The Sound of the Mountain

by Yasunari Kawabata

  ‘You’re prettier,’ he said affably. ‘And you brought flowers.’

  ‘I can’t get away once I’m at the shop, and so I walked around killing time. The florist’s was beautiful.’

  But the expression on her face was solemn as she approached his desk. ‘Get rid of her,’ she wrote with her finger on the desk.

  ‘What?’ He was startled. ‘Would you mind leaving us alone for a minute?’ he said to Natsuko.

  Waiting for Natsuko to go, Eiko found a vase and put three roses in it. She was wearing a slip-on dress that gave her the look of one who worked for a modiste. She had put on a little weight, he thought.

  ‘I’m sorry about yesterday.’ Her manner was strangely tense. ‘I – coming two days in a row, and all that.’

  ‘Have a seat.’

  ‘Thank you.’ She sat with bowed head.

  ‘I’m making you late for work.’

  ‘It doesn’t matter.’ Looking up at him, she drew in her breath sharply, as if she were about to weep. ‘Is it all right to talk to you? I’m boiling over, and I may be a little hysterical.’

  ‘Oh?’

  ‘It’s about the young mistress.’ She choked over the words. ‘I believe she had an abortion.’

  Shingo did not answer.

  How could she have known? Shuichi would hardly have spoken to her of it. But Eiko worked with Shuichi’s woman. He braced himself for unpleasantness.

  ‘It’s all right for her to have an abortion.’ Eiko hesitated again.

  ‘Who told you?’

  ‘Shuichi got the hospital money from Kinu.’

  Shingo felt a tightening in his chest.

  ‘I thought it was outrageous. Really too insulting, too unfeeling. I felt so sorry for the young mistress that I wanted to cry. He gives Kinu money, and so I suppose you can think of it as his money, but it wasn’t the right thing to do. He comes from a different class than the rest of us, and he could put together that amount of money any way he pleased. Does being on a different level make it all right for him to do things like that?’ She fought to keep her slender shoulders from trembling. ‘And then there was Kinu, letting him have the money. I couldn’t understand her. I was boiling over. I wanted to talk to you even if it meant that I couldn’t work with her anymore. I know I’m telling you more than I ought to, of course.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  ‘You were good to me here. I only met the young mistress once, but I liked her.’ Tears glistened in her eyes. ‘Have them separate.’

  ‘Yes.’

  She meant Shuichi and Kinu, of course – and yet the remark could also be interpreted as referring to Shuichi and Kikuko.

  Into such depths Shuichi had been pushed.

  Shingo was astonished at his son’s spiritual paralysis and decay, but it seemed to him that he was caught in the same filthy slough. Dark terror swept over him.

  Having had her say, Eiko prepared to leave.

  ‘Don’t rush off.’ He sought to detain her, but without enthusiasm.

  ‘I’ll come again. Today I’d weep for you and make a fool of myself.’

  He felt benevolence and a sense of responsibility in her.

  He had thought it remarkably indelicate of her to go to work in the same shop as Kinu; but how much worse were Shuichi and Shingo himself.

  He gazed absently at the crimson roses Eiko had brought.

  Shuichi had said that squeamishness had kept Kikuko from bearing a child ‘with things as they are now’. Was she not being trampled on for her squeamishness?

  Unknowing, Kikuko would now be back in Kamakura. He closed his eyes.

  The Scar

  1

  On Sunday morning, Shingo sawed down the yatsude at the foot of the cherry.

  He knew that to be quite rid of it he would have to dig up the roots; but he told himself that he could cut the shoots as they came up.

  He had sawed it down before, and the effect had been to make it spread. Once again, however, digging up the roots seemed too much trouble. Perhaps he did not have the strength.

  Though they put up little resistance to the saw, there were large numbers of stalks. His forehead was bathed in sweat.

  ‘Shall I help you?’ Shuichi had come up behind him.

  ‘No, I can manage,’ he answered somewhat curtly.

  Shuichi pulled up short.

  ‘Kikuko called me. She said that you were cutting down the yatsude, and I should go help.’

  ‘Oh? But there’s only a little more.’

  Sitting down on the yatsude he had cut away, Shingo looked toward the house. Kikuko, in a bright red obi, was leaning against a glass door at the veranda.

  Shuichi took up the saw on Shingo’s knee. ‘You’re cutting it all, I suppose.’

  ‘Yes.’ He watched the youthful motions as the remaining four or five stalks were cut down.

  ‘Shall I cut these too?’ Shuichi turned toward Shingo.

  ‘Just a minute.’ Shingo got up. ‘I’ll have a look.’

  There were two or three young cherry trees; or possibly they were not independent trees but branches. They seemed to come up from the roots of the parent tree.

  At the thick base of the trunk, as if grafted on, there were little branches with leaves.

  Shingo backed off some paces. ‘I think it would look better if you cut the ones coming from the ground.’

  ‘Oh?’ But Shuichi was in no hurry to set about cutting them down. He did not seem to think Shingo’s idea a very good one.

  Kikuko too came down into the garden.

  Shuichi pointed the saw at the young trees. ‘Father is in process of deliberating whether to cut them or not.’ He laughed lightly.

  ‘Yes, do cut them.’ Kikuko’s solution came readily.

  ‘I don’t know whether they’re branches or not,’ said Shingo to Kikuko.

  ‘Branches don’t come from the ground.’

  ‘What do you call a branch coming from the roots?’ Shingo laughed with the others.

  In silence, Shuichi cut the shoots.

  ‘I want to leave all the branches and let it grow and spread as it wants to. The yatsude was in the way. Leave the little branches there at the base.’

  ‘Tiny little branches, like chopsticks or toothpicks.’ Kikuko looked at Shingo. ‘They were very sweet when they were in bloom.’

  ‘Oh? They had blossoms, did they? I didn’t notice.’

  ‘Oh, yes. One little cluster, and two and three. And I believe the ones like toothpicks had single blossoms.’

  ‘Oh?’

  ‘But I wonder if they’ll really grow. By the time they’re like the bottom branches of the loquat and the wild cherry in the Shinjuku Garden, I’ll be an old woman.’

  ‘Oh, no. Cherries are quick growers.’ He looked into Kikuko’s eyes.

  He had told neither his wife nor Shuichi of the visit to the Shinjuku Garden.

  And had Kikuko revealed the secret to her husband immediately upon her return to Kamakura? Since it was not really a secret, she had probably spoken of it as a matter of no moment at all.

  ‘I understand you met Kikuko at the Shinjuku Garden,’ Shuichi might have said; but if it was hard for him to broach the subject, then possibly Shingo should speak first. Both were silent, and there was a certain strain between them. Perhaps, having heard of the visit from Kikuko, Shuichi was feigning ignorance.

  But there was no sign of embarrassment on Kikuko’s face.

  Shingo gazed at the tiny branches at the base of the tree. He painted in his mind a picture of them, now feeble, mere sprouts in an improbable place, growing and spreading like the under-branches in the Shinjuku Garden.

  They would make a splendid sight, dipping to the ground and heavy with flowers; but he could not remember having seen such a cherry tree. He could not remember having seen a great cherry tree with branches sweeping from its base.

  ‘What shall I do with the yatsude?’ asked Shuichi.

  ‘Throw it away in a corner somewhere.’


  Gathering the yatsude under his arm, Shuichi dragged it off. Kikuko followed with several branches he had left behind.

  ‘Don’t bother,’ he said. ‘You still have to take care of yourself.’

  Kikuko nodded and stood where she had dropped the branches.

  Shingo went into the house.

  ‘What was Kikuko doing in the garden?’ asked Yasuko, taking off her glasses. She was trimming an old mosquito net to use for the baby’s naps. ‘The two of them out in the garden together on a Sunday. Very unusual – they seem to be getting along better since she went home.’

  ‘She’s lonely,’ muttered Shingo.

  ‘Not necessarily.’ Yasuko spoke with emphasis. ‘She has a nice laugh, and it’s been a long time since I last heard her laughing so. She’s a little thinner, and when I see her laughing …’

  Shingo did not answer.

  ‘He comes back early from the office, and he’s at home on Sunday. Storms make trees take deeper root, they say.’

  Shingo still did not answer.

  Shuichi and Kikuko came in together.

  ‘Father, Satoko tore off your much-prized branches.’ Shuichi held the little branches between his fingers. ‘She was having a great time dragging away yatsude, and then she ripped off your branches.’

  ‘Oh? The sort of branches a child would be likely to rip off.’

  Kikuko was half hidden behind Shuichi.

  2

  When Kikuko came back from Tokyo, she brought Shingo an electric razor of Japanese make. Yasuko received an obi binder, and Fusako dresses for the two children.

  ‘Did she bring Shuichi anything?’ Shingo asked Yasuko.

  ‘A collapsible umbrella. And she seems to have brought an American comb with a mirror on the case. I’ve always been told that you don’t give people combs, because that means breaking off relations or something of the sort. I imagine Kikuko doesn’t know.’

  ‘I don’t suppose they’d say so in America.’

  ‘She brought a comb for herself, too. A little smaller, and a different color. Fusako admired it, and got it. It probably meant a lot to Kikuko to come back with a comb like Shuichi’s; and Fusako reached in and grabbed it. Just a silly little comb.’

  Yasuko seemed to find her daughter hard to excuse. ‘The children’s dresses are good silk, real party dresses. It’s true that Fusako herself didn’t get anything, but the children’s dresses were really presents for her. Kikuko must have felt guilty about Fusako when she gave away the comb. I don’t see how any of us can expect presents from her.’

  Shingo agreed, but had causes for gloom unknown to Yasuko.

  Kikuko had no doubt borrowed money from her family. Since Shuichi had gone to Kinu for the medical expenses, it did not seem that either he or Kikuko had money for presents. Under the impression that the medical expenses had been paid by Shuichi, Kikuko had probably importuned her parents.

  Shingo was sorry that for some time now he been giving Kikuko nothing resembling an allowance. He had, to be sure, had good intentions; but as Shuichi and Kikuko had drifted apart and he had drawn closer to Kikuko, it had become more difficult for him to give her money as if in secret. But perhaps, in his failure to put himself in her place, he had resembled Fusako as she took possession of the comb.

  And since it was because of Shuichi’s philandering that she was short of money, Kikuko could hardly come crying to her father-in-law for an allowance. Yet if Shingo had shown more sympathy, she would not have had to submit to the indignity of having the money for her abortion come from her husband’s mistress.

  ‘I would have felt better if she hadn’t brought anything,’ said Yasuko meditatively. ‘How much do you suppose it all came to? A great deal, I’d imagine.’

  ‘I wonder.’ He made a mental reckoning. ‘I have no idea how much an electric razor costs. I’ve never noticed.’

  ‘Nor have I.’ Yasuko emphasized this admission with a nod. ‘If you think of it as a lottery, you got the top prize. That’s the way Kikuko would want things to be. It makes noise and moves.’

  ‘The blades don’t move.’

  ‘They must. How else would they cut?’

  ‘No. I’ve stared and stared, and they don’t move.’

  ‘Oh?’ Yasuko was smiling broadly. ‘The top prize, absolutely, if only from the way it makes you look like a child with a new toy. You buzz and grind away every morning, absolutely delighted, and you feel your pretty, smooth skin all through breakfast. It embarrasses Kikuko a little. Not that she’s not pleased, too, of course.’

  ‘I’ll let you use it.’ He smiled, but Yasuko shook her head emphatically.

  Shingo and Shuichi had come home together on the night of Kikuko’s return; and the electric razor had been the object of much breakfast-room attention.

  The electric razor, it might have been said, did the honors in place of the awkward greetings that would otherwise have been exchanged between Kikuko, absent without leave, and the family of Shuichi, by whom she had been driven to an abortion.

  Fusako too smiled happily, getting the children into their new dresses and praising the good taste of the embroidery at the necklines. Having mastered the instruction booklet, Shingo gave the razor a trial.

  The inquiring eyes of the whole family were upon him.

  He moved his chin over the razor, the instruction booklet in his other hand. ‘It says here that it does well too with the downy hair at the nape of a lady’s neck.’ His eyes met Kikuko’s.

  The hairline at her forehead was very beautiful. It seemed to him that he had not really seen it before. It drew a delicately graceful curve.

  The division between the fine skin and the even, rich hair was sharp and clean.

  For some reason the cheeks of the otherwise wan face were slightly flushed. Her eyes were shining happily.

  ‘Father has a nice new toy,’ said Yasuko.

  ‘It’s not a toy,’ said Shingo. ‘It’s a finely tooled product of modern civilization. A precision instrument. It has a number, and it’s initialed by technicians for the trial and the adjustment and the final inspection.’

  In fine spirits, Shingo tried shaving with and against the grain.

  ‘You won’t cut yourself or give yourself a rash, I’m told,’ said Kikuko, ‘and you don’t need soap and water.’

  ‘An old man is always getting his razor caught in wrinkles. It will do nicely for you too.’ He offered the razor to Yasuko.

  But Yasuko pulled back as if in fright. ‘If you think I have whiskers, you’re quite mistaken,’ she said.

  He looked at the blades, and put on his glasses and looked again. ‘They don’t move. I wonder how it cuts. The motor revolves, but the blades don’t move.’

  ‘Let me see.’ Shuichi reached for the razor, but passed it on immediately to Yasuko.

  ‘It’s true. The blades don’t seem to move. Maybe it’s like a vacuum cleaner. You know how a vacuum cleaner sucks in dirt.’

  ‘Can you tell where the whiskers go?’ asked Shingo. Kikuko looked down and smiled.

  ‘Suppose we give a vacuum cleaner in return for the electric razor. Or a washing machine – that would do too. It would be a help to Kikuko.’

  Shingo agreed with his old wife.

  ‘We don’t have a single finely tooled product of modern civilization in this house. Every year you say you’ll buy a refrigerator, and it’s time for one again this year. And toasters. There are toasters that turn off automatically and send the bread flying when it’s done.’

  ‘An old wife’s views on domestic electrification?’

  ‘You are very fond of Kikuko, and a lot of good it does her.’

  Shingo unplugged the electric razor. There were two brushes in the case. One was like a small toothbrush, the other like a small bottle brush. He gave them a try. Cleaning the hole behind the blades with the bottle brush, he looked down and saw that very short white hairs were falling on his knee. He could see only white hairs.

  He slapped them from his knee.


  3

  Shingo at once bought a vacuum cleaner.

  It struck him as amusing that, before breakfast, his electric razor and Kikuko’s vacuum cleaner should be buzzing along together.

  Perhaps he was hearing the sound of renewal in the house.

  Satoko trailed after Kikuko, fascinated with the cleaner.

  It may have been because of the electric razor that Shingo had a dream of chin-whiskers.

  He was not a participant but a spectator. In a dream, however, the division between the two is not clear. It took place in America, where Shingo had never been. Shingo suspected that he had dreamed of America because the combs Kikuko had brought back were American.

  In his dream, there were states in which the English were most numerous, and states in which the Spanish prevailed. Accordingly, each state had its own characteristic whiskers. He could not clearly remember, after he awoke, how the color and shape of the beards had differed, but in his dream he had clearly recognized differences in color, which is to say in racial origins, from state to state. In one state, the name of which he could not remember, there appeared a man who had gathered in his one person the special characteristics of all the states and origins. It was not that all the various whiskers were mixed in together on his chin. It was rather that the French variety would be set off from an Indian beard, each in its proper place. Varied tufts of whiskers, each for a different state and racial origin, hung in sprays from his chin.

  The American government designated the beard a national monument; and so he could not of his own free will cut or dress it.

  That was the whole of the dream. Looking at the wondrous assortment of colors in the beard, Shingo half felt that it was his own. Somehow he felt the man’s pride and confusion as his own.

  The dream had had scarcely any plot. He had just seen a bearded man.

  The beard was of course a long one. Perhaps it was because he shaved his own face clean every morning that he had dreamed of that unfettered beard. He liked the idea of its becoming a national monument.

  A naïve, uncomplicated dream, and he looked forward to telling it in the morning. He woke to the sound of rain, however, and, shortly going back to sleep, woke again, this time from an unpleasant dream.