‘Tokyo Express’: Postwar detective noir basks in the details

The new title of “Tokyo Express” doesn’t quite do Seicho Matsumoto’s original justice. Though undoubtedly noir — evocative of films such as “The 39 Steps,” “Murder on the Orient Express,” even the 1963 James Bond movie “From Russia With Love,” among other train-featuring thrillers — its new English title doesn’t particularly mean anything within the context of the book.

The Japanese title, “Ten to Sen” (literally, “Points and Lines”), is more accurate in terms of the action, or rather the meticulously planned lack of action, within its pages. Nor does “Tokyo Express” quite express the sheer magnitude of the story. I say lack of action, but that’s not to say the book is dull or slow-moving. Far from it. Often cited as Matsumoto’s masterpiece — quite a feat considering the 1958 book was his first published novel (and at the age of 40, too) — it’s a twisting tale of obsessively planned details and the logic, not to mention perseverance, it takes to unravel the truth.

A couple is found on a beach, dead. A classic case of love suicide, they say — or is it? Fukuoka detective Jutaro Torigai thinks otherwise, soon finding an ally in Tokyo upstart Kiichi Mihara. Jesse Kirkwood’s translation is concise and timeless without the worn-out patter of 1950s jargon, giving contemporary readers a relatable window into the past.

This unswerving style matches Matsumoto’s incisive storytelling, which weaves a dense narrative devoid of embellishments. This is social realism with utilitarian descriptions and dialogue, and everything serves a purpose: Only in passing snapshots can readers guess characters’ moods and emotions. The curve of one character’s smile, for example, is all we need to know to conjure assumptions and raise suspicion. These miniscule asides are not for decoration, but more often than not serve to further the story, and to embed it in a sense of the here and now. Or rather, there and the past.

The events of the book, fictionalized as they are, take place in 1957. There was a lot going on this year. Coca-Cola started selling in Japan for the first time; Nobusuke Kishi became prime minister; the Soviet Union launched its Sputnik satellite. It was the dawning of a new era.

Matsumoto’s prose reveals morsels of modern life in this postwar Japan. Jutaro’s daughter’s outing to the cinema with her fiance; Kiichi’s love of coffee and how it’s all he misses whenever he leaves Tokyo. Matsumoto appears to have been a fan of coffee himself — he describes Jutaro “sipping a black, sugary liquid that he had been assured was coffee.”

Down in Fukuoka (Matsumoto’s home prefecture), Jutaro is masterfully painted as the shabby, initiative-led old hand. He murmurs, he’s unshaven, he’s slightly past his best — his hat has a “crooked brim” and “had clearly seen better days.” He’s described as an “unusual figure” who drags “the worn heels of his shoes across the floor.” The weathered sleuth is hard-boiled, not necessarily likable, grunting one-word orders at his wife.

Meanwhile, in Tokyo, the younger Kiichi is a symbol of modernity and self-contained youth. He frequents Ginza cafes, finds it awkward to share a table with strangers and gets flustered when a staff member mistakes him and another woman for a couple. These are two sides to the shiny coin that was peak Showa Era (1926-89): The tattered recent past, with all its baggage, and the present day with nothing but coffee, movies and newly inaugurated private air travel to imprint themselves on as yet untarnished memories.

Matsumoto sets the scene of the suicides at a location “these days known simply as Kashii Beach,” which the narrator mentions as the subject of a waka poem written by court noble Otomo no Tabito (635-731). After sharing the delicate praise of the once serene tidal flats in the ancient poem, the narrator takes a grim turn, coldly catapulting us into the “modern” world, announcing “the harsh present has no time for such lyricism.” Like a trigger warning for anyone reading, Matsumoto makes it clear that his is an anti-lyric tale.

But it’s not anti-emotive. In the two letters of the novel — a message from Jutaro to Kiichi and, later, the epistolary ending (a bold but satisfyingly realistic move) in which Kiichi explains his findings to the older detective — we find humanity. Both men doubt themselves, encourage each other, talk about the weather. The seasons change in the novel, from winter to summer, like an awakening.

“Tokyo Express” is well paced, but at times incredibly detailed. Much of the story concerns train timetables — accurate down to the minute according to 1957 schedules — and, while impressive, these logistical leanings are where the novel slows the most. This is easily forgiven; they are merely stops along the way as the mystery races to its revelatory final destination. And peeking over Kiichi’s shoulder in the cafe, on the tram, while he turns the facts over and over, you’re there every step of the way, hooked.