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It wouldn’t be too hard to pretend that
a suicide was actually death by illness, especially for someone with money and
influence. Take this a step further and say that this daughter was the victim of
domestic violence, grew despondent, and took her own life. Certainly not an
impossibility. It was a well-known fact that certain members of the so-called elite had
disgusting personalities and dark, twisted tendencies, as if they had taken more than
the share of darkness allotted to them
.
If that were the case, what would the rich old dowager do? Would she call it fate,
say that nothing else could be done, and give up? Not very likely. She would take
suitable revenge against whatever force had driven her daughter to her untimely end
.
Ushikawa felt he had a better understanding of the dowager. She was a daring, bright
woman, with a clear vision and a strong will. And she would spare neither fortune nor
influence to avenge the death of the one she loved.
Ushikawa had no way of knowing what kind of retaliation she had actually taken
toward her daughter’s husband, since all trace of him had vanished into thin air. He
didn’t think that the dowager had gone so far as to take the man’s life. But he had no
doubt that she had taken some sort of decisive action. And it was hard to believe that
she had left any trail behind.
Ushikawa’s conjectures thus far seemed to make sense, though he had no proof.
His theory, however, did clear up a lot of questions. Licking his lips, Ushikawa
vigorously rubbed his hands together. Beyond this point, though, things started to get
a little hazy.
The dowager had set up the safe house to sublimate her desire for revenge, turning
it into something more useful and positive. Then, at the sports club she frequented,
she got to know the young instructor Aomame, and somehow—he had no idea how—
they came to a secret understanding. After meticulous preparation, Aomame got
access to the suite at the Hotel Okura and murdered Leader. The method she used was
unclear. Aomame might be quite proficient in murdering people using a special
technique. As a result, despite being closely guarded by two very dedicated and able
bodyguards, Leader wound up dead.
Up to this point, the threads tying his conjectures held together—barely—but when
it came to linking Sakigake’s Leader to the center for battered women, Ushikawa was
at a total loss. At this point his thought process hit a roadblock and a very sharp razor
neatly severed all the threads.
. . .
What Sakigake wanted from Ushikawa at this point were answers to two questions:
Who planned the murder of Leader? and Where was Aomame?
558
Ushikawa was the one who had run the original background check on Aomame,
and he had found nothing suspicious about her at all. But after she had left, Leader
expired. And right after that, Aomame disappeared.
Poof—
like a gust of smoke in the
wind. Sakigake had to have been very upset with Ushikawa, convinced that his
investigation hadn’t been thorough enough.
But in fact, as always, his investigation left nothing to be desired. As he had told
Buzzcut, Ushikawa was a stickler for making sure all the bases were covered. He
could be faulted for not having checked her phone records beforehand, but unless
there was something extraordinarily suspicious about a situation, that wasn’t
something he normally did. And as far as he could tell from his investigations, there
wasn’t a single suspect thing about Aomame.
Ushikawa didn’t want them to be upset with him forever. They paid him well, but
they were a dangerous bunch. Ushikawa was one of the few who knew how they had
secretly disposed of Leader’s body, which made him a potential liability. He knew he
had to come up with something concrete to show them so they would know he was a
valuable resource, someone worth keeping alive.
He had no proof that the old dowager from Azabu was mixed up in Leader’s
murder. At this point it was pure speculation. He did know that some deep secret lay
hidden inside that mansion with its magnificent willows. Ushikawa’s sense of smell
told him this, and his job was to bring that truth to light. It wouldn’t be easy. The
place was under heavy guard, with professionals involved.
Yakuza?
Perhaps. Businessmen, those involved in real estate in particular, are often
involved in secret negotiations with yakuza. When the going gets rough, the yakuza
get called in. It was possible the old dowager might be making use of their influence.
But Ushikawa wasn’t very certain of this—the old dowager was too well bred to deal
with people like them. Also, it was hard to imagine that she would use yakuza to
protect women who were victims of domestic violence. Probably she had her own
security apparatus in place, one that she paid for herself. Her own personal system she
had refined. It would cost her, but then, she wasn’t hurting for funds. And this system
of hers might employ violence when there was a perceived need.
If Ushikawa’s hypothesis was correct, then Aomame must have gone into hiding
somewhere far away, with the aid of the old dowager. They would have carefully
erased any trail, given her a new identity and a new name, possibly even a new face.
If that was the case, then it would be impossible for Ushikawa’s painstaking little
private investigation to track her down.
At this point the only thing to do was to try to learn more about the dowager. His
hope was that he would run across a seam that would lead him to discover something
about Aomame’s whereabouts. Things might work out, and then again they might not.
But Ushikawa had some strong points: his sharp sense of smell and his tenaciousness.
He would never let go of something once he latched onto it.
Besides these
, he asked
himself,
what other talents do I have worth mentioning? Do I have other abilities I
can be proud of?
Not one
, Ushikawa answered himself, convinced he was right.
559
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