The Ark Sakura Read Free Page A

with tweezers and glue, I’ve heard.”
    “How many have you sold altogether?” I asked, deeming it safest to change the subject.
    “One.”
    “No, really.”
    “Look, if you want your money back, I don’t mind.”
    “Why do you say that?”
    “To avoid a hassle.”
    “There were some other people who bought one before me.”
    “No, there weren’t.”
    “Yes, there were. Don’t you remember? A man and a young woman.”
    “You haven’t been around much, have you? I hired them as sakura— decoys, shills, to lure customers.”
    “They looked on the level to me.”
    “Well, they have a standing contract with the department store, so they’re in a little better class than your average confidence man. Besides, the girl is terrific. She makes great cover.”
    “She had me fooled.”
    “She’s a looker, all right. She’s got real class. That son of a gun …”
    “There’s a new system for classifying women into types,” I said. “I saw it in the paper. The ‘quintuple approach,’ I think it was called. According to that, women fall into five main types—Mother, Housewife, Wife, Woman, and Human Being. Which one would you say she is?”
    “That sort of thing doesn’t interest me.”
    “It’s all been carefully researched by a top ad agency. It’s some new tool they’ve worked out for market analysis, so it should be fairly reliable.”
    “You believe that stuff?”
    A flock of sparrows flew low overhead. Then came a rain-cloud that brushed the department store rooftop as it sped by in pursuit. Canvas flaps over the stalls fluttered and snapped in the wind; shoppers paused uncertainly. Here and there some stallkeepers were already closing up. They would be the ones whose goods were sold out, or who had given up on selling any more that day.
    “Shouldn’t you be getting back to your stall? Looks like rain.”
    “I’ve quit.” He laid thin slices of ham and tomato on top of each other, speared them with a fork, and grinned. His boyish grin went surprisingly well with his bald head.
    “Don’t give up so soon,” I said. “The eupcaccia gives people something to dream about; I’m sure you can sell at least a couple more if you try.”
    “You’re weird, you know that? What do you do for a living, anyway?” He stroked his head with hairy fingers until the smokelike wisps of hair lay flat against his scalp, making the top of his head look even bigger.
    A customer wandered up to the stall next to the rest area where we were sitting. The item for sale there was an all-purpose vibrator, oval in shape, featuring a metal fitting for an electric drill on the end, in which a variety of tools could be inserted: back scratcher, toothbrush, facial sponge, wire brush, shoulder massager, small hammer … you name it. It certainly was ingenious, yet it failed to fire the imagination. Besides, there at the counter they had only samples. To make a purchase you had to go through some fishy rigmarole, leaving a ten percent deposit and filling out an order blank with your name and address; the device would supposedly be delivered to your doorstep (for a slight charge) within a week. I found it hard to see why anyone would want to buy such a thing.
    “There you have the opposite of a dream,” I said. “Sheer practicality.”
    “There you have a lesson in how to fleece people,” said the insect dealer. “Nothing wild or fantastic, you see. Plain, everyday items are best—kitchen stuff, especially. If you’re clever, you can even fool people in the same line. But it doesn’t bear repeating. You can never work the same place, or the same item, more than once. And until you’ve mapped out your next strategy, you’ve got to keep jumping from town to town. Not an easy life.”
    “Does the eupcaccia bear repeating?” I asked.
    “Ah—so now you’ve made up your mind it’s a fake.”
    “Just eat your sandwich, please. What did you have for breakfast?”
    “What does it matter?”
    “I always have