reddish-purple bruise on his chest. Sano pictured the room in the dark of night, a figure pressing the cushion against Egen’s face, a knee planted on the struggling man to hold him down. Sano imagined Egen’s muffled cries and waving limbs, his bowels voiding while he died.
“Egen didn’t die of drinking too much,” Sano said. “He was smothered.”
21
After long hours of unhappy wakefulness, after Sano had risen and left their bed, Reiko finally drifted off to sleep near dawn. She slept late into the morning and was awakened by an argument on the veranda outside her bedchamber.
“But I have to go practice martial arts,” said Masahiro’s strident voice.
“You’re not going anywhere, young master,” answered the patrol guard on duty. “You know that you and your sister are confined to the private quarters and garden.”
After Lord Matsudaira’s spy had been unmasked in the estate yesterday, Sano had laid down new rules to protect his family, had assigned extra guards to the innermost part of the estate. But Masahiro didn’t like confinement any more than Reiko did.
“That’s all right for Akiko, but I’m not a baby,” he protested. “Let me out.”
“Sorry. If you don’t like the rules, take it up with your father.”
Masahiro uttered a cry of frustration. Reiko heard a door flung open, his footsteps stomping down the corridor, and Akiko beginning to cry. Akiko was too young to understand what had happened and that the family was in danger, but she was very sensitive to other people’s emotions, and she’d caught her brother’s bad mood. Shushing sounds came from her nurse, trying to soothe her. Reiko climbed out of bed and went to Akiko, in the next room. But when Akiko saw her mother, she turned and ran. Reiko was left to muster the courage to face the day.
The quarrel with Sano still weighed heavily on her spirits. His mother was in jail, Sano’s time for exonerating her was growing shorter by the moment, and what new evil did Lord Matsudaira have in store for them? Reiko’s mind swirled with images from the capture of the spy and the ambush in the city. Another day seemed like more than she could endure, but she washed, dressed, put on her makeup, then called a maid to bring her breakfast. She ate mechanically, fueling her strength. She must put on a brave guise for the sake of her family.
Sano looked around the room where Egen lay dead. Among the things piled against the walls were lacquer chests, folded clothes in bright printed cotton fabric, pairs of new sandals, and wooden boxes open to reveal gold statuettes, porcelain vases, and musical instruments.
“He went on a shopping spree after he betrayed my mother,” Sano said.
“This collection is a big step up from the trash at his old place,” Hirata said. “It would be hard to tell if anything was taken, but note this box full of coins. This wasn’t a robbery.”
“I don’t see any signs of a fight.” Sano detected surprise on Egen’s face. “The killer must have attacked him while he was asleep.” Sano addressed the proprietor, who stood on the veranda outside. “Did you see anyone come in here last night?”
“No,” the proprietor said, wringing his hands, upset because a murder had occurred on his premises. A young peasant appeared beside him. “This is the night watchman. Ask him.”
When Sano repeated the question, the watchman scratched his chest, yawned, and shook his head. He had a bloated, red-eyed face. The proprietor said, “You’ve been drinking! Did you fall asleep on duty? You useless oaf!”
“I’m sorry,” the watchman said sheepishly. “He had a party. He invited me, and all the guests.” He pointed into the room and saw Egen. His bloodshot eyes goggled; his complexion turned green. “Is he dead?”
“He is, no thanks to you,” the proprietor said. “You’re supposed to protect our guests. But that sounds just like him.” His glare turned on the dead man. “He acted as if this were a teahouse in the pleasure quarter. Singing and playing the samisen, hiring girls to dance-”
“And pouring the sake,” the watchman said.
“I would have thrown him out today even though he paid for ten days in advance,” the proprietor said.
Sano said to Hirata, “A junk peddler moves into an expensive inn and buys all new things. He has money left to squander on parties. How did he come by his newfound wealth?”
“That’s a good question,” Hirata said.
“But not the only one,” Sano said.
“Here are two more: Who killed him, and why?”
Sano thought about the events of the last day in the tutor’s life. “I’m beginning to have some ideas.”
The inn’s guests had heard the commotion and they straggled out of their rooms, curious to see what it was about. Some twenty men gathered below the veranda where Sano and Hirata stood outside the dead man’s room. Sano noted their bloodshot eyes and hungover expressions. Four were accompanied by sluttish women with smeared makeup.
“What happened?” asked one fellow with a bald head and his kimono open to display his potbelly and loincloth.
“The host of your party has been murdered,” Sano said. Mutters of dismay and ghoulish interest came from the crowd. “How well did you know Egen?”
“I just met him yesterday, when he showed up here,” the bald man said.
The other men made sounds of agreement. One of the women spoke up: “He said he was new in town. He’d only arrived a few days ago.”
Sano supposed that Egen hadn’t wanted his new friends to know he was a lowly Edo junk peddler. But Sano had a hunch that something wasn’t right. “Arrived from where?”
“He didn’t say.”
“What else do you know about him?” Sano asked the crowd.
Heads shook. A man said, “He told a lot of stories and jokes, but he didn’t talk about himself.”
“He did mention that he’d had a lucky break,” said the bald man. “That’s why he threw the party.”
Sano had a hunch about Egen’s sudden wealth and extravagance. He said to Hirata, “Someone paid him for incriminating my mother.”
“It’s not hard to guess who,” Hirata said.
“Lord Matsudaira does come to mind,” Sano agreed.
“But I just found Egen yesterday, and I took him straight to the castle. How did Lord Matsudaira get to him?”
Before Sano could hazard a guess, a new crowd poured into the scene. Five samurai clad in leggings and short kimonos carried jitte-steel wands with two curved prongs above the hilt for catching the blade of an attacker’s sword. The weapons were standard equipment for the doshin, police patrol officers. Their leader was a tall, haughty man armed with a lance. He swished toward Sano in flowing silk trousers and a wide-shouldered surcoat made of gaudy silk fabric in the latest style.
“Just when we thought things couldn’t get worse,” Sano said under his breath to Hirata. “Greetings, Yoriki Yamaga-san.”
Edo contained more than a million people, but those Sano least wanted to see kept cropping up like bad coins. He and the police commander had been colleagues on the police force some eleven years ago. Yamaga had never forgiven Sano for being promoted out of their ranks. He never missed an opportunity to do Sano a bad turn.
“Greetings, Honorable Chamberlain.” His thin lips twisted in a familiar, sarcastic smile. “Perhaps you should enjoy your title while it lasts.”
When the conflict between Sano and Lord Matsudaira had started, Yamaga had hurried to jump aboard Lord Matsudaira’s ship. The five doshin smirked. Sano refused to dignify the barb with a response in kind. “What brings you here?”
“I heard there’s been a murder,” Yamaga said. “I came to investigate.”
Sano exchanged glances with Hirata. Here was another instance of events moving faster than made logical
