Clive Cussler - Dragon

“Fair is fair” did not apply to two-way trade with Japan.

He appeared to be on his way to the small condominium his wife and two young children called home during his assignment in Japan. The building was owned by the American government and housed most of the embassy workers and their families. The construction cost of the entire ten-story building was less than a third the price of the land it stood on.

His shadows had fallen into his travel routine, which never varied except when he put in an hour or two overtime. He smiled to himself as his stop came up and the two agents rose in anticipation of his getting off. He stepped to the door with the rest of the crowd, waiting for it to open onto the platform. It was the oldest trick in the world, one shown in the movie The French Connection .

As the door opened, Showalter flowed with the crowd to the platform and began counting. He hesitated and casually glanced at the two Japanese agents. They had stepped from the middle door in the next car and were walking slowly in his direction, shielded by a group of departing passengers.

When he hit twenty-five, he swiftly turned around and stepped back inside the car. Two seconds later the door closed and the train began moving. Too late, the Japanese secret service agents realized they’d been duped. Frantically they attempted to pry the doors apart and reboard the train. But it was useless. They leaped back on the platform as the train picked up speed and disappeared into the tunnel.

Showalter wasn’t overly pleased with the simple dodge. Next time his tails would be wary and make his evasive moves more intricate. He transferred to a connecting line at the next stop and rode to Asakusa, an atmospheric area northeast of Tokyo in a section known as Shitamachi. Asakusa was part of the old city of Tokyo that had preserved much of its past.

Showalter sat and studied the people around him as he had done so many times. Some of his fellow passengers studied him in return. They called anyone who did not share their thick black straight hair, dark eyes, and skin coloring a gaijin , literally translated as an “outside person.” He theorized that the close similarity in their physical looks was perhaps the basis for their unity and conformity. That and the isolation of their island home.

Their society evolved around the family and expanded to include everyone who worked around them. Lives were lived in a complicated quilt of obligations, contentedness, duty, and accomplishment. They accepted a regimented lifestyle as if all others were a waste to be pitied.

The uncohesive melting pot of the United States could not be conceived, nor would it be tolerated in Japan, a country with the toughest immigration laws to be found in the world.

The train stopped at the Tawaramachi subway station, and he stepped off and joined the crowd that rose to the busy street of Kappabashi. He hailed a cab and rode past the restaurant wholesale supply stores that sold the plastic food replicas seen in eatery windows. He directed the driver to a several-square-block section crowded with craftsmen’s shops, ancient temples, and old houses.

He got out and paid the driver at an intersection, and then walked down a narrow flower-lined lane until he came to a Japanese inn known as a ryokan.

Although rustic and worn on the outside, the ryokan was quite neat and attractive inside. Showalter was met at the door by one of the staff, who bowed and said, “Welcome to the Ritz.”

“I thought this was the Asakusa Dude Ranch,” Showalter replied.

Without another word, the muscular doorman with arms and legs like railroad ties showed him over the smooth flattened river stones of the entry. They stepped onto the polished oak floor of the reception area, where Showalter was politely asked to remove his shoes and put on a pair of plastic slippers.

Unlike most slippers that are too small for large Anglo feet, Showalter’s fit like they were custom-ordered, which indeed they were, since the ryokan was secretly owned and operated by an American intelligence agency that specialized in covert and safe retreats.

Showalter’s room had a sliding shoji paper door that opened onto a small veranda overlooking a formal garden with water trickling restfully onto rocks through bamboo tubes. The floor was covered by the traditional tatami straw matting. He had to take off the slippers and walk in his socks while on the fragile mats.

There were no chairs or furniture, only cushions on the floor, and a bed made up of many pillows and heavy cushions the Japanese called “futons.” A small fire pit sat in the center of the guest room with warm glowing coals.

Showalter undressed and donned a light cotton yukata, a short robe. Then a maid in a kimono led him to the inn’s communal bathing facilities. He left the yukata and his wristwatch in a wicker basket, and shielded by only a washcloth-size towel, he entered the steamy bath area. He stepped around the low stools and wooden pails and stood under a simple faucet. He lathered up and rinsed off. Only then was he ready to sink slowly into the hot water of a huge wooden pool-like tub.

A shadowy figure was already sitting chest deep in the water. Showalter greeted him.

“The Honda Team, I presume.”

“Only half of it,” answered Roy Orita. “Jim Hanamura should be along any time. Like a saki?”

“Against orders to drink during an operation,” said Showalter, easing into the steaming water. “But what the hell. I’m colder than ice cream. Pour me a double.”

Orita filled a small ceramic cup out of a bottle sitting on the edge of the pool. “How’s life at the embassy?”

“The usual dung one would expect from the State Department.” Showalter took a long sip of the saki and let it settle into his stomach. “How goes the investigation? Any information on the leads we received from Team Lincoln?”

“I checked out the company management of Murmoto. I can’t uncover a direct link between the corporate executive officers and the warheads. My own opinion is they’re clean. They haven’t the slightest idea of what is going on beneath their noses.”

“Some of them must know.”

Orita grinned. “Only two assembly line workers have to be in on it.”

“Why only two?”

“All that are required. The assembly line worker who oversees the installation of the air conditioners. He’s in a position to select specific cars to get the warheads. And the inspector who checks out the units to make sure they work before the cars are shipped to the dealers. He okays the phony units that don’t operate.”

“There has to be a third man,” disagreed Showalter. “An agent in the factory’s computerized shipping department who erases all trace of the bomb cars, except on the bill of lading which is required to satisfy foreign customs officials.”

“Have you followed the thread from factory to air conditioner supplier to nuke plant?”

“To the supplier, yes. Then the trail vanishes. I hope to pick up a scent and follow it to the source in the next few days.”

Orita’s voice became silent as a man came from the dressing room and walked toward the heated pool. He was short with silver hair and mustache and held the small wash towel in front of his groin.

“Who the hell are you?” demanded Showalter, alarmed that a stranger had broken the security of the ryokan.

“My name is Ashikaga Enshu.”

“Who?”

The man stood there without answering for several seconds. Showalter began frantically looking around, wondering why no security sentries were present.

Then Orita began laughing. “Great disguise, Jim. You fooled hell out of both of us.”

James Hanamura removed the silver-haired wig and pulled off the eyebrows and mustache. “Not bad if I do say so. I faked out Hideki Suma and his secretary as well.”