The Devotion of Suspect X - Keigo Higashino [8]
“Quick, mom! Quick!” Misato shouted.
There was no time for hesitation. Yasuko screwed her eyes shut and pulled as hard as she could. Her heart pounded in her chest. She could hear the blood surge inside her as she drew the garrote tighter and tighter.
She could not have said how long she stood like that, straining blindly, desperately. Finally, a faint voice calling “Mom, Mom,” began to penetrate her mental fog and brought her back to her senses.
Slowly Yasuko opened her eyes, the cord still tightly gripped in her hands.
Togashi was right in front of her face. His open eyes were blank, the color of slate, glaring out into nothingness. His face was a sullen blue, suffused with blood. The cord had left a dark line across his neck.
Togashi wasn’t moving. A line of drool hung from his lips. His nose ran. Yasuko yelped and dropped the cord from her hands. Togashi’s head hit the tatami with a thud. He still showed no sign of life. Misato gingerly slid off him and onto the floor. The skirt of her school uniform was a wrinkled mess. She leaned back against the wall. For a moment mother and daughter sat in silence, their eyes glued to the unmoving man. The buzzing of the fluorescent light in the kitchen sounded loud in Yasuko’s ears.
“What do we do?” Yasuko said, her voice barely a whimper. Her mind was blank. “I killed him.”
“Mom…”
Yasuko looked up at her daughter. Misato’s face was white, but her eyes were red, and dried tear tracks ran down her cheeks. She must’ve been crying, though Yasuko couldn’t imagine when she’d had the time.
She looked again at Togashi. She was torn, half wanting him to spring back to life and half wanting him to stay dead. Not that it mattered what she wanted. From the looks of him, he wasn’t coming back.
“He did this. It was his fault.” Misato drew up her legs, hugging her knees to her chest. She buried her face between them and began to whimper.
“What do we do—?” Yasuko began. Then the doorbell rang, and her whole body jerked with surprise.
Misato looked up, her cheeks glistening. Their eyes met, asking each other, Who could it be?
Then there was a knock on the door, and a man’s voice. “Ms. Hanaoka?”
It was a voice she’d heard before, though she couldn’t for the life of her place it. Yasuko was fixed to the spot, paralyzed. She and Misato simply stared at each other.
Knock, knock.
“Ms. Hanaoka. Ms. Hanaoka?”
Whoever was outside knew they were home. One of them would have to respond. But how could they open the door when inside was … this?
“Go to the back room. Close the door, and don’t come out,” Yasuko ordered Misato in a hushed voice. Her brain was slowly regaining its function.
Another knock at the door.
Yasuko took a deep breath. Nothing happened. Just another ordinary evening. “Yes?” she called, acting the part she knew she had to play. The part of a woman who hadn’t just strangled her ex-husband to death on the living room floor. “Who is it?”
“Oh—it’s me, Ishigami. From next door.”
Yasuko started. Who knew what kind of noise they’d been making? Of course their neighbors would have ample cause for suspicion. Ishigami was checking in on them.
“Just a moment please,” Yasuko called back, trying to sound calm, and entirely unsure of her success.
Yasuko looked around the room. Misato had retreated to her room and closed the sliding door. Yasuko then looked at Togashi’s body. She would have to do something about that.
The kotatsu table was at an angle to the wall, pulled out of its usual place. She dragged the table a few more feet until it just covered the body; the thick quilt hanging down from its sides hid Togashi from sight. It was an odd placement for a kotatsu, but there was nothing she could do about that now.
Yasuko checked to see that her clothes were in order and stepped down into the entranceway. Then she noticed Togashi’s scuffed shoes lying there. She shoved them out of sight.
Then, careful not to make any noise, she gently slid off the door