By The Sword Part 33

Yes... the Kuroikaze scrolls once again belonged to the Kakureta Kao. And that was good. Gerrish had delivered them as promised, but had reneged on the katana. Instead of turning it over, he had fled home with it. The Order's reach was limited here in this barbaric land, and it had been unable to locate him. So they had turned to the man they had overheard recommended to that mongrel, Nakanaori Slater.

At least that had been a good decision: The man had tracked down the katana.

"How could you have failed in the last act of the task? You were to sever all links between the katana and yourself, and thus the Order. You are skilled in the use of the katana. You know all the kata. How could you not only fail to kill him but lose the katana as well?"

Tadasu closed his eyes. "I had my moves carefully planned. But when I saw the blade... when I touched it... I could not help myself. I dropped my plan and flew into action without thinking."

"That is very unlike you, Tadasu. How could you be so reckless?"

"I don't know, sensei sensei. I had this sudden, overwhelming urge. I didn't give in to it. It... took over."

"And now, because of your foolish surrender to impulse, because of your weakness, the sword remains lost to us. It could be anywhere. Anyone could have picked it up."

"I saw him, sensei sensei."

"You did?" Toru felt a jolt of hope suffuse his heart. Here was a chance to set this right. "Why didn't you tell me? What does he look like?"

"I saw only part of him-just his hand."

"His hand?" The excitement withered. "Of what value-?"

"He had a tattoo, sensei sensei."

That might be useful.

"What did it look like?"

"It was the strange man-figure that I have been seeing painted on walls throughout the city."

A man-figure graffito? The necessity of hiding his face-certain to raise alarms in post-9/11 New York-kept Toru from leaving the temple often, but on a recent trip, sealed behind tinted windows, he thought he had seen the figure Tadasu was talking about.

He'd noticed a pen jutting from the breast pocket of the lab coat he'd borrowed. He went to hand it to Tadasu, then stopped as he realized both arms were in casts.

He looked around and found no paper, so he pulled back Tadasu's top sheet and began to draw. When finished he held it up where Tadasu could see it.

"Is this it?"

Tadasu gave another restricted nod. "Yes, sensei sensei. That was on his hand."

Toru had no idea what it meant, but he would find out. He would learn everything there was to know about this figure.

But now it was time to deal with temple guard Tadasu Fumihiro. He would be undergoing multiple surgeries. Who knew what he might say under the effects of anesthesia? The Kakureta Kao could not risk exposure.

From a pocket of the silk tunic he wore beneath the lab coat, Toru withdrew the small ebony case of doku-ippen doku-ippen. He opened it and chose one of the deadly black-ringed slivers. When he looked up he found Tadasu staring at the box with bulging eyes.

"Sensei, this is not necessary."

"Do you question me, Tadasu?"

"No, sensei sensei. But-"

"Accept your fate. It is a kind death I offer. One p.r.i.c.k of the skin and all your pain-in your heart and body-as well as the shame of your failure will be gone. It is for the Order, Tadasu."

The acolyte closed his eyes. Tears found their way between the lids.

"I shall never see the Hidden Face."

"No, but in making this sacrifice for the Order, you will make that possible for others."

Eyes still closed, Tadasu nodded. "For the Order."

Holding the sliver between thumb and forefinger, Toru found a small area of exposed flesh near Tadasu's shoulder and pressed the sharp tip into the skin.

Then he turned and started toward the door, knowing that Tadasu would be dead before he reached the hallway.

7.

... incinerated by Little Boy... August sixth, 1945 incinerated by Little Boy... August sixth, 1945...

Then Jack realized: "The Hiros.h.i.+ma bomb-same as the sword. Did the katana belong to these kooks?"

Slater shook his head. "It belonged to a j.a.panese Intelligence officer named Matsuo Ok.u.mo who was at ground zero with the sword when Little Boy went off. He died along with that psycho cult."

"Looks like they've risen from the grave."

"Maybe someone started them up again. They've had since forty-five to rebuild."

"If they're back, why doesn't anybody know about them? They're terrific tabloid fodder."

"If they're back, they're laying low. After the war it was discovered they were kidnapping children and mutilating them."

Jack stomach tightened. "Jeez. How do you know so much about them?"

"My father left a posthumous memoir-a b.a.l.l.s-to-the-wall tell-all that takes no prisoners. In his will he asked me to get it published, but no one would touch it as a memoir. I did manage to sell it as a novel. I called it Black Wind Black Wind. Didn't sell too well. If you want a copy-"

Thinking of the Compendium, Compendium, Jack waved off the offer. "Thanks, no. Got too much to read as it is." Jack waved off the offer. "Thanks, no. Got too much to read as it is."

"As you wish. My father was pretty merciless with himself as well. At times it was tough, as his son, to read about his failures of nerve, but in the end I respected him more than ever."

Jack thought of his own dad, and how close they'd become on their last outing... before...

He shook it off and said, "Okay, you've been told this Hidden Face thing is extinct, which may or may not be true, but the guy pretending to be you wore the tattoo and knew everything that you knew."

"Someone must have tapped my phone. That's the only way."

"He wanted the sword. Why?"

"It killed a lot of Kakureta Kao members."

"The memoir says so?"

Slater nodded. "Yeah. If they're back, they may want it as some kind of totem. Or to destroy it."

"Good luck. If Little Boy couldn't turn it into a Dali clock, I don't see how they... " A thought occurred to him. "Wait. If they're looking for it, that means they didn't steal it. Which leaves us with the question of who hired Gerrish."

"Gerrish?"

"The name of the thief. A pro-a very dead pro."

"Dead?" Slater's eyes narrowed. "You?"

"No. But he's not the only one. Two others have gone to their greater reward because of that thing." Jack decided not to mention how O'Day had pa.s.sed. "Almost like it's cursed."

"Maybe it is." He sighed. "My father told me he'd handled the sword a number of times before the bomb and said it felt different afterward... changed."

"Well, it took one h.e.l.luva beating."

"He didn't mean physically. He meant spiritually. Like it had lost its soul."

"Yeah, right." Jack tried to imagine that happening with one of his guns.

Slater shrugged. "You either get it or you don't. How'd you feel when you held it?"

Jack remembered the dark elation while swinging it around in his apartment. And the urge to keep it instead of give it up.

"Let's get back to this Kaka-Kookoo group. If they didn't hire Gerrish, who did?"

Slater shook his head. "Oh, they hired him. The scrolls that disappeared with the katana once belonged to Kakureta Kao. Matsuo Ok.u.mo gave them to my father for safekeeping."

"Then why-?"

"Would they hire you to find it? Maybe something went wrong with the plan. Maybe they tried to kill the thief like they did you, and he escaped and ran back here. Or maybe he thought he could get a better price for it elsewhere."

Or maybe decided to keep it, Jack thought, remembering his own vacillations.

"Well, it is, after all, the Gaijin Masamune."

Slater looked baffled. "What's that? I was told it was a Masamune blade, but 'Gaijin'...?"

"Apparently it's a fabled and much sought after collector's item."

"Sought after enough to kill for?"

Jack nodded. "You betcha. Three corpses will attest to that. And I could have been the fourth." As Slater shook his head in dismay, Jack added, "Something else you should know."

"I'm almost afraid to hear."

"There's another player on the field." He raised a hand as Slater opened his mouth. "Don't ask who because I don't know. I do know they're j.a.panese-underworld types, from the look of them-and ready to kill to get the katana."

Slater leaned back, puffing out his cheeks as he exhaled. "Man. Who'd have dreamed? I'm almost willing to forget the whole thing, except..."

"Yeah?"

"It meant so much to my father."

"He stole it from the museum?"

Slater jerked upright. "How the h.e.l.l did you-?" Then he relaxed. "Oh, yeah. My alter ego must have told you."

"Only that it belonged to the Hiros.h.i.+ma Peace Museum."

The burgers arrived then. Jack and Naka a.s.sembled them in silence, then bit in.

Slater let out a groan. "This is amazing. Why can't we get beef like this on the islands?"

They worked on their burgers a little more, then Jack quaffed some Hoegaarden to wash down a big bite.

"So how did the blade get from the museum to your dad's place?"

"The Peace Museum opened in fifty-five, ten years to the day after the bomb. My father was with the Occupation. When he saw the blade he knew it was Matsuo's and figured he had more claim to it than the museum. He too had been an intelligence officer and was owed more than a few favors. He collected on some by persuading a few commandos to sneak in and s.n.a.t.c.h it for him."

"That's why you can't go to the police."

He shrugged. "I doubt anyone connected with the museum would remember it now, even if they heard about it, but why take the chance?" He leaned forward. "I need that katana back. Both my parents revered Matsuo's memory. It was all they had left of him. My father made me promise to keep it in the family. So I don't see how I have much choice."

Jack spread his hands. "And I don't see how you have much hope."

"That bad, huh?" His expression was bleak. "You've got no idea at all where it could be?"

"No, but I know where to find the guy I gave it to. He didn't have time to hand it off before he was. .h.i.t, but maybe one of his Hidden Face buddies was waiting out there and snagged it after our friend and the truck got intimate."

"You've got to make him tell you."

"If he's crazy enough to be in that cult, I seriously doubt he'll be the sharing type. And there's something else you have to consider."

"Your tone says more bad news."