The investigation of the second crime scene begins. There are no unnatural tricks used here, either. The kettle is going to be important later. Pay attention.
The investigation of the second crime scene begins.
There are no unnatural tricks used here, either.
The kettle is going to be important later.
Pay attention.
“Kazuo! Are you okay?”
As Hoshizono's voice reached his ear, Kazuo suddenly felt someone supporting his back.
“Ah, wha-? ...Y-Yes. I'm fine.”
It may have been the only reason he was speaking as clearly as he was was because he could see Asako peering worriedly from behind Hoshizono. After taking a moment to catch his breath, Kazuo wiped his face with his hand. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Yumi standing away from the others, stunned into silence.
“Looks like he's dead.”
Akane sounded distracted. She stood in front of the door and looked fearfully into the room.
“Well, let's investigate.”
As Akane went to enter the room, Hoshizono...
“Wait.”
Gently held her back.
“What? What is it?”
“Look. What's that there?”
Hoshizono pointed to the entryway.
“Good question. What is that?”
Akane tilted her head.
At first, Kazuo didn't see what they were talking about. It was thin enough that you'd be unlikely to notice unless you were looking for it.
Inside the room, right in the door frame, there was a black thread stretched taut horizontally across the entrance. The thread, positioned at about chest level for a person of average height, drew a straight black line in the air, blocking the entrance.
“It's like we've all been banished from the room,” Sagashima said with a blink.
“Mr. Zaino would be the type to do something like that.”
Akane gave the thread a rough push. Without a sound, it snapped and disappeared off the sides of the entrance.
With Hoshizono taking the lead, he, Kazuo, and Sagashima cautiously entered the room. Akane and Asako stopped in the entryway. It was like a replay of yesterday morning.
The room was large, about twice the size of Kazuo's mattress room. [See Fig. 6, Staff Room]
To the left of the entrance, there was a curtain, with three beds in front of it, spaced apart. The room had originally been partitioned, with the nail marks where the partition had once been hung like in a hospital forming a U on the ceiling. On the opposite wall, next to the door, stood a steel office desk. Stacked atop it were a cardboard box, a desk lamp, an old wall clock, and other such assorted junk.
The corpse was lying on its back on the bed. He wore a sweatshirt and sweatpants.
Zaino's legs were twisted and thrown off to one side under the blanket. His upper body was exposed, and the way his face turned to look at them left a vivid impression. The corpse didn't appear to have been disturbed much, probably because the culprit had attacked him in his sleep. Kazuo wondered if the reason the blanket was overturned was because he had managed to put up a bit of a struggle. A dark red object hung from the corpse's half-open mouth, like a giant leech trying to crawl into his mouth. When Kazuo realized that it was Zaino's own tongue, he looked away.
Even after what happened yesterday, there was no way he could have gotten used to something like this. In fact, it came as an even greater shock today. Last night... No, only a few hours ago, they'd been drinking together and making noise. This was different then Iwagishi. More than anything, Kazuo felt a deep regret. If he hadn't drank so much last night, this might not have happened. If Zaino hadn't passed out drunk, he might have woken up when the culprit came in. He might not have died. And if Kazuo had stayed up to keep watch like he'd originally intended, he might have noticed that something was happening downstairs... This was partially his fault. Kazuo's head spun.
Hoshizono was sucking on his lip, the color draining from his face.
“Kazuo, let's take a closer look.”
He was clearly forcing himself.
Akane, Sagashima, and Asako all remained at the entrance, and Yumi and Mikiko didn't even bother looking in.
At Hoshizono's urging, Kazuo made up his mind and approached the bed in the back.
The familiar cylindrical stove was next to the bed, with Zaino's shoes neatly arranged next to it. There was no flame in the stove, and a kitchen knife lay on the floor a bit beyond it, silvery blade shining.
“Kazuo, look. There's a knife. I wonder if the culprit used it... Although, I don't see any bloodstains anywhere.”
“No, Mr. Zaino had that for self-defense.”
Kazuo turned away from the corpse as he explained. The useless knife's blade lazily pointed at the wall.
“I see... So it was Mr. Zaino's.”
Hoshizono murmured sadly to himself.
“What do you think? Nothing we can do?” Akane asked from behind them.
Hoshizono looked back at her.
“No. He's dead.”
Akane frowned.
“I can't believe this... What is this, a dime-store mystery novel?”
Kazuo felt the same way.
Hoshizono craned his neck to observe the corpse.
“This... doesn't appear to be a rope. What is this?”
He must have been referring to whatever was around the corpse's neck. It was a thick cloth twisted into a makeshift rope. One side was tied to the iron bed frame, just like in Iwagishi's case. It coiled around Zaino's neck and dangled over his shoulders. A silver metal fitting could be seen in the part twisted around the neck.
“Sir, isn't that a zipper there?”
“Where? Ah, I see it. It is a zipper. Oh, it's a pair of pants. They used a pair of pants with a zipper.”
Without question, it was a pair of pants. Brown slacks. Kazuo remembered Zaino had been dancing on the sofa last night in those same pants. The culprit had killed him with his own clothes.
“Kazuo, look over there.”
This time, Hoshizono was the one to point, at the floor on the other side of the stove. A kokeshi doll had fallen there. He hadn't seen it before because it lay in the shadow of the stove. There was a faint red mark on the simple drawing of its smiling face. Kazuo had seen that doll somewhere before.
“It's the same M.O. as in Mr. Iwagishi's case. They hit him with something, then they strangled him.”
Hoshizono's lips curled as he spoke. His tone was grim.
“There don't appear to have been any personal belongings left here, either. Our culprit is a cautious one after all.”
With that, Hoshizono turned on his heel. Kazuo followed the tall man.
At the entrance, Akane was turning her neck with a hand on her hip and a cigarette in her mouth. As usual, her body language was an old man's.
“Hey, Hoshizono. What do you make of that?”
Akane ruffled her hair and turned to look at Hoshizono and Kazuo.
To the right of the door was a strange object. It was an old-fashioned wicker umbrella stand with a kettle placed on top. Below the kettle were three phone directories. The covers read “Businesses: Western Saitama Prefecture”. The kettle was big and rugged, like the one used by the university rugby club.
“What sort of occult artifact is that?” asked Sagashima, sticking out his lips.
Asako bent down and picked something up off the floor.
“It's the thread, see? From before.”
The black thread was tied to the handle of the kettle. It was the one Akane had cut earlier.
The other half of the thread was hanging from a nail hammered into the wall to the left of the entrance, directly opposite the object. Asako also picked up that thread and brought both ends together. The thread was straightened out and blocked the entrance again. [See Fig. 7, Simple Alarm Using A Kettle] Akane crossed her arms.
“Aha, so it's an alarm. The phone books were used to adjust the height.”
“Oh, I see. When someone comes in, they pull the thread and the kettle falls, making a noise, right?”
When Kazuo said that, Hoshizono placed a finger between his eyebrows.
“Perhaps he got the idea when Mr. Sagashima knocked over the kettle yesterday.”
It had been at Iwagishi's lodge, when Sagashima knocked the kettle over when he burned himself.
“So Mr. Zaino set up a trick like this.”
When Asako said that, Sagashima responded...
“But it was no use. In fact, Ms. Kusabuki showed it just now. The kettle doesn't fall. The thread just snapped.”
“That's how it was.”
Akane took the thread from Asako.
“Look, even if I deliberately pull it, the kettle doesn't budge an inch. It's useless.”
Even though Akane was firmly tugging on the thread, the kettle wasn't moving. No wonder, seeing as how its spout was caught on the edge of the door frame. No matter how hard she pulled, the spout just dug deeper into the wooden frame.
“He relied on something as insecure as this, and the culprit took advantage of it,” Akane said regretfully.
Then she poked the kettle with a fingertip. Standing unstably on the phone books, it instantly fell down. There was a noise like thunder. Kazuo jumped in surprise. He hadn't expected the noise to be so loud. The tremendous cacophony shook his nerves and deafened his ears.
The kettle bounced three times, rolled for a bit, then stopped.
All five people in the room watched it with their eyes until it came to a stop.
When the kettle had quieted down, Sagashima took a shaky breath.
“That scared me... What a terrible noise.”
“Sorry... It scared the shit outta me, too. I thought my heart was gonna stop!”
Akane put a hand on her chest.
They heard someone cry out outside the door.
“What was that? Please, no more...”
Yumi's face timidly peered out from the hall.
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