The Hunter (17 page)

The guy nodded eagerly. Oh boy. Now the conversation would drag on some more.

"Wolves are one hundred percent wild animals. Wolf-dogs are of course dog hybrids, but the greater the ratio of wolf blood to canine blood, the stronger that streak of wildness. It's better not to think of them as dogs; rather, think of them as a completely different animal. The ones that can be successfully trained as police dogs are those with a relatively weaker concentration of wolf blood, around eighty percent."

"What happens when the concentration goes higher?"

"Well, let's see ...," said the guy, smiling with pleasure. Apparently there was nothing Mr. Smooth liked more than the sharing the delights of wolf-dogs. "Wolf-dogs are highly intelligent, with a range of dispositions. In folk tales and fairy tales the wolf is usually cast as the villain, and we tend to think of them as savage and terrifying, but that's a mistake. Basically, wild animals are extremely cautious and timid. Wolves are the same. We call them 'shy.' They are fearful of strangers. They have delicate sensibilities, so they can also be friendly to humans who treat them kindly."

Wolf-dogs inherited these traits accordingly, again in proportion to the amount of wolf blood in their veins. Quite a few have been known to be human-hating and timid, unable to show affection to anyone but their owners, unable to turn into the sort of pet their owners wished for. Others, of course, have been known to be friendly and playful, even as, on the whole, they seem to live by their own rules. They aren't the kind of docile animal that people can mold into pets for their own purposes. Since wolves normally live in packs in the wild, wolf-dogs similarly require constant companionship and ample affection.

"Ample affection," repeated Otomichi.

"If you treat a wolf-dog as a member of the family, shower it with affection, and gain its trust, it is capable of great things. Wolf-dogs are physically very gifted animals. But, to repeat, a wolf-dog does not think like a dog—it does not consider the defense of a human being to be its greatest aspiration in life. It has great pride and great wariness. A wolf-dog has allegiance only to someone it knows and trusts."

"Who would want to take on a hassle like that?" Takizawa interrupted, unable to contain himself.

The import guy smiled knowingly and nodded. "I appreciate what you're saying, Officer, but I think that if you ever saw one of them you would certainly understand the appeal. They have such enormous presence, if that's the right word—a kind of splendor that I would say even borders on nobility."

Takizawa snorted. This was not his idea of a fun pooch, but thanks anyway, pal.

"Yet even with a dog as splendid as all that," Otomichi soldiered on, "if someone used it for ill purposes, there's no telling what could happen, isn't that right?"

The smile disappeared from the man's face. "Why exactly are the police interested in learning out about wolf-dogs?" he inquired, showing unease for the first time.

Otomichi threw Takizawa a glance. "Ah, yeah," Takizawa began in a meaningless preface, and then proceeded to outline the incident at Tennozu.

Hearing this, the import guy sighed deeply. "I've been paying rather close attention to that story myself."

"Why is that?" asked Otomichi, swift as a bat.

The guy seemed flustered, looking from her to Takizawa and back again, shaking his head. "Well, I just mean that being in this line of work, you naturally prick up your ears at bad news involving dogs." The import guy frowned, and dropped his voice in a tone of deep melancholy. "We take it upon ourselves to ask our customers not to ever, under any circumstances, train their wolf-dog to be an attack animal. The wolf-dog's powers are, if I may say, a two-edged sword. Unless care is taken to prevent it, a wolf-dog has the potential to turn into a monster beyond human control. Of course, this is not to say that any of our customers, who want a wolf-dog so much that they will order one from Alaska, would ever—"

"Do you have a list of the customers you have supplied with a wolf-dog?" Otomichi asked.

Silence.

Bingo.
She finally asked the right question. Takizawa shifted his weight in the overly comfortable sofa and tugged on the hem of his coat. The leather screeched as he shifted position. With a doleful expression, the guy sighed and said, "I'll make you a copy."

"Tough crowd," Takizawa muttered after the import guy left the room. "Who the hell would want to keep an animal like that?"

Otomichi, her nose buried in one of the pamphlets, nodded without speaking. Just the way you'd brush off a kid who asked a dumb question. He itched to complain again, but since he'd decided to try a change of tactics with her, he bided his time.

Before long the import guy was back with a copy of the customer list. Looking at Otomichi, he asked in evident disbelief, "Do you really mean to tell me that that death reported in the newspapers was the work of a wolf-dog?"

"We can't be sure. But we do know that animal hair found at the scene of the crime doesn't match that of any known breed of dog, and that the victim was attacked by a very powerful animal. Also, tracks found near the scene of the crime were more wolf-like than dog-like. More oval than round."

Flipping through the pages of her notebook, she read aloud the measurements they'd been given in the morning's meeting.

The import guy now wore a look of deep sadness. "It's certainly true that the higher the concentration of wolf blood, the more a wolf-dog resembles a wolf in personality and appearance. It's not surprising if the tracks are more like those of a wolf than a dog. Tracks that big would have to belong to a fairly sizeable dog, and—if they really are oval—it's probably reasonable to assume that it was a large wolf-dog. Since, of course, there aren't any pure wolves in Tokyo."

"Could you tell us how to distinguish a pure wolf from a wolf-dog that's, say, ninety-nine percent wolf?"

"Hmm, with that high a concentration of wolf blood . . . Well, you know how there are fleshy pads on the back of the paw? In a wolf, those are black, but in a wolf-dog, they would probably be a different color."

"Would that be the only difference? "

"You like dogs, don't you," the import guy said, looking expectantly at Otomichi with a sense of simpatico as the conversation drew to a close.

"Yes, I do," she nodded.

If she likes dogs, I'm for cats, thought Takizawa dourly. Better yet, monkeys.

As they stepped outside, Takizawa stretched and looked at Otomichi. "So what do we do next? Check out the owners?"

Looking intently at her notebook, she said expressionlessly, "I wanted to talk to you about that. That would be one possibility, but—"

"Hold it." His cellphone was vibrating. It was headquarters.

"Where are you now?" the desk staff sergeant asked.

"In Ginza. We found something called a wolf-dog that's not exactly a wolf, but—"

Suddenly there was a new voice on the line. "Hello, Takizawa? Miyagawa here."

Takizawa answered tautly, "Yes, sir."

"A housewife has been killed in Kawasaki, same MO as Tennozu. I want you to go straight to the scene of the crime."

"Housewife in Kawasaki?"

"Report just came in. Other detectives are on their way. Get over there right away. Here's the address..."

Takizawa wrote it down, hung up, and hurried back to Otomichi. She was about to speak, but he grabbed her by the arm and said, "Let's go. Where's the closest station?" Damn, he thought, I hate the train.

"Sir?" Otomichi asked, flustered. "Where are we going?"

"To Tama Ward," he said as they hurried down the stairs to the subway.

"By way of Shinjuku, on the Odakyu line." His gut was making the dash a little hard on him, but he didn't slow down.

"I think the Chiyoda line is faster. Transfer at Omotesando," Otomichi shouted so he could hear. "The two lines share the same route."

Takizawa went through the wicket and was about to set off in one direction when he felt a tug on his elbow. For a moment, he was startled.

"Take the Ginza line. This way." Otomichi's voice was utterly calm, and she headed off in the opposite direction. Relying on the sight of her weaving with the fluid grace of a goldfish through the rush of passengers, Takizawa hastily followed her.

As they waited for the train on the platform, she leaned toward him and whispered, "What happened in Tama Ward?"

Takizawa, still agitated by the news, looked around to be sure he would not be overheard. "It happened again. This time it was a housewife."

Otomichi's expression underwent a transformation, hardening, toughening before Takizawa's eyes. He looked away reflexively. For some reason, in his mind her face overlapped with the image of the wolf he had seen in the Ginza dog-importing office. A creature that had gone back to its wild, savage state, silver fur around its neck, fleshy ears erect, tiny round eyes staring. Fuck you, Takizawa almost said aloud, don't look at me.

"I wouldn't want to be burned to death," Takizawa did say out loud, "but being mauled to death sounds worse."

The scene of the crime was on a street in a new residential area that had been created by leveling part of a hill. The neighborhood was relatively uncrowded, with new, prefabricated houses mixed in among older homes; squeezed in between these were low apartment buildings and dormitories for bank employees.

By the time they arrived, the body had already been removed, and here and there clusters of housewives stood talking. Markers placed by the crime-scene unit indicated the location of pieces of physical evidence, and a chalk outline showed where the victim had lain. But there was so much blood in the street that the markers were practically useless, and what seemed to be chunks of flesh were strewn about. By the edge of the road a shopping cart, with a bunch of green onions poking out, was flung on its side. The victim had been on her way home with her groceries.

Takizawa was spotted by a colleague inspecting the site along with investigators from the Kanagawa prefectural police. They greeted each other, and the colleague proceeded to brief Takizawa and Otomichi on the situation: "Victim was apparently attacked from behind. There were abrasions on the palms, knees, and jaw, the result of when she got knocked down. She was also bleeding from the head, and her neck was broken. Her windpipe was chewed out."

Takako felt her heart constrict. Secretly she was grateful that the body had been already removed. Hearing the report gave her a clear enough picture, and seeing the mutilated body would only be sickening. But more than anything, she did not want to be confronted with the evidence of what a wolf-dog could do.

"Same as Tennozu, huh?"

"Tooth marks look pretty big, manner of attack looks similar."

Takako stood a step back, listening to Takizawa and the colleague talk and feeling wretched; she did her best to go through the steps and make a careful inspection of the site.

"No witnesses," Takizawa's colleague was saying, "even in the middle of the day like this. Area is residential, quiet, little traffic. So far we haven't found anyone who heard anything—a scream, a bark, anything."

Takako contemplated the horror of the crime. Yet for reasons that she could not understand, she dreaded having to capture the wolf-dog that had done the deed.

". . . connection between the Tennozu victim and Hara now established. Seems they used to pal around, back in Hara's Roppongi playboy days. A woman paying Hara's bills back then identified him by his photo. A team is working on that angle now."

Takako turned around to join in the conversation. If this last bit was true, this was not an unrelated chain of incidents.

"Do we know the identity of this victim here?" asked Takizawa.

Before the conversation could go further, Captain Watanuki came hurrying by, looking grim. With him were two higher-ups whom Takako did not recognize, probably from the Kanagawa prefectural police. Watanuki greeted the group in his gravelly voice. "What do you think? See anything useful here?"

Before anyone could reply, Takako spoke up nervously. "We've picked up some new information today, sir." Her heart, constricted earlier, was pounding furiously. "I wonder if we could request the use of police dogs."

"Police dogs?"

Takako felt the eyes of everyone on her. She felt terribly nervous, but went on: "Sir, in our investigation we learned of a breed called the wolf-dog, actually a crossbreed between a wolf and a dog. The more wolf blood in the animal, the more it resembles an actual wolf in appearance and behavior. If a wolf-dog attacked this victim, its scent should still be here. It has a strong territorial instinct, and has probably marked the area at close intervals. A police dog could pick up the scent."

The captain gave a series of small nods, and turned to walk to his vehicle. Takako's heart was sore. Watching the crime-scene investigators go about their business, eagerly gathering evidence, she breathed deeply.

"Did that dog import guy say anything about marking?" Takizawa asked quietly.

Takako gulped. "It was in one of the books I read this morning."

Ever since their face-off outside headquarters this morning, Takizawa seemed to have undergone a change of attitude. He started to say something but held back, nodding only. He could be sympathetic, but Takako saw that his eyes were unsmiling. She knew better than to let her guard down.

"That explains how you were able to ask him all those questions. You did your homework."

"Had to. I didn't know anything about wolf-dogs," she said, her breathing still belabored.

Watanuki returned to say that, with the help of the Kanagawa prefectural police, a K9 unit would soon arrive. "But all I wish is that the perpetrator and his animal would keep running farther and farther away, and never stop." With this, the captain ordered two teams to remain at the crime scene, and the rest to begin a door-to-door investigation.

Takako wanted to stay and watch. When the police dogs picked up the scent of the wolf-dog, how would they react? She wanted to see with her own eyes what they would do.

As the day was drawing to a close, the police dogs arrived. Several intelligent-looking German shepherds on leashes went sniffing around the site, exhaling white breath. Takako watched with keen interest.
What do you say, fellas? Any trace of the scent of a bigger, fiercer creature than any of you? Which way did he come from, which way did he go?

By then members of the media, with their own sharp powers for sniffing out a story, had gathered around. From all sides came the sound of someone speaking into a microphone. The scene was lit up so brightly that the police equipment was all but unnecessary. In the midst of all this commotion, the police dogs were divided into two groups and headed out in different directions.

Disciplined not to bark, the dogs did nothing but pace ceaselessly around the scene with their noses to the ground, glancing up occasionally at their handlers. Takako had expected no less, yet she felt half-disappointed as she watched. However smart they might be, the dogs had no words at their command; how could they possibly tell anyone, "This is no ordinary creature, this is a wild animal vastly more powerful than any of us"? They did not howl or show any excitement. These were not ordinary dogs either.

The meeting started at 10:00 p.m.

"As a result of tracking by a K9 unit, we were able to determine that the scent of the perpetrator remained strong at the scene of the crime. The dogs followed scent trails in two directions from the spot where the victim was found. One trail ended in front of the victim's apartment building, about three hundred meters away, and the other went into a deserted grove of trees."

Takako was exhausted, and so short on sleep that she felt she was losing the ability to regulate her body temperature. God, what a long day. The meeting had begun with a discussion of the link between the victims Kazuki Horikawa and Teruo Hara. The two men had hung out together in Roppongi, but because it happened over a decade ago, it was difficult to find anyone who could testify to their connection, and yet that arm of the investigation was said to be making gradual progress.

Next, the team assigned to Teruo Hara reported no new significant results. Depending on the day of the week, Hara slept at the date club without returning to his apartment, and accordingly was often seen in the vicinity of the building that burned down; and yet, there was no evidence linking him with anyone but the various women about whom the police already knew. The team would next interview people Hara had received New Year's cards from, and people listed in his address book.

The pharmaceutical team found no evidence of anyone attempting to purchase benzoyl peroxide from a university lab or other source in Tokyo and the surrounding prefectures. The investigation would move to companies using benzoyl peroxide, such as refining companies and manufacturers of cosmetics.

The team investigating the timed incendiary device reported that the structure of the device was actually quite simple; it was a remodeled pedometer. The pedometer in question, which was widely available at nationwide department stores and discount shops, could be switched to function as a digital watch; and it was that switch that was used as a timed trigger. The source of electricity was a micro-cell battery that passed through the circuit, connecting to a Nichrome wire used for ignition. With a chemical that had a high ignition temperature, a micro-cell battery could never trigger a fire, but given the low resoluble temperature of benzoyl peroxide, it was adequate to the task. The metal case used to disguise the device as a belt buckle had not turned up as a product widely available on the market, and the team opined that it might yet provide a lead of some sort.

Next, Takizawa reported on the wolf-dog. For Takako, it was quite a sight to see the emperor penguin discoursing earnestly with her report in hand, given his reluctance even to take the word "wolf" seriously that morning. He had apparently lost the inclination—or run out of the energy—to be snide and abusive; for the first time since they'd teamed up, he said to her, as he looked over her report, "Well done."

Takako was equally fatigued, as far as that went.

It was past midnight when the report on the new victim began. No trace of the one-day mini-vacation remained on anyone's face.

"Near the crime scene there are groves of trees and wooded hills, places where people don't usually go, but the scent was still present in those thickets—even across a fence 1.5 meters high. We found one place where the surrounding grasses and weeds were packed down, with traces of animal fur on the ground. Tests are now being run to determine if that fur matches hairs found on the body of the victim."

"Well, that would simplify the investigation, wouldn't it?" a detective suggested. "If there are only a couple hundred wolf-dogs in the country and you've got a list of owners, then you just go down the list until you find the guy with the dog that matches the hair. That should do it."

This idea made perfect sense. Yet Takako wondered if there weren't another way, a shortcut or a detour. But more also had to be learned about the day's new victim—Chieko Yoshii, nee Inada, 28, a housewife married less than a year. And about all of the other threads in the case. If not, the list of victims might only get longer, and bloodier.

Trained to attack humans. But only certain designated targets.

Takako felt her mental energy ebbing. She had a feeling the answer was in front of her. But she couldn't think clearly. All that was clear was: They had to catch the animal. The animal, which wasn't the one to hate, would lead them to its human owner, who was the real culprit, the real killer.

I
want to see the wolf-dog run. In full flight
—
across a vast plain.

Stop. Got to concentrate.

The husband of Chieko Yoshii seemed to know very little about the past of his newlywed wife. First thing in the morning, a squad would visit her parents' home to learn everything they could.

Have to keep the wolf-dog from killing again.

The animal didn't know the meaning of right and wrong. The owner did—the human who taught it to kill. Designing a belt with a timing device that turned it into a lethal flamethrower would take scrupulous planning, but training a wolf-dog to kill like this could take years. Did the killer buy the animal in order to kill? How did the animal learn to recognize its victims?

Was this the work of one person with a lot of time on his hands?

As Takako's mind roamed, she heard Wakita ask: "If there is anything else you've noticed, speak up now." Reflexively, nervously, she raised her hand. She was beat. She wanted to go home and go to bed. Stretch out and fall asleep. Think about nothing. And yet here she was getting up from her chair, rising to her feet, with the eyes of all the male investigators turned on her.

"Wolf-dogs are extremely intelligent. Some owners train them like police dogs, and enter them in competitions. I realize the need to go through the list of two hundred wolf-dogs one by one, but it seems to me that no dog could carry out these killings without extensive training. Perhaps we should consider a visit to the training facility for police dogs?"

There, she'd said it. Seeing the chief nod with satisfaction, she sat down. In the end, it was decided to rework the direction of the investigation at tomorrow morning's meeting. It was nearly 1:00 a.m. when the meeting ended. Takako felt herself breaking into a cold sweat, or a greasy sweat, she wasn't sure which. She walked out of the investigation headquarters, striving to keep her composure.

So tired she was unsteady on her feet, she unlocked the door of her apartment, whereupon she was greeted by a cheery voice crowing, "Welcome home!" Tomoko, whom she had completely forgotten about, having assumed her sister would go back to their parents' house, was standing there with a smile on her face. Feeling all her strength ebb away, Takako looked at her sister and, lacking a word to say, stepped into the apartment.

"You must be tired. Are you hungry? I filled the tub for you, too. Hurry up and change, now."

Having grabbed her sister's shoulder bag and the manila envelope she was carrying under her arm, Tomoko walked around Takako's apartment with unconcealed pleasure, as if she owned the place. Not resisting, Takako went into the bedroom and collapsed on the neatly made bed. She could tell that her pulse was beating abnormally fast. There was a throbbing pain in the middle of her head, and her entire body, from her toes to the top of her head, felt as heavy as lead.