“You may refresh yourself, Ms. Egk. Mr. Fukai will see you in one hour. If you have any needs in the meantime, just speak out loud, and you will be attended to.”
Liese had been here to Nagasaki before, but she had never seen this place. “It’s beautiful,” she said.
Endo smiled. “It is restful,” he replied, and he bowed and left.
For a full minute Liese remained standing in the middle of the room, drinking it all in; the sights, the smells, the sounds, all carefully engineered to seem authentic, and all designed to promote a feeling of peace and security. Nothing bad could ever happen here.
This place had obviously cost Fukai a great deal of money. But as a business tool it had to have paid for itself dozens of times over each year by disarming those who came here seeking to do hard, fast business.
She crossed the room and stepped out onto the veranda. A very gentle breeze was blowing from the left, and it smelled faintly of the sea.
The evening (she decided the atmosphere was meant to be sunset) was balmy. Perfect.
She stepped out of her sandals as she unbuttoned her blouse and padded down the veranda to the shower head just beyond the tub. She wore no bra, and already her nipples were erect in response to the sensuous surroundings. She took off her skirt and panties, and layed them over the low wooden rack provided for just that purpose, and stepped under the shower head, the weight of her body on some hidden control beneath the floor boards turning on the water.
The spray was perfect in strength and temperature, and she turned slowly beneath it as she lathered her well-tanned, almost athletic body.
Endo stood just within an alcove at the far end of the veranda watching Liese take her shower, and he felt aroused. She was a beautiful creature, he decided. Mores the pity that he would have to kill her tonight.
Ernst Spranger had hinted that the woman was a lesbian, but watching her lather herself, he found that hard to believe. And, recalling the occasions she’d spent with Fukai-san, Endo felt that Spranger had hoped to gain something by such a lie. Now that he was dead, it had become a moot point.
When she was finished under the shower, clean and well rinsed as was the Japanese tradition, she moved gracefully, like a cat or some night animal, off the veranda, and across the stepping stones to the pool. She hunched down and dabbled her fingers in the water.
From where he stood, Endo had a perfect view of the curve of her haunches, and the delicate line of her backbone merging with the crease of her buttocks. He fought an almost overwhelming desire to go out there and touch her.
“She is a lovely animal, isn’t she,” Fukai said from within the alcove’s entrance hall.
Endo turned to face his master. Fukai was nearing eighty, but his hair was still jet black, his eyes still dark and clear, and his lean, compact body still well muscled because of the workouts he did every day of his life. But there was a cruel streak to his face; the set of his mouth, the expression in his eyes. Each time Endo looked at Fukai, he felt like a prize butterfly in the presence of a ruthless master collector.
“Yes, indeed she is,” Endo said. “Do you wish for me to kill her now, or would you like to watch her for a while?”
“Perhaps it won’t be necessary for us to kill her this evening,” Fukai said. “We shall see.” He was dressed in a spotlessly white kimono, wooden block sandals on his feet.
“Ernst Spranger is dead.”
“It is of no consequence.”
“Possibly… Endo said, but Fukai silenced him with a glance.
Liese straightened up, watched the fish swim beneath the waterfall for a long time, then turned and lanquidly went back up to the veranda where she slowly lowered herself into the scented, very hot water.
Fukai stepped around Endo onto the veranda. “You look like a fawn at peace in the forest.”
Liese turned. “Kiyoshi-san,” she said, apparently with pleasure.
Endo backed out of the alcove and left, certain that Fukai was making a mistake with the woman that might cost him his life.
Chapter 73
McGarvey stepped through a hatch onto a dimly lit catwalk that looked down into the engine room. The generators were humming, and one of the main engines was turning, but there were no crewmen.
Except for the few people on the bridge, the Grande Dame II seemed to be deserted. Below decks should have been alive with activity if the ship was being readied for departure, as she seemed to be. Yet the passageways were empty, as were the cabins he’d looked into, the galley, the crews’ dining area, and now the machinery spaces.
It made no sense unless something had happened ashore that had drawn the crew away.
Something incredibly powerful slammed into his right shoulder, sending him crashing against the railing, a tremendous pain rebounding throughout his body, nearly making him lose consciousness. Before he could recover, his pistol was snatched from his hand so violently his body was spun around.
Heidinora Daishi, the squat bulldog of a man from the Imperial Gardens in Tokyo, stood grinning at McGarvey, whose heart was hammering painfully in his chest. He was having trouble catching his breath and his vision was blurring.
“I hoped that I would see you again,” the Japanese killer said, his voice low-pitched and rough, and his English difficult to understand.
“This time you have lost your weapon, so the fight will be equal.” He casually tossed the Walther back into the passageway, sending it clattering along the deck.
McGarvey’s head was spinning as he desperately tried to work himself fully conscious.
Under the best of conditions this fight would have been unequal; the man he was facing was built like a Sherman tank, probably was an expert in any number of martial arts, and, more important, seemed to want to vent his power here and now.
“Stand up now,” Heidinora said, taking a handful of McGarvey’s drysuit and shaking him like a rag doll.
McGarvey feinted left, then came in under Heidinora’s right arm, and hammered three quick blows with every ounce of his strength to the man’s chest just over his heart.
Heidinora grunted in irritation, not pain, and batted McGarvey away like an insect, sending him sprawling on the catwalk, stars again bursting in his eyes.
Before he could move out of the way the Jap was on him, kicking him viciously in the side with his steel-toed shoe.
The pain was exquisite, and he knew that he could not take very much more punishment before he became totally helpless.
Heidinora kicked him again, this time on the hip, nearly dislocating his back.
Christ! The man meant to kick him to death. It could not continue. But he had no way of defending himself.
Heidinora kicked again, but this time McGarvey managed to rear up and deflect the blow with his left arm, momentarily pushing the man off-balance.
Rolling right, McGarvey pulled himself under the catwalk railing, and before Heidinora could react, twisted over the edge, and dropped the ten or twelve feet to the engine room floor, the hard landing knocking him temporarily senseless.
When he finally looked up, Heidinora was gone, on his way down to finish the job.
His head still spinning, McGarvey frantically looked around for something to use; anything. But the engine room was spotlessly clean. Not even an oily rag lay out; no empty coffee cups, no ashtrays, no tools.
He managed to get to his feet, where he had to support himself against a piece of machinery for a long moment until he regained his balance. The entire ship seemed to be spinning around, the decking heaving and bucking as if they were at sea in a heavy storm.
Straight ahead was a thick steel waterproof door on massive hinges. The sill was high, so that whoever came through would have to lean forward to step over it.