Cure (2010)

writhing sandwich, with the guard on the bottom and Ben on top.

At the moment their bodies collided, Kaniji had brought the knife down suddenly, plunging its tip into the sulcus between the guard’s collarbone and the top edge of his shoulder. When the group hit the floor the blade was driven home, piercing the man’s carotid arch in the process.

Other than the whoosh of air expelled from Kaniji’s and the guard’s lungs as they all collided with the floor, the first thing Ben was aware of was intermittent jets of spouting fluid. It took him a moment in the confusion of the event to realize that it was blood. As Ben scrambled away he could see that the blood was coming in progressively smaller spurts as the guard’s heart extruded the rest of his total of six quarts.

Although Kaniji was now covered with blood, Ben had been hit with only a few large drops, which ran down his forehead when he stood up. He’d feverishly brushed them off with the back of his free hand and then shook the hand.

For a second Ben stared down at the two intertwined bodies awash in red, one still struggling to catch his breath, the other motionless and pale. Without another thought, Ben took off. Clutching the laboratory books under his left arm like a football, he ran headlong back the route he and Kaniji had taken on their way to Satoshi’s old office.

Bursting forth from the building’s main entrance on the ground floor, Ben hesitated for a moment, not sure what to do. Without the ignition keys to Kaniji’s aged Datsun, there was no need to retrace the route to where the car was parked in a small copse of trees. As his mind raced through various but not too auspicious possibilities, he was shocked into action by the distant sound of approaching sirens. Although lost in a foreign city, he was aware of the Kamo River off to the west, which knifed through Kyoto north to south, and was near to the ryokan where he was staying in the old city.

With the stamina of someone who participated in triathlons, Ben struck off using the stars as a guide to get to the river. He ran swiftly and smoothly, trying to be as silent as possible. After only three blocks he heard the police sirens trail off, suggesting that the authorities had already reached the lab. Clamping his jaw shut tightly, Ben upped his pace. The last thing he wanted was to be stopped. Anxious and trembling, he would have trouble answering the simplest of questions, let alone explaining why he was out running at that time of night carrying books taken from a Kyoto University lab. When he reached the river, he turned north and settled into a rapid but consistent stride, as if he was in a race.

THREE WEEKS LATER

MARCH 22, 2010

MONDAY, 9:37 a.m.

TOKYO, JAPAN

Naoki Tajiri had been in the mizu shobai, or “water trade,” for longer than he cared to admit. Starting at the very bottom just after high school, washing sake cups, beer mugs, and shochu glasses, he’d slowly moved up the ladder of responsibility. To add to his resume, he’d made it a point to work in all manner of establishments, from the traditional nomiya, or drinking shop, to hard-core prostitution bar-lounges run by the Yakuza, the Japanese version of the Mafia. Naoki himself was not a member of any gang by choice, but he was tolerated and even in demand by the Yakuza for his experience, which was the reason he was the general manager of The Paradise, one of the most popular full-service night spots in the Akasaka district of Tokyo.

Although Naoki had begun his career in his small hometown, he’d moved to progressively larger towns over the years, finally reaching the big time in Kyoto, then Tokyo. Over the years Naoki had thought he’d seen just about everything associated with the water trade, including money, alcohol, gambling, sex, and murder. Until that morning.

It started with a phone call just before six a.m. Irritated at whoever was calling him just after he’d fallen asleep, he answered gruffly but soon changed his tune. The caller was Mitsuhiro Narumi, the saiko komon, or senior adviser, to the oyabun, or head of the Inagawa-kai, the Yakuza organization that owned The Paradise. For someone so senior to be calling him, a mere general manager of a nightclub, sent a shiver of fear down Naoki’s spine.

Naoki feared that something horrendous had happened at The Paradise overnight and, as the general manager, it was his responsibility to be aware of everything. But it was something else entirely: something rather extraordinary. Narumi-san was calling to inform him that Hisayuki Ishii, the oyabun, or head of another Yakuza family, would be coming to The Paradise for an important meeting with Kenichi Fujiwara, senior vice minister of Economy, Trade, and Industry: a very high-level, politically connected bureaucrat. Narumi- san had gone on to say that Naoki would be personally responsible for the meeting to go well. “Give them whatever they need or desire,” was his final order.

Relieved the call was not about a serious problem, Naoki then became curious why an oyabun of another Yakuza organization would be coming to an Inagawa-kai property, especially to talk with a government minister! But it was not his position to ask, and Narumi-san did not offer any explanations before abruptly terminating the conversation.

As the hour neared ten a.m., Naoki began to calm down. All was arranged. The regular furniture had been pushed aside and a special table had been placed in the center of the main cocktail lounge on the second floor. Naoki’s best bartender had been hauled out of his bed in case there was a request for exotic drinks. Four hostesses had been summoned in case their services were required by his visitors. The final touch was an ashtray, along with an assortment of cigarette packages, both foreign and domestic, at each of the two seats.

The oyabun arrived first, along with a cohort of cookie-cutter minions, all outfitted in black sharkskin suits, dark sunglasses, and spiked, heavily pomaded hair. The oyabun was dressed more conservatively in an expertly tailored dark wool Italian suit, worn with highly polished, English wingtip shoes. His hair was short and carefully groomed, and his manicure was perfect. He was the epitome of the highly successful businessman who ran a number of legitimate businesses on top of his responsibilities as the head of the Aizukotetsu-kai crime family, operating in Kyoto. He passed the bowing Naoki as if Naoki was a mere fixture of the environment. Once ensconced upstairs at the table, he brusquely accepted a splash of whiskey while distractedly shuffling through the assorted cigarette packs. As an added distraction, Naoki had motioned for his shift manager to bring out the women.

Naoki went back downstairs to the open-air entrance to the street to await the arrival of his second important guest. Since The Paradise was open twenty-four hours a day, three hundred and sixty-five and a quarter days a year, there was no door, per se. Instead there was an invisible curtain of moving air that kept out the cold of winter or the heat and humidity of summer. The idea was to capitalize on public whim by making entering as easy as possible. It was rare for a passing Japanese man not to step inside, intending to stay just for a moment, and then to remain for an hour or two.

The ground floor of The Paradise was a large pachinko parlor. Even at that time in the morning there were more than a hundred seemingly comatose players sitting in front of noisy vertical pinball games. With one hand they caused ball bearings to shoot up vertically before cascading down beneath the glass of the machines’ fronts. During the descent the stainless-steel balls smashed against various obstructions and byways. Pachinko inspired a near-fanatical devotion in many players, and though Naoki didn’t understand it, he didn’t care. The game was responsible for almost forty-five percent of the take of The Paradise.

Down the street, he could see the black sedans that had brought the oyabun and his retinue. Among the Toyota Crowns was the oyabun’s own vehicle, an impressive black Lexus LS 600h L, the new flagship of the Lexus brand and of the Japanese auto industry itself. The cars were all