The Devotion of Suspect X - Keigo Higashino [59]
Why had he gone to Benten-tei? And what was his connection to his old university classmate, the math teacher? If he had figured out something about the case, Kusanagi wanted to know what it was. Or was he still just catching up with his old friend, and their visit to the lunch shop where their primary suspect worked coincidental?
Kusanagi didn’t think Yukawa would just drop in on a suspect in an unsolved case unless he had something specific in mind. After all, Yukawa’s policy had always been to avoid direct involvement in Kusanagi’s cases—not because they annoyed him, as he claimed, but out of deference to Kusanagi’s position.
There was a status chart on the door to Lab 13, where students working there, graduate students, and professors with access to the lab would indicate whether they were in or out. Yukawa was “OUT.” Kusanagi clicked his tongue. If Yukawa wasn’t in the lab this late in the evening, he had probably headed straight home after finishing whatever he was working on.
Kusanagi tried knocking on the door anyway. If the chart was correct, there should be two grad students in the lab.
“Come in,” said a thick voice. Kusanagi opened the door. A young man wearing glasses and a sweatshirt came out from the back of the lab—a grad student. The detective had seen him here before.
“Yukawa’s gone home already?”
The grad student frowned and nodded. “Yeah, just a little while ago. Did you want his cell phone number?”
“No thanks, I already have it. It’s nothing urgent anyway. I was just in the area and decided to drop in.”
“Right, okay,” the student said, his face brightening. The students in the lab were familiar with Kusanagi’s visits.
“I know he works late a lot, so I figured I might be able to catch him here at the lab.”
“Usually, yeah, but he’s been leaving early for the last two or three days. I think today he had somewhere he had to go.”
“You know where?” Maybe the math teacher’s place again? Kusanagi wondered.
“I’m not sure exactly, but he said something about Shinozaki.”
Kusanagi blinked. That was the last thing he had expected to hear. “Shinozaki?”
“Yeah. He asked me the quickest way to get to the station there.”
“But he didn’t tell you why he was going?”
“No. I asked, but he didn’t say much.”
Kusanagi snorted. Then he thanked the student and left. He was beginning to suspect that something was afoot, he just didn’t know what. Shinozaki Station was the closest to the murder scene. Why would Yukawa be going there?
Leaving the university behind, Kusanagi pulled out his cell phone. He started to look up Yukawa’s number, but on the verge of calling, he hesitated, then shut the phone with a snap and slipped it back into his pocket. Now wasn’t the time to press his friend with questions. If Yukawa was on the case without so much as a nod from Kusanagi, he must be onto something.
Besides, he could hear the protest already.
What do you care if I do a little poking around myself?
* * *
Ishigami sighed. He was in the middle of grading make-up exams. They were terrible. He had designed the problems so they would be easy enough for everyone to handle—far easier than the ones on the real exam, so everyone taking the make-up test could pass—but he was hard-pressed to find a single decent answer in the pile. The students must not be studying, he decided. They knew that no matter how badly they did on their tests, the school would pass them anyway. After all, the board rarely held anyone back. Even when a student or two just couldn’t make the grade, the administration would find some reason to graduate the entire class.
Why don’t they just remove math from the list of required subjects, then? Ishigami wondered. Only a handful of people really understood mathematics anyway. There was no point in even teaching math at this low level. Wasn’t it enough to let them know there was this incomprehensible thing out there called mathematics, and leave it at that?
When he had finished grading, he looked at the clock. It was already eight P.M.
After checking that