to borrow a dressing room immediately offstage. There he positioned three of his subordinates who he knew had a basic command of English, and instructed them to obtain everyone's name, address, and a brief statement of activities since arriving at the club.
The subordinates sat behind a long table that normally served as a repository for random props and make-up kits. They spread out their papers, positioned lighters, cigarettes, and ashtrays, uncapped their pens, rolled up their sleeves, and began the familiar and very comfortable process of bureaucratic questioning. Among themselves, they agreed to each ask every guest the same three questions. The theory was that taking notes in English was tricky enough on the face of things, and three separate stabs at the three questions would produce at least a fairly representative composite which could be sorted out later.
It was observed that the guests began to lose patience with the second set of three questions, and more particularly with the third set of three questions. Kawamura's subordinates solved the problem by rotating themselves so that each spent time in the second and third chairs.
Meanwhile, Kawamura prowled the pool area as forensic experts and related scientists examined the scene of the crime. The body and head had already been whisked away to the police morgue where, among other things, the cause of death would be determined.
The fingerprint wizards in white gloves asked Kawamura permission to leave after about an hour on the job. They had covered about a quarter of the area and had already lifted over two thousand prints. It was determined, after a ten-minute conference, that other clues would have to be found if this puzzle was to be solved. Someone suggested draining the pool, and a patrol was sent to try and find the location of valves.
A breakthrough of sorts was discovered by one of Kawamura's trainees, who was assigned to the peripheral regions of the scene. Wandering around the kiddy pool and peering into the snack bar facilities on the patio, he noticed a laundry cart half full of towels. He began to rummage through the cart, and then he noticed that the towels were stained with blood. The means of transport to the pool of the head or body, or both, was now clear. Investigation shifted focus to the snack-bar area.
J.B. spent the intervening time roaming back and forth between the third and fourth floors of the main building. The employees, some two hundred of them that evening, had been ensconced on the third floor in various banquet rooms; their turn to be interviewed would come only after the members and guests had had theirs. Chatting with the employees still awake, J.B. gradually became aware that now, without the general manager, he was really in charge. Someone asked him if the club would open in the morning, and J.B. realized he wasn't even certain if the club ever opened in the morning. "Yes," he answered, figuring the odds at roughly the same as a coin flip. "Unless we don't open," he added as a hedge.
On the fourth floor, anarchy appeared imminent. Pete's widow had made her statement (thrice) immediately after the ambassadors, and had been led down to her apartment on the B-3 level of the building for sedation and rest. Arrangements had been made by the police department to borrow a young woman from the fire department to sit with Mrs. Peterson in her grief.
Upstairs, meanwhile, the effects of shock and horror were beginning to wear off. Certainly no one was larking about, but a party had been going on, a great deal of alcohol had been consumed, and now premature hangovers and mood swings related to fluctuating alcohol levels were beginning to exhibit themselves.
"Goddamit, J.B.," said the club secretary, "the Pakistan ambassador won't go home. He keeps pushing into line to report more details of his evening's activities to the police. He's been up there three times."
"J.B., I'm due to catch a plane to Korea tomorrow," announced a young man with an excessively frilled dress-shirt," and if I'm not out of here soon, I'm holding you responsible."
"I say, Culhane old chap, form and all that sort of thing are frightfully important, frightfully important indeed." The accoster was wearing medals on his tuxedo jacket. "But I'd be ever so grateful if you'd pop me ahead in line. My da—, ah, business associate here is concerned about her elderly parents, getting home and all that, and of course my wife is waiting, well you know, frightful evening, swimming pool and that sort of thing."
"Jacques," said Jacques, "my wife is going to have a babee. A babeeee," he emphasized (though Mrs. Jacques was perhaps three, three-and-a-half months pregnant.)
"Mr. Culhane, this is my boss and his wife visiting from Boston. They don't want to stay here any longer."
"Hey J.B., you bloody twit, if we're not out of here by midnight, you and Pete will soon be practicing chord progressions together on the bloody harp."
One of the problems, J.B. noticed, was that there was, in fact, a tendency toward volubility among people involved in official inquiries. To be on the safe side, folks were telling more than the inspectors probably wanted to know. Carrying the title of "president"—a carte blanche position in Japan—J.B. was able to wander at will in and out of the interview room.
Women tended to detail trips to the ladies room, men recounted bouts of table-hopping. Gordy Sparks began rambling on about a bug in his lunch, the Pakistan ambassador described his trip to the front desk for a cigar. The inspectors would periodically hop about switching chairs, lighters, and cigarettes—Americans demanded the opportunity to consult with their lawyers. By 11:30 p.m., there were still fifty or sixty people waiting to be interviewed.
J.B. went downstairs looking for his new pal Tim.
* * * *
"We think we know how Pete was murdered," confided Captain Kawamura to J.B. "Your chef informed to us that one knife and one, how you say. . . ," Kawamura made a quick chopping motion with his hand.
"Cleaver?"
"Creaver."
"Cleaver."
"Cleaver is missing."
The two men were standing in a small room off the corridor leading to the service elevator. The room was a temporary holding area for the service carts used to bring food from the B-1 main kitchen level to the banquet area on the top floors. The room was now empty except for two carts with broken wheels and a jumbled pile of large silver serving trays and domed lids in one corner.
"And that," continued Kawamura, pointing to brownish stains on the lower wall next to the room's entrance, "is blood."
J.B. and the police captain looked at the stains. Clearly, something had been splattered on the wall—almost as if a ripe tomato had been thrown against it at point-blank range.
"Are you sure? I mean, are you sure it's blood?" asked J.B. "It could be some kind of food like. . . a tomato."
"Or pumpkin?" suggested Kawamura, bringing to two the items neither man would be comfortable eating again.
"Yes, or a. . . well, never mind."
"It is no doubting blood," said Kawamura. "Those scrape marks came from our men's investigation. They have the way to judge."
"But if that's the case, how could what must have happened here really happen?"
"You mean cutting off of the head?"
"I guess so. I mean, there must be constant activity in here and out by the elevator. I don't see how such an. . . an accident. . ."
"Cutting off of the head."
