Харуки Мураками - Killing Commendatore

Masahiko had shown me the shrine the first time he took me to see the house. “You don’t find many houses these days that come with their own shrine,” he laughed, and I agreed.

“When I was a kid, though,” Masahiko went on, “it creeped me out to have that kind of weird thing on our property. So when I stayed over I avoided coming near here,” he said. “Even now, to tell the truth, I’d rather not go near it.”

I wasn’t a person who often thought in materialistic terms, but just like his father, Tomohiko Amada, having the shrine nearby didn’t bother me. People in the past set up shrines in all kinds of places, much like the little Jizo and Dosojin statues you see next to roads in the countryside. This shrine blended naturally into the scenery in the woods, and when I went on walks I often passed in front of it but never gave it much thought. I never prayed to it, or made any offerings. And I didn’t feel anything significant about having that sort of thing on the property where I was living. It was just part of the kind of scenery you’d find anywhere.

The bell-like sound seemed to be coming from near that shrine. Once I set foot in the woods, the tree branches above me blocked the moonlight and everything got suddenly darker. I carefully made my way forward, lighting the path with the flashlight. The wind would occasionally pick up, as if remembering to blow, rustling the thin layer of leaves on the ground. The woods at night felt totally different from walking there in the daytime. The place was operating under the principles at work at night, and those principles didn’t include me. That said, I didn’t feel particularly afraid. Curiosity spurred me on. I felt compelled to locate where that strange sound was coming from. I tightly gripped the heavy cylindrical flashlight, its weight calming me.

The horned owl might be in these woods somewhere, I thought. Hidden in the darkness on a branch, waiting for its prey. It would be nice if it were nearby. In a way that owl was my friend. But I didn’t hear anything that sounded like the hooting of an owl. The night birds, like the insects, were keeping quiet.

As I made my way forward, the bell-like sound became ever clearer. It continued to ring out intermittently, irregularly. The sound seemed to be coming from behind the little shrine. It sounded much closer, but was still muffled, like it was filtering out from deep inside a narrow cave. The silence between each ring had grown longer, and the number of rings was decreasing. As if the person ringing the bell had grown weak, become worn out.

The area around the shrine had been cleared and the moonlight shone beautifully on everything. Stepping silently, I walked over behind the shrine. There was a tall thicket of pampas grass and, led by the sound, I pushed my way into the thicket. There I found a small mound of square stones casually piled up, a kind of ancient burial mound. Though perhaps it was too small to be called that. At any rate, I had never noticed it was there before. I’d never gone behind the shrine, and even if I had, the mound was hidden in the midst of the pampas grass. You weren’t going to see it unless you had some reason to wade into the thicket.

I approached the mound and shone my flashlight directly upon it. The stones were old, but weren’t in their natural form, and had clearly been chiseled into squares. They had been carried up onto the mountain and piled up behind the shrine. The stones were of different sizes, most of them covered in moss. There wasn’t any visible writing or designs on them. There were twelve or thirteen stones altogether, by my count. In the past, the mound might have been taller and more orderly, but maybe an earthquake had made part of it crumble. The bell-like sound somehow seemed to be filtering out from the cracks between those stones.

I lightly rested my foot on top of the stones and searched for the source of that sound. But no matter how bright the moonlight, it was next to impossible to locate it in the dark of night. And what if I did happen to locate it? What then? I couldn’t lift these heavy stones myself.

At any rate it seemed like someone below the stone mound was ringing the bell. I was sure of it. But who ? It was at this point that an enigmatic fear began to well up inside me. Instinct told me not to get any closer to the source of that sound.

I left, and with the bell ringing behind me hurried back along the path through the woods. Moonlight filtering through the branches cast a suggestive mottled pattern on my body. I emerged from the woods, rushed down the seven stone steps, got back to the house, went inside, and locked the door. I walked to the kitchen, poured a glass of whiskey straight, no ice, no water, and gulped it down. I could finally breathe a sigh of relief. I took my glass of whiskey out to the terrace.

From the terrace I could hear the bell only faintly. If I hadn’t listened carefully I wouldn’t have been able to catch it. But the point was, the sound continued. The interval of silence between each ringing of the bell was definitely lengthening. I listened to that irregular repetition for some time.

What in the world lay beneath the stones of that mound? Was there a space there, and somebody locked inside who was ringing that bell, or whatever it was? Maybe it was a signal for help. But no matter how much I thought it over, I couldn’t think of a single plausible explanation.

I might have thought about it for a long time. Or maybe it was but a moment. I had no idea. My sense of time had vanished. Glass of whiskey in hand, I sank back into the lounge chair, shuffling back and forth in the maze of consciousness. And then it hit me. The bell had stopped. Everything was enveloped in a profound silence.

I stood up, went into the bedroom, and looked at the digital clock. It was 2:31 a.m. I didn’t know the precise time the bell had started ringing, but since it had been 1:45 when I woke up, I surmised the bell had gone on ringing for at least forty-five minutes. Soon after the mysterious sound ceased, the insects began chirping again, as if probing the new silence that had arisen. As if all the insects in the mountains had been patiently waiting for the sound of that bell to stop. Holding their breath, cautiously assessing the situation.

I went back to the kitchen, rinsed out my glass, then slipped back into bed. By this time the autumn insects were a lusty chirping chorus. I should have been too worked up to sleep, but the straight whiskey did the trick and I fell asleep as soon as my head hit the pillow. A long, deep sleep, bereft of dreams. When I woke again it was already bright outside the bedroom.

That day, before ten a.m., I walked out again to the little shrine in the woods. I couldn’t hear that enigmatic sound, but I wanted to study the shrine and stone mound once more in the daylight. I found a stout oak walking stick in Tomohiko Amada’s umbrella stand and took that with me. It was a sunny, pleasant morning, the clear autumn sunlight throwing the shadows of leaves across the ground. Birds with sharp bills flitted busily from one branch to another, squawking as they searched for fruit. Up above, a straight line of pitch-black crows was winging its way off somewhere.

The little shrine looked worn and shoddy in the daylight. Bathed in the bright, whitish light of the nearly full moon the shrine had looked deeply meaningful, even a bit ominous, yet now in the light of day it seemed like nothing more than a faded, seedy-looking wooden box.

I went behind the shrine, shouldered my way through the tall thicket of pampas grass, and emerged in front of the stone mound. It seemed completely transformed from the night before. What I saw before me now were merely square moss-covered stones long abandoned in the mountains. In the moonlight it had appeared like part of ancient historical ruins, covered with a mythic slime. I stood on top of the mound and perked up my ears, but couldn’t hear a thing. Other than the screech of insects and the occasional bird chirp, it was silent all around.