After the quake blind willow, sleeping woman dance dance dance

If you can’t understand it without an 
explanation, you can’t understand it with an explanation
. 
As he left the apartment, Tengo said, “When I call, I’ll let it ring three times, hang 
up, and call again. Then you answer. Okay?” 
“Okay,” Fuka-Eri said. “Ring three times, hang up, call again, answer.” She 
sounded as if she could be translating aloud from an ancient stone monument. 
“It’s important, so don’t forget,” Tengo said. 
Fuka-Eri nodded twice. 
Tengo finished his two classes, went back to the teachers’ lounge, and was getting 
ready to go home. The receptionist came to tell him that the man named Ushikawa 
was here to see him. She spoke with an apologetic air, like a kindhearted messenger 
bearing unwelcome news. Tengo flashed her a bright smile and thanked her. No sense 
blaming the messenger. 
Ushikawa was in the cafeteria by the front lobby, drinking a café au lait as he 
waited for Tengo. Tengo could not imagine a drink less well suited to Ushikawa, 
whose strange exterior looked all the stranger amid the energetic, young students. 
Only the part of the room where he was sitting seemed to have different gravity and 
air density and light refractivity. Even from a distance, there was no mistaking that he 
looked like bad news. The cafeteria was crowded between classes, but not one person 
shared his six-person table. The students’ natural instincts led them to avoid 
Ushikawa, just as antelope keep away from wild dogs. 
Tengo bought a coffee at the counter and carried it over to Ushikawa’s table, 
sitting down opposite him. Ushikawa seemed to have just finished eating a cream-
filled pastry. The crumpled wrapper lay atop the table, and crumbs stuck to the corner 
of his mouth. Cream pastries also seemed totally unsuited to Ushikawa. 
“It’s been quite a while, hasn’t it, Mr. Kawana?” Ushikawa said to Tengo, raising 
himself slightly from his chair. “Sorry to barge in on you again all of a sudden.” 
Tengo dispensed with the polite chatter and got down to business. “I’m sure you’re 
here for my answer. To the offer you made the other day, that is.” 
“Well, yes, that is true,” Ushikawa said. “In a word.” 
“I wonder, Mr. Ushikawa, if I can get you to speak a little more concretely and 
directly today. What is it that you people want from me—in return for this ‘grant’ 
thing?” 

---

378
Ushikawa cast a cautious glance around the room, but there was no one near them, 
and the cafeteria was so noisy with student voices that there was no danger of their 
conversation’s being overheard. 
“All right, then. Let me give you our best deal and lay it all out with total honesty,” 
Ushikawa said, leaning across the table and lowering his voice a notch. “The money 
is just a pretext. For one thing, the grant is not all that big. The most important thing 
that my client can offer you is your personal safety. In other words, no harm will 
come to you. We guarantee it.” 
“In return for which …?” Tengo said. 
“In return for which all they want from you is your silence and forgetting. You 
participated in this affair, but you didn’t know what you were getting yourself into. 
You were just a foot soldier acting under orders. They won’t hold you personally 
responsible. So all you have to do is forget everything. We can make it as though 
nothing ever happened. Word will never get out that you ghostwrote 
Air Chrysalis
. 
You are not—and never will be—connected with it in any way. That is what they 
want from you. And it would be to your advantage as well, I’m sure you see.” 
“No harm will come to 
me
. In other words, harm 
will
come to the other