Ring. Koji Suzuki

front of him, and in its shadow the darkness was even deeper. There had been lots of people on the tennis courts and in the restaurant. But here Asakawa was alone. He shut the curtains and looked at his watch. 8:56. He hadn’t even been in this room for thirty minutes. It easily could have been an hour or more, he felt. But just being here wasn’t dangerous in and of itself. He tried to believe that, to calm himself down. After all, how many people must have stayed in B-4 in the six months since these cabins were built? It wasn’t like all of them had died under mysterious circumstances. Only those four, according to his research. Maybe if he dug deeper he’d find more, but at the moment that appeared to be all. Thus, simply being here wasn’t the problem. The problem was what they’d done here.

       So, what did they do here?

      Asakawa then subtly rephrased the question. What could they have done here?

      He’d found nothing resembling a clue—not in the bathroom, not in the bath, not in the closet, not in the fridge. Even assuming there had been something, the manager would have disposed of it when he cleaned the place. Which meant that, instead of sitting here drinking whiskey, he should be talking to the manager. That would be quicker.

      He’d drained his first glass; he made his second a little smaller. He couldn’t afford to get drunk. He put a lot of ice in it, and this time he cut it with tap water. His sense of danger must have been numbed a little. He suddenly felt foolish: stealing time from work, coming all the way up here. He took off his glasses, washed his face, then looked at his reflection in the mirror. It was the face of a sick man. Maybe he’d already caught the virus. He gulped down the whiskey-and-water he’d just made and fixed himself another.