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quotient would have been 25, putting me in the top two hundred on Earth – His Serendipity had assured me, in person. I had ingested some of His Serendipity’s eyelashes. After winning converts on the Welcome Programme I was rewarded with a test tube of the Guru’s sperm to imbibe. It boosted my gamma resistance. I had been taken off the lavatory docket and been made a cleanser. For the first time in my life, I was becoming a name.
    The corrugated iron roof of an abandoned shed clattered to and fro in the wind.
    Nothing has gone wrong. Nothing has gone wrong, Quasar. It was your faith that brought you to His Serendipity’s notice. It is your faith that will guide you through the Days of Persecution, through the terrible days of the White Night to the New Earth. It is your faith that will nourish you now.
    Everything around me on this godforsaken island is crumbling. I should have stayed in Naha. I should have hidden in snow country, or deep-frozen Hokkaido, or lost myself amid a metropolis of my own kind. What happened, I wonder, to Mr Ikeda? Where do people who drop off the edge of your world end up?
    Typhoon weather.

    The curtains I keep drawn. Our Minister of Defence received some reports that the government of the unclean had developed micro-cameras which they implanted in the craniums of seagulls, which were then trained to spy. Not to mention the Americans’ secret satellites, scrolling over the globe, scanning for the Fellowship at the behest of the politicians and the Jews, who long ago had set up the Freemasons, and funded Chinese to pollute the well of history.

    I was sitting with my back to the lighthouse on the lonely headland. Headlights approached, seeking me out. I looked for a place to hide. There was none. A seagull watched me. It had a cruel face. A blue and white car pulled up. Too late, I looked for a place to hide. A door opened, and a dim light lit up the interior.
    They’ve found me! The rest of for ever in a cell . . .
    And then, so strangely, I’m relieved it’s all over. At least I can stop running.
    A hand was already clearing stuff from the front seat. Its owner leant forwards. ‘Mr Tokunaga, I presume?’
    Grimly, I nodded, and walked towards my captor.
    ‘I’ve been searching for you. The name’s Ota. I’m the harbourmaster. You spoke with my brother just the other day, about giving a lecture at my wife’s school. How about a lift back to town? You must be tired, after walking all the way out here, all on your own?’
    I obeyed, and still trembling I climbed in and put on my seatbelt.
    ‘Lucky I was passing . . . there’s a typhoon warning, you know. I saw a figure, all hunched like it was the end of the world, and I thought to myself, I wonder if that’s Mr Tokunaga? Not feeling too chipper, this evening?’
    ‘No.’
    ‘Maybe you’ve been overdoing it. The island air is good for clearing the head, but at the rate you’ve been tramping around . . . Terribly sorry to hear about your wife.’
    ‘Death is a part of life.’
    ‘That’s a sound philosophy, but it can’t be easy to keep your thoughts focused.’
    ‘I can. I’m a good focuser.’
    He braked and beeped a couple of times at a goat standing in the middle of the road. Magisterially, the goat sniffed at us, and wandered into a field.
    ‘Must tell Mrs Bessho that Caligula’s escaped again. You name it, goats eat it! So, you’re a good focuser, you were saying. Splendid, splendid. It would be a crime not to try diving while you’re here, you know. We have the finest Pacific reefs north of the equator, I’m told. By the way, the youngsters are delighted at the prospect of a real computer man coming to talk to them. No great scholars, I’m afraid, but they’re keen. My wife would like you to join us for dinner tomorrow, if you’re free. So, Mr Tokunaga. Tell me a little about yourself . . .’
    The road looped back around to the port, as all the roads on this island eventually do.
    Clouds began to