“Are you all right?” Aomame asked.

“Don’t worry,” he said.

“Shall I close the curtains a bit more?”

“No, that’s fine. I have a problem with my retinas. It takes time for them to adjust to light. I’ll be all right in a minute. Have a seat over there.”

A problem with his retinas? Aomame wondered. People with retinal problems are usually on the verge of going blind. But this was of no concern to Aomame now. She was not here to deal with this man’s sight.

While the man was covering his face with his hands and letting his eyes adjust to the light streaming in from the window, Aomame sat on a sofa and watched him. Now it was her turn to study him in detail.

He was a very large man. Not fat, just large. Tall and broad and powerful looking. She had heard about his large size from the dowager, but she had not expected him to be this big. There was, of course, no reason that a religious guru should not be huge. She imagined ten-year-old girls being raped by this big man and found herself scowling. She imagined him naked and mounted on a tiny girl. There was no way for such girls to resist. Even an adult woman would have a difficult time of it.

The man was wearing something like thin sweatpants that narrowed at the ankles with elastic bands, and a solid-color long-sleeved shirt that had a slight, silk-like sheen. The loose-fitting shirt buttoned up the front, but the man had left the top two buttons open. Both the pants and the shirt appeared to be white or a light cream color. These were not pajamas but more like comfortable lounging clothes or an outfit that would look normal under palm trees in southern lands. His bare feet looked big. The broad stone wall of his shoulders brought to mind an experienced martial arts combatant.

After waiting for a pause in Aomame’s observation, the man said, “Thanks for coming today.”

“It’s my job,” Aomame said in a voice devoid of emotion. “I go where I’m needed.” Even as she spoke, however, she felt like a prostitute who had come when called. Perhaps this was due to the way he had undressed her in the darkness with that penetrating gaze.

“How much do you know about me?” the man asked Aomame, his hands still covering his face.

“How much do I know about you?”

“That’s right.”

“Almost nothing,” Aomame said, choosing her words carefully. “I have not even been told your name. All I know is that you are the head of a religious organization in Nagano or Yamanashi, that you have some kind of physical problem, and that I may be able to help you with it.”

The man gave his head a few quick shakes and took his hands away from his face. Now he and Aomame were looking directly at each other.

His hair was long. His abundant head of hair hung straight down to his shoulders. It had much gray mixed in. The man was probably somewhere in his late forties or early fifties. He had a large nose that occupied a good deal of his face. It was admirably straight and brought to mind a calendar photo of the Alps. The mountain had a broad base and great dignity. It was the first thing one noticed when looking at his face, and it contrasted sharply with his eyes, which were set so deeply into his face that it was hard to tell what they were looking at. Like his body, his face was broad and thick. Clean-shaven, it bore no scars or moles. The features worked well together, producing a look of serenity and intelligence but also something peculiar, out of the ordinary, something that did not inspire easy trust. It was the kind of face that, on first impression, gives people pause. Perhaps it was because the nose was too big. Because of it, the face was missing a certain balance, perhaps the root of what left the observer feeling unsettled. Or perhaps it was the deep-set eyes that did it, the way they gave off the quiet glow of an ancient glacier. Then again, it might have been the cruel impression created by the thin lips, which looked as if they were ready to spit out unpredictable words at any moment.

“And besides that?” he asked.

“Besides that I have heard very little. All I was told was to be prepared to perform stretching exercises. The muscles and joints are my area of expertise. I don’t need to know much about my clients’ positions or personalities.”

Just like a whore, Aomame thought.

“I understand what you are saying,” the man said in a deep voice. “But in my case, you might need some explanation.”

“I would be glad to listen to anything you might wish to share.”

“People call me ‘Leader.’ But I almost never show my face to anyone. Most of our believers, although they belong to the religion and live in the same compound, have no idea what I look like.”

Aomame nodded.

“But here I am, letting you see my face. For one thing, I can hardly ask you to treat me in the dark or blindfolded. And there is also the question of courtesy”

“What I do is not a ‘treatment,’ ” Aomame calmly corrected him. “It is simply the stretching of the muscles. I am not licensed to perform medical procedures. All I do is force people to stretch the muscles they don’t normally use or the ones that are difficult to use, and that way we prevent the deterioration of their physical strength.”

The man appeared to smile faintly, though it might have been a mere illusion caused by a slight twitching of his facial muscles.

“I am quite aware of that. I simply used the word ‘treat’ for convenience’s sake. Don’t worry. All I was trying to say was that you are now seeing something that most people are not able to see, and I wanted you to be aware of that.”

“I was warned in there not to say anything about this to anyone,” Aomame said, pointing toward the door to the adjoining room. “But none of you need to worry. Nothing that I observe here will find its way outside. I touch many people’s bodies in my work. You may be someone in a special position, but to me you are merely one of many people with muscle problems. The only part of you that concerns me is your muscles.”

“I hear you were a Society of Witnesses believer as a child.”

“It’s not as if I chose to become a believer. I was simply raised that way. There is a big difference between the two.”

“Indeed, a very big difference,” the man said. “But people can never fully divorce themselves from the images implanted during early childhood.”

“For better or worse,” Aomame said.

“The Witnesses’ doctrines are very different from those of the religion that I belong to. If you ask me, any religion that takes the end of the world as one of its central tenets is more or less bogus. In my view, the only thing that ever ‘ends’ is the individual. That said, the Society of Witnesses is an amazingly tough religion. Its history is not very long, but it has withstood many tests and has steadily continued to increase the number of its believers. There is a lot that can be learned from that.”

“It probably just shows how close-minded they’ve been. The smaller and narrower such a group is, the more firmly they can resist outside pressure.”

“You are probably right about that,” the man said, pausing for a few moments. “In any case, we’re not here to discuss religion.”

Aomame said nothing.

“What I want you to understand is the fact that my body has many special things about it.”

Aomame, still seated, waited for him to go on.

“As I said before, my eyes can’t stand strong light. This symptom appeared some years ago. I had no particular problem until that time, but all at once, at some point, it started. This was the main reason I stopped coming into people’s presence. I spend practically all my time in dark rooms.”

“I’m afraid I can’t do anything for vision problems,” Aomame said. “As I said before, the muscles are my area of expertise.”

“Yes, I am quite aware of that. And of course I consulted medical specialists. I have been to any number of famous eye doctors and had many tests. But they tell me there is nothing they can do at this point. My retinas have been damaged, but they don’t know the cause. The symptoms are slowly progressing. If things go on like this, I will lose my sight before long. As you say, of course, this is a problem that has nothing to do with the muscles. But let me list my physical problems in order, and when I am through, we can think about what you can and cannot do.”