Dark Intent (13 page)

Tokyo, Japan

That same morning, Paul Adams rolled out of his
futon
in a small business hotel in Shinjuku. He dressed casually and after a wash and soak in the hotel bathhouse, went to the dining room where he met his two friends. They too were highly trained in
budo
,
the Japanese martial arts, and both men, like Adams, were English.

‘What have you got lined up today?’ asked one man, Adrian Peters.
He spoke to Adams.

‘I think I’ll spend a couple of hours at the
dojo
and then go and see if James Steiner and Sophie Carswell have arrived. Her father said they would be here now.’

‘Why don’t you forget about them,’ said the other man, David Brown.
‘They’re not worth it. I didn’t know you were so obsessed by them.’

Peters and Brown were already in Tokyo when Adams appeared and contacted them.
They were both very powerful individuals and the art of their preference had always been
karatedo
. They were trained in
kyokushinkai
, a different style from the
goju
-
ryu
that Steiner was heavily involved in and one in which emphasis in training was often given to full body contact, an approach Steiner found meaningless.

‘You would also be obsessed if someone raped your girlfriend, killed a very good friend of yours here in Japan and who has now got hold of her.
For all I know she had started a relationship with James Steiner before she and I split up. Talk about deceit.’

‘What will you do to them when you find them?’ asked Peters.
‘You can’t touch the girl.’

‘She’s a whore,’ said Adams. ‘But I know I can’t harm her.
Above anything else I want him to pay for killing my friend.’

‘I think you are throwing the girl into this as well,’ said Brown.
‘If you harm her the police here and in England will hunt you down. Your desire for revenge in this sordid case must only be satisfied by what you do to Steiner and that means finding him.’ Brown could sense death, a macabre fusion of excitement that some unfortunately developed after years on the mat. ‘We will help you. The quicker the job is done the better. I don’t want this Steiner business to spoil my holiday.’

Adams appreciated what Brown had said.
He wolfed down the last morsel of food. ‘I’ll see you guys here at eleven after a spell on the mat.’ He turned for the door and left.

At eleven precisely Adams returned to the hotel. He met Peters and Brown in the lobby and the three of them set out for Yoyogi.
When they left the station Peters touched Adams on the arm. ‘It’s just come to mind. Do you and Steiner know what one another looks like?’

‘No,’ said Adams.
‘I’ll ask the girl if he is there.’

‘You’re not thinking,’ said Peters.
‘This is only surveillance. The action comes later. If he is there with the girl, she will see you. You don’t want that.’

‘You are right,’ said Adams. ‘What do you suggest?’

‘I will have a look from the entrance, alone,’ said Peters. ‘It is highly unlikely Sophie Carswell is in there without Steiner and if I see a young white woman and a white male we will sit out here and be patient. You will know you have struck gold if Carswell later comes out with a white man. We will then follow them. If there is no white girl in there and no white male, I will go in and ask the office girl if they have arrived. I can’t do that if there are any white guys in there – one might be Steiner and she would call him. If there are white guys in there and no white female we will wait until we can get positive identification that one of them is Steiner. If he is not here, we are back to square one.’

‘Very clever,’ said Adams.
‘Let’s get going on this. Go and have a look. We’ll stay out of sight.’

Peters quickly crossed the road and went to the dojo.
He opened the door and scanned the space inside. He saw only a few Japanese men. Without hesitation he went to the office. The girl appeared, with no sign of recognition.

‘I’m a close friend of James Steiner,’ he said, disarmingly. ‘I heard he was coming over and was hoping to find him here.
I have no address for him. Can you help me?’

His manner brought an immediate response.
James had not told her to keep his plans to herself. ‘James
san
and the girl he was with are going to Nikko for a few days. They will be staying in the
ryokan
at Yomoto Spa on the north shore of Lake Yunoko. I do not know when he will return to Tokyo.’

‘Does he have an a
ddress in Tokyo,’ asked Peters.

‘No,’ she said.
‘He used to have a flat when he was here for long periods, but he cancelled the lease. Can I give him your address in Tokyo and your name?’

‘I do not have an address and I want to surprise him.
Thank you. I might see you again.’

Peters left the
dojo
and rejoined Adams and Brown. ‘We’ve cracked it,’ he said, clearly pleased. ‘Steiner and Carswell are going to the Nikko Reserve and staying at the Yumoto Spa
ryokan
on the north shore of Lake Yunoko.’

‘Good work,’ said Adams.
‘Let’s go back to the hotel and get our bags. We can also have some lunch before we head for Nikko. I would like to be there by early evening.’

KwaZulu-Natal, Republic of South Africa

When the two guerillas, John Nofomela and Paul Ngwenya, escaped from Krige and Dalton in the house they ran swiftly and separately through the grass.
Each knew where the other one would go and soon they met up in a small gully.

‘We can’t stay here for long,’ said Ngwenya.
‘They won’t give up on us.’

‘They don’t know the bush around here as well as we do,’ said Nofomela.
‘I think they will give up and go back to their masters but we can’t take the risk and we must move into the forest.’

They moved out of the gully and walked for a while along a well-worn footpath.
Then they left the path and entered the dense forest, ideal concealment except from sniffer dogs. They found a bare patch of ground near some boulders and settled down to rest.

For two hours the guerillas slept and then Nofomela woke up and nudged his friend.
‘We must discuss our plans,’ he said. ‘The whites killed Shozi and then came after us. They were working from detailed information about our whereabouts and it was a well organized operation. You said earlier that they will not give up hunting us and I think you are right. That means we must leave KwaZulu.’

‘Where will we go?’ urged Ngwenya.
‘We have spent much of our life in this area and hardly know anywhere else.’

‘Think carefully,’ said Nofomela.
‘We can quickly get used to any place we choose and organize ourselves. Clearly we must be careful because we might be found by others. But we have evaded the best of them before and we will do it again, as we proved tonight.’ He thought for a moment then said: ‘One thing is certain, we must make contact with people we know and use them to establish our base.’

‘Who do we know?’ asked Ngwenya, a little apprehensive.

‘There is someone I’ve known for years,’ said Nofomela. ‘He is white but we have a lot in common and share one another’s political beliefs. I knew him for a while in Angola when he was also on the run and we have kept in contact ever since. He is in Pretoria. He is a member of the ANC and they wanted a plant in the offices of an outfit known as the group of no name. Because of the internal bickering and bitterness in the ANC between the security forces, police and government bodies, the plant had to be independent and not aligned to any of the factions. This guy, Rupert Bosch, was selected.’ Nofomela got up and stretched his legs. ‘There is something I haven’t told you. I am virtually certain that one of the whites, who the other one called Major, was a man named Jan Krige and ex-head of the now defunct Johannesburg murder and robbery squad. His photograph has at times appeared in the press. I want to find out more about Jan Krige, why he came to kill us and who he is working for. He and the other guy weren’t doing that job alone.’ He looked around him and then resumed. ‘I think Rupert Bosch can shed some light on this and that is another very good reason for seeing him. Let’s start moving. We can pick up one of the night taxis and get to the station in Pietermaritzburg. After that it is Pretoria.’

Nikko Reserve

James Steiner and Sophie Carswell arrived at Nikko Station early in the afternoon, a couple of hours before Adams and the two men were due at the same destination.

‘That is one of the most famous places in Nikko,’ said Steiner, pointing to the entrance to a complex of mausoleums, temples and shrines a little further down the road. I told you the Toshogu Shrine, dedicated to Ieyasu Tokugawa the first
shogun
and the mausoleums of Ieyasu and his grandson, Iemitsu, are in Nikko. The complex over there is where they are entombed.’

They walked closer and admired the famous architecture and artwork of the buildings, regarded by many as the finest in Asia.
‘If you like, we can make time to visit this place when we leave,’ said Steiner. ‘I can assure you that it is worth it.’

Sophie marvelled at what she saw. ‘Let’s do that,’ she said.
‘How do we get to the hotel? I feel tired and would like to lie down for a while.’

Steiner put his arm around her and said:
‘Buses to the top of the reserve are fairly frequent and the ride will take about thirty minutes. There is a stop on the other side of this road.’

When the bus came there were only a few others on it, and after buying tickets seated themselves at the rear.
The bus followed a steep, winding road and at times they had magnificent views of mountains shrouded in forest of different shades of gold, red and orange. The region comprised several lakes, spread out and rising with the terrain from the town to Lake Yunoko and the Yumoto Spa. Two rivers joined the middle lakes, each with its own waterfall, the Ryuzu Cascade, north of Lake Chuzenji and known as Ryuzu-no-Taki or Dragon’s Head Cascade, and the Kegon Falls.

When Steiner and Sophie reached the Yumoto Spa
ryokan
, they disembarked and confirmed their reservation. They were shown to two rooms placed near one of the well-known bath houses, cut into the rock and always covered in a sulphurous mist that emanated from the spa.

‘These are lovely,’ said Sophie when they were shown the rooms, each with traditional ta
tami
on the floor, and
futons
already laid out. ‘I have heard
futons
are hard when you sleep on them.’

‘I am sure you will cope,’ said Steiner.
‘By Friday you will never want to give them up and you will have become true Japanese. Now have a rest. Give a knock on my door when you get up, or buzz me on the phone.’

Steiner closed her door and went to his room.
He sat in a chair near the window and looked out over the lake. His mind had been on Adams and the two men since leaving the
dojo
in Yoyogi. After their brief talk in the coffee house he had not spoken to Sophie again about Adams and neither had she. He thought it unlikely that Adams had gone back to the
dojo
today, found out from Michiko where he and Sophie were going and started out for Nikko. But if they had, they could be in Nikko now. He lay on the futon and closed his eyes.

A little over two hours later at eight, Sophie rang him on the phone.

‘I feel great,’ she said. ‘That was exactly what I needed. Do you want to go now for something to eat? I feel like some
sushi
.’

‘There are a number of other typical dishes,’ said Steiner.
‘I’ll go through them with you. Before we go and eat, would you like a soak in the bath house?’

‘I would love that,’ she said.
‘I’ll be ready in five minutes.’

A few minutes later Steiner knocked on her door and they went along the passage to the bath house.
There was no one else there. ‘Take one of these,’ he said He gave her a small flannel towel he took off a shelf. ‘When you have taken your clothes off you cover yourself with that. You then wash yourself at one of the taps over there against the wall and when you are finished you rinse yourself and get into the pool. It is very hot.’

‘Do I have to take the towel into the pool?’ she asked.

‘Yes,’ he said. He pointed to a one-person cubicle. ‘You change in there.’

They spent an hour in the bath house, most of it in the pool.
When they finally got out, Sophie said: ‘Don’t you want me. You never show any interest.’

You’re a great girl,’ said Steiner.
‘You have to be patient.’

She could not understand him. She knew she was one of the most alluring girls around and most men found her hard to resist.
But James Steiner was different, in an unknown, exciting way.

They ate in the main dining room and had several dishes, some of which they shared.
They then went for a walk along the shore of the lake, marvelling at the sulphurous vapour emitted by the subterranean pools through fissures in the rock.

At nine they went back to their rooms.
‘Tomorrow we’ll go down the road to Lake Chuzenji and perhaps climb the foothills of Mt Nantai, the highest peak in Nikko’ said Steiner. ‘It is so beautiful and isolated you won’t see anyone for miles. Except for me, you will be alone in your own little world.’

‘I look forward to that,’ she said.
She stepped closer and kissed him on the lips. ‘It’s really nice being here with you.’ She could only guess how appealing she was to him. She turned to go to her room.

‘Hang on,’ said Steiner.
‘Get your bag. You are sleeping in my room tonight’

‘Why?’ she asked, surprised.
She could see he wasn’t asking her to sleep with him.

‘I sense we are in danger from Adams and his friends,’ he said.
‘We must sleep together. I think they are closer than we think.’

She went quickly into her room, collected her belongings and joined him.

Inside his room he closed the door and locked it. ‘Sleep over there,’ he said, indicating the
futon
near the window.

She was scared of what might happen.
She went to him and said: ‘James, I am so glad you are with me.’

‘They’re not after you,’ said Steiner.
‘I am the one they want. Now get some sleep.’