Assignment - Manchurian Doll

by Edward S. Aarons

  Their struggle was violent and silent. He was aware of her as a woman, and there was a sexuality to the twining effort of her scissoring legs, the heave and twist of her body. He was reluctant to really hurt her. But she stabbed cruelly at a neural center in the side of his neck, and his left arm went numb. She kneed him in the stomach, kicked free, and scrambled, already running, to her feet. He tackled her about the hips and brought her down with a hard thump. Her skirt tore. He tried to pin her as she lay momentarily with her face in the dusty weeds, but she got away again, the edge of her palm cracking across the bridge of his nose. He began to regret his aim to let her almost break free and then crush her spirit with another recapture. Then she slid away and ran for the wall—her second mistake. Her newfound violence, triggered by whatever psychic meaning the words “Pere Jacques” had for her, made her only a panic-stricken creature trying to find solace in the dark.

  When he caught her, he pinned her throat with his forearm and put a knee into her stomach until she whimpered and her face went white in the pale moonlight. The shadows of the mountain pines filled her eyes. She struggled wildly for breath, but he kept up the pressure until her mouth opened and her body shuddered and she was abruptly still. He released his weight carefully.

  Watching her, still shocked by the violence and brutality of her struggle, he heard the sound of a motor car at the gates and Eliot’s shout of warning and the sound of running feet on the other side of the house.

  He carried Nadja back to the room. She breathed with raw, uncertain gasps. She would be deathly sick when she came to. He would have to revise his strategy, in view of the violent trauma his words had induced in her.

  He tied her to the bed, fashioning a line by tearing apart a bamboo screen. He worked quickly, aware of the sounds of argument from the front of the house. He had just finished when Tagashi entered. The man’s face was perplexed.

  “She did not talk?”

  “Not much. I hit a vital nerve, though. She admits she and Alexi were in love when she studied in Moscow. Alexi has been in love with her all through the time they’ve been separated at different duty posts.”

  “Then she will help him? And us?”

  “Not yet. She needs time to shift her perspectives.” “There is no time. She is either with us, or she destroys us. This woman has a bad record, Durell-san. Nothing directly can be charged to her, but if she escapes, she can wreck our operation.”

  “She won’t escape. Without her, we have no chance of finding Kaminov, anyway. She went haywire when I mentioned the words ‘Pere Jacques.’ I’m not a psychiatrist, Tagashi, but her reaction was genuine. She couldn’t fake it. The words are associated with a bad shock she got once, perhaps as a child. It may be that she can remember, but refuses to do so now. I wish we had more of her background files. I think, from the way she reacted, it’s tied up far back in her past, and with Kaminov.”

  “We know little of her history. And we have no time for subleties.” Tagashi’s eyes were suddenly cruel. “We committed this girl to our side. She knows us, can identify us. She can never be released. Does she understand that?”

  “I think so. I’ll try her again soon. Without her, Kaminov won’t come over to us, and SEATO will have to fish for its military data elsewhere—and by then it may be too late.”

  “If she refuses to cooperate, we must eliminate her, then,” Tagashi said flatly.

  Durell nodded. “We’ll see.”

  The tall Japanese turned his gaze from the girl. His grizzled, round head was bowed for a moment. Then he spoke on a different note.

  “I would not have interrupted you, Durell-san, but we have visitors. Two of Omaru’s men are here. Omaru got off the train and arranged the log blockade, and he is staying for the night in the village inn nearby. He wishes to discuss business with you, and has sent his men for you.”

  “Just like that?”

  “In Omaru’s world,” Tagashi said, “he is accustomed to obedience.”

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  They were two small, lithe Japanese in dark suits, and their eyes in their flat faces were impassive and cold. They carried U.S. Army Colts—undoubtedly stolen from an American military depot—and looked ready to use them. When Durell walked into the main room, Eliot Barnes glanced at him with chagrin. Yuki Tagashi sat cross-legged on the floor mat and looked angry and sullen.

  “Durell-san?” one of the small men said. “You come with us at once, please.”

  The other said: “You have the Russian woman spy?” Durell nodded. “Yes, we have her.”

  “Omaru wants her, too.”

  “Omaru can’t have her,” Durell said.

  “You are to bring her with you.”

  “No. Let Omaru come here, then.”

  The first man lifted his Colt tentatively. Durell walked across the room at once and without warning knocked the gun aside and slapped the man open-handed across his toothy mouth. There came a hiss of anger. The second gunman stepped forward, eyes narrowed.

  Durell said: “I will discuss the girl with Omaru, not with you.”

  For a moment the room was charged with violence. Then the first man shrugged and spoke sharply to his companion.

  “The insult will be remembered,” he said to Durell. “But we obey orders. Will you come with us now?”

  “I’m ready,” Durell said. “I’m looking forward to your Omaru. We have a few things to discuss.”

  Eliot began to protest, but Durell cut him off and followed the two men outside. Yuki smiled strangely. He didn’t like it, but he had to trust Tagashi to control matters in regard to Nadja Osmanovna.

  A small car was parked in the shadows of the gatekeeper’s hut. One of the men got behind the wheel and Durell sat beside him. The second man got in the back.

  “How far do we go?” Durell asked.

  “It is not far,” said the driver.

  In less than a minute they were twisting down the forest road and across a small river into the sleeping village. The thatched houses were all dark. Their passage aroused no one except a yelping dog. But some lights glowed on the opposite bank of the river, and this was their destination.

  It was a second-class Japanese inn, of red-painted wood, with an ideogram on the gatepost naming it the Suehiro, which meant The Folding Fan. The name signified good luck, but Durell expected none.

  The proprietor was a wizened old man in a yellow kimono who bowed repeatedly and then retreated at a growl from the driver. The inn consisted of a rambling series of wings, all dark except for the largest at the extreme right. The two gunmen headed Durell there, and he followed a gravel path between vague shrubbery where a small pond glimmered in the starlight.

  “You go in alone,” the driver said. “Omaru waits.”

  “How do I get back?” Durell asked.

  “Omaru-san may invite you to be his guest. If he asks you to stay, you stay. One way or another.”

  Durell slipped off his shoes and stepped into the inn. The paper screens were pale gold, and the usual tokonoma alcove held a simple stone Korean vase and a strip of red paper with beautifully brushed ideograms. A charcoal brazier took the mountain chill off the room. There were some low stools, a lacquered table, and a huge Western overstaffed chair, which looked most incongruous in this rustic mountain place.

  Omaru waited for him in the big chair.

  He looked even more enormous than when Durell first saw him on the train. He wore a pink yukata with family ideograms embroidered on the back. His bald head gleamed as if waxed, and there was no neck connecting the head to the ponderous shoulders and chest. Yet his feet, like the feet of many fat men, were small and even dainty. A Japanese girl was washing them, kneeling, her face averted as Durell entered. The wooden bowl she used held perfumed water. She seemed frightened, trembling. When Omaru touched her shoulder, she seemed glad to jump up and dart from the room.

  “Durell-san, I trust you will forgive my impetuous invitation. One must extemporize at times, and many things might ha
ve gone wrong tonight, had I not decided to act in your interests as well as mine. Please be seated. Would you like a drink?”

  “Nothing, thanks,” Durell said. “I’ll stand.”

  Omaru laughed, his belly shaking. “You are startled by my Irish accent? Naturally. But I am sure you know all about my early days in Dublin, when my poor mother took me home from the Orient and was hounded in the streets because my eyes were a wee bit slanty.” Omaru’s voice, though soft, had the quality of making the air tremble. His pale blue eyes were chips of weathered stone as he regarded Durell’s uncompromising figure. “You look like a man I can do business with. Not that I trust you, mind, any more than you trust me. But it seems we can work to mutual advantage in this Kaminov matter. Is it still arranged that I put my organization at your disposal?”

  “It is left to my discretion,” Durell said.

  “The price I set was twenty thousand dollars, the entire sum payable in American currency, in advance.” Omaru held out a pink hand. “I will take it now.”

  “Not yet. We have some problems.”

  “Nadja Osmanovna? Has she not talked yet?”

  “No.”

  “There are ways, sir, to elicit information.”

  “Not this time. She must be a willing ally.”

  “She will never be that. Her reputation makes the entire premise false. Alexi Kaminov is an idealist, a throwback to the romantic Russian soul of Tolstoi and Dostoievsky. Nadja is the new breed. Romance is unimportant to her. Alexi dreams of passion and endless love; she dreams of her position in the state heirarchy. She will not help us. Yet we need her advice, eh? We must learn the rendezvous point where we can kidnap Colonel Kaminov.”

  “He will be useless if he must be taken by force.” Omaru looked like a complacent Buddha. “I will not presume to advise you on your affairs. My job is to deliver Kaminov into your hands, for twenty thousand dollars. He will surrender only to you, in company with the girl, is that correct? This is the way the message read. I put the message into the appropriate pipeline and here you are, eh? A long way from home. My boat is ready in Akijuro. It takes thirty hours to cross the Japan Sea. We need only the rendezvous point, and Nadja will know this. You must make her talk, sir.”

  “It will take time.”

  “We have no time,” Omaru said. “Turn the girl over to me. Once we have the information from her, she can be eliminated. We can persuade Colonel Kaminov to cooperate. He will be caught between two millstones, eh? He will be committed to defect; he will not be able to go back then. So he will dangle between them and us. We offer him safety, a new life. Can he refuse? He will divulge the military statistics you seek. The future is predictable, whatever disappointment he suffers at not having Nadja waiting for his eager arms.”

  Omaru sighed and belched loudly. “Ours is a devious business. You are in it for patriotic motives, or perhaps from some private compulsions toward such a life. It is of no consequence to me. I owe allegiance to no land and no flag. Money is my only god, Mr. Durell. I have earned a lot of it through the Kaiwa Corporation, trading in bodies and propaganda in the Far East. I expect to earn more money in the future. So you know what I am, and what I do.”

  “I don’t deal with double agents and murderers,” Durell said.

  “You do me an injustice, sir. No doubt my activities irritate you. You would like to eliminate me and Kaiwa from events here, perhaps? But I make myself too useful to your side, as in this instance. Am I too complacent? I think not. Facts are facts. Who else can bring Colonel Kaminov to safety from Manchuria, into your hands? No one but Omaru.” “You don’t know where he is, however.”

  Omaru’s voice hardened. “I act in good faith. Without Kaiwa, Colonel Kaminov could never have contacted you. Are you suggesting that we do not do business together?”

  “Correct,” Durell said. “It’s no deal.”

  “You owe me twenty thousand dollars.”

  “You owe me some explanations. I don’t like being sent for by a couple of hoods—”

  “My apologies. You seem sensitive, sir.”

  “Perhaps I am.”

  “Have you the money with you?”

  “I have,” Durell said. “I will pay only ten thousand for what you have done now. Nothing more.”

  Omaru frowned. He shifted his massive weight in the big chair, stroked his huge belly, folded pale fat fingers like sausages over his pink yukata. The charcoal in the brazier made a brief crackling sound, like paper crumpling.

  “I have known your reputation, Durell, for some time. You have an enviable name. But in this case, it is a matter of kokuro, of heart. You seem to suffer from the Japanese disease of ense—a tiredness with life, sir. I could dispose of you now and take all the money at once.”

  “You could try,” Durell said quietly.

  “I could succeed. But—very well. Ten thousand dollars now, to show good faith for value received.”

  “An explanation, first,” Durell said. “Why did your men kill Waldo Fingal?”

  Omaru looked blank. “Who?”

  “Waldo Fingal. You know the name.”

  “I have many men in Kaiwa.”

  “But you don’t murder them. You had Waldo killed this morning in Tokyo.”

  Omaru’s eyes became more enigmatic than before. The pale light in the room emphasized the tinge of color in his skin. His mouth pushed out. “Is Waldo’s death important?”

  “It is, to me. He once worked for me.”

  “A drunkard, a coward, a wreck of a man?”

  “He was different, when I knew him.”

  “He was unreliable.” Omaru was curt. “He was eliminated. It was necessary.”

  “Because he tried to warn me of something?”

  “Of what?”

  Durell smiled. “If I were certain, I would not be here. You’re too clever to try to play games with me, Omaru. He said enough to make me feel we cannot do business at all.” “You need me,” Omaru insisted.

  “I need no murderers.”

  “Come, Waldo Fingal was unimportant.”

  “Was he? His death costs you twenty thousand dollars.”

  Omaru opened his eyes wide, then slitted them again. “This is ridiculous. I begin to feel angry with you, Durell. Waldo Fingal was given to hallucinations and lies. So you knew him once; but that was a long time ago. His elimination had nothing to do with our business arrangement.”

  “I think it did. And I’m calling it off,” Durell said. “From here on, keep out of my way, Omaru. Don’t interfere with the operation.”

  “Are we enemies, then?” Omaru whispered.

  “You name it as you please. We are not partners.”

  Durell was aware of movement then behind the soshi screens. One of them slid to one side. He turned and saw the masklike face of Baroness Isome. She wore a white kimono with a scarlet obi and her movement was like a drifting wisp of vapor as she glided into the room. She looked through Durell as if he did not exist, and spoke to the fat man in a light, thin voice. “Omaru, my dear?”

  “We are discussing business.” Omaru waved a fat paw. “Mr. Durell, if you refuse payment, I must warn you of a Japanese saying, to the effect that ‘virtue disappears in the face of poverty.’ In this case, the poverty will be mine.”

  They have another saying,” Durell returned. “When one wastes money, it is ‘like throwing gold coins before a cat.’ You get nothing from me, Omaru.”

  “We had a contract. I delivered a message, and I am prepared to deliver Kaminov to you, for twenty thousand dollars in American money.” Omaru lurched up, his big body trembling with anger. “You cannot do without me. I have the men and the facilities you need. All we lack is the exact rendezvous place. Osmanovna knows this. You must force it out of her.”

  “Under the circumstances,” Durell said, “there is no contract and nothing to discuss.”

  “I will not permit—”

  “Omaru!”

  The woman’s voice cut like a rasp through soft pulp
. The man stopped, turned slowly, his round shaven head thrust forward a little on his monstrous shoulders. The woman’s masklike face cracked slightly with a smile. She touched Durell’s arm with a light, feathery gesture.

  “You are angry because of your friend’s death. It is understandable. But this is not a time for rash decisions. We know where you plan to go—where Tagashi intends to take you. It is a small fishing village named Miyako, about five miles north of Akijuro on the coast. Tagashi has arranged quarters there for you, with an uncle, a fisherman of the village. Tagashi-san has many ‘relatives’, has he not? Have you thought of this?”

  “I’ve noted it,” Durell said.

  “Wherever you are, we shall send word to you. We can decide nothing tonight. Let us leave the matter open.” Omaru spoke bitterly. “But my patience is thin. Once the girl talks, my apparatus can take care of everything. I shall expect the money tomorrow, then, and when the business is concluded, I may make another assessment. I think that is all. Isome is right. We need not quarrel over the death of a drunken fool. My men will see you safely returned to your friends now, Durell-san.”

  “One moment.”

  Durell turned again at Isome’s words. She moved back to Omaru, hands clasped delicately before her, her painted face like a geisha’s, a mask that defied any guess as to her age or thoughts.

  “One matter must be decided,” she said in her thin, piping voice. “Omaru is greedy, and sometimes he takes great risks for money. I do not interfere. But this girl you took from the train is a great risk, indeed. She refuses to cooperate. If she does not, it is Kaminov who bungled, not we. Kaminov expected her to help, and put the burden of success on her assistance to us. We are committed now, and cannot turn back. Neither can Kaminov, though he does not seem to know it.”

  “What are you getting at?” Durell asked.