A Dog in Water (11 page)

Izumi knocked away the woman’s hand and swaggered off across the intersection.

Club El Dorado was located in the basement of a building behind Hotel Ibis. Pounding music poured out and enveloped the detective as soon as he opened the door. He stated the purpose of his visit to the man at the reception desk who turned and waved a finger towards the interior of the club. Immediately a hulking black man wearing a black suit approached. Under the blacklights on the walls his teeth floated oddly salient. The detective followed him into the club.

On stage danced a blonde, topless. Apart from the puny piece of cloth on her crotch she only wore high heels and shorts made of
strings and traipsed around a golden ball. The seats were nearly taken up, the spectators Japanese and Caucasian.

Across the floor and down a narrow hallway they came to a door. The hulking black man opened it and ushered in the detective. The room looked expensively appointed, awash in gold hues. Pricey furnishings sat with no sense of unity. Basically, it reeked of a nouveau riche sensibility.

The man seated at the sizable desk in the back looked up from some account book or other. Based on his appearance, he was Caucasian, period. He was around forty and had a large build.

“Please come in,” the man said in fluent Japanese. In fact, his speech was flawless, as good as any native speaker’s.

The detective bowed and approached the desk. “Sorry to take up your time when you’re so busy …” He stood before the desk and lowered his head again.

The man stood up from his high leather-clad chair and offered his right hand. “I’m Marco, the owner.” He shook the detective’s hand and sat and leaned back in his chair, his fingers laced over his belly. “So, what can I do for you?”

“Have you seen Yoichi Yoshino recently?” the detective asked bluntly.

“Yoshino? Oh, him. No, I haven’t. We were acquainted at one point, but not after I learned that he dirtied his hands with crime …” Marco smiled serenely.

“He’s missing. His family is extremely worried about him.”

“I’m very sorry to hear that. And sorrier still that I can’t be of any use,” Marco said with an air of finality. “On a different note, detective work seems like a tough field. Is your trade to thank for the state of your face? Seems like you’re bound to run into trouble pretty often, sticking your nose all over the place. I suggest that you be careful from now on.” The warning was implicit but clear.

“Actually, my time is running out. I can’t afford to be overly concerned about my wellbeing.”

Marco gave the detective a quizzical look.

“I just met Akio Izumi. He was arrested along with Yoichi Yoshino, and they were released around the same time. Yet Izumi seems to be doing quite well for himself.”

“What does that have to do with me?”

“Nothing.”

“Get to the point.”

“I have no interest in a drug-dealing ring. I just want to find Yoichi Yoshino. Will you cooperate?”

“I’m not sure I could.”

“I won’t cause you any trouble.”

Marco lost himself in thought for a moment then said, “Oh, right.” He opened a drawer in his desk and pulled out a box of matches. “Ask the guys here. They might be able to tell you something. It used to be his hangout.”

The detective picked up the box of matches stamped with the logo of the establishment: JB.

The bar was located on a backstreet near an intersection in West Azabu. The detective got out of his car and headed towards the sign that read “JB.” The lights were off and it looked pitch dark inside.

“That place shut down last month,” a familiar voice echoed down the dark street.

The detective turned around to discover Izumi standing next to his car.

“So we meet again,” Izumi smirked. He wore leather gloves on his hands, and a monkey wrench was gripped in his right. “And I’m sick of seein’ your mug.”

He brought his wrench down onto the detective’s car. With a sharp sound a white cloud the size of a soccer ball appeared on the windshield. As the detective made to walk towards Izumi, four men appeared from the shadows of a building. They were all foreigners from somewhere in the Middle East.

Izumi shattered the driver’s side mirror. The four foreigners approached the detective with blank expressions. The detective started
running in the opposite direction. The four men chased after him.

They overtook him not fifty yards away. He was struck in the back and sprawled forward onto the ground. A shoe dug into his stomach. A groan escaped the detective. Sharp pain shot across his fractured ribs under his cast.

Kicks landed indiscriminately all over his body. His nose guard flew off. Blood spurted from his nose. The detective did his best to curl into a fetal position.

Izumi’s voice rang out. The detective couldn’t even tell what language he was speaking, but the four men stopped their attacks. Izumi bent down, peered into the detective’s face and spat, “Now I’ve warned you.”

All the men walked away. Left alone, huddling on the dark edge of an alleyway, the detective couldn’t move. For a long while he breathed hoarsely. His whole body throbbed like a giant blister, but he didn’t think he’d suffered any new broken bones.

As his breathing steadied he gingerly touched his nose. It wasn’t broken. His ribs and the two fingers on his left hand covered in a cast were no worse off than they’d been before.

He pulled the vial of medical-grade morphine from his jacket pocket and opened it. He tried pouring some into his hand but ended up spilling it on the ground. Lowering his face to the pavement he snorted up every last grain. He pocketed the vial, closed his eyes and stayed huddled in the alleyway waiting for the pain to recede into the distance.

He heard a car approaching. A black sedan drove up and stopped next to the detective. The driver’s window slid open noiselessly and Yano peered out.

“You seem to be having fun.” Yano sounded like he was the one enjoying himself. “Why go lookin’ for a beating when you’re gonna kick the bucket in the morning?”

He got out of the car and toed at the detective, who remained motionless on the ground.

“Hey, you done already? Hey, hello.”

Still no response from the detective.

“Hey, you alive?”

Yano crouched down next to him and peered into his face. All of a sudden the detective’s hand whipped out and grabbed Yano’s necktie and dragged him closer.

“Hey! The fuck are you doing?!”

Yano shook off the hand and stood up. The detective’s right hand clutched the revolver that had been tucked in at his stomach until just then.

“Ah …” Yano stared down in disbelief.

The detective got to his feet slowly and leaned back against Yano’s car. Then he gazed at the lump of black metal that shone dimly in his hand.

Right … I have nothing left to fear
, noted the detective.

“I ain’t a cabbie,” Yano scowled as he drove. The detective sat in the front passenger’s seat wiping at his bloody nose with a handkerchief. The ruined windshield had rendered his own car inoperable.

“You’re following me around anyway, aren’t you? This way you don’t need to worry about losing track of me.”

With the nose guard gone, the detective’s nose was mottled with blue, yellow and copper bruising from base to bridge. It certainly didn’t make him look any less creepy than when he had the guard on his face. He finished daubing at his nose and opened the cylinder of the revolver he’d lifted from Yano.

It was a Smith & Wesson Model 36, a small revolver nicknamed “The Chief’s Special.” He confirmed that all five chambers were filled with .38 Special bullets and closed the cylinder.

“What’re you planning?” Yano asked.

“Just to keep doing my job,” answered the detective.

Yano turned to look out the window with an exasperated look. He could not get a bead on this detective. Yano’s black BMW sped along Roppongi Avenue and turned left one street before Gaien East Avenue.

“Stop here,” the detective said.

When Yano pulled over, the detective got out of the car and headed towards a building with a sign that read “El Dorado.” Waiting
until the detective was out of sight, Yano pulled out his cell phone and placed a call.

One look at the detective and the man at the reception desk began to fret. He hastily waved a finger towards the back of the club. The detective paid him no heed and proceeded anyway. The hulking black man from earlier appeared and stood to block his way. The detective opened his jacket to reveal the hammer and dark-stained wooden oversized grip of the revolver thrust into the belt of his trousers. The man instinctively put up both hands and slowly drew to the side. The detective continued onward as if nothing had happened.

He opened the door to discover Marco sitting at his desk, just as before. He froze once he saw the detective, then a smirk sprang to his lips. “Oh, still have business with me?” he asked the approaching detective.

The detective pulled out his revolver and aimed it towards Marco. “Enough chit-chat.”

Marco stopped breathing. The detective walked behind Marco and grabbed the collar of his silken shirt with his left hand.

“Where is Yoichi Yoshino?”

“You think you can get away with treating me like this?”

“You think you can get away with treating me like that?”

“I could have you killed anytime.”

“Care for a match? Over who can kill whom first?” He pressed the barrel of the gun into the back of Marco’s head.

Marco’s bluff evaporated. “Y-Yoichi hasn’t come back here, I swear.”

“You’re telling me to leave empty-handed after what you called on me?”

“I’ll have them search. I’ll tell my men to grab him by tomorrow night.”

The detective huffed a self-deprecating laugh. “I told you I didn’t have any time left.” He cocked the hammer of the revolver with a metallic click.

“Wait! Please!”

“Well?”

“There’s one guy who said he’s seen Yoichi recently.”

“Where?”

“He didn’t say. Just that he was with Kanemitsu.”

The detective held down the hammer, lightly pulled the trigger and de-cocked the revolver. “Who is this Kanemitsu?”

“He used to work with Yoichi and Izumi. But he got more interested in using drugs than selling them. He was risky and we cut him off.”

“Where is Kanemitsu now?”

“I don’t know, I swear.”

Suddenly the door burst open. It was Izumi who entered the room. “Haven’t you learned your lesson, bastard?!” he yelled and charged the detective.

Evading the downward swing of a monkey wrench, the detective rammed the gun barrel into Izumi’s mouth with all his might. Two incisors went flying.

Izumi crumpled on one knee by the desk; the detective’s shoe burrowed into his stomach. The dealer’s body floated for a moment then dropped. Clutching his gut with both hands, he cowered on the floor, a mixture of blood and bile spilling from his mouth.

The detective kicked the fallen wrench to a corner and turned to fix his gaze on Marco, who froze gripping the armrests of his chair as he stared at the detective.

Kicking Izumi’s butt, the detective asked, “Hey, where does Kanemitsu roost?”

“Urgh … Uh … I don’t fuckin’ know …” Izumi protested in a barely audible voice.

The detective crouched by his back. “Guess I don’t need you then,” he remarked and pressed the revolver to his temple.

“I-I know where!” Izumi cried, baring bloodstained teeth. His upper lip was split open and bleeding.

“Then I’ll let you lead the way.” The detective clutched Izumi’s collar and hoisted him to his feet. Standing behind him, he aimed the gun
at Marco. “Don’t do anything stupid.”

Marco still didn’t so much as budge.

“I’m going to Kanemitsu’s place. If any odd fellows are lying in wait for me there, the first one to drop dead will be this guy.”

Marco looked at the blood-soaked Izumi and the revolver in turn, then gave a weak nod.

Yano took the paper bag handed from the passenger’s side of the car that had pulled up alongside his, then waved it off. The other car sped away.

Yano was a member of the Sasaken Group, whose official territory was in Kanagawa, but the gang had made quiet infiltrations into Tokyo proper. Several men had set up in an office near Roppongi. Having placed a call to one of them, he emptied onto the passenger’s seat the contents of the paper bag he’d received. What tumbled out were a Beretta .380 and three fully loaded extra magazines.

Yano picked up the Beretta and removed the magazine, confirming it was fully loaded with .380 ACP rounds, then slammed the magazine back into the grip. He pulled the slide, loading the first round into the chamber, switched on the thumb safety and tucked the gun under his belt. Pocketing the extra magazines, he rolled up the empty paper bag and tossed it onto the street. It was then that he caught sight of the detective walking towards him, pressed close behind a young man with a bloodied mouth. That same man had rushed into El Dorado just before his gun was delivered. Yano had seen that loud suit before.

The detective opened the back door and shoved Izumi into the BMW before climbing into the back seat himself.

“Get blood on my seats and I’ll kill you,” warned Yano.

Izumi looked at him with searching eyes. “What’s a yakuza doin’ hangin’ out with a P.I.?” He was missing two front teeth. “Thought it was weird that this Dick turned into a gunslinger. The hell are you guys plottin’?!”

Yano pulled out his Beretta and aimed it at Izumi. “Shut the fuck
up, you little bitch!”

Izumi snapped his mouth shut. His eyes followed suit.

“You seem to own a fair number of those,” muttered the detective, looking at the Beretta.

“Never underestimate a yakuza,” Yano said as he belted the gun and faced forward. “Where do I drive next?”

Yano’s BMW turned off of Gaien East Avenue onto Sakurada Street then onto Keihin Route 2.

“What’s Kanemitsu like?” asked the detective.

“Just a junkie. Thought he’d kicked the bucket a long time ago,” Izumi spat. The detective didn’t press for more information.

The address Izumi gave for Kanemitsu was on the outskirts of Ohta Ward. Yano exited Keihin Route 2 just past the Yaguchi Overpass and drove along for a while until Izumi pointed left and ahead.