A Midsummer's Equation

SIX

It was a little before nine when Narumi, Sawamura, and the others left the meeting hall. “How about a drink?” Sawamura offered. Two of the younger members immediately agreed.

“How about you?” he asked Narumi.

“For a little while, sure.”

They said good-bye at the station to the people who had to leave right away, then headed to the usual bar, the one that stayed open the latest.

They had just reached the door when Narumi spotted her mother standing next to the seawall, staring out toward the dark ocean. She called out, and Setsuko turned as if she had just been woken from a dream. Her lips curled in a vague smile, and she walked across the road toward them.

“Good evening,” she said to Sawamura and the others before turning to Narumi. “You finish your meeting?”

“Yeah, but what are you doing out here, Mom?”

Setsuko nodded in the direction of the bar. “Oh, I brought one of our guests down. You know, Mr. Yukawa.”

“Let me guess, you joined him for a drink or two?”

“Just a wee bit,” she said, holding up her thumb and index finger a little way apart.

“Again? Mom, you know you’re not supposed to drive after you have a drink.”

“Mr. Yukawa’s going to take a taxi home, and it was just a little.”

“Even after just a little, Mom. The law’s the law.”

Ever since her father hurt his knee he’d stopped drinking, but her mother had always been overly fond of alcohol. Even if she didn’t come down to the bar, a whiskey before bed was her nightly routine.

Narumi sighed. “So that’s why you’re out here, trying to clear your head?”

“Something like that,” Setsuko replied, a bit mysteriously. “You need to watch how much you drink, too, young lady.”

“I’m hardly a young lady, and you’re not one to talk, Mom,” Narumi said with a smile.

“Then I’ll stop now while I’m ahead. I suppose I’ll walk home. Have a nice evening,” she said to Sawamura and the others.

“Wait, I’ll give you a lift,” Sawamura said, looking toward Narumi. “I came here in the pickup from the store, and I’m parked right by the station,” he explained. “I was wondering what to do with it anyway. This way I can take your mom back and leave it at home so I don’t have to worry about drinking too much.”

“Oh, you don’t need to go out of your way for me,” Setsuko said, waving her hand.

“It’s no trouble at all. And I can’t have you walking up mountains in the dark.”

“Are you sure? Well, thank you.”

“No need to thank me,” Sawamura said. Then, to Narumi, “I’ll be right back.”

“Right, thanks.”

After seeing Sawamura and her mom off, Narumi went into the bar with the other two from the meeting. Her eyes darted quickly over the place. Yukawa was sitting at a corner table, reading a magazine.

“Isn’t that the physicist from earlier today?” one of the two—a girl still in college—whispered in Narumi’s ear.

“Yeah, I think it is,” the guy agreed.

Narumi told them that Yukawa was staying at her family’s inn, and they nodded, making the connection. The three of them sat at a table across the room from Yukawa, who was still absorbed in his magazine.

They drank beers and chatted for about half an hour, at which point Narumi excused herself and walked over toward Yukawa’s table, announcing herself with a “Good evening.”

Yukawa looked up from his magazine and blinked. “Oh. Hi,” he said, unsurprised to see her. He must’ve noticed us earlier, Narumi thought.

“I heard you shared a drink with my mom?”

“I believe we had a round, yes. I hope that’s not a problem?”

“No, not at all. Actually, I was wondering if I could join you for a moment.” She pointed to the chair across the table.

“I don’t mind, but what about your friends?”

“They’ll be fine.” Narumi glanced at the two, deep in some conversation, punctuated by occasional laughter. She leaned closer to Yukawa and said more quietly, “I was kind of a third wheel anyway.”

“I understand.”

Narumi called over the bartender and ordered herself a shochu on the rocks.

“Your mother tells me you were at the hearing today.”

“Yes, you remember the man who asked about DESMEC’s plans to protect deep-sea organisms? I was with his group.”

“I see,” Yukawa said, nodding. “Then please apologize to him on my behalf for butting in on the conversation.”

“You can tell him yourself. He should be here any moment. But I don’t think there’s any need to apologize. It sounded like a very honest opinion.”

“Too honest, I’d say. I just can’t abide people making vague, illogical statements.”

The bartender brought Narumi’s drink. Yukawa raised his and they clinked their glasses together in a toast.

“From what your mother was saying, you’re quite the activist.”

“I wouldn’t put it that way. I just think I’m doing what I should be doing.”

“And what you should be doing is opposing undersea resource development?”

“I’m not against development per se. But I want to protect the environment, particularly the ocean.”

Yukawa rattled his ice in his glass and took a slow drink of his shochu. “What exactly does it mean to protect the ocean? Is the ocean such a fragile thing that it requires our protection?”

“It wasn’t, but we’ve made it fragile. In the name of science, and progress.”

“Science?” Yukawa set down his glass. “You sure you want to go there?”

“The ocean is the source of all life. Over millions of years it’s given birth to all kinds of species. But did you know that in just the last thirty years, the ocean has lost more than thirty percent of those species? Coral reefs are a prime example,” she said, the words spilling out with practiced ease. She’d been saying the same thing in a lot of places recently.

“And this is somehow science’s fault?”

“Scientists are the one who conducted that hydrogen bomb testing over the Pacific.”

Yukawa lifted up his glass, but before he drank, he looked up at Narumi. “It sounds like you’ve decided that this plan to develop the hydrothermal ore deposits off your shores is another example of us scientists making the same mistake we’ve made in the past. In other words, destroying the seabed without concern for the resulting devastation of the environment.”

“No, I think there is concern for protecting the environment. But how can you say what will happen for sure? No one predicted when we started using oil that it would raise global temperatures, did they?”

“Which is why surveys and research are so important. DESMEC isn’t saying they’re going to start digging up the seabed and commercialize those resources right this moment. It’s precisely because they don’t know what will happen that they’re trying to find out as much as they can before they start mining.”

“But as much as they can won’t be everything, will it,” Narumi pressed on. “Isn’t that exactly what you said at the hearing today?”

“I believe I said we had a choice. If getting those rare metals isn’t important enough to warrant digging holes in the seabed, then there’s no point to this operation.”

That was the question here: how much did they really need this undersea mining operation, and what sacrifices were they willing to make for it? That would be the central point in the debate tomorrow.

“Well,” Narumi said, “I suppose we should save the rest of this discussion for the community center tomorrow.”

Yukawa smiled. “Playing your cards close to your chest? Very well,” he said, ordering another round before looking back at Narumi. “But you should know, I’m not technically a supporter of the mining proposal.”

“You’re not?” Narumi asked. “Then why were you on stage today?”

“Because DESMEC asked me to be there. They thought they might need someone to explain electromagnetic surveying.”

“Electromagnetic surveying?”

“It’s where you use a large coil to measure magnetic fields in the seabed and analyze them. It allows you to determine the composition of the substrate for about a hundred meters beneath the seabed. In other words, you can find out how metallic deposits are distributed without digging holes.”

“Which is environmentally friendly? Is that your point?”

“That’s the largest merit of the technology, yes.”

Yukawa’s shochu on the rocks arrived. He glanced at the menu and ordered the squid shiokara. The pickled saltiness of the dish was a popular choice to offset the sweetness of the shochu.

“Doesn’t your involvement in that kind of research make you a supporter?”

“How does that follow? It’s true that I proposed a new method of electromagnetic surveying to DESMEC, who is clearly a supporter of the mining. But only because it seems to me to be the most logical choice both financially and environmentally, should the plan be approved. It makes little difference to me, however, if the plan doesn’t go ahead.”

“But won’t your research have gone to waste, then?”

“No research ever goes to waste.”

His shiokara arrived. “Now, this looks delicious,” Yukawa said, peering through his glasses at the dish just as the front door to the bar rattled open.

Sawamura walked in and took a look around the place. He hesitated when he saw Narumi sitting apart from the others, and with the physicist, no less.

He walked over to them, a perplexed look still on his face. “Well, what do we have here?”

“I believe you know Professor Yukawa from Imperial University? I might not have mentioned that he’s staying at our place,” Narumi explained.

Sawamura’s mouth opened in an “ah” of understanding, and he nodded. “That explains why your mother was talking about bringing Mr. Yukawa to the bar.”

“Care to join us?” Yukawa asked, indicating the chair next to Narumi.

“Why not?” Sawamura sat down and ordered a beer.

“You were gone longer than I expected,” Narumi said once he had settled in.

“Yeah, well, there was a bit of excitement at the inn.”

“What kind of excitement?” Narumi frowned. Excitement and the Green Rock Inn were not things she normally associated with each other.

“Well, calling it ‘excitement’ might be a bit of an overstatement. It sounded like one of your guests went out and didn’t come back when he was expected, so your father was worried. Anyway, I had my pickup there, so I drove around a little bit to help look.”

“Did you find him?”

“No, actually,” Sawamura said. His beer arrived, and he took a swig before continuing. “He wasn’t anywhere near the inn. I was going to look a little longer, but your parents said not to bother. They told me he’d show up sooner or later, and I should get back down here or else I’d miss the party.”

“Maybe he’s out night fishing,” Yukawa suggested.

“I don’t think so,” Narumi said. “I saw his luggage when he arrived, and he didn’t come prepared for anything like that. I don’t think he’s a tourist.”

Narumi explained that she’d seen him at the community center earlier that day. This confused Sawamura even further.

They drank a bit longer before leaving the bar. Narumi and Yukawa decided they’d walk back to the Green Rock Inn together.

“Well, I drank too much, but that was a good place. I might end up there every night,” Yukawa said as they walked.

“How long will you be in town?”

“I’m not sure. I was supposed to go out on the DESMEC survey boat and instruct them in how to test the electromagnetic survey equipment. Which would be fine, except the survey boat has yet to arrive. Apparently there’s some red tape holding it up. But I suppose if you work with a government agency, you have to expect to deal with a little bureaucracy,” Yukawa said.

Not the words of a strong DESMEC supporter, Narumi thought.

The front light at the inn was still blazing. Inside, they found Shigehiro and Setsuko in the lobby, both looking distraught.

“Still no sign of him?” Narumi asked

“Nothing,” her mother replied. “We were just talking about what to do.”

“Well, we could call the police,” Shigehiro said, “but I doubt they’d do much about it at this time of night. Let’s wait till morning, and if he’s still not back yet, we’ll give the station a ring.”

“Sorry to hear about the trouble,” Yukawa said. “Please let me know if there’s anything I can do to help.”

“No need to worry yourself,” Shigehiro said. “He’ll turn up any moment now, I’m sure.”

“Right, well, good night,” the physicist said, heading for the elevator.