Diamond approached to within a few yards without catching their attention.
"Mr. Leapman?"
Both men wheeled around.
"Hold it! Who are you?" the blond man asked in an American accent.
"Someone you people thought you'd disposed of," Diamond answered.
"You're that English cop."
Confirmation, if it was required, that this had to be Michael Leapman. "Drop it"
The heavy had just whipped out a knife.
"You're joking."
Diamond wanted no violence. But if necessary, he backed Yamagata—even against a hit man armed with a dagger. He beckoned to the woman with his right hand, inviting her to step away from the two Americans. "Dr. Masuda."
Her face crinkled as if in pain and she pinched her lips together, but she made no move other than to shake her head and draw her arms across her chest.
Leapman said with confidence, "We're walking right out of here with Dr. Masuda and you can do shit-all about it. Let's move, Dino."
Dr. Masuda seemed petrified. She could have stepped away from them. It wasn't as if the knife was at her throat. She turned her head and glanced behind her.
There was a slight movement to Diamond's left and he saw that Yamagata had hunched into the position the sumotori adopt immediately before the charge. Then Dr. Masuda cried something in Japanese.
Leapman said, "Hey, tell blubbergut to take it easy, will you? This little lady has made up her mind."
Whatever it was that Dr. Masuda had just said, it appeared to confirm Leapman's last statement, because Yamagata suddenly straightened and gripped Diamond's arm to restrain him.
A sumo champion backing down? It was difficult to credit.
Leapman gave the grin of a man who had won without so much as a scuffle. "I won't say it's been good to meet you, gentlemen. Have a nice day, just the same." He gestured to Dr. Masuda to walk ahead and she obeyed. "See what I mean?" He started to follow. The minder went, too, walking backwards to cover their exit, the knife held threateningly.
Yamagata's grip on Diamond's arm tightened. He would not allow Diamond to go in pursuit.
When they were out of arm's range, the reason why Masuda had gone so compliantly was made clear. Yamagata steered Diamond to the windows and pointed to where a figure was standing beside a red saloon car. Two figures, in fact. On first sight they had merged as one, for a man was holding a small Japanese child directly in front of him. She looked pale and passive, her hands limp at her sides, in spite of the cord around her throat.
It was Naomi.
Having anguished over her fate for so many days, having put so much into the search, this was a nightmare. To do nothing now—while she was there in view, under threat of murder—would be unforgivable.
Leapman had reached the door. He told Diamond, "She's coming with us because she wants her kid back. She hasn't seen her in months."
"You'll kill them both."
"Maybe, but she doesn't know that. She can't understand one word we say. And just in case you were thinking of following, I'm asking Dino to guard the door while we get clear."
Dr. Masuda had already gone through and Leapman followed. The henchman waited just inside, guarding the only exit with the knife held ready.
Although his heart was sick, Diamond knew in his head that Yamagata was right To have made a move now would certainly have put Naomi at risk. It wouldn't require much for the thug out there to strangle her. Very likely he'd been hired to kill mother and child anyway. One unexpected move might precipitate the deed. But it must have required astonishing self-restraint on Yamagata's part to hold back when all his training, all his pride, was based on the concept of the fight
Even at this stage, he continued to hold Diamond's right arm in the iron grip.
"They're getting away, for God's sake!" The scene unfolding on the other side of the glass appeared as remote as television. In fact, the windows were about the size of portable TVs, much too narrow to have climbed through.
"Will you let go of me?" Diamond demanded.
Now he could see Yuko Masuda running towards her child, her hands outstretched.
The henchman released Naomi, probably on orders from Leapman, who was following closely. The child stood still, unaffected, and then was gathered into her mother's embrace.
"It's too bloody late now!"
Leapman had the car door open and bundled mother and child into the backseat and got in beside them. The other man got into the driver's seat.
Only at this point did Yamagata release Diamond, by now rigid with anger and frustration. "Too bloody late!" he shouted.
Yamagata plainly didn't agree. Timing is fundamental to sumo wrestling and for him the fight wasn't over yet The huge man moved at astonishing speed before Diamond had even got the last words out. He went straight to the bed in the end bay. It was a good thing it was unoccupied, because Yamagata tucked his hands underneath, tipped it over, grabbed the underside and lifted the entire thing as if it were polystyrene. In the same forward movement he charged at the window frame and crushed the bed against it with tremendous force. Such was the impact that the entire casement and a section of wall collapsed at the first contact, leaving a gap framed by splintered wood and plaster. The rage, the humiliation of the last few minutes was being expelled in one eruption of action.
Yamagata almost fell across the bed when it landed upside down in a flower border outside, but he just succeeded in staying upright and clambering over it. His kimono was half off one shoulder, so he ripped it from his body without shifting his gaze from the focus of his anger.
The car was moving off, but it would have to pass Yamagata on the narrow road.
He stooped, legs astride, rubbing his hands, preparing to meet the car as if it were a rival in the wrestling ring. He actually indulged in some intimidatory action. He placed his left hand across his heart, stretched out his right, raised his right leg high in the shiko movement and slammed it down on the road.
There wasn't time to complete the ritual. The car was coming at him. Hunkering low again, he waited for the crunch. There was no question of giving way to two tons of automobile. Much more than his self-esteem was at stake.
With exquisite timing, he launched himself straight at the car at the moment it would have smashed into his legs. His huge body was visible rising over the bonnet in a movement that looked like a dive at the windscreen. The effect was made more spectacular by the car's acceleration, because all he needed to do was dip his torso and jump as the bonnet moved underneath him. His head shattered the windscreen and hit the driver with tremendous impact. The car veered off the road and smashed against the speed limit sign.
Peter Diamond was standing in a dust cloud of plaster, mesmerized by what he had just witnessed. Whether Yamagata had survived, he couldn't tell. The wresder's head and torso were entirely inside the car and the rest of him lay on the bonnet, ominously still.
Diamond shook himself out of the trancelike state and was preparing to clamber over the rubble to give help when there was a warning shout from behind, more of a scream than anything intelligible. Just in time he glanced behind and saw Leapman's other henchman charging towards him with the knife raised to strike.
Diamond was no sumo wrestler. Nor was he particularly fit. His right arm still ached from the beating he'd had in New York. But he still had quick reactions and his police training had given him some elementary judo. Until now he'd never been required to use the shoulder throw in a real fight. It was quite a contortion to twist sufficiently to grab the man's right sleeve and left lapel without being stabbed, but he succeeded. He bent his knees to get under his attacker's center of gravity, and gave a terrific tug. The man somersaulted over his back and thumped the ground heavily. Not bad for an amateur. Diamond grabbed the knife, but there was no need because the man was out cold.
The shout must have come from the nurse they'd seen attending to one of the coma patients. Now she was running straight past Diamond to t
he car. He followed.
One of the rear doors opened and Leapman climbed out, scattering fragments of broken windscreen from his clothes. Seeing the knife in Diamond's hand, he raised his arms. He was not the sort to fight for himself. Diamond ordered him to lie facedown on the verge.
Naomi got out next, making a whimpering sound, in some distress, but not visibly injured. Her mother followed and held her Yamagata's body was lacerated extensively, but to Diamond's immense relief, he began to move. He must have been stunned for a while, and no wonder. Slowly but without assistance he withdrew his bleeding torso from the front of the car. Astride the heavily dented bonnet he sat tidying his hair.
The nurse had been examining the man in the driver's seat, feeling for a pulse. Presently she stood back and shook her head. From the look of him, his neck must have been broken. He'd taken the full impact of Yamagata's head.
Hospital staff rapidly appeared from all sides, some just to watch or take pictures—for a Japanese is never far from his camera—and others ready to help.
Diamond stooped and picked up one of Yamagata's flip-flop sandals, or bedi, lost or discarded in the action. He looked for the other and found it. A doctor who spoke English made himself known to Diamond and arranged for the security staff to take charge of Leapman and the surviving henchman, who was regaining consciousness. The police were called.
The sightseers surrounded Yamagata until a nurse persuaded him to remove himself from the car bonnet and go for treatment. He was extensively marked, but the cuts were superficial. In a few days there would be no scars. Diamond eased a path through the admirers and handed the flip-flops to their owner. He would have liked to apologize for the way he'd ranted and tried to break free. Instead, he bowed. They both bowed. Then Yamagata made a generous gesture. First, he pointed to the henchman being helped to his feet by a security man and then he tapped Diamond's chest with his forefinger, nodding at the same time as if to express approval. He bowed again and with a sense of ceremony returned the flip-flops to Diamond. Words weren't required. There was actually a scattering of applause. Diamond was glad he didn't have to speak because he couldn't have trusted his voice at that moment.
Yamagata looked around. Something still troubled him. He spotted Dr. Masuda standing a short way off, holding Naomi by the hand. He strode across to them, exchanged a bow and a few words and then stooped and lifted the little girl into his arms.
She looked comfortable. Even contented.
The cameras clicked.
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
"Look at these! Jesus, what do they think I'm going to do?" The handcuffs on Michael Leapman really weren't necessary, but as the Yokohama police had insisted on this formality when they allowed Diamond to interview him, it was respected. They sat facing each other in leather armchairs in an office belonging to the senior detective, who observed from behind his desk with an interpreter beside him.
Diamond waited indifferently. He was confident that the protest would pass. If he'd ever seen a man who was ready to talk, it was Leapman, desperately wanting to justify his actions to somebody.
And the switch to sweet reasonableness was not long in coming. "You know, in a way I'm relieved. I wasn't in control of my life anymore. Mind if I tell it my way?"
A nod from Diamond and he was away.
"I can scarcely believe what an idiot I've been. Less than a year ago, I had things pretty well sorted. I was Vice Chairman, on a good salary in a prosperous company, although I have to say I could see the clouds gathering. Manny—the Chairman—wouldn't admit that we were slipping back in the pharmaceuticals league. He was a great personality, a real nice guy, a terrific manager in his time, but frankly he wasn't in tune with modern business. It's a shark pool now and Manny shouldn't have been there anymore. I know the drug industry. I was ambitious for his job and I expected to get it soon."
"Through a boardroom coup?"
"Right. I had a surefire plan to reverse the slide, but I knew he wouldn't back it Unknown to Manny, I'd already given the green light to certain research projects that he wasn't even aware of. Nothing unethical, just things that I considered Manflex should support to stay competitive. I diverted some funds quite legitimately from other projects we were phasing out and when the accounting got a little complex I actually injected some cash from my own pocket. It was an investment, the way I saw it. There was this project in Indianapolis with terrific potential."
"Churchward's?"
Leapman nodded. "Every drug company in the business was looking for a breakthrough with Alzheimer's. Alaric Churchward was getting some sensational test results with PDM3.1 was damned sure we had an all-time winner, and I was aiming to torpedo Manny with it I knew he wouldn't back it without all kinds of guarantees we weren't ready to supply. The Board was unhappy with Manny and I expected to make my bid for Chairman anytime. When I became boss I could give the drug my backing and turn Manflex into a top company again."
"You had support on the Board?"
"For sure. But they didn't know about PDM3 yet. That was the ace up my sleeve. I told nobody."
"You told the mafia."
"I needed money to fund the project More money than I possessed."
"But from the mafia?"
Leapman's cuffed hands moved apart in a parody of a man gesturing that he'd acted in good faith. "At the beginning I didn't know they were the mob. They crept up on me. I wanted large injections of cash without questions being asked and I approached one guy I knew from way back, who promised to talk to a venture capital person, and so on. One day a wad of money arrived. I didn't know it was mafia money until they followed up. Then I found myself talking to Massimo Gatti, who everyone knows is a mafioso."
"Yet you didn't back out at that stage?"
He glared at Diamond. "You should try backing out on a man like Gatti."
"So you were in his pocket"
"They saw ways of making big bucks on the stock market It was crazy. They set fire to one of the Manflex plants in Italy. Reduced it to ashes. You know why? To depress the market price so they could buy in on favorable terms. I wasn't a party to that, believe me. I only heard about it later. That was when I realized I was way out of my league."
"Did you know at the time that PDM3 was dangerous?"
"At the time I borrowed the money? Christ, no. What kind of monster do you think I am?"
"You trusted Professor Churchward?"
"Sure. He's a great scientist. Believe me, he wasn't part of this mess. Okay, he knew there were some ADRs—adverse drug reactions—but he believed they could be kept to a minimum with the right dosage."
"When did you find out the truth?"
"About Jantac? Six or seven months back. By that time, there was no going back."
"How did it come to light?"
"Alaric called me one afternoon with some technical query. He said he was aware that a number of preliminary studies had been started with the compound and not proceeded with. That's quite usual. Testing new drugs for biological activity can be a long and frustrating process and on top of that you're sure to have plenty of failures trying to discover if they have any medical potential. He wanted to know if there was anything still on file. I promised to run a computer check. I keyed in the chemical formula—"
"And found the file on Jantac?"
Leapman remembered and winced. "It was a real kick in the guts. The crucial decisions were made back in 1985, a couple of years before I joined the company. Dr. Masuda had done two years of testing here in Japan in her research into alcoholic comas, using the same compound as PDM3 under the proprietary name of Jantac. I learned that Manny had personally axed the research after Dr. Masuda detected liver damage that was caused by Jantac. The name Jantac was deleted from our list of drugs under research. I was deeply shocked when I learned this. By this time I'd staked my career and my personal savings in the same lousy drug."
"Didn't you inform Churchward?"
"No." Leapman shook his head, and it was an expressio
n of regret. "I faxed him some of the other studies I found, but I kept quiet about this Jantac bombshell. I hoped it might not be the serious problem it first appeared to be. Sometimes Manny Flexner was too cautious for bis own good. He took no risks whatsoever with drugs. Every drug has ADRs, and I argued to myself that alcoholism causes liver damage anyway, so maybe those Japanese results wouldn't show up to the same degree in patients who drank in moderation. Alaric Churchward's brilliant work on Alzheimer's didn't have to be jettisoned just because Manny was so ultracareful."
"All right, you rationalized," said Diamond, becoming impatient. "What did you do about it? Altered the records, for a start."
"That was no problem. I could do that sitting in my office and I did."
Diamond refrained from pointing out that he should also have gone down to the basement where the old file cards were kept.
"Computer records are simple to wipe," Leapman was saying. "But this had a human dimension."
Diamond gave a nod. "And you can't wipe humans so easily."
Leapman glared in defiance. "I am not a killer. Sure, I could foresee problems with Dr. Masuda. She was a real risk if she got to hear about PDM3. It was quite possible that she had a grudge against Manflex for what happened. I made some inquiries and learned that after her research was axed she stopped work altogether. She hadn't gone back since. So I flew to Yokohama to see her."
"Independently—without telling the mafia?"
"Yes. My idea was to buy her goodwill. I'd get her back to work on coma research, using some safe drugs we'd developed recently. Then I would change her file to make it appear that we'd continued to sponsor her without a break. But there was a complication."
"Naomi?"
"Excuse me?"
"The child. Naomi is what I call her."
"Ah. I understand. Yes, discovering that the little girl existed was a real shock, and even more so when I found that she was autistic. She needed round-the-clock attention. The only way I could get Dr. Masuda back to work was by finding a surrogate mother. Well, I discussed it with Dr. Masuda. After seven years of caring for a kid who doesn't respond one bit, she was ready for a break if we could find someone. I agreed to meet the cost. She already knew a woman in the University who'd had a kid who died. She'd wanted to adopt, but she was a single parent and the adoption agencies wouldn't play ball."
Diamond Solitaire Page 31