In the light of this evening, I guessed he was both.

  “We cannot discuss business until your friend is with us. Do you want my boys to search for him? It might end in significant damage to this vessel.”

  His syntax belied his involvement with the juvenile justice system, and I guessed he was something of an autodidact.

  Something or, rather, someone, crashed to the burnished teak flooring of the deck above us. A muffled thud, a grunt, another loud floor slam.

  Takeshi’s eyes rolled upward and studied the ceiling. I didn’t bother.

  Another thud, something large, like a human being, hitting the floor followed by something smaller, like a book slammed on a table. I guessed it was the sound of a gun with a suppressor going off.

  Takeshi looked back at me, alarmed and confused for a moment.

  “I believe my friend has been found by your boys. Or, rather, vice versa, unfortunately. For them, I mean.”

  Despite my outer calm, large ungainly butterflies bumped into each other in my chest.

  The typical flight-or-fight response.

  I do have the ability to achieve a stillness, a focus inside, but it usually only happens at the very moment before danger or in the midst of an altercation.

  It didn’t used to be that way. Meditation, yoga, Marsh’s tutoring, and, most importantly, an unseemly number of experiences fending off threatening behavior and actual violence have allowed me and my body and mind to jump into “lizard brain” mode when necessary.

  Not always, but often. And it has saved my life more than once.

  For Marsh, there seems to be no transition needed. He is always ready, and I’ve rarely seen him rattled by even the most extreme threats.

  It’s a gift, but not one that I envy.

  I love Marsh, but I don’t want his nature. I just want to learn enough to survive what I have to survive and avoid violence whenever possible.

  Although there are people, some very close to me, that feel that I court it. I don’t think I do, but it’s part and parcel of what I do for a living.

  Takeshi, his eyes wide, looked up again and shouted, “Charles!”

  No response.

  “John?”

  Nada.

  “Daniel?”

  Daniel did not respond to the great leader.

  “Baby!”

  I guessed Baby was curled up in a fetal position.

  Takeshi pulled a revolver from inside his coat and pointed it at Dao. “Call for him to surrender himself here or I will shoot the old man.”

  Before I could answer, Marsh appeared out of the hallway connected to the adjoining bedroom. He held the remains of the whiskey sour in his right hand but appeared otherwise weaponless.

  Takeshi and all the others in the room sighted their guns on him. “Stay right where you are.”

  Since he didn’t identify him by name, I assumed he didn’t know who Marsh was.

  Mistake numero uno.

  Marsh flashed a smile and started moving toward the bar.

  “Where are you going…” The gun waved up and down in Takeshi’s hand.

  He reached the bar, placed the empty glass on top of it, put his hand on top of Dao’s shoulder. Something passed between them, and Dao got up and joined Marsh behind the bar.

  “Stop! Stay where you are!”

  Too late. Marsh and Dao achieved stasis behind the bar.

  All guns and wide eyes in the room were trained on their every movement.

  Takeshi shouted, “George! Ba! Come now!”

  He glanced down at the floor, and I assumed those were the men I’d heard moving around beneath us earlier.

  “‘Fraid they’re fast asleep, just like the others upstairs.”

  “You killed them?” Takeshi’s voice reflected disbelief and alarm and reluctant admiration all at once.

  “No. Fortunately, they were all quite cooperative. Some might call them sloppy or amateurish. But it saved their lives. I can’t speak to the possibility of concussions.”

  “Who are you?” Takeshi asked, a sense of fear and uncertainty and the first gnarly touch of fear in his voice.

  “Just a regular guy trying to keep his nose clean in a world inhabited by cretins like you and your associates.”

  “I would be careful, Mister…?”

  “My friends call me Marsh. But you can call me Doctor Demento.”

  Takeshi did not know how to react. He looked at me, a little slack-jawed, his eyes wide, if not in panic, at least a rising level of confusion.

  I shrugged. I empathized with him. Encountering Marsh doing what he does best for the first time can be profoundly mind boggling.

  “So, Takeshi, you’re here to negotiate. Why don’t you explain your position? I only have it second-hand, and to be honest, I don’t really believe, as honest as Dao is, that he’s relayed your demand accurately. Because, man, it’s really far out,” I said, keeping my voice as steady as I could considering my racing heart and wobbly knees.

  Takeshi muttered something in Chinese, and the men behind him moved forward a step. All of them racked the slides on their single-action semi-automatics.

  He waved at his gang and their overwhelming weaponry. “You understand?” he said.

  I nodded. Dao trembled. Marsh didn’t do a thing.

  “The old man cheated my uncle out of millions of dollars. Most of his savings. We expect justice. That is all. As an act of good faith, we have requested a small deposit. Did you bring it, old man?”

  He glared at Dao, who looked away and stayed silent.

  “That is disappointing, old man.”

  Young punk was getting on my nerves. If he called my friend old man one more time, I didn’t know if I was going to be able to stop myself from making him eat his gun.

  “It was just a small gesture of good will. The old man has the money and will still have enough left over to last him the rest of his days. This is the only way my family will feel avenged for this profound injustice. It is fortunate that we do not believe in violence for violence’s sake, since, had this treachery been committed back in our ancestral home, the old man would have forfeited his life.”

  “Sounds fair,” Marsh purred like a big cat. “Are you sure you don’t want to ask for more? Perhaps Plank or I can kick in some money for having inconvenienced you tonight? Do you have taxi fare home?”

  “This isn’t a laughing matter,” Takeshi growled.

  “Only your demands are joke-worthy. If your uncle really gambled that much money on a speculative risk like this one, then something is wrong with him and the family should take him to a doctor. In any case, he was given all the proper warnings, but he chose to ignore them. Our friend Dao here has no responsibility and will not pay you a single solitary nickel. You continue to threaten him at great peril to your health and well-being. I suggest you leave right now while you still can.”

  Takeshi’s look morphed from astonishment to grim smugness. “You may have surprised my men upstairs in the dark. But it is not dark now. And…” he glanced at me, “I have someone outside of your girlfriend’s house with Meiying and the little girl.” He reached into his pocket and removed his cell phone and waved it. “One phone call and they both disappear.”

  “So you’re going to kill us?” Marsh asked. “You think you’ll slaughter us and skip out of here scot-free, assuming we haven’t already told the police all about your little gang?”

  Takeshi smiled. “Makes no matter. You’ll be dead, and what happens to us is none of your concern.”

  “That’s a relief,” Marsh said.

  “So,” Takeshi said, looking to Dao, “will you provide this small gesture of good faith?”

  Dao opened his mouth to answer, but Marsh touched his arm and said flatly, “Not one plum nickel.”

  Takeshi shook his head and started punching buttons on his phone. He stood watching us and listening for a long time. The rings were audible in the deathly quiet of the room. Ten rings. Fifteen. Twenty. With each passing peal, the confidence on his face cratered just a little. Finally, he clicked his phone off, swore, and said, “Ban will call back soon.”

  “I doubt it,” Marsh said. “I paid a visit to Meiying just before I arrived here. Ban is all tied up at the moment.”

  “Fuck you,” he screamed, lifting and leveling his piece.

  Marsh’s hands rose from beneath the bar. When they appeared above the beautiful walnut veneer, each gripped a hand grenade.

  With his thumbs, he jerked the pins free. They hit the floor with dual pings.

  Takeshi jumped back, his gun flagging.

  Marsh and Dao dove beneath the bar. Dao’s face was white as a ghost. I couldn’t see Marsh, just his hands primed to throw hanging fast balls.

  “Now, gentlemen, I suggest you file out in an orderly manner. The bar will protect us from the force of the explosions, but I fear all of you might lose limb and life,” Marsh said calmly from his crouched position.

  Feeling left out, I dived behind the cover of the bar. “‘Bout time, buddy,” Marsh said.

  “You’re crazy, man,” Takeshi screamed. “The old man will pay.”

  He barked commands in Chinese to his compatriots. Chatter ensued. Then, slowly, I heard the shuffling of shoes. I inched around to the edge of the bar and peeked out in time to see them disappearing out the door. More steps on the stairs rising to the upper deck. Scuffling, groans, whispers, heavy lifting as they retrieved their wounded from above and below.

  Then I heard the whole bunch of them stumble and bumble their way down the gangplank and onto the pier and away from the Sweet and Sour.

  Marsh stood up and put the grenades on top of the bar. Most people, including myself before being educated by Marsh, are misled by the movies. They think that the pin being released on a hand grenade means it will explode within seconds. Not true. The trigger, the long handle on the side of the bomb, is the actual detonator. Once the grenade is thrown, the trigger gets loose, the fuse is engaged, and three or four seconds later…boom!

  Still, I looked at the grenades with more than a little wariness, and said, “Marsh,” nodding toward the bombs.

  He winked at me, searched the floor, found the pins, and reinserted them.

  I took a deep breath. It felt like the first I had taken in a month.

  Eighteen

  The shimmery, bronze-toned curtain dropped with a shallow whoosh and billowed like a sail in a stiff headwind before settling lightly on the gleaming bamboo floor.

  I had no idea what I had just seen meant, but it had a seductive quality to it, a compelling otherworldly feel.

  “We’re going to have English narration. Headphones.”

  “That will be helpful.”

  “I wasn’t in favor of it. I’m an originalist, so to speak. I think the movements, the pageantry, the costumes convey all you need. But Dao insisted. He has less faith in us.”

  “Surprising.” I’ve never known Marsh to be overly optimistic about humans, especially of the American variety.

  We were sitting on unpainted makeshift benches in the center of the still-developing theater complex near the Aquarium on Fisherman’s Wharf.

  “What did you think?”

  Marsh had just finished explaining a bit about Kabuki—how it had been invented in Japan by a woman and performed for common people exclusively by women in the early sixteenth century. Within thirty years, the patriarchal powers that be were threatened by the erotic nature of the spectacle and banned women from participating. Since then it has been an exclusively male art, with men playing female roles. Kabuki—meaning sing, dance, and skill in Japanese—is highly stylized with elaborate costumes, makeup, outrageous wigs, and over-the-top acting. It’s basically a bombastic dance-theater spectacle. I felt it had more than a few similarities to opera.

  The gorgeous curtain I had just seen fall was just one aspect of the dynamic staging. Marsh said they were designing trap doors and revolving platforms and overhead wiring that would allow the actors to take flight above the audience.

  Kimonos would be offered to all patrons to get them into the proper mood.

  “I don’t know what was going on, but it felt like I was in another world. Strange and wonderful.”

  “That’s the idea.”

  A man wearing a horrific mask—a Joker-esque mouth with demon orange eyes and black horns—walked toward us.

  “Haruki, it was beautiful. Bravo.”

  The man slipped off the mask. He was a slender, boyish-looking man in his forties with expressive eyes and jet-black hair.

  “Thank you, Mr. Chapin. Did you like the oyama?” Haruki looked apprehensive.

  “Yes, tell Ichiro it was good.”

  Haruki’s smile broadened, he gave a little bow, to which Marsh responded with a nod, and disappeared behind the curtain.

  “Oyama?”

  “The female role, played by a male, of course. Ichiro just signed on. Haruki recruited him from Kyoto. That’s where I found Haruki, who is, more or less, our director and lead actor.”

  I didn’t know how Marsh could differentiate between what was good and bad acting, as most of the faces were covered in elaborate makeup or garish masks, and all the performances were extravagant to the extreme, but, as I say, it all wove a spell that was fascinating.

  “When does the theater open?”

  “Not until next summer. Lots still to do, the theater itself is months from completion. Green tea,” he said and got up.

  I followed him to a small anteroom in back of the theater where a pot of hot green tea sat on a Formica table. The tea cups were decorated with Kabuki masks, as was the pot. Marsh sat and poured the tea. I took the seat across from him.

  “How’s Dao doing?” I asked, knowing Marsh had dropped by the Sweet and Sour earlier that morning.

  “Shaken.”

  “He’s not the only one.”

  Marsh lifted the tea cup, gave the liquid a cursory blow, and sipped. He closed his eyes in appreciation. “He’s worried that Takeshi and his boys will come back. I told him not to worry.”

  “Easy for you to say. We don’t know what he’ll do. Seemed like the boy was suffering from an inflated sense of self. I’m sure you popped his balloon a little, but I don’t think he’s going to appreciate you embarrassing him in front of his men. I think he’ll be seeking revenge of some sort or other and likely to make another run at Dao.”

  “I don’t doubt that.”

  I tried the tea. It was palatable, but barely. I prefer coffee.

  “I’ve got someone watching the boat.” Marsh gave me a look. “You’re going to pay a visit to George Liu. We’ll find out where Takeshi is most likely to be found alone. See what the old man thinks of his nephew and what he knows about all this juvenile delinquency. Then—”

  A woman’s head appeared around the open entrance to the little room. “I’m leaving, Mr. Chapin. Do you need anything else? There are fortune cookies in the cabinets over there.”

  She was college aged and cute as a Japanese pixie.

  “Thanks, Jen. We’re fine. Smashing tea.” He raised his cup to her.

  She flashed a smile and waved goodbye.

  While staring reflectively at the space she had vacated, Marsh said, “I’ve got a couple of people on Takeshi’s trail. By tonight I should hear back if we have a firm fix on him so we can track his movements. I’ll let you know where and when you can talk to Liu. Any questions?”

  It looked like he had it handled as well as it could be. I was still nervous about my two old friends on the Sweet and Sour, that somehow Takeshi would circumvent Marsh’s defenses, but I knew that whoever he’d assigned to protect Dao and Meiying was more than merely competent.

  “Sounds like you’ve got it covered.” I paused, frowned, my thoughts drifting back to the Wambaugh affairs. “Anything on Christopher yet?”

  “As a matter-of-fact, yes. I just got a report late last night. The most interesting tidbit came from contacts at the Children’s Network. My associate talked with several employees who frequent a bar nearby and was able to determine that young Christopher has been volunteering on and off for several years. He was working there when the abuse charges arose and was questioned on several occasions by the police. The charges were eventually dropped, but the rumor is that the center settled with some of the parties involved. Others say a troubled kid made up the charges to get back at a couple of the counselors for being strict with him. It’s unclear what really went on. Just that Christopher was there at the time.”

  “Still, that doesn’t really tell us much so—”

  “And one young woman we spoke with, Mary Linn, said that the woman you encountered at the Network the night of the shooting, Liz, I believe is her name, is particularly close with Christopher. Some of the other people there even thought they might be having an affair. But Mary Linn thinks she just felt sorry for him, a motherly concern. So, it’s likely she was protecting him the night you showed up.”

  “Yeah. He probably escaped through the back door to an alley that leads to the wide world. There’s nowhere he could have hidden inside. I had access to every room. How about Sarah? I understand she has volunteered there, too. Maybe Christopher got her involved.”

  “I was going to tell you. It appears, according to Mary Linn, that she was asked to leave by the executive director not too long ago. Mary Linn didn’t know the whole story, but there was some tension between them. She said that Sarah had been volunteering for roughly the past year.”

  “Mmmm. That sounds like it needs a little follow up. Do you have any information about Scott, the executive director?”

  “Working on it. We have the basic information, but now, after talking with Mary Linn, we’re looking for more. Back to you soon. And, by the way, the associate I have following Christopher hasn’t had much to report. In the past couple of days, he’s only left the house twice. Once to go to Starbucks for a Frappuccino and the other time to buy a pair of jeans at Macy’s at a nearby mall. Otherwise, he’s stayed tight in the cradle of Mommy’s bosom.”

  “Nicely put.”

  “You’re still on for this weekend at the matriarchal abode?”

 

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