“It’s just that I-”

“Lord, it means nothing.”

“Yes, Kondo-san.”

They sat in the living room of the mansion next to Kiyosumi Gardens. It was nearly midnight. Kondo had spent the day going over his preparations. He had his own trained men; he had his kobun Nii, his most trusted fellow, virtually connected by tether to the child; he had forty toughened soldiers from Boss Otani, ready to die for him. No, they weren’t the best and they preferred to fight with Kalashnikov and Makarov than katana and wakizashi, but they would still rather die than yield, and would kill at the drop of a hand. And, if necessary, he had plenty of Kalashnikovs and Makarovs.

Still, the Shogun was nervous, Kondo could tell. He sat there, licking his lips, his face glowing in the light of the fire, swallowing, twitching occasionally, trying to control his nerves. He wasn’t so brilliant at this kind of thing. The Shogun didn’t even need to be there, but he had insisted. Still, regret seemed to cloud his thought.

“I just wish all this hadn’t happened,” he said petulantly. “We are running out of time.”

Pornographer! thought Kondo. There was no point in explaining to him that what happens is what happens. Feelings about what is past are silly; they contribute nothing; one must only look at the now.

“Lord, I have made all the arrangements. The koshirae will be completed in record time. The hard part was the polishing. Getting that done-and I understand the old man did a superb job, maybe his best-was the key. You will have the sword in plenty of time to announce it, to enjoy the prestige and attention, to empower your plans. All the things you desire will be delivered to you, exactly as planned. This unforeseen business-a trouble, I admit-is unfortunate, but we have it under control.”

“The stroke of the child. It was brilliant. We went from losers to winners in that single instant.”

“Strategy is very important.”

“You are a genius, Kondo-san. You will be well rewarded.”

“My service is my reward. But I’ll still take that four million dollars. Tomorrow at this time I will have both my fortune and my opponent’s head. I think I’ll take a nice vacation.”

“Try Los Angeles. I’ll give you some numbers. Fuck some blond white women. Very enjoyable. Once you do, you’ll see why only certain Japanese should be allowed that pleasure. It would corrupt the general public and soon the concept of ‘Japanese’ would be gone! We must protect the sexual powers of our men, the submission of our women, and the purity of our-”

You had to stop him or he’d go on for hours and Kondo wanted a little sleep. “I look forward to it,” he said.

Miwa went to pour himself another Scotch. He watched the amber fluid splash across the ice cubes. Then he raised his eyes and peered out the window, where the many spotlights created an intense and impenetrable zone of illumination.

“Kondo-san,” he said, “look! It’s snowing.”

41

An observer could be forgiven for thinking that indeed a kendo club had commandeered the banquet hall of the Kasaibashi Hotel on Kasaibashi Road a block from Kiyosumi Gardens in East Tokyo. The young men were husky, handsome, quiet, athletic, graceful, and all carried kendo bags, long enough to accommodate shinai, the bamboo sword of the sport. Other bagged gear surely contained the armor kendoists wore, and the appearance of medical technicians merely confirmed the impression, as kendo can be a rough encounter, leaving abrasions, bruises, sometimes even cuts. Their coaches, a few years older, were also husky, handsome, quiet, athletic, and graceful. All wore black jumpsuits under sweatshirts, all carried black watch caps wedged into their belts, all spoke only to friends if at all. So many young men-but they had to be a team because there was no joshing, no horsing around, no shoving or needling. Certainly, a big match loomed ahead.

The observer would have wondered about the gaijin who seemed to be some kind of consultant to them, for he enjoyed the confidence of the older fellows and soon took over the pep talk from the head coach. But what to make of the slim, beautiful woman in glasses, who also seemed to enjoy everyone’s confidence? Was she a kendoist? She was wearing blue jeans, New Balance sport shoes, and a black turtleneck, almost a kendoist’s outfit. And yet again, what of the final touch, the four Korean men, much squarer in face and blockier in build than their Japanese counterparts, who spoke to no one and hovered close to the woman? All in all, it was a very strange gathering.

But of course there was no observer. The Kasaibashi was a two-star business joint well away from tourist areas. At midnight, when this strange confab began arriving in ones or twos, checking in with a fellow who looked as much like a sergeant as a coach, only a single employee was on duty at the hotel, a night clerk who doubled as a telephone operator. He was earnestly advised to mind his own business by someone whose seriousness of purpose impressed him. And his switchboard was quietly disconnected from the outside. All this was done with utmost politeness but, at the same time, utmost sincerity.

In the big room, the men eventually assembled before a blackboard, each silent, each ready, until at 3 a.m., the meeting commenced, the head coach welcoming them, promising them that this would be their night, the night they had so long awaited, the night when their team would triumph. The men seemed, like all men in preathletic stress, tight and nervous and hungry at once.

Finally the gaijin stood in front of the men. Hmmm, what would a gaijin know about kendo? But this one held their attention, even if he didn’t seem to be talking about kendo.

“Last-minute check,” he said, speaking in an English that more than half understood, but which was translated by the woman with great technical fluency in near real time. “Medics, there are medics here, Major Fujikawa?”

The major nodded, as three men raised their hands.

“You’ve all got O-neg, plenty of needle and thread, plenty of QuiKlot, plenty of clamps and transfusion equipment? Wounds tonight will be cuts. You medics, I hope you’ve been practicing clamping and sewing, that’s what it’ll be all about.”

The appropriate men nodded.

“Okada-san,” he said.

The woman handed out Xerox sheets.

She said in Japanese, “That’s the latest satellite photo of the target, taken approximately six hours ago. Don’t ask who took it or how I got it. You can see the layout of the building, the layout of the walls. We have ID’d approximately fifty men on site. They seem to be quartered in the basement, because they go in and out of one lower-story side door. They were all inside as of nineteen hundred hours. The front gate is locked. You can also see that we’ve indicated by marker your approach to the target. It’s no more than half a mile from here.”

“Let me run through this one more time,” said the gaijin. “You’ve been briefed, but let’s take it by the steps.”

He ran through it again: how in small groups the men would infiltrate Kiyosumi Gardens, come out at the far end, and gather in two groups on the north and south sides of the wall around the Miwa mansion. The four snipers would take up positions on the walls. At that point Susan and Bob would approach in her RX-8, park next to the west wall midway between the two teams. The signal was a loud blast from the horn, and then the men would proceed over the walls.

“Captain Tanada takes the rear team over the south wall. Major Fujikawa will go over from the left of the gate, the north wall. I don’t want to breach the gate because I don’t want to use explosives, and if there are sentries inside with firearms, their first instinct will be to zero in on the gate. As they look at the gate, the snipers should find them in the windows and take them out. Okada-san and I will go over from our position on the east wall.