Tora and Maeda exchanged looks.
“Did the Mitsuis have frequent quarrels?” Maeda asked the priest.
“How should I know? I rarely saw them. This is dreadful. A shrine priest cannot afford scandal.”
The wife returned with a cup and handed it to her husband. “What happened to my father’s wife?” she asked Maeda.
“She was stabbed many times while she slept. Your father claims he’s innocent. He says he wasn’t home, and someone must’ve broken in.”
“Then why is he in jail?” she demanded.
“There’s no sign anyone broke in, and he was covered with her blood.”
She shuddered. “Horrible. It doesn’t feel real. Such things happen to other people.”
“Did you visit your father’s house regularly?” Tora asked.
“What do you mean by that?”
“You’re his daughter. Surely you visited. Maybe they both came here to visit.”
“No.”
“No?”
The priest put his cup down and struggled to his feet with his wife’s help. He said, “The Mitsuis lead very busy lives, and so do we. Different lives, I mean. If he says someone else murdered his wife, it must be so. You must find that murderer.”
Tora frowned. “You mean to tell us neither of you had contact with them at all? Didn’t you know they were badly off?”
The priest blustered. “If they were in want, they should have come to us. They didn’t.”
Maeda asked, “Was there perhaps a disagreement between your families?”
“Of course not,” snapped the priest.
“But your wife doesn’t seem particularly troubled,” Tora pointed out. “What about her relationship with her father? Or her father’s wife?”
She glared at him. “You have no right to judge me. I left home when I married, that’s all. I went to see them a couple of times at the New Year, but she was always busy with those dolls. She had her life, and I have mine. And my father favored by brother.”
Tora was troubled by this lack of feeling. “When did you see her last? Did she tell you she had to clean other people’s houses?”
Mitsui’s daughter exchanged a glance with her husband. “Yes, I knew. She went on and on about all the fine things in Hayashi’s house. She and her friend enjoyed working there.” She paused and bit her lip. As if it explained everything, she added, “They were Chinese.”
Before Tora could voice an opinion on a daughter’s duty to her parent, Maeda asked, “This friend of hers? She worked there also? What’s her name?”
This baffled her. “I don’t remember the names of maids.”
Maeda ended the visit, practically pulling Tora from the shrine priest’s house. Outside, he said, “Tora, you must curb your tongue. It’s best to make people feel at ease when you want information.”
“Sorry. You’re right, but I couldn’t help it. That woman is a she-devil, and her husband’s not much better. I’ll watch myself in the future. Let’s go find the friend next. Something isn’t right about this.”
The Hayashi house was a fitting residence for an important guild official. It had its own compound and small garden behind. Maeda got his information from a servant.
Yes, a Chinese woman by the name of Mei worked there, but she hadn’t shown up for work. They also had another Chinese woman by the name of Suyin, family name Zhou, but she couldn’t be spared during working hours.
Maeda did not press the issue. They headed back and entered the Chinese quarter. This was near the harbor but had its own moat and dirt walls. They passed through a substantial gate and found themselves in a warren of streets and houses built so closely together Tora could not tell where one began and another ended. He thought the many walls, some dirt and some wood or bamboo, enclosed other dwellings within them. Each unit seemed to enclose a small village of houses.
When he commented on this, Maeda said, “They have large families, and all stay together.”
The Chinese men wore tight, slit robes with narrow sleeves. The women put their hair in braids or buns on the back of their heads and some piled it high on top. Most struck Tora as plain, with flat, coarse faces and round bodies, but there were one or two young girls who were charming and graceful. The cut of the women’s clothes was straight and narrow like the men’s, but they wore skirts under the slit tunics. Their language sounded harsh and animal-like to his ears. He walked and stared, and once he laughed out loud, and Maeda gave him a look.
Tora sniffed the air. “It smells delicious. And it’s past time for the midday rice. How about sampling the local fare? I’ll pay.”
Maeda chuckled. “Either you’ve won a wager or your pay’s better than mine, as the case may be. Though come to think of it, your pay must be better. You’re the governor’s executive officer.”
Tora snorted. “As for that, I’ve yet to see a copper of it.”
They ate in a large Chinese restaurant called Golden Dragon near the harbor. To Tora’s surprise, the guests occupied wooden chairs like those of Buddhist abbots. Tora sat down, shifted his bottom around a bit, and grinned. “I could get used to this. It feels a little stiff, but you don’t have to worry about getting up and down and it keeps your robe out of the dirt.”
He was even more enthusiastic when the food arrived and he sampled. The noodle soup was particularly rich and delicious. “What’s this?” Tora asked, raising a pale succulent sliver with his chopsticks.
“Chicken.”
“May the Buddha forgive me for eating an animal.” He chewed and smacked his lips.
“Wait until you taste the pork dumplings.” Maeda held one out between his chopsticks.
“Are you sure it’s safe?”
“Taste it.”
The dumpling was the best thing Tora had ever put in his mouth. “Oh, I know I’ll go straight to hell for this. How do they manage all this killing of animals when it comes to their souls?”
“Buddhism isn’t very popular with the Chinese. They’re mostly devout followers of Master Kung-fu-tse.”
Tora ordered another plate of dumplings. “My master will like this. He’s not altogether convinced the Buddhist priests are right. By the way, how’s your prisoner?”
“Mitsui’s weeping and shaking like a leaf. He’s sure he’s going to the mines for the rest of his life. Or worse, as the case may be.”
“What’s worse than working in the mines?” Tora recalled conditions in the penal colony of Sado and shuddered.
“You know about mines?”
“Yes. My master was in one on Sado Island.”
Maeda stopped chewing. “You’re pulling my leg. He’s a nobleman, isn’t he?”
“Yes. But it’s the truth. I swear. He was pretending to be a convict to check into a murder there. He escaped. Barely.”
Maeda shook his head in amazement as he thought about this. “He must be a very brave man. You may have a point about mines being worse than a quick death. Here it’s cheaper to lose a prisoner while rowing him across the bay to the convict boat. Being chained hand and foot hampers the swimming.”
“That’s horrible. Is there a lot of crime in Hakata?”
“Not so you’d know. But plenty of bodies wash up. Okata enters them as accidental drownings.”
“What? Doesn’t a coroner look at them first? You do have a coroner?”
“Yes, a good one. Doc Fujita’s a trained physician. That reminds me. He had a look at Mrs. Mitsui. She had twenty-four stab wounds, most to the chest and belly, but also several to the face. Some cuts were very deep. Fujita says the knife was sharp and more than the length of a hand. She bled to death.”
Tora nodded. “It sounds either personal or the work of a madman. A husband might’ve done it in a fit of anger.”
“I took him back to the house and made him check if anything was gone. He said their big knife is missing. It’s about the right length. He insists the killer must’ve got in and used the knife to kill her.”
“Any signs of someone breaking in? She’d gone to bed.”
“No, but he says she would’ve left the door unlocked for him.”
“Careless. So what now?”
“Hmm. If he’s innocent, I suppose we are left with a madman.”