"Sure. Listen, at the University of California at Irvine, there's two floors of a research building that you can't get into unless you have a Japanese passport. They're doing research for Hitachi there. An American university closed to Americans." Sanders swung around, waving his arms. "And around here, if something happens that they don't like, it's just a phone call from somebody to the president of the university, and what can he do? He can't afford to piss the Japanese off. So whatever they want, they get. And if they want the lab closed, it's closed."
I said, "What about the tapes?"
"Everything is locked in there. They made us leave everything."
"Really?"
"They were in a hell of a rush. It was gestapo stuff. Pushing and prodding us to get out. You can't imagine the panic at an American university if it thinks it may lose some funding." He sighed. "I don't know. Maybe Theresa managed to take some tapes with her. You could ask her."
"Where is she?"
"I think she went ice skating."
I frowned. "Ice skating?"
"That's what she said she was going to do. So you could check over there."
And he looked right at Connor. In a particularly meaningful way.
Theresa Asakuma wasn't ice skating. There were thirty little kids in the rink, with a young teacher trying in vain to control them. They looked like fourth graders. Their laughter and yells echoed in the high ceiling of the rink.
The building was almost deserted, the bleachers empty. A handful of fraternity boys sat up in one corner, looking down and punching each other on the shoulder. On our side, up high, near the ceiling, a janitor mopped. A couple of adults who looked like parents stood at the railing, down near the ice. Opposite us, a man was reading a newspaper.
I didn't see Theresa Asakuma anywhere.
Connor sighed. Wearily, he sat on the wooden bleachers and leaned back. He crossed his legs, taking his ease. I stood there, watching him. "What are you doing? She's obviously not here."
"Have a seat."
"But you're always in such a rush."
"Have a seat. Enjoy life."
I sat down next to him. We watched the kids skating around the perimeter of the ice. The teacher was shouting, "Alexander? Alexander! I've told you before. No hitting! Don't you hit her!"
I leaned back against the bleachers. I tried to relax. Connor watched the kids and chuckled. He appeared entirely at ease, without a care in the world.
I said, "Do you think Sanders is right? The Japanese squeezed the university?"
"Sure," Connor said.
"And all that business about Japan buying into American technology? Buying professorships at M.I.T.?"
"It's not illegal. They're supporting scholarship. A noble ideal."
I frowned. "So you think it's okay?"
"No," he said. "I don't think it's okay at all. If you give up control of your own institutions you give up everything. And generally, whoever pays for an institution controls it. If the Japanese are willing to put up the money – and if the American government and American industry aren't – then the Japanese will control American education. You know they already own ten American colleges. Own them outright. Bought them for the training of their young people. So that they can be assured of the ability to send young Japanese to America."
"But they already can do that. Lots of Japanese go to American universities."
"Yes. But as usual, the Japanese are planning ahead. They know in the future it may get tougher. They know that sooner or later, there will be a backlash. No matter how diplomatically they play it – and they are in the acquisition phase now, so they're playing it very diplomatically. Because the fact is, countries don't like to be dominated. They don't like to be occupied – economically or militarily. And the Japanese figure some day the Americans will wake up."
I watched the kids skating in the rink. I listened to their laughter. I thought of my daughter. I thought of the four o'clock meeting.
I said, "Why are we sitting here?"
"Because," he said.
So we sat there. The teacher was rounding the kids up now, leading them off the ice. "Skates off here. Skates off here, please. That means you too, Alexander! Alexander!"
"You know," Connor said, "if you wanted to buy a Japanese company, you couldn't do it. The people in the company would consider it shameful to be taken over by foreigners. It would be a disgrace. They would never allow it."
"I thought you could. I thought the Japanese had liberalized their rules."
Connor smiled. "Technically. Yes. Technically, you can buy a Japanese company. But as a practical matter, you can't. Because if you want to take over a company, you first have to approach its bank. And get the agreement of the bank. That's what is necessary, in order to proceed. And the bank doesn't agree."
"I thought General Motors owns Isuzu."
"GM owns a third of Isuzu. Not a controlling interest. And yes, there are isolated instances. But overall, foreign investment in Japan has declined by half in the last ten years. One company after another finds the Japanese market just too tough. They get tired of the bullshit, the hassles, the collusion, the rigged markets, the dango, the secret agreements to keep them out. They get tired of the government regulations. The run around. And eventually they give up. They just . . . give up. Most other countries have given up: Germans, Italians, French. Everybody's getting tired of trying to do business in Japan. Because no matter what they tell you, Japan is closed. A few years ago, T. Boone Pickens bought one-fourth of the stock of a Japanese company, but he couldn't get on the board of directors. Japan is closed."
"So what are we supposed to do?"
"The same thing the Europeans are doing," Connor said. "Reciprocity. Tit for tat. One of yours for one of mine. Everybody in the world has the same problem with Japan. It's just a question of what solution works best. The European solution is pretty direct. Works well, at least so far."
On the rink, some teenage girls began to do warmups and a few tentative leaps. Now the schoolteacher was leading her charges along the corridor past us. As she went by, she said, "Is one of you Lieutenant Smith?"
"Yes, ma'am," I said.
One kid said, "Do you have a gun?"
The teacher said, "That woman asked me to tell you that what you're looking for is in the men's locker room."
"It is?" I said.
The kid said, "Can I see it?"
The teacher said, "You know, the Oriental woman? I think she was Oriental."
"Yes," Connor said. "Thank you."
"I want to see the gun."
Another kid said, "Quiet, stupid. Don't you know anything? They're undercover."
"I want to see the gun."
Connor and I started walking away. The kids trailed after us, still asking to see our guns. Across the rink, the man with the newspaper looked up curiously. He watched us leave.
"Nothing like an inconspicuous exit," Connor said.
The men's locker room was deserted. I started going through the green metal lockers, one after another, looking for the tapes. Connor didn't bother. I heard him call to me, "Back here."
He was in the rear by the showers. "You found the tapes?"
"No."
He was holding open a door.
We went down a flight of concrete stairs to a landing. There were two doors. One opened onto a below-grade truck entrance. The other went into a dark hallway with wooden beams. "This way," Connor said.