A police car had collected Kit from hospital and delivered him to this room on the ground floor of the new Azabu Police Station. A courtesy, that was how his transport arrangements had been presented. Equally, there had been no suggestion Kit might refuse the ride.
He would have signed himself out of hospital days before, but this suggestion had produced the administrator. A small man in a dark suit and tortoiseshell glasses who appeared in the doorway and announced, politely but firmly, that the doctors insisted Kit stay in bed for at least a week. He still needed to recover.
“From this?” said Kit, indicating the cast on his left arm.
The small man had smiled.
“Is it really broken?” Kit’s fingers worked perfectly, and apart from a dull ache in the elbow, his arm felt fine. The worst thing that could be said was that his skin itched like fuck beneath the plaster.
“We have X-rays showing a minor fracture. Nothing too serious.” The man spoke with a Hokkaido accent, the extra stress on each Z added a harshness to words someone from Tokyo would have left soft.
“What about my ankle?” Kit said.
The administrator appeared to think about this. “All right,” he said. “The cast on that can come off.” He hesitated. “You were killing yourself with drugs,” he said finally. “I don’t expect you to believe that because addicts never do, until they become ex-addicts. Only you know on which side of that line you now stand…”
The arrival of a police driver at lunchtime the following day was enough to make the administrator reappear, flanked by two technical assistants who looked as if they’d been chosen mostly for the width of their shoulders. Standing once again in Kit’s doorway, the administrator looked as if he personally intended to stop his patient and the police officer from leaving.
“I am troubled by this,” said the small man. He looked at the driver, who nodded to indicate that the administrator’s reservations had been noted. “Obviously, we are happy to do everything we can to help the authorities, but…”
“I have my orders,” said the driver.
The administrator sighed, his sigh obviously intended to indicate both his unease and the fact the matter was now out of his hands. “I’ll have his cases sent to the station,” he said. It was all Kit could do not to ask, What cases?
Half an hour after Kit arrived at the police station, still in pajamas and a dressing gown, a pair of matching leather suitcases turned up, full of clothes in his size. A brown envelope tucked into the top of his case contained a broken watch, a broken bead bracelet, and Kit’s wallet, minus its last twist of heroin. Mind you, the wallet bulged with money, far more than when Kit was bundled into an ambulance outside Pirate Mary’s.
So now Kit wore dark cotton trousers, a pale blue shirt with short sleeves, and a tan leather belt. Not his style at all, but they seemed to play well with everyone who came through the waiting room door.
“If you’re ready?”
“If I’m…?” Kit shut his mouth and followed a young policewoman along a corridor and up a flight of stairs. It was obvious that the carpet in the public areas was more expensive than the carpet in areas seen only by the police and those they brought in for interviews.
“Ah,” said Major Yamota. “There you are…This won’t take long.” Nodding to his assistant, he waited while the junior officer spread papers and photographs across a desk. The photographs mostly showed the ruins of Kit’s bar. The papers were more varied, with one whole pile relating only to Yoshi, everything from a certified copy of her family register to school certificates and a newspaper article about her status as one of Japan’s rising stars.
The paper Major Yamota actually wanted was an official-looking document from the Tokyo Institute of Police Science, Investigation Division/Explosions. “It was an accident,” said Major Yamota, holding up the report. “A gas explosion. All the evidence is in here.”
“Evidence?”
“Of fire patterns,” said the Major. “Smoke signatures and burning rates. Deeply regrettable, but still an accident.”
Kit held out his hand. “May I see the report?”
Major Yamota’s mouth twisted.
He had, Kit realised, just insulted the man. An insult so deep that it would have been regarded as utterly unforgivable had Kit not been gaijin. As such, his crassness was excused on the simple grounds that it would be unreasonable to expect better from a foreigner.
“I’ll have a copy made.”
“Thank you,” said Kit. “And the rest?” he asked, indicating the papers and files spread across the desk.
“Let’s see,” Major Yamota said. He gathered up a couple of forms and hesitated for a second over a third, before selecting it and a handful of other pieces of paper. “All of these you can read. Unfortunately, to see reports relating directly to Miss Tanaka you will need her family’s permission.”
A stab of a button produced Major Yamota’s assistant, who rushed away the bundle of forms. Seconds later the sound of a photocopier could be heard through the walls.
“Why do I need their permission?” Kit demanded.
“Because of the complication,” said Major Yamota, and before Kit could ask which complication, the Major told him. “It seems the two of you were not married.”
“But we…”
“Under Japanese law,” said the Major. “Citizens who wed abroad must register their marriage with the relevant ward office within a year. This did not happen. As you were not actually married to Miss Tanaka your rights to information are limited by statutory regulation. Her family also have the right to claim her remains. I should probably tell you,” he added, “that the funeral was yesterday.”
“In Tokyo?”
“No,” said Major Yamota. “They took her home.”
Kit knew where Yoshi’s sister lived and that Yoshi had an aunt in Kobe. Yoshi and Kit had shared a bed, lived in the same house, and together run a bar but he still didn’t know where she’d been born. Some shitty little village in the hills…That was what Yoshi said, when he asked her in the early days.
He had no idea which village or which hills.
CHAPTER 14 — Friday, 15 June
Major Yamota cut Kit loose from Azabu station with the two suitcases full of clothes he hadn’t chosen and a replacement resident’s permit. He had some money in his wallet and about 2,000,000 yen in his savings, roughly £10,000. Without it ever being put into words, Mr. Oniji had made it clear that Kit’s job teaching English to Mrs. Oniji was now over. At the door to his office, Major Yamota asked Kit where he intended to go.
“Back to the bar,” Kit said.
The Major opened his mouth to say something, then changed his mind. This is no longer my business, said the expression on his face. That Kit could read Major Yamota’s expression was a surprise. Maybe Kit had learned more from his time in Tokyo than he thought.
The wind outside was warm and stank of the river, which was a slightly sour smell, like that of an unwashed dog. It was years since Kit had smoked anything but the dragon, but a slot machine stood outside the steps to the metro and he found himself feeding coins into the slot before he even realised what he was doing.
Crumpling cellophane, Kit pushed the wrapper deep into his pocket and realised he still needed a light.
“Here,” said a boy. He looked about thirteen, bleach-blond hair and brutally ripped jeans. Too old to be out this early from school, but still young enough to offer his lighter to a foreigner standing on a street corner with an unlit cigarette.