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dominance in swordsmanship carried him through untold duels. Musashi pioneered the simultaneous use of two swords in
    Japanese swordsmanship but often faced his opponents armed with nothing but a wooden weapon. Once he used a carved-down boat oar. Whatever weapon he used, the results were always the same: a crumpled form in the dirt and Musashi stalking away, never satisfied, always hungry for another opponent. He always struck me as a man with something to prove.
    He's known today for writing A Book of Five Rings, a treatise on strategy in swordsmanship. It's been touted as some sort of major work on strategy for today's businessmen, and deluded MBA students read it, thinking a tough merger negotiation is the twentieth-century equivalent of a sword duel. The dust jacket claims it's the secret guide to strategy for Japanese executives, but if you go to Japan, it's hard to come by and only antiquarians are familiar with it.
    But I had to admit that it was a brilliant move. The weapons assembled were bound to draw a crowd.
    Which was pretty much how he laid it out and where I came in. Bobby was a bit of an egotist, but he was also shrewd enough to know what he didn't know. A show like this would have martial artists as well as scholars coming out of the woodwork. Some in both groups would be lunatics, but a significant number would be fairly well informed. As a result, Bobby needed to make sure that his display hype was historically accurate. He could have tried to get some reputable name to do it, but Bobby was not really connected with those circles.
    Domanova, like a shark smelling blood in the water, had sensed that Bobby was rapidly emerging as a successful and wealthy entrepreneur in search of some respectability. If I could do Bobby a favor on the cheap, the relationship with Domanova would grow and everyone would be happy. The president would give him a patina of respectability. Bobby would be slowly courted and stroked you could imagine the dorsal fins circling and eventually cajoled into making a sizable donation to the university.
    It was a very finely choreographed dance where need, ego, money, and illusion swirled together. In higher education they call it "institutional development."
    I don't pretend to understand all that, but my role in the process was pretty straightforward. Bobby called in his shiny receptionist to make copies of the documents in the folder and asked me to come up with some stuff on the different historical figures and their role in Japanese warrior culture. "Nothing too complicated, now, Professor," he reminded. "A little blood, a little guts, a little budo..." he grinned at me with that long horse face and I felt the urge to grin back. Bobby was not my kind of person, but it was hard not to respond to someone who was so obviously having so much fun.
    "You ever been to Samurai House before, Mr. Burke?" I shook my head and he headed for the door, giving me a "come along" jerk of the head.
    "I've been working on this place for years. Started as an Asian antique center. Ydu know vases, lacquer screens, that kind of stuff. I got a sense, though, that this martial arts thing was going to be big. So over time, I've been adding things a mail-order house here, videos, a gallery for traveling displays ..."
    "Diversification," I commented.
    He smiled. "It's a beautiful thing. My latest thing is the training and exhibition hall. Check it out."
    The office suite was tucked away in a corner of the business part of the complex. From the other side of the lobby waterworks, you entered the public area through large wood doors that matched all the furniture in the office suite. On this side, instead of an office reception area, there was a rock garden, you walked around it and could then access the training and exhibition hall. "Some of the stuff's in there now," Bobby said as we walked past the garden. "Got a special security detail to watch it."
    We went in through those sliding paper screen doors the