Captain Noonan, the “Bearded Holmes” of the Sandersonville Police Department, was deeply engrossed in a perplexing question of the capitalization rate of a four-plex that had a net annual income of $100,000 and a value of $1 million. According to the formula, the capitalization rate was 10%. This was not rocket science. Real Estate is only rocket science when it comes to passing the Real Estate test. Then it was all nuts-and-bolts.

            But there was a problem.

Two of them, in fact.

One was that the good detective’s wife was the individual taking the test, and second, she was having trouble understanding the arcane convolution of logic that went into the vocabulary of the biz. The problem, she said as she confronted her husband that morning with the question of Real Estate philosophy, was that the capitalization rate was like a rate of return. Logically, if you wanted a higher rate or return, you raised rents. Then the annual net income would go up, and the capitalization rate would go up, and this, by laws of supply, demand, greed, and the Real Estate formula would go up as well. With the first three of the four, this was true. Yet, according to the Real Estate text Noonan over which was pouring, a rise in the capitalization rate drove the value of the property down. Assuming that the annual income stayed the same. Which made no sense.

            He was still pondering the world of capitalization when Harriet, the Sandersonville Police Special Assistant, yelled that his wife was on line one. Noonan appreciated the fact that Harriet yelled. The two of them had started working for the Police Department at the dawn of time, before there were things like cell phones and intercoms. That is, before the Police Department agreed to pay for cell phones and intercoms. The rest of the country had been happily talking on cell phones for years before the Sandersonville Police Department decided it was time to plumb for hot water.

            So Noonan’s office was an old-fashioned one. People actually talked to one another. They didn’t send memos. The phone had four lines, and all the instruments were museum antiques, heavy plastic with rotary dials and lighted switches for the lines. All of the phones were black, save one. That was an imperial red indicative of power and prestige. That one sat on Harriet’s desk because she ran this office.

            Noonan punched in a button on the phone and said, “I’m working on it, dear. If the capitalization is the rate of return, the value of the property has to go up as the cap rate goes up but the formula doesn’t seem to work that way.”

            A strange female voice was on the line. “That’s because the capitalization rate is not the rate of return. It’s the cost of capital. It’s what you are paying for the money you borrowed to buy the property. The higher your interest rate on the loan, the lower the value of the property. If you could get a loan at one percent that was transferable, that property would have a very high value. The same four-plex with a 12% loan would be worth quite a bit less.”

            “Really?” Noonan looked at the mounds of yellow-lined paper around his desk. Suddenly, capitalization made sense. “That makes sense. How did you know that? Better yet, who are you?”

            “I am Harriet’s younger sister, Beatrice. I’m calling from Tokyo, where I have a bit of a problem. Harriet suggested I talk to you.”

            “Are you doing real estate in Tokyo?”

            “No, actually, I do real estate in Avon. I’m in Tokyo by accident, actually. I was on a tour of Australia when the weather forced us to land in Hong Kong.”

            “Hong Kong? I thought you said you were in Tokyo.”

            “I was in Hong Kong. Two days ago. I’m in Tokyo now. I got a good deal on a ticket that had a layover in Tokyo. I’ve never been to Japan, and I’m accidentally here now, so I’m taking advantage of a bad situation.”

            “Ah, an accidental occidental, eh?”

            “Harriet said you were card with trick words. Yes, you might say that. But the reason I’m calling is that I have a strange tale to tell.”

            “Everyone who calls my office does.”

            “Well, this is different. It involves a missing Geisha, two tong hit men that have been dead for a century, a forged scroll, and half a Samurai scabbard.”

            “Exactly my cup of tea, actually. Tell me more.”

            “One of the women I was traveling with is from Tokyo, the reason I decided to come to Tokyo after Hong Kong. She was on her way to the United States but decided to spend some time at home since she was accidentally in Tokyo.”

            “Ah!” Noonan said. “So we have an accidental oriental as well.”

            “Whatever,” there was a sense of restrained frustration in Beatrice’s voice. “She’s a Geisha historian, one of the best in the world. Her grandmother was a Geisha, a real Geisha, not one of these Suzy Wong wannabes. The grandmother was very well educated and historically-minded so she kept lots of notes and diaries and paperwork. So my friend, Ingrid, . . .”

            “Ingrid? She’s Japanese?”

            “Oh, yes. She is Japanese. But she changed her name to Ingrid to get her work published. If you are Japanese and use your real name to write a work of Japanese history that is not so, so . . .”

            “Refined,” Noonan cut in. “Or traditional.”

            “Right. If you write history of nontraditional subjects it brings shame on your family. So she changed her name. When her mother dies, she’ll change her name back.”

            “I see. Ingrid, I take it, has disappeared.”

            “How did you know that?”

            “If she hadn’t disappeared, you wouldn’t be calling me.”

            “Well, I don’t know if disappeared is the word for it. I received a ransom note. Sort of a ransom note, anyway. But it’s odd.”

            “Let me guess. The note is signed by two tong hit men from the last century.”

            “That’s right. But I surmise you guessed that from my conversation.”

            “Right. And they want the scroll that’s been put somewhere by Ingrid. You don’t know where the scroll is, and even if you did know where it was, you don’t read Japanese, so you wouldn’t know if you had the right scroll anyway.”

            “You’ve been reading my mail!”

            “Where does the Samurai scabbard fit in?”

            “I searched the apartment for some kind of document and found a piece of paper with Japanese lettering – I guess that’s what it’s called – in the scabbard. It appears to be very old, but who knows? I don’t want to create a problem for Ingrid if the paper turns out to be a laundry list of something like that. Anyway, it’s too recent to be what the kidnappers want.”

            “How do you know that?”

            “There’s a photograph of General MacArthur with his signature on the piece of paper. I can read the signature because it’s in English. What they want is a piece of paper a lot older. When I find what they want, I’m going to give it to them.”

            “Maybe what you have is what you want. Why not just turn it over to them and be done with it? Why are you calling me?”

            “Because,” said the voice on the other end of the line, “I’m being offered half a million dollars for that scrap of paper, and the man who wants it is an occidental from Peoria, and he didn’t say one word about Ingrid.”

* * *

            Noonan grinned. “OK. I’ll do what I can. But I need some more information. First, how do you know for certain that Ingrid has been kidnapped? Second, you said that the ransom note came from two tong members who have been dead for a century. How do you know that if you don’t read Japanese, and what connection do they have to Ingrid? Third, where did you actually find the paper, and how did your contact from Peoria know the paper was in your possession? Finally, even if the paper is genuine, how can you legally sell it?”

            “I can answer some of those questions. I don’t know that Ingrid has been kidnapped. She just disappeared. She’s been gone two days now, going on three. The note was written in English, and I recognize the names of the tong men from conversations with Ingrid. I actually found the paper in the handle of a samurai sword. Or what was left of a samurai sword. It looked like it had been blown apart, scabbard and sword were severed about six inches down from the handle. I assume that the note is genuine because of where I found it.”

            “How about the collector from Peoria?”

            “That’s the odd part. He just showed up. It’s not like he had an appointment or anything. He showed up at the door, Ingrid’s door actually. That’s where I’m staying. He said he knew what it was that we had and he’d pay half a million for it, no questions asked.”

            “Did he tell you what it was that he thought you had?”

            “Nope, not a word.”

            “And you don’t know if what you found is what the tongs want.”

            “That’s right. As you can see, it’s a real mess.”

            “Not really. It’s a lot more straightforward than what you think. Here’s what I think is happening. The paper that you have is worthless in terms of dollars. Ingrid – and that’s probably her real name, and I’ll bet she has nothing to do with studying geisha history – knows the document is worthless. She is using you to make a buck or two. She hasn’t been kidnapped; she’s in cahoots with the man who wants to pay the half million for paper.”

            “If she’s in league with the man with the money, why not just take the money and run, so to speak?”

            “Because the money they have is probably cash and hot. They have to convert it. What is probably happening here is that Ingrid has convinced some buyer that the paper you found is worth half a million dollars. How does she prove it? She has someone buy it for half a million dollars. She shows the bill of sale to the prospective buyer who checks out the sale. He finds that the money has indeed been transferred so he offers more, say $750,000. Ingrid then buys the document from the first seller. “

            “But he’s buying a fake document. He’s going to spot it right away.”

            “That’s the beauty of this little caper. Ingrid will say she’ll get his money back. Then she’ll switch $500,000 of the buyer’s dollars with the $500,000 she’s trying to launder. The second buyer gets his money back, so he’s happy. Ingrid gets to wash her $500,000, and she’s happy. Everyone will go their separate ways, and that second buyer will never know he’s been used to wash someone’s money. Then Ingrid will show up, thank you for helping her out in time of trouble, and you’ll leave Japan. That snaps all the threads back to the illegal transfer.”

            “So I’m being used?”

            “I’m afraid so.”

            “Is there anything I can do about it?”

            “My advice is to go to the airport and take the next flight out of Tokyo in whatever direction it is going.” Noonan smiled sardonically. “If you really want to upset the apple cart on your way out of town, leave a message for that buyer from Peoria and tell him you have received a competing offer for $600,000 and that you are on your way to Hokkaido to pick up the check. That should send him into a tizzy.”

            “It would be the least I could do for wonderful time Ingrid has given me here in Tokyo.”

            And with that comment, the line went dead.

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