“Of course not!” Tokiko replied.
“But that’s not natural. You are twenty, and if you are equipped with normal human emotions, you must have felt something for at least one young man, even if you had only thoughts and didn’t act on them. There must have been someone?”
Jūkichi’s words made Tokiko feel like a coward. “But I had no male friends at all,” she said, as if defending herself. “There was something,” she blurted out after some thought. “Once a young man put a letter in the sleeve of my kimono as I was on my way back from my music lesson. I thought about showing it to my father, but I was too frightened, and I tore it up and threw it away.” She spoke of this incident as if it qualified her for adulthood.
“So you threw it away without reading it?”
“That’s right. It’s probably best not to read such letters.”
“You should have read it. You might never have another opportunity to see a love letter sent specifically to you.”
Tokiko did seem to have regrets about not reading the letter. “I wonder what’s in a love letter?” she asked.
“It varies, depends on the man,” Jūkichi said, tilting his head to the side.
“I don’t understand how men think.”
“Women are a mystery to me, too.”
“Don’t you think men have more superficial feelings than women do? I’ve heard of men playing with a woman’s emotions, but I’ve never heard of a woman playing with a man’s emotions.”
“I don’t suppose it matters much. The important thing for you is to understand men.”
“I want to understand you!”
At around that time, Tokiko felt an urgent need to dispel the many doubts plaguing her. Jūkichi’s behavior seemed incomprehensible to her. Men’s hearts seemed dark and forbidding. Why did they suffer so? What did men really think of women? Answering these questions seemed like bringing up water from a bottomless well. It frightened her. Her father, uncle, brother-in-law, and school principal all were men, but they were not frightening. From her ethics courses and such books as Virtues of Chaste Young Ladies, she was vaguely aware of the distinction between men and women, that “men are strong and women weak” or “men are active in the world; women rule the household.” But these had taught her nothing of the vagaries of men’s hearts. How she longed to understand!
“Is something bothering you?” she asked, having come to recognize the signs of worry on her husband’s face.
For some reason, this concern seemed to irritate Jūkichi, “As long as I bring in enough to settle our accounts by the end of the month, you should have no complaints. If I am worried about something, it needn’t concern you.”
“But that’s not how a married couple should be. We’re not just two people living in the same house!”
“Yes we are. It’s the best sort of marriage,” Jūkichi snorted.
Tokiko saw that Jūkichi was becoming angry, and she kept silent.
VIII
Letter after letter came from Tokiko’s relatives in the provinces requesting that the couple pay a visit, if only for one day. The aunt from Aoyama arrived to plead with Jūkichi. If the couple did not make the trip, Tokiko’s relations and friends in the countryside would be subjected to vicious, unfounded rumors. Jūkichi promised that they would visit some time in April. Now April was approaching.
The azaleas were blooming white and red in the garden, and the Japanese rose also was in bloom. A soft breeze blew in from under the leaves of the oak tree. It was Jūkichi’s custom to take long walks in the suburbs during this time of the year. This year as well, he rode the Yamanote Line to Shibuya or Meguro or Yoyogi and took his walks there. He was not adverse to making the long journey to the countryside, with its fresh young vegetation, but he hated the idea that he was being forced to travel out of a sense of duty. Then he remembered, as he was apt to from time to time, that day in spring—he was not sure of the exact date—when he had passed through Tokiko’s home province, deep in the mountains.
He was returning from a pilgrimage to Zenkō Temple. He had spent the night at a hot spring resort in Suwa and had boarded the third-class passenger car the next morning for the lonely journey home. The train had stopped for thirty or forty minutes at a station called Hajikano at the base of the mountains.
Although the memory had been eroded by the passage of a year, Jūkichi still recalled the fresh spring colors of the mountains that surrounded him when he looked up from the train platform. The entrance to the long Sasago Tunnel was black with soot. “The tunnel’s more than three miles long,” someone told him, pointing it out. “The light from the entrance at the other side seems the size of a horse’s eye.” In the train car, a fellow with hairy arms and wearing straw sandals took a bamboo flute out from his parcel and began to play. Jūkichi remembered neither the man’s face nor what he was wearing, but the sound of the flute still reverberated in his mind, the tones from the man playing the shakuhachi in the depths of a deep green valley. Remembering himself, all alone on his journey, as he listened to the music, brought forth a variety of impressions and associations.
“I’ll have to go through that area again, won’t I? I wonder what I’ll think of it this time?” he thought. “We’re leaving for your hometown tomorrow!” Jūkichi announced to Tokiko. In the evening he went to tell the Yazawas.
“I’m glad to hear it. You’ll relieve her parents’ anxieties,” Mrs. Yuzawa commented.
“I don’t know about that.” Jūkichi wondered whether he would be able to tolerate the stifling ceremonies observed in provincial households. “You told me I should’ve gone on a trip with my new wife shortly after the ceremony, but even on this short train trip, I still feel traveling by oneself is best. With two of us, I feel restricted. It’s better to live one’s life alone!”
“I don’t think you mean that. Besides, I’m certain you’ll both enjoy yourselves on the train,” Mrs. Yazawa replied. “Still,” she continued, “my honeymoon was no fun at all. We went to Hakone. It didn’t turn out as I expected.”
“I always believed that a honeymoon was something you did with the person you found most fascinating in the world. I feel I’ve been deceived in my marriage. I have no interest at all in domestic affairs. It looks like the medicine of marriage isn’t working. I think I should stop taking it.” But while he was sighing in self-pity, he continued to harbor undefinable expectations.
Tokiko soon arrived, and the couple set off toward Kagurazaka to buy gifts for the relatives in the countryside. After Jūkichi finished his shopping, Tokiko took money out of her own purse and bought gifts for her friends at one shop selling Western-style products and at another that dealt in canned goods.
As if embarrassed to be seen with his wife, Jūkichi, his head down, was walking several paces ahead, but suddenly he turned and asked Tokiko if she were looking forward to her trip home.
“No, I don’t want to go back. They’ll be nagging me all the time.”
“I’ll have to put up with more than you will,” Jūkichi countered. “When you get home, everyone will make a big fuss over you. You must tell your parents how you’ve been treated in your new house. Keep nothing back.”
“I’m not going to tell them anything!”
“If you won’t talk, I will!”
“What will you say? What?” Tokiko asked, apparently concerned. But Jūkichi did not answer.
“You can ride in the second-class coach, and I’ll go third class,” he declared, not joking.
“Please don’t do that,” she replied in tears, thinking of the reactions of her family when they greeted her as she got off the train.
“Then you can ride third class, too. It’s less crowded and your surroundings are more interesting. Plus, it’s cheaper.”
“Please let’s travel as a normal couple would. I’ll pay so you can ride second class.”
“You must be quite wealthy. You seem to be carrying a lot of cash.” In one of the shops they had visited earlier, Jūkichi had
stolen a glance at Tokiko’s purse when she had paid the clerk, and it had seemed quite full, but she immediately put her purse back under her robe, as if she had been spotted by a pickpocket.
“I don’t have much money,” she replied.
“I wouldn’t try to take your money even if you had some. Rest assured.”
They returned home and stayed up late packing for the trip. Worried by one or another thought, Tokiko did not fall asleep until dawn.
“While we’re away, please look after the house,” Tokiko asked Jūkichi’s old maid as they departed. She had completely adapted to the role of mistress of the house.
They boarded the train at the station at Ushigome. Jūkichi arranged his air pillow and began reading Maxim Gorky’s The Confession. At first, he often put his book aside to gaze out the window at the passing scenery, but he soon became absorbed in his reading. It moved Jūkichi, the way this author consistently portrayed defenseless, ordinary people resisting their inexorable fates. On the one hand, his deeply troubled characters raged—“God is my enemy. Give me a stone and I shall hurl it at heaven”—or lost themselves in delusion—“Death is the great mystery, one I long to resolve.” On the other, they collapsed in self-abnegation, begging in tears for God to help them find peace. Such characters deeply moved the reader. Jūkichi was particularly attracted to characters who were overcome either by joy at having found a wife they loved or by grief at having lost the wife they loved. He envied their strong natural emotions when they either devoted themselves entirely to their loved one or despaired, unable to eat or sleep, over their loss.
Tokiko was sitting several seats away from Jūkichi. While he read, she kept her head modestly bowed. She was embarrassed by the idea that the other passengers in the car could tell just by looking that she and Jūkichi were newlyweds.
After passing through dozens of tunnels, the train emerged onto the Kōshū Plain. Jūkichi put his book back into his bag. As he was straightening his clothing, he noticed the name of a passing station somewhere in Yamanashi Prefecture. Isawa. Wasn’t Isawa the place where the eagle in Bakin’s Tale of Eight Dogs dropped Princess Hamaji? “Isn’t there a famous temple around here?” he asked Tokiko. “You know, the one where the eagle dropped Princess Hamaji?”
“I’ve never heard of it,” Tokiko replied.
“What would you know.” Jūkichi said in irritation.
The train arrived at Kōfu. Jūkichi immediately spotted Tokiko’s brother looking their way. He so resembled Tokiko that Jūkichi received a poor impression of the young man.
“I’ll take you on a tour of the town as we walk back,” the young man proposed, but Tokiko opposed this plan, and they took the shortest route, along a lonely road for about five or six blocks. When they reached the house, Tokiko almost ran inside. Jūkichi stood outside and surveyed the house and the shop before he entered.
Warned beforehand by the aunt and Mrs. Yazawa, everyone in the Shiga household took care not to irritate Jūkichi. After he finished his dinner, he was led upstairs to a large room and left to rest. Lying in the soft, comfortable bedding spread out on new tatami, Jūkichi looked around the room, his eyes resting on the scroll of a tiger and warrior’s helmet that decorated the alcove.
“This is a well-built house, with so many rooms. I feel I could sleep here for a week. And the food is delicious. I’d like more of that steamed sea bream,” he said to Tokiko.
“You can have as much as a you want. My sister made it.”
“Your sister married into the Takegawa family, is that right?”
Jūkichi was looking forward to visiting her the next day. He had heard that the Takegawa family owned the finest restaurant in the region. Onose, the Aoyama aunt, and members of Tokiko’s immediate family all seemed slightly ashamed of having in-laws engaged in such a vulgar profession, and they took pains to assure Jūkichi that the family was an old and respectable one and that they never allowed geisha or other such women to spend the night. Jūkichi did not object in the least to having a relative involved in a slightly disreputable business; indeed, he welcomed it.
“I’d like to go to the restaurant by myself this evening,” Jūkichi said. Tokiko went downstairs and came back up again.
“I telephoned my sister. I don’t want to see her, though,” Tokiko declared.
“How’s our newlywed today? Used to being a housewife yet?” Her father’s remarks were limited to such innocuous remarks made half in jest. But her mother would pull Tokiko aside and question her about the details of her everyday life and her husband’s attitude. She would caution Tokiko and offer advice. “Old servants are difficult to handle. If you aren’t careful, they’ll use you instead of your using them.” Or “Never rush out to buy pastries to serve guests after they’ve arrived. Always have something on hand to serve them.” Tokiko was irritated by her mother. She felt compelled to follow Mrs. Yazawa’s advice, even in regard to such minor matters as how to dispose of the daily newspaper. Her mother’s instructions, she simply ignored. But she was interested in the gossip her mother had to tell about her friends and former classmates.
The next morning, Jūkichi, dressed in formal Japanese clothing, was led around by Tokiko’s father to visit the homes of several relatives. People stared at him as he passed. They peeked out at him from verandas and windows. The bridegroom was on display, and the sensation was enjoyable. He had become another person. He seemed more exotic to himself than to those observing him. Jūkichi began to wish that Tokiko’s family had not been so sensitive to his wishes and instead had forced him to go through the whole formal ceremony, a parade through the town in full bridal dress, the townsfolk assembled to watch them pass, with Jūkichi the center of attention.
Tokiko’s father led him onto a narrow road. “We’re going to see Ōhigashi next. He’s my wife’s oldest brother and a doctor of Chinese medicine. He’s over seventy and he’s losing his eyesight and hearing, but we should visit for a little while anyway.”
There was building going on. Jūkichi could hear the carpenter’s saw. He stepped over the wood shavings and spotted an old man squatting on the veranda. He was dressed in an old-fashioned Japanese half-coat and dark hood. The old man squinted at them for a moment, then shouted a greeting in a unexpectedly loud voice. “Come in the front,” he instructed and went inside to welcome them at the entrance. The walls of the main room were lined with medicine cabinets, each drawer labeled neatly with names of medicinal herbs: “ginseng,” “dried orange peel,” “rhubarb root,” and so on.
After a brief greeting, the old man took up his pipe in his thin, blue-veined hand. “This construction’s wearing me down!”
“But when it’s finished, you’ll have a pleasant retirement residence,” Tokiko’s father said.
“It never gets easier. The roof leaks, and I have to hire carpenters. Then I have to serve them lunch or saké. That slows down the work. I won’t live in that house for long. The world’s nothing but pain and woe. Death will be paradise. Life is nothing but pain and woe,” he declared, and his wrinkled face formed into a weird smile. “If you have money, you’re always afraid a thief will steal it. If you have property or farmland, they’ll tax you to death. You never know whether what you have is yours or whether it belongs to the authorities. It’s better to possess nothing at all. You have a daughter. You worry yourself sick about finding her a suitable husband. Then you worry about whether the marriage is a happy one. That’s why I say life is nothing but pain and woe!”
“But we have expectations for happiness in the future,” Tokiko’s father said.
“That’s true. If my daughter had lived, I’d be having a tough time about now choosing a husband for her.” The old man leaned forward and peered at Jūkichi. “How old are you, sir?”
“Thirty-three,” Mr. Shiga answered in place of Jūkichi.
“Thirty-three,” the old man muttered. He fell silent.
The two said their farewells and left. “Strange old man, isn’t he? He’s always talking
like that. He always brings the silly conversation back to his daughter,” Tokiko’s father commented.
“Is that so?” Jūkichi showed no inclination to learn more about the old man.
Takegawa’s establishment was a large three-story restaurant. The calligraphy by distinguished people that decorated the walls gave Jūkichi an impression of the history of the place. The large room in which Jūkichi was seated was very quiet. After a while, he thought he might be in a temple. In the small garden off the veranda, peonies bloomed in profusion. Tokiko’s father came and took Jūkichi out to view the famous shrine dedicated to Yamato Takeru and the ruins of Takeda Shingen’s castle. On their return to the restaurant in the evening, fatigue was visible on Jūkichi’s face. Tokiko’s sister came in to talk with her father about the banquet to be held that night in Jūkichi’s honor.
“Won’t you rest until the bath is ready?” she asked Jūkichi.
“I’m tired as well. I think I’ll lie down for a bit, too,” her father said.
The maid came in and spread out the bedding. Almost as soon as Mr. Shiga’s head touched the pillow, he began snoring loudly. Jūkichi could not sleep. He stared at the ceiling. He did not remember the site of Takeda’s castle so much as the decrepit old man who explained the site to them. He also remembered the old man Ōhigashi with his stories about this life of pain and woe. Outside, the last traces of light had disappeared. He heard the sister’s soft footsteps approaching on the veranda. She had brought a yukata cotton robe, and she instructed Jūkichi where to find the bath. “Tokiko has arrived,” she told him.
Jūkichi changed into the yukata and went down the corridor to the bath. He saw Tokiko talking with her brother-in-law at the stairs. She seemed tired, and her face powder was applied too heavily. Mr. Takegawa did not look like the proprietor of a restaurant. He was over forty, and his face gave an impression of honesty. Jūkichi bowed slightly in greeting and continued on to the well-ordered and clean bathroom.
The Columbia Anthology of Modern Japanese Literature: From Restoration to Occupation, 1868-1945: vol. 1 (Modern Asian Literature Series) Page 31
