The Berlin Fried Bread Mystery (Part 2) | Contents | The Berlin Fried Bread Mystery (Part 4)
Like the Newspaper Club’s room, the Home Economics Classroom was also located on the first floor. I arrived in two to three minutes.
The Home Economics Classroom was equipped with sinks and cooking counters, and was filled with a unique smell which I couldn’t decide if I liked or not. In a corner of the spacious room, a singular boy clad in gym clothes was sharpening a kitchen knife while standing. He should have known that I’d entered due to the noise made from opening the door, but he did not turn to look at me, and instead continued producing shink sounds from his whetstone. I didn’t know which year he was in, so I addressed him politely.
“Excuse me, could I have a moment?”
The boy stopped and vacantly raised his head. His intimidating face contorted in displeasure as he stared at me, the uninvited guest.
“What?”
How should I introduce myself?
“I’m from the Newspaper Club.”
That wasn’t a lie.
Upon hearing that, he suddenly broke into a smile. From his mischievous grin, I sensed that his earlier displeasure was probably because he’d been concentrating on handling his knife. After putting down the kitchen knife, he scrupulously wiped his hand on a towel.
“Ah, so how was it?”
“What do you mean, how?”
“Didn’t you come here about the Berliners?”
He seemed to know the situation, which made things easier for me. I wondered about how much I should tell him about what had transpired at the Newspaper Club, but Kengo hadn’t said anything about keeping it a secret, and it didn’t seem fair to withhold any information on my end when I was here to question him, so I ultimately decided to give him a rough outline.
“Yes, but actually, when the Newspaper Club ate the agepan, nobody said that they got the one filled with mustard. I came here to confirm if there was really one with mustard.
The boy smirked.
“There was no mustard.”
Oh?
“What do you mean?”
I questioned enthusiastically, causing the other student to look perplexed.
“Seems that information about this situation wasn’t shared.”
“You’re right. All I was told is that Seba-senpai should have asked the Home Economics Club to have mustard added into one agepan. Is that wrong?”
“Yeah, it is. Well, I suppose I’ll explain from the start.”
With that, the boy pulled over a nearby chair and motioned for me to take a seat. I complied, and he opened with a preface.
“I don’t know that much, but…
“Seba talked to me yesterday, and asked if I could insert some mustard into a Berliner. I was planning to do just that, but when he brought me the actual Berliners, I asked if I should add whole-grain mustard or yellow mustard, and he said that anything is fine as long as it’s spicy. I was in a pickle, because neither of them are very spicy at all.”
I was actually curious about that point. Seba-senpai did not join the agepan taste testing because he couldn’t handle spicy food, but the impression I had of mustard was that it had a unique flavor and sourness, and was not actually that spicy.
“So I asked him to decide if I should add mustard or something spicy, and he told me to add something spicy. So that’s what I did.”
“What did you add?”
“Tabasco. And it was an extra-spicy flavor.”
The boy stood up and brought over a black bottle from a cupboard at the back of the room.
“Tabasco is a brand name, so to be precise, I used hot pepper sauce. It’s not the most spicy hot pepper sauce in the world, but it’s the most spicy out of those I consider to be flavorful.”
A red label was affixed to the bottle, and on it were letters of the alphabet that spelled out some words that were not English. I couldn’t read those words, but the skull mark drawn there made it clear that it was spicy enough to pose some dangers to one’s health.
“Did you pour this sauce over the agepan?”
“If I did that everyone would be able to tell which one has the hot sauce. I placed the Berliner in a small bowl, then inserted the sauce using a syringe through the hole they use to put in the jam. It was only two or three drops, but that should be enough.”
So the agepan didn’t contain mustard, but Tabasco… how would that affect the process of identifying the culprit? Or would it make no difference? This case could be more complicated than I thought.
“…Could I ask a few more questions?”
The boy opened his palms, meaning that I could ask as much as I wanted.
“Seba-senpai initially asked you to add mustard, but did he directly talk with you yesterday?”
“Yeah, but he kept rattling on about his requirements that I didn’t get the chance to ask about what type of mustard he wanted.”
“And he came over again today with the agepan?”
“Yup, but to be precise, he brought over a plastic bag. There was a paper bag in that plastic bag, and in the paper bag were the Berliners.”
I looked at the wall clock to see that it was a little past five.
“What time was it?”
I thought that he would have trouble with that question, but he answered it readily.
“About four, I think.”
“…You remembered that?”
“He said he would come at four, and he did. Of course I would remember that.”
Classes and home room would usually end at about half past three, and the German bakery was apparently close to school, so it wasn’t unnatural to go there and come back in thirty minutes.
“Who inserted the Tabasco?”
“Me. Seba was poking around the cupboards while I was dealing with the Tabasco. I opened the paper bag, picked up a Berliner with chopsticks and put it in a small bowl, then inserted the sauce through the jam hole using a syringe and put it back in the paper bag. As I was washing up the small bowl, Seba came up with a plate, and he moved everything in the paper bag onto that plate.”
I paused for a moment to imagine those events.
“…That plate is school equipment, right? Is it fine to use it like that?”
“Course not.”
“What a mess.”
“Yeah…”
It seemed that this guy had his fair share of worries, too. But putting that aside…
“Does this mean that even Seba-senpai doesn’t know which one contained the Tabasco?”
The boy grinned.
“Probably. He even said so himself.”
I’d actually thought that it would be easy for Seba-senpai to construct a situation where no one gets the lucky agepan. He could have gotten an extra agepan from the store, and secretly discarded the one filled with Tabasco. I didn’t know what motive he would have for that, but such an action was feasible.
But according to the Home Economics Club member’s account, Seba-senpai didn’t even know which one contained the Tabasco. In this situation, discarding one and adding in another that he’d concealed wouldn’t make any sense. I should strike off the possibility that he did some sort of trick to the agepan.
“Did you see the plate of agepan?”
I asked nonchalantly, but the boy looked flustered.
“Only a glance. I didn’t get a good look at it.”
“So, do you know how they were arranged, or how many there were on the plate?”
“Sorry, I don’t know. Is that bad?”
I contemplated for a moment. I’d already asked all that I wanted to, and there was no helping it if he didn’t see the agepan on the plate.
“…No, not really. What happened to the paper bag and plastic bag?”
“Seba left them here, so I threw them away. Wanna take a look?”
I nodded, and the boy produced two bags from the trash can. The plastic bag was the semi-transparent kind and did not have the store name or anything printed on, but the paper bag had “German Bakery Danke Danke” written on it, and was lightly stained with oil. Besides that, the bags contained no other points of interest.
“One more thing. Seba-senpai knew that the agepan had Tabasco instead of mustard, right?”
This time, his reply was unexpected.
“He doesn’t. I made sure not to tell him.”
“Eh? Why?”
“I wanted to surprise him. Seba should think that there is some slightly spicy mustard in the world, and I put that in the Berliner.”
So that was why he smirked when I introduced myself as being from the Newspaper Club. He probably wanted to find out how his prank turned out. Just in case, I asked.
“Do you have any idea why no one took the hit?”
“Nope, not at all. I put in the Tabasco, and I don’t think anyone can eat that without any reaction.”
So it must be very spicy.
I held up the black bottle in my hand.
“Could I borrow this for a while? I want to show this to the Newspaper Club members.”
The boy waved his hand languidly.
“Go ahead. You can even taste it if you want. I’ll be here for about another hour, so come back here with the plate by then.”
After that, he spoke with a serious look on his face.
“I’ll tell you just in case, but be careful not to get it in your eyes. It could send you to the hospital.”
It was difficult to imagine a situation where Tabasco would get into one’s eyes, but I didn’t have the faintest idea about what the Home Economics Club would use such a dangerous substance for.
I returned to the Newspaper Club room to find the door still wide open, as expected. Kengo, who had been standing up the entire time while I was there, was now sitting in a chair, and a small piece of paper was placed in front of each of the four students who were facing the big table.
“Thanks for your hard work, Jougorou. What did you find out?”
I searched with my eyes, but couldn’t find a seat for me. Well, while I was acting under Kengo’s request, I was just an outsider who had just poked his head into their internal problems, so I was fine with not having a chair. Moreover… standing while saying my piece could seem, for want of a better word, cooler. I subtly hid the black bottle I was holding behind my back.
“Seba-senpai definitely went to the Home Economics Club. He arrived at four, and met with the person he’d asked to handle the agepan.”
I still hadn’t mentioned that the agepan contained Tabasco and not mustard. The four pieces of paper on the table should contain their impressions of the agepan’s taste, so it would be better to tell them only after reading those notes.
“Have you compared each others’ impressions of the agepan’s taste?”
I asked, and Kengo replied in a brusque manner.
“It was your idea, so we thought we should wait for you to get back before checking everyone’s answers.”
That caught me off guard a little, but it made me happy.
“Well, thanks for your consideration. And I’m sorry for making you wait.”
“I wasn’t the one who made that suggestion. It was Sugi.”
I turned to look at her, but she shrank back.
Since they’d waited for me, I would feel bad to make them wait even more.
“Let’s take a look, then.”
Upon hearing my words, the four Newspaper Club members each flipped over the sheet of paper in front them.
Kengo: It was sweeter than I expected. Was it blueberry jam?
Makishima-san: The jam tasted rich and sweet in the lightly textured bread. It’s some kind of berry flavor or a mixture of two flavor, I think.
Monchi-kun: It was extremely sweet. I got some grease on my hands.
Sugi-san: It was sweet and really delicious. There was quite a lot of jam.
“So… no one wrote that they tasted mustard.”
“Yeah. Basically…”
Realizing where his words were going, Kengo clammed up.
I knew what he was about to say after the word “basically”. That almost certainly disproved the idea that the person who took the hit did not notice as such. If someone from the Newspaper Club did take the hit, that person was cognizant of that, and wrote down a lie to hide it.
The Newspaper Club members exchanged glances across the big table. From earlier, there had been an atmosphere of slight distrust that was trumped by confusion, but it evaporated. The four clubmates were now staring at each other with direct suspicion in their eyes.
Makishima-san lit the spark.
“We knew from the beginning that Pfannkuchen is sweet, didn’t we?”
She was implying that Monchi-kun, who hadn’t written down a concrete description of the taste, was lying. But that criticism did not only apply to him. Sugi-san sharply raised her head and snapped.
“I only wrote that it was delicious because I thought it was delicious!”
Having received a rebuttal from an unexpected angle, Makishima-san winced.
“I wasn’t talking about you, Sugi.”
But Monchi-kun did not let that statement go.
“If you’re not talking about Sugi, then who are you talking about, huh? Me?”
He snickered.
“To me, I can’t believe that you can tell that the jam is berry-flavored just by eating one small agepan. Makes me think that you’ve eaten it before.”
The one who suggested writing an article about agepan was Makishima, so it naturally followed that she knew before their research began that the German bakery near school sold agepan. Meaning that it wouldn’t be strange for her to know what it tasted like, and it would be easy for her to pretend she got a regular agepan… That was his argument. It made sense, but did not apply to just Makishima-san.
“Is it that unbelievable? The jam was definitely berry-flavored.”
With his arms folded, Kengo butted in. Sugi-san also chipped in vigorously.
“I also thought it was berry-flavored. I just didn’t write it down.”
She spoke quickly and without hesitation, but it was a poor excuse. As expected, Makishima-san retorted.
“If you thought that, why didn’t you write it down?”
“Because… I didn’t think it was a certainty.”
“Couldn’t you just have written, ‘I think it was berry-flavored’?”
“So you’re saying that I lied? Why would I do something like that!”
Sugi-san was right. She had no motive. But by that logic, the only person whose motive we could guess was Monchi-kun, and going further, it was also possible that Sugi-san told a lie to fan the flames on Monchi-kun and Makishima-san’s dispute, if a bit far-fetched. It was even not entirely impossible that Makishima-san actually hated the Newspaper Club and put on a show to make everyone else wrap themselves in suspicion, eventually leading to its disbandment.
In other words, thinking about motives was just a waste of time. It would be better to steadily narrow down the possibilities, starting from the least likely.
“By the way, the agepan did not contain mustard.”
As soon as I said that, the other four students turned to look at me all at once, their eyes filled with shock. The pleasure of this moment would have crippled me in the past. This time, however, I maintained a frosty demeanor as I set the black bottle I’d been hiding onto the large table with a light clink.
“It was Tabasco. Seba-senpai requested the Home Economics Club to insert mustard into the agepan, but since mustard is not that spicy, they asked Seba-senpai to decide if he wanted mustard or something spicy. Seba-senpai asked them to use something spicy, and they chose Tabasco… it’s extra-spicy, apparently.”
Bewilderment drifted onto the faces of the four Newspaper Club members in four different ways. Eventually, Kengo asked.
“That’s surprising, but… does that change anything?”
“Not much, but we can do a little experiment with the Tabasco I’ve borrowed. I still think there is a non-zero chance that the culprit didn’t notice that they took the hit.”
Raising his eyebrows sharply, Kengo ran his eyes over the four sheets of paper on the big table.
“What do you mean?”
“Taste disorders. There;s the possibility that the culprit cannot detect the taste of Tabasco. If so, it would be a great outcome if we can detect such a disorder early on.”
Makishima-san let out a low groan.
“…To be honest, I never thought about that.”
On the other hand, Monchi-kun was skeptical.
“Everyone felt that it was sweet. Is there even a disorder which prevents someone from tasting only Tabasco?”
I answered frankly.
“I don’t know.”
“Then you…”
“So how about doing the experiment? You’ll have to taste just a bit of Tabasco.”
Sugi-san promptly put on a sour look, but the other three seemed to think that it was better than simply glaring at one another. Some low murmurs flitted across the table.
“…Guess we have no choice.”
“Well, I suppose so.”
“It’s better than leaving it like this.”
Thus, they reached a consensus to try it out.
Kengo stood up and wandered around the room buried in paper, searching for something, but tilted his head after a while, as if he was unable to find whatever he was looking for. Seeing that the other three members weren’t helping him, it seemed that they also didn’t know what he was looking for.
“What are you doing?”
I asked, and Kengo replied while separating a mountain of paper into piles.
“We can’t taste it straight from the bottle. There should be some paper plates around here.”
Makishima-san got ready to stand up.
“You’re right, there should be some paper plates. Where did we put them again?”
Sugi-san instantly replied.
“On top of the fridge.”
Since I was the closest to the fridge, I turned to take a look, and there were indeed some paper plates in their packaging that they were sold as a set in. I moved closer to grab the plates, when I noticed that also placed on the fridge was a wooden tray. It was filled with candy, caramels and chocolates in their individual packaging. A piece of notebook paper was affixed to the tray with sellotape, and written on it in messy writing were the words, “Please place your survey response into this box. Feel free to take these sweets as thanks.”
“Oh? I see some candy over there.”
Kengo answered with a grin.
“Yeah. As it says, they’re a little gift for students who bring in their survey responses.”
“I brought them in, but didn’t get any.”
“Oh, right. Go ahead, take whatever you like.”
I didn’t want any, but I was surprised by how laid-back the Newspaper Club was. After collecting myself, I took four plates and served them to the four members. Also returning to his seat, Kengo picked up the black bottle of Tabasco and studied it with keen interest.
“I see, it does look spicy.”
“The label’s not in English, so I can’t read it.”
“Please keep away from children under twelve.”
I was astonished.
“So you can read it! What language is it?”
Kengo solemnly returned the bottle to the big table.
“I was joking.”
Did I just get completely taken in by Kengo…?
Kengo took the lead and added a drop of Tabasco to his plate. He then passed the bottle, and before long, the preparations were complete. Sugi-san leaned forward towards her plate and sniffed at it.
“…It smells really intense.”
Imitating Sugi-san, the other three brought their faces close to the liquid. In no time at all, Makishima-san choked and turned away. After a bout of coughing, she spoke, her breathing ragged.
“You’re right. It’s harsh.”
“Is the smell that strong?”
I asked, but it was not out of curiosity. Kengo understood the meaning behind my question.
“Of course, since we brought our faces so close to smell it. However, I don’t have much confidence that I can tell if this was in the Pfannkuchen by smell. During the taste test, no one sniffed at it so intently… well, if someone did that, the powdered sugar would get into their nose.”
I thought it could be a clue, but that didn’t quite work out.
Sugi-san was close to tears.
“Are we going to taste this…”
Monchi-kun had a somewhat strained face, but replied emphatically.
“We’ll continue feeling frustrated if we don’t. Let’s just get this over with.”
However, it was deemed too bad-mannered to stick out one’s tongue and lick a plate, so the Newspaper Club members decided to scoop the Tabasco with a finger, as chefs usually do, and thus they went out to wash their hands.
I was worried that I would have to taste the Tabasco myself, but no one had told me to share their pain yet. For now, I should just put on an innocent face.
The four students returned from the toilet and sat in their chairs. This being an experiment, I should tell them some points they should be aware of.
“This is what the Home Economics Club member said, but be careful not to let it get into your eyes. It is also dangerous to touch your eyes with the finger that came into contact with Tabasco.”
Sugi-san muttered again.
“Do we really have to taste this…?”
She’d imagined she would just be having fun playing a simple game involving German-style agepan, but was suddenly thrust into a situation in which she had to taste extra-spicy Tabasco. Considering her state of mind made me feel so sorry that I was at a loss for words.
Kengo took a deep breath.
“Right, let’s do this all at once. Jougorou, give us the signal.”
I wondered why I should be the one to give the signal, but Kengo probably decided that instead of being too pushy, he should let an outsider do it. Sugi-san would hate me for it, though. I raised my hand.
“Umm, alright. Get ready!”
The four student brought their fingers to their plates at different timings.
“…Go!”
Since I was unable to think of the proper words on the spot, it became a weird shout towards the end. The four scooped the Tabasco with their fingers, and delivered it to their mouths.
Silence fell for a second or two.
Right after that, I heard screams, groans, cries of protest, and witnessed a mixture of sorrow and rage that seemed to say, “Why is this happening to me?”, making me feel thankful that I was not in the midst of that storm. Kengo forcefully cleared his throat, Makishima-san’s face went bright red, Sugi-san cried out in tears, “That’s why I didn’t want to do it!”, and Monchi-kun raced out of the room with pants of “Water, water!” With Makishima-san glaring daggers at me and Sugi-san looking up at me resentfully, I thought that one of them would declare that it would be my turn next, making me want to leave the room and chase after Monchi-kun.
“Wow, this is really spicy!”
Kengo was half-smiling, as if the spicyness had made him go off the rails, and his voice also sounded weird.
“Is it so spicy that you can’t tolerate it?”
“Tolerate? You’re asking if I can tolerate this? Hahaha, Jougorou, it’s impossible!”
I accidentally started laughing out loud, but caught myself and kept it down. On the other hand, Makishima-san grimaced and exclaimed in a voice that barely contained her indignation.
“You’ve got to be kidding! No way the Home Economics Club put that in!”
With tears collected in her eyes, Sugi-san stood up.
“I, I also, water…”
With those words, she tottered out of the club room.
There were three findings from this experiment. First, the Tabasco provided by the Home Economics Club was very, very spicy. Next, there was no one in the Newspaper Club who couldn’t taste that level of spice. Finally, I could say with certainty that we’d gotten a “clear conclusion”. However, this “clear conclusion” went in stark contrast with the facts of this case. No matter how you thought about it, this could not have happened… this agepan case was certainly more complicated than it looked. I folded my arms and tapped my chin with an index finger, then spoke.
“Kengo. It seems that we need to organize the facts of this situation from the beginning. Can I ask you a few questions?”
But Kengo could only fan his tongue with his hand and look up at me with smiling eyes, unable to answer. One more fact was revealed by this experiment – the Home Economics Club’s Tabasco had a long-lasting impact.
The Berlin Fried Bread Mystery (Part 2) | Contents | The Berlin Fried Bread Mystery (Part 4)
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Editors (Tier 2): Suleman, Dedavond, Egi Pratama, Pearl H Nettle
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