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

“That’s what the police suspect us of, anyway,” said another.

“The newspapers have already made up their minds,” said yet another.

To all this Shiroyama replied, “I’m very aware of all this.”

“Shiroyama-san. You say that you told the police what you did because the criminals said they were holding the beer hostage, but that’s not entirely logical. If the beer is being held hostage, we can’t possibly protect the company without support from the police,” said another executive.

“I understand your point exactly, but if I were to tell the police that the beer has been taken hostage and that fact leaks to the papers, that cannot be undone. There is no option but to protect our products ourselves. We’re already in the midst of the summer sales season, so it’s imperative that whatever measures we take will not startle our distributors and consumers.”

“Does that mean you think there is no chance the criminals will be captured—?”

“No, but the reason the police don’t have any leads has nothing to do with me not accurately conveying the ransom. And so long as there is no guarantee that the criminals will be captured anytime soon, I feel it’s best for us to take precautions against their threats and make the best decisions possible as we go. I don’t feel that I have consented to their demands.”

“Do you really believe the criminals will make contact?”

“I do believe they will—it’s the sense I got from what they said.”

The questioning broke off there, but murmured complaints—“I can’t believe this” or “Why did it have to be Hinode?”—bubbled up before silence bore down on the room again.

“Gentlemen. Please take this opportunity to share your thoughts and opinions here frankly,” Shirai prompted.

“Can we really go through with the shareholders meeting with these rumors of a backroom deal?”

“I don’t think there is any need to get into details at the shareholders meeting.”

“But what if they actually do poison our products? Perhaps we should consider paying the two billion—”

“No, at this stage it’s too soon to come to a decision.”

“If we are going to reject their demand, then we should have cooperated fully with the police from the start.”

“But if there’s no chance that the criminals will be arrested—”

“Whatever the case, we have to avoid allowing it to affect orders during the high-demand season,” said one of the executives from the Kurata faction.

For the time being, each executive held fast to his own argument, and the dearth of ideas—an utter failure to see the big picture and make a commanding decision—was nothing out of the ordinary. As Shiroyama took in the discussion, which spun in circles like a yacht that could not set its direction, his own mind shut down any attempt to reach a decision. He was in no position to opine about the disorderly scene before him in which the executives, rather than showing any sense of crisis, instead revealed glimmers of their ulterior motives, their eyes on the next regime. Shiroyama just sat amid the board of directors, bearing the lie he had told that would force the company to unrightfully pay out two billion, and even as he did so, he was losing sense of the reality surrounding him bit by bit, until he no longer knew how he had come to be there—how he had been kidnapped; how intently he had deliberated, then wavered, and finally made a decision; the fact that he was deceiving the public and his company; the fact that he was president; and the fact that he was sitting there now.

And even though I lied, what does it matter when the lie is so small that it’s nothing compared to three-and-a-half million kiloliters of beer? It may seem I did it to save my niece and her family, but what are Yoshiko and Tetsushi to me? Did I return here for the sake of my company, or for my family?

Shiroyama knew he could only answer the last question. He was not doing this for anyone’s sake—he simply had not had the courage to die.

“Everyone, no doubt the president is tired tonight, so let’s start wrapping things up,” Kurata broke in.

“I’ll conclude,” Shiroyama said in response. “Everyone, I’ll be brief. Right now, what is being asked of us is this: how will we get through this violent crisis, as a corporation; how will we minimize the damage; and how will we keep this incident from interfering with our operations. With these as a premise, for today I have refrained from disclosing everything to the police, to leave room to negotiate with the crime group, should worse come to worst. I ask you to accept this point. If you have any objections please raise your hand.”

No one did.

“Next, as to how we should respond to the crime group’s subsequent movements, I would like to monitor the progress of the investigation for about a week, then have another discussion and reach a decision. Any objections? No? Then I’ll assume it’s approved. Next, let’s discuss whether to take this opportunity to step up our crisis management and strengthen our company’s general security preparedness. I will ask Kotani and the security company as well as the point person for security from each sector to come up with proposals for the necessary measures and cost for each stage—production, distribution, and wholesale—as soon as possible. With those materials in hand, I would like us to reconvene early next week to analyze our plan. How does that sound?”

“Allow me to confirm one thing before we finish.” The man who spoke was Kenji Otani, managing director of the pharmaceutical business division, one of the five executives who had refused to make eye contact with Shiroyama at the beginning of the meeting. Otani was a man who had driven the pharmaceutical division by demonstrating outstanding leadership abilities in new drug development but, it must be said, his was the kind of intellect, having never experienced setbacks or failure, that did not have the same