Read Online Salmonella Men on Planet Porno (Vintage Contemporaries) by Yasutaka Tsutsui - Free Book Online Page A

the backside. “Hey! Hey!”
    “What,” I groaned. I didn’t turn round – I knew what he was going to say.
    “Er, you’re not planning to get on this plane, are you.”
    So I did turn round. I looked hard into Hatayama’s eyes, which were now completely round with fear. “And why not?”
    “You mean you are? You’re going to get in a plane flown by a fatfarmer’s wife who’s carrying a baby on her back and hardly knows her wings from her ailerons? An aeroplane you get in and out of using a ladder?”
    But he obviously realized that I had no intention at all of changing my mind. A sardonic half-smile came over his face as he continued. “All right, let’s do it, then! After all, it’ll be a rare experience, won’t it, flying in a plane like this in a raging typhoon!”
    “Cut the sarcasm, will you? You’re getting on my nerves,” I said, turning away from him. Actually, I was only pretending to be strong. I needed him to get on that plane with me. But deep down, I was quivering with fear.
    Sticky Eye had been talking to Gorohachi’s wife and occasionally glancing back at us. Then he nodded and called over to us with a laugh. “Hey, travellers! You’re in luck! She says she’ll take you!”
    “Really?” I approached Gorohachi’s wife with a suitably grateful demeanour. We were entrusting our lives to her care, after all. We could do worse than ingratiate ourselves. “Thank you. Thank you very much!”
    “It’ll cost you though,” she said. “Two thousand yen each.”
    Sticky Eye intervened from the side, rather hurriedly.
    “Actually, Yoné, I just told ’em it were fifteen hundred, one way.”
    “Oh. All right, fifteen hundred then,” she said casually, without any sign of discomfort. “Well, come on then. Up you get.”
    “Gorohachi’s wife seems like a good person,” I said to Hatayama as we walked across from the hut with our baggage.
    He was shivering with fright. “That doesn’t mean she can fly a plane, does it,” he replied.
    I pulled a face. But he just carried on, with his waterproof camera case slung over his shoulder. “Just now, they said this Gorohachi had a proper pilot’s licence. I heard them. But they haven’t said anything about the wife. Then again, we’re in no position to go round asking questions, are we.”
    “Exactly,” I answered in exaggerated agreement. “So don’t.”
    “Yes, well, we’re sure to get back to Shiokawa in one piece, aren’t we. Yes.” Hatayama laughed nervously, nodding to himself several times. “After all, she’s had
some
experience as a pilot, hasn’t she.Even if she doesn’t have a licence. And even if it
is
a long time since she last flew. Yes. And those two farmers aren’t at all nervous about flying with her, are they. Even if they
are
ignorant and totally insensitive to danger. That’s all OK, isn’t it.”
    I said nothing. Otherwise, he might have started screaming his head off.
    We climbed the ladder into the aircraft. Inside, there were ten half-dilapidated seats, five on either side of an aisle covered with straw matting. There was no partition between the passengers and the pilot; the controls were in full view. Hatayama and I sat in the front two seats, on either side of the aisle.
    As soon as we’d sat down, Hatayama started up again. His hawklike eyes had spotted something in the roof of the cockpit, above the front window.
    “Look at that!” he exclaimed. “It’s a miniature shrine.”
    “So it is.”
    “That’s for luck, I suppose.”
    “So it is.”
    “So that’s why this plane has stayed in one piece so far. Sheer luck!”
    “Just shut up.” I glared at him again through narrowed eyes.
    Hatayama ducked his head apologetically. “Do you have to get so angry at everything I say? Give me a break, will you?!”
    The two farmers finished loading their baskets of beans and farming tools onto the plane. Then Gorohachi’s wife hoisted up the ladder and closed the door.
    “Right then, let’s be