by Shiro Hamao
In this way, that stormy evening wore on with all of us in a strange mood.
I ended up sleeping in a futon they put out for me in the downstairs room.
I spent a lot of time with Seizō but we had never had such unpleasant words as we did that night. It was somehow intensely pleasurable for me but at the same time I had a feeling of unspeakable foreboding as well.
Where would I end up? What was I doing loving another man’s wife? I can hear the voices whispering now.
VII
Seizō and Michiko were sleeping in the room just above me. I had never before slept under the same roof as Michiko. This was the first time.
The woman I loved more than my life was another man’s wife. The couple were asleep in the same room just above mine. This thought alone was enough to keep me from being able to sleep.
At first I thought the fatigue from having bathed in the ocean that day might be enough to put me to sleep. But then my head filled with thoughts and sleep eluded me. The storm outside had subsided but the rain still fell steadily.
With a youthful sentimentalism I thought about how Michiko and I loved each other but there was nothing we could do about it. I thought of Werther again and gave myself up to a succession of pleasantly sad thoughts. But then my thoughts came back to reality. I shuddered with disgust at the thought of Michiko’s voluptuous body sleeping in that room above me with a man who had neither love nor understanding for her. Once again, I cursed Seizō inwardly. I cursed his existence. I listened intently for any sounds as my mind filled with shameful thoughts. The rain did not let up.
A maid could be heard snoring in the other room. As I lay there I alternated between writhing on the floor with all my might just as I had swum in the ocean that day – barely able to resist the impulse to cry out – and shedding tears of romantic, dream-like downheartedness.
For more than an hour I shuttled in this way between heaven and earth as this jumble of feelings mixed with the day’s fatigue.
And then, suddenly, I heard the sound of a voice. It was a very quiet sound but my ears were on alert and they told me clearly that it was a human voice.
I sat up halfway and listened with my entire body. There it was again. Then I distinguished the sound of someone quietly moaning. It was coming from the first floor!
I felt my body begin to tremble.
The situation reminded me of a time when as a boy I visited an uncle in the village where I had grown up and overheard my uncle and aunt in their bedroom. Shaking with my own wretchedness I covered my head in the blanket.
After a few moments I ventured out again and heard the sound of someone talking. I got out of bed completely and focused on the room upstairs but this time I was assailed by a strange feeling.
This was clearly different from what I had overheard as a child. As I listened more, I realised just how different it was.
Seizō was scolding her about something. His voice was quiet but seemed angry.
I held my breath and listened. I heard my own name, ‘Ōtera’. Then I heard a groaning voice that seemed to belong to Michiko.
There was no longer any doubting it. Seizō suspected something between Michiko and me. Michiko was being made to suffer because of me. I stood up quietly but quickly. My feelings at that time were those of a medieval knight. I went up to the first floor as if I were going to save a damsel in distress.
It is of course a shameful thing to stand outside the doorway of a married couple’s bedroom and listen to what is going on inside. But my feelings at that time were of such a nature as to sanctify everything I did. I was going to save an innocent suffering woman. This is what I told myself as I tried to ascertain what was going on in that room.
It was a warm summer night but the shōji facing the passageway was closed. I noticed, however, that one could still see inside through a gap at the edge of the shōji. I quickly approached it and peered through the gap at the interior of the room.
The floor lamp was clearly visible. By its light, and through the white mosquito netting, I could also clearly see that Seizō was standing there, slightly hunched forward, and crouching down. As I watched he said, ‘You love Ōtera, don’t you!’ in a low, mumbling voice.
I opened the shōji a little more so that I could see in front of where Seizō was crouching. I was on the point of opening my mouth to scream.
My beloved Michiko lay there on the floor, her upper body completely naked and her hands tied behind her back. Seizō was abusing her every time he said ‘Ōtera’ and she was emitting a quiet groan.
I couldn’t stand it anymore. Michiko was suffering because of me. I thought of kicking in the shōji and barging into the room. But I hesitated for a moment in order to hear what she was saying back to him.
It was all I could do to restrain myself when, at that instant, I noticed something shiny in Seizō’s hand.
‘What about it? Why won’t you tell me?’
As he said this he was holding his hand close to her cheek and I got a clear glimpse of a blade. At the same time I heard a voice that seemed to be Michiko’s, saying, ‘Ah! That hurts!’ At the sound of her quiet yet still forceful voice I kicked aside the shōji and rushed into the room. Its occupants were obviously surprised.
When I entered the room, yelling, ‘What are you doing?’, Seizō stood up and screamed. ‘What’s this? Who is that?’
I seem to have collided with the mosquito net as I came in and ripped out its hooks but Seizō and I kicked it aside, after which we stood glaring at each other while Michiko lay all trussed up on the floor. The silence was deafening. Seizō had recovered from his initial shock and stood there staring at me with the knife blade still in his right hand.
It was at this moment that my descent to hell began. As that bizarre silence was broken the lives of the three people in that room were cursed forever.
It was Michiko who broke the silence.
‘Ichirō-san, what a silly boy you are! Such a silly boy! Tee hee!’
When this freakish sentence came out of Michiko’s mouth as she lay there with both hands tied, my world was turned upside down. Oh! Those words! That laugh!
Something flashed on in my mind and I stood there like a stone having been struck by lightning.
I could feel my brains sloshing inside my head and I began to kick the floor in frustration.
As I sit here in prison now I am struggling to remember the scene in as much detail as possible.
I experienced so many emotions at that moment that I would have been hard pressed to explain how I felt at the time, but now that I think back on it more calmly the facts all present themselves quite clearly.
Michiko’s words made it all too clear.
How could I have been so foolish not to have realised it before? Seizō and Michiko did not have a normal sex life. What they were doing here was nothing less than a perverted sex game. It was true that Seizō disliked me but the two needed a good story for the perverse plays they liked to stage. At some point my name had come to play a key role in their little theatricals. The husband got his thrills from putting on a play in which he tortured his wife in order to force her to confess, while she took pleasure in being tortured.
I fell to my knees, awash in shame.
But those words of Michiko’s that had already turned my world upside down were the cause of an even greater tragedy.
It was clear now that Seizō had been using me as a prop to satisfy his own desires. But did this mean that he did not actually suspect anything between Michiko and me?
In fact he did suspect us, as became clear at that moment.
Consider – while Michiko laughed off my sudden appearance on the scene, how did Seizō interpret it?
He ignored the kneeling intruder and went straight to Michiko, sidled up to her and asked, with uneven breath, ‘Why is Ōtera here?’
Seizō was clearly excited by his own lines in the play he was staging. ‘Couldn’t this play be real? What if Michiko really did love Ōte
ra and was thereby satisfying a double masochism?’ This is no doubt what Seizō was thinking. Indeed, the earnestness of his manner at the time suggested that he had already begun to believe it.
Seeing that Michiko remained silent he repeated himself.
‘Listen you slut! You’re fucking Ōtera aren’t you!’
If Michiko had been able to see how serious Seizō was when he said this, the tragedy that followed might not have happened.
But Michiko wasn’t paying attention.
She answered him with the same saucy tone that she always used in their games.
‘Why yes! Maybe I am!’
The look on Seizō’s face when he heard this surpasses description.
In the next instant something terrifying happened.
There was a sudden explosive cry of anger and distress. I started and tried to stop him but he had already stabbed Michiko in her right breast. Realising for the first time the seriousness of the situation, Michiko began to scream and to writhe in pain. Before I even had time to yell out, ‘You devil!’ or to reach out to stop him, he was already stabbing her again above the heart. When I tried to interfere he came after me, looking every bit like a devil, but then suddenly began to stab himself painfully in the chest. He crumpled to the floor onto his own futon, let out a groan of pain along with a mouthful of blood, and slumped forwards. I tried to help by holding his back but he only spit curses and blood at me and I saw that as he had leaned over with the knife it had somehow stuck him in the chest and now blood was rushing from his right breast and the knife was all tangled in his kimono.
I had lost all judgment. I didn’t care any more what happened to me. I took the knife out of Seizō and pushed him over (this is when he hit his head on the table and injured himself). I had decided to kill myself with his knife.
But at that moment the three from downstairs came into the room and I hesitated. It was after that when I clearly heard both Seizō and Michiko say my name.
Hearing this I realised I could not die without saying anything. I had to take revenge against this woman for toying with me and against this man for having so readily concluded I was guilty of the base crime of adultery. I figured I would soon die in any case. So I calmly allowed myself to be arrested.
The preceding is the truth about what happened that night.
VIII
I had decided to have my revenge. Michiko had made me into a pawn in their game. She had told me her husband didn’t love her and that he was abusing her. She had even shown me the scars! What a devil! I had felt real sympathy for her. But it was all a ruse and a lie! I was only one of many young men whom Michiko was using in this way. Sure, Michiko, you stayed faithful to your husband all right. But how many men’s hearts did you trifle with in the process? Did you think this could be forgiven?
When I go to hell you’re coming with me.
My dishonour in being sentenced to death is of course enormous, but it is surely no honour for you either to be known for having committed adultery and getting yourself killed out of blind passion. Nor does it do you any credit that your husband, who cursed me until he died, is known as a cuckold and a murder victim. Look at the two of you! Once so well regarded in society. And now you’ve gone and destroyed each other’s reputation. This young man from the country couldn’t feel less sympathy for you.
Once I was arrested I didn’t say a word for an entire day while I figured out what my story would be. I thought about it for a long time and decided to take my revenge against the Odas and against the legal system at the same time.
And what was the result? That judge with the difficult look on his face wrote in the official public documents that his reason for giving me the death penalty had to do with the fact that I was involved in a long-term adulterous relationship with Michiko. Right there, in the judge’s decision, was the proof that Michiko was mine forever.
The story that I dreamed up in the police office – a story that emerged from the soul of a devil – was now confirmed as a fact by the court.
Michiko’s beautiful flesh was mine now.
In exchange they’re going to take my useless life. What a bargain that is!
All of you who are tired of living – why not sell your souls to the devil? Turn your lives into something valuable! If you do you’ll find that nothing is impossible.
Justice! How many times has blood been spilled in your name?
And you, lawyers! You have the choice to believe what I’ve written here or not. If you believe it you will have to admit how feeble your powers are. You might have fallen straight into my trap – but the fact is that you have put an innocent man to death. You should be ashamed of yourselves. If you don’t believe what I’ve written, this will suit me just as well. In that case you have used the law to besmirch the reputation of a defenceless dead woman with the brand, much worse than death, of adultery. Ha! You make me laugh!
Oh Michiko! My beloved Michiko!
You are mine. You are my love.
Michiko! And yet…
Were you really sad after all? Wasn’t it true that Seizō didn’t love you? You might have been well matched physically and sexually, but weren’t you still alone? Didn’t you tell me that you were?
If that was the case, my revenge here has been all too cruel…
Michiko! Didn’t you really love me? Tell me! Tell me! I am going to die.
Oh! That’s right! You called my name. ‘Ichirō,’ you said. I know you weren’t calling out to me. But did you think that I wouldn’t hear this last word uttered by the woman I loved?
I know Michiko. You told the truth then. When Seizō said, ‘Ōtera, Ōtera…’ you heard it and used your last ounce of energy to say, ‘No… It wasn’t Ichirō…’
I heard it. I heard it. I was listening with my whole body to the last words of the woman I loved.
The others missed the rest of it. All they heard was my name like they were used to hearing it on your lips.
So you loved me after all. If that was true… if that was true…
Come Devil! Take me in your wings. Suck out the last human blood in my veins!
I hate women. I hate Michiko. Michiko was loyal to her husband. She never loved me. Devil! Tear my soul from my body and keep me by your side always.
Michiko. Even Michiko said my name when she died. What a hateful pair they were. Damn them both.
The law be damned!
Woman be damned!
And yet in the end I wonder… What if?…
Could Michiko have possibly –
IX
The bizarre manuscript ends here. Ōtera called out to the devil but it seems he was a human being after all. He seems to have been unable to continue since the text cuts off in midsentence. The paper is stained here and there with tears.
I will refrain from commenting on the manuscript and leave the rest for you to hypothesise and imagine. Are we to believe these earnest words? Should we simply lay them to rest as the preposterous ravings of a mad man? I will not say much.
There is one thing, however, that this unfortunate young man was no doubt wondering until the moment of his death. He wanted to know if Michiko was in fact lonely and really loved Ōtera Ichirō, or whether she got on well with her husband and was merely toying with Ōtera.
As for Michiko, it was also possible that she loved neither her husband nor Ōtera and was toying with both of them.
It is often the case with sex perverts that they are masochists on the physical level but the reverse in terms of their mentality.
It is not hard to imagine that, having been forced into a marriage for financial reasons, she allowed her husband to dominate her physically while mentally she placed herself in the opposite position.
In this case, she would have believed in her mind that she was manipulating her husband while also making a plaything out of Ōtera – thus having her fun with both men.
If that was in fact the case she managed to lose her life to the flames of jealousy that she her
self had fanned in her husband.
But Ōtera was too pure a young man to imagine such a complicated situation.
He could only imagine two alternatives: either Michiko truly loved her husband or she secretly loved him. Of course this was perfectly understandable on his part.
In any case, I pray that the victims of this tragedy may rest in peace.
My prayers are always with this beautiful young man who may have perished for a crime he did not commit. And as for Michiko, who lies in the earth burdened with a vile name she may not have deserved, I make sure that there are always flowers on her grave.
Glossary
Chow: In mahjong, a set of three tiles of the same suit and consecutive numbers.
Daimyo: Hereditary rulers of the several hundred small principalities that made up feudal Japan until the dismantling of the Tokugawa Shogunate in 1868.
Obi: Kimono sash
Shōji: A sliding door made with paper glued to a wooden latticework.
Paar: The German word for ‘couple’ often used in pre-war Japan to refer to a male-male couple.
Tatami: Rectangular straw mats used for flooring in traditional Japanese houses. They are made in a uniform size (although the precise measurements differ by region) so the number of mats may be used to indicate the size of a room.
Biographical note
Viscount Hamao Shirō (1896-1935) was the scion of one of modern Japan’s most prestigious families, a public prosecutor and a member of Japan’s House of Peers. In 1928 he gave up his career as a prosecutor to devote himself to writing detective fiction. He made his debut in the following year, with ‘Did He Kill Them?’ in the journal Shinseinen, or New Youth, a wildly popular literary magazine that promoted the heady brew of aestheticised decadence, gothic horror and pseudo-scientific sexology and criminology known in 1920s Japan as ero-guro-nansensu, or ‘erotic grotesque nonsense’. By his death six years later at the age of forty he had published sixteen novellas and three full-length novels, and was working on one more.
