It was imperative that all participants come on time. After the start of the service the security guards planned to shut the side door and stand guard.
Patron would wait in Kizu's apartment, and then Kizu and Dancer, after she'd finished checking all the invitations, would escort him to the service. The other participants would enter the hall on the building's south side, through a cor- ridor below the veranda on the first floor, while Patron would take an eleva- tor to the basement and proceed to the meeting room down a corridor between the bicycle racks and the laundry room.
Ikuo's task was to bring Patron from the office in Seijo to the apartment building; when he and his three security guards had arrived in the minivan with Patron, then and only then would the front gate be opened. Kizu and the building manager had already sent out a letter to the other residents, Kizu's university colleagues, asking their cooperation in not using their cars from 10 A.M. to 3 P.M.
After Kizu had checked the grounds, he walked up to the front gate, where Ikuo was just getting out the minivan to go pick up Patron. Ikuo left the security guards inside, thirtyish men dressed in light charcoal-gray pull- overs and dark gray trousers-a kind of uniform for those organizing the memorial service-and got out of the driver's seat; he was dressed similarly.
Kizu explained to him how the grounds of this building, which had served as the Cultural Affairs Section during the Occupation, was still, as in the old days, surrounded by a high, sturdy chain-link fence.
Ikuo listened attentively. "The security guards have all had military training," he said, "so unless we're attacked by a huge force, the front gate should hold. It's hard to imagine an attacking force of that size moving about the center of Tokyo, though, don't you think?"
The three uniformed guards inside, who didn't greet Kizu, nodded to one another at Ikuo's confident words. Ikuo had from the first been openly enthusiastic as he made the security preparations, and perhaps his bluster was for their ears.
Ikuo returned to the minivan. Kizu watched as he raced off; then he helped the guard close the front gate. The guard was an old Filipino man over seventy who claimed he'd been working there since the Occupation; far from looking put out at having to do something beyond his job description, the old man seemed positively buoyant. Kizu guessed this was due to Ikuo's influ- ence. Despite his dark, forbidding looks, the young man could be sunny and charming beyond belief.
A long table was set up next to the side entrance, where Ogi sat with the list of attendees; he nodded to Kizu, who walked over to him and said, "Ikuo's security squad seems to be doing a good job."
Ogi agreed, and looked out over the porte cochere. Right next to him were three more guards, also in their thirties and dressed in uniform; on the other side of the pavement, five guards stood at set intervals. Ogi didn't seem to mind that the guards who'd gathered at one end of the table heard him as he explained things to Kizu, who had dimly sensed the situation.
"The members of the security squad are all followers from the Izu re- search center, before the Somersault," Ogi said. "The radical faction, in other words… At that time the police intervened in everything they did, so they left the church, formed their own group, and continued to keep the faith… The ones who kidnapped Guide and caused his death were one element of this group, not the ones cooperating with us, of course; they didn't approve of that. Since the people who took Guide are being held in custody, there's no chance they'll be coming here."
"Aren't some of the members of the former radical faction who joined the security squad the ones who attended Patron's press conference?" Kizu asked.
"I believe so. It was afterward that Ikuo started getting in touch with members of the faction. He didn't act alone; he had Dancer's help in finding out how to locate them. I'm a naive person-hence my nickname-but if they'd asked me I would have advised them to discuss things with Patron first.
I was left out of the loop, but now that I see the security squad he put together I think Ikuo made the right decision."
The men, who were within earshot of Kizu and Ogi's conversation, casually moved away to stand beside the concrete wall of the entrance and, bunched together, began smoking. They had a sophisticated air about them.
"Still," Kizu said, "even if they criticized how their colleagues let Guide die, they used to be part of the radical faction, so aren't they still upset because of the Somersault? If Patron doesn't apologize for the Somersault at the memorial service, and doesn't criticize his own actions, then what…?"
"When I heard the guards for the service were former members of the radical faction the thought occurred to me too," Ogi said, "that if Patron plays dumb regarding the Somersault there might very well be trouble. When I mentioned that to Ikuo, he went over to discuss things with them, and apparently they came to some kind of understanding."
"I know bringing this up won't get us anywhere, but what if their under- standing with Ikuo is just a ruse and they're planning to take over the me- morial service and lynch Patron?" Kizu said, as he glanced around inside the side gate. "We'd be playing right into their hands. I mean, they're the only potentially violent group at the service."
"Dancer asked Ikuo the same thing. He said if it came to that, he'd stand up to them and defend Patron himself, and she was satisfied. What I'm hoping is that Patron's sermon will go over well, not just with the former radical faction but with the women's group you and Ikuo visited. We have limits on the number of participants, so we weren't able to invite anyone from the Kansai headquarters, the group that continued to run the religious corpora- tion. The rest of the people coming are individual participants. Professor, did you help prepare Patron's sermon for today?"
"I did," Kizu replied, "but I imagine he'll end up mostly improvising, even though his meetings with me have been like miniature model sermons.
The only thing I've done consciously to help him is to check some of the quotes from the Bible and elsewhere."
One of the men smoking by the wall took a walkie-talkie out of his pocket, spoke into it, and came back. In the broad street outside, a single large tourist bus was slowly pulling up to the curb with one of the security staff guiding it, also with a walkie-talkie in hand. He walked over to where Ogi and Kizu were and asked if they'd allow these participants, who had overes- timated the amount of time they'd be stuck in traffic, to come in early. As Ogi refused their request, Kizu saw a side of him he'd never seen before. "Have them find a place near the moat to park and let them eat their lunches a bit early," Ogi instructed the guard.
The tourist bus started off again, the clump of children in front look- ing out the window at them. It was the women's group Kizu had visited with Ikuo. The older girl who had led the line of children off after their prayers was among them, waving something that looked like a lily as it caught the faint white light. It was a hand bell. Her fingers rested on the inside to keep it from ringing.
2
In the meeting hall for the memorial service, a room combining the lounge and the dining room of the apartment building, there were already over three hundred and fifty participants, including the organizers. The women's group were the only ones who had brought their children with them.
Only they and the former members of the radical faction in the security de- tail were followers from before the Somersault; the rest were new converts from the past ten years, people Ogi had contacted after they had sent indi- vidual letters to Patron. One example of the latter was Ms. Tachibana, who'd brought along her mentally challenged younger brother. Ms. Asuka was there as well, recording the proceedings with her video camera.