“Fukuhara. . .” said Yukinaga in a low voice. “He’s in comparative civilization, isn’t he? Have you known him for some time, sir?”
“I’ve never met him,” said the old man, coughing slightly. “But we’ve exchanged one or two letters. I’m sure he’ll be receptive to us.”
A light shone from the crack in the doorway at the rear of the room. The door slid open, and the girl came in holding an old-fashioned lamp.
“Oh, my!” she said frowning. “The camellia . . .”
In the pale yellow circle of light cast by the old lamp, the tiny flower, fallen from the alcove post, lay like a spot of vivid color on the tatami, red as blood.
The next morning Onodera left for Kyoto with Kunieda, carrying Watari’s letter. The Super Express was in operation west of Shizuoka, but because of the precautions that had to be ob served, it took more than three hours to get from there to the express terminal in Osaka.
As he stood swaying back and forth in the jammed aisle, a sensation hard to define suddenly took hold of Onodera when he noticed that the train was crossing the Tenryu River. It was just a year ago that he had run into Goh at that water fountain near the rear entrance of Tokyo Station.
Now, as he thought back, he realized that that was when everything had started. He had not had the least idea at that moment what the future held in store for Japan or that he himself would become caught up in this kind of mission. A sense of secrecy and peril weighed upon him with oppressive force.
Osaka had almost entirely recovered from the effects of the great earthquake of the year before, but in Kyoto there was no way of missing the devastation evident in Gion, Ponto-cho, and the other districts making up the old Gay Quarters, which were the heart of the city, and in the close-packed downtown areas wracked by quake and fire.
When they arrived at the professor’s house in the northern part of the city, they learned that he had become somewhat ill the day before and had not gone out since. When he appeared in the parlor, wearing a pongee haori jacket, he seemed so youthful, with his boyish face and with no trace of gray in his hair, that Onodera, who knew that he was over fifty, would have had a difficult time guessing his age.
Professor Fukuhara read the old man’s letter again and again, his head tipped to one side, and Onodera and Kunieda, in turn, explained the situation to him. All the while he pursed his lips and finally uttered but a single phrase: “My, what an awful thing . . .”
And with that he got up at once and walked out of the parlor. Thirty minutes passed, then an hour, and still there was no sign of the professor. Their legs aching from being bent so long beneath them on the tatami floor, Onodera and Kunieda called the maid to find out what happened.
“The master is lying down upstairs,” was the answer she gave them.
“What the devil! This is what you call a Kyoto scholar? Making fools of us like this?” said the furious Kunieda. “We come all the way from Tokyo to tell him this, and all he can do is say ‘My, what an awful thing!’ and go up to take a nap.”
V
The Sinking Country
1
In a room in the Prime Minister’s residence, which still showed the effects of the earthquake, three men sat around a table with somber expressions: the Prime Minister, his face worn and haggard; the secretary general of the Cabinet; and its director general. On the table lay a single sheet of paper upon which was written:
“It’s altogether ridiculous,” said the director general, rubbing his face vigorously with a thick hand. “If it were true, it would be terrible, of course. But it’s an absurd mistake, a fantasy of that eccentric scientist Tadokoro.”
The secretary general eyed the Prime Minister shrewdly. He was like a foster son to him, and, a graduate of the same high school, he had come a long way with him down the road of politics. From the first, the secretary general had been bedeviled in this affair by the dread that this man who held the chief responsibility in the nation might, by some mental lapse, have become entangled in a great hoax and be on the way to a misstep from which there could be no recovery. Up to this point it had been possible to keep things concealed, and if the affair had taken a suspicious turn, it could easily have been hushed up. But from now on . . . should things advance to the next stage, then in terms of budget, in terms of organization, the affair would begin to take on a scale that would attract public notice. And then should something go wrong, the question of political responsibility might well be raised. The least blunder might prove fatal, not only to the Prime Minister but also to the party.
“The investigations haven’t yet enabled us to come up with an unqualified answer,” said the Prime Minister, unfolding his arms and raising his head. “So let us go on with them. The budget, the personnel needs are going to increase considerably, of course. And what are we going to do then?”
The Prime Minister’s words by themselves indicated nothing more than a prudent continuation along roughly the same lines, but the secretary general caught his breath. Oh-oh—he’s finally made up his mind, he thought. He intends to move ahead, no matter what. He’ll even risk political suicide.
“I don’t think there’ll be too much of a problem,” answered the director general, his big body rocking as he nodded. “The secretariat meeting is tomorrow.”
“Good enough.” The Prime Minister stood up. He took a bottle and three glasses from a shelf. “I’m a little tired,” he said, pouring out some cognac for the others and himself. “Should we take this up again tomorrow?”
“Fine,” said the director general, nodding as he took up his glass. “It would be good to get a little rest. What I have to say can wait till tomorrow.”
The three men raised their glasses in silence. The director general, whose huge frame was like that of a professional wrestler, downed his at a gulp. He got to his feet, bowed to the Prime Minister, and turned toward the door. The secretary general was right behind him a moment later, and the Prime Minister, too, rose to follow. As they walked down the corridor, with the director general a few paces ahead, the secretary general turned and whispered to the Prime Minister: “A change in the Cabinet?”
Caught somewhat off guard, the Prime Minister studied the face of his keenly perceptive confidant.
“Once the turmoil dies down,” the Prime Minister whispered, his face rigid. “In some respects, the earthquake is a good opportunity, I think.”
After the two Cabinet members had left, the Prime Minister returned to the parlor and poured himself another cognac. After the earthquake he had sent his family to Shinshu, and now in the huge house there was no one besides himself but a middle-aged maid, a steward to attend to his personal needs, and his bodyguards. Since even from this group no one was ever much in evidence, the interior of the residence was as quiet as though he were there by himself.
Things have come to a strange pass, he thought. As he felt the effect of the brandy lessening his fatigue, the Prime Minister raised his forefinger and rubbed his right eye. Then he closed his eyes, and a sense of weariness suddenly bore down on him from behind. He felt as though he were being dragged down into the depths.
The physical obliteration of a nation great in size, in economic power, and in historical tradition . . . Had an event so incredible ever occurred before? Had any politician ever been faced with a problem of such vast proportions?
The Prime Minister gazed absently into space as he gently jiggled his brandy glass. Had he the strength to steer a way through this peril? Should he perhaps give way to someone else? He downed his cognac abruptly. For the present there was no one else, he decided. When the situation grew more critical, perhaps a man might come to the fore and distinguish himself, someone more capable than he to deal with this crisis. But since that time had not yet come nor that man appeared, he had no choice but to carry on, to make the painful, frightening series of decisions. How odd, he thought. He had never detected any impulse toward the heroic in himself, neither before nor now. Furthermore, like all his colleagues, he
held as an implicit article of faith that the politician’s role was not to do but to let become. Political acts, after all, were but a portion of the great stream of fate.
Now, however, confronted with so perilous and complex a crisis, the Prime Minister found himself profoundly disturbed. He had always thought of courage as nothing more than a marginal necessity, but now it seemed an indispensable component of judgment.
To go somewhere for a day or two, even in the midst of his work, he thought, gazing at his brandy glass. To meditate in the Zen manner ... so as to quiet the spirit and see beyond the darkness ahead ... To consult with the old man . . .
2
Winter descended upon a Tokyo still bearing the raw claw marks of disaster. At the year’s end, like another blow following upon that of the quake, a cold wave hit.
Onodera, the collar of his overcoat up, was walking from Tameike toward Toranomon as a powdery snow fluttered down from a frozen sky. He intended to stop at the Prime Minister’s Office and then go to the Maritime Safety Agency, but he ran into a milling crowd by the Diet Building, the first large-scale demonstration since the disaster. In one place a clash had already broken out between students and riot police. To avoid the crowd, he decided to cut in front of the patent office and take a detour by way of Kasumigaseki.
The universities had been relatively undamaged, and the greater number of them had reopened. They still were being used to some degree, however, to house refugees, and since many of the faculty had been killed or injured in the earthquake, many classes were canceled. A number of boarding-houses had been destroyed, and many students had returned to their homes after the quake. As a consequence, then, although the traditional paraphernalia was in evidence—helmets, masks, long poles—the students were few and their spirit was not robust. Nevertheless, workers and ordinary citizens were also involved, and since there were never lacking some willing to take on the police, two or three struggles had broken out. Though no one threw any Molotov cocktails, they hurled chunks of concrete and bricks from destroyed buildings. Finally the riot police charged and scattered the demonstrators.
More than the students, the dark, somber mood of the ordinary people who had silently joined in with them unsettled Onodera. “Give us houses!” “Throw open your buildings!” “Money enough for refugees to get through the winter!” The faces beneath these signs seemed dark and shrunken from the cold, and a strange anxiety seemed to hover over them.
Maybe, Onodera thought, these people sense something.
It was as though a kind of darkness floated above the heads of the demonstrators, colored by a desperate anxiety that the eye could not perceive. As though it spoke of a people once determined to do great things who had lost their will to act.
As the demonstrators lowered the placards with the violent slogans, their sullen faces conveyed an anxiety to Onodera, like a kind of ill omen. People, of course, never took at face value the daily headlines—”A Great Depression Coming?” “Black Market Price of Fresh Foods up 40%, Fear of Food Crisis Next Spring”—but now, more than ever, they were on their guard.
We’re a sensitive people, thought Onodera as he passed the lines of demonstrators moving the other way. And he himself felt what they did, his skin prickling. All at once a painful sensation struck his chest. Suppose, he thought, suppose these people, who, on the one hand, have no definite information but who, on the other, are becoming ever more perceptive in the way they feel. . . suppose they learned of this thing, this thing which now stands a better than fifty-percent chance of occurring . . . what would happen? Would a great panic break out?
In a room at the Maritime Safety Agency, Onodera met Kataoka, who had arrived there just before him. The round, boyish, sunburned face of Kataoka had changed terribly in a very short time. He did not show his white teeth nor flash the bright smile that once had appeared so often. His eyes were without expression in a face that showed fatigue, its features somewhat blurred. He seemed to have aged ten years. Like all the members of the Plan D group, he was suffering from overwork, but more than that . . . the death of his entire family in Tamachi had crushed his high spirits, apparently forever.
“Did you run into the demonstration?” Kataoka asked in a listless voice.
Onodera nodded.
“It seems that lately the reporters are starting to get wind of things,” said Kataoka almost in a whisper as he gazed at the snow piled on the window ledge outside. “Today one of them came to the Defense Agency. He’s never talked to anybody of importance connected with Plan D, of course, but they say they had a hard time getting rid of him at the public-relations office.”
“That looks bad,” Onodera muttered. “What put him on to the Defense Agency, I wonder?”
“He probably saw Professor Yukinaga and Professor Tadokoro there. He knows who Professor Yukinaga is. And then with his suddenly leaving the university like that
“Kunieda told me something in confidence,” Onodera said. “Tonight the secretary general is having a quiet meeting with a group of major newspaper publishers. And then there seems to be in the offing a highly secret conference between the Prime Minister and the leaders of the opposition.”
“But how much is going to be held back?” asked Kataoka in a flat voice. “Weird rumors are cropping up everywhere. And with more people getting involved in Plan D every day, the greater the chance of leaks. By the way, how about that scholar from Kyoto they brought in? Fukuhara?”
“He’s at the old man’s place in Hakone.”
“And what’s he occupied with?”
“Well, I’m not sure, but—” Onodera smiled ruefully— “Kunieda was a bit perturbed. He told me that he did nothing but sleep all day.”
The door opened, and the assistant director of the Hydro-graphic Bureau came in.
“Hello . . . sorry to keep you waiting,” he said. He laid some papers on the table. “All the arrangements are made. At eighteen o’clock tomorrow, the Seiryu Maru will arrive at Yokosuka.”
“Thanks,” said Onodera, taking the papers. “Then, some time the day after, we can have our equipment and personnel on board.”
“And as it turned out,” the assistant director went on, “we were able to charter the sea lab and the submarine from a Japanese firm.”
“A Japanese firm!” said Onodera. “What firm is it?”
“Sea Floor Development. The sub is the Wadatsumi 2.”
Just as Onodera and Kataoka were leaving the Maritime Safety Agency, a man struck Onodera a hard blow on the chest. Stopped in his tracks, the startled Onodera saw a short, dark man blocking his way, eyes blazing with anger. The next instant a fist struck his left cheek with a flat thump. And then a third blow landed solidly on the right side of his nose.
“What do you think you’re doing!” shouted Kataoka, reaching for the man’s arm.
“It’s all right, Kataoka. Let him alone!” cried Onodera as still more punches struck home. “Take the papers and go ahead. It’s all right, I tell you!”
Since there were people all about, Onodera retreated to a place at the side of the building, taking punches all the while. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Kataoka glancing back over his shoulder as he walked away. Punches struck his eye, the bridge of his nose, his chest, his throat until finally Onodera stumbled over something and went sprawling backward.
“Get up, damn you!”
The short man stood with his legs spread, his breath racing.
“Well, Yuki . . . it’s nice to see you again,” said the supine Onodera as blood gushed from his nose. “How have you been?”
He felt the chill of the frozen ground penetrating his back. He watched the dark snowflakes falling like motes of dust from the gray sky. The shock of Yuki’s blows seemed to be stirring a long-absent sense of vigor.
“You bastard!” said Yuki, breathing fiercely as he looked down on Onodera. “Quitting without a word to me . . . without a word! Running off to another company!”
As Onodera got to his feet uns
teadily, Yuki pulled a crumpled handkerchief from his pants pocket and thrust it close to Onodera’s nose. Onodera, opening his swelling right eye, took the dirty handkerchief with a smile.
“You bastard! All you had to do was say one lousy word! I thought ... I thought first that you were missing in the earthquake. I was upset. I went to Kyoto a few times. And then when I heard that you deserted the company without any explanation, I tried to get in touch with you time after time. But you wouldn’t give me any answer at all, not a word. You clear out and you don’t think about your friend at all!”
“I’m sorry,” said Onodera, laying his hands firmly on the shoulders of Yuki, who was a head shorter than he. “It was inexcusable. I did get your notes, but at that time the situation was such that I couldn’t get in touch with anybody.”
“You’re going to dive in the Wadatsumi, right?” said Yuki, his eyes averted. “Somebody I know saw you hanging around here lately, and then he said that the Defense Agency put in a rush order for the Wadatsumi. And so I thought I’d come over for a look.” He hesitated for a moment. “You know what I’m going to do? I’m going down in the Wadatsumi too. I made up my mind to quit like you did.”
“What?” said Onodera. “Have you submitted your resignation already?”
“Tomorrow. I made up my mind. Listen, without us two together, how are they going to get the most out of that sub? One of us has got to be manning that phone up on the ship.”
“Thank you,” said Onodera spontaneously. In that instant he, too, made up his mind. Himself, Yuki—they made a fine team. He could depend upon him.
Japan Sinks Page 12
