...throat...
...moon...
This is such a great help! But...
You were saving this to buy an unabridged dictionary of Japanese history, right?
No, it's all right.
If you can use it, that's enough.
Then I'll be sure to use it well.
You were playing Humoresques, weren't you?
Yes.
The truth is, I want to play Wagner, but I just can't play well enough,
and Nomura-san recommended it so ardently, I decided to try it...
Have you gotten used to it yet?
That part where it changes keys is particularly tricky, right?
The rain's stopped.
Come with me to the Twelve-stories.
What? Now?
The thing is... I received a detective request, you see.
Maichou Shimbun Demon's Hour at the Skyscraper
In these modern times,
something like that couldn't possibly exist.
Oh! Looks like a crowd is gathering!
7:30, huh? It's just about the right time for...
That's...
The phantom of the demon tower...
Woodpecker Detective's Office
Poem 4 Strange Stories of the High Tower
Summer's long over already...
It must be holding a grudge.
Namandabu, namandabu, namandabu...
I-It really appeared... A ghost!
Yes...
It did appear, but...
Ishikawa-san!
It's me. Yamaoka.
It's been a long time! Have you been well?
Yes.
Oh, this is Kindaichi Kyousuke-san. My talented investigative assistant.
Kyousuke-sa—
Kindaichi-kun.
Huh?
This is a reporter for the Maichou Shimbun, Yamaoka-kun.
Oh. I've just started proofreading for the Asahi.
Really?
Maichou Shimbun Demon's Hour at the Skyscraper
Well, let's not stand around talking.
How about a little refreshment?
Three orders of your finest kabayaki eel, and three bottles of sake, too.
I'm not very hungry, so... just two of each.
I'm not feeling very well either, you see.
Really?
Really.
That's all.
Oh! Maybe we should have had monkfish instead.
Oh. Your nails.
Did you do that with the person you mentioned?
No, these aren't really...
I was wondering. You said something about investigating?
That's right.
I recently started working as a detective.
My talent flowers best, you see, when confronted by reality.
Poems, tanka, and novels are all just fictions in the end.
Still, saying that poets and detectives are alike is...
So... what are you looking into?
The ghost at Ryouunkaku.
Are you here gathering material, too?
No...
The manager of the Twelve-stories asked me to reveal the truth behind it.
He said it was just too eerie.
To tell the truth... it's causing me problems, too.
I work at the sumo hall next to the Twelve-stories.
What?
Did you end up quitting the newspaper?
Yes. At the end of September.
The end of September...
Eel
Keep the change!
What?
Thank you for treating me.
It doesn't even come close to repaying your kindness.
As conscientious as ever, I see.
And you... you've changed a little, I think.
I haven't changed at all.
Three years ago, when I was moving back to Kozukata,
he really helped me out.
Speaking of which...
Kyousuke-san, you haven't been home in a while.
Aren't you starting to miss your hometown?
Ishikawa-kun.
Is something wrong? That's quite a frightening expression.
I'm not... lending you any more money!
I feel you need to grow up a little.
Oh! The moon is so pretty!
You're right. It's beautiful.
Isn't it?
Throat...
...moon...
So, you're saying all the ghost commotion at Ryouunkaku
Woodpecker Detective's Office
is because of a trick being played by an entertainer in the area?
People are turning away from the Twelve-stories and the moving pictures.
The traditional entertainers are all excited.
I see.
Ishikawa-kun?
Kindaichi-kun!
This is Asakusa's Rokurou-san.
He's notorious in Asakusa,
If he sets his sights on you, you're as good as dead in Asakusa.
A very scary person.
No, no. Nothing like that.
My name is Kindaichi Kyousuke.
Sorry, but could you make some tea for us?
What?
And if you could put these golden lace flowers I bought in a vase?
I remembered the way they bloom at the foot of Mount Iwate, and I couldn't help myself.
Now then.
If we assume that the ghost is a trick being played by the entertainers,
then exposing the truth behind it might be simpler than I thought.
For example... a magic lantern?
That sounds like a good line of inquiry.
If I make a move, people get upset, so I'll just ask around a bit.
Here you go.
Sorry for the trouble.
Kikunyuusha Milk Newspapers
Milk Newspapers Kikunyuusha
Thanks for waiting.
Um... Is it true?
You've discovered the truth behind the ghost?
The articles on the ghost in the Maichou Shimbun...
You wrote them, didn't you?
What?
You quit at the very end of September.
And the daily ghost articles also stopped abruptly on September 30th.
Maichou Shimbun Demon's Hour at the Skyscraper
W-Wait, hold on a minute.
There were articles about it after that, too, weren't there?
Yes.
Even major papers who hadn't reported on it at all before
started reporting on it simultaneously starting on October 10th.
What do you think about that?
What do we think?
You can't mean... There's no reason for the Maichou Shimbun to print a false story.
That's exactly what I mean.
Just what I'd expect from you, Kyousuke-san.
In short, up until that point, no ghosts had appeared.
That's why the big papers had no reason to write about it.
To put it a different way, the ghost began to appear on October 10th.
And the one who made it appear...
was you, wasn't it, Yamaoka-kun?
Come to think of it, Rokurou-san got in touch with me recently.
He told me a gentleman named Koiso Matsukichi
used to be a magic lantern operator.
Yamaoka-kun, you wouldn't know him, would you?
I have no idea what you're talking about.
I have work, so...
Your nails!
Crimson nails, right?
"In the pale crimson
lingering emotions of balsam flowers
a breath blown across
nails waiting for snow."
There's a poem about it.
The ghost wouldn't have anything to do with those crimson nails of yours, would it?
You can't tell me about it?
Throat. Moon.
Woodpecker Detective's Office
Three Years Earlier
What time is your train?
Three o'clock.
I'll leave once I've finished this.
It's a shame.
A talent like yours...
Actually, I'm going to start working at the Maichou Shimbun.
Oh, that's great news.
So you can write your novel while you're working.
No. I won't be writing a novel...
There's someone I've grown very fond of,
but right now, there isn't any way for me to...
To live for love... that's life, too.
Well then, let's meet again one day.
I like your poetry.
In that case, I'll accept.
I'll leave the money here.
Thank you!
The dango here really are exceptional.
After seven, is it?
We should arrive at the prearranged spot right on time.
This is crazy, isn't it?
What is?
You never have money, and you just went and paid without any prompting!
Kyousuke-san.
I simply want to be honest with myself, that's all.
Honest?
Why are we meeting in a place like this?
What's wrong?
It seems we're being followed.
What?
Don't look back.
See?
You're right!
Now that I think about it, they say a woman was killed here not long ago.
Kyousuke-san!
I wonder who was following us.
The only ones who knew we'd be in Asakusa at this time were...
Rokurou-san,
and the man he introduced us to, Matsukichi, makes two.
Oh, but Rokurou-san is helping you, so...
Yamaoka-kun?!
Someone's dead over here!
That's Mattsan!
It's old man Koiso!
This man is Matsukichi-san?
An artificial leg!
Wait!
You shouldn't just go touching things...
This is from over two months ago.
"In a copse behind Sensou-ji,
an unidentified young woman, collapsed and bleeding from the head,
was discovered by a man named Koiso Matsukichi.
With her last breath,
the woman was heard to say these mysterious words: 'throat moon.'"
Throat moon...
Throat... moon...
Throat moon, huh?
That's what it was, Kyousuke-san!
The ghost of Ryouunkaku. This newspaper article is what caused it to rise.
A throat moon...
Did you hear? About the man who worked the magic lanterns getting killed.
Kikunyuusha Milk Newspapers
Milk Newspapers Kikunyuusha
The man on the run is named Yamaoka. A friend of Ishikawa-kun's I believe.
About two months ago,
the woman he loved was killed behind Sensou-ji.
He thought the magic lantern operator who found her had done it,
and this crime was the result.
Oh, right. Are you feeling better?
Huh?
There's nothing particularly wrong with me...
Well, Ishikawa-kun came to me recently saying you weren't feeling well,
and to build your stamina, he wanted to feed you monkfish,
so could I please help. He was quite persistent.
Really?
With me he said that Kyousuke-san was always helping him,
and wanted to give him a history dictionary,
but he didn't have the means, so...
Hold on!
With me he said he wanted to help him go back home for a visit
and could I help with travel expenses...
This is where you were!
Ishikawa-kun!
Feeding me monkfish! Buying me a dictionary! Sending me home!
What were you think—
This is no time for that!
Come on! Hurry up!
Wh-What? Wait!
My, my...
It just won't focus correctly, but that's part of the fun.
Where did you get something like this?
To expose the truth of the ghost,
I asked the client to borrow it for me.
But, there wasn't really a need to try it yourself, was there?
In addition to the client's request,
I thought I'd try reeling in the Matsukichi-killer.
You're saying Yamaoka-san will come here?
Oh. That's right!
You went and made out I was sick so you could borrow money, didn't you?
And you said you wanted to buy me a dictionary and send me home...
But... Kyousuke-san, you did seem unwell, and you wanted that dictionary,
and said you wanted to go home for a visit, didn't you?
But you ended up using the money you borrowed on yourself, didn't you?
It just happened to turn out that way.
Happened to?
Yes.
I wasn't lying when I said I wanted to feed you monkfish,
but it so happened that on the way back I caught sight of the golden lace flowers.
But, that's...
That's right.
Now that I think about it,
Wagner, and Wordsworth, too...
all the geniuses were burdened by tremendous debt!
You're just so...
Someone's here.
It was you, wasn't it?
Asakusa's Rokurou-san.
Wh-Why are you here?
And you, Constable Sahara. We've met before.
You're... from that other case...
Wasn't Yamaoka supposed to be here?
Well...
The person who killed Matsukichi-san wasn't Yamaoka-kun.
Rokurou-san. You killed him and tried to frame Yamaoka-kun for it, didn't you?
D-Don't be stupid.
Why would I do something like that?
The thing that made me suspicious
was that despite you profiting from the uproar about the ghost,
you offered to help me in trying to expose the truth behind it.
And when you even offered to introduce me to Matsukichi-san,
I was certain my suspicions were right.
And why would I need to kill Matsukichi?
Because... there was a certain fact regarding the origins of this ghostly uproar
that Matsukichi-san had figured out.
Kicking up a fuss...
Is someone there?
...throat... moon...
It's very likely that Matsukichi-san realized that you were the killer,
but as an entertainer in Asakusa,
crossing Asakusa's Rokurou-san was strictly forbidden.
On the other hand... he felt sorry for Yamaoka-kun, who had lost his beloved,
and to expose the killer, he agreed to help create the ghost.
If that's the case, then it would be even stranger
for me to help you meet Matsukichi, wouldn't it?
You made sure Matsukichi-san knew of us, while keeping your name out of it,
in order to test his loyalty.
Matsukichi-san brought the newspaper article about the murder,
intending to meet with us, so...
You decided he meant to betray you, and...
you killed him.
But, then... What about when you saw Yamaoka-san?
Rokurou-san used Matsukichi-san's name to call him out,
intending to frame him for the murder.
What are you talking about?
Well...
When we were on our way to the meeting place,
we were followed by Matsukichi-san...
By Matsukichi?
I'm sure he must have agonized to the very last moment.
This is hilarious.
So, you're saying that just before Matsukichi's body was found,
the man was following you, right?
Well, I suppose so.
But, you see...
I was drinking in a place on Nakamise when I got word that he'd died.
If Matsukichi was out by the haunted jizo statue playing tag with you,
then I couldn't have killed him.
How did you know we were near the haunted jizo?
I'm asking you how you knew where we were when Matsukichi-san was following us.
It's because the one following us...
was you.
I don't know what you're talking about.
Rokurou-san.
Would you mind taking off your scarf?
"Throat moon."
The strange words in the article Matsukichi-san was holding,
are referring to your neck, right?
Not "throat moon," "throat wound."
This is stupid. I'm leaving.
You're...
Show us.
Your neck! Show us!
Throat wound...
Yamaoka-kun!
He'd been searching this whole time
for someone with a scar on their throat, hadn't he?
He started by writing an article about the ghost,
then he made the ghost appear, making everyone look up.
Oh! It's the first snow.
"In Asakusa
atop the tower that scrapes the clouds
arms crossed, I ponder the day
a long journal entry, perhaps?"
It's a little... too late, isn't it?
Too late?
Crimson nails... it's another name for balsam flowers.
You crush the petals and paint your fingernails,
and if the color lasts until the first snow falls,
then your love will endure. That's what they say.
Living for love... and dying for love the way he did...
I believe I'm a little bit jealous.
What do you say to some monkfish on the way back?
What?
I'll pay, of course, so if you'd just feel greatly indebted to me...
It's true. You are a very honest person.
You eat what you want to eat,
wax nostalgic when you want to wax nostalgic,
when you feel something, you compose a poem...
In short, you are a genius...
and a child.
And I... I want to help you, just the way you are.
Somehow... I don't feel the need to fight you on that.
What's this? Hagiwara-kun, are you lovesick?
What? It's... um...
Yoshii-kun and Nomura-san were looking dazed, too.
Next Time: "Accursed Beast"
Ah, the season of love!
Illustration: Saki Kaoru