Secrets of the Apple Page 17

  “We actually ordered that chair as a gift for you, but I happened to sit in it yesterday and it threw me straight to the floor. Why didn’t you tell Kate it was broken? We would have replaced it for you.” Ryoki coughed to hide a nasty malediction he’d picked up from a cabbie in Cairo.

  Nine days later an aging Japanese-Brazilian maintenance man wheeled the chair in, grinning a toothless smile and spitting tiny droplets as he gumbled a string of unrecognizable words and waved a large black bolt that looked curiously familiar. Ryoki couldn’t understand the man, but realized the bolt looked just like the one that had rattled every time he opened or closed the center drawer of his desk in San Francisco, the one he had assumed to be a stray part of the desk itself. Possibly he was mistaken, many bolts look—um, no, too big a coincidence. Kate entered the room just as Gummy turned the chair over and began screwing the bolt under the seat. Her arrested step and widening eyes told him she recognized the chair—and the bolt. He looked from her to the chair and back, a light blinking on in his head.

  “So, in San Francisco, did you by chance keep a tool kit in your desk?”

  “You deserved it,” she said.

  Chapter Thirteen

  When Tanaka Inc. absorbed The Melo Group, they inherited a number of factories scattered throughout the lower half of Brazil, all of which needed extensive renovation and expansion, requiring a capital budget large enough to administrate a small country for one year. Unless these factories could produce at fifty percent capacity during the three-year renovation project, Tanaka, Brazil would sink under its own weight, an itchy point that had very nearly scuttled the venture in the discussion phase. With this in mind, the board began debating names to head this crucial renovation project very early in the planning stages, eventually boiling down to two: Izumi Nakamura, a longtime company man, and Jackson Browning, a well-known American consultant. There they deadlocked, the older members insisting they should stick with a solid Japanese man they’d known for twenty years, while the more progressive element argued that Browning had been successfully working these kinds of projects all over the world for twenty-five years, twice in Brazil. “He knows the language and the people. We Japanese need to open up, expand,” they said, distributing black and white reports containing seductive numerical proof that Brown had a magician’s gift for conjuring money from thin air. Still, tradition would very likely have won the day had Nakamura not suffered a near-fatal car accident, rendering him incapable of accepting the responsibility for many months, and leaving the progressives to romance Browning unchallenged.

  So it was that Kate and Ryoki found themselves flying down to Porto Alegre to inspect the southernmost cluster of factories and meet with Browning in his own office, strategically located hours from headquarters, where Browning bragged he could keep his fingers deep in his own pie. At first Ryoki had bucked at the inconvenience of opening a satellite office. Browning already spent so much time traveling between factories it seemed unnecessary to provide him with a separate base. But the location of his office had been a serious sticking point in Browning’s contract negotiations, and after tracking his miraculous progress since January, Ryoki had come round to conceding the point. In fact, Browning had exceeded expectations so brilliantly that Ryoki had begun to wonder if, given time, the man might prove himself the genius he claimed to be.

  Too bad Kate hated him.

  The first time Browning had come striding chest-first through São Paulo headquarters, Ryoki had almost heard the phantom clink of spurs, like a cowboy hero dusted off and handed a Harvard degree, which struck him as odd since the man wore a black three-piece Armani, immaculate wingtips and hailed from Chicago.

  At that first meeting Kate had welcomed Browning with an open smile, asked him where he was from, did he know the family of so-and-so that she’d been to school with, and surprisingly he did. As far as Ryoki could tell the meetings wore on amicably, but at some indefinable point the mercury had silently dropped to Antarctica and stuck there, the danger revealing itself during an afternoon break when Browning had begun expounding on the old-fashioned virtues of the American heartland as Kate pulled a crossword puzzle book from her bag and asked if anyone knew a seven-letter word for “donkey.” Just then a young intern entered bearing copies and Kate’s stone face suddenly flashed into a smile so glittery and dazzling the poor boy ran off in alarm, not even slowing when he clipped his head on the door. At the time Ryoki had looked at the date on his watch, having noted a bit of shrapnel generally flew right around the third week of the month, and discounted her frigid politeness for the rest of the day. Though he still couldn’t account for the little sniff and the word “pig” she continued to mutter whenever Browning’s name came up.

  On the way to the airport that morning, Ryoki had not been thinking about Browning at all. Kate had been quiet since breakfast, the ominous kind that had him rapidly ticking through any outrage he might have committed in the last twenty-four hours that theoretically could have set her off, finally quitting in despair when he realized the list had no actual end. At the terminal they were loaded onto the plane first and sat in isolated silence as the coach passengers funneled haltingly through the nearly empty first class cabin, juggling too many personal belongings in a narrow aisle and casting quasi-resentful glances at the attractive couple who could afford to sit together in the big seats, but seemed to spend their luxury staring blankly at their laps. By the time their plane was taxiing down the runway, Ryoki had had enough and asked her what was wrong.

  “Nothing,” she said with false lightness before turning to face the window. But Ryoki put a finger on her arm and asked again, so she had no polite choice except to face him. “Nothing, really—I don’t know, it’s just—” she broke off. It’s just is never good. Ryoki braced himself.

  “Are you upset with me?” he asked humbly, in an effort to minimize the damage.

  “Why, what have you done?”

  “Nothing, nothing at all,” he said quickly.

  “Men must suffer from chronic guilt,” she said. He wanted to tell her that men actually suffered from chronic incomprehension, but this didn’t seem the wisest moment. Kate chewed her lip.

  “What do you think of Browning?” she asked.

  Off the hook! Off the hook!

  “Why, does he have a knife up his pant leg?”

  “I wouldn’t know,” she said, then added almost under her breath, “Not that he hasn’t offered me the chance.”

  Ahh, there was the trouble. Browning was a bit rough-hewn from clawing his way up from the Chicago projects, even used colorful talk as part of his no-nonsense M.O. Very likely he’d made some unfortunate comment within her hearing. Ryoki tried to think if she’d ever been alone with Browning, but couldn’t think of a single time longer than a few minutes at most. Probably just rough talk, he concluded, a clash of personalities, lady and the tramp.

  Ryoki started to reach for the reports he’d stowed in his seat pocket, but pulled his hand away, suddenly feeling a pricking in the gut. What if Kate assumed he would be jealous, a weapon she could use against her perceived enemy? Without pausing to consider whether Kate would honestly employ such a ruse, he became irritated by the very possibility and automatically took up Browning’s defense.

  “He’s a manufacturing genius, brilliant reputation. Just ignore his quirks,” Ryoki said, going for soothing, but coming off patronizing. “I’m always standing right there. What can he do?”

  “You’re always standing miles away,” she said. Ryoki didn’t follow. He’d never have cause to send her to Porto Alegre alone. “The man’s a player,” she went on. “I did some checking. Did you know he’s been married four times and his current wife chose to stay in New York?”

  “Lots of people are unlucky in love, Kate, especially these days,” he said, though truthfully the statistic had given him pause when he read Browning’s company file.

  “Having met him, do you really think it’s about luck?” Kate spoke with such dista
in that Ryoki turned to look at her face, realizing he knew nothing about what had broken up her marriage, how it might have skewed her perception of men.

  “Men are good at compartmentalizing. I’m not saying it’s right, but a man can beat his wife and still maintain impeccable professional ethics, happens all the time,” he said gently.

  “What kind of swiss cheese ethics only protects the male population? I suspect that man’s blown through some major moral speed bumps, maybe even torn out his undercarriage. What’s to keep him from screwing somebody else should the need arise, like a rich young C.E.O. who didn’t have to struggle the way he did?” Raw patch. Direct hit.

  “I don’t think he’s interested in hitting on me,” Ryoki said coolly.

  Kate let out one of her strangled groans with something that sounded like “deliberately obtuse,” but he couldn’t be sure. “If he ever has a real need, I’ll bet he shows his colors. I’ll bet you a dollar,” she said, looking him directly in the eye. “And you’re right. He is brilliant.”

  Ryoki let his eyes drift casually to the papers in the seat pocket. The conversation was going nowhere and he was tired of it.

  “We pay him a fortune. What could he possibly need?”

  “I don’t know,” she said, turning to gaze out the window with a shrug that felt like an ending.

  Though he said nothing, Ryoki felt a hot sniff of anger in his nose. With all her rants about ethics and morals, she had ignored the uncomplicated fact that motivated both parties; Browning and Tanaka Inc. could make more money together than either could make separately, a fact that held sway whether Browning had one wife or fifteen. But those words would sound too harsh to someone like Kate who had not yet made peace with all the shades of gray. If she wanted to hold Browning’s divorces against him, that was her prerogative; no point discussing it further.

  She pulled a novel from her bag. That was part of their agreement, free reading during travel time, to help offset the long hours. Ryoki pulled the reports from the seat pocket, but his mind kept tickling around their disagreement and he couldn’t concentrate. Kate’s fault, making him mad, wasting his time, eating up his energy. She appeared to sense his irritation and twisted a bit in her seat, giving him her back. It wasn’t until they were in the car traveling from the airport to Browning’s office that they had thawed sufficiently to make stilted comments on the weather and Porto Alegre’s interesting architectural mix.

  Browning himself had scouted the location for the Tanaka Inc. branch in Porto Alegre, and the building turned out to be eye-catchingly lovely, reminiscent of old Europe. As they pulled up, Ryoki wondered if perhaps it had been chosen more for its impressive masonry than its convenient location. Unlike the São Paulo offices which took up seven floors of a skyscraper, the Porto Alegre branch required only two floors, though looking at the numbers, Ryoki thought they could have made do with one. Stepping out of the elevator onto the top floor, he understood the extra space. Apparently Browning liked to work on a scale that wasn’t just American, but Texan in size, much grander than São Paulo. Don’t pay attention to his quirks, Ryoki thought, admit it looks nice.

  Reception had already announced Mr. Tanaka’s arrival and Browning was just leaving his office wearing the big smile of a gracious host. “Welcome to my neck of the woods. I hope you like what we’ve done with the place. I’ve worked ten years in Brazil off and on, and I’ve admired this building every time I came down here,” Browning said as he led them to his office, leonine muscles rippling, barely contained under his custom-fitted jacket, his skin the leathery tan of an aging outdoorsman, dark hair shot with gray. A man’s man, power and money. The Dream incarnate.

  “I came down here with Ford, then with G.E. Got to know my way around the people.” A doe-eyed intern young enough to be his daughter watched Browning’s approach with a bright, expectant gaze, but he swept past without a glance. The girl’s head snapped back a fraction, her cheeks reddening like she’d been slapped. Ryoki wondered briefly whether Browning had been sleeping with her, but it was ridiculous to convict the man on such slim evidence and he put the thought down to the insidious influence of Kate’s feminist ravings. Still, as the group neared Browning’s door, Ryoki noticed the immediate area to be staffed almost exclusively with young, attractive Brazilian women, more so than he would have expected.

  Unsurprisingly, Browning’s office turned out to be large, twice the size of Ryoki’s, with tall, ornate windows filling two walls. “Care for anything after that long trip?” Browning asked, hovering over the bar on the credenza. “I think I have most everything.” Kate and Ryoki politely declined. “Well, if you change your mind, be my guest.” He smiled, his exceedingly white teeth gleaming under the flattering jewelry store lighting. “Most people are interested in these,” Browning said, strolling to a wall of antique weapons with the languid grace of a conquering prince. He showed off warlike native headdresses from Africa, America and China, and pulled a wicked-looking knife from its sheath, holding the blade to the light. “The first time I cleared six figures, I bought this to celebrate. These all came from formerly savage races,” he said with a wink and a broad smile. “But this here is the crown jewel of my collection. Late eighteenth century.” He slid back a pair of pocket doors and flipped on the light inside a large glass display case set into the wall, illuminating a splendidly preserved set of leather samurai armor with complete weaponry, the metal helmet gleaming over a grimacing black mask. Even unoccupied it looked haughty, brutal, ready to cut itself free of its gaijin prison. “This here’s safety glass,” Browning said, tapping the front with a knuckle as if teasing a caged monkey. “Nothing gets in and nothing gets out. Gotta keep it safe. My wife said I was crazy shipping it all the way down here, but I wanted it near me. Thought you might appreciate it.”

  Ordinarily Ryoki did not object to collectors owning bits of Japanese history, but somehow the moment had a sinister cast, which was either Kate’s irritation making him moody, or the precursor to a wicked headache. Either way, he didn’t appreciate the display and managed only a thin smile and a few noncommittal hmms and haws before being saved from utter perjury by the fortuitous entrance of Browning’s assistant Ms. Blatislav, a Brazilian native of Russian descent. Smiling and fluttering like a tardy hostess, she walked over to stand beside Browning, who impatiently shook off the proprietary hand she placed on his arm. Definitely sleeping with her, Ryoki thought.

  “They’re ready for you,” Ms. Blatislav said, gesturing to the door. Browning grinned broadly at Kate.

  “You ready to keep track of everything?” Kate busied herself checking her bag for a notepad and pen, and he turned to Ryoki. “How does your girl here feel about touring the factories in those high heels? Some of the catwalks can be tricky, especially if you’re on stilts.” Ryoki watched Browning’s gaze sweep down from Kate’s face to look—no, leer at her legs. Ryoki shook his head in annoyance. Kate had put an idea in his head and it was distorting everything he saw. Browning was looking at her shoes. They were a poor choice, Ryoki thought; she should have been more sensible. Kate bared her teeth in a frosty smile and headed out the door.

  She took assiduous notes as they toured two factories and listened to Browning’s booming voice as he strode among the workers, his darting eyes picking up the tiniest details, clapping the occasional foreman on the back, throwing out orders with the natural command of a king. By afternoon, Ryoki remembered clearly why they’d hired him, why he’d garnered the big salary. By the end, he had begun to compare him to his grandfather in his prime, the bullnecked sovereign of his domain. But in the car on the way back to Browning’s office, the heirloom armor ghosted into his mind, tasting like bile in his throat. With some effort he dismissed the impression as irrational and, in some immeasurable way, all Kate’s doing.

  Before returning to the airport they regrouped in Browning’s office where they were joined by Ms. Blatislav, who offered them drinks and escorted them to a leather furniture grouping that Browning t
old them had once belonged to Lord somebody or other, Grosvenor Square, London. As he spoke he dropped into a large gilt-studded square armchair at the head of the formation. Ms. Blatislav offered Kate and Ryoki the low sofa before seating herself in a spindly round-backed armchair next to her boss. As they were exchanging final pleasantries, Ryoki noticed a large glass shadow box hanging on the far wall, lit from within and divided into many small cells that each held some oddly shaped white object with a jewel-colored center. He got up to get a closer look, wondering what manner of weapon this could be.

  “Glass eyes,” Browning said with a kind a roaring laugh. “Been collecting eyes since my grandmother left me hers in her will, with an admonition to look up close for beauty and a lot of other old lady rot. Her glass peeper had fascinated me since I was a kid, and now I’ve collected them from the 1850s through 2000. I hadn’t planned on bringing this case down here. Didn’t think eyes went with the décor. But my wife shipped it down, said I needed watching, one of her little jokes.” Ryoki chuckled politely and Browning guffawed. As Ryoki returned to his seat he noticed Kate’s skirt had ridden up an inch above her knee. “Your girl there did just fine in those shoes,” Browning said, his eyes riveted on that top inch like a Victorian man salivating at the glimpse of an ankle. Kate did not appear to have noticed, but she tugged her hem and set to rifling through her papers. Ms. Blatislav cleared her throat and crossed her legs, her short skirt riding halfway up her thighs, but Browning took no notice. “Yes sir, she did just fine.” His eyes flicked from Kate to Ryoki and suddenly Ryoki knew Browning assumed he was sleeping with Kate.