It was a big compartment outfitted as an office, with carpeting on the deck and Japanese woodblock prints on the bulkheads and a massive teak desk set between a pair of portholes that looked out over the Bay. Some overstuffed chairs were arranged on the left side; on the right side was an elaborate teak bar. The room was soundproofed: when the Lump shut the door you couldn’t hear any of the restaurant sounds, or the cries of gulls outside.
There were two men in the compartment. One of them was standing next to the desk; the other was sitting stiffly in the nearest of the overstuffed chairs. I took the standing one to be Hisayuki Okubo. He was a good deal older, better dressed-a tan suit made out of silk, from the looks of it-and had an air of authority about him. Still, he wasn’t such-a-much. Short, a little on the plump side, with bland features and slicked-down hair like a gangster in an old George Raft movie.
Nobody moved for a few seconds. Then the guy in the silk suit came over to me, bowed slightly, and introduced himself. Okubo, all right. The Yakuza godfather. Not such-a-much in most ways, maybe, but when you saw his eyes up close like this, you could tell what he was made of. They were as cold and flat and hard as steel boilerplate, and they made a lie of the politeness in his voice and his manner.
I said, “I’ll make this short and sweet, Mr. Okubo; we’ve both got better things to do. I’m here to ask you to leave me alone, quit having me followed. I didn’t have anything to do with Simon Tamura’s murder, so there’s nothing for you to find out. Besides, it’s annoying and it makes me nervous and it’s interfering with my work.”
Okubo was silent. So were the Lump and the guy in the chair, who looked tense and worried. It was so quiet in there I could hear myself breathing.
“Well, Mr. Okubo?” I said finally.
“Tell me, please, what work it is you are presently engaged in.”
I told him. What I didn’t tell him was that there was some kind of connection between the Tamura homicide and Haruko Gage’s secret admirer. I did not want to get into that with him unless I was forced to.
He said, “You went to Mr. Tamura’s bathhouse to speak with Ken Yamasaki-correct?”
“That’s right. Mrs. Gage gave me his name along with a number of others, all former boyfriends. I’ve been trying to talk to Yamasaki ever since, but he hasn’t been around.”
“Why do you wish to speak with him?”
“The same reason I went to the bathhouse. And also because it’s his car those two boys of yours are using to follow me around. But then, you already know that.”
“Yes,” Okubo said, “now I do.”
“How was that again?”
“Also, those two men are not ‘my boys,’ as you put it.”
“Sorry; I didn’t mean that as a racial slur. Kobun, then, or whatever it is you call them.”
“No,” he said.
“No? Then what are they?”
“Friends of Mr. Yamasaki’s.”
“Not Yakuza?”
“Friends of Mr. Yamasaki’s,” he repeated.
“I don’t think I understand…”
“Would you still like to speak with him?”
“Yamasaki? Yeah, I would.”
“Very well. You may.” He turned and made a gesture toward the young guy in the chair. “This is Mr. Ken Yamasaki.”
It surprised me. I hadn’t paid much attention to the young guy; now, when I looked at him, I could see just how tense and worried he was. Afraid, too: the fear was in his eyes and in the faint sheen of perspiration on his forehead. He was pretty much as Haruko had described him to me-on the near side of thirty, slender in a way that was almost girlish, with ascetic features enhanced by thick, black-rimmed glasses.
“Well, well,” I said. “You want to tell me about these friends of yours, Mr. Yamasaki?”
Yamasaki didn’t answer. He didn’t look at me either; his gaze was on his hands chafing together in his lap. But then Okubo said something to him in Japanese, sharp words that made the young guy’s head snap up and the fear flare momentarily bright in his eyes.
“I asked them to follow you,” he said to me. “Without Mr. Okubo’s permission.”
“Or my knowledge,” Okubo said.
Now I understood. It had been a private matter all along: nothing much to do with the Yakuza, really, except that Yamasaki and his two friends were low-level members of the organization. Okubo hadn’t known anything about it until I showed up a little while ago; that was why he’d refused to see me at first. But when I made my threat he’d hauled Yamasaki in-the kid had already been here for some reason that didn’t matter-and got the truth out of him.
All of which meant that the Yakuza wasn’t interested in me at all. Or hadn’t been until now. There was no telling yet which way things were going to go, although I liked my chances of getting off the hook better than I liked Yamasaki’s.
I asked, “Why did you have your friends follow me?”
“The police told me it was I you came to see at the bathhouse. I had no idea why and it concerned me. I wished to find out.”
Damn McFate and his big mouth. “So you were the one they kept talking to on the CB radio?”
“Yes. I let them use my car and borrowed my girlfriend’s; she also has a Citizen’s Band. That permitted us to communicate.”
“All you had to do,” I said, “was come and talk to me face to face. I’d have told you why I wanted to see you-gladly. There wasn’t any need for you to play games.”
Yamasaki looked at his hands again. There was embarrassment mingled with his anxiety now, as if he realized that his blunder was stupid and inexcusable and he’d lost a lot of face because of it. “ Comen nasai,” he said softly. I didn’t need a translator to know that he was saying he was sorry, as much to himself as to Okubo and me.
I turned my attention to Okubo. “What happens now? I don’t want any trouble with you people; all I want is to be left alone to do my job:”
“An admirable wish.”
“I think so.”
“Tell me this: Would you actually have carried out your threat to damage our establishment?”
“No,” I said. “That was just a ruse.”
“Ah. Very ingenious.”
“Was it? That depends.”
“On what?”
“On whether or not I get my wish.”
“Of course,” Okubo said, as if he were surprised that I might think otherwise. “We, too, do not want any trouble; like you, we only desire to be left alone to do our work.”
I nodded, feeling relieved now. “What about Mr. Yamasaki’s two friends?”
“They will not bother you any longer. I have already seen to that — by house telephone, before you entered.”
“And Mr. Yamasaki? What happens to him?”
Okubo didn’t say anything. Nobody said anything.
I decided the smart thing for me to do was to shut up. If I tried to argue Yamasaki’s case, it would only get Okubo down on me again. The Yakuza and its code of honor were nothing for a Caucasian to try mixing in. Besides, I doubted if they’d do anything terminal to him; he hadn’t screwed up badly enough for that sort of punishment.
Pretty soon Okubo said something to the Lump in Japanese; then he bowed to me, and I bowed to him, and the Lump led me out into the companionway. The last I saw of Ken Yamasaki, he was sitting stiff-backed in his chair with the sweat glistening on his cheeks and the fear glistening in his eyes.
The Lump walked me through the now-crowded and noisy restaurant, all the way out to the gangplank. I went down without looking at him, across the wind-swept parking area to my car. There was no sign of the white
