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Nagano went quiet again. “Well, if you’re right, this is very bad news,” he said finally. “It means our investigation is at an end.”
“Why?” Joe asked.
“Han is beyond my reach,” the superintendent said. “He has dual citizenship and friends in the highest places. Between that and his money, he enjoys a type of unofficial diplomatic immunity. For me to launch an investigation would be pointless. It would be closed down by those above me and I would be reassigned to guard duty at an abandoned station in the mountains.”
“So he’s untouchable,” Kurt said.
Nagano looked pained but resolute. “I’m afraid so.”
“What if Ushi-Oni rolled over on him?” Joe said. “With two different members of the Yakuza implicating Han, your superiors would be afraid not to investigate.”
“Perhaps,” Nagano said, “but that brings us back to square one: finding Ushi-Oni. We still don’t know where to look. And, after this, he will vanish like the wind.”
“Not if you activate your tracking network,” Joe said, “since he’s carrying one of the coins.”
All eyes turned Joe’s way.
“While Kurt was goofing around and playing cards, I was actually working.”
Kurt raised an eyebrow. “As I recall, you were fighting for your life in the ring of doom. And I was rescuing you.”
“Ah, yes,” Joe said. “But how do you think I ended up down there?”
“Someone must have recognized you.”
“Someone did,” Joe said. “Ushi-Oni. As much as I hate to admit it, he got the jump on me. But once I stopped him from giving me a complimentary tracheotomy, I realized he’d given me the perfect chance to tag him. So while we wrestled, I slipped the coins into his pocket. Assuming he hasn’t tossed them in a wishing well, you should have no problem following him now.”
Kurt offered a bow of respect to his friend. “I stand corrected and duly impressed.”
“As am I,” Nagano said.
“We’ll help you bring him in,” Kurt offered.
“No,” Nagano replied. “You’ve done enough already. Ushi-Oni is too dangerous, I cannot have your blood on my hands as it almost was tonight. I will bring a few of my men into it. We’ll track Ushi-Oni and take him as soon as possible.”
“All right,” Kurt said. “You have your lead and we have ours. I hope you won’t stop us from looking into Mr. Han’s activities.”
Nagano shook his head. “Like I said, you’ll find him in Nagasaki. He’s scheduled to speak at the opening of his facility on the waterfront the day after tomorrow. Be careful. At the very least, he’s a powerful man with friends in several nations. But if he did hire Ushi-Oni, he’s more dangerous than I would have imagined.”
24
OSAKA-TO-SHANGHAI FERRY, EAST CHINA SEA
GAMAY TROUT picked her way through the narrow hall on the main deck of the Osaka-to-Shanghai ferry, squeezing past people, stacks of luggage and other items that lined the passageway. Because the journey was relatively short—and most of the passengers relatively poor—cabins were shared by multiple groups. Often six or eight people were in a room that would barely fit two on a standard Caribbean cruise ship.
This morning, the halls were particularly crowded as passengers who might have gone for fresh air on the upper deck remained inside, courtesy of gray skies and an icy rain.
Making it back to her cabin, she found Paul sitting at a desk that was entirely too small for him. “How’s it going?”
Paul was hunched over a chart, plotting their position. “I’ve figured out where we are, but I was starting to wonder where you’d gotten to.”
“I had to navigate by memory,” she said. “None of the signs are in English.”
She handed him a cup of hot liquid.
“Coffee?”
“Green tea,” she replied. “It’s all they had.”
