Steel Breeze (3 page)

“Someone
may be stalking us. It’s on a wireless network. Can you tell me if it’s
possible for someone to hack in and change my file while the computer’s in
sleep mode?”

“I
don’t know. I’d have to get a computer forensics guy in here to check out your
security…or bag up all your gear and take it with me.” Fournier said with a
grin.

Desmond
ran his hand through his hair and stared at the laptop.

“Listen,
Des…this kind of thing—somebody playing a prank by typing a poem on your
machine—it wouldn’t get police resources if Sandy wasn’t a murder victim. But
you ought to know by now that when that happened, your family’s privacy became
a thing of the past. Tossed out in service to the truth. So are you asking me
to be a cop and find out the truth about a cyber-breach, maybe even a break-in?
Because if you’re not, then my job here is to find out what you’re playing at.”

Desmond
sighed and deflated into a slouch in the rickety vinyl-upholstered kitchen
chair. “Alright, look: I make shit up for a living, but stuff from real life is
grist for the mill. It’s a personal process, and frankly I don’t want you or
some FBI profiler going through it, taking things out of context.”

Fournier
nodded. “I see…mining your family tragedy for literary gold is a very personal
process.”

Desmond
looked at a spot on the table and shook his head. “I should know better. I
shouldn’t have called you.”

“But
you did. For Lucas’s sake, help me understand before I make some choices here. Is
there more to this than just a few lines on a computer that make no fucking
sense whatsoever? I mean…it’s not exactly an explicit threat.”

“
Drake
is a word for duck. The lines describe a duck floating on the water and eating
a worm. There are a couple of reasons why that alarmed me.”

Fournier
waved his pen over his pad as if he were stirring a pot, one bushy eyebrow
cocked.

“A
male duck alone could be a reference to me as a widower…but the word
drake,
is
also an old word for dragon.”

“And?”

“Dragons
are prominent in Japanese art.”

“Seems
a little thin, Des. But you’re the one with the symbolism college credits. What’s
the other thing?”

“Yesterday
at the playground Lucas wandered off, and I found him with a guy in a hoodie,
looking at a male duck floating in a puddle. The guy ran away when I came near.
I didn’t see his face.”

“Shit,
Desmond, you’ve been saving that for last?”

“It
seems like the haiku is meant to tell me that the same guy who could have taken
Lucas yesterday can also get into our house if he wants to.”

Fournier
whistled. “How the hell did a guy make off with your kid, anyway? Weren’t you
watching him?”

Desmond
averted his gaze from the laptop.

“You
were writing?”

“I
was right next to the sandbox.”

“Yeah,
that helped. I should confiscate this thing just for that.”

“The
guy took off when I showed up. I think he’s trying to get my attention, but I
don’t know why. I mean, wouldn’t it be easier to hurt us without warning?”

“Yeah.
Did you set the computer down when you were looking for Lucas? Was there an
opportunity for someone—this hoodie guy, or an accomplice—to type on it at the
park?”

“No,
I had it on me the whole time.”

“Because
you wouldn’t want to risk losing something so precious.”

“Fuck
you, Chuck. If you don’t want to help, I think we’re done.”

“Too
close to home? You more involved with your work than you are with your boy?”

“I
didn’t ask for your opinion on my parenting. Are you a cop or a social worker?”

“Thought
you didn’t want me here in an official role. Doesn’t that make this a social
call?”

Desmond
did his best to glower at Fournier, but he couldn’t hold the stare.

Fournier
burped. “Alright, you keep the machine for now. I’ll get a guy over here to
check it for remote hacks, but if you want me to post a detail on your street,
you are not only going to have to report this—Oh my God, look at ‘im.”

Desmond
turned in his chair to follow Fournier’s line of sight to the stairs. Lucas was
sitting on the balding carpet runner, mid-flight, clutching one of his action
figures, sleep clinging to his eyes. “Hey, little man,” Fournier said. “You got
big since the last time I saw you.”

Desmond
got up from the table and went to sit on one of the lower steps. He touched the
unruly hair on the back of Lucas’s head and kissed him on the temple. “Good morning,
buddy. You want some water?”

Lucas
shook his head almost imperceptibly. In a whisper, he asked, “Daddy, who is
that?”

Fournier
waved a meaty hand. “I’m Chuck. I’m an old friend of your mom.”

Lucas
slid down a couple of steps on his bottom, and snuggled his head into Desmond’s
armpit.

Fournier
said, “I heard you saw a duck at the playground yesterday.”

Lucas
didn’t acknowledge the comment, kept his face pressed against his father’s
t-shirt.

“Is
that right, Lucas? You saw a duck?”

At
the pizza place Desmond had already quizzed Lucas about everything the man had
said, as well as his hair and eye colors, which Lucas had said were, “all
brownish, I think.” Lucas had said that he’d gone to collect acorns under the
trees and found the man lurking there, with his back turned to the trail. As
Lucas approached, the man had asked if he wanted to see a duck, had jogged down
the trail, pointed at the puddle, and said that it was a Daddy duck, you could
tell because of the green head. Lucas had asked, “Where’s the Mama duck?” And
the man had replied that she was gone. Then he had turned to look at Lucas, and
that was when Lucas saw that he had “a mad face,” and it scared him. That was
when Desmond had arrived, and the man had run away.

Fournier
said, “Lucas, if I came to visit you again, with a man who draws pictures, do
you think you could tell him how to draw a picture of the man who showed you
the duck?”

Lucas
nestled his head deeper into Desmond’s breast and gave a negative shake. Then
he pulled his chin back and said, “Daddy?”

“Yes,
buddy?”

“It
broke.”

“What
broke?”

Lucas
lifted his toy up to his father’s face and said, “Rocket Boy Bob broke.”

The
figure’s head was gone, snapped clean off. Lucas started to cry.

* * *

At
the police station Desmond waited with stale coffee and a stack of even staler
magazines. The coffee was his third cup of the day and he was drinking it
mostly just to keep himself occupied, even though he knew it would only make
him jittery and probably more paranoid than he already was. If that was
possible. Fournier had suggested that Lucas might give a more accurate
description if his father wasn’t watching him. “Kids try to say what they think
their parents want to hear. Don’t worry; this guy is good with kids. He won’t
scare him; he’ll make it like a game.”

Desmond
didn’t know if that was the real reason they were interviewing Lucas alone. Probably
only part of it. He had regretted consenting as soon as Fournier disappeared
behind a frosted glass door with his hand on Lucas’s shoulder, and now he
waited with his leather laptop bag resting between his feet like a napping dog.

When
the door opened again and Fournier waved him in, he found the room empty except
for a table with a manila folder on it. No artist, no pencils, no Lucas.

“Where’s
Lucas?” Desmond asked, stepping around the table toward the only other door.

Fournier
raised a placating hand. “He’s fine. I just want to talk to you about the
sketch.”

Desmond
pointed at the folder. “Is that it?”

“Yeah.”
Fournier pulled a chair out for Desmond to sit in, but Desmond ignored it. He’d
been sitting for over an hour and he didn’t feel like settling now. He just
wanted to satisfy his curiosity and then see Lucas as soon as possible. He felt
Fournier’s eyes on him as he opened the cover of the folder. He was thinking
that the whole presentation was typical police theater, that the only reason to
have the sketch in a folder was to frame his reaction to it when he flipped it
open, but he’d no sooner formed the thought than he saw the page inside and
recoiled in shock.

There
was nothing ordinary about this face.

He
had a mad face.

Desmond
had chalked up the description to a four-year-old’s limited vocabulary, but now
he saw that it was spot on. The face was mad, all right. Mad in every sense.

“Have
you ever seen this before?” Fournier asked.

“No.
I don’t think so.”

“What
does that mean?”

“I
mean not this one in particular, but I’m sure I’ve seen something like it.”

“Where?”

“Same
as you… movies, art, I don’t know, maybe a museum.”

“And
what would you say it is?”

“It’s
a samurai battle mask. The guy in the hoodie was wearing a samurai mask?”

“That’s
what Lucas saw.”

“And
the dolls. The decapitated dolls, and the haiku. Chuck… it has to be the guy. It
has to be Sandy’s killer.”

“Whoa.”
Fournier rested his knuckles on the table and leaned in. “Even
if
I was
willing to consider that we put away the wrong guy—“

“What
other possibility is there?”

“Could
be that some sicko who followed it in the news is playing a cruel trick on you….
Or it could be more complicated.”

Desmond
tore his gaze away from the drawing and squinted at Fournier. “You mean like me
planting the haiku and headless toys and working with an accomplice in a mask
to manufacture a suspect?”

“You
came up with that scenario pretty fast. Anything to it?”

“I
have a wild imagination, but yours is.... I want to see my son. Now.”

“I’m
afraid that’s not possible.”

Chapter 3

Shaun Bell
climbed the basement stairs. His steps slowed as he reached the top, his calves
heavy, his muscles sore from training and lifting. He thought about how the
high ceiling of the basement meant that there were more steps to climb. It
wasn’t easy finding a house with a high-ceilinged basement, but they had done
it twice now, once on each coast. It made for some inventive conversations with
realtors. Of course, a deep basement wasn’t the only important criteria; there
were also privacy concerns.

Sensei
had handled the realtors, but Shaun had listened attentively. There was purpose
in everything Sensei did and said. Nothing lazy, no words wasted. Even what
seemed like idle chit-chat served a purpose. So Shaun Bell had learned the art
of negotiation just as he had learned the art of tea and the art of harmonizing
body, mind, and blade. In all of these, the
kihon
, the fundamentals,
were the same: composure, intent, gauging proximity, and acting mindfully.

But
lately, hesitation had crept into his heart like a black-clad intruder. Some of
his actions these past few days had been spontaneous in the wrong way, arising
from impulses that were at odds with his sworn purpose. He reached the landing,
took a rag from his back pocket, and wrapped it around the doorknob. He drew a
long cleansing breath before opening the door and banishing the betrayals from
his mind on the exhalation.

In
the kitchen he washed the blood from his hands. From the sink he glimpsed
Sensei, seated in the kneeling position on the
tatami
mat in the empty
den. Sensei had already changed into his black
gi
and
hakama
—the elbow-length
sleeves and pleated skirt-pants of a warrior. His eyes were closed in
meditation, and his short sword lay beside his knees on the mat. A dissonant
tingle ran down Shaun’s spine at the sight of it.

 Shaun
prepared the white tea in the ceramic kettle. There was a coffee maker on the
counter as well, but they never used it. Shaun supposed they kept it as a prop,
like the television and so many other things Sensei had acquired to dress the
house in the trappings of an ordinary western life: photos of grandchildren who
did not exist, gadgets, magazines, and DVDs. All purchased for the same reason
as blue jeans and sneakers—to complete a disguise. Just as one couldn’t walk
the streets in a
hakama
without attracting unwanted attention, neither
could one keep a house adorned with nothing but calligraphy, an incense burner,
and an antique tea set. If the police should come calling on people of Japanese
ancestry, it was best to be able to offer them a cup of coffee.

Shaun
had been nine years old when 9/11 happened. By the time he got to high school
there were already paragraphs in history books about racial profiling. He knew
the issue was sensitive, but he wasn’t naïve. When a killer telegraphed an
obsession with the symbols and weapons of a particular race, the FBI would have
no compunction about interviewing local people who belonged to that race. They
would come knocking; it was only a question of when. When they did pay a visit
to the old Japanese man and his young Caucasian tenant, a house devoid of all
Japanese culture might be just as suspicious as one with no American junk. So
the grass
tatami
mats shared the den with a throw rug, the rock garden
coexisted with the statue of St. Francis the previous owner had left beside the
doorstep, and the painting of the bodhisattva Fudo Myoto with his chain and
flaming sword added color to the hallway among the fake family photos. Shaun
walked past these now on the way to his bedroom where his own
gi
and
hakama
hung in the closet.

There
was just enough time to dress before the tea was ready. Shaun didn’t wear a
watch, but he had an innate sense of how long the leaves needed to steep in the
same way that a man who wakes to an alarm every morning will eventually find
his eyes opening at the same time even when the clock is removed. There had
been a time, long ago, when he’d used a thermometer to make the tea. That was
back in California.
When I was an American
, he thought, and caught
himself. Of course, he was still an American by law—an American who could tell
when the tea was ready by its color and aroma and, if he was out of the room, by
the clock in his gut.

He
slipped into the kimono and tied the elaborate straps of the
obi
sash
and
hakama
pants with quick, nimble fingers. He straightened the pleats,
swatted lint from the black silk, and appraised himself in the mirror. His
dirty-blonde hair was getting long. He would have to cut it soon. Or maybe let
it grow out so he could put it in a topknot. Never in public, of course. His
stomach fluttered. Time to bring the tea.

In
the den he placed the tray on the floor between the two mats. He had bowed in
the archway upon entering, even though Sensei couldn’t see the gesture with his
eyes closed. Now Sensei opened them, and Shaun executed the formal kneeling
bow: left hand touching the floor first, then right, eyes level, but head low. He
poured Sensei’s tea into a cup the color of lapis lazuli and placed it into the
master’s hands. Sensei’s impassive face moved ever so slightly with the ripple
of an almost invisible smile. It was a strange smile, like a mirage in the
steam wafting up from the cup. Every time Shaun saw it, he wondered if it had
really been there.

Sensei
waited for his acolyte to pour his own cup. Then, in synchrony, they tasted the
tea in silence.

Sensei
said, “You obtained the target I requested?”

“Hai,
Sensei. It is prepared as you wished.”

Sensei’s
wakizashi
rested in its sheath on the floor between them, and Bell
noticed that, for the first time in their long friendship, it was oriented with
the blade edge facing away from Sensei’s own body, the handle near his right
hand. So
that
was what had felt so discordant. From their very first day
of training, Sensei had arranged his sword on the mat according to the
traditional etiquette: the mirror opposite of this, with the blade transmitting
peaceful intentions, as it would be difficult to draw it quickly on the person
seated opposite. Difficult, but not impossible for Sensei, and now—placed in
this more threatening orientation—very easy indeed.

“Tell
me again why you did not kill the boy in the woods.”

“There
wasn’t enough time. His father found us.”

“Not
enough time.” Sensei let the statement hang in the air. Dust motes floated in
the slanting late afternoon sunlight. The notion that time was a factor for someone
with Shaun Bell’s training was dubious, perhaps even laughable. But Sensei was
not laughing.

“There
was a headless doll in the sandbox. Did you see it?” Sensei asked.

“No,
Sensei. An auspicious omen, perhaps.”

“And
yet, it was not an auspicious day.”

Shaun
focused on his breathing, keeping it steady, keeping his rate of respiration
down so that his heartbeat wouldn’t quicken. He hoped Sensei couldn’t hear the
adjustment of his breath in the silent room. The doll was a peculiar
coincidence. He hadn’t put it there; it had just been at the scene, unearthed
by chance. But it
had
given him the idea to repeat the motif with one of
the boy’s own toys. Of course, for the warrior, there was no such thing as
chance. Did the appearance of the doll indicate that his course was aligned
with heaven? But which course? He was at a fork in the path. How many of the
tentative steps he had taken down the divergent way to see if his feet felt
right on it had Sensei witnessed?

It
didn’t matter now. As always, the master was correcting his trajectory. But if
Sensei knew with certainty of a betrayal, then Shaun would not be looking at
the sword on the mat right now, divining its meaning and waiting for it to be
drawn on him. He would already be dead. There was still doubt in the master’s
mind, and Shaun needed to advance into that space swiftly and decisively.

“I
hesitated, Sensei. I’m sorry. My skill with the short blade is less certain. If
I’d had my
katana
I would have acted, but the need for a concealed
blade, a shorter blade…. I doubted my reach, and when the moment arrived and
the man had found us, I decided that no cut was better than a poor cut.”

The
master’s face was like stone as he listened to the excuse. Then he said, “You
doubted the method. Did you not also doubt the righteousness of the kill?”

Shaun
was silent. The accusation was plain. To try to deflect it with a lie now would
be disgraceful and transparent. He might as well offer his neck and ask for a
dagger. Sensei had always been able to read him like a book.

When
Shaun was a boy, there had been a period after his parents’ divorce when he
became mute, unable to talk to his classmates, his parents, anyone. During
those months, he had retained only his ability to speak to animals. His parents
never knew that he talked to the dog in the privacy of his room. They didn’t
listen at the door, and they spent more time on the phone with the shrink
discussing pills for him than they spent with him. Nor did they ever know that
when the kindly old Japanese man moved into the downstairs rental, he was the
person Shaun found his voice with again. In retrospect, it made sense. Sensei
was in a different class of human, much more aligned with the animal kingdom;
he was a pure predator.

“Remember,”
Sensei said, “that your actions transcend you. You are an instrument in a
greater hand. You are a razor shard blown on the wind of karma. When we met,
you stepped into the path of that wind, but you are not the one who stirred it,
nor can you set its course.”

“Hai,
Sensei.”

Sensei
raised his right hand from his lap. Slowly and deliberately, he picked his
sword up from the mat and set it down again in front of his student, orienting
the blade in the proper position this time. “Do the honors,” he said.

Shaun
bowed deeply to the sword and exhaled. He picked the weapon up and inserted the
scabbard through the straps at his waist.

“Rise,”
Sensei commanded him.

Shaun
Bell walked to the basement door with his master one step behind him. He still
half expected to hear the
tachikaze
, the wind sound, of a sword behind
him as he descended the stairs.

He
drew a deep cleansing breath as he set foot on the concrete floor at the bottom.
His left hand was curled around the mouth of the scabbard, his right resting at
his side. Striding silently across the room, he moved his left thumb to the
drawing position and used it to push the handguard, loosening the blade from
its snug fit in the
saya
, freeing it up for a fluid drawing cut. Once
the body was in motion, there might be pauses in the lethal dance, just as
there were silent beats in the rhythm of music, but there were no stops and no
discrete movements—everything flowed into everything else. The stride, the
draw, the cut, the
chiburi
in which blood and tissue were jettisoned
from the blade in a sweeping arc, all of it was one dance.

The
black folds of the
hakama
swirled around his feet as he quickened his
step, giving the feeling that he was not walking but gliding across the empty
floor of the training room.

Mindful
of every nuance of posture and grip, alignment and bearing, he drew the blade
in a fluid, accelerating flash, rolling the scabbard with his left hand just
before the steel cleared the oiled wood, allowing the curved blade to travel
upward from his waist to his shoulder, slicing clean through the flesh of the
pig carcass mounted on the wooden stand in the center of the room.

The
top half of the animal slid toward the floor with a sucking sound, but before
it hit the concrete, the blade had already come down again, retracing its path
from ceiling to floor, and severing the pig’s head clean off at the neck.

Bell
took a step backward into a long stance, and completed the form with the wet
umbrella
chiburi,
sending a rain of thickening blood to splatter against
the concrete wall.

He
re-sheathed the blade with a graceful gliding maneuver, drawing the flat edge
across the crook of his left arm and over the webbing between his left thumb
and forefinger where he gripped the mouth of the scabbard, a long exhalation of
breath synchronized with the sliding of steel into wood.

Sensei
paced around the pedestal, examining the remaining section of carcass still
fastened to it and the two pieces that now lay on the floor.

“It
was the same height as the child?”

“Hai,
Sensei.”

The
master nodded, appraising the clean angles. “You will not fail again.”