Click.
86
When the giant lets go of his nose, a searing burst of pain careens through Reizo’s entire body. But the pain of humiliation is even greater.
“People call me Rokurobei,” says the giant. “It’s not my real name, but over the years I’ve come to identify with it.”
It takes a while for Reizo Shiga’s penny to drop. “If the masks are anything to go by you are a lover of Noh,” the man continues. “I prefer Shakespeare myself. The strangest and most besotted things happen in his plays… so true to life.” The man leans forward. The eyes behind the mask glisten with scorn. “But I couldn’t resist the temptation to borrow the identity of the storm god. If Shakespeare had known him he would have been crazy about him. He was in a state of awe about everything supernatural. Ironic isn’t it that Japanese men and women of your generation claim they don’t believe in the old spirits anymore, yet they’re all completely addicted to comic strips in which the supernatural is central. Ho hum… But as a writer you must surely have heard of shingao, tell me, Reizo Shiga?”
Reizo doesn’t answer. He saves face, in spite of his aching nose, by staring at the man unflinchingly.
“In the old days it literally meant: eat your face,” the masked man continues unperturbed. “It was presumed you would wipe out your own everyday face and replace it with the incarnated spirit of the mask you were wearing. What do you think, Reizo? Could that be true?”
Reizo’s voice cracks, but his words are far from a terrified whisper: “Let me put on the storm god mask and I’ll tell you.”
Rokurobei slaps his thighs with delight. His minions grin. “Look what we have here… a real man with karisuma!”
The underlying insult carried by the word charisma is crystal clear. But Reizo’s face remains rigid.
“But we’re not here to talk about culture. Your uncle Tomio Shiga lost his life recently in a bank raid. Did he try to contact you before he died, in whatever fashion?”
Surprised by the abrupt change of subject, Reizo tries to think on his feet. He was expecting a different question: where is my daughter? He’s standing face to face with the father of Mitsuko, the man she said would come for his blood when he left her behind in the metro service tunnel. But the drugs have left him indifferent. He realises that the man is unaware that his daughter is close by. Rokurobei is here for something else. Reizo grins obliquely. “My uncle, the magnanimous bank executive whose plan to save the Japanese economy was touted in the newspapers day in day out? A man like that isn’t likely to want anything to do with the black sheep of the family.” The figure before him moves in closer. Reizo observes that his neck is unnaturally long. He’s wearing a support collar that appears to be made of silver. “Is that so?” says Rokurobei. “A classical dilemma. Should I believe you? You could be telling the truth, I suppose, but I grew up with absolute values, do you get my drift? When I catch even a whiff of doubt I’m on my guard. Shortly before he died, your good uncle threatened me. He said the Shiga clan would be my downfall. And you’re part of that clan, whether you like it or not.”
The spirit of the young junkie isn’t to be tamed: “I don’t care if you’re on your guard. Why target me? I’m a member of the Brotherhood and that makes me a part of your…”
“I know you’re a member of the sect,” says Rokurobei. “But who told you I was a man of influence in Aum Shinrikyo?”
“I’m highly placed in the Brotherhood. I know things.”
“You’re lying. You’re a novice.”
“I’m one of yours!”
The man sighs. “That sounds so delightfully old fashioned. Are you a ronin, boy? Is that what you think you are? A mercenary in my employ? Let me give you some advice: open your eyes and look around. In a world of crisis and recession, fidelity and a person’s word are worth as much these days as a rat’s ass. Especially in Japan.” He looks round the room. “That’s even more true for someone like you, who lives the life of a rat.”
Reizo’s sense of honour lifts him out of himself: “So I’m old fashioned. My word counts.”
A lengthy silence follows. “So it would appear,” says the man, his tone polite. “Bushi no ichigon, neh?”
Reizo straightens his back. “I give you my word as a samurai, that’s true.”
“Mmm, I can trust the word of a samurai. But the word of a junkie?”
Reizo isn’t immediately sure how to react to this insult. Jump to his feet and challenge mister know-it-all to a duel, man to man? But his initial rage has been replaced by a paralysing indifference. A boundless fatigue takes hold of him. For years, the drugs had filled his dreams with visions of terrifying creatures creeping up on him, leering at him. Now that Rokurobei, the “serpent’s neck” as the demon was once called, is standing in front of him, large as life, the same drugs make him shrug his shoulders.
“Your uncle had information about a secret that is very important to me. I need to be sure no one else knows about it, even someone who calls himself old fashioned.”
Why is Rokurobei telling him all this? Reizo looks him in the eye and sees his answer: he belongs to the Shiga clan and he’s doomed to die. People didn’t just kill adversaries in ancient Japan. It was important to eliminate your enemy, but just as important to get rid of his family and his blood brothers. Otherwise you could count on a dagger or a sword in your gut sooner or later. His mouth dries up and he finds it hard to breathe. But he’s determined to stay calm and unmoved on the outside, whatever the cost.
“I’m told you’re keen on Mishima,” the serpent’s neck continues.
Reizo says nothing.
“Or rather, you want to outstrip Mishima.”
Reizo looks at the floor. He’s surprised at the clarity in his mind, a gift of the ghb, a clarity almost as intoxicating as any drug can be. It’s a sudden state of grace, of insight into his life and his motivations, something he’s never experienced before. Reizo remembers the anxiety attacks, and the shame that followed them. Speed made him reckless, but it also transformed the darkness into a place of monsters, all of them waiting for him, all of them wanting something from him. But if he confronted them with courage, they would turn and walk away, grey shadows. It all left him surprised and confused. Heroin made him grind his teeth, then it brought a white light that filled the world with breathtaking meaning. After that the illumination withdrew, leaving the darkest pit imaginable in its wake.
“Teach me something, Reizo Shiga,” says the storm god condescendingly. “Tell me about Mishima’s philosophy.” Reizo has a feeling the man knows he’s been parading Mishima all his life without ever having read him properly. He tries to think of an appropriate response. He’s never finished any of Mishima’s novels. It was the elitist author’s life that fascinated him most. Filled with shame, sadness and rebellion, he finally says: “You’re born as a worm, suffer a miserable life of anxiety and paranoia that prevents you from revealing the golden light inside you to others, and then you die, sobbing for your wasted, useless life.”
“A little stilted perhaps, but well put,” says Rokurobei. “And bungled together in too much of a hurry, boy. Mishima’s philosophy was simple, to the point, attractive and true. In Bunka Beiron he wrote: the emperor of Japan is the source of Japanese culture, and thus defending the emperor is the same as defending Japanese culture.”