The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle by Haruki Murakami Read Free Book Online

times. I gave up and took it. I would have preferred not to answer, but it might have been Kumiko.
    “Hello,” said a woman’s voice, one I had never heard before. It belonged neither to Kumiko nor to the strange woman who had called me the other day when I was cooking spaghetti. “I wonder if I might possibly be speaking with Mr. Toru Okada?” said the voice, as if its owner were reading a text.
    “You are,” I said.
    “The husband of Kumiko Okada?”
    “That’s right,” I said. “Kumiko Okada is my wife.”
    “And Mrs. Okada’s elder brother is Noboru Wataya?”
    “Right again,” I said, with admirable self-control. “Noboru Wataya is my wife’s elder brother.”
    “Sir, my name is Kano.”
    I waited for her to go on. The sudden mention of Kumiko’s elder brother had put me on guard. With the blunt end of the pencil that lay by the phone, I scratched the back of my neck. Five seconds or more went by, in which the woman said nothing. No sound of any kind came from the receiver, as if the woman had covered the mouthpiece with her hand and was talking with someone nearby.
    “Hello,” I said, concerned now.
    “Please forgive me, sir,” blurted the woman’s voice. “In that case, I must ask your permission to call you at a later time.”
    “Now wait a minute,” I said. “This is—”
    At that point, the connection was cut. I stared at the receiver, then put it to my ear again. No doubt about it: the woman had hung up.
    Vaguely dissatisfied, I turned to the kitchen table, drank my coffee, and ate my sandwich. Until the moment the telephone rang, I had been thinking of something, but now I couldn’t remember what it was. Knife in my right hand poised to cut the sandwich in half, I had definitely been thinking of something. Something important. Something I had been trying unsuccessfully to recall for the longest time. It had come to me at the very moment when I was about to cut the sandwich in two, but now it was gone. Chewing on my sandwich, I tried hard to bring it back. But it wouldn’t come. It had returned to that dark region of my mind where it had been living until that moment.
    •
    I finished eating and was clearing the dishes when the phone rang again. This time I took it right away.
    Again I heard a woman saying “Hello,” but this time it was Kumiko.
    “How are you?” she asked. “Finished lunch?”
    “Yup. What’d you have?”
    “Nothing,” she said. “Too busy. I’ll probably buy myself a sandwich later. What’d you have?”
    I described my sandwich.
    “I see,” she said, without a hint of envy. “Oh, by the way, I forgot to tell you this morning. You’re going to get a call from a Miss Kano.”
    “She already called,” I said. “A few minutes ago. All she did was mention our names—mine and yours and your brother’s—and hang up. Never said what she wanted. What was that all about?”
    “She hung up?”
    “Said she’d call again.”
    “Well, when she does, I want you to do whatever she asks. This is really important. I think you’ll have to go see her.”
    “When? Today?”
    “What’s wrong? Do you have something planned? Are you supposed to see someone?”
    “Nope. No plans.” Not yesterday, not today, not tomorrow: no plans at all. “But who is this Kano woman? And what does she want with me? I’d like to have some idea before she calls again. If it’s about a job for me connected with your brother, forget it. I don’t want to have anything to do with him. You know that.”
    “No, it has nothing to do with a job,” she said, with a hint of annoyance. “It’s about the cat.”
    “The cat?”
    “Oh, sorry, I’ve got to run. Somebody’s waiting for me. I really shouldn’t have taken the time to make this call. Like I said, I haven’t even had lunch. Mind if I hang up? I’ll get back to you as soon as I’m free.”
    “Look, I know how busy you are, but give me a break. I want to know what’s going on. What’s with the cat? Is this Kano