Deshi (27 page)

Finally, I found Yamashita working with a bunch of people from various aikido and jujutsu styles. They were dressed in blue or black hakama and white tops. You can often tell what style someone practices merely by looking at the type of knot someone has in the front of a hakama. Some iaido schools have elaborate systems for tying their hakama. My sensei uses a simple square knot: he’s mostly concerned that the knot is properly placed and doesn’t come undone. It’s hard to be deadly while your pants are falling down.

When I finally saw him, I felt the currents of old anger mixed with something else. I remembered some of Changpa’s advice. I had been trying to consciously avoid thinking about some of what he had said, but it must have been working on me subtly. Mostly, when I looked at Yamashita, I felt a type of comfort in glimpsing an important part of what had become my world.

Does absence soften the rough edges in people? If so, there was little indication here. The lesson that day made me feel as if I had never been away.

Yamashita was working with the students on variants of
tachi-dori
, the process of taking away someone’s sword.
Aikidoka
work with many of the same types of weapons Yamashita uses, but I’ve come to see a difference. Whatever their level of practice, in most other arts, weapons training is ancillary to the heart of the system, and it shows in the technique.

I glided quietly to the edge of the practice area, nestled amid a grove of big pines. The wooden platform was open to the air, with a roof that was high enough to permit the use of swords. Trainees lined the periphery of the platform while my master demonstrated his latest point.

“No,” Yamashita was saying forcefully. “You must focus!” He was letting a trainee try to disarm him. The guy seemed competent enough. He moved well and was obviously gliding in to set Yamashita up for a joint lock that would neutralize the older man’s attack. But Yamashita wasn’t budging. The guy moved in and made his move, but you could see my teacher set himself, extend energy, and refuse to be moved. It’s a variant on the same technique I used on Andy the night we first saw the Rinpoche.

“What are you doing!” my teacher protested.

“I’m trying to control your center,” his partner replied. I could see heads nod in agreement around the floor.

“My center!” Yamashita seemed puzzled. He looked at the man’s hand as it gripped his right wrist. “Where is the danger here?” my master asked the man.

His partner looked puzzled. “Well the sword, of course.”

“The sword,” the sensei replied, sounding skeptical. “Then why do you attack my wrist? You say the sword is the danger, but you do not take it seriously. You grab—so,” Yamashita glanced at his held wrist, “but the danger has moved.” My teacher let go of his bokken with his right hand, pulled it away with his left, and brought the point to bear against the man’s throat.

“Is the danger the sword or the man wielding it?” Yamashita asked.

“
Ki, ken. Tai,
” Yamashita reminded the group. “Energy, sword, body, all united as one.” It was my turn to nod as I heard the familiar admonition. “All these things are together when we fight, yes?” I saw the respect being paid him reflected in the faces of the people around the training floor. “So when you attack, you must defeat all these things at once. You must break the link between them to defeat your opponent. The center…” My teacher almost sounded amused. “It is easy to talk of the center. But easy also to be distracted from it. Be sure you remember where the center is before you attack.” He moved away from his opponent and brought his bokken up into the middle position. “Please,” Yamashita invited the man.

His partner raised his own sword and came forward. The two men’s weapons crossed at the tip as they met. They circled, regarding each other warily. As they rotated, Yamashita faced the edge of the floor where I stood. His eyes didn’t even flicker in recognition, although I knew he saw me. His opponent stepped back and raised his bokken, the wooden sword held high overhead. Yamashita’s response was subtle—he raised his sword a fraction and angled the blade portion to face his opponent’s left fist. With real swords, it would have permitted Yamashita to slice his opponent’s hand open if he struck down with his sword.

Other than that slight move, Yamashita was rock steady. The opponent sensed it and brought the sword down, bringing his leading left foot back behind him to increase the distance between them. I sighed quietly, knowing that it was all over.

In a flash, Yamashita shot forward, uttering a
kiai
, a shout that seemed to be generated from his hips. He came in on a tangent that would have allowed him to cut at the opponent’s entire right side, but instead he attacked the bokken that the man held. The wooden weapons barked as they made contact, and the snapping authority of Yamashita’s strike was so great that his opponent’s sword was jerked from his hands and flew, end over end, into the bystanders.

There was a murmur of appreciation. But I wondered how many people had actually seen everything he was trying to show them. I had been with him for years, but even now I was still discovering new facets to old techniques.

Yamashita approached me and I thought of all the things I wanted to say—a swirl of emotions fighting to get out. But this is not the Japanese way. I knelt there on the edge of the platform, as any latecomer would, to formally request permission to join the group. I had done this thousands of times. The movements were so familiar as to be almost automatic, the sensations of kneeling, the feel of the careful placement of the hands on the floor before me, were old and unremarkable companions. Yet it was invested with a meaning that, while it may not have been noticed by the students standing around me, was real nonetheless.

Typically, when a student knelt to ask permission to enter a lesson in progress at his dojo, Yamashita would remain standing, give a quick jerking bow, and gesture impatiently for the student to join the group. Today was different. He glided toward me, weapon held formally in his right hand, the tip pointing to the floor and the cutting edge facing behind him. That was unusual. Most times, he gripped the bokken in his left hand, where it could be brought into action in a flash. This posture was one of unqualified greeting. Of respect.

Yamashita knelt down before me with the unconscious grace of a master. His face was fixed, impassive. I bowed deeply. He returned it. And as we straightened up we looked at each other for a moment. Then he smiled. “You are here,” he said simply. And I felt an odd calmness wash over me. There is more than one way to disarm someone.

“I’ve seen the inka,” I told him. “And more…”

Yamashita nodded. “And so?”

“I think there is danger, Sensei,” I said quietly. I didn’t want anyone to overhear me, but I also felt a bit self-conscious with the melodrama of the words.

“Think? I believe there is more to it than that, Burke…” He somehow seemed obscurely pleased. Then he continued. “Danger, yes. Of that, there is no doubt.” He gazed at me and I thought I saw something like approval deep in his eyes. He looked about him reflectively at the waiting students. “I could have used you earlier, Burke,” he said, raising his voice. “There is great danger here…” his eyes crinkled in amusement “… we are surrounded by hundreds of warriors. None of whom seem to know how to hold onto their weapons.”

I understood that this was not the place to talk, and I nodded at the silent message he was sending me.

“Meet me here after the evening meal,” my teacher suggested quietly. “We will walk and listen to the sounds of the forest at night.”

“How’s the food?” I asked him, trying to maintain the casual mood.

“The food is adequate. The coffee, on the other hand, is a disappointment.” His words were sad, but his eyes twinkled.

21
TRUE BELIEVERS

Micky and Art had arrived late in the day, local cops in tow. My brother was fuming at how long it had taken to get the NYPD to react, and the technicalities of taking the investigation across state lines. The local cops politely questioned Kita’s people, flashed pictures of Han the Mongol, and got the predictable shakes of the head. No one had seen him. Kita himself was in transit from L.A., so the cops would be back.

After the questioning, I had walked with them down the sloping black-top path to where their cars were parked.

“This is bullshit,” my brother snarled. “Someone knows somethin’ and they’re not sayin’.”

The local guy hooked a pair of aviator sunglasses over his ears and nodded without enthusiasm. He was broad-shoul-dered, but still young enough not to have gotten thick around the waist. “You’re probably right.” He had copper-colored hair in a buzz cut and light gray eyes. The name tag on his sharply creased uniform shirt said “Wallace.”

“So where do we go from here?” Art asked thoughtfully. He rubbed the scar on his wrist absentmindedly. It was a new habit.

My brother eyed his partner and then looked away.

The local cop was talking. “We’ll flash the picture of your suspect around some. Locals usually have a good handle on who’s coming through these small towns,” he said.

“Whaddaya think?” my brother asked his partner. “Hang around?”

“Sure. Why not?” Art said. He looked at Wallace. “You guys can back us up?” The cop nodded.

“Maybe you want to go with the locals down into town, Art?” Micky sounded hesitant. “You know, in case Han shows somewhere else. I can cover this end.” It sounded lame, even to me.

Art flushed with annoyance. “So what are you sayin’, Mick?” My brother held up his hands to calm his partner down, but Art continued. “What? You think I can’t hack this?” Art turned away, hands on his hips, staring off down the road. “Shit,” he said.

“OK, OK, forget it.” Micky looked guiltily at the local cop. “We’ll stake out the entrance here,” Micky told him. “Wait for Kita.”

Wallace looked from one to the other of the two men. He didn’t say much, just thought about things for a minute, then nodded, although he didn’t seem real sure. “OK. Anyone on the inside who can give us a heads-up if this fella appears?”

Micky nodded at me. “He can.”

The local cop nodded slowly. “All right. The suspect shows up, Mr. Burke, you know what to do, right?”

“I’ll call you,” I said dutifully.

“And then run like hell,” my brother added.

Later, as night approached, I found Yamashita. We sat on a park bench near a stream, facing into the woods. I wanted to tell him something of what I’d learned and he could sense the eagerness in me. It was just like him to force me into a moment of calm. But maybe it wasn’t solely for me. Since my session with Changpa, I had tried to think about things from multiple perspectives. Yamashita could sense my agitation, but I was surprised to realize as I watched him react to passersby that he was on edge. The teacher-disciple bond cuts both ways: he could always read me, but increasingly I was able to read him as well. It made for silences alive with things unspoken. You could sense the faint tension in the air. It leaked off him like the buzz of a transformer. He was very careful with what he said and he kept his voice low when we spoke.

“So the police finally found the inka?” he asked. I nodded and he went on. “And what does it tell us? Does it provide what you had hoped for?”

“It’s a fraud,” I said. “Kita’s pedigree is a fabrication.”

He didn’t act particularly surprised.
Did you know something all along?
I wondered. But I didn’t ask.

Yamashita held a hand up, patting the air in a gesture meant to make me lower my voice. My teacher had changed his clothes and wore an old pair of khaki pants and a spotless white t-shirt. He’s not a tall man, and seated on the bench he could wiggle his legs to and fro, his zori sandals lightly scuffing the dirt in front of us. He looked slowly about to check for people nearby. Then he peered deeply into the woods where the outlines of rocks and tree trunks were slowly fading in the dusk.

“Indeed,” Sensei finally said. “He has built his world on a lie. Yet do not be fooled. Such a man is not without skill.” My teacher looked at me. “You should take the time to observe his students, Professor. There is something to learn here.”

I nodded, but knew he was seeking in some way to rebuild the links between us with the mundane issues of training. I dropped that thought for one more pressing. “Kita, Han… and Stark. They’re up to something.”

“Ahh, Stark,” Yamashita said, nodding. “I sense… confusion, not evil in that one.” Yamashita smiled to himself. “But each student is a different type of trouble.”

“The Rinpoche thought Stark was going to be in some sort of danger,” I reminded my teacher. “I don’t think that he was seeing things clearly. I think that maybe Stark is part of the danger.”

“Perhaps,” Yamashita said, seeming to be unwilling to take it further. He got up and stepped down the slope to approach the stream. He skipped lightly across the rocks and entered the darkening wood. I followed and the gloom covered us like fog.

“Today when I was instructing the trainees,” Yamashita began, “do you remember my admonition?”

“Sure. The need for focus. Controlling the center.”

“I cautioned as well against being distracted,” he told me. He heard me take a breath but began talking before I could respond. “I, too, am worried, Burke. But I think there are more important things to worry about than Stark. The police think that this man, Han, has murdered three people,
neh
? And yet from what you know of him, we would assume that his motives would be… mercenary.”

“That’s what Micky thinks,” I told him.

“Indeed. And we must respect his insight in this. So… Han is a weapon. But he cuts only where directed. Who directs him?”

“Kita,” I suggested.

“Perhaps,” Yamashita answered. “I know that for a man like Kita, the secret of the inka is one that must be kept. His pride would demand it. And the pride of his followers…”

“But is it enough to make them kill to keep the secret?” I asked. I had to be honest. Even at this point I wasn’t sure. You could hear the vestiges of disbelief in my voice.

“I do not know. An emotion like pride is a powerful force, certainly,” Yamashita said quietly as he slowly moved along a faint path in the woods. “These are proud people.” He looked at me. In the fading light his eyes were lost in dark shadow. “You know something of this. For Kita’s disciples it is an immature pride, but it is powerful nonetheless.”