First published in Japanese under the title Redi jōkā (レディ・ジョーカー)
Copyright © 1997 by Kaoru Takamura
English translation copyright © 2021 by Marie Iida and Allison Markin Powell
This English language edition is published in arrangement with
Shinchosha Publishing Co., Ltd. All rights reserved.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either
are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance
to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events,
or locales is entirely coincidental.
First English translation published in 2021 by
Soho Press, Inc.
227 W 17th Street
New York, NY 10011
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Takamura, Kaoru, author.
Powell, Allison Markin, translator. | Iida, Marie, translator.
Title: Lady Joker / Kaoru Takamura ; translated from the Japanese by
Marie Iida and Allison Markin Powell. Other titles: Redi joka. English
Description: New York : Soho Crime, 2021.
Identifiers: LCCN 2020032998
ISBN 978-1-61695-701-8
eISBN 978-1-61695-702-5
Classification: LCC PL862.A42295 R4313 2021 | DDC 895.63/5—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020032998
Interior design by Janine Agro, Soho Press, Inc.
Printed in the United States of America
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Dramatis Personae
岡村清二 Seiji Okamura
Former employee of Hinode Beer
物井清三 Seizo Monoi
Pharmacy owner; Seiji Okamura’s younger brother
半田修平 Shuhei Handa
Police Sergeant working in Criminal Investigation, Violent Crime Unit at Shinagawa and later Kamata Police Department; Monoi’s friend and fellow horseracing fan
高克己 Katsumi Koh
Credit union employee; Monoi’s friend and fellow horseracing fan
布川淳一 Jun’ichi Nunokawa
Truck driver; Monoi’s friend and fellow
horseracing fan
松戸陽吉 Yokichi Matsudo
AKA Yo-chan; lathe operator; Monoi’s friend and fellow horseracing fan
レディ Lady
Jun’ichi Nunokawa’s daughter
城山恭介 Kyosuke Shiroyama
President and CEO of Hinode Beer
倉田誠吾 Seigo Kurata
General Manager of Beer Division and Vice President of Hinode Beer
白井誠一 Sei’ichi Shirai
General Manager of Business Development and
Vice President of Hinode Beer
杉原武郎 Takeo Sugihara
Deputy Manager of Beer Division and Director of Hinode Beer; Kyosuke Shiroyama’s brother-in-law
野崎孝子 Takako Nozaki
Kyosuke Shiroyama’s secretary
秦野浩之 Hiroyuki Hatano
Dentist
秦野美津子 Mitsuko Hatano
Hiroyuki’s wife; Seizo Monoi’s daughter
秦野孝之 Takayuki Hatano
Hiroyuki and Mitsuko’s son
杉原佳子 Yoshiko Sugihara
Takayuki Hatano’s girlfriend; Takeo Sugihara’s daughter
西村真一 Shin’ichi Nishimura
Corporate underling of the Seiwakai,
a large crime syndicate; extortionist
田丸善三 Zenzo Tamaru
Advisor to the Okada Association, a group of corporate extortionists
菊池武史 Takeshi Kikuchi
Representative of GSC, Ltd., an investment management company; former Metro desk reporter for Toho News’ Osaka bureau
久保晴久 Haruhisa Kubo
Metro desk reporter for Toho News, Tokyo bureau,
in charge of Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department (MPD)’s First Investigation Division
根来史彰 Fumiaki Negoro
Metro desk reserve chief at large for Toho News, Tokyo bureau
菅野哲夫 Tetsuo Sugano
Metro desk chief for Toho News, Tokyo bureau,
in charge of MPD
神埼秀嗣 Hidetsugu Kanzaki
Head of MPD’s First Investigation Division
平瀬悟 Satoru Hirase
MPD, First Investigation Division. First Special Investigation Team, Second Unit. Assistant Police Inspector.
合田雄一郎 Yuichiro Goda
MPD, First Investigation Division. Third Violent Crime Investigation Team, Seventh Unit. Later joins Criminal Investigation Division, Violent Crime Unit at Omori Police Department. Assistant Police Inspector.
安西憲明 Noriaki Anzai
Omori Police Department, Criminal Investigation Division, White Collar Crime Unit.
Assistant Police Inspector.
加納祐介 Yusuke Kano
Public prosecutor in the special investigative department
of Tokyo District Public Prosecutor’s Office;
Yuichiro Goda’s former brother-in-law
1947—Confidential Document
Meeting Minutes (addendum)
Regarding the item of this past June 10th, in which an employee from general affairs, who opened and read a letter addressed to our company at the Kanagawa factory determined that the letter, being incomprehensible in its argument and unclear in its purpose, contains baseless accounts that affect the honor of our company, and as such at the meeting of the board of directors it was considered how said letter should be handled, and a conclusion was reached that it required no special response.
Regarding the “Communist Party member” referenced in the letter, Director of General Affairs Kuwata reported that, after consulting with the Shinagawa Police Department as a precautionary measure, he received a response that no such individual had been found.
Kuwata will approve the disposal of the letter.
August 1, 1947
Recorded in meeting room of Shinagawa temporary office, Tokyo main office
(Recorded by Hamada)
Hinode Beer Company, Kanagawa Factory, To Whom It May Concern:
I, Seiji Okamura, am one of the forty employees who resigned from the Kanagawa factory of Hinode at the end of this past February. Today, as I am currently confined to my sickbed and can hardly sit up or stand, and with ever so many things on my mind, I have decided to write this letter.
First, what must be made clear is the true intention and the trajectory of how a person who has already left the company has come to address you in this manner.
Recently, I heard from a certain individual to the effect that the Kanagawa branch of the Hinode labor union encouraged my resignation on the grounds of my medical ailment and need for rest only as a pretense when in fact they had been instructed to do so by the police. The branch was apparently advised that, “Since on last December 15th Okamura was seen with a former colleague somewhere in the Shiba district of Tokyo, such a subversive element should be made to resign quickly.” The person who conveyed this information to me was a man who was hospitalized in the surgical ward for appendicitis, a self-proclaimed Communist Party member by the name of Eiji Kono, but I do not know whether this is true or not.
Seeing that I am indeed ill at the present moment, I realize that even if such an event did not take place, the day of my resignation would have come sooner or later. Thus, whereas the “issue of last December 15th” can no longer have any effect whatsoever on my life, on the other hand when I think about the identity of my aforementioned “former colleague,” I am overcome with deep confusion and trepidation. My “former colleague,” that is to say Katsuichi Noguchi, himself resigned from the Kanagawa factory in 1942, but in the case of Noguchi, I know that his resignation took place with an unspeakable amount of disappointment and indignation, and that various circumstances transpired before and after.
The reason I string together such abstract words is that, although I do not claim to wholly understand what is in Noguchi’s heart, today it occurred to me that in certain ways he and I share a great deal in common. First, we are both human beings; second, we are not political animals; and third, we are absolutely destitute. I
