The Gift of Numbers aka The Housekeeper and the Professor

by Yoko Ogawa

The shopkeepers never made us feel uncomfortable, even though we spent hours looking without buying anything. When we showed up in search of Enatsu cards, they happily brought out everything they had; and when we were disappointed, they encouraged us to keep looking and not give up hope. At the very last shop on our list, the owner listened to our story and then told us he thought we should try looking for cards that had been used as prizes by a certain candy company back in 1985. The company had always included baseball cards with its candy, but in 1985 it had been celebrating its fiftieth anniversary and had commissioned a run of premium cards. That was the year the Tigers had won the championship, so their players were especially well represented.

  "What are 'premium' cards?" Root asked.

  "They made all kinds-some had real signatures by the players on them, others had holograms, and some had actual slivers from game bats embedded in them. Since Enatsu was already retired, they did a reissue of the glove card. I used to have one, but it sold right away. They're incredibly popular."

  "What's a 'glove card'?" Root wanted to know.

  "They cut up a glove and attach scraps of the leather to the card."

  "A glove Enatsu actually used?"

  "Sure. The Japan Sports Card Federation certified them, so they're genuine. They didn't produce many, and they can be tough to find, but don't give up; there's bound to be one floating around somewhere. If I get one in, I'll give you a call. I have to admit, I'm something of an Enatsu fan myself." He tipped back the brim of Root's Tigers cap and rubbed him on the head-just like the Professor.

  The day of the party was approaching. I saw nothing wrong with looking for an alternative present, but Root wouldn't hear of it. He was determined to find a card.

  "We can't give up now!" he insisted.

  I have no doubt that his primary concern was to make the Professor happy, but it was also true that he had taken a fancy to the whole idea of card collecting, and he had begun to think of himself as a hunter in search of that one elusive card somewhere out there in the great wide world.

  The Professor also seemed to be planning for the party in his own way. He had taken to checking the calendar whenever he was in the kitchen. Occasionally, he would go over and trace the circle I'd drawn to mark the eleventh, fingering the note on his chest the whole time. He was remembering the party, but he had no doubt long ago forgotten about the little matter of the Janaruobu.

  The Professor never found out that we had looked in his cookie tin. I had been momentarily mesmerized by the inscription on the thesis-For N, with my eternal love. Never forget. The handwriting definitely belonged to the Professor, for whom "eternal" meant something more than it did to the rest of us, eternal in the way a mathematical theorem was eternal…

  It was Root who brought me back from my daydream.

  "Mama, slide the ruler under so I can put it back in." He took the thesis out of my hand and returned it to the bottom of the tin, careful not to disturb or dishonor the Professor's secret.

  A moment later, all the cards were back in place, and there was no sign that the collection had ever been touched. The tin itself was undamaged, and the edges of the cards were neatly aligned. Still, something was different. Now that I knew about the thesis and its dedication, the tin was no longer a simple container for baseball cards. It had become a tomb for the Professor's memories. I set it carefully back on the bookshelf.

  I hadn't really thought anything would come of the last shopkeeper's suggestion, but somehow I was disappointed when he failed to call. Root made some final efforts, sending off a postcard to the readers' exchange in the magazine and asking around among his friends and their older brothers. Not wanting to be caught without a present, I had quietly arranged a backup. It hadn't been easy to figure out what to buy. I'd thought of pencils and notebooks, clips and note cards, even a new shirt. There were very few things the Professor really needed. The fact that I couldn't discuss the choice with Root made it all the more difficult.

  I decided on shoes. He needed a new pair, ones that he could wear anytime, anywhere-mold-free. I bought them and hid them away in the back of the closet, just as I had with Root's presents when he was little. If we did find the card in time, I would slip them into the Professor's shoe cupboard without saying anything.

  In the end, a ray of hope came from an unexpected place. I had gone to pick up my paycheck at the Akebono Housekeeping Agency and was talking with some of the other housekeepers. As the Director was listening, I had avoided mentioning the Professor, and just said that my son had been wanting baseball cards and I'd had no luck finding good ones. Then, out of the blue, one of them mentioned that her mother used to run a little store, and she remembered seeing some leftover cards that had been included with candy in a shed where her mother stored old stock.

  The first thing that caught my attention was the fact that her mother had retired and closed up the shop in 1985. She had ordered some candy to take on a trip her seniors group was planning, and the chocolates with the cards had been included in the shipment. Thinking the old folks would have no use for them, her mother had peeled off the little black prize envelopes stuck to the back of each box. She'd been planning to give them to a children's club, but had gone into the hospital later in the year and then closed the shop for good. This was how nearly a hundred mint-condition baseball cards had been stored in a shed all this time.

  We went straight from the agency to her house, and I headed home with a dusty cardboard box. I told her I wanted to pay her for them, but she flatly refused. In the end, I took them gratefully, not daring to tell her that these discarded prizes were worth far more than the chocolate they had come with.

  As soon as I got home, we set to work. I cut the envelopes open while Root removed the cards and checked them. It was a simple process, and we fell into a rhythm. We were now rather experienced with baseball cards, and Root could distinguish between the various types just by touch.

  Oshita; Hiramatsu; Nakanishi; Kinugasa; Boomer; Oishi; Kakefu; Harimoto; Nagaike; Horiuchi; Arito; Bass; Akiyama; Kadota; Inao; Kobayashi; Fukumoto… The players appeared one after the other; just as the man at the shop had said, some of the cards had embossed pictures, some had original autographs, and some were actually gilded. Root no longer allowed himself the editorial comments on each card. He seemed to feel that we would achieve our goal more quickly if he concentrated harder. A drift of little black envelopes had begun to collect around me, while the stack of cards Root had collected toppled and scattered between us.

  Each time I reached into the box my hand stirred up a moldy odor, mixed with the smell of the chocolate. But by the time we had worked our way through half the box, I had begun to lose hope.

  There were too many baseball players. Which was hardly surprising as every team fielded nine players at a time, and there were so many teams that they were divided into Central and Pacific leagues, and the history of the game in Japan spanned more than fifty years. I knew that Enatsu had been a great star, but there were others-Sawamura, Kaneda, Egawa-each of whom had his own fans. So, even with this big stack in front of us, it was unlikely we'd find the one card we wanted. I found myself lowering my expectations, hoping that the effort would at least satisfy Root. After all, I had a perfectly good present hidden in the back of the closet. They weren't particularly fancy shoes, but they were well designed and comfortable-looking, and they had cost considerably more than a baseball card. I was sure the Professor would be pleased with them.

  "Ah… " Root let out a very grown-up sound, the kind you might make if you'd just discovered the solution to a complex word problem. The little cry was so quiet and restrained that it took me a minute to realize that the card he was holding in his hand was the one we had been looking for. He sat staring at the card, keeping Enatsu to himself for a moment. Neither of us spoke as he showed me the 1985 limited-edition card containing a fragment of Enatsu's own glove.

  10

  It was a wonderful party, the most memorable one I've ever attende
d. It was neither elegant nor extravagant-in that sense it had much in common with Root's first birthday party at the home for single mothers, or the Christmases we'd spent with my mother. I'm not sure whether you would even call those other events parties, but I am sure that Root's eleventh birthday was special. It was special because we celebrated it with the Professor, and because it turned out to be the last evening the three of us would ever spend together in the cottage.

  We waited for Root to get home from school, and then set about preparing for the party. I worked on the food while Root mopped the floor in the kitchen and did other little tasks I assigned him. Meanwhile, the Professor ironed the tablecloth.

  He had not forgotten his promise. That morning, once he had confirmed that I was the housekeeper and the mother of the child named Root, he had pointed to the circle on the calendar.

  "Today is the eleventh," he said, fluttering the note on his chest as if he hoped to be congratulated for having remembered.

  I had not intended to ask him to do the ironing. He was so clumsy that it would almost have been safer for Root to do it, and I had been hoping that his only contribution would be to rest as usual in his chair and to stay out of the way. But he had insisted on helping.

  "How can I just sit here watching when you've got a little boy working so hard?"

  I might have foreseen this objection, but I would never have guessed that he would produce the iron and offer to press the tablecloth. I was astonished that he knew there was an iron in the closet; but when he pulled out the tablecloth, it was like watching a magician performing a sleight of hand. In the six months I'd been working in the cottage, I'd never seen a tablecloth.

  "The first thing you need for a party is a clean, ironed cloth on the table," he said. "And I'm quite good with an iron." There was no telling how long the cloth had been stuffed in the back of the closet, but it certainly was a wrinkled mess.

  The heat of summer had finally lifted and the air was clear and dry. The shadows in the garden seemed different as well. Although the sky was still light, the moon and the evening star had appeared and the clouds streamed by in ever-changing patterns. Smudges of darkness were beginning to collect around the roots of the trees, but they were still faint, as if the night had agreed to hold off for a bit longer. Evening was our favorite time of the day.

  The Professor set up the ironing board on the arms of his easy chair and went to work. From the way he managed the cord to the way he set the temperature, you could tell that he knew what he was doing. He spread out the cloth, and, like the good mathematician he was, divided it into sixteen equal folds.

  He sprayed each section with the water bottle, held his hand near the iron to make sure it wasn't too hot, gripped the handle tightly, and pressed down carefully to avoid damaging the fabric. There was a certain rhythm to the way the iron slid across the board. His brow furrowed and his nostrils flared as he forced the wrinkles to submit to his will. He worked with precision and conviction, and even a kind of affection. His ironing seemed highly rational, with a constant speed that allowed him to get the best results with the least effort; all the economy and elegance of his mathematical proofs performed right there on the ironing board.

  The Professor was definitely the best man for this job, we had to admit, since the tablecloth was made of delicate lace. All three of us worked together, and we took unexpected pleasure in preparing for the party. The smell of the roast cooking in the oven, the drip-drop of water from the mop, the steam rising from the iron-all blended together and heightened our expectations.

  "The Tigers are playing Yakult today," said Root. "If they win, they'll be in first place."

  "Do you think they'll win the pennant?" I had just tasted the soup and was checking the oven.

  "I'm sure they will," the Professor said, sounding unusually certain. "Look up there," he pointed out the window. "They say it's good luck when there's a little nick out of the bottom edge of the evening star. That means they'll win today and take the pennant."

  "What? That isn't true. You're just making it up."

  "Up it ingmak just re'you."

  No matter how much Root teased him, the Professor's iron kept its rhythm.

  Root got down on the floor to clean places that were normally overlooked-the legs of the chairs and the underside of the table. And I went to the dish cupboard in search of a platter for the roast beef. When I looked out again, the garden was deep in shadow.

  We were pleased with our work, and looking forward to the food, the presents, and the fun. But at the very last moment, just as we were about to take our places and begin the party, we discovered a little problem. The girl at the bakery had forgotten to put the candles in the box. The cake I'd ordered wasn't large enough to hold eleven candles, so I had asked her to put in one large candle and one small one; but when I pulled the box out of the refrigerator, they were not there.

  "We can't have a birthday cake without candles. You don't get your wish if you don't blow them out!" The Professor seemed more upset than the birthday boy himself.

  "I'll run back to the bakery and get them," I said, taking off my apron. But Root stopped me before I could get to the door.

  "No, I'll go. I'm faster, anyway." And before the words were out of his mouth, he was gone.

  The bakery wasn't far away and there was still some daylight left. I closed the cake box and put it back in the refrigerator; then we sat down at the table and waited for Root to return.

  The tablecloth looked beautiful. The wrinkles had vanished completely, and its delicate lace pattern had transformed the kitchen. The only decoration was a yogurt bottle with some wildflowers I had plucked from the garden, but they brightened up the cottage nicely. The knives and forks and spoons didn't match, but they were neatly laid out on the table, and if you scrunched up your eyes the general effect was magnificent.

  By comparison, the food was rather plain. I had made shrimp cocktail, roast beef and mashed potatoes, spinach and bacon salad, pea soup, and fruit punch-all Root's favorites-and, for the Professor, no carrots. There were no special sauces or elaborate preparations, it was just simple food. But it did smell good.

  I smiled at the Professor and he smiled at me; we were both a bit lost with nothing to do. He coughed, tugged at the collar of his jacket, and squirmed in his chair, anxious for the party to begin.

  There was an empty place on the table, just in front of Root's chair-the space I'd saved for the cake. Our eyes fell on it at the same moment.

  "Does it seem like he's taking a long time?" the Professor murmured, a hint of hesitation in his voice.

  "No, I don't think so," I said, surprised to hear him mention the time and see him look at the clock. "It hasn't been ten minutes yet."

  "Is that right?"

  I turned on the radio to distract him.

  "How long has it been now?"

  "Twelve minutes."

  "Doesn't that seem long?"

  "Don't worry. It's fine."

  I wondered how many times I had said those words since I'd come to work at the Professor's house. "Don't worry. It's fine." At the barber, outside the X-ray room at the clinic, on the bus home from the ball game. Sometimes as I was rubbing his back, at other times stroking his hand. But I wondered whether I had ever been able to comfort him. His real pain was somewhere else, and I sensed that I was always missing the spot.

  "He'll be back soon. Don't worry." This was all I could offer him.

  As it grew darker outside, the Professor's anxiety deepened. Every thirty seconds or so he would pull at his collar and glance at the clock. He was so agitated he didn't seem to notice the notes falling from his chest with each tug.

  There were cheers from the radio. Paciorek had a base hit in the bottom of the first and the Tigers had scored.

  "How long has it been now?" he asked again. "Something must have happened to him. It's taking too long." The legs of his chair scraped on the floor as he twisted this way and that.

  "Okay. I'll go look f
or him. But you mustn't worry. I'm sure he's fine." I got up and put my hand on his shoulder.

  I found Root near the row of shops by the station. The Professor was right, there was a problem. The bakery had been closed. But Root, resourceful as ever, had already come up with a solution. He had found another bakery on the other side of the station, and when he explained the situation they had given him some candles. We turned around and ran straight home to the Professor's.

  When we got there, we realized almost immediately that something was wrong. The flowers were as fresh as ever, the Tigers were still leading Yakult, and the food was still laid out for the party, but there had been an accident. In the time it had taken to find two candles, the table had been ruined. The birthday cake lay in a lump in front of Root's place, the very spot where the Professor and I had been staring just a moment ago.

  The Professor stood next to the table, still holding the empty cake box. The darkness at his back seemed about to engulf him.

  "I thought I'd get it ready. So we could eat it right away," he mumbled without looking up, as if apologizing to the empty box. "I'm so sorry. I don't know what to say. It's ruined…"

  We sat him down and did what we could to comfort him. Root took the box from him and tossed it on a chair, as though it hadn't held anything so very important. I turned down the radio and turned on the lights.

  "It's not really ruined," I told him. "It'll be fine. Nothing to get upset about."

  In a businesslike manner, I set about repairing the damage. The trick was to get everything back to normal as quickly as possible, without giving the Professor time to think.

  The cake had fallen from the box, crushing one side. The other half, however, was more or less intact, with most of the chocolate-frosting message still legible: The Professor & Root, Congr- I cut it in three pieces and used a knife to fix the whipped cream. Then I gathered up the scattered strawberries, jelly bunnies, and sugar angels and spread them around as evenly as I could. Finally, I put the candles in Root's piece. "Look!" I announced at last. "Good as new!"