Thick brown fingers coiled around my wrist. Hashita was no longer in front of me and no longer facing me. He was under my arm, with his back turned toward me. My arm was over his shoulder. He jerked my right wrist down. His shoulder smacked under my armpit. I felt my feet leave the floor. The bright lights in their tin cradle and the canvas mat reversed position. I seemed to hang suspended in the air for several seconds, then the padded canvas rushed up to meet me.
The jar made me sick.
I tried to get up, but couldn’t make my muscles respond. There was a quivering in my stomach. Hashita leaned over, caught my wrist and elbow, and lifted me to my feet so quickly it seemed I’d bounced up off the canvas. His teeth were now flashing in a wide grin. The gun lay behind him.
“Very simple,” Hashita said.
Bertha Cool’s diamonds flashed back and forth, up and down, as her hands moved in applause.
Hashita took my shoulders and pushed me back, raised my right arm. “Hold very steady please. I show you.”
He laughed — the nervous, mirthless laugh of a Japanese. I seemed to be standing still in the center of a room which was swaying back and forth on a huge pendulum.
Hashita said, “Now watch closely please.”
He moved slowly, but with such perfect rhythm there was no jerk to his motions. It was exactly as though I’d been watching his image projected on the screen in a slow-motion-picture shot. His left knee bent. His weight slid forward and on his left hip. As he dipped, he turned. His right hand moved forward. The fingers slowly clamped about my wrist. He twisted the ball of his left foot on the canvas. His left shoulder started coming up under my right armpit. The tension of his fingers increased. My right arm was twisted so I couldn’t bend the elbow. He exerted pressure, making a lever out of my own arm. The fulcrum rested on his shoulder, back under my armpit. He tightened the pressure until I could feel pain, and then feel my feet lifting from the canvas.
He relaxed his grip, turned smoothly back into position, and stood smiling! “Now,” he said, “ you try. Slowly at first please.”