The Makioka Sisters

by Junichiro Tanizaki

  She would be back in Japan almost before they knew she was gone. Still, it made her sad to think she was leaving Kobe for good. And in particular—she hoped they would forgive her for saying so—she had grown so fond of them, of Mrs. Makioka, and Miss Yukiko, and Koi-san. (She talked as rapidly as ever, and allowed no interruptions.) Each of the Makioka sisters had her own special qualities: three fine sisters, alike and yet different. The truth was that she had few regrets at leaving Kobe, but one thing did make her sad. She would no longer see the Makiokas, who she had hoped would continue to put up with her presence. It was a great delight to see two of the sisters today, and it was most unfortunate that Koi-san was not in. Koi-san would be around soon, said Sachiko. Should they try calling her? No, said Itani, standing up as Sachiko started for the telephone. It was unfortunate, but would they just pass on her regards? She was not sailing for ten days, she added. Might they be able, all three of them, to come to Tokyo? Not that she was asking them to see her off, but there was someone in Tokyo she wanted them to meet.

  This is the story Itani told, after stopping to catch her breath:

  She wondered about the propriety of saying so to the person most concerned, but what weighed on her mind, now that she was moving from Kobe, was that she would have to leave unmade the match she had hoped to make for Miss Yukiko. Each time she considered—no, she was not trying to flatter them—how few girls were as fine as Miss Yukiko and how few had such remarkable sisters, she felt that she was shirking her duty, and she wanted at least to make a beginning toward absolving herself. She had a new candidate. They must have heard the name: Mimaki, an old court family. Old Viscount Mimaki had figured in the Meiji Restoration. The present viscount, his son, was well along in years. Once active in politics (he had served on investigating committees in the House of Peers), he had retired to the old family seat in Kyoto. Itani had chanced to meet one Minoru, a Mimaki son by a concubine. This Mimaki Minoru was a graduate of the Peers School and had studied physics at the Imperial University, which he left to go to France. In Paris he studied painting for a time, and French cooking for a time, and numerous other things, none for very long. Going on to America, he studied aeronautics in a not-too-famous state university, and he did finally take a degree, it seemed. After graduation, he continued to wander about the United States, and on to Mexico and South America. With his allowance from home cut off in the course of these wanderings, he made a living as a cook and even as a bellboy. He also returned to painting, and tried his hand at architecture. Following his whims and relying on his undeniable cleverness, he tried everything. He abandoned aeronautics when he left school. Though he had had no regular work since his return to Japan some eight or nine years before, a house he designed half for the fun of it had attracted attention and he was known as an architect of some ability. He had even opened a small office in Tokyo. His houses cost money, however, being in the latest Western fashion, and orders fell off as the China Incident began to have its effect. Now he was a man of leisure again, forced to close his office after but two years in business. Such was the man’s story; and he was looking for a wife—or rather, the people around him were insisting that he had to have a wife. He was forty-four, Itani had heard. He had spent long years abroad, and he was used to the easy informality of bachelorhood in Japan. It seemed, therefore—not that they knew much about his life abroad—that he had never had a wife or a substitute for a wife. Since his return he had frequented the teahouses. But only until the year before, Itani added hastily. He no longer had enough money. In his youth he had received a settlement from his father, and he had been enjoying himself since. A man who knew how to spend and not how to earn, he was today in no position to waste money. Though somewhat late in making a start, he had hoped to earn his living as an architect, and if the times had been more favorable he would no doubt have succeeded. Now he faced an impasse. But he was a sort not uncommon among children of the nobility, sociable, witty, wide in his interests, thoroughly easygoing and rather inclined to think of himself as an artist, and his difficulties worried him not at all. It was because he was too easygoing that people said he must marry. This life would not do.

  Itani met Mimaki through her daughter Mitsuyo, who had graduated from Japan Women’s University the year before and was now working on the magazine Women’s Japan. It seemed that the president of the publishing company, a Mr. Kunishima, was extremely fond of Mimaki. The friendship had begun when Mimaki designed a house for Kunishima, and Mimaki was now a frequent visitor at the house, a friend valued as highly by Mrs. Kunishima as by her husband. The offices of the magazine being near Mimaki’s office, he had been in the habit of calling almost every day, and he had come to know the whole staff, and especially Mitsuyo. Mitsuyo was a great favorite of Kunishima and his wife, almost a member of their family. When, on a trip to Tokyo, Itani went to pay her respects at the Kunishima house, she found Mimaki there. He was most amusing even on first acquaintance, and he and Itani were soon friends. Itani really had little business there, but, with her daughter doing so well, she made three trips to Tokyo before the end of the year, and she visited the Kunishima house each time. Two of the three times she saw Mimaki. It was Mitsuyo’s story that the Kunishimas were extremely fond of gambling. They would stay up all night over bridge or mahjong, with Mitsuyo and Mimaki for their partners. Itani knew she should not boast of her own daughter, but Mitsuyo was a bright girl, precociously gifted at gambling, and she could stay up two nights running and still work twice as hard as anyone else in the office. Hence the Kunishimas liked her. Itani had been to Tokyo several times recently to arrange for her trip abroad, and she had had Kunishima’s help with her passport. She had seen Mimaki several more times. Each time she visited the Kunishima house, the talk, with Mimaki at the very center, turned noisily to “the question of Mimaki’s wife.” The Kunishimas were among the more aggressive advocates of marraige, and Kunishima, who knew Mimaki’s father, said that he himself would undertake to talk the Viscount into a new settlement if Mimaki agreed to marry. For the time being, then, the couple need not worry about money. Kunishima always asked Itani for word of likely candidates. She must let him know immediately when she thought of someone.

  Itani, who had been talking steadily, glanced at her watch and said she must hurry through the rest of her story. She had immediately thought of the Makiokas—this was exactly what they wanted for Miss Yukiko. But the timing was so bad. If she had planned to be in japan herself, she would have said that she knew exactly the girl, that she would arrange everything, but here she was going abroad. She finally decided to say nothing, though Miss Yukiko’s name had been on the tip of her tongue. But the problem still troubled her—such an ideal match, if only it could be arranged.

  She must tell them more about Mr. Mimaki. She had already told them that he was forty-four, probably a year or two younger than Mr. Makioka. As was so often the case with men long abroad, he was growing bald. He was also rather swarthy—one could not call him a handsome man, but one could say that his face told of his breeding. He was well built, a little stout—a strongly built man who had never been ill and who boasted that he could go on working whatever happened. And there was that most important matter, his finances: he had lived alone from his student days on a settlement of something over a hundred thousand yen, and one could say without exaggeration that not a yen was left. He had several times gone crying to the Viscount, who had given him money two or three times. That money too was gone. Not one to keep money when he had it, he would soon be as impoverished as ever. It was useless to give him money, the Viscount had said. And indeed no man past forty should be living in aimless bachelorhood, argued Kunishima. It was only natural that the Viscount and the world in general should look upon him with suspicion. The first step was to find steady work, however small an income it brought. The Viscount would then feel better, and possibly even help him. Since there had already been so many requests for money, the help would be of very small proportions, but Mimaki would not
need much. In Kunishima’s opinion, Mimaki was a man of really outstanding talent when it came to designing Western houses, and there was no doubt that he had a fine future as an architect. Though Kunishima did not claim that there was much he himself could do, he meant to back Mimaki to the very limits of his ability. Mimaki was having trouble because times were bad, but one need not be gloomy. The crisis would soon pass. Kunishima would see (and he thought the prospects were good) whether the Viscount would agree to pay the wedding expenses, to buy the couple a house, and to give them an allowance for two or three years. That, then, was the story. Itani thought— would they not agree?—that while they might have certain misgivings, Mimaki was the husband they were looking for. He had many merits: it was his first marriage; though he was the son of a concubine, his family was descended from the great Fujiwara clan and his relatives without exception were illustrious men; he had no one to support (she had forgotten to tell them that his mother died very soon after he was born, and he had no memories of her); and he was a man with refined and varied tastes, well versed in the speech and customs of both France and America. Though she herself had known him but a very short time and it would be well for the Makiokas to conduct their own investigation, she could say from what she had seen of him that he was an amiable, likable man with no apparent defects. He was a great drinker. She had seen him in his cups two or three times, and she had found that the more he drank the wittier and more entertaining he became. Thinking over and over again what a shame it would be to let this opportunity pass, she had cast about for someone to act as go-between in her place. Finally she had decided that, since the man moved so easily in polite society, the business of go-between need not be complicated. Once an introduction was arranged and matters began to look promising, Mr. and Mrs. Kunishima would see that the negotiations went smoothly. And Mitsuyo could help too. Mitsuyo was young, but she was a bold, forward girl, just the sort to help with marriage negotiations. They would find her of considerable use if they chose to make her their messenger.

  “Dear, dear.” She looked at her watch again, and stood up to go. “And I meant to stay only fifteen minutes.”

  And still she talked on. She had said what she had to say. She hoped they would think everything over. Kunishima was going to give a little party for her, and if they were at all interested in her story, would they consider representing Kobe at the party?— Mrs. Makioka and Miss Yukiko, and, because nothing could be better than having all three sisters, Koi-san too, if possible. With the farewell party for their excuse, might they not at least meet the gentleman? Their answer could wait. She would call from Tokyo, perhaps the next day, to let them know the exact time of the farewell party. She barely said good-bye as she flew from the house.

  28

  ITANI had been in too much of a hurry to tell them her train time. Sachiko called the house, only to find that she was out. The person at the telephone was most secretive. Itani had left strict instructions that no one was to see her off. In the evening, Sachiko managed to catch Itani herself. After all that Itani had told them, said Sachiko, they wanted to see her at least once more—and finally Itani let it be known that she was taking the nine-thirty express from Sannomiya Station. The whole family went to the station, and for the first time since the memorial services the autumn before, Teinosuke found himself escorting the three sisters, all in their most elaborate dress.

  “Why does Koi-san have on a kimono?” Fascinated, Etsuko stared across the dinner table. Taeko was wearing a silk print, large white camellias on a green background. Surrounded by all this finery, Etsuko was as excited as at the annual cherry-viewing.

  “And now do I look in my kimono, Etsuko?”

  “You look better in foreign clothes.”

  “A kimono makes you look fat, Koi-san,” said Sachiko.

  Taeko was beginning to wear Japanese dress even around the house. She had good legs, and when she wore Western clothes there was something of the pretty little girl about her. In kimono, with her legs hidden, she looked dumpy. In her efforts to gain weight, she was perhaps eating too much. Though she had always had rather good circulation, Taeko explained, her feet and legs had been unbearably cold in foreign clothes ever since her illness.

  “When women are young they like foreign clothes,” said Teinosuke, “but when they get older they turn back to kimono. Koi-san is getting old.”

  “Look at Itani. She has been to America, and in her business she ought to wear foreign clothes. But do you ever see her in anything except kimono?”

  “Never,” said Sachiko. “But then she is really old. What answer shall we give her, by the way?”

  “Suppose we do this: there is no need to talk much about husbands, but you ought to see her in Tokyo. You would have had to even if the other matter had not come up at all.”

  “I quite agree with you.”

  “I ought to go myself, but I am too busy. You and Yukiko go, and if Koi-san can go too that will be even better.”

  “I would like to go,” said Taeko. “When was I last in Tokyo? I wonder. And this is such a good time of the year, and I have to make up for the cherry blossoms.”

  Unlike her sisters, Taeko was not in debt to Itani. She was a steady customer at the beauty shop, but she complained that Itani was too expensive, and occasionally went elsewhere. Even so, she liked Itani’s free and open manner, that touch of bravodo so unusual in women. Turned out of the Makioka family the year before, Taeko had come to feel that the world was harsh, and that people with whom she had once been friendly were looking coldly on her. Only Itani was unchanged, as motherly and sympathetic as ever. There could be no doubt that Itani, whose shop was a rumor mart, knew all the details of Taeko’s misbehavior, and yet she chose to concentrate on what was good in the girl. Taeko was thoroughly delighted, then, when she heard that Itani had especially asked for “Koi-san” and urged that she too go to Tokyo. Each time a prospective husband appeared for Yukiko, Taeko felt like the skeleton in the family closet, and she read into Itani’s invitation the implication that the youngest sister was no discredit to the Makioka name, that the family should see her virtues and set her out on display. Taeko really must go to Tokyo.

  “You go too, then, Koi-san. The more the better.”

  “But the most important person of all …” Sachiko looked at Yukiko, who was smiling quietly. “The most important person of all seems unenthusiastic.”

  “Oh?”

  “She says that if all three of us go, Etsuko will be left alone.”

  “But Yukiko has to go if anyone does. Etsuko can stay and take care of the house for two or three days,” said Teinosuke.

  “Oh, no need to worry about me.” Etsuko was quite the adult. “I can watch the house. And O-haru will be here.”

  “Yukiko has one reservation, though.”

  “What is that?”

  Yukiko only laughed, and Sachiko went ahead for her. “She says she has to go for Itani’s sake, but she is not to be left behind afterwards.”

  “There is that problem, of course.”

  “Suppose we stay away from the Tokyo house,” said Taeko.

  “No, that will never do,” objected Teinosuke. “There will be trouble when they find out.”

  “Yukiko says we are to tell them that she will be sent to Tokyo later, but that this time I am bringing her back with me.”

  “But if you hate Tokyo so,” put in Taeko, “what chance is there that you will be interested in this man of Itani’s?”

  “Yes, what about that?” Etsuko agreed with Taeko. “Maybe you have to get married, but why to someone in Tokyo?”

  “You understand such things, do you, Etsuko?”

  “But will Yukiko like Tokyo? Will you, Yukiko?”

  “Possibly you should be quiet, Etsuko,” said Sachiko. “But I feel this way myself: Mr. Mimaki comes from a court family and Kyoto is in his blood. I imagine he might be willing to move west. After all, he only has a rented room in Tokyo.”

  “Especially if w
e find him work in Osaka. There is that Kyoto blood.”

  “But even coming from the same part of the country,” continued Sachiko, “Kyoto people and Osaka people are so different. Kyoto women are all right, but I have never found much to say for Kyoto men.”

  “This is no time to go looking for faults,” said Teinosuke.

  “Maybe he was born in Tokyo. And he has spent so much time in France and America. Maybe he is different from most Kyoto men.”

  “I never have liked Tokyo,” said Yukiko. “But I imagine Tokyo people have their good points.”

  They could wait until the Tokyo meeting to give Itani her farewell present. Upon Teinosuke’s suggestion, the five of them set out after dinner to buy a bouquet in Kobe. Etsuko was to present it. Though one would have expected the station to be alive with well-wishers, it was in fact rather lonely, the departure time having been kept secret. Even so there were twenty or thirty people at the train, including Itani’s brothers and their wives. The Makioka sisters, noting the rather sombre nature of the assembly, felt constrained to keep their cloaks on, and in the end they had no op portunity to display their carefully chosen kimonos. Sachiko managed to have a few words with Itani. They were most grateful for the visit that morning, she said. She had told Teinosuke of it, and they agreed that there was no way to thank Itani enough for worrying over the sisters to the very end, and now, more than ever, they felt that all three of them must be at her farewell party. Teinosuke added his thanks to Sachiko’s. How splendid, said Itani. All three of them! She would be waiting, and they could be sure that she would telephone the details the next day. She leaned out the window to repeat her assurances as the train pulled out of the station.

  There was a telephone call the next evening from the Imperial Hotel. The farewell party, said Itani, was to be three evenings later, at five o’clock, at the Imperial Hotel. There would be nine guests in all: Itani and her daughter Mitsuyo; Mr. and Mrs. Kuni-shima and their daughter; Mr. Mimaki, and, representing Kobe, the Makioka sisters. And where, asked Itani, would they stay? Possibly at the main house in Shibuya—but since it would be so much more convenient, suppose they too stay at the Imperial. With a festival in progress to celebrate the twenty-six-hundredth anniversary of the founding of the Empire, every hotel in Tokyo was crowded. Fortunately, relatives of Mr. Kunishima’s had taken a room and had suggested that they might let the Makiokas have it and go themselves to stay with the Kunishimas. Taeko would be going and Yukiko did so particularly want to avoid the Tokyo house and to conceal the reason for the visit. Sachiko therefore felt that, selfish though it was of her, she must ask Itani to arrange for a hotel room. They would leave for Tokyo either the next evening or two mornings later. Although they would like to see Itani off from Yokohama, they could not be away from Ashiya for very long, and they must ask her to forgive them for going only to the farewell party. They would stay two nights, including the night of the farewell party. But they would want to see the Kabuki and it was just possible that they would stay a third night. Itani answered that she might want to see the Kabuki herself. Should she reserve seats?