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their help. As he and Marume walked away from the stables, Marume said, “I think they’re telling the truth. Do you believe them?”
    “For now,” Sano said, reserving judgment until evidence should indicate otherwise. “The captain was right when he hinted that Ejima was a good candidate for murder.”
    “Because he was one of Lord Matsudaira’s top officials?”
    “Not only that,” Sano said. “His position made him a target. He headed an organization that spies on people.”
    No one was safe from the metsuke , especially in this dangerous political climate, when a man’s most innocuous words or deeds could be twisted into evidence of disloyalty to Lord Matsudaira and cause for banishment or execution.
    “If Ejima was murdered,” Sano said, “the killer may be connected to someone destroyed by a metsuke investigation.” And Sano recalled that Ejima had enjoyed his dirty job a little too much. The relish he’d taken from ruining people might have angered their relatives and friends.
    “Talk about a man with a lot of enemies,” Marume said.
    “But motive doesn’t necessarily mean murder,” Sano reminded them both. “Not when there’s so little evidence.” He resisted his hunch that Ejima had been a victim of foul play: Even samurai instinct was susceptible to influence by personal bias. “Before we go any further, we should finish interviewing all the witnesses.”
    He looked across the track, where Detective Fukida was still busy with the spectators, then up at the soldiers along the walls and in the turrets. “Even more important, we have to determine the exact cause of Ejima’s death.”
    This was something that Sano, despite all his past experience and newfound authority, couldn’t do himself. And the scope of the investigation extended far beyond the racetrack, past the men present at the scene of the death, to include Ejima’s foes as well as Lord Matsudaira’s. That could mean hundreds of potential witnesses—and suspects. Sano needed more help than Marume and Fukida could provide, from someone he could absolutely trust.
    “Send for Hirata- san ,” he told Marume. “Tell him to meet me here right away.”
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4

    Hirata sat behind the desk in the office that had once belonged to Sano, inside the estate where he was now master. Into the room filed ten members of the hundred-man detective corps that he’d once supervised for Sano and now commanded for himself.
    “Good evening, Sōsakan-sama ,” the detectives chorused as they knelt and bowed to Hirata.
    “What have you to report?” Hirata asked.
    The men described their progress on various cases he’d assigned them—a theft of weapons from the Edo Castle arsenal; a search for a rebel band suspected of plotting to overthrow Lord Matsudaira. The political climate had spawned many crimes to occupy the shogun’s new Most Honorable Investigator of Events, Situations, and People. As he listened, Hirata tried to ignore the pain from the deep, barely healed wound in his left thigh. He tried to never let his expression reveal his suffering. But Hirata couldn’t hide that he’d lost much weight and muscle after the injury that had almost killed him. He couldn’t deny that all the honors that had resulted from his valor in the line of duty had come with a terrible price.
    Six months ago he’d stopped an attack on Sano and saved Sano’s life. The cut from the attacker’s sword, meant for Sano, had gashed Hirata’s leg so badly he’d thought his death was certain. As blood poured from him and he lost consciousness, he thought he’d performed the ultimate act of samurai loyalty—sacrificing himself for his master.
    Three days later Hirata had awakened, and learned that Lord Matsudaira had defeated Yanagisawa, Sano was the new chamberlain, and he himself was a hero. The shogun had declared that if Hirata lived, he would be promoted to Sano’s former post. Hirata had been thrilled by the honor, and amazed that he—a onetime police