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apparently considered it a violation of Japanese dignity for the old man to have so publicly shamed himself by talking to us about it. When I went down later that week with a flagon of soy sauce and some saké, he was gone. All that was left of the random clutter of his shelter were some charred sticks and a bent jerry can.

7
    THE TICKET-HALL GANG
    (HIROSHI TAKARA)
    Two yankii sailors — enormous black men with flapping white trousers and tiny hats perched on the tops of their heads — were strolling amongst the clapboard stalls and counters of the Ueno Sunshine Market. I was stalking them — Captain Takara, 1st Ghost Army — and I’d collected half a dozen long cigarette butts already, when I saw that one of them was about to fling another to the ground.
    As soon as the war had ended, the markets had sprung up like mushrooms at all the main train stations around the Yamanote Line: Shimbashi, Shinjuku, and here at Ueno. At first, scruffy men and women had just laid out whatever they had to sell on bare patches of earth — cups, pens, any old rubbish. One morning, I’d even seen a soldier sell off all his clothes, piece by piece. First his greatcoat, then his boots, then his shirt and trousers, until finally he was down to just shivering in his underwear, and I thought for a moment he was even going to try and sell that, and go off with the money wedged between his cheeks.
    Soon enough, though, the yakuza gangs had decided to move in, and now the wasteground beneath the overhead train tracks was just like a real market, with electric lights and speakers playing gramophone records and peddlers who sold everything from saucepans to kimonos. There were noodle shops and counter bars selling tumblers of rough booze, and the place was patrolled day and night by the flashy toughs who worked for Mr. Suzuki, the market boss with a head like a bullet, who could sometimes be seen making his rounds, wearing his pale grey silk suit and felt fedora.
    We called it the American Sweet Shop. The GIs came along on Friday nights to swap their B-rations for whisky and fake antiques. We shined their shoes and scrounged chocolate and chewing gum; kids stole things from their pockets and some of the older girls took them off into the shadows under the railway arches.
    I was a cigarette boy. The yankiis all smoked like crazy — American cigarettes at that — and if you followed them for long enough, you could easily collect up enough butts to wrinkle out the tobacco into new two-sen smokes. You could then palm these off on some poor Japanese, who’d smoke them right down to the last cardboard embers.
    The sailor lifted his massive hand and flung his smouldering cigarette into the air. I pounced, but suddenly, he moved, and I slammed into his leg, as thick as a tree trunk. I sprawled there, stunned, for a moment. From nowhere, another cocky boy jumped in.
    â€œGet off!” I shouted. “This is my patch!” I twisted around and grabbed the boy, and we grappled and thrashed on the ground as the laughing sailors goaded us on, ducking and weaving behind their giant fists.
    My hand was around the boy’s throat and I pinned him to the ground. But then, as I slapped his terrified face, I had a sudden shock. It was Koji, the grandson of Mrs. Oka, the pickle seller who’d lived next door to us in Asakusa.
    â€œKoji?” I said, letting go of his neck. “Is that you?”
    The boy nodded and wiped away his snot and tears with dirty little fists.
    â€œDo you remember me?” I asked, brushing him down.
    He grimaced. “What happened to your face?”
    The thick welts on my cheeks had gone hard now, like the rubber on bicycle tires.
    â€œI got burned.”
    His eyes grew wider. “You look creepy!”
    I nodded. “What happened to your granny?”
    He thrust out his bottom lip.
    â€œOh. Sorry. Did I hurt you?”
    He shrugged.
    â€œYou