Giri

by Marc Olden

  The trouble out at the arena had resulted in a quick meeting in the back of a Mulberry Street social club in Little Italy among Molise, his father the don, and Giovanni Gran Sasso, Johnny Sass, the consigliere, the adviser. A very nervous Constantine Pangalos was there too, forced to sit in the bare room and remain silent while the three Sicilians spoke in Italian and made decisions about the rest of his life.

  After the Italians had deliberated among themselves they told Pangalos that he had acted stupidly, and from now on was to do nothing until they told him to. Buscaglia knew better than to open his mouth. The four security guards, each of whom had been hurt, would file countercharges against Decker, causing any charge against Buscaglia to eventually be dropped.

  “When you sleep, you sleep for you,” Johnny Sass told Pangalos. “But when you work, you work for us. Teeth placed before the tongue gives good advice. That’s an Italian saying. It means you shut your mouth, you never make a mistake.”

  As for who would take the blame for the phony seating plans, that would be Pangalos and Quarrels, the Greek and the Jew. If arrested, they would have the best lawyers and the don guaranteed that the case would appear before the correct judge. Files would be stolen, destroyed or doctored to help their case. Leave that to Sparrowhawk and MSC.

  With the old don watching, Johnny Sass had placed his face nose to nose with Pangalos and told him not to make any more trouble. The Greek, looking as if he’d just eaten a dead rat, had looked away. He had been sentenced and he knew death was not far away. Johnny Sass had never liked Pangalos. As a prosecutor he had sentenced some of the consigliere’s friends and hounded others.

  At the corner near Molise’s limousine a Santa Claus rang a bell to encourage people to drop money inside a black kettle suspended from a wooden tripod. In his other hand he held a tape recorder playing tinny Christmas carols. Molise felt like pissing in the kettle. First week in December and Santa’s already on the street with his hand in your pocket. Before you knew it there would be carols in July.

  He stepped inside the car, and Aldo slammed the door behind him and then walked out into the street to enter the car on the driver’s side. Molise wondered if it might not be better to skip dinner and meet his wife at his daughter’s school, where she was to perform in a dance recital; at least he could catch part of it. He wondered if Tricia might grow up to become a professional ballerina. Now that would be something.

  These thoughts relaxed him. Eyes closed, he leaned back in his seat. And never saw Aldo die.

  A slim figure in dark clothing, face hidden by floppy hat, dark glasses and a scarf, hands in the sleeves of a fur coat, detached itself from the crowd crossing the street in front of the parked limousine and walked up to the open window on the driver’s side. After looking to make sure no one was watching, the figure removed one hand from a sleeve, reached through the open window and slit Aldo’s throat with a knife. A kai-ken.

  A quick shove and the dying chauffeur-bodyguard was down on the front seat and out of sight.

  Hark the herald angels sing. Glory to the newborn king.

  The figure withdrew both hands from inside the limousine, pocketed the wet knife and looked around. No one was watching.

  Molise, eyes closed, felt a rush of cold air as the door opened and someone slipped into the back beside him. What the fuck. He frowned. Aldo should have been more alert.

  Michi removed her scarf, letting him see her face. Then she removed the floppy hat she wore and Molise saw the hachimaki, the headband with the characters for Jinrai Butai and a red circle that symbolized the rising sun, the headband that had belonged to her father.

  Molise said, “Look, I’m in a hurry to get home. What do you want? Did Dorian send you here? Is that it?”

  Michi said, “Kataki-uchi.”

  “Lady, I haven’t the slightest idea what you’re talking about Kataki what?”

  “Measure for measure. Retaliation.”

  Molise leaned toward the front. “Hey, Aldo, get rid of this crazy bitch, will you? I really don’t have the time—”

  Michi, seated to Molise’s left, drove the edge of a booted foot into his ankle, causing him to cry out and lean down toward the pain. As he did, Michi bent over him, arm extended overhead, fist clenched, then brought her elbow straight down, striking Molise behind the ear and driving him to the car floor.

  The pain split his skull and he wondered what the fuck she had hit him with. He fought to stay conscious, tried to rise, to grab the seat and pull himself into a sitting position, but he couldn’t. The Jap woman was sitting on his chest, her knees pressing down on his biceps. Crazy bitch. What had he ever done to her?

  God and sinners reconciled.

  No one passing by the parked limousine stopped to look through the tinted windows. In any case, Michi and Molise were out of sight, on the floor and in the darkness of the back seat.

  Kataki-uchi. Justice. Revenge. And by her hand. Manny’s American justice would not satisfy Michi’s ancestors.

  Reaching down to her boot top, Michi pulled out a steel needle, four and a half inches long, its point sharp enough to draw blood by the merest touch, and, squeezing it with both fists, placed the point under Molise’s jaw, hesitated only for a second, then drove the needle through his jaw, tongue and into the roof of his mouth. He shivered, groaned, tried to throw her off and failed.

  God, the pain. He struggled, but she was more than a match for him now. The blow behind the ear had weakened him and the pain in his mouth and head terrified him. The needle. One sound and he would rip his tongue in half.

  There was another needle in her hand and she held it close to his face so that he could see it. Then she shoved it through his right eye and into his brain and he made a sound, sending blood pouring from his mouth. He had to throw her off, but it was getting dark and he had no strength. His mouth was filled with his own blood and he wanted to swallow but that meant more pain because of the needle piercing his tongue.

  He never saw the third needle, but he felt it.

  In his left eye, into his brain. He groaned, stiffened and relaxed.

  And died.

  Michi removed the blood-wet needles, placed them in the pocket of her fur coat and sat back on the seat, eyes on Paul Molise. She whispered their names—her father, mother, sister, closed her eyes, bowed her head and remembered that you could never live under the same sky with someone who had done you a wrong. Ren-chi-shin, the sense of shame, could only be removed when those who had committed the wrong had been removed from under that sky. Blood must be washed with blood.

  She put on her hat, covered her face once more, stepped from the limousine on the traffic side and in seconds was swallowed up by the crowd.

  17

  DECKER BLEW GENTLY ON a shakuhachi, a wooden flute given to him by Michi, who clung to his arm as they stood in the Japanese Garden, part of the fifty-acre Brooklyn Botanic Gardens. The two were in front of the Cascades, five waterfalls over echo caverns designed to intensify the sound of falling water. Surrounding the waterfalls and miniaturized landscape were forest-sized pine trees, hills and a lake narrowed and shaped to reflect shadows and the beauty of the niwa, the Japanese landscape garden.

  Designed in 1914 by famed Japanese landscape architect Takeo Shiota, the Japanese Garden offered an escape into a “mirror of nature.” Decker came here often, and he wanted to share the beauty and tranquillity with Michi, who was leaving tomorrow on a business trip to London, Amsterdam and Paris. She would purchase diamonds, meet prospective buyers and return to New York in approximately ten days. Decker had already begun to miss her.

  From the echoing waterfalls they walked in silence to Drum Bridge, gracefully curved and casting a reflection in water so that, combined with the bridge itself, it formed a circular, drumlike image. Steppingstones had been placed in the water to trace the flight of wild geese. When the couple stopped again it was at the torii, two logs placed horizontally on top of two pillars to form an archway marking the presence of a nea
rby Shinto shrine. The shrine was located in a pine wood on a hill behind the torii and was made of redwood and held together by wooden pins instead of nails. Decker had never gone inside. He had visited similar shrines in Tokyo with Michi and knew that the inside would be plain and empty, in keeping with Shinto’s simplicity.

  He stopped playing the flute and looked at Michi. Her eyes were on the shrine and he knew she was thinking of the old religion. Shinto was nature worship. Its kami, gods, were not only men, ancestors, emperors, but animals, rocks, trees, rivers, birds, mountains. Shinto was also purification by wind and water. The mouth and hands had to be rinsed before entering a shrine, a symbolic reminder of the days when one could not be admitted to the shrine without being immersed in a river or the sea.

  Decker was about to play the flute again when he decided that it would intrude on Michi’s thoughts. She obviously wanted to meditate on the shrine a little longer, so Decker pocketed the flute and stood beside her in respectful silence. Let her pray for her dead in peace.

  What was it Kanai had said to him a few nights ago at the Cleveland Gallery?

  “You here in the West fear that your god will find you guilty of your sins. We Japanese concern ourselves with avoiding shame. This means we must live up to the expectations of others. We cannot live merely for ourselves. This is why we work so hard in business, to avoid shame.”

  To avoid shame.

  Decker thought of that when Kanai said, “According to your newspapers the killing of Alan Baksted remains unsolved.”

  “Seems to be the work of a professional hit man. Unfortunately, if police fail to solve a homicide within seventy-two hours, it usually remains an open case. Means we don’t have witnesses, motives, clues and probably won’t get them.”

  “There were torn fifty-dollar bills found on the body of Mr. Baksted.”

  “I guess he took something that didn’t belong to him.”

  “I have received letters and telephone calls from representatives of the Marybelle Corporation. I am told I can now see its private lists of gamblers, what you call its “pigeon list.’ ”

  Decker’s turn.

  In the crowded gallery the two men stood side by side in front of a framed watercolor by Ellen Spiceland’s husband. LeClair had ordered Decker to say nothing to the Japanese about Baksted, the Golden Horizon or the murder of Paul Molise junior. Decker didn’t have to tell Kanai of Molise’s connection to Marybelle and the Golden Horizon; the subject had already come up over dinner in the Fûrin a month ago. Kanai was waiting to hear the effect, if any, of those two murders on any investment he might make in the Golden Horizon. How did Decker tell Kanai what he wasn’t supposed to tell him?

  The detective sipped warm champagne from a plastic glass, then said, “Officially, I cannot comment on this case, Kanai-san. Please understand.”

  “Hai. Duty, Decker-san. Please excuse my lack of understanding in expecting you to reveal what must remain a confidence between you and your superiors. Tell your secrets to the wind and the wind will tell them to the trees.”

  For the Japanese nothing was what it appeared to be. Kanai was either being considerate or was shrewdly challenging Decker to find a way to pass on information without breaking the rules. The detective was undecided about playing the game and then he remembered what LeClair had done to Benitez and DeMain and he remembered LeClair’s way of despising those he had dumped on. He shrugged. And decided to play.

  He said, “Kanai-san, are you going to buy one of Mr. Juriot’s paintings?”

  “He has talent, yes. A strong sense of color, perhaps too strong for my taste. But I understand that Caribbean artists tend to emphasize color. One or two works have impressed me. I would buy to encourage him, yes.”

  The detective looked at Kanai. “These days people buy art as an investment. A hedge against inflation. They also buy collectibles. But you see, you have to be careful with certain collectibles.”

  He sipped from his glass. “Myself, I’d hesitate if a collectible involved, say, two million or more.”

  He cocked his head for a final evaluation. “Takai desu. Hai, takai desu.” Too expensive.

  Decker looked back at Kanai in time to see the Japanese bow almost imperceptibly. But the detective noticed it.

  “Domo arigato gozai mashite, Decker-san.”

  The detective returned the bow, his gesture just as contained and controlled. What Decker had just done for Kanai was no small service and both knew it. The detective would be in a position to collect on this favor in the future.

  And Kanai’s sense of honor would compel him to repay.

  In front of the torii at the Japanese Garden, Michi, eyes closed, bowed from the waist, then opened her eyes and smiled at Decker. He kissed her lips lightly, and they began walking once more, enjoying the crisp day and the clear, cold air. When they stopped to view the Waiting House, the tiny house where guests traditionally waited before being greeted by the host for the Japanese tea ceremony, she said, “I prayed for my father, my mother, my sister.”

  “Missed my chance,” Decker said. “Should have offered a prayer of my own, a prayer that you’ll come back to me from Europe.”

  She squeezed his arm. “You do not have to pray for that I shall come back to you, I promise.”

  “Let me know when your flight lands. I’ll try to meet you if I can. By the way, which god did you pray to, or is that a secret?”

  She laughed. “No, it is not a secret. I prayed to the local kami, to whichever god lives in that shrine behind us. Every village, every town has its own god, so I asked the god of Brooklyn—”

  Decker grinned. “You what?”

  Michi continued in all sincerity. “I asked the god of Brooklyn for his protection and that I might endeavor in all things, that I might persevere and never retreat from my duty. I asked for strength to serve the divine will and, of course, I praised him, as is our custom.”

  Decker looked upward. “The god of Brooklyn. Five boroughs we got in this city. Does that mean each one has its own god?”

  She nodded, still serious. “And each town in those boroughs, each neighborhood, each village, they have their own gods, many of them.”

  “I’ll take your word for it.”

  “Something else I prayed for. I prayed for you, that you will be safe in your job, that you do not get hurt.”

  He drew her close to him. “All I want from the god of Brooklyn is that he give you two safe flights, one going, one coming. The rest of it I’ll handle myself.”

  She looked down. “With Paul Molise dead, is it not easier for you?”

  He shook his head as they began walking again. “Wish it was. Unfortunately, it’s still hairy. Same bunch of players, except that one, Molise, is going to be replaced by someone we don’t know, someone whose habits are a damn mystery, who we’ll have to learn about pretty fast if we want to have a chance against him. I mean in one sense, it’s starting over. The Molise family’s still in business and so is Management Systems Consultants. With one player gone, a substitute comes in for him and the game goes on.

  “See, Michi, we were getting close to Molise. Pangalos could have helped us squeeze him, but with Molise dead, Pangalos, at the very least is going to hang tough. Just makes it harder on us, is all. We needed Molise alive, not dead. And I still can’t afford to make a mistake with LeClair.”

  LeClair was now in Washington for a quick conference with the Justice Department on whether or not Molise’s death would spark an outbreak of gang war among organized crime. LeClair didn’t know the answer. And neither did Decker. If Paul junior’s death was a mob hit, all hell was going to break loose among New York’s five crime families.

  Molise’s bodyguard had had his throat cut. No mystery about how he died. Molise, however, was another story. Cause of death had been some sort of metallic object, something long, thin, sharp. Stabbed under the jaw, slicing the tongue in two and causing a wound in the roof of the mouth. Wounds in both eyes as well, but the coroner wasn’t
sure if the jaw and mouth wounds and eye wounds had been caused by the same weapons. Whatever the weapons, the killing had been brazen and deliberate.

  Had Molise been killed as a warning to someone else? Had he been punished by someone in the underworld? His father had vowed to kill the person or persons who had murdered his beloved son. Decker didn’t want to be the man who had iced Paulie. In the pre-Castro days, Paul senior had sliced off the ear of a man who had betrayed him, then tied the man to a rope and trolled him behind a fishing boat off the Cuban coast and watched as sharks, drawn by the blood, tore the shrieking man apart.

  In the Japanese Garden, Decker and Michi stopped to look at a tall Kasuga lantern. Shaped out of stone into a miniature pagoda, the lantern bore signs of the zodiac. This was no place to be thinking of violence, and yet it was hard not to. At the Cleveland Gallery, Kanai had mentioned the kaishaku to Decker and Ellen Spiceland. A karateka who raped and murdered. Ellen had listened attentively, her mind storing up facts. Decker saw it in her face; she was going to do some checking on the kaishaku.

  Meanwhile, Decker had enough to keep him busy. LeClair. The task force. Cases with Ellen, ranging from child abuse to burglaries, from rapes to violence in local schools. And there was his role as a field associate.

  Kaishaku.

  On the way to the Instruction Building of the Brooklyn Botanic Garden, Decker mentioned the kaishaku to Michi. As she listened she clutched his arm tighter. “It sounds like something your soldiers did in Vietnam.”

  Decker stopped. “Jesus, you’re right. Double veterans, they called them. But isn’t the kaishaku different?”

  They resumed walking. “Yes,” she said. “He is what you call a second to the one who is to commit seppuku. To the samurai seppuku is a most honorable death. It is a form of self-punishment and only someone of great respect is allowed to perform it He must have a kaishaku, a friend who was a swordsman, and stays close to him, to put him out of his misery if the pain was too much. You know how seppuku is done.”