Lady Joker, Volume 1 by Kaoru Takamura (lightest ebook reader .txt) 📕

were untied and then bound again with duct tape. He also felt a man’s hand touch the front of his vest and his back, but Shiroyama could not tell what had been done to him. He was pulled to his feet but he could not walk right away, and he was practically carried away, his shoes put back on his feet. Then all at once there was a creaking sound, and a rush of cold outdoor air engulfed him.

Just as when he had been carried inside, snow fell from the tree branches, and he heard the sounds of footsteps crunching on ice or earth. However, this time the walk continued for a while longer. The ground was uneven, and whenever his feet caught on something and he stumbled, he was dragged up from under his arms. All around him the heavy reverberations of snow falling were overlapped by the sound of feet trampling over frozen earth, snow, and grass. He had no idea how far they had walked, but their early dawn march soon ended, and Shiroyama found himself standing on a flat road. He was then led by the arm and turned to face a particular direction, after which he heard the older man’s voice.

“We’ll release you here. Your attaché case is behind your heels. Take the duct tape from around your wrists and the blindfold off yourself. Once you take the blindfold off, you won’t be able to see anything until your eyes adjust, but don’t panic. Your vision will return after a little while. Until then, do not move from this spot. You are standing on a road. If you walk in the direction that your toes are pointing, you will find a fire station on your right. If you walk the opposite way, there are no houses. Follow the direction you’re facing now. Do you understand?”

They left Shiroyama with these final words: “There is a photograph in the interior pocket of your jacket. Before you start walking, make sure you look at it. You’ll have a lot to think about before you dash to the fire station.”

After a brief pause, he heard the two men take off running. Their footsteps faded into the distance behind Shiroyama, until the soft echoes of a door opening and closing and an engine revving reached Shiroyama’s ears.

Those noises were soon replaced by a near total silence that descended upon him like a force, and Shiroyama’s knees buckled and he sank to the ground. He moved his bound wrists behind him furiously, and once he had ripped apart the duct tape, his unfettered hands slipped the ring of cloth around his eyes off his head. Unconsciously he jammed it into his pocket, along with the duct tape, without even taking the time to notice the material he now touched for the first time.

The muscles around his eyes, having been constricted for more than two days, hurt intensely, and though he was able to open them, his eyeballs had been under an abnormal amount of pressure and at first could not withstand the external stimulation. As he blinked his eyelids open and closed, his eyes and nose ran to ease the pain. In the meantime Shiroyama ripped off the duct tape covering his mouth. Touching his chin and cheeks, his frozen hands felt the coarseness of his beard, which had grown long; when his fingertips touched the deep hollows of his cheeks, he could hardly believe they belonged to his own face; and as he felt his hair, which stood on end and refused to let his fingers pass through, terror overcame him.

Once the viscous film that had covered his retina thinned out, what Shiroyama saw first was a uniform blackness. The blackness then started to mottle, until gradually parting to reveal the ground, the shadows of trees, and the sky. Covered in lingering snow, the contours along the shoulders of the road appeared a shimmering indigo, while the surface of the road where there was no snow gave off a wet, black luster. The trees hanging over either side of the road were jet black, and the sky spread above them was a faintly brighter indigo. There were no guardrails or signposts along the road, and the overlapping trees stretched on without end.

His attaché case was indeed behind his heels. He picked it up first and by the time he raised himself again on unsteady legs, Shiroyama had regained a sense of composure. Suddenly remembering, he searched the interior pocket of his jacket and produced a photograph, which he held up to the light reflecting off the snow. Initially he could not make out the standard-size snapshot, but as he continued to gaze at it his eyes adjusted to the darkness, and he was able to distinguish two small faces. Shiroyama held the photo closer and peered at the two faces, disbelieving his own eyes as he brought it even closer.

His niece, Yoshiko, and her little boy, Tetsushi, who had just turned two.

After confirming that much, Shiroyama tucked the photo back in his pocket and started walking. As his mind raced again, the incident from four and a half years ago came rushing back at him like a gust of wind, and then receded—Oh, is that what this is all about?

The blood was gradually pumping through his body, and he registered the cold again. His heart, instead of rupturing, diligently continued to pulse as his feet propelled him forward. Once he had walked a ways, Shiroyama stopped and took the photo out of his pocket again, then tore it into pieces with his hands. Taking care not to drop any of the shreds, he ripped it again and again into tiny fragments, then clutching them all in his palm, he ventured from the shoulder of the road into the grove of trees and, a few at a time, buried them in the grassy soil he dug up with the tip of his shoe.

Meanwhile, he carefully began to amend his previous thoughts