I’d told Detective Jones more than one white lie. I’d no intention of showering or changing my clothes. I’d a more urgent task. I wanted to be at Takumi’s side when he woke up. Going to the hospital in my present state might raise eyebrows, but it was also good cover: I’d look more like a patient than anything else and would be able to get closer to him than if I turned up groomed and fresh-faced. The cops would be heading there next and I wanted to be gone from the hospital before they arrived. I drove, mulling over what I’d speak to Takumi about. I just couldn’t decide what I would broach first: if he knew the identity of his enemy or the necessity to keep quiet about him when questioned by the detectives. I wondered if his sense of giri was as strong as Yukiko’s.
Chapter 17
He should have shot Takumi and had done with it. He knew now that his split-second decision to go for the grandiose and painstaking death he chose was stupid. He wasn’t even positive that the 300 ml of insulin would be enough to kill the old man; understanding that it was all determined by how high his blood sugar levels were to start with. He vaguely knew that insulin dependent diabetics balanced everything by food intake versus insulin. For all he knew the old man had been stuffing himself with candy before he arrived and needed the equivalent of the injection he’d given him just to take him back to normal. He should have punched the crap out of Takumi, using his knuckles on the Jap’s head the way he’d pounded the heavy punch bag in his gym this morning. That would have pleased him, given him a sense of satisfaction, and then a bullet in his skull would have ensured death, and the fire would have put a cap on it. He was mad at himself, for allowing his anger to overshadow his good judgement. Now he couldn’t be sure if Takumi was dead. The stranger who turned up at the most inopportune of moments could have dragged him to safety. And who the hell was he any way?
He had run where he should have stayed.
He was more than a match for most men in a fight, and he could have smashed the stranger and left him to the fire too. Yet the noise of him beating the stranger to death might have brought out other witnesses, and he couldn’t allow that.
He should have turned and shot the man as they’d peered at each other over the top of that fence. The retort of his pistol would not have raised an eyebrow in the neighbourhood, not when it was filled with senile old farts. That would have stopped any hope of rescue for Takumi. But at the time he had been more concerned about the man getting a good look at him and describing him to the police, and instinct caused him to flee. Until now he’d taken great care and had left behind no clues as to his identity. He had prepared for this, had worked hard to gain the skills necessary to fulfil his mission — martial arts practice, hours spent on the shooting range, placing himself in the most conflict-laden situations he could find — but now he’d threatened it by being careless. Next time, he would make sure that death was immediate, and he’d be gone before anyone knew that another of Charles Peterson’s murderers had been executed.
He wasn’t a coward. When he’d run, he’d only done so for as long as it took to be sure he wasn’t being followed. The stranger had obviously rushed back to the burning house. Deeming it more suspicious for a grown man to be running through the streets, he had slowed, meandered his way back to his vehicle at a casual pace. He was still near enough to the location to hear the responding sirens, but far enough away that no one would associate him with the fire a couple of blocks across town. Back at his car he had a spare jacket — the one he wore at work — and a baseball cap and sunglasses. He drove a block over before stopping and changing into them. Now he looked nothing like the man who had been seen running from the house fire and believed he’d attract no attention if he went back there.
He was confident that the members of the murder ring would not speak with the police; to do that was sentencing themselves to prison. All of them were old enough that they would never see a day of freedom again. But he had to wonder if the presence of the stranger was more than what it seemed. Had one or more of them sought assistance, perhaps hired a private operator to protect them? It was feasible and made his task all the more difficult, but not yet out of reach. The presence of a tough guy did not frighten him — he’d been around tough guys all his adult life, and hadn’t met anyone he couldn’t beat — and he was sure that he was the man’s equal. No, he was more than equal, because he wasn’t constrained by the same rules that a private security guard was. Another advantage was that the man had no idea who he was, or where or when he would strike next. It would be a simple enough matter to discover this man’s identity and to kill him.
There was no time like the present to get started.
He pulled into Takumi’s street two blocks south of the fire, then drove along to the next intersection, and parked in a vacant spot. SFFD fire trucks blocked the road and most of his view of the activity on the street outside the burning house. But he was in time to see the ambulance pull away, its lights flashing and siren wailing as it bore its patient off to hospital. He chewed his lip. The fact that the ambulance was in a hurry probably meant that Takumi was still hanging on to life and they intended getting him to hospital as quickly as possible. He sorted through the figures moving about in a clot on the opposite sidewalk, discarding the fire crews, and those who looked like neighbourhood residents. He saw a man who looked a little the worse for wear, his face and clothing darkened with soot and dirt. He’d only had a second or so to look over the fence at the stranger before fleeing, but there was no denying it was the same man. He had to consider that the stranger had managed to get Takumi out of the fire, and was now waiting around to make his report to the police.
The man peeled away from the crowd, and approached a silver Chrysler parked near to the front of Takumi’s house. He popped the trunk, delved in it, and then in one swift movement dipped his hand into the small of his back and shoved whatever he’d taken out into the trunk. There was no doubting what the man was concealing: a gun. He didn’t want to be found with it when the cops arrived. Speaking of whom, he saw a nondescript sedan car approach from the far end of the block. When it parked, two guys he made as detectives stepped out. One cop was tall and raw-boned, with strawberry-blond curls, the other slighter, darker, more austere. They approached the fire chief, but after a moment the big one peeled away and approached the stranger. He had seen enough posturing in his lifetime that he could read their body language. The two men had history, and none of it good. Judging by their short discourse there was a pissing competition occurring between them, and the stranger won hands down. He watched the big cop muttering behind his back as the stranger walked away and got in his Chrysler. The guy pulled away from the kerb and began wending a route between the fire trucks.
His decision to follow was a no-brainer. But he wasn’t about to drive through a bunch of cops and firefighters who might spot him and note him for later. He backed up and spun the wheel, taking him on to the intersection where he raced to the next block over. He paralleled Takumi’s street, racing the car along it to make the next intersection. Something must have slowed the stranger down because his Chrysler was only now crossing the next intersection up. At the next block they’d both be back on Geary Boulevard and he was confident he could tuck in behind the stranger there and follow him to wherever he was going. He pushed across the intersection as soon as the silver car was out of sight, giving the sedan throttle and beating the other to the main road. He was fortunate in that there were no other cars ahead of him, because the traffic lights were on stop, but he nosed far enough into the junction so that he could see the Chrysler turn and come down the hill towards him.