by Taeko Kono
One of these men remained on stage, and announced that twenty people from the audience would be permitted to view the body. Would anyone interested please raise their hands? Hands shot up here and there.
“All right, you, and you,” the man said, pointing at people and counting them off on his fingers. “The gentleman by the aisle. The lady behind. Come on, get into line. You, and you too, sir.”
Rising from their seats, the volunteers were directed to use the steps on either side of the stage. No children, but several women decided to go. The foreign surgeons and nurses stood motionless behind the operating table. The man instructed the volunteers to line up between the table and the plastic tarp, and wait their turn.
There were various reactions. Some people paused, staring straight down at the body. Others sneaked a glance before their turn, only to avert their faces as they passed by. Nobody laughed. When the last person stepped down from the stage, the curtain fell.
Hisako didn’t tell Tsuneko and Noguchi that she had gone to the magic show. Not because she lacked confidence in her judgment, or because she feared starting another quarrel, or even because she thought Tsuneko might laugh at her.
“What?” Tsuneko might say. “Oh! You mean you really went to see it, just because I . . .”
She did inform Sumita that she had gone. But she took pains to talk as if it hadn’t amounted to much: “Even ‘The Beauty under the Electric Saw,’ the high point of the evening, was just an act,” she said. “It was so obvious.” Though she’d found herself in agreement with Tsuneko, she refrained from saying so. “But if I say I thought it was faked,” she told him, “it’ll seem as if I’m on Noguchi’s side. I don’t want to hurt Tsuneko. I’ll just say I didn’t go.”
She didn’t tell him anything else about what had occurred.
Something very strange had happened to Hisako in the bus on her way back from the show. She had picked out two ten-yen coins from her wallet to pay for her ticket, and was about to slip them into her hand, when she noticed that her palm had a bright red stain on it. Shifting her purse, she examined her other palm, and discovered that it was the same color. Trying to keep her balance in the jolting bus, she managed to bring one arm up between the bodies pressed tightly around her, hold her hand out, and scrutinize it under the lights that had just been turned on. It wasn’t a wet stain — it was more like the powdery dye that rubs off cheap origami paper.
Hisako pulled out the program, which she had folded and pushed into her shopping bag. On the back cover — the outside now — was a black-and-white ad for a stereo system. The only spot of red was a small trademark. The front cover — now on the inside — was colorful, but designed in yellow, purple, and blue. Only the lining of the magician’s cloak was red. No matter how much she folded or fingered the program, it wouldn’t leave a stain. The glossy, good-quality paper couldn’t have leaked any dye.
Pushing it back inside her bag, she pondered where the scarlet stain could have come from. After leaving the theater, she had boarded a train, and when she had changed lines, she had made two purchases of food at a department store near the station. After alighting from her local train, she had boarded a bus. All during that time, she had been taking money out of her purse, putting change back, and she hadn’t noticed anything. The food purchases were wrapped in the usual pattern of white and lilac. What could it have been? She hadn’t brushed or grasped anything at the theater, or afterwards. It wasn’t as if she had gone up on stage after the performance of “The Beauty under the Electric Saw.” Why then, were her palms, both of them, stained scarlet?
At home, the first thing Hisako did was pour an enzyme solution over her hands. It had no effect. Well, the stains clearly weren’t an animal substance. When she tried soap, the bar immediately became pink, and both palms returned to their normal color.
A small incident, but it had caught Hisako off guard. She could not help thinking that it was an omen of something dreadful, some awful event soon to occur. And just as her palms had turned scarlet without her even noticing, this dreadful, awful disaster would happen because of some lack of attention, some lack of vigilance on her own behalf.
She had only visited Tsuneko that evening for diversion — Sumita was away on a trip — but it was nearly midnight when she got back to the house. She had intended to leave much earlier, but Tsuneko had asked her to stay longer, saying Noguchi wouldn’t be home till late. Then, before she knew it, that was the time. Any number of opportunities arose when she could have taken her leave: she could have left after dinner; or when Noguchi came home at 8:30, having excused himself from a drinking spree; or when the children went to bed. But she’d simply sat back and continued talking, as if waiting for those opportunities to pass her by. Then she’d got caught up in their quarrel, and offered to go see the magic show. And she’d actually gone to see it. Why hadn’t she known better? It was just as if she were asking to be accused. What if, for example, the house had been broken into while she’d been away? She’d been just as blithe toward Sumita: “I went to Tsuneko’s one night. I stayed talking long after Noguchi came home. Then they had this fight. I said I’d go and see the show. Will you come too? ‘Go by yourself,’ you say? . . . Well, dear, I went! I went to see the magic show!” Sumita would have to think that she felt no compunction about enjoying herself while he was away.
Hisako’s consternation on discovering her scarlet palms gradually began to develop into panic. Yes, she thought: unless she set about being extra careful about everything she did and said, some disaster would befall her. She told Sumita she had seen the show, but she had no desire to go into details, about the handsome Spaniard ascending the ladder with swords in his mouth; and she certainly wouldn’t tell him about what had happened afterwards. The reason she didn’t want to tell Tsuneko and Noguchi that she had gone was that she didn’t want to make herself any more vulnerable than she already had.
One night, a week later, Hisako glanced at the newspaper Sumita had spread out on the tatami mats by the dinner table, and saw a handkerchief-sized advertisement for the magic show: “Final performances tonight and tomorrow only.” She waited apprehensively for Sumita to say something about it. But he didn’t seem to notice it, and simply turned the page. She relaxed and went on wiping the table.
The next moment, Sumita folded up the newspaper, and pushed it away.
“I wonder why women are such vigilant suspicious creatures?” he asked, wearily.
Hisako stopped wiping, and stared at him. He kept his eyes on the newspaper. Now what did he mean by that? Did he mean he didn’t understand women, they were always up to some scheme or other? Was he speaking in general, or about her? It was quite inappropriate, she thought, if it were about her. And yet, it did seem as if he were suggesting something. . . . She was at a loss for a reply.
“Wouldn’t you agree?” Sumita asked, giving her a glance. “Men aren’t that way at all. Men just lay themselves wide open.”
So he meant the complete opposite of what she thought. He meant why are women so distrustful of men.
“Do you think so?” Hisako said, carefully. She finished wiping the table, put the cloth in a corner of the tray stacked with dishes, and continued sitting there.
“Yes, I do,” answered Sumita. “No matter how wicked a man may be, he’ll lay himself wide open when it comes to women. That’s why bandits are poisoned by their mistresses.”
“But you also hear of women being poisoned by their husbands and sons.”
“See what I mean? It’s always so irritating to discuss things with you,” Sumita complained. “With any woman, for that matter. Especially when it comes to discussing differences between the sexes: women all seem to get more stupid than usual. It’s even worse than you discussing politics. I can’t remember who said that women are no good at talking politics — but whoever it was, he was wrong: the thing women are really bad at is discussing differences betwe
en the sexes. Basically, they don’t listen, precisely because they’re suspicious.”
Then he added: “I’m not just talking about the method of killing, you know!”
“I know that much,” Hisako said.
“But you don’t understand what I’m saying. What I mean is, men get murdered because they trust women — they’re not watching for any false moves. When women get murdered, it’s not because they’re gullible like men, but because they’re no match for men in terms of physical strength or resources. If men were half as suspicious as women, they wouldn’t get killed. It would be impossible.”
“Men get killed because they don’t respect women enough.”
“Wrong — they get killed because they trust women too much!” he replied. “Well, maybe they don’t actually know that they trust them. I’d say their attitude is somewhere between trust and a lack of respect. But my point is, men aren’t distrustful — they aren’t always on the lookout. About his marriage, for example, a man will relax — he’ll assume that something he’s done wrong in the past is over — that it’s all water under the bridge. But his wife won’t forget. And she’ll insist on reminding him. She won’t rest easy unless he joins her, reopening old wounds time and again — ”
“What exactly are you talking about?” Hisako interrupted.
“She’ll get furious when he forgets their anniversary — because she’s suspicious.”
“But for such supposedly suspicious creatures, look how easily women are deceived!” Hisako said.
“They’re deceived precisely because they’re suspicious!” Sumita retorted. “And when they’re not being deceived, they’re taking their men for fools!”
Throughout this exchange, Hisako kept trying to fathom why Sumita could possibly be bringing up this subject. With that small disturbing occurrence on the bus, she’d realized how inattentive she had become, and had resolved to really keep on the alert. Had he, perhaps, sensed something of her vigilance? She didn’t think her manner had changed very much, but perhaps it had, and was annoying him. Or maybe he meant he liked her to amuse herself visiting while he was away. On the other hand, perhaps he was showing her how he wanted her to be from now on, and was trying to get her to reflect upon some past behavior. . . .
As Hisako weighed these alternatives, the one she least wanted to be correct was the last. But she kept returning to it, and only tearing her mind off it by telling herself that, surely, he wouldn’t want to refer to that.
“Anyway,” Sumita declared, “In my opinion, the worst thing about women is their suspicious nature.”
Wishing to believe that these words referred to how he wanted her to behave from now on, Hisako said, ingratiatingly: “Is it all right, then, if I stop being suspicious?”
“What’ll you do if I tell you it is? Will you stop? That wouldn’t be like you.”
Hisako fell silent. So he had meant what she feared. But his next words exceeded her worst expectations.
“You haven’t been able to stop for the last three years. Every month I was amazed that you insisted on delivering the money yourself. Why do such a thing? Doesn’t that prove your suspicious nature? Oh, I thanked you, of course. Two months ago, when you made the last payment, I thanked you. But your continuing to the very last disappointed me. I could understand why you’d do it at first. I’d wronged you; it was natural for you to feel wary. But after a year, why couldn’t you have offered to mail her the rest? That really disappointed me — two months ago, your last visit, I realized you’d been to her place thirty-six times! That made me so angry, I considered divorce.”
“Divorce!” Hisako jerked up her drooping head.
“Oh, I could divorce you now. If you can’t stop being suspicious, what’s the point?”
“I don’t know what you — ”
“What did you say when Tsuneko spoke to you about it?”
“What did I say?”
“I know she spoke to you. Three times, at my request. I couldn’t tell you myself, so I asked her to tell you to stop going there. She told me you refused each time.”
“You mean you actually decided on such an arrangement?”
“What do you mean, ‘arrangement’?”
“Well, why couldn’t you have just told me to my face. . . .”
“Do I have to put it into words?” Sumita muttered.
Those scarlet-stained hands flapped up before Hisako’s eyes. She’d had a feeling something dreadful was going to happen — so, this was it. But had she really only become that to him? For three years, he had been watching her, and she had been unaware.
Sumita had broken up with Hisae three years ago — they’d been deeply involved. Ever since, Hisako had personally delivered a sum of money at Hisae’s apartment every month, the day after Sumita’s payday, for three years. The thirty-six installments added up to a tidy sum for the woman who had, after all, been her husband’s mistress. But far from merely consenting, Hisako had pushed Sumita to agree to the terms — out of relief, of course, that Hisae had finally agreed to break with him. But she also had a certain memory of Hisae that affected her.
One night, the door bell rang, and Hisako went and asked who was there.
“It’s me.” It was Hisae’s voice.
“He’s not home!” Hisako replied, without opening the door. Twice before she’d treated Hisae in this manner, and both times Sumita had been home and had overheard her and come out, and a quarrel had ensued. That night, however, he really was away.
“Yes, I know,” the voice said. “I’m sorry, but my child is ill, and if they don’t operate — ”
Hisako immediately unlocked the door.
“I’m sorry.” Hisae’s voice was shaking, and not from the cold: “My daughter has a terrible ear infection — she’s at the clinic. The doctor said her life may be in danger if we don’t operate by ten tomorrow. I came because I need some money. . . .”
The next day, Hisako went to the bank as soon as it opened. As she’d promised, she withdrew money, and took it to the hospital. It was a single-doctor clinic, in Hisae’s neighborhood. Hisae sat in a corner of the waiting room, dressed in a kimono. Seeing Hisako come in, she rose and bowed deeply; she wore no makeup, and her face was very pale. Hisako took the bank envelope out of her bag and handed it over. Hisae bowed again and slipped it into her sash.
“They’ve started,” she said.
“Sit down,” Hisako told her, and seated herself on the bench. “Can’t you go inside?”
Just then, Hisae got up and pushing past people, ran to a nurse who appeared into the corridor.
“Is the operation over?” she begged.
“No, it’s only just begun,” the nurse replied, disappearing behind a door. Hisae returned, looking as if she were about to weep.
“How long will it last?” Hisako inquired. Half an hour, Hisae answered. Hisako looked at her wristwatch. If the operation had begun at ten, it had been eight minutes so far. Had that really seemed like half an hour to Hisae? Hisae was oblivious to anything she said after that. She sat frozen stiff, her shoulders hunched, her hands in her lap. She didn’t bother to look at her watch, or to ask Hisako for the time. The same nurse came out and went back inside the door marked “Operating Room.”
Hisako glanced at her watch several times. About three minutes remained when she looked up to see the door of the operating room swing open. The nurse leaned out and beckoned to Hisae.
“It’s over.”
“Well, I’ll go now,” Hisako said, rising. Hisae bowed hastily and hurried away — Hisako caught only a glimpse of her face, but she was shocked by what she saw. The night before, Hisae had looked much older and wearier than usual, and this morning she was even more pale and drawn. Sitting side by side, Hisako hadn’t noticed but now she saw that Hisae’s eyes were wild and staring, her lips parched — like a mad person’s — a
ll in the space of twenty minutes. She looked as drained and exhausted as somebody suffering from a serious illness.
What a terrifying thing to be a mother, thought Hisako, who had no such experience. From Hisae’s desperate state it was obvious that her staring eyes could see nothing but her own child. The thought that the father of the little girl, hardly a year old, was her own husband, Sumita, disappeared from Hisako’s mind.
It was curious, but after seeing Hisae in that state of terror, Hisako never once imagined her as a mother desperately hanging onto the father of her child. In fact, Hisako began to feel much less bitter about this baby she’d never laid eyes on. Perhaps because Sumita had been away the night Hisae came, she had experienced nothing like her usual reaction — the back of her head tensing at the thought that they had a baby. Somehow, she’d started to be able to think of the baby less as “their” child, and more as a child that each was responsible for individually.
Six months later, Sumita came home after two nights away. Sitting down at the dinner table, he announced: “The baby died.” The little girl’s health had apparently failed after the operation; she’d started to suffer periodic convulsions. The inflammation had flared up again, bringing on another attack, and she had died yesterday morning.
The first thing that came to mind was the memory of Hisae in the waiting room — and then, fleetingly, Hisako felt as if a close friend, a widow, had lost her only child.
“Oh, how very sad for her,” she said, sincerely. The next moment, she realized the baby was Sumita’s, too. And she immediately started to wonder how this turn of events would affect her relationship with Sumita.
Less than a year later Hisae agreed to break with him, a decision which, surely, had to be related to their baby’s death. A friend of Sumita’s had negotiated matters for them. No doubt he’d been effective and persuasive, but Hisae had apparently remarked: “Well, I no longer have the baby. I’m under thirty. I can make a fresh start.”