Кэйго Хигасино - A Midsummer’s Equation

Kyohei looked up at the man in surprise. A blank look on his face, the man thrust his hand into Kyohei’s trash bag and pulled out the aluminum foil.

Before Kyohei even had a chance to say something, the man spread the aluminum foil out on his knee, then crumpled it in a ball around the cell phone.

“There,” he said, handing it back to Kyohei. “You can stay in your seat.”

Kyohei took the phone in silence. He felt like he was watching some kind of magic trick, but he wasn’t entirely sure what had happened.

“What’s that supposed to do?” the old man asked.

“Aluminum foil blocks cellular signals,” the man said, his eyes back on his magazine. “He won’t be able to send or receive calls. It’s the same as if it were off. Society lives to see another day.”

Kyohei gaped in shock between the two men. The old man looked a bit confused, but when he saw Kyohei looking at him, he coughed loudly and closed his eyes. His wife was grinning as if this were the funniest thing she’d seen all year.

A short while later, many of the passengers started getting up and pulling luggage off the overhead racks. An announcement indicated that they would soon be stopping at a popular destination for beachgoers.

The train stopped, and about half of the passengers got off. Kyohei considered changing seats, but the man across from him stood before he did. Pulling a bag off the rack, he moved to another seat further up the car.

Kyohei frowned. He couldn’t move too. He glanced across the aisle. The old man was snoring.

The coastline here was dotted with beaches, and at each station, the number of passengers on the train grew fewer and fewer. It was still a ways before Hari Cove.

The old man’s snoring grew louder, though his wife didn’t seem to notice. She was looking out the window at the view. Unable to concentrate on his game, Kyohei finally stood, picking up his backpack and bag of garbage.

There were plenty of empty seats to choose from now. He walked down the aisle, thinking to get as far away from the old man as he could, when he saw the man who had wrapped the aluminum foil around his phone. His back was turned, and he was crossing his legs and reading his magazine. Kyohei glanced at it over his shoulder. He was on the crossword puzzle page. Several of the blanks had already been filled in, but he wasn’t writing. He looked stumped.

“Temperance,” Kyohei muttered.

The man stiffened in his seat and looked around. “What did you say?”

Kyohei pointed at the blank line in his crossword puzzle. “Five down. ‘Who reads the bones?’ I think it’s Temperance.”

The man looked down at his puzzle and nodded. “It does fit. Is that someone’s name? Never heard it before.”

“Temperance Brennan. She’s the lead in Bones . She looks at dead people’s bones and figures out all kinds of things from them. It’s a TV show.”

The man narrowed his eyebrows and looked at the cover of his magazine.

“You can’t put fictional characters in a science magazine’s crossword puzzle. It’s not fair,” he grumbled.

Kyohei sat down across from the man, who had already returned to his puzzle. His pen was moving rapidly now, its previous hurdle cleared.

The man reached for the bottle of tea on the seat next to him. But when he lifted it up, he noticed it was empty and put it back down.

Kyohei held up his bottle of water, still half full. “You can have some.”

The man looked at him with an expression of shock on his face, then curtly shook his head. “No.”

Somehow disappointed, Kyohei was putting his bottle back into his backpack when the man added, “Thanks, though.” Kyohei looked up, and their eyes met for the first time. The man quickly looked away.

They were getting close to Hari Cove now. Kyohei pulled a printed map out of his shorts pocket with a marked location that read “Green Rock Inn.”

He’d been here two years ago, but that time, he’d come by car and with his parents. This would be his first time walking there from the station. He spread out the map and traced the route with a finger, when the man asked, “You staying all by yourself?”

“My aunt and uncle live there,” Kyohei said. “They run the place.”

“Oh? What’s it like?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, is it a good hotel? Are the facilities new, are they clean, does it have a view, is the food good, is there anything to recommend it?”

Kyohei shrugged. “Only been there once, so I dunno, but the building’s really old, I remember that. And it’s a little ways away from the ocean, so the view’s not very good either. I don’t know about the food. It’s okay, I guess.”

“I see. Could I have a look?”

Kyohei handed him the map, and the man wrote the name of the hotel, the phone number, and the address in the corner of his magazine and tore it off.

“Interesting name. Are the rocks green?”

“Not really. There’s a big rock out in front with the name carved on it, though.”

“I see,” the man said, returning the map.

Kyohei stuffed it back in his pocket, then looked out the window. The train was just emerging from a tunnel, and it seemed to him that the sea on this side sparkled just a little bit brighter.

By the time she had both sneakers on, the hands of the old clock on the wall were at half past one. Right on time, Narumi thought. If she took her bike, she could be there in fifteen minutes. That would leave her plenty of time to talk with the others.

“I’m heading out, Mom,” she called over the counter.

Setsuko came out through the long curtain hanging in the doorway to the kitchen. She had a handkerchief tied around her hair, a sure sign she was the middle of prepping dinner. “How long will you be?” she asked.

Setsuko looked young for a woman in her midfifties, Narumi often thought, and if she ever bothered to put on makeup, she would probably look even younger. But the most she could be bothered with in the summer was some sunscreen and foundation.

“I’m not sure. Maybe two hours?” Narumi said. “There’s a couple of guests coming in tonight, right? Know what time they’re getting here?”

“They didn’t say exactly, but in time for dinner I should imagine.”

“Well, I’ll try to be back before then.”

“Don’t forget that Kyohei is coming tonight, too,” her mother reminded her.

“Oh, right. Is he coming by himself?”

“That’s what they said. His train should be getting here anytime.”

“I’ll stop at the station on my way,” Narumi offered. “I’ll pick him up. I don’t want him to get lost.”

“Thanks, dear. I don’t think my brother would be happy with me if I lost his only son.”

Narumi nodded, thinking that was hardly likely in a small town like theirs. Outside, the sun was beating down. The large piece of polished obsidian engraved with the name of the inn reflected the sunlight, making it almost too brilliant to look at.

Slinging her bag over her shoulder, Narumi got on her bike and headed for the station. The roads in the area were hilly, but Green Rock Inn was up on a bluff, so she could coast all the way.

She was there in under five minutes, and passengers from the train that had just arrived were already coming out — only a dozen or so of them in all.

Among them she spotted a boy in a red T-shirt and khaki shorts, wearing a backpack.

The boy’s sullen expression looked familiar, but Narumi hesitated a moment before calling out to him. The reason for her hesitation was twofold. For one, it had been two years since they’d met, and if that really was he, he was a lot bigger than she remembered. Two, he was talking familiarly with the man walking next to him, but her mother had just told her he was coming alone, and she knew this man wasn’t her uncle.