Zero. Part 28

Philip stared in disbelief. What flashed through his mind as he stared at the wounds was the katana that Michiko had put at his throat the first time he had met Zen G.o.do. "It appears Silvers was killed with a j.a.panese longsword,"

Philip said.

"A j.a.panese killed Colonel Silvers?" David Turner had entered the room.

"Lieutenant Doss." He smiled. "I know that you're somewhat of an expert when it comes to things j.a.panese. So now we have a place to start."

Philip was going to say that though it appeared as if a katana had been the instrument of death, he doubted that a j.a.panese had wielded it. The deep slashes that ribboned Silvers's corpse, which had brought a froth of blood as a result of the frenzied attack, were crude, administered in haphazard fashion. No one with even the least bit of kenjutsu training would have killed in such a sloppy manner. General Hadley did not give him the chance to voice his thoughts.

"This is almost like a retribution," Philip's father-in-law said. He saw the expression on Philip's face, made a placating gesture. "It's all right, son, both Jonas and Turner know about the evidence you handed me against Silvers. I told them about it last night. It was so overwhelming, I thought it best they know about it before I went to MacArthur with it. I think you'll agree they deserved that courtesy, at least. I'd hate to have seen someone from outside give them the news, eh?"

Hadley circled the corpse. "I'll send these military policemen on their way.

This is no business of theirs." He looked at each of them in turn. "I believe we're all agreed on that point."

Hadley nodded. "Good. As far as Silvers is concerned, he has found his final reward. The fewer people who are made aware of his perfidy the better.

MacArthur agrees. He's given me full reign in this matter. He-and all of us, surely-wants this cleared up quickly and quietly. Therefore, I think it's best if this incident be reported as a suicide. In that way, all evidence can be put to the torch, and nothing more need be said concerning the matter." He looked around the room again. "Agreed?"Jonas and Turner nodded solemnly. Philip was about to protest. There were a number of points about the murder, small but nagging, that disturbed him. But looking at General Hadley, he knew that this was not the time to bring them up. In one sense, his father-in-law was correct. The CIG was on tenuous ground with President Truman anyway. If any hint of this matter should cross the Oval Office desk, the future of the service most certainly would be in the direst jeopardy.

Reluctantly, Philip nodded his a.s.sent. But why, as he did so, did he feel like one of the Roman senators conspiring to a.s.sa.s.sinate Julius Caesar?

Philip could not wait to sink himself into Michiko's tender flesh. The heat she generated caused him to tremble long before he even touched her. The fact that they were both married seemed not to exist or, perhaps, to belong to another world far outside their own.

Michiko, the fierce, implacable samurai, wielding her ka-tana with uncompromising skill, was, with him, in their most private moments, the docile and feminine lover. Docile, not in the normal sense. She did not lie still with her legs open wide waiting for him to mount her. But rather docile in the way a j.a.panese woman learns to be, almost from birth: to be attentive to the desires of her man, and to herself fully enjoy those pleasures.

This was what Philip meant when he said to Lillian that he could not teach her an understanding of the j.a.panese ethos. It was not something one could be taught. Rather, it had to be absorbed, a slow seeping that comes from stillness, observation, patience and acceptance. None of these concepts was in a Westerner's emotional or intellectual vocabulary.

What quirk of fate-of karma-Philip wondered, had allowed him to be born with this affinity? He could not say. The very qualities that had caused him to feel an outcast as he was growing up-to actively seek the outlaw's status as soon as he was old enough-were what bonded him to the inaccessibility of j.a.pan. He was known as "the special American." The kind of recognition that he had been unconsciously seeking all his life. The way out of the inevitability of his father's vision of life.

He said a prayer-to what G.o.d? Christ? Jehovah? Buddha?-that he had been allowed to find his way to this exalted state. Buried in the center of the cosmos, hidden for all time from his father and his father's spoken curse.

From everyone.

Here, he was beyond the law: He was the creator of the law.

BOOK THREE

HA GAKURE.

HIDDEN LEAVESSPRING, PRESENT.

TOKYO.

MAUI.

MOSCOW.

PARIS.

"Chinmoku," Kozo Shiina said. "In architecture, silence and shadow are the same. One stands for the other. Do you see this, Joji?"

"Yes, Shiina-san," Joji said. It pleased him that Kozo Shiina, one of the most powerful men in all j.a.pan, used the form of speech that indicated an equal talking with an equal.

They had come to the Kan'ei-ji Buddhist shrine in Ueno Park, in the northeastern sector of Toyko. The Kan'ei-ji possessed great significance for the j.a.panese. Following the ancient principles of geomancy-originally, a Chinese art based on the five cardinal elements of the world: earth, air, fire, water and metal-the northeast part of the city was the most vulnerable to invaders from both the corporeal and the spirit worlds.

"Outside these gates," Shiina said, "the hordes race by, intent on their daily ch.o.r.es. Inside the Kan'ei-ji a semblance of the old j.a.pan remains intact, unadulterated. The ancient silence creates its own s.p.a.ce in a metropolis with none to spare."

Accordingly, when the Kan'ei-ji was built, it included a powerful kimon, a demon's gate, which would protect the city. Gradually more kimon were constructed not only in this sector but throughout Tokyo. Until, at length, the city was completely encircled by demon gates. By their shadow silence, they kept the evil spirits at bay while at the same time providing, for the city's inhabitants, spiritual sanctuaries where the elemental concepts of the past could cleanse, renew and, for a time at least, deflect the growing modernization that threatened to rip the heart of j.a.pan from the fabric of its unique past.

"The shadow silence," Shiina said, "is what thrusting rock, rising wood and the gardens of sand artfully create." He stared through the dust motes dancing in the sunlight. Joji had the eerie sense that Shiina could see the true heart of this sacred place. "Yama no oto. Here, enwrapped by the silence, I can hear the sound of the mountain."

"I hope it has some words of wisdom for me," Joji said.

"Calm yourself, Joji. Instead of striding nervously about, sit here beside me.

Listen to the shadows creep along the walls, engulf the rocks, slide across the raked sand. Allow the silence to penetrate your impatience, to deflate your anxiety."

"Shiina-san," Joji said, "I have come to you because there is no one else I can turn to. I need help. My brother Masashi has wrested the power of the Taki-gumi from me. I am the rightful heir now that my eldest brother, Hiroshi, is dead."

Shiina waited until Joji was seated next to him before he said, "Do you know the true definition of war? No, I think not. It was given not by a samurai or a great general, but by a poet and a sculptor named Kotaro Takamura. He said that war was 'a very deep silence attacked.' "

"I don't know what that means."

"It is why I chose to come here instead of to the teahouse."

"I want to understand, Shiina-san."

"Just as architecture can create silence," Shiina said, "so does the human psyche: thought. Without silence, thought is impossible. Without thought, strategy cannot be formulated. Oftentimes, Joji, war and strategy are incompatible. The generals who congratulate themselves on the winning strategy are most likely deluding themselves. Unless one actively seeks put the silence in the midst of war-as I seek out this sanctuary in the midst of the cacophany of this gleaming modern-day metropolis-one has not won. One has merely survived."

Joji was struggling to understand.

"You are in the midst of a war, Joji. Either you will win that war, or youwill merely survive. This is the choice that you must make."

"I believe I have already made the choice," Joji said. "I have come to you."

"Now you must explain something to me. I was your father's enemy. How is it that you expect me to aid you?"

"If you back me, if you help me plan my strategy," Joji said, his heart fluttering with anxiety, "you will have one half of the Taki-gumi the day I am declared its oyabun."

"One half," Shiina said meditatively.

Joji, wondering if he had made the offer rich enough, said hastily, "That is what you have always wanted, Shiina-san, isn't it? And now, through me, you will have it. Together we can defeat Masashi, and we will both get what we desire most."

Shiina closed his eyes. "Listen to the silence, Joji. You must be able to interpret its many meanings. Then you will be able to learn. If you cannot learn, then you are of no use to me."

"Shiina-san, I am trying."

"So," Shiina said. "An earthworm, ripped from his underground home by an earthquake, tries to find his way in the light. But the light is not his milieu. Unless he can find his way back underground, he will surely perish."

"Is that how you view me, Shiina-san?" Joji said stiffly.

"You," Shiina said, "or your brother Masashi. As I see it, the problem is that your brother has cut himself off from the past. And the past, Joji, is where the threat to j.a.pan began. In the invasion of the Americans.

"It seems to me that Masashi seeks the future somewhat like a bat venturing out of its cave at noon. He is blind to the forces of nature that were set in motion years ago. He believes that history is the cynosure of old men simply because they are old, fossilized, that history is all that they have now to hold on to.

"How smug he is! How secure in his avarice! And because of that, he is being used. By people older, wiser, who possess the strength of history on their side. He wishes to control the currents of industry, bureaucracy and government by his brute strength. But without the knowledge history can provide, he cannot even identify those currents let alone hope to turn them to his advantage."

Joji, watching the inexorable march of the shadows across the temple rooftops, along the sheltered groves of bamboo, the stark rocks, the swirled gardens of sand, felt Shiina's words as if each one was a drop of acid on the center of his forehead. "Explain yourself, if you would, Shiina-san," he said.

Kozo Shiina's eyes were closed against the afternoon sun. "It is simple, Joji.

Through my contacts in the government, I have learned that your brother has made a number of alliances among a sector of rather, ah, radical elements within the various ministries."

"Yes, yes," Joji said. "He told me some of this."

"Did he?" Shiina's eyes snapped open, impaling Joji on their unwavering gaze.

"Yes," Joji went on. "Masashi seeks to gain entry into society. He wants to accomplish what our father could not, to become a true member of j.a.panese society. He craves respect. And because he is haunted by the accomplishments of Wataro, he has become incautious. I believe he will lose the Taki-gumi if he continues on this course."

A line of bald-headed priests walked along a path. A slow, even chanting began to fill the air. Rather than disturbing the slow silence of Kan'ei-ji, it deepened it.

When, at length, the chanting died away, Shiina said, "Tell me, then, why should I do anything to stop him?"

Thinking, Now I have him, Joji said, "Because if you help me, you will own part of the Taki-gumi. Isn't that far better than seeing it destroyed?"

"When you put it that way," Shiina said, "I don't see how I can refuse."

Joji frowned. "Your intervention will mean great changes for the Taki-gumi,"

he said, as if thinking this through for the first time. Up until now he had always had Michiko to help him reason complex matters through."Do not be sorry, Joji," Shiina said benevolently. "Think of the Meiji Jinja.

The shrine to the first Meiji Emperor was erected in 1921. It was destroyed during the war of the Pacific and rebuilt in 1958. This is true of a great many of our inst.i.tutions. They have a history of destruction and regeneration.

Yakuza clans as well." He smiled. "And think of the good you can do."

"For the moment, I can think only of how I will be able to deal with Masashi,"

Joji said.

"Listen to me," Shiina said. "Here, within this temple, we can observe the war like G.o.ds. In seeing both sides, we will be able to divine a strategy that will defeat your brother. But I warn you: We have little time. The alliances Masashi has formed grow stronger every day. If we delay too long, even I will be unable to help you."

"I am ready, Shiina-san," Joji said, like a samurai preparing for battle.

Shiina breathed a deep sigh of contentment. "I can see that, Joji. And I have no doubt that you will make a worthy champion."

"h.e.l.lo, Granny."

Listen, Michiko thought. You must pull yourself together and listen. But her heart was breaking, and all she could think of was her poor Tori held captive like an animal.

"How are you, my darling?"

"I miss you," Tori said. "When can I come home?"

"Soon, little one."

"But I want to come home now."

That plaintive little voice. Michiko could imagine her tear-streaked face.

Stop it! she told herself. You are not helping your granddaughter by acting like a weakling. Michiko listened to the background noises, just as she had every time Tori called. Sometimes Michiko heard the voices of men in the background. Sometimes she could even hear snippets of what they said: They were as bored with their vigil as Tori was.

Michiko remembered an episode of a TV show where the hero's girl friend was being held against her will. Every time the kidnappers called to make their demands, the hero heard a peculiar sound. He finally identified it as that of a pile driver and, checking city records of construction sites, was able to find his girl friend. Now Michiko strained to catch any aural nuance that might give her a hint as to where Masashi had hidden Tori.

There were no sounds other than those of conversation, nothing she could identify. She could not even say for certain whether Tori was in Tokyo or somewhere in the surrounding countryside. Michiko bit her lip. It was an impossible task. Only in movies was it possible for good to triumph over evil every time. This was real life. In real life one never knew the final outcome.

"Oh Granny, I want to see you so much. I want to come home."

She had pledged herself to fighting evil, but now, as she heard her granddaughter weeping, Michiko began to think that the price she was paying was far too high. Tori was an innocent. To have her dragged into this battle was unjust and terrifying.

"Listen, little one," Michiko said, making one last attempt. "Tori, do you hear me? Good. Are the men listening to you? No, don't look at them. I want you to tell me what you can see out the window of the room you are in."

"I can't see anything, Granny," Tori said. "There is no window."

"Then you are under-"

"If you try that again, Mrs. Yamamoto," a harsh voice she did not recognize said in her ear, "I will have to hurt your granddaughter."

Michiko lost control. "Who are you?" It was too much: the threats, the thought of the cruel man behind that harsh voice, images of Tori being beaten. "Where are you keeping her? Why don't you let her go?"

"You know why we can't do that, Mrs. Yamamoto. We are ensuring the cooperation of your entire family. Don't make me remind you again.""Let me speak to my granddaughter. I want to-"

She heard the click of the receiver at the other end of the line. The sound turned Michiko's blood to ice.

"Here there is power," Eliane said. "Here on Maui, here in lao Valley." In the semidarkness, only her eyes were visible, luminous pinpoints, a panther's eyes in the night. "I believe that there are places of power in the world.

Stone-henge is one, the pyramids at Giza and Les-Baux-de-Provence are others.

When I was little, I thought there were only one or two power places. But as I grow older, the list gets longer."