Part 24 (1/2)

An enemy in j.a.pan among the Yakuza? What was the connection with the yuhn-hyun?

He put his elbows on his knees, rested his weary head in his hands. His body felt as if he had just gone fifteen rounds with the heavyweight boxing champ. His mind was whirling with possibilities.

With a slight groan he rose and padded across the j.a.panese-style room. His shoes had been left at the doorstep. Took a long, scalding shower. He lifted his head up to the water flow, trying to wash the fatigue, pain and fear from his body and his mind. He knew that he was in a lethal area. The yuhn-hyun was under attack and unless he found the source at once, the delicate ring of people his father had spent more than fifty years drawing together would blow apart. The Triad dragons, especially, will be wary, s.h.i.+ Zilin had told him, constantly seeking to gain advantage over their rivals. Divided, we are vulnerable and may be cut down.

Fear flooded through Jake once again. The fear of failure. He was on the mountainside in the dark and the cold. His father had designated him Zhuan, the special one. Perhaps he had been wrong, perhaps his love for his one remaining son had blinded his visionary instincts. Perhaps he only wanted Jake to be Zhuan. Had s.h.i.+ Zilin chosen the wrong person?

Jake toweled himself off and dressed in a cobalt-blue linen suit, dove-gray s.h.i.+rt, blue-on-blue polka-dot tie. As he brushed his hair, he stared at himself in the mirror. He saw the intense, hooded copper eyes, deeply set beneath a wide straight brow. His curly black hair a genetic gift from his maternal grandfatherseemed unruly no matter how much he worked at it. He threw the brush down and, gathering up a couple of small items, went out of the room.

It was early afternoon, local time, just after lunch, so that the streets were merely crowded, not jammed. He had eaten on the plane but had tasted nothing. His stomach was full, nothing more.

Traffic, as usual, was at a standstill. In any case, he felt like walking. The day was sunny and exceptionally clear. There was still a bit of a chill in the air but the first cherry blossoms were in bud and the air smelled fresher and cleaner than it had any right to.

Jake strolled up to Sotobori-dori, turning left down the wide avenue, heading into the Akasaka area. Near the Mikado Theater, he went down off the street, taking the Choyoda subway line three stops to Meiji-Jingumae. He emerged in Harajuku. In the old, post-World War II days, this had been the site of Was.h.i.+ngton Heights, where the majority of the United States occupation forces were housed within the precincts of Tokyo.

Nowadays, Harajuku was more the province of the wealthy younger cla.s.ses. Trendy boutiques vied for the visitor's attention with restaurants serving Western food. If one was in the mood for a hamburger and French fries rather than sus.h.i.+ or soba, this was the place to go.

Along the wide, beautifully tree-lined boulevard known as Omo-tesando-dori, young people danced on bright Sunday afternoons. Dressed in fifties-style leather jackets and winklepicker boots, they wended their way into Yoyogi Park, site of the towering Meiji Shrine. To the insistent beat of blaring portable boom boxes, they swirled and gyrated in an almost lunatic frenzy.

Harajuku was also where Mikio Komoto had his corporate offices.

The skysc.r.a.pers of s.h.i.+njuku were where one might have first thought to look for them since that was the real hub of Tokyo's corporate life. But for many reasons, Mikio had decided to headquarter farther south.

It had proved a canny decision. With Harajuku's blossoming popularity, more and more small businesses were descending on the area in an effort to free themselves from s.h.i.+njuku's stifling atmosphere.

Mikio's offices were within Seicho No le just across from the Togo Shrine, within sight of the park's South Pond and noted iris garden. It was next to a high-tech kissaten, a stylish coffee shop where for two dollars one received a tiny cup of the liquid. The sum was also a form of rent for the table where one sat and watched the world go by. A relatively new j.a.panese custom borrowed without shame or excuses from a much older European one.

This place, with the odd name of the Barking Fish, was done in glossy green walls, highlighted by deep blue neon strips hidden behind polished-wood valences hanging from the glittery ceiling. Tiny marble tables were surrounded by midnight-blue lacquer chairs.

Jake pushed through the smoked-gla.s.s doors beside the kissaten and ascended in an elevator to the top floor of the building. At the end of a polished-granite and brushed-bronze hallway he went through the seeing-eye gla.s.s doors on which was printed KOMOTO SHOMU KOGYO in English and kanji. This translated roughly as ”Komoto Commercial Industry,” a rather nondescript name which could encompa.s.s virtually anything and everything.

Jake had no clear idea how the company actually made its money. Mikio was into just about everything: electronics, fiber optics, robotics, you name it. If it was an up-and-coming industry on the MIt.i.the Ministry of International Trade and Industrypriority list, Mikio was certain to be in it. MITI was the vastly powerful bureaucratic agency which, since the end of the war, set industrial trade policy for all of the private sector. One effective method was to offer businesses certain incentives to start up kobunfirmsin the areas that MITI had targeted as important for the country's economic expansion.

Just after the war heavy industry such as petrochemicals and steel had been at the highest priority. Now the emphasis had s.h.i.+fted to light industryelectronics and robotics, computer generation and the like.

Mikio's outer offices were paneled in kyokij.a.panese cypress. The built-in desks, consoles and cabinets were all in gleaming black lacquer. The floor was covered with an industrial Berber carpet, rich in tones of gray and brown. Seating in this areaat least for those waitingadmittancewas composed of a line of attached wood squares, covered on top with tatami.

Jake went over to the Plexiglas screen. There was a male receptionist, young and nattily attired. Jake gave his name and when the young man asked the nature of his business, Jake told him that it was personal.

As he leaned in, a womanthe Office Lady, Jake a.s.sumedturned and looked at him. She was wearing a severely cut suit of dark cotton. Her gleaming black hair was square-cut in a style Jake had not seen here since the mid-sixties. Her wide eyes regarded him for a time. Then, as if a trapdoor were slamming shut, she blinked and, swiveling around, returned to her work.

”Please be seated,” the young man said, after taking Jake's business card. ”I will contact Mr. Komoto's secretary.” He spoke English clearly and overdistinctly as if he were being careful about going too fast.

*Thank you,” Jake said and went back across the room. He sat. He was by no means alone. Dark-suited businessmen congregated like birds on a wire. From time to time one or sometimes several were summoned by a bowing functionary who emerged from behind the internal barrier to greet them in polite fas.h.i.+on and usher them inside.

As appointments departed others arrived and the process was repeated. Jake had been waiting for just under an hour when he got up and stuck his head through the opening of the Plexiglas screen.

”I beg your pardon,” he said to the young man, ”but I have heard nothing as yet.”

”I handed your card personally to Mr. Komoto's secretary,” the young man said, as if that were in itself an explanation.

”That was fifty minutes ago.”

”It's a busy day,” the young man said. His hair glistened. It was brush cut and, with the a.s.sistance of some modern-day pomade, stood straight up. The intercom gave a muted buzz and he said, ”Excuse me.” He stabbed at a b.u.t.ton, spoke softly into the wire headset he had on. In a moment he had rung off.

”I'm a good friend of Mr. Komoto's,” Jake said. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the Office Lady turn her head. Was she watching him again? ”When can I get in to see him?”

”When I know,” the young man said, ”so will you.”

”May I speak with Mr. Komoto's secretary then?”

The young man glanced down at his glossy PBX. ”I'm sorry but she's on the phone right now. Please have a seat.”

Another twenty minutes of that and Jake was back at the Plexiglaswindow. The young man looked up. He seemed disappointed when he saw who it was.

”Yes?”

”The bathroom?”

”Out the door, down the corridor to your left. Last door.”

Jake nodded and went out. The men's room was as s.h.i.+ny and modern as the rest of the building. But not large. There were two urinals and when the door opened and a man came in, he and Jake were wedged tightly together.

The only sounds in the small room were of the men pa.s.sing water. Jake saw that the other man was a j.a.panese in his mid-forties. He was wide-shouldered with salt-and-pepper hair. Like every other businessman in Tokyo he was dressed in a dark suit. The only difference was that he looked ill at ease in his. Muscles bulged beneath the sleek fabric. Old scars shone in his cheeks. He looked neither to the right nor the left but seemed fascinated by the blank wall in front of him.

Jake was finished, zipping up when the man said, ”A cup of coffee might be in order.”

He said it softly but quite distinctly. He had not turned his head and when Jake looked at him he made no sign that he was aware that anyone else was in the room with him. He zipped, washed up and was gone.

For a moment, Jake stood in the washroom wondering if he had actually heard the man speak. He thought for a time. He was getting nowhere at the offices of Komoto Shomu Kogyo.

Out in the corridor he looked both ways. No one was about. Jake took the elevator down to the lobby. Out in the street he went left. He pa.s.sed a chic Kenzo boutique, decorated in the latest j.a.panese minimalist style: flat gray walls, black rubberized wire racks, gray carpet flowing up from the floor to cover low counters on which piles of clothes were set.

He gave it a glance and went by. Then he stopped and went back. In the window was a highly stylized mannequin. She had orange and green hair and nails the color of topaz. She was wearing the suit the Office Lady at Mikio's had on.

An Office Lady wearing a Kenzo outfit? That would have cost her a year's salary. Unless she wasn't an Office Lady at all. Then who was she?

A cup of coffee might be in order.

Jake back-tracked farther to the entrance of the coffee shop in Mikio's building, the Barking Fish. The kissaten. He went in slowly, takingsome time for his eyes to adjust to the change in light. The neons were softened cast against the deep lacquer paint of the walls. He took a look around.

And saw the Kenzo suit sitting at a marble table. The Office Lady sat in Western style with her legs crossed. She was smoking a cigarette. A minuscule cup of coffee had been set before her. She smiled at him.

He went over and, as naturally as if they had made this date to meet, sat down across from her. He ordered a coffee and when they were alone said, ”Who are you?”

Her full lips moved into a mock pout. ”You are very rude, Mr. Maroc.”

”Pardon my barbarian manners,” he said in j.a.panese.

”That's better,” she said, switching from English. ”I'm glad you got the message.” Her eyes twinkled. ”It was amusing to guess at how long your bladder was going to hold out.”