Authors: John P. Marquand

Mr. Moto Is So Sorry (27 page)

“What's he saying?” Miss Dillaway asked. “Who's going to die?”

“I'll tell you later,” said Calvin. “I'm tired of trying to be a hero, Dillaway. I couldn't compete with Mr. Moto even if I wanted.”

“Thank you,” said Mr. Moto, “so very, very much, but this is simply a business matter. So very sorry that Miss Dillaway should be disturbed by it. We all here know that it is a simple business matter. We have all witnessed similar occurrences, though perhaps not so interesting. Mr. Holtz, have you a cigarette please?”

Mr. Holtz grunted and handed him a box from the table and lighted the match himself.

“Yes, my friend,” he said, “you are very cool. I would not be if I were in your place. Perhaps I am in better touch with Russia.”

“Yes,” said Mr. Moto, “perhaps. You are so very sensible, Mr. Holtz. Thank you very much.”

“Holtz,” called Captain Hamby, “come back here, Holtz, they're calling.”

Mr. Moto flipped the ash from his cigarette. “That is very fast,” he said. “I did not think that it would be so fast.”

The Prince leaned forward in his chair and looked at Mr. Moto.

“I know so well what you are thinking, my dear Prince,” Mr. Moto said. “It must be so very difficult for you. I know what you are thinking. It is not very nice for me, to have that answer come so fast. It indicates that they must have been waiting, and that everything has been arranged. No, it is not very nice. I am so very glad that you have arranged suitably for yourself, Mr. Gates. I am sure that you may rely on General Shirov. I am so sorry that Miss Dillaway should be disturbed.”

Mr. Moto wrote a line on the paper on his knee and folded it.

“Mr. Gates,” he said, “may I ask a favor please? I am so very afraid that things are going badly. I hope so much that you will leave China promptly. When you are in Tokyo would you call on the gentleman at this address? He is a very distinguished gentleman and he is so very nice. It may be that he will introduce you to an even more distinguished gentleman. Will you simply tell him please that I arranged the matter in spite of difficulty? He will understand so clearly what I mean. Tell him that I have been so happy to have been of service.”

Calvin took the paper.

“I don't see what you mean,” he said, and Mr. Moto drew in his breath politely.

“I am so afraid that you will see in just a minute,” Mr. Moto said. “It is not nice that their reply should come so quickly. I am so afraid that it means that they are grasping the opportunity. The plan was to give every possibility to the Russian command. They have it and I am so afraid that they are taking it. It was what we wished to know, whether or not they would act. I am so afraid that they are acting now.”

There was a stir at the far end of the room and Mr. Moto started and turned his head. Calvin saw Captain Hamby standing tense and motionless, staring through the half-open door of the room where the wireless instrument was kept. And then there was the sound of a shot. Captain Hamby shrugged his shoulders and turned upon his heel.

“Smile boys,” Captain Hamby was humming. “Smile boys, that's the style. Banzai for Japan!”

Mr. Moto had started up from his chair and Calvin Gates had put his arm around Miss Dillaway's shoulder. The sound of the shot had made him feel sick and weak, but he did not want her to know it. He held her close to him and whispered to her quickly.

“It's going to be all right, Dillaway,” he whispered. “Don't let it bother you, Dillaway.”

“I'm not,” she answered him faintly, “I'm not bothered at all.”

Mr. Holtz walked out of his wireless room, mopping his face, and the damp, heavy folds of his cheeks looked pale, like a moon in a cloudy sky.

“Shirov, he has shot himself,” he said.

“Yes?” said Mr. Moto sharply, “yes?”

Mr. Holtz pursed his lips and thrust his handkerchief into his trousers' pocket.

“Those Russians,” said Mr. Holtz. “I am finished with those Russians. There is always trouble up there, always difficulty. The GPU have arrested Shirov's chief and two generals, and what orders do we get?
There must be no incident to provoke Japan
. They will just stand and do nothing!”

Mr. Moto placed his hand elegantly before his lips.

“So interesting,” he said, “so very, very interesting. I must have possession of the message if you please. It will mean so much. So sorry that Comrade Shirov should have been obliged to shoot himself, although it was so necessary. He was such a dangerous man, but he was very nice. He always tried so hard.”

Mr. Moto paused and rubbed his hands together briskly.

“Everybody tries so hard, but ideas are so very, very different. I try so hard, and Mr. Holtz, he tries so hard, and so did poor Major Ahara. He tried so hard to have me eliminated several times. So very nice that everything is settled.”

Mr. Moto turned about briskly and clasped his hands and bowed to the Prince.

“We shall be so glad to draw an agreement, my dear Prince,” he said, “paying you for permission for our troops to assist you in defending your territory. It will be so nice to co-operate with you, my dear Prince.”

“I hope,” said Mr. Holtz heavily, “that I may have a trade agreement.”

Mr. Moto smiled genially at Mr. Holtz.

“Our trade commission will be so glad to co-operate,” Mr. Moto said. “You will be so glad to agree to handle only Japanese products, I think. All that Japan wants of anyone, of China or anyone, is economic co-operation and a cordial understanding.”

Captain Hamby grinned and his hard gray eyes twinkled.

“My word,” said Captain Hamby, “that's all that anyone wants, just a cordial understanding.”

Mr. Moto looked at Captain Hamby unsmilingly.

“One moment please,” he said. “May I say one word to the Prince in private, just one little word?”

Mr. Moto walked to where the Prince was sitting and whispered in his ear, and the Prince blinked his narrow eyes, and touched the shoulder of the man beside him, and said something in a gentle undertone.

“Well,” said Captain Hamby, “what's the secret? My word, we're all friends aren't we?”

“So nice,” said Mr. Moto, “that we are all friends.”

“Here,” cried Captain Hamby, “what's all this?”

The two guards who were standing behind the Prince's chair had moved before he spoke and were pointing their rifles at him. There was a hoarse, monosyllabic order and two more guards leveled their rifles. Captain Hamby's hand moved toward his pocket, but he must have thought better of it, for he finally stood stock-still.

“Not here,” said Mr. Moto, “it is so disturbing to the lady. Would you be kind enough to lead Captain Hamby outside please. So sorry, Captain Hamby, that you should have killed an officer of the Japanese army. Major Ahara was so very nice. Please do not be alarmed, Miss Dillaway. If you will show the lady a chair, Mr. Gates, do you not think it would be very nice if we had a cup of tea? The Prince will be so glad to join us I think, and Mr. Holtz will be so glad to get it. I am somewhat exhausted, please, but everything is so very nice.”

About the Author

John P. Marquand (1893â1960) was a Pulitzer Prizeâwinning author, proclaimed “the most successful novelist in the United States” by
Life
magazine in 1944. A descendant of governors of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, shipping magnates Daniel Marquand and Samuel Curzon, and famed nineteenth-century writer Margaret Fuller, Marquand always had one foot inside the blue-blooded New England establishment, the focus of his social satire. But he grew up on the outside, sent to live with maiden aunts in Newburyport, Massachusetts, the setting of many of his novels, after his father lost the once-considerable family fortune in the crash of 1907. From this dual perspective, Marquand crafted stories and novels that were applauded for their keen observation of cultural detail and social mores.

By the 1930s, Marquand was a regular contributor to the
Saturday Evening Post
, where he debuted the character of Mr. Moto, a Japanese secret agent.
No Hero
, the first in a series of bestselling spy novels featuring Mr. Moto, was published in 1935. Three years later, Marquand won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction for
The Late George Apley
, a subtle lampoon of Boston's upper classes. The novels that followed, including
H.M. Pulham, Esquire
(1941),
So Little Time
(1943),
B.F.'s Daughter
(1946),
Point of No Return
(1949),
Melvin Goodwin, USA
(1952),
Sincerely, Willis Wayde
(1955), and
Women and Thomas Harrow
(1959), cemented his reputation as the preeminent chronicler of contemporary New England society and one of America's finest writers.

All rights reserved, including without limitation the right to reproduce this ebook or any portion thereof in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Cover design by Andy Ross

ISBN: 978-1-5040-1636-0

This edition published in 2015 by Open Road Integrated Media, Inc.

345 Hudson Street

New York, NY 10014

www.openroadmedia.com