Temple of Fear

Chapter 6

The house was dimly lit by paper lanterns. "It is not so much that I follow the old customs," said Kunizo Matu as he led the AXEman into an inner room. "Bad lighting is an asset in this neighborhood. Especially now that I have declared my own private little war on the Chinese Commies. My daughter told you of this?"

"A little," said Nick. "Not too much. She said you would clear up everything. I wish you would. There is a lot that puzzles me."

The room was well proportioned, the furnishings in the Japanese style. Straw mats, a low table on the tatami, flowers on the rice paper wall, soft cushions around the table. On the table were small cups and a bottle of saki.

Matu pointed to a cushion. "You will have to sit on the floor, my old friend. But first — did you bring my medallion? I value it highly and I want it with me when I die." It was a simple statement of fact without sentimentality.

Nick fished the medallion out of a pocket and handed it to him. But for Tonaka he would have forgotten it. She had told him: "The old man will 3sk for it."

Matu took the gold and jade disc and put it away in a table drawer. He sank down across the table from Nick and reached for the saki bottle. "We will not stand on ceremony, my old friend, but there is time for a little drink to remember all the yesterdays. It was good of you to come."

Nick smiled. "I had very little choice, Kunizo. Did she tell you how she and her Girl Scout friends got me here?"

"She told me. She is a most obedient daughter — yet I had not really meant for her to go to such extremes. It may be that I was a little overenthusiastic in my instructions. I merely hoped that she could convince you." He poured saki into the eggshell cups.

Nick Carter shrugged. "She convinced me. Forget it. Kunizo. I would have come anyway, once I understood the seriousness of the matter. It is just that I may have a little trouble explaining things to my boss."

"David Hawk?" Matu handed him a cup of saki.

"You know that?"

Matu nodded and drank saki. He was still built like a sumo wrestler, but now the fat draped him in robes of flabbiness and his features were too sharp. His eyes were deep set, with huge pouches under them, and they burned with fever and with something else that was consuming him.

He nodded again. "I always knew a great deal more than you suspected, Nick. About you and AXE. You knew me as a friend, and as your karate and judo teacher. I was working for Japanese Intelligience."

"So Tonaka told me."

"Yes. I told her that at last. What she could not tell you, because she does not know — very few people do — is that I was a double agent all those years. I also worked for the British. For MI5."

Nick sipped at his saki. He was not particularly surprised, though it was news to him. He kept his eye on the stubby Swedish K machine gun that Matu had been carrying — it was on the table — and said nothing. Matu had brought him many thousands of miles to talk. When he was ready he would. Nick waited.

Matu was not yet ready to get down to cases. He stared at the saki bottle. Rain played a tinny ragtime on the roof. Someone coughed somewhere in the house. Nick cocked an ear and looked at the big man.

"A servant. A good boy. We can trust him."

Nick refilled his cup with saki and lit a cigarette. Matu refused. "My doctor does not permit it. He is a liar and says that I will live a long time." He tapped his huge belly. "I know better. This cancer is eating me alive. My daughter mentioned this?"

"Something of it." The doctor was a liar. Killmaster knew death when it was written on a man's face.

Kunizo Matu sighed. "I give myself six months. It is not much time to do the things I would like. A pity. But then I suppose it is always like that — one stalls and delays and puts off, and then one day Death is there and the time is all gone. I…"

Gently, very gently, Nick prodded him. "I understand some of it, Kunizo. Some of it I do not. About your people and how you have come back to them, the Burakumin, and that things are not well with you and your daughter. I know you are trying to make amends before you die. You have all my sympathy, Kunizo, and you know that in our profession sympathy is not given easily and is hard to come by. But we have always been honest and blunt with each other — you must come to the point, Kunizo! What do you want of me?"

Matu expelled a long breath. There was about him a peculiar odor and Nick wondered if it was the actual smell of the cancer. He had read that some of them did stink.

"You are right," said Matu. "Just as in the old days — you were usually right. So listen carefully. I told you that I was a double agent, working for both our intelligence and for British MI5. Well, in MI5 I came to know a man by the name of Cecil Aubrey. He was only a junior officer then. Now he is a knight, or soon will be — Sir Cecil Aubrey! Now, even after all these years, I still have many contacts. I have kept them in good repair, you might say. For an old man, Nick, for a dying man, I know pretty well what goes on in the world. In our world. The espionage underground. A few months ago…"

Kunizo Matu spoke steadily for half an hour. Nick Carter listened intently, interrupting only now and then to ask a question. Mostly he drank saki, smoked one cigarette after another and fondled the Swedish K machine gun. It was an exquisite piece of machinery.

Kunizo Matu said: "So you see, old friend, it is a complex matter. I no longer have official connections, so I have organized the Eta women and do the best I can. It is frustrating at times. Especially now, when we are confronted with a double plot. I am sure that Richard Philston has not come to Tokyo merely to organize a sabotage campaign and a blackout. There is more to it than that. Much more. It is my humble opinion that the Russians are going to swindle the Chinese somehow, double-cross them and leave them in the soup."

Nick's grin was hard. "Old Chinese recipe for Duck soup — first catch duck!"

He had come doubly alert at the first mention of Richard Philston's name. To catch Philston, even to kill him, would be the coup of the century. It was hard to believe that the man would leave the safety of Russia just to oversee a sabotage ploy, no matter how massive. Kunizo was right about that. It had to be something else.

He filled his saki cup again. "You're positive that Philston is in Tokyo? Now?"

Fat billowed as the old man shrugged his big shoulders. "As positive as one can ever be in this business. Yes. He is here. I had him and then I lost him. He knows all the tricks. It is my belief that even Johnny Chow, who is the leader of the local Chicoms, does not at the moment know where Philston is. And they are supposed to be working closely together."

"That means Philston has his own people, then. His own organization apart from the Chicoms?"

Again the shrug. "I suppose so. A small group. It would have to be small to avoid attention. Philston will operate on his own. He will have no connection with the Russian Embassy here. If he is caught doing — whatever it is that he intends doing — they will disavow him."

Nick thought a moment. "Their place still at 1 Azabu Mamiana?"

"The same. But it is no good watching their Embassy. For days now my girls have kept a 24-hour watch. Nothing."

The front door began to slide open. Slowly. An inch at a time. The grooves were well tallowed and the door made no sound.

"So there you are," said Kunizo Matu. "I can handle the sabotage plot. I can get evidence and, at the last moment, hand it over to the police. They will listen to me because, although I am no longer active, I can still bring certain pressures to bear. But I can do nothing about Richard Philston and he is the real danger. That game is too big for me. It is why I sent for you, why I sent the medallion, why I ask now what I thought I never would ask. That you pay a debt."

He leaned suddenly over the little table toward Nick. "A debt / never claimed, mind you! It is you, Nick, who has always insisted that you owe me for your life."

"That is true. I do not like debts. I will pay it if I can. You want me to find Richard Philston and kill him?"

Matu's eyes burned at him. "I do not care what you do with him. Kill him. Turn him over to our police, take him back to the States. Give him to the British. It is all one to me."

The front door was open now. A spate of rain drifted in to wet the matting in the hall. The man moved slowly toward the inner room. The pistol glinted dully in his hand.

"MI5 knows that Philston is in Tokyo," said Matu. "I saw to that. I spoke of Cecil Aubrey a moment ago. He knows. He will know what to do."

Nick was not particularly pleased. "That means I might be falling all over British agents. CIA, too, if he asks our help officially. Things could get cluttered. I like to work alone as much as possible."

The man was halfway down the hall now. Carefully, without the betraying snick, he eased the safety off the pistol.

Nick Carter stood up and stretched. He was suddenly bone weary. "All right, Kunizo. We'll leave it at that. I'll try to find Philston. When I leave here I'll be on my own. Just to keep it from getting too fouled up I'm going to forget about this Johnny Chow and the Chinese and the sabotage plot. You handle that angle. I'll concentrate on Philston. When I get him, if I get him, then I'll decide what to do with him. Okay?"

Matu had also risen. He nodded and his chins trembled. "As you say, Nick. Okay. It is best, I think, to concentrate and narrow it down. But now I must show you something. Tonaka let you see the body at the — the place you were first taken?"

The man in the hall, standing in the dark, could see the dim silhouettes of the two men in the inner room. They had just risen from the table. One was stretching.

Nick said: "She did. Gentleman name of Sadanaga. Due to go into the harbor any time now."

Matu went to a small lacquered cabinet in a corner. He stooped with a grunt, his big belly swaying. "Your memory is as good as ever, Nick. But his name is not important. Not even his death. He is, not the first and he will not be the last. But I am glad you saw bis body. It, and this, will serve to explain just how rough a game is played by Johnny Chow and his Chicoms."

He put the little Buddha on the table. It stood about a foot high and was of bronze. Matu touched it and the front half swung open on minute hinges. Light glinted on the scores of tiny blades set into the inside of the statue.

"They call it the Bloody Buddha," said Matu. "An old idea brought up to date. And not really Oriental, you see, because it is a version of the Iron Maiden used in Europe in medieval times. They put the victim in the Buddha and close it on him. There are not, of course, really a thousand knives, but does it matter? He bleeds to death very slowly because the blades are arranged very cunningly and none of them stabs too deeply or touches a vital spot. Not a very pleasant death."

The door to the room slid open the first inch.

Nick had the picture. "The Chicoms force the Eta men into this Society of the Bloody Buddha?"

"Yes." Matu shook his head sadly. "A few of the Etas stand up to them. Not many. Etas, Burakumin, are a minority and they do not have many ways of fighting back. The Chicoms use jobs, political pressure, money — but mostly terror. They are very clever. They force the men to join the Society by terror, by threats to their wives and children. Then if the men renege, if they find their manhood again and try to fight back — you see what happens." He pointed to the deadly little Buddha on the table. "So I have turned to the women, and with some success, because the Chicoms have not yet figured out just how to handle the women. I had this model made to show the women, what would happen to them if they are caught."

Nick eased the Colt .45 in his belt, where it was digging into his stomach. "That's your worry, Kunizo. But I see what you mean — the Chicoms are going to black out Tokyo and burn it down and your people, the Eta, will be blamed."

The door behind them was half open now.

"The sad truth is, Nick, that many of my people do riot. They do loot and bum, in protest against poverty and discrimination. They are a natural tool for the Chicoms. I try to reason with them, but I do not have much success. My people are very bitter."

Nick shrugged into the old trenchcoat. "Yes. But that's your problem, Kunizo. Mine is to find Richard Philston. So I'll go to work, the sooner the better. One thing, thought — it might help me. What do you think that Philston is really up to? His real reason for being in Tokyo? It just might give me a starting place."

Silence. Behind them the door had stopped moving.

Matu said: "It is only a wild guess, Nick. Crazy. You must understand that. Laugh if you want to, but I think that Philston is in Tokyo to…"

The gun behind them coughed nastily in the silence. It was an old-fashioned broom-handle Luger with a relatively low muzzle velocity. The brutal 9mm slug tore away most of Kunizo Matu's face. His head jerked backward. His body, laden with fat, did not move for a split instant. Then he fell forward, smashing the little table to splinters, spewing blood on the totami, crushing the Buddha model.

By that time Nick Carter had hit the deck and was rolling to his right. He came up in a crouch with the Colt in his hand. He saw a vague figure, a blurred shadow, moving away from the door. Nick fired from his crouch.

BLA M-BLAM-BLA M-BLAM

The Colt roared like a canon in the silence. The shadow vanished and Nick heard footsteps pounding down the hali. He went after the sound.

The shadow was just going out the door. BLAM-BLAM. The heavy .45 was waking the echoes. And the neighborhood. Carter knew that he had only minutes, perhaps only seconds, to get the hell out of there. He did not look back at his old friend. That was over now.

He ran out into the rain and the first false hint of dawn. There was light enough to see the assassin making a left turn down the way that he, and Nick, had come in. It was probably the only way in and out. Nick pelted after him. He did not fire again. It was pointless, and already he had the gut-churning feeling of failure. The bastard was going to get away.

When he got to the turn there was no one in sight. Nick ran down the narrow passage that led back to the flophouses, slipping and sliding in the filth underfoot. Voices were all around him now. Babies crying. Women questioning. Men moving, and wondering.

At the stairs the old beggar still crouched beneath his rain mat. Nick touched his shoulder. "Papa-san! Did you see…"

The old man fell over like a broken doll. The ugly gash in his throat stared up at Nick like a silent and reproving mouth. The mat under him was drenched in red. In one gnarled hand he still clutched the crisp bill Nick had given him.

"Sorry, Papa-san." Nick vaulted up the steps. Despite the rain it was growing lighter by the minute. He had to get out of there. Now! No point at all in hanging around. The assassin had gotten clean away, lost in the maze of slums, and Kunizo Matu was dead, the cancer was cheated. Take it from there.

The police cars came into the street from opposite directions, two of them neatly blocking all escape. Two spotlights fixed him like a moth on cork.

"Tomarinasai!"

Nick stopped. There was a strong odor of frame-up and he was in the middle of it. Someone had been using a telephone and the timing was exquisite. He dropped the Colt and kicked it down the stairs. There was a chance, if he could engage their attention, that they wouldn't see it. Or find the dead beggar. Think fast, Carter! He did think fast and went into his act. He put up bis hands and walked slowly toward the nearest police car. He might get away with it. He had drunk just enough saki to have the smell on him.

He walked in between the two cars. They were halted now, engines purring softly, turret lights sparking around and around. Nick blinked in the glare of the headlights. He scowled, managed to lurch a little. He was Pete Fremont now and he had better not forget it. If they threw him in the sneezer he was finished. A caged hawk catches no rabbits.

"What in the hell is this all about? What goes on? People banging guns all over the place, cops stopping me! What the hell anyway?" Pete Fremont was mad and getting madder.

A cop got out of each car and walked into the bath of light. Both were small and neat. Both carried Nambu pistols, the big ones, and they were pointed at Nick. Pete.

The lieutenant looked at the big American and bowed slightly. A lieutenant! He made a note of that. Lieutenants didn't usually ride prowl cars.

"O namae wa?

"Pete Fremont. Is it all right if I put my hands down now, officer?" Heavy on the sarcasm.

The other cop, a solidly built little man with buck teeth, gave Nick a quick frisk. He nodded to the Lieutenant. Nick let his saki breath leak into the cop's face and saw him wince.

"Okay," said the lieutenant. "Hands down. Kokuseki wa?"

Nick swayed a little. "America-jin." He said it proudly, triumphantly, as if he were just about to sing "The Star Spangled Banner."

He hiccoughed. "American-jin, by God, and don't you forget it. If you monkeys think you're going to kick me around…"

The lieutenant looked bored. Drunken Yanks were no novelty to him. He held out his hand. "Papers, if you please."

Nick Carter handed over Pete Fremont's wallet and prayed a little.

The lieutenant was riffling through the wallet, holding it before one of the headlights. The other cop was standing back out of the light now, keeping his pistol on Nick. They knew their business, these Tokyo cops.

The lieutenant shot a glance at Nick. "Tokyo no jusho wa?"

Christ! His address in Tokyo? Pete Fremont's address in Tokyo. He didn't have a clue. All he could do was lie and hope. His brain clicked like a computer and he came up with something that might work.

"I don't live in Tokyo," he said. "I'm in Japan on business. Just got in last night. I live in Seoul. Korea." Frantically he racked his brain for an address in Seoul Had it! Sally Su's house.

"Where in Seoul?" The lieutenant had come closer now, was looking him up and down more carefully, judging him by his clothes and his smell. His half smile was disdainful. Just who are you trying to kid, saki-head?

"19 Dongjadong, Choongkoo." Nick leered and expelled saki breath at the lieutenant. "Check it out, Buster. You'll find I'm telling the truth." He let a whine creep into his voice "Say, what is this all about? I haven't done anything. I just came out here to see a girl. Then when I was leaving all the shooting started. And now you guys…"

The lieutenant was regarding him with slight puzzlement. Nick took heart. The cop was going to buy the story. Thank God he had gotten rid of the Colt. But he could still be in trouble if they went snooping around.

"You have been drinking?" It was a rhetorical question.

Nick swayed and hiccoughed again. "Yeah. I been drinking a little. I always drink when I'm with my girl. What about it?"

"You heard shooting? Guas being fired? Where?"

Nick shrugged. "I don't know exactly where. You can bet I didn't go to investigate! All I know is that I was just leaving my girl's house, minding my own business, and all of a sudden wham — wham!" He stopped and looked at the lieutenant suspiciously. "Hey! How come you people got here so fast? You were expecting trouble, eh?"

The lieutenant frowned. "I ask the questions, Mr. Fremont. But we did get a report of a disturbance around here. This neighborhood, you understand, is not of the best." He looked Nick up and down again, taking in the bedraggled suit and the crummy hat and trenchcoat. His expression confirmed his opinion that Mr. Pete Fremont belonged in this neighborhood. The phone call, as a matter of fact, had been anonymous and skimpy. There would be trouble in the Sanya district, near the flophouses, in half an hour. Shooting trouble. The caller was a law-abiding Japanese and thought the police should know. That was all — that and the click of a softly replaced phone.

The lieutenant scratched his chin and glanced around him. The light was growing. The jumble of shacks and hovels stretched for a mile in every direction. It was a maze and he knew he would find nothing in it. He did not have enough men for a proper search, even had he known what he was looking for. And the police, when they ventured into the Sanya jungle at all, went in fours and fives. He looked at the big drunken American. Fremont? Pete Fremont? That name was vaguely familiar but he couldn't place it. Did it matter? The Yank was obviously broke, on the beach, and there were a lot like him in Tokyo and any large city in the Orient. He had been shacking up with some Sanya whore. So what? That was not against the law.

Nick waited patiently. This was a time to keep his mouth shut. He was following the lieutenant's thoughts. The officer was going to let him go.

The lieutenant was about to hand the wallet back to Nick when a radio crackled metallically in one of the cars. Someone called softly to the lieutenant. He turned away, still with the wallet in his hand. "A moment, please." Always polite, the Tokyo cops. Nick cursed under his breath. It was getting too damned light! They were going to spot that dead beggar and then the stuff would hit the fan for sure.

The lieutenant came back. Nick felt a little sick as he recognized the expression on the man's face. He had seen it before. Cat knows where there is a nice fat canary.

The lieutenant opened the wallet again. "You say your name is Pete Fremont?"

Nick looked puzzled. At the same time he moved a small step closer to the lieutenant. Something had gone wrong. Badly wrong. He began to make a new plan.

He pointed to the wallet and said indignantly: "Yeah. Pete Fremont. It's all in there, for Christ's sake. Say, what is this! The old third degree? It won't work. I know my rights. You either charge me or let me go. And if you charge me I'll get right on the horn to the American Ambassador and…"

The lieutenant smiled and pounced. "I'm sure the Ambassador will be glad to hear from you, sir. I think you will have to come to the station with us. There seems to be a most curious mix-up. A man has been found dead in his apartment. A man who is also named Pete Fremont and who has been positively identified as Pete Fremont by his girl friend."

Nick tried to bluster. He moved another few inches closer to the man.

"So what? I didn't say I was the only Pete Fremont in the world. It's just a mistake."

The little lieutenant did not bow this time. He inclined his head very politely and said, "I am sure it is. But you will accompany us to the station, please, until we have this matter arranged." He motioned to the other cop who was still covering Nick with the Nambu.

Nick Carter went to the lieutenant in a swift gliding movement. The cop, though surprised, was well trained and went into a defensive judo posture, lax and waiting for Nick to lunge at him. Kunizo Matu had taught Nick that one years before.

Nick stopped short. He offered his right arm as bait and when the cop tried to clamp his wrist for the shoulder throw Nick took the arm away and jolted a vicious short left into the man's solar plexus. He had to get close, fast, before the other cops could start shooting.

Stunned, the lieutenant slumped forward, Nick caught him and moved behind him in a motion as fast as a heartbeat. He got a full nelson and lifted the man off the ground. He didn't weigh more than 120–130. With his legs spread wide so the man couldn't kick him in the groin Nick backed toward the steps leading to the passage behind the flophouses. It was the only way out now. The little cop dangled in front of him, an effective bullet shield.

Three cops were training guns on him now. The spotlights were feeble rays of dead light in the growing dawn.

Nick backed cautiously toward the steps. "Stay away," he warned them. "You rush me and I'll break his neck!"

The lieutenant tried to kick him and Nick put on a little pressure. The bones in the lieutenant's thin neck made a snapping sound. He groaned and stopped kicking.

"He's all right," Nick told them, "I haven't hurt him yet. Let's keep it that way."

Where in hell was that first step?

The three cops stopped following him. One of them ran back to a car and began talking rapidly into the radio mike. Calling for help. Nick didn't mind. He didn't plan to be around.

His foot touched the first step. Good. Now if he didn't make any mistakes he had a chance.

He scowled at the cops. They were keeping their distance.

"I'm taking him with me," Nick said. "Down this passage behind me. Try to follow and he's going to get hurt. Stay here like good little policemen and he will be okay. Up to you. Sayonara!"

He went backward down the steps. At the bottom he was just out of sight of the cops. He could feel the old beggar's body against his legs. He put on sudden pressure, bent the lieutenant's head forward and slammed him across the neck with a karate chop. His thumb was rigidly extended and he felt a little shock as the calloused flesh blade of his hand slammed into the scrawny neck. He dropped the man.

The Colt was lying partly under the dead beggar. "Nick scooped it up — the butt was sticky with the old man's blood — and ran down the passage. He kept the Colt in his right hand, jutting out. No one in this neighborhood was going to interfere with a man carrying a cannon.

It was now a matter of seconds. He wasn't going out of the Sanya jungle, he was going in, and once in the cops would never find him. The shacks were all of paper or wood or tin, flimsy fire traps, and it was simply a matter of bulldozing his way.

He made the turn to his right again and ran toward Matu's house. He ran in the front door, still open, and on through the inner room. Kunizo was lying there in his blood. Nick kept going.

He smashed through a paper door. A brown face peered in fright from a floor pad. The servant. Too scared to get up and investigate. Nick kept going.

He put his arms in front of his face and bulled through a wall. The paper and flimsy wood tore away with slight complaint. Nick began to feel like a tank.

He crossed a little open court littered with junk. There was another wood and paper wall. He plunged into it, leaving the outline of his big body in gaping cut-out. The room was empty. He slammed ahead, through another wall, into another room — or was it another house — and a man and woman gaped in astonishment from a floor bed. A child lay between them.

Nick touched his hat with a finger. "Sorry." He ran on.

He ran through six houses, kicked three dogs aside and surprised one couple in copulation before he came out in a narrow winding lane that led somewhere. That suited him. Somewhere away from the cops who were blundering and cursing along behind him. His trail was plain enough, but the cops were polite and dignified and had to do things the Japanese way. They would never catch him. Not in Sanya they wouldn't!

An hour later he was over the Namidabashi bridge and approaching Minowa station where he had left the Datsun parked. The station was crowded with early workers. There were many cars in the parking lot and queues already forming at the ticket windows.

Nick did not go directly into the station grounds. There was a small snack bar already open across the street and he had a koka-kora, wishing it was something much stronger. It had been a rugged night.

He could see the top of the Datsun. No one looked especially interested in it. He lingered over the Coke and let his eyes wander over the crowd, sifting and judging. No cops. He could have sworn to that.

Not that it meant he was out of this yet. Home free. Cops, he acknowledged, were going to be the least of his worries. Cops were fairly predictable. Cops he could handle.

Someone knew he was in Tokyo. Someone had followed him to Kunizo's place, in spite of all his precautions. Someone had killed Kunizo and set Nick up for it. That might have been accident, happenstance. They could have wanted to give the cops someone, anyone, to stop pursuit and questions. They might. He didn't really think so.

Or had someone followed him to Sanya? Had it been a setup from the very beginning? Or, if not a setup, how had someone known he would be in Kunizo's house? Nick could think of an answer to that one and he didn't like it. It made him feel a little sick. He had come to like Tonaka.

He headed for the parking lot. He wasn't going to solve anything by beating his brains out over a suburban Coke bar. He had to go to work. Kunizo was dead and he was without contacts for the moment. Somewhere in the Tokyo haystack was a needle by the name of Richard Philston and Nick had to find him. Fast.

He reached the Datsun and stared down. Passersby hissed in sympathy. Nick ignored them. All four of the tires had been slashed to ribbons.

A train came in. Nick started for the ticket window, reaching for his hip pocket. So he didn't have a car! He could take his train to Ueno Park and change to a train for downtown Tokyo. It was better, actually. A man in a car was confined, a good target, and easy to follow.

His hand came out of his pocket empty. He didn't have the wallet. Pete Fremont's wallet. The little cop had it.