Prefecture D: Four Novellas Page 17

  Tsuge lit a cigarette.

  He crushed two, then three stubs in the car’s ashtray. The cabinet meeting was only four days away. Time was growing short, and he’d learned nothing of Ukai’s true intentions, or about the nature of the explosive in his possession. The question. The captain being forced to apologize. The numbers on the digital clock seemed, in that moment, like those on the timer of a bomb.

  8

  Tsuge was just as anxious and frustrated when September’s cabinet meeting was called into session. The question-and-answer session had, fortunately, been scheduled for the second day of the proceedings. That would be when Ukai would take to the podium.

  For the last four days Tsuge had made a daily pilgrimage to the assemblyman’s home in City K. He’d learned nothing new, except the name and voice of Ukai’s housekeeper. He didn’t even know if Ukai had genuinely been out or had just been pretending to be.

  “Have you told the captain?”

  “Not yet.”

  Not for the first time that day, Tsuge and Sakaniwa had gathered in the visitors’ room to discuss the matter in private. There was no longer any choice but to accept that Ukai could not be appeased. Their next step was clear: find out the nature of the question. If they did that, they could at least try to draft a response, however devastating the revelation turned out to be. It would be awkward, nothing more than a stopgap measure, but it would at least give the impression that the captain had made a considered response. They could not allow him to be blindsided, leave him to panic with nothing to say.

  The reputation of the headquarters would be in tatters.

  In addition to his gnawing anxiety, Tsuge found himself inundated with deskwork. The captain had returned the draft responses, together with plenty of red corrections. He’d devoted what seemed a significant amount of time to purging them of any words or phrases that came across as overly bureaucratic. That was fine, but the upcoming session was not the usual guarded affair. In it lurked a terrorist who hoped to destabilize the very foundation on which the Prefectural HQ stood.

  Tsuge and Sakaniwa reconvened that evening.

  “Here, perhaps you can use this.” Sakaniwa slid a memo across the table. On it, written in pen, was an address and room number for an apartment in City D. Kinue Taiyo. The woman from the nightclub. Sakaniwa had, it seemed, been busy following up on Tsuge’s lead.

  “This is where she lives?”

  “The room’s in Ukai’s name, but it seems she stays here. This is the only chance we’re going to get. Use her to pressure him into talking.”

  Sakaniwa’s tone was that of a man backed into a corner. But Tsuge wasn’t doing this as a favor—he was in exactly the same position. If Ukai saw this through, they would both end up taking the fall.

  “Take this with you.”

  Sakaniwa pushed a paper bag into Tsuge’s arms. It contained what seemed to be an expensive bottle of spirits.

  Nine o’clock. Tsuge stood outside the room on the seventh floor of the apartment complex, paper bag in hand. Knowing Ukai wouldn’t let him in if Kinue was there, he’d opted for a time that was busy in her trade. An empty bracket hung above the door, the kind that usually housed a security camera. His fingers were trembling slightly when he pushed the buzzer. After a short wait the door opened to reveal Ukai in a bathrobe.

  “You again.”

  He looked as annoyed as ever, but Tsuge thought he could see alarm in the man’s expression. He hadn’t committed a crime per se, but Tsuge doubted there were many members of the assembly who could remain impassive when caught in a love nest they’d set up for a woman of the night. And yet it would still all be over if Ukai chose to slam the door in his face. Tsuge took a deep breath before he spoke.

  “Assemblyman, I just need a moment of your time. I’ll make sure I’m gone before she gets here.”

  Ukai removed his glasses and glared straight into Tsuge’s eyes. “Are you trying to imply something?”

  “Just ten minutes. That’s all I need.”

  “…”

  “Assemblyman, please.”

  “Make it quick.”

  Tsuge gave a deep bow, then followed the man into the living room and took a seat on the couch.

  “You’ve got ten minutes, no more. Push it and I call the governor. Are we clear?”

  The phone in his hands began to ring the moment he finished speaking, causing him to tut.

  “This is Ukai. Uh-huh. Wait, just what the hell do you mean by that?” The assemblyman’s eyes darted briefly in Tsuge’s direction. He got up from the couch and said, “Hang on a second, I’m going into the other room.”

  It seemed there was something he didn’t want overheard. Ukai turned toward Tsuge and told him he was free to leave whenever he wanted. He disappeared into the bedroom and shut the door.

  Left alone, Tsuge realized how nervous he’d become. What is the matter with me? Just get it done. He glowered at the bedroom door, noticing something on the floor as he did so. Ukai’s briefcase. It was right there beside the couch. His pulse quickened. He looked back at the door, then at the briefcase. He gave the door another wary glance.

  He was moving before he even registered that he’d made the decision. Raising himself up a little from the couch, he began to shuffle sideways. He leaned forward to listen in to the bedroom. Ukai was talking. Completely absorbed, it seemed, in whatever it was he was discussing. Tsuge sat back down. Once at the edge of the couch, he dropped one knee to the floor. Keeping his eyes on the door, he reached out for the briefcase. His fingers registered the cool touch of the surface. Quietly, he undid the clasp.

  There were documents inside. His heart was pounding so hard it was a struggle even to breathe. He grabbed at the papers with sweaty fingers. He flicked through them one by one. A paper on environmental hormones. Statistics on small and medium businesses filing for bankruptcy. A pamphlet advertising life insurance. Another paper. A handwritten memo. A list of names from his committee. More statistics. Another list of names, this one for some kind of reunion. More papers. More papers. Still more papers. There was nothing inside to even hint at what the man’s question might be. Nothing that had anything to do with the police.

  Damn it.

  There was a noise from the bedroom. Tsuge fell back onto the couch. In the next moment, Ukai opened the door and came back in. He seemed to catch on to the fact that something was wrong.

  “Are you okay?”

  “I’m fine…” Tsuge realized his back was soaked with sweat.

  “That’s your ten minutes up. Time to leave.”

  “I can’t leave, not until I know what you intend to ask,” Tsuge said, his guilty conscience lending new force to his words. Perhaps it was the desperation. He’d seen nothing of the “time bomb” in Ukai’s briefcase, which probably meant the details of the question existed only in the head of the man standing before him. “I need to know. Just a few words will do.”

  “You’ll find out tomorrow.”

  “That’s too late. It’s vital that I know today.”

  “Your problem, not mine.”

  Tsuge’s teeth cut into his lip. This would be what people called bloodlust. He felt a powerful urge to beat the man senseless, to drag him by the feet and give him a good kicking. Tsuge got to his feet, then crumpled onto his knees. His hands hit the floor. He told himself it was just an act, even as he shook with rage and humiliation.

  “I’ll be in your debt. I’m begging you, please.”

  He brought his head even closer to the carpet. His cheeks were on fire. Blood coursed through his temples. The few centimeters left between his forehead and the floor were all that remained of his pride. He let go of that, too. He thought he would choke on the synthetic smell of the fibers. His heart was already elsewhere. He saw Morio and the boy with the snake eyes. He ran from them, too. He wanted the clear blue sky. The sky he’d seen that day at the viewing pillar, back when he’d still burned with raw ambition.

  “If you’re this good at ko
wtowing, you might want to consider running for election.”

  Tsuge’s head snapped up, only to see Ukai holding out the bag with the alcohol in it. The assemblyman flashed a grin.

  “I’ll see you in the hall tomorrow.”

  9

  The assembly hall, decorated in lavish marble and expensive wood, was bathed in a warm and dignified glow. Tsuge was in the waiting room behind it, unable to move from his seat. The question-and-answer session was already underway. Misaki’s voice was stately as it carried through the loudspeaker system on the wall.

  … the unforgivable cowardice of the driver has sparked outrage in our community and caused a great deal of sadness and fear. We must not allow this to go …

  Tsuge paid the man little attention. The room bustled around him as civil servants with stacks of documents hurried this way and that. They were standing by, having prepared a variety of documents to field any unexpected questions. Tsuge had nothing.

  Assemblyman Ichiro Ukai, if you would be so kind as to take to the podium.

  The speakers shook with the deep register of the chairman’s voice. Tsuge held his breath. Time was up. Ukai was going to detonate the bomb.

  The assemblyman’s voice began to fill the room.

  The risks posed by environmental hormones, currently the subject of much attention in the papers and on television, are now too great to be …

  Following the order of business, Ukai opened with a question on environmental hormones, then moved on to another regarding policy and small and medium businesses. That was now drawing to a close.

  Ukai coughed once, clearing his throat. For a moment there was silence. Tsuge closed his eyes. His hands clawed into his knees. His chest seemed to constrict. Ukai was speaking again. Sucked into the vacuum of Tsuge’s mind, the words took a while to form.

  I thank you in advance for your considered response. That is all.

  What?

  Tsuge stared at the speaker on the wall. Was that it? Ukai had finished?

  We do, of course, consider the issue of environmental hormones to be one of utmost importance. As such, we have put in motion plans to …

  The chief of Environment and Sanitation began to read out his response. Tsuge broke into a run. He inched open the door that led to the hall and scanned the area usually reserved for members of the assembly. Ukai was back in his seat, wearing his trademark look of annoyance. Leaning a little to the side, he was nodding as he listened to the chief’s answer.

  Ukai had finished. He really had finished.

  Tsuge’s feet dragged as he returned via the underground passage. He felt a mixture of relief and exhaustion, even as his mind busied itself with questions.

  Why?

  Why hadn’t the assemblyman followed through with his threat? Had he buckled under pressure from his committee? Had it been something to do with the call he’d taken the previous evening?

  Or …

  Tsuge was struck by a thought. What if he’d never had anything to start with? What if Ukai had only claimed to have something? Was that it? If so, for what reason? Maybe he’d wanted the police to panic. That didn’t make sense, though—his actions hadn’t had any impact on the force as a whole. They’d concerned only the Secretariat. Thinking about it, Tsuge realized that only Sakaniwa and himself had been affected. They were the only two who had suffered. Had that been Ukai’s intention? Again, the question remained: Why?

  Who the fuck knows?

  The door to the visitors’ room was open when he got back to the Secretariat. He saw the chiseled features of a private-sector CEO, one who had been there on a few previous occasions. Sakaniwa was there, too, sitting with his back to the door as he listened to what the man had to say.

  Tsuge took a seat at his desk. For a moment, everything seemed to go dark. His eyes traced slowly back to the other room, fearful, as though he’d seen a ghost.

  Sakaniwa. His back to the door.

  That was normal enough. The couches were arranged so that Sakaniwa could—and always did—offer the farthest one to visitors while he sat with his back to the door. But not that time. Tsuge had returned to the office following his meeting with Toyama. Hearing that Ukai was already in attendance, he’d opened the door to the room without so much as knocking. He’d seen Ukai’s and Sakaniwa’s faces together. Ukai had looked annoyed, but that was the man’s default expression. He hadn’t been angry, then, not until Tsuge had shown up. Not while he’d been sitting beside the chief.

  Had they been in collusion? Tsuge considered the idea. There was, he had to admit, one thing that lent traction to the theory. Not once had Sakaniwa tried to dissuade Ukai in person. He’d delegated all the work to Tsuge. Sakaniwa was himself a veteran when it came to working with the assembly. It went without saying that he and Ukai would know each other. Despite this, and regardless of the fact that his own head was on the line, he hadn’t gone to see the man in person. Did that mean they’d been working together? That it had been some form of entrapment? No, it couldn’t be anything like that. Tsuge had been made to do the legwork, that was all. No harm had come of it. Besides, he didn’t believe either of them had reason to hold a grudge against him.

  I’m getting paranoid.

  “Tsuge.” Sakaniwa came over, having already emerged from the visitors’ room. “I guess we should call this a win.”

  “Sir, I suppose. But—”

  “By the way,” Sakaniwa went on, lowering his voice, “someone told me Ukai filed a theft report with district.”

  “A theft report?”

  “Yes. It seems that someone saw fit to steal the man’s briefcase,” he said, a faint smile playing across his lips.

  Tsuge watched, mouth gaping, as the chief walked away. Briefcase. Theft. For a while everything seemed lost in a haze. Tsuge failed to notice Aiko Toda offering him coffee. Briefcase. He started to shake. Briefcase. Prints. Camera. Trap. The words came together to form a cohesive but unexpected narrative. The story belonged neither to him nor to Assemblyman Ukai. Instead, it belonged to Secretariat Chief Shoichi Sakaniwa.

  The man was hoping for a significant promotion come the next round of transfers. He would do all he could to secure himself a post as director. Before that, however, he had to first rid himself of the one blemish that could come back to haunt him.

  His one mistake, made seven years ago.

  The plan had already been in motion when he’d called Tsuge to join the Secretariat. He’d spun out the idea of the “time bomb” and made damn sure that Tsuge felt the pressure. He’d understood that Tsuge’s instinct for self-protection would compel him to lay hands on the briefcase. There hadn’t been a doubt in his mind.

  It was Sakaniwa who had called Ukai at his apartment the previous evening. He’d wanted to ensure that Tsuge was left alone with the briefcase. There’d been the empty bracket above the main door, the kind that housed a security camera. The camera itself would have been hidden, he guessed, in the room with him. Ukai would have kept watch from the bedroom, prolonging the call until Tsuge had done the deed.

  The briefcase had not been stolen. If Tsuge should ever come to pose a threat, it would turn up at a substation in some town. It would be flagged as the stolen property of one of the prefecture’s key assembly members. As such, it would be sent for forensics testing. Tsuge’s prints would be found plastered over all the papers inside.

  The officer who stole an assemblyman’s briefcase.

  The fact would never become public knowledge, but it would mark the end of his career in the force.

  Still, that wasn’t how the story had panned out. Tsuge would, of course, never breathe a word about Sakaniwa’s past transgression. Keep things on an even keel. The story was over the moment Sakaniwa got what he needed.

  Ukai had played a role, albeit a bit part, in the story. As Seshima had seen, the man was a coward at heart. The investigation had been devastating, and he’d been at the mercy of the force ever since. When Sakaniwa, one of the closest aides to the captain, ha
d approached him for a favor, he’d jumped at the chance to earn some goodwill.

  Yet Tsuge couldn’t help wondering whether there hadn’t been something more to the man’s ready agreement to become an accomplice. He recalled the ferocity of the anger Ukai had directed his way. Perhaps the man had decided to use him as a punching bag, as a means of venting his pent-up animosity.

  This would, of course, never be more than conjecture. These were questions no one would answer.

  He glanced at Sakaniwa’s desk. In profile, the chief’s unremarkable features had even less impact. Tsuge was surprised to find that he bore the man no ill will. He suspected he’d have done something similar in Sakaniwa’s position.

  It’ll come in useful, someday.

  He had to admit, the thought had been there at the back of his mind.

  The Secretariat returned to its usual quiet that afternoon.

  Tsuge saw the brown roof of the archives beyond the window.

  A narrow strip of blue sky peeked out from above.

  10

  The apartment was dark when Tsuge arrived home.

  Misuzu and Morio were in the next town along, at Misuzu’s family home. The school had granted them leave as an emergency measure to escape the bullying, which had apparently grown worse.

  Tsuge sipped at a bowl of noodles. He turned on the washing machine and started to run a bath but turned the tap off halfway. He collapsed into bed. He lay there for a while, arms and legs spread like a cross. There was a drawing of him on the wall, scribbled in paint and crayon. Tsuge didn’t think it much of a likeness. The words were a mess, too.

  Thanks for working so hard.

  Tsuge put on his clothes and left the building. There was something he needed to tell his son. He held on to the words as he set out in the car:

  Make a friend. Just one will do.

  He wasn’t sure if he really believed them, but he pushed down on the accelerator regardless, as though to stamp out the apathy growing inside him.