'Right. Well, I guess it's okay. What harm can a game do?' He returned the miniature Go board and conducted Nicholai to the visiting room.
Five minutes later the door opened, and General Kishikawa entered, followed by two more guards, another Japanese, and a thick-set Russian with the immobile, meaty face of the Slavic peasant. Nicholai rose in greeting, as the two new protectors took up their positions against the wall.
As Kishikawa-san approached, Nicholai automatically made a slight head bow of filial obeisance. The gesture was not lost upon the Japanese guards, who exchanged brief glances, but remained silent.
The General shuffled forward and took the chair opposite Nicholai, across the rough wooden table. When at last he lifted his eyes, the young man was struck by the General's appearance. He had expected an alteration in Kishikawa-san's features, an erosion of his gentle virile manner, but not this much.
The man sitting opposite him was old, frail, diminished. There was an oddly priestly look to his transparent skin and slow, uncertain movements. When finally he spoke, his voice was soft and monotonic, as if communication was a pointless burden.
'Why have you come, Nikko?'
'To be with you, sir.'
'I see.'
There followed a silence during which Nicholai could think of nothing to say, and the General had nothing to say. Finally, with a long, fluttering sigh, Kishikawa-san assumed the responsibility for the conversation because he did not want Nicholai to feel uncomfortable with the silence. 'You look well, Nikko. Are you?'
'Yes, sir.'
'Good. Good. You grow more like your mother each day. I can see her eyes in yours.' He smiled faintly. 'Someone should have advised your family that this particular color of green was meant for jade or ancient glass, not for human eyes. It is disconcerting.'
Nicholai forced a smile. 'I shall speak to an ophthalmologist, sir, to see if there is a remedy for our blunder.'
'Yes. Do that.'
'I shall.'
'Do.' The General gazed away and seemed for a second to forget Nicholai's presence. Then: 'So? How are you getting on?'
'Well enough. I work for the Americans. A translator.'
'So? And do they accept you?'
'They ignore me, which is just as well.'
'Better, really.'
There was another brief silence, which Nicholai was going to break with small talk when Kishikawa-san raised his hand.
'Of course you have questions. I will tell you things quickly and simply, then we shall discuss them no further.'
Nicholai bowed his head in compliance.
'I was in Manchuria, as you know. I became sick—pneumonia. I was in fever and coma when the Russians attacked the hospital unit where I was. When I became myself again, I was in a reeducation camp, under constant surveillance and unable to use the portal through which so many of my brother officers had escaped the indignity of surrender and the humiliations of... reeducation. Only a few other officers were captured. They were taken away somewhere and not heard of again. Our captors assumed that officers were either incapable or unworthy of... reeducation. I assumed this would be my fate also, and I awaited it with such calm as I could manage. But no. Evidently, the Russians thought that one thoroughly reeducated officer of general rank would be a useful thing to introduce into Japan, to aid them with their plans for the future of our country. Many... many... many methods of reeducation were employed. The physical ones were easiest to bear—hunger, sleeplessness, beatings. But I am a stubborn old man, and I do not reeducate easily. As I had no family left alive in Japan as hostages, they were denied the emotional whip with which they had reeducated others. A long time passed. A year and a half, I think. It is difficult to tell the seasons when you never see the light of day, and when endurance is measured in five more minutes... five more minutes... I can stand this for five more minutes.' The General was lost for a time in memories of specific torments. Then, with a faint start, he returned to his story. 'Sometimes they lost patience with me and made the error of giving me periods of rest in unconsciousness. A long time passed in this way. Months measured in minutes. Then suddenly they stopped all efforts toward my reeducation. I assumed, of course, that I would be killed. But they had something more degrading in mind for me. I was cleaned and deloused. A plane trip. A long ride on a railroad. Another plane trip. And I was here. For a month, I was kept here with no idea of their intentions. Then, two weeks ago, a Colonel Gorbatov visited me. He was quite frank with me. Each occupying nation has offered up its share of war criminals. The Soviets have had none to offer, no direct participation in the machinery of international justice. Before me, that is.'
'But, sir—'
Kishikawa-san lifted his hand for silence. 'I decided I would not face this final humiliation. But I had no way to release myself. I have no belt. My clothes, as you see, are of stout canvas that I have not the strength to tear. I eat with a wooden spoon and bowl. I am permitted to shave only with an electric razor, and only under close surveillance.' The General smiled a gray smile. 'The Soviets prize me, it would appear. They are concerned not to lose me. Ten days ago, I stopped eating. It was easier than you might imagine. They threatened me, but when a man decides to live no longer, he removes the power of others to make potent threats. So... they held me down on a table and forced a rubber tube down my throat. And they fed me liquids. It was ghastly... humiliating... eating and vomiting all at once. It was without dignity. So I promised to start eating again. And here I am.'
Throughout this minimal explanation, Kishikawa-san had riveted his eyes on the rough surface of the table, intense and defocused.
Nicholai's eyes stung with brimming tears. He stared ahead, not daring to blink and send tears down his cheeks that would embarrass his father—his friend, that is.
Kishikawa-san drew a long breath and looked up. 'No, no. There's no point in that, Nikko. The guards are looking on. Don't give them this satisfaction.' He reached across and patted Nicholai's cheek with a firmness that was almost an admonitory slap.
At this point, the American sergeant straightened up, ready to protect his Sphinx compatriot from this gook general.
But Nicholai scrubbed his face with his hands, as though in fatigue, and with this gesture he rid himself of the tears.
'So!' Kishikawa-san said with new energy. 'It is nearly time for the blossoms of Kajikawa. Do you intend to visit them?'
Nicholai swallowed. 'Yes.'
'That's good. The Occupation Forces have not chopped them down, then?'
'Not physically.'
The General nodded. 'And have you friends in your life, Nikko?'
'I... I have people living with me.'
'As I recall from a letter from our friend Otake shortly before his death, there was a girl in his household, a student—I am sorry, but I don't remember her name. Evidently you were not totally indifferent to her charms. Do you still see her?'
Nicholai considered before answering. 'No, sir, I don't.'
'Not a quarrel, I hope.'
'No. Not a quarrel.'
'Ah, well, at your age affections ebb and flow. When you get older, you will discover that you cling to some with desperation.' The effort to make Nicholai comfortable with social talk seemed to exhaust Kishikawa-san. There was really nothing he wanted to say, and after his experiences of the past two years, nothing he wanted to know. He bowed his head and stared at the table, slipping into the tight cycle of abbreviated thoughts and selected memories from his childhood with which he had learned to narcotize his imagination.
At first, Nicholai found comfort in the silence too. Then he realized that they were not together in it, but alone and apart. He drew the miniature Go board and packet of metal stones from his pocket and set it on the
