Zen Attitude (4 page)

“Don’t be silly.” Hugh put an arm around my shoulder.

“I should have noticed this nail. Damn it, I could swear I looked at every inch of the chest. I’m going to have to take it out. Get my
kuginuki
, will you?”

“Say what?” Hugh looked blank.

“The thing I use to pull out nails. Last time I used it, I stuck it in my underwear drawer.”

“Most women keep delicate, frilly things in their lingerie drawer. You prefer tools. What should I make of it?” Hugh came back with the short, pipe-shaped tool that was essential for antique-nail removal.

“This will tell me what I want to know,” I said, slowly easing out the nail. I then decided to remove the older nails holding the lock plate in order to better investigate things. Fifteen minutes later, the lock plate was off. I stared at what lay underneath. First was a horizontal blackened ring outlining the metal piece I’d removed. Inside the ring, the previously unexposed wood was a paler color. There was a smaller dark ring within that, and an even paler oval of unexposed wood. I shut my eyes, then opened them. I groaned and asked Hugh to tell me what he saw.

“I see a dark, shadowed area—I guess it’s the outline of the lock plate. Is that bad, the color transfer?” He sounded anxious.

“Darkening is okay. It occurs because of the reaction of the iron to warmth in the atmosphere—say, a coal fire burning in a nearby brazier.”

Hugh picked up the lock plate in his hand. “Okay, I see where there’s a large oval shape outlined in black. But what’s this second dark ring in the center?”

“A ghost,” I said.

“What do you mean?”

“It’s the outline of a different lock plate that was fixed to the
tansu.
There was a smaller lock plate here originally. You know what that means.”

“Rei, I hate these antiques quizzes! Get to the point.”

“The chest is not from the Edo period,” I said, unable to keep the bitterness from my voice. “Only the metalwork is. It was a newer chest that had its metalwork switched so it could be sold for a high price.”

“Oh,” Hugh said, finally getting it.

There was no point in further conversation. It was as clear as the proverbial protruding nail that I had made a terrible error. Whether it was because of the dark storeroom or my hurried appraisal, I was unsure. The end result was that Mrs. Mihori’s
tansu
, no matter how lovely, was resoundingly fake.

First I finished the bottle of wine. Then I cried. As I poured out my misery on Hugh’s Egyptian cotton bedsheets, Hugh tried in vain to console me. After that he shifted into lawyer mode and started making phone calls. The first was to Hita Fine Arts, which had closed for the evening. The next call was to his office, canceling a meeting for the following day. Finally, I heard him speaking to Yasushi Ishida, the antiques dealer who had been my mentor for the three years I’d lived in Japan. I had no idea what Mr. Ishida was saying back to Hugh, but I felt comforted enough to fall into an exhausted, alcoholic slumber.

I awoke the next morning with a throbbing headache and the realization that my career was over. The only way out was to flee back to the United States, changing my name and building a new life far away from antiques and Japanese people. I moaned this all to Hugh as we got into the double shower for our usual morning scrub.

“Two million yen is less than seventeen thousand U.S. dollars. I lost more in the stock market last year,” Hugh said while adjusting the shower to a pressure he considered properly vigorous.

I turned away from the harsh wall of water and spat, “You don’t understand! Twenty thousand dollars is all I have for the business. I’m going to have to go into my emergency funds to make up what I’ve spent.”

“If you raid your savings, you won’t have any money left to your name. You should let me buy the
tansu.
I really like it.”

“It’s kind of you to offer, but no.” I couldn’t let Hugh take the hit for my mistake; remembering the truck driver who had paid for my smashed taillight the day before added to my resolve.

“In any case, we don’t have to decide now,” Hugh coaxed. “Wait until your friend Mr. Ishida gets here and gives you an appraisal. When we talked on the phone yesterday evening, he said he thought you should try to arrange a return.”

“What if they won’t take it back? The
tansu
was a final-sale item.”

“You could always approach Mrs. Mihori with the honest admission that the chest is not as valuable as you’d first thought, but she might want it at the appraised value. You’d take a slight loss, not a total one.”

“No! She’s a high-class, knowledgeable person who would never buy a fake. She’s—she’s—
Japanese!”

“Just like the fellow who sold you the chest.” Hugh calmly started to shave.

I couldn’t argue with that, so I sighed noisily and left, slamming the shower door so hard his soap-on-a-rope fell off.

After Hugh left for work, I crept into the living room and examined the chest again, as if something could have changed overnight. The crooked nail gleamed up at me, black and unforgiving. I’d thought briefly that the
tansu
delivered to the apartment might have been a copy of the one I’d inspected in the shop. Under close examination, I became sure it was the genuine, disingenuous item.

When Mr. Ishida arrived at nine o’clock, he announced that before we looked at anything, we would drink tea. “I have brought a bag of the highest-grade
ocha
from Kyoto. It is especially good for the nerves,” he said, handing me a package wrapped exquisitely in dark green paper, a color symbolic of a gift from the heart.

One good thing about my seventy-four-year-old friend was his talent with tea. Another was the fact that I was too awed by him to break down the way I had with Hugh. My voice remained level as we sipped the mild green tea together and I replayed my shopping nightmare.

“So this Sakai person never actually said this was an Edo-period
tansu
?” Mr. Ishida’s face, crosshatched with many lines, looked skeptical by nature.

“No, he didn’t. And when I noticed the drawers were sanded, he swore he hadn’t worked on them himself.”

“Interesting.” Mr. Ishida stroked his chin.

“Let me show you what I mean.” I was itching to get his opinion.

“You hurry too much, and I am slightly tired from my early morning
tai chi
practice. Permit me to enjoy my tea, please.”

Twenty minutes later Mr. Ishida said he was ready to view the
tansu.
He surveyed it from all angles, bending his child-sized frame in half as he removed the drawers and then inspected the empty case. Using my
kuginuki
, he removed the rest of the metalwork in half the time it would have taken me. Then he put it back on. In the end, he settled himself comfortably on a cushion on the living room floor and gave me his appraisal.

“As you’d thought, the metalwork is genuine Edo, most certainly from the town of Yahata. The lacquer finish of the wood, and the shape of the shadow left by the earlier lock plates, lead me to think the
tansu
might have been built later in the town of Ogi, which is also on Sado Island.”

“Ogi craftsmen didn’t build chests until the Meiji period,” I said.

“Very good, Shimura-san. And I conclude your chest is from the late Meiji period, maybe ninety years old. It’s in good condition for its age, but I must remind you to fumigate it for fear of insects within.”

“What should I tell Mrs. Mihori?” I wanted a solution before we talked about such boring things as fumigation.

“Not saying is the flower.” At my blank look, he added, “This is an old proverb that means some things are better left unsaid.”

“You mean I should just lie about it?”

“Listen! Your customer has expressed gratitude to you already for two weeks of hard work. She would not feel comfortable rejecting the piece now. Therefore, I do not think you should make a declaration of the problem.”

“It’s my duty to tell her it’s not Edo period.”

“You said she is a high-class lady? No matter how disparagingly you speak about the
tansu
, she will feel obligated to buy it. Even if you tell her it is a bad piece of furniture, she will insist on taking it. However, she will never display it in her home, and the rumor will circulate that you cheated her.”

I put my head in my hands. The picture he was painting was worse than anything I had imagined.

“You must tell her the
tansu
did not arrive. Or perhaps your apartment suffered a terrible burglary!”

I shook my head. “At Roppongi Hills? This is the best apartment building in the neighborhood. No one would believe it.”

Mr. Ishida’s face brightened. “If you give me a spare key, perhaps I can arrange a burglary for you. There’s a very kind
yakuza
boss in my neighborhood I could ask to help. He will take only what we request.”

“Please don’t, Ishida-san!” I hated the way many Japanese regarded the Mafia as solid citizens. Even if they sponsored community parades and delivered food to earthquake victims, gangsters were still gangsters. I’d learned this the hard way.

“It was only a suggestion,” he soothed. “What would you prefer to do?”

“I’ll go to Hita and try to return the
tansu.
Maybe your appraisal will convince Hita Fine Arts to waive the final-sale policy.”

“Take some photographs with you, because the cost of transporting the piece back and forth could be enormous.”

His advice made sense. I wouldn’t pay for transportation of the
tansu
before I knew I was getting my money back. The damned piece of lacquered wood had cost me too much already.

By train it was just an hour to Hita, a much shorter trip than by car. I sat in the first compartment, near the driver’s windshield, so I had a panoramic view of mountains and rice fields. Compared to the freeways, the train was not crowded, with enough seats for all the leisure travelers in their bright summer shorts and myself, dressed up in a suit and high heels I thought looked businesslike. I’d even gone to the effort of swapping my customary backpack for a proper beige leather handbag. It contained a little money, the bill of sale, and Mr. Ishida’s official appraisal of the chest as worth one million yen. The figure was nothing to scoff at—it could have covered almost one year’s rent at my old apartment—but was half what I’d paid Mr. Sakai.

Disembarking in Hita, I regretted my prissy outfit. If anything, the air was steamier than the day before. My panty hose felt as though they were melting on my legs, and I had to wipe my face and neck with a handkerchief before entering Hita Fine Arts.

“Irasshaimase!”
Two clerks dusting fishbowls sang out the welcome greeting to me. I pasted an artificial smile on my face and swished upstairs.

Mr. Sakai wasn’t doing business at the rosewood table today. That table and all the large antiques I’d seen the day before were also gone. I poked my head into the back stockroom and called into the silence.

“May I help you?” The young T-shirt saleswoman was regarding me with the same fascinated but fearful expression she’d had when I’d knocked her down the day before. She probably sensed I was back to cause more trouble.

“Yes, thank you. I’m looking for Sakai-san.”

“He is not here today.”

“Is it his day off?” I had been rash not to call ahead, but I’d been relying on the element of surprise.

“No. He is gone.”

“Gone? Where to, the bank or someplace? Lunch?”

“Please, you cannot stay in the stockroom.” The young woman ushered me out of the stockroom and kept watch as I walked slowly downstairs to the customer service desk. I asked to speak to the general manager and had my business card ready when a harried-looking man in his fifties came out of a back room.

“Ah! You are very prompt, but we are not ready for applications yet.” The man handed back my card.

“Application?” I repeated.

“You wish to apply for the antiques concession, don’t you? Somehow, word was spread. We’ve had two telephone calls already this morning.”

“I’m looking for Sakai-san. That’s all.”

“Really!” His voice skipped an octave. “Well, I cannot tell you his location, but if you find him, will you let us know?”

Feeling hesitant, I asked, “Is there some problem?”

“Did you see how his area looked upstairs?” he exclaimed.

“It was fairly empty of furniture—”

“That’s right. After we locked up last night, Sakai got in somehow and removed all his wares. The antiques were his own consignments, so he did not technically steal from us, but still . . .” The manager scratched at a
miso
soup stain on his tie.

“He caused you a lot of trouble.” I finished his statement to show I was on his side. “I had a similar experience. Yesterday Sakai-san offered me a price on a
tansu
but increased it when another customer came in. I wound up buying the chest for much more than its appraised value.”

“That is too bad.” The manager suddenly seemed less intimate.

“See, I have it all documented.” I thrust Mr. Ishida’s appraisal and Mr. Sakai’s receipt on the counter. The manager looked at both papers without touching them. At last he commented, “This was marked final sale.”

“Please consider these special circumstances and the fraud involved.”

“It is a shame about your unwise purchase, Miss Shimura. I must stress that Sakai-san’s name is on the receipt, not ours. All we did was rent him space. Now I must help the next customer in line. . . .”

I had no chance to come up with a good rejoinder. I left Hita Fine Arts in such an unseeing, depressed haze that I bumped smack into a fishmonger carrying two buckets on a bamboo pole balanced over his broad shoulders. Water sloshed over the sidewalk, and the man had to dash after a crab that had escaped. As he grabbed the fiercely clawing creature back from the road’s edge I apologized, not knowing whether I should feel worse for the crab, who’d so briefly tasted liberation, the harassed fishmonger, or myself, wet and out two million yen.

I was going to find Mr. Sakai if it killed me. The most obvious way was through directory assistance; surely he had a phone number and address. I headed for a bank of public phone booths plastered with stickers advertising escort clubs, wishing I were rich enough to afford my own pocket phone.
Pocketo
, as these phones were called for short, were cellular receivers that worked like cordless extensions to a home phone, for up to forty miles. Hugh carried one with him, in addition to the regular cell phone installed in the Windom. He had wanted to get me a pocket phone, but, trying to keep my finances separate, I’d said no.