Murder on the Cliff

by Stefanie Matteson

  “Why’s that?”

  “The geisha and the sumo wrestler lead very similar lives. They both have an appreciation for the traditional arts. They both serve long apprenticeships, and they both undergo arduous training. They both live in a closed society, and they both are expected to behave in a particular fashion. Also, they are both readily identifiable from their appearance.”

  Charlotte hadn’t thought about it before, but he was right.

  “They even share some aspects of technique,” said Spalding, looking over at her with a twinkle in his eye. “They say the forty-eight traditional winning techniques in sumo correspond to the forty-eight positions of love.”

  Charlotte arched an eyebrow. Then she giggled as she thought of a four-hundred-pound sumo wrestler contorting himself into some of the positions she had seen depicted in Paul’s shunga.

  “That’s why their romance has gotten so much attention in the press. To the Japanese, they’re larger than life: they could be Romeo and Juliet or Tristan and Isolde.”

  “Somehow I have the feeling that these love stories don’t have a happy ending,” said Charlotte, thinking again of Madame Butterfly.

  “You’re right. They usually end like Romeo and Juliet, as a matter of fact,” Spalding replied. “With a double suicide. Caught between giri and ninjo, the lovers choose to be reborn together in another life.”

  At the end of the string of mansions, Spalding turned the car into a shopping-center parking lot across the street from the casino. In a city that was being taken over by day-trippers and the ice cream stands and T-shirt shops that catered to them, the casino was a relic of a gracious time when people still had the leisure to spend an entire summer doing nothing. Originally built as a country club—it had once been considered the most exclusive private club in the nation—it was a long, rambling structure sheathed in weathered wood shingles and adorned with a multitude of porches, gables, and verandas. The former club rooms on the upper story were now the home of the International Tennis Hall of Fame and Museum. Considered the masterpiece of the renowned architectural firm of McKim, Mead, and White, it was a combination of Victorian charm and Oriental elegance. If the Newport of the Gilded Age could be compared to the floating world, then the casino was its most popular teahouse, the center of its social life.

  “Spalding, what does Tojin Okichi mean?” asked Charlotte as they headed across the street to the casino.

  He frowned. “Where did you hear that?”

  “At the geisha party,” she replied. “I heard Hayashi whisper it—actually, it seemed more like he hissed it—into Okichi-mago’s ear as the party was breaking up. It seemed to upset her.”

  “It’s a derogatory term for a Chinese—we would translate it as chink—but in the larger sense it applies to all foreigners. Before Perry opened Japan, the only foreigners the Japanese were familiar with were the Chinese.”

  “But Okichi-mago wasn’t a foreigner; at least, she didn’t have enough foreign blood in her veins to make a difference.”

  “No. But she consorted with a foreigner. Tojin-Okichi or ‘Foreigner’s Okichi’ was one of the taunts that the townspeople hurled at Okichi because of her relationship with Harris. At that time, foreigners were ranked on the same level as animals. Some Japanese don’t think any better of foreigners today.”

  Charlotte nodded. She remembered the stricken expression on Okichi-mago’s beautiful face.

  6

  The casino’s street façade was relatively simple—the ground floor housed chic boutiques and galleries—but once one passed under the green awning and through the arched, wood-paneled passageway, one was in another world, another century. It was on the uneven brick sidewalk outside this dim passageway that the townspeople had once gathered to catch a view of the summer colonists taking their afternoon tea on the Horseshoe Piazza. Rubber plants, these stargazers were called. A few rubber plants were planted there now, trying to decide whether or not to pay their admission to the International Tennis Hall of Fame. The passageway opened onto an oval courtyard of smooth, green grass surrounded by one- and two-story piazzas enclosed by latticework screens pierced by round openings, like the moon gate in a Japanese wall. A fat clock tower bulged near the entrance, the white clock face contrasting with the weathered shingling. Beds of roses edged with boxwood surrounded the courtyard, and baskets of brightly colored flowers hung from the piazzas. Over all grew sheaths of old ivy. Beyond the courtyard lay the working—or rather, playing—part of the casino: a dozen or more immaculate grass tennis courts, an indoor court for the sixteenth-century game of royal tennis (one of only a handful in the United States) and a theatre. Although Charlotte had been there before, the place always struck her anew with its magic. It was as if this vivid oval of emerald green was the heart of the floating world that was Newport. On the green, a croquet match was in progress. In addition to housing the International Tennis Hall of Fame, the casino was the home of the New England Regional Croquet Association. Players in starched white trousers carefully lined up their shots while diners in the adjoining restaurant looked on.

  The Meet the Sumos reception was being held on the Horseshoe Piazza. Walking down a gravel path at the side of the courtyard, Spalding and Charlotte climbed the stairs to the U-shaped piazza, where members of the Black Ships committee and other guests were mingling with the sumo wrestlers, who were readily identifiable by virtue of their size, their bathrobe-like kimonos, and their distinctive topknots. One sumo wrestler who wouldn’t be present was Shawn. He had been discouraged from attending because he might hear about Okichi-mago’s suicide. Her death was being kept from him until after the match.

  At the head of the stairs, they were greeted by an extraordinary man. He was at least six foot four and must have weighed four hundred pounds. He wasn’t handsome—his deeply lined face was framed by long, bushy sideburns and several layers of fleshy chins, and his dark skin was pockmarked by a bad complexion—but he had a warm, infectious smile. Unlike the other sumo wrestlers, he was formally dressed in a kimono jacket over a culotte-like skirt.

  As Charlotte looked on, he enveloped Spalding in a bear hug. Spalding introduced him as Lani Kanahele, the Hawaiian sumo wrestler whom Spalding had written the book about and the first American to make it big in sumo. Despite their disparate backgrounds, the two men had a similar mission: the promotion of sumo wrestling. During his years in Japan, Spalding had developed a love of sumo, and was considered one of the foremost Western authorities on the sport.

  Spalding’s face beamed: he was obviously very fond of this amiable bear of a man. “Lani retired several years ago to serve as the international good will ambassador for the Japan Sumo Association. His job is promoting the internationalization of sumo,” he explained. “This tournament is his baby, one of the first professional tournaments to be held on American soil. We’re hoping to make it an annual event, aren’t we, Lani?”

  “Yes, we are,” the wrestler agreed.

  “If it weren’t for Lani, I doubt we’d be having a sumo tournament here today,” Spalding continued. “Lani’s the one who made all the arrangements from the Japanese end. And you can take it from me that arranging to import thirty-four of Japan’s top professional sumo wrestlers wasn’t easy.”

  “Nor was it easy from this end,” said Lani. His voice was surprisingly soft for so large a man. “Spalding made all the arrangements for room and board. And sumo wrestlers can pack away a lot of food. The meals have been supplied by the local restaurants, and they’ve been very good.”

  Charlotte had seen an account in the local newspaper of one meal: five courses, several tubs of rice, and as much as twenty cans of soda—per sumo wrestler. To say nothing of beer, sake, plum wine, and tea.

  “The food wasn’t a problem,” Spalding replied. “It was the damned dirt. We had a devil of a time finding fifteen metric tons of just the right kind of clay for the ring. To say nothing of getting it here.”

  “Is it unusual for sumo wrestlers to travel outside J
apan?” asked Charlotte.

  “It used to be,” Lani replied. “Five years ago, you could only see sumo in Japan. But it’s becoming more international. The Japanese would like to see it become an Olympic sport. In the last few years we’ve held exhibition tournaments in Korea, Brazil, Argentina, Mexico, France, Germany, Great Britain, and, of course, the United States.”

  “I’m afraid I don’t know much about sumo,” Charlotte said.

  “That’s okay, most Americans don’t. But it’s easy to catch on. The goal is simply to get your opponent out of the ring or down on the ground. Out or down—it’s that basic. Whoever steps out of the ring or touches the ground with any part of his body except the bottoms of his feet loses. It’s very fast—the average bout only lasts thirty seconds.”

  “But sumo is much more than just wrestling,” said Spalding. He was speaking in part for the benefit of a reporter who had appeared at Lani’s side, notebook in hand.

  “Oh yes,” Lani replied. “The history of sumo goes back two thousand years. It’s deeply rooted in the Japanese national religion, Shinto. Originally sumo was a fertility ritual. As you’ll see, elements of Shinto still figure heavily in sumo. It’s the ritual that appeals to Westerners. Except maybe for the lighting of the Olympic torch, Western sports are pretty devoid of ritual.”

  The reporter introduced himself as being from a local newspaper. By now, a knot of listeners had gathered around Lani. The other sumo wrestlers stood nearby in little clusters, isolated by their lack of English. Among the listeners was Marianne, Lester at her side.

  “Is that the reason for the peculiar hairstyle?” the reporter asked.

  “The chommage,” said Lani. “Yes, the chommage is worn by rikishi …”

  “Rikishi is the preferred name for a sumo wrestler; it means strong warrior,” Spalding interjected.

  Lani continued: “It’s worn by rikishi in the top two divisions. Wearing the chommage is synonymous with being a sumo wrestler. The chommage was once the universal hairstyle of Japanese men, but today only rikishi still wear it. It’s a symbol of a way of life in which the rikishi follows a strict code of conduct and ethics similar to the samurai’s code of bushido.”

  “A rikishi can never go incognito the way even a movie star”—Spalding nodded at Charlotte—“or a politician sometimes can. The chommage always identifies him as a rikishi, and as long as he’s wearing it, he’s expected to behave in accordance with the sumo creed.”

  “The first sentence of which is ‘Carry yourself with pride at all times because you are a rikishi in Japan’s national sport of sumo,’” Lani added.

  Charlotte thought of Shawn’s dignified responses to Marianne’s advances. Anyone else would have shown annoyance—if they hadn’t been interested, that is—but Shawn had behaved like a perfect gentleman.

  “In fact,” Spalding continued, “the chommage is so important to the rikishi that one of the few forbidden methods of attacking your opponent is by pulling his hair. If a rikishi pulls his opponent’s hair, he automatically loses. Likewise, fans are permitted to touch the rikishi—it’s a way of vicariously sharing in his power—but they may not touch his hair.”

  “Ordinarily, the chommage is tied in a topknot and then pulled forward, but for tournaments, the chommage of rikishi in the two top divisions is fanned out into the shape of a gingko leaf,” Lani added.

  Charlotte noticed that the sumo wrestlers at the casino wore their hair differently from the way in which Shawn had worn his at the party. The front part was fanned out stiffly, almost like a hair ornament. She also observed that Marianne was taking note too; it was an easy bet that the models in her next big show would be wearing their hair in the gingko-leaf style.

  “Why don’t you have a chommage?” the reporter asked Lani, whose dark brown hair was combed straight back.

  “My chommage was cut off in my retirement ceremony,” he replied. He proceeded to describe the day-long ceremony before an audience of twelve thousand fans in which his chommage was cut off strand by strand by the hundreds of people who had been part of his sumo career, from the lowliest worker to the master of his sumo stable.

  Producing a wallet from the leather pocketbook that hung from his wrist, he showed the reporter a photo. “This is my stable master making the final cut,” he said. He then showed the reporter another picture. “And this is my chommage.” The photo showed a shiny chommage dressed in the gingko-leaf style displayed on a red velvet cloth in a Plexiglas box.

  Charlotte thought it was grotesque-looking. Had the skin been attached, it could have been mistaken for an Indian scalp.

  “It was the saddest day of my life,” Lani continued, still speaking of his retirement ceremony. “But I wasn’t in shape anymore. I was losing most of my bouts. I couldn’t go on forever.” Flipping once more through his photographs, he turned up one of a pretty young Japanese woman and her baby. “My wife and daughter,” he said, showing the picture to the reporter.

  “Mr. Kanahele, can you tell us a little about this tournament?” asked the reporter, after admiring the photograph.

  “Well, this is a jungyo, an exhibition tournament. What happens here in two days is similar to what takes place in fifteen days every other month in Japan. Technically what happens here doesn’t count in the official rankings. But just because it’s an exhibition tournament doesn’t mean the rikishi don’t take it seriously. I think we can expect to see some, exciting sumo.”

  “Are there any wrestlers we should be keeping an eye on?”

  “Well, of course everyone’s eye is going to be on Akanohana.”

  “Is that Shawn Hendrickson?” the reporter asked.

  “Akanohana is his professional name,” Spalding explained. “It means red flower. Sumo wrestlers’ names often end with the suffix hana, which means flower. In Japan, the word flower carries the connotation of perfection. Akano means red, which stands for the red stripes in the American flag.” He continued: “As you probably know, Akanohana is Mr. Kanahele’s protégé.”

  To Charlotte, the sumo wrestlers’ names all sounded like the names of sushi bars on New York’s upper East Side.

  “Yes,” said Lani. “One of my missions as foreign minister for the sumo association is to find foreign wrestling talent. I discovered Shawn Hendrickson at an Ivy League wrestling tournament three years ago. He was a natural for sumo. A lot of Western wrestlers who try sumo drop out—the discipline is too rigid—but Shawn took to it like a duck to water.”

  More like a water buffalo than a duck, thought Charlotte.

  “Naturally, I’m very pleased that he’s done as well as he has,” Lani continued. “It’s every scout’s dream to discover a star.”

  “Why is everyone’s eye going to be on him?”

  “Akanohana has advanced through the sumo ranks more quickly than any rikishi before him. Last month, he was promoted to ozeki, which is the second-highest rank in sumo. He’s only the second foreigner to reach such a high rank. And there’s a very good chance that he’ll be the first foreign yokozuna in the history of sumo.”

  “What’s a yokozuna?” asked the reporter, still writing away.

  “Yokozuna means grand champion; it’s sumo’s highest rank. There have been only sixty-one yokozuna in the three-hundred-year history of professional sumo. At the moment, there are two yokozuna, but only one, Kotoyama, is participating in the Black Ships Festival Tournament. The other wasn’t able to attend because of an injury.”

  “What does Hendrickson have to do to become a yokozuna?”

  “He has to win two consecutive grand tournaments. He’s already won one: the grand tournament earlier this month. As I explained, the Black Ships exhibition tournament doesn’t count toward his ranking. But it does offer a preview of the kind of performance that can be expected of him at the fall grand tournament. One of the men he has to beat is his rival ozeki, Takafuji.”

  “What about the yokozuna, Kotoyama?” asked the reporter. “Wouldn’t a grand champion be favored to b
eat a lower-ranking sumo such as Akanohana?”

  “Akanohana is a rikishi, not a sumo,” Lani corrected with a warm smile. “Or, you could call him a sumo wrestler. Never just a sumo. To call a sumo wrestler a sumo is a little like calling a baseball player a baseball.”

  “Sorry. I thought this was a Meet the Sumos reception.”

  “That’s all right. That’s my job, to promote the international understanding of sumo.” He looked over at Spalding, his warm black eyes smiling. “Looks like I still have some work to do.”

  “We talked about calling it a Meet the Rikishi reception, but somehow it didn’t have the same ring,” said Spalding.

  “To answer your question,” Lani continued. “Not necessarily. Unlike the rikishi in the lower ranks, a yokozuna can’t be demoted. Kotoyama hasn’t been performing well for some time. He’s thirty-three, which makes him the oldest wrestler in the top division. Let’s just say that it’s about time he started planning for his retirement.”

  “You mean, it’s about time for the rikishi to cut off his chommage,” said the reporter, proud of his use of sumo jargon.

  Lani’s warm black eyes crinkled in a smile.

  “What are the chances that Akanohana will beat Takafuji?” the reporter continued.

  “Very good, I’d say. As you may know, Akanohana won his last forty-three consecutive bouts. He’s also favored to win the match today. If he does, he’ll be pitted in the playoff against Takafuji, who won yesterday’s match. Takafuji has pledged to beat Akanohana in the playoff, breaking his winning streak. We’ll see what happens; it’s bound to be a very exciting event.”

  The tournament began shortly after the reception. After a drink at the casino restaurant, Spalding and Charlotte, along with Marianne and Lester, joined the throngs that were pouring into the casino for the event. The match would be held in the casino’s Center Court, usually the site of professional tennis tournaments. The capacity of the stands was nearly five thousand, and it appeared that they would be full. In addition to Americans who were curious about sumo wrestling, the event seemed to have drawn every Japanese or Japanese-American in New England. Having thirty-four of Japan’s “best and the biggest,” as the posters put it, wrestling on American soil was an event that was not to be missed. Outside the entrance to the stands, the Black Ships committee members were doing a brisk business in commemorative T-shirts emblazoned with the red handprints that sumo wrestlers called tegata, and that were the sumo equivalent of the autograph. Also on sale were the tegata themselves: the red handprints of a rikishi on a piece of square white cardboard, signed with a brush in black ink. Not surprisingly, it was Akanohana’s tegata that were selling the most briskly.