Hanging the Devil, page 25
“When can I learn?”
“After you master the sticks, the staff, and the knife, we can try the sword.”
“So next week?” asked Grace, a smirk hiding in the corner of her mouth.
Sally smiled. “I did tell you that roosters should be confident, didn’t I?”
“And smart,” said Grace. “You said roosters are smart.”
“Well, Little Rooster,” said Sally, “did I mention they’re also impatient?”
Grace lowered her chin but kept her eyes up. She had mastered the eleven-year-old skill of being deferential and defiant simultaneously. “So next month?”
“That sounds like a goal,” said Sally.
“Can I learn how to use the sword in your room?”
Sally raised an eyebrow. “The naginata is a cavalry weapon. Do you know how to ride a horse?”
“Not yet,” said Grace. “But I was hoping you could teach me.”
“I don’t have a horse,” said Sally. “Only a visiting cat.”
As if on cue, the black cat with the lightning scar padded across the floor and nuzzled Grace’s elbow before climbing into her lap.
“Hello, Xan.” Grace stroked the cat’s back as a thunderous purr filled the room.
“Come with me,” said Sally. “Bring the cat.”
Sally stood and walked to her room. The naginata was mounted high on the wall. The blade was almost as long as the handle, weighted to be swung easily from a saddle.
Grace stood to Sally’s left. The cat strutted over to the bed and jumped onto the mattress. It curled into a crescent and swished its tail back and forth. Sally gestured at the sword.
The folds in the ancient metal shimmered like ripples in a pond under a full moon.
“This was the sword of the greatest samurai in history,” said Sally. “A woman named Tomoe Gozen.”
“I thought only men were samurai.”
“That was the tradition,” said Sally, “but in twelfth-century Japan, during the Genpei War, a woman broke tradition and became a great warrior.”
“I never heard that story before.”
“I’ve been thinking about that a lot lately.” Sally reached up and carefully removed the sword from its brackets. “This sword belongs in a museum, where people can learn its history.”
Grace stared at the long blade but didn’t try to touch it. “Where did you get it?”
“Someone gave it to me,” said Sally. “After they took it from a museum.”
Grace furrowed her brow. “It was stolen?”
“It was taken.” Sally hefted the sword. “So, yes.” She placed the naginata gently in Grace’s outstretched hands, supporting it until she was sure the weight wasn’t too much. “I used to think a sword like this should be free.”
“Free?”
“Used in battle,” said Sally. “But that was foolish. It’s Tomoe’s sword, not mine, and I’m not her.” Sally shook her head and smiled. “I wanted to be her so badly when I was your age, but as much as I would love to wield this sword, it doesn’t belong to me.”
“And you don’t have a horse,” said Grace.
“It was selfish to keep it as long as I have.”
“What are you going to do?”
“Return it to the museum.”
Sally extended her arms, and Grace returned the medieval weapon.
“May I come?” asked Grace.
“No,” said Sally. “Are you sure you’re ready to go back there?”
Grace took a breath before answering. “I don’t know if I’m ready, but I’m ready to go.”
“I’m not sure that made sense,” said Sally, “but I know what you mean.”
“I want to be brave.”
“Bravery is the acceptance of fear.” Sally set the sword carefully against the wall. “Do you know what The Tale of the Heike says about Tomoe Gozen?”
“Is that a book?”
“A very old book,” said Sally. “It says ‘she was a warrior worth a thousand, ready to confront a demon.’”
“A demon?”
“Yes,” said Sally, understanding the nuances between Japanese and Chinese mythology. “Like a ghost.”
Grace glanced at the sword before returning Sally’s gaze. “She sounds badass.”
“She reminds me of you.” Sally ran hand through Grace’s hair.
“Do you think the ghost will come back,” asked Grace, “to the museum?”
“Yes.” Sally held the naginata steady in her left hand. “He’ll come because he’s afraid.”
“Afraid?” Grace’s eyebrows did a little dance. “Why would a ghost—”
“—he’s not a ghost,” said Sally. “He’s a man. And men are always afraid of something.”
“Always?”
“Usually.”
“So not always—”
“—it’s what motivates them,” said Sally. “Fear of not being strong enough. Smart enough. Attractive enough—”
“—yuck.”
“Tall enough—”
“—he’s very tall—”
“—or clever enough,” said Sally. “Whatever it is, it’s the same drive.”
“What—”
“—failure,” said Sally. “The fear of failure.”
Grace chewed on her lower lip for a while before saying, “I got away from him.”
Sally nodded. “Which means you won…and he lost.”
“And I got away from his men.”
“Which means what?”
“He failed,” said Grace. “Twice.”
“Think about that,” said Sally. “The ghost failed twice—”
“—because of me.”
“Because of you.” Sally squeezed Grace’s shoulder. “Which means he’s afraid of you.”
Grace stood a little straighter and squared her jaw. “So I shouldn’t be afraid of him?”
“It’s okay to be afraid, as long as you remember that you’re scarier than he is.” Sally smiled. “Think you can do that?”
Grace took a deep breath and nodded.
“Good,” said Sally. “Now hold out your hands.”
Grace extended her hands, palms up and pressed together.
Sally took something from inside her left sleeve and placed it within the bowl of Grace’s hands. It was a box two-by-two inches wide and less than an inch high, made of a black composite material. In the center was a red button encircled by a clear plastic ring, through which wires and diodes were visible.
The question on Grace’s face was easy to read.
“Cape asked a friend to build this,” said Sally. “The button lights up when you press it.”
“When should I press it?”
“The next time you see a ghost.”
54
Cape Weathers had never seen a ghost, but he often spoke to the dead.
His parents had shuffled off their mortal coils, but he still gave them an earful from time to time. There was something about speaking to someone, if only in his imagination, that helped organize his thoughts. It kept him honest, as if the revenants of his imagination were calling bullshit any time he started talking nonsense.
Sometimes his thoughts ran to people he’d never really known. As a reporter, Cape had been a war correspondent for years before taking over the city’s crime beat. After seeing too many people killed in faraway places, he returned home, only to find dead bodies piling up in alleys, dumpsters, and shooting galleries around the city. Most of the dead had been powerless in life, so Cape tried writing about the people in power who could help but chose not to—it wasn’t long before he discovered the pen is not mightier than the sword when somebody in power owns all the ink. He traded his pen for a license to cause trouble.
Now he had trouble of his own.
His allies numbered less than the fingers on one hand. His opponents were everywhere and nowhere. They had infinite resources and the world’s largest surveillance state behind them. If Cape wasn’t being watched, he was certainly being followed.
He was a hot potato in a cold war that had nothing to do with him or his friends.
As he drove away from Maria’s hotel, Cape wondered what the man hiding in the back seat of his car would say about power, politics, and paintings.
Cape had driven Maria back to the Fairmont Hotel after their coffee with Beau. He spotted the tail as soon as he turned onto California Street. A black Honda three cars behind, weaving more than it should to give the driver a view past the intervening cars.
Cape retrieved the H&K automatic from the glove compartment as he pulled against the curb in front of the hotel. Maria cocked an eyebrow but kept the conversation on their plans. Cape left his car on the street and walked her to the lobby, where they agreed on a time and place to meet later. By the time Cape returned to his car, it had been unattended for less than five minutes.
More than thirty thousand car thefts or break-ins occurred in San Francisco each year. Five minutes was plenty of time for mischief, but Cape never would have guessed he’d find a man squeezed onto the floorboards of his convertible.
The intruder was facedown, body tense, entirely dressed in black. His arms were over his head, collar pulled high. It reminded Cape of a kid playing hide-and-seek, squeezing his eyes shut to make himself invisible.
This felt like a plan gone awry.
The stowaway’s intentions were clear. A bulge at the hip might be a handgun or something equally unpleasant. A wise man would walk away, but Cape was an impetuous man with the mind of a curious child.
He wanted answers.
The Fairmont was built on the crest of San Francisco’s steepest hill, where Mason Street and California Street intersect. Cape was tempted to release the parking brake and watch the car roll down California Street until it reached the bottom and crashed into the bay.
Pedestrians would get hurt, and Cape would be all alone with his questions.
The car was a 1967 two-door Mustang convertible, the original blue paint faded by the sun and bruised by the city. Cape didn’t have the best luck keeping his cars out of the scrapyard, so he wasn’t picky about the color. The best part of having a convertible was how easy it was to swing his legs over the door and get behind the wheel. This came in handy when he didn’t want to make noise opening a steel door that groaned with age.
Cape started the car and accelerated down California Street before the man on the floor realized what was happening. The sudden gravity of a street angled at thirty degrees squeezed the man’s arms against his sides, and his body tight against the back of the front seats.
Cape gunned the engine, gripped the wheel with his left hand and slipped his gun under his left thigh. It wouldn’t interfere with his driving but would still be a quick grab.
“Hi there,” said Cape. “You might think I’m talking to myself, or an imaginary friend, because I do that sometimes.” He reached back and patted the man on the buttocks. “But I’m talking to you.”
The car caught the light at Powell Street and almost bottomed out when the cross street flattened the angle of descent, but Cape pressed his foot to the floor and the Mustang leapt through the intersection. It landed on its front wheels with a jolt and sped toward the next light.
“Why don’t you sit up front with me?”
No answer.
“I’m very friendly,” said Cape. “And these are foam-padded, twin bucket seats.”
With a muffled groan, the man in the back did a push-up, struggling against the downward force of their descent. The car bottomed out on Stockton Street and the man’s arms buckled. His face slammed against the floor.
“My bad.” Cape spared a glance in his mirror to see if he’d lost the rear bumper. He eased up on the gas but kept his speed above the limit. “Oh, I should mention that if you try to use that thing on your hip, I’ll punch the gas and spin the wheel, and the car will flip. Your call.”
The man in the back seat managed to get up on his knees. Cape made eye contact through the rearview and saw the man was Chinese, with jet-black hair and a clean-shaven, handsome face. A thin trail of blood ran from his left nostril. Cape switched hands on the wheel, grabbed a handkerchief from his pocket and handed it to his reluctant passenger.
“Looks like that last bump got you,” said Cape.
The man’s expression was disconsolate, someone who realized he’d misread the numbers on his lottery ticket and wouldn’t be this week’s Mega Millions winner, after all. With a scowl that was mostly a pout, he climbed into the front seat.
Now that his passenger was riding shotgun, Cape slid the pistol from under his leg and pressed it hard against the man’s knee.
“I wouldn’t even have to slow down, but you’d carry a cane the rest of your life,” said Cape. “What’s on your hip?”
Cape inched the speed up as they rocketed past St. Mary’s Square, a small park below Grant Avenue with a playground and benches. The homeless had commandeered the benches. A handful of parents encircled the playground as a gaggle of kids climbed ladders, slid down slides, and ran through the sand.
Cape’s passenger twisted in his seat with an audible sigh and gingerly slid something off his belt. Cape kept one eye on the road and his speed in sync with the lights. As they crossed Kearny Street, the car jumped like a dolphin, rocking them both back in the seats.
The man held a Taser in his open palm. It was the size of a TV remote, a black plastic rectangle with a contoured grip and two metal electrodes protruding from the end.
“Toss it.” Cape pressed the barrel of the gun into the soft flesh above the man’s knee, which made him jump. A moment later, a glance in the side mirror confirmed the Taser was scattered in pieces in their wake. Cape withdrew the gun from the man’s leg, then shifted the pistol to his left hand so he could steer with his right and hold the gun out of reach.
“What’s your name?” asked Cape. “Mine is—”
“—Cape Weathers, I know.” He gave a disconsolate sigh. “Fang, my name is Fang.”
“Your nose stopped bleeding, Fang.”
Fang dabbed at his nose to confirm the observation. “Thanks.”
“If you don’t mind my asking, what was the plan?”
Fang shrugged. “We didn’t realize you drove a convertible until we started following.”
“We?”
“Feng and I,” said Fang. “He’s my brother.”
“Where is Feng?”
Fang craned his neck. “He should be behind us, but you’re driving so fast.”
Cape let the car roll across Montgomery and checked the mirror. Two blocks up the hill, a Honda Civic cruised through a yellow light.
“Black Honda?” asked Cape.
Fang nodded.
Cape kept his speed up to make sure the Honda stayed at least a block away.
“Why drive a convertible in San Francisco?” asked Fang. “It’s not practical.”
“Neither am I,” said Cape, “when it comes to cars.”
“It must get cold when the fog comes in.”
“Freezing,” said Cape. “There’s a hole in the top.”
Fang studied the analog dials on the dashboard. “How old is this car?”
“Older than you,” said Cape.
“Why drive something like this?”
“Clearly, you’re not a car person,” said Cape.
“My car has a roof.”
“When I bought my first car,” said Cape, “it was just like this, but hadn’t been restored. A beautiful wreck—scruffy, a little damaged, in desperate need of attention. We had a lot in common.”
“This is your first car?”
“No,” said Cape. “That got hit by a nice old lady in a Buick. Nobody hurt, but my car was totaled. Another car of mine flipped and crashed, one got blown to pieces by Russian mobsters, one drowned in the bay…”
“Your insurance payments must be horrible.”
“I’ve been buying the same car again and again for years,” said Cape. “It keeps things simple.”
Fang looked sullen. “Convertibles are stupid.”
“So your plan was to hide in the back seat, stun me with the Taser, and then what?”
“I would drive your car,” said Fang, “and Feng would follow in his.”
“That’s a terrible plan,” said Cape.
“No, it’s not,” said Fang. “This is a dumb car.”
“I check the back seat of any car I get into,” said Cape. “Professional habit. Didn’t you see Goodfellas?”
“The movie?”
Cape nodded. “Joe Pesci hides in the back seat of a car, then when the guy he’s after gets behind the wheel, Joe Pesci kills him with an ice pick.”
“I never saw it.”
“Doesn’t matter,” said Cape. “Your plan was shit.”
Fang sat up straighter, annoyed. “We didn’t have a lot of time.”
“Why the rush?” Cape checked his mirror before giving Fang a sidelong glance. “You work for Freddie Wang, don’t you?”
Fang’s mouth opened and closed, but he didn’t say anything.
“Freddie is an opportunist,” said Cape. “He’s impulsive; that’s his weakness.”
“He doesn’t like you very much.”
“He’s jealous of my rugged good looks,” said Cape, “because he looks like Gollum.”
The corner of Fang’s mouth rose a fraction before he clamped it back into place.
Cape grinned. “You saw that movie, huh?”
“All three,” said Fang. “I was Legolas one Halloween.”
“So tell me I’m wrong,” said Cape.
“Gollum has more hair than Freddie.”
“Fair enough.” Cape turned onto Sansome Street. The Honda didn’t make the light but was close enough to see him make the turn. “Where were you going to take me?”
“Freddie’s restaurant,” said Fang.
“For lunch?”
“No,” said Fang. “To the kitchen.”
“Where the knives are.” Cape wiggled the fingers of his driving hand.
Fang shrugged apologetically. “And the cleavers.”
“That’s not very nice.”
“Neither is shooting someone in the knee.”
“I said I was friendly,” replied Cape. “I never said I was nice.”
Fang sulked against the door for the rest of the block. As they crossed Sacramento Street, he turned sideways to face Cape.
