After the quake blind willow, sleeping woman dance dance dance

now, but not tomorrow. In a few days, I’ll 
have a different name and a different face
. 
She returned to the lobby and took her seat again, setting the gym bag on the table 
next to her. In the bag was a small automatic pistol with seven bullets and a sharp 
needle made for thrusting into the back of a man’s neck. 
I’ve got to calm down
, she 
told herself. 
This job is important, and it’s my last. I have to be the usual cool, tough 
Aomame
. 

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344
But she could not shake off the awareness that she was not in a normal state. Her 
breathing was strangely labored, and the heightened speed of her heartbeat concerned 
her. A film of sweat moistened her armpits. Her skin was tingling. 
I’m not just tense, 
though. I’m having a premonition of something. And the premonition is giving me a 
warning. It keeps knocking on the door of my mind. It’s telling me, “It’s still not too 
late. Get out of here now and forget all this.”
Aomame wanted to heed the warning if she could, abandon everything and turn her 
back on this hotel lobby. There was something ominous here, the lingering presence 
of circuitous death—a slow, quiet, but inescapable death. 
But I can’t just run away 
with my tail between my legs. That’s not the Aomame way to live
. 
It was a long ten minutes. Time refused to move ahead. She stayed on the sofa, 
trying to get her breathing under control. The lobby ghosts kept spouting their hollow 
reverberations. People drifted silently over the thick carpet like souls groping for their 
eternal resting places. The only actual noise to reach her ears now and then was the 
clinking of a coffee set on a tray whenever a waitress passed by. But even that sound 
contained a dubious secondary sound within it. Things were not heading in a good 
direction. 
If I’m already this tense, I won’t be able to do a thing when the time comes
. 
Aomame closed her eyes and almost by reflex intoned a prayer, the one that she had 
been taught to recite before every meal from as long ago as she could remember. That 
had been a long, long time ago, but she remembered every word with perfect clarity— 
O Lord in Heaven, may Thy name be praised in utmost purity for ever and ever, and 
may Thy kingdom come to us. Please forgive our many sins, and bestow Thy 
blessings upon our humble pathways. Amen. 
However grudgingly, Aomame had to admit that this prayer, which had given her 
nothing but pain in the past, now provided a source of support. The sound of the 
words calmed her nerves, stopped her fears at the doorway, and helped her breathing 
to quiet down. She pressed her fingers against her eyelids and repeated the prayer to 
herself over and over. 
. . . 
“Miss Aomame, I believe,” a man said close by. It was the voice of a young man. 
Aomame opened her eyes, slowly raised her head, and looked at the owner of the 
voice. Two young men were standing in front of her. Both wore the same kind of dark 
suit. Judging by the fabric and cut, these were not expensive clothes—probably 
bought right off the rack at a discount store. They didn’t quite fit in every detail, but 
they were admirably free of wrinkles. Perhaps the men pressed them every time they 
put them on. Neither man wore a tie. One had his white shirt buttoned all the way to 
the top, while the other wore a kind of gray crew-neck shirt under his suit jacket. 
They had on the plainest black shoes possible. 
The man in the white shirt must have been a good six feet tall, and he wore his hair 
in a ponytail. He had long eyebrows, the ends of which turned up at a distinct angle 
like a line graph. His face was serene, with well-balanced features that could have 
belonged to an actor. The other man must have been five foot five and had a buzz cut 
and a snub nose. A tiny beard grew at the tip of his chin like a mistakenly applied 

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345
shadow, and there was a small scar by his right eye. Both men were slim, with sunken 
cheeks and tanned faces. There was not an ounce of fat to be seen on either of them, 
and judging from the spread of their suits’ shoulders there were some serious muscles 
underneath. They were probably in their mid- to late twenties. The look in their eyes 
was deep and sharp, and the eyeballs moved no more than necessary, as with animals 
on the hunt. 
As if by reflex, Aomame stood up from her chair and looked at her watch. The 
hands pointed to seven o’clock exactly. Right on time. 
“Yes, I am Aomame.” 
Neither man displayed any expression. They did a swift examination of Aomame’s 
attire and looked at the blue gym bag next to her. 
“Is this all you brought with you?” Buzzcut asked. 
“Yes, this is it,” Aomame said. 
“That’s fine. Let’s go, then. Are you ready?” Buzzcut asked. Ponytail said nothing 
as he kept his eyes on Aomame. 
“Yes, of course,” Aomame said. She guessed that the shorter man was somewhat 
older than the other one and the leader of the two. 
Buzzcut went ahead with leisurely steps, crossing the lobby toward the elevators. 
Aomame followed him, gym bag in hand. Ponytail followed about six feet behind her. 
This meant she was sandwiched between them. 
They know what they’re doing
, she 
thought. They walked with erect posture, their gait strong and precise. The dowager 
had said they both practiced karate. Aomame knew from her martial arts training that 
in a face-to-face confrontation with these two, there was probably no way she could 
win. But she did not sense from these men the kind of overpowering menace that 
Tamaru projected. Defeating them was not entirely out of the question. The first thing 
she would have to do in hand-to-hand combat would be to render Buzzcut powerless. 
He called the shots. If Ponytail was her only opponent, she could manage to survive 
and escape. 
The three of them boarded the elevator, and Ponytail pushed the button for the 
seventh floor. Buzzcut stood next to Aomame, and Ponytail stood in the corner, 
facing them at an angle. They did all this wordlessly, systematically, like a second 
baseman and shortstop who live to make double plays. 
In the midst of such thoughts, it suddenly dawned on Aomame that her breathing 
and heartbeat had returned to their normal rhythms. 
Nothing to worry about
, she 
thought. 
I’m my usual self—the cool, tough Aomame. Everything will probably go 
well. No more bad premonitions
. 
The elevator door opened soundlessly. Ponytail kept the “Door Open” button 
depressed while Buzzcut stepped out followed by Aomame, and then he released the 
button and left the elevator. Buzzcut led the way down the corridor, Aomame 
followed, and Ponytail continued playing rear guard. The broad corridor was totally 
deserted: perfectly silent and perfectly clean, well cared for in every detail, befitting a 
first-class hotel—no trays of used room-service dishes parked in front of doors, no 
cigarette butts in the ashtray outside the elevator, the fragrance of fresh-cut flowers 
wafting from well-placed vases. They turned several corners and came to a stop in 
front of a door. Ponytail knocked twice and then, without waiting for an answer, 

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opened the door with a key card. He stepped inside, looked around to make sure there 
was nothing wrong, and gave Buzzcut a curt nod. 
“Please,” Buzzcut said to Aomame drily. 
Aomame walked in. Buzzcut came in after her and closed the door, locking it from 
the inside with a chain. The room was a big one. No ordinary hotel room, it was 
outfitted with a large set of reception-room furniture and an office desk. The 
television set and refrigerator were also full-size. This was clearly the living area of a 
special suite. The window provided a sweeping view of Tokyo at night. It had to be 
an expensive room. Buzzcut checked his watch and urged Aomame to sit on the sofa. 
She did as she was told and set her blue gym bag next to her. 
“Will you be changing clothes?” Buzzcut asked. 
“If possible,” Aomame said. “I’d prefer to change into workout clothes.” 
Buzzcut nodded. “First we’ll have to do a search, if you don’t mind. Sorry, but it’s