The Pearl Diver (32 page)

I awoke around eleven, when I heard a TV comedy show blaring in the apartment above. If I could hear them that clearly, how clearly could they hear our bedroom? But even worse than the embarrassment was my realization that Bento would be closing in roughly an hour without my getting in to research the employment records. Now was my chance.

I didn’t shower because I didn’t want to risk waking Hugh. Instead, I tiptoed to the dresser to get clean underwear and a little black dress. It made sense to go into Bento looking good, at the hour when I’d be entering it. Marshall wouldn’t be there anymore, and if the last dinner orders had been placed, Jiro himself would have headed home. The bosses would be gone, and I’d do my thing without attracting staff attention.

As an added precaution, I picked a Hiroshige woodblock print right off Hugh’s living room wall, and gathered up my tool kit. If anyone caught me in Marshall’s office, I would say that I was hanging a picture. Then, taking one final sweep of the room, which included packing up the can of wax as well as a real buffing cloth, I decided to do one last thing. I wrote a note.

I imagined his face, so I added,

That struck the right playful note. I headed outside, clicked the car open, and climbed in, locking up immediately. I was taking no chances. Once I got downtown, if I couldn’t park in the pad right behind the kitchen, I would park in the bus-stop zone out front. I figured that I’d be in and out within the space of ten minutes.

The restaurant was blazing with light as I drove slowly past it. The sea-grass and aubergine-painted walls, hung with the old plates and pictures I’d found for them, looked beautiful—at least, to me. The front tables still had a few customers, but I couldn’t tell what else was going on inside. I cut down the driveway that led to the back of the restaurant, where the parking pad was bare. The area was to be used for Marshall and Jiro’s cars and any deliveries—so if it was empty, that meant I was in good shape. I took Jiro’s spot and quickly hopped up the back staircase and into the kitchen.

One of the dishwashers, Toro, nodded at me, but the other guy practically had his head and shoulders buried in the stockpot he was washing. One of the vegetable prep guys was mopping the floor. I didn’t see anyone else cooking. That meant, I guessed, that the kitchen and waitstaff had all either gone home or had moved on to Plum Ink. The couple in the front were the last stragglers. There was probably one waiter around to bring them cappuccino and hand them their bill, but the house was basically empty.

“How lucky I am,” I murmured to myself as I swept with all
my things into Jiro and Marshall’s office. I wasn’t even going to bother with waxing the
tansu
. I’d just get to the papers I needed.

I moved to the file cabinet where Jiro had found my check the last time. I pulled on the door, but it didn’t budge. Locked. I swept my hand along the top of the file cabinet, and came up with a small key. Very efficient security, I thought wryly. If it were my file cabinet, I’d put the key in a truly hard-to-think-of place. Hanging behind a picture, maybe.

I flipped through the files carefully. My fingers were almost perfectly healed, I realized. It made things easy. I examined bills to be paid, bills paid, vendor names and addresses, accounting, employees…

I picked up the folder marked “Employees” and opened it. I’d been hoping for a list of names and Social Security numbers, but it turned out to be a grab bag of applications, some of which carried the names of people I’d never heard of, names, perhaps, of people Marshall might hire someday. There were also odd slips of paper with people’s names and phone numbers handwritten on them, and then, lots of photocopies of Social Security cards and green cards. Here were Alberto and Julio’s cards, proving both of them foreign-born but legal. David Macauley, the Australian waiter with whom Andrea was staying, also had legal working papers. The U.S. citizens included people I’d expected, like Justin, and some I hadn’t been sure of, like Phong. He’d been born in Arlington and his last name was Nguyen—just my luck, because it seemed there were even more Nguyens around than Shimuras. I wished I knew Toro’s real name. There were many Social Security photocopies with names that I didn’t recognize, names like Jiminez, Drake, Anders, Nebblet…

Nebblet. It was an odd, old-fashioned, English-sounding name that I’d heard somewhere. I hadn’t seen it in the military records, I thought, but I had looked at hundreds of names in the last twenty-four hours. The
N
name I recalled was Norton, not Nebblet. But then, as I tried the names together in my mind, I remembered.

In Lorraine Norton’s sorority photograph, her maiden name had
been Nebblet. And hadn’t Robert Norton said something about enlisting because a friend of his from boyhood had done so?

Maybe a relative of Lorraine’s was working in the kitchen. But since when? I remembered when Robert Norton had hurriedly left the Bento kitchen with me. He’d asked about Toro, the dishwasher, how long he’d worked there. If Toro were a Neblett—a relative through marriage—he should have talked to him directly. What was going on?

Maybe they’d been in the military together. Maybe he’d been one of the two men stalking Robert and terrifying Sadako. I would look for the name. In my bag, I had not only the command chronology, but a unit diary from the first company that Robert Norton had served in. There was the name. “Michael Neblett.” But who was he? I ran over the recognizably black employees in the kitchen. Dominic was Haitian, Luis was Brazilian, they both had green cards. Neither could be Neblett.

I sat down on the floor so I wouldn’t be so visible through the glass window in the door, and went through the notes I’d made on another page. Here was Robert Norton’s home phone number. I dialed it. On the fourth ring, just before I was ready to hear an answering machine and hang up, someone answered.

“Yeah?” The voice sounded like a young man’s, slightly high-pitched.

“Davon, it’s Rei Shimura, calling from Washington.”

“Yeah. You aren’t back in Japan yet?”

“No, there’s some serious business going on. I want to ask you if you’ve ever heard of anyone called Michael Neblett.”

“Sure. That’s my crazy uncle Mike. He was in ’Nam with Dad.”

“What do you mean, he’s crazy?” I asked.

“I dunno. People just say that ’cause he can’t hold a job. We haven’t seen him in years. Why do you care? Do you want to play with his mind, too, tell him about that girl who’s supposed to be my sister?”

“So whom did your father meet first, your uncle Mike or your mother?”

“Davon won’t know the answer to that,” a woman’s voice said. “Hang up, honey.”

I heard a clicking sound, and Lorraine and I were all alone on the long-distance line. I asked, “How long have you been listening in?”

“Long enough,” said Lorraine. “Listen, Robert told you to leave well enough alone. I will, too, but yes, if you must know, my brother Mike and Robert both enlisted in the Marine Corps.”

“What did your brother do in the military?” I asked.

“Oh, he went here and there. He’s suffering from PTSD and basically is supported by Veterans Administration benefits. It’s a very sad situation, actually, and I’d thank you not to pry any further or try to meet him.”

“He was with Robert in Vietnam,” I said, looking at the photocopied page of an old unit diary that I’d pulled. “He wasn’t in the squad that killed the women and children that night, but he was in the company. He must have found out what really happened.”

“You are out of line,” Lorraine said. “And by the way, I know for a fact you’re not really from Japan.”

“How’s that?” I asked.

“You’ve had a Social Security card since your birth in this country. Not that you’ve earned much toward your retirement allotment,” she added unnecessarily. “Social Security numbers are important to keep confidential. It would be terrible if someone took over your name and Social Security number for themselves.”

I laughed. “You’re trying to scare me into thinking you’ll screw with my Social Security number?”

“I said no such thing. But accidents do happen—”

“Lady,” I said, “I had a miscarriage after escaping from some thug kidnappers, one of whom I’m almost certain is your precious brother. After that experience, I’m hardly afraid of—bureaucratic chicanery.”

Lorraine started yelling then, but I was distracted by the appearance of a flash of color in the glass window of the office door. I looked up and saw Jiro Takeda standing outside, watching me. I hung up the phone immediately and got to my feet.

“What are you doing?” Jiro asked. He was dressed in civilian clothes, a black polo shirt and worn jeans. Obviously, he’d gone somewhere and come back, because he had his car keys in his hand.

I still had the picture right at my feet, the one I had planned to use as a ruse if anyone found me. But I wasn’t touching the picture—I had my hand right in the employment papers. And the room was soundproof, I knew from my time in there before. Since Jiro hadn’t heard the conversation, he probably believed I was there to steal the money that Marshall owed me.

I ran through possible explanations in my mind. I could pretend that I was looking in the employment records to find out someone’s birthday. I could say that I’d forgotten to give Marshall my Social Security number, which he’d need if he were to issue me a check. I could also explain what I was really doing, but I knew it would sound unbelievable.

“What are you doing?” Jiro repeated.

“I—I wanted to know the names of some of the people working here,” I said.

“If you wanted to learn names, why, then, didn’t you ask Marshall or me?” Jiro was almost hyperventilating. “Anyway, that file is locked! How did you get inside?”

“I found the key. Jiro, I swear I didn’t take any money. Check my bags. You’ll see that I’m as broke as ever.” I glanced out into the kitchen. The lights were still on, but in the time that I’d been searching the office, the remaining staff had left. At least I was all alone in this humiliation.

Jiro snorted. “I know you aren’t after money. You have the rich lawyer boyfriend,
neh
? What you’re after is something completely different. But it’s not names.”

“What do you think, then?”

He shook his head. “I am very disappointed in you. I thought you were a
yasashii-hito,
and I was wrong.” He had used the phrase that meant “nice person,” which had a connotation of comradeship. It was a lovely thing to call someone. And now I wasn’t one anymore.

“Please don’t tell Marshall,” I begged. “I wish I’d never done this. But the reason, actually, is a matter of life and death.”

“You talk like a chef or a waiter who doesn’t want to work his shift. I have no time for such talk. Get out.” Jiro was using rough Japanese with me, the kind only men used with each other, or inferiors. It was worse than any physical blow I could have received.

I bent my head to the task of gathering up my possessions. Jiro was the person at the restaurant I’d respected the most, and now he saw me as dirt. I could never come back, I knew now. After I’d picked up my backpack, I looked at the papers I’d had spread out on the floor.

“May I put the file back in place, at least?” I asked Jiro, only to find that he’d stormed off.

I ran a hand over my brow and put the papers back in the folder. Then the folder went into the file, the file into the drawer. I locked it with the key. Then I picked up my things and moved slowly out of the office.

Just as I did so, the lights went off. Jiro must have closed up and not cared that I was left behind. The framed woodblock slipped out of my grasp and the glass shattered. Damn it. I laid flat on the floor the remnants of the picture and made my way along the wall, trying to recall where the light switch was. I’d never had to turn the lights on or off anywhere in the restaurant because of the dilettante hours I worked. But I knew the kitchen met restaurant code, which meant there had to be plenty of light switches and outlets around. I could only hope Jiro hadn’t set an alarm on the door. I would be able to go out an emergency exit, I was sure, they had to be kept open, by law. Where was it again? Down the hall, near the powder rooms.

Just as I reached the edge of where I thought the door into the dining area was, the light snapped on. I blinked in the harsh fluorescence and saw that Toro was standing in front of me.

My initial instinct to say thank goodness was thwarted when I saw his face. He was looking at me in a way that made Jiro’s
recent expression seem neutral. Now I filled my eyes with the sight of the man I’d barely glanced at before, except to catalog the ugly things about him: the tattoo, the graying ponytail, the love handles. He was wearing one of his usual, awful T-shirts, one that strained at his belly, but he didn’t look too fat to move. Now I saw that his ponytail was black mixed with gray, and a kinky texture. And he had hard eyes, like Lorraine.

“Neblett,” I said. “You’re Mike Neblett. How did you choose the nickname Toro?”

“My old war buddy Garcia thought of it. Bull,” he said, knocking on his chest with one fist. How had I missed seeing that he wore brass knuckles? Maybe because he’d had latex gloves on while he was washing dishes.

“Bull, as in tough? Or bull, as in that whole story about what happened when Norton and the others shot up the mothers and their children in Vietnam?”

He smiled at me, a thin smile that revealed spaces where some teeth were gone. “They shot ’em for fun—the sergeant’s fun. I heard later about how they had to do it, from Robert, who had really wigged out. He thought he could trust me to help get the story to the judge advocate. But the sergeant stepped in first, ’cause he knew about our…conversation. And he made me an offer that was too good to resist.”