A Clean Kill in Tokyo

want to teach the person a lesson. But you know, in Japan, people almost never get upset in those situations. Japanese look at other people’s mistakes more as something arbitrary, like the weather, I think, not so much as something to get angry about. I hadn’t thought about that before I lived in New York.”
    “I’ve noticed that difference, too. I like the Japanese way better. It’s something to aspire to.”
    “But which are you? Japanese or American? The outlook, I mean,” she added quickly, I knew for fear of insulting me by being too direct.
    I looked at her, thinking for an instant of her father. I thought of other people I’ve worked with, and how different my life might have been if I’d never known them. “I’m not sure,” I said, finally, glancing away. “As you seem to have noticed at Alfie, I’m not a very forgiving person.”
    She paused. “Can I ask you a question?”
    “Sure,” I responded, not knowing what was coming.
    “What did you mean, when you said we had ‘rescued’ you?”
    “Just trying to strike up a conversation,” I said. It sounded flip, and I saw immediately from her eyes that it was the wrong response.
    You have to show her a little bit,
I thought again, not sure whether I was compromising or rationalizing. I sighed. “I was talking about things I’ve done,” I said, switching to English, which was more comfortable for me on this subject, “things I knew, or thought I knew, were right. But then later it turned out they weren’t. At times those things haunt me.”
    “Haunt you?” she asked, not understanding.
    “Borei no you ni.”
Like a ghost.
    “My music made the ghosts go away?”
    I nodded and smiled, but the smile turned sad. “It did. I’ll have to listen to it more often.”
    “Because they’ll come back?”
    Jesus, John, get off this.
“It’s more like they’re always there.”
    “You have regrets?”
    “Doesn’t everyone?”
    “Probably. But are yours like everyone else’s?”
    “That I wouldn’t know. I don’t usually compare.”
    “But you just did.”
    I chuckled. “You’re tough,” was all I could say.
    She shook her head. “I don’t mean to be.”
    “I think you do. But you wear it well.”
    “What about the saying ‘I only regret the things I haven’t done?’”
    I shook my head. “That’s someone else’s saying. Someone who must have spent a lot of time at home.”
    I knew I would learn nothing more about her father or the stranger today without questions that would betray my true intention in asking them. It was time to start winding things down.
    “Any more shopping today?” I asked.
    “I was going to, but I’ve got someone to meet in Jinbocho in less than an hour.”
    “A friend?” I asked, professionally curious.
    She smiled. “My manager.”
    I paid the bill and we walked back to Aoyama-dori. The crowds had thinned and the air felt cold and heavy. The temperature had dropped in the two and a half weeks since I had taken out Kawamura. I looked up and saw unbroken clouds.
    I had enjoyed myself much more than I had expected—more, really, than I had wanted. But the chill cut through my reverie, reviving my memories and doubts. I glanced over at Midori’s face, thinking,
What have I done to her? What am I doing?
    “What is it?” she asked, seeing my eyes.
    “Nothing. Just tired.”
    She looked to her right, then again at me. “It felt as though you were looking at someone else.”
    I shook my head. “It’s just us.”
    We walked, our footsteps echoing softly. Then she asked, “Will you come see me play again?”
    “I’d like that.” Stupid thing to say. But I didn’t have to follow through on it.
    “I’m at the Blue Note Friday and Saturday.”
    “I know,” I said, stupid again, and she smiled.
    She flagged down a cab. I held the door as she went in, an annoying part of me wondering what it would be like to be getting in with her. As the cab pulled away, she rolled down the window and said, “Come alone.”

CHAPTER 8
    T he next Friday I received another page from Harry telling me to check the secure site.
    He had found out the stranger on the train was indeed a reporter: Franklin Bulfinch, the Tokyo Bureau Chief for
Forbes
magazine. It turned out Bulfinch was one of only five male foreigners living in the Daikanyama apartment complex where I’d seen the stranger enter; all Harry had needed to do was cross-reference the names he found in the local ward directory against the main