The Japanese Corpse Read Online Free PDF

questions. It won't take long. Will that be all right?"
    "Yea," the girl said.
    "What else, miss?" Grijpstra asked. "Traffic in women?"
    The girl smiled sadly. "No, there are enough women in Japan. Even with birth control the farmers have too many daughters. They are contracted to the bars and brothels. There is some demand for white and black women, but the yakusa find them in Hawaii and America and pay them well. The daimyo doesn't like slave traffic; it's too conspicuous because the merchandise talks."
    "Art," the commissaris said, "Did your boyfriend sell a lot of Japanese temple art?"
    "Not too much. Most of the art sold here came from Thailand and Burma, but some scrolls and sculptures came from Japanese temples, and they were perhaps the most valuable. Buddhism has declined in Japan, although it still has millions of followers, but they follow the Buddist way in name only. The temples are still there of course, but they are not always run by priests, and some priests have had little or no training and are bored and uninterested. They will sell the objects of value entrusted to them, especially now that there is so much demand. Kikuji showed me some pots made by masters, tea ceremony bowls formed by hand hundreds of years ago. They came from a temple and he had paid very little for them. They sold at an auction here for thousands of dollars apiece."
    "So why was he killed?" the commissaris asked. " If he was killed. We aren't sure, we have to find the body first. The body may belong to somebody else. Perhaps it is the body of one of the fat little men in your photograph. Perhaps Mr. Nagai is safe in a hotel room in Utrecht and will contact you soon."
    She shook her head with such force that her hair bobbed. It had been cut with a simple straightforward line, bringing out her high cheekbones and wide forehead. "No, he is dead. I know. He wanted to leave the yakusa and set up an art store here in Amsterdam. He planned to import his own stock, and buy it legally. He was going to specialize in block prints, antique and reproductions, but the reproductions are made in the old way. They are beautiful, I saw them in Japan. They are made by craftsmen who still know the old ways. They can be sold here at three or four times the buying price. We would have been able to live comfortably. I wanted to manage the store, so that he would have time to buy and to study. His English was good and he wanted to write articles for the art magazines. But the yakusa didn't want to let him go. He asked and they refused. He thought he would be safe in Amsterdam, and he said he wouldn't go back. We were looking for an apartment. They threatened him. They threatened me too, through my boss at the restaurant. They only hinted, but a hint is powerful in Japanese."
    "Yes, yes," the commissaris said. He picked up his phone and spoke to the drugs department. A plainclothes constable came to take the girl to another part of the building.
    "Phone me at this number when you are through," de Gier said, writing it down for her on a page in his notebook and tearing it out. "I'll check the time of the train and take you to the station."
    The commissaris got up and looked at his watch. "Yes," he said to de Gier. "Cardozo can go in the train with her and sit in the next compartment. My niece will collect her at the other end and drive her to the house. What about your luggage, miss?"
    "I am leaving it all," the girl said. "I have my money in cash on me. It's a big sum. I was paid good wages and I saved. I can buy new clothes. Will you let me know when my new passport is ready? I have some passport photographs with me."
    "Yes," the commissaris said, putting the photographs in his drawer. "It shouldn't take long, you'd better leave your passport with me. I'll give it to the American embassy."
    "You are going to a lot of trouble, sir," Grijpstra said, when the girl had left the room and the commissaris had telephoned his niece again after having checked the train