Happy kept immaculate records, both computerized and by hand, all of which he made available to Tug. “Sometimes the computer makes mistakes,” Happy said unsmilingly. On Thursday, there had been a delivery of fresh gardenias in a round glass bowl to a women’s luncheon at a members-only club on the Upper East Side. Some gardenia corsages for a wedding anniversary in Chinatown. And a special gardenia bouquet for a performer at the Metropolitan Opera House.
They had no luck at Happy’s and then struck out three more times at the other florists that Haruo had mentioned in his phone message. Some florists said the information was confidential, with all the executives and celebrities who were their customers. Others didn’t keep detailed records, but just mentioned that gardenias were not hot sellers in the wintertime.
The only shop left was back in Brooklyn Heights. They should have started out with that one, but they wanted to meet with Happy first in Manhattan. A mistake, perhaps, but Tug was the one who had meticulously mapped out their whole path on his AAA map like he was leading a reconnaissance offensive. Chizuko had traveled the same way, so Mas was used to following. Besides, he wasn’t thinking that straight today.
“So, Mas, you going to tell me what happened yesterday to get you so jittery?” Tug and Mas walked south alongside Central Park, its bare trees full of crows.
Mas had almost knocked down a fake plastic pillar at one shop and stepped in a planter full of peat moss in another. There was no doubt that he was shaken by the run-in with Phillip and the drug dealers. He had said nothing to Mari and Lloyd, but went over it with Haruo early this morning over the phone. Who was this hired gun, Riley? He and his gang had probably stolen the gardening equipment from the Waxley Garden, so did that mean they killed Kazzy as well? If not, why had Riley insisted it was suicide?
Mas spilled the beans once again to Tug, every single part of it, including his conversation with the neighbor who complained too much. “I don’t think Foster do it,” Mas said. “Just an urusai neighbor. A dime a dozen. Don’t think he’d kill to get his way. Type to drive people kuru-kuru-pa and make them want to shoot him.”
“Well, how about the son, Phillip?”
“Well, I think he hire the boy to do some kind of itazura. I just don’t know what, exactly.”
“Well, Lil always tells me to get a second opinion. Maybe I’ll have a talk myself with this Phillip Ouchi.” Tug walked over to a pay phone and lifted a New York phone book attached by a flexible cord. The pages were all curled up and shrunken from repeated soakings of rain, sleet, and snow. “Ouchi Silk, Inc., right?”
Mas didn’t want to see Phillip Ouchi again, especially so soon after the incident at the factory building with the red door. He didn’t know what Tug was hoping to prove. Phillip could have contacts with other chinpira, that was for sure.
Ouchi Silk, Inc., had an office in the Garment District and then on Broadway. Tug called both to find out where Phillip Ouchi’s office was located. It was on Broadway, just south of Central Park.
Ouchi Silk, Inc., was in a modern steel building about ten stories tall. Each floor seemed a little narrower as you went higher; at least that’s what it looked like to Mas from the sidewalk. Mas tried to talk Tug out of going inside the building, but it was no use. Mas knew that during World War II, Tug had been in charge of his squad’s fifteen-pound Browning automatic rifle because of his great size. Just like in Europe, Tug was on a mission in Manhattan, and there was no stopping him.
Mas opted to wait outside. Tug must have thought Mas was losing his nerve, but actually Mas desperately needed a cigarette. Resting his tired back against a parking meter, he pulled out his next-to-last Marlboro and clicked a flame on his Bic lighter. He remembered how he once delighted Mari with smoke rings. “More, more, Daddy,” she’d beg from the dinner table. He’d let the smoke fill the cup of his closed mouth, round his lips, and then blow out perfect rings in descending size. The line of rings eventually distorted, broke down, and disappeared in a swirling tail of smoke.
Mari had also become a chain-smoker during her college years. But Mas saw no signs of tobacco in the apartment, so she must have broken the habit.
He also needed to quit someday, Mas knew. But this morning was not the day. Just for good measure, he walked the length of the block, blowing out a series of smoke rings, which seemed to hold their shape longer because of the cold air. He crossed the street. Parked against the curb in a no-parking zone was a Cadillac, the boy with the eel-like hair and red waffle-sole shoes leaning against the driver’s-side door.
“Hallo,” Mas said. What was the driver’s name again, J-O? J-Y?
“Hey.” The driver looked up. “I remember you from the Waxley House. I never got your name.”
“Mas. Mas Arai.”
“Hey, Mas, good to see you. J-E, remember?”
Mas nodded and, without J-E even asking, handed him a fresh cigarette. Mas would even use his last Marlboro to get in the driver’s good favor. “So your boss ova here?”
“Yeah, she has some kind of meeting with Kazzy’s son.” So now Phillip was working on Miss Waxley, was he? He had said himself that he wanted to stop the garden project before it bled more money. Becca, the sea urchin, and the sumo wrestler all seemed to be on the other side. Perhaps Phillip and Miss Waxley were conspiring to recruit one of the others to vote to get rid of the garden, once and for all. “You goin’ to Mr. Ouchi’s memorial service? Right after lunch.”
Mas shook his head. He had forgotten about the service.
J-E blew out some smoke from his cigarette and looked toward the Cadillac. “I wish I could quit this gig. But can’t afford to go back to taxi driving. I have a kid and all.”
“Oh, yah?”
“Ten months old.” J-E was wearing gloves again with the fingertips cut off. He dug his right hand into his coat pocket and produced a photo of a fat baby, in an oversized football jersey, drooling on a toy football.
Mas grunted. A baby was a baby, unless it was your own. Or your daughter’s, Mas added silently.
“You know who was over here, too? Howard Foster. And those other jerks, Penn and Larry. But they already took off.”
“Oh, yah.” Mas pretended not to care.
“Yeah, Waxley Enterprises’s just across the street.”
Sure enough, on the other side of Broadway stood a tall coral-colored building with lettering in gold, Waxley Enterprises.
“Those two are assholes, man. Always telling me to take them places. They know that I’m hired by old lady Waxley. She’s the ones who pays me, and they don’t tip, neither.”
Mas stared at the gold lettering on the building across from them. “You gonna be here for a while?”
“At least an hour.”
“Do me favor,” Mas asked. “If you see a Japanese ole man with white hair wandering around, tell him Izu ova there.” Since Tug hadn’t emerged from the building, he must have gotten a meeting with Phillip.
“Sure thing, Mas.” J-E nodded, the cones on his head trembling.
Mas walked across the street, trying remember the sumo wrestler’s full name. Larry something. Larry Perry. Larry Ball. What the hell was it? Something with the letter P. Pauley, like UCLA’s Pauley Pavilion basketball arena.
He entered the building’s lobby, which reminded him of a deluxe funeral home’s mausoleum. Everything was dead quiet and empty, other than a coffin-shaped desk in the middle. On one side of the granite wall was a list of departments and floors. Mas took out his reading glasses and looked at the directory in the lobby for a good ten minutes. Finally the receptionist, wearing a blue blazer and a floppy striped bow tied underneath the collar of a crisp white shirt, left her coffin desk and came to Mas’s assistance. She told him that Larry Pauley was vice president of public relations on the eleventh floor. What was public relations, anyway? Well, Mas was part of the public, so perhaps Larry would make time for him.