The Elephant Vanishes Part 26

"The balance?"

"In size. Of their bodies. The elephant's and the keeper's. The balance seemed to have changed somewhat. I had the feeling that to some extent the difference between them had shrunk."

She kept her gaze fixed on her daiquiri gla.s.s for a time. I could see that the ice had melted and that the water was working its way through the c.o.c.ktail like a tiny ocean current.

"Meaning that the elephant had gotten smaller?"

"Or the keeper had gotten bigger. Or both simultaneously."

"And you didn't tell this to the police?"

"No, of course not," I said. "I'm sure they wouldn't have believed me. And if I had told them I was watching the elephant from the cliff at a time like that, I'd have ended up as their number one suspect."

"Still, are you certain certain that the balance between them had changed?" that the balance between them had changed?"

"Probably. I can only say 'probably.' I don't have any proof, and as I keep saying, I was looking at them through the air vent. But I had looked at them like that I don't know how many times before, so it's hard for me to believe that I could make a mistake about something as basic as the relation of their sizes."

In fact, I had wondered at the time whether my eyes were playing tricks on me. I had tried closing and opening them and shaking my head, but the elephant's size remained the same. It definitely looked as if it had shrunk-so much so that at first I thought the town might have got hold of a new, smaller elephant. But I hadn't heard anything to that effect, and I would never have missed any news reports about elephants. If this was not a new elephant, the only possible conclusion was that the old elephant had, for one reason or another, shrunk. As I watched, it became obvious to me that this smaller elephant had all the same gestures as the old one. It would stamp happily on the ground with its right foot while it was being washed, and with its now somewhat narrower trunk it would pat the keeper on the back.

It was a mysterious sight. Looking through the vent, I had the feeling that a different, chilling kind of time was flowing through the elephant house-but nowhere else. And it seemed to me, too, that the elephant and the keeper were gladly giving themselves over to this new order that was trying to envelop them-or that had already partially succeeded in enveloping them.

Altogether, I was probably watching the scene in the elephant house for less than a half hour. The lights went out at seven-thirty-much earlier than usual-and from that point on, everything was wrapped in darkness. I waited in my spot, hoping that the lights would go on again, but they never did. That was the last I saw of the elephant.

"So, then, you believe that the elephant kept shrinking until it was small enough to escape through the bars, or else that it simply dissolved into nothingness. Is that it?"

"I don't know," I said. "All I'm trying to do is recall what I saw with my own eyes, as accurately as possible. I'm hardly thinking about what happened after that. The visual image I have is so strong that, to be honest, it's practically impossible for me to go beyond it."

That was all I could say about the elephant's disappearance. And just as I had feared, the story of the elephant was too particular, too complete in itself, to work as a topic of conversation between a young man and woman who had just met. A silence descended upon us after I had finished my tale. What subject could either of us bring up after a story about an elephant that had vanished-a story that offered virtually no openings for further discussion? She ran her finger around the edge of her c.o.c.ktail gla.s.s, and I sat there reading and rereading the words stamped on my coaster. I never should have told her about the elephant. It was not the kind of story you could tell freely to anyone.

"When I was a little girl, our cat disappeared," she offered after a long silence. "But still, for a cat to disappear and for an elephant to disappear-those are two different stories."

"Yeah, really. There's no comparison. Think of the size difference."

Thirty minutes later, we were saying good-bye outside the hotel. She suddenly remembered that she had left her umbrella in the c.o.c.ktail lounge, so I went up in the elevator and brought it down to her. It was a brick-red umbrella with a large handle.

"Thanks," she said.

"Good night," I said.

That was the last time I saw her. We talked once on the phone after that, about some details in her tie-in article. While we spoke, I thought seriously about inviting her out for dinner, but I ended up not doing it. It just didn't seem to matter one way or the other.

I felt like this a lot after my experience with the vanis.h.i.+ng elephant. I would begin to think I wanted to do something, but then I would become incapable of distinguis.h.i.+ng between the probable results of doing it and of not doing it. I often get the feeling that things around me have lost their proper balance, though it could be that my perceptions are playing tricks on me. Some kind of balance inside me has broken down since the elephant affair, and maybe that causes external phenomena to strike my eye in a strange way. It's probably something in me.

I continue to sell refrigerators and toaster ovens and coffee-makers in the pragmatic world, based on afterimages of memories I retain from that world. The more pragmatic I try to become, the more successfully I sell-our campaign has succeeded beyond our most optimistic forecasts-and the more people I succeed in selling myself to. That's probably because people are looking for a kind of unity in this kit-chin kit-chin we know as the world. Unity of design. Unity of color. Unity of function. we know as the world. Unity of design. Unity of color. Unity of function.

The papers print almost nothing about the elephant anymore. People seem to have forgotten that their town once owned an elephant. The gra.s.s that took over the elephant enclosure has withered now, and the area has the feel of winter.

The elephant and keeper have vanished completely. They will never be coming back.

-translated by Jay Rubin

Haruki Murakami was born in Kyoto in 1949 and now lives near Tokyo. His work has been translated into more than forty languages. The most recent of his many honors is the Franz Kafka Prize.www.harukimurakami.com

Books by Haruki Murakami

Fiction

After Dark

After the Quake

Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman

Dance Dance Dance

The Elephant Vanishes

Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World

Kafka on the Sh.o.r.e

Norwegian Wood

South of the Border, West of the Sun

Sputnik Sweetheart

A Wild Sheep Chase

The Wind-Up Bird ChronicleNonfiction

Underground: The Tokyo Gas Attack and the j.a.panese Psyche

What I Talk About When I Talk About Running

ALSO BY H HARUKI M MURAKAMI.

AFTER DARKMurakami's trademark humor and psychological insight are here distilled with an extraordinary, harmonious mastery. Combining the pyrotechnical genius that made Kafka on the Sh.o.r.e Kafka on the Sh.o.r.e and and The Wind-up Bird Chronicle The Wind-up Bird Chronicle international bestsellers, with a moving infusion of heart, Murakami has produced one of his most enchanting fictions yet. international bestsellers, with a moving infusion of heart, Murakami has produced one of his most enchanting fictions yet.Fiction/978-0307-27873-9AFTER THE QUAKESet at the time of the 1995 Kobe earthquake, Murakami's characters emanate from a place where the human meets in the inhuman. An electronics salesman who has been abruptly deserted by his wife agrees to deliver an enigmatic package-and is rewarded with a glimpse of his true nature. A man who has been raised to view himself as the son of G.o.d pursues a stranger who may or not be his human father. A collection agent receives a visit from a giant talking frog who enlists his help in saving Tokyo from destruction.Fiction/Literature/978-0-375-71327-9BLIND WILLOW, SLEEPING WOMANThis superb collection of stories generously express Murakami's mastery of the form. Here are animated crows, a criminal monkey, and an ice man, as well as the dreams that shape us and the things we might wish for. Whether during a chance reunion in Italy, a romantic exile in Greece, or in the grip of everyday life, Murakami's characters confront grievous loss, or s.e.xuality, or the glow of a firefly, or the impossible distances between those who ought to be closest of all.Fiction/Short Stories/978-1-4000-9608-4DANCE DANCE DANCEAs he searches for a mysteriously vanished girlfriend, Murakami's protagonist plunges into a wind tunnel of s.e.xual violence and metaphysical dread in which he collides with call girls, plays chaperone to a lovely teenage psychic, and receives cryptic instructions from a shabby but oracular Sheep Man.Fiction/Literature/978-0-679-75379-7THE ELEPHANT VANISHESWith his genius for dislocation, Murakami makes this collection of stories a determined a.s.sault on the normal. A man sees his favorite elephant vanish into thin air; a newlywed couple suffers attacks of hunger that drive them to hold up a McDonald's in the middle of the night; a young woman discovers that she has become irresistible to a little green monster who burrows up through her backyard.Fiction/Literature/978-0-679-75053-6HARD-BOILED WONDERLAND AND THE END OF THE WORLDj.a.pan's most popular fiction writer hurtles into the consciousness of the West. Murakami draws readers into a narrative particle accelerator in which a split-brained data processor, a deranged scientist, his undemure granddaughter, Bob Dylan, and various thugs, librarians, and subterranean monsters collide to dazzling effect.Fiction/Literature/978-0-679-74346-0KAFKA ON THE Sh.o.r.eThis book is powered by two remarkable characters: a teenage boy, Kafka Tamura, who runs away from home-either to escape a gruesome oedipal prophecy or to search for his long-missing mother and sister-and an aging simpleton called Nakata, who never recovered from a wartime affliction and now is drawn toward Kafka for reasons that he cannot fathom. As their paths converge, Murakami enfolds readers in a world where cats talk, fish fall from the sky, and spirits slip out of their bodies to make love or commit murder.Fiction/Literature/978-1-4000-7927-8NORWEGIAN WOODToru, a college student in Tokyo, is devoted to Naoko, a beautiful and introspective young woman. But their relations.h.i.+p is colored by the tragic death of their mutual best friend years before. As she retreats further into her own world, Toru finds himself drawn to a fiercely independent and s.e.xually liberated young woman.Fiction/Literature/978-0-375-70402-4SOUTH OF THE BORDER, WEST OF THE SUNBorn into an affluent family, Hajime has arrived at middle age wanting for almost nothing. The postwar years have brought him a fine marriage, two daughters, and an enviable career. Yet a sense of inau-thenticity about his success threatens his happiness. And a boyhood memory of a wise, lonely girl named s.h.i.+mamoto clouds his heart.Fiction/Literature/978-0-679-76739-8SPUTNIK SWEETHEARTA college student, identified only as "K," falls in love with his cla.s.smate, Sumire. But devotion to the writerly life precludes her from any personal commitments-until she meets Miu, an older and more sophisticated businesswoman. When Sumire disappears from an island off the coast of Greece, "K" is solicited to join the search party and finds himself beset by ominous, haunting visions.Fiction/Literature/978-0-375-72605-7UNDERGROUNDIt was a clear spring day, Monday, March 20, 1995, when five members of the religious cult Aum s.h.i.+nrikyo conducted chemical warfare on the Tokyo subway system using sarin, a poison gas twenty-six times as deadly as cyanide. The unthinkable had happened, a major urban transit system had become the target of a terrorist attack. In an attemp to discover why, Murakami talked to the people who lived through the catastrophe-from a Subway Authority employee with survivor guilt, to a fas.h.i.+on salesman with more venom for the media than for the perpetrators, to a young cult member who vehemently condemns the attack though he has not quit Aum. Through these and many other voices, Murakami exposes intriguing aspects of the j.a.panese psyche.Fiction/978-0-375-72580-7WHAT I TALK ABOUT WHEN I TALK ABOUT RUNNINGWhile training for the New York City Marathon, Haruki Murakami decided to keep a journal of his progress. The result is a beautiful memoir about his intertwined obsessions with running and writing, full of vivid memories and insights, including the eureka moment when he decided to become a writer. By turns funny and sobering, playful and philosophical, What I Talk About When I Talk About Running What I Talk About When I Talk About Running is rich and revelatory, both for fans of this masterful yet guardedly private writer and for the expanding population who find similar satisfaction in athletic pursuit. is rich and revelatory, both for fans of this masterful yet guardedly private writer and for the expanding population who find similar satisfaction in athletic pursuit.Memoir/Running/978-0-307-38983-1A WILD SHEEP CHASEA twenty-something advertising executive receives a postcard and appropriates its image for an insurance company's advertis.e.m.e.nt. What he doesn't realize is that included in the pastoral scene is a mutant sheep with a star on its back, and in using this photo he has unwittingly captured the attention of a man in black who offers a menacing ultimatum: find the sheep or face dire consequences.Fiction/Literature/978-0-375-71894-6THE WIND-UP BIRD CHRONICLEThe Wind-Up Bird Chronicle Wind-Up Bird Chronicle is at once a detective story, an account of a disintegrating marriage, and an excavation of the buried secrets of World War II. In a Tokyo suburb a young man named Toru Okada searches for his wife's missing cat. Soon he finds himself looking for his wife as well in a netherworld that lies beneath the placid surface of Tokyo. is at once a detective story, an account of a disintegrating marriage, and an excavation of the buried secrets of World War II. In a Tokyo suburb a young man named Toru Okada searches for his wife's missing cat. Soon he finds himself looking for his wife as well in a netherworld that lies beneath the placid surface of Tokyo.Fiction/Literature/978-0-679-77543-0