The Nicholas Linnear Novels (239 page)

“Watch this!”

Croaker’s left hand squeezed. There was a sound not unlike an explosion. A geyser of frothy beer plumed upward into the clear blue sky. When it came down it drenched them. The left hand opened and a flattened can fell to the deck.

Lew Croaker laughed at the look on Nicholas’s face. “Maybe that’s something even you can’t do,” he said good-naturedly.

Inside the cabin, at the helm, Alix said, “Look at them. Like a couple of kids. It’s so good to have you and Nick down here, Justine. How long can you stay?”

Justine, looking wistfully at the two boys at play, said, “Not long enough.”

Killan woke once to twilight seeping through the open window. Clear liquid dripped into a vein on the inside of her wrist. She saw the silhouette of a figure hunched in a chair. Nothing could be seen of her face, but Killan recognized those old, gnarled hands as the soft light fell upon them. The crooked fingers had lost little of their deftness as they quickly, efficiently folded rice paper back and forth. In no time the hands held a prancing horse. Turning her head slightly, Killan could see a parade of origami animals sitting on the windowsill, lovingly made by her grandmother.

“I’m thirsty.” A dusty croak.

Her grandmother rose, placed a porcelain cup against Killan’s lips. Tea, tepid, delicious. She drank deeply.

Killan closed her eyes and slept.

When she woke again, daylight was streaming through the window. Her grandmother was sitting in the same spot, her fingers working, working. There were more animals. Killan felt movement beside her, turned her head slowly. Her father was standing over her.

“I’m thirsty.” That same dusty croak.

Killan’s grandmother rose, but Ken Oroshi said, “I’ll get it.”

He gave her the tea, and Killan drank it all.

Ken Oroshi said, “I remember feeding you cold tea, just like this, when you were a baby. What fevers you had. Your mother was always frantic with worry.”

He put the teacup down. “The doctors have instructed me to tell you that it is a week since they brought you here,” he said as soon as he saw that she was finished. “They said that when you woke you might be a little disoriented.” His eyes searched her bruised, puffy face. “The police have told me everything.”

Not everything, she thought, and closed her eyes.

“The doctors tell me that you’re full of painkillers.”

“I don’t know,” she said, in a dry husky voice that cracked. “I don’t feel anything.” But she wondered at the anxiety in his voice. It must be the company, she thought. Does it make a difference that Kusunda is dead? Nakano is still destroyed.

“I suppose that’s good,” Ken Oroshi said, “for the time being. I imagine you’re wondering about the huskiness in your voice. There was some damage to your vocal cords.”

“That’s okay,” she said. “I’m beginning to like the way I sound.”

He cleared his throat, and Killan wondered what it was he wanted. He always wanted something when he spoke to her, even when it was only to rail against her “dangerous” revolutionary friends.

“You know, it occurred to me recently that I never treated you in the same way I treat your brothers. Well, you’re my daughter. I always thought that was right and proper. Women have their place in society, an important place, to be sure, but it is not the same as a man’s place. This used to be very clear to me.”

He shifted on his feet, as if he were suddenly uncomfortable in her presence.

“I wanted to tell you, since it seemed of some importance to you, that I have come to an accommodation of sorts. Tanzan Nangi, who bought Nakano, has put pressure on Nami. Since the scandal with Ikusa broke, Nami’s position has been irreparably undermined. The Emperor has disavowed their policies; he’s cut them off completely. Nami had no choice but to void the contract Nangi signed. As a consequence, Nangi’s bought
all
of Nakano, including the research and development department.

“He’s asked me to be Nakano’s president. Nangi will be chairman, of course, and I’ll report to him. But he has assured me that I will have a good deal of autonomy. I can hire my own people, for instance. The company feels like mine again, for the first time in years.”

Killan heard something new in her father’s voice. Was it humility? she wondered.

“Speaking of hiring,” Ken Oroshi said. “When you’re better, I’d like you to come up to Nakano’s offices, take a look around. In fact, I’ll give you the grand tour myself. We’ll be in our new headquarters, then, in the Shinjuku Suiryu Building, where Sato International is. And the R and D department is getting its own floor—I’ll show you that as well. Then, afterward, perhaps we can go to lunch, talk. I would like that, Killan.”

Killan, staring into her father’s eyes, nodded, mute.

When he was gone, she closed her eyes again. She heard movement near her, opened them to see an exquisite origami panda sitting on the bed covers. She picked it up, smiled. It was so long since she had done that, her facial muscles felt strange.

“When the police spoke to your father,” Killan’s grandmother said, “they played him a tape. I believe you know the one. Whatever he heard opened his eyes. He was shocked at what you did—but also I think he was proud of you. For the first time, he saw what it was you wanted. Perhaps it was the first time for you as well.”

Now Killan recognized the new note in her father’s voice. It wasn’t humility; it was respect.

“In any case,” her grandmother said, “you have given him his life back. Now, as is right and proper, he wishes to return the favor.”

Killan was silent for some time. At last she stirred, as if in sleep, or in the midst of a dream. She said, “Grandma, would you make me monkeys? I always loved monkeys.”

“Yes,” the old woman said, lifting a family of three origami monkeys from the windowsill. She placed them on her granddaughter’s chest. “I know.”

It was a bittersweet homecoming to his beloved Japan for Nicholas. The knowledge that he and Justine might now not stay here permanently was a dark companion that rode on his shoulder. Not that he resented their decision—which had all been worked out in Marco Island. They both had to be happy in Japan, otherwise their relationship was going to suffer. And, Nicholas knew, if it came to that, he could become content with trips to Tokyo every few months.

Nangi, Tomi, and Umi were at Narita Airport when he and Justine cleared Immigration and Customs. Nangi looked haggard but buoyant.

Umi took Nicholas aside. “The ice has begun to melt,” she said in her enigmatic way. “I am glad that you have returned. But I sense there is more yet for you to learn.”

In the car, Nangi spoke nonstop about the integration of Nakano Industries with Sato International, the ways in which its R&D department would spur revenues and profits in the coming years.

To this flood of good news Nicholas said barely a word. In fact, staring out at the countryside, he often seemed oblivious, displaced.

“Nick, what is it?” Justine said softly. Umi, her eyes closed, seemed lost in prayer or meditation. Nangi and Tomi were talking softly between themselves, and Justine and Nicholas had as much privacy as they could reasonably expect in Japan. “What’s troubling you?”

“I still don’t know enough about my grandfather,” Nicholas said. “Senjin’s sister told me he believed that So-Peng was a villain, that he was a murderer, that his mother stole the tanjian emeralds from the elders in Zhuji and that he kept them. I want to know the truth.”

“But who is left to tell you the truth?” Justine asked. “No one.”

Nicholas, his eyes clouded, shook his head. “Someone knows the truth, Justine.”

The Hodaka.

The fifteen days of true summer had come to the upper reaches of the Hodaka in the Japanese Alps. Stark black had turned to subtle shades of gray. The rock formations seemed softer, more forgiving. The snow had lost its brittle crust, and here and there the ice formations were melted to frigid water by the sunlight.

Three days after he and Justine landed in Japan, Nicholas was making his way along the last section of the rough path leading to Kansatsu’s mountain retreat.

“Have I come here many times before?” Nicholas asked when his mentor opened the door as he approached.

“No,” Kansatsu said, smiling. “This meeting will occur only once.” He retreated into the gloom of his house. “Enter.”

After tea had been made and consumed, Kansatsu said, “In truth, I had no way of knowing whether I would see you again.”

“Your gift could not reveal it?”

“Not this time,” Kansatsu said. “When it comes to you, I have no second sight.” He waited a moment. “Senjin is gone, then.”

Nicholas was startled. “You knew his name?”

“I knew
him,
Nicholas. He was once one of my students. That was how I knew the extent of the danger he presented, and I was afraid. But then you came to me here for the first time, trudging up the Hodaka, craning your neck for a sight of your nemesis, the Black Gendarme, and I knew there was hope.”

“If you knew Senjin was so dangerous,” Nicholas said, “why did you train him?”

“I didn’t, in fact, train him.” Kansatsu’s eyes were hooded, unreadable. “I use the word ‘student’ purely for convenience. Senjin came here to test me, just as he had tested my brother, Kyoki, before me. I had foreseen Kyoki’s death, and consequently knew how I must act with this
dorokusai.

“At the time he appeared here, he was already far more powerful than I. His mind had conceived of another discipline—which he called Kshira, the language of the sound-light continuum—far more advanced than Tau-tau.”

Kansatsu shrugged. “I did what I could. I humored him. This was as much as I could manage with him: I withheld my knowledge of the future and my antipathy toward him. This was why, years later, after he had made you
Shiro Ninja,
he murdered Kyoki and not me. Kyoki had made the mistake of threatening Senjin. Senjin did not consider me an enemy; he did not believe that I would help you even if you knew where to find me. On the contrary, I caused him to believe that he was learning from me during his stay here.”

Something in the incense-laden room stirred, hovered at Nicholas’s shoulder, making him uneasy. He shook his head. “You knew Senjin would one day murder your brother, yet you did nothing to stop him?”

“Untrue,” Kansatsu said. “On the contrary, I did what I could. I created you.”

“Me? How is it I could stop Senjin and you couldn’t?”

“Because, my dear Nicholas, you are the One. The last male connected with So-Peng. You are the guardian of the tanjian emeralds.”

“So it’s true, then.”

Kansatsu nodded. “As true as anything can be.”

“I want to talk to you about my grandfather,” Nicholas said. “Was he the murderer, liar, cheat that Senjin believed him to be?”

“Is that at all important?”

“Yes,” Nicholas said. “It is to me.”

Kansatsu sighed as he rose. “Let us continue this discussion outside on the Hodaka.”

They went out, crossing a long, gently sloping shoulder of snow.

“The truth,” Kansatsu said. “Down there,” pointing into the belly of civilization, “there is no truth. But of course you have discovered that for yourself. Which is why you have made the journey up here.” As they walked they left a trail behind them in the snow, a quiet melting that, in the utter silence, could perhaps be discerned. “But let me warn you, Nicholas, that where one finds the truth, it is often dangerous. Often it is better to turn one’s back, to walk away and never look back.”

“I want to know,” Nicholas said. “I have to know.”

“Yes,” Kansatsu said slowly. “Of course you do.” There was an odd note to his voice, as if he were reluctantly, sadly accepting the inevitable.

They crossed the snow shoulder, skirted a black, serpentine ridge of rock from which the snow had been scoured by the constant winds. Below, a four-thousand-foot drop, interrupted only by saw-toothed outcroppings of rock. Above, the sheer, indomitable face of the Black Gendarme impinged upon the purple-blue sky.

Kansatsu stared into a middle distance, at a landscape only he could see, as he began. “It is true that your great-grandmother, So-Peng’s mother, fled Zhuji with the mystic emeralds of the tanjian elders. She took sixteen. They were her birthright, bequeathed to her from the moment she came squealing into the world.

“The tanjian, of course, had other emeralds. But they squandered their power, overtaxed
kokoro
with their ambition to put emissaries in other lands. There came a time, therefore, when they needed her emeralds back.

“Toward this end, they concocted a story, fed it to a young tanjian named Zhao Hsia. He was talented but, in this case, particularly impressionable. This was why the elders chose him. They dispatched him to Singapore to bring back the emeralds along with So-Peng, who, they had heard, was a totally untrained tanjian.

“So-Peng’s mother was warned and, fearing the worst, she told So-Peng as much as she dared of his heritage. So-Peng did the rest. He sought out Zhao Hsia. They fought. So-Peng prevailed. But at a high price. Before he died, Zhao Hsia told So-Peng that they were half brothers. He had come from the same womb as had So-Peng.

“In the months afterward, knowing that he and his mother would be watched, So-Peng gave over the care of the emeralds to Desaru, the man whose dog’s life he had saved on the tiger hunt Tik Po Tak had taken him on. No one else knew of this man or of So-Peng’s relationship with him.

“And, true to So-Peng’s suspicions, the tanjian elders sent other emissaries to spy on him, to try to get the emeralds back. In this they were unsuccessful. But they managed in their devious ways to murder all of So-Peng’s daughters, those offspring whose sex would assure the continuation of the tanjian gift in his family. So-Peng did nothing; he was one man and the tanjian were many. But his blood-friend Tik Po Tak thought otherwise. He sought revenge against the tanjian spies, and was himself killed by them.

“Only when So-Peng’s second wife had died, when he had vowed not to take another wife, when they were assured that he would never have a daughter, did the tanjian spies withdraw back to Zhuji in China.