"Once you'd laid out enough quicklime to cover the bottom of the pool and tossed in the torn-up newspaper, you were excited by the great fire that was about to happen, and smug that Mr. Nakai, who had dared to threaten you, was about to die by your own hand.
"In your haste, after loosening the faucet, you hurried off according to plan toward the overpass on the other side—and just like that, you forgot your wristwatch at the scene."
Blue veins throbbed at Ryusei Ryuichi's temple. He refused to believe he could have made such a stupid mistake. But things had already come to this, and all he could do was try his best to salvage it.
He burst out laughing twice. "So that's where that watch was!—To tell you the truth, not long after I got it, it was stolen by someone."
As he spoke, he composed his expression and said as if helpless, "The gold watch was lost on the night of the award ceremony. There were many colleagues at that banquet, and I suspected someone was jealous of me, so they stole that watch that was full of commemorative significance.
"I won the award mainly through luck, so I can understand that kind of malice from a colleague.
"To keep the matter from becoming too ugly, I didn't make a fuss about losing the watch—but I really didn't expect that Nakai was the one who stole it. No wonder he argued with me that night at the award ceremony. So he'd had a problem with me for a long time."
Jiang Xia nodded, then, like a host who had finished listening to a guest's speech, turned his head toward the staff members. "Would you mind if I invited a guest up?"
Of course they did not