Part III, Chapterlets 5,6,7

5.
For the first few moments of waking after the night of the storm, the demon believed that light had gone out of the world. Then, he realized that the sound of the surf had grown distant. Pushing himself up, he walked toward the cave mouth, stumbling over unseen things as he went.
He reached the entrance to the cave, reached out a hand and was shocked to feel stone through the calluses on his hand—stone and not sand. He had expected sand, believing that the storm’s fury had made a little hill of it and placed it between his sleeping and the sea. He slowly ran his hand over the stone in wonder. The wonder did not last long. There were little cracks in the stone that he could push his fingernails into. The villagers had bricked him in.
More dismayed than angry, the demon put his back to his home’s new wall. As his eyes adjusted to the gloom inside the cave, he thought that the villagers must have been planning this wall for a long time. Whence the stone? Where the knowledge of how to cut it and place it? After all, did not the villagers still weave their homes from reeds around tall posts cut from trees on other islands and floated there alongside their little reed boats? Did they not stamp their earthen floors flat with their feet? How came they to place it without waking the sleeping demon? Or place it so swiftly?
The demon had watched his father build the house that became their home, and the stone foundation that it sat upon had taken the greatest part of the labor. The answers to those questions did not trouble him as much as wondering why they might have sealed him in that night of all nights. It was then that he noticed the smell.
Under the smell of salt and rock and decomposing fish, the demon could smell the faintest hint of more profound decay. His eyes fully adjusted, he looked for the source and quickly found it. The dead boy was there, on the floor, with a fishing net and a little reed basket filled with hard bread. One of his arms seemed disarrayed compared to the order of his other limbs. The demon realized that he must have stumbled upon the boy on his way to the cave mouth. For some reason, this filled him with anger and sadness. Then, it came to him. They had chosen this night because they felt that he had brought the storm and with it the wind that had killed this child.
Sadly, he turned from the body and walked deeper into the caves, turning from gallery to gallery in the warrens under the island, feeling his way deeper into darkness. Eventually, even his adjusted vision could not pierce the shadows that pooled in the low parts of the earth. When his sight failed, he proceeded with touch, deeper and deeper, until his feet encountered salt water. He waded into the black water to his waist, then took three ponderous breaths and dove.
He emerged back into air, spluttering, out past the tide line. When he turned back toward the shore, the demon could see torches and paper lanterns hanging on the new wall, framing a large statue that in his likeness. The demon was astounded. Not only had they learned to work stone--but carve it, too. Turning slantwise to the pull of the tide, the demon stroked silently for the shore. Determined to let the villagers know that he was not an enemy, the demon waded onto the beach, shook himself off, and made for the center of the village.

6.
Reason made sure that Star was as comfortable as possible under the doctor’s care before exiting the bathroom to see the source of the commotion. A large, square man in a business suit pulled the remains of the broken door out of his way with massive, gnarled hands and stepped into the room, moving through the doorway sideways, his shoulders being to broad to allow passage had they been square to the threshold. The night manager, seemingly enraged or frightened beyond his ability to control himself, stepped around the corner of the bed and began shouting at the large man. The large man looked around the room, apparently unconcerned by the night manager’s proximity and volubility. Not seeing what he was looking for—Reason’s guess was that he was looking for Star—he attempted to move around the night manager as another man stepped through the door.
The second man was wearing a brown linen suit with a white silk cravat. His bowler hat was chocolate brown. He carried a walking stick tipped in silver in one hand. The second man appeared to be extremely old, but he walked upright. The stick did not touch the ground. He carried it more like a scepter or seal of state than he did like an aid to locomotion. The large man had turned toward Reason. He began to walk forward, but the night manager had interposed himself. The large man backhanded the night manager so hard that the night manager left his feet and landed on the other side of the bed, groaning. The large man was quick, Reason decided. He was also explosively powerful. Reason subtly shifted his stance to an open attitude and smiled.
The large man approached him. Reason took off his glasses. Without moving his eyes, Reason watched the second man over the huge shoulder of the one who faced him. The old man was leaning against the door frame with one hand in his pocket and a strange expression on his face. Reason felt as though they knew each other somehow. The large man moved his lips slightly and suddenly Reason’s attention was all on him.
“Do I have to hurt you?” asked the large man in a very hoarse voice.
“That would depend on a number of psychological and physiological questions that I am afraid I am, at present, unqualified to answer,” responded Reason as glibly as he could. The large man’s brows came down slowly. He shifted his weight slightly. Reason said, “I wouldn’t.” His tone laughing, Reason subtly bent his knees and stretched his neck to his full height, nostrils very slightly flared—he concentrated all his energy in his hairline. The large man turned to look at the second man.
“Do I hurt him, Mr. Lee?” he asked. His hoarse voice never changed tone. The one addressed as Mr. Lee’s face registered the smallest flash of surprise so quickly that Reason almost missed it.
Then, the night manager staggered to his feet. He put his head down and slammed into the back of the large man in what seemed to Reason a clear example of a perfect football tackle. Not being a sports fan, Reason could still imagine that the only thing lacking was protection for the night manager’s head and neck. The method looked painful to all involved. The large man grunted as he was pushed face first into the drywall with a dull boom that shook the mirror behind Reason and rattled the objects sealed to the secret rites of Star’s toiletries couched in their hidden spaces.
The large man pushed off the wall and reached behind him, trying to get a grip on the night manager, but the latter backed up, lowered his head further, and speared the large man again with the top of his skull right in the kidney. The large man was quick to spin around when the night manager backed up to do the same thing again. He opened and closed his enormous hands with an audible creak as the night manager moved forward.
The large man was pushed into the wall again, back first, this time causing plaster to shower down over them both and a roughly circular section of the wall to cave in around him, but by pushing against the night manager’s shoulders, he managed to absorb most of the impact into his arms. The night manager snapped his head up, then, catching the large man on the chin and driving his head back against the wall with a resounding crack.
The large man released the night manager’s shoulders. The night manager delivered three quick punches then, one with his right fist into the large man’s crotch, one his left fist into the large man’s short ribs, and one to the large man’s exposed neck, again with the right fist curled and blurring. The large man gave a soft, rattling sigh and went to sleep, sliding down the wall in a sitting position with one hand on his groin and one on his throat. A fat ribbon of blood slipped over the front of the large man’s right ear and crawled quickly into the collar of his blued Oxford button-down shirt and out of sight.
Reason gave a quick glance back into the bathroom. The doctor now seemed to be actively talking to Star in muted tones. When he looked back, the night manager, blood dripping from scalp, nose, and both lips to make little flowers on the white carpet, was advancing on Mr. Lee.
“Excuse me, sir,” Reason said, “but this gentleman has not provoked you in anyway. I imagine that his intentions are entirely appropriate with respect to the lady. Am I right?”
Mr. Lee coughed and said, “That’s quite true. I have only miss Ashikaga’s welfare in mind. If I can be assured of her condition, I will be on my way.”
The night manager, who seemed to miss the exchange entirely, took a wobbly step toward Mr. Lee. Reason stretched out and put a tentative hand on his shoulder. The night manager spun and charged, yelling. Reason stabbed out with his right hand grabbed the night manager’s lower jaw. Simultaneously yanking down and turning his body into the path of the assault, Reason dropped to one knee, and, using the night manager’s sternum as a stable point for the fulcrum Reason had made of his own elbow, threw the night manager by his jaw headfirst into the mirror, spiderwebbing it and causing the can lights above the sink to blink on and off for a moment.
Reason watched, but he could tell by the way the night manager bounced off the marble countertop and landed with his full weight on the arm behind him that he was unconscious. More plaster dust fell from the ceiling, reminding Reason of the cold promise of snow outside. Reason examined his thumb. There was a small cut on the back of it where the night manager had clamped down. He would have to ask the doctor for some disinfectant, for the human bite was a filthy thing and dangerous to leave untreated.
Behind him, Mr. Lee was saying, “To what do I owe the pleasure of that particular intervention?”
Reason felt foolish saying that he felt Lee to be a kindred spirit, familiar to him in some way. Instead he responded with, “There was no particular cause for my intercession beyond my feeling that any justification for violence ended when he,” here, Reason gestured to the large man in the corner, “became unconscious.”
“I see,” said Mr. Lee.
The doctor chose to step out and give a report just then. “Star’s over the worst of it, now. I think the EMTs should be able to handle it without having to know I was ever involved.” Zweistein patted his jacket pocket.
“How were you involved, exactly?” Lee asked.
“I might ask the same of you,” said Zweistein, “but since the answer to that question seems obvious in your case,” Zweistein looked meaningfully at Lee’s walking stick and around the recently disarrayed room, finishing with the unconscious form of the large man, “then I should tell you that Star asked me for a prescription, and I was imprudent enough to write it for her. Good night, fellows. Destry, I’ll expect you for lunch on Tuesday.” With that, the doctor left.
Mr. Lee strode rapidly to the sleeping figure of the large man. He slapped him lightly a few times. When he groaned, Mr. Lee leaned in close and said, “Mr. Papatoa, I regret our relationship has come to an end. I will no longer require your services.”
As Mr. Lee turned, straightened and walked for the door, Mr. Papatoa shook himself and stood. He croaked, “I’ll hurt you, Lee.”
Mr. Lee turned and said, “I rather doubt it. It was a pleasure doing business, Mr. Papatoa. All things come to an end.”
“Then I’ll hurt the girl,” said Mr. Papatoa, smiling.
“You won’t,” said Reason. Mr. Papatoa opened his hands. Reason smiled. Mr. Papatoa looked at the leg of the night manager protruding from the alcove to his right. Reason said, “There will be no more violence. Too many have been hurt already. Go home and get some sleep.” Reason said this last with the air of dismissing one of his household staff, hoping that the man was so accustomed to taking orders that he might just take one or two more before he resumed thinking for himself. Mr. Papatoa brushed the white powder from his shoulders and left, his blank face looking straight ahead.
Mr. Lee walked to the bathroom. He said some words to Star that Reason couldn’t quite make out. She laughed weakly. Then Mr. Lee approached Reason. “Do me the pleasure of walking me out,” said Mr. Lee, “I think I hear sirens.”
As they walked down the hall, Mr. Lee slipped his arm through Reason’s, and, as he did so, leaned heavily on him. He became, in short, an old man. Reason said, “Star’s family name is Ashikaga?” asked Reason.
“Yes. Poor thing. My niece, you know.”
“I wasn’t aware that you were related,” said Reason.
“We’re not,” said Mr. Lee, “and I imagine that there is quite a lot about Miss Ashikaga of which you are ignorant.” After a slight pause, he continued with, “I’ve never seen anyone get Mr. Papatoa to talk when he is on the job.”
“Oh?” said Reason.
“I’ve never seen him question whether or not he should apply force, either,” said Lee. “He certainly never looked to me to make that decision before meeting you.”
“The Kensei once wrote that if you can beat one man with your hands, then you should strive until you can beat ten with your spirit.” Reason pressed the button for the elevator.
“So you beat him with your spirit?” asked Mr. Lee, smiling.
“No,” said Reason. “But I tried. He went the rest of the way by himself.”
Mr. Lee chuckled. As the doors to the elevator closed, he turned to Reason and said, “A position recently became available in my organization. I was wondering if I might convince you to fill it.”
“I would take any offer of employment seriously. What would be my title?”
“Executive Assistant to Henry Lee, panderer, importer of exotic goods, and narcotics trafficker,” said Mr. Lee.
“I will think on it,” said Reason as the elevator car lurched downward, but Reason knew that all thought had become impossible when he entered the fight.

7.
It was through Mr. Lee that Reason learned the superficities of Yuriko Ashikaga, but he did his wooing in his own way, and in person. Every day for the entire month of January, Reason left a card at the concierge’s desk at the Southern Hills Marriott, addressed to Miss Ashikaga, but he received no response. Calls for her from an outside line were always turned away with a “I’m sorry, but we have no guests registered under that name.” Reason’s plans came very close to ending in frustration.
He expressed his feelings on the matter at a luncheon in early February with the doctor. The doctor listened for about a minute before interrupting to say something like: “The sadness of a man runs away from him, ever away; it is a verifiable truth that it is hard, very hard to bear up under it, but it is also hard to keep it in sight. As a practitioner of medicine, I know in what parcel of the human meat a man keeps his heart in, or rather say ‘soul,’ and this knowledge also allows me a glimpse of what a confusion of those parts—a sudden spike in serotonin or a general flooding of endorphins—what the growing shape of a conditioning based on the chemical signature of a woman or a boy can do to find that parcel secreted in the blood dark recesses of the body to push it into the day. There is no transcendent sadness. Fuck no, there isn’t. Why? Physical response proceeds emotional response, that’s why. A smile makes one happy more than being happy makes one smile. To say you are sad is to say nothing but that you have the impression that a certain bundle of nerve fibers in your brain has been stimulated. A simple confusion of parts. You think your soul has been moved, but I tell you it’s just your cock and your serotonin reuptake inhibitors that are affected. It’s a pretty pickle, with those of us trained to be attuned to the highest strata of human feeling also most aware of the pitfalls, snares, tripwires—you get the general thrust of the image, no?—of the same sentiments. You task yourself with keeping your eyes on the heights. Well, be careful where you put your feet. That girl is quicksand, one way or another. Make no mistake.”
“What do you mean?” asked Reason.
“Did I tell you that I was in the oil field fires during Kuwait? Hell on Earth—” and, then, the doctor was off on another tangent. Reason knew that the doctor had said everything he was going to say on the topic of Miss Ashikaga. The luncheon finished in its usual way, with the doctor rushing off on an imaginary page and leaving Reason alone in the little café to pick up the bill. This time, as he waited for his car to be brought around, Reason decided to persist in his efforts until he had received a clear dismissal. He had not heard anything positive to encourage the pursuit, that was true, but he had heard nothing to the negative, either, notwithstanding the reference to quicksand in the doctor’s diatribe—the doctor not being the most impartial or reliable of character witnesses. Reflecting that he was faced with his own version of Pascal’s wager, with nothing to lose and everything to gain, he stepped into the back seat and slid across the leather, instructing the driver to take him once more to her hotel.