Clocktower Read online

  *

  His chauffeur picked him up promptly at eight, and sped him southbound into The Crown. The ride was short, but Johnny was once again keenly aware of the change in environment. Unlike the transition between The Bezel and The Lugs, which was marked by a passing of natural green into manmade gray, the path from The Bezel to The Crown was lined by a lushly flowered boulevard. The mid-sized homes and shops of The Bezel were replaced by towering mansions and stone statues. Unlit iron lamps appeared at regular intervals, and before long a massive, gothic cathedral was standing right in front of him.

  “Will you be attending the service today?” Johnny asked the driver as they pulled up to a small lot outside the cathedral’s northeastern wall.

  The driver tapped his radio. “I’ll be listening to the Grand Luminary’s holy words from right here. The madam asked that I await your return, after all.”

  “Any customs I should be aware of before entering?” Johnny asked, pulling on the door handle as he did.

  “It’s not like going to a Shinto shrine, if that’s what you’re asking. No handwashing or anything like that. Just stick with the crowd and find an open seat. Do as everyone else does, and . . . well . . .” He hesitated. “I’ve said enough. Enjoy the service, Mr. Tokisaki.”

  Johnny thanked him and exited the car. It was a short walk from the lot to the giant double doors of the cathedral, and he craned his neck to get a good view of everything. It was an entirely unthinkable structure to have along the California coastline. Not the slightest hint of Japanese influence marked the art on the walls or the figurines and statuettes that stood in front of them.

  The citizens of Sonnerie entered the cathedral in groups of families and friends. Johnny moved to join those entering the cathedral, but something caught his eye from above. A pair of mourning cloaks, their black wings fluttering overhead, danced together in the air before skittering off toward the east. Johnny followed them until they joined a flight of identical butterflies hovering above a small garden that surrounded a brilliant Pacific dogwood tree, whose white petals were likewise covered by a regiment of their ink-winged brethren.

  Curiosity piqued, he followed the pair of mourning cloaks until he found himself at a small arch, and a single man standing guard in front of it.

  “I’m sorry, sir,” he said, holding out a hand as Johnny approached. “The garden is currently occupied. I’m afraid I’ll have to ask you to wait.”

  Johnny looked down at the man, who had a golden pin on his lapel of two watch hands, both pointed directly up. One of Dr. Tonimura’s men, he was certain.

  “Occupied?” Johnny asked.

  The guard began to answer, but was interrupted by another voice from within.

  “It’s alright,” Dr. Tonimura said. “You can let the Investigator through.”

  The guard cleared his throat and stood aside. “Very well,” he said. “Mind your manners while you’re inside.”

  Johnny gave him a sarcastic grin and stepped through the arch into a lush, green world that encircled the Pacific dogwood. Dr. Tonimura stood on the far side, her eyes locked upon a single mourning cloak that had landed atop the back of her hand. Her garb was much the same as it had been when he had previously met her inside the morgue at Sonnerie hospital. A white lab coat that covered an elegant black blouse, and a long, gold accented skirt.

  “They’re beautiful, aren’t they?” she said without looking up.

  “They are,” Johnny replied, circling around the tree.

  “Most of the ones you see up there are sleeping. They hibernate in the winter and become active in the early spring. But occasionally, you get early risers. Restless little buggers. Just can’t wait, can you?”

  Johnny came to her side and turned his eyes to the butterfly that still rested on her hand.

  “I often come here to observe them,” she said. “In a couple short months, this place will be a hive of activity. Once they’re awake, they’ll spend a good time mating. It’ll be all they can think about until the deed is done, and fresh eggs saturate the branches of this place. In June, the eggs will hatch, and the circle will begin again.”

  She moved her hand next to his, and pushed the small butterfly over to him. Johnny lifted it up close to his face and inspected it. Sheer black wings with a solid gold border, and small blue dots that spanned from the top corner of each wing all the way back to the bottom.

  “Why do some of them wake up early?” he asked as he watched the insect.

  “Perhaps they can’t sleep? Perhaps something rouses them to flight before the others. A strong wind, or an unusually warm day. It’s impossible to say. One can never know the heart of a butterfly.”

  “Can you sleep, Doctor?” Johnny asked, looking up at her.

  “Hmm,” she smiled. “Still pursuing answers, I see. How go your inquiries, Mr. Tokisaki?”

  “Fruitful,” he said. The mourning cloak on his hand suddenly beat its wings and flew off to its sleeping comrades above.

  “May I ask you something, Investigator?” she asked. Despite her apparent age, there was not a hint of frailty in her voice.

  “You can ask,” he responded. “But I might not have an answer.”

  “Do you have a family?”

  “No,” he said. This time, it was he who broke eye contact. “I was an only child. My wife passed away five years ago.”

  “I see,” she said. “I know the pain of losing someone close to you. What you wouldn’t give to bring her back, I wonder.”

  Johnny’s brow furrowed. He felt suddenly uncomfortable, as if the question had an answer that only she could know.

  “You’re a doctor,” Johnny said. “You should know more than anyone that the ones we lose are gone forever.”

  “It is true. I’ve seen more than my share of death in this world. Even before Sonnerie. During the war, in the camps. That is where I first saw death.”

  Johnny studied her eyes, but made no answer. There was a loneliness in her. The pain of someone long lost. A pain that he knew well.

  “Madam Index!” the voice of the guard called back to her. “It is time!”

  “Well,” Dr. Tonimura said. “It appears our conversation is at an end for today. Good luck to you, Investigator. May you find the answers you seek.”

  “And you as well,” Johnny replied. “May you find peace in your sleepless nights.”

  *

  The inside of the cathedral was much the same as the exterior. Statuettes sitting upon daisies lined the walls, and a long gold-and-black carpet stretched into an absolutely enormous main hall. Here, the walls told a painted tale. A mural that bespoke a visual history of Sonnerie. On the far left was a scene he recognized. The same picture of the twelve Indices that he had seen more than a few times in the elevator at The Wheel Bridge. After that was a depiction of a great many people kneeling in prayer, and beyond that was the visage of a six-winged angel hovering over a single person.

  It was only at that point that the clocktower came into the picture, standing at the tallest crest of Sonnerie, right at the edge of the Pacific Ocean. From here, things took on a much more distinct horological theme. Wheels, cogs, pinions, hands. It would seem that the pursuit of timekeeping was not the original intent of the inhabitants, but was something born from a collective spiritual experience of the citizens of Sonnerie.

  So lost was Johnny in the murals that he marched straight into the back of a burly gentleman walking in front of him.

  “Forgive me.” Johnny looked up to apologize, but found a familiar face looking back at him.

  “Hāfu?” Nakahara’s eyes opened wide in surprise. “What are you doing here?” he whispered.

  “Gave up on looking for Jesus, and here I am.” Johnny looked around, keenly aware of the volume of attendees that had surrounded him.

  “Hāfu,” Nakahara said. “You shouldn’t be here.
Yama-san will be here. He gave you a warning. You should listen.”

  A group of people behind the pair had started clearing their throats in annoyance at the lack of forward movement.

  “Are you here with anyone?” Johnny asked.

  “No, I—”

  No sooner had the words left his mouth than Johnny took him by the arm and ushered him over to a pair of seats in one of the last rows.

  “Ow,” Nakahara protested.

  “It’s fine.” Johnny pointed at the pin on his collar. “I was invited here. And you look like a reputable, faithful man, the perfect type to teach me a little about Sonnerie and the church.”

  Johnny reached into his jacket pocket and produced the lighter that Nakahara had given him the day before.

  “Here,” he said, offering it back.

  Nakahara took the lighter in his hands and flipped it open and closed a few times. “Did you find it?”

  “The Bracelet? Yeah, made it there last night. But why did you point me in that direction?”

  Nakahara put the lighter in his jacket pocket and leaned in close.

  “Because you’re a prick, but Yama-san’s a bigger prick. If he’s not friendly with you, that means you’ve made an enemy here. A powerful one at that. So the enemy of my enemy is my friend, right?” His belly jiggled a bit as he muffled a laugh.

  “So I take it the First and the Sixth aren’t on the best of terms?”

  Nakahara snorted. “You could say that, hāfu. I’d say that there’s no more bitter enemy than an old friend. Remember that.”

  Johnny nodded his head and leaned back, examining the room once again. The faithful came in by the hundreds, and as more of them took their seats, Johnny was able to get a clearer view of his surroundings.

  In even distributions above the murals were semi-visible box seats. Twelve in total, they each marked the positions of the hour on a clock, and each had carved atop it the symbol of clock hands set at an hour respective of its position in the room. Try as he may, they were too far to make out the individuals that inhabited them.

  “Sheesh,” Nakahara complained as he took something out of his pocket. “You didn’t have to drag us into the nosebleeds, you know. I get here early for a reason. I hate using these things.”

  He took a pair of chipped, faded opera glasses in hand and wiped off the lenses with a cream-colored cloth. After a few rubs, he held them to his eyes and took a look back at a group of younger women who had just entered the main hall.

  “Oh, lovely Ms. Okita, you can’t hide those giant tits of yours through a tight little blouse like that, heh-heh-heh.” He licked his lips.

  Johnny rolled his eyes and snatched the opera glasses from Nakahara’s hands. “Give me that,” he said, resting the glasses on his nose.

  “Hey!” Nakahara protested loud enough that the people sitting in front of them turned back and stared him down.

  “Sorry,” he said, clearing his throat.

  Johnny paid them little mind. He scanned the room once again, starting at the front. In each box seat were five or six individuals. He tried to keep a mental note of them as he moved across the room. Most of them were talking among themselves and their faces were out of view, but occasionally he could make one or two of them out. As he turned to the seats at the six o’clock position, he saw Mutsumi Baba and her adopted son, Jack, though neither seemed to acknowledge or notice his presence.

  Notably, the boxes at the five o’clock and eleven o’clock positions were devoid of occupation. Empty seats among heaven’s banquet. Upon noticing this, he felt something begin to prick at his mind. A needle of truth from the garbled madness of Mei Goto. Johnny took out his small notebook and flipped it to the page that held her deranged musings.

  Twelve cups fight in a room where time stands still. They desire wine, but the servant keeps bringing them water. One cup fell off the table and shattered on the floor below. Another one cracked in the wash and the others never saw it again.

  “Be seated!” a single voice rang out over all the others. Johnny shoved the notebook back in his jacket and raised the glasses back up to his eyes.

  At the front of the hall, in a raven-colored robe accented by gold lines along the collar, was a gaunt, elderly man.

  “That’s the Grand Luminary,” Nakahara whispered. “Ninomiya, the Second.”

  “Bow your heads!” he called to his flock. They obeyed in perfect synchronization. Only Johnny’s head remained above the others, like a singular nail that had yet to be hammered down flush with its peers.

  Johnny scanned the seats of the Indices once more. He could see faces more clearly now. Most of them were wrinkled and serious, although occasionally a middle-aged person occupied the front and center seat in a box.

  Ninomiya began chanting in a language that both was and wasn’t Japanese. Occasionally the faithful would hum at certain queues, but they all kept their heads down. Johnny observed them coolly for a moment before something in the box of the First Index caught his eye. Movement. Not sudden or intense, but just enough that he felt the need to observe what was happening.

  He brought the glasses up to his eyes again at the man who he assumed to be Isshin Hanekawa, Ayano’s father. A man Johnny surmised must have been nearing eighty. Behind him and off to the left was Yama, the man who had failed to intimidate him at the shogi parlor. Isshin Hanekawa looked over his shoulder, then stood from his seat and welcomed someone in.

  Johnny noticed a sudden flash of sweat running down his cheeks and into his eyes. He took a moment to wipe his face down and pressed his eyes against the binoculars once more. The First Index was standing in front of someone now, directly obstructing Johnny’s view.

  Another round of sweat welled up on his forehead, forcing him to wipe himself off again. An unbearable heat had seized his whole body, and he felt as if he might melt away into a puddle under the pews.

  Johnny shook himself and looked one final time through the lenses. Now, there was the shape of someone next to the First Index. Smaller, feminine. A girl, staring straight back at Johnny. Straight through his looking glasses. Straight through his eyes. Straight through his heart. Her visage as cold and distant as the apogee of the moon.

  The second murdered girl.

  Ayano Hanekawa.

  Eighteenth Movement

  Painting

  Johnny’s stomach turned in on itself. There she was. Staring straight at him. And though consciously he knew that he could be no more distinguishable than an insect at the distance he sat from her, she was unmistakably watching him, her eyes poring over every small detail of his form and figure.

  His first thought was that this had all been some elaborate ruse. There were no dead girls. There was no mystery. Just a porcelain enigma wrapped in the stench of cold hard cash that had lured him in. He wanted to run, but any movement now would draw the attention of the entire congregation.

  Instinctively, he took his right hand and laid it on the handle of his revolver. He needed to grasp something real. Something solid. Something reliable. Something that gave him power over the world around him, no matter how it might twist and contort. He squeezed the wooden grip so hard he felt it nearly cutting into his skin. And the whole time, Ayano looked on. Neither smiling nor frowning. Only observing, like a scientist studying a specimen in a petri dish.

  After some time—Johnny could not tell—she offered the faintest hint of a grin, then looked away. The Grand Luminary continued to chant in his half-language, and the parishioners continued to hum in reply. It wasn’t until he felt Nakahara’s hand press against his knee that Johnny was jolted back to reality with such force that he nearly ripped his revolver from its holster.

  “Hāfu,” he whispered. “Put your head down.”

  Johnny’s body shivered back to life. He let go of his revolver and put his head down like the others.

  “What�
��s wrong with you?” Nakahara whispered again. “You look pale.”

  “Yeah,” Johnny nodded. “There’s someone here that shouldn’t be.”

  “Who?”

  Johnny furrowed his brow, but before he had time to think further, the Second called the congregation to raise their heads and listen.

  “My flock,” his voice rang out clearly across the hall. “Today I would speak to you of the miracle of Sonnerie. Of our people. Of you all, and of me.”

  Johnny brought Nakahara’s binoculars back up to his eyes and focused back on the box seats of the First. Ayano was still there. Mr. Yama had come to her side now, and was whispering something in her ear.

  “It is a miracle of death, and a miracle of life,” the Second Index carried on. “Of betrayal, and of loyalty. Of family, and of foe.”

  After a moment, Yama lowered his head as Ayano whispered something back to him. He nodded several times, then gave a concise but deep bow. She came to her feet, looking back over at Johnny one last time before disappearing behind the curtains.

  “A miracle . . .of resurrection!” the Second Index roared, and the entire congregation responded with one voice.

  “Our time will come!”

  Johnny couldn’t wait any longer. Ayano was on the move, and wherever she went, he had to follow.

  “I have to run,” Johnny said, pushing Nakahara’s binoculars back into his hands.

  “What? Hey! Hāfu?” He pulled at Johnny’s sleeve in a vain attempt to get him to sit back down, but Johnny’s focus was singular. He squeezed past the rest of the congregation in his row and nearly jogged through the main hall back to the giant front doors and out into The Crown.

  The driver was waiting just where he had left him, listening to the broadcast of the Second Index over the radio and tapping his fingers against the wheel.

  Johnny hurled open the car door, startling the poor man such that he jumped and hit his head against the ceiling.