The Moving Blade

by Michael Pronko

  The driver let her out at the same spot on the large street where she got out with Hiroshi two days before. She pulled the bag behind her with the other two over her shoulders, heading straight into the warren of lanes, turning and turning again. She remembered a low-hanging, rusted-out light socket and knew she was going the right way, surer still when she passed the neighborhood map neither she nor Hiroshi could decipher. She turned the corner to the small dead-end and let out an involuntary cry.

  Police tape stretched across the door of Shibata’s place. Jamie took in the smashed-in door, a broken stool on its side and what looked like blood stains on the pavement in front Shibata’s door. The dead-end was otherwise empty except for a uniformed police officer posted in front of the club.

  Jamie exchanged glances with him and he took a step towards her, about to say something. She threw him a naive, “little girl lost” look, flashed a big fake smile, and hurried on through the tight lanes.

  She tried to head towards the big street but got turned around. The suitcase kept bumping into the Styrofoam cartons, trash cans and air conditioning units that jammed up the alleys. Moving clumsily, she searched for an exit, a small alley or walkway of any kind along the endless rows of small doors.

  Finally, she saw an opening down a long narrow lane onto a bigger street. She checked behind her. When she got to the street, she called Shibata. If he had been hurt, Hiroshi would have called her and left a message, despite her not answering his calls. But if he wasn’t hurt, whose blood was that in front of his bar? Someone had busted in their front door and the stool was theirs.

  She crossed at a light and headed up an incline past love hotels and host and hostess clubs. The bland, clunky old buildings had been spiffed up with glitzy signs and theme-park exteriors, the faces of the hosts and hostesses smiling to lure in customers. Jamie felt the oversize head shots urged her to keep moving.

  She called Hiroshi, wondering if he’d forgive her, if he would come, then stopped, turned around and looked behind her. The late afternoon was beginning to draw out shadows and a few customers. She clicked off the call to Hiroshi and started walking again. She called Setsuko but got no answer.

  She tried calling Shinobu Katsumura. Her secretary answered and immediately forwarded her call. Jamie told Shinobu she would stop by her office within the hour. Looking both ways, she stopped a taxi, put her luggage into the trunk and clambered in.

  Chapter 34

  At Yokosuka Station, Akiko roused herself. With the heater under her seat toasting her bottom and thighs, she had let the train lull her to sleep. Outside the station, refreshed in the winter air, she walked briskly towards the taxi rank.

  English signs for American chain stores blanketed the walls of the surrounding buildings. Foreigners from the American navy base—large men with big biceps—walked with their American wives or local girlfriends. The area felt more like Hawaii than Japan. Akiko climbed in a taxi, dropping the computer bag and her purse on the backseat, still drowsy.

  Akiko’s taxi let her out in front of the ocean-view home of Eto Sensei. Eto Sensei’s wife had been waiting and opened the door with a smile. “We’ve been expecting you. I’m Yoko. Sensei is very excited to help.”

  Akiko bowed deeply. “Hiroshi has told me so much about you. I am sorry to bother you at home.”

  “We love to have visitors. Since retirement, he loves to work more than before. And I’ve got a space cleared for you.” Yoko took Akiko’s arm and led her to a large dining table.

  Eto Sensei came into the room, leaning as lightly as he could on his cane. His eyes crackling with interest, his maroon turtleneck and tweed jacket worn just right, he looked ready for class. “Where’s Hiroshi?”

  “He got detained. He’ll be here later.” Akiko answered, bowing deeply.

  “He’s easily led astray.” Eto Sensei laughed.

  “He often is. You have a wonderful place here. The view of the ocean is spectacular!” She took a step towards the back windows looking over the ocean.

  “In between takeoffs, it’s nice. The jet fighters rattle your teeth,” Eto Sensei said.

  “Hiroshi was so intent on getting your input.”

  “Was he?”

  “He’s been talking about your book the past several days.”

  “Has he?”

  “All he talks about usually is work, so it was a nice change.”

  “He’s probably too busy to read much.”

  “Usually, it’s just accounting books and police reports.”

  “I suppose that might be interesting.” Eto Sensei draped his cane over the edge of the table and settled into his chair. “I called a few old contacts. Several magazine editors are waiting to know what we have here. We can get a summary and excerpts out right away. Do you know what happened to the Endo brothers? I can find someone else to do this if they can’t.”

  “Hiroshi said they were robbed, their store trashed, but I don’t know if that means—”

  “It means Mattson must have found something important.” Eto Sensei beamed. “This is going to be a pleasure. Anyway, let’s see what we have. Hiroshi said he wasn’t entirely sure how it all connected.”

  Akiko checked her cellphone and saw many calls from Hiroshi, but she would call him once they found something to tell him. Akiko hovered over the table, setting up the computers. She handed Eto Sensei the notebook detailing all requested materials and then spread out a list of what documents were in the bags and what Hiroshi remembered that was stolen. She arranged the two laptops—the professor’s and the detective’s.

  Eto Sensei opened Mattson’s handwritten notebook. “Let’s start here. I liked the old days when information took its time.”

  “There’s this USB, too.” Akiko set Mattson’s USB from the library by the laptop she brought.

  “We’ll look at that in a minute. Let’s dig into Mattson’s list of requested materials first, see if we can find any patterns.” Eto Sensei started to make notes on a large piece of paper, sketching in circles and squares with swooping arrows between items.

  “That’s a big piece of paper.”

  “I used to use this butcher block paper when teaching. I’d make notes and then hang it up on the blackboard. I still have a roll or two left over. Probably classrooms don’t even have blackboards anymore now that you can use projectors.”

  “Blackboards are too expensive to remove.” Akiko sat down to start copying the companies he jotted down and start a database for reference, just as she did with all of Hiroshi’s cases.

  Yoko came in with a pot of tea, cups and a cherry bark tea caddy. “Having young people visit makes it seem like old times. Akiko, you must…”

  Eto Sensei cut her off, “Yoko, please. Work first, chat later.”

  His wife tsk-tsk-ed him and shuffled back to the kitchen.

  “Mattson did his homework.” Eto Sensei looked over his bifocals at her. “My whole career, I’ve never come across this much information. But a lot of what’s here seems to be about hazardous waste and the American bases.”

  “Why would he care about…?” Akiko looked at Eto Sensei for the answer.

  Eto Sensei shrugged a little and looked off at the windows. “Maybe he’s thinking of American land use on the bases. If they can secretly store napalm—”

  “Napalm?”

  “Okinawa was the staging ground for the Vietnam war. The bases stored surplus barrels of everything toxic for decades. It was discovered leaking into the ground water a few years ago.”

  “So, if they can get away with that on the bases…”

  “They have a lot of land, but let’s see what Mattson found out.”

  Yoko came in with sweet boiled chestnuts and rice crackers. Picking up one of the small USB drives on the table, she said, “Things get smaller every year, don’t they?”

  “But the problems get bigger,” Eto Sensei said.

  “I guess you didn’t have any lunch?”

  Akiko was about to answer, but Eto Sensei l
ooked up sharply. “Can you just wait until we get this all done before you start the parade of food?”

  “Hai, hai, hai. The tea is ready,” she answered, heading towards the kitchen, leaving the tea steeping.

  Akiko giggled at the old married couple. “So, do you think Mattson had a change of heart? That’s what Hiroshi said. I would have thought he’d defend the status quo more as he aged.”

  “In looking back, as old people do, maybe he felt Asian geopolitics might have been better if he had pushed harder for change. He was a gradualist. In one of his articles in Foreign Policy, he wrote that US military bases took too much of America’s entire budget. Old-fashioned diplomacy and treaties would be more effective—and cheaper—he argued.”

  “Japan pays for a lot of it.”

  “But I wonder how that figures in.” Eto Sensei poked his pen around the schematic he was sketching. “Perhaps he didn’t want to be known as the man who founded the American empire—800 bases in 70 countries.”

  “Japan is so small in comparison, isn’t it?”

  “Yes and no.” Eto Sensei examined the possible interconnections on his paper. “I’m not sure his change of heart alone is that threatening. There must be something else. Something he found.”

  “Hiroshi said he was helping with contracts for cleaning up Fukushima.”

  “The contracts were all awarded to Japanese companies, though most have little expertise or experience in handling nuclear waste.” Eto Sensei started writing again on his large butcher-block paper.

  Akiko looked through one of the folders she brought with information Hiroshi had asked her to find. “The Fukushima contracts were worth twenty trillion yen.”

  “That’s what? About 180 billion US? And the cleanup will take decades. That’ll keep rising. I won’t be here to see the end of it.”

  “Hiroshi asked me to find what services the contracts were for.” Akiko looked at Eto Sensei, deferring to the older man, politely hesitating in case he wanted to take the initiative.

  “Radioactive sludge, discarded protective clothing, radioactive rubble, contaminated soil, not to mention nuclear fuel rods. Those are the expensive things. And lots and lots of irradiated water. Without any place to put it, they’ve had to let it stream out into the ocean now and then.”

  “Really? That’s disgusting.”

  “That’s been in the newspapers.”

  “Hiroshi told me you read everything. I see that’s true.”

  “If only it were. Time is so limited. My friends in economics tell me the trillions-of-yen budget is going for the most important project in post-war Japan—the restoration of Japan’s honor. Others say the money is being doled out to political cronies. The bidding process is closed, with less oversight than usual.”

  “Honor? They don’t think of it as a danger to humans, to the environment? It makes me sick thinking of all the radiation released. I read the reactors could melt down even more.”

  “The full extent of the disaster is hard to know.” Eto Sensei wrote down notes on his large piece of paper, made a square in the corner and wrote down more. “Hopefully, exposing the worst aspects will steer the government ministries towards accountability, if just to save face.”

  “We can hope.”

  Eto Sensei smiled at her. “Hiroshi is lucky to have someone like you. You make things easy.”

  Akiko poked around on the computer. “I hope Hiroshi gets here soon. He wanted to hear everything you know about this.”

  “It’s probably what we don’t know that matters most. The number of government documents classified as secret reached an all-time high this year.”

  They got back to work, Eto Sensei sketching connections, Akiko making sure all the information Eto Sensei handed back to her was kept in order, notated and filed in the right place. Akiko opened the computer files from the archive and Eto Sensei skimmed through it on his computer, stopping to take notes and outline what he found on the huge sheet of butcher paper. Using color-coded arrows and lines, he connected the materials related to the cleanup, SOFA, and other government ministries. The intricate tangle of companies, sub-companies, government ministries, regulations and reports became layered so densely on the paper, Akiko wondered if any sense could be made of it at all.

  Both of them were so intent on what they were doing, they didn’t notice the early winter sunset coming down, and they didn’t hear the doorbell ring.

  Eto Sensei’s wife came from the kitchen, paused to watch them working, and then went to see who was there. After a brief conversation, she walked back in with a tall foreigner in a long black leather coat.

  “Here is the publisher’s representative,” Yoko announced.

  Akiko and Eto Sensei looked up into the blonde hair and keen dimples of Trey Gladius, his blue eyes staring down at them.

  Chapter 35

  Akiko stepped in front of the table with all the materials. Her eyes searched Eto Sensei’s living room for a way out. Was this the guy Hiroshi suspected? He looked like a magazine model, not like a criminal. Eto Sensei’s face was covered in a dark cloud of suspicion and Yoko stood rigid on the other side of the table. If only she had returned Hiroshi’s calls.

  Trey calmly removed his long leather coat and folded it over one arm, smiling at them one by one, slowly, in turn. “Shitsurei shimashita. Please excuse my rudeness. I’m from the publisher. My name is Trey Gladius. I’m here to collect Mattson’s manuscript and materials.” Trey spoke in the politest Japanese, bowing first to Eto Sensei, then to Akiko and Yoko, before extending his name card to Eto Sensei.

  Eto Sensei took the name card but didn’t look at it or bow in return.

  Keeping herself between Trey and the table, Akiko reached for her cellphone. “You’re not with any publisher.”

  Trey held his hand up for her to stop. “Maybe there was some miscommunication with Jamie, but publishing is a very competitive business. If we don’t get the first option, there’s no point in having a contract at all.” Trey unfolded the letter of agreement Jamie signed and set it on the table.

  Eto Sensei glanced at it, his face darkening. The phone by her ear, Akiko waited. Eto Sensei’s wife turned towards the kitchen.

  “Please stay right here,” Trey said to her, his voice calmly commanding. “I am from the publisher and I do have a contract. If the publishers agree, they will open the work, later, to academics. But for now, these materials are ours.” Trey looked around for a place to put his coat. He folded it carefully over a chair within easy reach.

  Akiko pressed the button to call, but would Hiroshi pick up? Hiroshi’s phone rang once, twice. With a quick sweep of his arm, Trey snatched the cellphone from her hands. He turned it off and slammed it on the table with a loud clack. His other hand stayed cupped, in the air, his shoulders tensed. He picked the phone up again and slammed it on the edge of the table, cracking the screen.

  Eto Sensei stood up. Yoko covered her mouth with one hand.

  Trey took a breath and tapped the smashed cellphone with a long finger. “No calls until I ascertain the materials. If you read that letter of agreement, you’ll find that all this should be in the publisher’s hands, not yours.”

  Akiko dropped her hands to her sides and backed against the table. She needed to save the materials. She could see the genkan entryway, but Trey’s long legs and broad shoulders would catch her before she got out the door, with or without her shoes. If she leapt forward to fight with him, maybe Yoko could get to the landline, or out the door, but turning things physical would mean someone got hurt.

  Before she could decide what to do, the air-rending blast of a fighter jet overhead rattled the house like a small earthquake. Everyone cringed, waiting for it to pass. When the thundering rumble eased into the distance, Eto Sensei said. “You’re not a publisher. Who do you think you’re fooling?”

  Trey dropped his bag on the table. “You’re right. I confess. I’m just the publisher’s representative, and I suppose you could say, in this matter, a p
rotector of information.” Trey leaned over the table and looked at Eto Sensei’s outline with approval. He ripped the large butcher paper off the table, scanning it with an impressed nod before folding it into a small, tight square and slipping it into his pocket. “Very nice work.”

  He picked up Mattson’s notebook of requested materials and flipped through the pages before putting it into his backpack with a flourish. Trey watched everyone carefully, his attention moving back and forth from the materials to where they stood. Trey pulled Eto Sensei’s laptop across the table and started scrolling up and down. He stooped down to read the long flow of documents more carefully.

  When he did, Akiko moved in front of the other computer. With her hands behind her back, she pointed, as best she could, at the USB drive. Yoko glanced down at it, waiting, cautious.

  When Trey leaned forward squinting at the screen, Yoko slid the USB drive out of the computer and popped it into the cherry bark tea caddy, fingering the USB drive down into the green leaves.

  Trey finished skimming through the computer documents and slammed the top down, returning his attention to the three as he put Eto Sensei’s laptop into his bag. Trey took a step towards the laptop Akiko brought, but Akiko didn’t move, trying to shield it from him, and to delay him as best she could.

  Trey shoved her aside and she caught herself from falling, and then stepped over next to Eto Sensei. Trey leaned down to the second screen but went through it more quickly than he had on Eto Sensei’s computer, satisfied, it seemed, with what was there. He slapped the top down and slipped the second laptop in beside Eto Sensei’s. He shook everything in the backpack into place with both hands.

  “That’s an official police computer,” Akiko said.

  “Well, I don’t officially know that. It looks like documents for Mattson’s memoir to me.” Trey’s blue eyes shone brightly as he examined each of them again. “Well, I think that’s everything,” he said in a cheery voice. “Or almost. How much of this did you read?”

  They stared at him in silence. Akiko glanced at the door, hoping Hiroshi would get there with Sakaguchi and the others. Would her phone still work? She tried to remember Hiroshi’s number.