Retribution ( M Mystery)

by Kit Crumb

  “We’re still assuming it’s them, “Ramos said. “The house is where the hotel was.” He took the picture from Buck and flipped it over. “No name, no date, but the clothes and the woman’s hair-do are a dead give away for the era.”

  The second and third pictures were of a grinning Asian man standing on the deck of a fishing boat.

  “You can just make out the cave in the background. Isn’t that a boat inside?” Lemon said.

  Buck tilted the picture to catch the light coming in through the glass sliding doors and squinted at the image. “Yeah, that must have been what those iron rings were for, they moored a boat in there.”

  Ramos pulled an oil stained envelope out next, and looked over at Buck. “Remember that toy wheel I found?”

  Buck reached for his coffee. “Yeah, and the remnants of a garden. And didn’t you say that M owned the property the hotel sat on?”

  All eyes were riveted on the envelope as he extracted a stack of hundred dollar bills.

  “What does it say there?” Jake said.

  Ramos slid off the currency band that held the stack of bills together and slipped it around his middle and index finger, and rotated his hand.

  “Fort Point Bank and Trust.”

  Buck reached over and lifted the paper band off his fingers.

  “Didn’t they change their name to Bay County some time in the 1950s when they moved to Dungeness Bay?”

  “Lemon, I want you over to Bank and Trust and see if they keep records that far back,” Ramos said.

  “What am I looking for?”

  “Find out if Yamoto took out a loan with his property as collateral. And check the library for back issues of the local newspaper.”

  Ramos counted the bills and handed the stack to Buck. “See what you get.” Then, looked inside the bag, reached in with two fingers and pulled out a folded piece of paper; the creases were deep with age and threatened to tear as he unfolded and flattened the paper on the table. It was covered with vertical lines of Japanese characters.

  “Any word on M?”

  Buck shook his head and passed the stack of bills to Jake. “Seems like her father bought the Yamoto house,” Buck said.

  “Pissed off somebody,” Jake said. “Ten thousand exactly. What in the hell would make someone put ten thousand dollars in a tin box in a cave?

  “A government that had condemned that somebody to a life of uncertainty,” Buck said.

  “If it was Yamoto, why didn’t he get his stash as soon as he was released?” Jake said.

  “I don’t know, but it looks like someone from the Yamoto family decided to take revenge,” Buck said.

  “Revenge for what? And we still don’t know for certain that this is the Yamoto family. Look at the husband, he’d be in his eighties if he were still alive. And what, this old guy would rage against the hotel by killing its guests? Go figure.”

  “Why didn’t they just go for the money and call it square? Unless they didn’t know the money was there,” Jake said.

  CHAPTER FORTY

  “HELLO, MARY.”

  “Ned?” M held the phone out and stared at the receiver before pressing it back to her ear. “It always surprises me when someone knows I’m calling.”

  “Caller ID.”

  “Yeah I know, but I’m calling from the hospital.”

  “Elementary my dear Mary, you’re the only person I know currently residing here.”

  “Alright, Sherlock, can you come get me?”

  “I’m on my way, you need anything?”

  “Clothes would be nice.”

  She had just settled back on the bed when Lemon walked in. She reached down and pulled one of the thin blankets up to her waist.

  “Sorry to drop in unannounced but I’ve got some information you might be interested in.”

  She adjusted the bed to a sitting position, “Something about the hotel fire?”

  He pulled up one of the green chairs and sat down. “No, something about your father.”

  She felt light headed at the mention of her father. She’d never forgiven him for putting her ashore when she was fourteen, and somehow kept expecting him to sail into the bay and take her aboard again. Then, when he was reported lost at sea, she’d banished all memory of him and buried the thought that is she’d she been aboard she might have been able to prevent his death.

  Lemon stood up. “Are you alright?”

  “Yeah, fine.”

  He turned at the sound of the door opening.

  M looked past the officer.“Ned?”

  Seeing her apparent distress, Ned moved briskly stepping between the police officer and his friend and client. Facing Lemon he took a step backward physically protecting her. “What’s going on?”

  She reached up and touched her protector on the arm. “It’s alright, Ned, Officer Lemon has brought me news of my father.”

  “How can that be?” Ned said.

  “It has to do with his purchase of the property the hotel sat on,” Lemon said.

  M pointed to the paper bag Ned was holding. “Are those my clothes?”

  He handed her the bag,

  “Give me a minute.”

  Ned led Lemon to the far side of the room where they stared at the wall while M climbed out of bed, her gown flopping open as she crossed the floor to the bathroom.

  While she changed, Lemon gave Ned the folder of legal papers he’d gotten from the city assessor’s office, the Bank and Trust and the library.

  “I’ve got to go pick up the sheriff, he wants M to meet him at the hotel.”

  She entered the room brushing her hair straight back. She was wearing a short sleeve shirt, jeans and tennis shoes. “Thanks for the brush.”

  Her bare arms sported bandages, and shiny spots of ointment. “When I came in, my hair was matted with blood. They had to shave the back of my head.” She turned and lifted her hair revealing a bandage the size of a playing card. When she turned back around, Ned was wiping at his eyes. “God, Mary, I thought I’d lost you.”

  She stepped forward and gave him a hug. Then stepped back and looked around the room. “Where’s Lemon?”

  “He said he’d meet with us and Ramos at the hotel.

  It was a short ride from the hospital to the burned out remnants of the hotel. Ned pulled into one of the parking spaces, leapt from the car to open the passenger side door.

  “I’m fine, Ned, really.”

  She didn’t look at the charred remains of the hotel she’d grown up to know as her father’s legacy. She walked to the edge of the bluff and gazed down at the rising tide. This had been her favorite spot to watch the sun set. She turned at the sound of tires on gravel. The sheriff’s SUV pulled next to Ned’s Crown Victoria. Lemon got out and handed Ramos a pair of crutches.

  “Where are Buck and Jake?” M said.

  “Flying to San Francisco. Nice to have someone on payroll who owns a plane,” Ramos said, as he hobbled up next to M.

  M looked puzzled.

  “Jake, not Buck.”

  M gave a quick laugh. “Of course.”

  “I’ve got to follow up on the domestic you caught this morning,” Lemon said.

  Ramos gave Lemon a wave, and nodded to the steps that had been revealed when the hotel burned. “NCIC came through with some information. If you don’t mind, I need to stay off the ankle as much as possible.”

  M followed him to some cement steps.

  He laid the crutches next to the steps and sat heavily keeping his injured ankle extended. She cleared some debris and sat next to the Sheriff.

  “M, we believe that the killings, your money problems and the burning of the hotel are all related. Buck and Jake are headed for San Francisco to find the killer’s karate teacher.”

  Ned walked over and handed the sheriff the folder Lemon had given him.

  “I’ll start at the beginning,” Ramos said. “You knew of course that your father bought the property the hotel sits on.”

  “Yeah,” M said. “At t
wenty-one I became eligible for a trust he’d set up, the hotel was part of it.”

  “Apparently the previous owners were Japanese, fairly well-to-do for the times. When World War II broke out, the entire family was swept into a relocation center. That would have been late 1941, your father bought the land in 1942.”

  Tears rolled down M’s cheeks, something her father had done before she was born may have provoked the murders. “God, are you sure about this?”

  He reached into the folder on his lap and produced a photocopy of a land deed. “The assessor’s office had a copy of the city’s lease along with the original bill of sale from the Fort Point Bank and Trust to your father.”

  With a trembling hand M took the copy of the bill of sale, eyes locked on her father’s signature. “Father, what did you do?”

  Ramos reached across and laid a hand on M’s. “Your father didn’t do anything wrong.”

  She jerked her hand from his touch, and glared with red-rimmed eyes. “How can you say that?

  He shrank back a bit. “Lemon visited the Bank and Trust,” Ramos said, and extracted a yellowed letter from the envelope. “Read it, and check the date.”

  She read it over twice and looked up shaking her head, tears streaming. “I’m not sure I understand.”

  “Yamoto forfeited the property to the bank when he couldn’t make the payments. The bank put it up for sale months before your father showed up. He had no knowledge of who the property’s previous owner was.”

  “Even if my father was responsible for the destruction of the Yamoto house, how could the murders possibly have anything to do with me?”

  He adjusted the position of his ankle.

  “Well, as you know, the character left at the site of the murders means ‘Retribution.’ When the family returned to Dungeness Bay, everything they’d known was gone – they’d even lost their fishing boats. We found a copy of the death certificate for the elder Yamoto. Heart attack. And judging from the date, he must have died within hours of returning.”

  “They probably had children,” M said.

  He rolled onto his right hip and picked up his crutches. “They had two boys.”

  M stood up, and offered him a hand. “Based on traditional Japanese culture, it would be up to the oldest son to seek Retribution for indiscretions against the family.”

  Ramos lurched onto his good leg and thrust a crutch under each arm. “That’s what we thought, until the Feds returned my call. The Yamoto’s oldest son died of pneumonia at Manzanar in November 1942.”

  “So it had to be the youngest,” M said, following him across the parking lot.

  “According to NCIC, Tyre Yamoto, born 1932, committed suicide. He would have been the youngest.” Ramos stopped and turned to face M. “It seemed a dead end until they issued a second report. Tyre had one son who witnessed his suicide. The boy was institutionalized. Mother dropped him off and left. He lived at the facility for ten years, got a job and left on his eighteenth birthday.”

  M was incredulous. “Could he do that? I mean just walk out of a state institution?”

  “It wasn’t that kind of facility. It housed children and young adults with no criminal records, who, for whatever reason, couldn’t make the transition from child to responsible adult. Peter was that kind of child, probably traumatized when he witnessed his father’s suicide. His social worker helped him get a job with Hewlett Packard down in Palo Alto, California.”

  He continued across the parking lot finally sitting down on the pickle weed at the edge of the bluff. “That tunnel you escaped through? We believe Peter Yamoto used it to go in and out of the hotel when he committed the murders.” He paused and looked over at M.

  “We found a metal box containing some pictures, ten thousand dollars, and a note.” He reached into his pocket and pulled out a photocopy. “Can you read this?”

  “It’s old Japanese. I can’t read all the characters.” She looked over at Ramos, then down at the note. “It’s to his wife, and says that if she is reading this, he is dead.” She looked over at him again. “Did you find any kind of journal?”

  “No.”

  “Apparently she carried her husband’s journal, but was forbidden to read it except in the event of his death. I guess the journal revealed the location of the money.”

  She continued reading the note, trying to make sense of it.

  “If she read the journal and it revealed the location of the money, why didn’t she get it?” Ramos said.

  M traced the characters down with an index finger. “Here it is. She was to give the journal to the eldest son. But you said he died at the camp so she must have given it to Tyre, but then why didn’t he go after the money?”

  “We’ll never know the answer to that one,” Ramos said.” His suicide was twelve years ago.”

  She handed the note back. “That would make Peter twenty-one or twenty-two. So where does that leave us?”

  He re-adjusted his sitting position. “God, this is a pain in the ass.”

  She smiled. “I thought it was your ankle?’

  “Right,” Ramos said. “Buck thinks Peter is blaming his family’s ruin and his father’s suicide on your father. He’s dead, so the blame falls to you.”

  She stood up and walked to the edge of the bluff, then turned around and gazed at the former site of the Yamoto home, trying to imagine her father doing the same.

  Ramos pushed himself up to his good leg, picking up his crutches on the way. “Your father is simply a player in a game that should have ended thirty-five years ago. There’s nothing to feel bad or guilty about.”

  She turned to face him. “Thank you, I appreciate that. But somebody forgot to tell Peter the game ended. Do you think Buck’s right?”

  “I do, I think this kid was acting from some kind of misguided honor.

  M suddenly snapped her fingers. “You might have hit on something. If this journal is the family legacy handed down father to son, Peter has it, but can’t read it through until he’s restored honor to the family name. He’s probably read just enough to learn about his father’s time at the camp. He doesn’t know about the money.”

  They exchanged looks as a police cruiser entered the parking lot. Ned sauntered over from where he’d been standing by his car. The officer drove up and rolled down his window. “Sheriff Ramos? A note from Detective Shore,” he said, handing him a folded sheet of paper. “Need me for anything?”

  “No, thanks,” Ramos said. He dismissed the officer with a smile and a salute, and unfolded the paper.

  He looked up from the note and turned to M. “Peter left the area when he thought you were dead.” He wadded up the paper and threw it into the rubble of the hotel. “Apparently he was watching when Jake first discovered the box and is coming back to find it.”

  “Then he must have read the journal, and knows about the money. All we have to do, is wait for him, right?” M said.

  “Maybe, but that still leaves us with a problem. Buck talked to his karate teacher, who said Peter thought you were dead when he left town. But the paper reported your rescue. Apparently as soon as he read it, he flew into a rage. Said he was returning to Dungeness Bay...to finish Retribution. In other words...to kill you”

  “According to Buck’s note, they just missed Peter. His karate instructor was pretty badly shaken at Peter’s outburst. I’d guess we’ve got about six hours to make a plan before Peter gets here.”

  “Why not just nab him when he arrives?” M said. “There’s only a couple ways into town.”

  “Problem is we don’t know what he looks like. Remember, when you saw him in the alley you thought he was in his sixties. I’m betting he’s coming to the cave to look for the box of money, and when he does, he’s not going to walk across the beach. He’ll use the tunnel, and we’ll be waiting.”

  “What do you have in mind?”

  Ramos was looking for a place to sit down. “That depends. How dangerous is this guy?”

  She reached up and touc
hed the side of her head. “If he’s half as good with a sword as he is with his hands and feet, real dangerous,” M said. “Let’s go over to the Out Pouring. I could use some coffee and you need to get off your feet.”

  She held his crutches as Ramos climbed in the backseat of the Crown Victoria. Handing him the crutches, she got in and sat down next to Ned.

  Ned turned off Main onto Spyglass and pulled into the lot behind the L-shaped building that housed the coffee shop, and parked as close to the entrance as possible.

  “I’d like you to be in on this,” Ramos said to Ned.

  Ned turned around in his seat. “I’m not up to anything physical but I’m a hell of a shot.”

  Ramos slid across the seat, pushing his crutches ahead. Ned and M stood waiting by the open door.

  “Hey, knock it off. I can manage just fine on my own.”

  Just then, one of the crutches slipped on the gravel and he had to grab the car door to stay on his feet. Slightly embarrassed, Ramos moved cautiously across the parking lot, flanked on either side by M and Ned who tried not to look concerned – or laugh.

  Ramos stopped at the cash register. “Grab us a booth big enough for four. I’m going to call Lemon.”

  Ned climbed in opposite M. “What do you think? Can we catch this guy without killing him?”

  Leaning forward on her elbows she said, “It depends on what Ramos has in mind. I’m more concerned about one of us getting killed.”

  M followed his gaze and climbed out of the booth to let Lemon slide in. Ramos handed his crutches to Ned and backed in so his ankle hung out in the isle.

  “What’d you do, pull him through the phone line?” M said. Lemon laughed. “I caught him just when he was dialing. He said you all were about to hammer out a plan.”

  “It’s simple,” Ramos said, “and it’ll work because it’s simple. Lemon will be on top, Jake in the hole where we found M. Buck and M will be in the back of the cave. Ned and I will be just outside the mouth of the cave. I have two officers backing us up.”

  Ramos adjusted his position, pulling his foot out of the way as a woman headed to the bathroom. He waited until the door closed behind her.

  “Lemon, you stay out of site until our boy goes down the tunnel, then you seal it so he can’t retreat. Jake will call out when he reaches the ledge. I’ll have floodlights positioned at the mouth and inside the cave with one pointed up the tunnel. With a gun on him and no where to run he’ll have to descend to the cave where M and Buck will be waiting to escort him out. Once at the mouth of the cave, Ned and the two other officers and I will cuff and bind him. Then the four of us will carry him to a waiting boat.”