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Joe handed over the keys and Kurt started the car. The engine fired easily. The exhaust singing in perfect harmony with the reverberation from the white sedan.
Without hesitation, Akiko pulled out and drove to the exit. Kurt grabbed the gearshift, threw the car into reverse and backed out. With a quick shift, they were moving forward and out into the Tokyo night.
Kurt had spent nearly eight months in Japan in what seemed like a lifetime ago. He’d spent plenty of time on the roads in England, Australia and Barbados as well. As a result, driving on the left came easy. The only danger came when one was changing roads at sparsely used intersections. Without another vehicle to follow, it was easy for the brain to slip back into its deeply ingrained pattern and drive down the wrong side of the street.
They picked their way through heavy traffic moving slowly all the way to the edge of the city. Finally, Akiko pulled onto a highway and began to accelerate. Kurt dropped down a gear and stepped on the gas. Soon they were racing to the southwest at almost a hundred miles an hour.
“Any chance we’re really under surveillance?” Joe asked.
“I haven’t seen anyone,” Kurt said. “But they are a secret group, opposed to almost everything their country holds dear.”
Kurt reached forward and began pressing the manual analog buttons on the radio. They went in, physically moving and setting the needle on the old AM/FM radio. “When I was a kid, this radio was the height of technology.”
Joe laughed. “Like the lady said, it’s digital electronics they’re against. Analog radios are okay. And this vehicle has a carburetor, a manually adjusted camshaft to open and close the valves and it was made before computer diagnostics and engine control units were even on the drawing board. It’s a pure machine. It does what the driver commands it to instead of thinking for itself.”
Kurt changed lanes, punched the gas and passed an Audi and a brand-new Lexus like they were standing still. “That it does.”
They continued on the highway for over an hour, heading out into the foothills. Well into the second hour of driving, they pulled off an exit and onto a secondary road. This stretch of blacktop twisted into the mountains and for the first time they were driving in darkness.
Kurt worked hard to keep up with Akiko on the unfamiliar road, but eventually they broke out onto a plateau and continued on a fairly straight line, heading toward a shimmering lake in the distance.
Akiko slowed down as they approached the lakefront and turned onto a dirt track.
“Not a house in sight,” Joe said. “And certainly nothing I would call a retreat.”
“I wouldn’t rule out a log cabin or tents by the water,” Kurt said, ruefully imagining another night sleeping on uneven ground.
They continued around the edge of the lake, arriving at a wooden causeway that led across a hundred feet of water to a small island.
Akiko turned her car gently onto the bridge and eased forward slowly, which seemed prudent considering the bridge was no wider than the sedan she was driving.
As she approached the island, the lights from the sedan lit up thick walls of impressive stonework and a drawbridge that was slowly being lowered into place.
“That’s no island,” Joe said, “it’s a castle.”
The ancient fortress had battlements of carved and fitted stone, overhanging ramparts and a huge pagoda-style structure set back and above the walls.
“Keep your eyes peeled for dragons,” Joe said. “This is the kind of place we’re likely to find one.”
Kurt was more interested in keeping his eyes on the road. With the high beams and the driving lights on, he could see how truly narrow the wooden bridge was. It was also noticeably rickety.
“Not the sturdiest of structures,” he said. “But if it held up the sedan, we should be fine.”
The drawbridge locked in place and the sedan rolled across it and into the castle.
“Our turn,” Joe said.
Kurt eased forward, bumping up onto the wooden planks. Not completely certain of his alignment, he reached for a button to lower the window so he could poke his head out and look down at the front tire. Instead of a switch, he found the hand crank.
Rolling down a window for the first time in years, he leaned out over the windowsill. The sidewall of the front tire was at the edge of the bridge.
“Plenty of room on this side,” Joe said.
“Plenty?”
“At least three or four inches.”
“That’s reassuring.”
