blackjack table. She had a stack of black one-hundred-dollar chips in front of her.
She waved him toward her. She gave him a delighted smile. “Cully, this is my lucky night,” she said. “I’m ahead twelve grand.”
She picked up a stack of chips and placed them in his hand. “This is for you,” she said. “I want you to have them.”
Cully counted the chips. There were ten of them. A thousand dollars.
He laughed and said, “OK. I’ll hold them for you, someday you’ll need gambling money.” And he left her and went up to his office and threw the chips into one of his desk drawers. He thought again of calling Merlyn but decided against it.
He looked around the office. There was nothing left for him to do, but he felt as if he were forgetting something. As if he had counted down the shoe in which some important cards were missing. But it was too late now. In a few hours be would be in Los Angeles and boarding a plane for Tokyo.
In Tokyo Cully took a taxi to Fummiro’s office. The Tokyo streets were crowded, many of the people wearing white surgical gauze masks as a guard against the germ-laden air. Even the construction workers with their shiny red coats and white helmets wore the surgical masks. For some reason the sight of them gave Cully a queasy feeling. But he realized that this was because he was nervous about the whole trip.
Fummiro greeted him with a hearty handshake and a wide smile.
“So good to see you, Mr. Cross,” Fummiro said. “We’ll make sure you have a good trip, a good time in our country. Just let my assistant know what you require.”
They were in Fummiro’s modern American-style office and could speak safely.
Cully said, “I have my suitcase at the hotel and I just want to know when I should bring it to your office.”
“Monday,” Fummiro said. “On the weekend, nothing can be done. But there is a party at my house tomorrow night at which I am sure you will enjoy yourself.”
“Thank you very much,” Cully said. “But I just want to rest. I’m not feeling too good and it’s been a long trip.”
“Ah, yes. I understand,” Fummiro said. “I have a good idea. There is a country inn in Yogawara. It’s only an hour’s drive from here. I will send you in my limousine. It’s the most beautiful spot in Japan. Quiet and restful. You have masseuse girls and I will arrange for other girls to meet you there. The food is superb. Japanese food, of course. It is where all the great men of Japan bring their mistresses for a little holiday and it’s discreet. You can relax there without any worries and you can come back Monday completely refreshed and I will have the money for you.”
Cully thought it over. He would be in no danger until he got the money, and the idea of relaxing in the country inn appealed to him.
“That sounds great,” he said to Fummiro. “When can you have the limousine pick me up?”
“The Friday-night traffic is terrible,” Fummiro said. “Go tomorrow morning. Have a good rest tonight and on the weekend and I will see you on Monday.”
As a special mark of honor Fummiro walked him out of the office to the elevator.
It was longer than a hour by limousine to Yogawara. But when he got there, Cully was delighted that he had made the trip. It was a beautiful country inn, Japanese style.
His suite of rooms was magnificent. The servants floated through the halls like ghosts, nearly invisible. And there was no sign of any other guests.
In one of his rooms there was a huge redwood tub. The bathroom itself was equipped with all different makes of razors and shaving lotions and women’s cosmetics. Anything anyone could need.
Two tiny young girls, barely nubile, filled his tub and washed him clean before he got into the fragrant hot water. The tub was so huge that he could almost swim in it. And so deep that the water almost rose above his head. He felt the tiredness and tension go out of his bones, and then finally the two young girls lifted him out of the tub and led him to a mat in the other room. And stretched out, he let them massage him, finger by finger, toe by toe, limb by limb, what seemed each single strand of hair on his head. It was the greatest massage he’d ever had.
They gave him a
The inn was on a hillside overlooking a valley, and beyond the valley he could see the ocean, blue, wide, crystal clear. He walked around a beautiful pond sprinkled with flowers which seemed to match the intricate parasols of the mats and hammocks on the porch of the inn. All the bright colors delighted him, and the clear, pure air refreshed his brain. He was no longer worried or tense. Nothing would happen. He would get the money from Fummiro, who was an old friend. When he got to Hong Kong and deposited the money, he would be clear with Santadio and could safely return to Las Vegas. It would all work out. The Xanadu Hotel would be his, and he would take care of Gronevelt as a son would a father in his old age.
For a moment he wished he could spend the rest of his life in this beautiful countryside. So still and clear. So tranquil as if he were living five hundred years ago. He had never wished to be a samurai, but now he thought how innocent their warfare had been.
Darkness was beginning to fall, and tiny drops of rain pitted the surface of the pond. He went back to his rooms in the inn.
He loved the Japanese style of living. No furniture. Just mats. The sliding wood-frame paper doors that cut off rooms and turned a living room into a sleeping room. It seemed to him so reasonable and so clever.
Far away he could hear a tiny bell ringing with silvery claps and a few minutes after that the paper doors slid apart and two young girls came in, carrying a huge oval platter almost five feet long, it could be the top of a table. The platter was filled with every kind of fish the sea could provide.
There was the black squid and the yellow-tailed fish, pearly oysters, gray-black crabs, speckled chunks of fish showing vivid pink flesh underneath. It was a rainbow of color, and there was more food there than any five men could eat. The women set the platter on a low table and arranged cushions for him to sit on. Then they sat down on either side and fed him morsels of fish.
Another girl came in carrying a tray of sake wine and glasses. She poured the wine and put the glass to his mouth so that he could drink.
It was all delicious. When he finished, Cully stood looking through the window at the valley of pines and the sea beyond. Behind him he could hear the women take away the dinner and the paper wooden doors closing. He was alone in the room, staring at the sea.
Again he went over everything in his mind, counting down the shoe of circumstance and chance. Monday morning he would get the money from Fummiro and he would board the plane to Hong Kong and in Hong Kong he would have to get to the bank. He tried to think of where the danger would lie, if there were a danger. He thought of Gronevelt. That Gronevelt might betray him, or Santadio or even Fummiro. Why had Judge Brianca betrayed him? Could Gronevelt have engineered that? And then he remembered one night having dinner with Fummiro and Gronevelt. They had been just a little uneasy with him. Was there something there? An unknown card in the shoe? But Gronevelt was an old sick man and Santadio’s long arm did not reach into the Far East. And Fummiro was an old friend.
But there was always bad luck. In any case it would be his final risk. And at least now he would have another day of peace here in Yogawara.
He heard the paper wooden doors slide behind him opening up. It was the two tiny girls leading him back to the redwood tub.
Again they washed him. Again they plunged him into the vast fragrant waters of the tub.
He soaked, and again they raised him out and laid him on the mat and put the
And then Cully held up two fingers to tell them he wanted two girls. They both giggled at that, and he wondered if Japanese girls thrashed each other.
