The Fine Art of Uncanny Prediction by Robert Goddard

Author:Robert Goddard [Robert Goddard]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: Fiction, Mystery & Detective, Traditional, Women Sleuths, Thrillers, Crime, General
ISBN: 9781473594166
Google: -cGcEAAAQBAJ
Amazon: B0BS61RTVP
Publisher: Random House
Published: 2023-08-16T23:00:00+00:00

2022

WADA WAS BEING MORE CAREFUL THAN SHE’D HAVE ADMITTED TO Troy Kimber. She didn’t go home after dinner that night, but spent it at a women-only capsule hotel, where she expected to be – and was – woken early by the pre-dawn departures of other guests.

She had breakfast in a nearby coffee shop, then headed straight for the Kono Building. She had a lot to think about, principally how to go on investigating the Nagata case without further run-ins with her assailants of the previous evening. She was undecided about Yamato’s role in luring her to Endo’s apartment. On balance, she suspected he’d been forced into playing his part in the deception. If so, though, how had that ended for him? She decided to call the Kantei and ask to speak to him rather than trying his mobile, which might have been stolen or hacked.

It would be an hour or more before she could expect to find him at his desk. She filled the time by searching newspaper online archives for a report on the supposedly accidental death of Daniel Perlman in October 2005. She started with Asahi and had worked her way through Yomiuri and Mainichi as well, finding precisely nothing, when her landline phone rang.

She wondered if Kimber was the caller. But no. The voice on the other end of the line belonged to her saviour of last night, Seiji Tago. ‘I am relieved to hear your voice, Wada-san.’

‘Why?’

‘I was worried that the men we … encountered … last night might have … come after you again.’

‘I particularly asked you not to worry about me, Tago-san.’

‘But what we worry about is dictated by our personality, which we are helpless to change, even if we wish to.’

‘My personality requires me to be unhampered by the attentions of those who do not think I am capable of looking after myself.’ She instantly regretted the harshness of her tone. What would have happened to her without his intervention, after all, wasn’t pleasant to contemplate.

‘In that you take after your mother. Who is currently out, which I mention in case you are concerned that she might overhear this call.’

‘Tago-san, you must let me be the judge of what risks I should run.’

‘I will, of course. As we agreed. But do you object to occasional … enquiries about your situation?’

She felt she needed to make some concession to him, however much it went against the grain. ‘I do not object,’ she said mildly.

‘Thank you, Wada-san. I wish you … a good day.’

She’d continued scrolling through the archived columns of the Mainichi as she spoke to Tago. Now, as she put the phone down, an idea suddenly leapt out at her. An accidental death in Yokosuka wasn’t necessarily going to be reported in any of the national newspapers. And there was no local newspaper for Yokosuka. Except, of course, in a sense there was. It was mentioned, in the article that had caught her eye: a small piece summarizing an interview that had appeared in Seahawk, the newspaper of the US naval base at Yokosuka.

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