Ruined Map - Abe Kobo [22]
At length the train passed by. After it had gone, a sound like the buzzing of insects lingered in my ears.
“Depressing weather, isn’t it?”
With these words the rigidity suddenly left his knees, like a film that begins to roll; and he shifted his body, turning slightly in my direction. When I flipped my cigarette out the side vent, he in turn took out one and lit it, pushing up his glasses, which kept slipping down.
“I’m sorry. I … to tell the truth … I told a lie back there. I’m sorry. There was really no need to.”
“You did it out of deference to the director, I suppose.”
“Well … no, I don’t think so. Because it was something the director knew all about. But why did he act as if he didn’t know anything at all about it and why didn’t he correct me? I feel awful. It goes against my conscience … because I’ve become an accomplice in betraying Mr. Nemuro, who’s the head of my section.”
“Don’t worry about it. If in the long run it’s to Mr. Nemuro’s advantage, it’s all right.”
“No, it’s not to his advantage. I knew from the start that it wasn’t. Otherwise, I wouldn’t be telling a lie. I realized that telling it was probably useless.”
“Just let me decide whether it was useless or not.”
“It’s about the destination of those documents.”
“Did you know?”
“The section manager … here,” he began, extracting from his breast pocket a calling card, which he brandished with a histrionic gesture. “I actually do recall hearing him make a telephone call about delivering some documents or other. Possibly about two days before he disappeared.”
“Oh, yes. A ward councilman. But it’s a ward you don’t often hear about.”
“It’s a newly formed one under joint management. But you won’t get anything by going there. We haven’t been sitting around with our arms folded.”
That was a line I seemed to have heard before. Yes, it had come from the brother back in the parking lot. Suddenly I was overcome with an uncontrollable anger.
“Look, come on now. While you’re at it why not have the courage to come clean?”
“What do you mean?”
“Just what I’m asking—you know that much.”
I turned on the radio, catching out of the corner of my eye my companion’s expression, which was stiff, as if pasted on. Someone accompanied by a guitar was singing in a sweet, childlike voice:
That’s all!
That’s all!
Just seeing you in my dreams,
That’s all!
Young Tashiro heaved his shoulders in a great sigh, wiping away the mist on the window with the flat of his hand. Actually, he wanted to say something. A wall of rainy sky loomed immediately beyond the tracks. The car seat was cramped, with no place really to stretch out in, no matter how one shifted around. The thumping of my companion’s heart seemed audible in my own body. Perversely, I waited in silence.
“All right, I’ll tell you,” he said, stretching out an arm and shifting his seat. Looking into the distance, he continued: “So please turn off the radio.”
“Yes, you had better tell me. I never do anything that might have an adverse effect on someone giving information to me. That’s my business.”
Two trains passed each other going in opposite directions, and the car was whipped as if by a steel lash as they sped by. The radio emitted a startled shriek as I hastily turned it off, making me think involuntarily of a dentist’s drill. I had lost a molar about a month before. If I sucked hard, I could still taste blood.
“Yes, I’ll tell you. Maybe I can’t claim to be entirely honest, but I didn’t intend to be uncooperative. I didn’t, really … because I was one of those who stood to lose by the section manager’s disappearance.