The Face of Another - Kobo Abe [90]
For distraction I turned on the television set. As luck would have it, it was just the time for the foreign news, and a report was in progress on the Negro riots in America. Having talked about the wretched black people in torn shirts who were being marched away by white police officers, the announcer continued matter-of-factly:
—The racial disturbances in New York are a cause for concern at the beginning of this long, black summer. They have materialized just as predicted by competent sources. Harlem streets are overflowing with more than five hundred helmeted police, Negro and white. One is reminded of the summer of 1943. In some churches, opposition meetings are being held along with Sunday services. The contempt and mistrust that exist between police and colored citizens.…
The words gave me an intolerable feeling of pain and depression, as if a sharp fishbone had thrust itself between my teeth. Of course, I had almost nothing in common with the Negroes, except for being an object of prejudice. The Negroes were comrades bound in the same cause, but I was quite alone. Even though the Negro question might be a grave social problem, my own case could never go beyond the limits of the personal. However, what gave me such a stifling feeling as I watched the riot scenes stemmed from an association of ideas whereby I saw thousands of men and women, like me without faces, gathering together. Could we, the faceless, arise resolutely against prejudice like the Negroes? It would be impossible. Disgusted with each other’s ugliness, we would probably begin to battle among ourselves. If we did not do that, the only thing for one like us would be to start running full speed until he disappeared from sight. No, if all this were true, I could still have borne it. However, I was apparently quite fascinated with the riots. On the slightest pretext, groups of us monsters might make unprovoked attacks on the faces of honest citizens. Out of malice? Or would it be some ploy to profit by increasing our ranks with every ordinary face we smashed? Both were definitely strong motives, but I seemed to be stimulated by a desire to be buried as a soldier in the riot’s storm. Surely the soldier enjoys an anonymous existence. Even without a face he would have no difficulty in accomplishing his mission, and he would be provided with an excellent raison d’être. Faceless battalions would be ideal groups of soldiers. Unflinchingly rushing on to destruction for the sake of destruction, they would make splendid fighting units.
This was perhaps quite true, but I was still as alone as before. I with an air pistol concealed in my pocket, I who had not even attempted to shoot down a bird. Disgusted, I switched off the television set and looked at my watch; the appointed hour had already gone by.
Naturally, I was upset. I listened for sounds outside, checking my watch every few minutes. I had an unbearable feeling like flood waters beginning to rise. There! Footsteps! But when the neighbor’s dog began to bark, I realized that it was someone else. But now? No, surely. The sounds were too heavy for you. For some time I listened to the noises of autos stopping and the opening and closing of