caught. “Why would she leave clues to where she planned to go? Why not take the book with her, or burn it?”
“Maybe she wasn’t smart enough to think of that,” Hirata said.
“The book could be a fake, with misleading details about her lover and her plans, that she put in the alley, to thwart anyone looking for her,” Reiko said.
Hirata defended his find: “Maybe she just didn’t think anyone would care enough about getting her back that they would bother looking for her pillow book.”
“Probably no one would have cared that much, if Wisteria hadn’t left Lord Mitsuyoshi dead in her room.” Sano followed this line of reasoning to a thought that disturbed him. “What if she didn’t know he’d died? That would explain why she carelessly tossed away the pages-if indeed she did. Maybe she’d already left Yoshiwara by the time Mitsuyoshi was stabbed. Certainly, there’s nothing in the pillow book to indicate that she witnessed the murder.”
Reiko and Hirata’s somber silence acknowledged the possibility that he was right.
Sano picked up the pages, then set them down. “In that case, these would do us no good, even if they’re for real, because finding Wisteria won’t help us identify the killer.”
The house was so quiet that they could hear the coals in the braziers crumbling into ash. The lantern’s flame flickered as the oil burned low. Yet Sano needed to keep hope alive.
“Still, I believe Lady Wisteria was in some way involved with the murder and does have knowledge that’s critical to our investigation,” he said. “The pillow book could be a genuine clue to her whereabouts. We’ll treat it as such, while we try to verify whether it is or isn’t.
“Hirata-san, tomorrow I want you to check out the Suruga teahouses and the noodle shops of Fukagawa. Also, send out a notice to the neighborhood headmen throughout Edo, ordering them to report any men from Hokkaido seen in their areas. I’ll send search parties out on the northern highway to look for a traveling couple, in case Wisteria and her lover have already left town.”
“Shall I find out if any of the women I know have heard anything about Wisteria’s secret lover from Hokkaido?” Reiko said. She looked chastened by her failure to learn anything today, and eager for a second chance.
“That’s a good idea,” Sano said. “The lover is a potential witness, and his name, or even a description of him, would help us find him and Wisteria.”
Nodding, Reiko smiled in thanks.
“We’ll keep the pages a secret,” Sano said. “Police Commissioner Hoshina is shadowing every bit of ground I cover, interrogating the same people. The pillow book is the one clue we have that won’t fall into his hands.”
Sano rose, adding in grim conclusion, “It could also be our only hope of beating him to the solution to the case before he sabotages us.”
13
Chamberlain Yanagisawa’s estate was isolated in a separate compound in Edo Castle, high on the hill and near the palace. Around this fortress within a fortress, spikes protruded from the top of the stone wall to discourage trespassers, and the cold, clear night vibrated with the alertness of many guards at the gates, perched on the roofs of the buildings, and hidden in the grounds. The mansion they protected was a maze of interconnected wings, with soldiers’ barracks surrounding principal retainers’ quarters. At the center lay the private domain of the chamberlain.
Here, Police Commissioner Hoshina stood at the threshold of the bedchamber. The doorway framed a view of Yanagisawa, who reclined on cushions inside, his elegant profile outlined by the lantern-light. With his silk kimono, trousers, and surcoat arranged in still, lustrous folds, he looked as perfectly composed as a painting. Deep in thought, he didn’t appear aware that Hoshina had come. Yet Hoshina knew Yanagisawa had heard the alarm given by the nightingale walk-the specially constructed floor that emitted loud chirps under approaching footsteps. Yanagisawa knew whose arrival the alarm signaled, because Hoshina was the only person welcome in his bedchamber.
But their relations had been strained since the murder of Lord Mitsuyoshi, and Hoshina hesitated, wondering whether to interrupt Yanagisawa’s reverie.
Then Yanagisawa lifted a silver tobacco pipe to his lips. He exhaled smoke, and turned toward Hoshina. As their gazes met, Hoshina felt his heartbeat quicken and his senses come alive, as they always did when he was with Yanagisawa, even after two years together. But Yanagisawa wore an air of abstracted calm; he merely gestured for Hoshina to join him.
“I looked for you earlier,” Hoshina said, entering the room and kneeling near Yanagisawa.
“I had business to attend to,” Yanagisawa said.
That he didn’t say where he’d been irked Hoshina. Although Hoshina accepted that he was accountable to Yanagisawa while the chamberlain owed him no explanations, Hoshina often found his subordinate status difficult to bear. His passionate love for Yanagisawa only worsened the damage to his pride and the hurt caused him by Yanagisawa’s cool greeting.
Nonetheless eager to please his master, Hoshina said, “I spent the day investigating the murder, and I’ve turned up some interesting facts. Treasury Minister Nitta has implicated a hokan named Fujio. Unfortunately, Sano got to Fujio before I did. But what Sano doesn’t know is that one of my spies-a maid at the Owariya-saw Fujio on the stairway just before the murder was discovered. She saved the information for me.”
The chamberlain nodded as if he’d not really listened, his expression inscrutable. During their affair, Yanagisawa had been generous about sharing his money, his authority, and his bed with Hoshina; yet sometimes he became aloof and taciturn. Hoshina never knew when these moods would occur, or what caused them. He suspected that his lover adopted the moods to keep him at a distance, because a man so powerful yet so insecure as Yanagisawa didn’t like anyone to get too close.
“Nor does Sano have the facts that my other spies have uncovered about Treasury Minister Nitta and Lady Wisteria’s chaperone.” Hoshina heard himself speaking louder to bridge the distance between him and Yanagisawa. “When Nitta left Yoshiwara the night of the murder, he didn’t go straight home. He rode a short distance with his entourage, then returned alone to the quarter and bribed the guards to let him back in. The guards didn’t tell Hirata when he interviewed them, because he only asked whether they’d let Nitta out, and they’re in my pay. Nitta could have sneaked back inside the Owariya and stabbed Lord Mitsuyoshi.”
Instead of replying, Yanagisawa gazed into space, smoking his pipe. Hoshina wondered whether the mood indicated boredom with their affair. Was he about to become one of Yanagisawa’s many cast-off paramours? Hoshina experienced a pang of dismay, because his career, as well as his happiness, depended on Yanagisawa.
“And Mitsuyoshi had been carrying on a flirtation with the yarite.” Hoshina, aware that he’d begun nervously clenching and unclenching his muscles, stilled himself. “It seems that he promised to take Momoko as his concubine. He liked to toy with people, but the old fool took him seriously, and when she found out he’d been joking, she was furious. So she did know him, and she had good reason to want him dead, which contradicts what she said earlier.”
“So you have incriminating evidence against all three suspects,” Yanagisawa said. “That makes one as likely a culprit as any other. Therefore, you’re no closer to solving the case than you were yesterday,”
Praise from his lover always exhilarated Hoshina; criticism like this was torture. As he gazed at Yanagisawa, resentment tinged his desire, because their sexual bond gave Yanagisawa all the more power over him.
“Sooner or later, my evidence will accumulate and point to the killer,” Hoshina defended himself. “Don’t you care?”
“I care as much as the case deserves,” Yanagisawa said.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Hoshina demanded, stung by his lover’s indifference. That they’d often exchanged private confidences seemed forgotten now; Yanagisawa was deliberately shutting Hoshina out. Hoshina rose, unable to sit still any longer. “Are you saying that the murder of the shogun’s heir doesn’t matter to you? That you don’t care whether the killer is caught? After I’ve been chasing clues and witnesses for the past two days?”
He saw a warning gleam in Yanagisawa’s eyes, but plunged recklessly ahead: “Or don’t you care whether it’s
