A Clean Kill in Tokyo

on, and one stop later I exited at the east end of Shinjuku Station, the older, teeming counterpart to sanitized, government-occupied west Shinjuku. I was still wearing sunglasses to hide my swollen eye, and the dark tint gave the frenzied crowds a slightly ghostly look. I let the mob carry me through one of the mazelike underground shopping arcades until I was outside the Virgin Megastore, then fought my way across the arcade to the Isetan Department Store, feeling like a man trying to ford a strong river. I decided to buy Midori an oversized navy cashmere scarf and a pair of sunglasses with wraparound lenses that I thought would change the shape of her face. Paid for them at different registers so no one would think the guy in the sunglasses was buying a neat disguise for the woman in his life.
    Finally, I stopped at Kinokuniya, about fifty meters down from Isetan, where I plunged into crowds so thick they made the arcade seem desolate by comparison. I picked up a couple of magazines and a novel from the Japanese best-seller section and walked over to the register to pay.
    I was waiting in line, watching to see who was emerging from the stairway and escalator, when my pager starting vibrating in my pocket. I reached down and pulled it out, expecting to see a code from Harry. Instead, the display showed an eight-digit number with a Tokyo prefix.
    I paid for the magazines and the book and took the stairs back to the first floor, then walked over to a payphone on a side street near Shinjuku-dori. I inserted a hundred-yen coin and punched in the number, glancing over my shoulder while the connection went through.
    I heard someone pick up. “John Rain,” a voice said in English. I didn’t respond at first, and the voice repeated my name.
    “I think you’ve got the wrong number.”
    There was a pause. “My name is Lincoln.”
    “That’s cute.”
    “The Chief wants to meet with you.”
    I understood then that the caller was with the Agency, that the Chief was Holtzer. I waited to see if Lincoln was going to add something, but he didn’t. “You must be joking,” I said.
    “I’m not. There’s been a mistake and he wants to explain. You can name the time and the place.”
    “I don’t think so.”
    “You need to hear what he has to say. Things aren’t what you think they are.”
    I glanced back in the direction of Kinokuniya, weighing the risks and possible advantages.
    “He’ll have to meet me right now,” I said.
    “Impossible. He’s in a meeting. He can’t get free before tonight, at the earliest.”
    “I don’t care if he’s having open-heart surgery. You tell him this, Abe. If he wants to meet me, I’ll be waiting for him in Shinjuku in twenty minutes. If he’s one minute late, I’m gone.”
    There was a long pause. Then he asked, “Where in Shinjuku?”
    “Tell him to walk out the east exit of Shinjuku JR Station directly toward the Studio Alta sign. And tell him if he’s wearing anything besides pants, shoes, and a short-sleeved T-shirt, he’ll never see me. Okay?” I wanted to make it as hard as possible for Holtzer to conceal a readily accessible weapon, if that’s what he was planning to do.
    “I understand.”
    “Exactly twenty minutes,” I said, and hung up.
    There were two possibilities. One, Holtzer might have something legitimate to say, the chances of which were remote. Two, this was just an attempt to reacquire me to finish the job they had botched outside my apartment. But either way, it was a chance for me to learn more. Not that I would count on Holtzer to be straight with me one way or the other, but I could read between the lines of his lies.
    I had to assume there would be cameras. I’d keep him moving, but the risk would still be there.
But what the hell,
I thought.
They know where you live, bastards have probably got a damn photo album by now. You don’t have a whole lot of anonymity to protect anymore.
    I crossed back to Shinjuku-dori and walked to the front of the Studio Alta building, where several cabs were waiting for fares. I strolled over to one of the drivers, a younger guy who looked like he might be willing to overlook a strange situation if the price were right, and told him I wanted him to pick up a passenger who would be coming out the east exit in about fifteen or twenty minutes, a
gaijin
wearing a T-shirt.
    “Ask if he’s the Chief,” I explained in Japanese, handing him a ten-thousand-yen note. “If he answers yes, I want you to drive him