Read Hard Rain for Free Online

used the same name, he would tell me that it was by
    this that he had managed to find me, thereby avoiding the need to
    reveal how he had really done it, and leaving the vulnerability intact,
    perhaps to be exploited again later.
    So I said nothing, affecting a slightly bored expression instead.
    He looked at me, the corners of his mouth creeping upward into the
    barest hint of a smile. It was his way of acknowledging that I knew
    what he was up to, meaning it was useless for him to keep at it, and
    that he would now get to the point.
    "Fukuoka was too small," he said. "Sapporo, too remote. Nagoya was
    too close to Tokyo. Hiroshima was possible because the atmosphere is
    good, but I thought the Kansai region more likely because it's less
    distant from Tokyo, to which I guessed you might want to maintain some
    proximity. That meant Kyoto, possibly Kobe. But more likely Osaka."
    "Because ..."
    He shrugged. "Because Osaka is bigger, more bustling, so there is more
    room to hide. And it has a larger transient population, so a new
    arrival draws less attention. Also I know how you love jazz, and Osaka
    is known for its clubs."
    I might have known that Tatsu would key on the clubs. During the
    Taisho Period, from 1912 to 1926, jazz migrated from Shanghai to
    Kansai, the western region of Honshu, Japan's main island, where Osaka
    is located. A host of dance halls and live houses were built in the
    Soemoncho and Dotonbori entertainment districts, and jazz took off in
    cafes everywhere. The legacy lives on today in establishments like
    Mr. Kelly's, Overseas, Royal Horse, and, of course, the Osaka Blue
    Note, and I couldn't deny that the presence of these places had been a
    factor in my thinking.
    I had even recognized, for the very reasons Tatsu had just articulated,
    that Osaka might be a somewhat predictable choice. But I had also
    found that I was reluctant to forgo the lifestyle advantages that the
    city would afford me. When I was younger, I would have reflexively
    forgone any such comforts in favor of the imperative of personal
    security. But I found my priorities were changing with age, and this,
    as much as anything else, was a clear sign that it was time for me to
    get out of the game.
    So sure, knowing me as he did, it wouldn't be too difficult for Tatsu
    to assume Osaka. But that wouldn't have been enough for him to
    pinpoint me the way he ultimately had.
    "Impressive," I told him. "But you haven't explained how you were then
    able to pick me up in a city of almost nine million."
    He raised his head slightly and looked at me directly. "Rain-san," he
    said, "I understand your desire to know. And I will tell you. But it
    is important that the information goes no further, or the
    crime-fighting effectiveness of the Metropolitan Police Force will be
    curtailed. Can I trust you with this information?"
    The question, and the revelations that might follow it, were intended
    to show that I could trust him, as well. "You know you can," I told
    him.
    He nodded. "Over the last decade or so, the major pre-fectural and
    ward governments have been independently installing security cameras in
    various public places, such as subway stations and major pedestrian
    thoroughfares. There is substantial evidence, much of it gathered from
    the experience of the United Kingdom, that such cameras deter crime."
    "I've seen the cameras."
    "You can see some of them. Not all. In any event, the cameras
    themselves are not really the issue. What is behind them is what
    matters. After the events of September eleventh in the United States,
    the Metropolitan Police Force undertook a major initiative to link up
    these informal networks of cameras with a central database that runs
    advanced facial recognition software. The software reads
    characteristics that are difficult or impossible to obscure the
    distance between the eyes, for example, or the precise angles of the
    triangle formed by the corners of the eyes and the center of the mouth.
    Now, when a