Read Linnear 02 - The Miko for Free Online Page B

insensitively ignoring civilized courtesies, then the next, show an inordinate amount of insight and caring. “I’ll do what I can as soon as we get back,” he said.
    At length, Tomkin turned his head toward Nicholas, and when he spoke his voice had unaccountably softened.
    “Nicky,” he said, “are you going to marry my daughter?”
    Nicholas, half-dreaming, nevertheless heard the touch of desperation in the other man’s voice and wondered at it. “Yes,” he said immediately. “Of course. As soon as we get back to the States.”
    “You’ve discussed it with Justine?”
    He smiled. “You mean have I proposed? Yes.” He heard Tomkin exhale deeply and opened his eyes, looked at the other man. “We have your blessing?”
    Tomkin’s face darkened and he gave a harsh bark that Nicholas recognized as an anguished laugh. “Oh, yes, for all the good it might do you. But don’t tell Justine. Christ, she might decide not to marry you just to spite me.”
    “I think those days are over.”
    “Oh, you’re wrong about that. Nothing will ever be right between me and my daughters again. There’s too much bitterness on their part, too much resentment of the way they think I’ve interfered in their lives. Rightly or wrongly. I’m not even sure I know which now.”
    Time to break the mood, Nicholas thought, and he clambered slowly out of the tub. Tomkin followed, and they went through another door into a steam room. They sat on hexagonal tiles while the long vertical pipe coughed and belched pockets of water that ran down, gurgling into the drain. Then, with a great gout of sound, the steam began to shout from the open end of the pipe and talk became impossible.
    Precisely five minutes after they entered, a warning bell rang. They could no longer see one another though they sat fairly close together. Periodically, the pipe running along the tiled wall to their left screamed like a banshee, delivering forth a new cloud of steam which wrapped itself around their shoulders with a new wave of heat.
    Nicholas touched Tomkin on his beefy shoulder, and they went out through the second door set into the far wall.
    They were in a fairly large, dimly lighted room that smelled faintly of birch and mentholated camphor. Four long padded tables were aligned along the periphery of the room. Two tables were occupied by dark lumps that they soon could make out as bodies. A young woman stood by each table.
    “Gentlemen.” A male figure sat up on the table to their right. He bowed slightly. “I trust you are more relaxed than when you entered our doorway.”
    “Sato,” Tomkin said. “It took you” But feeling the pressure of Nicholas’ hand on his arm, he changed in midsentence. “This’s a helluva way to greet us. The Okura couldn’t’ve done as well.”
    “Oh, no, we cannot come up to that standard.” But Seiichi Sato nodded his head in acknowledgement of the compliment. “Linnear-san,” he said, turning slightly, “it is an honor to meet you at last. I have heard much about you.” He swung his legs around, lay back down. “Tell me, are you pleased to be back home?”
    “My home is now America, Sato-san,” Nicholas said carefully. “Much has changed in Japan since I left, but I trust there is more that has remained the same.”
    “You missed your calling, Linnear-san,” Sato said. “You should have been a politician.”
    Nicholas wondered who was lying on the table against the far wall.
    “Lie down, please, gentlemen,” Sato said. “You have not yet completed your course in relaxation.”
    They did as he bade, and immediately two more young women emerged from the semidarkness. Nicholas felt the splash and roll of oil, then skilled hands kneading his muscles.
    “Perhaps you are already wondering why these girls are not Japanese, Linnear-san? J3o not think I am not nationalistic. However, I am a realist as well. These girls are from Taiwan.” He chuckled. “They’re blind, Linnear-san, could you tell that?