Thomas Hoover - The samurai strategy

After a few closing formalities, interspersed with a photo session of the Emperor and the president of Dai Nippon, the historic occasion ended with a reverential shot of His Majesty being escorted to his limo.

Who was that silver-haired executive, Tarn wondered. The man was audacious, and a genius. He'd just turned the Imperial Household into an accomplice in some kind of nationwide collection, using the Emperor for his own ends much the way shoguns of old had done.

But she sensed he'd touched a nerve that went very deep. A fund in honor of the Emperor (that's already how everybody around her in the shop was describing it), something in which to take pride, not just a numbered savings account at the post office. Suddenly the girls and their Japanese customers were all talking money. Here was something they could do to show their regard for His Majesty.

A line was already forming at the phone. The way she heard sums being pledged, she calculated Dai Nippon would garner five million yen, more than thirty thousand dollars, right there among the shampoos and curlers. The typical Japanese, she recalled, banked over a quarter of his or her disposable income. Little wonder most of them had at least a year's salary in savings. At this rate Dai Nippon's "Imperial Fund" would be over the top by nightfall.

That evening NHK newscasts claimed it had been fully subscribed in the first fifty-six minutes. After all, eight hundred billion yen was only about six billion dollars, scarcely more than loose change to a people saving tens of millions every day. It was, in fact, merely the beginning. The next day more "Eight-Hundred-Year" funds were opened, by popular demand. Soon the pension funds started to feel the heat, and a lot of institutions began calling up. Yen flowed in a great river. All those homeless Japanese billions knocking around the world had at last found a guiding ideal. Some rumors even claimed the Emperor himself was actually going to manage the money.

Tam couldn't wait to get outside and see firsthand what was going on. This was something Allan could never in his wildest dreams have predicted. As soon as she could get her hair dry she headed out; the girls didn't even bother to charge.

Tokyo, twelve million strong, was in the streets. Even in normal times the city could be overwhelming, but now… It was in pandemonium, an advanced state of shock. As she struggled through the crowds a lot of men were waving sake flasks, already gleefully smashed. The sidewalks had become one vast matsuri, festival.

Something else, too. She found herself feeling a little uncomfortable. There were glares, and then as she passed a withered old man running a noodle stand, she heard him mutter "Gaijin." What did it mean?

What it "meant," she reflected with alarm, was obvious. The world had just become a brand-new ball game. Japan's long-silent Emperor had once more spoken to his people, just as he had at the end of the War. Back then he had broken two thousand years of silence to inform his battered, starving subjects "the war situation has developed not necessarily to Japan's advantage." This time around he had confirmed Japan's long Imperial heritage. The "meaning" was clear as day.

This wasn't a new direction. This was just getting back on track. Even though the Emperor had been humiliated and secularized after the Great War against the threatening gaijin, his people still thought of themselves as a single, pure family. For a time they merely had no focus for that identity. Now they had it again.

Well, she thought, why not? National pride. Not so long ago we Americans had the Soviets telling us we were second best, so we blew a few billion in tax money to plant a man on the moon and straighten them out. The space Super Bowl. Why should Japan be any different? For years now they've heard half the world claim they're just a bunch of hard-driving merchants with a bank-account soul, when they knew in their hearts it wasn't true. Now here's the proof, straight from the Sun Goddess. Time to get crazy awhile.

In the middle of all the bedlam and horns and sirens in the street, she yearned for somebody to talk with, somebody levelheaded enough to put this frightening turnaround into some kind of perspective. That's when she thought of Ken.

Of course! He was Westernized; he took the longer view. Why hadn't she thought of him right away?

So off she went for a quick surprise visit with Kenji Asano at the Institute for New Generation Computer Technology, research headquarters for the Fifth Generation Systems Project. He and his staff would probably be in a holiday mood, just like everybody else. Maybe he'd loosen his tie and give her a little off-the-record rundown of what this was all about.

She knew the Institute operated out of the twenty-first floor of a downtown Tokyo skyscraper. She'd been there before. She still had the address, and the subways were clicking along right on time, though the fare machines were off now in celebration. Half an hour later she was there. She pushed her way through the milling lobby and grabbed an elevator.

As she rode, watching the lights tick off the floors, she found herself wondering again what Ken was really up to. And what had happened to Dr. Yoshida? However, it was hard to think about something as boring as MITI and American defense vulnerability when people were whooping it up and passing around paper cups of sake right there on the elevator.

Well, don't jump to conclusions. This paranoia of Allan's is probably just some grotesque misreading. Dr. Yoshida got promoted, and Ken's merely filling in for a while till the Institute can recruit a new director from some university. The work here's too important for politics. Intelligent computers are Japan's lifeline-the "steam engine" of the next century.

How would Ken react to her just showing up? After all, Kyoto was two years ago. He'd claimed to be a widower, but was that merely conference fast talk?

Best thing is just to play it straight, she told herself. Strictly business. Let the rest fall out in time.

As she stepped off the elevator, she was relieved to see that the offices were still open. Well, she thought, my first finding is that Ken Asano runs this place with an iron hand, just the way Yoshida did. Total dedication. Through floor-to-ceiling glass doors she could see the receptionist at the desk, now excitedly chatting on the phone. Tam waved, and the smiling woman immediately buzzed her through. Just like that. No different from the last time.

Doesn't look to be any MITI conspiracy here, she thought. What exactly had made Allan so worried?

She bowed and handed over her meishi, her business card.

"Asano-san, onegai shimasu."

"Matt, why don't you just send your action over to the 'bean pit' for chrissake?" The phone line from Chicago crackled. "That's where the crapshooters are."

"Jerry, I wouldn't know a soybean if I ate one."

"Hell, half of those loonies over there buying and selling 'bean contracts wouldn't know one either. Come to think of it, I don't know anybody over on the Merc who's ever even seen a pork belly. Do they really exist?" He was yelling to make himself heard over the din of the floor of the Board of Trade. Futures on commodities were being bought and sold all around him. Just then he paused, followed by a louder yell. "Right, I'll buy five, at the market. Yeah. I'm talkin' one and thirteen bid. What? You've got to be kidding. No way." Pause. I could almost see the blue-jacketed floor traders frantically hand-signaling each other. Then he yelled again. "Christ, Frank, I'm already long forty at sixteen. I'm getting murdered here. You guys are killing me… All right, all right, I'll pay fourteen for ten. Yeah… Shit. Hang on, Matt. I gotta write this down on a ticket… Jesus, I should be selling Hondas like my brother-in-law down in Quincy. Sits on his butt all day, screws his bookkeeper at lunch, and the man's making a bundle." Pause. "Hell, Matt, what'd I just say?"