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flowers around there, either. Nothing had changed shape or been discolored.
    One by one I examined the mushrooms the children had been picking. There weren't all that many, which led me to conclude that they'd collapsed not long after they began picking them. All of them were typical edible mushrooms. I've been a doctor here for some time and am quite familiar with the different varieties. Of course to be on the safe side I collected them all and took them back and had a specialist examine them. But as far as I could tell, they were all ordinary, edible mushrooms.

    —You said the unconscious children's eyes moved back and forth, but did you notice any other unusual symptoms or reactions? For instance, the size of their pupils, the color of the whites of their eyes, the frequency of their blinking?
    No. Other than their eyes moving back and forth like a searchlight, there was nothing out of the ordinary. All other functions were completely normal. The children were looking at something. To put a finer point on it, the children weren't looking at what we could see, but something we couldn't. It was more like they were observing something rather than just looking at it. They were essentially expressionless, but overall they seemed calm, not afraid or in any pain. That's also one of the reasons I decided to just let them lie there and see how things played out. I decided if they're not in any pain, then just let them be for a while.

    —Did anyone mention the idea that the children had been gassed?
    Yes, they did. But like me they couldn't figure out how it was possible. I mean, no one had ever heard of somebody going on a hike in the woods and ending up getting gassed. Then one of the people there—the assistant principal, I believe it was—said it might have been gas dropped by the Americans. They must have dropped a bomb with poison gas, he said. The homeroom teacher recalled seeing what looked like a B-29 in the sky just before they started up the hill, flying right overhead. That's it! everyone said, some new poison gas bomb the Americans developed. Rumors about the Americans developing a new kind of bomb had even reached our neck of the woods. But why would the Americans drop their newest weapon in such an out-of-the-way place? That we couldn't explain. But mistakes are part of life, and some things we aren't meant to understand, I suppose.

    —After this, then, the children gradually recovered on their own?
    They did. I can't tell you how relieved I was. At first they started squirming around, then they sat up unsteadily, gradually regaining consciousness. No one complained of any pain during this process. It was all very quiet, like they were waking up from a deep sleep. And as they regained consciousness their eye movements became normal again. They showed normal reactions to light when I shined a flashlight in their eyes. It took some time, though, for them to be able to speak again—just like you are when you first wake up.
    We asked each of the children what had happened, but they looked dumbfounded, like we were asking about something they didn't remember taking place. Going up the hill, starting to gather mushrooms—that much they recalled. Everything after that was a total blank. They had no sense of any time passing between then and now. They start gathering mushrooms, then the curtain falls, and here they are lying on the ground, surrounded by all these adults. The children couldn't figure out why we were all upset, staring at them with these worried looks on our faces. They seemed more afraid of us than anything else.
    Sadly, there was one child, a boy, who didn't regain consciousness. One of the children evacuated from Tokyo. Satoru Nakata, I believe his name was. A small, pale little boy. He was the only one who remained unconscious. He just lay there on the ground, his eyes moving back and forth. We had to carry him back down the hill. The other children walked back down like nothing had