Mr. Moto Omnibus

by John P. Marquand

  “Wait, please,” Jack Rhyce said to Mr. Moto. “We won’t be long”—and Mr. Moto smiled.

  In plan, the temple was typical of all the shrines of Japan dedicated to the Shinto sect, which was more of a national loyalty than a religion. The arched stone-lined causeway leading to the red-lacquer pavilions, and also the smaller paths that diverged beneath the dark pines, had undoubtedly been adapted, like so much Japanese culture, from early Chinese religious structures; but time had added dignity to this adaptation until Japanese shrines possessed an austere beauty entirely their own. There was a Spartan simplicity in the repression of design, as well as in the repression of the people, mostly elderly, who moved about the grounds, stopping now and then before a pavilion, clapping their hands and bowing their heads in prayer. The ashes of soldiers who had died for the Emperor were preserved there, and where there were not ashes there were names.

  “I come here,” he said, “because I’m responsible for several of these names.”

  There was no necessity, he realized, to have given her this explanation.

  “How many?” she asked.

  “I don’t know,” he answered. “Twenty-thirty. More, perhaps. You can’t always tell everything that a machine gun or a hand grenade does. And you see, most of them preferred to die.”

  They walked back to the car in silence, and he hoped he had taught her something about Japan that was both important and unfathomable. It was hard to realize that all the city streets had been torn by war, and that every person walking on them had lost some near relation, because the signs of war had almost disappeared, both from Tokyo and the faces of its people. It was valuable to understand that nothing was forgotten.

  Even during the journey, Jack Rhyce knew that he would never forget the motor rides to Miyanoshita. It was one of those unrelated lapses that come into one’s life when least expected, a sudden unalloyed period of beauty that became something more than memory. It was dangerous to feel as he was beginning to about the girl in the car beside him, but as he looked back over that long day he could not experience a single qualm of regret. Actually there had been no need for any, because there was nothing that he or she could have done about anything until they made contact with Bill Gibson at the hotel that night. There was no necessity to think or plan, and no immediate harm in being beguiled; and besides, all they did was part of the cover.

  It was part of the cover to be conscious of her nearness and to hope that the car would soon take another curve so that she would lean against him. It was as though they were both on the outside, that day, and it was more of a fact than an illusion. It was a part of his business to know perfumes. The first instant he had met her he knew that she used Guerlain’s and he had identified the variety, but there was nothing technical about the Guerlain any longer. He had immediately recognized her as beautiful, but now everything about her was subjective, not objective any longer, just as it might have been on the outside. The way a draft of air blew a wisp of hair across her forehead was beautiful, and so was the austere perfection of her profile when softened by a smile, and so were the quick gestures of her strong but delicate hands. A pair of white gloves lay across her lap, but she did not wear them, and she wore no rings, no jewelry at all except a plain gold clip.

  “It’s just as though we were on the outside,” he said.

  “Yes,” she answered, “and please let’s keep it that way.” And she did not move away when he took her hand.

  In a way that ride to Miyanoshita had everything. Later he could unroll it in his memory as one did a Chinese scroll painting, which should be seen in parts and never all at once.

  Their ride took them past the area of heavy industry that surrounded Yokohama, then along the sea and finally into the country. Except for the heavy traffic on the roads, the disruptions of the machine age were gone once they reached the country. The thatched farmhouses, the jade-green of the rice plants reflected in the shallow water of the checkerboard squares of the paddies, the bamboo windbreaks, the farmers in their huge straw hats meticulously tending each rice shoot, the jagged mountains in the background were part of an eternal picture of a way of life that could survive all change. Yes, the ride had everything. There was the immense Daibutsu Buddha and the island of Enoshima, with its crowded inns and its shops of seashell ornaments, the scene of the most masterly satire yet written on Japan. The Honorable Picnic. This was a book which had been banned before the war, but was now on sale everywhere. Had the war taught the Japanese to laugh at themselves? Like all those questions, there was no definite answer, except that the humor of Japan was as detailed and specialized as its ornamental ivories.

  Nothing that Ruth Bogart said or did was discordant. She had great adaptability, but Jack Rhyce was also sure that they both honestly liked the same things and were impressed by the same details. There were two incidents that day that were more vivid than the rest. The first was the sight of two wounded soldiers, on the path leading to one of the shrines at Kamakura. Each had an artificial hand, and each an artificial leg. They were dressed in well-washed khaki without insignia. When he stopped and gave them a fifty-yen note, they came to attention and saluted, and he had returned their salute before he recollected that he was in civilian clothes. They had spotted him as a soldier, too, and for a second all three of them must have been moving into the past. Now that the war was over, there was a lack of resentment impossible for a Westerner to understand.

  Then there was the fortuneteller who had his concession just beyond the alms-seeking soldiers, an emaciated elderly man who smiled and beckoned the moment Jack Rhyce and Ruth Bogart betrayed interest. On a stand near him was a miniature red-lacquer temple with three small black-and-yellow birds Perched in front of it—goldfinches, Jack Rhyce believed. He had never been good about birds. But, going back to his early childhood, he remembered tame birds looking just like them that would sing and fly and return to their cage at a whistle. The fortuneteller was clearly used to Americans, because he whipped out from his pocket a typewritten explanation.

  “Give any bird a fifty-yen folded note,” Jack read. “Bird will drop it in the cash box, fly to temple door, ring bell, enter temple, get fortune on folded paper and bring back same.”

  “It might be worth fifty yen,” Jack said.

  “Yes,” she said, “but let me pay for it. I want it to be my fortune.” She handed the old man a folded note. He held it in front of one of the birds, and just as the explanation said, the bird took it in its beak and dropped it in a tiny money chest.

  “Come on, Joe,” the old man chanted, “come on, Chollie, go on, Joe.”

  The birds and their owner repeated a pattern that Jack Rhyce had seen in nearly every city in the world. That act of fortunetelling must have dated back to temple necromancy, but here the words were new. They had an unfamiliar ring beneath the hot Japanese sky, telling their tale of lonely American soldiers on leave, back at home now, or dead perhaps in Korea.

  “Come on, Chollie, come on, Joe.”

  The tiny black and yellow bird cocked its head and its beady eye was remarkably intelligent. It fluttered from its perch to a tiny ladder that led to the temple porch. It pushed a small bell smartly with its beak, and the bell tinkled with a miniature clarity that completely rounded out the illusion. Then the bird disappeared inside the toy temple and emerged carrying a folded bit of paper.

  Then the bird fluttered back to its perch, and Ruth Bogart took the paper from its beak.

  “Don’t be afraid to read it,” Jack Rhyce said. “They only have good fortunes here.”

  He had meant to speak lightly, but he was disturbed by her intent look.

  “Yes, I know it’s rigged,” she said, “but I want it to be true.”

  The strip of paper resembled one of those fortunes that one used to find as a child inside a snapper at a birthday party. She glanced at the words and handed it to him.

  “Once you were unhappy,” he read, “but you are very happy now.”

  “Tha
t’s true, you know,” she said. “Absolutely true.”

  “Well,” he told her, “you wanted it to be.”

  “I don’t have to want it. It’s here,” she said. “And you’re happy too, aren’t you? I mean for just now?”

  “Oh, yes,” he said, “I’m happy.”

  She laughed. She was watching the outlines of the rock pines against the cloudless sky.

  “I was afraid you were going to say you were too happy,” she said. “I love it when you’re not careful, and you haven’t been all day.”

  “If you want to know,” he told her, “it’s pleasant for a change.”

  “There’s only one catch about it,” she said. “It says I’m happy now but it doesn’t say how long, and I want it to be long-term. Would you like it long-term?”

  She had said she liked it when he was not too careful—and he was not careful then. With her standing close beside him in that place, so far removed from anything that was familiar to either of them, it would have been impossible for him to measure everything he said, and he would have hated himself afterwards if he had done so.

  “Yes,” he said. “You couldn’t possibly know how much I want it that way.”

  That was all that either of them said, and it was all that was necessary. They both knew that the moment would be transient, but a weight was lifted from him. He felt a grateful relief that he was alive, but this relief had nothing to do with any of the cruder gratitudes for survival that he had experienced more recently. As it happened, neither of them had time to embroider on what they had said, because he heard a footstep behind them before she did, and he was back from the outside to the inside, turning slowly and accurately on his heel. Nothing was ever gained by appearing startled or suspicious.

  He did not know that Mr. Moto had followed them until then, nor was there any sure way of telling how long Mr. Moto had been behind them or what he might have heard—not that what they might have said would have affected any situation. There was nothing harder, Jack Rhyce was thinking, than to tread softly on a graveled walk, and only that single footstep had attracted his attention.

  “Oh, hello,” Jack Rhyce said. “Have we been staying here too long?”

  “Oh, no,” Mr. Moto said, “but there is still a great distance to go, and many things to see.”

  “All right,” Jack said. He put a slight edge to his words because he wanted to make it clear that he had not approved of that gentle approach. “Go on back to the car. We’ll be with you in a minute.” When Mr. Moto moved away, Jack Rhyce waited deliberately until the purple suit and tan shoes were a hundred yards in front of them.

  “Have you noticed one queer thing about him today?” Ruth Bogart asked.

  “I’ve noticed several,” Jack Rhyce said. “Which one did you notice?”

  “He said he was a guide,” she said, “but all day long he hasn’t tried to explain one single thing to us. Did you ever see a guide like that?”

  “That’s right,” he said, “but he’s an A-1 driver. He has to be, with all the crazy driving on these roads.”

  It was one of the few moments when they were both inside that day.

  “You’re right about his being in the business,” she said.

  “He was once, anyway,” he answered.

  “Do you think he knows what we are?” she asked.

  “Let’s not worry right now,” he said. “We’ll know better when we see Bill tonight. Let’s still try to be happy. I enjoy making the effort, as long as you do, too.”

  They had been in no hurry, and there were long, cool shadows across the road as they began to climb into the hills. The trees of the carefully tended forests that had replaced the rice farms in the landscape were the ginkgo, the feathery cryptomeria, trees that looked out of place when in a Western land, but fitted perfectly into the Japanese landscape. They would be at the hotel at half-past six.

  There were hot springs at the hotel, and a swimming pool, he told her. The rooms were very comfortable, and the food and service were very good.

  “But I’d rather stay at a Japanese inn,” he said. “I’ll take you to one sometime.”

  “I’d like it,” she said, but he knew she was thinking of something else. “Jack?”

  “Yes,” he said.

  “Jack, will you promise me something?”

  “Promise what?” he asked.

  “Don’t be so cagey,” she said. “If we get out of this, let’s try to live on the outside. And promise me you’ll get out of the business if I don’t come back.”

  “Listen,” he said, “have you got a hunch about something, Ruth?”

  “No,” she said, “no. But I’d like to have you promise before it gets you, Jack.”

  “Let’s talk about it later,” he said, “but I’m glad you like me that much.”

  “Yes, I like you that much,” she said.

  It must have been at that moment that the peacefulness of the day ended. It was time to drop a curtain on the day and think about the evening, and it was time to heed the warning of common sense. He looked through the plate glass at the back of Mr. Moto’s head. The man’s age, he was thinking again, was about fifty, but his reflexes were still excellent, and his driving on the switch-back turns of the mountainous road superb. Actually Jack Rhyce had not bothered to see whether the car was wired for sound, because nothing they had said was of any importance except those last speeches, but even a microphone would hardly have carried above the outside noises of the traffic on the heavily traveled road. He heard her laugh beside him.

  “Don’t worry,” she said. “The car’s all clean.”

  If she said so, she was correct, and it was not necessary to ask how she knew, or how she had made the opportunity to find out.

  10

  THE TOWN was on a slope of the winding road that led to Lake Hakone and, farther, toward the sacred Mount Fuji. The hot springs and the scenery had made it a resort for a great many years, patronized by the old nobility and wealthy people from Tokyo, many of whom had owned houses there; and the Japanese inns were excellent. The hotel to which they drove had been designed as a concession to European tastes, long before the war; time, plus the imagination of its proprietors, had given it an exotic Eurasian charm. Its grounds on the mountain slope were watered by rills from natural springs that made a continued merry sound of running water. The season was too late for the azaleas and some of the exotic blooms, but the hotel gardens were still very beautiful. The Japanese had ancient ways with plants and flowers which were different from those of other gardeners. They lavished a watchful care and patience on every shrub and even on the surrounding trees, so that everything, even if seemingly wild, was actually in order, even down to the arrangements of wind- and waterworn rocks.

  The spirit conveyed by the hotel was agreeable. It had frankly been designed as a place for a happy holiday, and it had brought peace and happiness to many travelers. There were highly European swimming pools and tennis courts, but the public rooms, stiff with formal furniture, reminded him that even the most adaptable Japanese had trouble in selecting suitable assortments of Western chairs, tables and carpets. Yet in spite of a cleavage in taste that was hard to bridge, on the whole the hotel had succeeded; the reason for its success might have been its rambling informality, growing from a profusion of halls, staircases, outside galleries and connecting ells that had happy names in English with an Oriental lilt—Plum Blossom Cottage. Cozy Nook. The Peach Bloom.

  Due to the crowded weekend, the parking spaces along the driveway were already filled with the cars of United States naval and air force personnel, and bellboys clad in white ducks were very busy with the luggage. The day was still warm but the air was cooler and fresher than it had been in Tokyo. Mr. Moto was speaking authoritatively to the Japanese concierge, and Jack Rhyce was contented to hear him say that his passengers were good people who would appreciate attention.

  “I will take the car,” Mr. Moto said, “but I will call later for orders and to see if all
is right.”

  “You don’t have to until tomorrow,” Jack Rhyce told him. “It’s been a very fine day, and thanks a lot.”

  The sunlight had grown softer and the shadows longer. He did not need to consult his wrist watch to know it was somewhat before six, but there was still plenty of time before dark to stroll about the grounds and to locate the cottage called Chrysanthemum Rest, where Bill Gibson would be staying. Nevertheless, he was afraid it would take more time than was available to be as familiar as he would wish to be with the halls and connecting passages of the rambling buildings.

  “It’s a mixed-up place, isn’t it?” Ruth Bogart said, as they followed the boy with their bags. Being built on the side of a hill, the hotel had several levels, they were passing through an arcade, lined with display cases of silks, lacquer, ivories and porcelains, and occasionally they encountered a direction arrow pointing to HOT BATHS, MAIN BAR and DINING ROOM.

  “Yes,” he said, “this would be quite a place to play cops and robbers in, wouldn’t it?”

  He was ashamed of his lack of caution the instant he said it, but it was not such a bad estimate of the situation. There were many places where you could lose yourself, and too many exits and entrances for one ever to be at ease.

  As Bill Gibson had said, a room had been reserved for them, very comfortable, as the clerk anxiously pointed out, with a bath, in a quiet section of the hotel known as Cozy Nook. Jack Rhyce did not know exactly what had been said or through whom the reservation had been made, but he found the solicitude of the clerk disturbing. Still, he only had to tell himself that nobody knew his business better than Bill Gibson in order to set his own mind at rest. When they followed the boy with their luggage along further passageways to the upper level of the hotel, he realized that in spite of years of practice in many places, the ground plan of this building was too much for him, and he greatly disliked the sensation of not being oriented. In consequence, his first task, he told himself, would be to get entrances and exits straight. Also the friendly smiles of the desk clerks had brought home to him again the necessity for cover, since the management seemed to be so clearly aware that he and Ruth Bogart had arrived for an off-the-record weekend. Although this could not have struck the hotel staff as unusual for two Americans, it was of the utmost importance to keep up the illusion. And now, facing the prospect, Jack Rhyce encountered in himself an embarrassment that made him very formal, especially when the boy opened the door to a spacious double bedroom. There was a 10 percent service charge, about which Japanese hotel employees were far more conscientious than their European counterparts, but still he gave a liberal tip and spoke enthusiastically as the boy backed out, bowing.