The hammering downstairs had stopped by now.
“There’s one more thing that’s perfectly clear to me now,” said Kiyoshi.
“What?” I asked, hopefully.
“It’s going to be a while before our hostess lets us move out of that freezing cold storeroom of a bedroom.”
I couldn’t help wishing he’d thought of that before opening his mouth.
SCENE 6
The Salon
That evening, despite my doubts, we were provided with dinner.
The guests had now been cooped up in the Ice Floe Mansion for a whole week, and they couldn’t hide any longer how exhausted they were. What’s more, among them (or in someone’s case, inside themself) was a homicidal maniac, and they were constantly living with the fear that the knife with the white string attached might end up in their own heart next.
Tonight, however, it was the police officers who were having the hardest time hiding their exhaustion. They looked at least ten times more haggard than even Kiyoshi had predicted, and anyone seeing the way their shoulders sagged couldn’t help but feel sorry for them. All the way through dinner, and even when it was over, not one of them spoke a word. If any one of them had opened his mouth to speak, doubtless he would have simply repeated the same phrases that they had said a hundred times already. I had to be constantly vigilant to make sure that Kiyoshi didn’t turn to them and ask them if they’d found so much as a rat’s nest in their search.
“What in God’s name is going on in this place?” said Okuma, making it one hundred and one times.
Nobody had a response. Ozaki and the others had put so much into the search that they could barely lift a hand to drink their tea. If Ozaki had opened his mouth right then, nothing good would have come out.
“We know nothing,” said Ushikoshi, his voice barely a whisper. “We have to accept it. Why was there a metre of string attached to those hunting knives? Why were there two stakes out in the snow the night of the first murder? As for the three locked rooms, especially the second two, we have no idea how it was done. And they only get more impossible as the murders go on. It’s just not feasible to commit a murder in such a perfectly impenetrable room! It’s impossible! So we stripped away the walls, the ceilings and the floors. And found nothing! Even the heating pipes were untouched.
“We know absolutely nothing. We’ve gained nothing. I’m left believing it was all done by some sort of evil spirit. My daily reports to HQ are torture for me to make. If there is anyone at all who thinks they can give me any sort of explanation that makes any sense at all of this freak case, then I will bow deeply and listen to whatever he has to say. If such a person exists.”
“I don’t think they do,” said Ozaki, massaging his own right shoulder.
And those were the only words he spoke all evening.
Kiyoshi and I were in conversation with Kozaburo. In the very short time that we had been guests at the Ice Floe Mansion, Kozaburo Hamamoto appeared to have aged about ten years. He wasn’t usually very talkative, but he did enjoy talking about music and art, and on these topics he seemed to have regained a little of his vitality. Kiyoshi must have taken note of my earlier complaints, or perhaps it was because of his own loss of confidence, but he had stopped baiting the detectives and was relatively subdued.
When it came to music it seemed that Kiyoshi and Kozaburo had surprisingly similar tastes. They’d been discussing Richard Wagner’s brash theatricality for close on an hour.
“Wagner was really ahead of his time. His music broke through the norms of the age, upset its harmony,” said Kozaburo. “A true revolutionary.”
“Right, right. At the time his music was considered truly avant-garde in England and other European countries. Even now he’s treated as something modern.”
“I agree. But he could only make it because he was under the patronage of Ludwig II.”
“I suppose you could see it that way. Wagner was demanding impressive sums of money from him. Without Ludwig II as a patron, after The Ring none of his greatest masterpieces would have been possible. He was deeply in debt, constantly being forced to flee different countries. If he hadn’t been rescued by Ludwig, he would probably have rotted away in some village in the middle of nowhere.”
“Well, that’s possible, I admit. But he still would have written his scores.”
“Just now you said something about harmony?…” Kiyoshi asked.
“The situation at that time in European cities just before the appearance of Ludwig II or Wagner, had reached a certain state of harmony, I believe. For example, the perfect architectural balance between the use of stone and glass and wood.”
“Aha. I see.”
“The layout and concept of the ideal cities of the day resembled a giant stage setting. In other words, a city was like a theatre, in which the common people were to go about their daily lives as if it were one great performance.”
“Huh.”
“In that environment, the technological development of glass as a new building material was the most important facet of this theatrical construction and one that added to its beauty. But you couldn’t make anything substantial with it. The leaning tower that I’ve built here couldn’t have been made in those days. And wouldn’t have been. Not only the architects and city planners, but also painters and musicians created their work with an implicit understanding of preserving harmony.
“And then, along came technological advancements that included the construction of strong steel frames and huge plates of glass, as well as the invention of trains. And that was when the giant that was Wagner made his appearance in Bavaria.”
“Interesting. You say he arrived to destroy the perfection of the Gothic period.”
“Right. And ever since, Europe has been racked with troubles. They’re still suffering today.”
“And what was the role of Ludwig II, the pure-hearted boy king, in all this? He copied King Louis of France and he took Wagner in. Was he just a frivolous airhead?”
“No, I think it was just the tendency of Bavarian people at the time. Society wanted to make Ludwig II appear a lunatic so they changed the definition of normal. It wasn’t only Ludwig II who liked to mimic France. Ludwig I had already created his own version of the Arc de Triomphe in Munich.”
“But what interests me most right now is you, Mr Hamamoto.”
“Me?”
“You don’t seem like Ludwig II. This mansion is no Herrenchiemsee Castle. A man of your intelligence doesn’t build a house on the farthest tip of the northernmost island of Japan for no reason whatsoever.”
“Aren’t you overestimating me? Or perhaps you are overestimating Japanese people in general. There are monstrosities like Herrenchiemsee Castle in Tokyo. How about the State Guest House—Akasaka Palace?”
“Are you saying this mansion is a kind of Akasaka Palace?”
“Yes, I suppose it is.”
“Well, it doesn’t look like it to me.”
“I guess that it’s the same way that you don’t look like a frivolous airhead to me.”
The two men lapsed into silence for a while. Eventually Kozaburo spoke.
“Mr Mitarai, you’re a mysterious man. I have absolutely no idea what you’re thinking.”
“Oh, really? Well, I suppose I am a little more difficult to comprehend than those police officers over there.”
“Do you think the police have comprehended anything?”
“Their minds haven’t changed since they arrived at this mansion. They’re like a Gothic façade. The house won’t collapse without them.”
“And how about you?”