“What is it?”
“Oh, nothing,” said Naoya, sucking up his iced tea through a straw.
“What I can’t quite figure out is why your wife needed to ask Ms. Mitsui to buy the scissors for her. Kisamiya is close to your shop, so she can swing by herself easily enough. There’s something else: why did she even need new kitchen scissors in the first place? Your mother showed me the ones you have now, and they look fine. I was hoping your wife would provide me with an explanation. But maybe that explanation involved something she felt uncomfortable with you hearing.”
“Perhaps you’re right.”
“Got any ideas?”
Kaga’s eyes bored into Naoya. Naoya sighed.
“Something occurred to me just now. I’m going to have to air some of the family’s dirty laundry, but I guess that’s better than leaving you with your suspicions. It’s a bit squalid, but there’s some family drama going on right now.”
Naoya proceeded to tell a rather startled-looking Kaga about the feud between his wife and his mother. He was relieved to have someone to confide in.
“The wife and the mother-in-law at loggerheads. That’s a bit of a cliché. What do you think it’s got to do with the kitchen scissors?”
“Maybe you’re lucky enough not to have firsthand experience, Detective, but women can be stubborn creatures. My wife and my mother both cook, but they don’t want to use the same utensils. The long and the short of it is that we have two of almost everything in the kitchen — one for my missus and one for my mother.”
“I see.” Kaga nodded sagely. “That would explain why your wife was planning to get another pair of kitchen scissors for her exclusive use.”
“That’s my interpretation. I guess she asked a third party to get them for her so that my mother and I wouldn’t know what she was up to. The staff at Kisamiya all know Maki, so she was probably worried that they would let it slip to my mother.”
“Thanks for letting me know. They’re really at each other’s throats, are they?”
“It’s a nightmare,” said Naoya, his lips twisting in distaste. “My mother will be away next week, so I’m looking forward to a little peace and quiet.”
“She’s going away? Where to?”
“Ise and the Shima peninsula. She’s excited about the abalone she’ll be able to eat there. Of course, that just made Maki fly off the handle. ‘How come no one’s taking me anywhere?’”
“Oh yes, the abalone...,” murmured Kaga, gazing into the middle distance.
5
Two days later, Naoya returned from work in the evening to find a battle under way.
The two women weren’t going at it like in the old days. Suzue was sitting stony-faced at the low dining table in the living room watching TV, while Maki was upstairs crying in the bedroom.
“What on earth’s going on?” Naoya asked his wife.
“I don’t know what I did wrong this time. I just wanted to tidy up,” Maki sniveled. “I found this letter, and your mother flew completely off the handle.”
Maki explained that she was tidying up the sewing basket when she discovered a letter addressed to a Mrs. Suzue Yanagisawa. She had only looked at the envelope when Suzue started yelling at her about reading other people’s mail.
“You didn’t open the letter?”
“No. Why would I do that?”
God, what a mess! thought Naoya, as he went back downstairs. Suzue was looking as crotchety as ever.
“Mother, why get so worked up about Maki touching a letter addressed to you? It’s ridiculous.”
Suzue glared at him.
“It’s straightforward enough: we may be family, but that doesn’t mean privacy has to go out the window.”
“Maki didn’t read the letter or even open it.”
“That’s not the point. She should just keep her silly hands off.”
“She didn’t mean any harm. She just came across it in the sewing basket. That’s all.”
“That’s exactly what I don’t like. Besides, she never does any sewing anyway.”
“She was going to sew my shirt buttons back on.”
“You’ve got to be kidding. She can’t sew worth a damn.”
“She’s been practicing, and she’s pretty good now. The whole thing’s your fault. I mean, what are you doing sticking letters in a place like that anyway?”
Naoya’s eye was caught by a gray envelope on the table.
“Is that what all the fuss is about?”
Naoya was reaching for the letter when Suzue snatched it away.
“You may be my son, but that doesn’t give you the right. Like I said, there is such a thing as privacy.”
“If you’re so desperate to keep your letters secret, you should find a better hiding place for them.”
“Don’t try and make out that I’ve got anything to be ashamed of. That’s not what this is about. It’s not me who’s in the wrong.”
Suzue got up, scuttled into her bedroom, and pulled the door shut with a bang.
Naoya sighed. Although he was hungry, now was hardly the time to start asking anyone to make him dinner. He scratched his head. Maybe a simple bowl of ochazuke rice will do, he thought.
6
Suzue was due to leave on her trip the next day. When Naoya came out of the subway station that evening, he heard someone calling his name. He turned to see Detective Kaga hurrying after him.
“This is a stroke of luck. I was about to come around to see you.”
“Now? Again?”
“It’s nothing serious; just something I thought might put your mind at rest. Do you have a moment?”
“Right now?”
“We could pop in there, seeing as it’s close by. It’ll be easy enough.” Kaga strode off without giving Naoya the time to reply.
Kaga led Naoya to Kisamiya. The shop’s glass doors were shut, but the lights were still on. The gray-haired owner, who was standing behind a low glass display case, broke into a warm smile when Kaga pushed his way through the door.
“Hard at it as usual, eh, Detective? Oh, hello there, Naoya.”
“Evening,” Naoya replied. He had known the old man his whole life.
Kisamiya was a small store. An L-shaped glass display case took up most of the space. Inside it was row upon row of sharp-looking cutlery gleaming like precious artifacts.
There were more glass-fronted display cases around the walls. These contained traditional cutlery from the Edo period rather than regular products for sale. The shop was like a miniature knife museum.
“Hi, boss,” said Kaga. “Got that thing for me?”
The storeowner grinned and extracted a pair of scissors from a case immediately behind him. They were a little under ten centimeters long, with blades that had blunt, rounded ends.
“What are those?” Naoya asked.
“The scissors your wife wanted to get. They’re not actually kitchen scissors. Ms. Mitsui, the murdered woman, made a mistake and bought the wrong kind.”
“What do you mean?” Naoya frowned.
“What kind of scissors are these, boss?”
The Kisamiya proprietor crossed his arms self-importantly over his chest.
“They don’t really have a specific name. We usually refer to them as food scissors.”
“Food scissors?” Naoya cocked his head to one side.
“That’s what your wife probably asked for. My guess is that Ms. Mitsui mistakenly assumed that food scissors and kitchen scissors were the same thing.” Kaga said.
“Plenty of people make that mistake.” The old storeowner beamed.
“So what are these scissors for?” Naoya looked at him inquiringly.
“You use them at meals to deal with hard and chewy food. Squid, octopus — things like that.”