Bill Pronzini - Quicksilver

“Well, well,” I said. “You want to tell me about these friends of yours, Mr. Yamasaki?”

Yamasaki didn’t answer. He didn’t look at me either; his gaze was on his hands chafing together in his lap. But then Okubo said something to him in Japanese, sharp words that made the young guy’s head snap up and the fear flare momentarily bright in his eyes.

“I asked them to follow you,” he said to me. “Without Mr. Okubo’s permission.”

“Or my knowledge,” Okubo said.

Now I understood. It had been a private matter all along: nothing much to do with the Yakuza, really, except that Yamasaki and his two friends were low-level members of the organization. Okubo hadn’t known anything about it until I showed up a little while ago; that was why he’d refused to see me at first. But when I made my threat he’d hauled Yamasaki in-the kid had already been here for some reason that didn’t matter-and got the truth out of him.

All of which meant that the Yakuza wasn’t interested in me at all. Or hadn’t been until now. There was no telling yet which way things were going to go, although I liked my chances of getting off the hook better than I liked Yamasaki’s.

I asked, “Why did you have your friends follow me?”

“The police told me it was I you came to see at the bathhouse. I had no idea why and it concerned me. I wished to find out.”

Damn McFate and his big mouth. “So you were the one they kept talking to on the CB radio?”

“Yes. I let them use my car and borrowed my girlfriend’s; she also has a Citizen’s Band. That permitted us to communicate.”

“All you had to do,” I said, “was come and talk to me face to face. I’d have told you why I wanted to see you-gladly. There wasn’t any need for you to play games.”

Yamasaki looked at his hands again. There was embarrassment mingled with his anxiety now, as if he realized that his blunder was stupid and inexcusable and he’d lost a lot of face because of it. “ Comen nasai,” he said softly. I didn’t need a translator to know that he was saying he was sorry, as much to himself as to Okubo and me.

I turned my attention to Okubo. “What happens now? I don’t want any trouble with you people; all I want is to be left alone to do my job:”

“An admirable wish.”

“I think so.”

“Tell me this: Would you actually have carried out your threat to damage our establishment?”

“No,” I said. “That was just a ruse.”

“Ah. Very ingenious.”

“Was it? That depends.”

“On what?”

“On whether or not I get my wish.”

“Of course,” Okubo said, as if he were surprised that I might think otherwise. “We, too, do not want any trouble; like you, we only desire to be left alone to do our work.”

I nodded, feeling relieved now. “What about Mr. Yamasaki’s two friends?”

“They will not bother you any longer. I have already seen to that — by house telephone, before you entered.”

“And Mr. Yamasaki? What happens to him?”

Okubo didn’t say anything. Nobody said anything.

I decided the smart thing for me to do was to shut up. If I tried to argue Yamasaki’s case, it would only get Okubo down on me again. The Yakuza and its code of honor were nothing for a Caucasian to try mixing in. Besides, I doubted if they’d do anything terminal to him; he hadn’t screwed up badly enough for that sort of punishment.

Pretty soon Okubo said something to the Lump in Japanese; then he bowed to me, and I bowed to him, and the Lump led me out into the companionway. The last I saw of Ken Yamasaki, he was sitting stiff-backed in his chair with the sweat glistening on his cheeks and the fear glistening in his eyes.

The Lump walked me through the now-crowded and noisy restaurant, all the way out to the gangplank. I went down without looking at him, across the wind-swept parking area to my car. There was no sign of the white Ford, not there on the waterfront and not anywhere on my way to Japantown.

Art Gage opened the Victorian’s front door in answer to my ring and said, “Haruko’s not back yet.” He looked and sounded short-tempered; his eyes, under their blond brows, were hostile.

Don’t mess with me, kid, I thought. Not today. “I’ll wait inside. That is, if you don’t mind.”

“Why should I mind? Come on in.”

He took me into the familiar junk-filled parlor, said he had work to do upstairs in the studio, and started out. I said, “Wait a second. Is it all right if I use your phone?”

“What for?”

“To make some calls on. That’s what people generally use phones for, isn’t it?”

He made a prissy, disgusted noise with his lips. “What the hell, go ahead,” he said. “It doesn’t matter what I say, anyway.”

It would, I thought, if you had anything to say.

He went out of the room and I moved over to where the telephone sat on a wobbly-looking table with rails around the top. I glanced at my watch as I picked up the receiver. It was just one o’clock.

I made Information calls first, to get the numbers of the eight Wakasas living in California. Seven were listed; the one in Fresno either had an unlisted number or no phone at all. Then I called each of those seven, starting with the ones in Oakland and Palo Alto. I did all of it by direct-dialing; the Gages would have to pay message-unit and long-distance charges regardless of whether they were on the phone bill or on my expense list.

There was no answer at one of the Oakland numbers; the other one drew a blank-the woman I spoke to had never heard of Michio Wakasa or Chiyoko Wakasa. Another blank in Palo Alto. And another in Eureka. No answer at the Vacaville number. Two more blanks at the Wakasa households in Southern California. Five down, three to go.

By the time I finished the last of the calls, it was after one-thirty. And Haruko still hadn’t come home.

I began to feel the same edginess I had last night when I couldn’t get hold of her. I sat on one of the fake Victorian chairs. Got up pretty soon and paced for a while. Stopped pacing and called the Oakland and Vacaville numbers again, still without getting a response at either place. Sat some more. Paced some more. Went to the bay windows and stood staring out at the empty street, at a sky that was clouding up again, building more rain.

Two o’clock. No Haruko.

Two-fifteen.

No Haruko.

Gage came clumping downstairs, poked his head into the parlor, saw me alone and pacing again, and said, “Where’s Haruko?”

“She hasn’t come back yet.”

“What?” He came over to where I was and scowled at me, as if her not being there was my fault. And maybe, damn it, it was. “She should have been back by now, even on the Muni. She said she’d be here by one o’clock at the latest, because you were coming.”

“She took the bus, you say?”

“Yes. Parking is such a hassle downtown.”

“Does she usually call if she’s going to be late?”

“She always calls.”

“Where was this nine o’clock meeting of hers?”

“On Post Street. Post and Mason.”

“Somebody’s office, or what?”

“The Sundler Agency.”

“You have their number?”

“I can look it up.”

He did that; and I called the Sundler Agency and asked a woman with a nasal voice if Haruko Gage was still there. The woman said no, she wasn’t, and sounded surprised at the question. Mrs. Gage, she said, had left their offices before lunch, at about eleven-thirty.

I put the handset down and turned to Gage and repeated the information to him. He looked worried and upset now-but not half as worried and upset as I was.

“All this time,” he said. “Where the hell could she be?”

Yeah, I thought grimly. Where the hell could she be?