Kage (7 page)

for a strike.

As his arms came up, I shot beside him in what the
aikido

people call an
irimi,
or “entering” movement. Now we were

both facing in the same direction. I used my left hand to grab

his neck from behind. I squeezed hard. It’s not that I was going

to make much headway against those muscles; it’s that people

hate to have their head or neck held in any threatening way.

He jerked his head to his left as if trying to look over his

shoulder—it’s a reflexive action—but he also moved to try to

break my hold at the same time. As movements go, it was OK,

and perfectly understandable. But for that one split second he

had lost focus on his sword. I was still beside him and his right

arm was stretched out, gripping the haft of the wooden sword.

I lifted my
bokken
, the point straight toward heaven, and

then brought it down vertically, slamming the butt into the

cluster of nerves on the inner edge of his right forearm.

It’s a funny feeling. Sort of. I heard him gasp and then the

bokken
fell out of his hands. I dumped him on the ground and

put the tip of my own sword about an inch from his nose. He

wasn’t stunned by the fall and his eyes crossed slightly as he

focused on the tip of my weapon.

I moved away carefully, taking three steps backward to bring

me out of range, and bowed formally to him.

29

John Donohue

Yamashita strode forward. He picked up my opponent’s

sword and looked around the room. “So…” he commented to

the watchful trainees. “Application is always more interesting

than rehearsal,
neh?
” I saw some heads nod ruefully. In more

than one face, I saw a dawning gratitude that someone else had

been selected to serve as a training partner. Yamashita moved

toward the man I had put on the floor. He got up, but I knew

that he wasn’t going to be able to use his right arm for a while.

His eyes bore into mine. For the first time that day, I let my

own eyes bore back into a trainee’s eyes.
Shoulda used the kote,

bud.

Yamashita watched the silent exchange. “What we have

seen here is a lesson with two aspects. Like a sword blade, there

are two sides,
omote
and
ura,
the front and the back, the obvi-

ous and the hidden.” He canted the wooden sword in his hand

to show one side of the blade, now the other. I saw some frowns

from the group as they failed to follow his logic.

Yamashita saw it, too. He sighed. “
Omote.
Burke Sensei has

clearly demonstrated how the technique you began to train this

morning can be finished in a match. It is not the only applica-

tion, perhaps,” he said and paused to give me a subtly arch look,

“perhaps not even the most elegant. But certainly effective.”

Heads nodded, and Yamashita stood there for a minute,

saying nothing. The lights of the
dojo
made the wooden floor

gleam and, if they seemed to make his eyes deeper and darker,

they also made his shaven head shine in imitation of the hard

surfaces of his world.

Finally, someone raised a hand. “Yamashita Sensei,” the

question came. “What was the second lesson?”

My teacher looked up and regarded the expectant circle

of trainees. He smiled slightly. “Ah. The hidden lesson?” He

30

Kage

looked around. “You spent all your time waiting for me. Doing

what Burke Sensei said, but waiting for me. The wise warrior

keeps himself hidden, in the shadows.
Kage.
You know the

word?” Heads nodded.

“Just so,” my master finished. “My pupil keeps himself in

shadow. Like most people, there is more to him than meets the

eye.”

The lesson was over.

31

3

Tales

I was talking to a bunch of mystery writers about the reali-

ties of fighting: how it works and the toll it takes. And how

long it takes to recover. The overfed guy was incredulous.

“A week!” he protested, his eyes blinking in outrage. The

conference room was a soothing beige and the hotel’s mam-

moth air conditioning units kept the desert heat from seeping

into the building, but I felt a bit warm anyway. The fluores-

cent ceiling lights played on the lenses of the man’s round steel-

rimmed glasses. He had a big mustache that helped balance out

his jowls and he held a hardcover book to his breast, front cover

out, so everyone could see.
Look. This is mine. I wrote it.

I nodded and held my hands up to calm him. “A week to

ten days,” I repeated. The rest of the audience murmured in

displeasure as well.

“But I can’t have my main character laid up for that long,”

the writer continued. “It would destroy the pacing of the novel!”

I nodded in sympathy. “Sure.” But it seemed that they

wanted something more from me. I looked around the con-

ference room at the fifty or so people whose eyes were sharp-

ened in concern. I began again. “I’m not telling you how to

write your books,” I pointed out. “But the fact is, when you a

take a good beating, you can figure that you’re going to be like

the walking wounded for at least a week. Trust me, in the real

world, people don’t take punishment like that and bounce back

right away.”

32

Kage

They were all deeply disturbed. They had been raised on

Hollywood’s version of combat. Most had never been in a real

fight. You could probably stun three quarters of the people in

the room into immobility with nothing more lethal than a

good hard slap to the face. These folks were mystery writers.

Their fictional activity dragged them over just a little into my

world but its rules didn’t mesh well with theirs.

I could see that the other panelists for this little talk were

eyeing me uncomfortably. When the conference organizers

invited me to come to Arizona’s premier mystery and thriller

writers’ conference to speak about the reality of unarmed fight-

ing, I think they had something else in mind. Tales of derring

do. Nifty tricks. Lethal uses of toothpaste.

Actually, they had someone else in mind as well, but my

brother refused to go.

Micky had snickered when he showed me the invitation.

“Hey, check this out. You know that guy from the
News
who

wrote the book about that Ronin guy?” I nodded. A columnist

from the
Daily News
had churned out a breathless true-crime

paperback about a case we had been involved in. It had al the

elements of a best sel er: a tale of revenge featuring serial mur-

ders and the exotic world of the martial arts. And, as far as I was

concerned, the ending was great because Micky, Yamashita, and

I got to walk away from the scene of the crime. Actual y, they

took me away in an ambulance, but that’s beside the point. The

guy from the
News
did a halfway decent job, but for some reason

the book never did catch on—that season the reading public was

interested in other things. But the author did his best to plug the

book whenever possible, and was asking my brother to join him

on a panel in an upcoming mystery writer’s conference.

33

John Donohue

I had handed the letter back to my brother. “Why not?” I

asked. “You were the cop who was featured in his book. You

could tell those people stories that would curl their hair.”

Micky had been a policeman for twenty years. He and

his partner Art had just retired and started their own security

consulting firm. They had spent the last decade as homicide

detectives in New York City. That and a recent brush with Phil-

ippine terrorists had provided them with a wealth of contacts

and tremendous street cred. As a result, business was booming.

But although my brother no longer carried his gold detective’s

shield, not much else had changed. Growing up, Micky was

always a handful. As he’s aged (I’m not sure whether matured

is the right term) he’s gotten quieter. But it’s not a comforting

type of quiet.

We’ve got a big family and we get together often: a dense

crowd of Burkes washing across various rooms and backyards.

My brothers and sisters follow the old ways. As a result, there

is a small army of Burke children that regularly alights on my

mother’s house like a swarm of Mayo locust. The adults settle

on chairs and sofas or cluster in the kitchen to rib each other

with the ease of long familiarity. The kids pound up and down

stairs, on fire to eavesdrop on the adults, yet torn by the equally

powerful desire to consume the salty snacks strategically placed

like lures in the family room and basement, far away from their

parents.

It’s a benevolent type of chaos, a restless celebration of

connection. But in the midst of it all, you’ll often spot Micky

sidling off to a window or the backyard and staring into the

distance.

They say that cops either care too much and burn out, or

grow callous out of self-preservation. Micky’s opted for a third

34

Kage

way. My brother seems to have mastered the art of keeping his

inner filament intact, of stoking a fire that burns but doesn’t

consume him. It makes him a great cop, but it also creates an

outlook that’s pretty cut and dried: just the facts, ma’am.

“Connor,” my brother had told me, as I emerged from my

reverie, “the world is full of bullshit. Why should I contribute

to it?” I nodded in silent agreement. Micky eyed me slyly and

pointed at the invitation. “You, however, would be natural for

this sort of thing.”

Which is how I ended up in Arizona, in a room full of

writers, annoying the Walrus Man. The conference people had

offered to pay my expenses, and Sarah had a consulting job

lined up in Phoenix that she’d been putting off, so we flew

in together. I dropped her off in Scottsdale and headed south

toward Tucson. We planned to meet up in a few days and

drive north. The Grand Canyon. Cliff dwellings. The wide-

open spaces. It was going to be great if I could just avoid being

assaulted by the people at this writer’s conference.

The audience was still waiting for something from me. A

retraction? I wasn’t sure. During my brief speech, I had gotten

up to talk and had moved away from the table where three

other speakers sat. Now I looked over to my fellow panelists

in a mute appeal for help. They were silent for an awkward

moment. I got the feeling they were happy just to be out of the

blast zone. Then one cleared his throat and stood up.

He was a lean, youngish guy with a full head of dark hair,

wearing jeans, a dark turtleneck shirt, and a sport jacket. He

looked every inch the best selling writer that he was. He had

a self-confident, easy manner that probably came with being

on the “A” list. All day people had been nodding and smiling

35

John Donohue

at him, pointing him out surreptitiously and gazing in rapt

admiration. So far no one had fallen to their knees and tried to

touch the hem of his garment, but the day was young.

“What Dr. Burke has done for us,” he said smoothly, “is to

remind us of the real challenge of the writer’s craft.” He smiled

at me and I smiled back. I couldn’t help it. The guy was good.

And besides, the crowd seemed to buy it. I slipped into my

chair and listened while he distracted the mob.

“What we do as writers,” he continued, “is combine the

world in our imagination with just enough reality to engage

people’s attention; to gain their trust. And then we spin a web

with language that makes them suspend something of their

critical faculties.” He paused and the crowd seemed to hold its

breath. “Then,” he concluded, “we pull them into
our
world.”

His fellow panelists nodded in agreement and there was a gen-

eral bobbing of heads all over the room.

No one asked me questions after that. I had, I suppose,

been officially noted as someone who would never enter
their

world. Fair enough. The session broke up and people milled

around chatting and hoping for a private audience with the

other luminaries on the panel. I was left pretty much to my

own devices. I cut across the room and started to move down

a side aisle, putting the rows of metal banquet chairs between

me and the writers lingering for a last word. Some of them

still looked annoyed with me. A vigilant defense is a successful

defense.

I escaped without incident into the foyer, which was located

at the center of a series of conference rooms. People milled

about display tables with colorful flyers and paperback books

on racks, or sat along the walls at small café tables, chatting

and drinking coffee. Everyone in this section of the hotel had

36

Kage