The Gentleman from Japan

by James Church

  The man turned to the butler. “Well, you heard our guest. See what the cook can do. And close the door as you leave, close it completely.”

  After the door clicked shut, we sat in silence. The elaborately carved chair was uncomfortable, probably because it was oak. The whole damned room was nothing but oak. The oak paneling on the walls was especially oppressive. It was hard to see how anyone could sit still for a whole meal in the room without breaking down and sobbing.

  “This chair is oak,” I said.

  “Yes, sturdy as a ship.”

  “My grandfather would say oak was the worst thing to use if you cared about comfort, because oak only cares about itself. He would tell me that in a slightly peevish voice as if it were my fault.”

  “Your grandfather? An interesting man, it seems. A furniture maker?”

  “He was a guerrilla fighter, but got tired of sneaking up and killing people. So he turned to carpentry.”

  The man absorbed this silently.

  “This table.” I tapped my finger on it. “Also oak.”

  “One massive plank.” The man brightened noticeably. “Must have taken ten men to bring it in here.”

  “Probably so,” I said. It was one massive plank, yes, but with no character. Simply a slab of wood, like a bloody steak, rounded on the edges but otherwise just as it had been when the tree had been felled and—as my grandfather would have said—lay dying on the earth, its limbs being torn away.

  “I see you are admiring the table,” the man said. “It is several hundred years old, and will last several hundred more no doubt. You won’t find many trees like that around here anymore. What about in your country?”

  “My country? We have no more trees. Every one has been cut down for chopsticks.”

  The man frowned and then reached for the bottle of wine. “That donkey didn’t bring me a corkscrew.” He went over to an oak cabinet and rummaged around in a drawer. “Success.” He held up a corkscrew with an elaborate wooden handle—oak. “Let’s have a drink, shall we? After that, we can have the soup, and then the main course will come—seafood. We love seafood in Barcelona. Ours is the best in the world. I think we may have something special for you as well.”

  After he had filled the glasses there was another long silence. Finally, I thought it was time to see what he was made of, besides Spanish curses and this bloodcurdling hospitality.

  “I hope you won’t think me rude, but first you have your thugs beat me up, then you give me a change of clothes and offer me fellowship around your ancient oak table beneath portraits of dear friends tortured to death long ago. All charming. What do you want?”

  The man held his wineglass up to the candlelight, took a sip, and then settled back in his uncomfortable chair. “No, I think you have it backwards. The question is, what do you want? We had a deal; there is even an elaborate and carefully worded contract, but now you seem to have broken it.”

  I held my wineglass up to the candlelight, looking to gain a few seconds in order to pull a brilliant thought or two out of thin air. He might know about my phone call yesterday to his colleague in the gray suit, though they didn’t seem to communicate all that well. It would be best if the sneering man had kept it to himself, because it had been a gigantic bluff on my part, and his boss, who had closed his eyes and was smiling faintly as he took in the bouquet of the wine, would by now have recognized that I was a fraud. On the other hand, given what little I’d learned sitting on the bench beneath the castle in Lisbon, this fellow might be talking about something that I barely understood. Either way, I was liable to hang myself no matter what I said. In that case, I might as well enjoy myself as long as I could. I took a sip.

  “Your passport is Costa Rican. You aren’t, of course, but I congratulate you on your imagination, and that of your organization.” He raised his glass.

  I nodded and raised my glass in return. It was a heavy glass, elaborate with diamond cuts and a thick square base. Nothing delicate in this country that I could see. Everything overdone. I wasn’t looking forward to the soup.

  “Drink up,” he said, and tipped his glass back for a mouthful of the wine. I did the same, thinking to myself that he had said “organization,” not factory, not enterprise, not company. Organization. Even allowing for translation from Spanish to English, it had a funny ring.

  I swallowed the wine and felt my knees twitch as the jolt of alcohol dropped into my system. This was not just wine.

  “We were unhappy with your predecessor. He was rather crude.” He took another large swallow.

  I cocked my head as if confused, which of course I was, both by the conversation and the wine. I took a dainty sip.

  “You came here through Portugal.” He gave me a hard look. “Why?”

  This at least I could answer without getting into trouble. “I’d never been there. It seemed like an interesting place.”

  “Bah. The castle in that shitty little city of Lisboa is nothing. You’d have to drive to Sintra for anything worth seeing. The Portuguese love to show off Sintra. Did you go?”

  “I’m a busy man, with very little time to sightsee.”

  “Well, there is much to see in Barcelona. Once we finish our business here, you must stay for a day and look around the city. Have you seen Gaudí? You will not believe your eyes. And besides, there is so much to enjoy at night.” He leered slightly and drained his glass.

  “Business first,” I said. I raised my glass, silently cursed Luis, and took another sip.

  The man reached over and filled my glass, after which he filled his own. “Of course, if you’ve been to Barcelona before…” The rest of the thought hung over the oak table before drifting toward the paneling in search of a window.

  If he knew more than he was saying, he was certainly taking the long way around. “Surely you don’t think I would just show up here out of the blue,” I said. “On something as important as this, we are naturally careful. That’s how the organization works.” I smiled when I said the word. “I assume you are careful, too, or do I assume too much?” I glanced casually around the room. “For example, the camera over the fireplace. I assume that’s why you wanted me in this seat. Would you like a profile shot? It helps in identification, I’m told.”

  The man looked at me carefully, his eyes narrowing. “How did you spot that camera? You must have been trained. What else have you been trained for?” He rang the bell, and when nothing happened, he rang it again, with more urgency. Again there was a wait before Yuri finally appeared.

  “If that was for the soup,” Yuri said, “it’s not ready.” The Russian smelled of alcohol, even from several meters away. He looked steady on his feet, though his eyes were not as focused as you might like for a bodyguard. “Something else you want I should do?”

  “Nothing, Yuri, nothing at all. We’ll have the soup as soon as it’s ready. Can you bring it here without spilling on our guest?”

  “Maybe,” I said once Yuri had left, “we should know each other’s names. It might make dinner friendlier, using names. When I say pass the rolls, I can attach your name to it. Señor such-and-such, would you be so kind as to pass me those delicious rolls? See what I mean? Or would you rather things stayed tense? I can eat dinner either way.”

  “Strange, you don’t know my name.”

  “Not really. Where I work, we trust no one, we share no information, we especially do not reveal contacts. There have been too many leaks, too many people talking, too many trials, too many shipments intercepted.” I was assuming what the taxi driver had told me was close to the truth.

  “Why, then, would you want my name? Wouldn’t it be dangerous to your organization?”

  “Of course it would! That’s the point.” I tried to make what came out next sound self-obvious. “If I know your name, and you know mine, we have guns cocked at each other’s head.”

  “But everyone already knows who I am, I own this company. I’ve lived here for decades. My neighbors respect me.”

  “
In that case, pass the rolls.”

  “Wait, wait. We mustn’t spoil your appetite. Let’s start with the surprise.”

  Again he rang the bell, again nothing happened. Then the door swung open and Yuri burst through, holding two bowls of soup. “Ready,” he said, and sloshed some from each bowl on the table as he set them down in front of us. “The cook says the seaweed is very nuanced. That was her word.”

  “Thank you, Yuri. Now, can you get the surprise? Put them on the big platter, the red and gold one, can you?” He looked more closely at Yuri. “Never mind, have the cook arrange them.” He turned to me. “Please, try the soup. It is a seafood broth. Why don’t you call me José for now? And I’ll call you Sakamoto.”

  “I wish you wouldn’t. I don’t like Japanese names.”

  “Oh? And why is that?”

  “Because I’m not Japanese. I’m Korean.”

  José’s spoon dropped into his soup with a splash.

  “Surprised? That was a nice tie, by the way. I hope you can get it cleaned.”

  José looked down at his shirtfront. “The tie was a present from an old mistress. She had good taste in most things. She was especially good with ties.”

  “You didn’t expect me to be Korean? But why not?” I took a leap into the unknown. “That’s who you’re dealing with, or didn’t you know that?”

  José’s smile was sly and gone in a flash. “We don’t want to know who the end users are, that’s our operating principle. We always know, of course, but we pretend that we don’t, even to ourselves. We sell machinery, piece by piece. No machine has value in and of itself. No value, no soul, no heart, no moral weight. We ship all over the world. Whoever wants a machine, they must have a reason. And if they have the cash, they have a machine.”

  He was about to say something more when the door opened and a woman in a cook’s uniform walked in, carrying a large serving plate on which, artfully arranged around a centerpiece of a miniature machine of some type, were about two dozen steamed dumplings.

  Chapter Five

  José beamed. “What do you think?”

  “The machine? Is that the one we contracted to buy? I hope not. Can we get spare parts for something so small?”

  “Good!” José slapped his hand on the oak table. “I didn’t realize Koreans had a sense of humor. Please, the dumplings, try one. We have our own Spanish version, but yours are different.” His face fell. “Oh, Mother of God, these are Japanese dumplings. Cook! Take these away!”

  “No, no, they look fine. They actually look nearly perfect. I’m not fussy about dumplings. Names, yes. Dumplings, no.”

  “We thought since we were about to deliver your first dumpling machine, you would enjoy this to mark the occasion. Of course, it was supposed to be for your predecessor…”

  “Who you did not like.”

  “I cannot abide a man with so many tattoos.”

  Things began to fall into place. My predecessor was Japanese mafia. My so-called organization was connected with the yakuza. “Yes, the organization has tried to rein that in, but it’s not easy. We haven’t even started trying to ease some of them out of the practice of chopping off the little finger. I am one of the first.” I held both of mine up to prove I was intact. “We’ve moved my predecessor off to another, ah, operation. Something more suitable.”

  “Please enjoy the dumplings.” José had reverted to full host mode. I didn’t know if he had accepted my explanation or not. “More wine? I had it fortified; it relaxes things. Then we’ll get to business. And then we’ll go for a tour so you can see the dumpling machine, the lovely madre de todas las máquinas before it is crated. This will please you?”

  “So! It was not shipped yet. There has been a misunderstanding, most unfortunate. If all is in order, yes, it will please me and I’ll be able to close off this chapter.”

  José’s face fell. I had a feeling I knew why.

  “If the machine works once it arrives at its intended destination, and the dumplings…” I paused searching for the words. “… are deemed satisfactory to those who know more about these things than I do, then I’m sure there will be more orders. One thing at a time, that’s how we keep ourselves ahead of the crowd.” I picked up a dumpling with my fork. It leaked all over my shirt and onto my trousers.

  José pursed his lips. “I should have warned you. These are soup dumplings. I thought all Asians would know that.”

  2

  Once we had finished with the dumplings—the skin was thick and unpleasant, very much like those served in the restaurant near my nephew’s house—José suggested we have brandy and cigars by the fireplace. I sat in the chair that looked like it would play havoc with the camera. The microphones could be anywhere and everywhere. In some ways it was nice not knowing, like being home again. Hidden microphones never bothered me. They’re much better than note takers, who tend to miss things and make you out to have said something you didn’t.

  José brought a bottle of brandy and two glasses from a cabinet recessed behind the oak panels. “Yuri must have smoked the cigars. If he weren’t so valuable, I’d break his legs.”

  “He’s valuable? I wouldn’t have guessed it. In fact, it won’t look good in my report to the organization when I describe the security setup here.”

  José poured the drinks. “Let’s not worry about reports. Let’s just enjoy this brandy and forget about business. There is more to life, you know. Business is just a necessary evil. As if there were not enough evil in the world already, eh?” He settled back in his chair and gave me a thoughtful look. “Does evil bother you?”

  Suddenly the room was very still and cold. The brandy warmed me only for a moment, and then I felt an icy hand squeezing my heart. “Evil is part of the order of things,” I said. “Evil is under rocks everywhere. It doesn’t shock me, if that’s what you’re asking. I don’t encourage it, but I don’t hurl myself into senseless combat with it.”

  “Really? What would your grandfather say to that?”

  I thought back to the conversations in the old man’s workroom, filled with woodworking tools, and pieces of lumber leaning against the wall, each in a designated spot depending on what my grandfather knew about its history, its age, its relationship with the earth and the sky. This was very complicated, and more than once I knocked something over and put it back in the wrong spot, only to earn a scolding—often, as he got older, a bitter harangue.

  “My grandfather?” I swirled the brandy in the glass. “He thought most of humanity was full of folly. After the war, when we walked past a village that had been destroyed by bombs, he’d say to me, ‘No reason, none. Just felt like dumping bombs here. Remember this place. It’s folly, that’s what it is. Do you understand what I’m telling you?’”

  “You had an answer?” José leaned forward, for some reason looking very interested in what I told my grandfather.

  “None. It did no good to answer, so I would look down and shake my head.” But in my memory was more than that. In my memory my grandfather grew pale, putting his face close to mine. He would say softly, like a bayonet going into someone’s thigh, “You don’t know, do you? You can’t imagine such a thing. But I can tell you this, folly has produced more evil in the world than a thousand devils working a thousand years. Folly killed your parents; folly and grief will always be your brother and sister. And evil? Why, you don’t need to look for evil, it will find you, always two steps behind folly. You watch, you’ll see.” And then he would walk quickly away, as if he didn’t want to be near me anymore, though why I never knew. But I didn’t tell this to José. It was none of his business.

  José poured a bit more brandy in my glass, then an equal amount for himself. “In some ways I am like your grandfather.”

  I kept myself from saying what I thought at that moment, which is that this man was no more like my grandfather than a turtle is like a shaft of light through the clouds after a summer storm. But the brandy was making me bold where I knew I should be silent.
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br />   “And why is that?” I asked. “He worked with wood. And you work with machines. They are not the same at all.”

  “Ah, good, now we get to the essence of things. You are right, and you are wrong. Machines are not natural, that is, they are not of nature. They are thus unnatural in a sense. In that regard, they are, as you suggest, the opposite of wood. Yet a well-built machine is more than the sum of its parts. The screws and bolts and shaped steel, the copper pipes, the gears and pulleys and precision movements are a composition. Moreover, they give birth; their offspring contribute to civilization.”

  My head was buzzing slightly. “Machines are cold. They are noisy. They pollute. They do not dance in the wind. As often as not, they deliver destruction. They provide tools of folly.”

  “And next you will tell me they bring evil.” Slowly the veneer was slipping away. His face lost the cloying smile that smothered the rest of his emotions; his voice sounded more of cold steel. “Evil, my friend, has nothing to do with machines. Nothing! If you are so concerned, tear up your contract! Go home to your trees, to your wooden dreams, to the breezes of morality that flutter the leaves of your imaginary kingdom of good.”

  If he had been drunk, I would have ignored the outburst, but he was stone sober and as serious as the silver pistol he had taken from somewhere and was now aiming at my face.

  “I could blow your brains out with just a twitch of my finger. And maybe I should. I don’t need the money your organization is paying, and I don’t need the headache of every intelligence service in Europe sniffing around my factory. If I kill you and then call the police, I can tell them that you were trespassing—a Korean trespassing at a machine factory in Spain, a very special machine factory that produces very special machines, so precise, so reliable, so beautiful! They will be interested. A Korean with a Costa Rican passport! They will be fascinated! They will think we argued over the terms of our contract, but no matter how they pore over my files and invoices and accounting books, they won’t find a trace of anything resembling a contract between us. They will jump at the chance to double-check all the shipments in and out of here, they will question all of the workers, they will hold the invoices up to the light and look for secret entries. All useless! But you will know nothing of this, because your brains will be splashed from here to kingdom come.”