He shrugged. "All I can offer you is a berth as an ordinary seaman, and I'll have to pull strings even for that."
An ordinary seaman. I didn't even need a high-school education for that. I had an engineering degree and I couldn't use it. I'd be mopping decks.
I said nothing.
"If only you had some special talent. Do you play a horn or take shorthand and speak French or German?"
"The only language I speak besides English is Japanese, but I doubt—"
Commander Foster's eyes lit. "Japanese? Do you really? You're not kidding me?"
"I learned it from our gardener as a kid."
"Why didn't you say so. I know someone who's been crying the blues because he can't find enough Navy men who speak Japanese."
"Why would—?"
"We're keeping a close eye on the Japs these days. They're getting uppity. Marched themselves out of the League of Nations last month saying if we didn't like what they were doing in Manchuria, we could stuff it. Oh, yes. We're watching those monkeys. And Ellis Zacharias, an old classmate of mine from Annapolis, is with the Office of Naval Intelligence now and he's looking for someone just like you. I'll call him today."
He stood up and extended his hand across the table. "Welcome to the United States Navy, Frankie."
MAY
TOKYO
Looking back, Meiko would wonder how a day so full of horror could have started so innocently. She remembered riding in the car with her family, all heading out of town for a spring weekend on Sagami Bay. The sun had been shining as they drove toward the train station; the sixty-mile ride south along the coast to their summer home between Odawara and Atami promised to be pleasant and peaceful. She had been thinking about her upcoming wedding.
One week... one week and I will be a married woman.
She wondered where the time had gone. It seemed she had been back in Japan only a few weeks, and here it was almost a year since she and Matsuo had returned.
She had been so busy with wedding preparations; perhaps that was why time had passed so quickly. She had forced herself into bouts of frenzied activity. It helped blot Matsuo out of her mind. And Matsuo, for his part, had resolutely avoided her, which made it easier for both of them.
A week from tomorrow she would wed Hiroki. And once she bore his child, the Mazaki family would be forever linked to the noble Okumo line. Such a signal honor for her to be chosen as the instrument of that linkage, to bring such honor to her family…
But she didn't want to be married to Hiroki Okumo. Something about him made her vaguely uneasy. Maybe it was because she wanted his brother.
She shuddered. She was thinking the unthinkable. She had to banish such thoughts from her mind forever.
Yet how things change. Four years ago she had been looking forward to this day with joyful anticipation, aching for its arrival. Now she dreaded it. Matsuo was only part of the reason. She had gone to America and lived there for four years, something beyond the imagining of any Japan woman, and beyond the experience of most Japan men. She had changed.
Hiroki had changed, too. He was still terribly handsome, but as she had come to know him better since her return to Japan, she realized his thoughts and interests were far removed from anything that mattered to her. She had seen hints of the widening gap between them over the years, but now it had become a chasm. All he talked of was politics, every form of politics—national, international, military, Imperial. And he was constantly running off to investigate this temple or that shrine in some remote area of Japan. Becoming a good husband, a man interested in knowing her and being her companion, seemed of no real interest to him.
But it was not her place to complain or object. She glanced up at her father sitting in the front seat next to the driver. The wedding was enormously important to him, a lavish Shinto ceremony with many members of the Imperial Council present. His political influence would balloon after next week.
Politics! Even her father had caught the infection. Probably from Baron Okumo and Hiroki—the three of them had become fast friends in recent years. Even this weekend, which was supposed to allow the family one final brief respite before the whirlwind of last-minute preparations next week, had been turned into a political maneuver.
Underminister Nitobi was meeting them at the station and accompanying them to Sagami Bay. Meiko didn't fully understand the politics of the situation, or even what, precisely, Mr. Nitobi was underminister of—neither her father nor her future husband thought she should bother her head with such things—but she had gathered that he carried a certain amount of influence in regard to some critical matter and that his ideas were quite a bit more liberal than those of the baron, Hiroki, and her father. An "accidental" meeting of the baron and the underminister was planned for tomorrow evening to see if the baron might persuade him to see things more their way.
Underminister Nitobi's car pulled up before Tokyo Station just behind theirs. He was a short, squat little man in a charcoal-gray business suit and a derby. He sported a pencil-line moustache; his smiles did not seem to extend beyond his lips. Meiko took an instant dislike to him and thought her father greeted him with undue courtesy, being gracious to the point of unctuousness.
Porters came running for the baggage, and they all walked into the redbrick station as a group. Her father had arranged for a private car, and so they bypassed the long ticket lines and headed straight for the platform.
* * *
It was almost time.
Shimazu stood against a wall and played his wooden flute. Through the weave of his wicker helmet he watched the crowds of passengers swirl and eddy across the wide-open floor of Tokyo Station. He despised this building. It had been built in the shadow of the Imperial Palace almost twenty years ago during the Meiji period, but instead of being classical Japanese in design, it had been constructed of red brick and concrete with a slate roof, slavishly modeled on the great rail station in Amsterdam. Shimazu fervently promised himself to see this and other Western-inspired abominations around Tokyo reduced to rubble after the coming war, when the Emperor's reign was secured.
He searched the crowd and found the particular person he was looking for: a gaunt, nervous young man who paced back and forth along the length of the platform. Anyone else watching him would think that he had an important appointment to keep and his train was late. Shimazu knew otherwise. The young man was a student, and a member of the Shimpeitai. He was here to kill two people.
Shimazu knew who—after all, he had been coaching the youth for months, inflaming him, honing his rage, directing its force against those who would stand in the way of the Son of Heaven assuming His proper place as ruler of the world. Those two people would appear.
Shimazu watched the main entrance and played another tune. He was barely halfway through it when the targets entered. But nothing precipitous would happen. At least not until the train pulled into the station.
* * *
As they waited for the train to arrive, Meiko wandered around the station. She stopped to read one of the posters plastered on the walls. The nearest had been affixed to one of the stone columns.
SHIMPEITAI
1 The Soldiers of the Gods are ready with Celestial swords to accomplish the Restoration of Showa as their life mission for the glory of the Empire;
2 The Soldiers of the Gods denounce all institutions and activities which are based on liberalism and socialism, and aim to establish a government, an economic policy and a culture which shall be based upon the position of the Emperor; and
3 The Soldiers of the Gods aim at the annihilation of the leaders of the financial groups, the leaders of the political parties, the villains of the Imperial Entourage and their watchdogs who are obstructing the progress of the Empire. They shall thereby establish the Imperial Restoration and proclaim the Imperial Rule throughout the world.
"Ah!" said a voice at Meiko's shoulder. "The Shimpeitai—the Soldiers of the Gods—the Heaven-Sent Troops."
Underminister Ni
tobi was smiling, but he didn't seem amused. Behind him Meiko could see the station filling with travelers.
"What does it mean?"
"It means no matter who you are, whether member of the zaibatsu or the major political parties or even the Imperial Court, do not criticize the adventurism of the military or you may fall victim to the 'Celestial swords' of the Shimpeitai."
"But who are they?"
"The rank and file are made up mostly of young military officers, fanatically devoted to the Emperor and to kodo."
"Ah, yes," Meiko said. "Kodo."
Hiroki had spoken of little else since her return. Originally it signified devotion to the will of the Emperor, but had rapidly become a code word for expansionism.
"But I fear the Shimpeitai leaders are less devoted than they claim. Some would actually like to see the Emperor removed."
Meiko gasped. "I can't believe that!"
"I don't want to believe it either, but I'm afraid it is a fact. Our Emperor is a gentle man. He opposes the militarism which grips this land by the throat. They think that shows weakness and a willingness to accommodate and even accept domination by the white races. They even whisper that he is personally weak, unable to father a son."
Meiko was speechless. Such talk bordered on blasphemy. It was unconscionable.
And yet she had heard grumblings against the Emperor in her own house. Hints from her father, Hiroki, and the baron that he was too timid in foreign affairs, a better marine biologist than national leader, and worries about his fathering four daughters and no sons with the Empress Nagako. No member of the Satsumas, of which Nagako was a clanswoman, would rest easy until she had delivered a male heir to the Throne of the Sun. Until that day, the rival Choshu clan would agitate for the Emperor to bed with a concubine—preferably a Choshu virgin—to assure continuity of the Imperial Line, unbroken now for thousands of years.
Yet she knew that no matter what their complaints and dissatisfactions with the Emperor, they would never plot against him.
"Why, just this week," Underminister Nitobi was saying, "I sent a long letter to the Diet denouncing the Shimpeitai and the forces behind it." He puffed himself up with pride. "It caused quite a stir, of that I can assure you."
"You aren't afraid?"
She could hear the train approaching from the switching yard. The station was very crowded now, with military uniforms prominent among the travelers.
"Of course not," he said with a snort, but Meiko caught a trace of uneasiness in his eyes. "And even if I was, I would still speak out. We can't let these fanatics bully us into letting them have their way with whatever of our nation's resources they wish to use. There have to be limits."
Meiko realized that despite his pompous air and his affectations, Underminister Nitobi was quite a courageous man. As he excused himself to rejoin their traveling party, she looked back at the proclamation.
The openly threatening tone, the steel-hard, unyielding self-righteousness of the words chilled her. What was happening in the Islands of the Gods?
Meiko heard the train begin to pull into the station. She hurried to join her family and prepare to board.
* * *
Now! Shimazu thought, mentally urging the student forward. First Nitobi, then the girl! Now!
He had no choice at this point. He had been unable to get near the Mazaki girl since her return from America. During the warmer seasons she was out of town at her family's summer home. In less hospitable weather she had been out of reach in either her house or a car. Too late now for a delicate touch. The wedding was only a week away. Besides, this way served a dual purpose—a meddlesome politician would die along with the girl.
If only a rift had developed during the four years the girl had been away. If only Hiroki were not so determined to marry her. If only the younger Okumo had given in to his feelings and seduced her in America. If only he had persuaded her to marry him and stay there with him, then this risky business would be unnecessary. But Matsuo Okumo had demonstrated his depth of character by resisting the strong feelings Shimazu knew burned within him.
So it is up to me, he thought.
Maybe this wasn't necessary. Maybe Hiroki's drive, his singleness of vision would not be diluted by a wife and family. Maybe. Shimazu could not take that chance. He sensed Hiroki's crucial role in the future of the Order. Nothing could be allowed to interfere with that.
And so the Mazaki girl had to die here in this Occidental obscenity of a rail station, today, this morning, now.
The student had been prepared. He knew what to do. In secret meetings over cups of sake in a room dark as the space behind a blind man's eyes, he had been convinced of the treason implicit in every word and gesture made by Underminister Nitobi, and of the seductive web of treachery woven around the underminister by Viscount Mazaki's American-educated daughter.
The student was convinced that both had to die.
And now, as the train rolled into the station, the student started toward the Mazaki party.
At last.
* * *
As she stood with her father and the underminister, Meiko saw a young man burst from the crowd to her left. He was shouting something as he ran toward her group but she could not pick out the words. His hand came out of his coat pocket and he waved it about. He was close enough now for Meiko to see that he held a small pistol.
She screamed in terror, and as she did, Underminister Nitobi turned around.
The young man cried, "Tenchu!" and began firing.
The underminister tried to duck and run but could not avoid the bullets. He cried out and spun as he clutched his chest. Bright red blood surged first from his white shirt front, then exploded from his head as his derby flew into the air. He collapsed on the platform as his derby rolled away. His body shuddered violently, then was still.
"Tenchu!" the young man cried again, brandishing his smoking pistol.
Then he turned and pointed it at Meiko's face. She saw the round opening of the muzzle, could almost look down the bore, saw the wild eyes aiming along the barrel. Horrified, she tried to run, but she couldn't move.
Suddenly Meiko felt an impact on her shoulder. She was shoved aside just as the gun fired. But even as she fell, she saw the gunman take aim at her again. The hammer snapped down with a click but there was no shot. The man screamed in frustration and hurled himself headlong in front of the approaching train.
The train station wavered before her as she lay paralyzed on the floor, watching a scarlet pool spread slowly from Underminister Nitobi's body. The air filled with cries of panic and terror. She tore her eyes from the underminister's body and rose to her knees. She turned and gasped.
Someone else was down, further away, near the edge of the platform.
She stumbled forward. No! No, it can't be!
That figure on the ground. It looked like—
She stopped as she reached the fallen man. "Father!"
Blood covered his head, dripping down over his right eye. It ran from his nose and his right ear. As she wiped his face with her kimono, he opened his eyes. They were dull and he blinked repeatedly, as if trying to focus them.
"Meiko," he said in a barely audible voice. "Why…?" Then his eyes closed and he said no more. Meiko screamed for a doctor, an ambulance, anyone who could help her father.
* * *
Count Mazaki—shot!
Hiroki's mind whirled as he strode through the halls of Tokyo Hospital, walking as quickly as he could but still unable to keep up with Matsuo a full two paces ahead of him and pulling away.
How could such a thing happen? Underminister Nitobi would not be missed. He was a stone in the path of Japan's destiny. But Count Mazaki—a man who was not only a staunch political ally, but destined to be his father-in-law as well, shot by a gunman crying "Tenchu!"
Punishment of Heaven, indeed. This was disaster.
In his heart, Hiroki knew he was not free of guilt. After all, hadn't he been party to the rise of the more violent
and headstrong factions in the armed forces? The Kakureta Kao had allied itself with the Black Dragon Society to promote kodo among the military men, especially the young officers. Hiroki had been playing a pivotal part, acting as liaison between the Order and the Black Dragons.
Their plans had been successful beyond their greatest expectations. The army was now straining at its leash, fairly howling to be let loose upon the world to fight for the glory of the Emperor and Japan.
Too successful, perhaps. Count Mazaki might be dead by now.
Up ahead he saw the Mazaki family clustered at the end of the hall. Meiko sat in a chair apart from the others, elbows on her knees and face resting in her hands, the picture of dejection. She looked up at their approach and Hiroki saw her expression crumble into naked grief. With a sob she ran forward with her arms outstretched. He stopped to embrace her but she never reached him.
She flung herself into Matsuo's arms and clung to him as if he were the last solid thing in a world that was crumbling to dust.
Hiroki's heart stumbled over a beat.
What is this? Could it be…?
Hiroki discarded the thought. Since returning from America, Matsuo had been a stranger to Tokyo. Between basic training and studying for his commission in Naval Intelligence, and his growing obsession with learning to fly, he had been away from home far more often than not. And when home, he never visited the Mazakis, even when invited.
No, he was sure there could be nothing between his brother and his bride-to-be. She embraced him because he had been closest. That was all. Nothing more.
Yet he could not deny that the sight of his bride-to-be in his brother's arms touched a raw nerve deep within him.
* * *
Hiroki is watching.
Matsuo pulled Meiko's arms from around his neck. He could think of nothing in this world he wanted more than to crush her against him and absorb her quaking sobs. He would stand here all day and hold her and smooth her hair and dry her tears if that was what she needed. But…