I wrote my fake name and fake address along with it on the lodging card, deposited fifty thousand yen, and finished the check-in formalities. The person at the front desk was looking down at the counter the whole time, but I did my best not to raise my face just in case.
My key card was for room number 1526. I declined having the bellboy guide me and went into the elevator.
When I got into the room, I immediately opened the window-curtains. Diagonally to the lower left, I could see the Hakozaki Metropolitan Expressway Junction. I took the binoculars out from the bag and quickly focused them. A dark blue domestic car coming from the Ginza district went by within my field of vision.
First test cleared. I breathed out in relief. I’d stayed at this hotel once in the past and knew that I could see the junction. Naturally, at that time, I hadn’t thought of any use for the view.
I took the phone and called home. It rang three times, and the answering machine message came on. I waited for the tone and opened my mouth.
“It’s room 1526. When you come in, knock.” Saying just that, I hung up. Juri would hear the message and immediately get going. I’d told her to use a taxi but to get off at Suitengu-mae on the Hanzomon subway line. From there, she could go underground and enter the hotel that way. Its B2 level was linked to the subway station. She could even use the elevator to go directly to the guest floors. In other words, she could completely bypass the front desk and lobby where people tended to be.
I took off my jacket, removed my tie, and started on the next part. I put the video camera on the tripod and set it at the window. Staring at the LCD screen, I adjusted the camera’s angle and zoom. Now it could capture all of the cars coming from the Ginza district.
Then I took out my laptop. Using a cord I’d brought, I connected it to the jack by the desk. To comply with the needs of businessmen, in addition to the internal phone, the hotel offered a normal line that could connect to the internet. That was also something I had found out on my previous visit.
I booted my laptop and tried to access the internet, and it worked right away. Just in case, I went to the CPT Owners Club. There was a new message from “Julie.”
Can’t wait (Julie)
Even though I’ve made my offer and prepared the money, I haven’t heard anything from them.
I wonder what they’re doing. Hurry up and give me what’s mine.
The golf caddy bag is crying at the door to be taken out.
Once again, I had to admire the incredibly well camouflaged writing. Anyone reading just this would surely think it was a girl who was bitching about not getting her car.
Anyway, that they were becoming impatient was evident. They couldn’t wait to find out what hand the kidnappers would play.
I took a bottle of mineral water out of the fridge and drank directly from it. I went over the plan again. I was certain that I’d omitted nothing and that there weren’t any holes in it.
I looked at the clock. Over thirty minutes had passed since I’d called. What was Juri doing?
Then, after another half-hour, there was finally a knock at the door.
“Who is it?” I asked just in case.
“Me,” was the reply I heard. I opened the door.
“What in the world were you doing? If you were just changing clothes—” After getting that far, I fell silent. Juri’s hair had turned brown, a brown that was almost blond. On top of that, it was shorter.
Heheh, she giggled. She quickly brushed up her hair.
“What the hell?”
“I dyed it. Not bad, right?” She looked around to appraise the room and approached the window. She looked into the video camera. “What are you filming?” she asked.
I wasn’t the one who ought to be answering questions. “What are you thinking?” I demanded.
“Huh?”
“That hair. You don’t think something as eye-catching as that is dangerous?”
“This? Eye-catching?”
“Look in the mirror.”
“You told me to disguise myself, so I tried my very best. I cut my hair on my own, dyed it myself. I also slipped into my new clothes, so look. Don’t I seem like a totally different person to you?” Her top was sleeveless and red, her bottoms were a black skirt. I was surprised that she had even changed her accessories and shoes. When had she bought them?
“I told you to wear a disguise that wouldn’t be eye-catching.”
Whether or not she’d heard me, she sat down on the bed and bounced her body up and down like a child playing on a trampoline. She was smiling.
“Hey, are you really a pro ad planner? Making a fuss over just this much is weird. Because right now there are fewer girls with black hair.”
“And why do they dye their hair? Is it so they wouldn’t stand out? That’s not it. It’s to be noticed.”
“Maybe at first, but now it’s different. Now black hair is just unfashionable. They don’t want to be that, so they dye their hair.”
I shook my head. It wasn’t the time to be discussing something so stupid. “Anyway, when you get home, change it back. You might have forgotten, but you’re a hostage. It’d be bizarre for a hostage’s hair color to change during the kidnapping.”
“Umm, the kidnappers are funky? They dyed the hostage’s hair for fun?”
“You’ll stop joking soon enough.” I took out the cellphone we had obtained at Akihabara and shoved it in front of her face. “There, the game begins. Call your Papa’s cell.”
“Me?” As might be expected, Juri’s face grew stern again.
“I was going to call, but since you’re here, I don’t need to. I want to make sure that my voice is heard by Katsutoshi Katsuragi as little as possible. Even though it’s very unlikely that your dad would remember it.”
“I call, then what do I say?”
“I’ve thought it out. Come here.” I had her sit in front of the computer. Then, I operated the keyboard and displayed a certain document on screen. It was something I had written while I waited for her. The document was divided into several items.
I pointed at the first bit. “Start with this. When you tell him this, you can hang up right away.”
Juri stared at the sentences with an earnest look. Seeing her face, I realized that it had all been a pose. Being strangely bold as she shopped and dying her hair were merely the flip side of her anxiety.
“Is it going to be okay calling from this phone?”
“Make it as brief as possible. If you take too much time, they’ll be able to specify the area.”
She took a deep breath. She looked at the buttons on the cellphone.
“Right now?”
“Right now. This is the number.” I put a note with Katsutoshi Katsuragi’s cellphone number in front of her. “If you don’t do it fast, the sun will set.”
“And it’s bad if it sets?”
“That video camera isn’t infrared, and the binoculars aren’t night-vision scopes.”
She seemed to take my meaning more or less and nodded wordlessly. With another deep breath, she passed the cellphone to her left hand and brought her right index finger toward the buttons. Looking at the note, she carefully pressed each number. After she finished dialing, she brought the phone to her ear and gently closed her eyes.
I could hear the rings, too. After two, the phone connected.
“Hello, it’s me. Juri. Don’t say anything, just listen to me.” She recast her gaze on the laptop screen. “Ten minutes after this, leave the house. Please load the caddy bag and other bag into the trunk of a car. Papa, you should be the only person in the car. Get on the Metropolitan Expressway and head toward Mukojima Interchange….Mukojima, MU-KO-JI-MA. If you can, follow the legal speeds as much as possible. Well, I’ll contact you again….Sorry, we don’t have the time to talk.”
She hung up and looked at me with plaintive eyes. Her cheeks were a little flushed. I gently kissed her half-open lips.
“Good job.”
“Am I contacting him n
ext time, too?”
“Well, basically, you communicate for me.”
“Basically?”
“You’ll understand soon.”
I accessed the internet again on my laptop. The Japanese Public Highway Corporation had a website that streamed information in real time. I went there. On the LCD display, a map of the Metropolitan Expressway appeared. The routes were indicated by white lines, but colored yellow or red depending on the congestion level. Today it seemed to be moving along more than weekdays, but even so, there were dabs of color here and there.
I followed the course that I thought Katsutoshi Katsuragi would take. There didn’t seem to be too much traffic for now, only a little red before and after Hakozaki Junction.
Alternating between looking at the clock and the map of the Metropolitan Expressway, I finished the bottle of water. I was horribly thirsty. Juri also started drinking a cola. Neither of us said a word. I refreshed the traffic information now and then, but there wasn’t a big change in the situation. Any would be due to an accident. Just not that, I prayed from the bottom of my heart.
I looked at the clock and snapped my fingers. “Juri, the phone.”
With a tense expression, she took the cellphone in hand. “What should I do next?”
“Ask him his present location. That’s all.”
Juri nodded and made the call. “Hello, it’s me. Where are you now?…Uh, Takebashi? You’ve just gotten past Takebashi.”
I gave her an okay sign with my fingers. She hurriedly hung up.
“He said Takebashi.”
“Okay.”
I shifted my gaze to the map of the Metropolitan Expressway. It was clear from Takebashi Junction to Edobashi. He could probably go at forty miles per hour. Edobashi to Hakozaki was moderately congested. That was an issue. The timing. It was all about the timing. I could only trust my instincts.
I snapped my fingers again. “Call. Confirm his position.”
Juri pressed the redial button. It seemed she connected immediately.
“Where are you now?…Almost at Edobashi?”
I stood up and gave her an okay sign. She hung up in a hurry.
I stood at the window and double-checked the position of the video camera. I beckoned Juri over.
“Call in one minute. Instruct him to exit at Hakozaki. After that, hand the phone to me.”
“To you? You’re talking to him?”
“Yes. From there I’ll do the talking,” I said, nodding.
Exactly one minute later, Juri made the call. Next to her, I took a gas canister out from the bag.
“Hello, it’s me. Exit at Hakozaki. Uh, don’t hang up,” she added hastily and handed the cellphone over to me.
I waited one beat and took the phone. It ought to have been light but felt awfully heavy. My heart started racing.
I stood at the window and used one hand to put the cellphone to my ear; in the other hand I held the pair of binoculars. I had already started the video camera.
I saw a silver-gray Mercedes gliding down the slope. I couldn’t make out the driver. I looked at Juri, who was peeking at the video camera monitor. She just nodded. It was Katsutoshi Katsuragi’s car.
I put the gas canister up to my lips, sucked in the gas, and spouted in one go, “Stay on the expressway and get on the circling lane.”
Juri, who was listening right next to me, turned to me dumbstruck. I couldn’t blame her. I had abruptly let out a voice like Donald Duck’s. I hadn’t thought a helium-based toy that altered my voice would ever serve such a use as this. It was a party novelty I’d bought for some occasion or other.
Katsutoshi Katsuragi must have been stunned, too. “What did you say? Wasn’t I supposed to go to Mukojima?”
I breathed in the gas before answering, “Drive in the circling lane.”
“There’s an entrance to the Ginza district on the right. I don’t need to go in there?”
“Drive in the circling lane.”
At that point, I hung up the phone and gave it back to Juri. I monitored Hakozaki Junction through my binoculars. A silver-gray Mercedes went past. Several passenger cars followed. There was also a truck. And a taxi.
The Mercedes appeared again. Hakozaki Junction formed a small ring. If you didn’t take any of the exits to head to any district, you could just go round and round until your tank was empty.
After the Mercedes had appeared a third time, I gave my next instruction to Juri. With a surprised face, she pressed the cellphone’s redial button.
“Hello, it’s me. The deal is off. Go home and wait for the next contact….I’m sorry. I don’t know what’s happening, either.”
After hanging up, she glared at me. I was sitting on the bed.
“What the heck, why did you suddenly cancel the deal?”
“Suddenly? That was the plan all along.”
“All along. You were going to cancel anyway?” Juri came to my side and looked down at me. “What was all that trouble for?”
“Just figuring out the police’s movements.”
I stood up and stopped the camera I had left running.
11
The screen displayed Hakozaki Junction. The silver-gray Mercedes kept driving past several times. Various other cars also drove through. However, the only car that was displayed more than once was Katsutoshi Katsuragi’s car.
“That’s weird. It really is only the Mercedes.”
Leaving the hotel room as it was, we had returned to the condo. Checkout was the next morning and I intended to do it then. If we checked out this evening, it would probably be suspicious to the hotel.
Juri was getting frustrated. “What the heck is weird? Just tell me already.”
“That the only car driving in the circling lane is the Mercedes is what’s weird. There ought to be more.”
“But there are. Trucks and taxis, there’s a ton.”
“Only once, though. The only car driving round and round in the circling lane is the Mercedes, there’s not one car among the others doing that.”
“That’s natural. The only car Papa was driving was the Mercedes.”
“But there should be a tail following that Mercedes. The police tail.”
Juri’s mouth half-opened. It seemed she’d finally understood my ploy.
“If there aren’t at least two or three of the police’s cars, even if they’re not following immediately after the Mercedes, that’s weird. If they don’t do that, they can’t instantly support him. But then, looking at this video, there aren’t cars that look like one. What’s going on?”
Juri tilted her head without answering, still looking at the screen. I didn’t think she’d have an answer to offer.
“There are a few things I can think of,” I said. “One is that for some reason or other, they didn’t have a police tail. In that case, they would be using an even better tracking method. For instance, an investigator was hiding in the Mercedes.”
“I wonder if there was one.” Juri’s face approached the screen.
“Let’s check.”
I chose an image from the video where the Mercedes’ interior was depicted most clearly and expanded it. The image was rough, but outlines were visible.
“It doesn’t look like there’s anyone in the backseat,” I noted.
“Might he have been hiding in the trunk?”
“That’s unlikely. A caddy bag and another bag with three hundred million yen were packed in there. Even if one person could fit, it’d be meaningless if he couldn’t move. It’s exactly why I instructed them to load the two bags in the trunk.”
Juri nodded, looking convinced. It seemed she had modified her opinion of me a bit.
“Hey, in books and movies, the police usually put a transmitter in the ransom, don’t they? Maybe they did that this time.”
“They may have deposited a transmitter,” I agreed. “But I doubt they’d rely on just that. Normally, they would always put a tail on, too. Or they would be watching from somewhere.”
&n
bsp; “Maybe they were.”
“Impossible. We instructed him to go to the Mukojima Interchange. Why would they think to watch Hakozaki Junction along the way?”
“I agree, but…what do you think, then?”
“I don’t know, which is why I’m bothered by it. Where in the world could those police guys have hidden?” I lay down on the sofa.
In fact, there was one more thing I could think of. But it was so hard to believe, I couldn’t let it out of my mouth. It was that the police hadn’t made a move. In other words, Katsutoshi Katsuragi hadn’t notified the authorities of the incident. In that case, it wasn’t a mystery that only the Mercedes had come.
But was it possible? Of course, I couldn’t say it wasn’t. Even Katsutoshi Katsuragi was a father. Maybe he was thinking first and foremost of his daughter’s life and obeying that instruction not to tell the police.
But, I shook my head. He wasn’t that sort of man. He wouldn’t succumb to a simple threat. He would try to outwit the kidnappers no matter what and save his daughter too. In order to do so, he needed the police’s help. The police had to be acting in some way. As Katsutoshi Katsuragi went around Hakozaki Junction like a horse on a merry-go-round, they had to have been waiting with bated breath for the kidnappers to appear.
“Hey, so when is it?” Juri asked.
“When is what?”
“The real time we exchange me and the ransom. What else? Or are you still planning some dry run?” She stood beside me and spread her arms. Her tone was mocking. It seemed she didn’t like my way of doing things.
“I just want to do it perfectly. That’s for your sake, too. You want the money, don’t you? You want revenge on the Katsuragis, don’t you?”
“Yes. But I don’t want to dawdle.”
“We’re not dawdling. We’re just being careful. Because, after all, this is Katsutoshi Katsuragi.”
“When are you doing it?”