We could steal time just for one day
We can be heroes for ever and ever
"Heroes" (David Bowie)
Gorgeous cover!
Earlier this year, I discussed
Yuuki Haruo's
Salome no Guillotine, a very memorable mystery set in the Taishou era, revolving around a series of murders among artists. It was only after reading the book I learned it was actually the latest entry in a series. In fact, I only realized that
after I first opened the book of today's review, and saw the names of the protagonists of
Salome's Guillotine on the first page... Yuuki Haruo's
Tokeidorobou to Akunin ("
Clock Thieves & Crooks"
2023) is the second book featuring the adventures of
painter Iguchi Sakuta and his friend and former burglar Hasuno in the late Taishou era, with the handsome Hasuno with his criminal experience of course being the detective, while Iguchi functions as our Watson. Iguchi and his wife are good friends with the loner Hasuno, who after a short career in relieving people of their possessions has now become
mostly an upstanding citizen, though the adventures of the two occasionally force Hasuno to make use of his unique talents again. And yes, this is the
second book in the series apparently, so I'm reading these out of order and I have no idea how much about their initial meeting is explained in the first book, but in
Tokeidorobou to Akunin, they form a great team. The book is technically a short story collection, but the stories do flow from one into the next, even if there's no tight overarching storyline.
The book opens with Kaemon-shi no Bijutsukan ("The Art Museum of Mr Kaemon"), where Iguchi has a major problem. Long ago, his father had bought an antique Dutch clock which once belonged to the Dutch royal family. When he purchased the clock, he also received a very well-made imitation of the clock, as the previous owner had been scared of theft. When Iguchi's father sold the clock to the collector Kaemon, he gave the imitation to Kaemon. The latter never noticed it, and Iguchi suspects his late father did it on purpose. The elderly Kaemon has not long to live anymore, and has recently had his country house renovated to include an art museum to display the art collection he gathered throughout the years. This would include the Dutch table clock, and Iguchi is afraid fellow art connoisseurs who will visit the museum will realize it's a fake, and that it will become public his father sold Kaemon imitation art. Iguchi and Hasuno visit Kaemon at his house, to see if they could just apologize and give him the real clock, but the attitude of the grumpy old man makes it clear there is only one solution: Iguchi and Hasuno have to break in the museum and swap the fake clock for the real one themselves. What follows is a fun adventure of Iguchi and Hasuno trying to sneak inside the museum, but while they are there, they notice something is off about the museum, but what? This is one of those mysteries where you don't really know what the mystery is until the conclusion, so I can't say too much about the mystery. But I'd definitely say it's a memorable one! The ingenious twist is definitely set-up very well with both physical and psychological clues, and I love the themes (motive) behind this story. Great opening of the book, especially with the banter between Iguchi and Hasuno.
Akunin Ikka no Misshitsu ("The Locked Room of the Family of Crooks") follows Atsuko, the maid of the Minoda family, who live in a large manor in Yokohama. Patriarch Akiyoshi lives in England with his wife, while his four children live in their parental home in Japan. None of the children, all of different mothers, really like their father, nor each other, but money is a great binding tissue, so they all live together. Oldest son Yukimasa one day receives a letter from his father telling him he is returning from England and he has also sent boxes full of furniture back to Japan. It appears his wife died, and now he's coming back, but his father wants his home in England replicated perfectly in the annex of their Japanese home, hence Akiyoshi not only sending back sofas and chairs, but even the doors. Yukimusa arranges for builders to come and construction starts based on the photographs his father sent him. One night however, as the maid Atsuko returns, she notices a figure floating in the rooms under construction, and when she peeks through the window, she sees Yukimasa's body hanging from a rope, with his legs resting on the bolted door latch (which was also imported from England). She calls the other siblings, but they can only enter the room by breaking the door down: meaning this was a locked room. At first sight, this therefore looks like a suicide, but when Iguchi and Hasuno visit the place (Iguchi's patron had sent Iguchi and Hasuno to sort out something with Yukimasa), they soon uncover not only that all of Yukimasa's siblings had a motive to kill him,, but they also find clues that indicate this was indeed a murder. But how could the murderer have left the locked room? On a purely technical level, the locked room mystery is not very original perhaps, but the way it ties to the motive is really great! It provides a fantastic reason why such a rudimentary trick was used, and the small unique elements of this locked room, like balancing the victim's feet on the latch, do transform it enough to create a good story. But it's definitely the motive, and the final implication regarding the victim, that makes this another good entry.
Yuukai to Ooyuki - Yuukai no Shou ("Abduction and Heavy Snow: Abduction") and Yuukai to Ooyuki - Ooyuki no Shou ("Abduction and Heavy Snow: Heavy Snow") is a two-part story, each focusing on a different mystery. In the first part, Hasuno asked to come disguised as a salesman to Iguchi's sister-in-law's place. When he arrives there, he learns Iguchi's niece Mineko has been abducted and a ransom note has been left in their letter-box. They ask Hasuno for advise, but the latter soon notices several odd points about the ransom note, leading to a surprising conclusion regarding why Mineko was abducted. The story then deals with the drop-off for the ransom, which is done by Iguchi's father-in-law, while Hasuno and Iguchi, in disguise, try to spot the abductors. Again, Hasuno quickly sees through the trickery of the abductors and soon the two are on their way to save Mineko. This chapter is the most adventurous of the whole book, I think, with a good deal of suspense as Hasuno slowly deduces the bigger story behind Mineko's abduction simply based on the instructions in the ransom note. The trick regarding the ransom money drop-off is fairly simple, but it's basically just a set-up to lead into the second part of the story. There we follow the story first from Mineko's point of view, as she finds herself abducted by a group of men. In the night, she's taken by one of the leaders to a hut outside and thrown on a hay bed: Mineko fears the worst and is knocked out by the man. When she wakes up however, she finds that man stabbed to death lying next to her. It is at that time her uncle arrives together with Hasuno, having found out where she was being held, but they have two problems: one is that their car broke down and even if they try to get away on foot now, they'll probably be caught by the rest of the gang in the house next door. The second problem is that the only footprints leading to the hut are those of the dead man, Mineko and Iguchi and Hasuno who arrived just now, meaning the only person who could've killed that man is Mineko. While Mineko has no recollection of killing the man, and Iguchi and Hasuno also don't believe that is the case, who then did kill the man, and how? While it might be hard to guess the details of how this was done, I think the general idea behind the locked room is probably fairly easy to guess, even if it can be a bit tricky figuring out the exact timing. The story then ends in a kind of reverse Home Alone, where Iguchi, Hasuno and Mineko try to round up the whole gang themselves, which results in some funny swashbuckling scenes.
Iguchi, like many of his fellow artists, has found a patron in the art-loving businessman Harumi. In Harumi-shi no Gaikoku Tegami ("Mr Harumi's Letter from Abroad"), Harumi asks Iguchi for some help, or to be exact, he needs the help of Iguchi's friend Hasuno. Not because Hasuno was a burglar, but because Hasuno also knows languages and Harumi needs a translator. His wife passed away some time ago, and he only now got around to sorting out her possessions, but he came across a strange letter from France, even though she did not have any friends there. Hasuno translates the letter, which is sent by the nephew of Marcel Champlain, stating he writes on behalf of his recently deceased uncle, who implored him to write a letter to Japan to express his thanks, and love to Ms Harumi. Harumi has no idea who this Marcel Champlain is, and asks Iguchi and Hasuno to figure out who he is and what his relationship was with his wife. The two dig into the history of Harumi's late wife, which is rather complex: Harumi's recently deceased wife was actually his second, and his first wife was actually her twin sister, who also passed away early, and there was another older sister too. The precise relationship between Harumi and his wife and sister-in-laws is rather complex and can make this story a bit confusing, and again, this is the type of mystery you don't really know was even present until it is explained to you, though I do like the truth Hasuno eventually uncovers, and it gives a very sad, but memorable meaning to the letter sent on Marcel's behalf.
In Mitsukawamaru no Ayashii Bansan ("The Alluring Dinner on the Mitsukawa-Maru"), Iguchi, Hasuno and fellow artist Ootsuki find themselves on the ship Mitsukawa-Maru, as representives of Harumi. The Mitsukawa-Maru recently returned from India, but ran into trouble just off the coast: while the ship itself is in no direct danger of sinking and the crew safely returned to the mainland, it will take a few days before the ship itself can be pulled free. However, the ship was carrying a unique cargo: two tigers.... which are going to be served at dinner. Hirokawa Koutarou, the owner of the ship, also runs a shady secret club where the members can enjoy strange things, which is why he had planned a dinner party with tiger meat. Due to the ship's troubles however, he has decided to hold the party on the ship itself now, with the invitees being brought especially on the Mitsukawa-Maru as it lays off the coast. While one tiger has already been prepared, the other is bit more troublesome: the ship's troubles led to one tiger cage being broken, and now that tiger is running free in two connected rooms in the hold. Terue is Hirokawa's maid, and she's on the ship too to take care of her boss' guests, but she comes across the dead body of one of them! She reports to her boss, but when they return to the place, the body is gone, and her boss is not really believing her. Hasuno and Iguchi however have reason to believe Terue might be right, as the victim was a reporter on the trail of a serial killer, who might be one of the other guests, and they start poking around and looking for the body. This is by far the longest story of the bunch, offering a closed circle mystery with unique elements like a friggin' tiger in the hold, but I feel this story was way longer than it needed to be, and even felt a bit tiring after a while. Hasuno and Iguchi are already aware of much of the background story by the time the story starts, so the reader is always at a disadvantage, and unfortunately, this story has no floorplan even though the characters move around a lot on the ship. Eventually, Hasuno deduces who the murderer is based on the actions they took, but to be honest, the whodunnit wasn't nearly as impressive as the whydunnit. At least, the whydunnit regarding the direct motive for the second death and the implications of that death was absolutely great, and I would perhaps have preferred a story focusing solely on that.
Houseki Dorobou to Okidokei ("A Jewel Thief and the Table Clock") brings up back to the Dutch table clock from the first story. Iguchi receives a letter from the (son of the) previous owner of the clock, who hopes to buy back the clock. Iguchi has two major problems: due to the conclusion of the first story, Iguchi is still in possession of the clock, even though it belongs to Kaemon and two: the clock was stolen. He had kept it wrapped up in a cloth in the bedroom, but for some reason someone stole the clock, and just the clock, with nothing else in the bedroom being disturbed. This was also only one theft in a series of thefts among friends of his wife: several rubies have been stolen, but all under nearly impossible circumstances: for example, one friend had a bracelet with a ruby embedded in it, and hidden it within an orange cloth, put in a box with many other wrapped up cloths, but the thief managed to steal only the one with the bracelet in it, without opening the other cloths. In another theft, the thief stole a ruby which had been put on a dress, but there had been four identical dresses, with the other three having very well made imitations, so how could the thief so quickly found the real ruby, not even having to touch the other three dresses? While the tricks behind each of these cases is fairly simple, I do like how some of them are connected, leading to some nice synergy moments: the explanation for the ruby on the dress theft for example is pretty clever on its own, but it also gives a great explanation for how the thief managed to find the antique clock in Iguchi's home. While I don't really think this is a very memorable story (I think I had expected it to connect a bit more strongly to the previous stories), it's an okay one, and it also leads directly into the events of Salome's Guillotine.
Overall though, I did really enjoy Tokeidorobou to Akunin. I think Yuuki Haruo especially excels in coming up with cool motives that not only are memorable, but they also often naturally lead to the core mysteries of howdunnit or whodunnit. I already noticed that in Salome's Guillotine, but as a short story collection, you of course see more instances of that here. The banter between Hasuno and Iguchi is also fun, and while some of the stories can become a bit darker, there is usually a slight comedic tone to them (the two stories told from the maid's POV for example have some funny moments where they lament having to work for their employers). So another recommended read! I should probably read the first book too...
Original Japanese title(s): 夕木春央『時計泥棒と悪人』: 「加右衛門氏の美術館」/「悪人一家の密室」/「誘拐と大雪 誘拐の章」/「誘拐と大雪 大雪の章」/「晴海氏の外国手紙」/「光川丸の妖しい晩餐」/「宝石泥棒と置時計」
