Another call to the DMV. Fletcher, had the list ready for me: eight Wakasas with California driver’s licenses, none of them named Michio; three in the Bay Area, one in Fresno, one in Eureka, one in Vacaville, and two in Southern California. Of the three locals, two lived in Oakland and one in Palo Alto. I wrote down all the names and addresses, thanked Fletcher, again, assured him I wouldn’t bother him any more for a while, and rang off.
I still had two hours until my meeting with Haruko Gage, and as I crossed the campus I decided to go home and use the time to telephone Wakasas. But I changed my mind when I came out on Phelan Avenue and again confronted the white Ford and the two kobun sitting inside it. Enough was enough. The Wakasa telephoning would have to wait a while.
The time had come for me to deal with the Yakuza, one way or another.
Chapter Eighteen
The Kara Maru Restaurant was on China Basin Boulevard a block or so off Third Street, tucked up between Pier 52 and a marine salvage company. It had once been a small ocean-going freighter and it still looked seaworthy; or it would have except for the canopied gangplank that led up to it from the wharfside, the silk banner proclaiming its name in English letters and Japanese ideographs, and the big sign in front that said you could get lunch, dinner, and cocktails every day except Sunday.
There was a parking area off to one side, mostly empty this early in the day, and I put my car into one of the slots. The white Ford stopped back on the street, alongside the long Pier 52 shed. When I got out I could see the two of them through the Ford’s windshield; if they were surprised that I’d led them here, you couldn’t tell it from their actions or their expressions.
It was cold this close to the Bay, and cold inside the Kara Maru, too, despite the unit heaters that had been mounted on the bulkheads. Cold and damp and a little musty, like an empty cargo hold or a shore cottage that has been closed up for several months. Creaks and groans from mooring hawsers and old caulked joints. A suggestion of movement underfoot, although the boat was tightly anchored to the wharf to keep it steady and its customers from throwing up on each other in bad weather. Teakwood tables and chairs, big soft-cushioned ship’s couches in the bar lounge and restaurant booths, and lots of highly polished brass fittings-nautical clocks, compasses, sextants, and the like-to complete the decor.
The lounge was off to the left as you came in; there wasn’t anybody in it except for a black-jacketed bartender. Straight ahead was a kind of foyer with another black-jacketed Japanese holding forth behind a podium thing built to resemble a ship’s wheel housing. Behind him was the main dining room: thirty or forty tables, half that many booths. Only two of the tables and one of the booths were occupied at the moment.
I went ahead to the guy at the podium. He smiled and bowed and said, “ Yoku irasshaimash’ta! One for lunch, sir?”
“No,” I said. “I’m here to see Mr. Okubo. Hisayuki Okubo.”
The smile vanished and his face went blank; it was as if some part of him had been switched off. He said in a flat voice, “Please wait in the lounge, sir.”
“Don’t you want my name or anything?”
“Please wait in the lounge, sir.”
So I went into the lounge and sat at the bar and ordered a plain tomato juice. Nothing happened until I was halfway through the drink; then a lump of a guy in a dark blue suit came in and approached me. He had no hair, not much in the way of ears, and eyes sunk so deep in heavy flesh that they were like holes poked in bread dough. The sumo wrestler type. The bouncer and bodyguard type.
He stopped next to my stool and said, “Yes, please?”
“I want to see Mr. Okubo.”
“Your name, please?”
I had already gotten out one of my business cards; I handed it to him.
Without looking at the card he said, “Your purpose?”
“A personal matter.”
“Your purpose, please?”
“Simon Tamura. Ken Yamasaki The two men in the white Ford.”
For all the reaction he gave that, I might have just recited my Christmas card list. He said, “Wait, please,” and went away with my card.
I sat there for another ten minutes, finishing my tomato juice. More people came in-tourists, mostly, with a few business types sprinkled among them. None of the customers was Japanese.
The Lump came back finally and stopped where he had before and handed me back my card. “So sorry,” he said. “It is not possible.”
“You mean Mr. Okubo won’t see me?”
“It is not possible. Good-bye, please.” And he turned and lumbered off toward the foyer.
It made me angry; it made me damned angry. I got off the stool and went after him and caught up just as he was nearing a door amidships, at the rear of the foyer. I scooted around in front of him, blocked his way. He stopped and looked at me out of those sunken eyes-the kind of look that was supposed to make me shrivel up and crawl away. I gave it right back to him, letting him see my anger.
“I’ve got a message for Mr. Okubo,” I said quietly. “Tell him that unless he agrees to see me, I’m going to start busting this place up. You know, destroy things-furniture, dishes, whatever I can lay my hands on. Maybe knock some of his people around a little too. One man can do a lot of damage in a few minutes. Then he’ll have to call the police; too many witnesses for him to do anything else. There’ll be newspaper reporters along when the cops get here, and I’ll tell them why I did it. Simon Tamura, Ken Yamasaki, the two men in the white Ford. Plus everything else I know about the Yakuza and the Kara Maru. It’ll be all over the papers tomorrow, he can bet on that. Should be great for business.”
The Lump didn’t react or move or speak.
“I know what you’re thinking, pal,” I said. “You’re thinking you’re a pretty big guy yourself and you and one or two of your friends can stop me before I do much damage. But don’t count on it; I’m just as tough as you are. Tougher, because I’m mad as hell. Tell Mr. Okubo that too. Either he and I talk like gentlemen or you and I fight like animals.”
He spent another few seconds absorbing all of that. Then some more customers came in and animated him again. He said, “Wait, please,” and made a careful sidestep around me and disappeared through the amidships door.
I went over to lean against one of the bulkheads. What I’d said about busting the place up had been a bluff; I was to old for that kind of brawl, and it would not only land me in jail, it would get my license yanked all over again-for good this time. But Mr. Okubo didn’t know any of that. He would either buy the bluff or he wouldn’t, on its own merits. It all depended on what he thought of me and how much it mattered to him whether he gave me an audience or not.
I had to wait more than ten minutes this time, and I was wired pretty good when the Lump reappeared. He stood in the open doorway and beckoned to me: Okubo had bought the bluff. I moved over there and into a companionway, and the Lump let the door swing shut. But we didn’t go anywhere just yet.
He said, “Weapons, please.”
“I’m not carrying any weapons.”
“You will please allow me to search.”
“I don’t think so,” I said. I did not want him putting his hands on me. Instead I backed off a ways, in case he had any ideas of getting rough, and opened my jacket. He didn’t move. So I took the jacket off, tossed it to him, watched him paw through it. Then I turned around in a slow circle so he could see that the only bulges on my body were made by fat deposits. “Satisfied?”
“ Hai,” he said. He let me have my jacket back and waited until I put it on. “This way, please.”
We went down the companionway, made a left-hand-turn into another one. At the far end of the second one was a closed door. The Lump tapped on the door in a deferential way, reached down to open it, and then stood aside to let me go in first.
