murakami, haruki - Norwegian wood

adios in our rooms, so if I don't come here once in a while, I don't
have any idea what's playing out there."
"Do you sleep in this place?" I asked the girl.
"No way!" she laughed. "I'd die of loneliness if I spent the night here.
The pasture guy drives me into town and I come out again in the
morning." She pointed at a four-wheel drive truck parked in front of
the nearby pasture office.
"You've got a holiday coming up soon, too, right?" asked Reiko.
"Yeah, we'll be shutting up this place soon," said the girl. Reiko
offered her a cigarette, and they smoked.
"I'll miss you," said Reiko.
"I'll be back in May, though," said the girl with a laugh.
Cream came on the radio with "White Room". After a commercial, it
was Simon and Garfunkel's "Scarborough Fair".
"I like that," said Reiko when it was over.
"I saw the film," I said.
"Who's in it?"
"Dustin Hoffman."
"I don't know him," she said with a sad little shake of the head. "The
world changes like mad, and I don't know what's happening." She
asked the girl for a guitar. "Sure," said the girl, switching off the radio
and bringing out an old guitar. The dog raised its head and sniffed the
instrument.
"You can't eat this," Reiko said with mock sternness. A grass-scented
breeze swept over the porch. The mountains lay spread out before us,
the ridge line sharp against the sky.
"It's like a scene from The Sound of Music," I said to Reiko as she
tuned up.
"What's that?" she asked.
She strummed the guitar in search of the opening chord of
"Scarborough Fair". This was apparently her first attempt at the song,
but after a few false starts she could play it through without hesitating.
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