by Osamu Dazai
I began from the following day to devote my energies to working in the fields. Mr. Nakai’s daughter sometimes helps me. Ever since my disgraceful act of having started a fire, I have felt somehow as if the color of my blood has turned a little darker, as if I am becoming every day more of an uncouth country girl. When, for instance, I sit on the porch knitting with Mother, I feel strangely cramped and choked, and it comes as a relief when I go out into the fields to dig the earth.
Manual labor, I suppose one would call it. This is not the first time I’ve done such work. I was conscripted during the war and even made to do coolie labor. The sneakers I now wear when I work in the fields are the ones the Army issued me. That was the first time in my life I had put such things on my feet, but they were surprisingly comfortable, and when I walked around the garden wearing them I felt as if I could understand the light-heartedness of the bird or animal that walks barefoot on the ground. That is the only pleasant memory I have of the war. What a dreary business the war was.
Last year nothing happened
The year before nothing happened
And the year before that nothing happened.
An amusing poem to this effect appeared in a newspaper just after the war ended. Of course all kinds of things actually did take place, but when I try to recall them now, I experience that same feeling that nothing happened. I hate talking about the war or listening to other people’s memories. Many people died, I know, but it was still a dreary business, and it bores me now. I suppose you might say I take a very egocentric view of it. Only when I was conscripted and forced to do coolie labor in sneakers was I able to think of it except in terms of its dreariness. I often had harsh thoughts about the coolie labor, but thanks to it I became quite robust, and even now I sometimes think that if ever I have difficulty in eking out a living, I can always get along by performing manual labor.
One day, about the time that the war was entering its really desperate phase, a man dressed in a kind of military uniform came to our house in Nishikata Street and handed me conscription papers and a schedule listing the days I was required to work. I discovered that from the following day I would have to report on alternate days at a base in the mountains behind Tachikawa. In spite of myself, I found myself in tears.
“I suppose a substitute wouldn’t do?” The tears kept flowing and I had begun to sob.
The man answered firmly, “The Army has work for you, and you yourself must go.”
The next day it rained. An officer delivered us a sermon as we stood lined up at the foot of the mountain. “Victory is a certainty,” he said by way of preamble. “Victory is a certainty, but unless everybody does exactly what the Army orders, all our plans will be thwarted, and we will have another Okinawa. We want you without fail to do every bit of the work you are given. Next, you are to be on guard against one another. There is no telling whether spies have been planted among you. You will now be working in military positions just like soldiers, and we want you to exercise every possible caution not to reveal to other people under any circumstances what you have seen.”
The mountain was smouldering in the rain as we stood there, close to five hundred men and women. We listened with all due reverence to his address, in spite of the drenching rain. The unit also included boys and girls from the elementary schools, all of them with frozen little faces on the verge of tears. The rain went through my coat, penetrated my jacket, and finally soaked through to my underwear.
I spent that whole day carrying baskets of earth on my back. The next time at the base I tugged ropes in a team of laborers. That was the work I liked best.
Two or three times while I was out working in the mountains I had the impression that the schoolboys were staring at me in a most disagreeable manner. I was shouldering baskets of earth one day when a couple of them passed by, and I heard one of them whisper, “Think she’s a spy?”
I was astonished. I asked the girl carrying earth next to me what made the boy say such a thing. She answered seriously, “Perhaps because you look like a foreigner.”
“Do I? Do you also think I’m a spy?”
“No,” she answered, this time with a little smile.
“I am a Japanese,” I said and couldn’t keep from giggling at the obvious silliness of my own words.
One fine morning which I had spent hauling logs along with the men, the young officer suddenly frowned and pointed at me. “Hey you. You, come here.”
He walked quickly toward the pine forest, and I followed him, my heart pounding with nervousness and fear. He stopped by a pile of timber just brought from the saw mill, and turned around to me. “It must be very hard working that way every day. Today please just watch over this lumber.” He spoke with a smile, flashing his white teeth.
“You mean I should stand here?”
“It’s cool and quiet, and you can take a nap on top of the pile. If you get bored, perhaps you’d like to read this.” He took a small volume from his pocket and tossed it shyly on the boards. “It isn’t much of a book, but please read it if you like.”
It was called Troika. I picked it up. “Thank you very much. There’s someone in my family also who likes books, but he’s in the South Pacific now.”
He misunderstood. “Oh, your husband. South Pacific. That’s terrible.” He shook his head in sympathy. “At any rate, today you stand guard duty. I’ll bring your lunch box myself later on. You just rest without worrying about anything.” With these words, he strode off rapidly.
I sat on the lumber pile and began to read the book. I had read about half when the crunching of his boots announced the officer’s return. “I have brought your lunch. It must be very tedious being here alone.” He deposited the lunch box on the grass and hurried off again.
When I had finished the lunch, I crawled up on top of the lumber pile and stretched out to read the book. I read the whole thing through and nodded off. I woke after three with the sudden impression that I had seen the young officer before, but where I could not recall. I clambered down from the pile and was just smoothing down my hair when I heard the crunching of his boots again.
“Thank you very much for having come today. You may leave now if you wish.”
I ran up to him and held out the book. I wanted to express my thanks, but the words did not come. In silence I looked at his face, and when our eyes met, mine filled with tears. Then tears shone also in his.
We parted without words, just like that, and the young officer never again appeared at the place where I worked. That was the only day I was able to take it easy. From then on I went every other day to Tachikawa to do my stint of hard labor. Mother worried a great deal about my health, but the work actually made me stronger than ever before, and even now I am, at least, a woman who is not particularly distressed even by the hardest labor in the fields.
I said that I hate to discuss the war or hear about it, but now I find I have told all about my “precious experience.” But that’s about the only memory of the war I ever feel the slightest inclination to relate. The rest might aptly be summed up by the poem:
Last year nothing happened
The year before nothing happened
And the year before that nothing happened.
Idiotically enough, all that remains of my war experiences is the pair of sneakers.
The mention of the sneakers took me off again on another digression, but I should add that although wearing what may be called my unique memento of the war and going out into the fields every day helps to relieve the secret anxiety and uneasiness deep in my heart, Mother has of late been growing weaker day by day.
The snake eggs.
The fire.
Mother’s health has shockingly deteriorated while I, quite on the contrary, feel as though I am steadily turning into a coarse, low-class woman. I can’t escape the feeling that it is by sucking the life-breath out of Mother that I am fattening.
Mother has never said a word concerning the fire except for her joke about the firewood bei
ng for burning. Far from reprimanding me, she seemed to pity me, but the shock she received was certainly ten times as great as mine. Ever since the fire Mother sometimes groans in her sleep, and on nights when a strong wind is blowing, she slips out of bed any number of times, however late it may be, and goes around the house making sure that everything is all right. She never looks well. Some days even walking seems a great strain for her. She had expressed a desire to help me in the fields, and although I had discouraged her, she insisted on carrying five or six great bucketfuls of water from the well. The next day her back was so stiff she could barely breathe. She spent the day in bed. After that she appeared to have given up the idea of manual labor. Once in a while she walks out into the fields but only to observe intently what I am doing.
Today, while Mother was watching me work, she suddenly remarked, “They say that people who like summer flowers die in the summer. I wonder if it’s true.” I did not answer but went on watering the eggplants. It is already the beginning of summer. She continued softly, “I am very fond of hibiscus, but we haven’t a single one in this garden.”
“We have plenty of oleanders,” I answered in an intentionally sharp tone.
“I don’t like them. I like almost all summer flowers, but oleanders are too loud.”
“I like roses best. But they bloom in all four seasons. I wonder if people who like roses best have to die four times over again.”
We both laughed.
“Won’t you rest a bit?” Mother asked, still smiling. She added, “I have something I’d like to talk over with you today.”
“What is it? If it’s about your dying, no thanks.”
I followed Mother to a bench under the wisteria trellis. The wisteria blossoms were at their end, and the soft afternoon sunlight filtering through the leaves fell on our laps and dyed them green.
“There’s something I’ve been meaning to tell you for quite a while, but I was waiting for a moment when we were both in a good mood. You see, it’s not a very easy thing to discuss. But today I feel somehow as if I can talk about it. I ask you please to restrain yourself and listen until I have finished. The truth is that Naoji is alive.”
I stiffened all over.
“Five or six days ago I had a letter from your Uncle Wada. It seems that a man who used to work for him has recently returned from the South Pacific. He went to your uncle’s office to pay his respects, and then, quite by accident, it came out that he had been in the same unit with Naoji and that Naoji is safe and will soon be returning. He had one unpleasant thing to report. According to this man, Naoji has become a rather serious opium addict.”
“Again!”
My mouth twisted as if I had eaten something bitter. When Naoji was in high school, in imitation of a certain novelist, he had taken to drugs, and he finally ran up such an enormous bill at the pharmacist’s that it had taken Mother two years to pay it in full.
“Yes. He seems to have taken it up again. But the man said that he’s certain to be cured by the time he gets back because they won’t let him return otherwise. Your uncle’s letter goes on to say that even if Naoji is cured when he returns there’s no immediate likelihood of finding a job for someone in his frame of mind. Even perfectly normal people become rather peculiar nowadays if they work in Tokyo—what with all the confusion—and a semi-invalid who has just recovered from narcotic poisoning might go berserk in no time. There’s no telling what he might do. If Naoji comes back, the best thing would be for us to take care of him here in the mountains for the time being and not let him go anywhere else. That’s one thing. And, Kazuko, your uncle had another thing in his letter. He says that our money is all gone, and what with the blocking of savings and the capital levy, he won’t be able to send us as much as he has before. It will be extremely difficult for him to manage our living expenses, especially when Naoji arrives and there are three of us to take care of. He suggests that we should waste no time in finding for you either a husband or else a position in some household.”
“As a servant?”
“No, your uncle wrote that he knew of a family that’s related to us and in the peerage where you could have a position as governess to the little girls. That probably wouldn’t be too depressing or awkward for you.”
“I wonder if there isn’t some other job.”
“He says that any other profession would be impractical for you.”
“Why impractical?”
Mother smiled sadly but did not answer.
“No! I’ve had enough of such talk!” I burst out hysterically, knowing even as I did so that I would regret it. But I couldn’t stop. “Look at me in these wretched sneakers—look!” I was crying, but I brushed the tears away with the back of my hand and looked Mother in the face. A voice within me repeated, “I mustn’t, I mustn’t,” but words, having no connection with my expressed self, poured forth, as if from the depths of my subconscious.
“Didn’t you once say that it was because of me, because you had me, that you were going to Izu? Didn’t you say that if you didn’t have me you would die? That’s why I’ve stayed here without budging from your side. And here I am wearing these sneakers because my only thought has been to grow vegetables you would like. Now you hear that Naoji’s coming home, and suddenly you find me in the way. ‘Go off and become a servant!’ you say. It’s too much, too much.”
My words seemed horrible even to myself, but they could not be stopped, as if they had an existence of their own.
“If we’re poor and our money’s gone, why don’t we sell all our expensive clothes? Why don’t we sell this house? I can do something. I can get a job working at the village office, and if they won’t hire me there, I can do coolie work. Poverty is nothing. As long as you love me, all I want is to spend my whole life by your side. But you love Naoji more than you love me, don’t you? I’ll go. I’ll go. I’ve never been able to get along with Naoji and it would only bring unhappiness to all three of us if I stayed. We’ve lived together for a long time, and I have nothing to regret in our relationship. Now you and Naoji can stay together, just the two of you. I hope for your sake he’ll be a very good son to you. I’m sick of it. I’m sick of this life. I’ll go. I’ll leave today, at once. I have somewhere I can go.”
I stood up.
“Kazuko!” Mother spoke severely. Her face was filled with a dignity she had never shown me before. When she stood and confronted me, she looked almost taller than I.
I wanted to beg her pardon, but the words would not come from my mouth. Instead I uttered quite different ones. “You’ve deceived me. Mother, you’ve deceived me. You were using me until Naoji came. I’ve been your servant, and now that you no longer need me you’re sending me away.”
I let out a cry and burst into tears.
“You are very foolish.” Mother’s voice as she spoke these words was shaking with anger.
I lifted my head. “Yes, I am. I’ve been taken advantage of because I’m a fool. You’re getting rid of me because I’m a fool. It’s best I go, isn’t it? Poverty—what’s that? Money—what’s that? I don’t understand such things. I had always believed in love, in my mother’s love, in that at least.”
Again I spoke in that stupid, unforgivable way.
Mother turned her head away abruptly. She was weeping. I wanted to beg her pardon and to cling to her, but my hands were dirty from my work in the fields, and this involuntary embarrassment kept me distant. “Everything will be all right if I’m not here. I’ll go. I have somewhere I can go.”
With these words I ran off to the bathroom where I washed my face and hands, still sobbing. I went to my room, changed my clothes, only once again to be overcome with weeping. I wanted to weep more, more, until I had drained every tear from my body. I ran to the foreign-style room on the second floor, threw myself on the bed, and covering my head in the blankets, wept my very flesh away. Then my mind began to wander aimlessly. Gradually out of my grief, the desire for a certain person crystallized in me, and I yearned u
nbearably to see his face, to hear his voice. I had that very particular sensation one experiences when the doctor prescribes cauterization of the soles of one’s feet, and one must bear the pain without flinching.
Toward evening Mother came softly into the room and switched on the light. She approached the bed and called my name in a very gentle voice.
I got up and sat on the bed, sweeping both hands over my hair. I looked at her face and smiled.
Mother also smiled faintly and then sank into the sofa under the window. “I have just disobeyed your uncle for the first time in my life. I wrote a letter in answer to his, requesting him to leave my children’s affairs to me. Kazuko, we’ll sell our clothes. We’ll sell our clothes one after another and use the money just as we please, for whatever useless things we feel like. Let’s live extravagantly. I don’t want to let you work in the fields any more. Let’s buy our vegetables even if they are expensive. It’s unreasonable to expect you to spend every day working like a farmer.”
To tell the truth, the strain of daily work in the fields had begun to take its toll. I am sure that the reason why I wept and stormed as if I had gone off my head was that the combination of physical exhaustion and my unhappiness had made me hate and resent everything.
I sat on the bed in silence, my eyes averted.
“Kazuko.”
“Yes.”
“What did you mean by saying that you had somewhere to go?”
