by John Burdett
When not full of ink and body art, his conversation debauched into the yakuza gangs of Tokyo and Kyoto, stories that to me owned the sadism and gigantism of an alien cosmology. It seemed, quite suddenly, that he was sharing his autobiography. Here too only the horimono mattered. How to persuade a thug, a failed sumo wrestler (say) with room temperature IQ, that he really doesn't want that ugly blue dagger in indigo from knee to crotch on both thighs, but rather a sinuous, elegant rose bush with each petal a masterpiece of detail? The cities of Ishy's Japan fairly burst with cutthroats swarming out from Underground at dusk (each with at least one pinkie missing), masters of mutilation, intimidation, and murder, of whom he was able to save only a few from the degrading cliches of his trade and then only at the risk of his own life. Nonetheless his fame grew: in Japan even thugs have culture. Senior mobsters called upon his services, he dined and drank at famous and famously discreet men's clubs where accomplished geishas entertained him and his clients; sometimes he was asked to tattoo the women with something elegant on the lower back or stomach. With enough sake in him he was able to overcome his inhibitions and attempt to bring enlightenment to the dull minds of the yakuza godfathers: his art was not an offshoot of graffiti (for which he had an abiding loathing) but part of the great ink-drawing tradition of Hokusai and his predecessors.
One karma-laden night he talked that giant godfather Tsukuba out of an M16 on both forearms and into a view of Mount Fuji, snow and all. Granted, Tsukuba was extremely drunk, as was Ishy.
"Do it now," demanded Tsukuba.
"Where do you want it?" the body artist inquired.
"On my forehead," yelled the don, provoking a chorus of admiration for his daring. Next day, sober, Ishy knew it was time to leave his homeland for good. A very powerful mobster with a brilliant picture of Mount Fuji on his forehead was baying for his blood. Natural destinations for one of his calling would have been Hong Kong, Singapore, Los Angeles, San Francisco-which is why he chose none of them, for surely Tsukuba would be looking for him there. Bangkok was the place to hide, with its small and discreet Japanese community and the countless tattoo-hungry hookers. He kept a low profile, rarely worked from home, accepted commissions only from trusted clients (Japanese businessmen mostly, who seemed to spend much of their waking lives dreaming up erotic horimono with which to decorate their favorite girls, having pretty much exhausted the vacant spaces offered by their wives' bodies). From time to time, though, the artist in him craved a deeper recognition. Much of the work on his own body he had done himself, but from the start he had known that his destiny lay with donburi: total body tattoo. Where even his resourceful tebori needles could not reach, he created detailed blueprints for a trusted apprentice to follow. The result was a beautifully integrated tapestry in which the themes that dominated his life were interwoven and explored like melodies in a Mozart concerto: Mount Fuji, a Toshiba laptop, a geisha in full regalia, the first Honda moped, a dish of Kobe beef, Admiral Yamamoto in full dress uniform, five drunken samurai in traditional body armor, each of the positions for copulation recommended by the Kama Sutra-and so on. In Bangkok he started parading himself at gay bars, just to exhibit his work.
Drunk together after more bottles of sake than I can remember, Ishy finally undid his shirt, then took it off. The donburi was like a silk T-shirt of quite fantastic quality, with a subtle symphony of colors composed on a precise pyramidal structure that, if I am not mistaken, was a clear reference to Cezanne. Thai waitresses all came to admire. "You can take off the rest of your clothes," one of them told him. "No way you're going to look naked."
So he did, and there it was, though I refrained from studying it too closely for fear of being misunderstood. The girls were less inhibited, however, and one of them worked his member, the better-she explained-to appreciate his art. Fully tumescent, his penis provided a unique and very Japanese perspective on the Battle of Midway.
Apparently most comfortable in his designer skin, Ishy poured more sake and shared his inner life.
"I was one of those, you know?"
I had learned by now that much of his conversation assumed clairvoyance on the part of the listener. "High tech from the start?"
"I never really learned to talk to people. It still feels weird to me, which is why I stutter so much. I played games on a pocket calculator from the age of four onward. When the first personal computers arrived, I knew why I had incarnated at this time. After a while I couldn't leave my bedroom. My mother used to leave food at the door, and my dad left books. Once they had a doctor come to examine me. He said I was nuts. There was no cure, half my generation had the same problem. One day my dad left a book of horimono illustrations along with some Hokusai prints-he was at the end of his rope with me." Ishy paused to swallow sake. "It was like a religious experience. Actually, it was a religious experience. I asked my father for more art books and, above all, more horimono. He obliged with a virtual library. Above all others the great Hokusai stood before me clothed in his gigantic talent. Even today I could sketch a perfect copy of each and every one of the ukiyo-e woodblocks, and I know every stroke of 'The Breaking Wave' as another man might remember the words of a favorite song."
Ishy paused to swallow more sake and spared a moment to stare curiously at one of the serving girls who had brought a friend from the kitchen and, crouching in front of him, was stimulating his member once again.
"It was as though I was remembering a previous lifetime. I directly experienced the excitement of the first woodblocks: to be able to make unlimited prints: what a breakthrough! And Moronobu's genius in seeing that ukiyo-e was the perfect subject! I followed ukiyo-e from these beginnings, through Masanobu, Harunobu, Utamaro, Hiroshige, and ultimately the incomparable Hokusai. But like any good apprentice, I perceived my master's weakness. No, that's too strong a word-let us say every generation must reinterpret reality in a form most suitable for them. This is the age of immediacy, is it not? How many kids have the attention span to even visit a museum or an art gallery, much less meditate on the wonders therein? But a Hokusai indelibly etched into the fabric of your own skin, now that speaks to the twenty-first century, that-I knew-even the dullest Japanese, even a mobster, would be able to appreciate. As soon as I could, I moved into a microscopic apartment in Shinbashi, the old red-light district of Tokyo. It was exactly like coming home." To the serving girl: "You only have to make it hard, darling, you don't have to make me come."
"It's amazing."
"Thank you. Another bottle, please."
I confess I could not resist watching while, suddenly bereft of care and attention, the great battleships sank into flaccidity. But it was four-fifteen in the morning-the Japanese manager of the bar, apparently in awe of Ishy and his tattoos, had allowed us to stay long after he locked the front door-but now the serving girls were in jeans and T-shirts. Having exhausted the power and wonder of Ishy's donburi, they were ready to go home to bed. I myself could not think straight, otherwise I would never have made the blunder that still haunts me as I write.
"Mitch Turner," I mumbled, hardly able to remain on my stool. The name slowly penetrated Ishy's drunken skull, light dawned, and he stared at me in horror, then slid off his stool onto the floor. I wanted to assist but fell down myself. The manager helped me into a taxi. I gave orders that Ishy was to be taken care of, his address obtained if necessary by going through his pockets. It had taken a week of hard footwork to find him-I didn't want to lose him. But I fear my instructions lost much of their original clarity to the alcohol that twisted my tongue. It had been an extraordinary night. I needed to pass out.
At about ten in the morning I woke up in a panic from an alcoholic coma. In my dream Pichai had come to me again: Why didn't you arrest the donburi?
Staring wide-eyed into cosmic darkness: He got me drunk. I think it was the tattoos. Who in hell is he?
Pichai's voice cracked up as with a defective satellite connection: Renegade… naga in human form… Nalanda… way back… tattoos… powerful
magic… try decoy-stakeout…
From my bed, head splitting with the worst hangover I can remember, I called the Japanese restaurant. Only the cleaning staff were on duty. Using Intimidating Voice, I persuaded the woman who answered the phone to get me the boss's home number. When I rang him, he denied knowing anyone called Ishy. No, he had never met a Japanese of that bizarre description-was I sure I had the right restaurant?
36
N ow you find me in familiar mode, farang, sitting in front of a computer monitor in my favorite Internet cafe, scrolling through various entries in the online version of the Encyclopaedia Britannica. You need not feel inferior, I don't know what the hell ukiyo-e is either. Here we are: These depicted aspects of the entertainment quarters (euphemistically called the "floating world") of Edo (modern Tokyo) and other urban centers. Common subjects included famous courtesans and prostitutes, kabuki actors and well-known scenes from kabuki plays, and erotica. Ukiyo-e artists were the first to exploit the medium of woodblocks.
The coincidence strikes me as almost grotesquely literary. Now Vikorn calls me on my mobile. I am summoned to the police station, where I am ushered into Vikorn's office. Hudson is there, somewhat wild-eyed, pacing up and down. The impression of a mind unraveling is quite strong. Or to be more accurate, the Alien Within is clearly taking over. I suspect an Andromedan, although I'm not an expert.
"Progress?" Hudson asks.
I tell a tall tale of tattoos and whores, a drunken night with Hokusai's posthumous apprentice, the effect that the two words Mitch Turner seemed to have, although in the circumstances it was hard to be sure.
"I need the Islamic connection," Hudson barks, staring at Vikorn. "That bitch is gonna have all our balls if she finds out about that little trip of yours to Indonesia." Swallowing: "I also want that fucking laptop."
Vikorn is hard to read at this moment. Is he actually intimidated by Hudson, or is he merely being obliging? My intuition discards both possibilities. Something is going on here, some drama long suppressed reaching back to before I was born. Vietnam/Laos: what is my karma here? My father? It is disturbingly easy to see Hudson as the source of the seed that became me, even though he is not Mike Smith. As Hudson turns his gaze to me, Vikorn stares at Hudson in a way I've never seen before.
"Forget the fucking tattoos," Hudson is saying. "Forget the whole Japanese connection. It's a red herring. Follow the Islamic trail. No Victory but Allah's." He hesitates for a moment, then recites what I take to be the original words from the Koran in Arabic. To me his accent sounds impeccable; there is relish in the guttural tones. Defensively (catching the look on my face): "I'm a good American, I'm entitled to my schizophrenia."
He paces, goes to the window again, stares out, then begins to speak in that narrative voice that might belong to a different man, or at least an earlier version of this one. There is heavy metal in the midtones.
"Most people don't stay in the Agency very long. It's like any other job in the States-Americans get restless, bored, enraged that their talents are not properly appreciated. We move on. We move on-change the view every ten minutes, and you can convince yourself for a while that you've escaped the treadmill. But not forever. After a certain specific moment in life, you start to look back. You discern a pattern. Something ugly, manic, cramped, tortured, and repetitive. That pattern is what you are, what your culture has made of you. But that's not a reason for giving up. It's not a reason for becoming a Mitch Turner. It's not a reason for changing sides. You got to soldier on, right or wrong. How you ever gonna know how wrong you are, how you ever gonna learn your life's lesson, if you're just a feather in the wind? You gotta suck it all up-there's no other way."
He resumes his seat as if nothing unusual has happened. "I want you to go back down south. Stop frigging around with mad Japs and crazy Bangkok whores. Stay there for a month, a year if you have to." He passes a hand over his spiky short hair as if to enforce patience. "And I want that fucking laptop." Another pause, then: "Before she gets it."
I raise my eyes to Vikorn, who nods.
But I really don't want to go back down south on a wild-goose chase. A brief prayer to the Buddha does the trick. I have no sooner stuck the incense in the sandbox than my mobile starts twanging.
37
T hat's exactly how I found him when I came this morning," Nat whispers, hoarse with horror, sharing wide eyes with Lek (to whom I had to talk sternly before he would get out of bed; he apologized in the cab, the estrogen is upsetting his system, he's starting to feel moody even though his nascent breasts are hardly noticeable). "I stayed with him every weekend. He gave me a key." She shows me.
We are standing in a rented two-room apartment on Soi 22, Sukhumvit. Stephen Bright had a beautiful body; its youth and sinewy texture are apparent still even though its internal organization has already failed. At this very moment cell walls are breaking down, bacteria are burrowing into previously forbidden zones, the composite has lost all integrity. The entity that played Bright for twenty-seven years is frankly relieved to be rid of its chemical prison and at the moment of writing is having a lot more fun in a gentler, kinder galaxy. He did all he could to avoid yet another early death by violence but, having performed his duty as he saw it, now looks forward to a long period of rest and recreation. He hasn't totally rejected our solar system but will probably favor Venus for his next visit. Looking at it with terrestrial eyes, though, his body, minus the penis (discarded in a cheap wastepaper bin), with a great gaping gash in his gut, purple tubes hanging out like bunches of grapes-well, what can one say? It's a mess. This time I am the one to turn the corpse over. Yep, afraid so.
Lek covers his mouth, shares another very female glance of terminal terror with Nat, then finds a carpet to kneel on while he wais the Buddha. Seeing this, Nat immediately joins him. (Over here it's not death but the dead who send the green balls down our trouser legs. Believe me, there's nothing more depressing than a clinging ghost on your back for life.) I wait while the two of them, palms joined in high wais, silently inoculate themselves with a potent mixture of magic, superstition, and customized Buddhism. Nat is the first to stand up, followed by Lek, who cannot resist a second glance into the wastepaper bin. He involuntarily touches his crotch area. (I've resisted this reflex myself, but only just.) Nat reads his mind. "It's different for you-they'll use an anesthetic, and anyway you don't need yours."
"I've always hated it," Lek agrees, "but I'm used to it, you know?"
I am watching Nat closely. The horror is genuine. So is the sorrow. She catches my eye. "Stephen Bright proposed to me a couple of nights ago. I thought maybe I'd finally got lucky. I mean, he was a serious boy, and I think he actually loved me. He'd suffered so much, you know, and he was always so grateful when we made love. He said I was a very generous lover. Actually, I didn't do anything I didn't do with other customers-he was just so grateful all the time." She bursts into tears.
"His back?"
She shudders. "That was my fault. I have this thing about tats, you know, and I kept asking him, wouldn't he like something on his back? He said he'd look into it. Then one night he surprised me with it. It went all the way from his shoulders to the top of his backside. It wasn't at all what I expected but it was amazing, I mean really superior."
"Did he tell you who did it?"
"He said it was a Japanese who was known to the intelligence community. That's all he said."
I have decided to bypass Hudson, not out of mistrust-his commitment to the meaningless is surely unimpeachable-but because I don't think I can quite stand his Arabic at this moment. The female CIA seems an oasis of sanity in comparison.
"Hello?"
"It's me, Detective Jitpleecheep."
"Yes, Detective?"
"You'd better come." I give her the address, then I tell Nat to take Lek back to the club. She puts her arm around him in a sisterly gesture, hugs him.
"I don't know if I'm really going to go through with it," Lek moans as they leave. "Maybe I'll ju
st use tape. Lots of dancers do."
"You really want to be half and half all your life?" Nat asks gently at the door.
"No."
The female CIA arrives, with Hudson. I watch her while she stares silently for several minutes at Bright's corpse; were she not a seasoned professional, I would describe the succession of expressions on her face as emanating from deep prurience. She composes herself eventually; it's like watching someone get dressed after an orgy: "You see, they severed his penis, just as we suspected they would. And look at his back."
Hudson and I follow her directions. There is hardly any difference between him and Mitch Turner in this respect-the whole of the top layer of skin has been peeled away, from shoulders to lower back, leaving the subcutaneous blubber to seep.
"Well, at least we don't need a homicide detective to tell us these deaths are linked." She looks at Hudson. "But the ones who assassinated Mitch Turner died in that explosion in Indonesia, am I correct? So this is a brilliantly coordinated, centrally planned, high-level Al Qaeda atrocity: different hitmen deliberately copying the first murder, so as to demonstrate corporate identity. The intention is to intimidate all Americans everywhere." Biting her lower lip: "This is big. Much bigger than I thought. It's the psychology of terrorism honed to a remarkable level of sophistication. If this gets out, Americans will be more afraid than ever to travel overseas. If these kinds of killings show up in the States, as I'm sure they will sooner or later, the whole of the American mind will be held for ransom. It's brilliant, it's evil." To me: "Any crinkly black hairs? I want the best forensic investigation you can manage on this apartment. If you need any special support-for example, a kit to lift prints off flesh, analysis of microscopic fiber samples-let me know. I'll have them ship whatever you need with some skilled operators on the next plane." Looking curiously at Hudson: "This really is starting to look like war."