by Morris West
On the short ride back to the hotel, Alex Boyko read me the notes Marta had dictated to him. She had made an almost surgical dissection of the Washington Post article and revealed it for what it was, a highly partisan piece which leaned heavily on the circumstances and psychology of another era and paid scant attention to the massive changes brought about by fifty years of global trade and communication. Boyko was confident he could turn the notes into a respectable and controversial rebuttal which would follow the original piece on its syndicated journey round the world.
When we got back to the hotel it was time for my morning tea with Max Wylie. He had already staked a claim to the most discreet corner of the Writers’ Lounge and was impatient to begin his interrogation. I decided to short-circuit the whole procedure.
‘I’ve spoken with the autopsy surgeon and the police, Max. It’s murder.’
‘God Almighty! Who did it?’
‘Person or persons unknown.’
‘Why?’
‘No known motive.’
‘Suspects?’
‘None. Tanaka’s in the clear. I’m clean. Cubeddu’s out of the country – that is, if your information is correct.’
‘It is. Triple-A plus. How was she killed?’
‘She was put to sleep with carotid pressure, then tossed over the balcony. She was alive when she fell.’
‘It sounds like a hired hitman.’
‘Do you know anybody who works like that, Max?’
‘Yes. But one’s in Hawaii, the other works out of Hong Kong.’
‘I’m guessing that this was arranged at very short notice, here in Bangkok.’
‘This is your town, Gil.’
‘It’s one of many, and I don’t work the dark side of the street.’
‘But you’re on it now, little brother. You’d better get some lessons in local geography.’
‘True. You can give me the first one. Suddenly Cubeddu’s heading for Seoul, eight hours before Miko is murdered.’
‘More like ten, eleven hours, allowing for checkout time and the trip to the airport. But why would he kill Miko? That would mean ruining a good investment. He was going to take her over, use her business as a base. Remember what this guy’s about. He’s a banker looking for investment connections in areas of high risk but very high returns.’
‘So why, suddenly, does he quit?
‘Because he’s out of the Tanaka/Leibig sydicate. Your press release made that very clear. Because he suddenly realised that Hoshino was setting him up for a big fall in Thailand – which is a bad place to take a fall.’
‘Why would it happen so suddenly, Max?’
‘Isn’t that the way it always goes, Gil?’ Wylie was now the wise man of the East, relaxed and tolerant. ‘You live for a long time with a certain framework of ideas and convictions, then one day you shrug, cough, bend to tie a shoelace and the whole damn structure collapses and you have to start building again from the ground up. It happens faster with a guy like Cubeddu because he’s always got the smell of danger in his nostrils. But for someone like you, Gil, full of temperate scholarship, it happens much more slowly. When I told you about Miko and Cubeddu, what did you do?’
‘Exactly what you knew I would do, what you wanted me to do. I told them both.’
‘Together or separately?’
‘Together.’
He stared at me for a moment in utter disbelief, then he shook his head violently as if to clear it of cobwebs. Finally, he said softly: ‘I never believed you would be so naive, or so goddam dangerous!’
‘That’s our problem, Max. We are naive because we’re vain and we think sometimes we hold the keys to the mystery of creation. When we find we don’t, then we become dangerous. We try to kick the door in. You say Miko was killed by a hired hitman.’
‘That’s a guess.’
‘Make another one. Who hired the hitman?’
‘Hoshino.’
‘On his own account?’
‘No. For Kenji Tanaka.’
‘Motive?’
‘Long-time mistress turned reckless and greedy, consorting with scum like Cubeddu. And remember, his information was rock solid, from Hoshino on one side of the fence and you on the other.’
‘So how do we prove it?’
‘We don’t. You don’t. They don’t. Hoshino’s a big man in this town, he makes a lot of money for a lot of people. You’ll never get within a shout of him. Even Cubeddu, with all that South American money to spend, was scared off in the end. Tanaka’s a big man in the other world, and he’s going to be dead very soon. Your Captain Aditya is going through all the right motions so that he keeps his record clean and builds up some credit on the side for conducting a discreet burial of an embarrassing affair. Money will change hands, of course. Documents will be lost or altered. In the end, what does it matter? Mai pen rai. Give it up, Gil. Cut loose and go about your own scholar’s business. It’s good advice, believe me!’
‘I know it is, Max. What sticks in my craw is that Tanaka was my friend.’
‘He still is, Gil.’ Max Wylie’s tone was curiously compassionate. ‘I believe he’s guilty, but I haven’t proved it. Under your rules and mine, he’s still innocent. Under his own rules, he has no guilt at all. He has performed a necessary duty. He has removed an embarrassment and a threat to his family name, to his colleagues, to a whole complex of relationships in which his obligations are specific. He has done it with the same determination with which he will remove himself from the scene before he, too, becomes an embarrassment. What the hell am I going on about? You know all this better than I do.’
‘Sure I know it. I’m not sure I believe it any more. God damn him to hell! I don’t have to live by his rules.’
‘So kick the door down.’ Max Wylie threw up his hands in resignation. ‘But don’t come crying to me if you break your toes.’
My final ordeal for the morning was the noon press conference, which this time had attracted a whole battery of reporters and all the international television crews resident in Bangkok. Alex Boyko had them settled down before I arrived. The women had distributed the handouts and were working the crowd quietly, explaining that I would take questions in any language, but if I had to do that, then there would be a strict time limit for each questioner.
It would have been easier to conduct the whole session in a single language but, since there were three nations involved in the negotiation and I was, in effect, the servant of all, it seemed there was much goodwill to be gained by a polyglot performance. The first question came from Associated Press. This was the one with dynamite in it. The others followed like buckshot from all corners of the room.
‘How, if at all, are these negotiations affected by the crisis in the Gulf and the unstable situation in the Soviet Union itself?’
‘We are trying to put together a complex commercial deal with international capital. We’re a bunch of experienced people, working with genuine goodwill. Of course we’re affected by contemporary events, every event, even the bushfires and the floods in Australia. Money itself is a mobile element. Agreements have to be both acceptable and enforceable.’
‘Can you see yourselves reaching agreement this week or next?’
‘No, we cannot. There are too many issues which must be resolved elsewhere before we can go ahead here. At a meeting of principals this morning, it was agreed to end the first stage this week and resume discussions at a later date.’
‘Was that agreement unanimous?’
‘Yes.’
‘That means the project is, to all intents and purposes, dead.’
‘On the contrary, it is very much alive. It is an initiative which, in one form or another, is vital to the Soviet Union, who invited the submission in the first place. Its leaders clearly recognise the large investment which has already been made and the pre-emptive right of the Tanaka/Leibig consortium to a continuity of interest in the development.’
‘When do you expect the conference to resume?’
&
nbsp; ‘I wish I could say, madam; but at this moment none of us can see round corners. Perhaps it’s just as well we can’t?’
‘How do you react to the suggestion which has begun to be circulated in the press, that this German/Japanese consortium is, in some sense at least, a model for a new Berlin/Tokyo axis which could in the end control both Eastern and Western trade with the Soviet Union?’
‘It’s obviously something we’ve all thought about. The Leibig organisation actually co-opted the distinguished historian, Professor Marta Boysen, to advise on geopolitical aspects. The Japanese government itself is involved in negotiations with the Soviet Union over the Kuril Islands. Obviously there are echoes of past history and questions about future relationships. It would be foolish to ignore them and irrational to try to deal with them in terms of another era.’
‘What can you tell us about the mysterious and tragic death of Mr Tanaka’s assistant?’
‘Nothing, I’m afraid. We are all deeply shocked. The Thai police are investigating. It would be unwise and improper to pre-empt their findings.’
‘One more question, Mr Langton. What do you know about “maverick capital”?’
‘I know that you’re quoting the words from the financial press. When I read them, I did not understand them. I still don’t.’
Alex Boyko stepped in then and closed the meeting. I invited him and the women to join me for drinks and sandwiches on the terrace. It made an agreeable coda to my first and last public performance on behalf of Leibig and Tanaka. I still had to face some private ones and I was not looking forward to them at all.
At two I was back in my suite, dictating a batch of business memoranda to Eiko, who was downcast at the thought of leaving Bangkok and her young salary-man. He was an owl-eyed fledgling whom she had presented to me as if he were the handsomest juvenile lead in the movie world. I was tempted to tell her she could do a hundred times better; but love is blind and Tokyo was not that easy for a virtuous young women and what the hell would I know anyway? My own recent judgments in business, politics and love had not been the wisest.
Instead, I consoled her with the offer of an extra day in Bangkok if she could switch the air booking. For a moment, I thought she was about to burst into tears, then she tucked her papers under her arm and went out walking on air, invoking blessings on my head.
I called Siri and asked if we might postpone our dinner for a day or two.
‘There’s too much happening. I’m tugged this way and that. I want to be calm and comfortable with the children.’
‘I understand. This is your house, Gil. Come when you please. Kukrit has told me about the Japanese woman. It’s all so sad and wasteful. He also tells me Marta will be discharged tomorrow. You know she will be welcome whenever you wish to bring her.’
‘I know, and thank you. I’m taking that one very quietly.’
‘That’s wise. Pity is the worst gift you can offer a woman and the most destructive indulgence for you, Gil.’
‘My God! Now we have an aphorist in the family. Where did you pick that one up?’
‘I wrote it myself. In my diary, last night. And I think it sounds better in Thai than it does in English. I was wondering how I could stop you making a mess of your life, which, in case you don’t know it, Gil, is a very lucky, very rich one, important to a lot of people.’
‘Do I sound sorry for myself?’
‘No, sorry for other people. Some of whom don’t deserve it. Look after yourself. Remember, you and I have work to do before you leave.’
There was a knock at the door. A messenger from the business office delivered a fax from Tanizaki:
All permanent staff prepared to make corporate offer for shares in Polyglot Press presently held by Tanaka Group or Tanaka personally. Our offer firm at book value plus goodwill calculated on three years of taxed profits. We have established that we can raise finance, outside Tanaka Group if necessary, at one per cent over prime. Thanks and salutations.
It was one less detail to worry about. I called Tanaka’s room. To my great surprise, because he was usually heavily insulated from casual contacts, he answered the telephone himself. I asked when it would be convenient to see him. He answered comfortably enough.
‘Captain Aditya is with me, let me ask how much more time he needs.’ There was a murmur of conversation in the background, then he came on the line again. ‘Give us fifteen minutes and then come up. I’d like to tidy all our business at this meeting. I leave for Tokyo in the morning.’
And there it was, cold turkey, no ifs, buts or maybes. The fix was in. Kenji Tanaka was getting away with murder.
Seventeen
In the brief respite before my meeting with Tanaka, I was overwhelmed by a flood of memories, still vivid after the lapse of decades. It was just after the birth of our first child, a year after Polyglot Press had opened its British office in Bloomsbury. My father was still alive, ailing, but sturdy enough to live alone in the small apartment over the office, active enough to meddle in any project that interested him, close enough to the university and the the British Museum to maintain a few academic contacts.
I was living in Hampstead, in an old Georgian house with a walled garden, a perfect nurturing place for a young family. In the very small hours of a winter morning, my father telephoned me with an outrageous demand.
‘Get yourself dressed, Gil. Meet me at the office in forty minutes.’
‘Are you drunk?’
‘I’m stone cold sober; but I need you. I need you now. This is life and death.’
‘Whose life, whose death?’
‘Don’t argue, for Christ’s sake! Just get here!’
‘Are you sick?’
‘No! But you’re going to make a sick call with me. Please don’t waste any more time; just come.’
I went of course. I found him outside the office, muffled to the eyeballs against the biting wind, stamping his feet to help his sluggish circulation. As he climbed into the car, he stifled my objections before they were spoken.
‘Not a word out of you, boy. Not a sparrow’s chirp. I’m collecting a small instalment on what you owe me and your Maker.’
‘Where are we going?’
‘Holland Street.’
‘Jesus! You could have taken a taxi!’
‘I didn’t want a bloody taxi! I want company. Now will you shut up please, and just drive!’
I could not, for the life of me, see why he needed company, because he was silent all the way to Holland Street and he left me freezing in the car outside a rundown terrace house with an overturned rubbish bin on the pavement near the front gate. He was obviously expected, because the door was opened a few seconds after his ring, though I could not see who received him into the house.
I waited. I waited thirty minutes, forty-five. A pair of policemen in a prowl car stopped and asked for my identification. They looked very dubious when I explained that my elderly father was visiting a sick friend, but the cold was too much even for them, so I was left alone for another fifteen minutes. When my father finally appeared, he was carrying a parcel wrapped in brown paper and tied with string. His only comment was: ‘Sorry I took so long. Get me home and I’ll make you an Irish coffee. You look as though you need it.’
I was too angry to give him the satisfaction of asking for an explanation. I would have preferred to cut my tongue out. Besides, he looked so drawn and doleful that I could not bring myself to bully him. When finally we reached the apartment, he tossed the package on his desk and, still mute, made very strong coffee laced with Irish whisky. Then, and only then, did he condescend to enlighten me.
‘I suppose you’re wondering what this is all about?’
‘You might suppose that, yes.’
‘I’ve been hearing a confession, a deathbed confession.’
‘And since when have you been a minister of religion?’
‘Longer than you might imagine, my son.’ Much to my surprise, he quoted softly: ‘ “Religion, pure and undefiled,
is this: to visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep yourselves unspotted from the world.” Your mother, God rest her, used to say: “Religion is the good you do in the bad times.” And tonight was one of the worst times. Here’s an old man, a fine scholar, long retired, a fellow I’ve shared wine and pasta with sometimes – just that, we were never close friends. And he’s dying and he doesn’t believe in God but he’s ashamed of stepping out into the dark with the load he’s carrying. So he calls me and we talk and he hands me the burden and when I left he was asleep and probably won’t wake again.’
‘And that’s all you’re going to tell me?’
‘If you’ll bribe me with another whiskey you can have the rest of the story.’ The moment I started pouring, he launched again into his narrative, ‘It’s a small tale really, a footnote to a subtext of history, overpassed and obscured long since by later researches. He was a philologist, you see, and his line of research was ancient Etruscan, of which we have a few decipherable fragments and many more undecipherable ones. Finally, he achieved a breakthrough which established his reputation as a scholar, gained him a doctorate and ultimately a tenured professorship. What he had done was establish a clear connection between the Etruscan texts and modern remnants of Illyrian languages, like Albanian … All very obscure stuff to the non-academic, but you know how important it is to the initiates. In that package on the desk are all his early papers, the foundation of a life’s work. He wants me to edit and publish them.’
‘And that’s a confession? It sounds more like a final act of academic vanity.’
‘He also wants me to publish the fact that he stole the original material and used it without attribution, as the basis of his own research.’
‘Stole it from whom?’
‘A junior curator at the Etruscan Museum in Rome, who made the original discovery but took longer to present and publish the material. By the time it was out, it was already superseded. He shot himself in a garret in Trastevere.’
‘God! No wonder your friend needed a confessor. All that guilt festering inside him for so long.’