The Moving Blade

by Michael Pronko

  After the first sip, Takamatsu raised his cup and said, “Hiroshi, you’re going to have to get over your bad mood. What happened last summer could have been done differently, but it wasn’t. Now it’s done.”

  Hiroshi had a hard time seeing Takamatsu with Sakaguchi between them.

  Sakaguchi grunted assent and turned to Hiroshi with his cup in the air. “A few bruises and a close call are just part of the deal.”

  Hiroshi started to object, “I was almost—” but he gave up and held his cup to them with a reluctant mumble of assent, “Hai, hai.”

  “Kanpai. Cheers.” They drank in unison.

  “Oh, master,” shouted the dyed-hair boy closest against the wall. “These girls have never had ikizukuri. Can you do one for us?”

  “That’s usually for the start of the meal,” the master said calmly, apologizing to the detectives again with his eyes.

  “For the girls,” the guy said his face pink and perspiring from drinking.

  Hiroshi leaned back and took a sip of sake instead of clouting the kid on the head like he felt like doing. Hiroshi focused on the master with his cutting board and fish knife. From the small, bubbling tank at the side of his prep counter, he pulled out a small silver fish. It squirmed on the cutting board as he sliced one side of the fish in rectangular pieces down to the bone and slid the knife along the smooth arc of bones to lift off the glistening flesh.

  He turned the fish over and sliced the other side into small squares and ran a skewer from tail to gill, curving the fish so both filmy grey eyes peered forward. The gills pumped like small wings and the mouth flexed open and shut. He nestled it onto a bed of fern leaves over crushed ice and circled the plate with a mound of white daikon, a pinch of wasabi, shiso leaves and a teensy blue dish for soy sauce. The mouth of the fish kept gaping and closing.

  “Itadakimasu!” The young couples dipped the small slices of fish into soy sauce and tucked them into their flushed faces. The girls covered their mouths with their manicured, polished nails and cooed delight, wiggling their thin, bare shoulders.

  The three detectives sipped their sake and glanced at the sliced fish being eaten half alive from its bed of ice.

  Sakaguchi’s cellphone rang, and he retrieved it from the depths of his jacket and stepped outside. Hiroshi and Takamatsu sipped their sake quietly.

  “What do you have against Saito?” Hiroshi asked Takamatsu.

  Takamatsu growled as if he was thinking about that himself. “He was a good detective when he was young, but like the bureau chief, he takes the easy route now.”

  “You think Saito hurried too quickly through the Mattson case?”

  “The more you dig into a case like that, the more trouble you bring on yourself. Saito avoids trouble at all costs. Like the chief.”

  When Sakaguchi ducked back through the sliding door, the master asked the four youngsters if they were finished.

  One of the young guys replied in curt, haughty Japanese, “We’ll leave when we’re finished.”

  Sakaguchi rose up from his stool and dropped a thick, heavy hand on the kid’s shoulder, letting it rest there. With his other hand, he pulled out his badge and held it in the kid’s face before tapping it—once, hard—onto the kid’s nose.

  The kid shook his head away and rubbed his nose, his eyes full of tears. The other three set down their chopsticks. The other boy said, “We’re done anyway.” His moussed wet-look hair bounced around as he flopped ten-thousand yen notes on the counter. The girls got up without another word and tossed their cellphones and handkerchiefs in their brand name purses. The boys tugged on their polyester jackets with dramatic sullenness.

  Sakaguchi remained standing in the middle of the sushi bar, leaving just enough room for the four youngsters to sidle out, if they were careful.

  Hiroshi waited for the one bump or the one word that would set off Sakaguchi in a tachiai charge.

  The four young people kept their eyes down and eased out. The only thing that touched Sakaguchi was the scent of their over-used fragrances.

  The master slid out from the opening under the counter to thank them in the politest Japanese. When they were gone, the master set a small “closed” sign out front and slid a wood latch to lock the panel door. The master picked up the platter of half-eaten fish, its jaws still gulping, and held it up as he asked, “What else can I get you?”

  Hiroshi looked into the cold, grey eye of the fish in the master’s hand and said, “Just chazuke is fine.”

  Takamatsu refolded his jacket on the stool beside him. “Just sake.”

  “Something grilled, iwashi maybe,” Sakaguchi said, sitting down.

  The master slid back under the counter with a shrug and got to work. The cologne and perfume started dissipating, replaced by the inviting smell of the master’s cooking.

  Takamatsu said, “There’s a guy I talked to about swords. In Shinjuku. Knows his stuff.”

  “You got the address?” Sakaguchi settled back onto his seat between Hiroshi and Takamatsu, who moved over as the master removed the used dishes.

  “Someplace.” Takamatsu scrolled through his contacts on his cell phone. “I’ll send it to Hiroshi. Get him out of the office. Look how pale he is, and that long hair.”

  Hiroshi started to protest, but didn’t want to provoke anything more. He was too tired.

  Sakaguchi handed Takamatsu the book from Mattson’s. Takamatsu hummed interest as he pulled open the big, heavy art book and leafed through the pages with a smile. He closed the book and handed it back. “There’s a shop in the used bookstore area of Jinbocho, Endo Brothers. They specialize in this. They’ll know about the shunga prints and the netsuke carvings.”

  Sakaguchi wrote down the name. “I’ll stop by, but I’ve never been much of a reader.”

  Takamatsu smiled. “You don’t need to read, you need to talk.”

  Sakaguchi sipped his sake. “Osaki said Mattson’s computer was completely blank. They must have erased it after they took what they wanted.”

  Hiroshi set down his sake cup. “Mattson was going to speak at the opening of the conference on Asian security and defense. Whatever he was going to say was probably on there.”

  Takamatsu sipped his sake. “You should start with it as just a burglary, and work up from there.”

  Sakaguchi tucked some pickles into his mouth. “This won’t get done before the conference. The Chinese, Korean and American diplomats are already pouring into Tokyo. They get first priority.”

  “Saito’s not in charge of security for that, is he?” Takamatsu looked at them, then groaned. “Oh, of course he is.”

  “Almost everyone’s been assigned over there. No one’s left in the office.” Sakaguchi set the book aside and sipped his sake.

  “Where’s the file on Mattson?” Hiroshi asked.

  Sakaguchi said, “I sent Sugamo to secure it. That’s who called. He said the file on Mattson was de-prioritized once the American embassy accepted he was killed during a robbery.”

  “Let’s reprioritize it,” Hiroshi said.

  “I just did,” Sakaguchi said, holding up his cup for another pour of sake from the master. After he refilled Sakaguchi’s cup, the master plonked the top on the large bottle and placed it back in the refrigerated case behind the counter. He pulled the iwashi sardines from the grill, the silver skin bubbled and browned. He set them on a rectangular plate in front of Sakaguchi.

  Sakaguchi barely blew on the still-smoking fish before popping one hot and whole into his mouth and chewing it, working it, bones and all, down to an easy-to-swallow mash.

  “Not much to go on, sword cuts, erotic prints and a blank computer,” Hiroshi said.

  “It’s enough if you read it right,” Takamatsu said.

  Chapter 7

  Nearby the sword shop, Hiroshi slowed to watch a long line of mainly older people carrying signs about the Fukushima meltdown. The chants of the elderly protestors echoed off the corridor of Shinjuku’s tall buildings. All were against nucl
ear power, but some aimed their outrage at the government, while other signs denounced the power companies. Not much separation between the two, Hiroshi thought, as the crowd moved along steadily shepherded by desultory police officers.

  The sword shop’s heavy door hushed the bullhorn slogans. Inside, Hiroshi let his eyes run over the swords arrayed by style and length in neat wall racks and chest-high glass cases, their shelves softened by silk-covered cushions. Even in the low light of the shop, the swords caught glints of sunlight that made them glimmer with readiness.

  The owner, a bonsai of a man with all but the keenest parts trimmed away, stood behind the counter explaining fittings to a customer. The tendons of his forearms flexed as he slipped collars and ray skin grips on and off, explaining precisely what worked and what did not. The owner’s neat-cut ponytail and traditional sagyo-bakama work clothes made it seem like he and the customer, a salaryman in office clothes, were talking across centuries, not just a counter.

  Hiroshi walked to a vertical rack in the corner holding tameshigiri, tatami mats rolled in tight round bundles. It took Hiroshi a minute to figure out what they were for—sword practice. Some were as tall as a man and varied in thickness from wrist to thigh to waist. Snatching only a few hours of sleep between the sushi place and the call to London Interpol at six a.m., his eyes were so tired he had to squint to read the elegant kanji characters stenciled into the intricate sword mountings.

  The customer in office clothes pulled open the door to leave, letting in the bullhorn chants from the street for a moment before the door shushed shut leaving only the sound of the owner rubbing a cloth over the menuki, tsuba and fuchikashira fittings he’d just shown the customer.

  “You must like swords,” the owner said, as he finished tucking the fittings away in a felt lined box.

  “I’m amazed at the patterns along the edge.” Hiroshi’s eyes roamed over the waves, zig-zags and asymmetric lines flowing along the silver blades.

  “Each has a unique hamon, made with an application of clay during tempering.”

  “It sounds complicated.”

  “Swords are the most complex construction of pre-industrial Japan—a combination of technology, design, engineering and spiritual force.” He ran the handleless blade across a cut of oiled paper, placed the blade on the shelf behind the counter, and carefully wiped his hands before retying the front of his cotton jacket.

  “A colleague recommended I stop by. Your name is Suzuki, isn’t it?”

  “Would your colleague be Detective Takamatsu?”

  “How did you know?”

  “I thought you might be an actor when you first came in. Actors get cast in one samurai movie and then want their own sword. Keeps me in business. If detectives started carrying swords, though, it would really boost sales.”

  Hiroshi was not sure if Suzuki was joking or not. His strong jawed face and deep-set eyes remained serious. Hiroshi handed him his meishi. “I’m Hiroshi Shimizu. Takamatsu is my mentor senpai, or was.”

  “Until he got suspended,” Suzuki said.

  “You seem to know everything.”

  “I keep my focus inside this shop. That’s enough.”

  “I was wondering if you could look at a photo,” Hiroshi said. “It’s rather grisly.”

  “I’ve seen the effects of swords. It’s never pleasant.”

  Hiroshi placed the photo of the dead man on the counter, being careful not to look at it. The images of the dead man from the night before had lost none of their persistence, bubbling up again to make the air in the shop stifling. He should have gone to the bookstore and let Sakaguchi work these photos.

  Showing no sign of being repulsed, Suzuki turned on a desk light at the side of the counter, examining the photo with magnifying glasses.

  “A tanto short sword, I would say. Those right there.” Suzuki nodded at a row of swords.

  Hiroshi stepped over to look at the horizontal display of shorter swords. They all looked the same to him except for their length. Thinking of them cutting into human flesh made their beauty confusing and frightening. Hiroshi rummaged in his head for what to ask. “Don’t all swords cut the same?”

  “One sign of a tanto is how it makes a clean cut.” Suzuki looked at him over the top of his glasses. “It was not a wakizashi sword,” Suzuki nodded at another rack of swords, “which are typically longer, and usually wider. See those over there?” He pointed at another horizontal ladder of longer swords. “You can take one down if you want.”

  Hiroshi hesitated, uncertain of whether he should actually reach for a sword. He knew there must be some etiquette for handling the swords, so he kept his hands at his sides.

  “Those long katana,” he nodded at a much wider rack on the other side of the store. “Hard to carry through the city without being noticed,” Suzuki said, taking off his glasses and looking up at Hiroshi.

  Hiroshi wondered if each of the swords in the shop had actually been used. “How do you know what each sword will do?”

  “If you cut into a tameshigiri, you see right away. The swords produce a distinct stroke. The practice targets are different than human flesh. And this is just a photograph, after he fell.”

  “This stroke looks practiced?”

  “Very.”

  “Why is there a slightly upward angle?” Hiroshi turned the photo back towards Suzuki. He pictured the whole scene again, making him queasy.

  “Perhaps he drew from the scabbard straight into the stroke.”

  Hiroshi frowned, thinking about the dead man’s last moments on the street of Golden Gai, bleeding out, feeling weaker, feeling nothing, alone.

  “There were no defensive wounds, right?”

  “No, but it looked like he ducked and the sword hit a door, shattering it.”

  “So, he’s fast, practiced and unafraid to kill.” Suzuki nodded.

  “Who would use a tanto sword so well?”

  “That’s a more difficult question.”

  “Narrow it down for me.”

  Suzuki folded his magnifying glasses and put them into their case. “He could have studied anywhere, and these days, buyers and sellers come from all over the world. But of course, the blade could have been purchased anytime in the past.”

  “There’s a lot of past.” What happened, he wondered, to all the swords made over the centuries? Hiroshi felt he might be wasting his time here. That was Takamatsu’s fault. He should have stayed in his office.

  “Check the list of purchases at recent conventions. Check that against the list of registered swords.”

  “How many would that be?”

  “Two million. Registered. No one knows how many unregistered swords there are.”

  “That’s a lot to check.”

  “Don’t you have one of those computers?”

  “Yes, of course, but even with that, it would take—” Hiroshi stopped, wondering if Suzuki was joking with him, but Suzuki’s features remained taut and focused. Hiroshi tapped the photo on the counter and put it away. “Computers are not much help for some things.”

  “It’s hard enough to focus on what’s in front of your senses.”

  “Do you know anything about seppuku?” Hiroshi set out a photo of Mattson with a smooth red line straight across his pale belly and another in the chair where he died, blood dripping on to the tatami below him. Hiroshi breathed in, pushing his revulsion, and fatigue, aside. “What kind of sword would be used for that?”

  “Traditionally, the samurai used a tanto sword.” Suzuki took the photo and put his glasses back on. “Short wakizashi swords could be used, too. The samurai would select their favorite sword, one they knew well and used often. Let me get one for you.”

  Hiroshi stood waiting as Suzuki went in the back room and returned with a plain wooden scabbard. He set it on a cloth on the counter and with his thumbs at the opening and the sharp side upward, he gently pushed the hilt out and removed the sword.

  “Why is the wood so, well, cheap?” Hiroshi felt embarrass
ed, and a bit ashamed, to know so little of Japan’s culture. Maybe Takamatsu was right—he had been overseas too long.

  “This is a shirasaya, a storage mount. All the fittings are attached when the time comes. You can see the hamon pattern here.” Suzuki held the tanto blade up to the light, moving it slowly so Hiroshi could see the patterns along each side. “You can see how the point, edge, tempered line and back are all different. The inner steel must be pliable, but the edge and point tempered hard.”

  “Why is that?”

  Suzuki looked at Hiroshi patiently, and explained, “The inner metal must bend under pressure, to not break, while the exterior layer must cut clean and hold its edge.”

  Hiroshi struggled to think what to ask next. “Committing seppuku must have taken great determination and tremendous self-control.”

  “Only trained swordsmen could ever bring it off. Not many of those anymore.”

  “Cutting oneself open across the belly, no matter how quickly, must be extraordinarily painful.”

  Suzuki shrugged. “So is whatever drives them to it. There was no kaishakunin, was there?” Suzuki asked.

  “Kaishakunin?” Hiroshi had no idea what he was asking about. He would tell Takamatsu that his sources might have information but offered it reluctantly, in disordered fashion. He should have stayed in his office and looked up most all of this online.

  “In ritual suicide, a trusted accomplice stood behind the samurai who was committing suicide. His job was to sever the head of the victim at the neck with one swift, merciful cut.”

  “He was cut across the abdomen, but not beheaded.” Hiroshi was again not sure if Suzuki was testing him, or if Takamatsu had told Suzuki to find how little Hiroshi knew. Either way, he was being tested.

  “The stomach held great symbolism in the past. Maybe it doesn’t any longer.”

  Hiroshi slipped the photos back in his pocket.

  “Was he tied up?”

  “Taped up.”

  “The swordsman leaned down for a quick stroke with a slight downward angle.”

  Hiroshi pictured the situation, mentally editing out the blood and gore. “Would a tanto work for that?”