Chapter 62 Section VIII

Yabe took the "My Wife No. 2" that night, and he only told Takimi that he was going to Sendai.Because the train was very crowded, Yabe realized that today was Saturday, and among the passengers, some people were carrying skis. When Yabe was looking at the scenery outside through the car window, he suddenly heard someone calling him behind him. Looking back, he saw Shinkichi Ijuin of "True Japan" standing on the aisle smiling at him. "Please let me go to Sendai with you." Ijuin stood up and said, his eyes were shining brightly, no longer the tired and melancholy eyes when we met in the cafe.

"Are you following me?" Yabe said with an unhappy face. "It can be said to be yes, or it can be said to be no. Judging from your re-investigation of the incident, you must be sure that it was a murder. In this way, Iseki Kazuhiko is the murderer. Therefore, I also want to go to Sendai to see." "You have the right to go to Sendai, but I don't want you to interfere with my investigation." "I know that." Ijuin nodded and said. "I used to work in a newspaper..." Ijuin said as if talking to himself, and suddenly frowned, maybe he touched his old scars.

"I will never interfere with your investigation work." Yijuin said in a loud voice. Yabe rested his head on the backrest and closed his eyes.He wasn't angry at Ijuin at all. Yabe smiled wryly.It seems that Yijiyuan went to Sendai to gamble, which is the same as him, and because of this, he smiled wryly.Yabe opened his eyes, and silently handed a cigarette to Ijuin. At 7:05 the next morning, Yabe's express train "Azuma No. 2" arrived in Sendai.Although it was sunny, it was very cold, more like winter than when he came to visit two days ago. "What are you going to do?"

After walking out of the ticket gate, Yabe looked at Ijuin's face and asked.A slightly embarrassed look appeared on Yijuin's face. "Then what are you going to do? Aren't you going to meet Kazuhiko Iseki?" "No, go somewhere else." "Where?" "Go to the scene of the fire." "Fire scene?" "are you going?" "Needless to say, I certainly hope you will take me with you." "Yes, but with conditions." "Is it because I can't take any action? I promise you." "In addition, there may be other things, please tell me."

"whats the matter?" "Let's talk about it after seeing the fire scene." Saying so, Yabe started to walk.For Yabe, Ijuin is a big burden, but he thinks this burden can be used. Odainohara, where Tsuneo Goto lives, is not far from the station. If you take a taxi, it takes about ten minutes. Compared with Tokyo, the streets of Sendai are relatively narrow. After ten minutes by car, the high-rise buildings disappear and the scenery of the suburbs appears. While talking about the self-immolation news published in the newspaper, the taxi driver drove the car to a stop near the scene of the fire.

"Are you friends of the suicide man?" the middle-aged driver asked while accepting the fare. After Yabe just nodded ambiguously, he looked at the fire scene surrounded by ropes. The fire scene has been cleared.Someone worshiped wild chrysanthemums at the scene of the fire. Under the morning light, the wild chrysanthemums glowed yellow. There are only a few houses around, and the words "people nearby..." made Yabe mistakenly think that it is like Tokyo, where there are people living around. Far away, not as close as Tokyo. This is a great place to paint. "Who committed suicide here?"

"I just wanted to know about this, so I came here." "As the taxi driver said, Goto was doused in gasoline..." "That is true." "Is Goto's suicide related to that incident?" "I also want to know." Yabe said with a look of embarrassment on his face, and walked away from the fire scene. There was a police station about 50 meters ahead, and Yabe walked towards the police station. In the small police station, there is a chunky middle-aged inspector, who seems to be very bored, warming himself by the fire. After Yabe greeted the inspector, he took out his police card and showed it to the inspector. The inspector opened his eyes wide, probably wondering what the detective from the Metropolitan Police Department was doing in Sendai?

"I'm here on vacation in Sendai." Yabe said with a smile in order to reassure the other party's doubts. "Because I heard that someone set himself on fire, I bent over to take a look." "That incident really surprised me too," said the inspector loudly. "Because that kind of thing is the first time I have ever encountered in my life." "Who identified the body?" "It was me. I died a miserable death. Because my whole body was covered with petrol before the fire was lit, my whole body was burnt to charcoal." "Are you sure that corpse is really the artist Tsuneo Goto?"

"yes." "But, the whole body is burnt into coke, isn't it difficult to identify?" "It's true, but I'm sure that the corpse is Tsuneo Goto, because that's his home, and the day before he distributed the painting to people nearby, it's obvious that he has suicidal thoughts." "What did you do with that charred body?" "Since no one came to collect the body, I handed it over to someone nearby for a proper burial." "Now, where's the corpse?" "After the cremation, the ashes were buried in the cemetery of Buddha Wuyuan. I think this is a kind of merit. Let me think about what his ring name is."

"No, you don't have to think about his ring name, I want to see his paintings, can I?" "If you want to see his paintings, I happen to have one here." The inspector stood up briskly, took out an oil painting from the shelf behind him and placed it in front of Yabe, it was a small landscape painting. "This is the view from the nearby hills." The inspector explained, but Yabe didn't care about the other party's explanation, and only looked at the signature of "T. GOTO" on the screen. Yes, it is exactly the same as the signature on the painting I saw at Yumiko Kuwahara's bar.

"What kind of person is Tsuneo Goto?" Yabe turned his gaze back to the inspector. "Well--" said the inspector in a good-natured tone. "He is not talkative and not easy to get along with others. There are many artists who have this virtue." "What about age?" "Thirty-two, three-year-old, medium build, round face, thick-rimmed glasses, wearing either a fedora or a flat hat—" While listening to the patrol's explanation, Yabe compared it to Kazuhiko Iseki in his mind. Glasses and fedora hats are different, but they are external objects, not important, medium build, round face and other physical characteristics and ages are the same—— "Is Goto Tsuneo's experience completely unclear?" "Yes. Because the investigation was done after the accident, and he did not come to the police station to register for moving in. The landlord also rented the house to him without investigating his identity because he had paid the rent for several months." "Is he painting every day?" "No, he said that he likes to wander a lot, so he is often away from home. I wonder if he will travel with his painting tools like Kiyoshi Yamashita? Although I don't know why he rents a house, but I know his paintings are very many." "You said he is often not at home?" "Yes. It's common to not see him for half a month. He said he was traveling in Hokkaido."