He who lends a book is an idiot. He who returns the book is more of an idiot.
Arabic Proverb
ePub
A4Chapter 26
S
hubunkan Junior High School was in the middle of a peaceful residentialneighborhood. The gentle glow of the carved school crest on the pillars of
the gate exuded history.
Kaga sauntered through the gate as if he owned the place. Matsumiya
just followed in his wake.
Matsumiya had requested Kobayashi for complete freedom of action
for the day. Kobayashi had gone and consulted with Ishigaki for a few
minutes before coming back to Matsumiya. He looked at him probingly.
“I got you your permission. No idea what you’re planning to do, but
make sure and report back to me.”
“Yes, sir.”
He bowed his thanks and was about to move off when he felt a hand
grab his arm. Kobayashi pressed his face to Matsumiya’s ear.
“You can tell me. You think Yashima didn’t do it.”
“I can’t yet.”
His arm was yanked violently.
“What are you after? What’s your line of inquiry?”
Kobayashi was clearly not willing to let him go without getting an
answer. “It’s the son,” Matsumiya replied reluctantly.
“The son?” There was an incredulous expression on Kobayashi’s face.
“The victim’s son?”
“We don’t know yet,” he said and shook off Kobayashi’s hand.
That was the truth: they didn’t yet know. They could be completely off
the mark. But Matsumiya sensed that they were onto something. The truth
was out there. Kaga was pushing forward and it was somewhere in his path.
A PE lesson was in progress in the schoolyard. One group of boys was
playing basketball and another was playing volleyball. The older man with
them had to be the instructor. He seemed to be keeping a rather distracted
eye on the games rather than doing any active coaching.
The administration office was on the first floor of the main building.
Kaga had a word with the person at the reception desk. After a short wait, a
woman emerged from the office.
She led them to a room labeled “Visitor Reception.” It contained a low
table with old-fashioned but expensive-looking sofas around it. The woman
invited them to take a seat on a three-person sofa, then brought them some
tea.
“I’ve not been inside a school for ages. I can’t think how many years
it’s been,” Matsumiya said. They could hear the sound of children singing.
The music room was probably nearby.
Kaga got up and walked over to a showcase in which various trophies
and shields were displayed.
“The school seems to take its sports very seriously,” he snorted.
“How about the swim team?”
Kaga pointed to one of the trophies. “They came in second in the relay
at the national championships.”
“Impressive.”
“It is ten years old, though.”
At that moment, there was a knock on the door. “Come in,” Kaga said.
A broad-shouldered man entered the room. His head was large and his
eyebrows thick. Matsumiya wondered if he came from the far south of
Japan.
The teacher’s name was Itokawa. He was the man Takeaki Aoyagi had
contacted by phone three days before he was killed. Kaga had already questioned Itokawa about that. He’d explained that Aoyagi had concerns
about his troubled relationship with his son.
Matsumiya introduced himself. Itokawa responded with a nod and a
disinterested look.
“Sorry to disturb you. I know you’re a busy man,” said Kaga
apologetically. “Were you teaching?”
“No, this is a free period for me. Anyway, what are you here for
today? If it’s the same thing as last time, there’s nothing more I can tell you.
You even asked me for an alibi.”
“I’m sorry about that, sir. As I explained to you, that’s something we
do with everyone who has any kind of link to the case. I apologize if I made
you uncomfortable.”
“Don’t worry. I’m comfortable enough. So, what’s today about?”
“We don’t want to talk about the current case but about something that
happened quite a while ago.”
At Kaga’s words, a mistrustful crease appeared on Itokawa’s brow. “A
while ago?”
“Three years ago, in fact. An accident that took place during the
summer vacation three years ago. I think you know what I’m talking
about.”
“Oh, that business?” A guarded look came over Itokawa’s face. “What
about it?”
“In the course of investigating the current case, we’ve realized that we
need to take a second look at that accident. We’d like you to tell us what
happened.”
Itokawa forced his face into a tense and unnatural smile. He looked
first at Kaga, then at Matsumiya.
“Not much I can tell you. Why do you think that the accident and your
current case are connected? They’re two completely separate things.
Besides, you already know who’s guilty. The man who died was the killer,
right? Why’s the investigation still ongoing?”
“Because the case isn’t closed yet,” Matsumiya chimed in. “We don’t
know for sure that he really was the killer.”
“Oh. Still, I don’t quite get why you need to dredge up an accident that
happened years ago.” Itokawa tilted his head to an exaggerated angle.
“Not an episode that you want to revisit, then?”
“I guess not.”
“What? Is it uncomfortable for you if we dredge it up?”
Itokawa’s eyes goggled. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“As detectives, that’s the interpretation we put on it. If someone is
reluctant to cooperate under questioning, we naturally assume that the
matter must be awkward and uncomfortable for them.”
Itokawa’s mouth twitched. “What do you want to know about the darn
accident?”
“Details. I believe you were first on the scene, Mr. Itokawa?”
“Yeah. Yes, I was.”
“If you can, I’d like you to talk us through the events leading up to the
accident. I believe there’d been a swim tournament at a sports center that
day?”
Itokawa ran his tongue over his lips and drew himself upright in his
chair. “Okay, I can do that,” he said, looking Kaga in the eye. Matsumiya
scrutinized the teacher’s face for any evidence of lying.
After they had parted with Tokiko Kanamori the night before, Kaga
had announced his intention to return to the police station. Since his partner
gave every sign of being onto something, Matsumiya had tagged along.
Back at the station, Kaga went online and, after doing some web searches
related to shrines, began trawling through old news stories. Matsumiya was
surprised to see the three keywords Kaga had typed in: “Shubunkan Junior
High School,” “swim team,” and “accident.” Why those particular search
terms? he asked.
“We know for a fact that Suitengu Shrine was the main focus of
Aoyagi’s shrine visits because that’s where he got his origami cranes burned
in the ritual bonfire. All the assumptions we made up to that point were
valid, but that is when we veered off course. We got too hung up on
Suitengu’s association with safe childbirth. Suitengu offers another benefit:
protection from drowning.”
“Drowning…” Matsumiya hadn’t known. Now that Kaga mentioned
it, though, he vaguely recalled having seen a water-sprite mask in the shrine
shop.
“Tokyo is full of shrines that protect people from accidents and
disasters. The majority offer protection from fire; shrines that protect
against water-related accidents are much rarer. Apart from Suitengu, the
only other one is Sogenji, a temple in Taito Ward. I came up with a theory
that some sort of water-related accident could be driving Aoyagi’s regular
visits to Suitengu. That’s when I remembered that his son had been on the
swim team in junior high school.”
What Kaga said jogged Matsumiya’s memory. “And Aoyagi contacted
Yuto’s old swim team coach three days before the murder.”
“Now do you see why I’m searching with these keywords?”
Kaga’s interpretation of events was soon proved to be correct. This
was one of the three-year-old newspaper stories he found.
At about seven o’clock on the night of the eighteenth, a second-year
student was found drowning in the swimming pool of Shubunkan Junior
High School. He was rushed by ambulance to the hospital where he remains
in a coma. The student is said to be a member of the swim team who had
slipped into the school without permission and was swimming alone when
he had an accident, the cause of which is unknown. There had been an
interschool swim meet at a sports center in the afternoon of the same day
and the student was supposedly depressed after having performed poorly. It was the coach of the swim team who found the student. He had gone to the
pool for a routine check when he discovered the student lying at the bottom
of the pool.
Unfortunately, they couldn’t find any follow-up stories. All they knew
for sure was that this was the only drowning-type accident to have
happened at Shubunkan Junior High.
Itokawa spoke in a flat voice, frowning in an effort of memory. The
swim meet had ended around four. The post-competition team meeting at
the sports center lasted about an hour, after which he had dismissed
everyone. He assumed that the boys then went home; he himself had gone
back to the school in order to input the results of the meet into his computer.
“I was busy inputting the data when I realized that I needed a
particular document. I went to the coach’s room to retrieve it. It’s right
beside the pool. Glancing down at the paved area by the side of the pool, I
noticed a pile of clothes as if someone had gotten changed. That alarmed
me. When I went down for a look, I found someone lying at the bottom of
the swimming pool. I pulled him out straightaway. He turned out to be a
member of the second-year swim team. I called 911 and performed mouthto-
mouth and CPR while waiting for the ambulance. All the other teachers had gone home by then, so it was the security guard who came to alert me
when the ambulance arrived. Only then could I get in touch with the boy’s
family and the headmaster. I was on my own, so I couldn’t do anything until
the ambulance got there.”
Itokawa exhaled heavily. “That’s everything I can tell you about the
accident.” He glared at Kaga, as if challenging him to pick holes in his
account.
“What was the name of the student who had the accident?” Kaga
asked. Itokawa frowned and pursed his lips. “We can easily find out, if we
have to,” Kaga added.
Itokawa sullenly provided them with the name. The boy was called
Tomoyuki Yoshinaga.
“I heard the family’s moved out of Tokyo to Nagano Prefecture. I
don’t know the address.”
“Did he make a full recovery?”
“No, you see…” Itokawa looked uncomfortable. “The accident had
long-term effects. It’s really too sad.”
The boy had barely managed to escape with his life.
“Did anyone bring up the school’s liability?” Kaga asked.
“The issue was raised. Should the school be so easy to break into?
And it’s a valid point. The school buildings can be locked, but on a practical
level, it’s simply not possible to stop people getting into an outdoor pool.
Yoshinaga’s parents accepted that, so the case never went to court.”
“Is it something that happens a lot? Kids sneaking in and swimming
without authorization?”
“I can’t say it never happens. From what the students tell me, it’s still
going on from time to time. Not just current students, apparently, but former
students who live nearby as well.”
“The newspaper story claimed that Yoshinaga was upset because of
his performance in that day’s swim meet.”
“I blame myself for that,” Itokawa said gravely. “I had very high hopes
for the lad and probably gave him too harsh a dressing-down. I had no idea
he was so down. He must have got a leg cramp or suffered some sort of
heart attack while swimming laps by himself.”
Kaga, who was jotting down his replies, abruptly looked up from his
notebook.
“Was he really by himself?”
“I’m sorry? What do you mean?”
“Oh, just that perhaps someone was with him. I mean, doing laps with
your teammates is more fun than doing them alone.”
“He was in no mood for fun. Anyway, daily distance training is
something they always do by themselves. Besides, if anyone else had been
there, the accident wouldn’t have happened in the first place.”
Kaga nodded. “I see,” he said, despite looking mildly dissatisfied.
“Could you show us the pool?”
“I can, though there’s no water in it at this time of year.”
“Not a problem.” Kaga got to his feet. “After you.”
They left the main school building and skirted the sports ground as
they made for the pool, which was located on the far side of the school gymnasium. It was far enough from the main school building to make it
possible to swim without being seen. In addition, the fence around the pool
was so low that a junior high school student could easily climb over it.
They followed Itokawa up the side of the twenty-five-meter-long pool.
The pool was empty and carpeted in dead, windblown leaves.
“I see there isn’t any lighting here,” Kaga said.
“There are emergency lights. We don’t normally use them.”
“You found Yoshinaga at seven at night. I know it was summertime,
but I’m assuming it was already quite dark.”
“Yes, it was pretty dark.”
“You did well to spot him.”
“Sorry?”
“You managed to spot Yoshinaga, who was lying at the bottom of the
pool, in the dark. That’s impressive. You mentioned that his clothes were in
a pile at the side of the pool. Still, there was no reason for his body to be
near them.”
Itokawa took a deep breath. “I had a flashlight,” he said.
“Ah.” Kaga nodded. “Incidentally, what was Yoshinaga’s best stroke?”
“Freestyle. He was particularly good at sprints. The fifty meters.”
“Was that the race he competed in at the meet that day?”
“Yes, it must have been—look, I know it’s my civic duty to cooperate
and I’m trying my best to be helpful, but what’s the point of all this,
Detective? Personally, I can’t see any link to the incident in Nihonbashi.”
Itokawa’s voice had an edge to it; he could no longer conceal his irritation.
“You’ve got every reason to feel annoyed. I understand that,” Kaga
rejoined blandly. “Whenever I question people, I always end up getting on
their nerves—asking a million questions without telling them anything at
all. There is a reason for my taking this approach, though.”
“Yeah, yeah, I know. You have to keep the details of ongoing
investigations secret from the general public. I get it, but still—”
“That’s not all. If I tell the person I’m questioning why I’m
questioning them, they can start developing preconceptions. I need answers
untainted by anything like that.”
Itokawa sighed and ran a hand over his face. “I can see that.”
“By the way, have you got a directory of former swim team members
who’ve graduated? If you have, I’d like to borrow it.”
Itokawa responded to Kaga’s request with a shake of the head. “I can’t
do that. That’s personal information. If you want it, you’ll need to get a
warrant.”
“Really? Okay, then.” Kaga didn’t insist. “Thank you very much for
everything.”
“Are we done?”
“Yes, that’s everything. I’ll be in touch if I have any further
questions.” Kaga bowed his thanks. “Let’s go,” he said to Matsumiya.
