Porter studied his image in the passport and the pay book.
‘So here’s the next thing,’ Yoshi said. ‘Why you stay out of sight. Koreans aren’t liked here. Working people don’t like them, the police. They regularly get stopped by the police. On no account are you meeting any police.’
‘I never had trouble before.’
‘It wasn’t so bad before. And if it had been bad, you were a Canadian with good papers. Now you’re a Canadian with funny papers. And a wig.’
‘Without the wig, with Sung’s papers?’
‘They run you in right away. One call from a police box, and they find you’re not Sung.’
‘Why would they call?’
‘They do call. I tell you, it’s routine, Koreans have a bad time. They don’t like them. Maybe there’s been trouble recently, violence, theft, whatever. Then what? At Tokyo central, a man on the switchboard, he knows the arrangement with the narcotics bureau? Don’t even think of it. This plan is nice because the timing is nice. Interfere with it in some way — get yourself locked up, an investigation — and there is no plan. This is why you don’t go out,’ Yoshi said.
Porter continued gnawing his pigtail.
‘Yoshi,’ he said, ‘I have to see the ship. They’re probably patching it up for one last voyage, like the other ship, and using cannibalised parts. The man who made that model was interested in compartments where narcotics could be hidden — not deck gear where it wouldn’t be. I am interested in it. I’ll be using it. I have to see it before the ship leaves dock. It’s the only place I can see it before boarding. And if I don’t see it I won’t be boarding.’
Yoshi slowly blinked at him.
‘If the ship can be seen,’ he worked out, ‘then it can be photographed. Why don’t we photograph it for you?’
‘All right. I’m still going to see it. I can’t take a chance on this.’
Yoshi continued blinking.
‘Today is too late anyway,’ he said. ‘It’s a long trip. And you can’t go on your own. If you go out at all, it’s as a businessman in a suit, and we go together.’
‘Okay,’ Porter said. ‘Keep me company.’
Nagasaki airport was at Omura, thirty miles from the port. They landed there before noon, into almost sub-tropical heat, and Yoshi hired a car.
The waterfront came in sight presently, sparkling far below, and they followed it round. Houses clung to the hillsides and narrow winding streets tottered down to the bay: the place was built on a series of terraces.
Yoshi had better information on the yard now and also a Port Authority map. On the map the dockyards were shown as a line of numbered blocks, and a key on the edge of the map gave the names. Porter kept his finger on Takeshuma’s. As Yoshi had said, it wasn’t far from Mitsubishi, and they slowed as they neared the area.
Just on two o’clock, they saw it.
The yard passed below, barely distinguishable, and they drove on to the next pull-in, and walked back. A steady stream of traffic was passing on the road but on the hillside, above and below the road, people were picnicking and taking photographs. There was plenty to photograph. Far below, winking in the sun, was the Park Lane of the marine world — a glittering array of success, supertankers, giant container ships, prosperous monsters of all kinds, lined up row on row.
Mitsubishi was the most prominent of the yards, its activities not only visible but audible, even palpable. The thump of its heavy forges echoed between the hills of the bay, rhythmically shifting the air. Just about here Madame Butterfly had taken the air, while awaiting the one fine day when a plume of smoke would herald Lieutenant Pinkerton. Yet it was not Pinkerton but another American who had occasioned the most momentous plume of all.
The B29 with its atom bomb had flown directly overhead, with Mitsubishi as its target — the yard, the steelworks and the munitions plant that had lain alongside. The bomb had landed almost half a mile away, demolishing the lot, and ultimately 73,000 citizens.
They climbed the hill, above the picnickers, and peered down through binoculars. Right away Porter saw why not much of Takeshuma had been distinguishable from the road. High shuttering screened it off from the road. From this height not all of it was screened off. Two ships were in the yard. They were lodged side by side, on chocks, in separate dry docks. All the after parts were visible; maybe even three quarters of the ships’ length.
‘I don’t know which one it is,’ Yoshi said.
‘It’s the nearest,’ Porter told him. He couldn’t see a name, but the gantry was clearly visible. It was a forty-tonner, right specifications. The other ship was a coaster; wrong shape.
‘It’s that one,’ he said.
He examined it for some time. Not only the gantry but the wheelhouse was in its blueprint position. He went over the ship section by section. Two of the derricks were in dismantled heaps on the deck. But he could see another, installed and standing. He couldn’t make out the container-shaft openings. The sun was aslant now and casting heavy shadows. It was blazing fiercely down however, and the workers below were swarming half-naked in the heat.
They were swarming everywhere — on the dock, on the ship, in cradles over the side. Propped high in the cement pit, the hull looked horrible; a bulbous shell, rusty, scabrous, salt-scarred. The men in the cradles were scraping at encrustations with long-handled implements, and being followed by others with power hoses and red lead. Floodlights were rigged round the dock and it was plain that work would be going on all night if the ship was to come out on time.
He heard a click and saw Yoshi at work with the camera.
‘Let me take a look,’ he said.
Through the binoculars everything had quivered in the heat. He needed a clear view of the derrick.
The Nikon had a big telephoto lens and the reflex view was good. But the thing was hard to hold steady. Again the derrick swam in the air currents. A fraction of a second could make a difference.
‘Is this thing motorised?’ he said.
‘Sure.’
Yoshi set the motor and Porter held the camera and shot off half a roll. Then they moved position and he tried again. The view was no better here; the derrick even obscured for some seconds by a group of men in hard hats gesticulating over it. But he kept the camera going and shot off the other half and they went back to the car.
It was after ten when they returned to Tokyo, and almost eleven as they rolled through the tunnel to the Theosophical Society. They had left it at seven in the morning, and 1800 miles had been covered in between. Of the thirty-six photos four were good and one very good, and this one Machiko enlarged.
Midnight passed while she did this; and the thirty-first of August had arrived.
16
For the thirty-first of August the plan called for Porter to have his first session with the ship’s architect, and also his try-on.
The architect came first and he studied the photographs made the night before. Porter had also studied them, without being able to identify the derrick. The architect couldn’t identify it either. He said the equipment was obviously old; he would have it looked up and get a copy of the works manual. But he was anxious to proceed with instruction on his model, and Porter moodily allowed himself to be instructed.
They spent the morning on it, but Porter barely listened. He had realised now what he had to do. He kept the matter to himself; and in the afternoon had his try-on.