by David Dun
They all understood Kenji Yamada.
Slowly Kenji poured himself the steaming hot sake. It had only required a second five-minute telephone call to the vice president of the railroad for Kim Lee to decide that the railroad would not sell its remaining rights in the property. Worse, Kim wanted to tell Kenji's father-in-law the whole story, including the part about the chemical spill and the bats. Only brute intimidation had kept him quiet to date. When it came down to it, Kim would save his own hide and sacrifice Kenji.
This was the chance of ten lifetimes and Kim had given up without coming up with even one creative plan. Success could advance the Asaka holdings beyond anything that any of them had ever dreamed about. By comparison, the computer giants of America would be midgets.
Kenji wondered about himself-how far he would go to attain his goal. He was a realist, dealing honestly at least with himself. So far, he had stolen and taken two lives. Kim Lee was now nothing but a liability. Kenji had watched the nervous tremor as Kim had wiped his brow. He could feel the man's weakness. Kenji felt as if he were being suffocated by the ineptitude of those around him. And all on the brink of greatness.
In the larger context of the Kuru holding company, Kenji's was a relatively minor post. On a fiscal basis Amada accounted for less than 8 percent of the family's net worth. Still, with the jolting discoveries of the past two years, it seemed possible at last that on his father-in-law's death Kenji might very well take over the parent company. If his ideas proved successful.
As the magnitude of the discovery became apparent, his ambition also grew. Slipping into violence would have seemed unthinkable even five years ago. Ambition had slowly seduced him and now had him in a stranglehold.
If he had not fallen under the spell of Catherine Swanson, his life would have been simpler. Fortunately, Groiter executed a perfect setup with the photographer. A few of the photographer's hairs and some of his semen was all it took. Groiter had been very clever about extracting the man's semen. And about removing from Catherine all traces of Kenji.
Now that he had killed twice, taking a third life (or fourth and fifth) to protect his plan didn't really matter. Getting rid of Kim had side benefits. It was important that someone in the Amada fold suffer violence at the hands of extremists. That would tend to eliminate Amada as a suspect.
Dealing with the fear was the hardest part. All great leaders had to overcome it or it ate them alive. Fear of the derision and ridicule of others was the worst. But he had already learned to live without them. Learned that he didn't need to be in the "in group." For just a moment with Catherine Swanson, he had forgotten that lesson. Once he remembered it, he had her anyway. And when he had her, it was without the anxiety-it was the way a man should have a woman. He had felt like a man, not some street scum who had landed in the palace between her thighs.
He stabbed a preprogrammed dialing button. Groiter answered immediately.
"I've been listening to tapes. They still have a set of pictures."
Kenji's breath hissed like steam from a ruptured boiler. "Anything else?"
"They've gone to the library. Found articles on the disappearance of Catherine Swanson."
"Why would they do that?"
"Well, it happened just a month ago, and violence is rare around here, so they're looking for any connection to the person who took their money. Dan Young's got a bulletin board at home, and he's plastering it with stuff just like a good little detective. They're making a list of everybody who lives in the mountains. It's a pretty good profile. I think it's only a matter of time before they add Schneider to their list."
"We should never have let them in. Never. Make sure you let me know the minute they are on to something that matters."
"I'll let you know a minute before."
"I called about another issue."
"Oh?"
"I will be deeply moved by the death of our associate Kim Lee at the hands of extremist elements."
There was a long silence, and then an exhale of breath from Groiter. "Are you sure?"
"He's been talking to Satoru about things that could profoundly affect your retirement."
"Corey is crazy, but it'll take some doing to get her to pull this off."
"I didn't say that Schneider actually had to pull the trigger." But something told Kenji that Groiter would protect himself and the best way to do that was to find someone else with an obvious motive. "I'm confident you'll think of something. I think it's time you got another bonus."
There was a steady rhythm like a drumbeat that echoed through his body, deep breaths that sounded like muted snorts, the leather, and the sweat smell. His body floated over the horse, its gallop impeccably regular as he raised the six-foot wooden bow. The target stood to his right at ninety degrees.
The contest took place on a three-foot-wide dirt track about one hundred yards long with three targets equidistant along the run. As the arrow slid from his fingers, he saw the exact spot on the bull's-eye where the arrow would strike. And it did.
The sport was called Yabusame and was conceived by a ninth-century warlord whose family name was Ogasawara. Yoshinari's horse was a big bay girded with the armor of the samurai, as was Yoshinari's own body. Twenty years previous he had been the Yabusame grand national champion of all Japan. As a senior he had held that title in the over-sixty class, five times running. Only a few of the younger men could best him, and only due to their superior physical endurance. They could retain the absolute stillness of mind and body required for perfection over many attempts. Today the crowd bowed and displayed appropriate awe, making him smile inwardly at his vanities.
Finished for the day, he rode back to his stables. As often as possible he held tournaments at his castle, for those were the only contests that he attended. He wanted to sit by the koi-pond bridge and sip his wife's tea. It seemed that he always returned there when troubled about his son-in-law.
Since Kenji regularly excluded Satoru from meetings and activities that would give him the opportunity to report back, it was necessary for Satoru to rely upon subterfuge, a practice most noxious to Yoshinari. And it had evolved into nonsense.
Shohei had made a report more complete than Satoru's on the bizarre seduction plot. According to Shohei, and consistent with the obvious, Satoru's real motive was to depose Kenji, to take over, and to use Catherine Swanson's political influence with her husband to benefit Amada.
Purportedly, the woman had presented Kenji with an opportunity to be unfaithful. There was little doubt in Yoshinari' s mind that if one paved the path to an extraordinary woman's bed with incense and warmed earth, Kenji would oblige his nose the fragrance and his feet the warmth. It was no mystery that Kenji loved his manhood at least as much as his nose and feet.
Shohei was certain that Kenji had taken the bait and most probably killed Catherine Swanson. According to Shohei, Micha knew of Satoru's attempt but believed Kenji had not succumbed to temptation. Meanwhile, Kenji's optimism regarding his secret project never flagged, and in this one thing Satoru believed Kenji was sincere.
Yoshinari found Shohei on his cell phone.
"I want to know more about the Highlands Laboratory," Yoshinari began. "I think you should go in unannounced. Kenji still mustn't know that you exist. As it is, he resents Satoru."
"I will break in?"
"Only to the extent you can do so without detection. I do not know what you are looking for, except to say I want to know about anything that doesn't appear to be Taxol research."
"Of course, I am not a chemist."
"I know. Do the best you can." Yoshinari disconnected.
Kenji kept Satoru from the laboratory at all costs, allowing him to visit the facility only twice. On both those occasions it had seemed evident to Satoru that they were experiencing temporary workforce reductions, as if everyone but a skeleton crew had gone on holiday in honor of his visit. Although they were supposed to be studying Taxol with pharmaceutical chemists, they were hiring molecular industrial chemists. Fur
thermore, Satoru was convinced that there were areas of the compound that he was never shown.
Yoshinari waited an appropriate number of hours before calling Shohei again.
"How are you progressing? I have great concern."
"I am building my database."
Yoshinari nodded, smiling. Modern spies must use modern ways. "I am most interested in your technique."
"I am downloading the names of all the people involved and their phone numbers. I am also downloading all phone records of every Amada executive, including Groiter and Kenji. As far as those that they call environmental extremists, it is harder. I am downloading car licenses and grouping names of people together that I know keep common company. I am also gathering all available information about the two lawyers."
"I want you to hire two of the best investigators you can find. Discreet men."
"Yes."
"They are to do nothing but assist you in building your database. Hire men with friends. Men who know the police.''
"Yes. They call that being 'connected.' It will be done."
Shohei found the forest intriguing. He had learned some of his art in the Okudake Mountains of Yakushima. There he had learned to become a ghostly whisper in the forest.
By painting himself with ash and pine scent even the animals did not know of his passing. Here the trees were much larger than back home and the undergrowth different. Many of the plants he did not recognize. But the humus scent and the cool quiet were the same.
Quickly he found the fence and avoided the dogs because they neither heard nor smelled him. His nimble body was able to elude everything but the razor wire atop the fence. Cutting the razor wire might set off an alarm.
Tunneling under the fence would not be a problem but for the dogs who might hear the activity. Cutting the chain link with bolt cutters seemed the best option, though it would leave a permanent record of his passing. It took only a couple of minutes. He had cut the first links of the second fence when he heard a low growl. Whirling, he saw two Doberman pinschers coming at him like bullets.
He squared himself toward the dogs, his fingers slipping his tanto from a pocket. He let his mind focus. The dogs' eyes were points of deadly determination. Seeing him calm, ready, they missed a stride measuring him and the distance for their leap. Shohei sensed their uncertainty and let his power grow. He threw the dagger.
He felt the first dog lose its will as the razor-sharp metal buried itself in his chest. He turned and baited the second dog with an outstretched arm. As the dog's body came at him, he dropped to the ground and kicked upward under the animal's throat. There was a loud snap and the dog went down-dead.
Such a nuisance. He was not to be discovered. With some effort he pulled the tanto from the first animal's chest, crawled under the fence, and moved off through the bushes. He had gone about fifty yards when he stopped to listen, to ensure that no one followed. There was something moving in the brush. From the pattern of its movement, he could tell it was a man. Painstakingly he followed. They were moving slowly back toward the compound fence but at a location some distance away.
He followed for six hours. Two of those were spent watching a woman in a tree while she studied the compound. She had found a place of good elevation and a big climbable madrona. It provided a view of a small clearing. When she left, he followed her to a truck that he later learned was registered to a Corey Schneider. That was the word he got from his connected men. In hours they had her address and unlisted phone number. She lived in the mountains.
When he put her phone number into the database, it immediately cross-referenced Hans Groiter's phone records. One short call from Hans Groiter's private line. Why did Groiter initiate a call to a woman who spied on Amada, who lived in the mountains, and who was a fringe-radical environmentalist? Why even once? Shohei viewed the telltale call as a slip-part of a pattern of communication normally undertaken from a phone booth or somewhere else untraceable. In a moment of impatience, perhaps, the call had been made from the office. Such mistakes were the undoing of great mysteries.
Shohei decided he would follow her some more.
12
Dan had just gotten off the phone with the sister of the photographer wanted in the investigation of the rape and murder of Catherine Swanson. It seemed that the photographer had been writing a novel and had it on a laptop. Supposedly, he had fled without his computer, hence without his manuscript. According to his sister, that was unthinkable. It was one of many reasons for her certainty that he was dead and not a fugitive. But she had told it all to the police.
He dialed his own sister.
"Hey, you gonna come over and take Nate and Jonathan to the park? They really wanna fish. But they need an adult.''
"I feel tired, so tired."
"Maybe a little apprehensive about going out?"
"A little."
"Take your pills?"
"I just hate taking pills."
"Uh-huh. But remember what the doctor said. To keep the old hard drive on the right track, we need the medicine. Then we can reprogram that brain of yours."
"I know. I know. I'll take my meds and come get the kids."
"Katie, you know it means so much to Nate and to me."
"Of course it means something to you. You're a workaholic, and I'm an enabler. Nate's a fisher-holic. How's Maria doing?"
"I guess fine. She doesn't always tell me."
"I think your boy is falling for her about as fast as his daddy."
"Oh, come on. There is nothing between us. I'm not ready for that and you know it."
"You should be, Dan. You should be. She died two years ago. She wouldn't want this. I'm sane enough to know that even if you don't. Why don't you ask Maria on a date?"
"You think she'd go?"
"Do pigs grunt on Sunday?"
"Well, it's not that easy."
"Is your tongue stuck to the roof of your mouth? What's hard about it?"
"It's like I said, I'm not ready. And we're adversaries."
"Yeah, it's a regular civil war. Sleeping in the same tent must be tough."
Dan found Nate and got him excited about fishing, then played catch until Jonathan showed up. Dan returned to his study and barely felt Katie's good-bye peck on the cheek.
Beside Dan hung every news article about the murder of Catherine Swanson. Since it was bizarre, violent, and had happened on Amada land, he'd thought it was worth investigating.
In front of him a giant bulletin board hid behind pictures and notes. Down the side of one bulletin board, every fact they knew or suspected about the person who took the money: female about 5'10"; lived in the mountains between Palmer and Interstate 5; probably single; lived alone; some police or military training; wore broken-in western riding boots; had connections either to industry or to the environmental movement; drove a black Chevy sedan with a license that included the letters SHR; used a. 300-caliber rifle, according to police ballistics; had a partner; was physically fit.
On a second bulletin board was everything they knew about the Amada compound. Dan had his secretary, Lynette, gathering information every moment she wasn't working on a critical legal project.
He had a huge stack of aerial photos and had begun trying to account for each house through the mountains in a swath 50 miles wide and over 120 miles long. Even though he started with the ones nearest the point of last contact, it was nearly impossible. There was Johnson City and other tiny towns along the rivers and hundreds of ranches. But he had a feeling in his gut that the person they were chasing through those mountains lived in them-somewhere.
He had just hung up from the photo shop and was getting ready to settle into his morning cup of coffee before calling Maria Fischer in her Sacramento office. It was his fifth try to the photo shop to make absolutely certain they had found no trace of his pictures in the rubble.
In his hand was a list of persons owning a residence within twenty miles of the point he and Maria had been blasted off the road.
; His pen ran down the list, making checks by the names: Corey Schneider, Mary Jenkins Smith, Betty Franklin, Jennifer Mills. Most of the entries had two names, a husband and wife. Some listed only a man. Only a few bore the names of single women. These were the next four of those entries, and they were all names about which he had no information. He would check them.
After a couple of good sips of coffee, he got Maria on the line.
"They still claim the pictures were destroyed in the fire," Dan said. "At least they have a sense of humor."
"I thought it was a one-hour photo place and you were going to wait.".
"Nate had his soccer game. Look, I need you to find a female enviro who lives between here and 1–5 and who is really nuts."
"Why do you think we were attacked by an 'enviro'?"
"Just humor me."
"All right, I'll ask around. You gonna check on crazy loggers' wives?"
"Absolutely."
"I have a confession to make," she said.
Dan sat forward in the chair. "What?"
"I think maybe you opened the bathroom door when I was showering. It's bugging the hell out of me."
"Well then, I have a confession to make as well," Dan said. "I have another camera in my bedroom, and while you were showering, I also took a picture of the bat photo and the documents. They're still in the camera."
"How the hell did you know when you opened the door that I would be in the shower?"
"Small window high in the shower. The top of your head is visible as a shadow from outside."
"You're unbelievable. You picked that little lock and opened the door?"
"Ah." He let out a long breath. "I'm just happy that you're being so good-natured about this."
"We know that Kim Lee, an industry man, is now in control of the environmental movement. He's the one who's passing the money. Stealing five hundred thousand won't stop it. Kim has already hushed it up. He controls the press, you know," the German caller said. "And he's got plenty more money to co-opt your people."