The Devotion of Suspect X - Keigo Higashino [37]
The boxed lunch arrived from the back. She handed it to Ishigami.
“He was an old classmate,” Ishigami said abruptly as he was paying.
“What?”
“An old classmate from university came to visit. I’m sorry if it alarmed you.” Ishigami talked without moving his lips.
“Oh, no … I’m fine,” Yasuko said, smiling despite herself. Then she looked down at the floor, so that anyone watching from outside would not see her mouth. “I see. I wondered—you don’t seem to have many visitors.”
“He was my first, actually. It was a surprise to me.”
“Well, I’m glad for you, then.”
“Right, thanks,” Ishigami said awkwardly as he took the bag with his lunch in it from her. “Tonight, then.”
Which meant he would be calling her again this evening. Yasuko nodded, smiling.
She watched the back of his stocky figure as he stepped out onto the street, wondering that even a man who was as much of a hermit as he was should have friends.
When the morning rush had subsided, she went to take her usual break in the back of the shop with Sayoko and her husband. Sayoko had a sweet tooth; she put out a couple of sweet bean cakes for her and Yasuko. Mr. Yonazawa, whose tastes ran more toward the salty and savory, looked at the cakes without interest and sipped at his tea. The part-timer, Kaneko, was out making deliveries.
“Did they bug you again yesterday?” Sayoko asked after a sip of tea.
“Who?”
“Them. The cops.” Sayoko frowned. “They had no end of questions for us during the day, you know. I figured they might drop by your place again at night. That’s what we thought,” she said, looking to her husband. The taciturn Yonazawa merely nodded.
“No, no. Nothing since that time I told you about.”
Actually, Misato had been questioned outside her school, but Yasuko didn’t see the need to tell them that.
“Well then, I’m glad. They can be very persistent.”
“All they were doing was asking a few questions,” Yonazawa said. “It’s not like they really suspect Yasuko of anything. They just have to follow procedure.”
“I suppose the police are public servants, after all. Still, even if she isn’t a suspect, I’m sure glad that her ex didn’t come here. If he had stopped in before he was killed, then the cops would be after Yasuko something fierce.”
“Now don’t go scaring her with your foolishness,” Yonazawa scoffed at his wife.
“You never know! Wasn’t the detective saying that Togashi had been asking around at Marian for Yasuko?” Marian was the club in Kinshicho where Yasuko and Sayoko had worked. “He said it would have made sense for him to come here next. He was suspicious of something. I saw it on his face.”
“Well, maybe—but that Togashi never did show up here, so we don’t have to worry about it, do we?”
“That’s why I said I’m glad he didn’t. If he had, then mark my words, the poor girl wouldn’t get a moment’s peace.”
Yonazawa frowned and shook his head, unconcerned. Yasuko wondered how he’d react if he found out that Togashi really had come to the shop. She felt a knot form in her stomach.
“Well, either way, it can’t be pleasant. You just need to hang in there, Yasuko,” Sayoko said brightly. “Of course the police will be investigating you; he was your ex-husband, after all. But once they are satisfied you had nothing to do with it, they’ll leave you be. And then you’ll be really free at last. I know Togashi was still hanging around your neck.”
Yasuko forced herself to smile.
“To be perfectly honest, I’m glad he got himself killed,” Sayoko said emphatically.
“Hey now.” Yonazawa frowned.
“Oh, what’s the harm in telling it like it is? You just don’t know how much trouble poor Yasuko went through on that man’s account.”
“And you do?”
“Well, I have an idea—Yasuko’s told me quite a bit. She started working at Marian just to get away from him, isn’t that true? And when I think about him snooping around there looking for her—why, it just gives me the shivers. I don’t know who killed him, but I’d like to shake their hand.”
Yonazawa rolled his eyes and stood. Sayoko, looking disgruntled, watched him leave, then turned to Yasuko. “Still, you have to wonder what did