Linnear 02 - The Miko (84 page)

“The threat of the Wu-Shing is gone. You have nothing more to fear from that quarter. Vice-Minister Shimada’s daughter has been silenced; she has been taken by the earth. Her revenge is incomplete.”

Nangi’s face seemed to collapse. His voice was a whisper. “Shimada-san had a daughter? I know only of his two sons, who were killed overseas in a plane crash. A daughter!”

“By a tayu oiran of the Yoshiwara.”

“Oh, my God!” A tic had begun beneath Nangi’s good eye. “I recall some information I amassed on him. There was mention of a courtesan mistress. But that she bore him a child!”

“It gets worse, I’m afraid.”

“I don’t see how.”

“Shimada-san’s daughter was Akiko Ofuda Sato.”

“Oh, Madonna, no! It’s impossible.” He wiped the sweat off his face. “Did Seiichi-san know?”

“No.”

“Thank God for that small blessing. She must have planned it allthe courtship, the wedding. How Seiichi-san loved her!” He watched his hands shake, fascinated that he had lost this much control. He looked up. “She’s gone, you say?”

Nicholas nodded. “Swallowed up in the recent earthquake.”

“She could have destroyed everything. Everything!”

“It was close,” Nicholas acknowledged.

“The Russians and the Americans aren’t the only ones interested in Tenchi,” Nangi said after a moment. “Now that we are partners, I have an obligation to tell you why I went to Hong Kong. I deliberately did not speak of it to Seiichi before I left because I had no way of knowing the outcome in advance and I did not want him to worry.”

Nicholas listened with growing interest to Nangi’s tale of intrigue.

“But I won everything,” Nangi concluded.

Nicholas was silent for a time, digesting all that he had heard. “I wonder,” he said at last.

“What do you mean, Linnear-san?”

“Would Lo Whan have any reason to lie to you about his motives?”

Nangi shook his head. “No. It cost him too much face. He was begging me for Tenchi’s secret.”

“I think we should give it to him.”

“What?” Nangi exploded. “After all you’ve said? You must be mad!”

“Oh, I don’t mean right away. Within thirty days Tenchi will be under way, the oil will be flowing; nothing can stop us then. Tell Lo Whan that he will have what he wants within a month’s time.”

“But that’s treason! The Communists”

“Would you rather have the Russians link arms with China? What kind of position do you think that would put Japan in? I don’t think even America’s might could save us then.” He spread his hands. “Don’t you see, Nangi-san? By providing this faction with a unique kind of ammunition, you will ensure that Russia and China stand apart, and you will gain an incredibly direct foothold into Peking, the Forbidden City. Lo Whan’s faction will owe us much. And in time they will have to repay that debt. The price will be up to us to negotiate.”

“But they are Chinese,” Nangi protested. “They are Communists.”

“They’re also Asian.”

Nicholas turned and brought up the silk-covered package. This he put on the table. “This is for you,” he said. “In light of this discussion I think it doubly apt.”

Nangi’s good eye opened wide and again he bowed until his gleaming forehead touched the black tabletop.

Carefully he opened the wrapping. An oiled boxwood container was underneath. He lifted the lid and peered inside. Age seemed

to dissolve off his face. With great tenderness, he reached inside and took out the two cups. They were of the most exquisite translucent porcelain.

“Tang Dynasty,” he breathed. He watched the light enter them, thinking of Oba-chama. “Domo arigato, Linnear-san.” It would have been unseemly to have said more.

He looked at his new partner, and perhaps, as he was learning, his friend. “I will consider your suggestion.” There was the ghost of a smile on his lips. “I for one would welcome constructive talks leading to an Oriental Alliance.”

Slowly, like the cool tendrils of the sea, Nangi felt a return of a certain centrism he had possessed all his life but which had been ripped from him by the news of Seiichi’s death. Without thinking, he hugged this core of comfort about him like a robe around a blue-lipped bather. It took him a while to reach the conclusion that this miracle of sorts had come about because he had allowed himself to trust another spirit. Gotaro, Oba-chama, Makita, Seiichi. And now Nicholas Linnear. With a sharp pang of excitement, he felt the rhythm start up inside him again, a powerful engine roaring in his ears.

When, sometime later, he was about to leave and they were standing side by side at the door, Nicholas said, “This kobun no longer manufactures petrochemicals, does it, Nangi-san?”

Nangi laughed. “Ah, Linnear-san, I believe I am going to enjoy our partnership immensely! If only you were going to stay here instead of returning to America. It is here that you belong, truly. Japan is your home, eh. But I tell you nothing that you do not already know in your heart.”

He smiled again. “But to give you an answer: no. Sato Petrochemicals was what it was when Seiichi-san began this kobun. But after the oil shock of 1973, he perceived that petrochemicals would rapidly become a declining industry in this country.

“The government, in the form of MITI, stepped in. That was me, of course, since I was still vice-minister of the ministry. Before Fujitsu, Matsushita, NEC, and the rest got into artificial intelligence and robotics, Seiichi-san and I spoke of such futuristic concerns.

“Slowly, so as not to bring any attention to our movements, we began to shift goals and priorities from past industry into future ones. We kept the old name as camouflage. And when, years later, the government began the Tenchi project, we were in a unique position to help them.”

He opened the door. “You must come up to Misawa one day and see Tenchi herself. You’ve earned the right.”

*

Nicholas found Justine on the fiftieth floor, near the pool where Miss Yoshida had been killed. She had not been told of Nicholas’ arrival.

He stopped still when he saw her tan face, his heart fluttering. And he thought, Yukio belongs to my past. Here is my future. “You look well.”

“Nick!” She whirled. “My God, I didn’t hear you come in!”

He laughed. “You should be used to that by now.” He came toward her, his face sobering. “Listen, Justine, there’s something I have to tell you.”

But she put the flat of her hand against his lips. “No, Nick, please. I’ve come thirteen thousand miles to tell you I love you. I acted like a spoiled little girl. I took out on you an anger that I felt at myself. That wasn’t fair, and I’m sorry. I know I hurt you, and just because I was hurt myself that was no good excuse.”

He took her hand away, held it. “Justine”

“Whatever you have to tell me doesn’t matter anymore. Don’t you see, there’s nothing you could possibly say that could change the way I feel for you. Nothing could diminish my love. So why say it?”

He saw that she was right, after all. He had wanted to tell her about Akiko, about Yukio. He recalled vividly her phone call to him just after Sato’s marriage. How wrapped up in his past he had been then! How impossible it had been for him to connect with her. He was sorry for that as well, but he thought that she already knew it.

He drew her into his arms, and she became aware of his maimed right hand.

“What have you been doing?” she said, taking it in both of hers.

He tried to joke. “Made a grab for another woman. She was a black belt in karate.”

She looked up at him. “Really,” she breathed.

“I stuck my nose in something and got someone mad. Really.”

“Will you ever tell me all of it?”

“Justine,” he said softly, his face in her hair. “It’s not so very important.”

She was weeping. “It caused you pain. It’s important to me.”

He stroked her hair, his eyes closed. “There’s no pain now. It’s all over.”

Together their lips opened, their tongues met, tasting. They felt the heat, passion rising, a cloud of heavy emotion enveloping them.

“Oh, Nick,” she murmured. “I’m so happy.” She was thinking of the couple on the crest of Haleakala crater. Now I have what they have, she thought, contentedly.

Slowly, gently, they began to reexplore each other, both physically and emotionally, two blind people who had suddenly regained their sight. They kissed as teenagers often do, as if this intimacy was the ultimate one, full of emotional complexities and tiny pleasures evolving into a shimmering network of eroticism. The kiss was representative of more than mere lust. Justine had always felt that one gave one’s heart in a kiss. The same could not be said for the sex act itself. It was quite possible to penetrate and be penetrated without kissing at all.

Love was waiting on his lips, in the flick of his hot tongue against the inside of her mouth. How long had she waited for this moment? She would never know for certain but she suspected that it had been all her life. She felt alive and free at the same time. The combination was an entirely new sensation for her.

She luxuriated in this pureness, but still there was so much about her that had changed, and she wanted to share it with him.

“Have you been successful so far?” she asked.

“How do you mean?”

“With Tomkin Industries, of course.”

He seemed skeptical. “You mean you really care one way or the other?”

“It’s my father’s company, isn’t it? My future husband’s running it, isn’t he? I think I have a bit of a stake in its success or failure!”

He smiled, surprised at how enormously pleased he was. “Nangi has just agreed to the merger of Sphynx Silicon and Sato’s Nippon Memory Chip kobun. But there’s much more. I think that within eighteen months, two years at the outside, more than just the two divisions will be merged.”

“Nick!” she exclaimed. “That’s fantastic!” She hugged him. “My father would have been so proud of you.”

“I see that’s changed, too,” he said, grinning.

She nodded. “I’ve done a lot of thinking about him since the funeral… About me. All the hate’s gone. I think I’m able to see him more objectively now; as he really was. I can see the bad and the good. I’m just sorry that it took his death to allow me to understand all of it. I’d dearly like to tell him all about it; to see his face when I told him.”

He stroked her arm. “Your father was an exceedingly strong personality, Justine. He was too much for many adults. It’s not particularly surprising that he should have overpowered his children. The important thing is that you realize that he did not dominate you and Gelda deliberately. He didn’t know any other way to live.”

She nodded and held on to him. “That’s another reason I love you so, Nick. You understand me. You understood him.”

They kissed again, sliding into it as if they could never get enough of one another. Nicholas, because it was his way, probed inside her with haragei. He found to his utter astonishment the flame of waperfect harmonyablaze inside her where before had only been darkness and chaos.

He sighed into her mouth and Justine groaned, melting against him. This state was what he perhaps had seen a spark of when first they had met, running into each other on the beach at West Bay Bridge. For both of us now, he thought, the long journey’s ended. And it’s just begun.

“Dinner tonight,” he said softly, after a long time in her arms.

Justine’s eyes were hazy with mingled love and lust. “And until then?”

“Go shopping,” he said. “Buy a Matsuda dress. Spend a fortune on tonight.”

“Yeah? What’s the occasion?”

“Can’t tell you,” he laughed. “It’s a surprise.”

“Oh, come on, Nick.” She had caught his mood, was laughing too. “Tell me.”

“Oh, no,” he said. “All I can say is that while you’re out making yourself even more beautiful, I’ll be working out with a friend. It seems he’s anxious to learn aikido and I’ve promised to go with him. There’s a dojo I’ve been to quite near the Okura, where we’re all staying. I sent him there this afternoon to make an appointment. We’ll meet you back at the hotel at about seven.”

“Wait a minute. You mean this friend’s the surprise?”

Nicholas shrugged, laughing still. “Don’t know. Could be.”

“Oh, who is he, Nick? This isn’t fair!”

“I’ll give you a hint. He’s an American. Someone you haven’t seen in a long time. Someone you thought you’d never see again.”

Justine screwed up her face. “I can’t think of who it could be.”

“You’ll meet him soon enough.”

“Oh, no!” she cried. “That’s all I’ll be thinking about all afternoon. I won’t be able to concentrate on anything, shopping included.”

Nicholas decided to tell her. His face was alight. “Justine, Lew Croaker’s alive and well and staying right here in Tokyo!”

“What? You’re kidding!” She watched his face. “But the paper…”

“The news story was wrong.It’s a long involved story, but the gist of it is someone tried to kill him and missed. Lew stayed ‘dead’ in order to do what he had to.”

“Oh, my God!” She gripped him. “But that’s wonderful! How fabulous! Oh, I’ve got to give him a kiss for not getting himself killed!”

Nicholas laughed, delighted that her reaction mirrored his. “At seven,” he said, “you can do whatever you want with himwithin reason, that is!”

They both laughed at that. Relief and a cessation of tension dissolved them into fits of giggles that did not stop for a long time. Their sides ached with the laughter, but still they did not stop. It felt far too good.

Nicholas met Croaker in the tiny exquisite park in Toranomoncho’s sanchome. They went up the steps to the building on the thirteenth block that overlooked the small temple and Atago Hill.

How long ago it seemed since he had first entered these doors, Nicholas thought. Like another lifetime. He and Justine were both so different now. And Croaker was there beside him.

In the locker room they changed out of their street clothes, Nicholas climbing into his gi, Croaker into the simple loose-fitting white cotton trousers and blouse he found neatly folded in the locker he opened.

It was very quiet in the do jo. Classes had been over for some hours. There was no one about, and so they went in search of Kenzo, the sensei who had almost defeated Nicholas the first time he was here.