Ghost of the Bamboo Road Page 10

  “You see?” Hiro said. “Even she knows better than to eat it.”

  Father Mateo sighed. “I begin to doubt that we can solve this mystery. We have no evidence, and everyone we talk to blames a ghost.”

  “We have no obligation to catch this killer,” Hiro reminded the priest. “We can leave for Edo any time you want to.”

  “And abandon Ana?”

  “I said nothing about leaving her behind.” Hiro stood, picked up his bowl, and opened the exterior shoji. Outside, a gentle snow had begun to fall.

  “But she is under arrest. . .”

  Hiro leaned halfway out the door, extended the bowl, and turned it over.

  The gruel splattered the ground with a sound like vomit. Righting the bowl, Hiro withdrew into the room and closed the shoji.

  “I don’t believe you.” Father Mateo gave him a disapproving look.

  “Do you truly think so little of me?” Hiro felt pressure in his chest. He knew he held his emotions close, but had truly believed the Jesuit understood. “I give you my word, I will not leave her behind.”

  “I didn’t mean Ana.” Father Mateo gestured to Hiro’s empty bowl. “You just dumped your dinner on the ground.”

  The pressure in Hiro’s chest released in laughter. “It would have ended up there either way. I simply chose the most direct—and least unpleasant—route.”

  Father Mateo took another bite of gruel. “I’ve been thinking. . .what if the killer is also the person who stole Noboru’s silver? You always say that people kill for a reason. And even if ghosts are not exactly people, I fail to see what Riko’s spirit gains by Ishiko’s death. No woman of Ishiko’s status could possibly have protected Riko from the demands of a samurai. Even in death, her daughter would know that. But a thief, who Ishiko-san discovered in the act, could take advantage of the yūrei legend to disguise his crime.”

  “That would mean the murder happened in the ryokan,” Hiro said. “We saw no signs of struggle in the kitchen.”

  “Perhaps we missed them.”

  Hiro shook his head. “I would have noticed. More importantly, Kane was here all night. She would have heard a struggle.”

  “Not necessarily,” Father Mateo said. “A heavy sleeper might not wake, especially if the struggle didn’t last very long, or if Ishiko-san did not cry out.”

  Gato returned to Hiro’s side and pawed at his knee. When he raised his hands, the cat hopped into his lap. He stroked her fur as she circled once and lay down.

  “Maybe the thief followed Ishiko-san to the burial ground and returned for the silver after she was dead.” The Jesuit lowered his voice. “Or what if Kane is the killer?”

  “She has no motive to steal the silver. As Noboru’s wife, she has the benefit of it already.”

  “But not control over how it’s spent. You heard Noboru yesterday.”

  “Stealing it would make it almost impossible to spend. Her husband would surely question her newfound wealth, especially so soon after his own had disappeared.” Hiro rubbed one of Gato’s ears. The cat leaned into his hand and her purr reached a crescendo. “Not to mention, this village has nothing to spend it on.”

  Father Mateo looked disappointed. “I still believe the killer is the thief.”

  “If all goes well, we’ll learn the truth tomorrow. Executed properly, the plan I have in mind should catch the thief.” And, perhaps, the killer also.

  “You have a plan?”

  Hiro explained what he had in mind, but omitted a few details to avoid an argument.

  “Do you think it will work?” Father Mateo spooned the last of the gruel from his bowl and swallowed it.

  “I hope so.” After a moment’s hesitation, Hiro added, “Though it could complicate matters if the thief is also the killer.”

  “Then you do think it’s possible.”

  “Of course,” Hiro said. “People kill for power, love, or money. Ishiko had neither youth nor beauty, and her death gives no one any significant power. Which makes money the likely motive.”

  “Kane gains power from Ishiko’s death,” the priest objected.

  “None worth killing over,” Hiro said. “Kane’s husband inherits the ryokan, and he will run it as he has before. She could not spend any stolen coins without raising suspicions. Most importantly, Ishiko’s death increased the work that falls on Kane’s shoulders, and—as Ana pointed out—the girl seems less than fond of labor.”

  “Who else would have known about the silver? Otomuro-san?”

  “A man who can levy a tax, or a fine, can steal with the law’s consent.”

  “Hanako, then?”

  “Again, she had no need to steal. Raising the price of Noboru’s meals and entertainment would deprive him ofhis silver just as quickly, and without the risk of hanging.”

  “That leaves only Akako’s family, Mume and Taso, and Zentaro.” Father Mateo counted them off on his fingers.

  Hiro raised a warning hand as footsteps approached the guest room. After a rapid knock, the door slid open.

  Noboru stood on the threshold. “We have come to prepare your futon.”

  He stepped aside and Kane scuttled into the room.

  She blinked at the sight of the empty bowls. Recovering quickly, she crossed to the built-in cabinet beside the door, slid it open, and removed the bedding.

  While Kane unfolded the futons and laid them out, Noboru said, “I have been thinking. You have an obligation to return the missing silver. After all, the yūrei returned, and my mother died, because of your servant’s greed.”

  Kane straightened. “Noboru! No! Your words will summon her again!”

  Chapter 25

  “Nonsense. Noboru gave his wife a dismissive look. Finish your task.”

  “Ana did not steal your silver.” Father Mateo stood up.

  “And your mother died before the coins were stolen,” Hiro added. Though greed may well have factored into her death.

  “Every time she comes, she takes two victims,” Kane whispered breathlessly. “She’s not finished.”

  “Enough!” Noboru snapped. “I told you already, no one else will die.”

  “But the priest didn’t come.” Kane covered her face with her hands. Her shoulders shook.

  “He will be here soon.” Noboru’s cheeks turned red. “We can discuss this later.”

  Kane lowered her trembling hands and unfolded a quilt atop the closest futon. When she finished, she stood up and wiped a tear from her eye. “Will Otomuro-san reduce the fine, if no one else. . .” She seemed unable to complete the sentence.

  “The fine?” Father Mateo echoed.

  “A penalty.” Noboru crossed his arms. “For the curse our family brought upon this village. It increases every time the ghost returns.”

  “Please,” Kane begged, as her eyes filled up with tears once more, “don’t talk about her. She will come.”

  “Take the bowls to the kitchen,” Noboru said, “and get the one from their servant’s room as well.”

  Kane grabbed the bowls and hurried from the room. As she crossed the threshold, a tear ran down her cheek and dropped into Father Mateo’s empty bowl.

  When she disappeared from view, Noboru bowed his head. “Once again I must apologize for Kane.”

  “You do not fear your sister’s spirit?” Hiro asked.

  “Why should I? I did not cause her death.”

  “And yet you lied to us about it.”

  Hiro turned, startled by the unusual anger in Father Mateo’s voice.

  “We know what Otomuro’s brother did,” the Jesuit said.

  Noboru raised a hand to his throat. His face went pale. “Who told you? Nevermind. If you know, then you also understand why I could not tell the truth. If I accused a samurai, I would share my sister’s fate.”

  “A fact you should remember before accusing us of angering her spirit, or attempting to force Father Mateo’s housekeeper to return the silver she did not steal,” Hiro replied.

  Noboru forced a mirthle
ss smile. “I suppose that means you still have no intention of replacing what was taken from me. So, I will leave you to your rest.” He bowed and closed the door.

  Father Mateo stared at the shoji. “Do you think that’s really why he lied to us about her death? Or is he hiding something?”

  “Those options are not mutually exclusive.” Hiro removed his swords from his obi and set them beside his futon. “But we have a lot to do tomorrow so, tonight, let’s get some sleep.”

  “Hiro!”

  The shinobi jolted awake at Father Mateo’s frightened whisper and sprang to his feet, wakizashi in hand.

  The Jesuit stood beside the open veranda door. Moonlight and freezing air swirled in, along with a distant, keening wail.

  Hiro saw no threats. “Have you lost your senses? Close that door.”

  “Th-the ghost—” Father Mateo pointed toward the teahouse as the silent keening stopped and began again.

  “That is a woman,” Hiro said. “Perhaps a deer. But not a ghost.”

  “I saw her, Hiro,” the Jesuit whispered. “When I opened the door for Gato, she was out there in the snow, beside the teahouse.”

  “You saw the yūrei.” Hiro didn’t even try to disguise his disbelief. “You don’t believe me.” Father Mateo shivered.

  “I believe we’ll freeze to death if you don’t close that door.”

  Gato leaped back over the threshold, padded across the floor, and tried to burrow under Hiro’s quilt. The distant wailing ceased.

  “I’m telling you, I saw her,” Father Mateo insisted. “Glowing, just as Saku said.”

  Hiro crossed the room and looked out the shoji. The brief snowstorm had ceased and the clouds had parted, revealing a haloed moon that illuminated the world with a silver glow. A veil of undisturbed, sparkling snow lay over the ground.

  In the silence that followed the ghostly cries, not even a breath of wind disturbed the air.

  “You must have imagined it,” Hiro said.

  “I would not believe it myself, if I had not seen her.”

  “What, precisely, did you see?”

  Once again, the Jesuit pointed toward the teahouse. “As I opened the door, I saw a light across the road, between the teahouse and the forest. It was a woman in a pale robe, with her hair unbound. She glowed.”

  “Did you see her face?” Hiro asked.

  “She was facing the forest, and floating in that direction. When she reached the trees, she turned and looked in this direction—and then she vanished.”

  “You mean she went into the forest?”

  “I mean she vanished. The glow winked out and she was gone.” Hiro closed the door. “You saw Hanako, or Masako, walking out to the latrine.”

  “In a glowing robe? Floating above the ground?”

  “A trick of the moonlight. Or you were still asleep.”

  Father Mateo gestured to the purring lump beneath Hiro’s quilt. “Do you think I let the cat out in my sleep?”

  “There is no yūrei,” Hiro returned to his futon and set the wakizashi on the floor again. “Whatever you saw, it has a reasonable explanation.”

  Father Mateo crossed his arms.

  Hiro yawned and covered himself with the quilt. “I will prove it, tomorrow morning, when we see that woman’s footprints in the snow.”

  Just after dawn, Hiro woke to the sound of a woman’s screams.

  He grabbed his sword and leaped to his feet with a nasty suspicion that Father Mateo’s midnight sighting might have been more than a nightmare after all.

  The Jesuit pushed his quilt aside and stood up. Like Hiro, he slept fully dressed. He hadn’t even removed the wooden cross from around his neck. “Did you hear that?”

  Hiro thrust his swords through his obi. Before he could answer the question, someone pounded on the ryokan’s front door.

  “Noboru-san!” an urgent voice called. “Come at once!”

  “That sounds like Akako.” Father Mateo started toward their door, but Hiro extended a hand to prevent him from opening it.

  “Wait.”

  Footsteps thumped overhead, down the stairs, and across the common room.

  Only when he heard the front door creak on its hinges did Hiro withdraw his hand and allow the Jesuit to slide the shoji open wide enough to look through.

  Akako stood on the porch, jacket askew. “Noboru-san, you must come now. Hanako-san—”

  “Is she injured?” Noboru sounded terrified.

  “She is fine,” Akako said breathlessly, “but Masako-san is dead. The yūrei killed her in the night.”

  Noboru slipped on his shoes and ran outside, leaving the door ajar.

  Chapter 26

  “We must find out what happened to Masako!” Father Mateo headed for the entry.

  Hiro closed the guest room door to prevent Gato’s escape and followed the Jesuit. They crossed the street and walked around the left side of the teahouse, following Akako and Noboru’s tracks in the thin veneer of snow.

  A storehouse and a small latrine sat behind the teahouse, near the edge of the forest. A lantern hung from a hook beside the entrance to the latrine, but the buildings were otherwise featureless. Just past the latrine, a pair of long-limbed cedars rose into the air, their branches stretching over the small wooden building like skeletal hands reaching out to grasp the teahouse.

  Akako and Noboru stood just to the right of the latrine, beside Hanako, with their backs to the travel road. They appeared to be staring at something on the ground.

  From a distance the object looked like a rumpled pile of dark blue cloth, but as Hiro drew closer he recognized the form as a human.

  Hanako turned at the sound of Hiro and Father Mateo’s footsteps in the snow. She shook her head. “Get away. I do not want you here.”

  Masako lay on her back with her arms at her sides. Frost silvered her indigo robe, and thin layers of snow covered the dead girl’s hands and bare feet. Ice crystals fused her hair into a stringy veil that covered her face and neck, and most of her chest as well.

  Hiro noted the robe’s dark color. Unless the priest had seen Masa-ko’s spirit leave her body, she was not the “ghost” Father Mateo claimed to have seen the night before.

  But perhaps he had seen the killer.

  Hiro gestured to the footprints on the ground, and to a single set that led into the forest. “As I told you,” he said in Portuguese, “a ghost does not leave tracks.”

  “Get away from here!” Hanako screeched.

  “Hanako-san, please.” Akako extended a reassuring hand, but the woman backed away.

  “This is their fault. I do not want to die!”

  Noboru continued staring at the body, as if in shock.

  More footsteps approached. Hiro turned to see Otomuro heading in their direction, in the company of a younger man that Hiro recognized as Chitose.

  When he arrived, Otomuro scowled at Masako’s body. “Her?” He seemed strangely offended. “What did she do to provoke the spirit’s wrath?”

  Hanako stabbed a finger at Father Mateo, and then at Hiro. “They are to blame. They said that. . .she. . .does not exist. They made her angry and she took revenge.”

  “The spirit always takes a second victim,” Noboru whispered. “I did not believe. . .”

  “You spoke to them about her in my teahouse.” Hanako wrapped her arms around her chest. “You put us all in danger, and Masako paid the price.”

  Chitose stood beside Masako’s body. “We should move her. It is wrong to leave her lying in the snow.”

  “No!” Hanako released herself and raised her hands in protest. “If you take her inside, the ghost will surely follow.”

  “Masako is dead.” Chitose’s hands clenched into fists. “Nothing can harm her anymore.”

  “I was not speaking of Masako,” Hanako’s voice grew shrill. “What if it comes for me!”

  “I would like to examine the girl before you move her.” Hiro knelt beside the body without waiting for an answer.

  Beh
ind him, Hanako gasped. “If you disturb her, she will become a yūrei too!

  Unfortunately, Masako’s body revealed little more up close than it had at a distance. Her body lay on its back as if in sleep, except for the curtain of hair that the killer had used to veil her head and upper body. Her fingernails appeared unbroken, and Hiro saw no signs of bruising or defensive injuries on her hands. He could not see her neck through the curtain of hair, but anticipated it would show signs of strangulation, like Ishiko.

  Whoever overpowered the girl had apparently done it quickly.

  “Noboru!” Hanako cried. “Make him stop!”

  Noboru blinked as if suddenly aware of his surroundings. “Please. . .you are upsetting Hanako-san.”

  “We are trying to help her,” Father Mateo countered.

  “The yūrei will return and kill us all,” Hanako wailed.

  Hiro rose and stepped away from the body. He had seen enough, at least for the moment.

  “Take her body to the ryokan,” Noboru said. “You can lay her beside my mother.”

  Before the innkeeper finished the sentence, Chitose bent and grasped Masako’s arms. His father took the dead girl’s feet, and together they lifted her off the frozen ground.

  As they passed, Father Mateo made the sign of the cross and bent his head in prayer.

  Hiro examined the dirty, frozen ground beneath the place where the body lay. It showed no sign of a struggle, and he saw no indication of a body being dragged across it, either. Whoever killed Masako must have carried her corpse and left it in the snow.

  Unfortunately, the girl’s diminutive size made that a fairly simple task. Anyone in the village, except for Saku, could have carried her with ease.

  “Hanako-san. . .” Noboru took a step toward the entertainer, but she shied away as if his touch would burn and ran off toward the entrance to the teahouse.

  When Hanako disappeared around the corner, Noboru hung his head and started walking slowly toward the ryokan.

  Otomuro took a step toward Father Mateo. “What are you doing here?”

  “Here?” the Jesuit looked confused.