Yes, thanks. Sorry to put you to such trouble.
Oh no, not at all. The sister-in-law bowed slightly, then stepped into the Japanese-style room, hand on her kimono sash.
In the bathroom, Asakawa took out the card. Pacific Resorts Club Members Card it read. Underneath this was Nonoyamas name and membership number and the expiration date. He flipped it over. Five membership conditions, in fine print, plus the name of the company and its address. Pacific Resorts Club, Inc., 3-5 Kojimachi, Chiyoda Ward, Tokyo. Phone no. (03) 261-4922. If it wasnt something shed found or swiped, Tomoko must have borrowed this card from this Nonoyama person. Why? To use Pacific Resorts facilities, of course. Which one, and when?
He couldnt call from the house. Saying he was going to go buy cigarettes, he ran to a pay phone. He dialed the number.
Hello, Pacific Resorts, may I help you? A young womans voice.
Id like to know what facilities I can use with a membership card.
The voice didnt respond right away. Maybe they had so many facilities available that she couldnt just list them all.
That is I mean for example, like on an overnight trip from Tokyo, he added. It would have stood out if the four of them had gone away for two or three nights together. The fact that he hadnt turned anything up so far meant that they had probably gone for no longer than a single night. She could easily get away for a single night by lying to her parents that she was staying at a friends house.
We have a full range of facilities at our Pacific Land in South Hakone, she said, in her businesslike manner.
Specifically, what sorts of leisure activities do you have there?
Certainly, sir. We have provisions for golf, tennis, and field sports, as well as a swimming pool.
And you have lodging there?
Yes, sir. In addition to a hotel, Pacific Land features the Villa Log Cabin community of rental cottages. Shall I send you our brochure?
Yes. Please. He pretended to be a prospective customer, hoping it would make it easier to extract information from her. The hotel and the cabins, are they open to the general public?
Certainly, at non-member rates.
I see. Can you give me the phone number? Maybe Ill go have a look.
I can take care of reservations right now, if you wish
No, I, ah, may be going for a drive down there sometime and just decide to have a look So could I just have the phone number?
One moment, please.
As he waited, Asakawa took out a memo pad and pen.
Are you ready? The woman returned and dictated two eleven-digit phone numbers. The area codes were longthey were way out in the sticks. Asakawa scribbled them down.
Just for future reference, where are your other facilities located?
We have the same sort of full-service resorts at Lake Hamana and at Hamajima in Mie Prefecture.
Much too far! Students wouldnt have that kind of war chest.
I see. Sounds like theyre all on the Pacific, just like the name says.
Then the woman began to detail all the fabulous advantages of becoming a Pacific Resorts Club member; Asakawa listened politely for a while before cutting her off. Great. The rest Im sure I can find out from the pamphlet. Ill give you my address so you can send it. He told her his address and hung up. Listening to her sales pitch, hed begun to think it actually wouldnt be a bad idea to join, if he could afford it.
It had been over an hour since Yoko had gone to sleep, and Shizus parents had already returned to Ashikaga. Shizu herself was in the kitchen doing the dishes for her sister, who was still prone to break down at the slightest provocation. Asakawa briskly helped carry dishes in from the living room.
Whats got into you today? Youre acting weird, said Shizu, without interrupting her dishwashing. You put Yoko down, youre helping in the kitchen. Are you turning over a new leaf? If so, I hope it sticks.
Asakawa was lost in thought, and didnt want to be bothered. He wished his wife would act like her name, which meant quiet. The best way to seal a womans mouth was not to reply.
Oh, by the way, did you put a disposable on her before putting her to bed? We wouldnt want her to leak at someone elses house.
Asakawa showed no interest, but just looked around at the kitchen walls. Tomoko had died here. There had been shards of glass and a pool of coke next to her when she was found. She must have been attacked by the virus right when she was going to have a drink of coke from the fridge. Asakawa opened the refrigerator, mimicking Tomokos movements. He imagined holding a glass, and pretended to drink.
What in the world are you doing? Shizu was staring at him, mouth wide open. Asakawa kept going: still pretending to drink, he looked behind him. When he turned around, there was a glass door right in front of him, separating the living room from the kitchen. It reflected the fluorescent light above the sink. Maybe because it was still bright outside and the living room was filled with light, it only reflected the fluorescent light, and not the expressions of the people on this side. If the other side of the glass was dark, and this side light, like it would have been that night when Tomoko was standing here That glass door would have been a mirror reflecting the scene in the kitchen. It would have reflected Tomokos face, contorted with terror. Asakawa could almost start to think of the pane of glass as a witness to everything that had happened. Glass could be transparent or reflective, depending on the interplay of light and darkness. Asakawa was bringing his face nearer the glass, as if drawn there, when his wife tapped him on the back. Just at that moment, they heard Yoko crying upstairs. She was awake.
Yokos up. Shizu wiped her wet hands on a towel. Their daughter usually didnt cry so hard upon waking up. Shizu rushed up to the second floor.
As she was going out, Yoshimi came in. Asakawa handed her the card hed found. This had fallen under the piano. He spoke casually and waited for a reaction.
Yoshimi took the card and turned it over. This is strange. What was this doing there? She cocked her head, puzzled.
Could Tomoko have borrowed it from a friend, do you suppose?
But Ive never heard of this person. I dont think she had a friend by that name. Yoshimi looked at Asakawa with exaggerated worry. Darn it. This looks important. I swear, that girl Her voice choked up. Even the slightest thing would set the wheels of grief in motion for her. Asakawa hesitated to ask, but did.
Did, ah did Tomoko and her friends by any chance go to this resort during summer vacation?
Yoshimi shook her head. She trusted her daughter. Tomoko hadnt been the kind of child to lie about staying over at her friends. Plus, she had been studying for exams. Asakawa could understand how Yoshimi felt. He decided not to ask about Tomoko any further. No high school student with exams looming in front of her was going to tell her parents that she was renting a cottage with her boyfriend. She would have lied and said she was studying at a friends house. Her parents would never know.
Ill find the owner and return it.
Yoshimi bowed her head in silence, and then her husband called from the living room and she hurried out of the kitchen. The bereaved father was seated in front of a newly-installed Buddhist altar, speaking to his daughters photograph. His voice was shockingly cheerful, and Asakawa became depressed. He was obviously living in denial. Asakawa could only pray that hed be able to get through.
Asakawa had found out one thing. If this Nonoyama had in fact lent Tomoko the membership card, he or she would have contacted Tomokos parents to ask for the card back upon learning of her death. But Tomokos mother knew nothing about the card. Nonoyama couldnt have forgotten about the card. Even if it were part of a family membership deal, dues were expensive enough that Nonoyama wouldnt just allow the card to stay lost. So what did this mean? This was how Asakawa figured it: Nonoyama had lent the card to one of the other three, either Iwata, Tsuji, or Nomi. Somehow it passed into Tomokos possession, and thats how things had ended. Nonoyama would have contacted the parents of the person he or she had lent it to. The parents would have searched their childs belongings. They wouldnt have found the card. The card was here. If Asakawa contacted the families of the other three victims, he might be able to unearth Nonoyamas address. He should call right away, tonight. If he couldnt dig up a clue this way, then it would be unlikely that the card would provide a means for finding when and where the four had been together. At any rate, he wanted to meet Nonoyama and hear what he or she had to say. If he had to, he could always find some way to track down Nonoyamas address based on the membership number. Asking Pacific Resorts directly probably wouldnt get him anywhere, but he was sure that his newspaper connections could come up with something.
Someone was calling him. A distant voice. Dear dear His wifes flustered voice mingled with the babys crying.
Dear, could you come here for a minute?
Asakawa came to himself again. Suddenly he wasnt even sure what hed been thinking about all this time. There was something strange about the way his daughter was crying. That feeling became stronger as he mounted the stairs.
Whats wrong? he asked his wife, accusingly.
Somethings not right with Yoko. I think somethings happened to her. The way shes cryingits different from how it usually sounds. Do you think shes sick?
Asakawa placed his hand on Yokos forehead. She didnt have a fever. But her little hands were trembling. The trembling spread to her whole body, and sometimes her back shook. Her face was beet red, her eyes clenched shut.
How long has she been like this?
Its because she woke up and there was no one here with her.
The baby often cried if her mother wasnt there when she woke up. But she always calmed down when her mother ran to her and held her. When a baby cried it was trying to ask for something, but what ? The baby was trying to tell them something. She wasnt just being bratty. Her two tiny hands were clasped tightly over her face cowering. That was it. The child was wailing out of fear. Yoko turned her face away, and then opened her fists slightly: she seemed to be trying to point forward. Asakawa looked in that direction. There was a pillar. He raised his eyes. Hanging about thirty centimeters from the ceiling was a fist-sized mask, of a hannyaa female demon. Was the child afraid of the mask?
Hey, look, said Asakawa, pointing with his chin. They looked at the mask simultaneously, then slowly turned their gazes to each other.
No way shes frightened of a demon?
Asakawa got to his feet. He took down the demon mask from where it hung on the beam and laid it face down on top of the dresser. Yoko couldnt see it there. She abruptly stopped crying.
Whats the matter, Yoko? Did that nasty demon scare you? Shizu seemed relieved now that she understood, and she happily rubbed her cheek against the childs. Asakawa wasnt so easily satisfied; for some reason, he didnt want to be in this room any longer.
Hey. Lets go home, he urged his wife.
That evening, as soon as he got home from the Oishis, he called the Tsujis, the Nomis, and the Iwatas, in that order. He asked each family whether they hadnt been contacted by one of their childs acquaintances regarding a membership card for a resort club. The last person he spoke to, Iwatas mother, gave him a long, rambling answer: There was a call, from someone who said hed gone to the same high school as my son, an older boy, saying hed lent my son his resort membership card, and could he get it back But I searched every corner of my sons room and never could find it. Ive been worried about it ever since. He quickly asked for Nonoyamas phone number, and immediately called it.
Nonoyama had run into Iwata in Shibuya on the last Sunday in August, and lent him his card, just as Asakawa had suspected. Iwata had told him he was going away with this high school girl hed been hitting on. Summer vacations almost over, yknow. I want to really live it up once before its over, or else I wont be able to buckle down and study for the exams.
Nonoyama had laughed when he heard this. You idiot, prep school students arent supposed to have summer vacations.
The last Sunday in August had been the 26th: if theyd gone anywhere for the night, it would have to have been the 27th, 28th, 29th, or 30th. Asakawa didnt know about the college prep school, but for the high school girls at least, fall semester began on the first of September.
Maybe it was because she was tired from being so long in unfamiliar surroundings: Yoko soon fell asleep right next to her mother. When he put his ear to the bedroom door, he could hear both of them breathing regularly, fast asleep. Nine in the evening this was Asakawas time to relax. Until his wife and child were asleep, there was no room in this tiny condo for him to settle down to work.
Asakawa got a beer from the fridge and poured it into a glass. It tasted special tonight. Hed made definite progress, finding that membership card. There was a good chance that sometime between the 27th and the 30th of August, Shuichi Iwata and the other three had stayed at facilities belonging to Pacific Resorts. The most likely place was Villa Log Cabin at Pacific Land in South Hakone. South Hakone was the only Pacific Resorts property close enough to be a viable candidate, and he couldnt imagine a group of poor students going all out and staying at a hotel. They would probably have used the membership to rent one of the cottages on the cheap. They were only five thousand yen a night for members, which came to a little over a thousand apiece.
He had the phone number for Villa Log Cabin at hand. He put his notes on the table. The quickest thing would be to simply call the front desk and ask if a party of four had stayed there under the name Nonoyama. But theyd never tell him over the phone. Naturally, anybody who had risen within the firm to the position of rental cottage manager would have been well trained to consider it his duty to protect guests privacy. Even if he revealed his position as a reporter for a major newspaper and clearly stated his reasons for inquiring, the manager would never tell him over the phone. Asakawa considered contacting the local bureau and getting them to use a lawyer with whom they had connections to ask for a look at the guest register. The only people a manager was legally bound to show the register to were the police and attorneys. Asakawa could try to pose as one or the other, but hed probably be spotted immediately, and that would mean trouble for the newspaper. It was safer and more effective to go through channels.
But that would take at least three or four days, and he hated to wait that long. He wanted to know now. His passion for the case was such that he couldnt bear to wait three days. What in the world was going to come of this? If indeed the four of them had stayed the night at Villa Log Cabin at Pacific Land in South Hakone at the end of August, and if indeed that clue allowed him to unravel the riddle of their deathswell, what could it have been anyway? Virus, virus. He was all too aware that the only reason he was calling it a virus was to keep himself from being overawed by the thought of some mysterious thing being behind it all. It made senseto a degreeto marshal the power of science in facing down supernatural power. He wasnt going to get anywhere fighting a thing he didnt understand with words he didnt understand. He had to translate the thing he didnt understand into words he did.