A couple of barflies, overhearing, laughed crudely. "I'd like milk from them boobs," one remarked as the buxom girl walked somewhat stiffly by him.
I returned to Hiroshi. "That bag..." I said.
He shrugged. "We have known each other long."
"Not that long. We only met at the Martial Open, and again in Japan. You advised me and showed me the ki power." How well I remembered. I had been drafted as the judo representative in an interdiscipline contest: judo, karate, kung fu, boxing, wrestling, aikido and Thai kick boxing. For the first—and, I hoped, the last—time, all the major fighting arts of the world had been pitted against each other, to see just which was the most effective in terms of self-defense. The result had been a tie between judo and karate, with kung fu a close third, but it could easily have turned out otherwise, for all the contestants were deadly. Hiroshi had been the representative for aikido, the smallest and oldest man in the tournament; and only through his help had I survived that ordeal. For he was the man of ki, that phenomenal yet elusive force that could heal a sick body or generate incredible strength. Hiroshi had suffered from a recurrence of malaria, yet continued to compete until has arm had been shattered; and even then, in his fashion, he had been active. There was no man I admired more.
"Time is of no moment when ki is shared," he murmured. I nodded. I could not refute that argument. The world he had opened to me by demonstrating the ki had fundamentally changed my life and prepared the way for the release of important buried experiences. The erratic ki I had developed after that had saved my life on several occasions and had enabled me to bring my karate assistant Ilunga out of her terrible drug addiction. My life, in one sense, had really begun with ki—and Hiroshi had been responsible.
His eyes dropped to the table. "There were many good men at that tournament. Your judo partner, Takao..."
The milk arrived, two tall glasses. Mine was chill creamy cow's milk; Hiroshi's had a yellowish tinge, with a number of what appeared to be globules of fat floating on the surface, and it smelled sour.
He lifted it to his lips and took a sip. I refrained from grimacing. He nodded sagely. "Excellent."
My brow furrowed. "You mean that really is yak milk?"
"Indubitably." He turned to the waitress. "My compliments to the chef."
She looked as surprised as I felt.
"A chef doesn't fix milk," I protested. "Or do you mean they put some kind of flavoring in it?"
"It is fermented, of course," he said. "This is the way they store it and use it in Tibet." He returned to the waitress. "I should like to meet the person who provided this."
Nonplused, she backed off. "I'll tell him."
Hiroshi had certainly changed, or maybe I was just seeing a new side of him. First he had reacted to that "fairy" snigger outside; now he was making a big thing of this yak business, and I could not be certain whether it was serious. The bartender could have dumped some spoiled cream into the glass, reversing Hiroshi's joke, so that now he was inviting the jokester to meet him face-to-face. Obviously there was still much I had to learn about Oriental humor.
"Poor Takao," I said, returning to the subject the yak had interrupted. Takao had been an older judoka, there as a judge at the Martial Open. But he had become a participant and my team partner, until his death in a violent match against kung fu. Takao and Hiroshi had had a decades-long feud that was resolved just before Takao's demise.
"He was at heart a good man," Hiroshi said. "I paid a call on his wife in Japan, as he desired. She thanked me for the money—the money that you had so generously made available from your tournament winnings—but she elected not to leave Japan."
"Money," I repeated. "Which brings us to the dia—" I broke off, not certain of our privacy. I nodded meaningfully at the bag sitting between us on the table.
"And do you remember when you suffered an injury and came to my dojo in Japan?" he inquired, still avoiding the subject. I suppressed my flash of irritation. I owed Hiroshi a lot, and respected him a lot, but this pussy-footing was frustrating. It was also not like him. So I had to assume that he was working his way into the subject in his own fashion, and had good reason for his seeming indirection.
"That was no injury, that was the delayed-action death blow," I said, remembering with a shudder. "You sent me to O-sensei Fu Antos for the cure."
He nodded. "Now you understand."
"Understand what?" I yelped. But then I had to break off again, for someone else was approaching the table.
It was a Latin-looking gentleman. For a moment I thought it was the father of one of the gang punks we had met outside, but I knew this could not be. If the parents were cognizant of their children's activities, there would not be any juvenile gangs. This was a stranger.
"Señor," the visitor said to Hiroshi. "You asked to see me?"
Hiroshi stood. "Ah, the yak milk!"
The man inclined his head. He was a dark, swarthy man with a slight Chinese look and a bulging belly. "I am José Peon. This is my son, Robertico."
Hiroshi bowed. "I am Hiroshi."
I waited with ill grace. Hiroshi had been about to explain about the diamonds, and now this interruption!
"You are from Japan?" José inquired politely.
The boy tugged at his father's sleeve. "Papi—"
"¿Qué quieres, hijo?" José asked his son.
"¿No lo conoces?"
"Lo acabo de conocer, como voy a saber quien es."
"That's Hiroshi! The aikido O-sensei!"
I knew very little Spanish, despite occasional travels to Central and South American countries. This rapid exchange left me in the air. I could catch a word here and there, and the intonation. But obviously the boy recognized Hiroshi.
Now Hiroshi bowed to the boy. "Yo soy."
"For God's sake!" I said, exasperated. Perhaps I was jealous of Hiroshi's linguistic ability; it made me feel ignorant.
"My friend speaks very little Spanish," Hiroshi said. "We are being discourteous."
José turned to me. "My apologies, señor," he said.
"Quite all right," I said, unwilling to admit that I was unmollified.
The boy stared at me. "Ese es Jason Striker—el campeón de judo." Now, that was more like it.
José frowned at the boy and spoke with a slightly sad voice. "We are speaking only in English now, son," he said.
"I see the boy is a martial-arts fan," I said.
José rolled his eyes. "At any rate, he is taking lessons. Not like his fat old papi."
I wondered what kind of a man would let himself go so obviously to pot while his son hero-worshipped martial artists, but of course I didn't say anything.
"You have studied in Tibet?" Hiroshi inquired of José.
The man shrugged, so that his fat bounced. It disgusted me. "It is true, sensei. I developed a taste for yak's milk."
Now it was coming clear. This man had been to Asia for some reason—it must have been before the Chinese Communists took over the region—and picked up some exotic tastes in the fleshpots there, and somehow he could afford to indulge them yet. The bar manager must have known of this, and laid in a supply; or perhaps José kept his own, and sold some to the bar on demand. At any rate, Hiroshi had his yak milk. I wondered whether it was pure coincidence that Hiroshi had asked for this particular drink. Somehow I doubted it; he had an almost supernatural ability to make special connections in devious ways.
"I have a friend who works at the city zoo," José explained. "In fact, he is in charge of hooved herbivores, so he gets me a gallon from time to time, and I store it here. I did not realize yak milk was becoming so popular." He made a gesture to show this was not seriously intended. "Yak cheese is also excellent, if you would like some."
"No, thanks!" I said quickly.
Hiroshi smiled. "We must talk again, amigo."
"At your pleasure." The two men shook hands, pausing a moment before breaking the grip and looking into each other's eyes. Then the boy insisted on shaking hands wit
h both Hiroshi and me, and finally they left, to my relief. I hate having the feeling that important things are transpiring when I have no part in them. Probably all they wanted to do was discuss yak cheese.
"Now, let's get on with this," I said. "I helped Fu-Antos change to his new body, if that's what really happened; he helped me survive the delayed death blow. Fair exchange. What has that to do with your visit, or those..." I nodded at the bag. I still wondered about my fantastic adventure with Fu Antos, the legendary ninja mystic. What had been real, what illusion? Had I really killed his ancient body by attempting to disembowel myself? It was a lingering nightmare, half-real; it would probably continue to repel me all my life.
"Fu Antos needs you again," Hiroshi said. He pushed the bag of diamonds across the table toward me.
"Now, wait a minute!" I said, my throat tight. I shoved them back as though they were hot-which they probably were. "I don't traffic in stolen merchandise."
He turned on me a gaze of purest innocence. "Stolen? Why would Fu Antos steal?"
I realized I had made a prejudicial assumption. It was a natural mistake, on this unnatural day. "These are his, uh, items? He's had them all along?"
Hiroshi nodded. "He mined them in Brazil, from land he has title to. Fu Antos cares little for wealth. He employs it only when necessary." Gently he moved the bag back to me.
Firmly I rejected it. This was like a game of Ping-Pong, with the diamonds bouncing back and forth. "I don't know anything about Fu Antos, but I don't like payoffs."
"I will tell you about Fu Antos," Hiroshi said. "That is why I came."
I raised an eyebrow.
He told. It was a compelling, awful, incredible history. Fu Antos, medieval warrior, top-level ninja, or jonin—betrayed by the shogun, or ruler, of Japan, betrayed again by his own lovely wife. A terrible siege, and a terrible sacking, and a terrible revenge. Then, comparative isolation in the second Black Castle—for centuries. At last, reincarnation in the body of a child. Return to the outer world of modern Japan. Destruction of a tungsten factory. Flight from an army of police.
"And so Fu Antos realized that he had no proper place in the modern world," Hiroshi finished. "Japan is overcrowded, industrialized. The ninja and samurai traditions are forgotten. Destroying the factory was symbolic, but it was not contemporary civilization that went up in the explosion. It was Fu Antos' own illusion that he could reverse the tide.
"For he did not stop the pollution. He only threw hundreds of poor employees out of work. A number of them lived in the very village he had seen. The father of the dead, deformed baby lost his livelihood and cursed the unknown perpetrator of the sabotage. Fu Antos realized, to his horror, that the peasants did not want to be liberated from either their commercial tyranny or the poison of their environment. Even as the famous modern Japanese writer Mishina came to the same realization. He harangued the troops, but found his ideals were not shared by those he sought to help, so he committed seppuku."
I sat bolt upright. "Fu Antos committed suicide?" I demanded, shocked.
"Mishina, of course. Fu Antos did not live four hundred years merely to desist because of a slight reversal."
"Oh. Sorry."
Hiroshi spread his hands. "And so he has left Japan. He has removed with his remaining ninjas to the wilds of the Amazon River in South America, there to build his third Black Castle and to form a medieval enclave apart from the modern scene. In a few more centuries, when even that desolate region becomes too crowded, he will remove once more, to some other planet, and build the fourth Black Castle."
"A good decision," I agreed, sipping the dregs of my milk. "He's really thinking ahead." Travel to another planet! From the medieval straight into science fiction.
"But there are complexities. Passports, immigration visas, permissions..."
"I thought you said he had already moved! What does he need with passports now?"
Hiroshi merely looked at me. Oh, no—Fu Antos had entered the Western Hemisphere illegally, and now he wanted me to make it right?
"That matter will be handled elsewhere," Hiroshi said. "Fu Antos also requires building materials for the castle, and special equipment, and weapons for defense."
"Weapons! The ninjas are well-armed." I remembered how viciously the ninjas had fought when I went to the ruins of the Second Black Castle.
Hiroshi shook his head. "They have not used guns. Now they will learn. Their preliminary survey indicates that there can be resistance to the establishment of an enclave. The enemy may come with very rapidly firing rifles, mechanized guns..."
"Machine guns," I said. "BAR's—Browning Automatic Rifles. Yes, I see your point. Even the most proficient swordsman would be at a disadvantage against a modern trooper." I paused. "But if the ninjas chose the most remote wilderness, no one would ever seek them out
"Ah, but they would. Fu Antos did not choose the region merely because it was remote; he also considered its resources, until now unknown to others."
"Oh, the diamonds!" I said, catching on. "Fu Antos must have psychic treasure-hunting powers!"
"Of course," Hiroshi said seriously. "It is an aspect of his ki. He can sense the ki of the inanimate. However, do not lose the diamonds; there are others, but they are impossible to recover without extensive mining operations, not worthwhile at present."
"Then there is still no danger. No one's going after a nonpaying diamond mine."
"You see, there is also oil."
"Oil! In the Amazon?"
"Yes. Fu Antos dowsed and discovered a massive oil-bearing stratum not far from the diamonds. He recognized it as the same substance the businessman in Japan set such store by."
"The one he let die in the poison smoke?" I asked dryly.
"The man is not dead. Fu Antos does not waste material. He is merely blind and disfigured. Fu Antos took him to Brazil as a technical adviser, and he confirmed the oil."
"I can't believe that man would help Fu Antos!"
"Subject to the ki," Hiroshi said gently. "At any rate, such secrets are very hard to keep. Eventually there is sure to be an intrusion."
"I should think so, with the price of oil what it is today," I said. "Maybe Fu Antos had better build elsewhere."
"But he requires money for the supplies and construction. These diamonds are all that he has at the moment. The oil should solve that problem."
"And bring a thousand more problems!" I said. "So he'll stand and fight against impossible odds. Well, I guess he knows what he's in for! His way obviously isn't my way, but each to his own. I must admit he's pretty damned sharp, the way he goes about things. But you'd better return the diamonds to him, since he obviously needs them more than I do."
Having made my decision, I thought that would be the end of it. I should have known better. Again, Hiroshi pushed the bag at me. "He requires an agent in this country, a native. For the acquisition of building supplies and drilling equipment. One he trusts."
"Now, just a minute!"
But he nodded his head authoritatively. "You. You can not refuse."
"I can and I do refuse! I'm no contractor; I know nothing about the Amazon, less about building a castle. I can't even get the oil out of my car's crankcase without gunking up the terrain!"
"It is possible to learn," he murmured.
"I have a job to do here! I'm a Fifth Dan judo instructor. I can't go traipsing around construction companies or oil combines; I wouldn't even know what to ask for!" My eye fell on the bag again, and I shuddered. "With a cache of uncut ice, yet!"
Hiroshi put his hand on mine, and I felt his powerful ki. The force pulsed through me, making the world seem surrealistic. It was like a hallucinogenic drug high, except that I never took drugs. Not voluntarily. "Indeed, for all these reasons, no one would suspect you. Therefore you are ideal."
But I summoned my own ki and fought it off. "Any other way, I would try to help Fu Antos," I said. "But this would be crazy. I would do him no favor by attempting something for which I am plainly in
competent. I'd only waste the only wealth he has. So for his own good, no. Hire a contractor, or a lawyer, or both. Or enlist the help of someone skilled in such ventures, like Johnson Drummond or Vicente Pedro." Drummond was the multimillionaire industrialist father of a lovely girl I had trained in judo, Thera. I still looked her up once in a while. Pedro was a Nicaraguan power who had been with me when I encountered Fu Antos; Pedro's hand had wielded the sword that finally ended the animation of the ninja's old body.
"Neither man is able to undertake such a project without immediate suspicion," Hiroshi said. But he removed his hand, and the ki ceased. "I must return to Japan."
I was both relieved and sorry. He had come all this way, and I could not help him. Yet what a crazy notion: me, builder and oilman!
"These matters are not, after all, within your sphere of competence," Hiroshi said.
"That's it exactly!" I agreed, refusing to be shamed.
"Fu Antos also required weapons of the modern type, as I mentioned. This would seem to be more within your sphere."
"Well, I'm hardly expert in guns," I said modestly.
"He accepts that level of expertise you offer." Yet again he moved the bag.
What a sucker's trap! I had used the pretext of ignorance in one area, and now I was half-committed in another. Hiroshi had in effect forced me into an off-balanced resistance to a forward throw, and then flipped me neatly to the rear.
But I wouldn't have it. I ignored the bag and signaled to the waitress, indicating we were ready for the bill.
"That has been taken care of," she said.
I shook my head. "We're the ones who ordered milk."
"I remember," she said. "Yak." She made a wry face.
"We haven't paid yet."
"The management is declining the money," she said. "The yak is on the house."
I realized that Hiroshi's new friend had spoken to someone on the way out; there wasn't much choice now, though I really didn't like being beholden to the man even for a glass of milk. It was hardly worth making an issue. "Tell the management thanks," I said gruffly. I deposited a tip that should more than cover the price of the drinks, and we moved out.