“Okay, sure,” I said.

Connor was still waving to me. He seemed impatient. I hurried down to see him. As I came down the steps, I saw a black Mercedes sedan pull up, and a familiar figure emerge.

It was Weasel Wilhelm.

16

By the time I got down there, the Weasel had his notepad and tape recorder out. A cigarette hung from the corner of his mouth. “Lieutenant Smith,” he said. “I wonder if I could talk to you.”

“I’m pretty busy,” I said.

“Come on,” Connor called to me. “Time’s a’wasting.” He was holding the door open for me.

I started toward Connor. The Weasel fell in step with me. He held a tiny black microphone toward my face. “I’m taping, I hope you don’t mind. After the Malcolm case, we have to be extra careful. I wonder if you would comment on racial slurs allegedly made by your associate Detective Graham during last night’s Nakamoto investigation?”

“No,” I said. I kept walking.

“We’ve been told he referred to them as ‘fucking Japs.’ “

“I have no comment,” I said.

“He also called them ‘little Nips.’ Do you think that kind of talk is appropriate to an officer on duty?”

“Sorry. I don’t have a comment, Willy.”

He held the microphone up to my face as we walked. It was annoying. I wanted to slap it away, but I didn’t. “Lieutenant Smith, we’re preparing a story on you and we have some questions about the Martinez case. Do you remember that one? It was a couple of years back.”

I kept walking. “I’m pretty busy now, Willy,” I said.

“The Martinez case resulted in accusations of child abuse brought by Sylvia Morelia, the mother of Maria Martinez. There was an internal affairs investigation. I wondered if you had any comment.”

“No comment.”

“I’ve already talked to your partner at that time, Ted Anderson. I wondered if you had any comment on that.”

“Sorry. I don’t.”

“Then you aren’t going to respond to these serious allegations against you? ‘

“The only one I know that’s making allegations is you, Willy.”

“Actually, that’s not entirely accurate,” he said, smiling at me. “I’m told the D.A.’s office has started an investigation.”

I said nothing. I wondered if it was true.

“Under the circumstances, Lieutenant, do you think the court made a mistake in granting you custody of your young daughter?”

All I said was, “Sorry. No comment, Willy.” I tried to sound confident. I was starting to sweat.

Connor said, “Come on, come on. No time.” I got into the car. Connor said to Wilhelm, “Son, I’m sorry, but we’re busy. Got to go.” He slammed the car door. I started the engine. “Let’s go,” Connor said.

Willy stuck his head in the window. “Do you think that Captain Connor’s Japan-bashing represents another example of the department’s lack of judgment in racially sensitive cases?”

“See you, Willy.” I rolled up the window, and started driving down the hill.

“A little faster wouldn’t bother me,” Connor said.

“Sure,” I said. I stepped on the gas.

In the rearview mirror, I saw the Weasel running for his Mercedes. I took the turn faster, tires squealing. “How did that lowlife know where to find us? He monitoring the radio?”

“We haven’t been on the radio,” Connor said. “You know I’m careful about the radio. But maybe the patrol car phoned in something when we arrived. Maybe we have a bug in this car. Maybe he just figured we’d turn up here. He’s a scumbag. And he’s connected to the Japanese. He’s their plant at the Times. Usually the Japanese are a little more classy about who they associate with. But I guess he’ll do everything they want done. Nice car, huh?”

“I notice it’s not Japanese.”

“Can’t be obvious,” Connor said. “He following us?”

“No. I think we lost him. Where are we going now?”

“U.S.C. Sanders has had enough time screwing around by now.”

We drove down the street, down the hill, toward the 101 freeway. “By the way,” I said. “What was all that about the reading glasses?”

“Just a small point to be verified. No reading glasses were found, right?”

“Right. Just sunglasses.”

“That’s what I thought,” Connor said.

“And Graham says he’s leaving town. Today. He’s going to Phoenix.”

“Uh-huh.” He looked at me. “You want to leave town, too?”

“No,” I said.

“Okay,” Connor said.

I got down the hill and onto the 101 going south. In the old days it would be ten minutes to U.S.C. Now it was more like thirty minutes. Especially now, right at midday. But there weren’t any fast times, anymore. Traffic was always bad. The smog was always bad. I drove through haze.

“You think I’m being foolish?” I said. “You think I should pick up my kid and run, too?”

“It’s one way to handle it.” He sighed. “The Japanese are masters of indirect action. It’s their instinctual way to proceed. If someone in Japan is unhappy with you, they never tell you to your face. They tell your friend, your associate, your boss. In such a way that the word gets back. The Japanese have all these ways of indirect communication. That’s why they socialize so much, play so much golf, go drinking in karaoke bars. They need these extra channels of communication because they can’t come out and say what’s on their minds. It’s tremendously inefficient, when you think about it. Wasteful of time and energy and money. But since they cannot confront—because confrontation is almost like death, it makes them sweat and panic—they have no other choice. Japan is the land of the end run. They never go up the middle.”

“Yeah, but…”

“So behavior that seems sneaky and cowardly to Americans is just standard operating procedure to Japanese. It doesn’t mean anything special. They’re just letting you know that powerful people are displeased.”

“Letting me know? That I could end up in court over my daughter? My relationship with my kid could be ruined? My own reputation could be ruined?”

“Well, yes. Those are normal penalties. The threat of social disgrace is the usual way you’re expected to know of displeasure.”

“Well, I think I know it, now,” I said. “I think I get the fucking picture.”

“It’s not personal,” Connor said. “It’s just the way they proceed.”

“Yeah, right. They’re spreading a lie.”

“In a sense.”

“No, not in a sense. It’s a fucking lie.”

Connor sighed. “It took me a long time to understand,” he said, “that Japanese behavior is based on the values of a farm village. You hear a lot about samurai and feudalism, but deep down, the Japanese are farmers. And if you lived in a farm village and you displeased the other villagers, you were banished. And that meant you died, because no other village would take in a troublemaker. So. Displease the group and you die. That’s the way they see it.

“It means the Japanese are exquisitely sensitive to the group. More than anything, they are attuned to getting along with the group. It means not standing out, not taking a chance, not being too individualistic. It also means not necessarily insisting on the truth. The Japanese have very little faith in truth. It strikes them as cold and abstract. It’s like a mother whose son is accused of a crime. She doesn’t care much about the truth. She cares more about her son. The same with the Japanese. To the Japanese, the important thing is relationships between people. That’s the real truth. The factual truth is unimportant.”

“Yeah, fine,” I said. “But why are they pushing now? What’s the difference? This murder is solved, right?”

“No, it’s not,” Connor said.

“It’s not?”

“No. That’s why we have all the pressure. Obviously, somebody badly wants it to be over. They want us to give it up.”

“If they are squeezing me and squeezing Graham—how come they’re not squeezing you?”

“They are,” Connor said.

“How?”

“By making me responsible for what happens to you.”