Microsoft Word KoboAbe-WomanInTheDunes doc

particularly strange, in fact, if his return ticket were to be her ticket out. 
Even suppose, for the time being, that she had made a mistake… after 
all, a mistake was a mistake. 
Don't look down. He mustn't look down! 
A mountain climber, a window cleaner on some skyscraper, an 
electrician atop a television tower, a trapeze artist in a circus, a 

---

chimney sweep on a factory smokestack—the instant of his destruction 
was the instant he looked down. 
24
HE had made it! 
His fingernails struck the sandbags and, not caring if his hands were 
stripped of their skin, he frantically scrambled up. There! He was on 
top! He no longer had to worry about slipping back even if he relaxed 
his grip. Yet it was impossible for him to straighten his arms and for 
minutes he remained as he was, clutching the bags tightly to him. 
On this day of his liberation, the forty-sixth he had been in the pit, a 
violent wind was raging. As he began to crawl along, his face and neck 
were struck by stinging grains of sand. He had not counted on such a 
savage wind. In the hole he had just felt that the sound of the sea was 
closer than usual, and right now should be the moment of the evening 
calm. Yet if it was blowing this much, surely he could not hope for any 
mist. Maybe the sky had looked muddy only from within the hole. He 
might well have mistaken the wind-blown sand for mist Whichever way 
it was, the situation was delicate. 
He looked up nervously. In the fading light the fire tower seemed to be 
leaning unsteadily to one side. It was surprisingly slight and far away. 
But as the man in it would be watching him through binoculars, he 
couldn't count on the distance to be in his favor. He wondered if they 
had already spotted him. No, if they had, they would have instantly 
rung the alarm bell. 
On a stormy night almost a half year ago, the woman had told him, a 
bulwark had given way in a hole located on the western outskirts of the 
village, and the house in it had been half buried. And then it had 
rained. The water-soaked sand had doubled in weight and crushed the 
house like a matchbox. Fortunately no one was injured, but the next 
morning the whole family had tried to run away. In less than five 
minutes after the alarm was sounded, they could hear the wailing of the 
old woman being led along the road in back. The family seemed to 
have had hereditary mental trouble, the woman had added in a 
convinced tone. 

---

No he could not waste any time. He raised his head resolutely and 
looked around. Long shadows fell along the hollows and rises of the 
dunes. The landscape was bathed in a murky reddishness, and the 
wisps of wind-blown sand streaming out from the shadows were 
swallowed up one after the other by other shadows. Could he escape 
detection behind his screen of blowing sand? Looking back over his 
shoulder to check on the effect of the light reflection, he stared in 
amazement. The wind-blown sand was not alone responsible for the 
pall of milky smoke that lay over the landscape, shading the sinking 
sun with crayon strokes of color. All at once a shredded and shifting 
mist was steadily rising from the surface of the ground. If it was blown 
away in one place, it rose in another; swept clear here, it billowed up 
there. From his experience in the hole, he was well aware that the sand 
attracted moisture, but he had had no idea that there was this much. It 
looked like the scene of a fire after the firemen have gone. Of course, it 
was a thin mist, not very conspicuous in the reflected light, but a good 
camouflage, enough to conceal him from the eyes of the lookout. 
He put on his shoes, which he had thrust into his belt, and stuck the 
coiled rope into his pocket. With the shears attached, it would be a 
useful weapon in an emergency. The direction of his flight was toward 
the west, which was shielded by the refracted light. His first need was 
to find a place to hide until the sun went down. 
Well, let's get going. Keep your back down and run along where it's low. 
Don't lose your head now. Keep your eyes peeled and get a move on. 
There! There's a hollow to hide in over there! What was that suspicious 
noise? An unlucky sign? Maybe not… up, and get going. Not too much 
io the right. The cliff on the right was so low that he might be seen. 
A path had been worn in a straight line from one hole to another by the 
night basket crews. The right side of the path was a smooth slope with 
a number of indentations. The rooftops of a second row of houses were 
barely visible. 
They in turn were protected by the line of 
houses to the sea side. The walls of the 
holes all along there were low, and the 
brushwood fence built as protection against 
the sand seemed to be still of some avail. 

---

From the village side of the wall they could apparently go in and out as 
they pleased. When he raised his head a little he could see all the way 
to the center of the town. Roofs of tile, zinc, and thatch clustered in 
black splotches in the center of the undulating terrain, which opened 
out like a fan before him. There was a straggling grove of pine, and he 
could see something that looked like a pond. And just to protect this 
pitiful bit of geography, more than ten households on the sea side had 
to submit to a life of slavery. 
The slave holes were now situated in a line on the left of the road. Here 
and there were branching paths made by the basket crews, and 
beyond, threadbare sandbags buried in the sand told where the holes 
were. It pained him just to look at them. In some places no rope 
ladders were looped around the bags, but more places had them than 
not. Not a few of the slaves, he supposed, and already lost all will to 
escape. 
He could easily understand how it was possible to live such a life. 
There were kitchens, there were stoves with fires burning in them, there 
were apple crates, in place of desks, piled full of books, there were 
kitchens, there were sunken hearths, there were lamps, there were 
stoves with fires burning in them, there were torn shoji, there were 
sooty ceilings, there were kitchens, there were clocks that were running 
and clocks that weren't, there were blaring radios and broken radios, 
there were kitchens and stoves with fires in them… And in the midst of 
them all were scattered hundred-yen pieces, domestic animals, 
children, sex, promissory notes, adultery, incense burners, souvenir 
photos, and… It goes on, terrifyingly repetitive. One could not do 
without repetition in life, like the beating of the heart, but it was also 
true that the beating of the heart was not all there was to life. 
Down, quick! No, it was nothing, just a crow. There was, alas, no 
chance of catching it and stuffing it, but such things no longer made 
any difference. The craving for decorations, medals, tattoos, came only 
when one dreamed unbelievable dreams. 
At last he seemed to be coming to the outskirts of the village, and the 
road lay atop the ridge of sand dunes; the view opened out, and to his 
left he could see the sea. The wind carried the pungent taste of surf, 
and his ears and nostrils hummed like a spinning top. The towel he had 

---

tied around his neck snapped in the wind and struck his cheek; as he 
had expected, the mist here seemed to lack the strength to rise. The 
leaden sea was overlaid with an aluminum sheet, gathered into 
wrinkles like the skin on boiled milk. The sun, squeezed by clouds that 
resembled frogs' eggs, seemed to be stalling, unwilling to sink. The 
horizon was dotted with the motionless silhouettes of black ships, 
whose size and distance from him he was unable to guess. 
Beyond were only the smooth sand dunes, undulating in countless 
ridges that stretched on to the promontory. Maybe it was dangerous to 
go on like this. Worried, he turned and looked behind him; fortunately, 
the fire tower was cut off from view by a slight rise in the sand. As he 
raised himself on his toes little by little, his eye was caught by a low-
lying shack half buried in the slope immediately to his right. Because of 
the angle, it had not been visible in the shadows. To the leeward was a 
deep hollow that looked as if it had been scooped out with a spoon. 
An ideal place to hide. The texture of the sand was as smooth as the 
underside of a shell, and there was not a sign of anyone's having been 
there. But what was he to do about his own footprints? He retraced his 
steps and found that beyond about thirty yeards they were already 
completely effaced. Even where he was standing they were caving in, 
transforming before his very eyes. The wind was good for something. 
As he was about to go round to the back of the shack, something dark 
came slinking out from the inside. It was a reddish dog, thick-set like a 
pig. He must not frighten it Go on, get away! But the dog showed no 
sign of retreating and stood rooted, its eyes fixed on him. One ear was 
torn, and its small unbecoming eyes made it seem all the more shifty. It 
sniffed at him. Would it take it into its head to bark? he wondered. Just 
let it try. He gripped the shears in his pocket. Let it make a sound and 
he would put a hole in its brains with these! The dog stared back at him 
defiantly, but in silence, not even growling. Was it a wild dog? It had a 
seedy, lusterless coat, and its muzzle was covered with scabs. They say 
it's a dangerous dog that doesn't bark. Damn! He should have brought 
some food. And speaking of food, he had forgotten to bring along his 
potassium cyanide. Oh well, let it go. The woman would probably never 
find where he had hidden it anyway. He held out his hand and gave a 
low whistle to see if he could get the dog's attention. For an answer, the 
dog curled its thin lips, which were the color of smoked herring, and 

---

bared its yellow sand-incrusted fangs. The brute certainly couldn't have 
much appetite for him, he mused. It had a beastly large throat, though. 
He had better manage to get him on the first try, but… 
Abruptly the dog looked away, his scruff went down, and he ambled 
lazily off as if nothing had happened. It had apparently given in to his 
unbending will. His mental power was not in bad shape if he could 
stare a wild dog down. He let himself slide into the hollow and lay as 
he was, against the slope. He was screened from the wind, and he gave 
a sigh of relief and contentment. The dog, staggering under the gusts, 
disappeared beyond the blowing sand. The fact that a wild dog had 
made the place its home was a guarantee that people did not come 
around. As long as the dog did not go tale-bearing to the office of the 
farm co-op, his safety here seemed assured. In spite of the sweat that 
began slowly and steadily to ooze out, he felt well. How quiet!… Quite 
as if he were enveloped in gelatin. Although he was clutching a time 
bomb, set for moment X, it bothered him no more than the sound of the 
balance wheel of his alarm clock. His Mobius friend would have 
immediately analyzed the situation, so: 
—My friend, what you're doing is consoling yourself with the means of 
your escape and not keeping your eye on the goal. 
And he would have agreed easily: 
—Very true. But I wonder if you have to distinguish so precisely 
between means and end. Wouldn't it be all right to use the definitions 
as need dictates? 
—No, no, that wouldn't do at all. You can't spend time vertically. It's an 
accepted fact that time really goes horizontally. 
—What happens if you try spending it vertically? 
—You're a mummy if you do! 
He chuckled and took off his shoes. Indeed, time did seem to run 
horizontally. He could not stand the sand and sweat that had collected 
between his toes. He took off his shoes and socks and stretched his 
toes, letting the air in between them. Hmm, why did places where 
animals live have such an unpleasant smell? Wouldn't it be fine if there 

---

were animals that smelled like flowers! No. It was the smell of his own 
feet. A curious feeling of friendliness welled up in him when he realized 
this. He recalled that someone had said that there was nothing that 
tasted so good as one's own ear wax, that it was better than real 
cheese. Even if it weren't that bad, there were all kinds of fascinating 
things one never tired of smelling… like the stink of a decaying tooth. 
The entrance to the house was more than half blocked with sand, and 
it was almost impossible to see in. Was it the remains of an old well? It 
would not be so strange if a shack had been built over a well to protect 
it from the sand. Of course, you could hardly expect to find water in a 
place like this… He tried to look in, and this time he was enveloped by 
the real smell of dog. Animal smell is beyond philosophy. He 
remembered a socialist saying that he liked a Korean's soul but he 
couldn't stand his smell. Well then, if time did run horizontally, it had 
better show him how fast it could run… Hope and uneasiness… a 
feeling of release and impatience. He found it most unbearable to be 
tantalized this way. He put the towel over his face and lay down on his 
back. It might be his own smell, but he was not about to pay it 
compliments. 
Something was crawling fitfully up the instep of his foot. Its manner of 
walking could hardly be like that if it belonged to the beetle family. He 
decided it must be some kind of ground bug, for it drew itself along with 
difficulty on its six weak legs. He didn't even feel like finding out. 
Supposing for the time being it did belong to the beetle family; even, so 
he still hesitated, wondering whether he really felt like going after it or 
not. He was apparently incapable of a definite decision. 
A breeze flipped the towel from his face. Out of the corner of his eye he 
could see a ridge of dunes glistening and golden. A smoothly rising 
curve cut off the line of gold and abruptly slipped away into the 
shadows. There was something strangely tense in the spatial 
composition, and he shuddered with an uncanny loneliness for people. 
(Yes, this certainly is a romantic landscape… A setting like this would 
be a great attraction for young tourists these days. Precious, gilt-edged 
stock it is… I can guarantee its future development as someone who's 
experienced in this profession. But if you're going to develop it, first 
you've got to advertise! Even flies won't come if you don't advertise. 
The place might just as well not be here if no one knows about it. It's 

---

like having a precious stone and not finding a practical use for it. Well 
then, what shall we do? I'll put the thing in the hands of a first-rate 
photographer and have him make me up some good-looking picture 
postcards. In the old days you used to find a beauty spot and then 
have your postcards made. But now, it's common sense to have the 
cards made first… and afterwards think up a beautiful place. I have 
brought along two or three samples, if you'd care to look them over.) 
The poor postcard salesman had come with the intention of taking the 
villagers in, but he had been the one to be taken in, and in the end he 
had got sick and died. But then, he certainly could not imagine that the 
card man had been particularly eloquent. He had probably been 
surprisingly sincere in his hopes for the place and had doubtless staked 
all he had on the business. What in heaven's name was the real 
essence of this beauty? Was it the precision of nature with its physical 
laws, or was it nature's mercilessness, ceaselessly resisting man's 
understanding? 
Until yesterday the very thought of this landscape had filled him with 
nausea. He had actually thought, in a fit of spleen, that the holes were 
just right for swindlers like picture-postcard vendors. 
However, there was no reason to think of the life in the holes and the 
beauty of the landscape as being opposed to each other. Beautiful 
scenery need not be sympathetic to man. His own viewpoint in 
considering the sand to be a rejection of the stationary state was not 
madness… a 1/8-mm. flow… a world where existence was a series of 
states. The beauty of sand, in other words, belonged to death. It was 
the beauty of death that ran through the magnificence of its ruins and 
its great power of destruction. No. Just a minute. He would be in a spot 
if he were criticized for holding on to his round-trip ticket and not 
letting go of it. You like movies of wild animals and of war because you 
find that the same old day, following the same old yesterday, is waiting 
for you as soon as you come out of the movie house… you even like 
the films that stick so close to reality they nearly give you a heart 
attack. Is anybody really foolish enough to go to the movies with a real 
gun, loaded with real bullets? Certain kinds of mice that are said to 
drink their own urine in place of water, or insects that feed on spoiled 
meat, or nomadic tribes who know only the one-way ticket at best, can 
adjust their lives to the desert. If from the beginning you always 
believed that a ticket was only one-way, then you wouldn't have to try 

---

so vainly to cling to the sand like an oyster to a rock. But nomads have 
gone so far as to change their name to "stock breeders," so… 
Yes, perhaps he should have spoken about this scenery to the woman. 
Perhaps he should have sung her the song of the sands, which has 
absolutely no room for a round-trip ticket, even though he might have 
sung it badly. At best he had given a poor imitation of a gigolo trying to 
catch a woman by dangling the bait of a different kind of life. But with 
his face pressed in the sand, he had been like a cat in a paper bag. 
The light on the ridge suddenly vanished. The whole landscape sank 
into darkness before his eyes. Unnoticed, the wind had died down, and 
now the mist was coming back strongly. That was probably why the sun 
had set so abruptly. Well then, let's go! 
25
HE would have to escape by passing through the village before the 
basket gangs began their work. Judging by experience, there should be 
about an hour left or, to be on the safe side, forty-five minutes. The spit 
of the promontory, as if embracing the village, gradually curved in 
toward the land, reaching as far as the inlet on the east side and 
squeezing the village road into a single lane. There the sheer cliffs of 
the promontory ended in what seemed to be slightly elevated, washed-
out dunes. If he went straight ahead, keeping the mist-shrouded lights 
of the village on his right, he could expect to come out just about where 
the cliffs stopped. It would be a little over a mile. And beyond that lay 
the outskirts of the village. He could not remember any houses, only 
occasional plots of peanuts here and there. If he could just get across 
the dunes, then it would probably be safe to walk down the road. At 
least the roadbed was red clay, and if he were to run with all his might 
it would take him about fifteen minutes to get to the highway. If he 
could get that far, then he would have won the game. Buses would be 
running, and people would be in their right minds. 
Thus, according to his calculations, he had thirty minutes to get 
through the village. What was bad about the sand was that one wasted 
strength, not because one's feet sank into it but because there was no 
resistance. Running was most wasteful of all. Walking with long, careful 
steps would probably be more effective. And yet, the sand compensated 

---

for sucking away one's strength by deadening the sound of footsteps. It 
was good, at least, that he didn't have to worry about his footsteps 
being heard. 
Well, look where you're walking! It didn't really make any difference 
whether he fell or not, and he frequently would stumble on the little 
rises and hollows and sink to his knees. That was all right, but if by 
chance he were to fall into another sand hole, what in heaven's name 
would he do then? 
It was dark, and the sand stretched forever on in irregular undulations. 
There were waves within waves, and within the small ones there were 
many still smaller ridges and hollows. The lights of the village, on 
which he had made his fix, seldom came into his view, for they were 
screened off by the crests of the endless undulations. When he could 
not see the lights, he went on by instinct. His mistakes were always 
appallingly major. Perhaps it was because his feet turned irresistibly 
toward the higher places, unconsciously seeking the lights. 
Ah! Again he had made a mistake! It was more to the left. If he went on 
like this he would end up by going straight into the village. Although he 
had crossed over three small hill-like dunes, the lights did not seem to 
be getting much nearer. It seemed as if he were circling around in the 
same place. Perspiration ran into his eyes. He paused and took a deep 
breath. 
He wondered whether the woman was awake yet. He also wondered 
what kind of reaction she would have when she did awake and realize 
that he was not there. No, 
I
she probably wouldn't realize it right away. 
She would I doubtless suppose he was just relieving himself behind^ 
the house. Tonight she would be tired. She would be surprised she had 
slept until it was dark and would probably be barely able to get herself 
up. Then, finally, she would remember what had happened between 
them in the morning from the lingering warmth between her legs, still 
slightly painful and dry. She would smile bashfully as she groped for 
the lamp. 
But anyway, there was no reason for him to feel any obligation or 
responsibility for her smile. By his disappearance she would lose only a 

---

fragment of her life, one that could be easily replaced by a radio or a 
mirror. 
"You're really a great help," she had said. "It's so different from when I 
was alone. I can take it easy in the mornings, and the work is finished 
at least two hours sooner. I think I'll ask the village association to give 
me some kind of extra work to do at home. I'll save the money. And 
someday, maybe I'll be able to buy a radio or a mirror or something." 
(Radio and mirror… radio and mirror…) As if all of human life could be 
expressed in those two things alone. Radios and mirrors do have a 
point in common: both can connect one person with another. Maybe 
they reflect cravings that touch the core of our existence. All right, when 
he got home he would buy a radio right away and send it off to her. He 
would put all the money he had into the best transistor on the market. 
But he couldn't promise the minor so easily. A mirror would go bad 
here. The quicksilver on the back would peel , off in half a year; even 
the surface of the glass would get cloudy with the constant chafing of 
the sand in the air. Just like the mirror she had now: you looked in it 
with one eye, and you couldn't see your nose… and if you could see 
your nose you couldn't see your mouth. No, it didn't matter to him how 
long it lasted. A mirror was different from a radio; for it to be a means of 
connection she would first have to have somebody else there to see her. 
What use would a mirror be to someone who no longer could be seen? 
She would be feeling surprised about now. She'd prick up her ears. 
Wasn't he taking too long about his business? He certainly was… the 
rascal had been clever enough to get awayl Would she set up a howl? 
he wondered. Would she collapse? Or would her eyes just dim with 
tears? Whatever she did, it was no longer his responsibility. He was the 
one who had refused to recognize the necessity for a minor. 
—It's a story I read some place… Leaving home is all the fashion now. I 
thought it was because of bad living conditions, but that doesn't seem 
to be the only reason. They mentioned a middle-class farm family that 
had recently added land to its holdings, bought machinery, and was 
doing quite well, when the eldest son suddenly left home. He was a 
quiet, hard-working young man, and his parents were completely 
puzzled; they didn't know why. In country villages you have social 

---

obligations and reputation to think of, so there really must have been a 
reason for the heir of the family to have left home… 
—Yes, certainly. An obligation is an obligation. 
—Then, it appears that one of the relatives took th$ trouble to find the 
young man and hear his story. He wasn't living with a woman, and he 
didn't seem to be driven by debts or pleasure; there was no single 
concrete motive. Then whatever was the reason? And what the young 
man said made absolutely no sense at all. He seemed unable to explain 
it very well himself, beyond saying he just couldn't stand it any longer. 
—There really are foolish people in the world, aren't there! 
—But when you think about it, you can understand his feelings. When 
farmers increase their workable land they have that much more to do. 
In the final analysis, there's no end to their labor, and they only wind 
up with more to do. However, the farmer at least has a return on his 
potatoes and rice. Compared with a farmer's work, shoveling away the 
sand is like trying to pile up rocks in the River of Hades, where the 
devils cart them off as fast as you throw them in. 
—Well, what happens with the River of Hades in the end? 
—Not a thing. It's an infernal punishment precisely because nothing 
happens. 
—Well then, what happened to the son after that? 
—He had planned the whole thing in advance and had probably even 
settled on a job beforehand. 
—And then what did he do? 
—Well, he went and took his job. 
—And after that? 
—Well, after that he probably got his pay on payday, and on Sundays I 
suppose he put on a clean shirt and went to the movies. 

---

—And then…? 
—We'll never know unless we put the question to him directly, will we? 
—And when he saved up some money, he probably bought himself a 
radio, didn't he…? 
At last, he thought, he had finished his climbing, but he had come only 
halfway. No, that was wrong. It was already flat here. Where had the 
lights that he had fixed on gone to? He continued walking with a feeling 
of disbelief. The place where he stood was apparently the ridge of a 
rather high dune. Why ever couldn't he see the lights from here? A 
feeling of apprehension paralyzed his legs. Perhaps his previous 
laziness was the cause of his failure. He slid down the steep slope, 
heedless of the direction. It was an unexpectedly long ravine, not only 
deep but wide too. Many lines of rippling sand lay tangled and 
confused at the bottom; they troubled his judgment. Even so, he 
couldn't understand at all why the lights of the village were not visible. 
His margin of error was not more than a half mile on either side of his 
line of advance. He may have missed his way, but it could not be 
serious. He wanted to go left, but, perhaps because of his fear of the 
village, he also felt he should strike out boldly to the right in order to 
get nearer to the lights. Soon the mist would lift and the stars would 
come out. The quickest way, in effect, would be to climb up to any 
elevated place, regardless of where it was, and get the best perspective 
he could. 
Still, he couldn't understand. He did not understand at all the reason 
why the woman had to be so attached to that River of Hades… Love of 
Home and obligation have meaning only if one stands to lose 
something by throwing them away. What in the world did she have to 
lose? 
(Radio and mirror… radio and mirror…) 
Of course he would send her a radio. But wouldn't it work out, to the 
contrary, that she would lose more than she would gain? For instance, 
there would be no ceremony of giving him a bath, which she liked so 
much. She always used to save water for washing him, even at the 
expense of the laundry. She would splash warm water between his legs 

---

and, quite as if she were doing it to herself, bend over squealing in 
laughter. There would not be another chance for her to laugh like that 
again. 
No, she shouldn't be under any misapprehension. From the beginning 
there had been no contract between him and her, and since there had 
been no contract there could be no breach of contract. Furthermore, he 
too was not completely untouched. For instance, the stink of the cheap 
sake" that came once a week and seemed as if it had been squeezed 
from a compost heap… the flexing of the flesh on the inner side of her 
thighs where he could see the muscles standing out in ridges… the 
sense of shame in scraping away, with a finger he had wet in his mouth, 
the sand like burnt rubber that had gathered on the dark lips of her 
vulva… And her bashful smile that had made these things appear more 
indecent. If he added them all up, they would come to quite a lot. Even 
if his involvement seemed unbelievable, it was nonetheless a fact. A 
man, more than a woman, tends to abandon himself to bits and pieces 
of things. 
When he thought about what the villagers had done, he realized that it 
would be almost impossible to calculate the harm he had suffered. The 
relationsip between him and the woman was of little importance. He 
intended sometime to take a full measure of revenge on them. He 
hadn't yet decided what would be the worst. At first he had thought of 
setting fire to the whole village, or putting poison in the wells, or laying 
a trap to lure them one by one into a hole in the sand. He had spurred 
himself on, whipping up his imagination by thinking up such direct 
measures. But now that he would have the opportunity of actually 
putting them into practice, he couldn't continue thinking such childish 
things. After all, the violence of a single person wouldn't amount to 
much. The only way was to make his complaint to the authorities. Even 
if he did, he was somewhat concerned as to how much of the cruel 
significance of the experience they would grasp. Well, for the time 
being, he would report it at least to the pre-fectural police. 
Ah yes, and then there was one more thing… 
Wait! What was that noise? He could no longer hear it 

---

Maybe it had been his imagination. By the way, wherever had the lights 
of the village gone? Even though the land was uneven, it was really too 
absurd that they were nowhere to be seen. He could easily conceive 
that he had tended to swing to the left and, having veered too far in the 
direction of the promontory, was screened from the village by some 
high ridges. He could waste no time. He would strike out boldly to the 
right. 
… Finally, there was one more thing he did not want her to forget… she 
had never been able to answer his question. It had been raining for two 
days. When it rained, the force of the sand slides increased, but there 
was much less flying sand. Since they had done a little extra work on 
the first day of rain, they had been able to take it easy on the next. 
Taking advantage of the first period of leisure in some time, he had 
determined to push on tenaciously with a project. He had decided he 
would try to get at the reason that kept her in the hole, and he would go 
about it with the same patience one has in picking at a scab left from 
some skin disease. His perseverance had surprised even himself. At 
first she had cheerfully let the rain strike on her naked body, but at last 
she had been driven to the point of tears. Finally she began to say 
something to the effect that she couldn't leave simply because of the 
remains of her child and her husband, who had been buried along with 
the chicken houses on the day of the typhoon. Well, that was 
understandable. It was quite rational of her, and he could even 
comprehend her reticence in not speaking to him about it until then. 
But anyway, he had decided to believe her; he at once determined on 
the following day to devote some of his sleeping time to looking for the 
remains. 
He had continued digging for two days at the place she had indicated. 
But he had not found even a trace of the chicken houses, to say 
nothing of any bones. Then she had pointed out another place. He 
could not find anything there either. And then she indicated still 
another. He had dug vainly in this way for nine days, in five different 
places, and then she had begun to make excuses, looking as if she were 
about to begin crying again. She had said that the location of the house 
had evidently changed, shifted by the constant pressure of the sands. 
Or perhaps it might have been that the hole itself had shifted. She had 
also said that the chicken houses and the remains of her husband and 
child might well have been buried under the thick wall of sand that 

---

divided her house from her neighbor's, and that they might have moved 
into the neighbor's garden. It was theoretically possible, certainly. Her 
unhappy, beaten expression obviously showed that she hadn't meant to 
lie, but that she had had no intention of telling him from the very 
beginning. The remains, after all, were no more than an excuse. He had 
not had the strength to get angry. And then he had decided to leave off 
trying to figure out who was indebted to whom. She would certainly 
understand this, he thought, but… 
What's that? He threw himself headlong to the ground. Everything had 
happened too quickly; he couldn't grasp the situation. Suddenly the 
village lay before him. He had apparently been walking straight toward 
the sandy promontory that was adjacent to it. At the instant the 
prospect opened before him he found himself in the very center of the 
hamlet. Before he could collect his thoughts, a hostile barking sounded 
from a nearby brushwood fence and was picked up by one dog and 
then another. In the dark, a circle of white fangs pressed in upon him. 
He pulled out the rope with the shears, sprang up, and began to run. 
There was no choice. The only thing to do was to make a direct run for 
the village gates. 
26
HE ran. 
The houses, floating in the vague light of burning lamps, formed a maze 
of obstacles and passageways along the single path of his flight. He 
could taste the wind wheezing through his tightened throat like luke-
warm rust. A desperate gamble on a sheet of thin glass that was already 
bent to the breaking point. The basket gangs had certainly left their 
houses already, but it was still too soon to expect them to have covered 
the distance to the seashore. In fact, he did not remember hearing the 
sounds of the three-wheeler. He could not possibly have missed the 
put-put of the crazy two-cylinder engine from at least a half mile away. 
The situation was extremely serious. 
A black lump suddenly sprang out of the shadows. 
It was a fairly big dog, judging from its breathing. 
The dog, however, had evidently received no 
training in attack and had committed the blunder 

---

of barking just before it was about to sink its teeth in him. He lashed 
out with his rope, and the shears struck something; the dog let out a 
baleful howl and melted again into the shadows. Fortunately it had 
only bitten into the cuff of his trousers. His legs slipped out from under 
him as he recoiled, and he turned a somersault as he fell. At once he 
was on his feet again and running. However, there was not just one 
dog, but, apparently, five or six. Discouraged, perhaps, by the failure of 
the first, the others awaited their chance as they circled around him, 
barking. Maybe the squat red dog from the shack was urging them on 
from behind. Then he jumped over a mound of shells in an empty lot 
and ran between some narrow brushwood fences, cutting through a 
garden where straw was spread out to dry. At last he came out on a 
broad road. Only a little more and he would be out of the village. 
Just beside the road there was a small ditch. Two children, who looked 
as if they were brother and sister, scrambled out. He noticed them too 
late. He did what he could to bring the rope around to the side, but it 
struck them and all three tumbled into the ditch. Something like a 
wooden pipe lay at the bottom, and the dull sound of splintering wood 
accompanied their fall. The children screamed. Damn! Why did they 
have to yell so loud? He pushed them away with all his strength and 
clambered out And at that very instant the beams of three flashlights 
lined up, blocking his way. 
At the same time the alarm bell started to ring. The children were 
crying… the dogs were barking… and at every sound of the bell his 
heart jumped a beat. His pores opened, and a thousand prickly little 
insects, like grains of rice, came crawling out One of the flashlights 
seemed to be of a type that had an adjustable focus, and just when he 
thought the light was dwindling it suddenly pierced him again like a 
white-hot needle. 
Should he try a frontal attack, kicking them aside as hard as he could? 
If he could just get across there, he would be outside the village. He 
might regret the tactic later and then again he might not, but all 
depended on this instant. Come on! Don't hesitate! If he didn't seize 
the opportunity now, it would be too late. He couldn't count on a 
second chance. 

---

Even as he was thinking this, the flashlights, poised in a half circle 
around him, spread out to the left and the right and slowly approached 
him. He grasped the rope more firmly and knew he must move, but he 
only stood there with his toes biting into the soft ground, unable to 
come to any decision. The places between the flashlights were filled 
with the dark shadows of men. And that obscure shape by the side of 
the road, which at first looked like a hole, was certainly the three-
wheeler. Even if he were successful in getting through, he would be 
caught from behind. In back of him he could hear the steps of the 
children, who had stopped crying, running away. Suddenly a 
magnificent idea occurred to him: he would get the children and use 
them as a shield. By taking them hostage he could stop the men from 
coming nearer. But when he turned to pursue them he could see other 
lights waiting for him. The road behind had been cut off too! 
He recoiled and, gathering his strength, ran back along the way he had 
just come. His decision was a kind of reflex; he hoped to find some 
place where he could cut across the dune that lay adjacent to the 
promontory. The men from the village yelled as they ran after him. His 
knees felt weak, as if his joints had loosened; perhaps he had been in 
too much of a hurry. But for the time being, at least he seemed to have 
taken them by surprise, and he was able to keep enough distance 
between him and them in order to turn around now and then to see 
where they were. 
How far had he come? he wondered. He had already ruq up and down 
several dunes. Yet the more he strained, the more he seemed to be 
running vainly, dreamily, in one place. But this was no time to reflect 
on efficiency. There was a taste of honey mixed with blood on the back 
of his tongue. He tried to spit it out, but the substance was too viscid. 
He put his finger in his mouth and scraped at it. 
The alarm was still ringing, but it was already faraway and intermittent. 
The barking of the dogs, too, had become a peevish, distant chatter. It 
was his own breathing, like a file on metal, that was the disturbance he 
was aware of now. The three pursuing lights were still in a line, 
wavering up and down, and while they did not seem to be coming 
closer, neither did they seem to be getting any further away. It was just 
as hard for him to run away as it was for them to run after him. From 
now on it was a question of endurance. But he could not be very 

---

optimistic about that. The strain had perhaps lasted too long. His mind 
suddenly seemed to buckle; in this moment of weakness he even hoped 
his strength would give out and he would have done with the whole 
thing. The symptom was dangerous. Yet it was still well that he realized 
just how dangerous. 
His shoes were full of sand, and his toes began to hurt Looking around, 
he perceived that his pursuers had fallen back to seven or eight yards 
behind him, on the right Why had they gotten off the track like that? 
Perhaps they had tried too hard to avoid the slopes and had ended up 
by bungling the chase. Apparently they were pretty tired too. The 
pursuer, they often say, tires more quickly than the pursued. He paused 
and hastily took off his shoes, to run barefoot. He stuck them into his 
belt, since they would be a bother if he put them into his pocket. 
Recovering his spirits a little, he ran up a fairly steep slope in a single 
burst of speed. If things went like this and he had a little luck, he might 
give them the slip yet. 
Although the moon had not risen, the countryside was splotched with 
faint patches of bright and dark from the starlight, and he could clearly 
distinguish the distant ridges. He seemed to be heading for the end of 
the promontory. Again he felt the urge to bear to the left. As he was 
about to change direction, he was suddenly brought up short. If he 
changed, he would at once shorten the distance between his pursuers 
and himself. He was thunderstruck, aware for the first time of their 
plan. 
Their pursuit, which at first had seemed implausible, was in fact very 
well thought out: they were trying to push him in the direction of the 
sea. Without knowing it, he had been guided. When he thought about 
it now, he realized that the flashlights were meant precisely to let him 
know their positions. The way they kept their distance without coming 
near was certainly done on purpose. 
But it was still too soon to give up. He had heard that there was a way 
to climb up the cliffs somewhere, and if it turned out to be necessary it 
would not be impossible to swim over to the back of the promontory. 
He thought of being caught and taken back; there was no room for 
hesitation. Abrupt descents followed long, gentle rises; abrupt rises, 
then long, gentle descents. One foot after another… one step added to 

---

the next, like stringing beads… patiently… patiently. Unnoticed, the 
alarm had ceased. He could no longer distinguish between the sounds 
of the wind and sea and the ringing in his ears. He ran up a hillock and 
looked around. The pursuers' lights had disappeared. He waited for a 
moment, but they did not reappear. 
Had he really gotten away? he wondered. 
His rising hope made his heart beat faster. If it were true, it was all the 
more reason he should not relax now… one more dash… on to the next 
rise! 
Suddenly it was hard to run. His legs felt strangely heavy. It was not 
only the feeling of heaviness: his legs had actually begun to sink. It was 
like being in snow, he thought, and by then he had sunk to his calves. 
Astonished, he pulled out one foot and the other sank quickly until he 
was knee-deep. What was happening? He had heard of sand that 
swallowed people up. He struggled, trying to extricate himself some 
way, but the more he struggled, the more deeply he sank. His two legs 
were already buried up to the thighs. 
Ah! So this was the trap! Their target had not been the sea at all, but 
here! They intended quite simply to liquidate him without even going to 
the trouble of capturing him. Liquidation indeed! Even a sleight-of-
hand artist could not have done it more smoothly with his 
handkerchief. Another puff of wind and he would be completely gone. 
Even the best police dog would be helpless. The bastards didn't even 
have to show their faces any more. They hadn't seen anything or heard 
anything. A stupid outsider had lost his way by himself and had 
vanished. They had managed the whole thing without soiling their 
hands in the slightest. 
Sinking… sinking… soon he would be up to his waist… What in God's 
name could he do? If he could increase the area of contact with the 
sand, his body weight per square inch would be lighter, and perhaps he 
would be able to arrest the sinking somewhat. He flopped down, his 
arms spread out. However, it was already too late. He had intended to 
lie on his stomach, but the lower half of his body was now fixed 
vertically in the sand. It was impossible to keep his already exhausted 

---

hips at a right angle for any length of time. Unless one were a trained 
trapeze artist, sooner or later there would be a limit to this position. 
How dark it was. The whole world had closed its eyes and stopped its 
ears. No one would even turn around to look at his death spasms. Fear 
convulsed his throat and suddenly burst out His jaw dropped open, 
and he gave an animal-like cry. 
"Help!" 
The stock expression! Well, let it be a stock expression. What was the 
use of individuality when one was on the point of death? He wanted to 
go on living under any circumstances, even if his life had no more 
individuality than a pea in a pod. Soon he would be up to his chest, to 
his chin, to his nose… Stop! This was enough! 
"Help! Please! I'll promise anything! Please! Help! Please!" 
At last he began to weep. At first his sobbing remained under control, 
but soon it changed to unrestrained bawling. 
He submitted to his fear with the horrible feeling that all was lost. There 
was no one to see him, it made no difference. It was too unfair that all 
this was actually happening without any of the formalities being 
observed. When a condemned criminal died, he at least left a record. 
He would yell as much as he wanted. Since no one was there to see… 
he might as well… 
And so, when voices called to him suddenly from behind, his surprise 
was all the more shattering. He was completely defeated. Even his 
feeling of shame vanished like the shriveled ash of a dragonfly's wing. 
"Hey, there! Take hold of this!" 
A long piece of board slid down to him and hit his side. A circle of light 
cut through the darkness and fell on the board. He twisted the disabled 
upper part of his body, entreating the men he felt were behind him. 
"Pull me up with this rope, won't you?…" 

---

"No, no. We can't pull you out as if you were a root." A laughing voice 
broke out behind him. He could not be sure, but there seemed to be 
four or five of them. 
"Just hold on a little longer; we've sent for a shovel. Just put your 
elbows on that piece of wood and you'll be all right." 
He placed his elbows as he was told and cradled his head in his arms. 
His hair was soaked with perspiration. He felt no particular emotion 
except that he wanted to have done with this shameful situation as 
quickly as possible. 
"Say, there… You're lucky we followed you. This is a regular mush 
around here; even the dogs stay away. You really were in danger… Lots 
of people have wandered in here without knowing it, and they've never 
come back. The place is a mountain cove; there's a lot of drifting. In 
winter the snows blow over, and the sand over that, then the snow 
comes again. This has been going on for about a hundred years until 
it's become like a pile of thin crackers. At least that's what the old 
union chiefs second boy said, the one who went to school in town. It's 
interesting, isn't it? If you dig down to the bottom you may find 
something valuable…" 
Whatever was he telling him this for? He could stop talking so 
innocently any time, as if he didn't know the truth! It would be better if 
he would just show his colors. Or he would at least prefer to be left 
alone with his own tattered resignation. 
At length there was a commotion behind him. The shovel had evidently 
arrived. Three men wearing boards attached to the soles of their shoes 
clumsily began to shovel around him in a wide circle. They stripped the 
sand away in layers. His dreams, desperation, shame, concern with 
appearances—all were buried under the sand. And so, he was 
completely unmoved when their hands touched his shoulders. If they 
had ordered him to, he would have dropped his trousers and defecated 
before their very eyes. The sky had grown lighter, and it looked as 
though the moon would soon rise. How would the woman welcome 
him back? It really made no difference to him any more. Now, he was 
nothing more than a punching bag to be knocked around. 

---

27
A ROPE was passed under his arms, and like a piece of baggage, he 
was again lowered into the hole. No one said a word; it was as if they 
were at an interment. The hole was deep and dark. The moonlight 
enveloped the dune landscape in a silken light, making the footprints 
and the ripples of sand stand out like pleated glass. But the hole, 
refusing a role in the scenery, was pitch-black. It didn't particularly 
bother him. He was so exhausted that merely raising his head to look 
at the moon made him feel dizzy and nauseated. 
The woman was a black splotch against the black. She walked with him 
as he went toward the bed, but for some reason he could not see her at 
all. No, it was not the woman alone; everything around him was 
blurred. Even after he had fallen onto the bed, in his mind he was still 
running with all his might over the sands. Even in his dreaming he 
continued to run. But his sleep was light. The memory remained of the 
distant barking of the dogs, and he could hear the coming and going of 
the baskets. He was aware that the woman had come back from her 
work once during the night for something to eat and that she had lit the 
lamp beside his pillow to eat by. He awoke completely when he got up 
for a drink of water. But still he did not have enough energy to go and 
help her. 
Having nothing to do, he lit the lamp again and absent-mindedly 
smoked a cigarette; a fat but agile spider began to circle around the 
lamp. It would be natural for a moth, but it was strange that a spider 
should be drawn by light. He was on the point of burning it with his 
cigarette, but he suddenly held back. It continued to circle around, 
quite precisely, within a radius of seven to ten inches, like the second 
hand of a watch. Or perhaps it was not a simple phototropic spider. He 
was watching it expectantly when a moth with dark-gray wings, mottled 
with white and black crests, came fluttering along. Several times its 
enormous shadow was projected on the ceiling as it crashed against the 
lamp chimney; then it perched on the metal handle, motionless. It was 
a strange moth despite its vulgar appearance. He touched his cigarette 
to its body. Its nerve centers were destroyed, and he flicked the writhing 
insect into the path of the spider. At once the expected drama began. 
Instantly the spider leapt, fixing himself to the still-living victim. Then it 

---

began to circle again, dragging its now motionless booty with it. It 
seemed to be smacking its lips in anticipation of the juicy meal. 
He had not known there were spiders like this. How clever to use the 
lamp in place of a web. In a web it could only wait passively, but with 
the lamp it could engage its prey. However, a suitable light was the 
prerequisite of the method. It was impossible to get such a light 
naturally. It would not do to look for a forest fire or wander about under 
the moon. Could this be a new species of spider, then, that had 
developed its instincts by evolving with man? It wasn't a bad 
hypothesis. But, in that case, how could you explain the attraction of a 
moth for light? A moth is different from a spider, and lamplight can 
hardly be thought of as useful in maintaining the species. And yet the 
point was the same: both phenomena had come about after man-made 
lights had come into being. The fact that moths did not all go flying off 
to the moon was irrefutable proof of it. It would be understandable if 
this were the habit of only one species of moth. But since it was 
common to moths of about ten thousand varieties, he could only 
assume that it was an immutable law. This crazy, blind beating of wings 
caused by man-made light… this irrational connection between spiders, 
moths, and light. If a law appeared without reason, like this, what 
could one believe in? 
He closed his eyes. Spots of light seemed to float before him. When he 
tried to catch them, they suddenly swirled rapidly and escaped him. 
They were like the shadows of beetles left on the sand. 
He was awakened by the woman's sobbing. 
"What are you crying about?" 
The woman stood up hastily, trying to hide her embarrassment. 
"I'm sorry… I was just going to make you some tea_____" 
Her tearful voice puzzled him. Her back as she bent over, stirring the 
fire in the hearth, made her seem strangely jittery, and it was some time 
before he understood the meaning of it. He was slow, as if he were 
forcing his way through the musty pages of some book. Yet he was able 

---

to turn the pages. Suddenly he seemed so miserable that he was sorry 
for himself. 
"I have failed!" 
"Yes." 
"I have really failed!" 
"But there hasn't been a single person who made it… not one." 
She spoke in an unsteady voice, but there was a certain strength in it, 
as if she were defending his failure. What pitiful tenderness. It would 
be too unfair if such tenderness were not rewarded. 
"Well, that's too bad. If I had been successful in escaping, I was 
thinking of sending you a radio." 
"A radio?" 
"I have been thinking about it for a long time." 
"Oh, no… you don't have to do that…" the woman said, flustered, as if 
she were making an excuse. "If I work hard at my side jobs, I'll be able 
to buy it myself. If I bought it in installments, the down payment would 
be enough…" 
"Well… that's right. You could, if you bought it in installments…" 
"When the water's hot, shall I wash your back?" 
Suddenly a sorrow the color of dawn welled up in him. They might as 
well lick each other's wounds. But they would lick forever, and the 
wounds would never heal, and in the end their tongues would be worn 
away. 
"I didn't understand. But life isn't something one can understand, I 
suppose. There are all kinds of life, and sometimes the other side of the 
hill looks greener. What's hardest for me is not knowing what living like 
this will ever come to. But obviously you can never know, no matter 

---

what sort of life you live. Somehow I can't help but feel it would be 
better to have a little more to keep busy with." 
"Shall I wash you…?" 
She spoke as if she were encouraging him. It was a soft, moving voice. 
He slowly began to unbutton his shirt and trousers. It was as if the 
sand had filled his whole skin. (What was the other woman doing now? 
he wondered.) What had happened before yesterday seemed like ages 
ago. 
The woman began to rub some soap on a wet cloth.