MR. "OKASAKI"
In fifteen minutes Brett was bowling along Knightsbridge in a hansom,
having left Hume with a strict injunction to rack his brains for any
further undiscovered facts bearing upon the inquiry, and turn up promptly
at ten o'clock next morning.
Although the hour was late for calling upon a complete stranger, the
barrister could not rest until he had inspected the Jiro ménage. No. 17
was a long way from the ground level. Indeed, the cats of Kensington, if
sufficiently enterprising, inhabitated the floor above.
He rang, and was surveyed with astonishment by a very small maid-servant.
"Is Mr. Numagawa Jiro at home?" he inquired.
"No, sir, but Mrs. Jiro is."
An infantine wail from one of the apartments showed that there was also a
young Jiro.
The maid neither advanced nor retreated. She simply stood stock still,
petrified by the sight of a well-dressed visitor.
Brett suggested that she should inform her mistress of his presence.
"Please, sir," whispered the girl, "are you from Ipswich?"
"No; from Victoria Street."
"I only asked, sir, because master is particular about people from
Ipswich. They upset missus so."
She vanished into the interior, and came back to usher him into the
drawing-room. The flat was expensively furnished, but very untidy. He at
once perceived, however, that the "former" Mr. Okasaki was not romancing
when he boasted of his artistic tastes. The Japanese articles in the room
were gems of faience and lacquer work.
The entrance of Mrs. Jiro drew the barrister's eyes from surrounding
objects. He was momentarily stunned. The woman was almost a giantess, and
amazingly stout. In a tiny flat, waited on by a diminutive servant, and
married to a Japanese, she was grotesque.
Originally a very tall and fairly good-looking girl, she had evidently
blossomed out like one of the gorgeous chrysanthemums of her husband's
favoured land.
Assuredly she had acquired no Japanese traits either in manner or
appearance. At first she seemed to be in a genuinely British bad temper,
but Brett excelled in the art of smoothing the ruffled plumes of
femininity.
"What is it?" she demanded, surveying him suspiciously.
"I wish to see Mr. Jiro," he said, "but permit me to apologise for making
such an untimely call. As he is not at home, I must not trouble you beyond
inquiring a likely hour to see him to-morrow."
He smiled so pleasantly that the lady became more complaisant.
"He may not be very long--" she commenced, but the youthful Jiro's voice
was again heard in fretful complaint.
"My baby is not well to-night," she explained.
"Poor little darling!" said Brett.
He was tempted to add: "What is its name?" but refrained.
"Won't you sit down?" said Mrs. Jiro. "As I was saying, my husband may not
be very long--"
She was fated not to complete that doubly accurate sentence, for at that
moment a key rattled in the outer door.
"Here he is," she announced; and Mr. Jiro entered.
It was fortunate that the gravity of his errand, no less than his power of
self-control, kept Brett from laughing. As it was, he smiled very broadly
when he greeted the master of the flat, for the little man was small even
for a Japanese.
The contrast between him and his helpmate was ludicrous. He could not
possibly kiss her unless she stooped, nor would his arms encircle her
shoulders.
"And how is my pretty _karasu_?" he asked, regarding his wife fondly.
"Don't call me that, Nummie!" she cried.
Turning to Brett she explained: "He calls me a crow, and says it is a
compliment, but I don't like it."
"In Japan the clow speaks with the voice of love," grinned Jiro.
"Well, it sounds funny in London, so just attend to this gentleman. He has
come to see you on business."
Mrs. Jiro forthwith seated herself to listen to the conclave. Brett,
though warned by the maid's remark, could not help himself, so he went
straight to the point.
"Over a year ago," he said, "you were in Ipswich."
Instantly a severe chill fell upon his hearers. The man shrank, the woman
expanded, but before either could utter a word, the barrister continued:
"Personally, I know no one in Ipswich. I have only visited the town twice,
during an Assize week. It has come to my knowledge that you gave the
police some information with reference to a Japanese weapon which figured
in a noted crime, and I have ventured to come here to ask you for
additional details."
Mrs. Jiro heaved a great sigh of relief.
"My gracious!" she cried, "you did startle me. I can't bear to hear the
name of Ipswich nowadays. I was married from there."
"Indeed!" said Brett, with polite interest.
"Yes; and my people are always hunting me up and making a row because I
married Mr. Jiro. Sometimes they make me that ill that I feel half
inclined to go with him to Japan. He is always worrying me to leave
London, but the more I hear about Japan the less I fancy it."
"Ah, my own little _gan_--" broke in her husband.
"There you go again," she snapped. "Calling me a _gan_--a goose, indeed!
Now, Mr. Brett, how would you like to be called a wild goose?"
"I have often deserved it," he said.
"You do not understand," chirped Jiro. "In Japan the goose is beautiful,
elegant. It flies fast like a white spilit."
His English was almost perfect, but in words containing a rolled "r" he
often substituted an "l."
"I understand enough to keep away from Japan, a place where they have an
earthquake every five minutes, and people live in paper houses. Besides,
look at the size of your women-folk. Just imagine me, Mr. Brett, walking
about among those little dolls, like a turkey among tom-tits."
"We give fat people much admilation," said Jiro.
"Nummie, I do hate that word fat. I can't help being tall and well
developed; but it is only short women who become 'fat'."
She hissed the word venomously, as if she possessed the scorpion's fabled
power to sting herself. Evidently Mrs. Jiro dreaded corpulence more than
earthquakes.
Brett had never previously met such a strangely assorted couple. He would
willingly have prolonged his visit for mere amusement, but he was
compelled to return to the cause of his presence. Unless he asked direct
questions he would make no progress. He took from his pocket-book the
drawing made in the Black Museum, and handed it to the Japanese, saying:
"Would you mind telling me the meaning of that?"
Jiro screwed his queer little eyes upon the scrawling characters. The
methods of writing in the Far East, being pictorial and inexact, require
scrutiny of the context before a given sentence can be correctly
interpreted.
The little man made no trouble about it, however.
"They are old chalacters," he said. "In Japan we joke a lot. Evely sign
has sevelal meanings. This can be lead two ways. It is a plovelb, and
says, 'A new field gives a small clop,' or 'Human life is but fifty
years.' Where did you see it?"
"On the blade of the Ko-Katana that killed Sir Alan Hume-Frazer," answered
Brett.
And now he experienced a fresh difficulty. The Japanese face is
exceedingly expressive. When a native of the Island Empire smiles or
scowls, exhibits surprise or fear, he apparently does these things with
his whole soul. Such facial plasticity provides far more effective
concealment of real emotions than the phlegmatic indifference of the
Briton, who, in the words of Emerson, requires "pitchforks or the cry of
'fire!'" to arouse him.
It is possible to throw an Englishman off his guard by a shrewd thrust;
but Mr. Numagawa Jiro was one of those persons whose lineaments would
reveal the same amount of pain over a cut finger as a broken leg.
Nevertheless, Brett's reply did unquestionably make him jump, and even
Mrs. Jiro's bulging features became anxious.
"Is that possible?" said the Japanese. "It is velly stlange the police
gentleman did not tell me about it."
"He did not know of it until to-day," explained Brett, "and that is why I
am here now. It is the motto of some important Japanese family, is it
not?"
"It is a plovelb," repeated Jiro, who evidently intended to take thought.
"So I understand, but used in this way it represents a family, a clan?"
"I do not know."
"What! A man so interested in his country's art as to go to an
out-of-the-way English provincial town merely to see a small knife, must
surely be able to decide such a trivial matter as the use of mottoes on
sword blades!"
Mr. Jiro's excellent knowledge of English seemed to fail him, but his wife
took up the defence.
"My husband had more to think about in Ipswich than a small knife, Mr.
Brett."
"Very much more, but it was the knife which brought him to the place. He
carried the major attraction away with him."
Mrs. Jiro thought this sounded nice. She turned to her husband:
"Why don't you tell the gentleman all you know about it, Nummie?"
The little man looked at her curiously before he spoke to the barrister.
"I have nothing to tell," he said. "I told the police all that they asked
me. That was a velly old Ko-Katana, a hundred yeals old. It was made by a
famous altist. I have told you the meaning of the liting. That is all I
know."
"Why did you give your name at Ipswich as Okasaki?" demanded Brett.
"Oh, that is vely easy. Okosaki is my family name. You English people say
it quicker than Numaguwa Jiro, so I give it. But when I got mallied I used
my light name. Japanese law does not pelmit the change of names now. My
ploper name is Numagawa Jiro"--which he pronounced "Jilo."
"You told the detective at Ipswich that the device on the handle
represented the setting sun. How did you know the sun was setting, and not
rising?"
It was a haphazard shot. The description was Hume's, not Winter's.
Again the Japanese paused before answering.
"It was shown by the way in which the gold was used. Japanese altists have
symbols for ideas. That is one."
"Thank you. I imagined you recognised the device, and could speak off-hand
in the matter. By the way, do you use a type-writer?"
"Yes," said Mrs. Jiro. "My husband is clever at all that sort of thing,
and when he found the people could not read his writing he bought a
machine."
"I have sold it again," interfered Jiro, after a hasty glance round the
room, "and I am going to buy another."
Mrs. Jiro rose to stir the fire unnecessarily.
"They are most useful," said Brett. "Which make do you prefer?"
"They are all vely much alike," answered the Japanese, "but I am going to
buy a Yost or a Hammond."
"I am very much obliged to you for receiving me at this late hour," said
the barrister, rising, "but before I go allow me to compliment you on your
remarkable knowledge of English. I am sure you are indebted to your good
lady for your idiomatic command of the language."
"I studied it for yeals in Japan--" began Jiro, but in vain, for his very
much better half resented the word "idiomatic."
"I don't know about that," she snorted. "He talked a lot of nonsense when
we were married, but I've made him drop it, and he is teaching me
Japanese."
"His task is a pleasant one. It is the tongue of poetry and love."
Again there was a pause. A minute later Brett was standing in the street
trying to determine how best to act.
He was fully persuaded that Jiro had, in the first place, identified the
crest as belonging to one of the many Samurai clans. But the motto was new
to him, and its discovery had revealed the particular family which claimed
its use.
Why did he refuse to impart his knowledge? There must be plenty of
Japanese in London who would give this information readily.
Again, why did he lie about the type-writer, and endeavour to mislead him
as to the make of the machine he used?
To-morrow, for a certainty, Jiro would dispose of the Remington which he
now possessed. Well, he should meet with a ready purchaser, if a letter
from Brett to every agency in London would expedite matters.
He did not credit Jiro with the death of Sir Alan Hume-Frazer, nor even
with complicity in the crime. The Japanese had acted as the unwitting tool
of a stronger personality, and the little man's brain was even at this
moment considering fresh aspects of the affair not previously within his
ken.
Moreover, how maddening the whole thing was! Beginning with Hume's
fantastic dream, he reviewed the hitherto unknown elements in the
case--Capella's fierce passion and queer behaviour, culminating in a
sudden journey to Italy, Margaret's silent agony, the existence of an
Argentine cousin, the evidence of "Rabbit Jack," the punning motto on the
Ko-Katana, Jiro's perturbation and desire to prevent his wife's
unconscious disclosures.
With the final item came the ludicrous remembrance of that ill-assorted
couple. Laughing, Brett hailed a hansom.