Free The Iris Fan by Laura Joh Rowland Page A

as well as solve the crime.
    “You’re just in time,” Sano said. “The shogun has made me chief investigator and you my assistant.”
    “That’s great!” Masahiro visibly warmed toward Sano; his eyes shone with excitement. He was old enough to understand the danger that the attack on the shogun posed for his family, but young enough to think of the investigation as an adventure and an opportunity.
    “Luck is on our side for once.” Marume, scrubbed clean, looked delighted by the fact that Sano was back in favor with the shogun. “What do you want us to do?”
    Their enthusiasm buoyed Sano’s spirits. “You search for socks and clothes with blood on them. Masahiro and I will question everybody.”
    A tall, square woman, neatly dressed in a dark brown kimono, marched up to Sano. “If you are going to speak with the women or enter their rooms, you will do it under my supervision.” Her deep, stern voice was crusty with age. Her white hair, pinned atop her head, gave off a strong odor of peppermint-and-jasmine-scented hair oil. The bristly mustache on her upper lip was white, too. She must be in her sixties now, but Sano recognized her from that long-ago investigation.
    “Madam Chizuru,” he said. “So you’re still the otoshiyori .”
    The otoshiyori was the chief lady official of the Large Interior. Her most important duty was to keep a vigil outside the shogun’s chamber when he slept with a female concubine, to ensure that the concubine behaved properly. There had been little need for that service. Her other duties included keeping order in the Large Interior.
    She looked surprised to see Sano. “So you’re a detective again.”
    Sano had reason not to let her oversee the search and interviews. He knew something about her that he didn’t mention now. “Where were you when the shogun was stabbed?”
    Her prim, dainty lips thinned in dislike. “I was in bed, asleep.”
    “Did anyone see you?”
    “No, I have my own room.”
    “Then you’re a suspect.” Sano told Marume, “Put her under guard, apart from the other women. I’ll talk to her later.”
    Cloaked in indignation, Madam Chizuru let Marume lead her away. Masahiro said, “That was fast.”
    Later Sano would tell Masahiro why he thought his first suspect was a likely culprit. They began questioning the women, who all had roommates to confirm their statements that they’d been asleep during the attack on the shogun. Sano noticed things that had changed in the Large Interior since his previous case. The concubines were all homely. Lord Ienobu must have ensured that if the shogun should ever want a female bedmate, none of them would tempt him into fathering a new heir. And the shogun’s mother was gone. Lady Keisho-in had died a few years ago, at age seventy-six. Sano and Masahiro questioned female relatives of the shogun, and the ladies-in-waiting and maids. They, too, had alibis. So did the male guards.
    “I think they’re telling the truth,” Masahiro said.
    Sano agreed. With each moment that passed he felt increased pressure to find witnesses and evidence. Detective Marume called, “Hey, I can’t get this door open.”
    Sano and Masahiro hurried around the corner. Manabe, their shadow, followed. They found Marume rattling the locked door of a chamber. “Break it down,” Sano said.
    Marume heaved his shoulder against the door. The wooden panel fell into a room that exhaled warm, damp air. Sano saw a round, sunken bathtub filled with steaming water, surrounded by a floor made of wooden slats. “Who’s there?” he called.
    No answer came. Sano, Marume, and Masahiro stepped inside the bath chamber. In the corner crouched a young woman dressed in a white cotton robe. She was small, slim, and beautiful, perhaps eighteen years old. Her long black hair hung in damp straggles. Her limpid eyes were huge with fright.
    “Who are you?” Sano asked.
    “Tomoe,” she whispered. “A concubine.”
    So the shogun still had one beautiful