Play/The Master Likes a Mystery

Introduction

西洋文化と日本文化の入り混じる大正時代。 東条財閥の子息として、自由気ままな生活を送っていた志岐は ある日、道端でハンカチの落とし物を拾う。 小間使いに届けさせるという執事の鷺島の意見を押し切って、 直接草薙家へ届けに出かけるのだった…

Western and Japanese cultures merge – the Taisho period. As the heir to the Tojo business conglomerate, Shiki lives a free-spirited life according to his own whims. One day, he picked up a handkerchief left on the roadside. Shiki’s butler, Sagishima, proposed to have a maid deliver the handkerchief. However, despite Sagishima’s suggestion, he and Shiki set out for the Kusanagi residence to deliver the handkerchief themselves…

About

The Master Likes a Mystery is the Winter Troupe’s second play.

Cast

LEAD ACTOR	Homare Arisugawa as Tooru Sagishima
	The Tojo household’s butler.
Original Cast Cards
SECOND LEAD A	Hisoka Mikage as Shiki Tojo
	The heir to the Tojo business conglomerate.
Original Cast Cards
SUPPORTING CAST A	Azuma Yukishiro as Shizuma Kusanagi
	The victim’s older brother.
Original Cast Cards
SUPPORTING CAST B	Tsumugi Tsukioka as Keiichi Soma
	The victim’s fiancé.
Original Cast Cards
SUPPORTING CAST C	Tasuku Takato as Keiji Nakatsu
	A detective.
Original Cast Cards
SUPPORTING CAST D	Any Character as Butler
	The Kusanagi household’s butler.

Play Translation

	Western and Japanese cultures merge – the Taisho period.
	As the heir to the Tojo business conglomerate, Shiki lives a free-spirited life according to his own whims. One day, he picked up a handkerchief left on the roadside.
	Shiki’s butler, Sagishima, proposed to have a maid deliver the handkerchief. However, despite Sagishima’s suggestion, he and Shiki set out for the Kusanagi residence to deliver the handkerchief themselves.
Butler	Thank you very much indeed for going out of your way.
	Please, do come in.
	The young miss should be in the garden at about this time.
	!? M-ma’am!?
Shiki	That person on the ground – is that Miss Kusanagi?
Sagishima	Master Shiki, please stand back.
Shiki	Call for a doctor at once—
Butler	Y-yes sir!
Sagishima	I’m afraid it’s too late.
Shiki	What?
Sagishima	She’s dead.
	Shiki found the corpse of a young woman in the garden.
	Detective Nakatsu arrived soon after, and began to inquire the three of them as the witnesses to the crime.
Butler	This way, please.
Nakatsu	I’m the one in charge of this case. My name is Nakatsu Keiji.
Shiki	Detective Nakatsu?
Sagishima	My lord, detectives typically do not introduce themselves as Detective such-and-such.
Nakatsu	Keiji is my name.
Shiki	Detective Nakatsu Keiji.
	It’s almost as if you were born to be a detective.
Nakatsu	I’m often told that.
	They were made to go home after the investigations. However, the detective suspects Shiki as the culprit and tails him.
	Under the pretense of clearing his name, Shiki begins his own investigations to uncover the real culprit as a way to kill time.
Shiki	Sagishima, investigate Miss Kusanagi’s interpersonal relationships at once.
Sagishima	Master Shiki, you have a bad penchant for meddling in other people’s affairs.
Shiki	I’m suspected as the culprit who murdered the count’s daughter.
	I can’t stay quiet.
Sagishima	Who would be so insolent as to suspect you, Master Shiki?
Shiki	Even a dog would notice if it’s being tailed by a detective around the clock.
Sagishima	To think that a dog would be outwitted by Master Shiki.
	…That is unfortunate.
Shiki	What do you mean by that?
Sagishima	Oh, no, it’s nothing.
	According to Sagishima’s investigations, two people stand out as suspects.
	Miss Kusanagi’s brother, Shizuma, and Miss Kusanagi’s fiancé, Soma Keiichi.
	Shiki meets with the two of them at the Kusanagi mansion.
Butler	Please excuse me.
	Mr. Shiki has arrived.
Shiki	I’m sorry for the wait.
	Now then, I would like to hear your side of the story.
Shizuma	My sister was not the type to incur ill will.
	She was an intelligent, good-natured young woman loved by everyone.
	How could something like this have happened to her…
Butler	Oh, Miss Kusanagi…
Keiichi	As a fiancé, she was the perfect woman.
	I couldn’t have wished for more.
	I was not worthy to be her partner.
	Just a few days ago, she showed me her smile when we met for the ceremonial preparations…
Shiki	I’ve figured out who the culprit is.
Sagishima	Oh? Who is it?
Shiki	It’s you, Sagishima.
Sagishima	I wish to hear the reason why it would be me.
Shiki	The person least suspected by the detective turns out to be the culprit.
	It’s a cliché.
Sagishima	Is that so?
	Then it cannot be helped that I’ve been exposed.
	Thank you for taking care of me all these years.
	I shall take my leave.
Shiki	It was a joke. Don’t take it seriously.
Sagishima	I would be troubled if you treat me as a murderer for a mere joke.
Keiichi	What a pointless charade. I shall take my leave.
Butler	Mr. Soma! Please wait!
Shizuma	Shiki-kun, thank you for doing this for my sister.
Shiki	I’m doing this to prove my innocence.
Shizuma	Chance encounters happen in the most unexpected places.
	Don’t you think so?
Shiki	Indeed. I feel like we’re going to be good friends.
	Shiki gets on well with Kusanagi Shizuma during their investigations.
	However, finding nothing suspicious of the two suspects’ testimonies, the investigations come to a standstill.
	And then one day, Shiki and Sagishima discover that Soma Keiichi is being intimate with other women besides Miss Kusanagi.
	Immediately afterwards, Shiki receives a threat letter.
	The threat letter’s contents read: “Should you continue your investigations, you shall suffer the same fate.”
Shiki	This is quite easy to understand. Now, I wonder what I shall do.
Sagishima	Master Shiki, please do not do anything too dangerous…
Shiki	Heh, I’m simply going to scatter some bait.
	Ominous things begin to happen around Shiki ever since he received the threat letter.
	Despite Sagishima’s opposition, Shiki lays a trap for its sender.
	Thanks to that, they identify the one who wrote it.
Shiki	You were completely caught in the trap.
	Were you the one who wrote the threat letter, Soma Keiichi—
Keiichi	Gh…
Sagishima	Now why would Miss Kusanagi’s fiancé threaten Master Shiki?
Shiki	Is it not obvious?
	It’s because he was the one who murdered Miss Kusanagi.
Keiichi	You’re wrong! I did not kill her!
Shiki	What? Then why did you threaten me?
Keiichi	I would be in trouble if Mr. Kusanagi finds out about my relations with women.
	Mr. Kusanagi promised that he would give me aid even after her death.
	There is no way I would let something like this ruin that for me—
Shiki	What a greedy man.
	You should be ashamed of yourself.
	Due to Shiki’s trap, they identified that Soma Keiichi was the one behind the threat letter.
	Soma Keiichi had relations with multiple women since his engagement with Miss Kusanagi. Fearing that the Kusanagi family will find out, he targeted Shiki.
	However, Soma Keiichi denies killing Miss Kusanagi… And so their investigation goes back to square one.
Sagishima	That is an unusual book you’re reading.
Shiki	Shizuma-kun lent it to me.
	He’s quite an interesting fellow.
Sagishima	I am most glad that you’ve found a friend you can get along with.
	Shall we cease our search for the culprit?
Shiki	Why would it come down to that? Of course we’re not stopping it.
Sagishima	Very well.
	Shiki notices that the bookmark inserted in the book Shizuma lent him has a fragrance similar to the scent of Miss Kusanagi’s handkerchief.
	When he casually inquires Kusanagi Shizuma about the scent, Kusanagi Shizuma answers that it’s a scent they use in the study.
	Shiki realizes that it doesn’t match with Kusanagi Shizuma’s testimony of not meeting Miss Kusanagi on the day of her death.
Shiki	That can’t be… Then, the one who murdered Miss Kusanagi is…
Sagishima	What are you so taken aback for?
	If Soma Keiichi was not the culprit, then there is only one suspect left.
Shiki	But…
Sagishima	This is why I inquired if you would like to cease our search for the culprit.
	Even a dog would outwit you, Master Shiki.
Shiki	What did you say?
Sagishima	*cough*
	Well? What do you intend to do?
Shiki	Of course, I’m going to ascertain the truth directly.
Sagishima	Is that so?
	Well, that must be what he’s hoping for as well.
	Shiki hurried towards the Kusanagi residence. There, Kusanagi Shizuma greeted them with a calm expression, and began confessing to murdering his younger sister.
	He confessed that he knew about Soma Keiichi’s womanizing and tried to persuade his sister to rethink the engagement. However, it turned into an argument, which led to him murdering her.
Butler	Master Shizuma—
Shizuma	You were my only miscalculation, Shiki-san.
Shiki	What a shame.
	I thought that we could become good friends.
	After his confession, Kusanagi Shizuma stood up silently and left the mansion to turn himself in to the police.
Sagishima	Are you truly fine with this, Master Shiki?
Shiki	Of course.
	But for things to turn out like this…
	Miss Kusanagi must have felt remorseful as well.
Sagishima	I wonder about that.
	Miss Kusanagi’s corpse showed no traces of resistance.
Shiki	What does that mean?
Sagishima	Kusanagi Shizuma may have lied about quarrelling with his sister.
Shiki	You mean to say that Kusanagi Shizuma made a surprise attack to murder her?
Sagishima	She was stabbed from the front.
	Of course it could not have been a surprise attack.
	Meaning that Miss Kusanagi may have accepted the fact that Kusanagi Shizuma was going to kill her.
	I cannot think of any other possibility.
Shiki	She accepted that he was going to kill her?
	But why?
Sagishima	Well, who knows. As they say, ‘dead men tell no tales.’
	Perhaps she chose to be killed by her beloved older brother, instead of be wed to a man she did not desire.
Shiki	I don’t understand.
Sagishima	I expect no less from Master Shiki. Even a dog would—
	No, never mind. It’s nothing.
Shiki	…What a windy day.
Sagishima	Master Shiki, your gloves are going to get blown away.
Shiki	It had also been this windy that day too.
	Perhaps I was summoned unexpectedly by Miss Kusanagi that day.
Sagishima	You will catch a cold. Let’s head home.

maria

Gallery

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Translator Notes

• I realize I messed up because on the cast list here, everyone’s names are listed in given name-surname order. But in the play itself & in all my other translations I use the surname-given name order…