She nodded. "The gentlemen are upstairs, sir."
"Wonderful! Which room?"
"Ichigo room—sign on door. It is private. May I announce you?"
Smiling, Burroughs got up. "No, that's all right—I'd rather surprise them. Can you direct me?"
The geisha was obliging—these girls were paid to be—and Burroughs was about to go up a stairway when he glimpsed somebody starting down. Ducking back around, tucking into the recess of the restroom hallway, Burroughs allowed Otto Kuhn to exit the stairwell and head out the entryway to the parking lot.
Then the writer slipped his shoes back on and followed after.
Kuhn moved quickly, his white linen suit flashing in the night, like a ghost on the run; but Burroughs trotted after him and caught up with the German near the parked Caddy.
"Well, Otto," Burroughs said, "we just keep bumping into each other."
Startled, Kuhn wheeled, blue eyes wide in the bland oval of his face. "Burroughs ... Edgar. I didn't know you frequented the Shuncho-ro."
"My first time."
"You, uh, simply must try the ogana tonight... superb. Well, if you'll excuse me—"
Burroughs stopped him with a hand on an elbow.
"You're always in such a rash, Otto. I'm a driven, intense sort of fella myself... but I've learned to relax in Oahu."
Kuhn drew away from Burroughs's grasp. "Edgar, please, my wife is waiting."
"Really? You didn't take her along to the restaurant, on a Saturday night? I hope you two kids aren't having trouble."
Irritated, Kuhn frowned saying, "She doesn't care for Japanese cuisine. If you'll excuse me ..."
"Or maybe you were still doing business? I know you had business downtown, earlier—maybe this is an extension of that."
Kuhn's eyes hardened. "If it is business—it's my business... and, frankly, none of yours."
"Funny that you would be dining with Mr. Mori-mura, tonight, when you almost went out of your way, at the luau last night, to avoid him."
Mention of the vice consul's name had widened the blue eyes again; Kuhn had the look of a startled deer. "Who says I was dining with... what was the name?"
"Morimura, and the waitress in there said you and he had a private room upstairs."
Kuhn lifted his chin. "What are you implying?"
"Not romance. You see, Otto, I think somebody... maybe your Jap pal in there... called you last night, woke you and your lovely wife up."
"I don't know what you're talking about."
"I'm talking about you pinning a murder on that poor bastard Harry Kamana."
Kuhn's bland features contorted fiercely. "You're out of your mind! I saw that musician bludgeon that girl with a rock—he bashed her damn skull in!"
"Did he? Or did you?"
The German drew back, sucking in a breath. Then, as if hurt, even offended, he said, "I don't have to put up with this."
"Maybe not from me... but my friend Detective Jardine, him you'll have to talk to. Last night you added to some already damning evidence to help make Kamana the obvious, and only, suspect. Today, though, things are looking different."
"What are you talking about?"
"I'm talking about that late-night phone call. I'm talking about your vice-consul pal in there bawling out that girl in public, just hours before her murder."
Kuhn shoved Burroughs, roughly, and the writer knocked into the next parked car with a metallic whump. Kuhn was opening his car door, getting in, when Burroughs latched onto his shoulder, spun him around and slammed a fist into his face.
His mouth bloody, Kuhn shoved Burroughs again, then went clawing inside his white jacket; the German's fingers were on a small black Liiger, snugged away in a shoulder holster, when Burroughs doubled him over with a hard fist to the belly.
Dazed, Kuhn tumbled to the crushed coral, sitting between his Caddy and the parked car next door, lean-ing on both hands, while Burroughs reached down and inside the man's jacket and plucked the L¸ger like a hard little flower.
Then the writer pressed the automatic's barrel to the German's forehead, and released the safety, a tiny click that echoed in the stillness of the night.
Eyes glittering with alarm, Kuhn said, "What do you want?"
"The truth. Did you see Kamana kill that girl?"
Swallowing thickly, the German shook his head, and the pressed-to-his-flesh pistol went along. "Morimura called me. Told me what to say."
"Did Morimura kill her?"
"I don't know. Maybe. I only know he wanted the musician identified. As far as I know, Kamana really could be the killer... I just... I just didn't see him do it."
"Why was Pearl Harada killed?"
"I don't know, I don't know. She flitted around—she was a pretty girl. Jealousy makes men crazy."
"Did you have an affair with her?"
"No! No. Of course not."
Burroughs pushed harder against the German's forehead. "What about Morimura?"
"I don't know! I don't know....I'm not his goddamn chaperon."
"No, you're his stooge, though. Or should I say his understudy?"
Now the blue eyes tightened—alarm dissolving into fear. "Wh... what do you mean?"
"The Consulate's been busy burning its papers; coded messages to Japan have been flying. You're a good Nazi, aren't you, Otto? Waiting to help your ally, after we're at war, and diplomats like Morimura are suddenly prisoners...."
Stiffly, Kuhn said, "I am not a Nazi."
"Should I pass that news along to your uncle Himmler?"
"Why are you ... what are you ... You're just a writer!"
"I'm just an American. Otto—did that girl's murder have anything to do with espionage?"
"What? No! How should I know?"
Burroughs pressed harder with the gun barrel. 'Try again."
Trembling now, sweat pearling down his forehead, Kuhn said, "I swear to sweet Jesus I don't know....I told you what you wanted! I admitted Morimura called me... that alone could get me killed."
Burroughs thought about that—then removed the gun from the German's forehead; it had left an impression, in several ways.
"Get the hell out of here," Burroughs told him, disgustedly.
Kuhn swallowed again. "What about my gun?"
"Spoils of war," Burroughs said, and dropped it into his pocket.
Kuhn didn't argue the point; he scrambled to his feet, climbed into his car and—as Burroughs headed back toward the Shuncho-ro—roared out, throwing crushed coral, finally waking up the Japanese chauffeur ... for a few moments.
The word Ichigo appeared in both English and Japanese on a small oak plaque by an upstairs door. Burroughs knocked.
A male voice from within answered: "Yes?"
The writer spoke to the door. "Mr. Morimura? Ed Burroughs. Could I have a word with you?"
Moments later, the door cracked open. The handsome young Japanese diplomat stood eye to eye with Burroughs; Morimura's black hair was slicked back, and his slender form was wrapped up in an off-white robe with a scarlet sash. His feet were bare. He smelled heavily of musk.
"I do not understand, Mr. Burroughs." Morimura's expression was friendly but his dark eyes were not. "Why do you seek me here?"
Burroughs leaned a hand against the doorjamb. "I took a chance you might be at the Shuncho-ro. I heard it was kind of a second home to you." "Could we not meet another time, another place?"
"This won't take long—I just want to chat for a few minutes. May I come in?"
"I have company."
Burroughs pushed the door open and shouldered past Morimura. At a low table, three Japanese girls wearing nothing at all were sitting on tatami mats. They were lovely of face and form, though their frozen embarrassment was painful to see.
"Put your kimonos on, girls," Burroughs said, "and take a break."
The pretty trio made sounds that mingled distress with giggling as they quickly got into their kimonos, which had been folded neatly on the floor behind them. This was another s
parsely decorated, oak-lined, cream-walled room; a row of big picture windows looked out onto the ocean ... and Pearl Harbor, Ford Island visible to the west, the Army's Hickam Field just to the left. A powerful telescope on a stand awaited any ... tourist... who might want a better, closer look.
The now-clothed geishas scurried out past Morimura, who stood near the door with his arms folded, his face blank.
The consul said, "You are a rude and foolish man."
Burroughs strolled over and touched the telescope admiringly. "Maybe it's just cultural differences. Besides, I don't think you're a fool—even if everybody else seems to."
"Perhaps all Americans are foolish."
"They are if they don't think you're a damn spy."
Morimura smiled, almost gently. He gestured to the low table and the tatami mats. "Sake, Mr. Burroughs?"
"No thanks. I'm on the wagon."
"Wagon?"
"Never mind. But I'll sit with you, while you drink."
They sat across from each other at the low table; neither partook of the pitcher of sake.
Morimura's arms were again folded. "I am not a spy, Mr. Burroughs—I am a diplomat. Any information I have obtained has been through strictly legal means. Blame your own... American openness. Much can be gleaned from your daily newspapers, for example—and is there a law against looking through a telescope at a restaurant's lovely view?"
"Did you kill Pearl Harada?"
Morimura blinked, and his expression became one of horror. "What? What a ridiculous question!"
"Did you?"
"No. Certainly not I barely knew her."
"Do you... 'barely' know her, the way you 'barely' know those three geisha girls?"
"No. The singer and I were not romantically involved."
"How about carnally?"
"No."
"Then why were you arguing with her, in the Niumalu parking lot, the night of her murder?"
Morimura's eyes widened—obviously, he didn't know he and Pearl had been seen.
"Her uncle asked me to speak to her."
"Her uncle? The grocer?"
"Yes. He heard rumors she was planning to marry an American boy. A sailor. He disapproved. I merely conveyed this message to her, and she was....disrespectful, both to me and in speaking of her uncle."
"Why didn't her uncle tell her this himself? He was around the Niumalu in the afternoon."
Morimura glared at Burroughs. "Why are you curious? What business is it to you, the murder of this girl?"
"I helped put the cuffs on Harry Kamana... I caught him at the beach with his hands bloody."
The diplomat nodded. "This I have heard."
"Between the two of us, you and me, we really nailed the poor bastard."
"The two of us? Nail? Your meaning escapes me."
"You called Otto Kuhn in the middle of the night, and had him pretend to be an eyewitness. You had him finger that musician."
"Nonsense."
"Kuhn told me himself."
Morimura frowned. "If so, he lies. When did he say this?"
"Just now, in the parking lot. I don't blame you for trading his company in on those geishas... no comparison. Anyway, Otto admitted you called him, and had him play eyewitness. You see, Otto receiving a call last night, well... that's a known fact."
"Really? I understood there was no switchboard at the Niumalu."
Burroughs grinned. "How interesting that you'd know a trivial detail like that, Mr. Morimura, considering you're not at all involved in this. By the way, don't take it out on Otto—he's afraid you'll kill him, or have him killed, because of what he told me."
"Did you bribe the German?"
"Hell no."
"Ah." Morimura's eyes narrowed. "I see the scrape on your knuckles. You beat it out of him." Morimura stood. "Perhaps you would care to try taking that... very American approach to seeking information... with me."
The consul moved away from the low table and struck a martial-arts pose. A single eyebrow raised, tiny smile on his thin lips, Morimura said, "Judo."
Burroughs rose and took the L¸ger out and pointed it at him and said, "Gun."
Eyes flickering with fear, the supposed diplomat slowly raised his hands. "Shoot me if you wish, Mr. Burroughs ....but I will say nothing more. I am not like Otto Kuhn. I am not weak."
"And I'm not a murderer," Burroughs said, and slipped the gun in his pocket, and went out.
ELEVEN
Hotel Street
The exceptionally beautiful weather and the lopsided victory in this afternoon's football game coalesced into a night of rampant partying, excessive even for a Saturday in Honolulu. The city was rife with private parties and public revelry, and alive with music, from radios bleeding syrupy Hawaiian strains, seemingly designed to make lonely men feel even lonelier, to a lively battle of the bands at the Naval Receiving Station at Pearl Harbor, where the U.S.S. Arizona band was going over big, with the upbeat likes of "Take the A Train." Hotel ballrooms, like the Royal Hawaiian and the Ala Moana, were offering fox-trots, while swing music emanated from the town's less stodgy bandstands, like those at the Niumalu or the dance hall at Waikiki Amusement Park.
Swing also jumped from jukeboxes up and down Hotel Street, where sailors and soldiers swarmed in ribbons of white and khaki. A fleet of rickety taxis, wheezing buses and rattletrap jalopies charged down the two-lane highway connecting Pearl Harbor and Honolulu, conveying the invading horde to their dropping-off spot: the Army and Navy YMCA, at the eastern end of Hotel Street, a suitable starting point for an evening of good-natured debauchery.
Awash in garish neon, flickering under the strobe of fluorescent bulbs, Hotel Street was a glorified alleyway lined with low-slung stucco buildings wearing tin awnings like gambler's shades. To boys longing for home, the midway that was Hotel Street seemed to echo carnivals and state fairs, this rude collection of taverns, trinket counters, massage parlors, photo booths, pool halls, shooting galleries, curio stores, tattoo artists, and dime-a-dance joints.
Along the narrow sidewalks of every block were one or two barbershops, the barbers invariably young attractive Japanese women, and at least one lei shop, with pretty Hawaiian girls stringing flowers. Other sorts of "leis" were available, as well: hotels whose rooms all had the shades drawn—the Rex, the Anchor, the Ritz—attracted lines down the block of sailors and soldiers waiting to choose between two varieties of "room": three dollars for three minutes, or five dollars for an extended stay, up to ten. Relatively safe, too: the local police, in turning a blind if well-paid eye, insisted on weekly blood tests for these unofficially sanctioned soiled doves.
Hully and Jardine had recruited Sam Fujimoto to join on their Hotel Street expedition. Sam knew both
Ensign Bill Fielder and Corporal Jack Stanton, the former better than the latter, but in either case enough to recognize either in this sea of uniforms. Starting at the west end, Hully and Jardine, who were on a first-name basis now, took one side of the street, while Sam took the other—they had agreed to rendezvous at the Black Cat Cafe in an hour and a half.
"You figure whoever killed Pearl Harada," Hully said to the Portuguese detective, "killed Terry Mizuha, as well."
They were shouldering their way down the tight, teeming sidewalk, faces around them flushed with neon—theirs, too.
"Probably," Jardine said.
"Why was Terry killed? What could he have known?"
Jardine shrugged. "It's possible this Terry was a real eyewitness ... which may be more than can be said for Otto Kuhn."
A group of sailors slouched under a tin awning in front of a cafe, laughing, smoking, caps at jaunty an-gles, pant legs flapping in the almost cool breeze.
Hully said, 'Terry wouldn't've had to be an eyewitness to be dangerous to the killer. Everybody knew he and Pearl were best friends. She might have confided in Terry about something that allowed him to know, or anyway strongly suspect, the murderer's identity."
Jardine nodded. "There's another possibility."
>
"Which is?"
They were passing by a shooting gallery where soldiers were throwing baseballs at milk cans, and sailors were playing Skee-Ball and pinball.
"Perhaps," Jardine said, 'Terry Mizuha wasn't strictly mahu—maybe he was even closer to Pearl than we've been led to believe."
"Oh, that's crazy...."
"Is it? Gates have been known to swing both ways, on this island. Suppose this jealous sailor pal of yours, or that soldier, came upon Terry and Pearl, together on the beach?"
"What, and confronted by a sudden act of violence, Terry fled?"
"Yes ... and was afraid to come forward, for fear of looking a coward—hoping his silence would buy him a free pass from the killer."
"I don't buy it, John."
The detective summoned a thin smile. "Well, it's your own damn fault, Hully."
"My fault?"
"You're the one that started me thinking—I was content with Harry Kamana as the murderer."
Looking for Bill and Stanton, Hully and Jardine tried various taverns—the Two Jacks, the Mint, the New Emma Cafe—wading through clouds of cigarette smoke laced with the smell of stale beer, sorting swarms of sailors and soldiers, who were crowded at tables, packed in booths, flirting with Oriental waitresses, whom they so greatly outnumbered. None of the fresh, young, happy, sad faces belonged to Bill Fielder or Jack Stanton.
Hully and the detective checked tattoo parlors, where boys sat bare-chested under bare bulbs as Filipino artists inscribed American flesh with hula girls, anchors and "Mother." They tried curio shops where this sailor bought a fringed pillow cursively designated "Honolulu," and that soldier purchased a monkey-pod carving. They tried storefront photo studios, where gobs and GIs posed with pretty, grass-skirted Hawaiian girls who had no interest in a date. They tried cafÈ's—the Bunny Ranch, Lousy Lui's, Swanky Franky—where servicemen who had gotten drunk too fast tried to sober up just as quickly. No Fielder; no Stanton.
They tried a dime-a-dance joint, a barnlike second-floor ballroom not unlike a church hall or an Elks club. A small combo—piano, guitar, drums—played slow tunes; tables were scattered on either side of the heavily varnished, underlit cavern. Many of the girls were surprisingly good-looking, Hully thought, a variety of Japanese, Chinese, Puerto Rican, Hawaiian and combinations thereof—also the occasional white girl—in low-cut, shoulder-baring evening gowns. No liquor was sold on the premises, nor was it allowed to be brought in.
The Pearl Harbor Murders Page 12