He sat in front of it, and his latest helpmate pressed a switch. While the machine was booting up, she had a spasm of uncertainty. “Are you quite sure Michael said you could inspect the personnel files? Only a few of us have the password to get into them.”
“That’s all right,” he assured her. “I’m not out to discover how much you people earn or what age you are. I just want to look up a research scientist, someone who is sponsored by Manflex.”
“That’s no problem,” she said, with obvious relief. “It’s much easier to access researchers man permanent staff. What name are you hoping to find?”
“Masuda. Dr. Yuko Masuda.”
“That doesn’t sound English.”
“It isn’t I have a cousin who went to Japan.”
“Let’s try, then. Masuda. Would you spell mat?”
When the name appeared on the screen, Diamond’s hopes of new information were dashed. It was a thin account of twelve years of research.
Name: MASUDA, Dr. Yuko (female). Date of Birth: -
Address: Care of Dept. of Biochemistry, Univ. of Yokohama, Japan.
Qualifications: M. Sc, Ph. D.
Dates of Sponsorship: From: September 1979.
To: Continues.
Subject of Research: Drug-and alcohol-induced comas.
Drugs Under Research: Sympathomimetic.
Publications: “An insult to the brain: coma and its characteristics.” Postgraduate thesis, 1981. “Narcosis and coma states.” American Journal of Biochemistry, May 1981. “The treatment of alcoholic coma.” Paper presented to Japanese Pharmacological Conference, Tokyo, 1983.
“It isn’t much,” he complained. “Hasn’t she published anything since 1983? I thought research scientists were constantly publishing.”
The woman gave a shrug. “Maybe the file hasn’t been updated.”
At least the file confirmed that David Hexner had been entirely frank about Yuko Masuda. This was all familiar stuff from the interview at the station house.
“Is there any way of telling when this file was put together?”
“Oh, sure. There’s a checklist of all the dates when entries or deletions were made.” She pressed two keys and a window was displayed on the right of the screen. “Just two entries. As you see, the file was created on September 10, 1987, and the latest entry was only three months back.”
He hesitated. Something was wrong. “But the last entry on file refers to a conference in 1983. Which piece of this data is new? What did anyone find to enter three months ago when all I can see here relates to work published up to 1983?”
“I’m sorry, I can’t answer that. I have no idea.”
“The computer can’t tell us?”
“No.”
He sighed. Three months ago would have been shortly before Naomi was brought to London. Possibly there was a connection. Apparently there was no way of finding out.
He had another thought “Can anyone make additions to these files?”
“If they can get into them, sure, but only a few of us have the password.”
“That would include the Chairman���?”
“The Vice Chairman, Personnel Director, Research Director, Senior Systems Analyst and some secretaries, including me.
“Whose secretary are you?”
“Mr. Hart’s. He’s Personnel.”
“And you are���?”
“Molly Docherty. I thought you were never going to ask.”
“I’m Peter Diamond. And who is the Research Director?”
“Mr. Greenberg. Would you like to meet him?”
“How long has he been in the job?”
“About two years.”
“Then I don’t think I want to meet him.” Diamond tapped the screen with his finger. “Tell me, Molly, where was this information stored prior to September 1987?”
“It was all on a card index. Mr. Flexner-Mr. Manny Flexner, I mean-was a sweet man, but he was a little slow in catching up with the computer age. He didn’t trust modem technology.”
Nor I, thought Diamond. “And all the information on the card index was transferred to the computer?”
“Oh, yes. Everything. And triple-checked. I was one of the operators.”
Before asking the next question, he sent up a silent prayer. He was agnostic in his thinking, but if help was to be had from any source he needed it now. “Do those filing cards still exist?”
There was an agonizing pause for thought before Molly Docherty said, “I believe they were put into storage somewhere.” “Where?”
“Now you’re really asking. The basement, I guess.”
“Would you mind escorting me?”
She laughed, he supposed at the way he’d expressed himself. “I’ll have to clear it with my boss.”
“You don’t have to mention me.”
On the way down in the elevator, she said, “You must be very devoted to your family.”
“Why?” He was thrown briefly, and then remembered his trumped-up reason for inspecting the files. “It isn’t just a matter of making a family tree. I want to get the background on these people.” Even to himself, he sounded pretty unconvincing.
The basement was a cold, echoing place stacked with outmoded office furniture: wooden desks with the veneers exposed, gray metal cupboards of the kind so popular in the sixties and a great variety of chairs with their covers ripped and frayed. The discarded personnel files were easy to locate, stored in five metal boxes-locked, but Molly had thoughtfully collected a set of keys from upstairs.
“These go back thirty years at least,” she told him. “There must be a thousand in each box.”
“Let’s open one.”
She stooped and found the appropriate box. As she tried the keys, she remarked, “This is like treasure hunting. I do hope it’s worth your trouble.”
She flicked through the cards rapidly with a long, lacquered fingernail, picked one out and handed it to Diamond. “Voila!”
He didn’t need long. “This doesn’t match the computer entry.”
“It wouldn’t,” she said. “We’re constantly updating,”
“Deleting information?”
“No, adding it.”
“What do you make of this, then?” He handed back the card.
Name: MASUDA, Dr. Yuko
Address: c/o Dept. of Biochemistry, Yokohama University
Qualifications: M. Sc, Ph. D.
Dates of Sponsorship: From: September 1979.
To: July 1985.
Subject of Research: Comas, drug-induced and alcoholic
Drugs Under Research: Jantac
Publications: “An insult to the brain: coma and its characteristics.” Postgraduate thesis, 1981.
“Narcosis and coma states.” American Journal of Biochemistry, May 1981.
“The treatment of alcoholic coma.” Paper presented to Japanese Pharmacological Conference, Tokyo, 1983.
“What’s the problem?”
Clearly the details weren’t written so indelibly in Molly Docherty’s memory. Diamond explained. “It says here that the sponsorship terminated in July 1985. On your computer, that isn’t mentioned. It states that the sponsorship continues. That’s a big difference, surely?”
“I guess she resumed the research at a later date.”
“Wouldn’t that be recorded upstairs?”
“The point is that she’s back with us now. I guess whoever updated the entry did the simple thing, deleted the date she stopped and substituted ‘continues.’ “
He wasn’t satisfied with that. “It gives the impression she was continuously doing research. There must have been a gap”
“For a short period.”
“Of about two years? The computer was installed in 1987, you said. And everything was triple-checked from these cards?”
As if resenting the implication that someone had erred, she said, “I’ll just see if there’s an entry on another card. Maybe the data from two cards was collated.”
Bu
t there was no second card for Yuko Masuda.
“This drug-Jantac-isn’t listed on the computer, either,” Diamond pointed out. “There’s something quite different and unpronounceable. Sympatho-something or other. What exactly is Jantac?”
“Sorry,” she said, “but there are thousands of drugs. I can’t tell you.”
“Is it a Manflex product?”
“It isn’t familiar to me, but we can check the list upstairs.”
“And could we also make a photocopy of this card?”
She looked doubtful. “Is this really for family history?”
“Only remotely, I’m afraid. I’m a policeman on the trail of a little girl who is missing from home. Dr. Masuda is her mother.”
“And what did you find out about this drug?”
Eastland looked more at ease sitting at his own desk in the station house.
“Jantac? Not much,” Diamond admitted. “It was on the Manflex list of experimental drugs.”
“Was?”
“It isn’t any longer. They pulled it in 1985.”
“The year your Japanese lady’s research stopped.”
“Exactly.”
“Do we know why it was withdrawn?”
“No, but I intend to find out.”
“You think it could be important?”
“Someone wiped it from the computer record. I’m satisfied that it must have been transferred accurately from the cards. Molly-the woman who helped me-insisted that everything on those cards went on to the computer and was triple-checked. But listen to this-the computer entry was altered for the first and only time three months ago.”
“About the time you found Naomi in London?”
“Yes.”
Eastland leaned back in his chair. “Where will you get this information-about Jantac?”
“Yokohama University, I reckon. That’s where the work was done. I’ll fax them.”
“Before you do that, there’s something I should tell you.
We found Leapman’s car.”
“Where?”
“JFK.”
“The airport.”
“It was in the parking lot. Been there some time.”
“How do you know?”
“He flew out last night. Japan Airlines, direct to Tokyo. I’ve spent the afternoon checking passenger lists.”
“Tokyo. Have you told them?”
“Too late. He’s already landed and cleared. With Naomi.”
CHAPTER THIRTY
A Japan Airlines Boeing 747 taxied down the runway at the International Airport at Narita, thirty-five miles east of Tokyo. From his window over the wing Peter Diamond could see watchtowers, water cannon and riot policemen in full battledress. He’d read somewhere about the mass riots here in the mid-eighties and the long-running dispute with the local farmers over landing rights. Even so, this degree of security was daunting. It led him to wonder how stringent the immigration arrangements would be. Narita was not the most auspicious airport at which to arrive if your luggage consisted of a carrier bag containing only a pink sweater, cotton trousers, disposable razor, face cloth, toothpaste and toothbrush. His apprehension was borne out when he produced his passport and it was taken away. He was asked to step into an interview room, where he waited under video surveillance for twenty minutes while, presumably, they checked their list of undesirable aliens.
Finally he had an opportunity to tell an immigration officer (who spoke faultless English) that he was a detective engaged in an investigation.
The young man eyed him dubiously. “Scotland Yard Special Branch?”
“No.” He had the strong impression that anything he said was liable to be checked, so he kept to the truth. “I’ve been working with the New York Police. Twenty-sixth Precinct.”
“You are with the NYPD?”
“In cooperation with them. I am a senior officer. My passport, if you examine it-”
“I already have. Is Detective Superintendent your present rank, Mr. Diamond?”
He noted a distinct emphasis on the “Mr.” “Former, actually. I have retired from the regular police.”
“Retired? So you are a private agent?”
“Er, yes, in a sense.”
“And are the Japanese police aware of your present mission?”
“No-em, not yet. There wasn’t time. They know about the case, but they didn’t know I was flying here. Look, this is an emergency. I’m pursuing a suspect who has abducted a child. When I heard he had flown to Tokyo I took the next available flight.”
“The suspect is���?”
“An American by the name of Michael Leapman.”
“And the child?”
“The child is Japanese.”
“Japanese? You say the Japanese police have not been informed yet?”
This was sounding more reprehensible by the minute. He could see himself spending the rest of the day repeating his story to policemen-and not necessarily policemen with as good a command of English as this beacon of the immigration service. “It’s an extremely urgent matter. Obviously, I’ll notify the police, but even as we’re speaking, the trail is going cold, if you understand.”
“I understand, Mr. Diamond. But I am not certain if you understand the difficulties you would face tracking a suspect in Tokyo. You don’t speak Japanese?”
“No.”
“You don’t know anybody in Tokyo?”
“Oh, I know someone.”
“Who is that?”
“A sumo wrestler by the name of Yamagata.”
“Yamagata?” The name had a remarkable effect on the immigration officer. He gripped the edge of the table, blinked several times and swayed back. “You know the Ozeki Yamagata?”
“Yes.”
“You’re quite sure of this?”
“I wouldn’t have mentioned him if I wasn’t.”
“You have actually met him?” It was if they were speaking of the God-Emperor.
This, Diamond thought, is an opportunity. Without trying too obviously to impress, he underlined his links with Yamagata. “We met when he was in London. He’s paying my fare. He hired me, in fact. He’s taking a personal interest in the case.”
“You should have mentioned this.”
“I just have.”
“Yamagata-Zeki?” He repeated the name as if having difficulty in believing what Diamond was saying.
“He lives in Tokyo. I’m sure he’ll vouch for me. Would you like to check with him?”
“I would.” The man’s face lit up. “I would indeed. Thank you.” This, it emerged, was an inspired suggestion, the bestowal of an honor. The immigration officer reached for a phone book. His face was flushed. The pages shook as he turned them.
He stood up to make the call, rigidly, like a soldier. Without understanding a word, Diamond watched fascinated as the stern face of the immigration officer become coy, then ingratiating and finally elated.
After the conversation ended, the young man continued to hold the phone, gazing at it as if it were a thing of beauty.
“You got through all right?”
“Yes.” The voice was dreamy. “I have just been speaking to Yamagata-Zeki.” He put down the phone and flopped into his chair.
“Is that all right, then?”
“I can’t thank you enough.”
“May I have my passport?”
It was handed across. “Now I must call a taxi for you. Yamagata-Zeki looks forward to greeting you in the heya where he lives.”
“There isn’t time,” Diamond said flatly.
“You can’t refuse.”
This was infuriating. How could he make a social call when he was chasing Leapman? But while thinking actively how to get out of the arrangement, he began to see that a detour to Yamagata’s heya might actually be necessary. As the immigration officer had pointed out, a complete stranger to Tokyo faced problems. He couldn’t begin to go in pursuit without some practical help from the locals, and that would be difficult if most of them s
poke no English.
Not long after, still fretting over lost time, he was in a taxi being driven to the heya, which the immigration officer had informed him was one of thirty or more “stables” for sumo wrestlers in Tokyo, most, like this one, in the district of Ryoguku, east of the Sumida River. His new friend for life (“forever in your debt, Superintendent”) had assured him that no fare would be required. Diamond wasn’t sure whether it would be settled by the Immigration Department or Mr. Yamagata. He couldn’t believe that the taxi driver would make the trip for no other reward than the honor. Yet undoubtedly the support of a famous sumo patron was going to be useful.
He wasn’t really taking in his first sights of the real Japan. Instead he was trying once again to understand Leapman’s motive in coming here. The necessity of escaping from New York was clear, but to escape to an alien country whose language the man didn’t, presumably, speak was extraordinary unless he had something else planned. Something Leapman believed was vital to his survival.
On the plane, Diamond had been handed a New York Times. The conference at the Sheraton was reported in the business section under the heading Manflex Director Mystery. Leapman’s untimely disappearance was given a couple of paragraphs rich with innuendo, yet it appeared that the market had still been impressed by the claims Flexner and Churchward had made for PDM3. Manflex stock had soared by more than five dollars, offering large profits to insiders whose stake had been purchased cheaply. In all probability, Leapman was still set to make a fortune if he could keep clear of the law. He could take his profits simply by calling his stockbroker-from Tokyo, or anywhere else.
But why Japan?
Was it possible that the man had some humanity after all and had come here to return Naomi to her mother? Clearly, he didn’t want to remain in charge of a small child. He knew she was being sought. To hold her for long was dangerous as well as impractical. He was a swindler, hand in glove with professional criminals, but maybe he drew the line at murdering a child because she was in the way. Could it be as simple as that?
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