by Steve Cash
It was four o’clock in the afternoon. The sun was already a faded, pale yellow far to the west. Low, broken clouds spread across the sky. Sailor and I walked the length and breadth of Homer in twenty minutes. Sailor said he felt an odd sensation, but didn’t elaborate. At the south end of town, jutting out on a spit of land and rock, was a restaurant and saloon with its own sizable dock and direct access to the sea. As we approached, we detoured down to the water’s edge and made our way toward the dock. Suddenly Sailor stopped in his tracks, holding me back and pointing to a lone figure of a man squatting on the dock, staring up at the forest of pines and boulders in the hills above the restaurant. We followed the man’s gaze with our eyes. “Eagles,” Sailor said, and he was right. I could see at least fifty or sixty bald eagles perched in the tops of trees and maybe twenty more in the air, circling and soaring. We walked the ten paces separating us, stopping just short of the dock. The man had his back to us. He was wearing baggy trousers and a heavy, plaid shirt. His hair was dark and thick.
Sailor said, “Sak?”
The man turned in one motion and stared at both of us without saying a word or showing any expression. Gradually, a trace of a smile crossed his face and he reached inside his pocket, fumbling for something. He found it and extended his arm with a closed fist toward Sailor. Then the man surprised us more than we had surprised him. He turned his hand over and opened his palm, offering Sailor a small cube of salt and uttering the oldest of Meq greetings. “Egibizirik bilatu,” he said. “I am Sak.”
Sailor glanced once at me and turned back to Tomizo Hiramura, saying something I had never heard him say to a Giza. “I am Umla-Meq,” he said, “Egizahar Meq, through the tribe of Berones, protectors of the Stone of Memory.” After that, he introduced me in the same manner.
Sailor then dropped his formal speech, but continued talking. Once again I was amazed by his facility with languages. Speaking to Sak in the same even tone he always used, he spoke for twenty minutes. There was nothing unusual about that, except it was in fluent Ainu, a language I had never heard, nor had many others. I had no idea what Sailor said; however, I heard him mention the Fleur-du-Mal twice. He finished abruptly. He bowed his head once, saying in English, “I thank you for listening to the foolish tale of a foolish traveler.”
Silence followed for a moment with Sak and Sailor staring at each other. Sak was only a few inches taller than Sailor and me. He had a wide, square jaw with a thick beard and thick eyebrows over dark eyes, and looked to be about forty to forty-five years old. He and Sailor stood on the dock nearly eye level with each other. In the late light, the only eagles visible were the few still in the air.
A hint of a smile appeared again on Sak’s face. In a deep and clear voice he said, “What do you wish of me, akor ak?”
Within twenty-four hours the three of us were in Anchorage and booking passage to Nome. In that short span of time, Sailor had learned that Sak did know of a casi, or mountain castle, purchased around the turn of the century in Japan by his father and sold to a Meq known to the family only as Xanti. The location of the castle was kept secret, even from Sak, but he said his brother, Nozomi, could find out. I wondered how Sak had known the oldest of Meq greetings, “Egibizirik bilatu,” which roughly translated means “the long-living truth, well-searched for.” I learned from Sailor the ancestors of Pello and the ancestors of Sak were part of the same great clan of Giza who were seafarers and travelers during and after the Time of Ice. Using reindeer hides for sails they navigated the world’s oceans and seas for millennia, migrating immense distances, trading knowledge of the sea, sailing techniques and technologies, culture, and most of all—language. Sailor believed the Ainu tongue, at its root, is the only language on the planet similar to Basque. Sak agreed to help us and even lead us to someone he called “the Russian cousin,” who would take us into Japan without being noticed. Sak seemed more perplexed at how we became aware of his existence at all, let alone found him. Sailor didn’t tell him about “Cardinal,” but he did mention Solomon, whom Sak had heard his father and sister speak of many times and always with great respect.
Landing in Nome, we disembarked just as the first winter winds swept in from Siberia. Sak led us to a small hotel in an older part of the historic town. Nome and the small hotel had both seen better days. A devastating fire in 1934, combined with the Great Depression, had taken its toll on Nome.
The storm that followed the winds gave Sailor and me time to get better acquainted with the odd, middle-aged Ainu, Tomizo Hiramura, or Sak as he preferred to be called. Sak had a keen mind and wit. He spoke English well, with only a slight accent, but he had a habit of incorporating slang terms and certain expressions that were purely his. For example, he called everyone “son” in the same way Mitch might use “man” to address someone, and every so often for no apparent reason, he would shout out the phrase “Holy Coyote!” None of this affected his efficiency, however. After the weather cleared, we traveled up the Seward Peninsula to the home of “the Russian cousin.” The man’s face was lined heavily and burned dark from years at sea. His name was Isipo and Sak introduced him as “the last of the Kuril Ainu.” Isipo owned a fishing trawler, which regularly sailed the coasts of Alaska and Russia, fishing mostly for salmon and trading with the native populations, and caring little for international laws and regulations. He could easily get us to the Russian port of Petropavlovsk in Kamchatka. From there, we could make our way through the Kuril Islands and into Hokkaido. Once we were safely in Japan, we could find Sak’s brother in Tokyo. Isipo assured us we could make the run before the weather got too rough. The plan sounded risky, but good, and Sailor and I put our complete trust in the two Ainu men, two of the strangest characters we’d met in years.
It took Isipo a mere four days to prepare the trawler and gather enough false papers and certificates of commerce to cover us if we happened to be stopped or boarded. Isipo set the time of departure for dawn the next day. Sailor and I used the time to shop for new clothes and footwear more suited for life at sea in rough, cold waters. In Nome, finding them in boys’ sizes wasn’t easy.
Sailor thought we should not send word to St. Louis about what we’d learned or where we were going. “What purpose would it serve?” he asked. “Even if Geaxi or Opari or any one of the others were to receive the information, it would be too late.”
“Too late?”
“Yes. If…no, I should say when the Japanese are finally at war with the West, the Fleur-du-Mal will surely return to his castle and Zuriaa, and especially Susheela the Ninth. He will not lose her nor take the chance of it. I have no doubt.”
“How do you know the Japanese will be at war with the West?”
“I have seen countless wars begin, Zianno. Except in scale, this one is no different. Believe me, another world war is coming. It is simply a matter of time.”
Luck was with us crossing the Bering Strait and sailing south to the fishing lanes along the coast of Russia. Isipo handled the trawler skillfully, while navigating our way through wild and turbulent seas. Many times, the troughs between waves sank twenty to thirty feet deep. Nevertheless, in a month, we were preparing to enter Avacha Bay and the city of Petropavlovsk. It was bitterly cold, but clear, and the majestic, snow-covered peaks of three separate volcanoes rose up behind and around the old port.
“Koryaksky, Avachinsky, and Kozelsky,” Isipo said, waving at each of them one by one. “Most beautiful,” he added with a grin.
There was a sizable Soviet naval force stationed in Petropavlovsk, as well as an extensive coast guard. Isipo was stopped by a small patrol boat and asked a few questions. Gratefully, we were cleared and told to proceed into port. We made repairs and restocked supplies, then set out for the Kurils the next day.
In three weeks, we’d snaked our way south as far as Kunashir Island, where we were surprised just after dawn by a Japanese naval patrol. While Sailor and I stayed silent and unseen in the background, Isipo showed the young lieutenant his false papers. The li
eutenant scanned the papers and gave Isipo and Sak a hard, vicious look, followed by an expression of disgust. He turned and ordered his first officer to draw his pistol and arrest Isipo. Sailor and I glanced at each other. We hadn’t used the Stones in years, but we had no choice. Without hesitating, Sailor and I withdrew our Stones and held them out toward the two sailors.
“Lo geltitu, lo geltitu,” we droned in unison. “Ahaztu! Ahaztu!”
The lieutenant’s face suddenly clouded over with confusion and he instantly went blank. His first officer dropped his pistol on the deck and stared at it, as if the gun had no meaning whatsoever.
“Go like lambs, now, Giza. You will forget,” Sailor said in perfect Japanese. “Ahaztu!” he repeated.
The two sailors climbed slowly back into their patrol boat and the lieutenant walked numbly toward the bow and pointed with a weak finger in the direction of the port of Yuzhno-Kurilsk. In minutes, the patrol boat was over the horizon and Isipo headed the trawler south to Hokkaido. He and Sak never said a word about what they’d witnessed. They both seemed to have expected it. By the time the sun set, we’d cleared the straits and rounded the eastern coast of Hokkaido and were slipping into Kushiro as just another fishing boat, coming in a little late. After all that time in Alaska, we were finally in Japan. It was the last day of January 1940. That same night, Sailor’s dreams began again.
We said farewell to Isipo from the docks in Kushiro. He was going to return to Petropavlovsk and spend a few weeks, depending on the weather, and eventually sail home to Alaska and the Seward Peninsula. Sailor thanked him in Ainu and in Meq. Isipo nodded and shook our hands. His hands were strong and sinewy as rope. He told Sak to come home in one piece, then said good-bye.
We turned and disappeared fast. We had no legitimate identification, and wouldn’t have until we reached Sapporo and the home of Sak’s sister, Shutratek. It helped that Sak was an Ainu and he and Sailor spoke Japanese, but none of us were legal. We decided in case we were asked for identification, Sailor and I would pose as Portuguese orphans abandoned in Macao and rescued by Sak. Luckily, we had no confrontations because the story would never hold up to someone like the naval lieutenant we had encountered at sea. Neither Sailor nor I wanted to use the Stones again unless absolutely necessary.
We followed several lonely, wintry roads to Obihiro, catching short rides where we could. There weren’t many. Along the way, we exchanged our Western clothes, piece by piece, until we were indistinguishable in a crowd. In Obihiro, we obtained seats on the only bus traveling through the mountains to Sapporo. It was a long, beautiful, treacherous journey, and cold. Sailor seemed to doze and sleep often on the trip, much more than usual. Every time he woke he muttered a name under his breath. He said the name slowly, with his eyes closed and a faint smile on his lips. In a low whisper, he breathed, “Su…shee…la.” He said it with such quiet reverence, I could think of only one thing. I knew it didn’t make sense, but it sounded as if he was in love.
As we approached the outskirts of Sapporo, Sak seemed bewildered by how much the city had changed and grown since he’d last seen it. I asked how long it had been and he paused before answering. He was anxious and agitated. I knew something or someone had driven him from Sapporo and his family years earlier, but he’d never given a reason and I’d never asked. Sak said, “Thirty years next month.” His anxiety was understandable. He also had no gift to give his sister, and this seemed to upset him more than anything else. Sailor solved the problem by removing the piece of onyx hanging on the tassle of the small braid behind his ear. “This should suffice,” Sailor said. “It is very old and from very far away—Ethiopia.” He handed Sak the polished black stone. Sak accepted it humbly and thanked Sailor for saving him profound embarrassment.
Shutratek lived in a large complex of houses and buildings, all clinging to and around the sides of a steep hill. A wide veranda circled the house on three sides and made the view even better. Birch trees and scrub pine crowded the hillside. Falling snow kept the neighborhood quiet and traffic was light. Sak knocked once on the door.
When their eyes met Shutratek and Sak both began to cry. Neither made a sound. He presented her the stone and they held each other in silence and let the tears roll down their faces. Shutratek was in her mid-sixties; a short, stout woman with steel gray eyes and silver hair pulled back and tied in a bun at the back of her head. “My brother,” she said finally in Ainu. She looked once at Sailor, then over to me and smiled. I wondered if she remembered. “You have very old eyes for one so young,” she said. I laughed then, recalling what her father, Sangea, had told her to tell me on the train.
“I wasn’t sure if you’d remember,” I said.
Shutratek laughed along with me, a big hearty laugh for such a small woman. “Nineteen-oh-four,” she said. “Seems like yesterday.”
Shutratek served us a delicious fish and onion soup with noodles and she warmed her best sake. She smiled each time she looked in Sak’s eyes, but their reunion was bittersweet. Sak learned their father and his older brother, Nozomi, had been murdered only three years after Sak left Sapporo. He also learned his eldest brother, Bikki, the one who remained in the United States at the conclusion of the World’s Fair, had never come home. Shutratek and Sak were now each other’s last living relative. When Shutratek learned our purpose and the reason for Sak’s return was to find Xanti Otso and his fortress/prison, she gasped and covered her mouth with her hand.
“This one you seek,” she said, “he have green eyes, wear ruby earrings?”
“Yes!” Sailor interrupted. “Yes, he does.”
Shutratek turned and put both hands on her brother’s face. “This is same one who kill father and Nozomi,” she said. Waiting a moment, then speaking in Ainu, she said, “He carve roses in their backs, Tomizo.”
Sak was shocked, but I wasn’t, nor was Sailor. It made perfect sense in the Fleur-du-Mal’s mind to eliminate anyone who had assisted him in finding his fortress, then leave his grotesque signature and calling card behind for much darker reasons.
“Shutratek,” Sailor said, “do you know the location of this place?”
“No,” she answered. Shutratek saw the disappointment spread across Sailor’s face. “I never learn…they never tell,” she said.
I looked over at Sailor and he looked at me. His “ghost eye” clouded over and swirled. We were in Japan all right, but it felt like we were back at the beginning.
“We’ll find it, Sailor,” I said. “And we’ll find her.”
“I will go with you,” Sak said. There was a fury in his eyes I understood well.
“And so I,” Shutratek said, taking Sak’s hand in hers.
By April, our search was under way. We traveled together posing as grandparents and grandchildren. Sak and Shutratek played their parts well. Sailor and I darkened our faces and all of us dressed simply. We were rarely stopped and both Sak and Shutratek could ask our questions and make our inquiries. We used buses and trains, crisscrossing the landscape and following whatever information we could uncover, which was little or none. The hardest part of the puzzle was in knowing and defining exactly what we were seeking. The medieval castle of Japan is called a shiro and there were less than a hundred not in ruins. But as Sailor pointed out, the Fleur-du-Mal would prize the location of the fortress more than condition. He would have it renovated to his specifications regardless of its physical state. This made the number of possible locations increase tenfold. The entire northern island and province of Hokkaido was eliminated from the search because of its isolation. Tokyo was taken from the list for the opposite reason—it was too convenient and likely to be bombed first if war broke out. We thought it more probable the Fleur-du-Mal would choose somewhere in the mountains or along the coast. Therefore, we ignored the plains-type castles and fortresses and concentrated on the mountain castles, which are a different type of structure and all located in central and southern Honshu or on the island provinces of Shikoku and Kyushu.
That first
summer and fall, Sailor remained patient in our search, although his dreams continued nightly. He didn’t talk about them, but gradually his eyes showed concern, frustration, and alarm. The military presence and increasing numbers of soldiers everywhere, combined with the fanatic actions, attitudes, and speeches of their leaders, made him feel certain war with the West was imminent. Sailor said he agreed with Zeru-Meq, who loved all of Japan and Japanese culture, but hated the Japanese Empire.
We pushed on through the winter and spring and into the following summer. The fall of 1941 found us in and around the ancient capital of Nara. By December, we had moved to Kyoto and were staying as guests of a Sumi-e master Sailor and Sak had befriended. On the eighth of December, Shutratek and I awoke early and walked down to the open market. As we entered, the smell of daikon was everywhere, overpowering and masking the other fresh scents in the market. Music was blaring through a loudspeaker directly above the daikon stand. At seven o’clock, the Japan Broadcasting Corporation began their first news broadcast of the day. The local population usually paid little attention to the radio, but that morning they all stopped precisely where they were standing and every one of them acted stunned by what they heard. I asked Shutratek what the man had said. She blinked once, as if waking herself, then translated literally: “The Army and Navy divisions of Imperial Headquarters jointly announced at six o’clock this morning, December 8, that the Imperial Army and Navy forces have begun hostilities against the American and British forces in the Pacific at dawn today.” World War II had finally erupted. From that moment on, I could not smell daikon without thinking of war.
That evening, Sailor and I discussed our plight and tried to speculate on where Opari, Geaxi, Mowsel, Ray, and Nova might be, or more accurately, where they got caught, because from now on it would be impossible to move at will. We also assumed we had missed our chance to find Susheela the Ninth before the Fleur-du-Mal returned. Sailor was certain the Fleurdu-Mal was already in Japan, or would be shortly. Once he returned, there was no predicting what he might have in mind for Susheela the Ninth. This thought upset Sailor visibly. His face tightened and his “ghost eye” clouded and blackened like a thunderstorm. Much later that night, Sailor shook me awake and held me by the shoulders, staring at me. His “ghost eye” was completely clear.