The Devotion of Suspect X - Keigo Higashino [11]
Hesitantly, Yasuko joined him where he knelt. All the life had drained from Togashi’s face. Spittle, or something else—it was hard to say—had run down from his lips and dried on his skin.
“You heard us, didn’t you?” Yasuko asked.
“Heard? Heard what?”
“Through the wall. You could hear us. That’s why you called.”
Ishigami turned to Yasuko, his face blank. “I couldn’t hear you talking, if that’s what you mean. For all its faults, this building’s quite soundproof. That was one of the reasons why I moved here, actually.”
“Then how did you—”
“Realize what happened?”
Yasuko nodded.
Ishigami pointed to a corner of the room. An empty can lay there on its side. Some ash had spilled from it onto the floor.
“When I knocked on your door a few minutes ago, I smelled cigarette smoke. Figuring you had a guest, I looked for shoes by the door, but I couldn’t see any. I glanced into the room, and noticed it looked like someone was under your kotatsu, and the cord was pulled. But if someone wanted to hide, they could’ve just gone into the back room. Which meant that the person under the kotatsu wasn’t hiding there, they had been hidden there. When I put that together with the thumping noises I’d heard, and the fact that your hair was unusually disheveled, it wasn’t hard to imagine what had happened. Oh, and one more thing: there aren’t any cockroaches in this building. I’ve lived here several years now and never seen one.”
Yasuko stared at Ishigami’s mouth as he talked. His voice was calm, never rising, his expression never changing. I’ll bet that’s exactly how he talks when he’s giving a lesson to his students, thought Yasuko, her mind wandering nervously.
Then she realized she was staring at him, and she averted her eyes. She felt that he had been watching her, too.
He’s terribly levelheaded, and smart, she thought. How else could he have accurately reconstructed such an elaborate scenario after only a glance through her front door? At the same time, Yasuko felt relieved. If he hadn’t heard her conversations, he didn’t know the details of what had happened.
“He was my ex-husband,” she said. “We’ve been divorced for several years, but he kept coming around. He wouldn’t leave unless I gave him money … that’s what he came for today, too. I couldn’t take it anymore, and I guess I just snapped…” Yasuko lowered her eyes. She wasn’t going to tell him everything that had happened. She had to keep Misato’s involvement out of this.
“Are you going to turn yourself in?”
“I think that’s the only way. I hate to do this to Misato, though. She doesn’t deserve this.” She would have said more, but she heard the sliding door of the back room fly open. Misato, furious, stepped into the room.
“No, Mom, you can’t! I won’t let you.”
“Misato, be quiet!”
“I won’t. I said I won’t. Listen, Mr. Ishigami? I’ll tell you who killed that man—”
“Misato!” Yasuko raised her voice.
Misato’s mouth snapped shut and she glared daggers at her mother. Her eyes were completely red.
“Ms. Hanaoka,” Ishigami said evenly, “you don’t have to hide it from me.”
“I’m not hiding anything—”
“I know you didn’t kill him by yourself. Your daughter must have helped you.”
Yasuko shook her head. “No, that’s not true. I did do it myself. She only just came home—she came home right after I killed him. She had nothing to do with it.”
It was clear Ishigami wasn’t believing a thing she said. He sighed and looked at Misato. “I think hiding it is only making it harder on your daughter.”
“I’m not lying. You have to believe me!” Yasuko laid her hand on Ishigami’s knee.
Ishigami stared at her hand for a moment, then looked back at the corpse. Then he tilted his head. “What matters is how the police see things. I’m afraid they’ll not be fooled so easily.”
“Why not?” Yasuko asked, before realizing