Ransom

by Jay McInerney

  More and more, Ransom found himself watching his back. The sensei, he remembered, told him that the old karate masters never approached a corner directly, but always moved out and around. Taking immediate inventory of people in public places, Ransom suddenly noticed that the proprietor of his local newsstand was tattooed. In the Osaka subway one morning, he glanced at the overhead strap beside his and saw a hand one finger shy; that same night, riding home, a man in a brown suit and hat had stared at him from Osaka to Takatsuki, sitting directly across from him, his gaze never wavering when Ransom looked up from his paper.

  Ransom addressed him: Is something the matter?

  The man raised his eyebrows and said nothing.

  Find something else to do with your eyes, Ransom said.

  The man acted surprised, even sheepish, and when he trudged off at the next stop Ransom feared he had overreacted.

  Maybe, he thought, it was the weather: the air thicker and wetter by the day, the barometer plunging.

  Marilyn called him at the coffee shop the next morning, Saturday. He didn’t want to meet anywhere in the city, and if they were followed, the country wasn’t safe either. Deciding that crowds provided good protection, Ransom gave her the number of a bus and told her to take it to the end of the line to Arashiyama. They would meet at six in the park beside the river, where people gathered to watch the pelican-fishing, but not likely anyone they knew.

  At five-thirty Ransom set out, riding east along the Arashiyama road. The Scrambler lagged and surged, and Ransom wondered how Udo was making out with the 350. The city thinned and gradually disappeared, soon giving way to temples and rice fields, knee-high in green in the late afternoon sun. Turning into the parking lot, he smelled fried food from the stalls along the riverbank. The unpaved lot was unattended, but the Nissans and Toyotas were parked in perfect rows.

  The riverbank was carpeted with tatami mats on which families camped with picnic gear. Roman candles and rockets hissed and sputtered over the water. Ransom picked his way through the crowd, looking for Marilyn. Hawkers in the food stalls invited him to buy grilled squid, barbecued corn, chicken parts on sticks, hot dogs fashioned from mysterious animal and fish products and binders. As the Kyoto bus rattled to a stop in the parking lot, the first boat rounded the bend upriver.

  Ransom waved to Marilyn, who walked cautiously, in high heels, toward the river.

  “Where are we?” she demanded.

  “Relax, it’s a festival. One of my students told me about it. We’re just a couple of tourists watching the pelicans.”

  “What kind of festival?”

  “Beats me, maybe an equinox or something.”

  “It smells terrible.”

  Ransom untied the rolled tatami mat from the back of the Scrambler and coaxed Marilyn to a spot upriver where they could spread out. He bought a handful of Roman candles from an old man and fired one out over the water.

  “You really know how to show a girl a good time,” Marilyn said.

  “I guess you had all kinds of festivals in Vietnam.”

  “Sure, lots of fireworks during Tet—grenades coming through restaurant windows, car-bombs in the street.” Although she was wrapped in a fox jacket and the temperature was easily seventy, Marilyn sat stiffly on the mat, hugging her body with her arms.

  “I just wanted to meet someplace out of the way.”

  “I’m kind of edgy,” she said, fishing a cigarette from her purse. “I’ve been thinking. It was nice of you to try to help, but I don’t think we better see each other anymore. I had a hell of a time getting away today and my oyabun, he might do something crazy.”

  Ransom looked out at the boats coming down the river.

  “Someone put sugar in my gas tank.”

  “Gas tank? What are you talking about?”

  “My motorcycle’s. The sugar pretty much screws up the bike.”

  She stared out at the water. “That means he’s found you. Please, I don’t want you to get hurt.”

  “Maybe it wasn’t him.”

  “You have other enemies?”

  “Somehow sugar in my gas tank doesn’t quite strike me as a yakuza move.”

  “Well, one day he threatens to kill me and the next day he brings me flowers and cries in my lap.” She drew on her cigarette. “He says we’re going to get married soon.”

  “What do you say?”

  “You seem to forget that I don’t have any choices. Anyway, why don’t you get out while you still can?”

  The sun had fallen behind the mountains, and Ransom watched the silhouettes of the boats against the river. Marilyn looked at him. “Whose lap do you cry on?”

  “I keep a ten-gallon bucket handy.”

  She lay back on her elbows in the grass. “Do you have any girlfriends?”

  “Not really.”

  “Are you, do you like men? I mean, gay?”

  “No, not hardly.”

  She sat up and took his hand in both of hers. “I like you, Ransom.”

  “Thank you,” he said.

  “I don’t even know your first name.”

  “Chris Ransom. I don’t like the Chris much.”

  “You don’t like me at all, do you?”

  “I like you just fine. And I can help you more if we leave it at that.”

  “What is it with you?” she said. “If you live long enough with a hurt, then you’ll start liking it.”

  “My disappointments,” Ransom said, “are none of your business.”

  Downriver, the boats had gathered in a small flotilla. Marilyn squinted. “What are those?”

  “Pelicans,” Ransom said. “Come on, let’s go down.”

  They walked to the main landing, and above the noise of the crowd they heard the weird voices of the birds. Perched shoulder-to-shoulder along the gunwales of the boats, the pelicans looked like clowns in a chorus line, all noses and feet. Guiding Marilyn in front of him, Ransom pressed ahead until they stood among many others around the lead boat. The man astride the boat held the ends of the leashes fastened to the pelican’s legs. He addressed the birds in a crisp, military tone, cuffing them and jerking the leashes when they became unruly. Get in line. Knock it off. He then lit a torch and fired up the wood-filled iron basket hanging over the bow, the captains in the other boats following suit. A cheer rose from the crowd. Rockets arched over the water. The pelicans bobbed and shook their heads in anticipation.

  “What’s going on?” Marilyn said.

  “You’ll see.”

  The fires drifted out over the water. Ransom couldn’t make out if the birds jumped into the water on command or if they were pushed, but the leashes trailed them, stretching out on the water then sinking as the pelicans dove under. The man up front hauled them back, one by one, and held them upside down until they had disgorged their catch into the boat. Iron rings around their necks prevented them from swallowing.

  “That’s disgusting,” Marilyn said, when Ransom explained.

  He heard his name called, and turned. DeVito was standing in the trees along the bank above them.

  “What does he want?” Marilyn said.

  “To fight.”

  “Here?”

  “Promise me you’ll get back to the bus.”

  “You’re not going to fight him, are you?”

  “No. But I’m not leaving until you get clear. Go down along the bank and then up to the parking lot. Keep close to people.”

  “Let’s both go.”

  “He’d follow us.”

  “Are you coming up here,” DeVito called, “or do you want me to chase you?” He started down the bank, and Ransom told Marilyn to get going. The throng around them provided temporary insulation, but her progress seemed incredibly slow. DeVito was shoving his way through the crowd, which was swelling as the boats headed back toward shore. Ransom slipped out of his shoes. Beside him, a young father hoisted his son up on his shoulders. Moving toward the water, Ransom turned to see DeVito’s samurai haircut advancing above the dar
ker heads, getting closer. Two boats were sculling in to show their catch as Ransom stepped into the river, then spun around.

  “What exactly do you want?” he said. DeVito was almost within spitting distance.

  “You know what I want. So why run? A fair fight, hotshot.”

  The boatmen had started to tie up at the dock, calling at the crowd to make room, while the pelicans gurgled and clapped their beaks. Two boats were waiting just a few yards out from Ransom, who dove into the water between them. When he came up, with the two boats between him and the shore, the clamoring at the dock had increased in pitch, and he heard splashing behind him. He swam out into the river, turning gradually downstream, slowed by his jeans. When he looked back, the flaming basket at the prow of the boat farthest from shore was swinging wildly, and the boatman was flailing at the water with an oar. Ransom thought he saw someone in the water, amid the splashes of the oar. He glanced downriver, and the foundations of the Arashiyama Bridge were arching up above him.

  Below the bridge he clambered up onto the road, breathing hard, watching for movement behind him. Once in the parking lot he crouched between cars and surveyed the area, wondering if DeVito would recognize the bike that Udo had lent him, wondering for that matter how DeVito had found him.

  Two young men, drunk and happy, were looking for their car, and Ransom asked what all the noise was about. A crazy gaijin, they said, jumped into the river and got tangled up with the pelicans. Possibly two gaijin, but in any case it was the funniest thing they had ever seen. The pelicans flapping in every direction, the gaijin cursing and tearing at the leashes, and the enraged boatman trying to brain him with an oar. Only now did they really see Ransom—a wet, barefooted gaijin—and immediately both stopped laughing. He wished them good night, located his bike and rode off.

  22

  The heat built up, collecting at first in certain areas—behind the refrigerator, in the bright patches of sunlight over the tatami—and then spreading throughout the bowl within the mountains that ringed the city. The beer gardens on the rooftops of the big hotels reopened, and the air itself fell into lassitude; the kites flying over the river gradually disappeared, and with the burden of growing humidity, the sky seemed to lower itself on Kyoto like a canvas tent sagging with the weight of rainwater. The point of saturation would be reached by the middle of June, and the sky would open up in earnest to begin the tsuyu, the rainy season.

  To avoid the hottest part of the day, the sensei changed Sunday practice from noon to ten. No one in the dojo sweated so profusely as Ransom, who nevertheless was satisfied by his progress. He scored two more points on the Monk and managed to keep himself from getting injured. At the same time, he felt he was moving, or being moved, toward some crisis point of his own. Marilyn’s yakuza had given her an ultimatum: she would marry him in June or he would turn her over to immigration, of which the only possible result was deportation.

  At the U.S. consulate in Osaka, Ransom asked what could be done. The young man he talked to, who was about Ransom’s age, was cheerfully discouraging and seemed to relish his thoroughly realistic interpretation of this bleak situation. Political asylum was highly unlikely. Almost two hundred thousand Vietnamese had entered the States in the last two years, way above the quota set by Congress. Tens of thousands more were seeking entry from camps in Malaysia, Hong Kong and Thailand. He managed to convey the impression that even though affairs of state required his immediate attention, he was willing to devote his valuable time to this small matter. About the only way Marilyn could get into the States, he said, would be for an American citizen to marry her.

  Ransom had suspected more than once that this was what she was angling for all along. He thought it conceivable that there was no yakuza boyfriend, that she had invented him for her purposes and that she was just another Asian girl who wanted out.

  She had mentioned the name of the club where she supposedly sang and Ransom decided to check her out. The club, on the edge of Gion, was a flashy establishment whose doorman and awning were somebody’s idea of the Las Vegas style. Inside, the walls appeared to be covered with polished aluminum. A hostess in a sequined minidress escorted him to his table, where within minutes he was joined by another hostess who nearly sat in his lap as she fed him slices of octopus and ran through her repertoire of English. He endured these ministrations for over an hour, aware that all this was costing him a fortune, and tried to ignore the exuberant performances of a female impersonator and a male duo. As he was leaving, Marilyn appeared on the stage, and from the door he listened to her sing “The Sound of Music.” He listened just long enough to decide that, as far as he could judge, she had a good voice.

  Walking into Buffalo Rome the next night, he sensed immediately that something was wrong. The frequency and quality of the noise was different, the voices frantic. Aikido Eric walked up and grabbed Ransom’s elbow.

  “Miles is in the hospital,” he said. “Beat up.”

  “What?”

  “He’s in a coma.”

  Everyone but Ransom was certain that DeVito was responsible, and he kept his doubts to himself. No one, it seemed, knew for sure which hospital he was in.

  Phoning Ryder’s house, Ransom got no answer, so he rode over but no one came to the door. Finally an old woman came out of the house next door, and reluctantly gave Ransom the name of the hospital. Where gaijin were involved, she seemed to feel, there was no telling what would happen.

  At the front desk a nurse explained they were giving details only to immediate family. Ransom explained that he was a brother, and was given directions to the room. The hospital was small and dingy, and Miles’s room was at the end of an especially dark hallway. Miles lay on his back in one of three beds, taped up, his head above the eyebrows concealed by bandages. Akiko sat in a chair beside him. The elderly man in the next bed, rigged up with intravenous bottles, noted Ransom’s arrival with obvious interest, while a middle-aged man snored loudly in the bed by the window.

  “He’s asleep,” Akiko said.

  “What happened?”

  “I don’t know, Chris. He went out this afternoon and the hospital called this evening. When I got here he was sleeping.” He had a broken arm, cracked ribs and a concussion, she added, but the doctors claimed he’d be fine in a few weeks.

  “How about you?” Ransom said. “Anything I can do?”

  “Nothing, thanks, really.”

  “You’re due soon, aren’t you?”

  She looked at her feet—“Perhaps one week”—then looked up. “Is Miles in trouble?” she asked.

  “I don’t think so,” Ransom said. “He didn’t say anything?”

  She shook her head, and her expression touched Ransom deeply: resignation that had passed beyond sadness.

  “Hello, hello,” the old man offered. “I am a boy. Sank you very much.”

  Ransom said hello, then turned to Akiko.

  “I’m going to take care of this, Akiko. Nothing like this will happen again.”

  She nodded—without conviction, it seemed to him. Though he knew she didn’t mean to, Akiko made him feel implicated in this violence, responsible in his genes, in his nationality. Gaijin, she must think, are all so strange and violent.

  From the hospital Ransom went to a sushi bar not far from Marilyn’s club. He ordered a nigiri tray, which he wanted delivered. Ransom was a frequent customer and the sushi master was glad to see him. A red-faced businessman at the counter was looking Ransom over as if he expected him to change form any minute.

  He speaks Japanese, the master said.

  Really? The businessman sounded doubtful.

  Ransom sat at the bar over a cup of tea and while the master prepared the tray he wrote a note to Marilyn. Ransom explained that the sushi was for a woman friend, and asked if he could send a message along with the tray.

  You have to watch out for those nightclub girls, the master said. They’ll empty your pockets before they unzip your fly.

  Ransom told the delivery
boy it was important that he hand the tray directly to Marilyn, and that nobody was around when he gave her the note.

  Almost an hour had passed before she came in, wearing a long coat over one of the sequined outfits. The businessman was favorably impressed. Nudging Ransom, he said, “Pretty, okay?”

  “What’s so urgent?” Marilyn asked, after ordering a beer.

  For a moment she seemed not to understand what he said. She hadn’t expected them to bother Ryder, she said, but then added, “His underlings, the kobun, most of them are so stupid they wouldn’t even know they had the wrong gaijin.”

  “But they had the right one.”

  “No, I told him it was you.”

  “Maybe they’re getting at me through my best friend, is that it?”

  “That’s not impossible,” she said.

  “Hello,” the businessman said, leaning across Ransom to address Marilyn. “My name is Yamaguchi Sato. Okay?” He reeked of sake.

  The sushi master came around from behind the counter, pulled the businessman into an upright position and convinced him to move to a stool farther down the bar. “Goodbye,” the man said, waving.

  Ransom turned back to Marilyn. “You don’t seem too terribly concerned about Miles. You haven’t even asked how he is.”

  “I’m sorry,” she said. “It’s just—”

  “Don’t be sorry. I thought you liked him, that’s all.”

  “You’re impossible to please, aren’t you? When I was going out with Miles, you didn’t like it at all. Now that I’ve stopped seeing him, you don’t like that either.”

  “He’s my friend.”

  “You blame me, don’t you?” There were tears in her eyes. She took a cigarette and a Kleenex from her purse. “I didn’t ask for any of this.”

  “Has your oyabun said anything recently?”

  “That he’d kill you if I saw you again.”

  “That’s ridiculous.”

  “He’s a jealous man.”

  “He’d have to be more than jealous. Can you imagine all the shit a murdered gaijin would bring down? He still wants to marry you?”