Klara and the Sun by Ishiguro Kazuo & Ishiguro Kazuo

Author:Ishiguro, Kazuo & Ishiguro, Kazuo [Ishiguro, Kazuo]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Faber & Faber
Published: 2021-03-02T00:00:00+00:00

PART FOUR

The Friend’s Apartment was inside a townhouse. From the window of its Main Lounge I could see similar townhouses on the opposite side of the street. There were six of them in a row, and the front of each had been painted a slightly different color, to prevent a resident climbing the wrong steps and entering a neighbor’s house by mistake.

I made this observation aloud to Josie that day, forty minutes before we set off to see the portrait man, Mr Capaldi. She was lying on the leather sofa behind me, reading a paperback she’d taken down from the black bookshelves. The Sun’s pattern was falling across her raised knees, and she was so engrossed in her reading, she made only a vague noise in reply. I was pleased about this because earlier she’d been getting very tense with the waiting. She’d relaxed noticeably once I’d gone to stand at the triple window, knowing I’d alert her the moment the Father’s taxi drew up outside.

The Mother too had been getting tense, though whether on account of the coming meeting with Mr Capaldi or because of the Father’s imminent arrival, I couldn’t be certain. She’d left the Main Lounge some time before, and I could hear her voice from the next room on the phone. I could have listened to her words by putting my head to the wall, and I even considered doing so, given the possibility she was talking to Mr Capaldi. But I thought this might make Josie even more anxious, and in any case, it occurred to me the Mother was more likely to be speaking to the Father to give street directions.

Once I’d understood Josie was depending on me to look out for the Father’s taxi, I put aside plans to learn further the Friend’s Apartment and concentrated on the view from the triple window. I didn’t mind this, particularly since there was always the chance the Cootings Machine would go by, and even if I couldn’t very well chase after it, such a sighting would be an important step forward.

But by then I’d come to accept that the chances of the Cootings Machine passing the Friend’s Apartment were slight. Earlier, during our drive into the city, I’d become overly hopeful because, while still on the outskirts, we’d passed numerous overhaul men, and even when the men weren’t to be seen, their barriers were there closing off one street or another. That was when I’d begun to think the Cootings Machine would appear at any moment. But though I kept looking from my side window, and though twice we passed other kinds of machines, it never appeared. Then the traffic became slower and there were fewer overhaul men. The Mother and Miss Helen, in the front, were talking to one another in their usual relaxed way, while beside me in the back, Josie and Rick pointed things out to each other in soft voices. Sometimes one would nudge the other as we passed something, and they’d laugh together, even though no words had been exchanged.

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