In the underground parking lot, about a hundred people had gathered, from the chairman and the entire board of directors, all the way down to the managers and deputy managers from every department, as well as executives of the subsidiary and affiliated companies that had offices in the building. Applause arose as soon as Shiroyama disembarked from the vehicle, followed by a swirl of voices calling out, “Welcome back!” “What a relief!” and “So glad to see you safe.”
This welcoming scene seemed inappropriate for a man who had caused significant aggravation to the company by being kidnapped due to his own carelessness, much less one who was lying to the company and trying to force them to pay out a sum of two billion. Though none of them knew the truth, Shiroyama wondered—who had planned such an elaborate homecoming, who had complained about it, and who had given the okay in the end. Once his suspicions began to grow they soon engulfed him, leading to a sense of isolation.
He could not survey the entire assemblage at once, but he managed to distinguish the faces of the board members from the main office in the front row. He nodded instinctively at the remarks thrown his way, he bowed, received handshakes, and with every step he took told himself that this was all following protocol. Meanwhile, he took in several other faces: Takeo Sugihara, his coarse expression failing to contain his anxiety; Sei’ichi Shirai, whose mind seemed to have kicked into high gear dealing with the aftermath of the incident; and Seigo Kurata, his visage already stripped of any personal emotion. He saw the inscrutable faces of several board members whose real feelings he could not deduce, as well as more than a few gentle faces of those who were all smiles for the time being. And, behind all these men, Shiroyama saw his secretary Takako Nozaki, peering at him with a reserved smile.
Knowing that hers was the only earnest smile among them, Shiroyama felt a new wave of anguish as he called Ms. Nozaki over to him.
“I am so glad you are safe,” Nozaki said in her usual calm manner, bowing once, before asking briskly, “What can I do for you?”
“I’m so sorry to have caused you concern. It will take me about forty minutes from now to go around each floor to greet everyone. Then, I’ll see to urgent matters in my office, and there will be a board meeting at 6:30 p.m. Please make arrangements accordingly. Also, if you could have a light meal ready for me in my office by 6:10 p.m.—something simple will do.”
“Of course.”
Several voices urged him to rest, to delay greeting employees until tomorrow, but Shiroyama feigned a smile and responded, “No need to worry. I’m fine, as you can see,” and went on ahead into the waiting elevator. With him were four men: Takeo Sugihara, whom Shiroyama had signaled to join him with the merest of glances; Keizo Suzuki, the chairman of the board; Hiroshi Sakakibara, the corporate secretary and executive director of general affairs who came into the elevator saying that he needed to speak to Shiroyama briefly about the board meeting; and finally Hajime Ide, manager of general affairs. As soon as the doors closed, Suzuki began talking first, as if he had too many things to say.
“I must apologize to you and your family. Until I received the call this morning that you were safe, I felt like I could hardly breathe. Everyone here regrets having been a little too lax about the company’s security. The police seemed to find our risk management procedures cumbersome, but if you ask me they’re not nearly sufficient.”
Sakakibara’s issue, on the other hand, had to do with the proceedings of the board meeting. “I’m sorry to bother you when you must be exhausted, but before the meeting the consultants would like to take ten minutes to report on the current situation and explain the risk management countermeasures. Then Ide will brief you on his communication with law enforcement officials. Would that be all right with you? Perhaps we should delay the meeting with the consultants until tomorrow morning?”
As he spoke, Sakakibara cautiously glanced at Shiroyama’s face. I see, Shiroyama thought. They were bracing for him to start disclosing more sensitive matters at the board meeting tonight, rendering any discussions with the outside risk management company useless. Having grasped this, Shiroyama prepared himself anew to face the thicket of anxieties and speculations of the executives. “No, I’ll talk to them today.”
Ide then reported, “While you were gone, the police questioned us about various matters. I will send you a memo summarizing all their inquiries.”
Sakakibara and Ide got off on the twelfth floor. “Every man shows his true colors in a time of emergency,” Suzuki offered casually after the elevator doors closed again. “We installed the risk management system last year after the board reached a consensus on it, but some have started to voice their frustrations now that a crisis has hit. They say it’s useless and causes more trouble than it’s worth. They complain about who in this company would be held responsible for a manual that was generated by an outside source—”
“Who can blame them, now that the person who suggested the idea in the first place was the one to be kidnapped?” Shiroyama shrugged it off with a bitter laugh, though his eyes conveyed an appreciation for Suzuki’s considerate words.
What Suzuki, in his position as chairman, was hinting at with his carefully chosen remarks was clear to Shiroyama: during the two and a half days of his absence, there had been some outward signs of discord on the board. And yet, the consensus of the board was in essence no more than an aggregate of the individual members’ compromise and restraint and preservation of self; it would have been strange had no disagreement arisen when the members were compelled to assess the delicate situation. Shiroyama still held the title at the helm of management, and steering the company’s dissension had become second nature. He did not feel particularly shocked as he listened to Suzuki’s advice.
“By the way, Shiroyama-kun. It’s fine for you to make the rounds of the floors but you can’t possibly do it alone—”
Before Suzuki had finished speaking, Takeo Sugihara volunteered, “I’ll accompany him.”
Shiroyama got off the elevator with Sugihara on the twenty-ninth floor, where the beer division was based. After bowing to the chairman, who was headed up to the thirtieth floor, Shiroyama made sure the elevator doors had closed before turning to Sugihara.
As if he had been waiting for the opportunity this entire time, Sugihara bent his body in half deferentially and lamented in a low voice, “I am so sorry for what happened. There are no words to express my regret . . .” What Sugihara said made it clear to Shiroyama that he too had been called in and grilled by the police about the particulars surrounding the letter of complaint from 1990.
“Stand up! What if someone sees you?”
Shiroyama was overcome by a futile irritation. There was no need to guess the position that Sugihara must be in, with his daughter’s scandal made into fodder for corporate extortion. Now that the police had seized upon it, it was only a matter of time before the media would expose it.
Yet Shiroyama wondered if this man really understood the situation—that if corporate profits were given the highest priority, Sugihara’s moral responsibility as a company executive was too large a topic to address now, and that they could not afford to question it—for the safety of Sugihara’s family. If Sugihara did understand, there were other ways to show his deference. Certain things needed to be done before he could give vent to his personal anguish. Conceding his failure might have been inevitable, but this was not the way for him to do so.
But at the same time Shiroyama was painfully aware of how detached he felt. He harbored no ill will toward Sugihara, the husband of his younger sister, but there was no way for him to feel familial empathy for him; all that Shiroyama could do—had ever been able to do—was to engage with him as fairly as possible. Facing him now, Shiroyama perceived Sugihara as a man whose good breeding had, once he’d hit fifty, turned into obtuseness; a man caught in a vicious cycle wherein his weak bearing generated a defensive attitude, which in turn weakened his foothold ev
en further. There was no hope of his retaining his post as deputy manager of the beer division. As president, Shiroyama would eventually need to consider which of the board members—Sugihara among them—would be temporarily transferred to an affiliate company, and when he factored in their personal circumstances, he could hardly keep himself from berating Sugihara. He was forced to tamp down his emotions once again.
“Sugihara-san. Do you know whether the police shared the matter of the tape with all the members of the board?”
“Kurata-san was the first one called in by the police, and I heard they asked him about it. Apparently Kurata-san made a statement then that the only six people who knew about the matter of the tape were himself and Shirai-san, you and me, and the human resources manager and general affairs manager at the time.”
“So the story hasn’t leaked to the rest of the board members, correct?”
“I believe not.”
“Sugihara-san. I will talk about this in further detail at the board meeting, but the crime group’s demand is money. This has nothing to do with the tape from 1990. Right now, our only duty is to come up with a countermeasure that will not damage the company. I need you to keep the affair with your family completely separate from this.”
“But the media may find out about it . . .”
“Even so, that story has nothing whatsoever to do with the company. Do you understand? There must be plenty of executive tasks that require your attention right now. Be sure not to forget that, as deputy manager, the fate of the beer division rests with you.”
“I am aware of that.”
“Sugihara-san. I am speaking to you as a relative—I’m on your side. I feel the same way about not wanting to involve Yoshiko-chan’s family in this controversy. Well, there’s no time for this now. Let’s go.”
Shiroyama checked his watch and began walking briskly ahead. Beginning with the beer division on the twenty-ninth floor, then continuing through another sixteen or seventeen floors in descending order, all he could do was to peer into each room and to thank everyone with a slight bow. As he moved his feet around the office, conversing and displaying his usual facial expressions, Shiroyama repeated to himself that bending to the crime group’s demand was what would ultimately protect this company and its employees. Were he not to think this way, it was doubtful that he could bear up against the future accumulation of lies, deceptions, and schemes—both personal and public—as well as the inevitable complications that would arise from the discord on the board.
Shiroyama returned to his executive suite on the thirtieth floor by 5:45 p.m., as planned. His secretary Ms. Nozaki followed right in after him, just as she always did, saying, “Sorry, but could you confirm this first?” She handed him the day’s itinerary, which Shiroyama examined while still standing. An itemized list of things he was to have accomplished that day—receiving guests, meetings, interviews, and scheduled visits—were all crossed out in red, and in the empty spaces next to them were corrections: canceled, postponed, will contact later, and alternate date required. Pages two and three were for tomorrow and the day after.
“For today, the only urgent matter is the Takasaki factory on-site briefing—would you like to set an alternate date or instruct only the pharmaceutical division to attend?”
He had been preoccupied for some time with attaining approval from local residents for the construction of a manufacturing plant for immunosuppressive drugs based on genetic-modification technology, so he could not delay the matter any further. “Please consult with them and reschedule the date for either this weekend or early next week,” Shiroyama replied.
“Understood. As for the rest, I’ve already sent a proxy letter to the trade issue council and the Japan Business Federation. Vice President Shirai attended the dedication ceremony for Tomioka’s new distribution facility on your behalf, but he forgot to bring with him the greetings message in your name. If we are going to send one tomorrow, I think we should revise the language a little.”
“Please show me the revised letter before you send it out.”
“What about the calls you’ve received?”
“Just see what the business is for today.”
“I understand. Then, please look over the schedule for tomorrow and the day after and check off the items you would like to cancel.”
Shiroyama did as Ms. Nozaki requested, still on his feet but leaning over his desk as he began to edit his calendar. First he deleted tomorrow’s monthly business headquarters meeting planned for nine in the morning, and wrote in, Executive staff, Morning assembly. 5th floor hall. The police interview was scheduled for 9:15. He had no idea how many hours it would take, but he went ahead and canceled the rest of the morning’s planned visitors and meetings. At noon there was a thirty-minute press conference for the media. He kept the rehearsal for the stockholders’ meeting as it was, scheduled for 12:30 p.m. He scanned the list of places he was supposed to be in the afternoon, narrowed it down to two, and canceled the rest.
For the day after tomorrow, he canceled all his outings save for the management council for major distributors, which he decided he couldn’t possibly miss; the induction of the new president of Limelight Japan; and the closing ceremony for the technical training program that was to take place at the Kanagawa factory. He looked up briefly once he had amended the itinerary. His eye caught on five magnificent white tulips, mottled with pale red tinges, which had been arranged in a vase and placed upon his desk. The petals, curling and opening ever so gently, had a porcelain luster, like a still life by Jan Brueghel or Hans Bollongier, which transfixed him despite everything. Ms. Nozaki must have bought them with money out of her pocket.
As Shiroyama handed back the itinerary, he said to her, “Those must have been expensive.” A brief smile of satisfaction flashed on Ms. Nozaki’s face, but she did not say more.
“By the way, is Yamazaki the driver off today?”
“The police have been interviewing him for two or three days, so someone else has taken his place for now.”
“I see.”
“Now shall I bring in the light meal you requested? Would you like a little something to drink? I put a Hinode Meister on ice.”
Ms. Nozaki swiftly disappeared from the room and, once alone, Shiroyama turned to his desk. The items that had accumulated while he had been away were piled high, arrayed like a kiosk counter. At one end he saw the Nikkei, the Nikkei Marketing Journal, the food industry newspapers and other trade publications, along with a binder of important article clippings. One section of a national daily was folded to reveal the headlines written in bold, black letters: confined for fifty-six hours, hinode beer president abducted, and six hundred million ransom!
Wondering how the newspapers had covered the incident, Shiroyama could not stop from reaching for the evening paper. But then, reminding himself that this was not the time to further rattle his mind, he pulled his hand back.
Next to the newspapers was the set of business reports delivered every Monday morning and another set of monthly financial statements. Shiroyama leafed through the business reports, even though he had already received them last Friday, and reconfirmed that the numbers indicated that the cumulative order volume of their newest product had reached the targeted increase of 19 percent.
Next to these reports was a mountain of well-wishing telegrams from clients and government agencies—no doubt they had been astonished by this morning’s news—as well as from concerned peers within the industry. On top of the neat pile, Ms. Nozaki had attached a list of the senders, including the addresses to which thank-you notes should be sent and those whom Shiroyama should personally call. Also clipped to the list was a draft of the thank-you note, along with samples of the font, company letterhead, and envelope to be used when printing them. Beside this was a sample of the letter of apology to be sent to their valued customers, which Shiroyama had instructed Kurata to prepare earlier that
morning at the Fujiyoshida Police Department, and a separate list for those addresses. There was another list of clients to whom executives had already paid personal visits and the names of those executives. Next, also per his instructions to Kurata, was the bundle of reports from each division on the general business that had been conducted that day. Shiroyama paged through those too, and for the time being, he placed the minutes from the meeting about the arrangements for the stockholders’ meeting, which had been submitted by general affairs, at the top of the pile.
Next to this was another bundle of letters, about twenty of them. And a tabulated list of internal and external calls that Ms. Nozaki had fielded today, charting the callers and their messages. She had underlined in red the names of those whom Shiroyama needed to call back at a later date. Among these names were shareholders from banks and insurance companies, and others from government agencies, financial organizations, as well as members of the Tokyo Metropolitan Assembly who had called with well wishes; also included were coded names of politicians as well as political organizations and ultranationalist groups. Although it wasn’t underlined, Shiroyama singled out a name that appeared on the list without a title—Kiyoshi Iwami. They were both alumni of the law department at Tokyo University and still saw each other a few times a year at public and private functions. For a moment, as Shiroyama pondered what Iwami must have looked like that day as he put in a call from the commissioner-general’s office of the National Police Agency in Sakuradamon, he almost reached for the phone, but then stopped himself. Instead, Shiroyama placed the list back on his desk.
Lady Joker, Volume 1 Page 47
