“What am I going to do with one pearl?”

“Do you want more? I can get more.”

Her eyes were so intense that Harry said, “No, one’s plenty.”

“Put it in your pocket.”

After he did so, she took his hand and slipped it under her dress and up her thigh, which was so skinny he felt the bone. She had no chest, no shape at all, but her eyes were so intense, so many blues and greens at one time, that Harry couldn’t take his hand away until a voice came over the water. “Abby? Abigail?” The man on the far bank was waving. She let Harry’s hand slide out and whispered, “I have to go.”

“Abby?” Harry said.

“Yes?” She swung her focus back to him.

“Double the money? Really?”

“Yes.”

“That’s great. Thanks.”

She stood, stepped on her cigarette and hesitated on the verge of something inexpressible.

“Hope your dad does okay,” Harry said.

She nodded. After she was gone, darting along the trees that fringed the river, her gaze still seemed to hover over Harry.

Harry lost the pearl almost immediately. He learned later that the church reprimanded Abby’s father but allowed him to remain. Harry heard the following year that Abby got pneumonia and died in Japan, just like her mother.

11

A GONDOLA SWUNG on a cable above the rooftop garden of the Matsuya department store. Sheathed in aluminum, streamlined and shining, the gondola looked like a spaceship from the future. The interior was more down-to-earth, with leather straps and wicker seats, but Harry and Alice Beechum had the craft to themselves and, from its porthole windows, a view of the Ginza’s wide avenues, willow trees, French cafés. The gondola floated eight stories above trolleys, noodle wagons, the buzz of motorcycles racing to different newspapers. Farther off were waves of blue roof tiles and the green ridge of the imperial palace; to the south, rising over charcoal smoke, the white cone of Fuji.

The rooftop garden offered the foot-weary shopper an amusement park high in the air. Spider monkeys flew from tree to tree within a huge wire mesh enclosure. Cages displayed macaws, peccaries, raccoons. Children pedaled cars around a track while their mothers contemplated bonsai gardens. The latest attraction was a tank of water fifty feet in diameter holding model warships of the Japanese and American navies. Boys gathered around naval cadets who manipulated radio controls that sent the two fleets around the tank, the Japanese chasing the American, the Rising Sun after the Stars and Stripes. Battleships the size of sharks led aircraft carriers, cruisers and destroyers, their screws churning up swells. Out of tinny loudspeakers poured a navy anthem: “Across the sea, a corpse floating in water / Across the mountains, a corpse in grass.” The Japanese ships began firing, each salvo of guns signaled by red lights in their barrels and black smoke spewing from the Americans in retreat.

Harry said, “You know, there’s hardly anything as satisfying as a rigged fight. An honest fight is just a brawl, a rigged fight is theater.”

“You always have the most individual opinions.” Alice sat back in her riding suit of green tweed, her head resting on the golden pillow of her hair. Maybe it was the English complexion that made tweed sensual, Harry thought. He couldn’t help but think of stiff woolen fibers pricking her delicate skin, her map of light freckles and the fine down on her arms and the nape of her neck. She was saying, “I did my best to blacken your reputation after you left the Imperial, but you have to stop your friend Willie from telling any more tales about Nanking.”

“He got carried away.”

“He’s going to get you killed with those stories. The Japanese have a different version of their victory in Nanking. Willie tells me that you’re also being stalked by a man with a sword, a Colonel Ishigami.”

“I can handle Ishigami.”

“Oh, well, then nothing to worry about. Do you remember the wonderful stage direction from Shakespeare, ‘Exit, pursued by a bear’? You seem to have any number of bears. So, tell me what happened. Quick, did you get on the plane?”

Harry grinned. From a furoshiki, he lifted out two glasses and a split of champagne that he’d picked up in the Matsuya food emporium.

“I didn’t just get on the plane. After this morning’s little talk, my friend from Nippon Air will personally tuck me into my seat.” He thumbed off the cork and caught the foam as it rose. Opening champagne in such close quarters was chancy, but for some occasions sake would not do. “I’m going to sit right next to you, Alice. We will wave good-bye to Tokyo together. I may even teach you poker on the way.”

“Harry, you’re the worst man I ever met.”

“Even I blush. Cheers,” Harry said as if laying down a winning hand. “Nippon Air to Hong Kong on Monday the eighth. BOAC out of Hong Kong to catch the Clipper in Manila, then Midway, Hawaii and California, in that order. Happy?”

“Ecstatic.”

“Sounds like smooth sailing to me.”

Alice shielded her eyes to watch a salesclerk down on the roof demonstrate a yo-yo. The yo-yo spun in place to Walk the Dog and snapped into orbit for Around the World. She asked, “What does Madame Butterfly think of you going?”

“Michiko? I’m telling her tonight. I have to give her a chance to make other arrangements. I’ll set her up financially.”

“Do you think that will make her happy?”

Harry thought that “happy” was not a word that really related to Michiko. “Happy” was fatuous, like a helium balloon. Michiko carried the threat of a larger pop. “I’ll explain things to her. I’ll say it’s time to go. I’ll wear armor plate.”

“That would probably be wise.” As the cable lurched, a thud came from within the furoshiki at Harry’s feet. “Did I speak too soon?”

Harry spread the cloth and lifted the lid of the cigar box so that Alice could see the pistol inside.

“That’s lovely. Harry, you’re aware that it’s illegal to own a handgun?”

“I got stuck with it. It’s an army pistol. A Baby Nambu.”

“Why would a soldier leave his gun with you?”

“It was a setup, he had his own.”

“If it was a setup, he’ll tell the police. Leave the gun with me. I have some degree of immunity, and once I get home, I’ll throw it in with Beechum’s collection. He has elephant guns, African spears, the lot.”

“No, but I’d appreciate it if you took the box.” He tucked the pistol into the back of his belt and tried to settle in his seat.

“Comfortable?” Alice asked.

“Been more.”

“What are you going to do with it? This is not Chicago, people don’t carry guns. You’re not thinking of using it on Ishigami, are you?”

“A foreigner shoot a war hero? That would be an interesting form of suicide.” He spied a soldier and a girl sharing cotton candy. Public displays of affection were frowned on, but exceptions were made for boys who were shipping out. “You know, this rooftop used to be the place for suicides. You should have been here. Lovers lined up to hold hands and jump two at a time. It caused some anxiety about shopping in the neighborhood. You came for a cute chapeau and ended up planted in the sidewalk by a pair of star-crossed lovers. The silver lining is, since the war, suicides are down.”

“Has Michiko ever suggested a double jump?”

“Well, she’s romantic that way.”

“Wasn’t there an American reporter last year who died after he fell from the first story of a police station? The police said he jumped.”

“He probably didn’t have many options.”

“Whereas you only have to hide a gun from police who are already following you.”

“I’ll get rid of it, don’t worry.” A gondola swung by in the opposite direction. Two little girls in red kimonos bowed from the passing car while Alice studied Harry as if from a distance rather than knee-to-knee.