Hard Rain

long silence. Then Tatsu said, "Kanezaki-san, what do you
    propose to do?"
    Kanezaki looked at him, his expression uncertain. Well, originally I
    wanted someone non-Agency to run counter-surveillance for me tonight.
    So I could know whether I'm being watched, or being set up, or
    whatever. But not you. You're ..."
    Tatsu smiled. "I am Keisatsucho."
    "Right. It wouldn't do to have the Japanese FBI observing a CIA
    meeting with a sensitive national asset."
    "I thought tonight's meeting was fictitious, designed to test your
    theory that someone wishes your assets ill."
    "It is fictitious. But I've filled out paperwork saying that it's
    real. If I get caught with you, the consequences will be the same."
    Tatsu shrugged. "If someone sees us together, you can tell them you
    are developing me as an asset. Following up on the original contact
    you and Station Chief Biddle made when you were looking for our friend
    here."
    Kanezaki looked at him. "Maybe I am developing you."
    I thought, Tatsu knew you were going to say that, kid.
    "You see?" Tatsu asked. "Not so far-fetched."
    I thought of an old poker players' expression: If you look around the
    table and can't spot the sucker, the sucker is you.
    No one said anything for a long time. Then Kanezaki let out a long
    breath and said, "I can't believe I'm doing this. I could go to
    jail."
    "For a meeting with a potentially important asset?" Tatsu asked, and I
    knew the deal was closed.
    "Right," Kanezaki said, more to himself than to anyone else. "That's
    right."
    I thought of another saying I once heard: It's easiest to sell to a
    salesman.
    All that training in how to suborn an asset into signing a receipt.
    Kanezaki had practically bragged about how adroitly a good case officer
    could do it. And yet he'd just stepped over a line without even
    looking down to see if it was there.
    I thought of those pictorial representations of the food chain, a fish
    being swallowed by a bigger fish being swallowed by an even bigger
    one.
    I glanced at Kanezaki and thought, At least Tatsu won't betray you.
    Unless he absolutely has to.
    Eighteen.
    We all departed so that Kanezaki could go to his 'meeting' and Tatsu
    could have men run countersurveillance for him. We agreed to meet back
    at Christie in two hours. I asked Tatsu before we left whether he'd
    managed to get another gun for me. He told me he hadn't.
    I spent a short time browsing among the antiques in the basement of the
    nearby Hanae Mori Building. The shops were closed, but through the
    windows I admired the delicate Art Nouveau cameo glassware of artists
    like Daum Nancy and Emile Galle. I lost myself in the little worlds
    depicted on the vases and tumblers: a green meadow inhabited by
    hovering dragonflies; windmills slumbering under a blanket of snow; a
    forest of trees so sensuous they seemed to sway in their glass
    etchings.
    I returned to Christie well in advance of our follow-up meeting, but I
    didn't wait there. Instead, I checked the places that a surveillance
    team would use if it were interested in someone in the shop, and then,
    confirming that these spots were deserted, I perched like one of
    Tokyo's baleful ravens in the darkness atop the incline to the right of
    the shop, observing its entrance. Only after I had seen Kanezaki, and
    then Tatsu, return, and only after I had waited to ensure that they
    weren't followed, did I descend and join them.
    "We've been waiting," Tatsu said when I came in. "I didn't want to
    start without you."
    "Sorry," I said. "I got held up."
    He looked at me as though he understood exactly what had caused the
    delay, then turned to Kanezaki and said, "I took two men to observe the
    area around your ostensible meeting. We discovered someone who was
    there attempting to photograph the proceedings."
    Kanezaki's eyes bulged. "Photograph?"
    Tatsu nodded.
    "What did you do?" he asked.
    "We took the individual into custody."
    "Oh man," Kanezaki said, probably imagining the headlines in tomorrow's
    papers. "Official custody?"
    Tatsu shook his head. "Unofficial."
    "Who is he?" Kanezaki asked.
    "His name is Edmund Gretz," Tatsu said. "He came to Tokyo three years
    ago, hoping to make a living as a freelance photographer, with visions
    of models on runways. Instead he found himself giving English lessons
    at various Japanese corporations. But eventually he did manage to find
    someone interested in his talents as a photographer."
    "The Agency?" Kanezaki asked, his complexion pale.
    "Yes. He is a