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  'Then what? Are you getting insurance or something?'

  'No, of course not,' Yayoi stammered. 'He didn't have any insurance.'

  'Then you're in the same boat as me: no husband and nothing but a part-time job to pay the bills. How do you think you'll get by?'

  'To tell the truth, I haven't really thought about it much. I imagine I'll stay here and do the best I can. My mother thinks that's the best plan, at least for now.' This earnest answer to her rhetorical question irritated Kuniko.

  'What about your parents?' she said.

  'They'll help some, I'm sure. But there's only so much they can do.'

  'That's not what Masako told us when she promised you'd pay.'

  'I'm sorry,' Yayoi whispered.

  'Well, I'm not asking for much. Your dad has a regular job you should be able to get something out of him now.' Desperate to extract whatever she could, Kuniko continued to wheedle, but Yayoi simply repeated that she would have to wait, and eventually, realising that she was wasting the price of the call, Kuniko hung up.

  Masako was next. Kuniko saw her every night at the factory, but they hardly said a word to each other. Ever since she'd learned that Masako knew Jumonji, she'd been more than usually wary of her. Despite her money problems, she still somehow associated herself more with the elegant world of her fashion magazines than the back streets where the likes of Masako and Jumonji hung out.

  Nevertheless, the due date on the payment was almost up and she had to do something, no matter how risky. She'd already forgotten that a similar attitude had just recently got her involved in Yayoi's mess. She dialled Masako's number.

  When Masako answered, there was none of the background noise she'd heard at Yayoi's place. Kuniko wondered what Masako did all by herself in that big, clean house. A chill ran down her spine at the memory of the scene in her bathroom. Did she shower on those tiles that had been splattered with blood? And what did she feel like when she settled into a tub that had held those awful bags? The thought made Masako seem even scarier.

  'It's Kuniko ... ' she said in a breathy voice.

  'Your payment's due, isn't it?' said Masako, dispensing with formalities. Apparently she hadn't forgotten.

  'That's right. I'm wondering what I should do.'

  'Don't ask me. It's your problem.'

  'But didn't you say we'd get another loan to cover this one?' she whined, feeling she'd been misled.

  'So go get one,' Masako told her. 'I'm sure you'll find someone dumb enough to lend you more money. Use that to pay off Jumonji and then go find another to pay off that one.'

  'How does that solve anything? I'll just be running in circles.'

  'What do you think you've been doing?'

  'Don't say that! I'm asking you what I should do.'

  'You are not. You don't want advice, you want money.' Kuniko winced at her scornful tone of voice.

  'Then why don't you let me have some? Yayoi just tells me to wait.'

  'I don't have any to lend. When things settle down, I'm sure Yayoi will come through. You'll just have to make do until then.'

  'But how?'

  'You're young and healthy. You figure it out.'

  Kuniko slammed the receiver down. Some day, she'd get back at Masako, figure out how to make her sorry for treating her this way; but at the moment she couldn't think how, and it made her so angry she wanted to spit.

  Just then, the intercom rang. Startled, she crouched down, wanting to curl up in a ball and hide, if just for today. She wrapped her arms around her head, breathing hard.

  The buzzer rang again. Probably another detective. Worse yet, it could be the same one, that nosy Imai who'd come three weeks ago. She thought she'd managed to avoid telling him anything important, but she hated the way he looked at her. What if he said they had a witness who'd seen a green Golf at Koganei Park? What would she do then? She just couldn't face him again right now. Deciding to pretend she wasn't home, she lowered the volume on the television; but as she was doing this, someone began knocking on the door.

  'Jonouchi-san? It's Jumonji from Million Consumers. Are you in there?'

  'Yes,' she stammered into the intercom. 'I know the payment's coming up, but I still have a few days, don't I?'

  'Of course,' said Jumonji, sounding pleased to have caught her in. 'I actually wanted to talk to you about something else.'

  'About what?'

  'I guarantee it will be worth your while. Could I come in for a minute?' Kuniko was still wary, but her curiosity got the better of her and she opened the door, to find him standing there holding a box of cakes. She shrank back, conscious of her thick legs in a pair of shorts. He was dressed more casually than usual, in chinos, sunglasses and a loud Hawaiian shirt - birds of paradise on a black background. 'Sorry to bother you like this,' he said, handing her the box, 'but there's something I'd like to discuss with you.' She hesitated, but his smile was beginning to work its magic.

  'Come in,' she told him. He peered about curiously before sitting down at the dining-room table while she hurriedly picked up the magazines she'd strewn on the floor.

  'Shall we have the cakes?' she suggested, bringing out plates and forks and an almost empty bottle of oolong tea. Then she told a lie. 'If it's about the payment, I'm all set to make it, the day after tomorrow, I think it was?'

  'Actually, it has nothing to do with your loan. It's something else, something that's got me very curious.' He took a pack of cigarettes from his pocket and offered her one. She nearly pounced on it, having been unable to buy cigarettes lately, and he watched as she lit it and took a long, satisfied drag. 'You're welcome to keep the pack,' he told her.

  'Thanks,' she said, putting it down in front of her.

  'I get the feeling things are rather difficult for you now.'

  'You might say that,' she sighed, no longer bothering to keep up a front. 'I haven't heard from my husband '

  'I assumed you'd be heading off to work soon, so I wanted to catch you before you left. Actually, I wanted to talk to you about the lady who signed your guarantor's form the other day Yamamoto-san.' Kuniko looked up at him with a start. He was watching her with a good-natured smile. 'I was reading the paper the next morning, and I got a shock when I realised she must be the wife of that guy who was found cut up in the park. And since then there's something that's been bothering me: why would she have signed as your guarantor when she was in the middle of all that?' His speech seemed well rehearsed.

  'Because I asked her to. We're friends from the factory.'

  'But why didn't you ask Katori-san? She worked at a credit union for more than twenty years, so she knows all about that kind of thing.'

  'A credit union?' So that was Masako's secret past. Now that she thought about it, she could just picture her sitting at a computer terminal behind the counter at some two-bit bank.

  'What I'd really like to know is why you'd choose Yamamotosan to be a guarantor.'

  'Why do you want to know?' The question was natural enough. Jumonji laughed, running his hands through his brown hair.

  'Plain curiosity.'

  'Because Yamamoto-san is nice. Katori-san isn't - it's as simple as that.'

  'And it didn't matter to you that her husband was missing?'

  'I didn't know that at the time.'

  'It was pretty generous of her to agree, considering what she was going through.'

  'Like I said, she's a nice person.'

  'Okay. Then why did Katori-san come to get the form back?'

  'You've got me,' Kuniko said. He wasn't here out of 'plain curiosity', that much was obvious. Sensing trouble, she began to feel panicky.

  'Katori-san must have known the husband was missing,' he suggested, 'and thought it might look bad if her friend's name turned up on the form.'

  'No. She thinks I'm an idiot. That's why she went to get it back.'

  'It just doesn't add up,' he said, folding his hands behind his head and staring at the ceiling, as if he enjoyed playing the detective like this