It had been a vicious attack. The killer must have been either demented or so furiously angry with his victim that he was no longer rational. Akitada thought of Nagaoka, the husband.
Kobe, untroubled by either philosophy or psychology, urged impatiently, “Well, come on! Or are you waiting for the coroner to tell you what happened to her?”
“Talking about me behind my back again, Superintendent?” asked a high, brisk voice from the doorway. A small, dapper man in his fifties walked in with a bouncing step. He gave Akitada a glance, bowed slightly to both of them, but spoke to Kobe in a casual, almost jovial manner. “So? What gives us the honor of a second visit, Super?”
“ ‘Us’?” Kobe grinned, raising his brows. “Have you appropriated police headquarters, Masayoshi, or just the morgue? Or perhaps you have formed a closer relationship with the late Madame Nagaoka here?”
The dapper man cackled. “The latter, of course. It is a professional bond which always develops between the coroner and the latest victim of a crime. The intimacy of my investigation has much of love and passion in it.” He winked at Akitada, who frowned back.
“I brought a friend,” explained Kobe. “His name is Sugawara. He’s the nosy fellow who likes to solve my cases. As he wanted a look, I thought you could use some help, being that you don’t seem to be able to make up your feeble mind about the cause of death.” Kobe turned to Akitada. “This is Dr. Masayoshi, our coroner.”
Akitada gave the man a cool nod. He was scandalized by the coroner’s flippant attitude toward the body of a respectable young married woman.
If Masayoshi noted his expression, he ignored it. “I’ve heard of you,” he said. “There was a great deal of talk the time you pinned a strangulation of a girl from the pleasure quarter on one of the silk merchants.”
Akitada stiffened. “Nobody pinned anything on the silk merchant. The man was guilty. It was a long time ago, and you cannot be expected to have all the facts. Also, it required no medical skills. I have since had opportunity to learn a few things from one of your colleagues, but could not, of course, match your expertise. Please give me the benefit of your opinion in this case.”
“Ah!” said Masayoshi, his eyes twinkling. “I see how it is. The superintendent has brought an ally. It would hardly be fair if I spoke first. Tell us what you think happened to her.”
Irritated by the man’s manner, Akitada said, “Very well,” and began an examination of the dead woman. Nagaoka’s wife was of average height, as he knew from having seen her at the gate, and had a well-shaped and pale-skinned body. There were no visible wounds anywhere except, of course, for the mutilated face and shoulders. Nudity of men and women was too common a sight in bathhouses, or in ponds and rivers during the summer, to trouble him as he bent closer to scrutinize the well-shaped legs and arms, the small, firm breasts, flat belly, and rounded hips. “She was young and attractive, perhaps in her early twenties, and has led an active life,” he said, and moved to study the soles of her feet and the palms and fingers of her hands. “Her skin is too smooth and white for a peasant,” he noted, “and her hands and feet are well cared for, but…” He felt the upper arms and thighs, pursed his lips, and straightened up.
Kobe met his eyes impatiently. “Come on! What about the way she died?”
Akitada glanced at the terrible wounds made by the killer. Several of them could have been fatal. They had obliterated the face, nearly severed the neck, and left deep gashes in her shoulders. “The cuts were made with a sword, I believe. No knife could have left such deep, hacking gashes, but sword wounds look like that. I have seen many of them.” Unwelcome memories rose; Akitada pushed them firmly aside and knelt again to look more closely at the wounds. “Strange,” he muttered. “She must have been prone. Whoever wielded the sword stood over her, for the cuts are deeper at the top and quite shallow lower down. Also the swordsman, or perhaps it was a woman, must have cut the throat deliberately, for that required a change of direction.”
Kobe said, “Hah!” and exchanged a triumphant glance with Masayoshi, who chuckled and asked, “Anything else?”
Akitada was still looking and probing with his long index finger. The wounds of the face gaped, puddles of dried blood mingling with cartilage here and there, and pieces of bone protruded whitely from the raw flesh. One eye was closed; the other had disappeared completely in a mass of bloody pulp. Where the lips had been, broken teeth glimmered against the coagulated blood which filled the mouth cavity. It was no longer a human face. Akitada controlled a shudder.
“There is not enough blood,” he said after a moment, and looked up at Masayoshi, his face suddenly tense. “That means she was already dead when she was hacked to pieces, doesn’t it?”
“Excellent!” cried Masayoshi, clapping his hands. His tone was that of a teacher praising a bright child. “But come, how then did she die?”
Irritated by the coroner’s manner, Akitada looked at the corpse again. Except for the carnage about her head and shoulders, there were no wounds on the front of her body. He gently rolled her onto her stomach. The silken hair was tied in back with a bow, once white but now mostly dark with dried blood. The young woman’s back was also without wounds. “Perhaps a head wound,” he muttered, feeling the skull through the soft hair. Whatever blood the facial wounds had produced had run down her neck to gather between the shoulders. Her hair and bow had soaked up what little there had been. The skull itself proved to have neither cuts nor the soft depressions caused by bludgeoning. “No,” he said, sitting back on his heels and looking at her thoughtfully. “If we eliminate poisoning, the cause of death must be hidden by her wounds. Her face and throat are slashed so badly that it is hard to tell how she died, but it could have been many things. An arrow or knife thrust through the eye or mouth, or through the throat, for example, in which case she would have bled to death elsewhere.”
“I’m impressed.” Masayoshi nodded, smiling broadly. “They do teach you young gentlemen something after all.” His tone was openly offensive.
Akitada got to his feet slowly. From his full height he looked down at the short coroner and said coldly, “I gather from your remark that you know nothing about a gentleman’s education. It would have been wiser to hold your tongue under the circumstances. Your specialized training is what put you in your present occupation. Confine yourself to that in the future.”
Kobe gave a snort which could have been either surprise or satisfaction, but the coroner’s face froze. He bowed stiffly, saying, “I beg your pardon, my lord. I forgot myself.”
The man had a careless tongue, and Akitada did not like the manner of the apology, but he controlled his anger. He had no wish to humiliate people who performed useful tasks, but the coroner had taken intolerable liberties. A coroner was a mere functionary of the courts and he, Akitada, had held the rank of governor. He had been the one who administered justice and maintained good order among his people. He said brusquely, “Very well. Please explain your findings now.”
Masayoshi bowed again and turned to the corpse. He pushed aside the woman’s hair and pointed to the back of her neck. The blood had been washed off, and the skin gleamed softly white—except for a thin pink line, hardly noticeable, beneath one ear. “There it is,” he said dryly.
“It is nothing,” said Kobe quickly. “Anything could have done that. It certainly did not kill her.”
Akitada bent to look. He slowly turned the woman’s head, following the thin line until it disappeared in front under the torn flesh of the severed throat. Straightening up, he looked at the coroner. “I believe you are right. You think she was strangled with a rope or cord of some sort?”