Кобо Абэ - The Ark Sakura

“My nerves were getting to me, I guess,” I apologized.

“You’re not the only one. I made a damned fool out of myself.” The shill ran his fingers lightly along the barrel of my Uzi. “Aha, so this was no toy after all. Now I see why it attracted Komono, with his eye for guns.”

“It’s converted. If you go easy on the gunpowder, you can use it as a semiautomatic.”

“Put it on safety, please. Things like that have a way of causing more trouble than they’re worth.”

“Komono says a crossbow isn’t much use against more than one enemy, since you can’t fire in volleys.”

“Have all the guns in here been converted?”

“Yes, more or less.”

“I’ll be damned. You’ve got yourself enough for a small army.”

He sat back in the chair in the lowest armory and looked around excitedly. He’d spoken like a pacifist a moment before, but now that he found himself surrounded by weapons, it seemed to set his blood racing after all. It was certainly true that guns could be the source of much trouble. I kept them to use against rats, snakes, and stray dogs; to date, I had exterminated seven rats and one cat. For protection against human invaders, I had greater faith in dynamite. In the end, man-made cave-ins would protect us like the door to a safe.

“I’ll go get the sleeping bags,” I said.

“Wait a minute. This is where we are now, right?” The moment he set eyes on the wall map, he was absorbed. When I came back lugging two new sleeping bags, he was tearing off strips of red vinyl tape and sticking them on the map, like some big chief of staff.

“Here, and here — see, the enemy has to cross at least three barriers. Especially climbing down the shaft here, they’ve got to go single file with their backs turned toward us. It’d be a cinch to wipe ’em out.”

“As long as they didn’t attack while we were sleeping. This one with the yellow stripes is a medium. You can have it.”

“Looks like we’d better have sentry duty tonight, anyway.”

We went back under the bridge and laid out the sleeping bags, with the insect dealer at the far end, me by the stairs, and the shill in the middle. My brain felt suddenly exhausted, as if somebody had kneaded it in flour. Without asking, the shill helped himself to a beer from the refrigerator.

“If the free drinks go on forever, that only reduces their value,” I said.

“Is that a nice thing to say? Of course I expect you to bill me for anything I eat or drink. That’s a fundamental rule of community life, isn’t it? — pay for what you consume.”

“About the night watch — you and I are the only ones awake.”

“I know. Funny, isn’t it?” He opened the can and lowered his mouth to it as carefully as if it contained hot soup. “Get a load of Watermelon Head here, sleeping like a pig.”

“Watch your language.” My voice went shrill despite myself.

“I didn’t mean anything by it.” He smiled apologetically, then quickly straightened his face and said, “After all, if I really thought so I’d never say so, right?”

“You shouldn’t look down on pigs.” I took off my shoes, tore the label off the brand-new sleeping bag, unzipped it, and stretched out inside, propping myself up on my elbow. “Sure, they’re stupid. At least as stupid as people. But what’s really stupid is to go around thinking pigs are inferior to people. I’ve already told this to Komono too: I’m not having any muscle-worshipping types share this ship with me. It’s going to be a long trip.”

“All right.”

“Do you know what mark the Olympic Prevention League chose as their symbol?”

“No — what?”

“A pig. A round green pig, like a ball with legs. Olympic Prevention League members wear the badges on their chests. You may have seen them — round green badges trimmed in silver. When they march in demonstrations, the members carry a flag with the same design. Just so no one will think it’s an ad for pork cutlets, the mouth is slightly open, with tusks bared. OPL is still a tiny fringe movement, but I hear people with that badge are scattered all across the country, and all around the world. Most are obese, or at least fairly overweight. Which Olympics was it, now. remember, on the TV news? Members of the Olympic Prevention League marched boldly onto the playing field, waving their flags. I remember I felt a little bit sympathetic to their aims, but also a little put off, a little embarrassed, actually. The slogans began pouring in from hand mikes:

“ ‘Down with muscle-worship!’

“ ‘Down with vitamins!’

“ ‘Down with the national flag!’”

. They wanted to pull down all the national flags on display overhead. It certainly is true that that cluster of national flags in the Olympic stadium is presumptuous. People are all too ready to pick sides for no good reason. Showing the national flag only takes advantage of that inborn weakness. And why should any country get excited about a well-developed set of muscles? It’s unnatural. There’s got to be some plot. Besides, to raise the national flag and play the national anthem in honor of robust bodies constitutes a clear act of discrimination against the rest of the citizenry. There in that sports arena being used openly as a ceremonial hall to exalt national prestige, it was only natural for the pig group to launch an attack on the flags, and for the steering committee to take the defensive.

Grounds keepers ran around blowing police whistles. Angry at having the games interrupted, the spectators began throwing things:

hamburgers

boxed lunches tin cans

spectacles strings tissue paper

false teeth

condoms chewing gum

Next the players and guards together attacked the league members. The announcer issued earnest appeals, as if gargling in sand:

“Players, please return to your assigned positions and stand by. The games will resume momentarily. Spectators are requested to wait quietly. The lavatories are presently all occupied.”

But by then it was impossible to stanch the flow of waste articles that came pouring down the bleachers like lava. The conical stadium was soon buried in trash, and some of the judges announced they were leaving. The players became more and more crazed. Not content merely with ripping the prevention league pigs apart, they consigned the officials to oblivion and then advanced against the spectators. A sports commentator offered his analysis: “If things go on this way it will be a darned shame for the athletes.” Finally the whole stadium swelled up like bowels with the anus sutured shut, in the shape of a giant toilet. It also bore some resemblance to a dirigible with the back hollowed out. At any moment it would lift off tearing away from its anchor and go scudding over the seas where a hundred tropical low-pressure zones clustered.

Better split before they come checking tickets.

Everybody knows they were pork cutlet restaurant owners in disguise.

[And they all lived

happily ever after.]

“H E Y, Captain, isn’t there any TV here?”

I awoke at the shill’s voice. I had a feeling we had had some sort of run-in over hogs, but I could not tell exactly where that had left off and my dream had taken over.

“Forget it.”

“Darn. It’s almost time for my favorite show.”

“Look, TV isn’t going to be around forever.”

“Don’t you get bored?”

“I just take a trip somewhere if I do: with three-D aerial-photograph maps, I can fly anywhere I want. Want to take a look?”

“That’s okay, I’m not in the mood.”

The shill gave a huge yawn, fell on his sleeping bag, and wiped tears from his eyes. At last, for the first time in hours, it was back: silence. The walls of the underground quarry sighed as if they knew my feelings. CCCCCCcccccccchhhhhh. . a silent mutter as of grass seeds bursting open. Until now these walls had seemed a second skin to me. They had seemed the inner walls of my own bowels, turned inside out for my contemplation. Now that special intimacy was gone forever. Community life meant that they must appear the same to all. The walls were ordinary walls, the floors ordinary floors, the ceilings ordinary ceilings. I would have to refrain from talking out loud to no one but the stone; from singing crazily off key till I was covered in sweat; from dancing ecstatically in the nude. Yes, everything had changed. Even if I could somehow have chased away the shill and the insect dealer, the old tranquillity would never return. Someone was watching me. Even if what I saw had been an illusion, the figment the shill had spotted and chased had at least a ninety percent chance of being real. How else could I explain the way my traps had been tinkered with? Even if the mysterious interloper was Sengoku, it would mean that he not only knew about the secret toilet and the alarm system but also had been listening in on my monologues and songs. The mere thought made every mucous membrane in my body feel soaked in tannin.