The Last Samurai

by Helen Dewitt

  I said: What do I have to do to get in? Do I have to read a lot about chess endings?

  Sib said: Well, it worked for RD.

  Sib seemed to have no interest at all in helping me set a record. I argued with her for a long time until at last she said: Why are you saying all this to me? Do whatever you want. If you pay £35 you can go to as many lectures as you want; the RATIONAL thing to do would be to pay £35 or whatever it is, get the lecture lists, go to whatever looks interesting, collect reading lists, go through the reading lists, decide on the basis of evidence which lecturers are moderately competent teachers, decide on the basis of evidence which fields you are interested in & who is doing interesting work in those fields; collect further evidence at OTHER universities (assuming THEY let in paying guests) by going to lectures given by the interesting people to see whether they are reasonably competent teachers & then decide where to go when you are about 16.

  SIXTEEN! I said.

  Sib began to talk about boring people she knew who had got jobs at Oxford & someone brilliant who had just gone to Warwick.

  I did not say WARWICK! but Sib said drily that I would have of course to weigh very carefully the benefit of studying with someone brilliant against the undoubted drawback that people would merely say all my life (if they bothered to mention so uninteresting a fact) that I had gone to Warwick at the age of 16.

  I could see that at any moment she was going to start talking about Sugata Sanshiro so I said quickly that we could talk about it some other time.

  I said: Aren’t you supposed to be typing The Modern Knitter?

  Indolence, interruption, business, and pleasure; all take their turns of retardation, said Sib. I’m up to 1965.

  I said: I thought you were going to finish it by the end of the week.

  Perhaps no extensive and multifarious performance, said Sib, was ever effected within the term originally fixed in the undertaker’s mind. He that runs against Time, has an antagonist not subject to casualities.

  Sib went to the computer and typed for five minutes or so and then she stood up and sat on the sofa and turned on the video.

  Kambei raised the bowl of rice. I understand, he said. No more shouting. I’m not going to waste this rice. Fair enough, said my father.

  Tough-looking samurai strode up and down the street. In a doorway stood the farmers, impressed, Katsushiro, impressed, Kambei, arms crossed, unimpressed. Thanks, said my father. I mean that.

  Kambei sat inside facing the door. He handed Katsushiro a heavy stick. Hide behind the door, he said. Get in position. Take the overhead-sword stance. Hit the samurai when he comes in, hard. No holding back! As hard as you can. Fair e

  I stared at the screen. Katsushiro stood behind the door. I stood up and began walking up and down while a samurai came through the door and parried the blow.

  Now I did not hear my father’s voice or see his face; though the film had moved on I saw in my mind a street full of tough-looking samurai, and Kambei in a doorway watching the street.

  In my mind I saw Katsushiro standing behind the door with a stick. I saw Kyuzo slicing through a blustering second-rater. But a good samurai will parry the blow.

  I thought: I could have James Hatton after all! Or Red Devlin. Or both!

  I thought: I could have anyone I wanted!

  I thought: Opening middle game endgame.

  I thought: A good samurai will parry the blow.

  I thought: A good samurai will parry the blow.

  I looked at Sib’s paper & it said that HC was about to walk across the former Soviet Union, and that he was planning to go alone.

  I thought, HE could fight with swords. Here I thought was a man to challenge, a man who knew 50 languages, a man who had faced death a hundred times, a man impervious to praise and ridicule alike. Here was a man who on meeting his son for the first time would SURELY encourage him to go to Oxford at the age of 11, or at least take him on an expedition instead.

  The paper did not say where he was staying.

  I called his publisher and asked whether there would be any book signings. I counted on the charm of my childish voice to elicit the information I required, and in fact after a short time I was given a list of places where books would be signed.

  He was signing books the next day at the Waterstone’s in Notting Hill Gate.

  I took the Circle Line and ascended to the street.

  I went to the book signing, and as I expected HC left on foot. He was as tall as she had said and covered ground fast, but I had expected that too and had brought my skateboard.

  The house was large and white, with white pillars. In front was a little square of grass and roses around a paved stone circle, with a birdbath in the middle of the flagstones. There was nowhere to leave my skateboard. I walked ten houses down to a For Sale sign and hid my skateboard in the long grass and then walked back.

  I rang the doorbell, and a woman with shining hair and jewellery and makeup and a pink dress came to the door.

  I stared at her in surprise. I hadn’t known he was married. Or it could be his sister.

  I said I had come to see Hugh Carey.

  She said: I’m awfully sorry, he isn’t seeing anybody.

  I said I was sorry and I went away and retreated up the street. Later the woman in pink came out and went to a car and got in it and drove away. I went back to the house and rang the bell.

  He came to the door and said What do you want.

  His face was creased and brown and there was a badly healed scar down one cheek. His eyes blazed blue. His eyebrows were shaggy, he had a straggling moustache. His hair was bleached very light, and there were white hairs in it.

  What do you want? he said again.

  I have to talk to you, I said. I knew that if I walked away I would despise myself for the rest of my life.

  He said he could spare a few minutes and I followed him inside. I don’t know what I expected but I was surprised by the shining wooden floors and thick rugs and stuffed sofas. An interesting form of the subjunctive is not something you can bring back as a trophy but still this was not what I had expected.

  We went into a room with a black and white marble floor and a pale yellow sofa and he gestured to the sofa and said again What do you want.

  I looked into that face of stone and knew I was about to die. He would see instantly through the lie and be filled with contempt. I thought of him walking across China with the boy, and walking across Kazakhstan with a tiny band of men; it was cheap and contemptible to play a trick on someone like that. I should make some excuse and leave.

  Kambei tells Rikichi to call a samurai to a fight. He sits inside waiting. He tells Katsushiro to stand just inside the door with a stick. A good samurai will parry the blow.

  I thought that if I were a coward I really would be my father’s son.

  I said: I wanted to see you because I’m your son.

  You’re my—

  I was dead.

  Eyes like the burnished blade of a sword blazed in his hard face. I was dead.

  His mouth tightened. I was dead.

  At last he spoke.

  How the hell did that happen? he said irritably. She told me she had everything taken care of.

  She forgot that she’d taken the pill a day late the day before, I said truthfully. I couldn’t believe this was happening.

  Women! he said contemptuously. You must be older than you look, it can’t have been later than 83 which would make you—

  13 and 10 months, I said. I look young for my age.

  Well, and so tell me about yourself, he said heartily. Where do you go to school? What are your interests?

  I don’t go to school, I said. I study at home.

  I was about to explain that I already knew Greek, French, Hebrew, Arabic, Japanese, Spanish, Russian and some Latin (in no particular order), plus a smattering of 17 or 18 others, when he exploded.

  Oh my GOD! he exclaimed in horror. What is the stupid woman thinking of? Do you know ANYTH
ING? What’s 6 × 7?

  What do you mean? I asked cautiously. I hadn’t done much on philosophy of number yet.

  Oh—my—God.

  He began pacing up and down the room, with a heavy-footed, slightly lame step—I remembered that he had covered thousands of miles on foot. He said: We’ve got to get you into a school pronto, my young friend. He said: Don’t get any ideas. I couldn’t possibly stump up school fees. He said: I hear some of the state schools aren’t bad. He said: My God, I knew the whole times table up to 12 by the time I was 6.

  I’d known the times table up to 20 by the time I was 4, but I was too disgusted to say so. I said: Oh, you mean you wanted to know the product of 6 and 7.

  What did you think I meant? he asked.

  I don’t know, that’s why I asked what you meant, I said.

  You’ll soon get that sort of nonsense knocked out of you at school, he said.

  I said I had always heard that logical thought was discouraged in schools. I could not believe someone so stupid had been to find the lost silent tribe; no wonder they hadn’t wanted to talk to him.

  He kept shooting me fierce glances out of narrowed eyes as he stumped up and down. What’s the capital of Peru? he said abruptly.

  Oh, does it have a capital? I said.

  Oh—my—God.

  Madrid? I said. Barcelona? Kiev?

  What is the country coming to?

  Buenos Aires! I said. Santiago! Cartagena—no that’s Brazil isn’t it don’t tell me I’ll have it in a minute it isn’t, it wouldn’t be Acapulco would it no forget I said that it’s on the tip of my tongue don’t tell me it’s coming ancient holy city of the Zincas Casablanca.

  He said: Lima.

  I said: I thought Casablanca didn’t sound quite right, ask me another one.

  He said I must give him my mother’s phone number and he would have a word with her.

  I said I would rather not.

  He said: What you want is neither here nor there.

  I wanted to get this over. I hadn’t come for money but I had to say something so I said: Look, I really didn’t come here to discuss my education. I know the product of 7 and 6 is 42, and 13 × 17 is 221 and 18 × 19 is 342 and I know the binomial theorem and I know

  is the Bernoulli equation for inviscid incompressible irrotational flow. I plan to learn to work as a member of a team when the other members of the team are out of their teens. My mother doesn’t know I came here, she didn’t want you to be bothered. But she’s going insane at her work. I want to buy a mule and go down the Andes. I thought you might help.

  The last thing I wanted was to be alone in the Transural with this lunatic. I also couldn’t see myself confiding my ambition to go to Oxford at the age of 11. But I had to say something.

  Go down the Andes on a mule? That doesn’t sound very in character, he said. Are you sure this isn’t something you want?

  Yes it’s something I want, I said.

  Well, the best piece of advice I can give you is never rely on anyone but yourself for anything you want out of life, he said. Everything I’ve got I’ve got by my own efforts. You don’t grow up by having people hand you things on a platter.

  By the time I grow up it may be too late, I said.

  You’ve got your whole life ahead of you, he said, and he stopped pacing to stand beside me. One hand gripped the back of the sofa; I saw that a finger was missing. He’d probably offered a piece of advice to a member of the Lost Silent Tribe.

  That’s what worries me, I said.

  Well there’s nothing I can do, he said. Nobody ever did anything for me and it never did me any harm. It made me what I am today.

  I was glad we weren’t fighting with real swords. If we had been this might have killed me. I said I would bear that in mind.

  He said: I’ve got a son already. He’d be older than you are if he’s still alive. Not by much, but he’s already a man—they grow up fast.

  He said: When a boy reaches 12 he goes through an initiation ceremony. He’s stripped to the waist and flogged—not a lot, just five or six welts to make the back bleed. Then he’s tied up. There’s a beastly stinging fly that’s attracted by blood—of course they gather. If the boy cries out he gets another lash. It’s over when he’s been silent for a day. You’ll see them stretched out, backs solid with the feeding flies—sometimes they’re unconscious for the last 12 hours or so, sometimes the father will slap a boy awake to make sure they don’t get off lightly. It’s hard to be a man there.

  I said: Yeah, I hear they don’t even use case endings.

  He said: Who told you that?

  It’s in the book, I said.

  No it’s not in the book, he said.

  I heard it somewhere, I said.

  She must have told you. I don’t suppose she told you how I found out.

  He grinned at me; his teeth were yellow and brown beneath the moustache.

  She said you hid behind a tent, I said.

  I tried that, he said. I got nowhere. Then one day the mother of the boy came to me. She’d sold him again to some traders—they don’t like impure blood in the tribe. But she was curious all the same—that’s what had got her in trouble the first time. She couldn’t stay away. I got her to teach me a few words and one thing led to another. The women spat at her and pulled her hair when they found out. Anyway we’d lie about in the grass and I’d copy something she’d said and she’d slap me or laugh at me for copying her. Then I overheard a couple of men talking to each other and realised what was going on. I laughed till I cried. Then she got pregnant. She made me leave. Probably sold the little bastard to the Chinese. If so he won’t have been initiated, he said, and he grinned, and he said, If these things happen to anyone why shouldn’t they happen to my son?

  I said: In that case why should you care whether I know the multiplication table and why should you care whether I go to school?

  He said: There was nothing I could do. I couldn’t take her with me, and they’d have killed me if I’d stayed. This is different. Your mother has been completely irresponsible.

  I began to laugh.

  Steps approached the front door, which opened. The door to the room opened while I was still laughing, and the woman in pink came in.

  What’s going on? she asked.

  This is my son, he said.

  No I’m not, I said.

  What do you mean? he said.

  Have you seen Seven Samurai?

  No.

  I have, said the woman.

  It was a test, I said. I couldn’t tell my real father because it was true.

  I don’t begin to understand, said the woman, and the man said

  In some parts of the world you’d be flogged for this.

  I said it was not necessary to leave England to find people who did stupid things.

  Who are you? he said angrily. What’s your name?

  David, I said without thinking.

  I don’t understand, he said angrily. Did you want money? You made it up to get money?

  Of course I want money, I said, though there were other things I wanted more. How am I supposed to buy a mule without money?

  But why in God’s name—

  I did not know what to say. Because you were a linguist, I said. I heard the story about the case endings and I thought you’d understand. Of course you don’t understand. I’ve got to go.

  But it’s got to be true, he said. How could you know about the case endings? She must have told you. It must be true. Where is she?

  I’ve got to go, I said.

  He said: No, don’t go.

  I said: Do you still play chess?

  He said: She told you about the chess?

  I said: What?

  The woman said: Hugh—

  He said: What does it take to get a cup of tea in this house?

  She said: I was just going, but she looked at me as she went.

  He said: What did she tell you about the chess?

  I said: Do you mean you
let him win?

  He said: Didn’t she tell you?

  I said: She said you didn’t let him win.

  He said: Of course I didn’t let him win, and he stumped up and down the rug.

  He said: He won 10 games out of 10. He stopped saying What am I going to do; he sat smiling at the board. He said I do what you do better than you can yourself, and you can’t do what I do at all. I thought Where would you be if it weren’t for me, you stupid bastard?

  I said You talk a good game.

  He said Meaning?

  I said Is it a game because I say it’s a game? And I said that if I treated it as a game because I thought it was a game and he treated it as a game not because he thought it was a game but because I said it was —

  And he said Yes

  — which of us was doing the thing he thought he did

  And he said Yes

  and that was the last thing I said to him

  Before the exam, I said.

  Yes, he said.

  What was the last thing he said to you? I asked.

  None of your business.

  What did my mother say? I said.

  I can’t remember. Some daft thing.

  What? I said hoping it would be something Sibylla couldn’t possibly have said.

  I can’t remember. Something sympathetic.

  I wanted to ask whether the woman had looked bored, but I thought he probably wouldn’t have noticed.

  He said: Tell me where she is. I’ve got to see her again

  I said: I’ve got to go

  He said: You’ve got to tell me

  I opened the door and went down the front hall. I could hear him behind me. I broke into a run and slipped on a silky rug that slid on the polished wood and got my balance and caught at the first Chubb lock and I could hear him behind me coming fast. I snapped open the first lock and I opened the second Chubb lock and the third Chubb lock with both hands and I got the door open just as his hand gripped my shoulder.

  I twisted away and pulled myself free. I crossed the walk in three strides and vaulted over the gate and when I looked back he was just standing at the door. He looked at me across the birdbath and the rosebushes and then he turned.