The Gate

CHAPTER 12

“So why didn’t they explode it?” Lake asked.

Harmon was seated now, staring at the logs in front of her as if they might suddenly jump up and bite her.

“Maybe it didn’t work,” she said.

“The one in Korea worked,” Lake said, remembering they’d already had this conversation. “There’s no point dwelling on that right now. The key issue is, was this contact really a midget sub and, if it was, is it still down there?” The answer came to him even as he asked the question. “Yeah, I think that contact was it and I think it’s still down there.”

“Why?” Harmon was rousing out of her shock and closing up the logs.

“It makes sense to me now. They knew the midget sub could only stay down so long and make it so far against the current with its batteries. If they could just make it to the mouth of the harbor, they could anchor it against the base of the southern tower. The northern one is connected to land, but the southern one stands alone in deep water. Then with the bomb tied off there, they could blow it at any time. Imagine taking out the Golden Gate? Not only that, but the blast would have hit the headquarters for the HDSF right here at Fort Point and the adjacent areas in the Presidio.” Lake remembered the other night and the paint sprayer on top of the bridge. “And the prevailing winds would have carried the fallout right over San Francisco.”

“You really think it’s still down there?” Harmon asked.

“Yes. I think that’s what the North Koreans are hot after and has the Japanese scared shitless.” Lake had a feeling that Araki might even know this and had withheld this little piece of news. Or perhaps Araki had been using Lake as bait on the hook he was using to fish for the bomb’s location.

“What are you going to do about it?” Harmon asked.

“I don’t know at the moment,” Lake said. “I have to think about it.”

“Well, while you ponder that,” Harmon said, “I do have to get back to the campus.”

Lake checked his watch and nodded. “I have someone I’m meeting there at three.”

Harmon drove out of the lot and headed back to Berkeley. She glanced over at Lake a couple of times. He knew she wanted to talk, but he was deep in thought.

“You’re troubled,” she finally said.

“Well, we just discovered that there might be an old atomic bomb tied off to the base of the Golden Gate Bridge,” Lake said. “I’d say that might be cause for concern.” He sighed. “I feel like I’m only seeing part of what’s going on here. Sort of like an iceberg — most of what’s happening is hidden from me.”

“I’ve been thinking the same thing,” Harmon said tentatively. “There’s some aspects of this that bother me beyond the idea that there might be an atom bomb sitting at the base of the bridge.”

“Such as?” Lake asked.

“The end of the war. I’ve been analyzing it with the added perspective of the Japanese having an atomic bomb.

Asking myself how that would have affected things that happened.”

“And what have you come up with?” Lake asked.

“It might explain some things that have puzzled historians, especially recently. Under the Freedom of Information Act, quite a bit of material on World War II has become unclassified and open for researchers to study. One of my colleagues recently published a book based on some of this information. He uncovered documents that indicated that the Japanese ‘and the Russians were conducting secret negotiations in June of 1945. They were going to split Asia between them. That would allow the Japanese to redeploy their Kwantung army in Manchuria — over a million troops — back to Japan to face the American invasion. My colleague stated that the documents he had access to said that the Soviets had very seriously considered the proposal.

“When I first heard of that, I thought it was almost as ridiculous as the story of a Japanese atomic bomb,” Harmon said. “I saw no reason for the Soviets to negotiate for what they could, and did, seize by force. But putting the two together, I see now that maybe the Japanese did have something to offer the Russians. Maybe they offered to split Asia between them without a fight and throw in the secret of atomic weapons at the same time. The Russians were already splitting up Europe at that time and looking ahead to their next enemy — the United States.”

“Jesus,” Lake said. He was staring at Harmon as they negotiated the streets of San Francisco. “Do you think that’s possible?”

Harmon’s hands were gripping the steering wheel tightly. “I think it is. I think the dropping of our bomb on Hiroshima put an end to that, but I think the Russians would have been very tempted to get the secret of the atom from the Japanese and might have been willing to pay.a very high price for it. It might also explain why the Russians were so keen on occupying and keeping North Korea after the war was over.”

Lake felt a splitting headache, centered right between his eyes. They were turning onto the Bay Bridge, leaving San Francisco behind. “I don’t know, Peggy. This whole thing is so far beyond me, I can’t even begin to see all the angles and edges to it. Is anything the way it was in the history I was taught in school, or is it all just a bunch of lies and cover-ups and double-dealing?” “Depends if you want to look at the world as a good place or a bad place,” Harmon said.

“No,” Lake disagreed. “There is a truth under it all.”

“There may be, but it’s a truth no one will probably ever know. Even if you can find out exactly what happened, you can never be sure you know the why. And it’s the why behind an action that is key. That’s the trouble with being a historian.”

“But I’m not a historian,” Lake said. “I can try to find out.” He looked out the window at the water of the harbor below. “I can most certainly try to find out,” he whispered.

He felt her right hand slide over and touch his forearm. It slid down his arm until she had his hand. “I’ll help you as much as I can,” she said. She wrapped her fingers in his and they made the rest of the trip like that in silence.

“I believe I am getting tired of seeing you here,” Okomo said.

Nishin was tired of coming to the Japan Center. He felt like he was tied to the Yakuza’s coattail for information, but this was their country, not his. “I need to find where a phone number is.”

“You come to me for something as simple as that?” Okomo shook his head. “Have you never heard of a reverse directory?”

Nishin remained silent, not wanting to admit he hadn’t. He longed for this mission to be over and to be back in Japan where he understood the environment in which he worked.

“The number?” Okomo asked, his voice dripping with disgust.

Nishin repeated the number Jonas had given him and one of the men at Okomo’s side spoke into a phone. A few seconds later he wrote something down on a piece of paper and handed it to the old man. Okomo looked at it, then folded it and tossed it at Nishin’s feet. “There is the location of your phone. Is there anything else you need? Perhaps someone to wipe your chin after you eat?”

Nishin slowly bent down and picked up the paper. He locked eyes with Okomo.

“Take him out of here,” the old man said, not blinking. Two Yakuza grabbed Nishin’s elbows and hustled him to the staircase. As soon as he was gone, Okomo slowly walked to the elevator to his rear. It slid down into the earth and when the doors opened to the dim red light he stepped forward, head down.

“Nishin is going to the gun dealer’s last location.”

The voice that came out of the shadows behind the desk was no more than a rasp, a whisper of what might have once been something more. It was old, but beyond that little could be told of the owner of the whisper. Only Okomo of all the Yaku/a was allowed down here. “That is no longer important. The North Koreans have a trawler en route. It will arrive much sooner than I expected.

“The gun dealer’s superior is the one we want to be here and he is coming. Direct Nishin further so that he is where we want at the right time and most importantly so that word gets back to his superior that the stakes have risen and that time is short. Hold your men ready. As we planned, the clouds are gathering and the storm will break very soon.”

Okomo bowed at the waist. “Yes, Oyabun.”

Lake briefed Araki as succinctly as possible about all they had found out, leaving out the detail of the bomb’s location. He felt that since the bomb was in American water, that was more his concern than Nishin’s. They were seated on a bench outside Wellman Hall, the sun shining brightly down on them. Students passed back and forth on the walkways all around.

“So the bomb might be here?” was the first thing Araki said when he was done.

“Yes,” Lake answered, feeling like he wasn’t holding too much back from the Japanese agent. For all he knew, Araki knew exactly where it was. “Somewhere off the coast. Maybe within three miles of the harbor.”

“And that is why the Koreans are coming,” Araki said. “This is very bad news.”

Lake frowned. “How would the Koreans know that, though? It wasn’t in the records that we found.”

“Maybe they have other information,” Araki said.

“What about the trawler?” Lake asked. “When is it due in?”

“Sometime after midnight and before dawn at its present course and speed.”

“And your stealth ship is still off shore?” Lake asked.

Araki gave a half-smile. “Perhaps.”

Lake had had enough. It was Feliks’s problem now. He stood up. “I don’t know what’s going on and it’s no longer my jurisdiction. I’m done with it.” “What do you mean?” Araki asked, surprised at his sudden movement.

“I’ve been relieved. My superior is coming here to take over the entire case.” “You did not tell him about me, did you?” Araki asked, concerned.

“No. But I’m done with it, so you’re on your own.”

Araki stood. “It was good to work with you.”

“Yeah, right.” Lake turned and walked away. After turning the corner, he went into a side door of Wellman Hall. Harmon was in her office, waiting for him.

“How did it go?”

Lake settled down onto the old battered couch next to a bookcase. “I told him what he needed to know but not about what we just found out. If nothing else happens, at least the Japanese will stop the Koreans from recovering the bomb.”

“Why not tell Araki where the bomb is and let the Japanese take care of it? They put it there,” Harmon said, “why not let them take it away?”

“I don’t know,” Lake said, rubbing his forehead.

Harmon came over with a mug of fresh coffee and sat down, handing it to him. “How are you feeling?”

“Beat,” Lake said, taking a sip, then leaning his head back against the wall.

Harmon put a hand on his forehead and gently pressed down, her fingers strong and firm, massaging from the center around to his temples, then again.

Lake slowly felt himself relax, the stress of the past weeks receding for a little while at least. He felt her lean closer, her breath on his neck, her side pressing up against him. He opened his eyes and turned his head, looking into her eyes so close. He cradled her head with his hands and drew her to him. He felt her lips on his, then was briefly startled as her tongue snaked out, ran around his lips, then darted inside his mouth and just as quickly was gone.

Lake turned, sliding his hands down until he had his arms around her waist, then he stood, easily lifting her. Her legs wrapped around his waist, her skirt sliding up around her hips. “I—” he began, but she quieted him with a finger to his lips. “Not a word.”

He pressed her back against the wall between the bookcase and couch. She reached down and unbuckled his belt. It was awkward but their sudden passion overcame each obstacle, unzipping, pushing aside, until he slid into her.

Lake felt her mouth on his neck, her teeth biting. He pulled his head back slightly and tried to see her eyes, but they were closed. She leaned her head back and it thumped lightly into the wall with each stroke he made. She didn’t seem to notice but he did. He carried her over to the desk and laid her down on top of the message folders from the Japanese Navy in World War II.

“What if one of your students walks in?” he softly said to her, leaning over, nibbling on her neck.

“They’ll get the thrill of their life,” she whispered in return.

“What about—” Lake paused.

Her eyes opened. “God, ever the practical one. I’m on the pill. Now shut up.” She punctuated the sentence by grabbing the collar of his windbreaker and inducing her own rhythm over his. Lake shifted his own body, feeling the flow of her body under his, the pressure of her hands, the pace of her breathing.

Nishin looked around the hotel room. It was as bare as a room he would have occupied. He’d searched it thoroughly, although there wasn’t much to search. An empty dresser. A bed with one sheet on it that looked like it had never been slept in. An empty closet. An empty medicine chest. If Nishin had not confirmed that the phone number Jonas had given him was the pay phone down the hallway, he would have thought no one had been in here in days.

He walked over to the grimy window and looked out on a debris-filled alley. The room was on the second floor and a fire escape was right outside. It was exactly the type of room Nishin would have chosen.

There were footsteps in the hallway. Nishin drew his 9mm and slid across the room so that he would not be seen as soon as the door opened. The door swung wide open and an Asian man wearing a leather jacket and a black watch cap stepped in. Nishin drew a bead on the back of the man’s head.

“Do not move or you will die,” Nishin said in English.

He was surprised when the figure answered him in fluent Japanese. “I come from the Oyabun. He had more information about the man you are seeking. The man from this room.”

The barrel of the gun didn’t waver. Nishin wondered why they couldn’t have told him this when he was at the Japan Center. “Go ahead.”

“He is an agent of the American government who spies on the Patriot movement. He works for an organization called the Ranch, which is headed by a man named Feliks.”

“Why wasn’t I informed of this earlier?”

“I am relaying a message for the Oyabun,” the man simply said.

“Anything else?”

“That is the message.”

“Go.”

Nishin left via the fire escape on the chance that the Yakuza might be waiting for him below. He hurried to the first pay phone he could find and called in what he had just learned to Nakanga.

“The American government had an agent on board the North Korean trawler that was sunk,” Nakanga said. “He perished with the ship when it went down, but the man was aware of the North Koreans and the breakin at Berkeley, so we must assume that the American government knows something.”

Genoysha Kuzumi watched his chief sensei without expression or comment.

“The American’s name was Lake and he worked for a secret organization called the Ranch. His superior’s name is Feliks. I do not know whether that is a code name or not. This information was given to Nishin by the Yakuza. I do not know where they got their information from. We do have a file on the Ranch and a man named Feliks,” he added, but he didn’t seem overly happy about that piece of information.

Kuzumi looked at Nakanga’s hands. They were empty. He felt great irritation. “Where is the file?”

“There was just a file folder, Genoysha. There was nothing in it. It is among the old records. We do not know when it was started or what happened to the material in it.”

Kuzumi stiffened. Only the Genoysha could permanently remove material from the intelligence files and he knew that he had not done so. That meant it had been done before his time. Genoysha Taiyo must have hidden or destroyed the material. It also meant this went back many years.

Nakanga hurried on. “The second North Korean trawler will arrive in the vicinity of San Francisco after midnight, local American time. About eleven or twelve hours from now.”

“Why is it heading there?”

“I do not know, Genoysha. Perhaps to recover something from the sunken first trawler.”

I do not think so, Kuzumi thought. Not if it was equipped to search for radioactivity. There was much Nakanga did not know, that Kuzumi was getting from his own source. The American named Lake had not perished. The Koreans were on the trail of Genzai Bakudan itself. It was all bad news, but inside the dark cloud of this information there was something that thrilled Kuzumi: to think they had made it so close with Genzai Bakudan!

Kuzumi’s mind had been racing ever since receiving the news about 1-24. He cursed Taiyo even more. What had the man held back from him? The only thing Taiyo had ever told him about the second bomb was that it had been lost at sea en route from Hungnam to Japan. Obviously that was a lie.

Kuzumi stiffened. He could see clearly the first Genzai Bakudan, lying in the entranceway to the cave, ready for its journey to the dock. The second bomb right behind it.

He had done the final preparations on both bombs himself. The thought that sent chills up his spine was the realization that he had prepared the two remote detonators for the I24 bomb. One had been taken by an agent of the Black Ocean a week prior to the bomb’s departure. Kuzumi remembered the man now, and he remembered asking him where the detonator was going.

The man had not answered him other than to say that he was working under direct orders of the Genoysha. He had left the cave, the detonator in a black leather bag, such as that carried by doctors, and gone to the airfield to fly out. Kuzumi had never heard what had happened to that detonator. But now that he knew what had happened to the bomb, he knew what had happened to the detonator.

The bomb was designed to be towed by the midget sub to its location. It would then be left in place. They would have to wait on final orders for detonation and the proper timing. The crewman would either leave or die with the submarine, but he could not survive underwater for more than a day or so. There was enough air in a midget sub for that long. So they must have prepared another way to detonate the bomb at the target with the remote.

It was very plain to see now. It was what Kuzumi would do if he had to make such a choice. The remote detonator had been sent to America through the TO network and Kuzumi knew whose hands it had ended up in: Nira’s. Why had she not detonated it? Had it malfunctioned, or, as was more likely, had she been stopped from finishing the mission?

Was there more to her “suicide” than Taiyo had let on? What had happened? Had the Americans stopped her? Why was the file on this American organization missing? Kuzumi saw plots within plots and he saw the death of the woman he had loved a half a century before at the center of a typhoon of deceit. The question was: Who had been the architects of all this? For the first time in his life, Kuzumi turned his head and looked at the painting of the Sun Goddess that hung behind the desk and he was uncertain.

Kuzumi’s fist slammed into the teak desktop, startling Nakanga, who had been waiting patiently for further orders. “Make preparations for travel,” Kuzumi ordered.

Nakanga inclined his head, indicating he understood the order. “Where am I to go, Genoysha?”

“You are going with me.” Nakanga’s head snapped up, his eyes wide in disbelief. “To San Francisco.”

“But, Genoysha! You cannot—”

“Prepare for travel.” Kuzumi’s voice left no room for argument. “We leave immediately. How long will it take us to arrive in San Francisco?”

“By our fastest jet, it will take us nine hours, Genoysha.”

“Then we may arrive before the trawler?”

“Yes.”

“Make the arrangements, quickly.” Nakanga paused in the doorway. “And Ronin Nishin, Genoysha? What should his orders be?”

“He is to do nothing.”

“But what about the Korean ship? Should it not be stopped?”

“I have already made arrangements for that,” Kuzumi said. “Now, no more discussion. We must leave immediately.”