Sano Ichiro 9 The Perfumed Sleeve (2004) Read online

  Torn between his chamberlain and cousin, loath to offend either, the shogun flung up his hands and turned to Sano. “You decide who will supervise you!”

  Sano was appalled that the shogun had passed the decision to him. Chamberlain Yanagisawa and Lord Matsudaira wore expressions of displeasure that they’d failed to coax the shogun and he’d put their fate in the hands of an inferior. They fixed ominous glares upon Sano.

  Once more, Sano sensed their antagonism rising toward the danger point. He pictured armies poised to charge. Again he saw the moment depending on himself.

  He said, “Your Excellency, I would be honored to have both Chamberlain Yanagisawa and Lord Matsudaira supervise my investigation.”

  “You asked for them both?” Reiko spoke as if she thought Sano had lost his mind.

  “My only alternative would have been to choose one of them,” Sano said, “and provoke the wrath of the other.”

  He and Reiko lay in bed in their chamber. He’d told her about his meeting with the shogun, as well as what he’d discovered about the death of Senior Elder Makino. A lantern on the table illuminated their somber faces as they listened to Edo Castle’s nighttime sounds of mounted troops and foot soldiers patrolling the streets and grounds, horses neighing and stomping in stables, and dogs barking somewhere on the hill. Sano ached with exhaustion from his busy day and previous night without sleep, but the meeting had left him tense and wakeful.

  “I see,” Reiko said. “Choosing one would have forced you to join his faction. I think you were wise to avoid that. And whichever you didn’t choose would have interfered with your investigation nonetheless.”

  “This way, perhaps they’ll counteract each other’s interference,” Sano said without much hope.

  “But now you’ll have both Chamberlain Yanagisawa and Lord Matsudaira on your back, each demanding that you implicate the other in Makino’s murder and each certain to punish you if you don’t.”

  “Refusing to serve either one exclusively is my only hope of conducting a thorough, impartial investigation,” Sano said, though he feared the consequences as much as Reiko did.

  She turned to Sano. He took her in his arms and drew comfort from their closeness. “What happens next?” Reiko asked.

  “Lord Matsudaira and Chamberlain Yanagisawa have both assigned men to observe and report to them on my investigation,” Sano said.

  Reiko lay stiff in his arms, and Sano perceived that she had other worries besides the murder case. “Is something else wrong?” he said.

  She emitted a tense sigh. “I went for a ride today.”

  “That’s good.” Sano was glad that she’d recovered enough spirit to go outside.

  “I ran into Lady Yanagisawa. Or, I should say, she ran into me.”

  Sano was alarmed. The last thing they needed was that madwoman plotting more mischief against Reiko.

  “Please don’t worry,” Reiko said, clearly anxious to spare Sano more problems. “I can handle Lady Yanagisawa.” She changed the subject: “What are your plans for tomorrow?”

  “I’ll go back to Senior Elder Makino’s estate and start looking for suspects. His wife, concubine, chief retainer, and houseguest are likely possibilities.”

  “Is there anything I can do?” Reiko asked.

  “You can make inquiries about the wife and concubine,” Sano said. Reiko moved in social circles that were closed to Sano, and she often brought him inside information about the women in a case. “And you can pray that the killer is unconnected with either Lord Matsudaira or Chamberlain Yanagisawa, and the final result of my investigation will please them both.”

  * * *

  6

  Shortly after daybreak the next morning, Sano and Hirata arrived at Senior Elder Makino’s estate with a team of detectives and two men sent by Lord Matsudaira and Chamberlain Yanagisawa to observe the investigation. A chill rain puddled the pavements, dripped from eaves, and soaked the black mourning drapery that hung over the portals. A sign posted on the gate announced the funeral procession tomorrow. In spite of the early hour, news of Makino’s death had spread; despite the bad weather, numerous officials converged on the estate to pay their respects to Makino—or gloat over his death. Servants ushered them and Sano’s party through the courtyard, which was rapidly filling with sodden umbrellas, and into an entry way crammed with swords and wet shoes. As Sano and his party followed the crowd along the corridor, they passed a banquet room, where maids bustled, setting out food and drink for the guests.

  “Detectives Marume-san and Fukida-san, you’ll cover the banquet room,” Sano said. From a reception hall down the corridor came the hum of chanting and subdued conversation. “Inoue-san, you and Arai-san take the reception hall. The rest of you, patrol the rest of the house.”

  As the detectives went off to obey, Lord Matsudaira’s man said, “Wait.” He halted in the corridor, forcing Sano and Hirata to stop. He was a heavyset samurai named Otani, in his late thirties, with a puffy face. His shrewd eyes regarded Sano with suspicion. “What are your men going to do?”

  “They’re going to spy on the funeral guests,” Sano said in a low voice that passersby wouldn’t hear.

  “Why?” demanded Chamberlain Yanagisawa’s man, Ibe. He was a slight, nervous fellow whose nostrils twitched frequently, as if scenting trouble.

  Sano realized that his two watchdogs knew nothing about investigating crimes. He said, “Senior Elder Makino’s enemies as well as his friends will be here. My men will be on the alert for any behavior or conversations that implicate anyone in the murder.”

  “But I’m supposed to watch your investigation,” Ibe said, his nasal voice rising to a whine. “You can’t send your men off to do things for you in different places, because I can’t see what they’re up to and stay with you at the same time.”

  “He’s right.” Otani gave his grudging support to Ibe, whom he obviously detested as a member of the enemy faction. “Lord Matsudaira said nothing should happen in this investigation without my knowledge. Call back your men.”

  Sano realized with dismay that not only did Chamberlain Yanagisawa and Lord Matsudaira each want him to incriminate the other, but their representatives might keep him from accomplishing anything.

  “I need my detectives to split up because I can’t be everywhere and do everything at once,” Sano explained patiently. “If we stick together, just so you can keep an eye on us, we may miss important clues.”

  “Is that what your masters want?” Hirata challenged Otani and Ibe.

  They exchanged uneasy glances, then shook their heads.

  “Then let me conduct this investigation as I see fit,” Sano said. “When my men report their discoveries to me, you can listen. I promise we won’t hide anything from you.”

  Otani and Ibe nodded in disgruntled approval. They followed Sano and Hirata into the reception hall, where guests lined up in front of the dais, upon which lay the oblong wooden coffin. Below the dais, a kneeling priest with a shaved head, dressed in saffron robe and brocade stole, chanted prayers. Near him, Senior Elder Makino’s widow and chief retainer knelt by a table that held a wooden tablet inked with Makino’s name, a branch of Chinese anise in a vase, a smoking incense burner, oil lamp, offerings of water and food, and a sword to avert evil spirits. Tamura wore formal black robes. The widow was dressed in muted violet, her face pale with white rice powder, her hair rolled neatly atop her head. One by one, the guests approached the coffin, knelt, and bowed. Each lit an incense stick at the lamp and spoke ritual condolences to the senior elder’s chief retainer and wife: “Congratulations on the long, prosperous life that Makino-san lived. I hope we all enjoy similar good fortune.”

  Sano, Hirata, and their watchdogs joined the line. When Sano reached the dais, he was startled to discover that the coffin was open, not closed according to custom. Inside reposed Makino, his head shaved bald. He wore a white silk kimono. A pouch hung around his neck contained a coin to pay his toll on the road to the netherworld. His sandals
faced backward to signify that he would never return to the world of the living. Beside him lay a Buddhist rosary and a bamboo staff, almost buried in the powdered incense that lined the coffin and sweetened the smell of the corpse. Sano supposed that the open coffin gave Makino’s friends a chance to say good-bye and his enemies a chance to see that he was really dead.

  When Sano reached the front of the line, the widow received him with the same wordless courtesy she’d shown everyone else, but Tamura grimaced in annoyance.

  “Sōsakan-sama. I’ve been expecting you.” Obviously, Tamura had heard that Sano had pronounced Makino a victim of murder and the shogun had ordered the investigation to continue. “But I hoped you would choose a better time to come looking for the murderer.”

  Hirata, Ibe, and Otani prayed briefly over the coffin and lit incense. Tamura bowed to Ibe, representative of Chamberlain Yanagisawa, who’d been his master’s master. He ignored Lord Matsudaira’s man Otani.

  “I’m sorry to intrude on the funeral rites, but His Excellency has ordered me to proceed without delay,” Sano said. “I need to speak to the wife of Senior Elder Makino.”

  Tamura’s slanted eyebrows bunched together in a scowl. “Surely you wouldn’t ask a widow to desert her duty to receive her dead husband’s colleagues.”

  The widow murmured, “It’s all right ... I must do the sōsakan-sama’s bidding.” Her hesitant voice was so quiet that it seemed to drift toward Sano from far away. She rose so gracefully that her body seemed made of pliant flesh without bone. She flowed up to Sano as if her feet under her trailing robes skimmed upon air above the floor.

  Sano addressed Tamura: “I’ll want a word with you later. In the meantime, where are Senior Elder Makino’s houseguest and concubine?”

  “I don’t know,” Tamura said with controlled calm. “Somewhere around the estate.” Mustering his dignity, he turned away to greet other guests.

  “Find the concubine and houseguest and interview them,” Sano told Hirata. Then he said to the widow, “Is there a place where we can talk privately?”

  She nodded, eyes modestly downcast. “I’ll show you, if you’ll come with me.”

  Hirata moved toward the door. Ibe and Otani blocked his way, their expressions obstinate.

  “This divide-and-conquer approach has gone too far,” Otani told Sano.

  “You’re trying to avoid our observation by running too many inquiries at once.” Ibe’s suspicion of Sano allied him with his enemy counterpart.

  “You must conduct the interviews one at a time,” Otani said, “so we can be present.”

  Ibe nodded. Hirata looked to Sano, who realized that if he did as his watchdogs said, they would continue to dictate his every move. It was bad enough to have Chamberlain Yanagisawa and Lord Matsudaira trying to control the investigation, and Sano refused to bow to their lackeys.

  “We’ll conduct the interviews simultaneously,” Sano said. “That’s final.”

  Otani and Ibe glared. Ibe said, “I’ll tell the honorable chamberlain that you’re resisting his supervision.”

  “Go ahead,” Sano said. “I’ll tell him—and Lord Matsudaira—that the two of you are hindering my progress.”

  Indecision, and fear of their masters, blinked the men’s eyes. “I’ll accompany you,” Otani said to Sano.

  “I’ll go with Hirata-san,” Ibe said.

  “At the end of the day, I want a full report on the discoveries that I didn’t witness,” Otani said.

  “Same here,” Ibe said. “And you’d better not leave anything out.”

  Hirata and Ibe departed together. As Sano and Otani followed the widow down the corridor, Sano felt glad he’d established authority over his watchdogs, but his head had begun to ache. The widow led him and Otani to a smaller, vacant reception chamber. She gestured for them to sit in the place of honor before the alcove, which contained a verse on a scroll and bare branches in a black vase. She knelt and waited meekly.

  Sano and Otani seated themselves. “My apologies for interrupting your husband’s funeral rites and intruding on you, Lady Agemaki,” Sano said. He recognized the name of a princess in The Tale of Genji, the famous novel of the Imperial Court, written some six centuries ago. Makino’s widow had a certain regal, refined air that suited the name to her. “But the circumstances give me no choice. I’m sorry to say that your husband was murdered.” Sano explained about Makino’s letter. “The shogun has ordered me to honor your husband’s wish that I bring his killer to justice and avenge his death. Now I need your help.”

  Agemaki nodded, glancing at Sano from beneath lowered eyelids. “For the sake of my beloved husband ... I will gladly help you.”

  “Then I must ask you to answer some questions,” Sano said.

  “Very well.”

  “I understand that you live in Makino-san’s private quarters. Is that correct?”

  “That is correct,” Agemaki whispered. Her speech had a prim, formal quality.

  “Were you there the night he died?”

  “Yes ... I was there.”

  “When was the last time you saw him alive?” Sano asked.

  Agemaki hesitated. Sano had a feeling, based only on instinct, that she was deciding whether to tell the truth—or how much of it. “I believe I last saw my husband soon after the temple bells rang the hour of the dog,” she said. “That was his usual bedtime.”

  “What happened?” Sano said.

  “We bid each other good night,” Agemaki said. “I retired to my chamber.”

  “You didn’t sleep in his?”

  An indefinable emotion fluttered the woman’s eyelashes. “No.”

  If she was telling the truth, then she wasn’t the woman who’d had sex with Makino that night, Sano thought. The fabric and style of the torn kimono sleeve didn’t match her age or marital status. He had no reason to doubt her word, except an unfounded hunch.

  “Did you speak to your husband after you left him?” Sano asked Agemaki.

  “No... I did not.”

  “What did you do next?”

  “I went to bed.”

  “Did you hear any sounds from your husband’s chamber?”

  Agemaki slowly inhaled, then exhaled, before she answered, “I heard nothing.”

  “Would you please show me your chamber?” Sano said.

  “Certainly.”

  She led Sano out of the mansion, across the walkway and garden to the building that housed Makino’s private quarters. Otani shadowed them, frowning as he tried to discern Sano’s purpose. Inside the quarters they followed the corridor past Makino’s chamber and turned a corner. As Sano had noted yesterday, the building was roughly square, with the rooms arranged around the courtyard. Agemaki opened the door to a room adjacent to Makino’s. Upon entering, Sano saw furnishings appropriate for an aristocratic lady—a dressing table with mirror and jars of makeup, an expensive brocade kimono on a stand, a screen decorated with gilded birds, lacquer chests and silk floor cushions. Sano noted the lattice-and-paper partition that separated the chamber from Makino’s.

  “Are you sure you didn’t hear anything that night?” Sano asked Agemaki.

  She stood by the door, hands folded in her sleeves. “I am quite sure.”

  Sano wondered how she could not have heard Makino having sex on the other side of the flimsy partition or being beaten to death one room away. Agemaki murmured, “I took a sleeping potion. I slept very soundly.”

  A reasonable explanation, Sano thought; but he pictured her sliding open the partition and stealing into Makino’s room in the dark of that night.

  Her face suddenly contorted; tears flooded her eyes. She dabbed them with her sleeve. “I wish I had heard something,” she said, her voice broken by a sob. “Maybe I could have saved my husband.”

  Sano pitied her even as he wondered if her grief was an act. “Have you any idea who killed him?”

  She shook her head. “If only I did.”

  “May I look around your room?” Sano said.

/>   Agemaki gestured, granting him permission. He opened cabinets and chests, surveyed neatly folded garments and paired shoes. Otani stuck close by him, peering over his shoulder. While Sano searched for a murder weapon and bloodstained clothes, Agemaki watched mutely, indifferent. He found neither. Maybe she was the blameless, grieving widow she seemed.

  “How long had you and Senior Elder Makino been married?” Sano asked her.

  “Six years,” she said sadly.

  Sano had known she wasn’t a first, longtime wife to Makino, whose sons were in their forties. She was too young to have borne them, and at least three decades younger than Makino.

  “Were there any problems between you and your husband?” Sano said.

  “... None whatsoever.”

  “Had you quarreled recently?” Sano prodded.

  “We never quarreled,” Agemaki said with pride. A fresh spate of weeping seized her. “We were devoted to each other.”

  But they hadn’t shared a bed. And Makino had had a young, beautiful concubine, as did many rich husbands. Marital troubles often arose from such a situation. Sano wondered if Agemaki knew he was seeking a motive for her husband’s murder. If so, she would also know to deny any reason for killing him, as well as protect herself by appearing to cooperate with Sano’s inquiries.

  “Who is your family?” Sano asked, curious about her.

  “The Senge. They’re retainers to Lord Torii.”

  Sano recognized the clan as a large, venerable one, and Lord Torii as daimyo of Iwaki Province in northern Japan. “Have you any children by Senior Elder Makino?”

  Agemaki sighed. “I regret to say that I have none.”

  “What will you do now that your husband is dead?” Sano doubted that Makino’s clan, which was notoriously venal and exclusive, would support a widow from a brief marriage who had no strong political connections to it. “Will you go back to your family?”

  “No. My parents are dead, and I haven’t any close relatives. I will stay here until my official period of mourning is done. After that, I will live in a villa that my husband owned in the hills outside Edo. He left me the villa, along with an income to provide for me.”