A Quiet Place Page 5

  Eiko’s trips had lasted three to four hours, and had taken place in the middle of the day. Sometimes twice, sometimes three times a week. Not all these trips were to her haiku teacher’s home in Suginami Ward. She’d told Asai that sometimes she visited friends and acquaintances from her haiku circle, and occasionally she would go for a stroll somewhere that might inspire a poem. Asai had heard this so many times that he’d let the information wash over him. Now he realized that he should have listened more carefully; three to four hours was just about the perfect length of time to meet a lover.

  When the insects had begun to swarm, he’d grabbed Eiko’s haiku notebook in an attempt to discover some written clue, but there was nothing that suggested a love affair. This was the very same notebook that Eiko had been carrying in her handbag at the time of her death; the one she’d desperately tried to show to Chiyoko Takahashi.

  The notebook contained a list of addresses; a list that the haiku teacher had collected and distributed as a way of identifying all her students. There was nothing suspicious about it at all. There wasn’t a single sentence written in the whole book that could be interpreted as a message of love. Eiko’s own poems were in the style of the Hototogisu School of haiku, relating to the beauty of nature and the harmony between man and the natural world. Every poem was about nature. And yet not one of the locations described seemed to evoke Yoyogi. Maybe somewhere, buried deep in these poems, was a secret.

  Even if Asai was on the right track, he had absolutely no idea who the lover could be. What kind of man could make Eiko burn with such desire that she forgot about her weak heart? In the whole seven years that Asai had been married to her, he’d never once seen Eiko show any interest in other men. She’d always seemed to him to have a rather bland personality – she despised romantic novels and never read them, and he’d never heard her discuss love or sex. If there was any hint of a love scene on a TV programme she would immediately change channels or turn it off.

  Similarly, Eiko had shown no interest in her husband’s job. She’d never made an effort to understand what kind of work he did, and never asked questions about it. She’d wanted to hear how many days he’d be away on his business trips, but never asked where he was going, who he was going with, or the purpose of the trip. She had simply checked what day he’d be home so she could get the house ready for his return. She’d been so indifferent that it didn’t matter how late he came home on any given working day, she’d never bothered to ask him where he’d been.

  Eiko had never been fond of spending time with the wives of his colleagues at the ministry. Asai understood it could be tedious, but all the other wives put up with it, didn’t they? Surely that was their contribution to their husbands’ careers. She really ought to have made more of an effort to cosy up to the wives of his superiors, but she’d never even tried. That was the kind of person Eiko had been: completely unconcerned with Asai’s career advancement.

  Generally, when a wife is completely disinterested in her husband’s social standing, he is forced to dig deep and find his own source of motivation. This depends, of course, on the personality of the husband in question, but Asai believed he had what it took. Because he’d never enjoyed the cooperation and support of his wife, Asai knew that he’d been given the opportunity to pour all his energy into his work. If things had been different, and Eiko had been too involved in his career – if she either henpecked or overprotected him – it would have weakened his own motivation. Asai saw plenty of men like that around the ministry.

  A wife who was passionately involved in her husband’s career didn’t necessarily love her husband any better than a wife who had no interest in it at all. Every woman was different. Actions did not necessarily speak louder than words. After seven years of marriage Asai and Eiko had a relationship as natural as air or water. Even the wives who had the deepest involvement in their husbands’ careers would never have a complete understanding of their jobs. That was how Asai had always seen it.

  But the wife who felt that all passion was gone from her daily life, who looked for a way to rekindle that passion with some other man besides her husband… well, he’d read about this kind of thing in novels and the advice column in the newspaper, but he’d never imagined it actually happening to him.

  And yet something occurred to him when he really thought about it. Perhaps he had adjusted his own personality too easily to Eiko’s. If he’d paid her a little more attention, maybe she would have been less passive. Her sensuality may have been right there under the surface waiting to blossom. But he’d been lacking as a partner. He’d been too concerned with her health problems, held back too much. The doctor had emphasized that all his warnings were just standard textbook, so there must have been some other way to continue making love. Perhaps they should have gone to other doctors, asked for more advice.

  Eiko had never been assertive and definitely hadn’t been the type to take the initiative in the bedroom. It seemed that she’d been unable to break the habits they’d fallen into at the start of their marriage. Perhaps she didn’t have the courage. The rigidity of their seven years of marital relations had gradually formed a protective shell into which she had retreated.

  This other man would have had to work on breaking that shell and overcoming the modesty that she had always shown around her husband. And it looked as if he had found a way in. She had apparently undergone a complete transformation.

  Asai recalled something the doctor had said, way back.

  “Heart disease is an invisible illness, undetectable in everyday life, so people tend to become careless. Let me give you an example. One of my friends, a doctor who suffers from heart disease himself, was out one day driving his car to a house call when his tyre got stuck in the drainage ditch by the side of the road. He got out, tried to lift the car out of the ditch, and instantly suffered a heart attack. He died on the spot. Even though he was a doctor, he completely forgot about his own illness. You need to take care.”

  Who was this object of Eiko’s obsession? Who had made her forget about her disease? This man who had given her a shock strong enough to paralyse her coronary artery – where was he?

  It struck Asai now that the reason Eiko never read romantic fiction or watched soap operas or other TV dramas wasn’t because she’d disliked them. She’d been avoiding them. She didn’t want to stir up all those feelings and sensations that she’d been trying to repress. And he’d taken it for a lack of interest!

  Eiko had studied singing and painting, so she must have had a sensitive side. She’d been interested in romance novels and TV soaps after all. She avoided them so that they wouldn’t awaken her sexual desire. Taking singing then giving it up, switching to painting and giving that up too, never sticking with anything for long – she was seeking something elusive, something that she needed. Did those ballads stir something tremendous in her soul? Traditional Japanese-style painting was probably far too tame. But in order to express the true beauty of nature in a haiku poem, she needed to go outside, take walks: that was when the opportunity had presented itself.

  Yes, her lover was someone she’d met since taking up haiku. Sometime in the past couple of years, not before.

  But here was the mystery: why had Eiko been walking up that hill? In other words, why hadn’t she been in a taxi or some other vehicle? All the other people that he and Miyako had seen that Sunday – the couple leaving the hotel and others who looked as if they were on their way in – had all been in cars. It was the natural way to travel when you were going to a place like that. No one wanted to show their face – best to simply drive in.

  What’s more, Eiko hated steep hills. It wasn’t like her to walk when she could have been driven. So why had she been on foot?

  Asai spent the next few days mulling over this puzzle, not only at home in his spare time but at work too. He checked over documents, drafted proposals, issued orders to his junior staff, consulted with his senior managers, met with visiting manufacturers, attended meetings and c
oordinated with staff in other departments, all the while absorbed by this conundrum.

  Eventually all the little threads of ideas and conjecture came together in his mind and formed a viable hypothesis…

  Eiko had suffered a heart attack while she was at a hotel with her lover. How should the man have reacted? Normally, he would have called a doctor, but this hotel was decidedly dodgy. It would have been impossible to remain anonymous. A heart attack was serious. You couldn’t get away with giving a false name.

  The man must have decided he had to get out of the hotel before calling for help. He got the hotel to call a taxi, and somehow got Eiko into it. Unfortunately, the pain had got worse, and he’d let her out of the taxi somewhere down the hill – probably near the bottom, a little way beyond Takahashi Cosmetics. That would explain why Chiyoko Takahashi had seen her come up the hill from the left.

  How could Eiko’s lover have made her get out of the taxi like that? Maybe he was taken by surprise by the seriousness of her condition; maybe he realized she needed the attention of a doctor right away. But why didn’t he drop her in front of a hospital, then? Because the hospital would have questioned the identity of a man who turned up with a half-dead woman in his arms. After arriving like that, it would have been difficult for him to make his escape. Time was running out, so the man had dropped Eiko off. He’d left her to run into the nearest house so she could get them to call an ambulance. Someone had been bound to help. He’d decided this was the best way to deal with the situation. He had never needed to give a name or address. He’d simply offloaded his problem on the side of the road and fled. Writhing in agony from the heart attack, Eiko couldn’t protest.

  Asai’s investigation began with the Tachibana.

  On his way home from work, he stopped in at an oden restaurant for a drink, then took a taxi up to Yoyogi. As the car drove past Takahashi Cosmetics, he peered out at the shopfront, but the brightly lit boutique was empty and there was no sign of Chiyoko Takahashi. Miyako had confessed that she was intrigued by the female shopkeeper and the fact that she seemed to be living there in that house all alone. The shop was probably empty right now because she had no family members to help out. But there were no customers either. It wasn’t exactly a thriving business. Anticipating good sales from this upmarket residential neighbourhood, she’d stocked only the most expensive brands – an amateurish mistake. She was like a widow who’d tried to go it alone after the death of her husband. Miyako had assumed right away that Ms Takahashi was a widow, and that had piqued her interest even more. Asai had an uncomfortable feeling that inside his sister-in-law’s head there was already a match being made between the cosmetics shop owner and himself.

  The taxi sped by the family homes, which looked more sinister now in the darkness.

  Asai got out right in front of the hotel. As usual, the sign on the roof was switched on; a red neon HOTEL TACHIBANA floating in the pitch-blackness of space.

  He entered through the gate he’d seen the previous Sunday. Guided by the light of the stone lanterns, he made his way across the stepping stones. Once he had navigated the front garden, he expected to arrive at the hotel entrance, but all he discovered was the side of the building and more stepping stones leading off in two different directions.

  As he wondered what to do, a female employee emerged from out of the shadowy building next to him. She bowed politely but at the same time eyed him a little suspiciously. After all, he had no companion with him.

  “Do you have any rooms available?”

  “We do. Would you prefer one in the western style, or should I show you to a Japanese room?”

  “Either’s fine.”

  “This way, please.”

  The maid led him along the path to the left. In the darkness, he could just make out a small thicket of bushes.

  He was shown to a small Japanese room. The sleeping area was behind a sliding paper partition, decorated with a classic pattern of tiny birds and blue waves.

  An ukiyo-e painting hung in the alcove above a small flower vase. The wall was ochre. There was a television in the corner; next to it was a phone. As Asai sat down at the red lacquered table, the maid withdrew to the doorway, knelt and placed both hands on the tatami flooring.

  “Welcome to the Tachibana. Will the… er… other party be joining you later?”

  “No.” Asai gave a short laugh. “There’s no one else. I’m on my own.”

  “I see.”

  She didn’t seem particularly surprised. Apparently single men did come to this hotel. And she had already anticipated the next question.

  “I’m very sorry, but we’re not able to perform that kind of service. I hope you understand.”

  “Oh no… I think we’ve had a misunderstanding. That’s not why I’m here. Actually, I have a small favour to ask you.”

  “I’m sorry?” She regarded him uncertainly.

  “I’m afraid I have rather an embarrassing question to ask. Would you mind coming a little nearer?”

  The woman looked to be around forty years old and was sturdily built under her purple apron. Still kneeling, she scooted a little closer to Asai.

  “Thank you. I… um… well, it’s a little difficult for me to say. Still, I’ve made up my mind to talk openly about it. You see, about two weeks ago my wife left me for another man – someone I’ve never met.”

  The woman’s eyes didn’t leave his face.

  “Well, a little while back I found evidence that she’d been using this hotel. Actually, it was that box of matches – the ones by the ashtray over there. The other day, I found the same matches in my wife’s handbag.”

  There was no response from the maid.

  “I have two small children at home. The only reason I’ve swallowed my pride and come here to ask you these questions is because my kids are missing their mum. I just want to find her and bring her home. But right now I haven’t a clue where she might be. To keep up appearances I don’t want to get the police involved. I thought that if I came here, I might be able to find out what kind of man my wife was here with. If I just knew what he looked like I might be able to guess who he is… Oh, I was forgetting: I brought a picture of my wife with me.”

  The humiliated husband produced his wife’s photo from his pocket, and handed it to the maid.

  “I hope you’ll forgive me if I don’t tell you my name.”

  6

  Asai had decided that posing as an estranged husband whose wife had walked out on him was a sure way of gaining sympathy from a woman – particularly from the maids who worked at the hotel. Every day in their jobs, they witnessed other women’s sexual infidelities. He was certain that off the job they would be inclined to pity a man with a cheating wife. Asai imagined this from a psychological point of view: women like these, who had been trained to act indifferently towards openly immoral behaviour, had to be repressing all kinds of feelings. Outrage for sure, a touch of jealousy; maybe even downright hatred.

  This maid was now carefully examining Eiko’s photo. But there was no sign that she recognized his dead wife.

  “I’m sorry. I don’t remember her. Should I ask some of the other maids to take a look? I don’t meet all the guests who come here.”

  “Of course. Yes, please could you ask them?”

  The maid hesitated. She was making a show of being uncomfortable disclosing his private affairs to other people, but at the same time it was obvious that she was dying to share this with her colleagues.

  “Please, go ahead. I mean, that’s what I came here for in the first place – to ask people about my wife. Could you just make sure it stays within these walls?”

  Asai’s voice was filled with distress, but the maid reassured him.

  “I understand. When you work in this business, keeping secrets is part of the job description. You’ve nothing to worry about.”

  “Then if you don’t mind…”

  The maid’s gaze returned to the photograph. She sighed.

  “My, what a b
eautiful wife you have.”

  “Really?”

  Asai had never thought of Eiko as a great beauty, but the photo had captured her at her best. She looked younger than her age, fresh-faced and modern.

  “She looks like the quiet type.”

  “I used to think she was the perfect wife.”

  “Clearly she fell under someone’s evil spell. Otherwise she’d never have left her children like that.”

  “Do you think the quieter types tend to be more susceptible to that kind of temptation?”

  “You might be right on that. I wouldn’t say it’s the rule, but we do see a lot of women like that in here.”

  “I know it sounds strange coming from the estranged husband, but my wife never even had male friends. I didn’t think she had the slightest interest in men at all.”

  “Although I hate to say it, that’s even more dangerous.”

  “Why?”

  “Women who spend a lot of time in the company of men learn to express their feelings better. They’re also better at seeing through all the charming things that men say, and don’t tend to fall for all that rubbish. And the kind of wives who go out looking for affairs, well, that’s a completely different story.”

  Asai was shocked into silence.

  “And then the ones who don’t have male friends – I mean those who don’t have a good relationship with an acquaintance who also happens to be a man – tend to keep all their feelings bottled up inside, and then those feelings all come flooding out the moment the opportunity presents itself.”

  In other words, the maid was saying that an introverted personality, one who kept her emotions sealed up inside, would be easy prey to seduction. Asai, remembering his quiet marriage “as natural as air or water”, realized that she was probably right.

  “I imagine your wife was on her guard against those kinds of men,” the maid added, continuing her professional observations. “But I think she let her guard down when she met this one. She’d been wary of men for so long that she didn’t really know enough about them any more. She had a mental image of what a man was like, but the one she met was completely different from this, and in an unguarded moment she let him in. Men these days know all sorts of tricks to pick up women.”