After the quake blind willow, sleeping woman dance dance dance

CHAPTER 10 
Ushikawa 
GATHERING SOLID LEADS 
Ushikawa traveled to Ichikawa. It felt like quite a long excursion, but actually 
Ichikawa was just over the river in Chiba Prefecture, not far from downtown Tokyo. 
At the station he boarded a cab and gave the driver the name of the elementary school. 
It was after one p.m. when he arrived at the school. Lunch break was over and classes 
had just begun for the afternoon. He heard a chorus singing in the music room and a 
gym class was playing soccer outside. Children were yelling as they chased after the 
ball. 
Ushikawa didn’t have good memories of his own days in elementary school. He 
wasn’t good at sports, particularly any kind that involved a ball. He was short, a slow 
runner, had astigmatism, and was uncoordinated. Gym class was a nightmare. His 
grades in other classes were excellent, though. He was pretty bright and applied 
himself to his schoolwork (which led to passing the difficult bar exam when he was 
only twenty-five). But nobody liked him, or respected him. Not being good at sports 
may have been one reason. And then there was his face. Since he was a child, he had 
had this big, ugly face, with a misshapen head. His thick lips sagged at the corners 
and looked as if they were about to drool at any moment, though they never actually 
did. His hair was frizzy and unruly. These were not the sort of looks to attract others. 
In elementary school he hardly ever spoke. He knew he could be eloquent if 
necessary, but he didn’t have any close friends and never had the opportunity to show 
others how well spoken he could be. So he always kept his mouth shut. He kept his 
ears open and listened closely to whatever anyone else had to say, aiming to learn 
something from everything he heard. This habit eventually became a useful tool. 
Through this, he discovered a number of important realities, including this one: most 
people in the world don’t really use their brains to think. And people who don’t think 
are the ones who don’t listen to others. 
At any rate, his elementary school days were not a page of his life that Ushikawa 
enjoyed reminiscing over. Just thinking that he was about to visit an elementary 
school depressed him. Despite any differences between Saitama and Chiba 
prefectures, elementary schools were pretty much alike anywhere you went in Japan. 
They looked the same and operated on the same principles. Still, Ushikawa insisted 
on going all the way to visit this school in Ichikawa himself. This was important, 
something he couldn’t leave up to anyone else. He had called the school’s front office 
and already had an appointment for one thirty. 

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The vice principal was a petite woman in her mid-forties, slim, attractive, and 
nicely dressed. 
Vice principal?
Ushikawa was puzzled. He had never heard that term 
before. But it was ages ago when he graduated from elementary school. Lots of things 
must have changed since then. The woman must have dealt with many people over 
the years, for she didn’t blink an eye when faced with Ushikawa’s extraordinary 
features. Or perhaps she was just a very well-mannered person. She showed 
Ushikawa to a tidy reception room and invited him to take a seat. She sat down in the 
chair across from him and smiled broadly, as if wondering what sort of enjoyable 
conversation they were about to have. 
She reminded Ushikawa of a girl who had been in his class in school. The girl had 
been pretty, got good grades, was kind and responsible. She was well brought up and 
good at piano. She was one of the teacher’s favorites. During class Ushikawa spent a 
lot of time gazing at her, mainly at her back. But he never once talked with her. 
“I understand that you’re looking into one of the graduates of our school?” the vice 
principal asked. 
“I’m sorry, I should have given you this before,” Ushikawa said, and passed her 
his business card. It was the same card he had given Tengo, the one with his title on 
it: Full-time Director, New Japan Foundation for the Advancement of Scholarship and 
the Arts. What he told the woman was the same fabricated story he had told Tengo. 
Tengo Kawana, who had graduated from this school, had become a writer and was on 
a short list to receive a grant from the foundation. Ushikawa was just running an 
ordinary background check on him. 
“That’s wonderful news,” the vice principal said, beaming. “It’s a great honor for 
our school, and we will do everything we can to help you.” 
“I was hoping to meet and speak directly with the teacher who taught Mr. 
Kawana,” Ushikawa said. 
“I’ll check into that. It’s more than twenty years ago, so she may be retired 
already.” 
“I appreciate that,” Ushikawa said. “If it’s all right, there’s one other thing I would 
like you to look into, if you would.” 
“And what would that be?” 
“There was a girl in the same year, I believe, as Mr. Kawana, a Miss Masami 
Aomame. Would you be able to check into whether she was in the same class as Mr. 
Kawana?” 
The vice principal looked a bit dubious. “Is this Miss Aomame in some way 
connected with the question of funding for Mr. Kawana?” 
“No, it’s not that. In one of the works by Mr. Kawana, there is a character who 
seems to be modeled on someone like Miss Aomame, and I have a few questions of 
my own on this topic that I need to clear up. It’s nothing very involved. Basically a 
formality.” 
“I see,” the vice principal said, the corners of her lips rising ever so slightly. “I am 
sure you understand, however, that in some cases we may not be able to give you 
information that might touch on a person’s privacy. Grades, for instance, or reports on 
a pupil’s home environment.” 

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“Of course, I’m fully aware of that. All we are after is information on whether or 
not she was actually in the same class as Mr. Kawana. And if she was, I would 
appreciate it very much if you could give me the name and contact information for the 
teacher in charge of their class at the time.” 
“I understand. That shouldn’t be a problem. Miss Aomame, was it?” 
“Correct. It’s written with the characters for green and peas. An uncommon name.” 
Ushikawa wrote the name “Masami Aomame” in pen on a page on his pocket 
notebook and passed the page to the vice principal. She looked at it for a few seconds, 
then placed it in the pocket of a folder on her desk. 
“Could you please wait here for a few minutes? I’ll go check our staff records. I’ll 
have the person in charge photocopy whatever can be made public.” 
“I’m sorry to bother you with this when you are obviously so busy,” Ushikawa 
said. 
The vice principal’s flared skirt swished prettily as she exited the room. She had 
beautiful posture, and she moved elegantly. Her hairstyle was attractive too. She was 
clearly aging gracefully. Ushikawa shifted in his seat and killed time by reading a 
paperback book he had brought along. 
The vice principal came back fifteen minutes later, a brown business envelope 
clutched to her breast. 
“It turns out that Mr. Kawana was quite the student. He was always at the top of 
his class as well as a very successful athlete. He was especially good at arithmetic and 
mathematics, and even in elementary school he was able to solve high-school-level 
problems. He won a math contest and was written up in the newspaper as a child 
prodigy.” 
“That’s amazing,” Ushikawa said. 
“It’s odd that while he was touted as a math prodigy, today he has distinguished 
himself in literature.” 
“Abundant talent is like a rich vein of water underground that finds all sorts of 
places to gush forth. Presently he is teaching math while writing novels.” 
“I see,” the vice principal said, raising her eyebrows at a lovely angle. “Unlike 
Tengo, there wasn’t much on Masami Aomame. She transferred to another school in 
fifth grade. She was taken in by relatives in Adachi Ward in Tokyo and transferred to 
a school there. She and Tengo Kawana were classmates in third and fourth grades.”