"I don't really understand it myself," Mayumi said, "but when you con- sider the way the future might turn out, it's not good for the dead to have too much influence on those who should be living in the future. I heard from Gii that tomorrow the Fireflies will be meeting with the leader of your church. That's had me a bit concerned, which is why I wanted to talk with you.

Mayumi stopped speaking, rested her arms against the white mica- flecked railing of the bridge, and then spoke in a changed tone of voice.

"When the fog rises from the forest and merges with the descending clouds like that, it means rain's on the way. You may not be able to walk back to the Hollow in time. I apologize for having kept you."

3

The rain continued until the next morning. Ikuo got up early with Kizu, seemingly concerned about the Fireflies' dawn march through the forest.

During breakfast, undeterred by the chilly damp air coming in from outside, he opened the window facing the lake, trying to catch the moment when the shift in wind direction would carry the sound of the Fireflies' movements their way.

After they cleared away the breakfast dishes, Ikuo came over to Kizu, who was back in bed reading, and told him he wanted to meet up with the Fireflies when they emerged out of the forest at the crossroads and give them a ride to the monastery.

"Patron's going to hold a meeting with the Fireflies today while they all eat lunch. I'm sure they'll be soaked after being in the woods and if they go back home to change they'll keep Patron waiting. I'd like to have them clean up in the monastery's communal bath and dry their clothes in the dryer there. Then they can start right at noon."

"There aren't many opportunities to hear Patron directly," Kizu said, "so I suppose there'll be a lot of people, won't there? I think I'm going to go a little early."

"Everyone's planning to take their lunch trays over to the chapel. Thanks in advance for helping out."

When Kizu followed Ikuo's directions and took his tray over to the chapel it was still a while before the meeting was to start, but everyone had already taken their seats. The chairs were set in two facing rows. Seated in the row on the lake side of the chapel were Patron, Dancer, and Ogi, Ms. Tachibana and her brother, and Dr. Koga, who was able to get away from the clinic only during the noon hour. The seat beside Ikuo was left vacant for Kizu. Twenty of the Fireflies were in the other row, already eating lunch, their carefree upbringing reflected in their physiques. Surrounding them all were the Technicians, as well as all the Quiet Women who weren't on kitchen duty. The whole scene was quite lively.

Ikuo, seated beside Kizu, had already devoured his lunch and didn't introduce Kizu to the Fireflies, but Kizu could tell they already knew who he was. The Fireflies looked very different from young boys Kizu had seen in Tokyo. These boys were all dressed alike, in jeans or soft cotton trou- sers and T-shirts, and they all looked well scrubbed after their communal bath.

The Fireflies kept their movements and conversation to a minimum as they wolfed down their meals. They weren't the only ones making short work of their food; the people in Kizu's row of seats were nearly done with theirs, and as the Quiet Women in charge of the meal went around handing out tea in disposable cups, Kizu had just about figured out which of the young men was Gii. He was seated in the middle of their group, and in the way he moved his shoulders and hands and in the timing of his little inclinations of the head, Kizu could understand the charm Ikuo had described.

Soon the church members, too, had finished their meals, and everyone waited for Morio and Kizu to finish. Meanwhile, several of the Quiet Women gathered all the dishes of the church office staff and the Technicians onto trays and carried them out to the dining hall. Ikuo motioned to the young men not to take their trays out but to stack them instead in a corner of the church. Time was of the essence, and he wanted to get the meeting under way as soon as possible.

"We planned on having a private meeting today between Patron and the Young Fireflies," Ikuo said, "but since there were so many in the church who wanted to attend, and there's no need to keep any of this a secret, the meeting has grown to include all these other folks too. I discussed with Pa- tron how we should proceed, and he said he'd like the Fireflies to ask him whatever they want. I think it would be best to have Gii represent the Fire- flies in asking questions. First Patron has a few words he'd like to say, and if he asks any questions I'd like Gii to be the one to answer them, fust follow the same procedures we've used in our own meetings."

As Ikuo sat down, Gii stood up, the eyes of all the boys suddenly riv- eted on him. Gii had a high forehead but not the type of hairline you'd expect to recede when he got older, dark eyebrows, and a sharply etched nose. Apart from a slightly pronounced jaw, his tanned face overall had a classic look. With hardly an ounce of extra flesh on him, he had the sharp yet lovable look of a dog just out of puppyhood. But as he stood there, tensely waiting Patron's words, the whites of his eyes glistening like porcelain, there was a childish, fragile feel to him.

"Ikuo wants me to answer questions from the Fireflies, but first I hope you'll indulge me by letting me ask some questions of my own," Patron said, still seated, returning Gii's gaze. "How did you come to make the Fireflies?

You might very well want to ask us why we came here to make a church, but first I'd like you to answer me."

Gii's face showed a boyish bashfulness and a bit of pluck, for what both he and his companions wanted was straight talk, not beating around the bush.

"It might be a little unexpected to start off answering this way, but the basic reason we made the Fireflies and the reason you have this building are the same-the declining birthrate in Maki Town.

"The Church of the Flaming Green Tree built this chapel, and right afterward the church was dissolved and the building was supposed to be donated to the junior high. The town council decided that the land where the monastery is now was to be made into new classrooms. But foreseeing that the number of children going on to junior high would decrease, the council abandoned the plan. Your church expressed an interest, and it was a conve- nient out.

"Since long ago in this region, second and third sons went off to the cit- ies to find work. Because the birthrate is now low, most of us are only chil- dren and have ended up living at home. That being the case, we decided to find a positive reason for staying here. Every one of us agrees with that. And that's how the Fireflies began. Could we ask some questions now?"

Patron nodded silently.

"While we were out training this morning, we discussed what we should ask you. Most of the requests were along the lines of having you tell us in simple terms what it means to believe in God. We hope you won't yell at us and just say that's a childish question-something you can't explain in simple terms-but we'd still like to hear what you have to say."

Dancer, mouth characteristically ajar, turned her gaze to the space above the Fireflies. The overlapping new green leaves in the oblong window on the forest side of the concrete wall were, until a moment ago, clearly visible, but now they were darkly shaded, meaning that the treetops were gleaming brightly. A faint smile came to her lips. Kizu wondered whether she found Gii's innocence amusing but decided that wasn't the case. As one might ex- pect of Patron, he neither made light of Gii's question nor did he try to side- step it.

"As you all know," Patron said, "I'm a person who's done a Somersault.

I'm not the kind of person, then, who can very well use God and belief in the same sentence. However, based on long experience I can say that even if God is completely out of the picture, one can still speak of belief. This gets a little tricky, but belief involves viewing oneself vertically, not just thinking along a horizontal axis.