Genda left his office as if walking on a cloud. The man he admired more than anyone else in the world-the man all Japan admired more than anyone else in the world-approved of him! Most of Japan knew-or rather, knew of-Admiral Yamamoto from gushing newspaper and magazine articles. Genda knew the man himself, and found him all the more admirable for the acquaintance.

Trying to suppress a silly grin, Genda went up the stairs from the basement. He got to the top at the same time as Cynthia Laanui, the newly crowned Queen of Hawaii, came down the back stairs from the ground floor of Iolani Palace. “Your Majesty,” Genda said in English, carefully keeping the irony from his voice.

“Hello, Commander Genda. How are you today?” The Queen knew him by sight; he was one of the four officers-two from the Japanese Navy, two from the Army-who’d chosen her husband from among the possible candidates for the restored Hawaiian throne. Stanley Owana Laanui-King Stanley now-was the first candidate who’d made it plain he would cooperate with Japan.

Genda didn’t think Queen Cynthia knew how simple the selection criteria were. He didn’t intend to enlighten her, either. “Better now, thank you,” he said. He read English well but, unlike Yamamoto, spoke less fluently.

Cynthia Laanui smiled at him. She was, without a doubt, the first red-haired Queen the Kingdom of Hawaii had ever had. The smile packed a punch. She was somewhere between twenty-five and thirty, with green eyes, freckles, and, from the neck down, an abundant profusion of everything a woman ought to have.

“I want to thank you for everything you’ve done for my husband,” she said. King Stanley was at least twenty years older than she was; Genda didn’t think she was his first wife. Why he’d married her was obvious. Why she’d married him wasn’t, not to Genda. But she seemed to care about him.