The Last Assassin

13

I left for Tokyo from JFK in the morning. I would have preferred an indirect route, but we didn't have a lot of time. For security, Dox was traveling separately, and we would link up again at Narita.

Before going through security, I found a restroom at the end of the departures area. It was more distant from the check-in lines and from security screening than any of the others I had passed and, I hoped, would therefore be frequented by fewer travelers. I used a length of duct tape to secure the Strider to the underside of one of the toilets. I figured there was at least a fifty-percent chance it would be found by a cleaning crew, but if I got lucky, it would be waiting when I got back after finishing my business with Yamaoto, and I would be saved the hassle of having to get a new one.

I arrived at Narita late in the afternoon of the following day. After taking steps to verify the absence of a local welcoming committee, I found Dox and we caught a Narita Express train to Tokyo Station. The big man seemed perfectly at ease in the Asian surroundings, and I remembered how much time he had spent in the region. As for me, my feelings were, as always, mixed at being back here. For a long time, Tokyo had been the closest thing I had to a place I might call home. But it's not as though I ever belonged here, either, or ever really would.

While Dox roamed the mazelike station, I stopped at the local Vodafone shop so Mr Watanabe could buy another pair of prepaid cell phones. I would have preferred not to put the additional stress on the Watanabe identity, but the mini-bazaars for black market phones that were running out of Shin-Okubo and Ueno when I lived in Tokyo had been cleaned up, and I didn't have time to go searching for wherever they might have been reconstituted. Anyway, the connection between Cingular in the States and Vodafone in Japan seemed manageably remote. I would have asked Dox to buy the phones, but I was determined to do everything I could, to obscure his involvement.

When the phones were taken care of, I called Midori. She didn't pick up, but I left her a voice mail giving her the new mobile number. Even if she didn't need to reach me, or want to, I wanted to show her I could be there for her, and for Koichiro, even if only by phone. I didn't want her to think I was going to just disappear like a ghost, the way I had when she'd first left Tokyo.

We headed out. I wanted to see Tatsu right away, so Dox, who had spent enough time in Tokyo to know his way around, went to outfit himself with his customary personal cutlery while I headed to Jikei hospital. I caught the Yamanote line train to Shinbashi Station and walked the short distance from there. It was a cool but clear evening, and it felt good to be outside after the long trip from New York.

I circled the hospital, checking the hot spots, and used a side entrance to go in. On my own I felt secure, but Tatsu was a known nexus of mine, with plenty of his own enemies, and in going to see him I might be walking into an ambush. Nothing set off my radar. I went to the information desk in the bustling reception area and told one of the women sitting there that I wanted to see Ishikura Tatsuhiko, a patient. The woman checked the computer and told me that Ishikura-san was in the hospital's Oncology Clinic.

The sounds around me faded out. A wave of cold stole across my face and neck and spread through my gut. The woman gave me directions but I just stared at her, not hearing. I asked her to repeat herself but then after I walked away I realized I couldn't remember most of what she had said. I followed signs, feeling lost in the winding, fluorescent-lit corridors.

I found the ward, but couldn't recall the room number the receptionist had told me. I asked a nurse and she escorted me down the hall. Outside one of the doors stood an athletic-looking crew-cut Japanese man in a gray suit. There was a bulge under his jacket and a communication device in one of his cauliflower ears. He looked at me as I approached and I made sure to let him see my hands.

We stopped outside the door. While the man patted me down, the nurse poked her head inside and said in Japanese, 'Excuse me, Ishikura-san, you have a visitor…'

'Ii yo,' a weak voice responded from inside. Okay.

The nurse gestured to the room. The bodyguard walked me in, staying just behind me.

Tatsu was propped up in bed, surrounded by the usual depressing hospital machinery, an IV line snaking into his arm and a tube up his nose. I'd seen him only a month before, but he was ten kilos lighter now and looked as many years older. Whatever he had, it was eating him alive, and I could instantly see that all the machinery and IV lines in the world were nothing but a sick joke by comparison.

A pretty young woman sat to the right of the bed, a sleeping infant in her arms. Tatsu's daughter, I realized. He had told me the last time I saw him that his first grandson had just been born.

I hesitated, feeling I was intruding, but Tatsu waved me in. 'Hisashiburi,' He said weakly. It's been a while. He nodded to the bodyguard and the man left.

A number of lies came to my lips, but none made it farther than that. 'Damn, Tatsu,' I said, shaking my head, looking at him. 'Damn.'

He nodded weakly as if to say, Yes, I know, then gestured to the woman next to him. 'My daughter, Kaoru. And grandson, Arihiro.' His eyes were sunken but they lit up with his smile.

I bowed to the woman. 'It's good to meet you,' I said stiffly.

Because of the baby, she stayed in her seat, but bowed her head. 'I've heard a lot about you,' she said. 'You help my father in his work.'

I glanced at Tatsu. 'I try to.'

Tatsu said, 'Don't tell him what I say.'

The woman smiled. 'Only good things.'

I nodded. 'He's probably lying, then.'

Tatsu chuckled. The woman stood up, the child in one arm, her free hand on Tatsu's shoulder. 'I should get the baby home,' she said. 'Feed him and put him to bed.'

'Yes,' Tatsu said. 'Go. My friend here doesn't talk much, but he's good company.'

Tatsu turned toward the woman with a slight grimace, and she lowered the baby and held him there. Tatsu whispered something in the child's ear, and then, with another grimace, moved closer and kissed him softly on the cheek. He eased back onto the bed and let out a long breath.

'I'll see you tomorrow,' the woman said, her hand on his shoulder again.

Tatsu nodded. 'Yes. Bring the little one.'

The woman smiled and said, 'Of course.' She walked to the door and turned to me. 'Thank you,' she said. I wasn't sure for what. I bowed, and she was gone.

Tatsu looked at me and gestured to the chair. 'Let's talk, my friend. You didn't bring any good whiskey, did you?'

I sat down beside him. 'I thought you were off that stuff. Wife's orders.'

He looked at me with the trademark wry expression he reserved for moments of stupidity too monumental to bear comment, and for an instant he looked like himself again. 'Well, it doesn't matter very much now, does it?' he said.

'It's bad?'

The wry look gave way to a smile, as though this was the most amusing conversation he had had in a long time. 'What do you think?' he said.

We were quiet for a moment. I asked, 'How long?'

He shrugged. 'A few weeks, maybe.'

Christ. 'They can't…'

'Gastric cancer. Stage four. It's already in the lymph nodes, the esophagus… that's why I've lost all this weight. I can't hold anything down.'

'The whiskey would have been a waste, then.'

He chuckled. 'I could have just smelled it.'

We were quiet again.

He said, 'I assume you're still interested in finishing Yamaoto?'

I didn't know what to say. He had so little time, it didn't seem fair to make him use it talking about this. But then I realized, That's what he wants, maybe even what he needs.

'I'm still interested.'

'Good. The delivery will be at Wajima harbor.'

'Wajima…'

'On the Noto Peninsula, Ishikawa prefecture. The Sea of Japan. The gangs avoid large ports because of better security in the major facilities. They prefer quiet places like Fushiki in Toyama, Minamata in Kumamoto, Hososhima in Miyazaki.'

'Or this time, Wajima.'

'Yes. Yamaoto's men have made reservations at an inn there called Notonosho. The area is known for a hot spring, Nebuta, and apparently these men like the waters. Their names are Kito and Sanada, but they might be traveling under something else.'

'What timing are we talking about?'

'They arrive the day after tomorrow. The delivery will be the night after that. My informant still doesn't know how many Chinese will be involved. But my guess is no more than three. Otherwise the two yakuza would feel uncomfortable.'

I was thinking the same thing, but I only nodded.

'Rain-san, forgive me, but you're not as young as you used to be. Can you…'

'Look who's talking,' I said.

He laughed.

'Don't worry,' I told him. 'I've got help.'

He raised his eyebrows. 'Anyone I know?'

I shook my head. 'What about you? I know you're a workaholic, Tatsu, but how are you able to…?'

'During the day, I have a steady stream of visitors. The doctors hate it, but when they complain I say, "So? A little work won't kill me."'

We laughed, then were quiet again.

'It has to look as though Yamaoto's men killed the Chinese and stole the drugs,' he said. There was an odd fervor in his eyes. 'This will put a great deal of pressure on Yamaoto. A great deal.'

Most men, lying on their presumable deathbeds, would be focused on other matters. But not Tatsu. Fighting corruption was his life's work, and he would devote every last breath to it.

I put my hand on his shoulder. 'I'll take care of it.'

He nodded and seemed to settle in his bed. 'Good,' he said, patting my hand.

Without thinking, I turned my hand around and took his in mine.

He gritted his teeth for a moment and groaned, then whatever pain had caused the groan passed. He said, 'You have to hurry, Rain-san. Soon I won't be able to help you.'

I nodded.

He smiled. 'Why do you look so sad?'

I shook my head. 'You're an asshole.'

I thought he would laugh at that, but he didn't. Instead he squeezed my hand for a moment and then said, 'I've thought a lot about what you said, you know. About being a manipulative bastard. I don't have a lot I can do besides lie here and think.'

'You come to any conclusions?'

'That you're right. That I knew exactly what I was doing when I showed you those photographs. That the situation has turned out exactly as I had hoped. Except for one thing.'

'I forgot the whiskey?'

He squeezed again. This time he didn't let go. That I might have put your family in danger. If something were to happen to your son…'

Tatsu had lost his only son in an accident when the child was an infant. He had spoken of it to me only twice: first, when I had asked him years earlier, and again, on the night he told me that I, too, had become a father. The boy had died over three decades earlier, but the pain still showed in Tatsu's eyes. It always had, and I knew now there was only one thing that could deliver him from it. And that thing was coming far too soon.

'Nothing's going to happen to him,' I said. 'We're going to take care of this.'

He closed his eyes and mumbled something. It took me a moment to pick up what it was. Onegai shimasu. Please.

We sat like that for a few minutes more. His eyes remained closed and I realized he was sleeping.

I got up and moved to the door. I nodded to the bodyguard, then checked the corridor. All clear.

I used the stairs and a back exit, then ran a route to make sure I wasn't being followed. It was good to have something operational to focus on. It helped me to not think.

When I was satisfied I was alone, I called Dox. He had already checked into his hotel, the large and anonymous Shinagawa Prince. We agreed to meet at a Starbucks in Shinagawa Station in two hours, after I'd checked into the equally unremarkable Shinjuku Hilton.

I clicked off and headed toward the Yamanote. Tatsu's words echoed in my mind: Soon I won't be able to help you.