Ruined Map - Abe Kobo [5]
No, rather than walking, I had the feeling he was fighting gravitation, diligently lugging around his heavy bag of skin packed with viscera. Some were returning, going back to the place they had left … leaving in order to return. They go out to obtain walling material to make the thick walls of their houses thicker, stronger than ever to return to.
But sometimes, though rarely, some men go out never to return.
“WELL THEN, what about clues? Tell me in detail whatever occurs to you.”
“I can’t. There’s absolutely nothing at all.”
“Just anything that comes to you. Even if you don’t have proof or anything to back it up.”
“Well, all right … There are the matches, for one thing.”
“What did you say?”
“A matchbox. A half-used box of matches from some coffee house. It was in his raincoat pocket along with a sports paper.”
“I see.” Suddenly her expression changed. Looking again at her face, which quite confused me, I found it rather unpleasant. Her face—the shallow smile quite suited it, as if the disappearance of her husband were a kind of satisfaction—was strangely composed, in perfect balance. Or could it be that after a half year of sorrow and despair the mainspring that controlled her will had been completely broken, and she had sunk to the depths of distraction at having been abandoned? Perhaps she had been a beautiful woman. Her features seemed to have slipped out of their proper place; it was as if I was looking at her through an unfocused lens. “If you think the matchbox might be some sort of clue …”
“No, not particularly. It’s just that it was in the raincoat pocket, and I thought …”
“Now if I could just get you to sign this application, we’ll get on with the investigation. But as I’ve explained to you, the deposit which you pay covers the investigation expenses for a week. In case we cannot locate your husband within one week we take no remuneration, of course; but there is no question of returning the thirty thousand yen on deposit, you understand. In case the investigation continues, that will mean another thirty thousand. And besides that, we are obliged to charge for the actual expenses connected with the investigation.”
“Is this the place I sign?”
“But I can’t carry on much of an investigation with the vague information you have given. It’s all right, I suppose, since it’s our business to get it, but don’t you feel as if you were throwing thirty thousand yen out the window?”
“Oh, what a mess this is!”
“There must be something, something more concrete, like who you want me to tail, where you want me to look.”
“If only there was,” she sighed, turning her head slightly to the side. She raised the glass of beer to her mouth, drinking alone, for I had refused, since I was driving. “But I can’t believe this whole thing happened. He had all kinds of opportunities, nobody could understand … nobody.”
“Opportunities?”
“Business ones, I mean.”
“You’ve done some investigation yourself, haven’t you? It’s already been half a year.”
“Yes, my younger brother has.”
“Ah. He was the one on the telephone, wasn’t he? He talked as if he represented you. If that’s the case, it would be simpler if I addressed myself directly to him, I think.”
“But … well … I don’t know exactly where he is.”
“Come now. It’s a vicious circle, a man looking for someone who’s disappeared and who has himself disappeared.”
“My brother isn’t lost, you know. He always telephones me once every three days. He does. As long as he phones, there’s still hope. I have such terrible thoughts. I can’t stand not knowing my husband’s motives.”
“But it doesn’t seem all that terrible, does it, really?”
“It’s strange. Maybe I’ve just got into the habit of being patient.”
“Since you’ve entrusted things to your brother, haven’t you done anything yourself?”
“I’ve waited. Every day, every single day.”
“You’ve just been waiting …?”
“My brother was against my doing anything, and then I was afraid to leave the house empty, too.”
“Why?”
“Well, it would have been awkward if by any chance my husband had taken it into