by Nagai Kafu
From then on, every afternoon Toshiya would walk with Kikue through the village paths, the orchard on the hill, or the cemetery not far from the college. When the night fell in the woods and stars started to shine atop the old trees where squirrels squeaked, Toshiya even held her tightly under his overcoat to protect her, ostensibly, from the cold evening wind. Kikue no longer had the strength to resist him. On another occasion, as they went picking violets blooming in the fields, he offered to pin a bunch of them on her collar; bringing his face close to hers, he impulsively kissed her on the cheek, but even this just made her blush bashfully.
So, in less than a month, Toshiya became as happy a man as he had long dreamed. This happiness was of the kind that only newlyweds enjoyed in secret gratefulness to God and to fate.
Two years passed, and as the summer preceding his senior year arrived, Toshiya left the campus to travel, as he said, to the New York–Boston area during the vacation. But he never came back in time for the start of the academic year in the fall.
All he did was send a letter to Kikue to the effect that “due to certain circumstances, I have switched to an eastern college; I intend to obtain a degree here and then go back to Japan next year. I thank you deeply for your numerous kindnesses in the past. . . .”
A year passed, then another year.
Toshiya had returned home and become a promising employee of a certain company. One day, at the Shinbashi station, he ran into a theologian, Yamada Tarô, his fellow student during his early days in the United States.
Yamada held Toshiya’s hand in a friendly gesture, but what a story he had to tell!
He was now a minister and was married to Kikue. According to Yamada, Kikue had completely lost her senses when she realized that she had been forsaken, or rather used as a temporary plaything, by Toshiya. And one winter night, during a frightening snowstorm in Michigan, she wandered about the woods trying to kill herself, but was rescued by Yamada by chance and confessed everything. Yamada felt deep pity for Kikue for having been victimized by a demon and did everything he could to care for her in order to save her from her dark despair and to restore her to her former happy self.
Upon receiving his degree, he returned to Japan with Kikue and, after consulting the elder of a certain church to which both belonged, entered into holy matrimony in front of the Cross.
“Mr. Ôyama. I am no longer blaming you for your sins at all. She and I have been saved from our earlier sins, Kikue through the mercy of God, and I through the power of love, and she has become once again a gentle lady, and I the master of a good family. So I hope you too will express your sincere thanks to God.”
Since this encounter, whenever young people of his firm argue among themselves about the merits and demerits of Christianity, Toshiya has been given to saying, “Well, at least it is clear that Christianity never causes harm to society. . . .”
So saying, he always gives a puff at the cigar he holds in his mouth.
Lodging on a Snowy Night
Whenever Japanese men in America come together to indulge in idle talk, without fail the first topic of discussion is what they think of the United States—from its politics and business to general customs and manners, but most of all its women as they have observed them.
Western women—especially American women—are educated and strong-willed, so unlike Japanese women, they are rarely deceived or corrupted by men . . . thus concluded one of the men who were at this evening’s gathering.
To which another immediately objected, “But even in the United States, not every woman is so strong-willed. I have heard many incredible stories. . . .”
“Tell us. Are they true stories?”
“Of course they are. If you don’t believe me, I’ll introduce such people to you anytime!”
He took his glass of beer, slowly drank from it, and began.
It was December last year, before Christmas, in the evening when it had snowed for the first time.
However, in the early evening, even though the sky became overcast, there was little wind, and it was not yet that cold. I had been invited to the theater by a family I knew, and so as soon as I returned home from my company, I quickly shaved, washed my face, combed my hair again, and put on my jet-black dress coat, an opera hat, a snow-white tie, and pure white gloves. Just before I was set to depart, I stood proudly in front of the mirror and took one last look at myself. . . . How good it made me feel!
The play we saw was one of those musical comedies. The female star was said to be from Germany. She had a better voice than looks.
The show once over, like everyone else on his way home after the theater, we entered the corner restaurant, Shanley, to have a bite.19 We spent so much time in idle talk that by the time we came out it was past one o’clock, and the streets were completely white. It was a heavy snowstorm; we had no idea when it had started.
At the nearby subway entrance I parted with the family who had invited me, as we were going home in different directions. I turned the corner onto Forty-second Street in order to take the elevated train, but the snow was blowing so hard in my direction that I had to pull my hat down over my eyes as I walked with my head bowed, without looking ahead. In no time, I bumped into someone coming toward me.
The person must also have been walking without looking; before I said anything, “Oh my, I am sorry,” uttered a female voice, in an offhand, coquettish manner. Startled, I looked up.
“Dear me, it’s Mr. K—. Where have you been? It’s such awful weather.”
It was a woman I knew. I don’t have to tell you what sort of things she did . . . the kind of person who could be walking on Broadway past one o’clock at night.
“Where have you been yourself, in this heavy snow? Take it easy with your sweethearts, otherwise you could lose your life.”
“Ha, ha, ha, ha. My sweetheart is right here, and I don’t need another one,” she said, snuggling close to me. “Seriously, Mr. K—, we haven’t seen each other for a long time. I was thinking that you must have gone back to Japan without telling me.”
“Rather, you were thinking that you had finally gotten rid of the Jap . . . but then this happens tonight. Too bad about that.”
“What are you saying? I’m not going to let you talk like that.” Through the veil she was wearing, the woman pretended that she was angrily glaring at me.
“Let’s go. I can’t really bear this cold. See, it feels like ice.” Thus saying, she pressed her cheek against my face.
“Where are we going? To have a drink to stave off the cold?” “It’s too late for bars. Let’s go to . . . my house. It’s really been such a long time.”
She decided all by herself and took my arm, resting her plump body against me.
I couldn’t resist such an attack. We walked toward Broadway, from where I had just come. It was much better there, as the buildings on both sides of the street sheltered us from the wind.
For a while we stood at the corner, arm in arm. You should have seen the sight of the snow at midnight in Forty-second Street, the theater district that could be called a nightless city!
From the tall Times building and the Astor Hotel up north to the opera house and the faraway Herald Square with department stores like Macy’s and Saks Fifth Avenue in the other direction, the rows of buildings are all clad in snow and loom like clouds or shadows, their blurry tips completely buried in the dark sky. Only from the windows, higher up and lower down, lights are shining like fireflies or stars. Here and there, at the entrances to theaters or the doors of bars and restaurants, bright lights of various colors still glitter, as they did earlier in the evening. But some of those farther away are covered with the driving snow and look like lanterns on a spring night.
The sidewalks on both sides are all covered with white snow and particolored like so many ribbons—blue in places, red elsewhere—by the colored electric lights. Men and women who are only now leaving the pleasure quarters go to and fro, arm in arm, some boarding the streetcars that
approach noiselessly parting the snow, others hailing a nearby automobile or carriage. Gradually people disappear, one couple after another.
Looking at the sight, I really felt that the theater district late at night was at its best blanketed in snow. Maybe this is because a profound harmony is produced by the combination of the lights that look tired in the depth of the night after so much merrymaking and the snow that arouses in everyone a sense of inviolable quietude.
Prodded by one of the coachmen who were waiting for hire in the streets, I helped the woman into his cab and we rode away, although our destination was not that far off.
Even in Japan, there is something romantic about riding together with a woman on a snowy night; all the more so when you are in a comfortable horse-drawn carriage with rubber wheels. Holding each other’s hands, leaning against each other, and flirting with abandon as if we owned the whole world, soon we reached the woman’s house.
It was a flat house [sic] with a huge front door, and her place was on the third floor. She took out a key from the muff she was carrying, opened the door, and led me to the parlor at the end of the hallway.
On the walls hung two or three nude prints in color. On one side of the room was a piano, and on the other a cozy corner partitioned off with some cheap Turkish woven fabric. Here we sank down, drinking, singing, then kissing and tickling each other. Gentlemen! If you want to have a really good time, indulging in all kinds of tomfoolery, reserved Japanese women are no match for Western women.
After a while, there was a light knock on the parlor door, followed by a voice, apparently belonging to the madam of this house.
“Bessie, Bessie, please come over for a moment.”
My Bessie, quite irritated, answered in a shrill voice, “What do you want?”
“I need you just for a second. The girl is being difficult again.” “Don’t bother me, I am too drunk,” she said, but nevertheless stood up and left the room.
In the room next door, a man was saying something in a deep, grumbling fashion. Bessie and the unfamiliar voice of another young woman could be heard. Evidently, there was some trouble.
The man with the deep voice—apparently one of those amorous and jealous types not uncommon in such a place—must be leaving, although the others tried to detain him, for after a while I heard the madam’s voice, followed by the sound of the door being opened and shut . . . and then the entire house was quiet again.
“I’m really sick and tired of this. Why on earth did our madam get stuck with such a woman?” Bessie was muttering as she came back. She immediately sat next to me and said, “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have left my precious darling. . . .”
“It sounded like a lot of trouble.”
“Yeah. But it couldn’t be helped. The girl came here only four or five days ago.”
“You mean she jilts her customers?”
“Not even that, she simply doesn’t take them in. But then, she didn’t come here because she wanted to. I mean she was tricked into coming.”
“Tricked . . . ? By a man?”
“Yes, from the country. She was tricked by one of those bad characters who want to make money by ensnaring women.”
“Then she wasn’t exactly cheated by her lover?”
“No. Things like this happen all the time.”
“Is that right? So that means there are pimps in America too,” I said, intrigued by this discovery. “But how do they manage to lure them away? Just because they are women doesn’t mean they would be cheated so easily, does it?”
“Sure, but you see, these bad characters will try everything, depending on time and circumstance.” Bessie became more and more eloquent. Striking a match on the sole of her high-heeled shoe and puffing out cigarette smoke, she continued, “Take Annie, for instance . . . who came here . . . she used to live in the country miles out of Buffalo, working in a pharmacy or some such place. But she met a man boarding for a while in a house near hers, who said he was an official of an insurance company in New York. One day he managed to persuade her by saying, ‘Why don’t you come with me to New York to see the sights?’ You know, anyone living in the country would want to see New York at least once. So I guess she fell victim to temptation and let herself be brought to New York. She had thought that he would help her look for a nice job, but in fact she was like a mouse caught in a trap. As soon as they arrived at the station, he took her without warning to one hotel after another before finally bringing her to this house. And then he disappeared into thin air. She had no money to go back home; as you know, if you hang around in this house, sooner or later you have to join the business.”
“It may work out that way, but what if she is a chaste woman who would rather die than degrade herself?”
“You won’t find many women like that,” Bessie immediately contradicted me, being one of those jaded creatures.
“In the beginning, everyone is virtuous. Even I once made an honest living. I come from New Jersey, from a respectable home that is still there. Coming to New York, I worked for a while as a salesgirl at a department store on Thirty-third Street. But how can you live on a measly wage of only five or six dollars a week? I couldn’t. Of course, that was just enough to eat, if that was all I wanted. But it was like living for the sake of not dying; how could a young person idly watch the hustle and bustle of New York? You would want to wear fashionable clothes others are wearing and go to the theater just like everyone else. I wanted to experience such luxury and so first I willingly became the mistress of a man who worked at the same store, and following that steadily slipped into a shameful life. Of course, at times, being human, I would become anxious about my future and tell myself that I shouldn’t be doing things like this, that it would be better to go back to the country. But the thing about New York is that once you are exposed to its winds, you can never leave this place, even if you end up dying in the street. For the young, New York is everything, like it or not.
“So with Annie, just wait and see. Even if she had worked at a respectable house, it wouldn’t have been the end of it. Once you are in this New York, it is inevitable that sooner or later you say to yourself, ‘I might as well have some fun while I am young!’ ”
Sure enough, Annie changed each time I visited Bessie after that night. First she would come and drink with us, then she would start cracking jokes . . . and she became more and more blasé. Her transformation never ceased to amaze me.
Today she is quite something to behold: the way she smartly holds up the rear hem of her skirt with one hand and clicks the narrow heels of her French-style shoes on the pavement of Broadway. How about it? If you like, I can introduce her to you.
Everyone laughed, drank more, smoked more, and then resumed the conversation.
In the Woods
Travelers who have been sightseeing in boisterous northern cities such as Chicago and New York will be surprised by what they see when they come to the capital of the United States, Washington. On the one hand, the whole city is like one large park, with beautiful deep clusters of maple trees covering the streets, and on the other, there is a large number of ugly Negroes wandering all over the city.
I too am a wanderer in the new continent. One autumn, I arrived at this capital and for two weeks saw just about everything one is supposed to see: first, the official residence of the president, the White House, the Capitol, various government offices. And, having also paid my respects at Washington’s grave in far-off Mount Vernon up the Potomac River, I began visiting several places in the suburbs to enjoy the colors of the fall season at their peak in this foreign land.
I can never forget the twilight over the meadows of Maryland that I saw yesterday.
About half an hour after sunset, the fiery evening glow gradually fades and leaves only a faint rosy hue around the edges of the white clouds floating in the sky. The vast grass-covered surface of the fields turns into a misty blue sea, and at the distant horizon it is difficult to tell where sky ends and earth begins. On the other
hand, the whiteness of certain objects—the pure white walls of the farmhouses here and far away, the white skirts of four or five women who are probably driving cattle across the fields, the treetops tinged here and there with yellow leaves, or the flowers of some unknown plants—is truly striking as it reveals itself, perhaps reflecting the rays of light from the sky, against the surroundings that are slowly growing darker. As I watched these objects, I had a strange sensation that they were gradually moving toward me.
What a mysterious sight. It evoked in me, not just in my eyes but from the bottom of my heart, an indescribably pleasant feeling. I could not help but remove my hat and wave it intently as if to beckon those moving colors, until it became completely dark around me. What a mysterious sight it was.
The following day, wishing to savor this beautiful twilight dream once again, I waited till sunset and left—but this time for the woods across the Potomac. I was already in the state of Virginia as I crossed an iron bridge at the foot of a cliff at the end of the city.
