“I don’t mind telling you, dearest Christopher,” she writes, “that at the time, I was disappointed, to say the least, at the way things transpired between us. But don’t worry, I have long ceased to be cross with you. How could I remain cross when Fate in the end chose to smile so kindly on me? Besides, it is now my belief that for you, it was the correct decision not to come with me that day. You always felt you had a mission to complete, and I dare say you would never have been able to give your heart to anyone or anything until you had done so. I can only hope that by now your tasks are behind you, and that you too have been able to find the sort of happiness and companionship which I have come lately almost to take for granted.”
There is something about these sections of her letter—and those last lines in particular—that never quite ring true. Some subtle note that runs throughout the letter—indeed, her very act of writing to me at that moment—feels at odds with her report of days filled with “happiness and companionship.” Was her life with her French count really what she set off to find that day she stepped out on to the jetty in Shanghai? I somehow doubt it. My feeling is that she is thinking of herself as much as of me when she talks of a sense of mission, and the futility of attempting to evade it. Perhaps there are those who are able to go about their lives unfettered by such concerns. But for those like us, our fate is to face the world as orphans, chasing through long years the shadows of vanished parents. There is nothing for it but to try and see through our missions to the end, as best we can, for until we do so, we will be permitted no calm.
I do not wish to appear smug; but drifting through my days here in London, I believe I can indeed own up to a certain contentment. I enjoy my walks in the parks, I visit the galleries; and increasingly of late, I have come to take a foolish pride in sifting through old newspaper reports of my cases in the Reading Room at the British Museum. This city, in other words, has come to be my home, and I should not mind if I had to live out the rest of my days here. Nevertheless, there are those times when a sort of emptiness fills my hours, and I shall continue to give Jennifer’s invitation serious thought.
A NOTE ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Kazuo Ishiguro was born in Nagasaki, Japan, in 1954 and moved to Britain at the age of five. He is the author of four novels, including The Remains of the Day, an international best-seller that won the Booker Prize and was adapted into an award-winning film. Ishiguro’s work has been translated into twenty-eight languages. In 1995, he received an Order of the British Empire for service to literature, and, in 1998, was named a Chevalier dans l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres by the French government. He lives in London with his wife and daughter.
ALSO BY KAZUO ISHIGURO
The Unconsoled
The Remains of the Day
An Artist of the Floating World
A Pale View of Hills
THIS IS A BORZOI BOOK
PUBLISHED BY ALFRED A. KNOPF
Copyright © 2000 by Kazuo Ishiguro
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. Published in the United States by Alfred A. Knopf, a division of Random House, Inc., New York. Distributed by Random House, Inc., New York.
www.aaknopf.com
Originally published in Great Britain by Faber and Faber Limited, London.
Knopf and Borzoi Books are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Ishiguro, Kazuo
When we were orphans / Kazuo Ishiguro. — 1st ed.
p. cm.
1. Parents—Death—Psychological aspects—Fiction. 2. British—China—Shanghai—Fiction. 3. Private investigators—Fiction. 4. Shanghai (China)— Fiction. 5. Missing persons—Fiction. I. Title.
PR6059.S5 W47 2000
823'.914—dc21 00-026120
eISBN: 978-0-375-41265-3
v3.0
When We Were Orphans Page 32