“Where are they now?” Reiko asked.
“They moved away from the district,” said the barber.
“Their son’s disgrace was too much for them,” his wife clarified. Her expression showed pity. “They were shunned by everyone in the neighborhood.”
Reiko admired her generous spirit that had sympathy to spare for the suffering of their daughter’s murderer’s kin. “Can you tell me where they went?”
The barber shook his head. “They left in the night. No one saw them go. They didn’t even tell the neighborhood headman where they were moving.”
As she fought disappointment, Reiko said, “If you hear anything about where they might be, will you let me know immediately?”
“Of course,” the barber said.
Reiko thanked the couple for their kindness. They accompanied her and Lieutenant Asukai to the door, where the wife said, “I’ll chant prayers for good luck for you, Lady Reiko.”
“I hope the gods listen to her,” Asukai said as he walked Reiko down the path. “What do you want to do now?”
“Look for Goro’s family. Maybe the neighbors have heard news of them.”
Asukai’s expression was dubious, skeptical. “They certainly had a grudge against you, but I can’t see them as capable of killing Lord Mori or setting you up. They’re just simple, merchant-class folk. How could they have gotten close enough to a daimyo to kill him, never mind think up a scheme to get you in trouble for it?”
“I’ve already thought of that.”
“Then how can you believe they’re responsible for what happened to you? Why spend any more time on them?”
“Because there are connections and patterns that are invisible to us.
And because I remember the last thing Goro’s mother said to me when she cursed me.“
The words spoken two years ago echoed in Reiko’s mind, a threatening prophesy of the future now about to come true. “ ‘Someday you’ll find out what it’s like to be punished for something you didn’t do.”“
A walled enclave within Sano’s compound held valuables that included money, government records, and spare household furnishings. “I want to look at those weapons that Hirata-san found,” Sano told the guard who let him and Marume and Fukida through the gate. The weapons were the only material clue found during his entire investigation. He hoped a close examination of them would yield important facts. “Where are they?”
Square, identical storehouses, built with thick plaster walls, tile roofs, and iron doors to protect their contents from fire, stood in rows like a small, deserted city. “Here,” the guard said, opening the door of one storehouse.
Marume and Fukida entered and opened the shutters. Following them inside, Sano breathed dank air that smelled of metal and grease. He peered through the dimness at the thirty wooden crates on the floor.
“I need more light than this,” he said.
The detectives helped him move the crates onto the pavement outside. Fortunately the rain had paused. An eerie, silver glow lit the early evening sky. The air was still warm, and Sano and his men sweated while working. When they had the crates lined up between the storehouses, they removed the lids.
Fukida picked up and read a paper that lay atop the arquebuses inside one crate. “Detective Arai did an inventory of the guns. There are twenty in each crate, six hundred total. All appear to be in good working order.”
“Are those his only observations?” Sano asked, concerned not just because they were so limited.
When Fukida nodded, Marume said, “What else do we need to know?”
“Where Lord Mori got them would be helpful.” Sano wondered why Hirata had left an important task to his subordinate, apparently without checking the results.
“That might tell us who was conspiring with him to overthrow Lord Matsudaira,” Marume agreed. “But didn’t Hirata-ran say he searched the crates for documents to show where the guns came from and didn’t find any?”
“Yes. But documents aren’t the only means of tracing guns.” Sano thought Hirata should have been aware of this fact, should have taken it into account. “Help me inspect these for gunmaker’s marks.”
Looking over each gun, they found characters and crests, etched into the barrels or branded on the wooden stocks, that identified the craftsmen who’d made them. “Four different gunmakers so far,” Marume said after they’d gone through twenty crates. “Two of them have big workshops in Edo. They supply guns to the Tokugawa army.”
“Maybe someone in the army is in on the conspiracy,” Fukida said.
“They also make guns for the daimyo,” said Marume. “Don’t count them out.”
These possibilities heartened Sano. The army and the daimyo class could offer plenty of treason suspects besides himself-but he shouldn’t jump to conclusions. “There have been thefts from the arsenal during the three years since the war,” Sano pointed out. “These guns could have gotten into Lord Mori’s warehouse via the black market.”
“I don’t recognize the other two marks,” Fukida said.
Nor did Sano. “They must belong to craftsmen in the provinces.”
He and his men were down to the last three crates. As soon as Sano lifted out a gun he saw on its stock a circular crest with a chevron inside. He felt a mixture of triumph and dismay.
“Is something wrong?” Fukida asked.
“That’s a new mark,” Marume said, peering at the gun. “I don’t recognize it.”
“Neither do I,” said Fukida.
“I do,” Sano said. He had good reason to, whereas his men didn’t and neither did Detective Arai, who’d done the inventory and overlooked the marks. “It belongs to a workshop in the Hatchobori district. They make guns for the Edo police force.”
“I didn’t know the police had guns,” Marume said. “They don’t carry them.”
“Many of the commanders have them for target practice. That’s their hobby.” A former police commander himself, Sano knew this. “They’ve built up quite a collection.”
“This is just what we’ve been looking for.” Excitement animated Fukida’s serious features. “A clue that points to Police Commissioner Hoshina.”
“He could have been putting together a gang to overthrow Lord Matsudaira’s regime and do away with you at the same time,” Marume said to Sano.
“Maybe he recruited Lord Mori and put him in charge of collecting guns for another war,” Fukida said.
“Maybe Lord Mori had second thoughts,” Marume said, “and Hoshina was afraid he would report the conspiracy. That would explain why he’d have wanted Lord Mori dead.”
“What if he went to the Mori estate and happened to see Lady Reiko there?” Fukida speculated.
Marume pantomimed shooting a bow and arrow. “Two birds at once. Down goes Chamberlain Sano as well as Lord Mori.”
The detectives had followed Sano’s line of thought to a conclusion that obviously delighted them. Sano was gladdened, too, that the guns had implicated Hoshina in murder and treason, but less happy about how and when this clue had come to light.
Fukida handled a gun, frowning at the telltale mark. “I wonder why Sosakan Hirata didn’t notice this. He used to be a police officer.”
“It seems as if he’d have recognized-” Marume interrupted himself. He and Fukida glanced at Sano, then away.
An uncomfortable silence fell.
Sano knew they were thinking the same thing he was: Hirata didn’t even look for the marks. He missed an important clue.
“No harm done,” Marume said, too loudly.
“We have the evidence against Hoshina now,” Fukida said.