Warning: Nothing of importance. Smallish references to P. G. Wodehouse's books – I really couldn't help myself.
Disclaimer: Me no ownies……. Alas…….
-Chapter 2: Meetings
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'So far, no sign of anything sinister – but let us live in hope…' - Agatha Christie - Cat Among The Pigeons -"Why, it's Mouri Ran-chan! Have you come to visit Sonoko-chan or to solve our local mystery?"So much for incognito, Ran thought while facing her former high school doctor and smiling brilliantly back. "Doctor Araide! I didn't know you were there, as well…"
"I have come down to the country for a few days," was the tranquil response, in a tone that made her think that if she didn't already know about the study and the letters, he wasn't going to tell her about it. He hadn't changed much in the five years they had not met – his features had sharpened and there were small crow's-foot wrinkles at the corner of his eyes, making him look just older and more experienced. "I trust you remember my wife "
Now Ran was on for a surprise. She remembered Hikaru-san perfectly well, but last time she had seen her she had been a maid at the late doctor Araide's house. Yet, curiously, she had never suspected this result to arise from that closeness between the two young people. Yasumoto Hikaru had grown into a young mother of thirty-two, beautiful in her sort of way, with a sweet smile, a swollen belly, and in her attitude remnants of her previous diffidence.
The following minutes were pleasant enough. They recalled their former meetings, and though Araide's presence could not help but remind her of Shinichi (though unknowingly, since he had never known of her long-lost intimacy with a man who was now one of Japan's most renowned detectives, and indeed had never been aware that himself had been close to him at a time), but it was a nice dive in the past. How the medical cabinet was going, when the baby should be born, what good work herself was doing as a lawyer – so many questions and enquiries she was glad to make or answer to.
Two people passed them as they talked, deep in conversation (one of those she recognised to be a well-known politician) before they were interrupted by the butler, who, in the true Jeeves-fashion, informed them that he had carried Mouri-san's luggage into her room, and suggested that they should depart into a nearby sitting-room, where he should then be able to bring them refreshments.
It was only when they were situated in a quiet drawing-room that Ran risked herself to tackle the subject, in an oblique way. She asked after their stay, its length, the other guests; and though he answered amiably to the two first questions, the third brought restraint in Araide's voice. He mumbled a few casual words, rapidly drowned them in his glass of plum-brandy, and switched to something else.
"I came here once when I was younger," Ran attacked on another flank. "But the buildings have greatly changed. I did not know the manservant who welcomed me. Are there a great many of them? Such a grand mansion must require a huge lot of attendance."
"Surprisingly, there aren't a great deal of them," Araide answered thoughtfully. "There's Briggs, of course – that's the butler – who knows everything and takes care of everything, the porter at the gate, the cooks in the kitchen and one or two chambermaids, I think."
"Three," Hikaru-san corrected. "One for each floor."
"I only saw two. They are all the same."
Ran left them to it and relaxed in her seat, sipping carefully the brown-gold alcohol. It was just as well that the two of them should be there. It narrowed the spectre of suspects – for she refused to picture them (either or both indifferently) as the insane writers of deranged anonymous letters. If anyone were ever sane, they were…
She thought she could rule out the domestics, as well – for the moment, at least. The letters showed a close knowledge of all the guests' reputations and works, and who could better be informed of that but one of them? Yes – unless one of the menservants had got hired under some false name and pretended to be someone else; in which case he could be just anyone, and all the more suspect. But she could easily check from Sonoko whether one or several of their domestics had entered but recently at their service.
Those were the first moves. Yet then, what was one to do? Patrol the corridors at night? Control the guests' rooms? No, that was silly, or at least impossible on her own. She needed outward assistance, and Sonoko and Makoto-kun were going on Sunday…
Of course, there was always the police's aid, if it came to that, but if scandal was to be prevented on every account… There would arrive the press and journalists and whatnot if the police came. Then again, what would they find? Nothing, in all likelihood. The Poison Pen, whoever that was, was clever enough to destroy all proofs and present a perfectly innocent face. And that might have led to suspicion, too; only, she supposed from what she had seen and guesses of the guests so far, so they would all. They could not risk even to be suspected.
No, what such a place and such a situation wanted was a sleuth, a nosey parker who could creep in anywhere and hear everything without being either seen nor heard. A paid detective… Shinichi…
Her mind strayed away for a few moments, then came back to the point. The best thing to do, for the moment, was to shut up and listen. In this state of things (and the letters had slowly built to a tension that was all the more likely to break rather sooner than later), it was next to impossible that nothing at all should happen till Sunday. By then, as she had told Sonoko, there was nothing to do but wait.
-
The first evening Ran spent at the mansion was nothing like she had imagined, and certainly nothing like she had thought should be the reunion of personalities gathered for a study. The atmosphere, if anything, was relaxed; if the guests were divided into groups, those seemed to have formed under the necessities of discussions and not the pressure of rivalries. Only Hikaru-san seemed to be a bit excluded from the lot, but that was only because the subjects of conversation were no objects of interest to her; accordingly, Ran went and sat by her, and engaged conversation about the baby, who was to be a little girl. She caught the glance of gratitude her companion's husband sent to her, then, as the questions and answers on both sides were slow-paced, she let her gaze wander through the room.
The rest of the guests were strewn around the room in groups of two or three; often, as perfect hosts, Sonoko and Makoto went from one to the other, and got their lot of smiles. By the heart stood two rather tall men, both dressed in dark business suits; one of them was a politician and the other a well-known lawyer. His name was Asama Taichi and Ran had always admired him and his work; it had been a shock to meet him there.
Another lawyer, a woman this time, who reminded her vividly of her own mother, was presently talking to Dr Araide, and he did not look like he was having the time of his life. She probably disagreed with his entire argument and was busy breaking it point by point. A second woman sat alone beside the library, reading, - she was a strict-looking practitioner, with thick-mounted glasses encircling her dark eyes and an enormous book in her hands; she had barely looked up from it when Ran had been introduced. Sometimes, one out of the group of three people who were animatedly talking right beside her right elbow turned to ask her a question, and she answered briefly and clearly before she dived back into her reading.
At this point the conversation with Hikaru-san accelerated, and Ran got interested. Her concentration was such that she didn't hear anyone approaching until long legs stretched under her nose and a hand was extended in front of her face, together with a pair of light eyes and a cheeky, unfaltering grin.
"Mouri Ran, aren't you?" said the youth cheerfully. "Look, I'm frightfully sorry to burst in and all that, but I think I owe you a thanks."
He looked anything but frightfully sorry, seated comfortably between her chair and Hikaru's, the hand she had bewilderedly shaken now tapping a rapid, gleeful rhythm on the chair's armrest. She was fairly certain she had never seen him before. "What should you thank me for?" she asked.
"Oh, well – you saved the guvernor from the gallows two years ago, so since all his money would go down to some old cousin because of that bloody will and for now he still deigns to gratify my existence with a coin or two per month, I thought I'd drop at your knees and consume myself with gratitude, eh, what?"
Wonderful – after Jeeves, Bertie Wooster. She recognised him now – recognised the resemblance, at least. He was the son of a great industrialist whose cause she had defended in court a few years back – charge of murder. The man was a crooked swindler who had got involved in all sorts of fishy business ever since he was fifteen, but in that case, he had been innocent – though she wouldn't have been surprised if he'd done it. What his son was doing here right now, though, she had no idea.
"Yes, of course – now I recognise you. And what are you doing down in the country, Kano-san?"
""Ah, please – Akira. 'Kano-san' is my father. I hate it when people talk like they'd do to my father. Discourages a fellow." He punctuated this with a dazzling smile that probably sent many girls weak at the knees; it would not do for her, though. For one thing, she was several years older than him. For another, he could very well be the author of those letters.
"Very well – and what are you doing down in the country at this time of the year, Akira-san?" she repeated, mid-mocking, mid-severe.
"Damned if I know." He shook his head sadly. "The old bird sent me, but the reason – there! What does one do in the country? This and that, I expect. Fishin' and huntin'."
Though unable to determine whether he was very clever or very stupid, Ran watched with amusement as he cocked his head to the side and called out to one of the two men who'd been talking by the hearth, "Hullo, Ken-kun! Would you mind coming over for a minute?"
Kenjin Kenzaki excused himself and approached them. He was a well-preserved man of forty-five or so, with a smiling composure and smart readiness of attitude; he seated himself among them, helped himself to a slice of cake, and looked fit to answering questions.
"That lady here," Akira-san said with a pointed look at Ran, "demands to know what exactly we are here for. Do you have an idea, by any chance?"
"Not in the least," was Kenjin-san's answer. "Nothing much. Fishing and hunting, I suppose."
""That's what I said," triumphed Akira-san with a gratified voice, and having thus proved his intellectual superiority over common mortals, extended his long legs further afield, got out a cigarette, and proceeded to feel his pockets for something to light it with.
"You see, miss, this mansion is a very solitary place, so there aren't so many occupations," Kenjin-san was that kind of person who can dissert on any kind of subject once they got a start, "but the hunting season had just begun and there is a fish-full river fifteen minutes away in the forest—"
"Damn!" Akira-san expostulated from his right. "I say, Ken-kun, don't you possess one of those small items they call lighters? They come in prodigiously handy sometimes."
"I've got matches," Kenjin-san answered. He fished in his pocket, produced the box, and tossed it over to him. The creaking of the match against the sole of one's shoe, the fizzling of the flame, then the rapid shake of the hand to blow it out; one could see Akira's grin through the light smoke.
At eleven, the party broke off without a hitch. Ran exchanged a few words with Sonoko, and was able to tell her that nothing suspicious had arisen from her conversation with her neighbours; then proceeded to walk up to her room when she was stopped in mid-staircase by Sakagushi Shizue's voice calling behind her, "I would like to have a word with you, Mouri-san, if you can spare me a few minutes."
Accordingly, Ran came down again and followed the elder lawyer to her rooms, which were large and well furnished, and whose window curtains their owner impatiently drew on the night outside.
"Do sit down," she said, remarking that Ran had remained on the doorstep, hesitating. "Can I offer you anything? Tea or coffee – or brandy maybe?"
Ran accepted the brandy, feeling with some reason that caffeine, at this time of the night, would keep her from sleeping, and sat in silence while her host stirred up the fire and seated herself opposite her guest, where the flames cast reddish glimmers on her horn-rimmed glasses. She was a very beautiful woman around forty of age, with dark-brown hair gathered at her back, a well-cut tailleur and a severe look – the kind of person who can get more from you in ten words than you get from her in a thousand.
"Mouri-san, I do not think myself mistaken when supposing your coming to visit Suzuki-san at this precise moment is no coincidence," she got to the point immediately, her voice serious and grave. Behind those glasses, which hid the shade of her eyes, a razor-sharp mind must be at work. "I should not be surprised at all if she had called you for the matter of those anonymous letters."
Ran might have fidgeted. Twenty-eight or no, she felt like a disobedient child faced with a particularly strict teacher. "Actually, she did," she admitted. "And I should warn you that you are suspected of writing them, as well as everybody else."
This, unexpectedly, brought a first, small smile. "I should think very ill of you if you didn't suspect me," the lawyer said. She stood up to fill her empty glass, proposed some more to Ran, who declined, and sat back down. "I have heard much about you, Mouri-san – I even went to one of our audiences once to see you in court. You are a very talented lawyer." She paused, for the necessary protestations to fill in, and continued, "I do not, however, think you are the fittest person for this particular matter, yet I will do everything in my power to help you."
Ran muttered a thanks and watched her extricate a novel from the nearest bookcase and open it. "If, therefore, you cannot tell me anything of your personal deductions, I can tell you of mine, and provide you with intelligence others have no access to."
She displayed before Ran's eyes a whole stack of letters, fifteen or twenty maybe, all of them identical in paper, size and printing to the anonymous letters Sonoko had shown her. The messages they contained, however, differed: they were grimmer, nastier, and turned to downright obscenity towards the last two or three; the person who'd written them must have loathed Sakagushi-san very much.
Ran studied them closely, attentive to any distinctive detail, however small and insignificant, that might differ them from the letters Sonoko had entrusted her with, but as far as she could see they were similar in every way. Size of the card, size and ink of the letters, grain of the paper – she could discern no difference.
"Of course," she said, laying them aside with the intention to compare them more carefully with the ones she had locked in a drawer of her bedroom, "you might easily have written them yourself and pretended you had received them." This was alleged by the number of letters: if she was saying the truth, she must have found at least two of them per day, and very likely more.
"Of course," was the short reply.
"Do any other guests have received more letters they have not shown Sonoko?" But what could be their reason for keeping it a secret? If it came to that, why had she?
"Not that I know of. But of course, I haven't told them about those, so they have really no reason for telling me." A pause ensued, which she spent watching into the hearth, the silence merely broken by the crackling of the fire and a log occasionally falling down, whipping up a whirl of sparks. Ran watched her serious profile and wondered what kind of thinking was forming itself behind the thick, light-reflecting glasses.
"Mouri-san, all I can tell you is this," her host finally said, without looking at her at first. "That I have no reason whatsoever for assaulting with pointless anonymous letters such a respectable family as the Suzukis, but that I have no reliable defence to offer against my having done it." (She evidently was reluctant at using words such as alibis, mobiles, witnesses and such.) "I can, however, give you my personal deductions in regard to the matter – unless you should think I could try to influence or impress upon you."
"I'm open to suggestions," Ran said, a little quaveringly. She did not wish the older woman to be the author of the letters; her mind and faculty both to reason and to foresee would make her a remarkable opponent, and it was likely she should never pin her down to anything. "You are innocent until proven guilty, in any case."
Sakagushi-san wasted no time on thanks. "Very well. I think our man (I tend to think it is a man, for the style of the letters is more masculine than feminine, unless it is a remarkable imitation – in which case the fraud could produce itself sometime) I think our man is a very clever person. His mind must have a capacity to reason and foresee," echoing without knowing it Ran's own thoughts about her a moment ago, "and a peculiarly developed insight – too much, maybe, for him not to balance constantly on the thin edge between genius and mental decay."
She picked up the poker and piled two more logs in the hearth: flames rose briskly up, with a shower of sparkles. "I think you ought to be very careful, Mouri-san."
Later that night, as she lay sleepless in her bed and considered thoughtfully the different conversations that had followed one another at day, it occurred to her that she should perhaps keep track of the dates and incidents, in case the matter was to be handed later on to the police or to a paid detective. (Any name resembling that of 'Kudo' was kept firmly at bay.) She got up, slipped in a dressing gown, and sitting at the desk facing her bed, she took up Sonoko's dossier containing the letters.
For a few moments, she considered them in silence; in the darkness only partly broken by the glow of her desk lamp, with the gloomy nightly noises and atmosphere surrounding her bedroom like a long curtain, the neat words stood out against their white background with nasty accuracy. It was no longer difficult to imagine the ghostly figure tiptoeing down the corridors as though draped in shadows, the lunatic mind at work, writing out grim messages and threat-like notes, slid under people's doors—
She started, her heart suddenly thumping hard against her ribs: a small white rectangle of paper lay on the parquet, just a few inches from the threshold.
After the first initial shock, and once the frantic ba-bump-ba-bump in her chest had eased down, she found it was not so much of a surprise after all. In fact, she had been a fool not to expect it. Her assumed ignorance of the whole study-and-letters matter was easily see-through…
She picked up the card and read it carefully. "I'll keep that in mind," she murmured, as though her voice was by some miracle able to reach the author of the words.
On the white paper, black letters wrote out, disagreeably, "DON'T COME CRYING AFTERWARDS AND SAY YOU WEREN'T WARNED."
-
To all those who expected Shinichi and were disappointed… don't kill me (again). He's in there, I swear. But you haven't, er… met him right now. (sadistic author cackles for herself) (second update in a week! Yayness!!)
Thanks for reading!