THE BUTTERFLY EFFECT
THE
BUTTERFLY
EFFECT
BY
Eve Zaremba
A HELEN KEREMOS
DETECTIVE NOVEL
The “butterfly effect” is the notion that a butterfly beating its wings in one spot today can affect a storm system next month across the globe, i.e., tiny differences in input can produce huge differences in output, and complex outcomes can result from simple causes. Based on Chaos Theory, which describes this phenomenon as “sensitive dependence on initial conditions.”
This is a work of fiction. The author has used names of some existing places and organizations in the interest of verisimilitude, but any resemblance to real people, places and organizations is coincidental and unintended.
CANADIAN CATALOGUING IN PUBLICATION DATA
Zaremba, Eve
The butterfly effect
“A Helen Keremos detective novel”.
ISBN 0-929005-56-2
I. Title
PS8599.A74B8 1994 C813’.54 C94-930563-4
PR9199.3.Z37B8 1994
Copyright © 1994 by Eve Zaremba
Printed and bound in Canada
Edited by Margaret E. Taylor
Copyedited by Lynne Missen
Second Story Press gratefully acknowledges the assistance of the
Ontario Arts Council and the Canada Council
Published by
SECOND STORY PRESS
760 Bathurst Street
Toronto, Ontario
M5S 2R6
For all the ex-pats in Japan and every student of Japanese
in Canada — especially the one I live with.
Contents
Part I
1 Prologue
2 Getting There
3 Jet Lag
4 What Now?
5 Waltzing Matilda
6 Ladrone Investigations
7 Job(s) for Helen
8 Surprise!
9 Bullet Train
10 Nagoya
11 Meeting Keiko
12 Bar Talk
13 Dinner for Three
14 Julie’s Luggage
15 Helen Unmasked
16 Inspector Haruo Suzuki
17 Nangi’s Office Lady
18 Meeting Julie
19 Doctors
20 Suzuki at the Hospital
21 Meeting Helen
22 Sonny Burke
23 CHNOPS
24 Suzuki’s Men
25 Helen’s Knees
26 Piper’s Purse
27 Escape Plans
28 Nagoya Castle
29 Brass Tacks
30 Piper’s Umbrella
31 Among the Burakumin
32 Julie v. Helen
33 Nerves in Nagoya
34 Helen Goes to Tokyo
35 Mar’s Bar
36 Sex in the Afternoon
37 Self-investigation
38 Julie Exits
39 Case Filed
Part II
40 Ladrone Partners
41 Helen in Hong Kong
42 Helen Interrogated
43 Helen and Sonny
44 Ladrone Data Bank
45 Sonny Again
46 Angus Talks
47 Suzukis Correspondence
48 Mel Romulu
49 Keiko in Toronto
50 Sashimi for Four
51 Helen Connives
52 Ms. Khayatt
53 Las Vegas
54 ARTrace
55 Poker Games
56 A Death
57 Back Home
58 Julie Calls
59 CHNOPS, The End
60 Epilogue
PART I
1
Prologue
The tall man with eyebrows like an unclipped hedge juggled the phone from his left to his right ear and tried to keep the eagerness out of his voice.
“So when’s delivery?”
“Hey, man, what d’you think this is, UPS? We don’t deliver. You’re going to have to pick it up.”
“Pick it up! … Oh, okay. Where?”
“Tokyo.”
“What the hell do you mean, ‘Tokyo’!? I haven’t got time to go to Japan …” Mel Romulu’s voice rose, his vowels broadening. “That wasn’t our deal!”
“Deal? Our deal was, I was to get the merchandise. Well, I’ve got it. You want it, you pick it up. In Tokyo. No home delivery, Doctor, you know that.” A smiling sort of voice with American intonation coming clearly over the long-distance crackle all the way from Hong Kong into Romulu’s ear in Toronto.
“Damn it, Sonny! I can’t pick it up myself this time! I’ll have to send someone to collect it. It will cost me at least a couple of grand on top of what I’m paying you …”
“Cheap at the price, Doctor. Right? Hey, cheap at twice the price. You want it or not?” A definite chuckle this time. Sonny Burke was sure of his ground.
“What d’you think? I’ll have it picked up. Where and when?”
“Next week. The Tokyo Hilton. Your courier will be contacted there. Just let me know who it is and make sure he’s got the 10 grand on him.”
“Oh, all right. Call me tomorrow. And don’t worry about the money.”
“I’m not worried, not for a minute. Nice doin’ business with ya.”
The line went dead. Doctor of dentistry Melhior Romulu swore and put the phone down gently. Then immediately picked it up again and punched in a familiar number.
“Hal, I need someone to run an errand for me. Out of town, outside Canada, in fact. Be gone three, four days or so. Yes, with passport. Who’ve you got? … Of course he must be reliable! Who? Wayne Tillion? … Sure I remember him, how could I forget! Yeah, I guess he’ll do. Strong, sound and not too smart. A good Canadian type, eh? Send him up here as soon as you can. Great. Let me know. Thanks.”
Romulu replaced the phone, his good humour restored. It was okay. The merchandise was indeed cheap at twice the price. He rubbed his large hands together and smiled.
2
Getting There
Terminal 3 of Toronto’s Pearson International Airport is pretty new. Its claim to fame is that it is more like a covered shopping mall than many shopping malls. Which, as it happens, isn’t even true. Still, its “a user friendly, state-of-the-art facility” with 70 check-in counters, fully automated ticketing facilities, moving sidewalks, computerized baggage routing, dedicated check-in service, 3,300 indoor parking spaces, two luxurious lounges, an on-site hotel and scores of pricy boutiques to take your money. Canadian Airlines International, its chief tenant, likes to call it the home of civilized travel. Wayne Tillion loved it.
He took his time crossing the concourse, rubbernecking as unobtrusively as possible. The glass dome stretched out way above his head, a monstrous air-conditioned greenhouse. He loved the size, the glitz of it. Hefting his brand new garment bag with the shiny brass locks — $98.95 plus tax at Gold’s on Queen Street — Tillion reached one of the 70 check-in counters, was given royal treatment, assigned a seat and directed to the International Empress Lounge where he could sit and drink gratis until his Tokyo flight was called. He loved that too.
Wayne Tillion blended perfectly with the business types around him. He was an unexceptional young man in his twenties with a prominent Adam’s apple: clean shaven, well barbered, his shoes shined, his fingernails clean. His bespoke suit, although more than two years old, was cut to show off his athletic build while minimizing his extra thick shoulders and neck. (Wayne’s hobby was body building.) The suit had been a gift from Rebecca Gurton, a fashionable lawyer who wanted an escort who didn’t look too much like Hulk Hogan. Wayne had never had a tailor-made suit before. During their brief but eventful affair, Rebecca had tried to apply some much-needed polish to the rough diamond that was Wayne. Enough of it stuck for Wayne Tillion to be able to pass, at least with his mouth shut, for an up-and-coming MBA, instead of a high-school dropout.
A certain amount of native intelligence combined with ambition and physical strength had made Wayne Tillion highly employable. After his short stint at schooling and a brush with the law — aggravated assault, dismissed — Wayne made a reasonably good living on the fringes of the “hospitality” industry. He filled in where required as desk clerk, bartender, bouncer, security enforcer, gofer, chauffeur and general dogsbody to one Hal Glendenning, a man with interests in a dozen different enterprises, not all of them a 100 percent legit. Glendenning’s flagship was a third-rate, near-fleabag on Jarvis Street in downtown Toronto, predictably called Imperial Palace Hotel. That is what Wayne Tillion had been calling home since he’d split up with Rebecca and had to vacate her North Toronto condo.
His boss considered Wayne smart but not too smart, discreet and loyal — a man who did what he was told, yet who could think on his feet if the occasion called for it. This combination of characteristics made Wayne endlessly useful. The Glendennings of this world live and prosper through “connections,” a constant flow of favours taken, granted and exchanged. Lending Wayne to Melhior Romulu cost Glendenning nothing while putting the wealthy and influential ex-dentist in his debt. It is on such small civilities that fortunes are built.
Wayne Tillion considered his current assignment a plum. Of all the jobs he’d ever had, surely a trip to Japan (Business Class yet!) with $1,000 dollars in expenses had to top them all. Stay at the Hilton, sample Tokyo’s night scene … the girls! He’d heard about geishas and the like. In movies, the Western male got bathed, massaged and generally serviced by a bevy of totally subservient lovelies. Maybe he couldn’t afford a whole bevy but just one …
The errand Tillion was to run for Romulu was simple. He would be contacted in Tokyo, he would meet someone and receive a sealed package small enough to fit into a suitcase — or a garment bag. In return, he would turn over an envelope, clearly containing money, which he carried in a belt around his waist. A straightforward exchange. He’d done them before. No sweat.
Once on the plane and settled in his Business Class seat, Wayne accepted a glass of champagne from a smiling cabin attendant, female. She was attractive enough to feed his fantasies but not sexy enough to be disturbing. That was fine. He stretched his legs luxuriously; there was almost room enough for all of his two metres. Better still, the adjacent seat was empty. He was offered a newspaper — did he prefer The Globe and Mail or the Financial Times? He chose the Globe, quickly scanning the sport pages before ostentatiously turning to the unfamiliar “Report on Business.” Although no one watched him, Wayne was enjoying playing the part of an international businessman. He peered out from behind the paper at his fellow B Class passengers. All were male, all wore suits not unlike his own, all but one were deep in a business paper and all but two drank champagne. Satisfied, he turned back to the Globe, looking for Japanese business news. It paid to be knowledgeable.
One movie, two meals, three drinks and four hours later, the DC10 landed in Vancouver for a two-hour pit stop. There was time to check out the place. Tillion left the plane and spent some time looking out of the airport windows trying to get a glimpse of Vancouver. It was nowhere in sight. All he saw were flat acres of grass, a few airport buildings and what might have been a mountain in the far distance. Dullsville. It was his first disappointment of the trip; there had been more to see from the plane. The last two hours he’d been looking down on mountains. Awesome. He’d always imagined the Rockies running all the way to the Pacific with Vancouver sort of hanging in on the edge. How come it was so flat and boring? So much for all that hype about Beautiful British Columbia. He went back to his seat.
Excitement returned; the seat next to his had now been filled, by a Japanese businessman no less. Wayne sat quietly and watched as the man — small, neat, of indeterminate age and in a dark suit (exactly as per expectations) — folded his suit coat just so, and waving aside the hanger offered by a zealous attendant, placed it carefully in the overhead bin. He took out a short “happi coat” from his bag, put it on, sat down and took off his shoes. Tillion was enchanted. Screw Vancouver, it was only a boring Canadian city anyway; here next to him was the real thing, perhaps a genuine Japanese martial arts expert! Kung Fu movies were Tillion’s favourite. He wanted to stand up and bow to his neighbour as he knew was proper but it didn’t seem cool. Anyway there wasn’t room and anyway the man fell asleep almost immediately.
Other people were taking off their shoes and making themselves comfortable for the long transpacific flight. The Business Class cabin was now full. Wayne looked around checking out the newcomers. Still mostly businessmen singly or in pairs, except for one mixed gender couple with kids, a perfect Japanese nuclear family … Suddenly he went rigid. Was that …? Couldn’t be … yes, it was! What’s her name … Helen Keremos, that damned dyke snoop, here on the same plane with him, on the way to Tokyo. What a bummer of a coincidence. Was it coincidence? Wayne wasn’t given to attacks of paranoia, but for a moment he considered the possibility that the presence of Helen Keremos on the plane was somehow connected with his trip. With his errand for Doc Romulu. Nah, no way, couldn’t be! Well, maybe? Maybe she was here to check up on him, to see he did what he’d been told to do, to stop him taking off with the money in the belt around his middle. Nah, didn’t make sense. If he hadn’t been trusted, he wouldn’t have been sent. Duplicating couriers would be a waste of money. Neither Hal Glendenning nor Mel Romulu were exactly famous for that.
So if she wasn’t here to watch him what was she doing on the plane? Maybe she was working for the opposition. Whoever they were: Wayne had no idea. The people who were to receive the dough? Maybe they were planning a double-cross: knock him on the head, take the money without giving him whatever it was they were to give him. Nah, that made even less sense. To cheat the Doc all they had to do was not turn over the right item to Wayne. Any sealed parcel would do, since he wasn’t even supposed to look inside. Anyway, to do any of that why would they need to import this broad all the way from Vancouver? Her presence on the plane had to be coincidence.
The logic was persuasive but logic isn’t everything. For a while Wayne couldn’t relax. He sat bolt upright and stared at Helen Keremos across the aisle two rows ahead.
What he saw was a long string bean of a woman, just this side of old, with coarse, black hair going seriously grey at the temples. She sprawled comfortably in her seat wearing dark pants, a cotton sweater and black leather Reebok walkers. He could see only the side of her face, with its long rather prominent nose, high cheek bones and very wide mouth over sharp, carnivorous teeth. He remembered her eyes as dark brown, small for her face and set wide apart. Her ethnicity was unclear. Perhaps because of her name Helen Keremos was sometimes taken for Greek. Yet she didn’t look Mediterranean. Or Native Canadian either. Who knew?
Whatever her background, Helen Keremos made Wayne uneasy. She looks like a witch, he thought fancifully, or a blackbird, a raven or maybe a crow. In any case bad luck.
Quite unaware of being stared at, much less of the role she was playing in Wayne Tillion’s imagination, Helen sipped her orange juice and continued reading the first of three books she’d saved for this trip. Ten hours of reading time, with meals served at regular intervals seemed like a holiday in itself. She’d used her frequent flyer points, acquired on her many trips to Toronto to see Alice Caplan, to upgrade to Business Class for the comfort of a larger seat and more legroom. Whatever lay ahead for her on the other side of the Pacific, she was determined to get full value from the trip.
There was no way of evaluating in advance how profitable the journey would prove. The letter from Hong Kong suggesting cooperation had certainly been interesting but it was the enclosed international money draft for $1,000 towards the fare that made it a serious proposition worth her time. The letterhead said Ladrone Investigation and Security Agency, Central District, Hong Kong — with the names of the three principals running down the left margin: Ray Choy, Ruth Choy, Angus McGee. Helen thought that it was nice, if unexpected, since she and Ray Choy had only met once on a case in Vancouver, for Choy to consider her for Ladrone’s Canadian contact. The situation wasn’t easy to figure but there was no harm in checking it out. Business in Vancouver was slow and Alice showed no sign of moving back West from Toronto. A trip to Hong Kong, with a stopover in Tokyo, was just the thing to add some spice to life.
3
Jet Lag
What can be said about Tokyo’s Narita Airport that hasn’t already been said? For first-time Western visitors to Japan it starts by confirming their worst fears about Japan — it’s big, modern, expensive and full of officious people in white gloves. Then it proceeds to undermine these very stereotypes — it’s chaotic, badly located too far from Tokyo and has to be protected from attacks by ecologists and local farmers by club-and-gun-toting guards. Hardly a model of Japanese efficiency and order.
Passage through Narita and subsequent trip into Tokyo is not an experience to be treasured under any circumstances. After a day spent 37,000 feet above sea level in a stuffy plane, on a seat engineered for the “average” and therefore nonexistent, human frame, fed on prefabricated food and too much booze, it is in a category of hell all by itself. Memory of the ghastly trip from airport to city fades once in Tokyo when jet lag hits with full force. Much the way pneumonia drives out the memory of a mere cold. A special excruciating feature of Pacific jet travel from North America is crossing the international date line. Few things are as disorienting as “losing” a day. Going west to get to the Far East. Only homo saps, triumphs of evolution that we are, would willingly put ourselves through such an process. Membership in our species has its price.
Wayne Tillion didn’t give jet lag a thought. He’d heard all about it, of course, but saw it as just a fancy way of saying “I’m tired,” a way of claiming jet-set status. He’d yet to learn that “jet lag” isn’t so much about jets as about “lag.” In this area, as in many others, experience is the only teacher. Wayne had only flown once before and that was to Atlantic City, which hardly counted. He realized that he was tired and a bit hungover from all that free gin, but so what? He’d navigated the chaos of Narita, found the right line for the Hilton Hotel bus and watched with dazed interest as white-gloved minions expertly lined up, tagged and loaded luggage, including his new garment bag. He was still relatively fine sitting inside the plush bus, listening to the precise, foreign English of the welcoming recording. He even noticed that the seats were a bit small and that the driver sat on the right of the vehicle. They drove on the left in Japan! It hadn’t occurred to him that the Japanese, masters of the auto trade, would drive on the left like the Brits, whom he considered quaint.
By the time the bus dropped him off at his hotel almost two hours later, Wayne had a little trouble concentrating. Oh, the Tokyo Hilton was wonderful, he was certainly conscious of the organized smoothness with which he was registered and wafted up to his room. In the best international hotel style, the bellhop turned on the TV and all the lights, showed him the bathroom, relieved him of a couple of dollars and left.
Wayne decided to take a shower. Just as he took off his suit jacket and started to take off his pants, he was hit by a strange sensation. Jet lag. The room spun; he felt sleepy and disconnected. It didn’t seem worthwhile to do anything but collapse on the bed.
For three hours he slept like one dead. Then he awoke sweaty, disoriented and still tired. But now sleep proved impossible. He tried everything he could to attain that blessed state but without success. Having no previous experience of insomnia, Wayne felt an irrational and unaccustomed fear. He would never sleep again! He would be this tired and sleepless forever. All the symptoms of insomniac paranoia, this early a.m. panic.
Perhaps a drink or two would help. Wayne dragged himself up from the bed and, staggering slightly as if already drunk, began to investigate the courtesy bar. He had just opened a tiny bottle of Johnny Walker Black when the phone rang. For a few seconds he didn’t recognize the odd noise, then couldn’t find the instrument, locating it finally back at the bedside table. As he picked it up, his other hand still grasping the bottle, he broke out in a cold sweat. Who could be calling him? He didn’t know anybody in Tokyo. What … what was he doing here anyway? His mind seemed to become a great blank expanse, without content or connections. The voice that came across the line and out of the unfamiliar phone didn’t help. It was female, young, cheery and unmistakably Australian.
“Wayne Tillion? Oh, beuwdy! Got you at last. I called hours ago but you didn’t answer. Never mind, got you now. Listen mate, get to Tokyo Central as soon as you can, catch me at the Shinkansen platform. The 9:53 train to Nagoya. Got that? Don’t forget the necessary. And don’t be late. I haven’t got time to hang around. See ya. Oh, by the way, my name is Julie. Julie Piper.”
Wayne stood there stunned. It had come to him that this was the message he had been waiting for. This Julie Piper was the person he’d been sent halfway across the world to meet. Jesus!
He stood there in his dirty jockey shorts, holding the little bottle of whisky and tried to concentrate. He didn’t know what time it was or how to get to Tokyo Central. He didn’t know what to do except that whatever it was he had better do it fast. He poured the whisky down his throat, choked, sputtered, turned and stumbled towards the bathroom, tripping over his pants and jacket of his best suit. It was crumbled on the floor. His best suit. His only suit.
4
What Now?
“Doc ? … Dr. Romulu … Sir. I’m sorry but I missed her, Julie Piper her name was … somehow. I was asleep when she called … and there just wasn’t time to get to Tokyo Central, it’s, like, a railroad station. She mentioned this train to Nagoya … I couldn’t figure out the name. The Shinkansen. Turned out to be. what they call ‘The Bullet.’ But who knew, eh? I can’t understand why she left it so late, our meeting I mean. The taxi got me there okay but I couldn’t find my way around this damned place. It’s kind of big. So … it’s not easy to … nobody much speaks English … and … she wasn’t there, anywhere. I looked …”
Wayne was back in his hotel room, sputtering into the phone, filling the airwaves with explanations. He didn’t want to admit it to himself but he feared Romulu’s reaction to his failure. He was mad at himself for blowing a simple job. Romulu would be fully justified in being mad as hell.
“So you missed a meeting, eh Wayne? That’s too bad. Just set up another, that’s all. No big deal.”
Mel Romulu’s voice stayed cool and controlled. It only made Wayne feel worse.
“But I don’t know how to contact this Julie Piper! I thought maybe you would know, like … who do I call to set up another meeting, eh?”
“Easy now, easy boy. They’ll get in touch with you, of course. Just sit tight and wait. She’ll call, don’t you sweat. Presumably she had urgent business, maybe out of town. Anyway couldn’t wait. What was that place you said? Nagoya. Right. Once it’s done, she’ll be back. How far is it from Tokyo anyway?”
“But Doc, how come I haven’t heard from her already? It’s three o’clock! She’s had five hours to get in touch with me here. I’ve been waiting all this time. I only called you because there’s no word. What do I do if she don’t call soon, eh?”
“I see. Well, five hours isn’t so long. You have to wait, that’s all. Stay in the hotel, near the phone. Call me once you hear from her and make sure this time the meeting is someplace you can get to without getting lost! Don’t blow it again! Good boy.”
The line from Toronto went dead. Wayne slammed down the phone and swore. It was humiliating. He hated having to sit in his room waiting for that damned girl to call. He hated Tokyo, he hated Japan, he hated not understanding the language, not being able to communicate. He hated the feeling of helplessness that being foreign brings with it.
Reaching into the courtesy bar he took out three bottles of liquor, one each of gin, vodka and whisky. All familiar brands. He lined them up on the table next to the phone, flung himself on the bed, counted “eeny, meeny, miny, mo” and started on the gin. He would wait, damn it, as long as it took and he wouldn’t blow it again!
Four hours later he was still waiting. He’d finished the three drinks, ordered and eaten a Western-style meal and, to stay awake, forced himself to watch a TV show of which he couldn’t follow one word. Finally the phone rang. He grabbed it eagerly.
“Tillion here!” he almost shouted.
“No word yet, eh?” It was Romulu’s voice.
Wayne felt hope drain from him.
“No. What do we do now, Doc?”
“Wait. It’s all you can do. I’ll be in touch.”
Again dead air. Wayne collapsed back into the rumpled bed. He’d been in Japan less than 24 hours and it felt like years. He wished he were home.
5
Waltzing Matilda
Sonny Burke was as restless as Sonny Burke ever got. It had been a slow day, only half a dozen phone calls and a few faxes. Just the usual run of business — no crisis, nothing new or exciting. A good time to relax. For Sonny relaxing normally meant working up improvements in existing business and dreaming up new scams. Like any progressive businessman, he looked for more and better ways to increase profit and minimize risk. There his resemblance to most businessmen ended. Sonny did his planning as he did all his business — sitting in his “office” which was the Waltzing Matilda Bar, downstairs from his bedroom, sipping Diet Coke and contemplating his assets. All of them were in his head: he called it “taking inventory of his assets” and took it most seriously. Sonny Burke’s major assets consisted of his contacts, phone contacts — he did all his business via the wire (phone or fax) — throughout the world. He could keep literally thousands of names and numbers in his head because he had one of these phenomenal visual/aural memories. Total recall: once seen or heard, never forgotten.
The evening was young. Waltzing Matilda, a second-story bar in the Wanchai district of Hong Kong, was quiet and Sonny’s was the only body at the bar. He sat in his regular place in the corner next to the wall, which held the essential tool of his trade — a phone. This was one of three of Sonny’s very private phone lines. Two others were upstairs in his room, one of which was dedicated to a fax machine, the other to a smart switching and answering machine, which spewed out and accepted messages with amazing accuracy and frequency. But the bar phone was where Sonny did his most creative work. The instrument hid shyly behind a fly-specked, pop-up poster advertising Heineken. Only bar regulars knew it was there. No regular would have dreamed of using it or even of sitting on the adjacent stool in those rare moments when it was unoccupied by Sonny’s slim behind. The spot was Sonny’s and had been since he’d bought Waltzing Matilda, both the building and the business, from its bankrupt owner. Other men fantasize about owning and running a bar; Sonny owned it but didn’t run Matilda and never intended to. A large smiling Chinese man known as Canton Bill managed the enterprise to suit himself. Sonny just sat safe and anonymous in the corner of the bar with the phone to hand, conducting his business.
Tonight “taking inventory” did not hold his attention. This was most unusual and Sonny didn’t like the unusual. Not in his own affairs. He had constructed this perfect life, built around the Matilda and international phone systems, a life over which he had almost total control. Then into his life had walked a leggy Aussie kid called Julia Piper. It was okay as long as she remained in Hong Kong. She would bounce into the bar every couple of days or so, have a drink with the boys and bounce up to Sonny’s bedroom with him. That’s how he’d liked things to be.
There had always been women as well as men in his life. And both sexes always wanted more from him than he was willing to give. More love, sex, time, money, attention, whatever. Julia didn’t seem to want anything, of itself a disturbing circumstance. And what’s more, she kept taking off for other parts. Like L.A. or Taipei or Seoul or Singapore. When she was away he couldn’t concentrate on business. Which was most unusual and damn worrying.
This time Julia had gone to Japan, for an indeterminate period. Although he hated to see her go, Sonny couldn’t prevent himself from manoeuvring her into doing him a favour or two in Japan, “since you’re going there anyway.” She would deliver an item of merchandise to a North American courier plus pay a small debt he owed to one Kusashita in Nagoya. This and that. Simple chores like that.
For Sonny this was a perfect arrangement in all respects, totally safe. Neither the “item” in question nor the money for his services were ever directly in his personal possession. The delivery of the item to Julia was arranged by phone. Payment for Sonny’s services could not be traced to him since the money would stay in Japan.
This was a good example of a system that was at the heart of Sonny’s method. He was the quintessential middleman. He never soiled his hands by actually performing any of the tasks for which he was contracted. Using his encyclopaedic knowledge of who, what, where, how and how much, his shtick was to subcontract all jobs for somewhat less than his quoted price and keep the difference. Someone else always did all the work and took all the risks. Business came to him by word of mouth — recommendations from satisfied customers. Much of it was repeat business and no wonder; he was knowledgeable, always available, reliable and not too greedy. If some of his clients, like Mel Romulu, found Sonny’s telephone manner obnoxious, that was too bad. They could go elsewhere. But few did. For Sonny was tops. A perfectionist. Much more than money, he loved an elegant plan elegantly executed. And, while every aspect of every deal he undertook was usually meticulously planned and carried out by the very best specialists in the field, Sonny was also adept at taking advantage of opportunities when they presented themselves. As in this case.
Now his pleasure at a perfectly designed deal was being spoiled by Julia. By her absence. He twisted on his seat restlessly, drumming his fingers on the fake oak surface of the bar. Then he waved a thin brown hand and Canton Bill on duty behind the bar immediately refilled his glass.
“What you want to eat tonight, boss?” Canton’s voice showed his concern at Sonny’s unusual behaviour but if he guessed at the cause of it, he didn’t let on. The question about food was a signal for a return to normalcy. It was part of an unacknowledged daily ritual, the existence of which was crucial to the relationship between the two men. It confirmed that all was as it should be.
Gratefully Sonny looked up at Canton’s face, saw it was minus its usual smile and tried to snap out of it.
“What’s on tonight, Chief?”
“Ribs are good tonight, Sarge. How about ribs?”
“Ribs sound good to me, Top.”
“Coming up.” Bill turned and spoke quietly in Cantonese into a speaking tube which connected the bar with the restaurant kitchen downstairs.
“Sonny’s usual. Send it up.”
The two men grinned at each other.
Minutes later, the meal arrived on a creaking dumbwaiter. Bill set the plate of garlic ribs, side order of stir-fried vegetables and a bowl of rice in front of Sonny. As Sonny reached for his chopsticks, the phone rang. He picked it up in one smooth, practised movement and half-turned to face the wall. Canton Bill moved away to serve a newly arrived customer.
“Sonny?” Romulu’s voice sounded tentative.
“Yeah! What’s up, Doc?”
Romulu ignored the maddening and perfect Looney Tune imitation and plunged straight to the point.
“My courier missed the first rendezvous. We need to set up another.”
“Oh? Missed a randyvoos, did he? Who was the lucky girl?”
“Come on, Sonny! This could be serious. Your Julie Piper. She arranged to meet him at a railroad station but he was late. Apparently she took a train to Nagoya and hasn’t called back. My man is sitting in Tokyo chewing his nails and costing me a mint. Do something.”
“Nagoya. Right,” suddenly Sonny was all business. “Now relax, Doc. I’ll get on it.”
He replaced the receiver and turned to his meal with renewed appetite. Having cleared every dish, he slid off the bar stool, ducked under the counter flap and with a nod at Canton Bill made his way through an unobtrusive door behind the bar to his own private stairs, which led up to his own private space on the floor above the bar. It was one large room plus bathroom taking up the whole of the third floor. The Waltzing Matilda took up all of the second floor while the storefront housed a restaurant run by Canton Bill’s large extended family. That family, in turn, occupied the two top floors of the five-story building. Thus Sonny’s sanctum was the essential meat in the sandwich as he himself called it, protected top and bottom by the bread and butter.
He walked in and looked around his private domain, experiencing again the thrill that the place never failed to produce. The walls were hung with yellowing momentos of “Nam,” Sonny’s war. Two of the walls contained large blurry blow-ups of what Sonny called “pic-bites”: that famous shot of the last helicopter hovering over the U.S. Embassy right next to a early Saigon street scene of GIs on R & R with Vietnamese girls; a black soldier setting fire to a village hut right next to a Life photo of the President with a bunch of white brass hats looking at a map, smiling into the camera; an image of a man with extended arm pointing a gun at the head of the Vietnamese civilian, captured just at the point of execution, etc. Next to the window hung two flags, South Vietnamese crossed with the MIA/POW emblem. Near the computer the wall decorations were smaller and more personal: snapshots of uniformed men — black, white and brown — most of them long dead.
Humming softly with satisfaction, Sonny proceeded into his regular routine. First he checked the fax machine, quickly scanning the printed pages and committing their contents to memory before shredding the pages. Still on his feet, he listened to whatever messages had been picked up and stored by the answering machine. Next he clicked on all three TV monitors simultaneously and spent a few minutes looking in at CNN and at two local news stations, one in Cantonese and the other in English. Finally, after getting himself a Diet Coke from the cooler and still humming, Sonny sat down in front of a large solid oak table containing nothing but a telephone and started his work.
After two calls, both to Japan, he knew the worst. Julia Piper had gone missing. For real. It wasn’t just a scare manufactured by Romulu’s incompetent courier. His only two contacts with Julia in Japan had come up empty. She had checked out of her Tokyo ryokan as per plan but had missed her appointment in Nagoya with Kusashita’s representative, Tetsu Nangi. Mr. Nangi was currently unavailable but his displeasure at this turn of events was conveyed to Sonny in excellent English and in unmistakable terms by a young female voice. Mr. Burke was advised to rectify the situation immediately. Preferably before Mr. Kusashita himself had to be apprised … Bet she wouldn’t sound like that in Japanese, he thought.
It took Sonny only a moment to come to the unpalatable conclusion that he had to get help in finding Julia Piper. It was clearly unthinkable to call upon his usual business contacts; the matter was too sensitive. Word that Sonny had “lost” his sheila would get around. That he’d gotten her to deliver his merchandise and a payoff and that she’d run out on him would be just too good to be kept quiet. Like all active businessmen Sonny had competitors and enemies, not to mention so-called friends who could be counted on to delight in taking him down a peg. The story would hurt his reputation and thereby damage his business.
The normal channels being closed in this instance, Sonny had but little choice. He took a deep breath and punched a local Hong Kong number.
6
Ladrone Investigations
“Ladrone Investigations. Good morning.”
“Lemme talk t’McGee.”
“Who is calling, please?”
“Sonny Burke.”
“Please hold on, Mr. Burke.”
Pause. Then a soft Scottish burr: “Sonny? How are you, me boy. Now I know you’re not calling to pass the time. What can we do for you?”
“I need to find someone in Japan. D’you have an operative there, right now? And I mean now! Someone who’s already there. There is no time to waste.”
“Oh? …” McGee couldn’t quite disguise his surprise. Sonny Burke was notorious for having more contacts throughout the world than American Express. Why would he need to go to a detective agency? One couldn’t ask. McGee collected himself and pressed on. “Oh. Right. An operative in Japan. Could be … Let me find out and call you back. Who is it you’re trying to find? Anyone in particular or …?”
“A young woman. Westerner. Doesn’t speak Japanese. Shouldn’t be hard to track down for the right person.”
“Right. Call you back right away.”
Angus McGee replaced the receiver slowly. A small smile appeared under his grey military mustache. Sonny Burke — asking for help from Ladrone! This was unprecedented. Something unusual was in the works. McGee considered the possibilities. Whatever it was it might represent an opportunity. And Angus McGee hadn’t let an opportunity pass in all of his 60 years. Accordingly he heaved his beefy frame out of the chair and, pulling down his waistcoat, walked into the office next door. His partner, Ray Choy, looked up expectantly from a computer terminal. In a few words McGee shared the gist of Sonny’s request with him.
“What d’you think, old son? Can we oblige him? Do let’s!”
“Interesting. Who is the woman? Any idea?”
“Not for sure. But if it is who I think it is …! Julie Piper, who else, right? Of course we don’t have anyone in Japan right now. So we’ll have to fudge it somehow. Be worth going to some trouble, don’t you think so, old son?”
“Helen Keremos is now in Tokyo. She just called me. Perhaps …”
“Who? Who d’we have in Tokyo that I don’t know about?”
“Calm down, Angus. Helen Keremos. You remember? A private investigator from Vancouver we are vetting as a possible contact for Ladrone in Canada. We agreed. Remember now?” Choy asked.
“Oh, yes, yes. Your Canadian lassie. What about her? Are you suggesting we use her on this job for Sonny Burke? We don’t know a thing about her! How could we trust such a delicate situation to an unknown? And a woman!”
“We don’t have any choice, Angus. She’s in Tokyo. We don’t have anyone else. And it would be very interesting to find out more about Mr. Burke and his doings, as you yourself remarked. So, do I call Helen in Tokyo and set it up or do you want to call Sonny and tell him that we can’t help?”
It was no contest.
7
Job(s) for Helen
Helen swung the elongated hot water spigot from over the hand basin to a new position above the bathtub and turned on the water in preparation for taking a shower. All without moving from the toilet seat. She was rather enjoying performing the usual ablutions, although millions wouldn’t, in this tiny perfect bathroom, which was attached to a tiny perfect hotel room, with a tiny perfect bed and not much else in it. It wasn’t just that the bathroom was small but that it seemed like a Rubbermaid product, i.e., tub, sink and toilet, walls, floor and ceiling appeared to have been moulded all in one piece from the same pale beige, hard-impact vinyl. It was like being inside an egg; every time she vacated this seamless cocoon, Helen felt like a hatchling. Under the influence of jet lag she had felt like a real yoke but had managed to get over it since.
A more lasting impression produced by staying in a room in a Japanese “business” hotel — as opposed to an “international” tourist hotel — is that of being on a small boat. Unlike the traditional Japanese ryokan with a futon on the floor, it has a bed (bunk) and a Western-type bathroom (head). As on a boat, everything in it is built-in, tidy and tiny, with no space wasted on anything extraneous. It makes for a simpler life and this too suited Helen just fine. She always liked boats.
Wrapped in a blue and white yukata supplied by the management, a clean and relaxed Helen sat on the bed — there were no chairs or room for them — doing her nails when the phone produced an odd sound. She took it, correctly, for a ring.
“Hallo, Helen?” Ray Choy’s voice sounded tentative, as if he wasn’t sure of his purpose in calling. Curious, since they had spoken just a few hours ago and she wasn’t expecting another call from him. Helen made affirmative noises.
“Well, Helen, I am sorry to interrupt your holiday in Tokyo but my partner and I wondered whether you would mind doing a little job for us while you’re in Japan. It shouldn’t take you long …”
“What kind of a job did you have in mind?” Helen interrupted. “And hey, Ray, is this a real job or a test to see whether I measure up to Ladrone standards? Because if it is, then forget it. You guys can take your business and shove it.”
“Not at all, not at all!” Grateful that his partner couldn’t hear Helen, Ray Choy continued, “A real job, and you would be doing us a favour if you could see your way to help us out.”
“A favour?” Helen asked suspiciously. Favours came free.
“Yes! Of course, I mean at your usual rates. Plus expenses, of course.”
“Of course, of course. What’s the deal?”
“A missing person, a woman.”
“A Westerner, I trust. You wouldn’t hire me to find a Japanese person in Japan.”
“Naturally a Westerner. We have an urgent commission to find her. You will need to get started right away. There is no time to spare.”
“So brief me.”
“The client insists on briefing you himself. He will phone, then probably fax you details. I will give him your number. His name is Burke, Sonny Burke.”
“Who am I working for? Ladrone Investigations or Sonny Burke?”
“For us, for Ladrone. Absolutely.”
“Good. Okay. Til be waiting. The meter is on as of right now.”
Half an hour later, a fully dressed Helen picked up the phone again. Sonny Burke was on the line, his telephone manner professionally faultless. She listened carefully, noting the flat American accent as he sketched out the case.
“Julia Piper, ‘Julie’ to her friends. Australian. About 28. Tall, thin, fair, good looking. Should stand out in Japan like a pig at a Muslim wedding. Flashy dresser but I don’t know exactly what she had on last. Checked out of her hotel in Tokyo, then missed an important contact at the Tokaido/Sanyo Shinkansen platform at Tokyo Station. She seemed to have taken the train to Nagoya. However, didn’t make her appointment there. Now see, she’s got valuable merchandise on her. My merchandise.”
“How valuable? How portable? Diamonds, drugs, gold?”
“Just valuable. Worth $10,000 to me. On the open market, many times that. And it’s portable. Not like diamonds but portable. Not drugs, not gold. Nothing like that.”
“You thinking she took off with your loot? I need to know the chances that she’s in hiding. It makes a difference. People who don’t want to be found are harder to track down. Does she want to be found?”
“I don’t know. Can’t be sure. But most likely, yeah, she wants to be found.”
“Good. I need to know what it is she’s carrying. These appointments she didn’t make. First here and later in Nagoya. They have anything to do with this ‘merchandise’ of yours?”
“Yes. At the station she was to exchange the merchandise for 10 grand. She set up the meeting herself so presumably she’d meant to make it. But the courier was late, the Nagoya train had left. So I’m assuming she left for Nagoya. But I don’t understand why she didn’t wait, take a later train or contact the courier and make another appointment.”
“I’ll need to talk to that courier. Now what’s with Nagoya?”
For the first time in the conversation Sonny Burke hesitated just slightly. They’d reached the tricky part. Helen picked this up as if he’d spelled it out aloud.
“I don’t understand it. Her job was to make the delivery and get that $10,000 in Tokyo then make a pay-off in Nagoya for me. Why would she go to nagoya first? And she didn’t make it there either …”
“Right. If she’d intended to rip you off and disappear she would have been smart to get the maney first, right? Except you just told me that this merchandise is worth more than 10 grand. So. Complicated situation.”
“My hunch is that something happened to her either on the train or in Nagoya. Anyway, I don’t believe she’d double-cross me for a lousy eight grand. You see, she was to keep two for her trouble anyway.”
“Hum. Generous. Did she have any other reason to go to Nagoya? Other than to deliver the eight grand to your associate? By the way, I’ll need his name and way to reach him. He’s Japanese, right?”
“Yeah. His name is Tetsu Nangi. She didn’t show.”
“Do we believe him about that? And even if we do, where did they plan to meet? How and by whom were the arrangements made? That’s what he’d know and that’s what I need to find out. Just what sort of business are you in, Mr. Burke?”
Helen heard Sonny sigh at the other end of the phone.
“Yeah, yeah. Got to hand it to Ladrone. They sure got smart operators. Listen, Helen Keremos, I can’t wait for Julie to be found before I make that payoff in Nagoya. You dig? I need you to make it for me. So, here’s the goods. Nangi works for Kusashita, the man I owe money to. Kusashita is the chief of the Nagoya area yakuza. You know what ‘yakuza’ means?”
“Like the mob or something.”
“Oh, baby! Mafia, the syndicate, Unione Siciliano. Like that.”
“So?”
“How about Wah Ching? That’s Chinese. United Bamboo out of Taiwan? Our own triads here in Hong Kong? Know anything about them?”
“Secret criminal societies? Not much, I guess. So tell me.
“Secret criminal societies, sure. But forget most of that comic book stuff. In Japan, yakuza are part of the way things are run. They are criminal all right, but lately there hasn’t been much secret about them. They got so powerful in the eighties they don’t have to hide much. But make no mistake. They can be very, very bad dudes. It isn’t healthy to cross Kusashita, for instance.”
“You owe him money and you’ve fouled up the delivery.”
“He don’t know that. Yet. And with luck he’ll never know we fouled up. Here’s what I propose. You take Julie’s place. I wire you the money in Tokyo, you hightail it to Nagoya and get it to Nangi. You being a woman makes it perfect. They were expecting a woman, see. What d’you say? Make it worth your while.”
“Why not just wire the money directly?”
“You don’t understand. That’s not the way things are done. Anyway it sends the wrong message. When you show up it’s just a slight delay in delivery, is all. Much easier to explain than having my courier disappear completely. I have to think of my long-term business prospects with the Japanese. With Kusashita for sure. Major screwup would blow it for me. Make me seem unreliable, see what I mean? You getting that money to Nangi ASAP takes him off the hook too. See, any screwup he’s connected with is bad for his rep, regardless of whose fault it is. Nangi is an important contact for me.”
“I get it. Supposing I do it. What’s it worth?”
Til wire 9K. You give Nangi 8K.”
“What about Ladrone?”
“What about them?”
“They’re paying me to find Julie Piper. What do I tell them about this deal?”
“Nothing. None of their business. You go on looking for Julie. I want her found and I’m paying that shot as well. You’ve got two separate gigs with no conflict. What’s the problem? Just do the delivery first.”
Helen considered. The ethics of the proposition were murky. For sure, Ladrone would expect her to report on her conversation with Burke. As far as they were concerned, she was working for them and not for Burke directly. It suited Burke to discount the possibility but experience told Helen that once she was in the middle, the chances of conflict were very high, practically 100 percent. She knew that she would be smart to turn him down now. These complications apart, it was crazy to take a job over the phone from someone she’d never met, whose real agenda she could only guess at, to deal with a strange mob in a country like Japan. She would be stepping into a situation, the ramifications of which she could know nothing. And with no support, no network, no language! She knew she was nuts to consider the possibility even. She also knew she couldn’t turn down the opportunity.
“Let me think about this. Meanwhile let’s get back to finding Julie since you say you do want her found. I want to know what ‘Merchandise’ she was carrying for you. Plus, I still have to talk with your client’s courier here in Tokyo before I go to Nagoya. What’s his name and where do I contact him?”
“Look, Helen. Telling you the nature of the merchandise is a no-no in my book. The item belongs to my client. The matter is confidential, see? You wouldn’t blab your client’s business, I hope, right? We’re professionals, you and I. You understand. All I’ll say is that my client is an art lover.” Pause. “Now about my client’s courier. He’s at the Tokyo Hilton and his name is Wayne Tillion. Got that?”
“Wayne Tillion? Yes, I got it.” Helen managed to keep her amazement from showing. There had to be more than one Wayne Tillion in the world.