The trial hadn’t filled in the major gap in Sano’s case against Haru- her lack of motive for the other two murders. Reiko had never believed that Haru had killed the woman and child, and in spite of her disillusionment with Haru, she still didn’t believe it.
Haru was nodding, though wariness lurked in her eyes. Reiko said, “If you didn’t kill Chie and the boy, then someone else in the Black Lotus did.”
As Haru looked around at the other people in the room, her features sharpened with suspicion.
“Someone set you up to be punished for his crimes,” Reiko said, feeling sudden tension in Kumashiro’s body. “Someone wanted you executed so he-or she-could go free.”
The eight priests seemed indifferent to Haru’s scrutiny, but Abbess Junketsu-in and Dr. Miwa averted their eyes from her, their expressions suddenly guarded. Haru’s gaze came to rest on Anraku, whose face took on an ominous intensity.
“Yes,” Reiko said. “Even if he didn’t kill Chie and the boy with his own hands, he ordered their deaths. He meant for you to die, too.” Haru shook her head vigorously, but her stricken countenance belied the denial. Reiko challenged the high priest: “Didn’t you?”
Anraku’s tongue rolled inside his cheek, and Reiko saw from his discomfiture that she’d placed him in an intolerable position, as she’d meant to do. Either he must acknowledge his guilt and weaken his influence over Haru, or admit that he didn’t control everything that happened. He didn’t want to lose this contest with Reiko, but neither could he afford to have his omnipotence exposed as a fraud.
Wicked inspiration glinted in the high priest’s eye. He spoke to Abbess Junketsu-in: “You shall tell us about the events leading up to the fire in the cottage.”
“Me?” Junketsu-in blanched as everyone looked at her. “But-I don’t know anything. I-”
Anraku’s gaze captured hers, and she halted. Her resistance dissolved as his will subdued her. She said meekly, “That night I was walking alone in the precinct, when I saw two girls sneak out of the orphanage.”
So she hadn’t been in her quarters with her attendants as she’d claimed, Reiko observed. She realized that Anraku had cleverly diverted Haru’s suspicion from himself to the abbess, and she’d lost a round in her fight for her life. But here was her chance to learn the truth about the murders and fire, and the telling of the story bought her more time.
“I meant to send the girls back to bed,” Junketsu-in went on, “but then I spotted Haru walking ahead of them. They were following her. I wanted to know what she was doing, so I followed, too. When we got near the cottage, the other two girls turned and headed back toward the orphanage. I hid behind a tree so they wouldn’t see me. Then I continued after Haru.
“There was a light in the cottage. She slipped through the door. I stood outside and watched through the window. I saw Haru with Commander Oyama. His legs were around her neck, and she was screaming. He shouted at her. Then they were fighting, and she hit him on the head with a statue and killed him.”
While Junketsu-in described watching Haru come out of the cottage, hide the statue, and return to the scene of Oyama’s death, Reiko listened in utter amazement. Here was Haru’s exact story, confirmed by a witness who had no reason to lie for the girl’s benefit. Haru had told the truth about how Oyama died!
“I thought of how Commander Oyama had arrested me and doomed me to whoredom in the Yoshiwara and forced me to service him here, and I was so delighted by his death that I laughed.” Vindictive glee shone in the abbess’s eyes. “And at last I’d caught Haru at something bad enough to persuade Anraku to throw her out of the temple.”
Clearly, the abbess had hated Oyama and relished the turn of fate that had not only punished him, but placed Haru in her power. Junketsu-in hadn’t cared whether Haru was punished by the law, as long as the girl no longer troubled her, and Reiko guessed why she hadn’t reported Haru later.
“Then I remembered that I was the only one who’d seen Haru kill Oyama,” the abbess said, confirming Reiko’s guess. “She could deny everything. It would be my word against hers, and Anraku might take her side. She could get away with murder!”
Outrage shook Junketsu-in’s voice. “But I wouldn’t let her. After I followed her back to the cottage, I slipped off my sandals, which had thick wooden soles, and grabbed one.” The abbess raised her hand, the fingers curled around an imaginary shoe. “I stole up behind Haru, and I hit her on the head with my sandal.”
Junketsu-in pantomimed the blow. “Haru fell down and didn’t move, but she was breathing. I went to the storehouse and got some oil and rags. I tied the rags around a stick to make a torch. Then I returned to the cottage. Haru was still unconscious. The lantern was still burning in the room where she’d left Commander Oyama, and I lit the torch there. I poured oil on the floor and along the corridor, and I ran around splashing more kerosene on the outside of the cottage. I touched the torch to the wall, and it burst into flames. I tucked the oil jar in the bushes and put on my shoes. Then I went back to my quarters, leaving Haru lying in the garden. I knew that her husband had died in a fire, and I wanted people to think she’d burned Oyama to death.”
This was how Haru had come to be found at the scene, ready to receive the blame for the fire and Oyama’s murder, Reiko understood at last. A wondrous sense of vindication momentarily lifted her above her fear. Haru hadn’t murdered Oyama in cold blood; she hadn’t set the fire. That she was innocent of those crimes indicated that her husband’s death had been accidental, as she’d claimed. Haru was indeed a liar and troublemaker, yet also a victim. Reiko’s instincts had been true all along.
Haru had been listening with an expression of mingled disbelief and confusion. She said to Junketsu-in, “It was you who framed me.”
The abbess sneered. “I just made you face the consequences of your actions.”
“And you killed Chie and Radiant Spirit.” Now Haru spoke in a tone of angry realization. “You were jealous of them because Anraku liked Chie, and Radiant Spirit was his son.”
“I had nothing to do with their deaths,” Junketsu-in retorted. “They weren’t even in the cottage when I was there.”
Reiko, elated by personal triumph, seized the chance to reintroduce the issue of Anraku’s culpability. “The abbess’s story explains why you were unconscious in the garden and couldn’t remember anything about the fire,” she said, “but not how Chie and the boy died. That was Anraku’s doing.”
Haru swiveled her head toward Anraku, refocusing her fury on him. New hope kindled in Reiko, but he gave her a disdainful smile and said, “Dr. Miwa shall tell the rest of the story.”
Behind Haru, the doctor started in fear; air whistled through his teeth. “Oh, but-” Anraku’s gaze impaled him, and he surrendered. “Chie became unhappy here after she bore her son. She wanted to care for Radiant Spirit herself, but the nuns took him away to raise with the other children and rarely allowed her to see him. She disliked the way the children were trained. She couldn’t understand that prayer and fasting builds their spirits, and she complained whenever Radiant Spirit was beaten for disobeying.”
Reiko thought of the boy’s bruises and emaciated body, the result of the cruel indoctrination.
“Soon Chie began questioning our other practices,” Dr. Miwa said. “She objected to my experiments-she said it was wrong to give helpless people medicines that made them sick instead of healing them. She demanded to know the purpose of the potions we mixed. When she learned that they were poisons for contaminating the wells in Edo, she tried to persuade me that what we were doing was wrong. She begged me to stop. We argued, and she ran from me.”