Ransom Read online

  Contents

  1 Kyoto, April 1977

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  6 South China Sea, April 1975

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  15 North-West Frontier Province, Pakistan, March 1975

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  23 North-West Frontier Province, Pakistan, March 1975

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  30 North-West Frontier Province, Pakistan, March 1975

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  A Note on the Author

  By the Same Author

  Also by Jay McInerney

  1

  Kyoto, April 1977

  When Christopher Ransom opened his eyes he was on his back, looking up into a huddle of Japanese faces shimmering in a pool of artificial light. Who were these people? Then he placed them. These were his fellow karate-ka, members of his dojo. And there stood the sensei, broad nose skewed to the left side of his face, broken in the finals of the Junior All-Japan Karate Tournament fifteen years ago. Ransom was pleased that he could recall this detail. Collect enough of the details and the larger picture might take care of itself.

  The sensei asked if he was okay. Ransom lifted his head. Turquoise and magenta disks played at the edge of his vision. He was hoisted to his feet; suddenly the landscape looked as if it was flipped on its side, the surface of the parking lot standing vertical like a wall and the façade of the gym lying flat where the ground should be. Then the scene righted itself, as if on hinges.

  The sensei asked him what day it was. The surrounding darkness indicated night, but which night? Ransom thought it was Friday, and said so. The narrowness of the sensei’s eyes and mouth Ransom took to signal annoyance, although it was hard to tell. He had less range of expression than the average household pet. Ransom looked away. Obviously he had fucked up. He had been knocked down, and one did not get knocked down except through an abdication of vigilance. It was axiomatic that you got what you deserved. Ransom tried to remember how he’d gotten his. His left temple throbbed painfully. He recalled that he had been sparring with Ito. Despite the ache in his temple, he experienced a warm sense of relief that the match was over and the results no worse than this. The pain was fading and he was relatively intact.

  “Mawashi geri,” the sensei said, specifying the gambit to which Ransom had proved susceptible—a reverse roundhouse kick. The sensei mimed Ransom’s last moments of consciousness, dangling his arms beside his hips and rolling his head idiotwise. He told Ransom his guard was low and that Ito had faked with a left. Ransom nodded. Divided between chagrin and relief, he hoped only the chagrin was showing. The last time he sparred with Ito he’d been kicked in the balls and was sick for three days.

  The others stood around him, absorbing the lesson of his failure. Ito stood with his hands folded across his crotch, distant and innocent. Ransom wanted to remove his front teeth with extreme prejudice. At the same time he felt humble, contrite. He wanted to be as good as Ito. Going up against him was a way of learning quickly. Ransom reminded himself that there was nothing personal in Ito’s violence. He was a pure instrument of the discipline, a regular martial arts batting machine.

  The arrival of Yamada was a merciful diversion. Yamada’s Nissan 240Z squealed around the corner and stopped sharply just short of Ransom’s motorcycle. Yamada jumped out and stripped off his shirt, bowing repeatedly and begging the sensei’s pardon as he approached the group. He quickly donned his gi, then dropped to his knees on the asphalt in preparatory meditation. The sensei narrowed his eyes still further. A general restlessness spread while everyone watched Yamada and waited for the sensei’s next command. Ransom tried to regain bearing and dignity with a few high kicks. The others stretched and shadow-boxed. The spotlights from the gym cast their elongated forms against the wall of the adjoining building. Ito alone stood perfectly still, his eyes barely open.

  The sensei would sometimes pause like this for minutes. At first Ransom suspected absentmindedness, but by now he realized that the sensei was managing the tension and energy of his students. The present caesura seemed directed toward Yamada, whose nearly consistent tardiness, Ransom thought, was beginning to erode the sensei’s patience.

  When Yamada finished stretching, the sensei called his name and Ito’s. Two points, no restrictions—no restrictions meaning that the head as well as the body was a target, although you were supposed to pull your hits short of the face. The others formed a circle some ten feet in diameter around them, and the younger boys were visibly excited by the prospect. For his part, Ransom was glad to see Ito fight somebody besides himself.

  They faced off. Ito crouched low in a cat-leg stance, his weight all back on the right leg, the left leg cocked in front of him, toes pointed for the kick. There seemed to be no straight lines or acute angles in his posture, his limbs tracing a series of S-curves. Almost six feet, and thin, he had the build of a basketball player and the flexibility of a gymnast. In his current posture he looked weightless, as if the breeze might waft him away at any moment. Yamada, on the other hand, had the aspect of a Patton tank. He held his arms nearly straight out from the turret of his massive shoulders. He looked martial, whereas Ito appeared serene, almost sleepy. Both held the same rank, but they appeared to be practicing distinct, incompatible disciplines.

  Yamada had done most of his training at another dojo, a Shotokan school, and had joined here only two years ago, shortly before Ransom did. Shotokan was a hard school, and Yamada’s karate was based on straight thrusts and relentless attack. By comparison Ito’s karate, the sensei’s karate, was circular and fluid. The school was Goju: hard-soft, based on a notion of alternating tension and relaxation, systole and diastole. The style combined hard Okinawan techniques and the more flexible Chinese kempo. At least so Ransom, with his imperfect Japanese, had gathered. Whatever it was, Ito had it down, with an emphasis on the soft techniques. He turned his opponents back on themselves. It was always hard to remember how he had gotten you. The last thing you remembered was thinking you had him.

  The difference was also a matter of temperaments. Yamada was rough and garrulous; Ito had the demeanor of a monk on Quaaludes. Ransom thought of him as the Monk.

  When he had begun, trying to learn the basics while keeping his face intact, Ransom used what he had—his relative size and strength. In this he was like Yamada, who was built like a weightlifter. The sensei was always shouting at both of them to stop boxing. Ransom found Yamada and his karate to be congenial, more accessible; but Ito, in his foreignness, came to be his model. The Monk embodied something Ransom did not understand: a larger set of possibilities than the pursuit of, say, football or golf. Ransom knew that eventually, with practice, he could do what Yamada did, which was a sophisticated form of kick-boxing. But he aspired to that which he did not know he could do. He didn’t just want to be good. He wanted to be transformed.

  This ambition did not necessarily make facing the Monk in combat any easier.

  Yamada feinted with a jab to the face. Testing the waters. The Monk didn’t move. Yamada launched a barrage of front kicks, the Monk retreating and sweeping the kicks away with rhythmic forearm strokes. The kicks had enough force to break an arm, but Ito finessed the contact, making it sound like distant clapping. Yamada followed with a combination of front jabs. The canvas sleeves of his gi snapped crisply on the rebound. Then they were both still, holding their original stances, the distance between them just longer than a kick. Yamada attacked again. Ransom didn’
t see the opening until the Monk had already filled it. When Yamada reached on a jab, bending forward from the waist, Ito snapped a kick into his gut.

  The sensei called the point. They faced off again. Yamada noisily drew breath, and then, grunting, expelled it. For some minutes they stood perfectly still, watching each other’s eyes. Yamada was going to try to wait Ito out. The Monk made waiting seem like the smart strategy. He seldom initiated attack. Now, though, he threw a kick. Yamada smashed it down and followed with two front kicks and a roundhouse, all of which the Monk slipped away from. Yamada’s was basically a machine-gun strategy: spray the target area. The Monk was a marksman who fired few rounds.

  Yamada’s arms had dropped during his barrage. The Monk aimed a front jab at Yamada’s face, but was knocked backwards by a kick to the chest before he could deliver it. Propelled back into the spectators, the Monk quickly resumed his fighting stance.

  The winning point was so quick Ransom wasn’t sure he had seen it. He heard the snap of the Monk’s sleeve, saw Yamada’s head jerk back. They exchanged bows.

  Ransom was anticipating final calisthenics and a shower when the sensei called his name. He felt a sudden terrible plummet of spirit, an ominous premonition of vacancy in the bowels.

  Sparring, one point, the sensei said. Ito and Ransom.

  Ransom smiled inquisitively as if he had not comprehended the announcement or else expected revision. He then bowed to the sensei and took his place opposite Ito in the circle. He bowed to his opponent, keeping his eyes fixed on Ito’s, because you should never drop your guard, and because the fight was often determined, before the blows were struck, by the eyes; then slowly lowered himself into a ready stance, wishing to prolong the process indefinitely with meticulous adjustments of posture, weight, balance, stance; noting the smell of pork and garlic from the noodle shop across the street and hearing the metronomic progress of a Ping-Pong game from a room within the gym. The same breeze that chilled the sweat inside Ransom’s gi lifted Ito’s cowlick aloft. Ransom inhaled deeply and expelled the air in forced bursts from his diaphragm. He inhaled again and told himself that his fear was right there, balled in his lungs. He blew it out with the bad air. Then it was time to fight.

  Ransom bent down in order to get his head under the jet of the shower. The cold water focused the ache in his forehead and numbed his scalp. Someone banged on the wooden door of the stall for him to hurry up.

  He was changing into his street clothes when the Monk approached and asked if he was all right. During practice any gesture of concern would have been irrelevant and insulting, but now it was okay. Ransom assured the Monk that he was fine and that it was his own fault anyway.

  You’re improving, Ito said. The second bout you almost scored with that mawashi geri. Soon you’ll be defeating me.

  Ransom protested that he was a rank beginner, although he was in fact rather proud of his second bout. What he told Ito, however, was something to the effect that he was no good and never would be. The Monk disagreed. He was already good enough for a kuro obi, the black belt.

  Oh, no, not at all, Ransom protested.

  This was all terribly Japanese.

  The Monk bowed and said goodbye. Yamada was towelling off beside the door of the gym, telling the high school boys about a cabaret he had been to the night before. The sensei approached from behind, smoking a cigarette. With his free hand he grabbed one of Yamada’s arms and twisted it until he went down, his cheek almost flush against the asphalt.

  He let go and said, Don’t leave your back exposed like that. He asked Yamada why he was late for practice and Yamada muttered something about his job.

  The sensei turned to Ransom. You wanted to talk?

  Beg your pardon?

  The sensei said, Before practice you said you wanted to talk.

  Ransom remembered, sickly, that he had wanted to ask about the kuro obi. This was an unfortunate time to raise the subject. For months his confidence had been accruing. He was staying on his feet, staying on his toes, mastering through rote repetition the kata and the kumite—the forms and the fighting—until they began to seem instinctive reflexes of the blood. He was the best in the dojo—after the sensei, the Monk and Yamada—and in any other dojo he’d be a second-dan at least. The sensei did not put much stock in belts. Ransom understood the principle, but he wanted some verification of his progress. Somewhere along the line, the Monk had gotten his black belt and added three grades to it. Yamada had gotten his elsewhere. Everyone else had white belts, Ransom included.

  The sensei was waiting, so Ransom asked if his front kick needed work. The sensei said his everything needed work.

  Excuse me for asking, sensei, but, unworthy as I am, do you think that it is possible that in the near future, at some time, I might receive the kuro obi? Or not?

  The sensei reached under Ransom’s arm and tugged at the obi wrapped around the bundle of his gi, both white. He said something Ransom couldn’t make out, and slowly repeated himself. The sensei said, If you get this obi dirty enough, I’m sure it will turn black.

  I’m serious, Ransom said.

  What difference does it make? he asked. When you’re good enough, you won’t care what color your belt is. As long as you want it, you’re not ready for it. The sensei lit a cigarette. If I were you, I’d concentrate on not getting knocked down.

  Ransom bowed. Thank you, sensei.

  The sensei nodded.

  Ransom thanked him again, walked over to his bike and tied his gi on the back. Yamada hailed him from the other side of the lot. Though Ransom liked Yamada more than anyone else in the dojo, tonight he needed quiet and expiation, feeling on the verge of some incremental addition to his knowledge of himself.

  Yamada slapped Ransom’s shoulder and lit a fresh cigarette from the end of a butt. They chatted for a few minutes, replaying the practice, then walked across the street to the noodle shop. The toothless old sobaya-san bowed as they came in and called out a welcome. The warm interior reeked of pork broth, garlic and tobacco. The sensei sat with some of the others at a corner table. On the walls were photographs of him—holding trophies, shaking hands with the mayor, smashing a stack of pine boards with his fist. Kojak was on the television set over the counter, speaking perfect, lip-synched Japanese. You can run, Ransom thought, but you can’t hide. You don’t even have to go home again. His father was one of those listed in the credits. After his first karate practice, Ransom had come here with his new comrades, suffused with the glow of initiation into a foreign sect; following his introduction to the aged, somewhat shabby proprietor, he had glanced up and seen his father’s name on the television screen.

  Ransom sat down next to the sensei. The Japanese-speaking Kojak screamed something that translated, “Get in here, Crocker.” Yamada went behind the counter and changed channels. He called for quiet. The face of a game-show MC filled the screen.

  Hope you enjoyed our fat girl contest last week, the MC said. Our winner, Miti Keiko of Hyogo Prefecture, has received a lot of mail since the show, including an invitation to participate in the summer sumo tournament.

  The sensei offered that the champion fat girl looked like Yamada’s sister.

  Tonight, the MC said, we have something really special for you. Ransom didn’t catch what came next.

  What did he say?

  Farting contest, Yamada said.

  The four men in director’s chairs on the stage introduced themselves: a Keio University student who said his main interest was video games; an office worker from Nagoya who clearly had second thoughts about the whole thing, since he would not look at the camera; a tongue-tied fat man whom the MC finally identified as a Tokyo subway motorman; and a sushi-shop apprentice who kept waving at the camera. Standing beside the fat man, the MC suddenly pinched his nostrils and shouted, False start. The fat man squirmed in his chair. One more and you’re disqualified. The MC flourished an aerosol air freshener.

  The fat man took the prize: ten cases of canned sweet beans and a
life-sized poster of Olivia Hussey as Juliet. Microphones and matches had helped to determine the outcome. All very tasteful. Coming up next was a man who swallowed live gerbils. Somebody, Ransom thought, ought to save Japan from the Japanese. He hated to admit it, but the crap his father turned out was better than this.

  He left at ten and rode home along the river, which rippled with moonlight like the slow bulk of a sleeping reptile. The river looked much better at night, when you couldn’t see the submarine garbage and the water’s dubious tint. He stopped beside the Imadegawa Bridge and shut down the bike, an aging Honda 350 Scrambler that fashion-conscious Japanese bikers wouldn’t be seen dead on. The air coming off the river was cool and rank with effluvia. The moving water made him restless. It was April and he could feel the ferment of soil and flora around him. He was twenty-six years old and he had been in this country almost two years. He felt a keen pang of nostalgia, but he didn’t know for what. Maybe for the time before he had realized that good intentions don’t make you innocent, for the time when he had less to regret. Ransom wasn’t sure if he was waiting for something to happen, or hoping that nothing would. Sometimes he felt he was preparing for some sort of confrontation, and at other times he believed that he had seen enough trouble already.

  Ransom kick-started the bike and turned around, retracing part of the route he had just taken, giving in to an urge he had been resisting—for easy company and conversation in his native tongue.

  2

  Buffalo Rome was the place to go if you hankered to see someone you’d met in Katmandu or Chiang Mai. The Asia pilgrims were a different type from the less druggy Japan hands, professorial students of Muromachi period temple architecture, acolytes of Zen and tea ceremony. The Dharma Bums washed up here after bleary months on the subcontinent, travelling high and dry—ahead of the monsoon rains, behind the cannabis harvest—arriving at this terminus trailing strange stories and doctrines. The Japanese patrons, mostly students whose costumes ranged from beatnik to proto-punk, were here to cop some cool from the various gaijin.