“Hi, Zoomzoom. Full of yourself as ever, you parakeet?”

Reiko was mystified.

“Hear you've been busy flashing the cash,” Captain Imaizumi said.

“Says who?”

“Spreading it around in Shinjuku yesterday, I heard.”

“Don't know what you're talking about,” Katsumata said, then turned away.

Reiko was at a loss, but her impression was that Imaizumi had got the better of the exchange.

A couple of minutes later, Yuda ushered Hashizume into the room.

“Thanks,” said the director. “I'll take it from here.”

He did a quick survey of the room. From where people were sitting, he deduced that Reiko had called the meeting.

“You again, eh? What now? You want us to mobilize the army?”

Hashizume sat down in the vacant chair on the other side of Imaizumi.

“Keep it short and sweet. The morning meeting is due to—”

Reiko interrupted him. “I already told the task force coordinator to push the start time back by half an hour.”

Hashizume frowned in distaste. He was about to snap at her, but thought better of it.

“You boys want a seat?” Reiko pointed to some vacant places on the other side of the table, and Katsumata's four subordinates sat down.

“Officer Otsuka, will you begin?”

Otsuka passed a sheaf of paper across to Hashizume and Imaizumi. It was a document that he and Reiko had put together the day before. There were extracts from the printouts Otsuka had shown Reiko in Ikebukuro, with key sections highlighted in marker pen.

Katsumata brazenly looked over Captain Imaizumi's shoulder as he scanned the document.

“What you have there is information I got from an interview with Tomohiko Tashiro on the nineteenth of August,” began Otsuka. “Tashiro and Namekawa have been close friends since college. Namekawa had mentioned a Web site called Strawberry Night to his friend. Tashiro didn't think much of it at the time, but when he got the news that Namekawa had been killed, he remembered that Namekawa had said something about a ‘murder show.' Suspecting a possible connection to Namekawa's murder, Tashiro brought the matter to my attention.

“If you look at the documentation, you can see that this ‘murder show' has been the subject of discussion on several message boards for quite a while now. This is a printout of actual postings on a single specific day. If it's hard to follow, refer to the summary I added at the bottom of the page. You can see that there are several points of overlap between Strawberry Night, which they are discussing, and the case we are currently working on.

“For starters, note that the ‘murder show' is held on the second Sunday of the month. The different online communities have different ideas on the date: on one message board, they think it's the thirteenth of the month; somewhere else, they say the tenth. However, the contributor who appears to be by far the best informed states that the show is held on the second Sunday of the month.

“The same contributor says something else very interesting. Turn to the next page, please, the one headed ‘Event Format.' Apparently, somebody is murdered on a stage. So far, so straightforward. What's really interesting is that the person who's murdered is actually chosen from that day's audience. The spectators, in other words, can themselves end up as victims at any time. What if Kanebara and Namekawa had both been spectators at the show for months, until one day the tables were turned and they found
themselves
being murdered onstage? That would fit the pattern of unexplained absences of both victims on the second Sunday of the month, and it matches the date of their murders.

“That brings me to my third point. According to the various message boards, the Strawberry Night homepage is not normally accessible. It only shows up occasionally, apparently in response to a online search for it, and then it can only be accessed for a few hours. After that, the URL takes you nowhere. You get a ‘server not found' notice, and searching for it turns up nothing. As a result, a very limited number of people have successfully accessed the actual homepage. Their reports circulate mostly as hearsay, which diminishes their credibility, of course. There are, however, multiple accounts that the video on the homepage shows someone having their throat slashed with a box cutter. The knife is put to the victim's throat, then pulled to one side, killing them.… Since we're talking about digital images, we can't rule out the possibility that the whole thing is a hoax. Against that, there is the fact that everyone who claims to have seen the page stresses how real the video looks.

“Putting all this together, I think that a valid case can be made that both Kanebara and Namekawa accessed the Strawberry Night homepage and attended the murder show, and that Namekawa was selected as the victim and murdered last month, with the same thing happening to Kanebara this month. The oldest thread I can find about Strawberry Night is from November of last year. That would suggest that the show has been running for at least ten months—which would give us a minimum of ten victims.

“Hang on a minute,” Director Hashizume said. “The divers spent five days searching the Mizumoto Park pond, and Namekawa's was the only body they found.”

“Are you recommending we go on some more fishing trips?” sneered Katsumata.

Hashizume treated Katsumata to a withering stare, then turned back to Otsuka.

“What you've got here is way too much hearsay for me. Most of your report isn't even secondhand—it's third-hand or worse.
Apparently
this and
what if
that. What are you going to come up with next, man—the hound of the bloody Baskervilles? The whole thing looks like an urban myth to me.”

That's pretty much the reaction I expected from you, Director
.

Reiko got to her feet. It was time for her to strut her stuff.

“As things currently stand, Director, this is the only hypothesis that can establish a link between the victims' mysterious behavior patterns and their deaths and that can provide a logical explanation for both. The numerous cuts on the victims' torsos, we assume, come from torture. The sadistic infliction of injuries like these makes for a good spectacle. Then there's the cut to the neck. That's the show's grand finale. It is also reputed to be the part that was streamed online. They need to kill the victims in an unambiguous, even spectacular fashion—in a way that draws a clear and explicit line between life and death. That's why they slash the carotid artery. Because it releases the most spectacular fountain of blood. Last of all, there's the cut to the abdomen. We've already solved that particular puzzle and how it enables them to conceal the bodies underwater. I believe that Strawberry Night is not a myth, that Kanebara and Namekawa were involved with it, and that they died as a result.

“Nonetheless, I understand your skepticism, Director. Otsuka's report does indeed lack credibility. The information in it is nothing more than hearsay pulled off the Internet. I can't deny that on the same message boards some of the contributors dismiss Strawberry Night as a silly urban legend.

“That is why I don't think we should make Strawberry Night the main focus of the task force's investigation. At best, it's just one hypothesis for us to test and perhaps eliminate. There's no need to put the entire task force on it. My squad has enough manpower. Why not let us handle it?”

Katsumata glowered at Reiko with pure hatred in his eyes. She had set up this preliminary meeting knowing full well that Hashizume wouldn't devote all of the task force's resources into investigating what might be a fantasy. She'd played her cards well, and now she got to take personal control of this whole aspect of the investigation. Katsumata, meanwhile, was left no way to muscle in on it. At least, not overtly.

Katsumata scowled and clenched his jaw. Reiko savored his frustration.

Suck it, Stubby! How'd you enjoy my master class on how to hijack an investigation?

“I think Himekawa's entire squad is too much manpower to throw at this,” said Director Hashizume to Captain Imaizumi.

“You're probably right,” concurred the captain.

“I want two of your guys to stick with interviewing the victims' friends and families.”

Reiko shot a glance at Ishikura and Yuda. They nodded their assent.

“All right, Director. Otsuka, Kikuta, and I will investigate this lead.”

Hashizume jabbed a finger at her. “How, exactly?”

“Based on the available information, I think it's fair to assume that the murder show is probably held in one of the capital's livelier shopping and entertainment districts. Anywhere quiet, and the locals would get suspicious about unexplained large groups. So we'll start our inquiries in Shinjuku, Shibuya, and Ikebukuro. Specifically, we'll be looking for places with a stage and room for an audience—strip clubs, small theaters, and live music clubs—that aren't in daily use or have closed down. We'll locate them by combing through the relevant local publications for the sex industry; we'll also talk to local real estate agents.”

Reiko felt a throb of pleasure as the investigation began to develop real momentum.

We're going to fight, and we're going to win
.

Reiko no longer knew whether the voice in her head was Detective Sata speaking to her or if she was simply talking to herself.

“Sounds dangerous to me,” growled Katsumata.

 

2

Otsuka and Kitami were assigned central Ikebukuro.

Ikebukuro was one of Tokyo's top entertainment and nightlife districts. There was a whole cluster of department stores—Tobu, Seibu, Mitsukoshi, Parco, Marui, Sunshine 60—around ten electronics emporiums, plus every kind of restaurant and bar imaginable, movie theaters, karaoke parlors, amusement arcades, pachinko parlors, sex clubs, love hotels. The whole district was so stuffed with people and businesses that it was a challenge to think of anything that was
not
there.

Otsuka stepped out of the north exit of the station and made a beeline for the first “fashion health” establishment—as blowjob parlors were euphemistically known—that caught his eye. It was in the basement of a rather seedy building that housed an array of business tenants. The staircase was stuffy and humid and reeked of mold. Sweat oozed out of their pores as they walked down. When they pushed open the rickety, gaudily painted door at the foot of the stairs, a blast of cold air rushed over them. It was like walking into a refrigerator.

“Good morning, gentlemen.”

A woman, on the wrong side of fifty and caked in makeup, greeted them in a bored voice. She looked like an evil-tempered toad. She was sitting at a narrow counter with the photographs of around fifteen girls displayed on the wall behind her. A long hard look at each of the pictures revealed that none of the girls were that good-looking. Compared to the woman at the front desk, however, they were without exception ravishing.

“These girls are available right now.” The woman swiveled around and pointed at a number of the photographs.

“That's not why we're here.” Otsuka showed his badge. “We're police.”

The woman gulped and her body tensed. She was clearly up to something dodgy that she didn't want the police to find out about. Reluctantly, Otsuka let it go. That wasn't what they were there for. They needed information.

“And we're not from Community Safety either. We're working on a case, and we'd like to ask you some questions.”

“Uh-huh.” The woman continued to eye them suspiciously but shifted on her stool to sit a little more upright.

“Have any strip clubs or similar establishments near here gone out of business recently?”

“Strip clubs?”

“Yes, or lap-dancing clubs. That kind of thing.”

“And you're interested in places that have closed down?”

“Correct.”

“That's a funny question.”

The woman tilted her blubber-encircled neck to one side and had a think. Unfortunately, she came up with nothing.
It's the luck of the draw
, thought Otsuka. He hadn't expected much.

“I'd like to ask a small favor.”

“Oh yes?”

“Have you got any old sex magazines? Can we have them?”

“Old magazines?”

“Yes, from the last year or so.”

“You really are a funny pair.”

This time they'd hit the jackpot. The old woman brought out around twenty copies of the sort of sex magazines that you'd see on convenience stores shelves. They stretched back to the end of the previous year. It was a bumper crop.

“They're a bit grubby, sorry. You can have 'em all. Saves me chucking 'em out.”

Otsuka thanked her. They left, with Kitami carrying the stash of magazines.

We're going to have to look through this lot, but a good strong bag would be helpful.

The two detectives walked around to the west side of the station and settled down in the upper floor of a well-air-conditioned fast-food joint. They went through all the magazines, comparing the data on Ikebukuro sex clubs month by month. Strip clubs and burlesque clubs that had shut down or had a name change were their main focus.