Текст книги "1q84"

Автор книги: Haruki Murakami

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Текущая страница: 71 (всего у книги 81 страниц)

CHAPTER 20

Aomame

ONE ASPECT OF MY TRANSFORMATION

On Sunday the wind had died down. It was a warm, calm day, totally different from the night before. People took off their heavy coats and enjoyed the sunshine. Aomame, however, did not enjoy the nice weather—she spent the day as always, shut away in her room, the curtains closed.

As she listened to Janáček’s Sinfonietta, the sound down low, she stretched and then turned to her exercise machine to do some resistance training. She was gradually adding routines to her training workout and it now took nearly two hours to complete. Afterward she cooked, cleaned the apartment, and lay on the sofa to read In Search of Lost Time. She had finally begun volume three, The Guermantes Way. She tried her best to keep busy. She only watched TV twice a day—the NHK news broadcasts at noon and seven p.m. As always, nothing big was going on—no, actually, lots of big events were happening in the world. People all around the world had lost their lives, many of them in tragic ways—train wrecks, ferry boats sinking, plane crashes. A civil war went on with no end in sight, an assassination, a terrible ethnic massacre. Weather shifts had brought on drought, floods, famine. Aomame deeply sympathized with the people caught up in these tragedies and disasters, but even so, not a single thing had occurred that had a direct bearing on her.

Neighborhood children were playing in the playground across the street, shouting something. She could hear the crows gathered on the roof, cawing out the latest gossip. The air had that early-winter city smell.

It suddenly hit her that ever since she had been living in this condo she had never once felt any sexual desire. Not once had she felt like having sex. She hadn’t even masturbated. Maybe it was due to her pregnancy and her body’s hormonal changes. Still, Aomame was relieved. This wasn’t exactly the place to find a sexual outlet, should she decide she had to sleep with someone. She was happy, too, to not have any more periods. Her periods had never been heavy, but still she felt as if she had set down a load she had been carrying forever. It was one less thing to have to think about.

In the three months that she had been here, her hair had grown long. In September it had barely touched her shoulders, but now it was down to her shoulder blades. When she was a child her mother had always trimmed it short, and from junior high onward, because sports had been her life, she had never let it grow out. It felt a bit too long now, but she couldn’t very well cut it herself. She trimmed her bangs, but that was all. She kept her hair up during the day and let it down at night. And then, while listening to music, she brushed it a hundred strokes, something you can only do if you have plenty of time on your hands.

Normally she wore almost no makeup, and now especially there was no need for it. But she wanted to keep a set daily routine as much as she could, so she made sure to take good care of her skin. She massaged her skin with creams and lotions, put on a face mask before bedtime. She was basically a very healthy person, and just a little extra care was all it took for her skin to be beautiful and lustrous. Or maybe this, too, was a by-product of being pregnant? She had heard that pregnant women had beautiful skin. Either way, when she sat at her mirror, let down her hair, and examined her face, she did feel she looked prettier than ever before. Or at least she was taking on the composure of a mature woman. Probably.

Aomame had never once felt beautiful. No one had ever told her that she was. Her mother treated her like she was an ugly child. “If only you were prettier,” her mother always said—meaning if she were prettier, a cuter child, they could recruit more converts. So Aomame had always avoided looking at herself in mirrors. When she absolutely had to, she quickly, efficiently, checked out her reflection.

Tamaki Otsuka had told her she liked her features. Not bad at all, she had said. They are actually very nice. You should have more confidence. That had made Aomame happy. She was just entering puberty, and her friend’s warm words calmed her. Maybe I’m not as ugly as my mother said I was, she began to think. But even Tamaki had never called her beautiful.

Now, however, for the first time in her life, Aomame saw something beautiful in her face. She was able to sit in front of the mirror longer than ever before and examine her face more thoroughly. She wasn’t being narcissistic. She inspected her face from a number of angles, as if it were somebody else’s. Had she really become beautiful? Or was it her way of appreciating everything that had changed, not her face itself? Aomame couldn’t decide.

Occasionally she would put on a big frown in the mirror. Her frowning face looked the same as it always had. The muscles in her face stretched in all directions, her features unraveled, each distinct from the other. All possible emotions in the world gushed out from her face. It was neither beautiful nor ugly. From one angle she looked demonic, from a different angle comic. And from yet another angle her face was a chaotic jumble. When she stopped frowning her facial muscles gradually relaxed, like ripples vanishing on the surface of water, and her usual features returned. And then Aomame discovered a new, slightly different version of herself.

“You should smile more naturally,” Tamaki had often told her. “Your features are gentle when you smile, so it’s a shame that you don’t do so more often.” But Aomame could never smile easily, or casually, in front of people. When she forced it, she ended up with a tight sneer, which made others even more tense and uncomfortable. Tamaki was different: she had a natural, cheerful smile. People meeting her for the first time immediately felt friendly toward her. In the end, though, disappointment and despair drove Tamaki to take her own life, leaving Aomame—who couldn’t manage a decent smile—behind.

It was a quiet Sunday. The warm sunshine had led many people to the playground across the road. Parents stood around, their children playing in the sandbox or on the swings. Some kids were playing on the slide. Elderly people sat on the benches, intently watching the children at play. Aomame went out on her balcony, sat on her garden chair, and half-heartedly watched through a gap in the screen. It was a peaceful scene. Time was marching on in the world. Nobody there was under threat of death, nobody there was on the trail of a killer. Nobody there had a fully loaded 9mm automatic pistol wrapped in tights in her dresser drawer.

Will I ever be able to participate in that quiet, normal world again? Aomame asked herself. Will there ever come a day when I can lead this little one by the hand, go to the park, and let it play on the swings, on the slides? Lead my daily life without thinking about who I will kill next, or who will kill me? Is that possible in this 1Q84 world? Or is it only possible in some other world? And most important of all—will Tengo be beside me?

Aomame stopped looking at the park and went back inside. She closed the sliding glass door and shut the curtains. She couldn’t hear the children’s voices now and a sadness tugged at her. She was cut off from everything, stuck in a place that was locked from the inside. I’ll stop watching the playground during the day. Tengo won’t come in the daytime. What he was looking for was a clear view of the two moons.

After she had a simple dinner and washed the dishes, Aomame dressed warmly and went out on the balcony once more. She lay the blanket on her lap and sank back in the chair. It was a windless night. The kind of clouds that watercolor artists like lingered faintly in the sky, a test of the artist’s delicate brushstrokes. The larger moon, which was not blocked by the clouds, was two-thirds full and shone bright, distinct light down on the earth below. At this time of evening, from where she sat Aomame couldn’t see the second, smaller moon. It was just behind a building, but Aomame knew it was there. She could feel its presence. No doubt it would soon appear before her.

Ever since she had gone into hiding, she had been able to intentionally shut thoughts out of her mind. Especially when she was on the balcony like this, gazing at the playground, she could make her mind a complete blank. She kept her eyes focused on the playground, especially on the slide, but she wasn’t thinking of anything—no, her mind might have been thinking of something, but this was mostly below the surface. What her mind was doing below the surface, she had no idea. At regular intervals something would float up, like sea turtles and porpoises poking their faces through the surface of the water to breathe. When that happened, she knew that indeed she had been thinking of something up till then. Then her consciousness, lungs full of fresh oxygen, sank back below the surface. It was gone again, and Aomame no longer thought of anything. She was a surveillance device, wrapped in a soft cocoon, her gaze absorbed in the slide.

She was seeing the park, but at the same time she was seeing nothing. If anything new came across her line of vision, her mind would react immediately. But right now nothing new was happening. There was no wind. The dark branches of the zelkova tree stuck out, unmoving, like sharp probes pointed toward the sky. The whole world was still. She looked at her watch. It was after eight. Today might end as always, with nothing out of the ordinary. A Sunday night, as quiet as could be.

The world stopped being still at exactly 8:23.

She suddenly noticed a man on top of the slide. He sat down and looked up at one part of the sky. Aomame’s heart shrunk to the size of a child’s fist, and stayed that size so long she was afraid it would never start pumping again. But it just as quickly swelled up to normal size and started beating again. With a dull sound it began furiously pumping fresh blood throughout her body. Aomame’s mind quickly broke through to the surface of the water, shook itself, and stood by, ready to take action.

It’s Tengo, she thought instinctively.

But once her vision cleared, she knew it wasn’t him. The man sitting there was short, like a child, with a large square head, wearing a knit hat. The knit hat was stretched out oddly because of the shape of his head. He had a green muffler wrapped around his neck and wore a navy-blue coat. The muffler was too long, and the buttons on his coat were straining around his stomach, ready to pop. Aomame knew this was the child she had seen last night coming out of the park. But this was no child. He was more near middle age. He was short and stocky, with short limbs. And his head was abnormally large, and misshapen.

Aomame remembered what Tamaru had said about the man with a head as large as a Fukusuke good-luck doll, the one they had nicknamed Bobblehead. The person who had been loitering around outside the Azabu Willow House, checking out the safe house. This man on top of the slide perfectly fit the description Tamaru had given her last night. That weird man hadn’t given up on his investigation, and now he had crept up on her. I have to get the pistol. Why of all nights did I leave it back in the bedroom? Aomame took a deep breath, let the chaos of her heart settle and her nerves calm down. I mustn’t panic. There’s no need for the pistol at this point.

The man wasn’t, after all, watching her building. Seated at the top of the slide, he was staring at the sky like Tengo had done, at the very same spot. And he seemed lost in thought. He didn’t move a muscle for the longest time, like he had forgotten how to move. He didn’t pay any attention to the direction of her room. This confused Aomame. What’s going on? This man came here searching for me. He’s probably a member of Sakigake. No doubt at all he’s a skilled pursuer. I mean, he was able to follow the trail all the way from the Azabu mansion to here. For all that, there he is now, defenseless, exposed, staring vacantly at the night sky.

Aomame stealthily rose to her feet, slid open the glass door a crack, slipped inside, and sat down in front of the phone. With trembling hands she began dialing Tamaru’s number. She had to report this to him—that she could see Bobblehead from where she was, on top of a slide in a playground across the street. Tamaru would decide what to do, and would no doubt deftly handle the situation. But after punching in the first four numbers she stopped, the receiver clutched in her hand, and bit her lip.

It’s too soon, Aomame thought. There are still too many things we don’t know about this man. If Tamaru simply sees him as a risk factor and takes care of him, all those things we don’t know about him will remain unknown. Come to think of it, the man is doing exactly what Tengo did the other day. The same slide, the same pose, the same part of the sky, as if he’s retracing Tengo’s movements. He must be seeing the two moons as well. Aomame understood this. Maybe this man and Tengo are linked in some way. And maybe this man hasn’t noticed yet that I’m hiding out in an apartment in this building, which is why he’s sitting there, defenseless, his back to me. The more she thought about it, the more persuasive she found this theory. If that’s true, then following the man might lead me right to Tengo. Instead of searching me out, this guy can serve as my guide. The thought made her heart contract even more, and then start to pound. She laid down the phone.

I’ll tell Tamaru about it later, she decided. There’s something I have to do first. Something risky, because it involves the pursued following the pursuer. And this man is no doubt a pro. But even so I can’t let this golden opportunity slip by. This may be my last chance. And from the way he looks, he seems to be in a bit of a daze, at least for the moment.

She hurried into the bedroom, opened the dresser drawer, and took out the Heckler & Koch semiautomatic. She flicked off the safety, racked a round into the chamber, and reset it. She stuffed the pistol into the back of her jeans and went out to the balcony again. Bobblehead was still there, staring at the sky. His misshapen head was perfectly still. He seemed totally captivated by what he was seeing in the sky. Aomame knew how he felt. That was most definitely a captivating sight.

Aomame went back inside and put on a down jacket and a baseball cap. And a pair of nonprescription glasses with a simple black frame, enough to give her face a different appearance. She wound a gray muffler around her neck and put her wallet and apartment key in her pocket. She ran down the stairs and went out of the building. The soles of her sneakers were silent as she stepped out on the asphalt. It had been so long since she had felt hard, steady ground beneath her feet, and the feeling encouraged her.

As she walked down the road she checked that Bobblehead was still in the same place. The temperature had dropped significantly after the sun had set, but there was still no wind. She actually found the cold pleasant. Her breath white, Aomame walked as silently as she could past the entrance to the park. Bobblehead showed no sign that he had noticed her. His gaze was fixed straight up from the slide, on the sky. From where she was, Aomame couldn’t see them, but she knew that at the end of his gaze there were two moons—one large, one small. No doubt they were snuggled up close to each other in the freezing, cloudless sky.

She passed by the park, and when she got to the next corner, she turned and retraced her steps. She hid in the shadows and watched the man on the slide. The pistol against her back was as hard and cold as death, and the feeling soothed her.

She waited five minutes. Bobblehead slowly got to his feet, brushed off his coat, and gazed up one more time at the sky. Then, as if he had made up his mind, he clambered down the steps of the slide. He left the park and walked off in the direction of the station. Shadowing him wasn’t particularly hard. There were few people on a residential street on a Sunday night, and even keeping her distance, she wouldn’t lose him. He also had not the slightest suspicion that someone was observing him. He never looked back, kept walking at a set pace, the pace people keep when they’re preoccupied. How ironic, Aomame thought. The pursuer’s blind spot is that he never thinks he’s being pursued.

After a while it dawned on her that Bobblehead wasn’t heading toward Koenji Station. Back in the apartment, using a Tokyo map of all twenty-three wards, she had gone over the district again and again until she had memorized the local geography so she would know what direction to take in an emergency. So though he was initially headed toward the station, she knew that when he turned at one corner he was going in a different direction. Bobblehead didn’t know the neighborhood, she noticed. Twice he stopped at a corner, looked around as if unsure where to go, and checked the address plaques on telephone poles. He was definitely not from around here.

Finally Bobblehead picked up the pace. Aomame surmised that he was back on familiar territory. He walked past a municipal elementary school, down a narrow street, and went inside an old three-story apartment building.

Aomame waited for five minutes after the man had disappeared inside. Bumping into him at the entrance was the last thing she wanted. There were concrete eaves at the entrance, a round light bathing the front door in a yellowish glow. She looked everywhere but couldn’t find a sign for the name of the building. Maybe the apartment building didn’t have a name. Either way, it had been built quite a few years ago. She memorized the address indicated on the nearby telephone pole.

After five minutes she headed toward the entrance. She passed quickly under the yellowish light and hurriedly opened the door. There was no one in the tiny entrance hall. It was an empty space, devoid of warmth. A fluorescent light on its last legs buzzed above her. The sound of a TV filtered in from somewhere, as did the shrill voice of a child pestering his mother.

Aomame took her apartment key out of the pocket of her down jacket and lightly jiggled it in her hands so if anyone saw her it would look like she lived in the building. She scanned the names on the mailboxes. One of them might be Bobblehead’s. She wasn’t hopeful but thought it worth trying. It was a small building, with not that many residents. When she ran across the name Kawana on one of the boxes, all sound faded away.

She stood frozen in front of that mailbox. The air felt terribly thin, and she found it hard to breathe. Her lips, slightly parted, were trembling. Time passed. She knew how stupid and dangerous this was. Bobblehead could show up any minute. Still, she couldn’t tear herself away from the mailbox. One little card with the name Kawana had paralyzed her brain, frozen her body in place.

She had no positive proof that this resident named Kawana was Tengo Kawana. Kawana wasn’t that common a name, but certainly not as unusual as Aomame. But if, as she surmised, Bobblehead had some connection with Tengo, then there was a strong possibility that this Kawana was none other than Tengo Kawana. The room number was 303, coincidentally the same number as the apartment where she was currently staying.

What should I do? Aomame bit down hard on her lip. Her mind kept going in circles and couldn’t find an exit. What should I do? Well, she couldn’t stay planted in front of the mailbox forever. She made up her mind and walked up the uninviting concrete stairs to the third floor. Here and there on the gloomy floor were thin cracks from years of wear and tear. Her sneakers made a grating noise as she walked.

Aomame now stood outside apartment 303. An ordinary steel door with a printed card saying Kawana in the name slot. Just the last name. Those two characters looked brusque, inorganic. At the same time, a deep riddle lay within them. Aomame stood there, listening carefully, her senses razor sharp. But she couldn’t hear any sound at all from behind the door, or even tell if there was a light on inside. There was a doorbell next to the door.

Aomame was confused. She bit her lip and contemplated her next step. Am I supposed to ring the bell? she asked herself.

Or was this some clever trap? Maybe Bobblehead was hiding behind the door, like an evil dwarf in a dark forest, an ominous smile on his face as he waited. He deliberately revealed himself on top of that slide to lure me over here and take me captive. Fully aware that I’m searching for Tengo, he’s using that as bait. A low-down, cunning man who knows exactly what my weak point is. That’s the only way he could ever get me to open my door from the inside.

She checked that no one else was around and pulled the pistol out of her jeans. She flicked off the safety and stuffed the pistol into the pocket of her down jacket so she could get to it easily. She gripped the pistol in her right hand, finger on the trigger, and with her left hand pressed the doorbell.

The doorbell rang inside the apartment. A leisurely chime, out of step with her racing heart. She gripped the pistol tight, waiting for the door to open. But it didn’t. And there didn’t seem to be anyone peering out at her through the peephole. She waited a moment, then rang the bell again. The bell was loud enough to get all the people in Suginami Ward to raise their heads and prick up their ears. Aomame’s right hand on the pistol grip started to sweat a little. But there was no response.

Better leave, she decided. The Kawana who lives in 303, whoever he is, isn’t at home. And that ominous Bobblehead is still lurking somewhere in this building. Too dangerous to stay any longer. She rushed down the stairs, shooting a glance at the mailbox as she passed, and left the building. Head down, she hurried under the yellow light and headed toward the street. She glanced back to make sure no one was following her.

There were lots of things she needed to think about, and an equal number of decisions she had to make. She felt in her pocket and reset the safety on the pistol. Then, away from any possible prying eyes, she shoved the pistol in the back of her jeans. I can’t get my expectations or hopes up too high, she told herself. The Kawana who lived there might be Tengo. And then again he might not. Once you get your hopes up, your mind starts acting on its own. And when your hopes are dashed you get disappointed, and disappointment leads to a feeling of helplessness. You get careless and let your guard down. And right now, she thought, that’s the last thing I can afford.

I have no idea how much Bobblehead knows. But the reality is that he’s getting close to me. Almost close enough to reach out and touch. I need to pull myself together and stay alert. I’m dealing with someone who is totally dangerous. Thetiniest mistake could be fatal. First of all, I have to stay away from that old apartment building. He’s hiding in there, scheming how to capture me—like a poisonous, blood-sucking spider who has spun a web in the darkness.

By the time she got back to her apartment Aomame’s mind was made up. There was but one path she could follow.

This time she dialed Tamaru’s entire number. She let it ring twelve times, then hung up. She took off her cap and coat, returned the pistol to the drawer, then gulped down two glasses of water. She filled the kettle and boiled water for tea. She peeked through a gap in the curtain at the park across the street, to make sure no one was there. She stood in front of the bathroom mirror and brushed her hair. Even after that her fingers didn’t work right. The tension remained. She was pouring hot water in the teapot when the phone rang. It was Tamaru, of course.

“I just saw Bobblehead,” she told him.

Silence. “By just saw him you mean he’s not there anymore?”

“That’s right,” Aomame said. “A little while ago he was in the park across from my building. But he’s not there anymore.”

“How long ago do you mean by a little while ago?”

“About forty minutes ago.”

“Why didn’t you call me forty minutes ago?”

“I had to follow him right away and didn’t have the time.”

Tamaru exhaled ever so slowly, as if squeezing out the breath. “Follow him?”

“I didn’t want to lose him.”

“I thought I told you never to go outside.”

Aomame chose her words carefully. “But I can’t just sit by when danger’s approaching me. Even if I had called you, you wouldn’t have been able to get here right away. Right?”

Tamaru made a small sound in the back of his throat. “So you followed Bobblehead.”

“It looks like he had no idea at all he was being followed.”

“A pro can act like that,” Tamaru cautioned.

Tamaru was right. It all might have been an elaborate ruse. Not that she would admit that. “I’m sure you would be able to do that, but as far as I could tell, Bobblehead isn’t on the same level. He may be skilled, but he’s different from you.”

“He might have had backup.”

“No. He was definitely on his own.”

Tamaru paused for a moment. “All right. So did you find out where he was heading?”

Aomame told him the address of the building and described its exterior. She didn’t know which apartment he was in. Tamaru took notes. He asked a few questions, and Aomame answered as accurately as she could.

“You said that when you first saw him he was in the park across the street from you,” Tamaru said.

“Correct.”

“What was he doing there?”

Aomame told him—how the man was sitting on top of the slide and staring at the night sky. She didn’t mention the two moons. That was only to be expected.

“Looking at the sky?” Tamaru asked. Aomame could hear the gears shift in his mind.

“The sky, or the moon, or the stars. One of those.”

“And he let himself be exposed like that, defenseless, on the slide.”

“That’s right.”

“Don’t you find that odd?” Tamaru asked. His voice was hard and dry, reminding her of a desert plant that could survive a whole year on one day’s worth of rain. “That man had run you down. He was one step away from you. Pretty impressive. Yet there he was, on top of a slide, leisurely gazing up at the night sky, not paying any attention to the apartment where you live. It doesn’t add up.”

“I agree—it doesn’t make much sense. Be that as it may, I couldn’t very well let him go.”

Tamaru sighed. “But I still think it was dangerous.”

Aomame didn’t say anything.

“Did following him help you get any closer to solving the riddle?” Tamaru asked.

“No,” Aomame said. “But there was one thing that caught my attention.”

“Which was?”

“When I looked at the mailboxes I saw that a person named Kawana lives on the third floor.”

“So?”

“Have you heard of Air Chrysalis? The bestselling novel this past summer?”

“Even I read newspapers, you know. The author, Eriko Fukada, was the daughter of a follower of Sakigake. She disappeared and they suspected she was abducted by the cult. The police investigated it. I haven’t read the novel yet.”

“Eriko Fukada isn’t just the daughter of a follower. Her father was Leader, the head of Sakigake. She’s the daughter of the man I sent on to the other side. Tengo Kawana was hired by the editor as a ghostwriter, and rewrote Air Chrysalis. In reality the novel is a joint work between the two of them.”

A long silence descended. Long enough to walk to the end of a long, narrow room, look up something in a dictionary, and walk back. Finally Tamaru broke the silence.

“You have no proof that the Kawana who lives in that building is Tengo Kawana.”

“Not yet, no,” Aomame admitted. “But if he is the same person, then this all makes sense.”

“Certain parts do mesh together,” Tamaru said. “But how do you know that this Tengo Kawana ghostwrote Air Chrysalis? That can’t have been made public. It would have caused a major scandal.”

“I heard it from Leader himself. Right before he died, he told me.”

Tamaru’s voice turned a little cold. “Don’t you think you should have told me this before?”

“At the time I didn’t think it was so important.”

There was silence again for a time. Aomame couldn’t tell what Tamaru was thinking, but she knew he didn’t like excuses.

“Okay,” he finally said. “We’ll put that on hold. Let’s cut to the chase. What you’re trying to say is that Bobblehead marked this Tengo Kawana. And using that as a lead, he was tracking down your whereabouts.”

“That’s what I think.”

“I don’t get it,” Tamaru said. “Why would Tengo Kawana be a lead to find you? There isn’t any connection between you and Kawana, is there? Other than that you dealt with Eriko Fukada’s father, and Tengo was the ghostwriter for her novel.”

“There is a connection,” Aomame said, her voice flat.

“There’s a direct relationship between you and Tengo Kawana. Is that what you’re saying?”

“He and I were in the same class in elementary school. And I believe he’s the father of my baby. But I can’t explain any more beyond that. It’s very—how should I put it?—personal.”

On the other end of the phone she heard a ballpoint pen tapping on a desk. That was the only sound she could hear.

“Personal,” Tamaru repeated, in a voice that sounded like he had spied some weird creature on top of a rock in a garden.

“I’m sorry,” Aomame said.

“I understand. It’s a very personal thing. I won’t ask anymore,” Tamaru said. “So, specifically, what do you want from me?”

“Well, the first thing I would like to know is if the Kawana who lives in that building is actually Tengo Kawana. If it were possible, I would like to make sure of that myself, but it’s too risky to go there again.”

“Agreed.”

“And Bobblehead is probably holed up somewhere in that building, planning something. If he’s getting close to locating me, we have to do something about it.”

“He already knows a certain amount about the connection between you and the dowager. He has painstakingly hauled in these various leads and is trying to tie them all together. We can’t ignore him.”

“I have one other request of you,” Aomame said.

“Go ahead.”