Rainfall

double murder. In which one of the victims was well connected in the LDP. I am under substantial pressure to solve this, you know.”

    “Tatsu, aren’t you even going to tell me it’s good to see me? I have feelings, you know.”

    He smiled his sorrowful smile. “You know it’s good to see you. But I would wish for different circumstances.”

    “How are your daughters?”

    The smile broadened, and he nodded his head proudly. “Very fine. One doctor. One lawyer. Luckily they have their mother’s brains,
ne
?”

    “Married?”

    “The older is engaged.”

    “Congratulations. Sounds like you’ll be a grandfather soon.”

    “Not too soon,” he said, the smile evaporating, and I thought
I’d hate to be the kid Tatsu caught fooling around with one of his daughters
.

    We headed back across the mall, past a perfect reproduction French château that looked homesick in its current surroundings.

    The small talk done, I got to the point. “Yamaoto Toshi, head of Conviction, has put a contract out on your life,” I told him.

    He stopped walking and looked at me. “How do you know this?”

    “Sorry, no questions about how.”

    He nodded. “Your source must be credible, or you wouldn’t be telling me.”

    “Yes.”

    We started walking again. “You know, Rain-san, there are a lot of people who would like to see me dead. Sometimes I wonder how I’ve managed to keep breathing for all this time.”

    “Maybe you’ve got a guardian angel.”

    He laughed. “I wish that were so. Actually, the explanation is simpler. My death would establish my credibility. Alive, I can be dismissed as a fool, a chaser of phantoms.”

    “I’m afraid circumstances have changed.”

    He stopped again and looked at me closely. “I didn’t know you were mixed up with Yamaoto.”

    “I’m not.”

    He was nodding his head, and I knew that he was adding this bit of data to his profile of the mysterious assassin.

    He started walking again. “You were saying. ‘Circumstances have changed.’ ”

    “There’s a disk. My understanding is that it contains information implicating various politicians in massive corruption. Yamaoto is trying to get it.”

    He knew something about the disk — I’d heard Yamaoto saying on the transmitter that Tatsu had sent men to Midori’s apartment, after all — yet he said nothing.

    “You know anything about this, Tatsu?” I asked.

    He shrugged. “I’m a cop. I know a little about everything.”

    “Yamaoto thinks you know a lot. He knows you’re after that disk. He’s having trouble getting it back, so he’s trying to eliminate loose ends.”

    “Why is he having trouble getting the disk back?”

    “He doesn’t know where it is.”

    “Do you?”

    “I don’t have it.”

    “That is not what I asked you.”

    “Tatsu, this isn’t about the disk. I came here because I learned that you’re in danger. I wanted to warn you.”

    “But the missing disk is the reason I’m in danger, is it not?” he said, affecting a puzzled, innocent look that would have fooled someone who didn’t know him. “Find the disk; remove the danger.”

    “Ease up on the
inakamono
routine,” I said, telling him I knew he wasn’t a country bumpkin. “I’ll tell you this much. The person who has the disk is in a position to publish what’s on it. That should remove the danger, as you put it.”

    He stopped and grabbed my arm. “
Masaka
, tell me you didn’t give that fucking disk to Bulfinch.”

    Alarm bells started going off in my head.

    “Why do you ask that?”

    “Because Franklin Bulfinch was murdered yesterday in Akasaka Mitsuke, outside the Akasaka Tokyu Hotel.”

    “Fuck!” I said, momentarily forgetting myself.

    “Komatta,”
he swore again. “You gave it to him, didn’t you?”

    “Yes.”

    “Damn it! Did he have it with him when he was killed?”

    Outside the Akasaka Tokyu — a hundred meters from where I gave it to him. “What time did it happen?” I asked.

    “Early afternoon. Maybe two o’clock. Did he have it with him?”

    “Almost certainly,” I told him.

    His shoulders slumped, and I knew he wasn’t playacting.

    “Damn it, Tatsu. How do you know about the disk?”

    There was a long pause before he answered. “Because Kawamura was supposed to give the disk to me.”

    I raised my eyebrows in surprise.

    “Yes,” he went on, “I had been developing Kawamura for quite some time. I had strongly encouraged him to provide me with