The Woman in the Dunes - Machi Abe [22]
The shovel was standing with the kerosene cans against the outside wall that went around the earthen floor. The dented edge of the shovel gleamed white like a piece of cracked porcelain.
For some time he concentrated on digging. The sand was exceedingly tractable, and his work appeared to be progressing. The sound of the shovel as it bit into the sand, and his own breathing, ticked away the time. However, at last his arms began to grow weary. He thought he had worked for a considerable time, but his digging had apparently had no results at all. Only a little bit of sand had fallen from right above where he was digging. Somehow, it was working out very differently from the simple geometric process he had evolved in his head.
Rather than worry further, he decided to take advantage of a rest period and put his theory to the test by constructing a model of the hole. Fortunately, materials were plentiful. He chose a spot in the shade of the eaves and dug a hollow about a half yard wide. But the incline of the slope did not make the angle he had anticipated; it was only forty-five degrees at the most, about like a wide-mouthed mixing bowl. When he tried scooping sand from the bottom, the sand flowed down the sides, but the incline remained the same. There would appear to be a fixed angle for sand. The weight and resistance of the grains seemed to be in perfect balance. Supposing this were true, did the wall he was trying to overcome have about the same degree of incline?
No, that could not be. It might be an illusion, but it could not be true. When you looked at any incline from below it obviously appeared less than it actually was.
Then, shouldn’t he perhaps consider it to be a question of quantity? The pressure would naturally change with different amounts of sand. If the pressure changed, a variation in the balance of weight and resistance would naturally occur. Perhaps it depended on the nature of the sand grains. Clay that has been packed down and clay from a natural deposit have completely different resistance to pressure. Furthermore, he had to consider the question of moisture. In short, another law was probably functioning, different from the one that applied to the model he had made.
Despite his failure, the experiment was not completely in vain. The very fact that he now realized that the slope of the wall was in what he might call a superstable state was an important find. Generally it is not particularly difficult to make a superstable state into a normally stable one.
A supersaturated solution, just by being shaken, at once produces a crystalline precipitate and moves toward the normal saturation point.
Suddenly he had the feeling that someone was near; he turned around. He had been unaware of the woman, who was standing in the doorway staring fixedly at him. He was understandably embarrassed and took a step back in confusion, glancing around as if in search of help. He raised his eyes, and there at the top of the east bank were three men, all in a row, looking down at him. They wore towels wrapped around their heads; as they were not visible from the mouth down, he could not be sure, but they seemed to be the old men of the day before. At once he straightened up, but just as suddenly he changed his mind and decided to ignore them and go on with his work. The fact that he was being watched spurred him on.
The perspiration ran into his eyes and dripped from the end of his nose. Since there was no time to wipe it away, he just closed his eyes and shoveled. Under no condition must he rest his arms. When they saw his unflagging pace, they would realize, unless they were dim-wits, how despicable they were.
He looked at his watch. He wiped it against his pants to remove the sand on its face; it was only 2:10. The same ten minutes after two as when he had looked before. He suddenly lost confidence in his pace. From a snail’s point of view the sun probably moves with the speed of a baseball. He changed his grip on the shovel,