“General Officers should be commanding men, not looking for photo ops and greasing the hands of politicians.”
I shrugged. “I wouldn’t know. I was too busy trying to stay alive.”
“Korea, right?”
I nodded.
“Nothing like World War Two. Now that was a real war.”
My mind’s eye returned to the frozen arms and legs of too many dead marines scattered across the Chosin Reservoir. “No, sir. Nothing like it.” Enough of the dick-measuring chit chat. “We need to discuss your operation against Countess Mizuki.”
He frowned. “That’s what I was told. Why bring up that old op? It’s done and done.”
“Your reports indicated that she perished in a fire. We have reports that she is still alive. I’m trying to examine those two facts and see which is real?”
“Are you challenging my integrity?”
“I’m questioning whether or not her death was verified or assumed.”
He paused and gave me a hard stare. I’m sure had I been a second lieutenant I would have found a sword and committed seppuku. “As I recall, there was a fire. No one could have survived.”
“Did you find her body after the fire was put out?”
He shook his head. “The fire was so hot it consumed everything.”
“Everything?”
He nodded.
“So you can’t actually verify that she was dead.”
“Listen. I shot her, she fell back and knocked over an oil lamp. That was it. The silk screened walls and cedar rooms went up faster than one could believe.”
“Where’d you shoot her?”
His eyes searched mine, but I kept my stare hard and dispassionate. “The chest. Yes, the chest.”
Nancy had come up behind him and stood with a file to his chest. I nodded to him.
“Do we have further evidence?” I asked.
Hermann spun in his seat and looked askance at my Japanese-American officer.
Nancy ignored him and pulled a black and white photo from the file. “We have this photo.”
Before I could look at it, Hermann snatched it away. “Where was this taken?”
“Japan… before your operation.”
Hermann laughed hollowly and handed the picture to me. “You call this evidence? Evidence of what?”
“When was this taken, Gunnery Sergeant Chiba?”
“February 12, 1917.”
Hermann’s eyes widened. “But that’s not possible. She looks the same as she did when… is this some sort of trick?”
“No trick. Did it ever occur to you that Countess Mizuki might be a vampire?”
He sat back and stared. “It had occurred to us, but she was killed by fire. Everyone knows that fire kills vampires.”
I could see the seed of his failure growing in the egotistical mulch of his mind. “But you found no body.” I shook my head and made tsking sounds. I stood and held out my hand. “Thank you for coming in Mr. Hermann. Your service, as always, is appreciated.”
He stood warily. My use of mister went unnoticed.
“What are you going to do?”
“Clean up your mess.”
“My mess?”
Nancy let the final shoe drop, surprising both of us.
“Customs reports that a woman matching her description landed at San Francisco International Airport three weeks ago. She took transit on TWA Flight 23 from Tokyo with an entourage of thirteen women.”
“Yes, your mess. Thanks to your shoddy work we now have a vampire hive to deal with. This, on top of all the other problems we are currently tracking, is going to be a problem. Now if you’ll move along and go back to playing your game with the little white ball, we’ll continue our mission to save America from the fate others would wish her.”
He stared at me, unable to move.
I sat down. Nancy handed me the file and stood next to me as I reviewed the documents. I paid particular attention to the customs form. After a minute or two, Hermann turned and tottered out of the office.
We’d found her location with the help of some of the flatfoots. Count on street cops to know their own territories, and an older police sergeant had already noted the disappearance of homeless in his area as well as the opening of a new oriental massage parlor. He didn’t piece them together. Why should he have? But for Nancy and Brahm, it was clear as day. Soon after, I had Marshall and Evans conducting surveillance on the place.
Jakes returned early afternoon. Harvey wasn’t with him. Jakes said Harvey was following down a lead. When asked which one, Jakes explained how they’d discovered one other scientist who’d attended the party at Countess Mizuki’s. He was now under protective custody in a safe house in Marin County. He didn’t have much to add at this point, but verified the existence of Countess Mizuki, as well as her entourage of beautiful women.
What concerned me was what had also concerned Harvey: why hadn’t Rachel Nakamura told us about this third scientist? Surely she’d known about the three of them traveling together. It was as if she was intentionally trying to keep us from getting to the bottom of this. I was eager to hear what Harvey came up with.
I didn’t have long to wait. At three that afternoon, he called in.
“Where have you been?”
“Gilmore.”
“What took you to the Garlic Capital of the World?”
“Ms. Nakamura. Her security clearance paperwork indicated she went to Gilmore High School.”
“Did she?”
“Yes. I even saw her in a copy of the senior year book, as well as a cheerleading photo.”
“So it was a dead end.”
“Not at all. Her clearance paperwork listed her as attending Lyman Gilmore Middle School. Turns out she did. All of the records indicate that she was here, then at Green Grass Elementary before that.”
“Doesn’t sound like you found anything?”
“I wouldn’t have. The paper trail was covered nicely. But whoever put it there couldn’t have counted on me encountering Ms. Magill who rules the front office of the middle school like a queen.”
“I’m listening.”
“Turns out she remembers when young Rachel Nakamura showed up and where she came from.”
“You’re drawing this out for the drama, aren’t you?”
Harvey laughed. “Caught me. Turns out the girl never even went to the elementary school. She arrived at the middle school during the seventh grade year.”
“Why’d she lie?”
“No one would have questioned the paperwork. Who would have actually taken the time to verify it? All the security clearance requires is that she fill in her high school and any colleges she attended. But thanks to Ms. Magill’s excellent memory, we now know that she immigrated to America from the Kuril Islands.”
The Kuril Islands were a string of Islands near Russia that were claimed by both countries. Some belong to Japan and the rest belong to Russia. All of them are heavily Russian influenced. I’d noted when we met that she appeared to be only half-Japanese and half Caucasian. I’d assumed it was American, but could just as easily have been Russian. “What does her paperwork say regarding her citizenship?”
“Says she was born in Los Angeles Memorial Hospital.”
“Did you check?”
“There are records there confirming that.”
I paused. We either go with the memory of an old woman or believe all the physical evidence before us. “What do you want to do?”
“Roll her up.”
I thought about it for a moment, but ultimately agreed. “Okay, but get Jakes to help you.”
I spent the rest of the afternoon working with Nancy, running down information about known Russian entities and any relationship they might have with the Kuril Islands. We had boxes and boxes of files and went through each file as fast as we could. It was an eye-straining, back-breaking two hours, but we eventually discovered that a shoemaker living in Pacific Heights had been flagged in 1957 for sending mail by way of Japan to Ekarma Island. The lead came when a Russian drop ship house was busted in Hokkaido in 1957 by Air Force OSI. The mail was read, recorded and translated, then sent on. I held copies of birthday letters the shoemaker sent his wife as well as young daughter. They were simple, filled with love and longing and nurturing a growing through line of regret as the girl grew from the age of three to fifteen. The OSI Detachment tracked the letters for hidden messages. Each letter had a cryptologic analysis attached to it. All read negative. It didn’t mean there weren’t hidden messages, just that none could be found.