Betty. There was no chance now that she would see the piece, that his original plan would come off. Wu was incompatible with sexuality; it was, as Paul said, solemn and holy, like a relic.

“I gave each of these individuals one of your cards,” Paul said.

“Pardon?” Childan said, preoccupied.

“Your business cards. So that they could come in and inspect other examples.”

“I see,” Childan said.

“There is one more thing,” Paul said. “One of these individuals wishes to discuss this entire subject with you at his location. I have written out his name and address.” Paul handed Childan a folded square of paper. “He wants his business colleagues to hear.” Paul added, “He is an importer. He imports and exports on a mass basis. Especially to South America. Radios, cameras, binoculars, tape recorders, the like.”

Childan gazed down at the paper.

“He deals, of course, in immense quantity.” Paul said. “Perhaps tens of thousands of each item. His company controls various enterprises that manufacture for him at low overhead, all located in the Orient where there is cheaper labor.”

“Why is he—” Childan began.

Paul said, “Pieces such as this…” He picked up the pin once more, briefly. Closing the lid, he returned the box to Childan. “… can be mass-produced. Either in base metal or plastic. From a mold. In any quantity desired.”

After a time Childan said, “What about wu? Will that remain in the pieces?”

Paul said nothing.

“You advise me to see him?” Childan said.

“Yes,” Paul said.

“Why?”

“Charms,” Paul said.

Childan stared.

“Good-luck charms. To be worn. By relatively poor people. A line of amulets to be peddled all over Latin America and the Orient. Most of the masses still believe in magic, you know. Spells. Potions. It’s a big business, I am told.” Paul’s face was wooden, his voice toneless.

“It sounds,” Childan said slowly, “as if there would be a good deal of money in it.”

Paul nodded.

“Was this your idea?” Childan said.

“No,” Paul said. He was silent, then.

Your employer, Childan thought. You showed the piece to your superior, who knows this importer. Your superior—or some influential person over your head, someone who has power over you, someone rich and big—contacted this importer.

That’s why you’re giving it back to me, Childan realized. You want no part of this. But you know what I know: that I will go to this address and see this man. I have to. I have no choice. I will lease the designs, or sell them on a percentage basis; some deal will be made between me and this party.

Clearly out of your hands. Entirely. Bad taste on your part to presume to stop me or argue with me.

“There is a chance here for you,” Paul said, “to become extremely wealthy.” He continued to gaze stoically ahead.

“The idea strikes me as bizarre,” Childan said. “Making good-luck charms out of such art objects; I can’t imagine it.”

“For it is not your natural line of business. You are devoted to the savored esoteric. Myself, I am the same. And so are those individuals who will shortly visit your store, those whom I mentioned.”

Childan said, “What would you do if you were me?”

“Don’t under-evaluate the possibility suggested by the esteemed importer. He is a shrewd personage. You and I—we have no awareness of the vast number of uneducated. They can obtain from mold-produced identical objects a joy which would be denied to us. We must suppose that we have the only one of a kind, or at least something rare, possessed by a very few. And, of course, something truly authentic. Not a model or replica.” He continued to gaze past Childan, at empty space. “Not something cast by the tens of thousands.”

Has he stumbled onto correct notion, Childan wondered, that certain of the historic objects in stores such as mine (not to mention many items in his personal collection) are imitations? There seems a trace of hint in his words. As if in ironic undertone he is telling me a message quite different from what appears. Ambiguity, as one trips over in the oracle… quality, as they say, of the Oriental mind.

Childan thought, He’s actually saying: Which are you Robert? He whom the oracle calls “the inferior man,” or that other for whom all the good advice is meant? Must decide, here. You may trot on one way or the other, but not both. Moment of choice now.

And which way will the superior man go? Robert Childan inquired of himself. At least according to Paul Kasoura. And what we have before us here isn’t a many-thousand-year-old compilation of divinely inspired wisdom; this is merely the opinion of one mortal—one young Japanese businessman.

Yet, there’s a kernel to it. Wu, as Paul would say. The wu of this situation is this: whatever our personal dislikes, there can be no doubt, the reality lies in the importer’s direction. Too bad for what we had intended; we must adapt, as the oracle states.

And after all, the originals can still be sold in my shop. To connoisseurs, as for example Paul’s friends.

“You wrestle with yourself,” Paul observed. “No doubt it is in such a situation that one prefers to be alone.” He had started toward the office door.

“I have already decided.”

Paul’s eyes flickered.

Bowing, Childan said, “I will follow your advice. Now I will leave to visit the importer.” He held up the folded slip of paper.

Oddly, Paul did not seem pleased; he merely grunted and returned to his desk. They contain their emotions to the last, Childan reflected.

“Many thanks for your business help,” Childan said as he made ready to depart. “Someday I will if possible reciprocate. I will remember.”

But still the young Japanese showed no reaction. Too true, Childan thought, what we used to say: they are inscrutable.

Accompanying him to the door, Paul seemed deep in thought. All at once he blurted, “American artisans made this piece hand by hand, correct? Labor of their personal bodies?”

“Yes, from initial design to final polish.”

“Sir! Will these artisans play along? I would imagine they dreamed otherwise for their work.”

“I’d hazard they could be persuaded,” Childan said; the problem, to him, appeared minor.

“Yes,” Paul said. “I suppose so.”

Something in his tone made Robert Childan take sudden note. A nebulous and peculiar emphasis, there. And then it swept over Childan. Without a doubt he had split the ambiguity—he saw.

Of course. Whole affair a cruel dismissal of American efforts, taking place before his eyes. Cynicism, but God forbid, he had swallowed hook, line and sinker. Got me to agree, step by step, led me along the garden path to this conclusion: products of American hands good for nothing but to be models for junky good-luck charms.

This was how the Japanese ruled, not crudely but with subtlety, ingenuity, timeless cunning.

Christ! We’re barbarians compared to them, Childan realized. We’re no more than boobs against such pitiless reasoning. Paul did not say—did not tell me—that our art was worthless; he got me to say it for him. And, as a final irony, he regretted my utterance. Faint, civilized gesture of sorrow as he heard the truth out of me.

He’s broken me, Childan almost said aloud—fortunately, however, he managed to keep it only a thought; as before, he held it in his interior world, apart and secret, for himself alone. Humiliated me and my race. And I’m helpless. There’s no avenging this; we are defeated and our defeats are like this, so tenuous, so delicate, that we’re hardly able to perceive them. In fact, we have to rise a notch in our evolution to know it ever happened.

What more proof could be presented, as to the Japanese fitness to rule? He felt like laughing, possibly with appreciation. Yes, he thought, that’s what it is, as when one hears a choice anecdote. I’ve got to recall it, savor it later on, even relate it. But to whom? Problem, there. Too personal for narration.