Collins, Max Allan - Nathan Heller 10 (30 page)

“Captain Tatehiko no speaks English,” the
shichokan
informed me. “Please to sit. I will speak to him of what we have said.”

Chief Suzuki and I returned to our teakwood chairs while Captain Tatehiko—who was apparently the liaison officer between the Navy and the colonial government—stood with crossed arms, like a sentry, listening to the
shichokan,
who had remained standing. Then the
shichokan
handed the letters to Captain Tatehiko and stood beside him, pointing at words as he read/translated.

Tatehiko listened to all this expressionlessly, then nodded curtly and took the third chair, beside Suzuki, as the relieved
shichokan
took his seat behind the desk, again.

“Father O’Leary,” the
shichokan
said, leaning forward, hands flat on his desk. “Why do you honor us with visit?”

I stood, to lend some weight to my words. “The I.R.A. has since January of last year been waging a bombing campaign against Britain. Unfortunately our resources are limited. The quality of our explosives, homemade or stolen, has not always been the best.”

“Forgive please,” the
shichokan
said, holding up his palm again. “I must translate as we go.”

And he translated for Tatehiko. Then he nodded to me to continue.

I did: “We have been discussing an alliance with Germany for many months. Arrangements are being made for Sean Russell to go to Berlin. He seeks aid to fight the common British enemy.”

I paused, to allow the
shichokan
to translate for Captain Tatehiko, which he did.

Then I went on: “I am acting as a courier in hopes that Mr. Russell, or some other I.R.A. envoy, can go to Tokyo to build a similar alliance with your imperial government. Britain bedevils you by aiding China; they hold island territories in these waters that are rightfully yours. With funding and supplies, the I.R.A. can mount a sabotage campaign aimed at key British war industries.”

Again I paused, and again the
shichokan
translated.

“The I.R.A. can damage the British transportation structure,” I said, ticking off a list on my fingers. “It can demoralize the British public. And it can cripple the British aircraft industry. But we need funds, arms, and supplies. That is the substance of the message I have been asked to convey.”

And the
shichokan
translated.

And I sat.

Captain Tatehiko mulled all of this over, briefly, then spoke in Japanese, at some length, while the
shichokan
listened intently.

Then the governor said to me, “Captain Tatehiko thanks you for your message, and your friendship. Your message will be conveyed.”

“That’s all I ask,” I said. I looked at the Captain, said, “
Arigato,
” and nodded.

He nodded back.

The
shichokan
said, “Some time may pass before we have a reply to your message. Captain Tatehiko will speak to Rear Admiral who will speak to Naval Ministry. I will do same with
chokunin
of
Nan’yo chokan.
”

“I understand,” I said. “However, I have arranged passage on a German trading ship due to dock at Tanapag Harbor two days from now. Back to the American territory, Guam.”

Captain Tatehiko spoke to the
shichokan,
apparently asking for a translation, which the
shichokan
seemed to provide. Tatehiko spoke again, and now it was the governor’s turn to translate for me.

“Captain Tatehiko say that if you stay longer, we will arrange safe passage to Guam at a later date.” The
shichokan
held his open palms out in a gesture of welcome. “Will you be our guest until that time?”

“I would be honored.”

The
shichokan
beamed. “You honor us, Father.”

Both Chief Suzuki and Captain Tatehiko excused themselves to pursue their official duties, but I remained behind, at the
shichokan
’s insistence, for luncheon, with the promise of an island tour thereafter.

My pudgy host and I sat in another room, on woven straw mats in the usual cross-legged Nipponese style, with a sliding door drawn back on a view of green hills rising into the mist. Two lovely young women in colorful kimonos attended our every whim, keeping first our teacups filled, then later serving tiny warm cups of sake, which I sipped guardedly. Lacquered trays with small dishes of food—seaweed, rice, pickles, miso paste—were set before us. The stuff was lousy.

It wasn’t like I didn’t know or appreciate Japanese cuisine. There was a place back home, on Lake Park Avenue, called Mrs. Shintani’s where they cooked sukiyaki on a little gas stove right at your table, thin slices of beef, crisp fresh vegetables, the warm aromas rising to your nostrils like undulating dancing girls. Take a young lady to Mrs. Shintani’s for an intimate evening of heavenly dining, and I dare you not to get lucky.

This tasteless goo wouldn’t get you to first base.

“I hope you enjoy meal,” the
shichokan
said. “We eat only finest imported food. Sent from home in can, jar, sack.”

“Aren’t there farms here?” I asked, my chopsticks finding a pinch of flavorless seaweed. “I know there’s fishing.”

The
shichokan
made a sour face. “Island food. We do not eat the harvest of primitive people.”

On a tropical paradise, surrounded by waters teeming with fish, where coconuts and bananas and pineapples flourished, where native farmers raised chickens, cattle, and hogs, these proud people ate canned seafood and seaweed out of jars. This was my first real indication that they were nuts.

The roly-poly
shichokan
’s tour of the island was fairly brief—an hour and a half or so—but illuminating. Riding in back of another black sedan, with a white-uniformed driver, our route was at first scenic, following hard dirt roads south through lush foliage, stopping to take in a small bay, a tidal pool, a blowhole, and several craters. Then, apparently to demonstrate to his new I.R.A. friend the capabilities of the Japanese, the
shichokan
paused to allow me to take in the panorama that was Aslito Heneda airfield.

Two vast crushed-coral runways, two service sheds with spacious crushed-coral aprons, five dark-green wood-frame hangars, and a similarly constructed terminal, Aslito Heneda was a modern airfield in the shadow of an ancient mountain. The facility had an unmistakable military look, but as we coasted by, I caught sight of no fighter planes, no bombers—the only planes on the apron were a pair of airliners—and a few parked automobiles, with some civilian activity around the terminal building, a small ground crew on the field.

“Great Japan Airways,” the
shichokan
explained. “People come to work Saipan. Some come for vacation from Tokyo.”

Later, the
shichokan
pointed out a flat stretch of land, which looked to have been recently cleared, and said, “Marpi Point. We begin clear second airfield soon.”

Saipan didn’t seem to be in dire need of another commercial airport; in fact, Aslito Heneda was barely used for that purpose. In his sly way, the
shichokan
was letting his I.R.A. ally know that, though military aircraft and combat units were not yet in place, the island was undergoing heavy-duty fortification.

He was less coy back in Garapan, when we rolled past the chain-link-fenced-off Chico Naval Base with its sprawl of barracks skirting the seaplane base with its ramps and repair shed, and modest population of two flying boats. Within that fenced-off area, there was no sign of any military personnel.

“Those buildings full by next year,” the governor bragged. “With
konkyochitai
…” Noticing my confusion, he thought about that and came up with a translation: “Battalion. Also, a
bobitai,
defense force. Five hundred men. And
keibitai
…guard force. Eight hundred navy troop.”

Our sedan headed back up the main street, and turned over onto a side street parallel to the waterfront, my spider-haired chubby tour guide proudly pointing out an imposing low-slung complex of concrete buildings on golf-green grounds—a modern hospital specializing in tropical diseases (“Dengue fever, big problem Saipan”). Across the street was a small park, where a few palm trees and stone benches attended a towering pedestal on which stood a larger-than-life-size bronze statue of an older Japanese gentleman in a business suit, a hand in his pocket, an oddly casual pose for such a formal monument.

“Baron Matsue Haruji,” the
shichokan
said, answering my unasked question. “Sugar King, bring prosperity to Saipan.”

On a side street nearby, however, the tour turned less cheerful, as the sedan pulled over by an undeveloped overgrown plot of land, a reminder of the jungle this town had been carved out of. Across from us were two one-and-a-half-story concrete buildings with high barred windows. The building at right was long and narrow, stretching out like an endless concrete boxcar; across a crushed-stone area, where several black sedans were parked, a similar but much smaller building squatted, a concrete bungalow with four barred windows. Probably the maximum-security section.

“Father,” the
shichokan
said quietly, “we give you trust. We show you…” He searched for the words and found perfect ones. “…good faith.”

“That is true,
Shichokan.”

He nodded slowly. His bassy voice was somber as he said, “We ask a favor.”

I nodded in return. “You honor me,
Shichokan.
”

“We would like you to speak to two American prisoners…. Pilots.”

My heart raced but I kept my voice calm. “Pilots?”

“Spies.”

I gestured toward the concrete buildings. “Are they held in that prison,
Shichokan?
”

“One is. Man.”

“There is a woman, too?”

“Yes. She is famous woman in your country…. She is call ‘Amira.’”

I was trembling; I hoped he didn’t see it. “Amelia,” I said.

“Yes. Amira.” He grunted a few words in Japanese and his driver pulled out into the street, turned at the next corner.

I said nothing; my heart was a fucking sledgehammer, but I said nothing. He had brought up the subject. It was his to pursue.

We hadn’t gone far—maybe six hundred feet—when the sedan came to a stop again, opposite another concrete building, a two-story one; it loomed over its neighbors (a low-slung general merchandise store at left, a single-story frame house at right) looking at once modern and gothic, a church designed by Frank Lloyd Wright. Its four upper-floor windows, divided by decorative pillars, were tall and narrow, and the lower floor—which had a shallow, one-story extension to the street—had arched windows that cried out for stained glass.

But it wasn’t a church.

“Hotel,” the
shichokan
said. “This hotel—Kobayashi Ryokan—run by military. Keep honored guests, like honored friend, here…. Also political prisoners.”

An interesting mix.

“The woman is here?” I asked, with a casual gesture to the building.

“
Hai,
” the
shichokan
said. “Second floor…. Please go to hotel. You expected. Your questions answered.”

He gave me half a bow, and my door was opened by his driver; I damn near fell out of the sedan, or into the driver’s arms. But within moments I was crossing the dusty, unpaved street, watching the sedan roll away, with—framed in its rear window—the
shichokan
’s inanely smiling face. I approached the boxy gothic structure, and went in.

The one-story extension served as the hotel’s minuscule lobby: at right, nobody was behind the check-in counter; at left, under a churning ceiling fan, straining their rattan chairs, sat two massive Chamorro men, playing cards on a rattan table with a deck turned splotchy from sweaty, dirty fingers. Also on the table were the kitchen matchsticks they were betting, a pack of Japanese cigarettes, two long black billy clubs, and a sheathed machete.

They were the first native males I’d seen wearing shirts; in fact, they wore suits, only soiled-looking, threadbare, as if these were hand-me-downs from the Japs.

But that seemed unlikely, because these were two very big boys. One of them was hatless, with a thatch of black hair atop a cantaloupe head with watermelon-seed eyes in walnut-shell pouches of skin in a litchi-nut-toned face so unwrinkled, it was as if neither thought nor emotion had ever traveled across that arid plain. Twenty years of age or maybe fifty, he was just plain fat, bursting his seams.

Such flab made him less dangerous than the other one, a bull-necked mass of muscle and fat in a straw fedora, with a face so ugly, features so flat and blunt, so wrinkled, so pockmarked, the white knife scar down his right cheek seemed gratuitous.

The worst part was the eyes: they were not stupid; they were hard and dark and glittering and smart. He looked at me above a hand of cards clutched in knife-handle fingers and said, “Six.”

At first I thought he was making a bet, but when a frown tightened around the hard dark eyes, I asked, “Pardon me?”

He was missing a front tooth; the others were the shade of stained oak, approximately the tone of his skin. “Six.”

“That’s, what? My room number? Room six?”

He played a card. “Six.”

“Do I need a key?”

“Six!”

That seemed about as close to getting directions as I was going to get, so I entered the main building through a doorless archway, making my way down a central corridor, my shoes echoing off the hardwood floor. Doors to rooms were on either side of me; the walls were plaster, not rice paper. Stairs to the second floor were at the rear, but there seemed to be no exit down there. Fire inspectors apparently played it fast and loose in Saipan.