Conspiracy (41 page)

In all she spoke for nearly an hour, presenting their case. She never said that she had copies of documents taken from Harrison's office, only that she had reviewed them.

As she spoke, she tried to focus equally upon Suzuki, Nakamura, and Fujimura, not knowing whether the prime minister would form his own opinion or rely heavily upon his justice minister and Fujimura. All three were listening carefully without any visible reaction. From time to time the prime minister leaned his head back and closed his eyes for a few moments, but she knew that he was still listening intently.

During her long monologue, she also watched Harrison. With earphones that gave him an English translation, he looked more and more outraged. In contrast, Sato remained cold and aloof, making no effort to conceal his contempt for her and the proceeding.

"And so I called Fujimura-san," Taylor said in conclusion. "Whom I have known for many years. I flew to California to meet him. I explained to him the entire story. A day later he asked me and Cady to come to Japan."

Suzuki turned to Harrison and Sato. "Would either of you care to speak?"

Harrison rose to his feet, looking at Taylor with a sympathetic eye. "Miss Ferrari has unfortunately taken some facts and jumped to very strange and unjustified conclusions. I feel sorry for her because of what happened to her close friend, Senator Boyd. It is regrettable that he violated the law relating to campaign contributions the first time he ran for Congress. When it was clear that the facts would become known, he killed himself rather than face the consequences. He committed the crime ten years ago that caused his disgrace. It's understandable that he would take his own life rather than live with the humiliation that he alone caused."

Harrison continued in the smooth voice that made him such an effective lawyer. "The real estate man, Gladstone, was killed when his car crashed off an icy mountain road. Driving conditions were hazardous. He was old and tired, and should not have been driving that night. Those are the facts. The rest of her story is fabrication. A creative story worthy of a novelist. Not the truth."

"As for her claims of a conspiracy being directed by me and Yahiro Sato, there's absolutely no evidence, just the conjecture of a troubled woman who, as she told us, is wanted for arrest by American legal officials. In other words, she herself is a criminal and a fugitive. Is that whom you would believe? Someone like that with no evidence, with no proof?"

With a look of righteous indignation, Harrison finished his speech and sat down. He was good; Taylor had to admit that. If she didn't know better, she might have believed him. When she glanced at Cady, she saw he was impressed too. Yet he was already reaching into her briefcase for more ammunition.

Suzuki turned back to Taylor. "Harrison-saw has asked about evidence and proof. Do you have anything to corroborate your story?"

She took the material Cady handed her. Harrison was acting as if nothing she brought forth could possibly harm him. She handed the documents she had copied in Harrison's office over to Suzuki, who studied them for a moment. "Would you explain these?" he asked.

"They all came from Mr. Harrison's office. Please look at the two speeches first, Suzuki-san. What you have is a draft and the final version of a speech to be delivered by Sato immediately after his election. The speech calls for the United States to remove all of its forces from Japan and for radically increased Japanese militarization. The draft has handwritten changes in the margin in Philip Harrison's handwriting. All of the changes proposed in the margin were made in the final."

Suzuki spent several minutes looking at the speeches to satisfy himself that Taylor was correct about the changes. Then he silently handed the speeches to Harrison.

Harrison didn't deny what she had said. "Of course I suggested those changes in Sato's speech. I'm a Washington lawyer. Sato asked for my advice on a speech that impacted the United States. I regularly offer suggestions to the French finance minister on his speeches as well. There's nothing inappropriate in that."

"But the program of militarization he proposes," Taylor said to Suzuki, "it's—"

Harrison interrupted her in midsentence. "It's an internal Japanese matter. It wasn't my business, and it shouldn't be yours. But since you're so concerned about what's proper, why don't you explain to Mr. Suzuki that you broke into my office and stole these speeches from a locked drawer?"

"Don't let him bait you," Cady said quietly to her.

"I won't." Instead she directed Suzuki to the next document. "It's a fax of a message that Harrison sent to Yahiro Sato confirming that they were involved in this conspiracy together."

Suzuki looked at the fax and passed it to Harrison. He studied it carefully. "I have no idea what this is," he said flatly, "or where she got it."

"It came from your office. You obviously used a code."

"And you obviously mixed some forged papers in with the ones you stole from my office."

She glanced at the back of the room. The prime minister's face told her that he was annoyed. She felt a sick wrenching in the pit of her stomach. This hearing was all a great show to discredit her and Cady.

"Next?" Suzuki asked her in a crisp, impatient tone.

"There is an entry from Philip Harrison's diary showing that he met in Buenos Aires on August twenty-eighth with Yahiro Sato."

Again Suzuki examined the documents. "It only has the initials Y.S. It doesn't have the name Yahiro Sato."

He held out the document to Harrison, who waved it away with his hand. "I'm happy to concede that I met with Yahiro Sato on that occasion. He asked me to advise him in preparing the speech we spoke about earlier."

She had now exhausted the pile of documents she had given to Suzuki. She looked flustered and defeated. Harrison was staring at her with contempt.

"Do you have any thing else, Miss Ferrari?" Suzuki asked scornfully. It was as if his time and that of Prime Minister Nakamura had been wasted with false accusations.

"There is one other thing," Cady said. He reached into her briefcase again and extracted a microcassette and a recorder. He smiled at her, filling her with renewed confidence. Harrison, she saw, was leaning forward, straining to see what it was.

"This tape," she announced, "contains a recording of two conversations between Harrison and McDermott, the attorney general of the United States. May I play a portion of it?"

Harrison shot to his feet. "Those recordings were made without my knowledge. They would not be admissible in an American court of law."

Suzuki was irritated at Harrison's outburst. "You may sit down, Harrison-san. I don't know if they are admissible in an American court, but that's not where we are now. Besides, I doubt if an American court would be sympathetic to someone who helped manipulate their presidential election." He looked at Taylor. "You may play the tape."

She had the tape set at the most dramatic part of the second Harrison-McDermott meeting.

"I don't like the idea of accepting that deal if Boyd offers it," McDermott's voice said. "I'd rather make him go to trial."

"Either you accept the deal, or I'll tell the president and the newspapers about your girlfriend and child in Sarasota," Harrison's voice replied.

"The first time we met, you said that all I would have to do was help you with the California records relating to Mill Valley. Now you want me to blindly follow your orders and tell Cady and Doerr how to run the case against Boyd. You're asking for too much. This could be a conspiracy to harm the United States. President Webster is my friend. I'D risk the embarrassment of your disclosure before I'll agree to what you want. You have to tell me what this is about."

"Just do what I say."

"You tell me, or you can go fuck yourself."

There was the sound of a car door slamming.

"Okay, I'D tell you," came Harrison's voice.

"Well?"

"This is all being engineered by Yahiro Sato."

"The Japanese politician?"

"Yes."

"Why?"

"If Sato is elected prime minister, and Boyd is in the White House, he'll never be able to proceed with expelling American troops and remilitarizing Japan."

"But Webster will let him do those things. He would like an Asian counterpoint to China's growing military might."

"Precisely."

"So you're an agent of Sato's. Why? For money?"

"I never received a cent."

"Then why?"

"That's none of your business."

Taylor turned off the machine and stared at Harrison. He was as white as a sheet. How in the world had he been such a fool as to let McDermott tape their conversation, and how in the world had she been able to get that tape? For the first time in all the years she had known him, he was speechless.

"Very nice," Cady told her softly.

She turned around, facing Nakamura. "So I respectfully request that you grant our request to extradite Sato and Harrison to the United States, where they can stand trial for these events."

Suzuki looked at Sato. "Do you have a statement?" he asked.

Sato remained seated. "I have no denials and no apologies to make," he said. "Some time ago I became convinced that Japan was being treated unfairly by the United States and that we were facing great danger from China. We have succeeded economically with our exports of technologically superior products, but we refused to assert our own national pride. Well, that time is over. Japan is a great nation, and a great nation needs a powerful military. We have as much moral right to be the policemen of Asia as the Americans, who don't understand our part of the world. Even Germany, with all of their crimes against the Jews and others in the war, was permitted to return to normalcy. We alone continue to be punished. The reason for that unfair treatment is American racism aimed at us."

"You want us to be an aggressor again in Asia?"

"You're an intelligent man, Suzuki-san. Don't you understand what's happening? The Chinese are already heavily arming with modern technology. Soon they'll be able to fire missiles at us across the sea. Can we afford to be ill prepared for the next war with China?"

Suzuki broke in. "But even if you believe all of this, why did you interfere in the American election for president?"

"Because it's imperative to ensure that the White House is occupied for the next four years by someone who will not block Japan's rightful attempt to regain its fair military place in the world. It is in the best interests of our nation. We're victims of American imperialism. They don't keep their troops here to protect us. They keep them here to dominate us and to make certain that our military doesn't pose a threat to them."

"How did you become involved with Harrison-san?"

"After research to find an American who could help me, I discovered that Harrison was perfect. He shared my hatred for the Chinese. So I invited him to meet me in Buenos Aires. There I persuaded him to help me achieve my goal. When I enlisted his help, I told him to operate legally. To force Boyd out by lawful means. He got carried away and violated the law. That's not my responsibility."

"In the last month, two innocent people have died in the United States," Suzuki said. "Senator Boyd and Harvey Gladstone, because of what you and Harrison did."

"Correction," Sato said forcefully. "I had nothing to do with those deaths." He raised his hand and pointed a finger at Harrison. "All actions in the United States were being directed by him."

Harrison was appalled that he had ended up in this situation. When Sato had sent him the note with the date of his father's death and an invitation to meet in Buenos Aires, he had been sufficiently intrigued to go. When he had heard about what Sato wanted to do, he had eagerly agreed to help. It was the perfect way of avenging what the Chinese did to his father by helping to rearm their mortal enemy. There wasn't any thought that violence or murders would be involved. He figured that all he had to do was get carefully prepared evidence about Mill Valley into the hands of a strong-willed prosecutor and help Sato with some speeches. He had thought he was so smart, yet somehow he had lost control over events. And Sato was too clever for him. His desire for revenge had blinded him to the grim realities of what was happening. That desire for revenge had destroyed him—had taken the entire life he had built for so many years and reduced it to rubble.

"And what about the death of Alex Glass?" Suzuki asked Sato. "How do you explain that?"

This was the question Sato had been dreading, the one loose end that couldn't be laid at Harrison's door. He was boiling with anger toward that fool Ozawa and toward himself for letting Ozawa go to dinner with Glass. "An unfortunate accident," he said in a cold voice. "The Tokyo police have not found a single shred of evidence to the contrary."

Suzuki looked dubious. "An odd coincidence coming at that moment, wouldn't you say?"

"Life is full of coincidences."

"Do you have anything else to add?"

"Only that if you put my actions to a vote in Japan, many others, surely a majority, would agree with me."

"I very much doubt that," replied Suzuki. "Most of our people would recall with horror that similar thinking by militarists in the thirties brought a great disaster on our country and its people. Now I think we should take a recess."

* * *

Nakamura, Suzuki, and Fujimura went into another room to confer. As Harrison headed toward the bathroom, Sato slipped outside and took his cell phone out of his pocket.

He turned on the power and pressed a single button. "Ozawa here," came the response.

"Where are you?" Sato asked.

"About seven miles away. I have two truckloads of soldiers with me, fully armed and ready to move if you give the order."

"What about here in Nakamura's compound?"

"Of the thirty soldiers, at least ten will support us, perhaps more if a battle starts."

Sato nodded with satisfaction. He planned to speak with Nakamura later and help him reach a peaceful resolution of this matter, one that preserved the integrity of the Japanese nation. If Nakamura didn't accept that, then what followed would be his responsibility. Sato didn't feel any remorse about his plans. For thousands of years patriotic warriors had undertaken actions precisely like the one he was planning. Technology might be more sophisticated now, but people were still the same. Power belonged in the hands of bold men like him, not bureaucratic cowards who were serfs of a Western nation, like Nakamura.