“Sickening,” Mr. Tagomi said.
No more SD men appeared in the open doorway.
“Possibly it is over,” General Tedeki said after a pause. Mr. Tagomi, engaged in tedious three-minute task of reloading, paused to press the button of the desk intercom. “Bring medical emergency aid,” he instructed. “Hideously injured thug, here.”
No answer, only a hum.
Stooping, Mr. Baynes had picked up both the Germans’ guns; he passed one to the general, keeping the other himself.
“Now we will mow them down,” Mr. Tagomi said, reseating himself with his Colt .44, as before. “Formidable triumvirate, in this office.”
From the hall a voice called, “German hoodlums surrender!”
“Already taken care of,” Mr. Tagomi called back. “Lying either dead or dying. Advance and verify empirically.”
A party of Nippon Times employees gingerly appeared, several of them carrying building riot equipment such as axes and rifles and tear-gas grenades.
“Cause célèbre,” Mr. Tagomi said. “PSA Government in Sacramento could declare war on Reich without hesitation.” He broke open his gun. “Anyhow, over with.”
“They will deny complicity,” Mr. Baynes said. “Standard technique. Used countless times.” He laid the silencer equipped pistol on Mr. Tagomi’s desk. “Made in Japan.”
He was not joking. It was true. Excellent quality Japanese target pistol. Mr. Tagomi examined it.
“And not German nationals,” Mr. Baynes said. He had taken the wallet of one of the whites, the dead one. “PSA citizen. Lives in San José. Nothing to connect him with the SD. Name is Jack Sanders.” He tossed the wallet down.
“A holdup,” Mr. Tagomi said. “Motive: our locked vault. No political aspects.” He arose shakily to his feet.
In any case, the assassination or kidnapping attempt by the SD had failed. At least, this first one had. But clearly they knew who Mr. Baynes was, and no doubt what he had come for.
“The prognosis,” Mr. Tagomi said, “is gloomy.”
He wondered if in this instance the oracle would be of any use. Perhaps it could protect them. Warn them, shield them, with its advice.
Still quite shaky, he began taking out the forty-nine yarrow stalks. Whole situation confusing and anomalous, he decided. No human intelligence could decipher it; only five-thousand-year-old joint mind applicable. German totalitarian society resembles some faulty form of life, worse than natural thing. Worse in all its admixtures, its potpourri of pointlessness.
Here, he thought, local SD acts as instrument of policy totally at odds with head in Berlin. Where in this composite being is the sense? Who really is Germany? Who ever was? Almost like decomposing nightmare parody of problems customarily faced in course of existence.
The oracle will cut through it. Even weird breed of cat like Nazi Germany comprehensible to I Ching.
Mr. Baynes, seeing Mr. Tagomi distractedly manipulating the handful of vegetable stalks, recognized how deep the man’s distress was. For him, Mr. Baynes thought, this event, his having had to kill and mutilate these two men, is not only dreadful; it is inexplicable.
What can I say that might console him? He fired on my behalf; the moral responsibility for these two lives is therefore mine, and I accept it. I view it that way.
Coming over beside Mr. Baynes, General Tedeki said in a soft voice, “You witness the man’s despair. He, you see, was no doubt raised as a Buddhist. Even if not formally, the influence was there. A culture in which no life is to be taken; all lives holy.”