The tape recording on the bus had announced this place as Osawa Onsen, where there was a hot spring.
“Did she ever speak to you of the town being called Osawa?” I pushed the stop signal as I spoke.
“I’m not sure.” He frowned. “I’m sorry. I think I heard that word somewhere. Is that this town’s name?” He squinted at the station sign, which was written in hiragana.
“Let’s jump off. We can always catch another bus, if we’re wrong.” I was already standing up and following a couple of backpackers who were getting off.
We paid our fares—$11 apiece for just a thirty-minute bus ride—and disembarked. The backpackers walked off, clearly following signs for a hot spring resort.
“Did you take a taxi from this point?” I asked Ramzi.
“No, we walked this way,” Ramzi said, sounding confident. As we walked alongside a rice paddy and then cut through an orange grove, Ramzi explained that Emi had led him on a circuitous route so that people wouldn’t talk. It was a summer house, and the Haradas weren’t there very often, but still, the risk that someone would notice Emi with a boy was too great to bear.
After passing through the fields, we reached a wall at the back of a house. The wall, covered with black tiles fixed in a diamond pattern with thick white plaster, was a fortified style particular to Shimoda, to fortify its houses against strong sea winds. Over this beautiful wall a succulent vine trailed, making it picture-postcard perfect.
“This is the back of the house, I think. I’ll know for certain in a minute,” Ramzi said, leading me along.
“I heard there’s a security system in the house,” I said, eyeing the wall with some nervousness.
“Yes, there’s an alarm system, but I’ve got the code.”
“Really? I wouldn’t want to chance anything,” I said. After he’d revealed his trouble remembering directions, I couldn’t imagine that he’d know any code.
“No, I have it. Here, in my calendar.” He patted his pocket.
“Why did you write down the code?” I asked suspiciously.
“I told you that we had plans to meet here again. It made sense for me to know.”
I shook my head. “We mustn’t go in. If two foreigners like us are caught—well, it could mean jail or deportation. Believe me, I have experience in these things.”
“Why did you ask me to bring you here, if you didn’t want to go in?” He sounded impatient.
“As I said to you on the phone, I just wanted to see the place from the outside.”
“Well, I came because I plan to go inside.” He scowled at me.
I hesitated. I supposed my only option was to abandon ship and not go a step farther. If Ramzi stormed the house and something went wrong, the police would come and we would both be in the soup.
“Ramzi, if you go in, it’s your decision. But I’m not going to stay on the premises if you do that. I’m not willing to take the risk.”
He pressed his lips together. “Then why don’t you just go?”
He’d called my bluff. He knew I had to see the house. “Please, Ramzi. Let’s just walk there, and I’ll give you time to mourn, I really will, and then we’ll go back.”
“It’s a left turn ahead, I think. This looks familiar.”
I took the turn with him, and then he stopped. Ahead of us was an especially high wall of diamond tile, with kanji characters making up the name Harada on a mailbox, followed by the numbers 2-17-1 and the kanji for Isobe. I copied down both the kanji characters and my translation to call in to Brenda Martin as soon as I had some privacy, away from Ramzi.
“What are you writing?” Ramzi asked. He’d walked over to a pair of tall, iron gates that barred entrance to a long driveway disappearing into what looked like a small forest. The property was huge; I’d thought only Japanese aristocrats lived that way.
“Two-seventeen-one Isobe Street, in Osawa. That’s the full address,” I said, walking over to join him. “It looks like a beautiful place.”
“Ten hectares of forest. Emi took me around. It’s great,” Ramzi muttered. Then he stepped to the right and flipped open a small box, revealing a keypad. He punched in a code, and slowly, the gates opened.
“You can’t go in,” I said quickly.
Ramzi turned to me. “I told you what I was going to do. Why else did you think I came here?”
As I stared at him, a sense of foreboding started to grow inside me. “Ramzi, what are you planning to do inside the house?”
“It’s not your concern.”
I could hardly choke out the words. “Are you thinking of…ending your life?”
“Suicide? I’ve thought of it before, yes, but not now.” His manner was brisk. “I’m here to take back something that belongs to me.”
“Okay, but let’s—let’s just wait a moment, maybe go around the corner to talk. We shouldn’t just hang around right in front—” I had been thinking that the way we looked was fine for the train, but I was worried that in this exclusive neighborhood, we might attract suspicion.
“Well, if you’re going, I’ll just say good-bye now!” Ramzi shot over his shoulder as he walked through the open gate. I held my breath, imagining motion detectors or another force that would spring to life at Ramzi’s invasion. But nothing happened. He continued up the long pebbled driveway and disappeared around a bend.
I’d thought Ramzi was helping me, but what he really wanted was an assistant of his own. Now I wondered if he was about to deface the house, or steal something from it—perhaps the ibex vessel. Ramzi had never answered me straightforwardly about whether he’d seen the piece; and now, because I’d asked about it, maybe he’d gotten an inkling of how important it was, and how its loss could devastate Emi’s father.
I had promised Michael that I wouldn’t go into the house, but I couldn’t let Ramzi get away with the vessel. And that could be done, if there was anther exit from this large property. I picked up the cell phone and called the first number Brenda had given me, then the second. She didn’t answer either. Well, so much for support. As I listened to her recorded voice tell me to leave a message, I decided against it. I’d come up with a plan.
I was going to walk onto the property, but I would wait in a hidden position outside the house, to see what Ramzi was up to. And then, if things looked bad, I’d call Michael Hendricks. So with a flutter of excitement overlying fear, I nipped through the opening Ramzi had left me, positioning the gate so it looked closed but still would allow me passage out.
39
I jogged up the wide driveway, which led through a naturalistic garden filled with tall pines and cedars. The Emerald Forest, I thought to myself, because in my girlish frock, I felt a little bit like Judy Garland going up the yellow brick road toward Oz. My expectation that this house would have magical qualities was confirmed when I turned the bend that Ramzi had taken and saw a long, single-story stucco house, elegant in the same East-West style as the Haradas’ home at Setagaya. Under a tiled-roof carport, two cars were parked: a black Mercedes and a white Toyota Camry, both with Tokyo plates.
Two cars. I immediately got off the path and went behind a stand of trees. As I stopped and tried to still my breath, I thought frantically about possibilities. Had Mr. Harada received a call from the loyal potter and come here to spirit away the ibex ewer? I hadn’t believed that I’d given Kazu Sakurai the impression I was any kind of police officer or agent, but the fact that Harada was probably inside the house had to be connected to my visit. But why two cars, instead of one? And had Ramzi dared to go into the house when it appeared to have people inside?
He probably had, I realized when I heard dogs barking within the house. Kenichi Harada must have brought the guard dogs that had been shut up in his house during the memorial service in Setagaya. And judging from the timbre of their bark, they were not a small breed. Also, Ramzi had said something to me about the dogs. What was it—that they were German shepherds? Perhaps Mr. Harada might not call them off if they attacked an intruder.<
br />
I slipped my phone out of my bag and programmed in the digits 110. At the first sound of something ugly, I planned to call Japan’s nationwide police emergency number. The prickling feeling I’d had when I’d encountered the fake cop had come back. Something terrible was going to happen; I felt it.
The door slid open with a crash and two huge, furry beasts bounded out. The gate was too far away for me to get back to it. The only way I could go was up, and I’d always been rotten at climbing ropes. Still, I did my best, flailing my way four feet off the ground on the lean cedar. Why hadn’t I raced over to one of the large maple or ginkgo trees nearby? I cursed myself because the cedar had no large, sheltering limbs. The dogs surrounded me, barking raucously and jumping. The phone. I still had my lifeline to the outside world, even though I had to deal with it one-handed, because my other hand was hanging onto a limb. It was a fidgety thing to handle, and as I was searching for the “talk” button I lost my grip on it. The phone fell to the ground, and the larger dog took it, then spit it out a few feet away. The other one raced over, made a few circles around it, and then came back to me.
Did they think I was playing? I began feeling around the tree for a furry cedar branch I could snap and throw. If I got them far enough away, I could slide down and get my phone, which lay half-buried in a heap of red maple leaves.
Before I could attempt anything, I heard the crunching sound of leaves and someone walking. Timberland boots came into view before I saw Ramzi. I was getting ready to call to him about the phone, but then realized that he was not alone. He was followed by his uncle Ali Birand and Kenichi Harada.
Harada said a few words and the dogs came to stand behind him, their tails wagging. I was not a dog person, I thought to myself. Never had a dog, never wanted one. But now I wished I had the kind of dog savvy to befriend them, trick them into letting me get away.
“Oh, hello. Thank you. I didn’t know if they were playing,” I said in Japanese, striving to act normally—as if it could possibly be normal for a thirty-year-old Lolita to be climbing a tree in a locked-up garden.
“Why don’t you come down? Please.” The tone of Harada’s voice was anything but courteous. I also noticed that he’d spoken English—was it because he wanted to make sure the Birands understood?
I slid down faster than I intended, scratching my legs as I went. I smoothed down my short skirt as I landed, unable to stop feeling ridiculously vulnerable. I thought about picking up my phone, then thought better of doing something that seemed so obviously panicky. Instead, I continued in my faux friendly tone. “Well, then! What a coincidence to see Mr. Birand is here with you, Harada-san, when Ramzi and I had come out to the area to—pay our respects.”
“I called Birand-san here because I thought I needed to solve a faraway problem. But the problem’s right here.” Kenichi Harada spoke English and looked straight at me.
“And we found another problem in the house!” Ali Birand cuffed his nephew on the ear. Ramzi flinched but didn’t do anything in return. He looked as frightened as I felt.
“What have you explained, so far?” I asked Ramzi. I needed to know the basic framework of what our excuse was going to be.
“I told my uncle that I was here to get what was mine,” he said stonily. “I said nothing about you. Why are you even here? You said you were staying outside.”
Now both men were staring at me, waiting.
“As I was saying, we traveled to Izu so Ramzi could pay his respects. I came into the garden because I was afraid for his safety,” I explained, wishing now that I had worn my usual clothes. It was hard to act convincingly like an adult while dressed like a Polly Pocket doll.
“I doubt that entirely. From my conversations with Birand-san and others around the country, it seems clear that you want to take something from me.” Harada watched me as he spoke.
“I’m not sure what you’re talking about,” I said mildly. “All I’ve heard about is a gift from Ramzi to Emi that he wants back for his own personal sense of peace.”
“My nephew has no right to give away anything from our shops or storage areas,” Ali Birand said hotly. “This vessel was a gift my brother made to the ambassador. That’s all there is to the matter!”
“Please, that’s enough information. She knows too much already,” Harada said reprovingly to Birand.
“Who would say such a thing?” I asked, watching him.
“A colleague showing proper respect,” he said. “That’s all you need to know.”
Mr. Watanabe. He had become a mole, when it turned out that the scandal over the ibex vessel could taint a government official. The situation had turned out just as Michael had predicted. But Mr. Harada didn’t know that I knew Mr. Watanabe, or he wouldn’t have spoken the way he had. He still thought I was clueless. I would have to use that fact to my advantage.
“Which vessel are you talking about?” Ramzi seemed to have regained a bit of confidence. “All I wanted was my watch, which I left here by accident—the last time.”
“Really? What kind of watch?” I asked skeptically.
“A Tagheuer. It has my initials engraved on the inside. You know, Uncle—my watch!”
“Yes, yes, he does have a watch of that description—a gift from his father, his last birthday.” Ali Birand spoke in a placating way to Mr. Harada, who seemed to bristle a bit less.
Well, maybe. Maybe a Tagheuer was the kind of thing you wanted to take with you, no matter what. Or was it that Ramzi was trying to annoy Emi’s father by making it clear that he’d taken off his watch and clothes and slept with Emi in this house?
“The watch is irrelevant. You are not to disturb my household anymore. I know that your father and uncle made that clear.” Harada spoke to Ramzi firmly. Then he turned to Ali Birand. “So, this is what we will do. You and your nephew will go into the house and retrieve this watch, and then the two of you may drive back to the city. In the meantime, I will take Shimura-san out to the gate.”
Ramzi cast an awkward last look at me and went inside with his uncle. Obviously, Harada trusted the uncle in the house. But he didn’t trust me to walk to the gate.
“I can go alone.”
“I don’t think so.” Then he pointed me not toward the driveway at all but toward the woods behind the house.
“That’s not the way to the street,” I said, and for the first time I felt fear. Ramzi and his uncle wouldn’t know what had happened. Even if they came out in five minutes, it would be too late.
“It’s—how do you say it in English? A shortway.”
“Shortcut,” I said, and then switched to Japanese. “And it’s not a shorter way. It’s the wrong direction.”
“Ah, so Shimura-san thinks she knows the boundaries of my property better than I do.”
“I know the way out. After all, I just followed Ramzi in.” I thought about running down the path toward the gate, but there wasn’t enough space between us. And he had a small bulge in his pants pocket, something that couldn’t possibly be part of a Mae West joke. It might be a weapon. In Japan, there was gun control, but there were still guns. Gangsters had them, and diplomats who could travel without having their luggage examined might have them too. I knew for sure that this man, not Ali Birand, was the dangerous one.
“If you’re sure that I’m a thief, why don’t you call one-ten?” I asked. My two goals were delay and distraction. If only I could stay in place until the Birands emerged. Why was it taking so long to find the watch?
He didn’t answer, so I tried again.
“Yes, you went to great lengths to try to get rid of me. I almost wonder at times if it was revenge because of Emi. You know, I’m very sorry about that—”
He wrinkled up his nose. “Revenge? Because you desire to take her former fiancé, now that he’s free? That’s not of interest to me.”
So he didn’t know about that night. He wasn’t out to avenge Emi. But he still felt strongly enough to want to walk me into the woods, away from the Birands, a
nd get rid of me.
Why was he so worried about the vessel? It was more than a gift. Something my aunt had taught me early on came back, all of a sudden; that once you gave someone a present, he was duty-bound to give you one in return, something that was worth the same.
I wondered what the Birands might have received in exchange for an ancient, indescribably gorgeous piece of pottery. A favor, perhaps. What had it been? I tried to recall how long Ali Birand had been living in Tokyo. When was it that Ramzi had said that his uncle was granted a visa?
The visa. I remembered Simone and Richard talking about visas, and my own hassles. It was very difficult for most foreigners except Americans and northern Europeans to get visas to live and work in Japan. Ramzi had used a French passport to get in. Yet Ali Birand, a citizen of Turkey, had gotten a visa and been able to secure a business address in a top-flight section of Tokyo. That was what frightened Kenichi Harada—the threat of exposure of how he’d abused his government privilege for a gift.
“Go,” he ordered me, in the imperative form used with inferiors. “If you don’t do as I say, I’ll set the dogs on you!”
I eyed the dogs, judging my chances against the two of them. If they attacked me and the Birands came out, he’d say it was my fault. And even if they doubted him, they’d be afraid enough of the dogs—and of what might happen to them as foreigners in the Japanese judicial system—to agree with whatever he wanted them to do, or say.
My survival was contingent on the Birands’ coming out before I was dragged into the woods. Delay was the only strategy I had left. If I could get Kenichi Harada invested in finding out more about what I knew, I’d live.
In a steady voice, I said, “The Birands were able to give you the ewer because they couldn’t possibly sell it. But I feel worried that maybe it was an unfair thing that happened to you—how could you know its origin?”
“Obviously, there’s something important about it, if you came all the way here to take it from me. But that is not the point. All I know is that you have invaded my property with the purpose of theft, and I plan to exercise my right to order you to leave.” Again, he waved his hand in the direction of the woods.
The Typhoon Lover Page 29