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Bangkok,
    Taipei, Mexico City, Cairo, Bombay
    Satisfaction Is Guaranteed

    A little while later she got undressed and went to bed. But lying there alone in the darkness, she found she could not sleep.

4.

    They were actually quite kind at the Clinic. Nicer, at least, than Reiko had anticipated. In her mind she had pictured a stark, sterile-white hospital setting. It was reassuring, then, to sit in the pastel waiting room, with cranes and other symbols of good fortune traced out delicately upon the wall reliefs. Tetsuo remained behind when her name was called, but he did smile and offer her a nod of encouragement as the nurse bowed and ushered her into the examination room.

    The doctors were distant and professional, for which Reiko was grateful. They tapped and thumped and measured her temperature. When it came time to take various samples, there was only a little pain, and her modesty was protected by a screen across the middle of her body.

    Then she was returned to the waiting room. One of the doctors accompanying her bowed and told Tetsuo that she would be ready to conceive in three days' time. Tetsuo replied with a polite hiss of satisfaction and exchanged further bows with the doctor before they turned to leave together.

    During the next few days Reiko saw little of Tetsuo. He really did, it seemed, have business to do in Seoul—meetings and sales analyses. The Clinic provided a guide to show Reiko and a few other prospective mothers the sights, such as they were. They saw the Olympic Village, the war memorials, the great public museums. Only occasionally did some passerby glance sourly at them on hearing spoken Japanese. All in all, Reiko found the Koreans much nicer than she had been led to expect from the stories she had heard since childhood. But then, perhaps the Koreans she met felt the same way about her. It was all very interesting.

    Still, this was no second honeymoon. Not the resumption of bliss she had hoped for. When Tetsuo returned late to their hotel room the following two nights, she could tell that he had spent part of his day in close proximity to other women.

    Even the explanation offered by one of the other wives did not much ease Reiko's disappointment. "The clinic prefers to have some fresh semen to supplement the frozen samples they stored during our husbands' past visits," Mrs. Nakamura confided while they waited together on the third day. Reiko's head spun in confusion.

    "You—you mean he has been . . . donating for some time?"

    Mrs. Takebayashi nodded, confirming that Tetsuo had had this in mind for months, at least. On at least his last two trips to Seoul, he must have visited the Clinic to collect his seed for freezing. Or, more likely, he had used the kairaku house next door, which Reiko was now certain maintained a business relationship with the Pak Jong doctors.

    "I am sure the place is licensed and regularly inspected," Mrs. Nakamura added. And Reiko knew which establishment she meant. Reiko nearly bristled at the presumption that Tetsuo would ever think of patronizing an unlicensed house and so risk his family's health with some filthy gaijin disease.

    She restrained herself, knowing that part of her passion arose out of a sense of bitter disappointment. Somehow Reiko managed to see a bright side to it all. The donated material probably has to be prepared quickly. That is why he continued to use the pleasure house, even when I was here.

    She was well aware that she was rationalizing. But right at that moment rationalization was all that stood between Reiko and despair. When, a little while later, she had to endure intromission by cold glass and plastic, Reiko lay back and clasped her arms tightly across her breasts, dreaming of her first conception, which had come the natural way, with her hands and legs wrapped around a living, breathing, sighing man, her loving husband.

5.

    Three weeks after they returned to Tokyo, it became apparent they had succeeded—at least so far as