Japantown (28 page)

Making an enemy of Goro Kozawa was tantamount to career suicide. If Tejima did not tread carefully, by tomorrow morning the recalcitrant bureaucrat would be holding transfer orders to one of Japan’s Siberian outposts.

“I am pleased you have returned to tonight’s program. Now, Brodie-san, you were saying?”

I retook my seat. “What kind of special military, Tejima-san?”

Eyes downcast, Tejima murmured into his lap, “The Kempei Tai.”

A current of fear roiled my blood. This thing just got worse by the
hour. First Kozawa, then Hara’s betrayal, and now state secrets of the dirtiest sort. In Tejima’s pond, there would be sharks who would feel threatened by what we were about to learn.

Trading uneasy glances, Noda and I shared the same thought: yet another way to get ourselves killed.

CHAPTER 46

T
EJIMA
had just mentioned one of Japan’s most securely closeted skeletons.

Wartime Japan swarmed with police agencies that regulated every aspect of domestic and military life, such as the Special Higher Police (known as the Thought Police), and the Secret Military Police, a.k.a. the Kempei Tai—the most feared of them all. Espionage and counter-intelligence was their territory, and their eventual leader, the legendary Tojo, gave them the power to terrorize at home and abroad, which they did with unshackled fervor. Comparisons between the KPT and Nazi Germany’s Gestapo were frequent, but after the Japanese surrender at the end of World War II, the Allied Occupation authorities played down the KPT’s murderous reign in a bid to remake Japan’s image as a new and humbled American ally in the East. With the eruption of the Korean War five years later, America needed Japanese bases as a launching pad against its new ally’s feisty neighbor to the west, so all skeletons were permanently deep-sixed. In world annals, KPT activity remains an unexplored chapter. There was no Asian Simon Wiesenthal to hunt down the worst offenders.

I gave Tejima a further nudge. “How many Kempei Tai went missing after the surrender?”

“Among the low- and middle-ranking KPT officers, losses were typical. However, among the elite, nineteen. More than our experts can explain. Of those elite nineteen, seven had formed part of a super-elite group. The men were born in Soga-jujo. Two of the seven were top KPT officers. What makes those two significant is that with two other top
KPT officers
not
from Soga, they controlled the equivalent of a million American dollars in gold bullion. In nineteen-forties dollars, mind you.”

“How many of the four officers who controlled the funds went MIA?” I asked.

“All of them.”

“You’re joking.”

“Unfortunately, no.”

“Were any bodies ever found?”

“No.”

“How nice. A war chest becomes a start-up fund for Soga.”

Tejima protested. “We have no proof that such is the case.”

Kozawa scowled. “Tejima-kun . . .”

“Which could, in itself, be construed as the next closest thing,” the chastened civil servant added hastily.

“How many other non-Soga KPT officers knew about the secret funds?”

“Six.”

“And how many of
those
men survived the war?”

“None.”

I fell back in my seat and stared at the bureaucrat in disbelief. His admission was staggering. I glanced at Noda. His face gave away nothing. I wondered if the chief detective was thinking what I was: the efficiency of the disappearances was a chilling reminder of how ruthless Soga could be.

“So,” I said after considering the revelation, “in a sense, you’ve been assigned to clean up your own backyard, haven’t you? Exhuming the skeletons for more secure reburials, before they become a public embarrassment?”

Tejima grimaced. “Do you have time to listen to a recording?”

“All the time in the world, provided it’s now.”

Nodding, Tejima reached for his briefcase. He keyed in a combination, popped the latches, and extracted a handheld digital recorder. With exaggerated concern, he spent several long moments aligning the corners of the machine with the table’s edge, as if he were surreptitiously buying time to steel himself against his next revelation.

I studied the man before me. He took good care of himself. His
grooming was impeccable. His haircut was expert, his cologne discreet. His hands were manicured, with cuticles shaped into perfectly rounded arcs. White half-moons peeked from the arcs. The half-moons began to tremble as he turned on the machine.

We heard a rush of air as a door swung open. Two sets of footfalls approached over hardwood. Chairs scraped the floor.

An assured male voice: “
Ugoiteru no ka?”
Is it running?

A second male: “
Ugoitemasu
. I was testing the machine. Shall I rewind the tape?”

Subservient, lower-ranking,
I thought.
The first voice belonged to the leader.

First male: “No. Keep it going. We’re ready. Let’s begin.”

A third voice, grim and tense: “Will you do me the honor of listening to my story?”

The first man: “We are grateful to be allowed the opportunity. Saeki-kun, you may leave us now.”

“As you wish, sir.”

A silence, probably filled with a bow, was followed by receding footsteps and the sound of a closing door.

The first man: “Now, if our session is to be productive, let me suggest you be as candid as possible. I shall, quite naturally, hold your comments in confidence.”

The grim voice: “I will tell you everything in one sitting. Are you sure you’re ready?”

“Yes. I will gratefully receive all you wish to impart.”

“Good, because once we begin there is no turning back.”

“I understand. Now, why have you come forward?”

“By birth, I am
roku dai
: sixth generation. The oldest families are
ju-yon dai
: fourteenth generation. My father was killed on the job, but the job made him a millionaire. My mother has no financial worries, so she resisted my enlistment.”

“They let you go?”

“There is never any shortage of willing recruits. The work requires stamina and complete devotion, but after an intensive three-year training program, the pay is extraordinary. Now my mother has passed on and I never married, but I see my nieces and nephews nearing recruitment age.
My sister pleaded with me to find a way for her children to grow up free.”

“Won’t your speaking out put their mother at risk?”

“No. Only their uncle.”

A short pause, then: “By which you mean yourself?”

“Yes.”

I heard firmness in his one-word answer. It was the voice of a determined man who had made a hard choice before stepping forward. Made it, accepted the consequences, and regained his balance enough to offer gallows humor. Impressive, if he was the real thing.

“I see. What makes you think your sister will remain unharmed?”

“The Rules of Soga. As long as she stays with her land, in the village, she’s safe.”

“Okay, so for the record, how could the secret be kept for so long?”

“Theirs is a fiercely loyal brotherhood, and almost everyone has a family member or relative involved. Soga is ingrown and there is
giri
—deep obligation over generations. The group has always watched over the village. During natural disasters, the villagers turned to them. In old times, Soga protected them from ambitious warlords and overzealous shogunate troops. As recently as four generations ago, their support during a famine kept many of the poorer farmers from selling their daughters to brothel owners in the cities. After World War Two, Soga provided money to rebuild.”

During our visit to the village, Noda and I had seen that loyalty, and in the okami-san the fear it engendered.

“This brotherhood acts as a patron of the village, then?”

“Yes.”

“What about the others?”

“Others went into the police, the military, the ministries. They are
kakure
Soga. The hidden ones. They lead normal lives, but form an extensive covert network of Soga natives, relatives, and longtime associates. They are all loyal, and all benefit financially. Using them, Soga has infiltrated all the important power structures in Japan. The supply of ‘information gatherers’ is continually replenished. Many others are simply well-paid informants who know nothing of Soga’s activities but owe their careers and financial stability to a network established more
than three hundred years ago. The villagers who spy for Soga don’t know any details, either. I do because my father secretly started my training before he died.”

“Have there been others who tried to disengage?”

“One or two, but Soga’s outplacement program involves incense and prayer beads, not retraining.”

Again the gallows humor.

A caustic chuckle. “Your sense of the dramatic, Mr. Taya, is impressive. However, let’s stay focused on the facts.”

“My name!”

“What of it?”

“You use it so freely! And on this recording!”

“Calm yourself.”

“We agreed—
no names
.”

“This recording is for in-house use only.”

“Haven’t you been listening? They
are
in-house.”

“You are paranoid, I think.” The bureaucrat’s voice was tinged with condescension. “Let’s leave that for the moment. You hinted in our previous exchange of a long history. When did it begin?”

A pause, then: “With Kotaro Ogi. He was a high-ranking samurai from Soga in the inner circle of the Dog Shogun until he was caught honing his swordsmanship on a stray mutt in direct defiance of his master’s edict. Ogi was stripped of his rank and tossed in a dungeon.”

The shock of recognition flooded through me. General Ogi was the man honored in the memorial monolith I’d seen in Soga.

“Is ancient history really pertinent here?” the bureaucrat asked.

“That one incident forged Soga.”

“How?”

“When the jails were emptied after the Dog Shogun’s death, General Ogi was also released. He emerged from imprisonment a changed man. The experience showed him how vulnerable he was, and he vowed never to put himself at the mercy of a higher authority ever again.”

“I’m not following you.”

“From that day forward he relied only on himself, his family, and his fellow villagers. Returning home with all the samurai from his village around 1710, Ogi assembled his own outfit, which he hired out for
special assignments. He provided discretion and quality, and as a former high-ranking samurai in the late shogun’s employ, he had instant respectability, since no one took his incarceration seriously once the Dog Shogun had died. Word spread and when the new shogun needed an outside agent for deniability, he tapped the general. From that point on, Ogi’s group hired out to each new regime, as well as local lords on favorable terms with the regime. Work was never lacking. Beatings, blackmail, and kidnapping made up the bulk of the work, but spying and even assassination also came into play—anything that the ruling powers needed done but needed distance from was parceled out to Soga. They were samurai gone astray, yet provided an essential service. When the samurai way fell to a modernizing Japan, most of Soga’s contacts made the transition to the new government. So the arrangement continued.”

“Are you implying that such secret links continue to this day?”

“Yes.”

Derisive laughter. “Your story is too incredible for words.”

The bureaucrat was mocking his informant,
I thought.
The arrogant bastard.

“But let’s move on,” the bureaucrat said. “In our earlier talk, you also mentioned new methods. Tell me about those.”

Taya went on to recite how they had updated their fighting techniques. They became proficient at modern weaponry of all types, surveillance, hand-to-hand, and poisons. They charged high fees from an exclusive clientele, and—above all—secrecy kept them in business. “They will do anything to protect their secret. They have done so with great success for three hundred years. When there is doubt, the source of the doubt is silenced.
Kanzen ni
.” Completely.

“So tell me their weakness.”

“I know of only one. They operate in teams of four. Only one or two people at the top know the whole operation. If you kill the leaders, it would be like killing the queen bee. The workers would be unable to do anything but buzz around aimlessly.”

“I bet they store illegal weapons in Japan, correct? If we could catch them with a stockpile of firearms—”

“You can’t crush them with a legal technicality.”

“We are the Ministry of Defense, Mr. Taya, and we work within the law.”

“There are only a handful of munitions in this country. But it’s a minor stash and not the point—”

“Well, then, my committee’s job will be a tad more difficult, won’t it?”

“Listen to me! They can kill as easily with a knife or their hands,
Mr. Azuma
. Most Soga-assisted deaths appear accidental, but aren’t. Forget your technicality.”

“My solution would solve everything so neatly. If we could establish the location of a cache of guns, I could propose a raid, and under the Japanese constitution—”

Taya let out a weary sigh. “Listen very, very carefully. It may be your only chance. They are professionals by training, tradition, and blood, and have refined their art for fourteen generations.”

The bureaucrat clicked his tongue in disdain. “No doubt, no doubt. Have you any other nuggets of wisdom to offer us?”

“Just one: If you are to succeed against them, you have to break your normal patterns. They
use
patterns, they use everything. You will be enlisting trained fighters against them. Any men you send should assume their attack to be expected no matter what level of secrecy is employed. If, en route, anything out of the ordinary attracts their attention—a small noise, a shadow, a whisper, an unexpected knock,
anything
—they must shoot first and question later. If they wait for verification, they will be dead.”

“Is that all?”

“I have given your men the difference between life and death. Isn’t that enough?”