by Mori Ogai
“I don’t have a problem with mackerel, provided it’s grilled. Braised mackerel is a little tough for me to get down.”
“I’m sorry, the landlady didn’t know. If you like I could bring you some eggs or something?”
“Wait,” I said. “I’m still not very hungry, so I guess I’ll go for a walk. Just think of something to tell the landlady. Don’t tell her I don’t like her cooking or anything like that. I don’t want her to get all worried.”
“Are you sure? That just doesn’t seem right.”
“Give me a break.”
I stood and began to put on my hakama, so the girl took the tray and took it down the hall. I called out to my neighbor.
“You there, Okada?”
“Sure. What is it?” He sounded alert.
“Nothing really. I was thinking of taking a walk, maybe stopping by Toyokuni on my way back. Care to join me?”
“Absolutely. I had something I wanted to discuss with you anyway.”
I took my hat from the nail it hung from and the two of us left the Kamijo. I think it was just past four o ’ clock. We never discussed the route we might take, but after stepping out the door we both turned to the right.
When we came to the hill on Muenzaka I nudged Okada with my elbow. “Hey, there she is.”
“Huh?” he said, but he understood who I meant and his eyes darted to the house on the left.
Otama was standing in the entrance. She looked worn out, but was still incredibly beautiful. She had all the looks of her youth, but she had clearly put work into her cosmetics that day as well. She seemed to me to have changed in some indefinable way —still lovely, but different. Her face was sharp and focused, and I felt a sort of brightness coming from her.
She was gazing at Okada, fawning even. Suddenly shaken, he snapped his hat off and tipped it in greeting before, apparently without thought or notice, quickening his pace.
With the lack of tact typical of uninvolved third parties, which I was at the time, I made many backwards glances to Otama after we passed by. She watched Okada for a very long time.
Okada hung his head and continued down the slope without lessening his quickened pace. I stayed silent and followed him. There were many conflicted emotions raging within me. The most prevalent of these was a desire to switch places with him, if only I could have. But I soon noticed the base emotion and, finding it revolting, attempted to beat it away —as if I was in such a poor position myself! I attempted to beat it away, but was unsuccessful. How revolting it was! However, my desire to switch places with him was not simply because I wanted to give myself over to her temptation. I just wanted to feel what it would be like to be looked after by a beautiful woman, the way he was. As for what I would do if I did find myself so desired? I’d prefer to leave myself some freedom in that area, but I certainly would not run away like he did. I would stop and speak with her. I wouldn’t dirty my body, but I would stop and speak with her. I think I would love her like a sister. I would try to do what I could for her. I’d pull her from the mud and muck—my imagination got the better of me then, and took me so far.
The two of us were silent until the intersection at the bottom of the slope. By the time we passed the small police box on the corner, I ’d worked up the courage to say something. “Well this whole situation sure has developed.”
“What do you mean?”
“What do you mean, what do I mean? I know you’ve been thinking of that woman these past few minutes. I kept looking back, and you know what? She was watching you the whole time. No doubt she’s still standing there looking off in this direction. It’s like something out of the classics back there. She’s burning holes in your back.”
“Stop it, will you? I have something I want to talk to you about—and only to you. I don’t see the need to tease me any further.”
We found ourselves by the shore of the lake, and the both of us stopped for a moment.
Okada pointed to the north. “Let’s go that way.”
I nodded in agreement and we turned to the left, following the shoreline. After we ’d walked ten steps or so I looked over at the two-story houses lining the street to the left. “There’s where Ouchi and Suezo live,” I muttered to myself.
“An odd combination, to be sure, thought to be honest I’ve heard that Ouchi isn’t of exactly the most reputable character,” said Okada.
I didn ’t think, but just blurted out, “Well, once you enter politics, you’re bound to have everyone start complaining about you.” I think I had simply wanted to widen the gap between the two of them.
Past the wall of the Fukuchi estate and up maybe three houses from there was a little shop with a sign reading “River Fish”. “Something about that sign makes it look like they’re serving fish from the lake.”
“I thought so too. But it can’t mean the hero of Ryozanpaku has opened up shop, now can it?”
We chatted like this and soon crossed a little bridge to the north side of the lake. At the other side we came upon a young man, dressed like a student, inspecting something. He saw us coming and called out to us. His name was Ishihara. He was obsessed with Jujitsu and science, never reading about anything other than these two topics. We were not on particularly friendly terms with him, but by no means were we enemies.
“What are you looking at in a place like this?” I asked.
Ishihara said nothing, but pointed to the lake.
Okada and I looked to where he pointed, under the darkening, grey sky. Back then the whole area was covered in reeds. The leaves from the reeds covered the lake and moved over its surface, collecting in the center where random bundles of tall reeds cracked and hung to the water at acute angles. The surface of the lake sharply reflected the sky and the reeds. Ten or so geese silently plied their way among the bitumen-colored stalks. One of them appeared unable to move.
“You think you could reach them with a rock?” Ishihara asked Okada.
“I’m sure I could reach them, but I don’t know if I could hit them,” answered Okada.
“Try it.”
Okada hesitated. “They’re going to sleep soon. The poor things, why hit them with a rock?”
Ishihara laughed. “So sensitive to life’s little tragedies! If you don’t throw it, I will.”
Okada begrudgingly picked up a stone. “If that’s how it is, I’ll scare them away.” He threw the rock hard, and it whistled through the air. I watched it fly. One of the geese had its neck craned high over the water, but it suddenly fell limp. Three other geese squawked out their warnings and, beating their wings, flit away over the lake. But they did not fly away. The first goose remained where it was, limp in the water.
“You got ‘em,” said Ishihara. He watched the water in silence for a moment before speaking again. “I’m going to go get that goose. When I get back with it, will you two help me out?”
“How are you going to get it?” asked Okada. I found myself listening closely.
“First of all, think of the time. It will be dark in thirty minutes. Once it’s dark I’ll just jump in and grab it. You don’t need to help then, but help me out when I get back. We can all split the goose later,” said Ishihara.
“All right then,” said Okada approvingly. “But what do you want to do till it gets dark?
“I’m going to go walk around. You two go somewhere and come back. People will notice the three of us standing around here otherwise.”
I turned to Okada. “Want to walk around the lake then?”
“Sounds good to me,” he said, and we started walking.
Chapter Twenty Three
We walked across Hanazonomachi and headed for the stone steps at Toshomiya. No words passed between us. Then, as if speaking to himself, Okada said, “So there are miserable geese too.” Without finding any logical reason for it, the Muenzaka woman came to mind. “All I did,” he continued, addressing me. “Was aim for the goose and throw a rock.” I nodded along, but all I could think of was the woman. “I do want to se
e Ishihara try and get the goose though,” I said after a moment. Okada nodded in acquiescence, and we plodded on in silence. He must have been thinking about the goose.
We turned to the south and walked for Benten, but the death of the goose had cast a dark shadow over us, and we said very little to one another. When we passed by the torii of the Benten shrine, Okada appeared, through some great effort, to shove aside the rumination on the goose. He turned to me. “I had something I wanted to discuss with you.” What he did say took me completely off guard.
It went something like this: He was planning to talk with me that night, but because I had invited him on a walk he decided to come and discuss it then. As we were walking he planned on talking over dinner, should we stop to have some. It seemed that would not happen. He opted to have the discussion then. Okada, rather than wait for his graduation, had decided to go overseas. He’d already bought the ticket and notified the school of his decision. The reason was a certain Professor W, who had come to research Asian disease. This same professor decided to employ Okada with 4000 marks travel expenses and a monthly salary of 200 marks. He was looking for a student who could command German and also read Chinese with ease. Baelz introduced the two of them. Okada went to see W in Tsukiji, where he was administered a test. There were equal numbers of simple and difficult questions, just three of so of each. He also was asked to translate passages on Chinese medicine. Well anyway, he passed the test and was given a contract right then and there. W was a professor at a university in Leipzig. Okada was to accompany him back to Germany where he was to take a test for his doctorate. The test would be administered by W. He could use documents translated for Mr. W as his dissertation. He would be leaving the Kamijo for Tsukiji in the morning, where he would help Mr. W collect various Japanese and Chinese documents. Then Okada and Mr. W would both travel to Kyushu for research before boarding a Messagerie Maritime boat.
Listening to all these plans I would occasionally pause and mutter, “You’re kidding me,” or, “You sure have made up your mind.” We walked slowly then, our focus on the conversation. But when I glanced at my watch I realized only ten minutes had passed since we parted ways with Ishihara. We had already covered two thirds of the lake’s circumference, however, and were coming up on the lake in Nakacho.
“We’ll be early if we just go there now,” I said.
Okada suggested we stop by Renkyokuan and have a bowl of soba, to which I agreed, and we both walked for the shop. It was the most discussed shop from Shitaya to Hongo at the time.
Soon after Okada was slurping noodles and speaking between gulps. “After all this work it’s kind of a shame that I’m not going to graduate. But the government sure won’t take me on as an exchange student, so if I miss this chance I’ll never get to see Europe.”
“You’re right,” I agreed. “Don’t let this get away from you. Who cares about graduation? If you become a doctor over there it’s basically the same thing. Who needs to be a doctor anyway?”
“I know. It’s just about listing qualifications. Waste of time maybe.”
“Are you ready to go? Sounds like it’s going to be a pretty hectic morning for you.”
“What do you mean? I’m just going like this. Mr. W says that even if I bought clothes here, I wouldn’t be able to wear them overseas anyway.”
“Really? Well, I read in Kagetsu once that Ryohoku Narushima once was watching boats at Yokohama, and he just decided to get on one then and there.”
“I read that too. It said he didn’t even write a letter to his family. I, of course, have notified my own family about everything.”
“All set then? I’m jealous. And you’ll be with Mr. W, so nothing should go awry on the way. I wonder what the journey will be like? I can’t even imagine.”
“I don’t really know either, but I met with Shokei Murasaki yesterday, and he’s been helping out this whole time, you know. Well anyway, when I told him about all this he gave me a book about going to the West.”
“I didn’t even know there were such books.”
“Apparently they aren’t for sale. Pass ‘em out to the starlings.”
I glanced at my watch after a while to realize that we only had five minutes until our meeting. We quickly paid our bill, left the Renkyokuan and made for our agreed meeting spot with Ishihara. It was very dark when we got there, and the lake sat in silence. The faded shrine of Benten was just visible in the darkening mist.
Ishihara was waiting for us, and he quickly took us over to the shore of the lake. “The timing is perfect,” he explained. “The geese have all moved away. I’m going out there. You two stay here and tell me what to do. You need to watch closely. Over there you can see a lotus with its stalk bent to the right, and then past that there is a shorter one bent to the left. You see them? I need to go in a straight line between them, a little at a time, so if it looks like I’m going off course you two shout out corrections. To the left, to the right—you know, that kind of thing.”
“Got it. We’re the parallax correction, if you like. I don’t think it’s that deep though,” answered Okada.
“I don’t see you jumping in,” quipped Ishihara before quickly tearing off his clothes.
Watching him slip into the water, it was clear that the mud was only about knee-high. Ishihara moved like a heron through the water, raising one leg after the other and moving them in sweeping arcs as he bumbled through the muck Occasionally the water appeared to deepen, only to shallow out again shortly thereafter. Soon enough he was before the mentioned lotus stalks. A moment later Okada called out, “Left,” as Ishihara had drifted off to the right. Ishihara stopped and stooped down into the water before going back where he came from. Once he’d made it to the further stalk he raised his right hand high, indicating he’d found the prize.
He came back to the shore, his thighs covered in mud, holding the largest goose I ’d ever seen. He washed off his legs and got back into his kimono. There was no one walking by, and we’d managed to complete the whole operation without being seen.
“How are we going to get it home?” I asked.
Ishihara was slipping into his hakama. “Okada has the biggest overcoat, so we’ll hide it in there. I’ll do the cooking at my place.”
Ishihara rented a room in a house in that area. The owner was an old woman who didn ’t take kindly to most people. If we were to split the goose with her, it seemed she’d keep the secret. The house was in Yushima, down an alleyway just behind the Iwasaki mansion. Ishihara quickly explained the path to Okada. There were two main paths one could take, one that approached from the south, and one that came from the north, through Muenzaka. The two of them cut a block out of town centered on the Iwasaki mansion, and were essentially the same distances. The only trouble might be a police box, of which there was one on each path. Eventually we decided on the Muenzaka path, if only because it was less crowded than its alternative. Out best plan was for Ishihara and myself to flank Okada to the left and right to try and hide his suspicious bulk.
Okada winced a little as he picked up the goose. No matter what position he held it in, a few inches of wing poked out from his coat. The body expanded and held out his coat, making him look something akin to a traffic cone. It would be our job to try and make him look normal.
Chapter Twenty Four
“All right, let’s walk like this,” said Ishihara, and maneuvered Okada between himself and I. Our first concern was the police box that stood at the bottom of Muenzaka, at the corner of the intersection there. Ishihara suggested that everything after the box would be smooth sailing. If we were to worry, we’d act suspicious, and if we acted suspicious, we’ d get caught and end up in trouble. Ishihara proffered a fable: the tiger that refused to eat the drunk man. He must have heard it suggested, in more appropriate surroundings, by a professor wiser than himself. No doubt he just was saying whatever came to mind. Okada noticed this and drew out the metaphor, “So the police would be the tiger, and I suppose the three of us are… w
hat was it again, the drunk man?”
“Silentium!” shouted Ishihara. We were approaching the intersection at the foot of the slope.
Turning the corner we could see carts and boxes stacked at the entrance to the alleyway formed by the Kawachou and Machiha buildings. The policeman at the intersection was visible even from then.
Ishihara spoke to Okada. “Hey, do you remember the equation for the volume of a cone? What? You don’t? It’s easy. It’s just a third of the base times the height. So if the base is a perfect circle, it’s 1/3r 2 π h. If you just remember that pi equals 3.1416, it’s easy. I’ve got pi memorized to eight digits, so it’s simple for me. Look. 3.14159265. You don’t really need to know any more of it.”
Over the course of the dissertation, we crossed the intersection. The policeman was standing just to the left of the alleyway, looking off toward a cart on its way to Nezu. He paid us no heed save a quick glance. We must have just seemed like a group of incomprehensible students.
“Why did you start prattling on about cones and their volumes?” I turned to Ishihara, but at the same time I saw the woman standing halfway up the slope. She was looking over at us, and I felt suddenly affected by her presence there. In truth, from the moment we’d chosen our return path, my mind had been on her—not the policeman. I’m not sure what exactly lent the impression to the scene, but she appeared to be waiting for Okada. My imagination did not prove inaccurate, as she was standing three houses down from her own, waiting for our approach.
I caught Ishihara ’s eye and looked quickly between the woman and Okada, whose typically blushed face was now clearly a darker shade of red. He shifted his hat for a moment before pinching it’s brim to her. The woman’s face was hard and immobile as stone. Her eyes were shining beautifully, but they were filled with a boundless disappointment.