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TOHRU MIYOSHI

A Letter

From The Dead

Tohru Miyoshi is perhaps Japan's leading spy writer. He is one of the contemporary "social novelists" who came on the scene after Seicho Matsumoto, and his books deal with national and international politics, revolutionary movements, and worldwide points of view. He is especially interested in "pursuing the thought behind the crime."

His story in the Japanese Golden Dozen is more than just a well-written detective story. Through the character Wakizaka it portrays the faces of human nature and some of the pain that can be dealt by a maddening twist of fate.

Imagine a newspaperman of today receiving a letter "from the banks of the Styx." It has often been said that "dead men tell no tales." It follows that "dead men do not write letters"—and therein lies the provocative problem. . . .

EARLY in April, the curious letter arrived in the readers' column section of the newspaper office. The readers' column, a branch of the editorial section, was responsible for selecting material submitted by subscribers for publication, and for answering questions about news items. Its staff was small and did less flashy work than the local news or political sections. Most of the employees on the readers' column were older. Their work consisted in going through piles of letters delivered daily, reading them, working them up into printable form. When work was light, or when some of the staff finished early, no one complained if they took long coffee breaks or killed time somewhere. On the other hand, there was little chance of making a scoop or stepping into the limelight on the readers' column.

Shunya Wakizaka was unhappy with his daily grind. All the people who worked with him were over forty and interested in nothing but raises in salary and promotions. Oda, who sat next to him, had five or six years left before retirement, but the first thing he did every morning was open the paper to the stock report.

Wakizaka was only thirty. He had transferred from a provincial branch of the paper to the Tokyo readers' column six months ago. He wanted desperately to be put in the local-news section. First, he could not get used to what he considered old folk's work. Then, he was envious of friends who had joined the newspaper at the same time as he and who were now doing exciting work in other sections.

Still, he must do his work. So, on that April day, he turned to the pile of letters on his desk and began opening them.

"What the hell kind of joker's this?" Oda growled, waving a letter around in front of him.

"What's the matter?" Wakizaka asked.

Oda signaled one of the office girls to bring him a cup of tea, then said, "I'm pretty good-natured most of the time. But it gets under my skin when people try to make a fool of me. What's this guy mean, 'I'm writing this letter from the banks of the River Styx'?"

"The banks of the River Styx?"

"Yeah."

"Lemme see—"

"It's nutty. When you're finished, toss it in the basket." Oda began slurping the tea the girl brought. Wakizaka read the letter: