Onodera had just finished a series of diving tests in the Kumano Sea and was about to return to Tokyo for a night before starting the actual exploration, which would be still more demanding. All its defects repaired now, the Kermadic was in satisfactory condition. Kataoka, the mechanical genius, had done a painstaking job of repairing and refitting it.
When Onodera had finally been able to drag himself from beneath a pile of tiles in Ponto-cho after the earthquake, he had made use of the quickly restored phone service to contact Tokyo, and, at Nakata’s direction, he had taken off at once for Europe to negotiate the purchase of the Kermadic without even taking the time to stop at his parents’ home. From Italy he had sent a cryptic cablegram announcing his resignation, which stunned his superiors at Sea Floor Development, who had been under the impression that he had died in the quake. Now, his work finished in the Kumano Sea area, he boarded a military seaplane and flew to Haneda Airport. The next day, together with Yukinaga and Nakata, he was to fly back to the Takatsuki, which was bound for a spot 310 miles east of Cape Inubo. Such was Onodera’s frantic pace.
As soon as he stepped into the headquarters in Harajuku, he was taken in hand, especially by Nakata and Yukinaga, and swept up into an interminable discussion of the communication system and a variety of other aspects of the project. Onodera was astounded at the incredible tempo of Plan D. No sooner was one problem dealt with than still more loomed up. Can they expect, he wondered, to get through this fantastic amount of work with no more men than they have?
Finally, after a lengthy period of give and take, Nakata threw a sheaf of documents brusquely aside and yawned extravagantly.
“Well, no matter how long we stuck at it, we wouldn’t finish,” he said. “And the survey starts tomorrow. What do you say we get a good night’s sleep tonight? Onodera, how about going out for a nightcap with us? After all, you won’t be seeing Tokyo for a while, will you?”
“Thanks,” said Onodera, glancing at his watch as he stood up. “An hour or two’ll do no harm.”
They went to a bar at the very top of a new building in Yoyogi which offered a panoramic view of the city. The lighting in the bar was so dim that it took time to make out the faces of the patrons, and though it was eleven o’clock when they arrived, it was rather crowded. At each table flickered a candle covered with a red or blue shade. Band music flowed quietly through the room, and well-dressed men and women talked as though in whispers. In the midst of a gloom like depths of indigo blue, the smooth faces of the women, their bare arms and shoulders, and the necklaces and pendants that hung at their breasts glowed pale, like the bellies of fish swimming over the dark ocean floor, while the tiny orange flames of cigarette lighters flashed from time to time.
The six of them sat at a table near the window, ordered a bottle of white wine, and then quietly touched their glasses together.
“Well,” said Kunieda, “here’s to the bold project that we start tomorrow.”
“I don’t know anything about bold projects,” said Onodera with a half-smile, “but here’s to the success of our research.”
“And here’s to the safe performance of the Kermadic,” said Yukinaga.
“And, finally,” said Nakata, in a last toast, “here’s to Japan and the road ahead for her.”
The glasses clinked softly. The cold, mellow liquid flowed down their throats. After he had filled his glass a second time, Onodera leaned back in his chair as though to withdraw some what from the quiet conversation that had begun at the table, and gazed at the scene spread out below him, beyond the sheet of glass that extended from ceiling to floor—the city at night.
Tokyo by night was, as always, a flood of lights. The white beams of headlights and the red flash of taillights coalesced in swift-moving currents between the chilly glow cast by lines of mercury lights. Yellow sodium lights shone on the freeways winding about the city like huge snakes, and here and there skyscrapers towered up, giant black slabs studded with thou sands of lights despite the lateness of the hour.
How could one possibly conceive of such a thing happening! Onodera stared out into the night beyond the dark sheet of glass.
Like a black, ominous bird, a huge passenger plane, flashing red and white lights on its approach to Haneda, seemed to graze the peak of Tokyo Tower, etched in the night sky with specks of brilliance.
Everything he looked at—should the thing that Professor Tadokoro feared come about, if it turned out to be real. . . this vast city, the teeming life that pulsated through it, what would become of it all? The 110 million people of this race that had come into being and flourished on this soil rich in history—what of the dreams cherished by each of them as they looked toward tomorrow? To build a home. To raise children. To go to college. To travel abroad. More than 100 million people, with their petty hopes—what in heaven’s name was to become of all of them?
Go ahead and enjoy yourself, thought Onodera, as he looked out on the scene flooded with lights, his mood almost that of a man offering a prayer. Go ahead, for now at least, enjoy yourself to the full, all of you. Enjoy every moment like something never to come again. The memory of even paltry pleasures is better than none at all. So enjoy yourselves for now. As for tomorrow . . . maybe it will never come.
“I guess it’s time,” said Nakata, looking at his watch as he stood up. “Let’s everybody get a good night’s sleep tonight.”
While they were standing by the cashier’s counter, a short, slim girl, wearing the kind of beige suit touched with pale blue that was stylish that fall, glanced at Onodera and then cried out in a small voice: “My goodness! It’s . . . ah . . . Mr. Ono . . .”
“Well,” said Onodera, placing the girl. “Mako—right?”
“Yes! You’re kind enough to remember me. Oh, how nice! Mr. Onoda—no, Mr. Onodera.”
“That’s right. Your place is the . . . let’s see . . . the Miruto, isn’t it?”
“You haven’t been there at all since then, have you? Yuri’s just heartbroken that you never taught her how to use an aqua lung.”
While she talked, Mako clung to Onodera’s arm as though she were intent on abandoning the stout, distinguished-looking gentleman she was with. “Please come back. Oh, yes—Mr. Yoshimura has been in, but he said that you left the company. Is that so?”
Frowning slightly, Onodera nodded.
“Well, anyway,” said the girl, “please come again. And give me a call, please. Don’t forget.”
“A cute little girl,” said Kunieda ironically. “Is she a hostess?”
“Yes. It’s awkward to run into her like this,” muttered Onodera as he watched the girl disappear into the bar, chattering to her companion like a sparrow. “Should I tell her to keep her mouth shut?”
“No, there’s no need. With a girl like that, there couldn’t be cause for concern,” said Nakata. “Besides, tomorrow you’ll be at sea—or, rather, at the bottom of it.”