Trifecta (61 page)

Eve glanced at Sabrina, who was looking at her with horror.

"Then he would dissect the brain to get the computer. 
The CAT scan would help to see where the computer is located and how to surgically
remove it.  Maybe he would leave the body alive, like a vegetable, but I would be
gone.  I don't shiver, because I don't get cold, but that thought causes internal
shakes." 

"And you were going to go with that monster?" 
Sabrina said, horrified at Hashimoto's cold calculations.

"Don't worry.  I can act stupid enough so that I will
be able to escape when it gets really dangerous.  They don't know I understand their
language.  Hashimoto wanted to put you out of business so that you would be forced
to go to Japan and open a shop there.  He expected you to be grateful to him.  Very
grateful.  He planned to have you as his mistress."

Sabrina looked at Eve in utter disbelief, as Eve went on,
"I imagine you find him as physically repulsive as I do.  But he does not even
conceive that you would resist him.  He does not understand about American women
at all."

"Evidently not,"  Sabrina snapped angrily.

Eve looked at her approvingly.  She was in the anger stage. 
To help the shock-healing Eve went on talking.

"And if I went to Japan and you stayed here, he was
planning to do simultaneous testing to see the inherent differences caused by the
computer.  He would pay you lots of money to take these relatively easy tests. 
That's what he and his doctor were discussing at lunch.  He would give us the Wechsler
Adult Intelligence Test, the Wechsler Memory Scale tests, the Bender Motor Gestalt
Test, Progressive Matrices Test, and the MMPI, or the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality
Inventory.  Also the Wide Range Achievement Test.  All testing, of course, to find
out the differences caused by Ferd's computer.

"But his reasoning is very simplistic.  I'm simply
smarter than the test makers.  They have checks and balances to make sure that the
test-taker is consistent and honest.  I can correlate that for every question because
of my memory and deductive reasoning.  And I almost wish I could do it."

"Why."

Eve smiled mischievously.  "I would test out as a
moron on the Wechsler Intelligence Test.  And I would prove to be a psychotic on
the MMPI personality inventory.  It would have been fun."

Eve took her attention off her driving to smile at Sabrina. 
"All those Neuropsychological Tests would have proven was that I'm a Psychotic
Moron."

Sabrina was smiling.

"So if you want to keep the store for a while, I will
go to Japan and make an ass of myself."

"No.  Thanks.  I will get another store."  Finally
tears started rolling down her cheeks.  The body was leaking out a little pain. 

When they reached the shop it was closed.  Sabrina opened
the cash register, wondering how much money Bea had collected, but it was empty. 
She almost panicked and then looked under the cash drawer.  There was the spool
with the amount of cash receipts for the day.  As Sabrina examined it she saw a
note on the bottom.  Bea had been afraid to leave so much cash and had taken it
to the bank. 

"Look at this,"  Sabrina said, showing Eve the
spool from the cash register.

"I know.  I used the telephone at the bank.  Told
Bea to double the prices.  I didn't think the Hulks would know the difference. 
Of course, Hashimoto will notice and be upset."

"That's an understatement."

"The bank manager was kind of angry that I used the
phone on his desk without permission, but it was worth it."

Sabrina laughed in delight, "It certainly was.  Now
I have more money to help open the new store."

"You should really show off your talent.  On Sunset
Boulevard, or Rodeo drive.  Someplace in Beverly Hills."

"I could never afford it."

"Oh yes you could,"  Eve said positively.  "You're
the best designer in Los Angeles.  And then there will be a design store in San
Francisco.  And New York."

H
aving been in the CIA for some fifteen years,
and having been a military man, Burgess Whitcomb knew plenty about the Komitet Gosudarstvennoi
Bezopastnosti, the Committee of State Security for the Soviet Union, more commonly
known as the KGB.  But never before had he believed one of his own operations was
infiltrated. 

Burgess knew the organization was gigantic, with approximately
400,000 employees and yearly budget somewhere in the range of three billion dollars. 
The KGB also used millions of citizen informers to gather information on political
dissidents inside its own country. 

Burgess Whitcomb contacted the head of Soviet Counter-Intelligence
in his Maryland office, giving him the three names that he had under suspicion,
Willard Modert, Sergi Malcovich and Ivar Cousin.  He pumped the man about Soviet
agents; how they were organized, what he should do in case he had people on his
own staff that proved to be KGB; what system there was to stop them, or turn them
to the advantage of the CIA. 

The KGB expert told Burgess that spies were often far less
ideological than is generally assumed, their priority being self-preservation rather
than a commitment to ideological Communistic beliefs.  Many are known to very tough
and have blood on their hands.  Even when the West thinks one has turned and become
a double agent, they are always distrusted and are never given vital security information,
but are used to spread disinformation back to their own country.

The expert on the KGB told Whitcomb that agents work from
field stations abroad and are often placed for years in deep cover.  Their jobs
consist of infiltrating traditional military plants, to find out about weapons systems
and military secrets.  They may use industrial espionage to collect information
from computer networks, but they also employ burglary, wiretapping, and try to buy
information from employees.  Besides training in lethal defense methods they are
also trained to penetrate secret information by technological methods.

The man told Whitcomb that KGB agents try to recruit American
citizens to become spies.  They usually don't have a large budget to turn a company's
highest officials, but the person in the mail room or the one running the xerox
machine can prove be useful.  They routinely get access to TRW records, see who
is in debt in the industry they've infiltrated and try to bribe that person into
providing information.

Burgess was told that his best strategy for now was to
do nothing overt and to watch the men.  Their backgrounds would be scrupulously
studied from the Counter Intelligence office.  Burgess was also told that the scenario
he had described, the note planted on one man with the accusation he was with the
KGB, might be a vendetta.  It sounded like two agents, who were notoriously brutish
men, might be having a feud and that was why the information about his secretary,
Willard Modert, was revealed in such an unusual manner.

Burgess hung up the phone.  He was starting to believe
that his target in this investigation really was one of the two Miller women.  A
Japanese corporation, heavily financed in computer hardware and software, was showing
an unusual interest in them, and in Ferd Steinbrenner.

Burgess was forming an insidious investigative network
around the two women, which included Sabrina's boyfriend, Mark Ponti, and which
now included Hashimoto International. 

T
he small Japanese waiter who had helped Sabrina and Eve
escape from the luncheon was still serving at the table where Hashimoto and his
staff were dining.  He waited in mirthful anticipation for a reaction to their disappearance. 
As he was serving the different courses he had a chance to overhear the conversation. 
Sato Hashimoto was boasting that the women wanted to make themselves beautiful. 
That was why they were taking so long.  Women, Hashimoto explained, always used
their beauty to get what they wanted, so before they began negotiations they would
endeavor to make themselves appear as delectable as possible. 

The waiter watched as Hashimoto took out a cell phone. 
The waiter assumed good news as Hashimoto gloated, practically rubbing his hands
together in glee, when he told his staff that his controller bought a building.

It was only after he had finished the telephone call that
Hashimoto began frowning and glancing toward the back of the restaurant where the
Ladies' Room was situated. 

Since the diminutive waiter's first language was Japanese
he had no trouble following the conversation as he hovered solicitously near.  One
of the men commented that surely the gaigen, or foreign women, were beautiful enough
that they did not have to spend twenty minutes in front of a mirror! Several others
agreed that it was very strange, unless they were indisposed.  Both had eaten copious
amounts of food.  Much more than any self-respecting Japanese women would eat. 
There were several comments about the eating capacity of American woman and how
disgraceful it was.  And did you notice that they could not even master the simple
techniques of eating Japanese food with the proper utensils?

The women had a very aggressive way of looking directly
at a man's eyes when he talked to them, too.  It was an extremely disconcerting
mannerism.  Japanese women showed suitable respect by glancing down with proper
regard for their superiors, indicating modesty and correct feminine style.  These
American women had even tried to have a conversation with very important men while
they were eating.  Asking questions and then staring into their eyes.  Deplorable!
One could never understand what American men could see in their women.  Aggressive. 
Unfeminine.  Demanding.  They wanted equality! Ha.  That was laughable.  Women could
be useful in business, serving tea and taking guests sightseeing; doing diminutive
feminine tasks.  But never decision making in the board room.  And never at the
top salaries men received.  American women tried to usurp men, but they would never
get away with that kind of conduct in Japan.  Everyone knew women were of the earth,
men were of the heavens.  Any woman who tried to change that would be quickly punished.

All agreed that American women might make very good mistresses. 
Except that these women were so very large.  Almost six feet in height.  Amazons. 
But that could be intriguing.  They had very long legs and might be able to arrange
them into interesting and provocative positions.  Everything pointed to the fact
that they were not demure and had not a shred of modesty.  Aggressive behavior in
the bedroom would be a rather unique experience.  Even the traditional Geishas,
experts in providing pleasure through all of the senses, music, dance, singing,
and in the bedroom, were trained to be very modest.  It was rather exciting to think
about these American women with the wonderful and disturbing, staring blue eyes. 
Maybe they would like to use mirrors and watch.  The possibilities were endless.

There were giggles and titters and all the while Sato Hashimoto
sat frowning.  Finally he banged his hand flat down on the white table cloth forcefully
enough to make plates and chopsticks bounce, cursing, "Bakayaro!"

Everyone stopped chattering.  Their small waiter was immediately
at his side.  Hashimoto told the waiter to go to the Ladies' Room and find out what
was taking the women so long.

The waiter smiled and said, So sorry, but it would be improper
for a man to knock on a Ladies' Room door.

Hashimoto told the waiter to find a woman to check the
Ladies Room. 

The waiter took his time.

Hashimoto fumed.

The waiter came back and said, So sorry, the women are
not in the Ladies' Room. 

Hashimoto asked if the entire restaurant had been searched.

The waiter went off to search.  There were many banquet
rooms and he walked through each one slowly and returned with the message that the
women were not on the premises.

Hashimoto used his phone again and called to see if the
entire contents of a store had been purchased.  He was informed that only half of
the merchandise had been sold.  Then the store had been closed.  From the look on
Hashimoto's face, the waiter could tell he had been tricked in some financial fashion. 

Hashimoto smiled his ugly smile, unsuccessfully hiding
extreme anger, which was noted by the Japanese waiter, who had earlier watched and
enjoyed the sight of such beautiful identicalness in the two women.  He had relished
helping them escape from the arrogant businessman who was keeping vile secrets. 
He also enjoyed the kao, or loss of face the host experienced by the disappearance
of the women, who had fled in the middle of an extremely expensive meal, after consuming
as much as they wanted.  Hashimoto certainly would not burp with pleasure at the
end of this meal.

If the small waiter had understood the extent of Hashimoto's
anger he would have been shaking in his small shoes.  Hashimoto was taken over by
fury.  The fact that he was in a public place was the only thing keeping his behavior
in control.  Hashimoto was not called The Volcano for nothing.  When his anger erupted
he was awesome.  His co-workers never wanted to see him in one of his rages because
it was like a spoiled child's temper tantrum blown to gigantic proportion.  In board
meetings he ranted and raved, arms chopping, while spittle flew.  When rages were
upon Hashimoto, employees who could hide from him hid, because he would not fire
them, but he would humiliate them beyond endurance.  Even in this modern day and
age, several of Hashimoto's older employees had performed the ritual suicide, hara-kiri,
after having been the brunt of one of his frantic screaming angers. 

Now Hashimoto was going through an internal rage so immense
that he vowed he would ruin the women.  If he could not have them, he would see
them worse off than if they were dead.  As he sat in outward calm, he imagined himself
performing buriburi, or the beating with many sticks, ritually performed on woman
in Japan who displeased their master.  He imagined using his martial arts on them
himself, causing internal injuries with lethal blows to stomachs, breasts, necks
and heads, so fearful that they would bleed internally and then blood would flow
from all body orifices.  He imagined crushing their long bodies in the machines
in his industrial plants.  Slowly. 

Hashimoto became calmer and calmer as he presented himself
scenes of the women's destruction.  He was finally reaching a place of wa, or harmony. 
After all, he did have Sabrina's store.  And he would get the computer out of Eve. 
His scientists would duplicate the computer and the implant method.  He would put
all of his enormous wealth behind this scientific endeavor.  Someday he would possess
an army of strong androids.  Then there would be nothing he could not achieve. 

The world would be his oyster.