12
The name, eerily evocative, made Savage tingle. He strained to remember when he'd heard it before-and suddenly recalled that Akira had mentioned it on the way to Dulles Airport while he tried to teach Savage and Rachel about Japan prior to flying here.
“Amaterasu.” Savage nodded. “Yes, the goddess of the sun. The ancestress of every emperor. The ultimate mother of every Japanese from the beginning of time.”
Taro cocked his ancient head; he clearly hadn't expected Savage to recognize the name. “Few gaijin would… I compliment you on your knowledge of our culture.”
“The credit belongs to Akira. He's as excellent a teacher as he was your student… Amaterasu? What about her?”
The old man spoke with reverence. “She symbolizes the greatness of Japan, our purity and dignity before our glorious ways were contaminated. Kunio Shirai has chosen her as the image of his purpose, the source of his inspiration. In public, he calls his movement the Traditional Japanese Party. In private, however, he and his staunchest followers refer to their group as the Force of Amaterasu.”
Savage straightened sharply. “What are we talking about? Imperialism? Is Shirai trying to recreate what happened in the nineteen thirties? A mix of religion, patriotism, and might to justify trying to dominate the Pacific Rim and…?”
“No,” Taro said. “The opposite. He wants Japan to become secluded.”
The statement was so astonishing that Savage leaned forward, trying to repress the force in his voice. “That goes against everything that…”
“ Japan has accomplished since the end of the American occupation.” Taro gestured in agreement. “The economic miracle. Japan has become the most financially powerful nation on earth. What it failed to do militarily in the thirties and forties, it achieved industrially in the seventies and eighties. It subdues other countries economically. We bombed Hawaii in nineteen forty-one but failed to capture it. Now we're buying it. And huge chunks of mainland America and other nations as well. But at a cost beyond money, a terrible penalty, the increasing destruction of our culture.”
“I still don't…” Savage squeezed his thighs, frustrated. “What does Shirai want?”
“I mentioned that his ancestors date back to sixteen hundred, the beginning of the Tokugawa Shogunate. Did Akira explain what happened then?” Taro asked.
“Only briefly. There was too much to know, too little time for him to… You tell me.”
“I hope you appreciate the value of history.”
“I was trained to believe it's imperative to learn from mistakes, if that's what you mean,” Savage said.
“Not only mistakes but successes.” Taro braced his shoulders. Despite his frail body, he seemed to grow in stature. His eyes again assumed a faraway gaze. “History… During the middle ages, Japan was inundated by foreign cultures. The Chinese, the Koreans, the Portuguese, the English, the Spanish, the Dutch. To be sure, not all of these influences were bad. The Chinese gave us Buddhism and Confucianism, for example, as well as a system of writing and an administrative system. On the negative side, the Portuguese introduced firearms, which quickly spread throughout Japan and almost destroyed bushido, the ancient noble Way of the warrior and the sword. The Spaniards introduced Christianity, which attempted to displace the gods, to deny that Japanese were divinely descended from Amaterasu.
“In sixteen hundred, Tokugawa Iyeyasu defeated various Japanese warlords and gained control of Japan. He and his descendants returned Japan to the Japanese. One by one, he banned foreigners. The English, the Spanish, the Portuguese… all were expelled. The only exception was a small Dutch trading post on a southwestern island near Nagasaki. Christianity was exterminated. Travel to foreign countries was forbidden. Ships capable of reaching the Asian mainland were destroyed. Only small fishing boats, their designs restricting them to hugging the coast, were allowed to be built. And the consequence?” Taro smiled. “For more than two hundred years, Japan was shut off from the rest of the world. We experienced-enjoyed-continuous peace and the greatest blossoming of Japanese culture. Paradise.”
At once the old man's face darkened. “But all of that ended in eighteen fifty-three when your countryman, Commodore Perry, anchored his squadron of American warships in Yokohama Bay. They are still known by their bleak prophetic color. Perry's black ships. He demanded that Japan reopen its borders to foreign trade. Soon the Shogunate fell. The emperor, formerly kept in seclusion in Kyoto, was moved to Edo, which soon changed its name to Tokyo, where the emperor became the figurehead ruler for politicians eager to exercise power. It's called the Meiji Restoration. I believe in the emperor, but because of that restoration, the gaijin contamination resumed… increased… worsened.”
Taro paused, assessing the effect on his audience.
Rachel breathed. “And Kunio Shirai wants to return Japan to the quarantine established in the Tokugawa Shogunate?”
“It's easy to understand his intention,” Taro replied. “As a tribe, we no longer abide by the ancient ways. Our young people disrespect their elders and treat tradition with irreverence. Abominations surround us. Western clothes. Western music. Western food. Hamburgers. Fried chicken. Heavy metal.” Taro pursed his lips in disgust. “Eventually Japan, like a sponge, will absorb the worst of other cultures, and money-not Amaterasu-will be our only god.”
“You sound like you agree with Shirai,” Savage said.
“With his motive, not his method. This building, the four years of isolation that each of my students submits to… they are my version of the Tokugawa quarantine. I despise what I see outside these walls.”
“You've joined him?”
Taro squinted. “As a samurai, a protector, I must be objective. I follow events. I don't create them. My destiny is to be distant, to serve present masters without involvement -and without judgment. The Tokugawa Shogunate insisted on that relationship between retainer and principal. But I hope he succeeds. He probably won't, however. The thrust of history moves stronger forward than backward. Shirai can use his wealth, his influence and power, to bribe, to coerce, and entice multitudes of demonstrators. But on television, I've seen the faces, the eyes, of those demonstrators. They're not devoted to the glory of their past. They're consumed by hate for outsiders in the present, for those who don't belong to the tribe. Make no mistake. Pride controls them. Longrepressed anger. Because America won the Pacific War. Because atomic bombs were dropped on our cities.”
Chilled, Savage noticed that Akira's eyes had become more melancholy. In despair, with compassion, Savage recalled that Akira's father had lost his first wife… and his parents… and his brothers and sisters… because of the A-bomb that hit Hiroshima. And the father's second wife, Akira's mother, had died from cancer caused by radiation from the blast.
Taro's brittle voice rasped. “Make no error. Whenever you speak to a Japanese, no matter his reserve and feigned politeness, he remembers the bombs called Fat Man and Little Boy. And this long-repressed rage is the power behind the multitudes Shirai has gathered. He wants retreat, a return to the glorious sacred past. But they want a too-long-postponed attack, to the land-of-gods destiny. Domination.”
“It'll never happen,” Savage said flatly.
“Not under present circumstances. Greed insists, and if Shirai misjudges, the multitudes he incites will outreach his control. Land, possessions, money. That's what they want. Not peace and balance. Not harmony. Shirai was right to protest America 's presence in Japan. Away with you! All of you! But in the vacuum of your absence, the Force of Amaterasu could become not a blessing but a curse.”