The Gate of Sorrows Page 7

  The proportions were indeed like a tea caddy, but the details were ornate, with projecting bay windows adorned with fancy ironwork, reliefs on the outer walls, and a rooftop encircled by a crenellated wall like the turret of a medieval castle. To Shigenori, the building looked like a cheap imitation of an old European castle, or perhaps a monastery. In the building’s heyday, the entrance had actually been flanked by stone statues—a knight in a suit of armor and a robed goddess.

  When the tech bubble popped and the young tycoon’s business sense proved to be a myth, the building was left to its fate. Perhaps because it was a tax dodge, the building had multiple layers of ownership, and multiple people came forward claiming to own it, with each denouncing the others as imposters. A civil suit ensued, and the trustee sealed the building temporarily; then, when a resolution had seemed to be in sight, the building was reopened, gutted and remodeled several times by a series of commercial tenants—a beauty salon, a bar, a restaurant—with each new business going bust almost as soon as it opened its doors. Then another hasty renovation would follow, with another grand opening and another business failure.

  Around the time Shigenori moved to Wakaba, these attempts to do business at the tea caddy building came to an end, and it stood abandoned and empty. Rumor had it that the ex-wife of the original owner had managed to capture half the rights to the building, but without the other half she couldn’t sell it. It wasn’t close to any station, and its history seemed to put potential tenants off. The building’s doors were locked, but it was empty and unwatched, and it soon became a hangout for local teenagers, who seemed to have a talent for spotting opportunities of this kind. A year earlier there had been a minor panic over a small fire that had broken out. Since then the Ida District Association and associations from neighboring districts had taken to regularly patrolling the building, though all they could do was check the outside.

  “Is there something wrong with the building?” Shigenori asked. “Did the patrol run across something?”

  “It’s not easy to explain, actually,” said Shigeru. “In fact, it’s rather odd.”

  He found the image he had been searching for and held the camera out so Shigenori could see the screen. “Take a look.”

  It was a photo of the building, but not from the ground. It had been taken at roof height, from about ten yards away. “I took this from Tae’s living room window,” Shigeru said. Tae Chigusa was the vice-chair of the Ida District Association. She was in her seventies and lived alone.

  Shigenori blinked, puzzled. “Am I supposed to see something?” Without a doubt, the image was odd, but not in a way anyone familiar with the building would’ve thought surprising. “It’s just that bizarre statue.”

  A monster out of European legend perched on the edge of the roof. It had astonished Shigenori when he saw it for the first time.

  It was a gargoyle, a demonic creature with wings sprouting from its back. The face and ears were not those a Japanese demon would’ve had. It looked more like an evil bat. Shigenori had looked it up; gargoyles were a decorative element of Gothic architecture. They usually decorated drain spouts that kept rainwater from flowing down the sides of buildings.

  The tea caddy building’s gargoyle was pure decoration. It sat almost directly above the entrance, and there were no visible rainspouts or gutters anywhere near it. If it had been a drain spout, people using the building entrance would’ve been soaked.

  Shigeru smiled like a mischievous child. If his manner of dressing belied his age, so did his youthful vigor. It was a smile that suited him perfectly.

  “It’s the statue, but can you spot the problem? It’s not quite like the one I’m used to seeing.”

  Shigenori took the camera for a closer look.

  “Tae noticed it. She can see it from her window, whether she likes it or not.”

  There it was. Shigenori nodded and kept looking at the monitor. “He’s holding something, isn’t he?”

  “Very good,” said Shigeru brightly. “Holding, or maybe shouldering it. It looks like a pole.” The long object projected backward at an angle from the right shoulder of the crouching form. It hadn’t been there before.

  “A pole, or maybe the handle of something,” Shigenori said. “How long has this been here?”

  “About a week, according to Tae. Remember the big storm?”

  Shigenori nodded. A tropical storm had hit Tokyo in the middle of December, but the rain had been cold as ice.

  “Next morning she’s brushing her teeth and looking out the window. That’s when she sees this thing sticking out over the statue’s shoulder. At first she thought there was something wrong with her eyes. Tae is old and her eyes are none too good, but when she looked the next day, there it was again. She thought it was odd, so I dropped by and took the picture.”

  Shigeru chuckled a bit uncomfortably. “The thing is, that’s not all. It gets stranger still. The statue is moving. Just a little, but it moves every day. Tae was so surprised by the pole that she’s been watching it like a hawk. There’s no mistake, she says.”

  The gargoyle, which originally faced away from her, would be facing slightly to the right the next day. Or the wings would be folded a bit differently, or it would be in a slightly different spot. The position of the head would be different. Sometimes the pole would be nearly vertical. On other days it would be at a forty-five-degree angle.

  “I guess it’s alive after all.” Shigenori smiled. Shigeru laughed and Shigenori joined him.

  “I know. I laughed too. Tae gave me a piece of her mind.”

  The statue was bronze, or perhaps stone. Neither of them knew for sure. Whoever placed it there had very strange tastes, as Tae put it. A statue would not move around or get a pole from somewhere and put it over its shoulder. Someone was playing a prank on the neighborhood.

  “Tae says the neighborhood isn’t safe.”

  “Well, it is strange, I suppose.”

  If someone were trespassing, that would be hazard enough, but if they also attached that pole to the statue, it wasn’t likely to have been done professionally. It might fall into the street.

  Since the building was empty, some members of the district association had questioned whether it was safe to leave the statue there at all. It was exposed to the elements and might be developing cracks. It was an irregular object, and some part of it could fall off. That was danger enough.

  “Tae went to Goro for advice, but he’s in the hospital at the moment.”

  Shigeru scratched his head. Goro Ito was the head of the Ida association. He was elderly too, and had a chronic illness that put him in the hospital regularly.

  “So that’s why she came to you,” said Shigenori.

  “Well, we go back a long way.” Tae had come to him yesterday morning. That was when he’d taken the photo.

  “I’m guessing that she’s making too much of this, but I’m a bit concerned myself, so I decided to look into it. I spent half a day trying to discover who I needed to talk to if I wanted to get in there. It wasn’t easy. I finally found out that the original owner’s ex-wife remarried. Her new husband’s company is looking after the building. I got their permission to go inside.”

  Shigenori shifted in his chair, slightly impatient. “So you’re going to check it out?”

  “Yes. Someone from the company is meeting me outside with the key this morning. Now, I wanted to ask you …” Shigenori lowered his voice. “In a case like this, do you think I could get a policeman to go with me?”

  Shigenori couldn’t serve on the association, since it would mean a lot of walking around. But when Shigeru discovered his background, he began consulting him frequently on keeping the district safe, and Shigenori had tried his best to help out.

  “A police officer.” Shigenori folded his arms. “What does the company say?”

  “They’re treating it as a joke. They als
o said it wouldn’t look good to call the police until we know more.”

  “I’m not surprised they’re worried about their image, but if that’s what they say, I guess you have to go along with them.”

  “I was afraid you’d say that. Well, we don’t know for sure whether anything’s been stolen or damaged. I didn’t really expect to have the police along. But this whole thing has got me a little spooked.”

  Shigeru ran the association with energy and vigor, but he was old, and that was a fact. Shigenori could see that venturing into an empty building with a stranger might worry him.

  “Shall I come along?”

  Shigeru was startled. “You can’t do that. In your condition?”

  “I’ll be fine as long as we keep the pace slow.”

  “The power’s off. We won’t be using the elevator. You’d have to climb all the way to the roof.”

  “If you can do it, so can I.” Shigenori smiled. “I’m quite a bit younger than you.”

  “Of course, but still—”

  “You need to go now, don’t you?”

  Shigeru checked his watch. “Yes, we’re meeting in front of the building.”

  “Then I’ll get my cane.”

  Shigenori went to the living room, wrote a short note to Toshiko and left it pinned to the refrigerator with a magnet.

  Going for a walk with Shigeru.

  He got his threadbare down jacket and threw a muffler around his neck. He put his phone in his pocket, paused to think, then gathered a few extra things and stuffed them in his pockets too.

  “Sorry to trouble you,” said Shigeru.

  Next to Shigeru with his alpaca coat, Shigenori with his walking stick looked much the older of the two.

  The tea caddy building was officially named the West Shinjuku Central Round Building. The name was still there, etched in fancy script on a brass plaque by the front entrance. When the two men arrived they found a tall young man in a new trench coat, carrying a black briefcase and standing near the plaque with a bored expression. Shigenori could only walk slowly, and they were almost ten minutes late.

  “Hello. Sorry to keep you waiting,” Shigeru greeted him.

  As the young man introduced himself—his last name was Aizawa—and traded cards with Shigeru, Shigenori sized him up. Late twenties, just under six feet, probably 175 pounds. He wasn’t just tall, he had muscles, the kind you get from working out. If something happened, he would be good to have along.

  And what might that “something” be?

  To justify his presence, Shigeru introduced Shigenori as a security consultant for the district association. Shigenori tried to look appropriately serious.

  “I handle sales for Labbra Technofusion,” Aizawa said. “We’re terribly sorry the building is causing you concern.” He was surprisingly polite. “I just joined the company, so I don’t know much about it, except that it’s been in this state for quite a while. My boss has been telling me to get out and apologize to the association.”

  Aizawa was still wet behind the ears, but his sincerity came through. Shigenori hoped Labbra Technofusion was a legitimate operation.

  “We’re just glad you came so quickly,” said Shigeru. “Shall we go inside?”

  The main entrance was a large double door faced with heavy planks of wood. It had a pair of iron door handles that looked like they could serve as boat anchors in a pinch. A heavy chain had been wound around them, secured by a fat padlock. Aizawa opened his briefcase and took out a large key ring with a metallic jangle.

  “I can open this padlock, but I’m told the door can only be unlocked from the inside. There’s a service entrance around the back.”

  Aizawa turned toward the walkway that ran between the building and a low cinder block wall. Before he could set off, Shigenori spoke up.

  “Just a minute. Mr. Chairman, I’d like you to take a picture of this lock and chain.”

  Shigeru pulled out his camera. “You want a picture of that?”

  “Yes. We’ll need it for evidence.” Shigenori was being a little dramatic, but who knew what they might find? He examined the chain with its padlock. There didn’t seem to be any evidence of tampering. There were tiny cobwebs between the chain links.

  “Does this path go all the way around the building?” he asked Aizawa.

  “Yes, it should.”

  “It’s a tight fit, but let’s circle the building first.”

  Shigeru was still holding the camera. He smiled at Aizawa. “Shigenori used to be a detective.”

  Aizawa’s eyes widened. “That’s cool! I’ve never met a real detective.”

  “I’m just an unemployed old codger now.”

  “Why do you want to go all the way around? Are you looking for signs of a break-in? Or traces of a ladder or footprints? The windows on the first floor don’t open. All the windows from the second floor up are covered with grilles.”

  He seemed to be enjoying himself now. If his employers had been skittish about getting the police involved, they’d sent the wrong guy.

  “I’d just like to have a look. By the way, when businesses were operating in this building, did the staff have to use this path to reach the service entrance?”

  Shigeru spoke up. “No, there’s a little walkway that leads to the back door from the street behind the building. But the association blocked it off. That was after the break-in.”

  The gap between the building and the wall was not much more than a foot wide. The passage was filled with leaves and scraps of trash. The first-floor wall was pierced here and there with ventilation slits of different sizes. These too were dusty and full of cobwebs.

  The walk from the street behind the building to the service entrance went through a gap in the cinder block wall. The entrance was only a few feet from the street. The walk was flanked with plots of soil that had once been flowerbeds. Now they were choked with weeds.

  The walk was blocked by a barricade of stamped metal chairs bound securely with rope. The chairs were stacked in a matrix, like gymnasts in a human pyramid with legs sticking out here and there. It looked far too heavy to push over.

  “We found these chairs in the employee lounge. The design is unusual, so I guess they couldn’t unload them. They just left them there.”

  “That’s amazing.” Aizawa grasped the legs of a chair that pointed to the sky and tried unsuccessfully to move the barricade. “Solid as a rock. Whoever did these knots knew his stuff.”

  “One of the guys from a shipping company in the neighborhood put this together,” said Shigeru with a touch of pride. “The patrols make sure the ropes are tight and in good shape. It’s very sturdy.”

  Shigeru told them the service door had been replaced after the fire. “Someone pried it open with a crowbar. We don’t know if it was the same person who started the fire. Without the fire, no one would’ve noticed the break-in.”

  A crowbar was a violent way to get inside. Professional thieves often used them to strip empty buildings of valuable materials like wiring and plumbing fixtures. The kids partying here probably came along after the lock was broken.

  Aizawa jingled his keys and unlocked the door. He pulled a long flashlight from his black briefcase. “I thought we might need this.”

  “You came prepared.” Shigeru nodded approvingly.

  The first floor of the West Shinjuku Central Round Building was cavernous and empty. There were no partition walls. From the service entrance they could see nearly the entire expanse of round floor. There were no traces of the fire. Someone had been in to repair the damage.

  “Looks like it’s in pretty good shape,” said Aizawa. The flashlight was needed after all; the sun was shining, but the windows were too small to shed much light. “This used to be a gallery. I heard the owner was into pop art. Gothic art outside, pop art inside.”

  On the opposite s
ide of the floor, they could see a stairway that followed the curve of the north wall. Aizawa started toward it, but Shigenori stopped him.

  “Sorry … I need you to put these on over your shoes.” He pulled out a stack of plastic shopping bags that Toshiko had carefully folded, along with a small roll of scotch tape. “Tape them around your ankles. They’ll make it harder to keep your footing, so be careful.”

  Aizawa had another attack of excitement. “This is just like CSI.”

  Shigeru noticed Shigenori’s puzzled look. “It’s an American TV series. My grandchildren can’t get enough of it.”

  They slipped the bags over their shoes. Shigenori helped his two companions tape their feet. He put a bag around the tip of his cane, but took it off because it seemed likely to slip.

  “Even with these bags, we should be careful where we walk, right?” Aizawa asked.

  “Don’t worry. You don’t have to be that careful.”

  After Shigeru took several shots of the first floor, they headed toward the stairs. Shigenori naturally took the lead, with Aizawa bringing up the rear.

  “The fire was a year ago?” Shigenori asked.

  “Middle of last November, I think,” said Shigeru.

  Close to thirteen months had passed since the firefighters were in the building. Dust accumulates even in tightly closed spaces. Shigenori squatted and ran a finger along the stair. The surface was grainy. There were no footprints.

  There was a bar counter on the second floor, with two round tables. The windows here were larger, and the light poured in. Aizawa turned off the flashlight. Shigeru took pictures of everything.

  “How’s your leg holding up?”

  “I’m fine. Thanks for asking,” Shigeru said. Luckily the stairs ascended at a shallow angle.

  “Everything seems okay here too,” Aizawa said.

  Perhaps in consideration of the older men, Aizawa took the lead to the third floor. He stayed close to the wall as he went up so as not to disturb any evidence, but here too there were no footprints or other signs that anyone had been here for months.