something else. It was not a sound as much as a feeling. He felt almost dizzy with excitement, and although he could not see the woman, he felt drawn to her, as if there were an electric current flowing between them.
He turned and looked up the street at the lights shimmering in the fog and the headlights of the bus, pinpoint halos in the distance.
‘What do you want?’ he asked.
‘Was it not you who asked for information at the Kabuki-za in Tokyo?’
He hesitated again. The pull was so strong that he almost turned around. Fog swirled around them Like flux.
‘Yes,’ he said finally.
She spoke in a whisper. ‘You seek the one known as Chameleon?’
‘Yes.’
‘Why?’
‘To talk.’
‘Talk? Hah! You must kill him.’
He wanted to turn again. His nerves were humming. He felt strangely in tune with her, but it was a feeling he could not interpret. He thought back to the previous night when he was doing his exercises and the presence of Chameleon had seemed overwhelming. Now he felt it again. It was as if the woman was marked with Chameleon’s scent.
‘I am not an assassin,’ he said.
‘You will understand when you met him.’
‘When will that be?’
She leaned closer. ‘Chameleon is there.’
Now he felt almost elevated. His blood surged through his veins, and fuses of fire streaked down his arms and legs. He could almost reach out and touch the danger in the air but, oddly, he felt no immediate threat.
‘You mean here in Japan?’
‘In Kyoto.’
‘Where in Kyoto?’
‘I have written the address — a house in the Shiga prefecture
— on this piece of paper. He will return tonight at nine. And he will be alone.’
‘How do you know this?’
‘I know. The why of it is not important. He will be there.’ The bus lights swept over them.
‘Why are you doing this?’
There was a pause. ‘Because I am a prisoner and I want to be free,’
‘A prisoner?’
‘Yes. Here, take the paper, put it in your pocket. Quickly, he has spies everywhere.’
Without turning, O’Hara said, ‘I must know. . . how did you know I was looking for Chameleon?’
The bus pulled up at the curb and stepped.
‘Please, do not betray me,’ she said. ‘Go now. Nine o’clock. Do not be late.’
There was no time left.
O’Hara jumped aboard the bus and heard the doors swish shut behind him.
A hundred feet away, among the trees in the park, Tony Falmouth watched O’Hara board the bus. He twisted, from his ear, the small speaker attached to his long-range parabolic mike. He had heard every word perfectly. He made an instant decision to follow the woman and drop O’Hara for the moment. It would be no problem to pick up O‘Hara’s trail. But this woman held the key, he felt it. His pulse began to trip. He was close. The small listening device telescoped into a thin accordion-like rod. He put it in his pocket, and jogging from tree to tree, started to follow her.
He followed her away from the market, along the edge of sprawling Maruyama Park. She skirted the heart of the city and shuffled into a small suburban section down through myriad quiet, high-fenced walkways that sheltered homes from which sequestered sounds segued as he passed from house to house: a baby crying, a radio playing elevator music, another soft rock, two women laughing softly, a man singing opera in pigeon Italian, a Coke TV commercial in Japanese. Lanterns swung idly overhead, moved by the gentle breeze, and cast Halloween shadows on the fences.
She was easy to follow; there were few people on the streets, and except for the muffled sounds from the houses, it was so quiet it was almost funereal. He could hear her sandals clopping on the cobblestones a block or so ahead of him.
