“Well, I’m glad you’re so willing to help,” Marume said, his voice cheerful now, “because here’s your big chance.”

Sano stepped around the partition, into the parlor. “Good evening, Hoshina-san.”

Shock widened the yoriki’s eyes. “Sōsakan-sama,” he said. “But I thought-”

Aware of Hoshina’s part in the plot against him, Sano was gratified by his reaction. He permitted himself a sardonic smile. “You thought I was dead? Of course you did, after coming from the scene of my murder.”

Hoshina rose, staring at Sano. Marume stood, too, surreptitiously moving between Hoshina and the door. Hoshina shook his head in disbelief. “But I saw your body, and your blood on the ground, and Detective Fukida grieving over you.”

“Obviously, you and your men didn’t see any need to look at the face of the corpse,” Sano said, glad that his prediction of the police’s behavior had proved accurate. “That was a stupid mistake for someone as smart as you think you are.”

The insult brought a scowl to Hoshina’s face. His breathing quickened and his mouth worked as he struggled to get his emotions under control and understand what had happened. “If you didn’t die at the palace, then who did?” he asked.

“It was Aisu,” Sano said.

He saw instant recognition of the name in the yoriki’s gaze, then fear. But Hoshina quickly masked his response with a bewildered expression. “Who on earth is Aisu?”

“He was a high-ranking bakufu retainer from Edo. You may have met him during the past few days.”

“… No, I don’t believe so.” Hoshina frowned in a studied attempt at remembering, then said, “I’m sorry; I’ve never even heard of the man.” But the energy of racing thoughts and mounting distress radiated from him. “What was this Aisu doing in Miyako?”

“You tell me,” Sano said.

Hoshina gave a nervous chuckle. “How can I, when I didn’t know him?” Then he spread his arms as if to embrace Sano, and said earnestly, “Look, I’m overjoyed to see you alive and well. But why have you let everyone think you dead?”

Sano’s plan required the clement of surprise, which had already unbalanced Yoriki Hoshina, and which he hoped to employ to even greater advantage soon.

“Why did you sneak into my quarters?” Hoshina added.

Ignoring the questions, Sano said, “Where is he?”

“Where is who?” Hoshina spoke in a tone of puzzled innocence, but his gaze shifted furtively.

“Chamberlain Yanagisawa,” said Sano.

“The shogun’s second-in-command? In Edo, I suppose. How would I know?”

Marume laughed in derisive amusement. “You’re a pretty good actor. Maybe you should have chosen a career in the Kabuki theater instead of with the police force, because then you wouldn’t be in as much trouble as you are now. Answer the sōsakan-sama’s question.”

“I assure you that I would if I could,” Hoshina said. Anger and panic shone through the transparent veil of his courtesy; his tongue flicked out to wet his lips. “If you’re threatening me, I don’t understand why. Maybe I could be of more help if someone explained what’s going on.”

Sano was growing impatient with Hoshina’s false innocence, but he found a certain satisfaction in laying out what he’d deduced. “Yanagisawa wants to solve the mystery of Left Minister Konoe’s death and destroy my reputation as a detective and my standing with the shogun by beating me at my own game. He won’t risk a public defeat, so he came to Miyako secretly. But he can’t identify the killer without information about the victim, the crime scene, and the suspects that he couldn’t get for himself while staying hidden. He also intends to benefit from whatever leads I find.

“Therefore, he needs someone to feed him facts and inform him on my progress. Someone inside the local bakufu, with expertise in investigating crimes, upon whose assistance I would rely. Someone he could trust to sabotage me by withholding information about the case.” Sano stared at Yoriki Hoshina. “Someone like you.”

“With all due respect, you’ve got the wrong idea about me.” Now Hoshina arranged his face in the confident, ingratiating smile of a man accustomed to using looks and charm to ease his way through life. Yet the air in the room was sour with the reek of his anxious sweat. “I’ve done everything in my power to help you. I haven’t withheld anything from you. If Chamberlain Yanagisawa is in Miyako, it’s news to me. And there’s not one reason why I should sabotage your investigation.”

“There’s exactly one reason,” Sano said, eyeing Hoshina with a contempt that extended to himself for thinking this man merely untrustworthy and no real threat. “Ambition.”

“All right; I am ambitious. That I want to advance in the world is no secret. Therefore, it was in my interest to do my best for you so you would think well of me and recommend me for a promotion in Edo.” Hoshina was all reasonableness and affability. “I’ve nothing to gain by making you look bad.”

“You have much to gain by serving a man who can do more for you than I can.”

“I’m sorry you’ve taken such a dislike to me,” Hoshina said contritely, but his eyes had the wary look of someone humoring a madman. “At least tell me what it is you think I’ve done against you, so I can defend myself and set things right.”

“You knew I needed to make further inquiries about Lady Asagao after she revealed her quarrel with Konoe and lied about her alibi to my wife. You guessed that I would search her rooms or send someone to do it. You planted the bloodstained robes in her cabinet.”

Sano watched Hoshina for a reaction, but the yoriki’s face showed only consternation that might indicate either guilty or innocent surprise.

“One of your palace spies must have stolen her clothes for you,” Sano continued. “If I look in the police stables, will I find a horse with a recent cut? Did you dip the robes in the horse blood and heat them over a fire to dry them and make the stains look a month old? You and Chamberlain Yanagisawa arranged a false arrest so he could show up later, catch the real killer, and take all the credit.”

Hoshina burst out laughing; he slapped his knee. “Pardon my amusement, sōsakan-sama, but that’s the most far-fetched story I’ve heard in a long time. Surely, the real killer planted the fake evidence to frame Lady Asagao. That seems to me a more logical explanation.”

He might be right, Sano realized, and even if not, Hoshina wasn’t going to admit to anything. Now that he’d recovered from the shock of seeing Sano, he’d regained his bluffing skills. The longer the interrogation went on, the less Hoshina would give away, and the greater the chance that someone might come and see that Sano was alive.

Sano said, “You didn’t stop at withholding information and misguiding me. You and Chamberlain Yanagisawa set me up to be murdered tonight.”

The yoriki’s face froze in its amiable, concerned expression. His body tensed, and Sano knew what he was thinking. Hoshina could get away with sabotaging the investigation because Yanagisawa had ordered him to do so; he wouldn’t suffer any punishment as long as he had Yanagisawa’s protection. But conspiracy to murder the shogun’s sōsakan-sama was a graver charge. Even without proof of the plot, or of Hoshina’s involvement in it, Sano could ruin his career just by accusing him publicly. If Sano put him on trial for the crime in a judicial system where most trials ended in a guilty verdict, he would be condemned to death. Yanagisawa would let Hoshina take the whole blame, sacrificing the yoriki to save himself.

This awareness flashed in Hoshina’s eyes in an instant. His smile became a grimace; he relaxed his muscles with slow, deliberate effort, but held himself cautiously still, as if he stood at the brink of a deep gorge. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said.

Without warning, he bolted toward the door. Sano lunged after him, but Marume moved faster. The burly detective locked his arms around Hoshina’s thighs and brought down the yoriki with a crash. Hoshina kicked and flailed, trying to break free. Marume hung on. Sano wasn’t surprised that Hoshina had decided to run. His best hope of avoiding ruin was to find a way to warn Yanagisawa that Sano was alive and knew about the plot.