Fishing for Stars (35 page)

He stooped and picked up the Browning, holding it by the tip of the barrel to protect my prints, then he dropped it into a plastic bag one of the police officers held open.

I could hear the tapping of the cane growing louder as Konoe Akira returned. He appeared at the entrance to the passageway, then crossed the room to stand directly in front of me, forcing the bemused police sergeant to step aside. He’d found a means of holding up his trousers – the waistband was now bunched and turned over, lifting his trouser legs and exposing his bare ankles. Akira was tall for a Japanese, six foot, perhaps a little less, though he was still obliged to look up at me. Grim-faced, shaking, his lips spume-flecked with rage, he yelled, ‘Where is my esteemed mother?’

I shook my head and then shrugged, trying to keep my voice steady. ‘What? I don’t understand. But you said . . .’ I replied, hoping the feigned innocence was convincing.

I had decided that if
Fuchida-san
had escaped arrest or even if he hadn’t, I wasn’t going to betray him or the
yakuza
. While this may at first seem chivalrous, it was no more than commonsense on my part. If, as the
oyabun
of Tokyo, Fuchida possessed the influence with the authorities he claimed, then he was going to be my only possible chance of avoiding a very long stay in a Japanese prison. If he thought I had betrayed him after he had set out to help me reach Anna, he would obviously make no attempt to intervene on my behalf.

Konoe Akira turned to the senior cop. ‘He has abducted my mother!’ he cried. ‘She will not live! It is murder!’

‘Your mother is missing? You’re saying she has been kidnapped by this man?’ the sergeant asked.

‘Who else?’ Konoe spat, still furious.

He turned back to me. ‘Where is she?’

Obviously Fuchida, Saito and the three others had not been arrested. Somehow they must have been warned and left before the police arrived on the scene. I shook my head. ‘As you can see, I am on my own, sergeant.’

‘
Hai!
We will soon find out, Nick Duncan.’ He turned back to Konoe Akira. ‘It is only you and your mother who live in the house?’

‘She has a nurse, but I cannot wake her up.’

‘She sleeps in the same room?’

‘Yes, but she has been drugged.’

‘You know this for sure?’

‘I cannot wake her!’ Konoe Akira repeated.

The sergeant nodded to one of his men, indicating he should take a look. ‘No servants, just the nurse?’

‘Oh, also my staff sergeant.’ He pointed at me. ‘He has tied him up. He is lying outside my bedchamber.’

‘This woke you up?’ the sergeant asked.

‘I beg your pardon?’

‘The noise – tying your . . . er . . . staff sergeant up?’

‘No, this man is well trained, a professional. I heard nothing. I pressed the alarm when he crossed the room to fetch my clothes.’

‘Professional?’ the sergeant sniffed, glancing at me. ‘And he allowed you to get dressed?’ Then he added, ‘How very considerate.’

I don’t suppose you can blush when you’re shitting yourself, but I’m sure I did; I certainly felt my face burning. The old bloke had outsmarted me and pressed the alarm virtually under my nose.

I would later learn that because most of the foreign embassies and the Imperial Palace were in the same vicinity, they had all been wired up, alarmed directly to the
Keishicho
, the Metropolitan Police Headquarters in Central Tokyo. Konoe Akira had been permitted to avail himself of the system, a buzzer or some such at his bedside, which he had pressed to alert them. The cunning old bastard knew if he delayed me sufficiently they’d arrive in time to arrest me. It said something for Saito and his men that they’d moved the old crone without waking anyone, and Nick Duncan on his own had made a bloody great hash of things. I should have marched him out barefoot in his red flannel nightshirt; chivalry has no place in today’s world.

‘Are you sure he was responsible for your honourable mother’s disappearance?’ the sergeant asked. ‘Old ladies sometimes go wandering. They can be senile and confused. It is not uncommon.’

‘But there is the nurse to mind her,’ Konoe Akira insisted. Then glancing malevolently at me he spat, ‘
Of course
he did it!’

‘With their help . . . the
yakuza
, it is possible,’ the policeman replied.

‘As you can see there are no
yakuza
. I am on my own,’ I said unnecessarily.

The sergeant shook his head slowly and then, with the beginnings of a smile, asked me, ‘Do you expect me to believe that two unrelated incidents, the one a kidnapping and the other an attempt to kidnap, took place coincidentally in the same home almost simultaneously?’

I held his gaze knowing he was right and that there was no other way to explain things. ‘I can only answer for myself. Perhaps you should ask
Konoe-san
why I entered his home and attempted to abduct him. It obviously wasn’t in order to rob him – I could have done that easily enough.’ I pointed to the green vase. ‘It belongs in the Goryeo Dynasty and is near priceless. Why would I not take that and leave well satisfied?’

‘Because you are a professional and knew the vase was alarmed and you want a ransom for my esteemed mother!’ Konoe Akira shouted. Which explained why he’d offered the vase in exchange for his life. I had to hand it to him, he was resourceful.

‘If I had kidnapped your honourable mother, which I haven’t, why then would I kidnap you if I wanted to hold her to ransom?’ I turned to the sergeant. ‘Perhaps you should ask
Konoe-san
why he thinks I have attempted to kidnap him. My partner and I are
gaijin
and strangers in a foreign country.’ I pointed to Konoe Akira. ‘He has kidnapped her for reasons that will soon become apparent. It is he who is the kidnapper and who forced me to enter his home to discover where she is!’

It was the first time I had admitted knowing more of Konoe Akira’s background than he might have supposed and he blanched, crying, ‘He lies!’

‘Enough!’ the sergeant said, finally running out of patience. ‘Why did you not report this alleged kidnapping to the police? Kidnapping is a serious offence.’

I sighed. ‘It seemed at the time to be a matter I could clear up on my own.’ I pointed at Konoe Akira. ‘My partner and this man have a long association. They are not strangers. This man has a personal agenda.’

‘I am taking you into custody, Nick Duncan. Anything further you say may be used in evidence.’ He turned and dipped his head in a cursory bow to Konoe Akira. ‘You may be required to give evidence, sir. I would request that you inform the police if you intend to leave Tokyo.’ The sergeant handed Konoe Akira his card in the two-handed manner of the Japanese, bowing slightly.

The two policemen sent to find Staff Sergeant Goto now appeared with him in tow. He was rubbing his wrists, his expression totally distraught. He broke away from the two officers and went to stand in front of Konoe Akira, bowing deeply. ‘I have let you down, Colonel. I must be punished,’ he said.

‘
Hai!
I will deal with you later. Fetch my belt!’ Konoe Akira snapped.

The thoroughly dejected Goto turned to obey and, suddenly observing me, let out a sharp cry, then pivoted on one foot and karate-kicked me high in the chest, obviously aiming at my throat. With my hands handcuffed behind my back I had nowhere to go but backwards, knocking into the green vase and sending it crashing to the floor, where I joined it moments later, coming down on my arse, then my back, my head finally knocking hard against the wooden floor. I lay dazed among the shards of porcelain with the ear-piercing racket of the alarm filling the room. It took only a few seconds for me to realise that I was bleeding, but how badly I couldn’t say. I attempted to rise, but with my hands secured behind my back I had no way of getting to my feet. I looked up to see Konoe Akira standing over me, weeping like a small child.

I left the Emergency Department of the University of Tokyo Todai Hospital in a police car just after dawn. Whilst I wasn’t severely injured I had multiple cuts to my backside and the back of my arms, most fairly deep, and one just below the right shoulderblade, in all requiring fifty-seven stitches. I was told once the painkillers wore off to expect a bit of a headache from the bump on the back of my head, but I wasn’t concussed and while my sternum felt bruised where Goto had kicked me, an X-ray showed nothing was broken. I was probably carrying the most expensively acquired sutures the hospital would have performed in a long time. Years later in New York I saw a similar vase for sale in a Fifth Avenue antique dealer’s for two million American dollars. I recall how Anna wanted to buy it for me. Laughing, I’d quickly refused. ‘It gives me a pain in the bum just to look at it,’ I’d remarked, kissing her for the generous gesture it undoubtedly was.

I was taken to the huge Metropolitan Police Department Complex located in the Kasumigaseki district of Central Tokyo, the biggest in Japan with five hundred police officers operating from it. Here I was brought to the charge desk where a sleepy sergeant, no doubt looking forward to the completion of the night shift, started the paperwork, charging me with attempted kidnapping, assault, breaking and entering, and possession of an unlicensed and prohibited firearm. He explained in a bored voice that later in the morning I might have to undergo an interview by the public prosecutor who would decide whether I was to be indicted, but that the police could hold me for forty-eight hours without charge.

After my belt and shoelaces were removed, I was escorted to the holding cells. Prison cells in foreign lands are usually depicted as filthy holes with blood, gore, urine and vomit on the floor, the toilet in one corner overflowing with faecal matter. These were clean and smelled of strong disinfectant, and were arranged in a semicircle with the bars facing the guard station so that the occupants were under twenty-four-hour surveillance. The nocturnal sounds issuing from the cells reminded me of the islands where passengers sleeping on deck emitted the same snores, grunts, snuffles and cries in their sleep. The only sound missing was the cry of an infant. I suddenly felt very far from home and very alone.

My cell, better described as a dog box, had
tatami
flooring, slightly less than half of which was occupied by a narrow futon on which lay two blankets, two small towels roughly the size of dishcloths and a toothbrush and miniature tube of toothpaste. There was no washbasin, but at the far end was an open semi-squat toilet. It seemed that even the process of defecating was under observation. The entire cell was about three metres long and one and a half metres wide. I was to learn that the lights were perpetually on, though dimmed at night.

For a bloke my size it was a tight fit, my head either up against the open bars of the cell door or resting against the toilet. I was dog tired. Over the last two days I’d managed to snatch only a handful of hours in the hotel after the meeting with
Fuchida-san
and the other
oyabun
at his penthouse apartment. It felt like several days ago but was in fact only yesterday afternoon. Forced by my various wounds to lie on my stomach I chose to sleep with my head against the toilet, burying my nose in the blankets, rather than look through the bars at the guards.

However, try as I might, I couldn’t sleep; my mind was racing wildly. I’d screwed up big time: Anna was no nearer to being rescued and I now found myself incarcerated, wounded, exhausted and beyond desperation. I tried to look at each of the problems separately, to see if I could find a way out of our predicaments, otherwise I might end up rotting in a Japanese jail, and Anna could possibly be physically harmed or perhaps even killed. By ordering her kidnapping, Konoe Akira had potentially implicated himself with the Shield Society. This could soon become public knowledge and the honour of his noble family and his personal and professional reputation would be deeply compromised. So, I reasoned, he might be prepared to organise Anna’s release as soon as possible in return for keeping his association with these extreme rightwing fanatics from the public and his business associates. This seemed initially a positive thought. At least Anna would be free.

But, almost immediately, it occurred to me that there wasn’t anyone to plausibly implicate him or link him to the organisation. My own evidence was hearsay and would probably be regarded as entirely specious. The only confirmation that Anna’s kidnapping had been the work of the Shield Society under orders from Konoe Akira came from the Jade Mistress. Furthermore, the likelihood of her confirming this fact, or even that she knew Konoe Akira, was negligible. That is, unless she was forced to do so by
Fuchida-san
, the
yakuza
boss who had her written and signed confirmation. Without that document, Konoe could refute the accusation and, for that matter, deny knowing Anna. The only tangible proof that he’d known her in the past was the inscribed silver cigarette case he’d given her all those years ago as a parting gift, and it was now back in his possession, since Anna had used it as her calling card. My mind was going round in circles, but I couldn’t stop. This meant that
Fuchida-san
, with the cooperation of the Jade Mistress, was the only possible link between him and the extreme rightwing society, and with Anna.