“Slowly.”
“Certainly.”
I locate the cup, I rinse them both lightly with hot water, I prepare the tea.
“No, don’t pass it to me,” he says, and he reaches forward and takes the cup from where I had filled it.
I suppress a desire to smile.
“Would you have a lump of sugar?” he asks.
“Sorry.”
He sighs and reaches into his other pocket, from which he withdraws a small flask.
“Vodka? In tea?”
“Don’t be silly. My tastes have changed. It’s Wild Turkey liqueur, a wonderful sweetener. Would you care for some?”
“Let me smell it.”
There is a certain sweetness to the aroma.
“All right,” I say, and he laces our tea with it.
We taste the tea. Not bad.
“How long has it been?” he asks.
“Fourteen years—almost fifteen,” I tell him. “Back in the eighties.”
“Yes.”
He rubs his jaw. “I’d heard you’d retired.”
“You heard right. It was about a year after our last encounter.”
“Turkey—yes. You married a man from your Code Section.”
I nod.
“You were widowed three or four years later. Daughter born after your husband’s death. Returned to the States. Settled in the country. That’s all I know.”
“That’s all there is.”
He takes another drink of tea.
“Why did you come back here?”
“Personal reasons. Partly sentimental.”
“Under a false identity?”
“Yes. It involves my husband’s family. I don’t want them to know I’m here.”
“Interesting. You mean that they would watch arrivals as closely as we have?”
“I didn’t know you watched arrivals here.”
“Right now we do.”
“You’ve lost me. I don’t know what’s going on.”
There is another roll of thunder. A few more drops spatter about us.
“I would like to believe that you are really retired,” he says. “I’m getting near that point myself, you know.”
“I have no reason to be back in business. I inherited a decent amount, enough to take care of me and my daughter.”
He nods.
“If I had such an inducement I would not be in the field,” he says. “I would rather sit home and read, play chess, eat and drink regularly. But you must admit it is quite a coincidence your being here when the future success of several nations is being decided.”
I shake my head.
“I’ve been out of touch with a lot of things.”
“The Osaka Oil Conference. It begins two weeks from Wednesday. You were planning perhaps to visit Osaka at about that time?”
“I will not be going to Osaka.”
“A courier then. Someone from there will meet you, a simple tourist, at some point in your travels, to convey—”
“My God! Do you think everything’s a conspiracy, Boris? I am just taking care of some personal problems and visiting some places that mean something to me. The conference doesn’t.”
“All right.” He finishes his tea and puts the cup aside. “You know that we know you are here. A word to the Japanese authorities that you are traveling under false papers and they will kick you out. That would be simplest. No real harm done and one agent nullified. Only it would be a shame to spoil your trip if you are indeed only a tourist. . . .”
A rotten thought passes through my mind as I see where this is leading, and I know that my thought is far rottener than his. It is something I learned from a strange old woman I once worked with who did not look like an old woman.
I finish my tea and raise my eyes. He is smiling.
“I will make us some more tea,” I say.
I see that the top button of my shirt comes undone while I am bent partly away from him. Then I lean forward with his cup and take a deep breath.
“You would consider not reporting me to the authorities?”