Tengu (18 page)

“What
ryu
?” I asked him.

Ueda turned his head to talk but didn’t slow down. “Kyokushinkai,” he told me. I grunted. The karate trainees of Kyokushinkai were notorious for their breaking techniques—boards, bricks, bottles—they hacked through them all. Some even practiced breaking baseball bats with their shins. You had to admire their persistence. Me, I prefer breaking baseball bats on someone else. I wondered if that kind of skill came in handy in the cultural attaché business.

We emerged through the rotating glass doors of the terminal into the dense, warm air. Taxis formed a jagged line that stretched along the curb, engines idling and filling the air with exhaust. Past a center island, limousines and shuttle buses waited, their tinted windows making it hard to guess who was inside. Motorcycles and scooters wove in and out of the passing traffic. It was a typical airport scene, and only the distant vista and the faint aroma of humid green hinted that you were in a foreign land. That and the presence of the brightly colored jeepneys—the distinct jeep/bus hybrid of the Philippines.

Ueda stood and slowly scanned the scene. He may have been looking for his car, but I suspected that he was looking for other things as well. He may not have been expecting anything specific, but I’d bet that the cultural attachés who lived to retire developed this habit pretty early in their careers.

He grunted faintly in satisfaction and looked toward a black limo. “There,” he told us.

As we approached the car, the trunk lid popped open and we threw our bags inside. We could have fit in there as well. A uniformed driver got out of the front and opened the rear door. You felt the cool of air-conditioning rush pass you in a little cloud when he cracked the door open. We climbed into the gloom of the backseat. Ueda stood for another minute and then got in the front.

It was dim in the limo after the brightness of the day, but I could see him clearly enough, and I could see from my brother’s face that he also recognized the man sitting there—Mori.

The last time we had both seen him, he was driving off from a crime scene, protected by his diplomatic status. Events had culminated to his satisfaction. He had been hunting a rogue killer from his organization who had made it to the U.S. It was a convoluted story, but it ended simply enough, in a late night sword fight in Manhattan. Micky and I both had to do an awful lot of explaining, and I got to take my first serious ride in an ambulance. We hadn’t been crazy about him before that night. Neither of us was very happy to see him now.

Mori’s face was square and flat and expressionless at the best of times. He watched us settle ourselves and react to his presence. Then he spoke. His voice sounded raspier than I remembered, like a man who prefers silence.

“Dr. Burke. Detective.” He nodded at each of us. “And you must be the partner,” he said to Art, “Pedersen. I was glad to hear that you had recovered from your wounds . . . ”

Mori was impeccably dressed as usual, his white shirt glowing faintly in the dim recesses of the limo. His dark suit jacket fit perfectly. His feet, flat on the floor, were encased in gleaming black leather. His posture was perfect but there was something in the set of his shoulders that exposed his exhaustion. Despite that, it seemed to me that he was going to persist in the pattern of polite small talk that is the hallmark of Asian conversation. Still, he couldn’t keep himself from glancing at his watch with a grimace.

“I am sorry, Mori-san,” Ueda told him. “The policeman met them and I thought it best to remain unnoticed.”

“I understand,” the older man grunted. He took a breath and turned towards me, as if summoning up energy for an unpleasant task.

“I . . . ” he paused and swallowed “ . . . regret extremely the situation that brings you here, Dr. Burke.” His head came down and his torso jerked forward in a small bow. Even in the confines of the limo, it was an obvious act of humility.

“
Shigata ga nai
,” I told him. It can’t be helped. I wasn’t interested in hearing apologies from Mori; I wanted what information and help he could provide to get Yamashita back.

“You know what I want to know?” Micky broke in. “I want to know what brought Yamashita here in the first place.”

“What do you mean?” Mori answered. “Surely the embassy officials in New York explained the situation to you, Detective.”

“Don’t blow smoke at me, Mori,” Micky told him. “I know how you work. We get told exactly what you want us to know, and nothing more.” He sat forward on his seat and gave Mori a hard stare.

Art put a hand on Micky’s arm, reminding him of the need for restraint. “Mr. Mori,” he began calmly, “this is an extremely complicated and dangerous situation.”

“I would agree,” Mori said gruffly.

Art nodded encouragingly. “So you can understand our need to get as much information as we can. If we’re going to help find Yamashita
Sensei
, we need you to tell us what you know.”

Mori looked at us and nodded. “I am prepared to do that. Ueda-san has been fully briefed on the situation and will provide you access to the support I have arranged.”

“We wanna hear it from you, Mori,” Micky pressed.

The older man looked again at his watch. He smiled tightly. “I regret that I will only be able to remain here a little while longer, detective. It seems that my . . . activities to date have not been well received by the Philippine government. As a result, I have been asked to leave the country. I am boarding a flight shortly. So perhaps it is best to ask me the most pressing questions now and Ueda-san will fill in what gaps remain?” His voice was reasonable, but his eyes darted from one to the other of us, wary of what we would ask.

“Why was Yamashita
Sensei
used to deliver the ransom, Mori-san?” I pressed him. “Why? What’s the link between him and the kidnapped woman?”

Mori closed his eyes. “The reasons are multiple,” he said finally. “The woman kidnapped, Abe Hatsue, is the child of my only sister. I care deeply for my niece, Dr. Burke, and sought a trusted friend to help me, someone capable of dealing with a difficult and dangerous situation. Was I so wrong in reaching out to your master?”

I looked at Mori. He and Yamashita had a long history together, serving in an elite section of the Imperial Household Agency tasked with training guards for the Imperial family. That had been years ago, but the bonds of loyalty and obligation are strong ones in Japan. And the links formed in the elite ranks of that organization named Kunaicho were even stronger. If that were not enough justification, there was also the fact that Yamashita was one of the most capable and dangerous men either of us knew.

But there was something wrong here. I could see it in the way Mori set his face and the slight jerking of his eyes.

“Yamashita
Sensei
is a skilled
bugeisha
,” I admitted to him. I thought of Micky and Art’s earlier discussion as I continued. “But he is an older man now and was half a world away at the time.” I gestured at Ueda. “I am sure that there were many skilled and capable men available for this duty who could have been summoned in half the time, Mori-san. So I’ll ask again, why Yamashita?”

Mori fidgeted slightly. “Over the years, I have seen your teacher in many situations. Ones you have no knowledge of. He was . . . is . . . without peer.” But Mori was still evading me, and I pressed him on it.

“No, Mori-san,” I said, shaking my head in emphasis. “It doesn’t wash. Kidnappers work to keep the families of their victims off-balance. They make outrageous demands and insist that things happen quickly. They force you to play their game. The delay in getting Yamashita from New York would have set off alarms. If you cared that much about your niece, I don’t think you’d take the chance . . . ”

“Unless there’s something else you’re not telling us,” Micky said.

“Wouldn’t that be unusual?” Art added snidely.

Ueda was watching Mori carefully from the front seat. “Mori-san,” he prompted quietly.

Mori’s head shot around in anger and he glared at the younger man. “Silence!” he commanded.

“
Ie
, Mori-san,” Ueda responded. “If you will not tell them, I will.”

Micky sat back in the seat with an anticipatory sigh. “I told you there was something hinky here,” he muttered to Art.

You could see Mori struggling. He was a proud man and accustomed to being in control. I don’t imagine he admitted to failure, much. And the situation he had on his hands was a debacle. His niece hadn’t been ransomed. His family was out a few million dollars. And the colleague he had brought in to help had been abducted. Now, to add further humiliation, he was being pressed by
gaijin
, foreigners, to reveal something he did not wish to. I almost felt sorry for him. Almost.

I was sitting on the limo’s jump seat, directly across from Mori. I leaned forward. “Listen to me,” I hissed. “Stop wasting my time. I’m here to get my teacher back. It seems that you are the cause of all of this and I want to know why! And I don’t care about your sense of shame or your dignity. You have an obligation to your friend, and a duty to help me find him. If I have to beat it out of you,“ I saw Ueda tense and I held up a hand to calm him, “and your driver and anyone else you throw at me, I will. I’m here to get Yamashita back.” By this time, my face was maybe an inch from his and I was looking right into the black of his pupils. His lids had narrowed in defense. I spaced my next words out and jabbed his chest with a hard index finger to emphasize each one. “Do—You—Understand—Me?”

Mori’s lids closed slowly and his body sagged wearily. Then he straightened up with a great deal of internal effort. “The kidnappers specified that only Yamashita would be acceptable to deliver the ransom,” he said quietly.

“Shit!” Micky exploded.

“You idiot,” Art added. “It was a set-up.”

I looked at the two cops and the certainty in their eyes. It made my stomach sink.

“Did he know?” I asked wearily.

“What?” Mori said.

“Did
Sensei
know they had asked for him to deliver the money?”

“No,” Mori admitted. “He only knew that I asked his help.”

Micky shook his head. “You are some piece of work, Mori. How many friends do you have, anyway? I mean ones that are still alive?”

The air conditioning was working hard in that car, but we were all beginning to sweat a bit. Ueda broke in.

“Dr. Burke, I agree with you. Whatever the circumstances that have led us to the place we are in now, our first priority needs to be finding the two kidnap victims.” Ueda was working hard to bleed some of the tension off things. “Mori-san’s continued presence in this country has been strongly objected to by the Philippine government . . . ”

“They’re not alone,” my brother mumbled.

Ueda didn’t miss a beat. “ . . . and I am here to represent the Abe family’s continuing interest and to provide you with the resources you may need to assist in the search for your teacher.”

“Big deal,” Micky said. “You guys created this mess. The least you can do is help clean it up.”

That was too much for Mori. “I was operating in the best interest of all concerned,” he began to protest. Ueda read the expressions on our faces and broke in with some comment about the time and Mori’s need to clear security before take-off. It provided the older man with an excuse to leave. It was thin, but Mori took it with alacrity.

He looked at me one final time. His face was somber and pale. His chin was pulled in and he looked old and fleshy. Again, he bowed toward me in silent apology, but couldn’t bring himself to say anything.

Mori left the car. The chauffeur and Ueda got out to accompany him to the entrance of the terminal.

“What a turd,” Art commented.

Micky snorted in agreement. Then he looked at me. “You, on the other hand. Whattaya been eating, raw meat?”

“The whole finger-jabbing thing was very impressive,” Art agreed.

“Not like you at all, Connor,” my brother concluded. “I like it.”

I watched the three Japanese men conferring on the sidewalk. “Let’s get our ducks in a row,” I said, ignoring the comments. “What do we need right away?”

“We need a continuing line to the PD in this town and whatever info they’re collecting,” Art started. “Probably have to be unofficial, since Reyes is not going to be on fire to help the Japanese.”

“Okay,” I nodded.

“We need weapons,” Micky said, “and whatever associated gear necessary, as well as transportation.”

“Mostly,” Art told me, “we need a guy with connections and knowledge of the local scene. Cop or ex-cop. Someone who knows the players and how to grease the skids to get things done.”

“You think Ueda’s the guy?” I asked them. The cultural attaché had bowed and Mori and his driver headed toward the terminal doors.

“No,” my brother answered. “He can help. Probably mostly in terms of a bankroll. But we need a Filipino.”

Ueda reached the car and, as the door opened, the sounds of traffic grew in volume. There were any number of noises—car horns faintly blaring in the distance, the hiss of tires along the road, doors and trunks slamming, and, growing with the insistent buzz of an approaching insect, a high-revving motorcycle.

Ueda got back in the car and the noise was muffled, but I could see the thing as it came into view. It was a bright yellow racing bike, the helmeted driver bent low over the machine as he wound his way through the traffic, leaning and swaying through narrow gaps with an urgency out of sync with the rhythm of drop-offs and pick-ups.

I looked from Mori to the approaching biker to Ueda and had a mental flash—a geometric diagram unfolding with a terrible inevitability.

“Ueda!” I said, and reached for the door. He looked at me, then glanced out the window. The attaché had good reflexes. We jumped out of the car almost simultaneously.

There was perhaps thirty feet separating us from Mori. It may as well have been a mile. Ueda called out a warning, but it was blurred in the ambient noise of airport traffic. The motorcycle shot up to the terminal entrance with a squeal of tires. Mori looked up in surprise. The biker’s helmet encased his head and wrapped around the lower jaw. The dark visor was in its down position so that the rider’s face was totally hidden.