The Japanese Corpse

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"Bah," the Commissaris said, and pulled his mattress out of the cupboard. "I am going to take a nap. I think I have done all I should have done, but it is too complicated for an old man. I can't keep this up much longer; too many things to keep in mind. Let me see now. I phoned Mr. Johnson from the bathhouse up the street. The bathhouse phone won't be tapped. Maybe the phone here isn't tapped either, but I couldn't take the chance. Mr. Johnson doesn't speak Dutch and some Japanese speak English. The CIA is going to do everything we want them to do. They are flying out a Dutchman to Hong Kong. He'll be our agent. Mr. Woo gave me the telephone number of his agent and a time. It was on that slip of paper which also gave the amount we are supposed to pay for the heroin. According to Mr. Johnson, the price is right. So our agent phones Woo's agent and the two can meet on the day next week that Woo is meeting us here. The two yakusa in Amsterdam will stay in jail for the time being. I don't know how Johnson is going to arrange it. Our public prosecutor won't like it at all. Maybe they are working it through our Ministry of Justice. Some justice, but that's got nothing to do with us. And the CIA will supply us with the money to give to Mr. Woo. I can pick it up tomorrow at some bank here; I've got the address. It'll be a nice tidy sum to carry around. The yakusa should be shadowing us. Well, we'll just take that risk. They haven't stopped us yet so maybe we'll get through again. I can stuff the money in my pockets and ask for big bills. I don't want to carry a briefcase or anything. In fact, I don't want to do anything either. I never have. But I am the tool of circumstances, a bit of flotsam in a choppy sea. That's what I am. A sleepy bit of flotsam." He was patting the little cushion lovingly. "A little nap, that'll be nice. And what have you done today, sergeant?"

De Gier had sat down and was rolling a cigarette. The package of Dutch shag tobacco looked out of place, but de Gier's dextrous movements and the way he licked the cigarette paper offset the impression.

"Sergeant?"

"Yes, sir. I am going sailing tomorrow with the yakusa girl. Yuiko-san has a few days off, she is still recuperating from the operation. We'll rent a boat."

"The girl fell for you, eh?"

"No, sir," de Gier said, and rested his head against a post in the wall. "Her loyalty is with her employers. Maybe she likes me. She held my hand when she was in the hospital and I came to visit her. She was drugged then. But she'll have me killed if that's what the daimyo wants. I am sure she wouldn't hesitate at all. I think they'll have another try tomorrow, when I am on the lake.

"We just had a meal together, Yuiko-san and I, and we talked. She told me that the daimyo thought of the tricks with your mask and my death on the stage. She says he likes doing that sort of thing. The roughhouse stuff is planned by Kono, the bully who tried to make you do the knife trick. I have a feeling the daimyo will take his turn tomorrow. They must know that Woo Shan has visited us, and if we can get the heroin trade away from them too, it should be too much to accept."

The commissaris rolled over on his mattress and looked at the ceiling. A scraping rustling sound was penetrating through the slabs and beams.

"Funny," the commissaris said. "That sounds like sweeping, doesn't it? But this isn't the time for cleaning rooms; the maids do it earlier in the day. The daimyo, you said, that's their top banana. Yes, maybe you are right. Lake Biwa would be an ideal playground for him, and you'll be in a sailboat, all on your own with a few miles of water to separate you from the shore and eventual help. But we can have another boat hovering around. Dorin will be delighted, I am sure. We could also arrange for a plane to keep an eye on you. But maybe there is no reason to worry. We are prepared now and half the danger of the daimyo's charades lies in the victim being unaware. Although…"

De Gier was looking at the ceiling too. The sound continued; there was a steady rhythm to it.

"If that is sweeping, there must be a lot to sweep," de Gier said, "and the floors here are always very clean. We walk about barefoot or in our socks. I have seen the maids clean, but all they catch is a bit of ash and minute particles of dirt, and the straws of their own broom. I think their cleaning is more like a ritual."

"Yes. Strange. The daimyo, he is clever. I wonder how well he has penetrated into our minds. If he has been observing us he may know what to do. Perhaps we shouldn't underestimate our own weakness. I should know by now; I was drooling at the mouth when he caught me in the temple garden."

There was a knock on the door and Dorin came in, carrying two large paper bags and a broom.

"Was that you sweeping?" de Gier asked.

"Yes."

"But your room is next door to ours, isn't it?"

"They moved me out of it this morning. I prefer the room upstairs. I can look over the wall now, into the temple compound across the road, and the priests are having a big ceremony tomorrow which I want to see. They all come in their best robes and do a sort of dance. They do it once a month. Yes, that was me sweeping. I was sweeping up dead flies. They are in these bags now."

He opened one of the bags and showed its contents to the commissaris, then to de Gier. The bag was full to the brim. The flies were fairly large. They had striped bodies, green wings and bulging eyes. And they were all dead.

"When Dutchmen go to the Far East, flies follow," the commissaris said slowly.

Dorin sat down and lit a cigarette. His hand was shaking a little and his eyes looked tired; the finely drawn eyebrows sagged and there were deep wrinkles on his forehead.

"If each fly is a hint you got a lot of hints," de Gier said. "There must be somebody here in the inn who keeps the yakusa informed about us. You only moved into the room this morning, didn't you?"

"Yes, and I was out for an hour only. They must have been waiting for me. I wonder where they got the flies. I can't stand flies, but most Japanese hate them. We are a proverbially clean people, and flies have to do with dirt and rotting food and corpses and disease."

"And Dutchmen," de Gier mumbled, and walked over to the other bag, which Dorin had left near the door and looked into it. "Where did I see a lot of flies once?" he asked aloud, staring at the bag. "At a farm I think it was, in Holland somewhere. We were investigating somebody's death, a long time ago. That's right. I went into the barn and opened a door leading into a partitioning, and there were a million dead flies. The farmer said that they had all come out of their eggs at the same time, but they were in a closed part of the barn. He had built the partitioning during the winter. When the flies hatched they couldn't find any food and died of starvation. Everything in the room was covered with their bodies. Maybe these came from a barn too. A barn. I had something to do with a barn. But what was it?"

"A barn?" the commissaris asked. "Have you been in any barns since we arrived in Japan? I haven't been near a farm as far as I know."

"Bird barn!" de Gier exclaimed. "Yuiko-san was telling me about Kono. Kono has a birdbarn. He sleeps in it when the peacock eggs are incubating. The bird barn is on the grounds of the daimyo's castle."

"Well," the commissaris said brightly. "The dead flies didn't upset you, did they, Dorin?"

"They did," Dorin said. "I vomited twice; I just made it to the bathroom each time. I knew I had something coming, but I find it very difficult to defend myself against this sort of thing."

"So why did you sweep them up? The maids could have done it for you."

"A little revenge," Dorin said. "The sergeant asked me this morning if I believe in revenge. I do. Maybe it doesn't accomplish much and only provokes action from the other side and sets off an endless chain of suffering, but it will relieve my feelings. I am going to sprinkle these flies all over the bar in the yakusa nightclub, tonight some time."

"Right now," de Gier said, "there may be nobody around. It's still early in the afternoon. I'll help you If you like."

"You are too conspicuous," Dorin said. "Thanks anyway. And you are right about the time. I'll go as a plumber. It's a disguise I have used before, and I have some affinity with the trade. My uncle is a plumber and I used to go with him on jobs when I was a kid. I have the right clothes with me, and one of my bags is a plumber's toolbox. I'll find a few pipes which I can keep under my arm."

"Yes," the commissaris said. "You can go through the back door. Can you pick locks?"

Dorin nodded.

"There's something else," de Gier said. "I am going sailing with a yakusa girl tomorrow, on Lake Biwa. The commissaris thinks you might be around too, in another boat or a plane."

"A boat," Dorin said. "I can get one easily. We'll discuss the details after I come back, and if I don't come back you can phone the emergency number you have. You should phone it anyway if I don't come back. They'll know what to do. But perhaps you shouldn't go sailing tomorrow. I telephoned my superiors in Tokyo this morning, and they think we know enough. They are prepared to give the word to have both the nightclub here and the daimyo's castle raided. We don't really need a well-prepared case. I am not a policeman and my superiors aren't either. They have enough power to wipe out the daimyo and his tribe. They didn't have it before, because the daimyo has friends in Tokyo too, government rats, rats with sticky paws, but their paws are drying up. The daimyo is losing his strength. The heroin connection to Europe was important to him, and it's gone now. The art business is only a sideline, but now that we have proof we could approach a few reporters and get the magazines to do illustrated stories. JAPANESE HOLY TREASURES GOING WEST. The government rats don't want to be associated with a juicy scandal and the magazines could make it very juicy. Unfortunately, we still don't know the identity of the daimyo."

"So how do you know you have caught him when you raid his castle?" the commissaris asked.

"We'll raze it. I'll bring in special troops, the Snow Monkeys of my own regiment. We don't have a standing army anymore, but there are still warriors in Japan, volunteers, hand-picked, well trained."

"Snow Monkeys?" the commissaris asked.

Dorin smiled. He looked much better now. The bags of flies stood leaning against the table, forgotten. His eyes were sparkling.

"Snow Monkeys, the monkeys of Hokkaido, our big island in the North. They are macaques, short-tailed monkeys that can live anywhere. In Africa they are short-haired, but our variety has grown fluffy gray coats, and they walk in single file through the snow. When they get too cold they warm up by bathing in the hot springs, and while their bottoms are almost boiled the snow still sits on their heads. They survived even during the times that we hunted them, and they can act in groups and on their own. Japanese have never been known for their individual strength. The American soldiers would try to shoot our officers, for they knew they could pick off the soldiers one by one afterward. But the Snow Monkeys can make their own decisions, although they are disciplined enough to obey orders. And they have retained some of the old samurai values. They won't surrender."

"What do they believe in?" de Gier asked.

Dorin shrugged. "I don't know what my fellow officers base their guidance on, but I have never encouraged any idealism in my own men. I try not to believe in anything myself. Ultimately there is nothing, and it is better to believe in nothing from the start. But it takes great courage not to believe. My own life is continuous proof. Anything upsets me, even dead flies. But I try."

"And so do the Snow Monkeys," the commissaris said. "If they attack the palace they will destroy it completely, I imagine, and the daimyo with it, if he happens to be in. What sort of weapons do your men use, Dorin?"

"They are familiar with most weapons, but their main training is with the American M-16 automatic rifle, the Uzzi submachine gun and the Walther pistol. I would like them to use tanks or machine-gun carriers when they attack the castle, but the roads are too narrow and the yakusa will see them coming. I think I'll have them flown in with helicopters and supply them with jeeps. They can use small mortars for blasting the compounds of the castle, and the helicopters can gun anyone down who shows his face. There will also be a bit of bombing, and the men can rush the place once the bombs have exploded. It should be over in half an hour at the most. The palace may have escape tunnels, but they will have to come up somewhere, so I can have roadblocks at various strategic points. There aren't too many roads and we have good maps; the maps show the mountain paths too. Some of the Snow Monkeys are in the Rokko Mountains right now, disguised as tourists. So there is really no need for you to take any more risks. Maybe it would be foolish to go further. The yakusa haven't guessed who we are, but they may one day, tomorrow perhaps."

"Or today," de Gier said, "while you are sprinkling the dead flies about in their nightclub. I am rather looking forward to my outing on Lake Biwa tomorrow. What do you think, sir?"

The commissaris got up and took off his kimono. He put his right leg in his trousers and almost lost his balance.

"I am feeling peckish. I am going out to have a tempura dinner in one of the stalls of the market. If either of you two wants to accompany me you are welcome. I don't know about going on really. Dorin is our host and protector. We are on loan to the government of Japan, and Dorin is our connection with that government. If he thinks the yakusa should be wiped out in their lair, by short-tailed apes who like to boil themselves alive in hot springs… well… good luck to them, I say. We are only a couple of smelly barbarians from a faraway swamp."

Dorin, whose face had clouded when the commissaris had started his preamble, was grinning broadly.

"But I would prefer to go on for a day or two," the commissaris added, "personally I mean. Maybe we'll have a chance to find out who the daimyo is."

"O.K.," Dorin said. "I am off to sprinkle flies, and we'll discuss our plans for the picnic on Lake Biwa when I come back. You two can eat your tempuras. Get some good shrimps in them, select them yourselves. The restaurant owners like their clients to show an interest in what they are going to eat. And stay away from the green mustard this time. I have a gaijin friend in Tokyo who had to drink milk for a year; the mustard burned ulcers into his stomach. It is full of ginger concentrate and horseradish. It doesn't just make you sneeze."

De Gier sighed, relieved, when Dorin had left the room. "Good thing you put in that bit about smelly barbarians, sir. He didn't like the quote about short-tailed apes. He had said it himself, of course, but you were hurting his vanity when you repeated his own words. Strange that he has any vanity left, don't you think? It's the first time I saw it."

"Our Dorin is a very evolved human being," the commissaris said, still trying to struggle into his trousers, which were weighed down by the pistol strapped to the belt. "He'll be an angel in his next life, or a bodhisattva, as the Daidharmaji priests call them. But angels are vain too, and not only Lucifer."

"Gabriel," de Gier said. "If Dorin gets us to the plane home I will call him Gabriel. We've got too many odds against us."

"Do you mind?" the commissaris asked.

"No, sir. But I have nothing to go back for."

"You have," the commissaris said, "and you should find out about it. Time is short, sergeant. You will be a graybeard soon, doing crossword puzzles in an overheated room in a home for retired policemen."

De Gier looked up.

"Never mind," the commissaris said, "sometimes I get a little depressed."