His eyes smart in the oil smoke. The men wipe the grease blood of his car onto the legs of their overalls. One of them opens the hood, and gestures for him to look. The insides offend him — the intestinal complexity of them. The pipes and wires tangle into each other, black grit rubbed into the knot of the engine, collecting in its teeth.

He would like time and space enough to consider these things singularly, but they are too crowded. He is overcome by a need for what is simple. He wades for it through his dense ugly head.

Just before he took himself, Mishima had admonished him: complex wholes arise from the combination of simples. Yasunari concentrates on this. He remembers the simple blade, the single stroke, the new patterns on the carpet. It is starting to make sense for him. The entire engine clarifies itself into parts. One curved tube disappearing into a black corner. Three identical red discs. A sheer plastic plane. The dark shop itself, these silent men. And the road to Kanagawa, which it would be hours until he reached.