Haruki Murakami - The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle

And so you see, my friends, he was saying, everything is both complicated and simple. This is the fundamental rule that governs the world. We must never forget it. Things that appear to be complicated and that, in fact, are complicated are very simple where motives are concerned. It is just a matter of what we are looking for. Motive is the root of desire, so to speak. The important thing is to seek out the root. Dig beneath the complicated surface of reality. And keep on digging. Then dig even more until you come to the very tip of the root. If you will only do that-and here he gestured toward the map-everything will eventually come clear. That is how the world works. The stupid ones can never break free of the apparent complexity. They grope through the darkness, searching for the exit, and die before they are able to comprehend a single thing about the way of the world. They have lost all sense of direction. They might as well be deep in a forest or down in a well. And the reason they have lost all sense of direction is because they do not comprehend the fundamental principles. They have nothing in their heads but garbage and rocks. They understand nothing. Nothing at all. They cant tell front from back, top from bottom, north from south. Which is why they can never break free of the darkness.

Noboru Wataya paused at that point to give his words time to sink into the minds of his audience.

But lets forget about people like that, he went on. If people want to lose all sense of direction, the best thing that you and I can do is let them. We have more important things to do.

The more I heard, the angrier I became, until my anger was almost choking me. He was pretending to talk to the world at large, but in fact he was talking to me alone. And he must have had some kind of twisted, distorted motive for doing so. But nobody else realized that. Which is precisely why Noboru Wataya was able to exploit the gigantic system of television in order to send me secret messages. In my pockets, I clenched my hands into fists, but there was no way I could vent my anger. And my inability to share this anger with anybody in the lobby aroused in me a profound sense of isolation.

The place was filled with people straining to catch every word that Noboru Wataya spoke. I cut across the lobby and headed straight for a corridor that connected with the guest rooms. The faceless man was standing there. As I approached, he looked at me with that faceless face of his. Then, soundlessly, he moved to block my way.

This is the wrong time, he said. You don't belong here now. But the deep, slashing pain from Noboru Wataya now urged me on. I reached out and pushed the faceless man aside. He wobbled like a shadow and fell away. I'm saying this for your sake, he called from behind me, his every word lodging in my back like a piece of shrapnel. If you go any farther, you wont be able to come back. Do you understand?

I ignored him and moved ahead with rapid steps. I wasn't afraid of anything now. I had to know. I had lost all sense of direction, but I couldn't stay like that forever.

I walked down the familiar-looking corridor. I assumed the man with no face would follow and try to stop me, but when I looked back, there was no one coming. The long, winding corridor was lined with identical doors. Each door had a number, but I couldn't recall the number of the room to which I had been taken the last time. I was sure I had been aware of the number back then, but now my attempts to recall it yielded nothing, and there was no question of my opening every one.

I wandered up and down the corridor until I passed a room-service waiter carrying a tray. On it was a new bottle of Cutty Sark, an ice bucket, and two glasses. I let the waiter go by, then followed after him. Every now and then, the polished tray caught the light of a ceiling fixture with a bright flash. The waiter never looked back. Chin drawn in purposefully, he moved straight ahead, his steps in steady rhythm. Sometimes he would whistle a few lines of music. It was the overture to The Thieving Magpie, the opening where the drums come in. He was good.

The corridor was a long one, but I encountered no one else in it all the while I followed the waiter. Eventually, he stopped in front of a door and gave it three gentle knocks. After a few seconds had passed, someone opened the door and the waiter carried the tray in. I pressed against the wall, hiding behind a large Chinese-style vase, and waited for the waiter to come out. The room number was 208. Of course! Why hadn't I been able to remember it until now?

The waiter was taking a very long time. I glanced at my watch. At some point, though, the hands had stopped moving. I examined the flowers in the vase and smelled each fragrance. The flowers seemed to have been brought from a garden only moments before, so perfectly fresh were they, retaining every bit of their color and aroma. They probably still hadn't noticed that they had been severed from their roots. A tiny winged insect had worked its way into the core of a red rose with thick, fleshy petals.

Five minutes or more went by before the waiter came out of the room, empty-handed. With his chin pulled in as before, he went back the same way he had come. As soon as he had disappeared around a corner, I walked over to the door. I held my breath and listened, expecting to hear something. But there was no sound, no sense that anyone was inside. I took a chance and knocked. Three times. Gently. As the waiter had done. But no one answered, I let a few seconds pass and knocked three times again, this time a little more forcefully than before. Still no response.

Next, I tried the knob. It turned, and the door opened soundlessly inward. The room looked pitch dark at first, but some light was managing to find its way in around the thick curtains on the window. With effort, I could just barely make out the window itself and a table and sofa. This was the room in which I had coupled with Creta Kano. It was a suite: the living room here and the bedroom in back. On the table were the dim forms of the Cutty Sark bottle, the glasses, and the ice bucket. When I opened the door, the stainless-steel ice bucket had caught the light from the corridor and sent back a knife-sharp flash. I entered the darkness and closed the door quietly behind me. The air in the room felt warm, and it carried the heavy scent of flowers. I held my breath and listened, keeping my left hand on the knob so that I could open it at any time. There had to be a person in here, somewhere. Someone had ordered the whiskey, ice, and glasses from room service and had opened the door to let the waiter in.

Don't turn on the light, said a womans voice. It came from the bedroom. I recognized it immediately. It was the voice of the enigmatic woman who had made those strange calls to me. I let go of the knob and began to feel my way toward the voice. The darkness of the inner room was more nearly opaque than that of the outer room. I stood in the doorway between the two and strained to see into the darkness.

I could hear the sound of bedsheets shifting. A black shadow moved in the darkness. Leave it dark, said the womans voice.

Don't worry, I said. I wont turn on the light. I kept a firm grip on the door jamb. Did you come here alone? the woman asked, sounding vaguely tired. Of course, I said. I figured Id find you here. You or Creta Kano. I've got to know where Kumiko is. I mean, everything started with that first call from you. You opened Pandora's box. Then it was one weird thing after another, until finally Kumiko disappeared. That's why I'm here. Alone. I don't know who you are, but you hold some kind of key. Am I right?

Creta Kano? the woman asked in guarded tones. Never heard of her. Is she here too? I don't know where she is. But I've met her here more than once. Each breath I took brought with it the strong smell of flowers. The air was thick and heavy. Somewhere in this room was a vase full of flowers. Somewhere in this same darkness, they were breathing, swaying. In the darkness filled with their intense fragrance, I began to lose track of my own physicality. I felt as if I had become a tiny insect. Now I was working my way in among the petals of a giant flower. Sticky nectar, pollen, and soft hairs awaited me. They needed my invasion and my presence.