Kenzaburo Oe - Somersault

Ikuo fielded this one. What Patron built is the Church of the New Man, so doesn't it make the most sense for those who lead to be the ones who have, in many senses of the word, the greatest possibility of becoming New Men?

After hesitating to ask again the reason why Ikuo didn't see himself as that kind of person, Fred asked, "Do you really believe young Gii is the right person to be the leader of the church?" And for the first time, Fred revealed his trump card.

In their little tête-à-tête in the corner it was obvious that Gii had been pestering Fred about something, which turned out to be whether Fred knew of any GI group in Okinawa or on the mainland that sold contraband machine guns out of the bases. Once he got hold of these high-powered weapons, Gii said, he'd have some Americans who fought in Vietnam train the Fireflies in their use. If they reinforced the ceiling of this chapel with steel sheets and the armed Fireflies holed up inside, they should be able, for a while at least, to hold off an attack by the riot police and military helicopters.

As if he were re-creating a battle scene from a Coppola movie, Gii de- scribed the Fireflies battling it out from their chapel stronghold-all the while making sure that everything he was saying was off the record. "I just want you to understand," Gii went on, "when you talk with those groups I men- tioned earlier, the level of resolve the Fireflies have as a part of the Church of the New Man. We're ready to take on Japan and the world!"

Gii was very much drawn to the same concept of a postinsurrection millennial reign of repentance that the lzu radical faction had had before the Somersault, something that people now knew was clearly different from the Aum concept of a self-centered Armageddon. Having an insurrection lead straight to the end of the world, to nothing but death, was a defeatist attitude.

"Through an insurrection based on using the Church of the New Man as our foundation," Gii told Fred, "I want to make the millennial reign of repen- tance a reality. Even in the European idea of the millennium, a millennial reign isn't seen as such an impossibly long time. If we turn the chapel into a for- tress with the weapons that spill out of the American military bases-even if we only hold out for ten days-our call for repentance will reach the ends of the earth. We've already started our own Web page. And the memory of what we do, like that of He Who Destroys and Meisuke-san's uprising, will remain forever in the realm of myth. The next New Men who arise will carry on where we left off. In other words, through the Church of the New Man we will become one with the legends of this land."

"What do you think about these ideas of Gii's?" Fred asked Ikuo. "You still plan to hand the church over to him?"

"Since more than anything else Gii hates a defeatist attitude," Ikuo re- sponded, "he won't rashly start an insurrection. For the longest time I've been mulling over Patron's final words in his sermon-the call of Long live Karamazov! When Dancer was going through Patron's effects, she found a dog-eared copy of the novel with the following commentary circled in red pencil. I read this over so many times I can quote it verbatim: "Not just Aloysha, who thirteen years hence is supposed to be crucified for being an assassin of the Tsar, but the lustful Dimitri, who carries the burden of a crime he didn't commit, as well as the Grand Inquisitor Ivan, who cries out in his thirst for life-all of them make a complete change from their positions and reach the sublime at the chorus of shouts from the boys of Long live Karamazov!' "

Ikuo translated this very deliberately into English. After this, when he spoke next, Ogi felt he was seeing the Ikuo of old, as if a bizarre, out-of- control Yonah had removed his mask. And what he remembered later with unusual clarity was the strong feeling that Ikuo had a beauty not in keeping with his face-no, more accurately even his face was part of this now. Yet despite this he was someone who might very well be Ogi's lifelong adversary.

All the while, a faint smile rose to Ikuo's lips, inscrutable but quite the opposite of the meaningless smile that Japanese display when talking with foreigners-the adjective that Fred used when, days later, he was going over with Ogi his notes of his conversation with Ikuo-and Ikuo said that when Patron shouted out Long Live Karamazov! he had to have been thinking of those here, the Japanese version of young men full of possibilities for the future.

"No matter what frightening things the young people in the church do over the next ten or fifteen years," Ikuo continued, "as long as they're New Men I'm not going to drive them out. I imagine that from now on Gii will, in both what he says and does, be the one who fluctuates the most violently, but right now in the church he's our number-one New Man. I want to educate him to be the one who shouts Long live Karamazov! and succeeds the dead. I want to raise him up in our church-and outside it, too."

Days later, when he was reviewing his conversation with Ikuo, Fred Parks asked Ogi whether, on that day in the chapel, Gii and Ikuo hadn't planned out all their answers ahead of time-at Gii's instigation, mainly-and were pulling his leg. But Ogi was less inclined to think about that than the crystal-clear memory he had of Ikuo that day-a memory that in later years often came back to haunt him.

On his final day Kizu had clearly been growing weaker, but he had his pillows piled up high on his bed and, with the lightweight opera glasses Mr.

Soda had brought over as a gift when he came to visit, was gazing at the wild cherry blossoms on the east shore. Ikuo had been watching over him all night, and Dancer had joined them. The night before was a full moon with only a thin scattering of clouds, and Kizu had tried to view the cherries in the moon- light but couldn't see them so well, he said. Checking to see that he'd be all right for a few moments, Ikuo had walked down to below the dam where Gii and some of the Fireflies were parked and asked them to take care of something.

Gii had uncoiled a long line they'd used in the summer conference from a covered outlet at the foot of the outside wall of the chapel and shone a flood- light on the wild cherries on the jutting crags where the bilberries grew. Ikuo was happy that the attempt was a success. But Kizu had been too worn out to lift his head from his pillow.

With no way for Ikuo to signal Gii and the Fireflies by the crags, the young men could do nothing but remain standing next to the floodlight.

Concerned about how things were turning out, Kizu fell into a comalike sleep for ten minutes, then opened his eyes and asked three times whether the flood- lights were still lit. Ikuo looked out at the moonlit ink-colored forest and the cherry blossoms looming up palely in the floodlight and said yes. With the dark gray of the grove of cherry trees just outside the ring of light, the whole scene was one of great depth. But since there was no way they could even get Kizu's head raised up to look out a little, Ikuo asked if he'd like the curtains closed, to which Kizu responded in a listless, muffled voice-Dancer had skillfully helped him get up the phlegm-that it wasn't good to keep the young boys out there if they were still standing by the crags.

As the moon shifted, the surface of the lake was thrown into dark shad- ows and Kizu awoke from a lengthy sleep and asked Ikuo to pose for him.

Dancer acted shocked, thinking Kizu was hallucinating and thought he was painting, but Ikuo knew differently. An easel stood next to the bed, with one of the drawings Kizu had done for the triptych, a sketch of a nude Ikuo he particularly liked. Ikuo stripped off his clothes and struck the same pose.

Slowly tilting his head on the pillow, Kizu gazed intently at him.