Glittering Gallows

Chapter 51

313 C Chapter 51 he air inside the security company’s building was refreshingly cool. The floor was thickly carpeted and all the visitors’ chairs were empty. The furniture and furnishings were oaken and bamboo respectively. The walls were indigo and decorated with sketches of ninjas and Samurai fighters. If Katherine hadn’t seen the signpost outside, she would’ve thought she had strayed into the headquarters of a martial arts club. A young Japanese woman in a kimono sat behind the reception desk. After warm greetings and a word with the woman, Katherine was asked to walk into a room marked ‘INTERVIEW ROOM 1’, one of five along a passage. The room was a small cubicle padded with acoustic panels. Two armchairs faced each other separated by a low table. Nothing else was in the room. As soon as she sat in one of the chairs, a Japanese man in a dark business suit walked in, bowed towards her and closed the door. He carried a diary. Lean with neither a moustache nor a beard, he was boyish and on the pretty side. If he wasn’t Moagi’s age, then he was slightly younger. Introducing himself as Mr Ryuu Masayoshi, he took the other chair and welcomed her to Bushido Security Company. Katherine gave him her first name only. They shook hands. “Would you like a beverage... coffee or whiskey?” “No, thank you.” “What can we do for you, ma’am?” he asked in a reserved tone, opened a page in the diary and held a pen at the ready. “I need to know what happens at my house.” “Are you suspecting your husband or someone of infidelity?” “I’m suspecting something worse than that. I need tangible evidence.” “Where do you live, ma’am?” “At the Randlord Mansion in Wonderboom. Hon. Moagi Makgunda is my husband.” T 314 The man bowed again. “I’m sorry I didn’t recognise you, Mrs Makgunda. My apologies. But you look different from the pictures we see on television.” “It’s the wig, I suppose, Mr Masayoshi.” “What precisely do you want Bushido to do for you, Mrs Makgunda?” “I need an undercover investigator in my house. I wouldn’t want to pre-empt anything, but I suspect something sinister and unpronounceable is going on at Randlord. I want a detailed report of what happens during the day and during the night.” Mr Masayoshi scribbled in his diary and looked up at her. “Do you want us to focus on an employee or a member of the family?” “I want to know what everybody who lives in the mansion does. Everybody is a suspect.” “You don’t need an undercover agent, Mrs Makgunda. You need hidden motion-sensor cameras installed in strategic places in your mansion. Everyone’s movements will be captured 24/7.” “I want them installed in every bedroom.” Mr Masayoshi shook his head. “Ethics forbid it. We can install them in lounges, drawing rooms, porticos and passages, but never in bedrooms.” He leaned back in his chair. “What about your children’s privacy, Mrs Makgunda? The law doesn’t allow us to make nude recordings without the written consent of the subjects under focus.” “You don’t understand, Mr Masayoshi. It’s imperative that I know what happens in my daughters’ bedrooms. It’s for their protection and well-being that I seek your services.” “If we captured them in the nude and the recordings leak, Bushido would be shut down and charged for malpractice.” “I thought you were professional and treated your findings in the strictest confidence.” “We try our level best to do that, but we aren’t expert at breaking the law. Our installations record theft, pilferage and robberies in departmental stores, factories, offices, commercial banks and car parks. But when we mount cameras in bedrooms we’ll surely make nude recordings. We won’t be able to defend ourselves in court or before the Ethics Committee.” 315 “You’ll install cameras in my children’s bedrooms,” she said in a fiery commandeering voice. “Bushido’ll treat the recordings with the strictest confidence. No one, and that includes my husband, should know about my concerns or the recordings.” The Japanese gaped. “I’ll grease your palms and pay double your normal rates.” He sat up and cleared his throat unnecessarily. “Confidentiality is our second nature, ma’am. You’ve my word.” “Your word...