"Your cousin is being taken care of, commissaris," Mr. Johnson said. "He is staying in a very nice hotel in Hawaii. He was flown out of Hong Kong last night, in a military plane. Nobody saw him leave. All you have to do now is fly to Hong Kong and take his place for a day or so, to familiarize yourself with the cover. After that you can board any passenger plane for Japan. A passport will be given to you in Hong Kong at your arrival."
"My cousin liked the idea?" the commissaris asked, looking concerned.
More wrinkles appeared around Mr. Johnson's eyes. "Sure," he said. "We made it worth his while. He will have a most enjoyable stay in one of the lesser known islands."
"No risk when he comes back?"
Mr. Johnson made a smoothing gesture. "There is always a risk, but maybe we can be of help."
The commissaris continued looking worried. The chief constable, an elegant gray-haired man of some fifty years old, smiled. He didn't think the commissaris was worried, but the chief of his murder brigade often looked as he was supposed to look, and he was supposed to look concerned at this particular moment. The public prosecutor also smiled, and the smile set off a grin on the bland gleaming face of the Dutch ambassador, who felt that something was going on and tried to analyze what it was. He succeeded in a few seconds. The old bird doesn't care a hoot, the ambassador thought. He put his hands on the table and looked around. The chief constable nodded in response.
"Right," the ambassador said briskly, "so we can go ahead. My Japanese colleague, whom we are honored to have with us, has expressed agreement with our plans, our somewhat half-baked plans, so far I should say." He turned toward the Japanese ambassador and bowed ponderously.
The small oriental gentleman took his cue immediately. "Not at all, not at all," he assured his audience. "My government is very appreciative of your efforts and will do all it can to be of assistance. We are most grateful that you will go to so much trouble to break this pernicious traffic." He looked down at a sheet of paper lying next to his coffee cup. "Yes, pernicious. Drugs and stolen art. We are very sorry that a Japanese organization, even if it is an unlawful organization, seems to be implicated in this traffic and are most anxious to smash same. Yes. Smash it completely. But we need proof. If you can supply us with such proof we will be most thankful, and if, by chance, proof will be unavailable we will still be eager to realize the worth of your endeavor. In any case we will do everything possible to be of assistance." He had come to the end of his notes and his golden canines flashed.
The commissaris had been listening carefully. He was quite taken by the speech. The formal words were, he thought, sincere. He studied the Japanese ambassador's eyes and saw intelligence and compassion. His right hand raised itself a little, and the ambassador made a slight bow in response.
"About the two suspects we are holding in jail at present," the chief constable said quietly. "I believe the prosecutor has something to say about them."
"Yes," the prosecutor said. He looked immaculate, in spite of the heat, and his chin was set fiercely. "I am not impressed by the police reports. It seems we are holding the two gentlemen on a very flimsy pretext. A hostess employed in a local Japanese restaurant has accused them of murdering Kikuji Nagai, her boyfriend and allegedly a member of a Japanese gangster organization which employs, or employed-we are not sure if the skull fragment found in Mr. Nagai's car does indeed belong to Mr. Nagai-him as a salesman, and perhaps also a buyer, of valuable religious art. O.K. That's one statement by one person. We can't hold suspects on such an allegation; we can't even brand a man as a suspect because another person accuses him of this and that. We have further evidence that the two gentlemen had a meal with Mr. Nagai on the day that Mr. Nagai disappeared. The manager of the restaurant and his wife both say so, and Miss Andrews says so too. But sharing a meal is not a criminal act. The State Police has brought in three witnesses. One person saw an Eastern man-Chinese or Japanese, he doesn't know what race or nationality- buy a spade in a store in Abcoude, a town near the speedway between Amsterdam and Utrecht. We introduced the two suspects to this witness, one by one, and he stated that the first suspect had bought the spade. When the second suspect was brought into the room the witness seemed confused and said that the buyer of the spade could also have been the second suspect. We had the same experience with the other two witnesses who had seen a Japanese or Chinese man washing a new white BMW near a pond, again close to the speedway between Amsterdam and Utrecht. It seems that Japanese look alike to our citizens." He looked at the Japanese ambassador as if to apologize, but the ambassador was bowing and smiling.
"Yes, indeed," the ambassador said, and giggled. "You will find that the reverse is also true. Foreigners are called 'gaijin' in our country and they look alike to us. It is strange, for some foreigners are tall and have red hair; others are small and have black or brown or blond hair. But they still look the same in our eyes. I began to see differences after a short while, but then-I am often in the presence of foreigners and have been ever since I started my career."
"Right," the prosecutor said, "but this means that the witnesses are useless. Officially we have little to go on and I would be happy in a way if the suspects could be released forthwith. On the other hand, I have my doubts too. I met Mr. Takemoto and Mr. Nakamura, and they do not look like salesmen of chemicals to me. They might very well be gangsters and professional killers, not innocent tourists. They are, to my mind, too calm about their predicament. The Japanese consul in Amsterdam was good enough to act as an interpreter and I fired a lot of questions at them. So did the judge whom I was accompanying at the time. None of the questions seemed to touch them. They just smiled and sat back and smoked and drank tea."
"Japanese people are reputed to react differently to a difficult situation," the chief constable said softly.
"What did my consul say after the questioning was over?" Everybody turned to the Japanese ambassador who had lost his smile and was looking intently at the prosecutor.
"He said they could be very dangerous men."
"Yes," the ambassador said. "He said something like that to me on the phone. My consul is an experienced man. He was a naval officer during the war and our naval officers used to be the elite of our fighting forces. I would be inclined to let his words weigh heavily."
"So I would suggest that we hold them," the chief constable said, "even on the flimsy evidence we have collected so far. But we will have them transferred to a comfortable jail and see to it that they have meals sent in from the restaurant they were frequenting. Meanwhile Adjutant Grijpstra can continue the investigation. He is the best man I can think of, do you agree?"
The commissaris and the prosecutor nodded.
"Beautiful," the Dutch ambassador said, and began to rub his hands. "Very nice. So the commissaris will be leaving for Hong Kong in a few days and should be in Japan soon. Now what about the man he will take with him? I believe there is a detective-sergeant around who meets our specifications. Speaks English reasonably well, is a good shot, has a black belt in judo and has been with the murder brigade for quite a number of years. Sergeant de Gier, I believe. Is he ready too?"
The chief constable coughed. "The sergeant has been forced to put up with a severe loss, a personal loss. Two nights ago his girlfriend was killed in a traffic accident and his cat was seriously wounded at the same moment. The cat had to be shot, by the sergeant himself. He had had the cat for a long time." The chief constable was staring at the table in front of him; he seemed embarrassed.