Chapter 2 - The Cipher of the Mulberry Paper
The silence inside the corner booth stretched so thin that Samantha could hear the rain drumming against the restaurant’s stained glass.
August Blackwood didn't move for an entire minute, his mind clearly sorting through memories that were four years cold.
His gaze shifted from his tattooed arm back to Samantha’s face, searching for any trace of deceit or nervousness.
He found none, only the quiet resolve of a woman who knew her subject better than the scholars at the local museum.
Across the dining room, Arthur Miller finally gathered enough courage to approach the table with a stiff, furious posture.
“Excuse me, Mr. Blackwood,” Arthur stammered, pulling a gold pen from his vest.
“I must apologize for this server’s shocking lack of decorum.”
“She will be removed from the floor immediately, and your meal is entirely on the house tonight.”
August didn't even turn his head to look at the manager.
“Miller,” August said, his voice flat and deadly as winter ice.
“Take three steps back before you lose the ability to speak permanently.”
Arthur stopped dead in his tracks, the color draining from his face until he resembled a ghost in a tuxedo.
August pulled a thick clip of hundred-dollar bills from his inner coat pocket and threw it casually onto the white cloth.
“This covers the table, the bourbon, and Samantha’s wages for the next six months,” August declared without blinking.
“If she doesn't have her personal belongings in her bag within three minutes, I will buy this restaurant tomorrow and burn it to the ground.”
Arthur bowed three times in rapid succession, trembling as he retreated toward the kitchen without another word.
Samantha sat frozen, her fingers gripping the edge of the leather cushion beneath her.
“You didn't have to do that, Mr. Blackwood,” she said quietly.
“I needed that job to keep the bills paid.”
“You don't work for Miller anymore,” August said, standing up and buttoning his charcoal suit jacket with casual authority.
“You work for me until we finish reading what my wife wrote on my skin.”
“I am a waitress, not a private investigator,” Samantha replied, standing as well to maintain her dignity.
“You are the only person in this city who looked at this ink and saw something other than a tragic love story,” he countered.
“Get your coat, Samantha.”
“We are going to my office, and you are going to look at the original document.”
Five minutes later, Samantha was sitting in the back of a black, armored Mercedes that glided through the rain-soaked streets of downtown St. Louis.
A silent, burly man named Marco drove the car, his eyes scanning the side mirrors with military vigilance.
August sat beside Samantha, opening a small, fireproof leather briefcase that rested on the floor between his polished shoes.
From the interior pocket, he retrieved a weathered brass locket wrapped in dark velvet.
Inside the locket was not a photograph, but a folded scrap of paper yellowed with age and preserved in thin plastic.
“This is the slip Christine handed to the tattoo artist in Osaka two weeks before we boarded the yacht back to the States,” August said.
He handed the plastic sleeve to Samantha, his large hands unusually careful as he released it.
Samantha held the sleeve up toward the soft interior reading light of the limousine.
The paper was extraordinary, textured with delicate, uneven edges and fibrous strands that caught the light.
“This isn't ordinary paper,” Samantha noted immediately, feeling the slight weight through the thin plastic.
“It’s handmade Kozo mulberry paper, crafted in the traditional Echizen style.”
“My grandmother keeps two sheets of this exact paper in her cedar chest at home, reserved only for formal legal wills.”
August leaned in closer, his broad shoulder brushing against her coat as he focused on the paper.
“Look at the brushstrokes,” Samantha instructed, pointing to the dark sumi ink that had dried years ago.
“The tattoo artist didn't make a mistake; he followed the original template with photographic precision.”
“Your wife intentionally wrote the radical for boiled meat instead of eternity.”
August’s jaw clenched so hard that a vein pulsed along his temple.
“Why would she do that?” he demanded, his voice trembling with a mixture of grief and simmering rage.
“She loved me.”
“I spent five years tearing down my enemies so she could live in peace in our house on the bluff.”
“She didn't write this to mock you, Mr. Blackwood,” Samantha said softly, turning the plastic sleeve under the light.
“Look at the corners of the characters.”
“See those microscopic hooks at the termination of the vertical strokes?”
August squinted, his breath catching in his throat as he noticed the deliberate, needle-sharp tails on the ink.
“Those are calligraphic markers used in old merchant families to encode numbers,” Samantha explained.
“My grandmother taught me how secret societies in the Kansai region communicated without their rivals understanding the ledgers.”
“This isn't a phrase.”
“This is an alphanumeric coordinate disguised as a vulgar joke.”
August reached into his pocket and pulled out a gold lighter, his hands shaking slightly before he caught himself.
“She knew that if she wrote an obvious code, the people watching her would confiscate the paper,” he muttered.
“Who was watching her, Mr. Blackwood?” Samantha asked, looking directly into his stormy eyes.
August looked out the window as the car crossed the Eads Bridge, the dark waters of the Mississippi churning beneath the iron pillars.
“At the time, I thought we were surrounded by friends,” August whispered, his voice turning bitterly cold.
“My lieutenant, Julian Crane, organized that entire trip to Japan.”
“Julian booked the hotels, hired the local guides, and introduced us to the tattoo master who inked my arm.”
“And two weeks after we returned, Christine’s car went over the bridge into the river during a sudden electrical storm.”
Samantha felt a cold shiver run down her spine as the puzzle pieces began to align into a terrifying silhouette.
“Did they find her body?” Samantha asked quietly.
“They found the car burned to the frame three miles downstream,” August answered, his voice devoid of all warmth.
“Julian’s coroner identified her by her dental records and the silver ring I gave her on our wedding day.”
“I buried her in the family mausoleum at Bellefontaine Cemetery four years ago.”
Samantha looked down at the mulberry paper again, her sharp eyes catching a watermark embedded in the fibrous pulp.
She angled the plastic toward the car’s dome lamp, and her breath caught entirely in her throat.
In the center of the paper, pressed into the dried mulberry fibers, was an embossed seal of a three-leaf pine branch.
It was not a commercial maker’s mark.
It was the personal family crest of the Tanaka clan—her grandmother’s family crest.
Samantha’s fingers began to tremble, nearly dropping the plastic sleeve onto her lap.
“Where did Christine get this paper, Mr. Blackwood?” she asked, her voice barely a whisper.
August looked at her, noticing the sudden drain of color from her cheeks.
“She brought a small wooden box of that stationery from an estate sale in Chicago before we were married,” he said.
“She guarded that box like it was made of solid diamond.”
“Why? Do you recognize that watermark?”
Samantha looked up from the paper, staring at the mob boss who held half the city in his iron grip.
“That is my family’s private seal,” Samantha said, her voice shaking with disbelief.
“Only three women in North America possessed that paper four years ago.”
“My mother, who passed away when I was twelve.”
“My grandmother, who is currently lying in a nursing home on Lindell Boulevard.”
“And my aunt Sayuri, who disappeared from our family fifteen years ago and was presumed dead.”
August Blackwood stared at her, the interior of the armored car suddenly feeling like the center of an earthquake.
May you like
“Christine was not an orphan from Chicago,” August whispered, the realization hitting him like a physical blow.
“Christine was your aunt.”
