Gaijin Cowgirl (4): Prelude to danger

“I made a lot of money on perverts."

(Previous chapter, or start at the beginning.)

The piano bar stood beside an elevated train track aimed at Shinjuku Station. Normally the floor would shudder every few minutes as a train ground past, but at this hour, Val only heard the absurdly joyful piped music and the bored gossip of the two waitresses. The piano player had finished and was quietly sipping a beer by himself.

“I made a lot of money on perverts, until my grandfather got me out of it,” Suki said, pouring a packet of sugar into her coffee. “My friends and I started looking for them on the trains. I would stand alone and wait, and then we would pounce like cats when the guy got out. If no hands touched me, then sometimes I would smile at the guys near me, or maybe even press against him a little, just to get him started.”

“Did you need it? The money, I mean,” Val asked.

“Need it?…need it. No, that was never the problem.”

“So why do it?”

“I don’t know why. It just seemed like the only thing I could do.”

Val frowned. “I don’t know, Suki, I can think of better hobbies.”

“Oh, I guess the shopping was fun. It helped pass the time. Until my mother realized I was lying about all this money and we had a big fight. She was fighting cancer and I…just made things worse.”

Val squeezed Suki’s hand. “Is she okay now?”

“She’s dead. They’re all dead.”

“Oh…I’m sorry.” Val had a pang of sorrow, but also of understanding, because her brother was dead too, and her mother was as good as gone. But she had learned long ago to twist her emptiness into hatred and direct it at her father. Suki didn’t have that luxury.

“And your grandfather?”

Suki smiled into space. “He was the one who taught me English. He was a translator after the war, when the Americans were here. He liked the Americans, especially their cars. He was convinced American cars were the best in the world, and that the Japanese could never make their own cars. He came from a rich family and had managed to regain most of the fortune after the war, and he invested all of it in a business importing American cars. Fords, I think. By the time I was born we had lost everything.”

“Ouch.”

“Yeah,” Suki sighed. “Well, when I was a little girl, he came from Osaka to live with us. He was a sad old man even then, but we became friends, I guess. He’d speak to my mom and dad in Japanese, but never to me. For me it was just English. By the time I was getting into trouble at school and doing this thing with my friends on trains, he was the only one I could talk to.” She paused. “Somehow, saying these things in English is easier.”

Val lit a cigarette. “Sounds like your grandfather’s a great guy.”

“Yeah. He was.”

“Your English get you to New York?”

“My grandfather convinced me to apply to a university in the United States. I thought he was crazy, but the more I thought about it, the more I realized how badly I wanted to escape this place. Another of my grandfather’s passions had been European cameras. He was convinced Europeans made the best cameras and that the Japanese could never make good cameras. Another reason the family lost all its money. Anyway, he showed me his Leicas and got me, well, taking snapshots of things. It wasn’t anything serious, but it let me study photojournalism at NYU for two years.”

Val looked at her with renewed respect.

“Wow.”

“And what about you? Do you like New York?”

“I lived in Manhattan for a while,” Val said. “I was working in midtown for this German publishing house.”

“It was such a great time for me, living in a place with hardly any rules. That’s when I really felt like being Suki, who is very cool, and not like that other girl whose name I buried. At first it was scary, and the whole time I missed Japan like crazy. But I liked having an American boyfriend. It was very different than having a Japanese boyfriend. What about you, do you have a boyfriend?”

“No.” Then she hesitated. Why had she said that? Wasn’t Charlie her boyfriend? But she didn’t want to interrupt Suki’s story now.

“But I finally had to come back, and it just wasn’t the same. My mom and grandfather had both died – that’s what forced me to come back, when my grandfather passed away. It was the worst, Val, the worst thing ever.”

Suki toyed with packets of sugar on the table. Val let her take her time.

“And I was alone. I couldn’t relate to my girlfriends anymore. One of them ended up as a call girl. I was so relieved I had escaped that. But I didn’t know what to do. I couldn’t get a real job here. I wanted to be a photojournalist, but I didn’t have enough experience, and if you’ve ever worked at a Japanese newspaper or wire service, you know it’s a boys-only kind of thing. The economy’s been pretty bad. Unless you’re in a union you can’t get a job, especially if you’re a young person. I just sort of drifted into hostessing work, to save up some money so I could take time off and build a real portfolio, something I could show agencies and get my name established. But I…I just never did.” She looked more tired than sad.

“But what about your father?” Val asked.

“Him? Oh, he was a useless man. He slaved at his company and came home drunk after I had gone to bed. When I was thirteen he committed suicide.” Her face hardened. “So useless.”

“My father is a bastard,” Val said. “In a way you’re lucky, Suki. Mine’s still around.” The venom in her voice startled Suki, whose eyes widened. Val flagged the waitress and ordered another coffee. “Yeah,” she said, picking up her cigarette pack, only to find it empty. “Damn.”

“Tell me about him.”

“My father? He’s a big shot. Important guy back home. Congressman.”

“Really?”

“Really. Congressman Frederic Huxley Benson. Fast Freddie to his friends. Freddie the Fucker to everyone else.”

“How can you say that about your father?”

“Whaddaya mean, how can I say that? You just called yours ‘useless’.”

“But I didn’t say he was fucking useless.”

They laughed.

“Well I’m saying he was more than fucking useless,” Val said, wishing to hell for another smoke, or something. The only other customer was the piano player, who had traded Ellington for a beer, but he wasn’t a smoker. “He was fucking around, that’s what he was doing.”

She suddenly fell quiet. She hadn’t talked about her father to anyone, ever, not out loud. Charlie knew enough of the story but she had never just said it. Where was that coffee?

“Do you have any cigarettes?” she asked Suki.

“No. You promised you’d tell.”

“I am. My senior year in high school, Daddy was away a lot in Washington, getting ready to launch his re-election campaign. It was kind of strange, him being away so much, when he should have been back home, campaigning. That’s about the time my mom got really sick. She had always been a delicate woman. A beautiful woman, but I think when she married my father she bit off more than she could chew.”

“What does that mean?”

“Means she got in over her head. Couldn’t deal with a husband always away in Washington, or the endless campaigning. She couldn’t handle stress of his being in the news all the time. She’d just get sick, get these killer migraine headaches, and have to go to bed.”

“I think I understand.”

“I wasn’t much help as a teenager. I partied a lot. My brother, he kept Mom going.”

“What’s his name?”

“Tyler. Tyler Huxley Benson. Ty was such a great guy, the best little brother in the world. He liked to walk with me to school because he wanted to protect me – not that I needed any protection. But he made a good bodyguard anyway. Nobody ever bullied him, he was such a big guy, but sweet, like a smiling bear. And funny. God, he’d make me laugh with his stupid jokes. He did this great Star Trek imitation thing. I can’t do it, but it was really funny. He could do Robin Williams stuff, Eddie Murphy. My senior year, he left for a military academy. My parents, all of us, were so proud of him.”

“Where’s he now?”

Val paused, her heart racing. She realized her fingers were shaking the coffee cup, making it rattle against its saucer. She pulled her hand away. This was new territory for her.

“See, the reason my dad wasn’t around that year was because he was having an affair with one of his assistants in DC. Somebody leaked it to the press and it was all over TV, night after night. Election year, he held a valuable seat – senior guy on the Committee of International Relations and on the Committee on Armed Services. He had a lot of enemies who wanted him out. You can imagine Mom didn’t handle it too well. The doctors didn’t know what to do except give her drugs, lithium and stuff like that. My brother wasn’t there, and I was so angry that I was never around either.”

“So what happened? What did you do?”

“Do?” Val let out a snort. “What could I do? I was confused. I hated him, desperately, but I felt jilted too, and guilty, like maybe my bad behavior was what made him want to be in Washington instead of home. I guess I wanted to forgive him – I wanted him to come home and make things right. He did come home but reporters caught the mistress at his apartment in DC, so I knew he was full of shit.

“And then…” Her voice trailed off. Suki held Val’s hands.

“Ty decided to come home early from the academy. He felt he needed to be with us, to help my dad sort things out. He drove like hell halfway across the country. He ran a red light and another driver hit him. That was it.”

The waitress ambled over but, sensing the intensity at their table, backed off.

“I loved him so much. Ty…I miss him like you can’t believe, Suki, I miss him so much. And it’s all because of Daddy that he’s dead.”

“It was an accident.”

“There was no other reason for my brother to be on the road that day. He was racing home to keep the family together, to clean up my dad’s mess. The worst part is, though, that suddenly the reporters got sympathetic. My dad was no longer a public joke but a tragic figure. And did that bastard milk it for every penny it was worth. Carried my brother’s academy hat with him to stump speeches, talked a lot of horseshit about family values. Family values! Him! He killed Ty and got re-elected for it.”

She suddenly felt the full brunt of being up at four in the morning. Suki handed her tissues. Val ignored her coffee, now cold, and closed her eyes and didn’t want to open them again.

“Well,” she said eventually, cleaning herself up, “I decided I wanted him out of my life. Daddy set up a trust for me, and when I was at college, I made the mistake of drawing down a payment. I needed the cash, or at least I thought I did, and, well, I thought I deserved his money, after everything he’d done to us. But now I wish I hadn’t touched it, ever.”

She couldn’t stomach telling the rest – how she had become addicted to his trust money, how she couldn’t hold a job, how she wandered from one dead end to the next, always the slave to his ready mint…but also how every time she drew it, he could trace it to the bank branch and send private investigators after her.

Because Congressman Benson wanted his daughter back. He needed a daughter to affirm his commitment to Family Values, or maybe he was just lonely, now that her mother Daisy was staying permanently at the ‘wellness center’ and didn’t seem to recognize him or anyone else anymore. Or maybe he wanted his guilt to go away.

She had kept running, knowing that with each drawdown from the trust, he’d catch up with her, send messages to her, send men after her, to try to get her to come home.

The truth was, being a hostess in a Japanese men’s club didn’t mean a thing. Her body wasn’t for sale, but Val felt like she had prostituted herself long ago.

“So now you’re working at Cowboy to be independent,” Suki said, flagging the waitress.

“Yeah…something like that.”

“We’re both just killing time at that place, aren’t we?”

“I guess so. You gonna tell me your real name?”

“Never ask me that, Val. That’s the one rule I have.”

“Sorry. Forget it.”

“What are you going to do about the Painter?”

“The Painter?” Suki’s question startled Val out of her grim reverie. “What about him?”

“He said tonight he wants to paint you. It could be worth a lot of money.”

“Oh, that.”

Val wondered. How much money, exactly? Enough to wean her off Daddy’s trust account? Enough to get her a plane ticket back to the States, get her started, maybe get back into publishing for real – and keep Fast Freddie in the dark? But what about Charlie, her…her friend. Not her boyfriend. But the last thing in the world she wanted to do was hurt him again.

“You realize,” Suki added, “it’s going to be dirty.”

Val counted out the money for the bill. “I’ve already been rolling around in the mud,” she said. “What’s a little more?”

* * *

Once it became known among the hostesses that Takahashi wanted to paint Val, the gossip reached record intensity. For many women this was delicious news, for the perversity of the Painter was universally believed – or if not believed, at least hoped for, because most of the women, particularly the Japanese, resented the way Takahashi reserved his favors for itinerant foreigners, making the rest of them lose face.

But Val saw something else in the Painter, whose conduct never hinted at such behavior. Throughout the weeks before he was to appear on CNN as an accused man, Takahashi spent most of the evening dancing and singing with Val, exhibiting the vigor of a man thirty years younger than he was. Though the Painter had troubles, he never let on, even when his entourage began to shrink. Toward the end only Yoshino remained by his side, murmuring urgently into his cell phone, keeping his eyes peeled.

Finally one night Takahashi visited the club but didn’t seem his usual self. He was subdued. The Painter waved away Val’s concerns. “It’s nothing – just business,” he said.

“I thought you had retired.”

“They still call on the old man when the youngsters get in trouble,” he said breezily. Then his face darkened. “But not for much longer.” And he fell into Japanese, his voice trembling:

“Aisareshi

ga o omoide ni

chiru yanagi.”

“That’s beautiful,” Val said. “What does it mean?”

He cleared his throat. “It is a haiku written by a nineteenth-century monk named Namagusai Tazukuri. It means:

In fall

the willow tree recalls

its bygone glory.”

And for a moment he sat in silence, staring at nothing while the music thumped and Yoshino barked orders into his cell.

“That’s sad,” she said at last.

“Yes.”

“And beautiful.”

“Beautiful, yes. Beauty like life is fleeting, however. And I want to remember your beauty, Benson-san, for as long as I can.”

And that was when he revealed his price to paint her: three million yen, close to $30,000. It was the highest price he had ever offered. “I am an old man now, and rich, and you are young and beautiful, and I would rather part with worthless paper than give you any excuse not to let me paint you.”

* * *

Val shared this news with Suki. Her friend was startled dumb by the disclosure. So much money, for nothing! How long could it take to sit for a portrait? Three million yen. Three million yen, to sit naked for a few hours with a man too old to do anything about it!

After that, however, Val didn’t see the Painter. He left messages for her at the club, usually to apologize and say he would have to see her another evening. She thought nothing of it, but after a few cancellations she began to wonder. He even stopped leaving messages. He disappeared, leaving nothing but the words “three million yen” hanging like a cloud of smoke from Mama-san’s cigar.

Charlie wasn’t around. He was constantly flying to the US or the Hague, filing motions. His case had switched to a higher gear and she saw almost nothing of him. No Charlie, no Painter. Val was on her own.

She spent time with Suki. Sometimes they would meet during the day, maybe to go shopping, see a movie or just enjoy a coffee at one of Omote-sando’s fashionable cafes.

Then one day the Painter left a message at Cowboy promising he would see her the following night. When Val showed up at the club that evening, however, another of the Painter’s messages greeted her, apologizing profoundly that he couldn’t make it. Perhaps just as well, because she wanted to break the news to Charlie that she was moving out, and he had just returned from the Netherlands in a triumphant mood.

Charlie took her out for a celebratory dinner. The World Court had agreed to hear the case. The lawyers hadn’t gotten far suing the Japanese government on behalf of Asian comfort women. But now they had a particular client, a Korean woman living in Japan, for whom the firm had amassed enough evidence to file charges against individuals accused of running wartime brothels that had enslaved women.

It had taken nearly fifteen years of research to come up with enough of a case to take to a judge. More than once local courts had dismissed them. But the Hague-based World Court heard their argument, and international attention would be cast on people who had hidden behind Japan’s government for over five decades.

For once he was full of life, not pouting or playing the angry young man, but optimistic – young. Handsome. Fun. All the things that Charlie had once been to her, back in San Francisco. She didn’t want to ruin this for him by breaking up with him, not just yet.

Besides, she was beginning like it in Japan. Okay, so the job was wearing her out. She wanted something with regular hours, something she could put on her résumé. But with the Painter’s money in her purse, she could afford to take time off and really hunt down something better. Maybe help Suki get out of this rut too.

The day after their big dinner, she decided to give him the news.

Val came home in the early evening to find Charlie working. He was still in celebration mode and wanted to relax a little more away from the office.

“Hi,” she said, hanging up her coat.

“Hi. The embassy called,” he told her.

“The embassy?”

“Yes, the American embassy. They called just a half hour ago. They’d like you to call them tomorrow.”

She dropped her purse and removed her coat, feeling a pinch in her stomach. “Did they say what they wanted?”

“No,” Charlie said, watching her undress.

“You’re home early,” she said.

“Just wanted to keep you company.”

She nodded and walked into the tiny bathroom and closed the door. She ran cold water. “What did they say?” she asked.

He called from the sofa, “Just a name and a number. Any idea what it’s about?”

She slapped cold water on her haggard face. She had no dealings with the embassy. It could only have something to do with her father. He had traced her to Japan. Daddy knew about Charlie; he must have put the pieces together, told the embassy to track him down and ask for her. She closed her eyes and bent over, leaving her hands dangling under the running faucet.

“Val,” came Charlie’s voice, now very distant, “any idea?”

She opened the door and looked at him. “No, Charlie. No clue.”

The next day she picked up the notepad by the telephone that Charlie had left for her: a woman’s name, Lucy Mathers, US embassy, and a local telephone number. She weighed the notepad in her hand for a moment. Then she tore off the top sheet, ripped it into several pieces, and threw the debris into the toilet.

Every time she prepared to announce her leaving, she thought of the embassy, and it paralyzed her. She wanted to be free of Charlie. But she had hoped she could remain in Tokyo. And now she didn’t know what to do.

The embassy left two more messages that week, one with Charlie – again, just please call Ms. Mathers – and one on the answering machine. A chirpy American woman’s voice said: “Hello, this is the United States Embassy calling for Valerie Benson. There is a matter of importance regarding Congressman Benson. Could you please call me right away? My name is Lucy Mathers from the office of political affairs.” She left both her office and her cell number. “Please contact me as soon as you get this message. Thank you.”

Val deleted the message without copying down Lucy Mathers’ numbers.

The telephone rang no more after that, and Val started to breathe easier. The danger had passed. They had stopped bothering her. She continued with her routine of working late, sleeping late, and running chores or shopping in the afternoon. Leading him on was a mistake but she wanted the cocoon of this almost normal life.

She was sitting on a half-empty subway train rumbling past Iidabashi Station when she felt her mobile phone rattle in her bag. Probably Suki. “Hello,” she said absently.

“Valerie Benson?” The voice was sunny and irritating. “Hi, this is Lucy Mathers from the American embassy. I’ve been trying awfully hard to reach you!”

“How did you get this number?” Val demanded.

“You see,” continued Lucy Mathers breathlessly, “your father is coming on an official visit and he wants to see you.”

“Don’t call this number again,” Val said, moving her thumb to kill the connection.

“Wait, Miss Benson, please. We’ve been asked by the Congressman to invite you to a dinner hosted at the embassy.”

“I don’t think so.”

“He can either expect to see you there, or he can call you himself.”

Valerie nodded to the invisible Ms. Mathers. Daddy probably needed to show his daughter off for his own purposes: proof of the Congressman’s friendly intentions toward the Japanese government, look, his own child lives among you. This was his way of making it painless for her. If she refused, she could start expecting even greater intrusions.

“He doesn’t need to call me,” she said.

“Great!” Lucy Mathers said. “Thursday evening at the embassy, seven o’clock. You know where we are?”

“Just tell him not to call me.” And she hung up.

Her mind howled. He had tracked her down so quickly. And now he was showing up in person?

The very thought of facing him was too much. Suddenly Val knew what to do. She had to see the Painter. She had to get that three million yen and go. With the Painter’s money plus her own savings, she wouldn’t need Japan anymore. She wouldn’t need the Congressman’s trust fund.

There was no way she was going to see her father, at the embassy or anywhere else. But she couldn’t shake her fears. She had spent years kidding herself that she was free of him. Why did he have to go call her bluff?

Hours later at Cowboy she watched from Mama-san’s office as the Painter made his angry denials on TV. It was sickening, but it took her a few minutes to realize that separate parts of her life had collided – for of course Takahashi was on Charlie’s list. The Painter was being accused of running a wartime brothel filled with women slaves. It was a monstrous thought. She couldn’t believe it. And the rumors had always been there.

Watching the Painter on Mama-san’s TV was too much: Val fled to the lady’s room at Cowboy. She was haggard and ill. She didn’t want Ute’s coke; she wanted to puke.

“Are you all right?” Suki asked her, standing in the bathroom doorway.

“Fabulous,” she replied, hanging her head over the sink.

“What are you going to do?”

“I…I’m not sure.”

“You want to go somewhere?” Suki asked.

“Yeah. Let’s get the hell out of this place.”

But as they were leaving, Mama-san held up a hand. Palm down, she waved them over to the bar, where she was on the telephone. “Val-san,” she said. “For you.”

Val took the telephone, her hand shaking, and put it to her ear. Her stomach was in knots. “H-hello?”

“Valerie,” said the Painter, “I wonder if you’ve seen the news.”

She looked around. Mama-san was watching her like a vulture. Val turned to give the old lady her back. “Yes, I have.”

“Well, sugar, I can tell you it’s nothing but lies. I don’t want a sweet, beautiful lady like you to get any notions. A man in my position has enemies and I’m ashamed of this whole business.” He didn’t sound ashamed, though. He sounded…amused. There was something supremely dangerous about that, she thought. No one should be so unruffled.

“Okay,” she said, trying to keep her voice neutral.

“Look, sweetheart, I still want to do that painting. I’m, I’m burning to do it. Do you understand the whims of an old man who remembers what it was to be young?”

“I guess so.”

“Well, if you’re still willing, let’s do it. What do you think?”

“I don’t know, sensei, I really—”

“No more chances. This slander is going to keep me occupied for a while. I’m not going to be able to visit you at Cowboy, and I’m going to miss you. I’d like to have something to remember you by, a portrait, so whenever I need to, I can look at you and remember how pretty you are and all the great times we had.

“And of course,” he added, “I’d like to pay you what I promised.”

(Next chapter.)