Shinsuké was no longer in possession of his own mind. That he had played straight into her hand, he saw; and yet, in the face of all that, he now allowed himself to lapse from the resolution which he had so assiduously hugged for three days past.
“So, then, you’ll do that for me? Oh, how happy!” cried Tsuya, and, in her wild exultation, she danced about; lastly flinging herself against his chest blotched over with bloody clods.
Shinsuké who had gathered himself into a stony lump, like a dead body, in an attitude of deep thought, was now left alone and aside, as Tsuya set about to dispose of the corpse, without his aid. As a first thing, she slipped her hand into the bosom and pulled out a purse holding a hundred “ryo” which, in her words, the dead man would not need for his trip to Hades. All pieces of clothing, carefully peeled off, were done into a tight roll, bound up with a piece of string. It was her idea to take away from the spot any and all things that might serve as evidence of the crime. As a last thing, she took the razor and cut the face of the man all over, who was finally buried in the mire of the paddy field. The remains were now beyond any possible recognition, should it chance to be discovered.
More unfrequented ways were carefully picked, as they turned back for the Naka-cho. Late that night, the two fugitive figures crawled into their home.
Part V
PART V
SEARCH for the whereabouts of Tokubey, made at large and at length by his henchmen, had proved quite fruitless. Ashizawa admitted to the inquiry that he had wounded the man, who, however, took to his heels with his two companions. Tsuya’s account was that the three of them, while fleeing in fright of officers’ possible pursuit, lost one another on the way; he had not been seen since then. Even if he had made his way out of trouble, she opined, there would be very little chance of his surviving the wounds he had suffered.
Abiding in their luck, which was little short of the devil’s own, the couple had neatly pulled the wool over the eyes of the world. Nothing more to check them, they plunged into a life of gaiety and laughter. Her methods were oft subject to whispered comments, and yet the name of Somékichi continued to rise in fame. To the girl at the zenith of her career, life seemed to be a cup never to be drained.
One morning, about half a month or so after the night of the last murderous deed, the front lattice door of the Tsuta-ya was opened and admitted, on a voice of morning greeting, a caller who was of all callers the least expected, Kinzo of the Narihira-cho. Shinsuké who was just then seated over a brazier and a bottle of drink for his morning repast in the adjoining room, sped upstairs the instant he caught the sound of his voice.
A parley ensued downstairs between Tsuya and Kinzo. “I know no man of that sort,” she retorted, insisting on her ignorance in a manner that was more brusque than it was tart.