by Georgia Byng
“Wow! Nice plane!” said Gerry. “Is it yours?”
“For today,” said Toka. “It’s hired. Let’s get on. Mr. Proila is in the front part with Miss Sny. We’re in the back. Mr. Proila doesn’t want to see us or you.”
“He’s usually like that,” said Chokichi.
“Really?” said Gerry, following Toka up steps at the rear of the plane.
“Yes. Unless he wants company,” said Chokichi. “Doesn’t really like us much. Loves the money we make him, though.”
“That’s for sure.” Toka laughed.
“He sounds mean,” Gerry commented. His hat tipped slightly as he spoke, as Titch made himself comfortable, but nobody noticed.
“Did Micky decide not to come?” Hiroyuki asked Molly as they boarded.
“Yes. He’s homesick.”
A friendly flight attendant nodded to Molly. “I am Miss Yjuko,” she said. “I spoke to you this morning. Welcome on board.”
Molly shook her hand. “Hello, nice to meet you.” She knew that any second this woman would need to see proof of their parents’ permission for Gerry and her to be on the plane. Molly needed to sort the situation out urgently. “Erm, excuse me, Miss Yjuko, before we do passports and stuff, could I have a glass of water, please?”
Miss Yjuko nodded and moved toward the galley. Molly followed her and switched on her eyes. When Miss Yjuko turned, holding out the glass, Molly had her captive. “You are under my power,” she told her quietly and quickly. She glanced at the others to check no one was watching. “You now think that you met Gerry’s and my guardians at the airport and that they signed papers, but that you left the papers behind.”
Miss Yjuko nodded. “Yes, I left the file in the airport terminal with my colleague,” she agreed dumbly.
“And you think you have seen our passports,” Molly hurriedly added.
The woman nodded again.
“When we leave the plane,” Molly went on, “you will have forgotten that we were ever on board. Also you will destroy any records of us that you have. You will not mention to the captain or his copilot or to anyone at the airport that we are on board. It must be as if we are not on board. Is that clear?”
“Of—course—miss, whatever—you—say.”
A small part of Molly felt guilty. This part of her knew that Primo and Lucy would worry about where she was. But another part of her felt it really was their fault that she’d had to do this. They should have given her more freedom. They’d made her rebel, her logic argued. With her hand on the gold coin in its pouch in her pocket, she went and sat with the others.
“This is one of highest airports in world! It two thousand eight hundred meters above sea level!” Hiroyuki pointed out as the private jet cut up through the air. Below, Molly watched the buildings, mountains, and green valleys drop away.
“That way good,” Toka said as they climbed higher and higher. He gestured to the left of the plane. “Pacific Ocean. If you keep going, you get to Galapagos Islands.”
“Oh, I’ve heard of them,” Gerry shouted eagerly over the roar of the climbing jet engines. “One of the only places in the world where humans haven’t killed all the wild animals.”
“Yeah, it’s cool,” Toka said. “Lots of islands there. I want to go there one day and swim with seals. I love animals!”
Gerry laughed. “So do I! And I hate people killing animals, especially whales.”
“Same here!”
“Do you like mice?”
“Oh yeah,” Toka replied. “Got six back home.”
“Why didn’t you bring them with you?” Gerry took off his hat and began to undo the Velcro around Titch’s compartment.
Petula trotted over to join them at the back of the aircraft. The plane had leveled out now, and Molly, Gerry, and the band boys had started watching a movie. Molly had taken off her black jacket and hung it over the back of her chair. Petula edged her nose close to it.
The golden coin was in the pocket, Petula knew. She could smell it, but more than this—she could somehow feel it, too. It had a pull—a magnetism, she realized. It drew Petula toward it. Something else was happening as well. It was as if Petula could hear the coin calling to her with a mesmerizing, alluring tune.
Petula’s nose went closer and closer to the pocket. Suddenly Molly’s hand snatched her jacket away.
“It’s mine!” she hissed. Her green eyes were almost fiery. Molly had never looked at Petula this way before—ever.
Petula shrank back apologetically, but was also very scared. Molly wasn’t herself, and Petula had a suspicion that her strange behavior had something to do with the coin.
Eight
The flight was eighteen hours long. Although they had left in the morning, due to the time difference it was after lunch the next day when they arrived in Tokyo.
Gerry was the most excited of all of them as the plane approached Narita Airport. He tapped the window and bobbed up and down in his seat.
“Look!” he cried. “Look at the skyscrapers! There’s so much glass! Tokyo looks like a space-age city.”
The plane touched down and taxied to the private-jet hangars. Molly put on her jacket. She was sorry she’d snapped at Petula. She patted the pug’s head.
She looked out and was amazed to see hordes of Zagger fans gathered behind the wire fences of the airport.
Miss Sny came through from the front.
“Boys,” she said, pointing to Hiroyuki, Chokichi, and Toka, “you get off at the front. Your friends get off at the back.” She smiled apologetically at Gerry and Molly. “S-s-sorry,” she stuttered. “Mr. Proila’s orders. He doesn’t want the fans to see anyone but the band.”
The boys went with her. Then the rear door of the plane opened and Molly, Petula, and Gerry stepped out. To their surprise, the crowd erupted—some screaming, some shouting.
“They’re Titch’s fans,” Gerry joked as they walked toward the terminal. “Cor blimey,” he added, watching his new friends signing scores of autographs. “It’s a lot of work bein’ famous.”
When they reached the airport building, a line of security men made sure the mass of fans waiting there didn’t surge forward. Four big bodyguards stood by the door. Hiroyuki, Chokichi, and Toka bowed to them and they bowed more deeply back.
They were ushered quickly through all the airport security. Then, as the sliding exit doors opened, the hubbub of cheering and hysterical calling of the fans outside filled the airport hall.
“Look at her!” Gerry said to Molly, pointing. “The way she’s screamin’, it’s like there’s a monster behind ’er tryin’ to eat ‘er.”
Molly, Gerry, and Petula were bundled toward a stretch limo. Still shocked by the size of the welcome for the boy band, they got inside.
Petula jumped onto Gerry’s lap as Hiroyuki, Chokichi, and Toka clambered in after them.
As they drove into central Tokyo, Molly sank into the padded seat and thought how lovely the boys’ life was.
Tokyo was enormous. Everywhere was concrete or metal or glass or mirror or asphalt or stone. Molly could see only a few trees.
“What tiny houses!” Molly remarked as they passed through a homey neighborhood.
“Tiny?!” Chokichi exclaimed. “Those are huge for Tokyo houses. You see, Molly, there isn’t enough space here. There are so many people who want to live in the city. Those houses are thought of as very big, very expensive. Rich people live in them.”
“So where do poor people live?” asked Gerry, playing with Titch.
“In really tiny houses,” Toka replied.
As he opened a bag of rice crackers, Hiroyuki joined in the conversation. “Japanese people very good living close together.”
“Look, there is Shinto shrine!” Chokichi said, pointing to a pretty little building held up by red wooden pillars. Its gray roof curved up at the edges like tiled wings. “We go to shrine and make offerings to good kami to help us. Priest give us special ema—pieces of wood with good luck written on them. We
like ema.”
Molly gazed out of the window and fingered her gold coin. She hadn’t been listening to the boys. She was thinking that if she lived in Japan, she would want a beautiful, huge penthouse in the top of a skyscraper with a view of the whole of Tokyo.
The limo swung through the super-modern main streets of central Tokyo, where banners hung from shops, flapping in the wind. Office workers in business suits, mothers with strollers, and teenagers who seemed to be dressed like characters from comics or cartoons walked the sidewalks.
Finally the car pulled up in front of a very smart building with a polished steel front that reflected the cloudy blue sky. Again, fans were standing about and barriers had been put up to control them.
Gerry was appalled. “What, they’re waiting for you ’ere, too? Do they never leave you alone?”
Hiroyuki, Chokichi, and Toka laughed as they all got out.
Molly looked up. The green building looked like a huge pea pod, its apartments giant peas.
After another frenzy of starry-eyed fans taking photographs, with Molly and Gerry and Petula waiting inside the marble lobby of the building, the band boys came in. They all stepped into a polished chrome elevator, and up it went to the fourteenth floor.
“Who lives on the floors above?” Molly asked.
“Mr. Proila, of course.” Toka grimaced. They stepped out of the elevator to a bright landing with a view of the city to their right. “He’s got whole top two floors—sixteenth and seventeenth. And we have fourteenth and fifteenth. There is roof garden on top, but nothing much to see up there at the moment, just some bare cherry trees.”
The black ebony door to the apartment stood ajar. A round-faced woman in a blue tracksuit waited there with a smile on her face and open arms. Hiroyuki, Chokichi, and Toka rushed to hug her.
“Molly, Gerry, meet Miss Shonyo,” said Chokichi. “She helps us with . . . well, with everything really—especially with food!” He said something in Japanese to Miss Shonyo, who smiled and bowed to Molly and Gerry and Petula.
“Miss Shonyo great cook!” Toka said, patting his big stomach.
Molly and Gerry laughed. Both were thinking that Tokyo looked as if it was going to be a lot of fun.
Nine
Miss Shonyo held the front door to the apartment open and everyone went in. Just inside was a row of slipper-like shoes that the Japanese brothers started to change into.
“Ah,” said Chokichi. “Custom of changing shoes is everywhere in Japan. We keep the street dirt outside. We will get you some indoor shoes, but for today just wear socks inside.”
“Sobo?” Hiroyuki called into the apartment. “Sobo is our grandmother,” he explained to Molly.
The inside of the boys’ apartment was lovely. The entrance opened out into a huge modern room with high ceilings and elegant tall windows. A balcony ran along the outside, and a neat spiral staircase at the back of the room led up to a mezzanine platform with doors leading off.
In the main room the walls were hung with three long tapestries, each a picture of one of the boys surfing. There was a long orange sofa, and a few giant bright-green beanbags, which looked like massive squashed peas.
“Make yourself at home,” invited Toka. “I go sort out where you guys sleep.”
Gerry went with him, and Molly walked over to the windows. Tokyo stretched away for miles. Beyond its urban horizon was the backdrop of a brilliantly blue cloud-specked sky, dotted with helicopters and small aircraft.
As Gerry’s excited voice gabbled away upstairs, Molly stood drinking in the city.
“Wonder if Titch will get on with your mice,” Gerry was saying, as Toka showed him his bedroom. “Wow! I’ve never seen so many posters of sumo wrestlers!”
Petula had followed Gerry upstairs. Now, from the mezzanine, she looked down at Molly. She was a little scared of her now. The way Molly had reacted on the plane had given her a real shock. Petula sighed and watched her lovely Molly as she sat down on the sofa and picked up a book. Petula was convinced that that coin was having a bad effect on her friend.
Something small and hard hit Molly’s head. She looked up at the mezzanine expecting to see Gerry there, but the platform was empty. Molly rubbed her head and glanced about her. Something clipped her hard on the cheek and landed on the sofa. It was a dried pea.
She spun around. This time a pea hit her smack on the nose.
The pea seemed to have come from what looked like a miniature shrine that stood up against the wall. Molly went over and peered between the little statues of gods and the decorations of zigzag paper. Was there a hiding place behind the shrine?
Another pea pipped her on the cheek. It had come from a shadowy place under the staircase.
A squeaky noise came from the darkness. An ancient shrunken woman with a turnip-like head emerged from the gloom. She was in a rickety old wheelchair. She wore a silk flowered kimono (the traditional dress for Japanese women) and red socks that separated her big toes from the rest. On her lap was a long, apparently hollow, stick. Lifting this to her lips, she dipped her gnarled hand into a bag that was resting on her knees and picked out a pea. This she put into the end of the hollow shooter, and fired again. The pea hit Molly thwack between the eyes.
“Hey! Hang on a minute!” Molly exclaimed, shocked and affronted. “What are you doing?”
The old woman laughed and pointed at Molly.
“Hey!” she mimicked, echoing Molly. Like a spook from a nightmare, she started to wheel herself forward, her chair squeaking hysterically. Molly stepped backward but still the woman approached. She wheeled forward until Molly was pinned against the window and the old lady was directly in front of her.
Her skin was thin, creased round her eyes and mouth in well-ironed pleats. Her eyes were long slits and her nose, which she was now wrinkling, was small and flat.
Molly was confused and, she had to admit, a little panicked. Why was this woman being so aggressive? Perhaps she thought Molly was an intruder? Molly assumed the woman was the sobo, the grandmother Hiroyuki had called to. She decided to see what was going on in the old lady’s mind and so she summoned a thought bubble over her head. For a moment nothing happened. For some reason Molly had to try harder than usual to get a bubble to appear. Eventually one did. And to Molly’s surprise, inside it was an image of herself with devil’s horns. The picture was such a shock that Molly lost her focus and the bubble popped.
The old woman spread out a hand, splaying her bent fingers. As if her palm had eyes in it, she moved it in front of Molly’s body from left to right and up and down. When she reached Molly’s jacket pocket, the old woman pulled back sharply. Her eyes opened in shock, and with a swift jerk of her wheelchair she moved away. Molly reached into her pocket and clutched her coin.
“Aieee!” the old lady exclaimed. With horror on her face, she continued reversing across the room, back to the dark corner where she had been before.
Just then Hiroyuki looked over the platform ledge. “You want to see room, Molly?” He came down the stairs and saw the old woman’s socked feet sticking out from the shadows. “Oh, and this is Sobo, our grandmother. She probably too shy to say hello to you. She deaf and can’t see well, but she very sweet. She like to hang out under stairs. Small spaces make her feel safe.” The old woman glared from the shadows, silent and wary.
Hiroyuki went toward her and bent into the darkness to give her a kiss. She said something to him in a low rasping voice. Molly felt sure it was something nasty about her. Why had the old woman turned against her? She didn’t like it at all. She put her hand into her pocket again and began turning her coin over and over. It was time to change the subject.
“Why don’t you live with your parents?” she asked Hiroyuki.
“We want to, but Mr. Proila say we have to live with him for band to work. He allow Sobo to come here but not our mother and father. My parents sign contract—so now it cannot change.”
Molly stroked her gold coin. Instead of concentrating on what Hiro
yuki was saying, she found herself wondering how much money Zagger made a year.
“One day we will all live together again,” Hiroyuki said. He placed the origami bird that he had made on the table.
Molly didn’t hear him. She was totally absorbed in her thoughts. Her eyes fell on a building a couple of blocks away. It had a roller coaster on its roof.
“Wow! I’d love a ride on that! It must be awesome.”
If Molly had been her usual self, she would have been as shocked as Hiroyuki was by her lack of care for his troubles. But she wasn’t her usual self. Thanks to the coin, she was growing into something else.
The phone rang. It was Miss Sny.
“What time?” Hiroyuki, who had answered it, asked. “Fine. Thank you, and can you remind him we’ve got two guests?” He replaced the receiver. “Dinner tonight at a restaurant called Mizu,” he explained. “We have to go whether we like or not. Mr. Proila wants to talk to us about big show tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow?”
“Yes, he works us. But we like it . . . or at least Chokichi and I do.”
Petula padded into the room and peered at her mistress warily. The odd smell was back. A thin, sour lemon odor permeated the air about Molly, pungent as steam from a hot sulfurous pool. Petula shrank back.
Chokichi and Toka and Gerry came out onto the mezzanine. Gerry was holding three mice. “Look, Molly! Titch has got new friends!”
Toka laughed beside him, his own arms filled with well-behaved mice, too.
Molly barely smiled back. She wasn’t interested in small talk right now. Instead, what made her feel good was that tonight she was going to meet one of the most powerful men in Japan. Since arriving she had become more and more keen on getting a place to live in Tokyo. Mr. Proila would be able to help her.
It was a long time since she had used hypnotism to get things for herself. Most people used their skills for their own ends. Hypnotism was her skill. So why shouldn’t she use it to get what she wanted?
