Hasunuma’s shoulders twitched. “This is a restaurant, right? You serve food and drink here,” he said, cocking his head and giving Natsumi a look. “So where’s my beer, then?”
“There’s no beer for you here,” Yutaro said. “No food, either. Go on, get out.”
Hasunuma raised his chin and glared up at Yutaro.
“Hey, you.” Tojima, who was seated some distance away and had been quiet up to that point, was pointing a finger at Hasunuma. “I thought something was upsetting Natsumi. Now I see that it was you. You’ve got some nerve, showing your face in here.”
“Shut up, Shusaku,” barked Yutaro, swiveling around briefly before turning back to Hasunuma. “I don’t know why you’re here, but you’re not welcome.”
“Oh yeah?” Hasunuma scratched one side of his nose. “Why not?”
“It’s pretty darn obvious: You’re bothering our other customers. Come on, scram.” Turning smartly on his heel, Yutaro headed back to the kitchen.
“I think you’ve got your wires crossed, Mr. Namiki.”
Yutaro stopped in his tracks. “My wires crossed?”
“Yeah,” said Hasunuma, his jaw hanging open. “I don’t know what you all think, but as far as I’m concerned, I’m the victim here. I was treated like a criminal because of you all. I lost my job. I lost my credibility. How are you going to make that good?”
“Treated like a criminal? You’re guilty. I know you are.”
Hasunuma emitted a derisive snort.
“If I’m guilty, how come I’m here and not in jail?”
“It’s only a matter of time,” Yutaro said. “The police haven’t given up yet. It won’t be long before they come and rearrest you.”
“I wonder...” A smile played about Hasunuma’s lips. “Anyway, you haven’t answered my question. How do you plan to compensate me for what I suffered?”
“Compensate you? What d’you mean?”
“I’m talking about financial damages. You’re the guy who shopped me to the police, aren’t you? You cooked up a bunch of half-truths to get me arrested. I’m right, aren’t I?”
“I just told the police the truth.”
“Bullshit. I know exactly what you told the police. And I’ll tell you why: because of what they asked me in my interrogation. That is why I’ve got every justification in the world to be here. I want to negotiate my compensation with you.”
Yutaro took a step forward. Thinking her father was about to take a swing at Hasunuma, Natsumi held her breath.
“If that’s what this is about, then come back when the restaurant’s closed,” said Yutaro. His voice was soft but full of suppressed rage.
“I’ll come here whenever I want to. But for today at least” — Hasunuma got to his feet — “I’ll do you a favor and leave. Besides, you probably need a while to adjust your attitude. Just remember one thing, though: I’m not being indicted. The prosecutor is talking some crap about ‘deferment of dispensation’; basically what that means is I’m off the hook, scot-free. You’ve got no grounds for bad-mouthing me; no grounds for kicking me out of this restaurant. I’m the victim here; I’m the injured party who was falsely accused by you all. What I deserve from you is pity.”
After this brazen declaration, Hasunuma looked around the restaurant. The customers’ faces expressed a combination of perplexity, shock, and distaste. Hasunuma’s mouth twisted into a smug smile, and he left the restaurant, roughly pulling the door shut behind him.
“Machiko,” Yutaro shouted. “Bring me salt. A whole bag of the stuff.”
Machiko came out of the kitchen, holding a plastic bag of salt with both hands. “Give that here,” said Yutaro, grabbing it from her. He headed for the door, which he slid open before starting to scatter fistfuls of salt in the street.
11
Kusanagi was at the Fukagawa Police Station when he got the news. It came via a phone call from Inspector Muto at Kikuno Police Station who was in charge of the continuing investigation into the unnatural death of Saori Namiki.
“Chief Inspector, I know that you’re working on another case and must be extremely busy. Still, I felt I had to let you know about this.” Muto spoke in a subdued tone.
Kanichi Hasunuma had moved out of his apartment in the Edogawa Ward the previous day, Muto said. The reason was simple enough: His lease had run up.
“We knew the cutoff date was imminent, so we asked the landlord if he planned to renew the lease. Having heard about this case, he wasn’t wild about having someone who’d been arrested for murder staying in his building. He cooked up some plausible excuse for not rolling over the tenancy agreement and we watched Hasunuma after he moved out to see where he went.”
Hasunuma, Muto went on, had made a beeline for Kikuno. That was already startling enough, but from Kikuno station he went straight to Namiki-ya.
“Hasunuma? Went to Namiki-ya? What the hell for?”
“He didn’t stay long. One of our investigators went into the place to find out what had happened. He spoke to Yutaro Namiki and some of the customers. Apparently, Hasunuma was raging about the way he’d been treated as a criminal and is set on getting compensation from Namiki. The term he used was ‘damages.’”
“Damages...”
It was absurd. Kusanagi had never heard anything like it. But given the kind of man Hasunuma was, it sounded like something he would try. He’d won reparations from the police in the Yuna Motohashi case. Since he hadn’t even been indicted this time, perhaps he was planning to extort money from the people whose cooperation had led to his arrest instead.
“And his final destination? Do you know where it was?”
“We do. It’s a warehouse. It belongs to the recycling company where he used to work.”
“A warehouse?”
“Not exactly. It’s a small office that’s part of a warehouse. The warehouse itself is hardly used anymore, so the company converted the office into a living space four years ago and one of the company employees now lives there. He’s particularly close to Hasunuma and is someone that our investigators have spoken to multiple times. Hasunuma was in touch with him from time to time after he stopped working at the place.”
Kusanagi burrowed into his memory. This must be the fellow Hasunuma used to call from pay phones to check whether the police were showing any interest in him.
“The man’s name is Masumura; he’s around seventy,” Muto continued. “I sent an investigator to the recycling company today. He spoke to Masumura who confirmed that Hasunuma had called him a few days ago. He asked if he could stay at his place while he looked for a new place to live.”
“Masumura said yes?”
“No reason to turn him down, he said. We had put a watch on the place last night. It was quite the party. They must have been celebrating their reunion — they were up till all hours drinking.”
Kusanagi sighed. If there was someone who could be friends with a monster like Hasunuma, then it really was true that it took all types to make a world.
“I made a few inquiries about this Masumura fellow. He’s been inside.” Muto had lowered his voice. “Manslaughter. Forty-plus years ago.”
Kusanagi emitted a noncommittal grunt. They sounded like birds of a feather.
“How are you planning to proceed with the continuing investigation?”
Kusanagi’s question elicited a pained groan.
“The only thing we can do is gather eyewitness testimony. Honestly, I feel like we’ve already done everything we can.”
“Will you maintain surveillance on Hasunuma?”