The Master Key

PROLOGUE 1 April 1951: At the Otsuka Nakacho crossroads On that day, the snow (unusual for April) which had fallen on the night before was still half an inch deep in the morning. But before midday the sun peeped through the clouds and a thaw set in. In no time at all, the streets once again danced in the sunshine of spring. At exactly noon, a woman tried to cross the road at the Otsuka Nakacho crossroads, even though the lights were against her. Her head was completely hooded by a red scarf, and she wore a thick winter coat over black ski pants. This in spite of the fact that everyone else on the street was beginning to sweat slightly in the warm sunshine… When the woman had got about a third of the way across the road, a small van came racing towards her from the direction of the Gokokuji temple. It was fully laden with wooden kegs of nails. The young driver, a boy from the mountains, was affected by the snow; his mind was full of the rosy-cheeked girls of his native place, and he had his foot hard down on the accelerator as he came up the slope. The green light seemed to beckon his youthfulness on—hurry! hurry! it seemed to say. From the corner of his eye, he caught a sudden glimpse of the girl in the red scarf but to him it was just a further reminder of the girls in his snow-bound native village. Perhaps that was why he skidded on the tramlines, although one cannot be sure. At any rate, the inexperienced young driver slammed on hisbrakes, but the van did not respond to his efforts to control it. It slid right around and headed back towards the woman. The last thing the young man saw before closing his eyes was the red-scarved and astonished face of the woman as she came crashing through his windscreen. It took three minutes for the white ambulance to come from the fire station a hundred yards from the junction; it sped away with the casualties, and in another three minutes had delivered them to a nearby branch of the T University hospital. During this time, the girl opened her mouth and muttered something three times, but no one could catch what she was trying to say. By the time the ambulance reached the hospital, it was over. A tall, white-coated doctor examined the body and pronounced it dead. ‘In spite of the lipstick, this was a male,’ he added in a strangled voice. His face was quite expressionless. Those present had difficulty in repressing their laughter, until they were overcome by the solemnity of death, so that even the horror of the traffic accident was driven from their minds. The young driver, who had been but the instrument of destiny, was punished beyond reason. He was in deep shock, and even after admission to the hospital he seemed unable to close his mouth. He slavered constantly, and kept muttering disjointedly, but all he could say was, ‘The red scarf, the red scarf.’ Time passed. The busy police detectives waited for a family to come forward and identify the body of an unknown male, aged about thirty, who wore female dress…Time passed. A cub reporter covering crime, with time on his hands, went around the homosexual world of Ueno showing the photograph of the unidentified male… Time passed. The doctors and nurses at the hospital gradually ceased to joke during tea-breaks about the unidentified male, in female dress, who had been run over at the Otsuka Nakacho crossroads. But somewhere, a woman waited alone in a darkened room… waited for the man to come back to her. The room was on the fifth floor of an apartment block, buried in the shadows just two bus stops away from the Otsuka Nakacho crossroads. She awaited the return of the man whom she had dressed in her own red scarf, winter coat and black ski pants, the man who had gone off with slumped shoulders, without even looking back. She waited, alone, for seven years. She is still waiting. The name of the building where she lives is ‘The K Apartments for Ladies’.PART ONE Three hints The eye-witness: Three days before the accident The man stumbled yet again as he climbed the stairs. The Gladstone bag that he was carrying seemed to get heavier and heavier; already, he had had to stop on the landing of the third floor to change hands. He gazed at the brown dyed leather bag, cursing its weight, but betraying no emotion towards its contents. He was too far gone to think of that any more. All he was now concerned about was getting everything over with as soon as possible. He had been driven along for the last few hours by a feeling of resignation, a hope that the end was at last in sight. His consciousness seemed blocked by a wall, or blinded in limitless darkness. Now that the end was at last near, he felt no elation, merely a sense of despair. Shrugging his shoulders, he wiped his forehead with a handkerchief and carefully readjusted the red scarf around his face before picking up the leather bag again. The sweet female perfume on the scarf affected him profoundly. Recovering his spirits, he lifted the heavy case and carried it, bumping his knees, up the staircase. From time to time, he could hear footsteps or voices downstairs. Hurrying on, he reached the fifth floor and, pausing only to make sure there was no sign of life in the corridor, made his way to the door of a certain apartment.A girl was waiting there. Glancing at the travelling bag, she asked, ‘Did the receptionist say anything?’ ‘No, she was so deep in her newspaper that she didn’t even notice me.’ As he replied, he lowered the case onto the doorstep. The leather base curled and the bag overbalanced onto the concrete floor with a dull thump. ‘Hey, watch what you’re doing! You shouldn’t treat it so roughly!’ exclaimed the girl in a loud voice. The man wanted to point out how heavy the bag was, and how his hands were slippery with sweat. But he could only mumble, ‘It makes no difference.’ The woman, without seeking his help, lugged the bag into the middle of the room. ‘Poor little thing. Well, we’d better get him out quickly.’ ‘Poor little thing.’ The woman repeated herself, but the man could only slump on the floor and gaze blankly at her. The woman snapped apart the clasp of the bag, which fell open. Inside, there was the body of a small child. She unwrapped the thick blanket, revealing miniature features in apparently tranquil sleep. His silky flaxen hair glimmered like gold in the lamplight. The girl chattered ecstatically. ‘Oh my, oh my! Poor little fellow—we must get you out of this, mustn’t we now? What a good little boy to put up with such cramps for so long!’ As she bent down to draw the little blanket-swaddled body from the bag, she noticed for the first time that he was gagged with a white handkerchief stained with clotted black blood. After a while she spoke, but her voice now had a hollow ring to it.‘He’s dead.’ The man propped himself up on his elbows. ‘It couldn’t be helped. It was the only way.’ For a long while, all was silent in the room. The man and the woman just sat there with the corpse of the child in the travelling bag between them.