The Samurai's Daughter (8 page)

“Maybe it was those teenagers,” Hugh said to my parents. “They could have removed the key as a prank. That's the kind of thing the local lads did back in my day.”

“But if it was teenagers, why didn't they take anything?” I mused aloud. “I can understand them skipping the antiques, but what about CDs or cash or electronic equipment? Why did they just snoop on the third floor?”

“We need to have our locks changed,” my father said. “I'll get on the phone to see if there's a locksmith working today. I expect we'll have to pay a premium.”

“And I'll call the police,” I offered. “You never know whether any other houses on the street might have been hit. If there's a pattern, it could be easier to catch whoever was here.”

I made my call, but was startled that the police weren't willing to come to our house. The matter of a missing house key and rustled possessions was deemed small enough for me to just relate the details over the phone. They took down the details for an incident report they said we could give to our insurance company, should we want to make a claim for the cost of having the locks changed. Finally, I was warned not to keep keys in safe places outside of houses, because no place was truly safe. Yes, I agreed. I'd tell everyone in the house.

Two new locks and four keys to match cost a breathtaking $800, something my father grumbled about all through lunch. At least the locksmith had come. Our castle was impenetrable again. Still, my parents were so depressed that I thought they needed a change of scenery. I reminded them of their invitation to a neighbor's open house around the corner, and they departed with the plan to organize everyone there into a neighborhood watch group.

Manami went upstairs to search her room again, just in case she'd missed something that had been taken. I sat down in the kitchen with a bowl of warm water, the silver polish, and some soft cloths; I'd promised my mother I'd polish her antique Stieff silver tea service for the forthcoming ALL party. Hugh sat down across from me, working on e-mail from his laptop computer.

“Domestic bliss,” I said as I finished rubbing the sugar bowl to a sparkle.

“It would be, if I weren't so on edge,” Hugh said. “I've received an e-mail from Charles Sharp ordering utmost confidentiality. I hate to think what might have happened if my briefcase had been stolen. We came close to utter disaster.”

“No thief would know what to make of your notes,” I tried to reassure him.

He pressed his lips together. “Well, it didn't happen, that's the
important thing. But I'm on edge. Let's go out, do something more cheerful.”

I agreed wholeheartedly. I placed all the finished silver on the sideboard, and then ran up the two flights of stairs to check if Manami wanted to come along.

“No, thank you. I'd rather stay here and read,” Manami said somberly.

“What about dinner—would you like to go out with us?”

“Oh, no. Today's food was enough. It was delicious, but so heavy. If I become hungry, I will boil some Japanese noodles.”

Feeling secretly relieved that I'd now have some time alone with Hugh, I went downstairs to tell him we were at liberty.

“Great. Do you think your mother would mind if we borrowed her car? I'd like to see something more of the city, especially since I have to work tomorrow.”

“I'm sure it's no problem,” I said, going into the kitchen to find my mother's car keys in the dresser. “What do you want to see?”

“Well, I'm a bit embarrassed, because it's so touristy…”

I winked at him. “Let me guess. The Golden Gate Bridge?”

 

I was right, of course. It wasn't a particularly good day to see the bridge, because of all the fog and the fact that it was getting late; however, there would be no rush hour traffic, given that it was Christmas. I brought a travel mug of tea for each of us and a map, just in case we became lost. I didn't feel as sure on the streets as I used to. My plan was to take Van Ness to Lombard and drive through the Presidio. We would wind up in Sausalito after we'd crossed the bridge. I would find a place open for dinner there, and spend a few more hours away from home.

A household intrusion shouldn't shake me up this much,
I thought. I'd suffered worse in my lifetime. But the truth was, the house on Green Street had always seemed like a sanctuary to me. Now it had been violated. We had new locks and a set of special keys the locksmith swore couldn't be duplicated by anyone but my parents, whose names would be on register at the shop. But that didn't seem like enough.

“You're so quiet,” Hugh said, taking my hand.

“I'm sorry Christmas turned out this way,” I said. “You would have been better off in Scotland.”

“Not really,” Hugh said. “Can you stop?”

“Stop what?”

“The car.”

“We're still a few miles from the bridge.” In fact we were just driving through Presidio, an old military installation that was one of the city's prettiest parks.

“Please, Rei.”

There was something in his voice that alerted me that this was really serious. Ready for bad news, I turned off into a parking area. I pulled over in a spot marked reserved, and turned off the car.

“If we walk down this trail, you'll really see the water,” I said. I led him around a massive stand of eucalyptus that had been planted long ago to camouflage the layout of the base, and there we had it: the Pacific Ocean, gray-blue and endless.

“Two more days and I'll be flying over it,” I said.

“Soon enough, we'll be there together.”

“Just like old times,” I said.

“But I don't want it to be like the old times,” Hugh said.

Aha. So he was going to break something to me. What? I had a feeling of panic. Was he so pressed with work that he wanted to postpone our relationship?

Hugh didn't meet my eyes. He was busy digging in his pocket, taking something out. When I saw the small red parcel, a wave of relief rushed over me.

“I thought the G-string in the book was the private present,” I said.

“No, that was a joke,” Hugh said.

This isn't.
That was the unspoken message. My fingers tore clumsily at the paper. I had once opened a box like this expecting a ring, and it hadn't been. I had no idea what could be within this box—earrings? A pendant? I wasn't going to expect anything, I swore to myself.

“You look grim,” Hugh said.

I didn't answer, but let the wind carry away the last shreds of
paper and looked down on a faded blue velvet box. It had to be family jewelry, I thought, and my heart began pounding.

“My grandfather gave this to my grandmother in the early thirties,” Hugh said. “If it's too art decoish for you, we can change it—”

“No,” I said, after I opened the box and saw the ring lying nestled on creamy silk. A rectangular emerald was surrounded by tiny pavé diamonds set in narrower rectangles. The band was a luminous metal that I knew had to be platinum.

“No?” Hugh breathed. “You mean that you don't want it?”

“No, that's not it. I said no because I wouldn't dream of changing it! Oh, Hugh, it's exquisite.”

“This is the fourth time I'm asking you to marry me,” Hugh said.

“Fifth,” I said, laughing. “Four's an unlucky number, remember?”

“Will you?” He took the box from me, and took the ring out of its cushioning.

“Of course.” I found that I was choking up. “I didn't expect this, but I do—I do want it. I want you always.”

As we kissed each other, I had the strangest feeling of being in a play—maybe it was because of the perfectly styled setting in front of the Bay, or because it was Christmas. But I knew the way I felt about Hugh was sincere. He had grown and changed so much for the better in the few years that I'd known him. I hoped I had, too.

I felt the ring slide on my finger, and it rolled about a little loosely.

“It's too big,” Hugh said mournfully. “Well, I should have expected that. My grandmother was a big woman, six feet tall.”

“They can resize it at Hopewell's,” I said, sniffling a bit. “I'll go there tomorrow. Do you want to come with me?”

“I have to work,” Hugh said gently. “That's why I was so hell-bent on getting this time with you today. Tomorrow I work, and the day after you go back to Japan. I wanted to settle things.”

“Your timing is auspicious,” I said, smiling at him. “I wouldn't be surprised if we could start sleeping under the same roof in my parents' house tonight.”

“Do you really think so?” Hugh's eyes gleamed. “Well, let's go back and tell them. I'm too excited to continue sightseeing.”

“Can you imagine,” I said as we ambled back to the car, “how
my mother's going to spring into action? The question is whether she's going to push for a wedding right away, so we don't get cold feet, or make us wait a year so she can organize things perfectly.”

“I wonder—oh, shite.” He broke off, and I followed his line of vision to my mother's car. The passenger window had been thoroughly smashed. Thousands of tiny bubbles of glass on the street made me think, absurdly, of Christmas stars. “Rei, I'm sorry. I shouldn't have insisted you stop—”

“It happens. Life in America, you know.” I walked up to the car and looked in. “The question is what was stolen. I hope my mom didn't have anything valuable in the car.”

“Oh,” Hugh said. “Wow. Look, my new cell phone and even that little shortbread tin I brought with us is gone. We're completely cleaned out.”

Fortunately, he'd left his briefcase at home, just as I'd left my backpack. The break-in was more of an annoyance than anything else.

But it was the second break-in in the same day.

I found it hard to believe it was a coincidence.

 

The police didn't come out to solve this crime, either. Once again, a phone report was the order of the day. Though, as Hugh pointed out, if they'd come and seen where I'd parked, I'd probably have gotten a ticket for parking in a reserved space.

“Two bad things have happened to us in one day,” I protested over the phone to the sergeant on telephone duty. “It seems as if it could be a pattern!”

“Well, lady, do you have anyone in your life who doesn't like you? Ex-husband, ex-best friend, someone with a vendetta?”

The truth was, I had recently seen Eric Gan, and it seemed clear that he was annoyed that Hugh and I were together. But his livelihood depended on working on the class action with Hugh; it would be stupid of him to stalk us. After a long pause, I said, “No.”

“Well, I'll write up an incident report to use for—”

“My mother's car insurance. Yeah, yeah. I know.”

I was afraid of what my mother would say about her smashed window, but she was surprisingly unfazed. The emerald on my finger had done enough, apparently, to mitigate all the trouble. And she didn't see a link between the two break-ins, because of the different locations of the events.

“What do you think, Dad?” I asked him when we were alone—my mother had gone to start the dumbwaiter to transfer Hugh's luggage to my bedroom.

“I think…you should take your time, not rush into anything,” he said.

“You mean about thinking there's a link?”

“No, I'm referring to your very sudden engagement.”

So he was talking about our personal news, not the break-ins. I took a few deep breaths and said, “Dad, last night you put Hugh on the spot about not having…serious intentions. Now we've told you what we thought you wanted, and you don't want it—”

“Just a minute!” He held up a cautionary finger. “Please don't put words into my mouth. I'm only saying you're both going through significant milestones regarding work and moving. To add another element of stress like a wedding might cause problems for both of you.”

“I can't imagine what kind of problems. Unless it would mean something like you and Mom not coming to the wedding.”

“Is that a threat?”

“No,” I said to my father. “It's just that if you're unhappy, you might decide not to come.”

“How many months until you plan to actually go through with things?”

I shrugged. “There is no plan yet. We'll talk about it in Japan.”

“I like him, Rei. Please believe that. It's just that you've only recently rekindled the relationship. Why not give it a year?”

“I'm almost thirty,” I said to my father. “Hugh's already there. How long until we're grown-up enough to make our own decisions?”

 

All night, I tossed and turned in bed next to Hugh; I'd decided not to tell him what my father had said because I didn't want to make him even more paranoid.

I lay in bed, listening to the twanging noises of the old radiators and the occasional creak elsewhere in the house. My worries about whether Hugh and I would ever be accepted by my father turned to a nagging sense of worry about things. I hadn't been able to find a glass repair shop willing to fix the window until tomorrow, so the car was essentially sitting open to anyone in the driveway. I also wasn't sure if my parents had remembered to lock the door with the new keys after they'd come home.

I got up quietly, went out into the hallway, and turned on the lights, which offered reassuring illumination as I tiptoed down the stairs. I walked to the front door and checked it. Locked. Ditto for the back door. Looking out the kitchen window, I saw that the car was indeed in the drive. There was nothing more I could do to feel safe.

As I made my way upstairs again, I used the kitchen staircase—a simple wooden one that once had been used by servants. As I paused on the back end of the second floor, I heard a new sound.

It sounded like sobbing, stifled in a pillow, and then more quiet sobs.

Manami. Was she crying because she was missing her family? Or was it because we'd forgotten to check in on her when we'd come home?

I started up the stairs to her floor, and the cries quickly stopped. She must have heard me coming.

I spoke softly outside her door in Japanese. “Manami-san? It's Rei. May I come in?”

“No,” came the answer, broken and Japanese. “I'm sorry that I woke you.”

“You didn't. I was already awake. But I'm worried about you. Is there anything I can do to help?”

A gusty intake of breath, and then her voice, faint but in better control. “No, Rei-san. I was just…feeling strange. That's how it is for me in America sometimes.”

I couldn't force my way in, so I went downstairs and crawled
back into the warm place next to Hugh. Well, I had a project now. I would figure out what Manami needed to feel like part of our family. Maybe the act of doing so would take away the heavy disappointment that my father had caused me on a day that should have been my happiest.