Fishing for Stars (42 page)

Muzi-san
appeared in the shirtmaker and I thought it looked rather dull, although the colour would suit Anna’s skin tone and dark hair.
Muzi-san
was right – it was a bit too sophisticated for someone in her early twenties but probably right for Anna. What’s more, I
definitely
didn’t like the dress. ‘Okay, that’s the one. Can we have it in a size ten?’ I said to the assistant. Then addressing
Muzi-san
, ‘This time I want you to choose the spring dress you would like above all others. I feel sure that is the one Anna would like. Get a size eight and try it on. Maybe a party dress or a cocktail dress to wear in the evening, something glamorous, eh?’

Muzi-san
looked pleased and returned wearing an off-the-shoulder silk dress with ballerina skirt festooned with tiny pink roses set against a cream background. She had nice legs and it looked terrific, a knockout, making it absolutely worthless for Anna. ‘Wonderful!’ I said. ‘We’ll take it!’

Muzi-san
looked slightly doubtful. ‘Perhaps it is not wise,
Duncan-san
. You asked me to choose what I personally most liked, but I am a younger woman, maybe it is too . . .’

‘Nonsense, you have wonderful taste!’ I interjected, nodding to the assistant to confirm that we would take the dress. When
Muzi-san
had returned to the changing room I instructed the sales assistant to select a size eight and not a ten.

The next stop was the lingerie department and here
Muzi-san
hesitated. ‘Lingerie, it is a very personal thing,
Duncan-san
. How can I choose?’ Then she brightened. ‘But, of course, you will know yourself.’

But, of course, I didn’t. I guess I’d seen Anna in her underwear literally hundreds, maybe a thousand times, but like all men my mind was always on something else and all I’d ever registered was lace and semi-transparency in black, pink or white. Or was that Marg? Come to think of it, it probably was Marg. Moreover, off the body it simply looked like a handful of satin and lace and I hadn’t a clue what to choose or even what to look for. I shrugged. ‘
Muzi-san
, pick what you would wear on your wedding night,’ I suggested.

She blushed furiously then giggled. ‘That is for taking off, not for putting on. Maybe something more practical?’

‘No! Anna has been through a tough time, she will want to look pretty. The wedding night ones will be perfect.’

Our final stop was at the shoe department where it turned out the two women wore the same shoe size.
Muzi-san
selected a pair of strappy Italian sandals for the teal blue shirtmaker and a pair of impossibly high-heeled cream French courts to match the background of the party dress.

The five separate parcels were then elaborately wrapped, and with the congratulations of our personal shop assistant and much bowing we departed.

We were back in the office in slightly over the hour, and I had scarcely thanked an astonished and overwhelmed
Muzi-san
by presenting her with the party dress and court shoes, when to my surprise
Fuchida-san
’s phone call came to tell me Anna was safe, though covered in blood.

Perhaps you think me insensitive, and wonder how I could go out shopping with one of the girls from the legal firm when things were so very fraught. Of course, I knew nothing of the
yakuza
plan to ‘take out’ the Shield Society guards, and if I had, I would have rejected it as much too dangerous.

Fuchida-san
, probably sensing this and knowing that I was overwrought, had wisely kept me in the dark, assuring me that
Kinzo-san
would hand over the ransom money and Anna would be released into the custody of
Saito-san
without incident. This assurance had, to a large degree, kept me moderately calm, and without it I feel sure I would have completely flipped. I recalled the wartime words of Sergeant Wainwright:
‘Boyo, in times of crisis, if we allow our imagination to dictate the state of our disposition it becomes a one-way street to a crack-up.’
So, rather than sit on my hands biting my bottom lip, I had kept myself busy procuring the heroin and buying new apparel for Anna. It felt as if I were doing something for her.

The four nights and days that had passed since she’d left the Imperial Hotel in high dudgeon had been, to say the least, bizarre. Anna’s kidnapping, my abortive attempt with the aid of the
yakuza
to rescue her, the debacle at Konoe Akira’s home, the accident with the vase, my arrest, the apparently necessary torture during my interrogation and my extremely fortunate but nevertheless harrowing session in front of the state prosecutor – what an unholy fuck-up, and most of it of my own creation.

Shopping with the cheerful and intelligent
Muzi-san
was almost the first bit of normality since we’d stepped off the Qantas jet at Haneda Airport. To my mind, the small gift of snazzy shoes and a pretty dress didn’t begin to thank her.

Fuchida-san
phoned from the heliport to tell
Kinzo-san
it would not be necessary to pay the ransom, then asked to talk to me. ‘
Hai!
Duncan-san
, your junkie is safe.’ He giggled excitedly. ‘But she will need a good wash; she is covered in blood.’

‘Blood!’ I cried, alarmed. ‘Is she injured?’

He laughed. ‘No,
Duncan-san
, it is not her own. Have you no faith in me? We will be there in half an hour.
Hai!
That one, she is a veritable tiger!’ Then, as I was about to question him further he abruptly hung up, leaving me completely confused. Anna covered in blood?
Please, God, no more mental scars!
I prayed silently, feeling acutely the burden of being in large part to blame for the whole humungous screw-up. Something had obviously gone badly wrong. How? Why?
Saito-san
could scarcely have reached the place where Anna was being held. How then could he be back in half an hour?

Now I was once again up to my eyebrows in excrement, about to face a bloodied, distraught Anna, who was quite possibly even more severely damaged psychologically and enduring the throes of drug withdrawal. The short shopping excursion with
Muzi-san
was all I had to anchor me to what laughingly passed for normality.

Anna, her head covered with a large towel, arrived in the big Mercedes and was taken up in the lift to
Kinzo-san
’s suite of offices. I had been instructed to wait for her in the conference room, no doubt because the prestigious legal firm didn’t want a messy emotional scene in the foyer, which, like the lift, had also been cleared for Anna’s arrival. Led by
Muzi-san,
who had been delegated to meet her, she entered the small room with the towel still draped over her head.

I rushed to greet her. ‘Anna! Oh, oh! My darling!’ I cried, snatching the towel from her head and embracing her, holding her close to my chest before I’d even had a chance to get a good look at her face. Anna wrapped her arms around me and wailed, not as a woman in her forties might have done, but like a small, distraught child. I must have held her for three or four minutes, my hand almost enfolding the back of her head, the only part of her hair I would later observe that wasn’t crusted with dried blood. Finally her weeping turned to serious sobs. It was a long time before she drew away from me.

‘Nicholas, I am so sorry!’ she sobbed.

‘Christ, I’m going to cry,’ I gulped and then grabbed her again as we sobbed in each other’s arms. ‘My fault,’ I choked. ‘It was all my stupid bloody fault!’

‘No, no, Nicholas!
Fuchida-san
says you were wounded and tortured and put in prison!’ Anna burst into fresh sobs. ‘They could have killed you!’ she wailed. She drew back and looked at me; her weeping had left two clear tracks down her blood-crusted cheeks. She knuckled the fresh tears from her eyes. ‘Then, I would have killed myself!’

All I could do was laugh. ‘Darling, you’re safe, that’s all that matters now.’

My words triggered an entirely new reaction from Anna, who began to shiver, hugging herself, teeth chattering. Until now her extreme distress had masked her need for a hit. ‘Nicholas, I am not well,’ she stammered.

I produced the gear she needed but had no idea how much heroin she would require. ‘Ferchrissake, don’t overdose!’ I cried, not knowing how much was too much.

Her hand trembled as she measured the dirty white powder onto the square of foil but then she couldn’t manage to trigger the cigarette lighter, whimpering in frustration. I took it from her. I had never done this before and it seemed deeply wrong, despite the fact that I had procured the heroin for her in the first place. I guess the Puritan in the child dies hard in the man. I held the flame under the foil, heating the powder until it began to melt, immediately giving off a thin coil of smoke. Suddenly my nose was assailed by the most dreadful smell and I realised why in some parts of the world heroin is referred to as ‘shit’, for that was a distinct part of the stench, along with the acrid smell of fresh vomit. Anna, oblivious to the foul smell, grabbed the straw and, sticking it up her nostril, inhaled as if her very life depended on the effusion.

I had no idea how quickly heroin reacts in the bloodstream, but as the last traces of smoke disappeared Anna looked up. ‘Oh God! That was wonderful!’ she exclaimed, the stress gone from her face and her expression clear. ‘Thank you, Nicholas. I love you very much.’

‘The smell! Jesus, Anna, how ever do you put up with the smell?’

Anna looked slightly bemused. ‘Smell? What smell?’ she asked.

I gazed at her, dumbfounded, and for the first time took in her appearance. ‘You look a mess, darling. There’s a bathroom and facilities in this office.
Muzi-san
, one of the office girls, will escort you. She has also arranged for a hairdresser to come up to the office to do your hair.’ I picked up the receiver and dialled
Muzi-san
.

‘
Mushi mushi,
’ she answered. I asked her if she’d take Anna to the bathroom. ‘
Hai!
Duncan-san
, there is nothing I would not do for you. I will be there in a moment.’

I have always known that Anna is made of sterner stuff than most mortals, but a little over two hours later when she emerged, it was difficult to believe the transformation. Her glossy hair was washed and perfectly styled, her make-up was faultless, and her gorgeous violet-blue eyes were clear and shining. Moreover she looked perfectly stunning in the blue dress and elegant sandals. Just short of reaching me she propped and posed. ‘Nicholas, this outfit is perfect,’ she said in English. Then added in some surprise, ‘How very clever of you!’

Muzi-san
had prudently neglected to mention her involvement in the matter. I knew I was going to chicken out and my only hope was that my shopping companion wouldn’t think any less of me. Then I realised that, of course,
Muzi-san
didn’t understand English, which, in turn, made me feel doubly guilty for not giving her the credit she deserved for selecting the outfit. I grinned. ‘All the years of sitting outside changing rooms clutching your handbag have paid off,’ I said, lying smoothly. I imagined that asking another woman to go shopping with you to pick an outfit for the woman you love just isn’t
de rigueur.

Anna looked at me quizzically, her right eyebrow slightly arched. ‘And you learned how to pick exquisite lingerie where?’

‘Anna! That’s not fair!’ I protested. ‘I’ve seen you undressing hundreds of times.’

‘Oh? Strange. I almost always do so in the dark,’ she replied.

I suddenly remembered this was true. Though never afraid for me to see her naked, Anna always undressed in the dark or entered the bedroom completely nude. ‘Anyway, I asked the young lady assisting me to choose what she’d wear on her wedding night,’ I said, explaining.

Anna smiled, forgiving me. ‘Well, she has very good taste.’ She pointed at her feet. ‘And in Italian sandals, too.’

We were ushered into the main boardroom where we found a very short greying Japanese man not an inch above four feet ten. He appeared to be somewhere in his sixties and possessed all the comedic characteristics loved by wartime propaganda cartoonists – spectacles as thick as the bottom of Coke bottles, behind which his eyes, despite the gross magnification, were hidden by the narrow slits of his lids, teeth jutting alarmingly and skin the colour of iodine. He wore a black suit, white celluloid collar on a light blue shirt, a polka-dotted red and white bow tie, and, like Dr Honda, white spats and shiny black shoes with pointed toes. He bowed deeply as we entered and
Kinzo-san
introduced him as the honourable
Miyazaki-san
. ‘Delighted to meet you, Madam, Sir,’ he said in an almost flawless upper-crust English accent. ‘Miyazaki Tono, first-class honours in law and philosophy, Magdalen College, Oxford, 1936.’

I admit I was taken aback and only just recovered enough composure to say, ‘Pleased to meet you, sir.’ Which wasn’t the cold, hostile greeting I had intended to give this individual.