The Canadian Gold Coin Mystery

***The Canadian Gold Coin Mystery*** (カナダ金貨の謎, *Kanada Kinka no Nazo*) is a collection of Japanese short stories by Alice Arisugawa in his Himura Hideo series, which is also the tenth collection of the *Country* series.

## Plot Overviews

"**The Night the Captain Died**" (船長が死んだ夜, *Senchō ga Shinda Yoru*)

     (First published on *Seven Detectives New 30th Anniversary Anthology*, Kodansha Novels, September 2017 issue)

Himura hires Alice to drive him to a mountain in Hyōgo. The next morning, they learn that a murder had occurred in a village near the lodge. The victim is a former captain, who had retired from the ship and returned; apparently, he was poked with a knife while he was sleeping after drinking for the night. The suspects include two women fighting over him — Sumiyo Tsuchii and Mishio Tachibana — and the latter's husband, Nobutake Tachibana. There is no alibi at the time of the suspected criminal time, and the only surveillance camera in the village seemed to have captured the culprit who walked away with a blue sheet that had been removed from the captain's house.

"**Air Cat**" (エア・キャット, *Ea Kyatto*)

     (First published on *The Cat is Watching*, Bunshun Bunko, July 2017 issue)

Alice talks about a case involving Himura with a senior novelist named Sayoko. It was the case when Himura and Alice went to a crime scene that was initially disclosed as a locked-room murder, but was actually a typical murder because the backdoor was later discovered to be opened. The victim's man lived alone after retirement, and he lived as if his air cat and his old cat were still alive and together. The man's library, where he spends his hobby of reading, is lined with books by Natsume Sōseki and Mori Ōgai. In particular, Sōseki's *I Am a Cat* seemed to have been read many times and was severely damaged.

In the library, Himura suddenly picks up Sōseki's *Sanshirō*. A bookshop receipt from the day before the murder comes out from inside, and an acquaintance that he reunited by chance recognises the crime and resolves the case. Alice stops at the house where he lived and enters a room full of books to borrow a magazine. He finds a piece of paper that seems to have been written by him under the desk. The piece of paper wrote "*Sanshirō*". As if he knew in advance the clues of the incident, Himura smiles slightly.

"**The Canadian Gold Coin Mystery**" (カナダ金貨の謎, *Kanada Kinka no Nazo*)

     (First published on *Shōsetsu Yasei Jidai*, September 2014 issue)

Tanji Kaede is strangled with a cord and killed. The culprit avoids making the scene look like a robbery, with the room not being ruined and the victim's wallet placed on the table. Furthermore, fingerprints are erased. The suspects are Ayane Yoshihara and Koji Tachikawa.

Apparently, the victim's chain pendant with a frame and a real maple leaf gold coin attached to it is reportedly missing. A testimony states that the victim had been wearing the necklace prior to his death, hence suggesting that the culprit might have taken it away. With the police monitoring the two suspects, which of them murdered the victim, and what is the motive behind disposing the maple leaf gold coin pendant?

"**A Trick Break**" (あるトリックの蹉跌, *Aru Torikku no Satetsu*)

     (First published on *Da Vinci*, Kadokawa (episode 1) August 2016 issue)

Alice, who finally gives a finished manuscript to his editor Katagiri pulls out an old trick note that he had stored when he was younger and flipped it around. The note that came out wrote, "*Poet Detective (1)*". He remembers his college days when he wrote a manuscript during class and Himura, who was sitting next to him, began to read it without permission. This was the beginning of their long-term friendship that continues to persist.

"**Where the Truck Goes**" (トロッコの行方 , *Torokko no Yukue*)

     (First published on *Mephisto*, Kodansha, Vol. 1 2019 issue)

Shortly after 10:00 p.m., a woman named Masayuki Ukita falls off a pedestrian bridge across the prefectural road in Suita City and died. No one had seen the fall, and an ambulance was called by a passerby. Immediately afterwards, two police officers rush across the footbridge. Until the ambulance arrived, Ukita seemed barely conscious and uttered, "*This is a gathering place*", "*I was suddenly poked from behind*", and "*long hair*". The scene was not crowded, there were no cameras, and a car stopped at a red light, so there was no image showing the appearance of the crime or the appearance of a culprit, but the crime occurred at 9:55 p.m. according to the information gathered by the police. It took about five minutes for Masayuki to leave the convenience store on the opposite road, talk to a friend over the phone, and then fall over the bridge. Three suspects are named: Isami Yano, Chōko Tomizuka, and Kaneyoshi Tomizuka, but all three's alibis are confirmed. Consequently and unusually, Himura seems to have no idea who the culprit is.

## See Also

* "Detective, Blue Era": The episode adaptation from *Another Story* loosely based on "A Trick Break", depicting how Himura and Alice first met in college.

## References

1. ↑ 作家アリスシリーズ — Wikipedia (Japanese)
2. ↑ テーマは名探偵、『7人の名探偵』のあらすじとネタバレ感想 — I Want to Solve All Mysteries
3. ↑ アンソロジー小説『猫が見ていた』あらすじとネタバレ感想 — I Want to Solve All Mysteries
4. ↑ 有栖川有栖「火村英生（作家アリス）シリーズ」第26弾『カナダ金貨の謎』あらすじとネタバレ感想 — I Want to Solve All Mysteries (Japanese)