I half-turned to follow the direction of his gaze. A young guy had just come through a door in the opaque fiberglass wall that adjoined the next greenhouse. As he approached I saw that he was about thirty, tallish, wiry, good-looking in a careless sort of way. Bristly mustache, hair that fanned down over his shoulders, eyes that had the light of mischief in them. He wore running shoes and faded Levi’s and a sweatshirt with the sleeves cut off; on the front of the sweatshirt were the words NO NUKES in bright red letters.
“Hey, Pop,” he said, “what happened to those live seafoam and shooting-star miniatures? I don’t see them anywhere.” Pop, like Number One Son addressing Charlie Chan. He didn’t even glance at me.
“Gone,” his father said.
“Gone? You mean you sold them?”
“Yes.”
“Pop, I told you yesterday morning the Crawley brothers wanted them. What’s the matter? You going senile on me?”
Mr. Ogada didn’t say anything. So I said, “Everybody forgets things now and then, particularly when they’ve been working hard.”
The young guy, Edgar, put his eyes on me for the first time. There was no hostility in the look, nor even any annoyance; it was just a look with a question: Who are you?
I said, “I’d like to talk to you for a few minutes, if you don’t mind. A personal matter.”
“The washers in this valve need to be changed,” Mr. Ogada said, “Will you do it, Edgar? I have invoices to prepare.”
“If I’ve got time.”
“ Hai,” Mr. Ogada said, and bowed slightly in my direction, and went away toward the outside door.
Edgar said, “What’s this personal matter you want to talk about?”
“A former girlfriend of yours. Haruko Gage.”
His forehead wrinkled slightly; that was the extent of his reaction to Haruko’s name. “Why?” he said. “Who are you, anyway?”
“A private detective.” I gave him my name and showed him the photostat of my license. “Mrs. Gage hired me to investigate a little problem she’s having.”
“You mean Haruko’s in trouble?”
“No, nothing like that.”
I told him what the problem was, and he didn’t react much to that either. A little surprise and a little puzzlement, nothing else.
“I don’t get it,” he said. “Anybody who’d do something like that has to be nuts.”
“That’s what Haruko is afraid of.”
“But why talk to me? I don’t know anything about it.” He paused and frowned again. “Hey, she doesn’t think I’m the one who’s doing it, does she?”
“No. Your name was one of several she gave me-old boyfriends, men who’ve been serious about her in the past.”
“Well, that lets me out. I’ve never been serious over any girl. There’s too many of ’em, you know? Too many sakana in the umi.”
“Uh-huh.”
“We had some fun, Haruko and me,” Edgar said. He grinned. “I brought her here once and we were, you know, getting it on over at the house and Pop almost caught us. That would have been a heavy scene. Pop’s old- fashioned; he doesn’t think people ought to screw unless they’re married.”
“Is that how your mother feels too?”
The grin vanished. “My mother’s dead,” he said in a different, softer voice. “She died last summer. It’s been rough on Pop; that’s why he works so hard.”
Rough on Edgar, too, judging from his tone. I said, “How do you feel about Haruko now that she’s married?”
“Same as I’ve always felt about her. We’re still friends, only without the sex.”
“No regrets about that?”
“A few, sure. I wouldn’t mind getting it on with her again if she ever dumps Art the Fart; we were good together, real good. But it’s no big deal. A guy can always get laid.”
“I take it you don’t like her husband much.”
“He’s a jerkoff. I don’t know why she married him, unless it’s because he lets her tell him what to do. Or maybe he’s Clark Kent with his clothes on and Superman in the sack.” He shrugged. “Who knows why women do anything? I never could figure ’em out.”
That makes two of us, brother, I thought. “Do you know Ken Yamasaki?”
“Sure. Not too well, though. He thinks he’s an intellectual; I don’t think I am.”
“Could he be Haruko’s secret admirer, do you think?”
“It wouldn’t surprise me.”
“How about Kinji Shimata?”
“Shimata… no, never heard of him.”
“Nelson Mixer?”
“Is that somebody’s name?”
“Yes. A history teacher at City College.”
“I didn’t go to college,” he said and shrugged again.
I thanked him for his time, and he said, “Sure, I hope you find the nut,” and I left him and went out of the greenhouse. Most of the vehicles and workers had disappeared; so had Ogada Senior. The black-veined clouds were overhead now, scudding along in front of the sharp west wind like bales of gangrenous wool.
The rain started again, hard driving bullets of it, before I was halfway to my car.
With the exception of Ken Yamasaki, I had exhausted the list of names Haruko Gage had given me and I hadn’t learned much of anything so far. I had Yamasaki’s address, but I couldn’t look him up until I cleared it with Leo McFate. After having had my license suspended for a time five months ago, even though I hadn’t done much of anything wrong to deserve it, I could not afford to get the cops miffed at me again. And I couldn’t go down to the Hall to see McFate until four o’clock; he’d answered the homicide squeal last night, which meant he was working the four-to-midnight swing this week.
Another talk with Haruko seemed to be the only tack I had left. I could find out if she knew about Ken Yamasaki’s apparent Yakuza connections, and I could ask her some more questions about her past, maybe get a few more names worth checking out.
I came back into San Francisco on the 19th Avenue exit off Highway 280, drove straight to Japantown, and managed to find the same parking spot near the Gage Victorian that I’d occupied yesterday. When I went up and rang the bell, Haruko herself opened the door. She was wearing a tight white sweater today, and a pair of form- fitting designer slacks, and her glossy black hair was piled high on her head and held in place by a lacquered Oriental comb. Artie must have licked his chops when he saw her dressed up like that. Even I had to admit that she looked pretty sexy.
“Oh, good,” she said when she saw me. “Did you get my message?”
“Message?”
“The one I left on your answering machine.”
“No, I didn’t get it. I haven’t been home.”
“Are you here because you found out something…?”
“I’m afraid not. I talked to Shimata and Mixer and Ogada, but no luck so far. I just wanted to ask you a few more questions.”
“Damn,” she said angrily, but the anger wasn’t directed at me. “Well, I called you this morning because I received another package.”
“Oh? The same sort as before?”
“Not exactly. Come in and I’ll show you.”
She led me into the cluttered, ersatz-antique parlor where we’d held yesterday’s conference. On the coffee table were a small white gift box with the lid on and some package wrapping and twine. There was no sign of her wimpy husband.
