But the sign was not hanging over a store for Asian food. On the display window it said, “The Best Gay Place In Town.”
“A gay sex store,” Irene said. She couldn’t help letting out a deep sigh. Møller glanced at her but didn’t say anything. They walked up to the shop’s window.
Things were also hanging from the ceiling in this display window. They looked to Irene like Barbie’s fiancé, Ken, but when Peter and Irene came closer, Irene realized her mistake. These boy dolls were not intended for little girls; they were supposed to be used by boys and grown men. The dolls were dressed in different outfits but their pants were pulled down to their knees, in order to show that they were well endowed. A human-size display doll stood on one side of the window. The uniform he was wearing looked surprisingly like a real police uniform and he was holding a bunch of handcuffs in both his hands. Across from the police doll hung a porcelain urinal. Along the edge there was a whitish liquid that was apparently supposed to represent semen. Dildos, videos, and magazines lay on the floor. One of the covers caught Irene’s eye. The magazine was called Fist, which would have been Knytnäve in Swedish. The picture showed two male hands spreading apart the buttocks of another man.
“This is sick,” Irene said loudly.
Møller shrugged but didn’t comment. Irene turned toward him and caught his gaze.
“Have you or anyone else from the police been here and spoken with the owner about the sign and the connection to our murder-mutilation case?”
“No.”
“Then we have to go in and find out if he knows anything.”
Møller sighed. “We probably should. Then you’ll get to meet Tom Tanaka.”
“Who’s that?”
“The owner.”
Again he went first and held the door for Irene. His courtesy pleased her. He was polite and well mannered but unaccustomed to being so, in Irene’s opinion. She stepped into the gay shop with an uneasy feeling in her stomach.
Everything she had anticipated was on display. Leather clothes, leather corsets, leather scrotums, whips, and rubber clothes were hanging everywhere. There were neat shelves lined with videos and magazines and sex toys of whose purpose she had no idea. Two men were standing close together over a leather corset, talking, but they stopped when Irene made her entrance. They weren’t relieved when Peter Møller appeared right behind her. Suspiciously, they observed the police officers’ progress to the store counter. Tom Tanaka was enthroned behind it.
Whatever Irene had expected, this man surprised her. He was almost two meters tall and probably weighed over two hundred kilos. He looked like a sumo wrestler, and wore his hair in the characteristic style with small hard knots of hair at his crown. To Irene’s relief, he was not wearing the diaperlike pants in which sumo wrestlers compete; instead his huge body was covered in black silk pajamas.
Irene’s undisguised surprise must have been obvious because Tom Tanaka made a hint of a bow and said in English with a strong American accent, “If you’re surprised to see me here, it’s nothing compared to how I feel about seeing you.”
His voice was very deep and his tone ironic. Irene couldn’t keep from smiling.
“Good day. My name is Irene Huss. I’m a police officer from Göteborg, Sweden, and I’m investigating. . a crime. May I ask a few questions?” she said in her broken English.
Tom Tanaka looked at her without expression through dark eyes embedded in the huge rolls of fat on his face. Irene didn’t believe that the man in front of her was an out-of-shape, harmless mountain of lard. Fighting with a sumo wrestler was like running right into an oncoming steam locomotive traveling at full speed.
The Japanese man nodded slightly. In a deep bass he rumbled, “Emil.”
The door behind Tanaka opened almost instantaneously, and a tall, ruddy young man stuck out his head and also answered in English, but with a heavy Danish accent, “I’m almost done eating-”
He stopped himself when he became aware of Irene and Peter. His gaze locked onto Peter but quickly shifted. Irene suspected there had been a hint of recognition. Emil swallowed hard several times, and his prominent Adam’s apple yo-yoed up and down his thin throat.
“Will you take over the store while I’m speaking with the police officers?”
Emil hurried to finish chewing. He slipped through the door and stood behind the counter as far away from the arm of the law as he could get, nervously pulling at his red goatee.
With a massive hand Tom Tanaka gestured toward the door. They passed through a small windowless employee lounge with soft lighting and two comfortable black leather recliners. Tom Tanaka went over to a heavy door and unlocked it.
Inside there was a huge, very modern kitchen done in white, black, and stainless steel. The floor was laid with wide polished boards of cherrywood. A strong smell of fried fish hung in the air. On the other side of the kitchen Irene glimpsed a sizeable room like a living room. She heard the sound and saw the color flickering from a TV. Between the kitchen and the living room there was a small hallway.
“I live here,” Tanaka said simply.
“So you don’t have far to go to work,” Irene tried to joke.
“True,” the Japanese man replied.
He led the way through the kitchen and then headed to the right. The floor beams creaked under his considerable weight. He opened a door and preceded them into the room. There was no other option since neither Irene nor Peter would have been able to squeeze past him.
“My office,” said Tanaka.
This room was also large. A pleasant smell of expensive cigar smoke encircled the visitors. The room was sparsely furnished in Japanese style. The desk was made of black shiny wood, and the black leather desk chair had obviously been specially constructed to hold Tom Tanaka’s colossal body.
Along the short side of the room there was a glass cabinet containing knickknacks and prize buckles. Irene observed, “You must be a good sumo wrestler.”
One of the corners of Tom’s mouth twitched and Irene took it to be an amused smile.
“Was a good sumo wrestler. I’m retired.”
Irene looked at him, surprised. He couldn’t be older than she was.
“We retire at age forty.”
She didn’t know why she volunteered, “I’ve also worked with Japanese wrestling-jujitsu.”
Tanaka didn’t respond. He pointed at two cloth-covered chairs next to the desk.
“Please,” he said.
Irene and Peter Møller sat. Then Irene realized that Møller hadn’t said a word since they’d entered the store. She looked at him but he remained silent so she started talking about the dismembered male corpse they had found in Sweden. She emphasized that the only clue they had to the man’s identity was a dragon tattoo, and raised her gaze over Tanaka’s head to look at a silk painting that was evidently the original of both the sign and the tattoo.
There was one important difference: there was no sign for man on the painting. Instead, a pointy mountaintop could be seen. Irene recognized the holy mountain, Mount Fuji. She said so and Tanaka nodded.
“Colleagues here in Copenhagen contacted us when we sent out the picture of the tattoo via Interpol. That’s why I’m here. Do you know who the man might be?”
“No. No idea.”
“You don’t know of anyone who has had a tattoo done based on your sign or this painting?”
He shook his head in denial.
“I’ve had the store for less than two years. I inherited it from my cousin. He was the one who started it, years ago. Maybe the tattoo was made during his time. The idea for the sign and for replacing Fuji were also his,” he said.