People Who Eat Darkness Read Free Page A

English name Scott.
    —She has written a letter to Casablanca to say that she will not be coming back to work.
    There was a pause. Louise began to sob.
    —Anyway, what is your address?
    Louise said, “My address…”
    —The address of your apartment, in Sendagaya.
    “Why … why d’you need to know my address?”
    —I want to send you some of Lucie’s belongings.
    Louise’s dread, which up until now had been on behalf of her friend, suddenly became personal. “He wants to know where I live,” she was thinking. “He’s going to come after me .” She said, “Well, Lucie knows it. She knows her address.”
    —She is not feeling too well now and she cannot remember.
    “Oh, I can’t remember either.”
    —Well … can you remember where your house is near?
    “No, no, I can’t remember.”
    —What about the street? Can you remember the street?
    “No, I…”
    —Anyway, I need to send her belongings back.
    “I can’t remember…”
    —If it’s a problem, don’t worry.
    “I haven’t got it on me now…”
    —That’s okay. Don’t worry.
    Louise was overcome by panic and emotion. Weeping, she handed the phone to a friend, an Australian man who had lived in Tokyo for years.
    “Hello,” he said in Japanese. “Where is Lucie?”
    After a few moments, he handed the phone back. “He’ll only speak English,” he said. “He only wants to speak to you.”
    But Louise had collected her thoughts. She realized that it was important to draw the conversation out, to try to find out where Lucie was.
    “Hello,” she said. “This is Louise again. So, can I join your cult?”
    The voice seemed to hesitate. Then it said, —What religion are you?
    Louise said, “Well, I’m a Catholic, but Lucie’s a Catholic too. I don’t mind changing. I want to change my life too.”
    —Anyway, it’s up to Lucie. It’s up to what she thinks. I will think about it.
    “Please let me speak to Lucie,” said Louise desperately.
    —I’ll speak to my guru and ask him.
    “Please let me speak to her,” Louise cried. “I’m begging you, please, let me speak to her.”
    —Anyway, I have to go now, the voice said. —I’m sorry. I just had to let you know that you won’t see her again. Goodbye.
    The cell phone line went dead for the second time.
    *   *   *
    Lucie disappeared on Saturday, July 1, 2000, at the midpoint of the first year of the twenty-first century. It took a week for the news to reach the world at large. The first report appeared the following Sunday, July 9, when a British newspaper carried a short article about a missing tourist named “Lucy Blackman.” There were more detailed stories the next day in the British and Japanese papers. They named Louise Phillips, as well as Lucie’s sister, Sophie Blackman, who was said to have flown to Tokyo to look for her, and her father, Tim, who was on his way there. Reference was made to a threatening phone call and the vague suggestion that she had been kidnapped by a cult. Two of the stories spoke of “fears” that she had been “forced into prostitution.” Lucie was identified as a former British Airways stewardess, but the following day’s news identified her as a “bar girl” or “nightclub hostess” in “Tokyo’s red-light district.” Now Japanese television had seized on the story and camera crews were prowling through Roppongi, looking for blond foreigners. The combination of the missing girl’s youth, nationality, hair color, and the implications of the job she had been doing had tipped the story over the threshold that separates mere incident from news; it was now impossible to ignore. Within twenty-four hours, twenty British reporters and photographers and five separate television crews had flown to Tokyo, to join the dozen correspondents and freelancers permanently based there.
    That day, thirty thousand posters were printed and distributed across the country, mostly in Tokyo and in Chiba, the prefecture immediately to the east