by Arne Bue
In minutes, seamen assembled and lowered the foot gangway. The ship had accomplished its early arrival at ten minutes after nine by Mr. Nakano s watch. On the dock, Anna began speaking to drivers intending to board.
Mr. Nakano recognized a yellow dog, a Golden Lab seen here before. The dog once belonged to Jeffrey Johnson, the man assassinated by Sugimoto. Distraught, Nakano quickly returned to his cabin.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
Mr. Nakano lay in his bunk, and wished himself to drift into sleep, but he could not. The ship's horn discharged another acrimonious lament. The Tustumena would depart Sand Point shortly. But there was more to hear besides the horn. At first he thought his heart was hammering in his ears, but no, someone had banged on his door. Every nerve leaped. His face tightened and his body went numb and for a moment he could not move.
The assassin Kiichi Sugimoto has come for me. This would be his time, shortly before departure. He will kill me. He uses the Glock with the silencer. When I open the door, he will place one bullet in my head. He will follow with two more after I fall. That is the way of this particular assassin. Misako will not live in comfort. My son will not be an honorable man. They will force my son to join them.
There were more knocks. He would pretend he was not here, but his curiosity drove him nonetheless to press his head to the door to listen. He could hear only the ship's engines chanting to themselves at first, but as he pressed closer to the cabin door he was certain he heard a voice, a woman speaking to someone with words and voice remindful of fog. This was not an assassin. There was another purpose to this visit.
Mr. Nakano opened. A gray-haired Aleut woman stood there. An old man waited behind her. The old woman glared at Mr. Nakano.
"I don't know why I agreed to do this, but here," she said. She handed him an envelope. Mr. Nakano thought to thank her, but she spoke again. "Why don't you Japanese go back home?" she said bitterly. "You bombed Dutch Harbor."
"That was a long time ago," Mr. Nakano said, politely. She was an Alaskan Native elder, so he bowed from the waist.
"We remember. We old ones, we all remember," the old woman said.
"I was a little boy then. We were afraid, too," Mr. Nakano said. "Now we are friends."
The old woman looked at him. Mr. Nakano could hear the old woman working her lungs. The old man said to her, "We better go."
The elders walked away. Mr. Nakano looked at the envelope in his hand. He closed the door and slit open the top with his glinting blade. A car key. A message in Japanese.
I am in Sand Point. The key is for a white, four-door Nissan Sentra, Alaska license number CMW 345. The driver's seat is modified. On the back, find the horizontal zipper. My driver will drive the car away at the next stop.
Kiichi Sugimoto.
Sugimoto remained in Sand Point? Impossible. Uchigama would have said something. Next stop, I must call that stupid accountant again, get an explanation for this outrage. The note is blatantly unconscionable. Following this note I must risk the sanctity of this secret creation, this route, by violating Coast Guard regulations, descend from the promenade deck, use the inside stairs, go all the way down to the car deck. There must be another way. Perhaps let the ship make its voyage to the next stop, let Kiichi Sugimoto's driver come aboard, take the Sentra off without completing the transaction.
No. No. I must have the money. Misako will live in poverty without the money. Perhaps I will speak with the purser, tell her of an emergency. I've left medicine in the car. No. No. She knows I have no car. Besides, she'd accompany me down to the car deck personally. There is no choice. I must risk the route, my life, the comforts of Misako, the honor of my son. I must violate the Coast Guard regulations. I must go down there.
He took his sketch pad and charcoal pencil with him, for as usual sketching would be his excuse if he were interrupted in his mission. He'd use his worse English and misunderstand all words spoken if he encountered any crew. He began the climb down the stairs. This time of the evening, Dick, the night watchman, would not be on the car deck, no problem. His only worry would be one of the oilers walking about, looking at the tie-downs. He reached the door, and tested the handle. The car deck door was not locked. He opened the door and stepped into the belly of the ship, an echoing cave with lights, studs, stanchions, beams and cold steel, and the taste of iron upon the teeth.
Cars and trucks lined like chained Siberian animals, three rows to a side. Why hadn't Sugimoto been more specific? He could have disclosed in the note on which the side of the ship he'd parked the car. But maybe this man, this common defilement, did not drive the car aboard. Sugimoto said in the note he'd hired a driver to take the car off the ship at the next stop, so it would be reasonable in prophesying he, also, had hired someone to drive the white Nissan Sentra aboard. That being so, Sugimoto would not know on which side the deckhands had positioned this white car. Such a stupid man.
Mr. Nakano chose the port side, and ducked among the vehicles, searching all the way to the stern of the ship. The Nissan Sentra was not there. The car must be on the starboard side. His sports bag glanced off a Toyota truck, a distraction that made him loosen his grip on the sketch pad. The pad slipped from his arm to the deck. Mr. Nakano made small errant noises and grunts that may have climbed from under the beat of the engines and traveled to the ears of any crew that could be wandering about checking on tie-downs. He chastised himself and crouched and waited. His knee gave him much pain in this position. The sketchpad had slipped beneath the Toyota. He reached under and stretched. The knee gave him a torment that made his stomach turn, so he moved his body around to lessen the agony, but this repositioning only tightened his jaw and shook his body. Even so, he somehow joined the cold raw deck and stretched himself out flat so the soreness and pain would lessen. The smell of engines, oil and tires reached him. He looked over, and into the shadows beneath the Toyota. He'd have to accomplish a reach of almost 60 centimeters for the pad.
There, he had it. He'd dropped nothing else. The charcoal pencil remained cellophane-wrapped in his shirt pocket. He rolled to his stomach, rose carefully and looked. No one. He hobbled to the starboard.
A man stood aft of a row of vehicles, his back to Mr. Nakano, his clothes loose and dark as night. The watchman Dick was supposed to be on the promenade deck, but here he was talking to someone, his head moving slightly around, the overhead lights in the cavernous deck glinting from the coke bottle lenses in his glasses.
Mr. Nakano ducked between a GMC and a Sentra. He checked the Sentra's license plate: CMW 345. He peered down a row. The watchman had disappeared, but he saw another man, shaggy beard, blue coveralls. The man stepped between the rows.
An oiler, writing something. The man passed within a few feet of Mr. Nakano, but did not look up. Mr. Nakano waited. The engines thrummed and the ship swayed. The winds, Mr. Nakano surmised, had increased, the way the car deck rolled. He heard no other sounds. When he stood up, he saw no one.
Mr. Nakano slipped the key in the driver's side of the Sentra. The interior light came on when he opened the door. The oiler had probably gone down to the engine room. The watchman probably had returned to the promenade deck where he was supposed to be. Mr. Nakano reached round and flipped open the lock to the back door. He gave a shove and heard under working diesels a muffled click. The front door had closed all the way. He opened the back door, and shunted inside.
He must prepare a reason for being here. He took his pad and from memory lightly sketched the aft section of the car deck, with the car elevator. That would do for now. He dropped the charcoal pencil on the back seat, on top of the sketch.
Mr. Nakano ran his hand along the vinyl-like material of the front seat. He felt a zipper and carefully slid open the custom-made pouch. Inside, were packets of American one hundred dollar bills, several rows deep. He pulled out the money and gave it a quick, estimated count. He slipped into the pouch quantities of awakening drugs. Normally, he'd have been more careful in the counting, but this would be the las
t trip. The completion of this transaction would keep them away for now, perhaps convince Sugimoto he was hard at work. Tokyo, he believed, was likely using the assassin Sugimoto to check on him as well as complete transactions the hapless Jeffrey Johnson once took to heart. And the shortage at Chignik. Maybe that was a test, to see how he'd account for it. Never mind. There is always a way to gain honor in the eyes of the organization. But after this last trip that may be of no concern.
There should be no shortage, however. My appointed supervisor, Redbeard, must account for this. Every dollar is important. The money from the secret pouch on the back of the Sentra's seat went in the bag. He raised his head. The mid-section of the night watchman blocked the window to the back door.
Mr. Nakano grabbed the sketch pad and charcoal. The movement must have attracted the man. The watchman leaned, brought his head level to the window and peered directly into Mr. Nakano's face. Through the lenses, Dick's eyes were similar in texture and size to two blue jellyfish.
Mr. Nakano held up his pencil and smiled and got out, not minding the shooting pain to his knee. He rested on the good leg.
"Thank you, thank you," Mr. Nakano said.
"What you doing down here?" Dick was speaking with an edge and a raised voice that could be heard clearly above the drone of the engines. His words may well have carried over the stanchions and bulkheads, all the way to the car lift. Maybe even the oiler heard this watchman's surprised cry.
"I must get my charcoal and do my drawing here," Mr. Nakano said.
"You ain't supposed to come down without crew. That's regulations." Behind the thick wire-framed lenses, the watchman's eyes changed to shrewd little chips of quartz.
"Here is my charcoal. I draw cars and insides, rows and rows and trucks and the car's turntable down there." Mr. Nakano furiously ran the charcoal in bold black strokes over the outlines he'd done earlier, bringing up shapes. Nibbles of charcoal scampered down the paper and dirtied his drawing hand. He finished the lift and the table for holding cars and passengers in the stern.
Dick looked, his mouth agape as the shapes formed into a scene.
"I draw you?" Mr. Nakano asked.
"You got to understand," the night watchman said, quieting, looking at the shapes, "you ain't supposed to be here at all. No one is. Not unless crew comes down here with you. You know there could be an open gas flare on an RV, or some spilled gas. Then you ain't thinking, and you light up. You don't want no fire on a ship. That's the worst thing could happen."
"Fire? There is a fire?" Mr. Nakano said. Poor English and an appearance of misunderstanding was appropriate at this time.
"No. But that's what I mean. Now follow me. I'll take you on up. We've got to report this to the bridge. What's in the bag?"
He will end the voyage! This night-man with the dark loose clothes and the thick lenses will cause Misako a life of poverty. My son will be caught up in the gang and have no honor! However, Mr. Nakano reasoned, endurance is one of the most difficult disciplines, and it is to him who endures that the final victory comes. I feel no hatred or resentment toward this night watchman. None. One must remove resentment when he is feeling that way. One must remove sorrow while he is in the midst of sorrow. One must remove greediness while his is steeped in greed. To live a pure unselfish life, one must count nothing as one's own in the midst of abundance.
Mr. Nakano did not follow Dick. Rather, he used the car key and opened the trunk to the Nissan, and looked inside. The night watchman's eyes became like crystals as he looked back. Dick appeared displeased and perhaps believed Mr. Nakano had not understood his suggestion, as Mr. Nakano wished.
"Sir, you've got to come with me. I've got to let the bridge know I found you down here. We've got to look in the bag. Sir?"
When one has the feeling of dislike for evil, when one feels tranquil, when one finds pleasure in listening to good teachings, when one has these feelings and appreciates them, one is free of fear.
Mr. Nakano leaned into the trunk and lifted the flooring and looked for the tool bag. There, the vinyl pouch lay above the spare tire. He removed the wheel nut wrench from the bag. The dark clothed man was coming over.
"What you doing?" Dick asked.
"I came here to my friend's car to get extra sketch pads. I use those made by Meade. The ones my friend has are smaller than the other ones. I prefer the larger size. I am used to that size, and my friend put his car aboard and left me some of the smaller ones, and I have put them in my bag." Mr. Nakano was not feeling so well for some reason. The ship was swaying slightly, but this was not seasickness. This was lack of control. He was talking too much. He'd made Dick the night watchman suspicious, from the way the man s eyes were snapping to his bag. Perhaps he could get the watchman's head positioned just so. Mr. Nakano set the red bag on the deck.
"Please, look inside my bag," Mr. Nakano said.
"Yeah." The man leaned over. Even above the thrumming of the diesels Mr. Nakano could hear the measured purr of the zipper opening.
Do not become attached to the things you like, do not maintain aversion to the things you dislike. Sorrow, fear and bondage come from one's likes and dislikes. Mr. Nakano raised the wrench.
With the swing, Mr. Nakano let out an explosive cry. "Unh!"
There was a jaw-tight rawness to Mr. Nakano's energy as he struck across the back of the man's neck. The man fell forward toward the trunk, his hands out. Though stunned, the watchman braced himself. Dick moved his head side to side and moaned. The man was still conscious. Mr. Nakano brought the wrench down, another explosion, on the soft part of the watchman's temple. The man's torso slumped into the trunk. Mr. Nakano dropped the wrench inside.
Rust grows from iron and destroys it. So evil grows from the mind of man and destroys him. Mr. Nakano opened the long sharp blade. The night watchman, half in the trunk, moved and seemed to mutter something Mr. Nakano could not understand.
Impure acts defile a person. Evil acts defile not only this life but also following lives. Mr. Nakano moved the blade across the watchman's throat. The man's body moved suddenly, then after awhile stopped. Mr. Nakano wiped the blade on Dick's dark clothes and lifted Dick's feet and forced Dick inside. Mr. Nakano closed the trunk. He thought he heard something from inside, but decided that could not be.
The defilement to be most dreaded is the defilement of ignorance. A man cannot hope to purify either his body or mind until ignorance is removed.
And is that not what I have accomplished?
With the red bag Mr. Nakano faltered between cars and vans and hefted himself up the stairs, through the passage and up the other flight to the sun deck. His heart and shortness of breath were making him dizzy and his knee tightened. He walked stiff-legged and limped along the passage, finally, gratefully, into his cabin, 208.
He washed charcoal and blood from his hands.
How he wanted to lie down, but he could not, for the visitors would come soon. Mr. Nakano emptied his bag and spread the money beneath the mattress, and stuffed his sketch pad in the red bag, along with his camera. He sat in the movie director's chair. Had anyone seen him come up the stairs? He waited, looking directly at the door. He waited five minutes before the knock came. He said nothing and did not move.
"Mr. Nakano. It's Anna Knight. You OK in there?"
"Knee hurt, but I am fine," he called.
"Billy Sullivan, our porter, said he saw you in the passage and you were limping real bad, like you were really sick or stiff or something. You need some Aspercreme? You want to use that? I've got some here, if you want."
Ah, yes, Billy. The porter. He observes too much.
"No. I am fine," Mr. Nakano said.
"Well, open up. I want to see how you are."
Mr. Nakano hitched over to the door and opened. Perhaps she would leave quietly after a short talk and let Mr. Nakano rest his mind and his body.
Anna looked at his shirt buttons, not his eyes, and her jaw was forward in her face.
"Billy said he was
pretty sure you came up from the car deck. That right?"
"I was only on the stairs. I was going to sketch the stairs."
"You shouldn't ever go down on that deck. Never. Not unless you check with me first, understand?"
"Ah," Mr. Nakano said. His bag sat behind him like a satisfied dog. The camera strap was plainly visible, as was a sketchpad.
Anna Knight looked.
"Well, I'm going to have to mention this to the bridge. I guess you know that. The Captain might want to tighten things up. If it happens again, he'll come talk to you, and believe me, you don't want that to happen."
"Sorry," he said. Mr. Nakano's throat had become chalk. He gave her a wide, forced grin, but he knew he could not make his eyes smile for her. "Look. See chair and table? So kind," he said.
Anna Knight's face turned the color of paste. Her eyes held a sort of reserve he could not place. The wise little eyes were not bright and bemused at all.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
Anna Knight stood before Captain Sewell in the Master s Quarters and spoke with a too well-controlled steadiness that betrayed the tight place of anxiety. "Last we saw," she said she paused as if fighting off a strange and nervous unease, hesitant about completing her thought "Dick went off on his rounds, and no one's seen him. Not for a long time." Anna s eyes shifted about as though she looked for him in her mind. She was taking short breaths that gave an inner warning to Captain Sewell, made his body go rigid, his fists clench. Dick was reliable, careful, experienced. He couldn't just disappear. Not Dick.
"Do a search," Sewell said. "The whole ship. Start with the stores deck. Something could've broke loose and clobbered him, a big wave. You never know." He'd had a talk with the cook about that last month, keeping stores secure in sea.
"Yes, Captain," Anna said.
"Let me know how this goes, step-by-step," Sewell said, looking at Anna s hand-held radio, and over to the satellite hookup to Juneau. There was a strange, nervous unease in the way his chief purser moved out into the red-lighted passageway of the quarterdeck.