The Mad Kyoto Shoe Swapper and Other Short Stories

by Rebecca Otowa

  Kisuke stood still, breathing the scent of the olive flowers. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw a form outside the gate, twenty paces or so down the road. His mother, clad in ceremonial white like the rest, stood there motionless, holding her long-staffed naginata halberd. She had said farewell to Kisuke the previous night, just before he left for the shrine, both of them sitting facing the family altar. Now all her tears had been shed, and she was ready to do her duty—to cut down her son if he should lose the contest. She was determined to save the family the shame of a public execution.

  There was a stir at the end of the road, and the official party came in sight, their gorgeous court clothes glinting in the level rays of the sunrise. Tall standards bearing the Tokugawa crest were carried on poles at the front. Twenty or so lesser nobles from the shogunate in Edo, along with local officials who would act as witnesses, walked behind the three horses bearing the government-appointed judges, all in silence. They passed Kisuke’s mother without a glance.

  A few of the men from both factions, including Kurazaemon, had been invited to the billet of the officials the previous night, and had drunk with them, but this morning was all business. The officials reined in their horses and dismounted. The creak and jingle of the tack was very loud in the stillness. Then the three walked smoothly through the gate in single file and up the gravel path between the waiting villagers. The priest followed them, gesturing to Kisuke and Kakubei to follow.

  The two rivals walked side by side up the gravel path, their straw sandals whispering, their white clothes rustling. Kisuke could hear Kakubei breathing heavily. Was he excited, or scared? Thanks to his training at the hands of the shrine priest, Kisuke himself was calm, though one corner of his mind was crying out in terror. As they came to the shrine building, where the altar was visible in the dimness at the top of a short flight of wooden steps, Kisuke noticed that a large dais had been set up to one side. This was where the officials would sit. Directly before the altar building were two large charcoal braziers filled with glowing coals, their heat making the air shiver above them. Wooden signs with the legends “East” and “West” had been erected before the braziers, and two buckets, made of fresh pine wood and filled with water, stood next to them on the gravel. Draped over each bucket was a thin straw mat about the size of a piece of scroll paper. The braziers were attended by two shrine assistants.

  After the judges were seated on the dais, the priest gave the signal for two miko dancers to perform the rites of purification. They danced in the slanting sunshine, with capes of crisp white lawn overlaying under-kimono of a startling red, their faces painted celadon white, the glinting ceremonial bells held in their upraised hands, turning in slow circles on the green turf. Kisuke had never seen anything so beautiful. If this was to be his last day on earth, he was grateful for such a sight to close his life. The ritual ended, and the dancers withdrew.

  The moment had arrived. The judge in the center spoke. “Let the axes be placed upon the braziers.”

  Kisuke and Kakubei approached their respective braziers and laid the iron axes in the beds of coals. A few orange sparks spiraled up lazily. During the pause while the axes heated up, one of the noblemen opened a scroll and read out the proclamation in measured tones.

  “Hear ye all! Officials of Edo, noblemen of this region, heads of villages, we are gathered here to witness the contest of Kisuke of the Eastern faction and Kakubei of the Western faction, who will endure the Ordeal of Fire and Iron to win the rights to Mount Toyama and adjoining peaks. Everything is prepared and now the ordeal will be performed. The two contestants will approach the braziers at the same time and dip their hands in the water for purification. Then they will receive the straw mats, which will be placed on the palms of their bare hands, and upon them the red-hot axes. They will walk ten steps—five steps on the ground and five steps on the wooden stairs. They will lay the axes on the altar in front of the sacred sake and the sacred leaves, reflected in the sacred mirror overhead. The one who completes this task, or comes closest to completing it, will be deemed the winner and his faction will be awarded the rights to the mountain range. The loser will be executed tomorrow. The Shogun has spoken!”

  Dead silence, broken only by the whisper of the burning coals. Kisuke braced himself for the command to go forward. At this moment, however, the three judges were seen to confer among themselves. Then the judge in the center gestured to the one reading the proclamation and whispered in his ear. The nobleman cleared his throat and resumed.

  “Herewith a codicil. It is the will of the Shogun that the two contestants will exchange axes. The Western representative will carry the Eastern ax and the Eastern representative will carry the Western ax.”

  In spite of the solemnity of the occasion, the onlookers gasped softly at this turn of events. Kisuke could not imagine what this might mean. He heard a small sound, like a squeak, escape Kakubei.

  “Begin!”

  The two contestants walked forward together. Before the braziers, they dipped their hands in the cool water and accepted the straw mats, holding them like trays with their hands underneath. As ordered, they changed places so each faced the brazier of the other’s faction. Both men stretched their hands out over the beds of coals. Water from them dripped and hissed with small jets of steam.

  The assistants raised the glowing red axes with heavy iron tongs. With a loud shout of self-encouragement, Kisuke received the ax on his mat, which immediately began to burn, yellow flames licking between his fingers. Still yelling as loudly as he could, he took five quick steps toward the shrine. The mat was burned away by the time he began to climb the steps, and when he reached the altar, he had to shake his hands to rid them of the ax, which had adhered to his skin. It fell with a thump to the altar and a tail of smoke arose as it branded itself into the wood. Panting, he brought his ruined palms together as best he could and bowed to the altar.

  It was only after Kisuke had turned around that he was able to notice what had happened to his rival. Kakubei had fallen to his knees on the gravel before the braziers, screaming hoarsely, cowering and pressing his hands under his armpits. The red hot ax lay before him on the ground, along with the remains of the straw mat, still in flames. Even in his extremity, Kisuke felt Kakubei’s disgrace. He had not taken even one step, and now his life was forfeit. What were all his proud words worth?

  Members of the official party now came forward and grasped Kakubei by the arms, holding him between them. The dishonored man stood trembling, his streaming eyes fixed on the ground. Meanwhile two other officials led Kisuke back to the bucket of water, and he plunged his hands into it with a cry of relief.

  The central judge raised his voice to speak over the muted babble of the crowd. “I have officially witnessed the events of this trial. I declare the East the winner in the dispute. The representative of the West will meet his death tomorrow at the execution stage of Hibari-no. This trial is now concluded.”

  The men of the East could barely contain themselves till the officials and the priest had withdrawn to a nearby shrine building for refreshments. Then they crowded around Kisuke, bringing bandages and liniment for his poor hands and all talking at once, showering him with congratulations. Straightening to his full height for a moment, Kisuke looked around until his eyes found the unhappy Kakubei being led away by the officials. Kakubei took one look over his shoulder and met Kisuke’s eyes, then walked with bowed head, sobbing softly in the agony of his disgrace. His men fell in behind him silently.

  Later that night, there was feasting and jollity in the villages of the Eastern faction as the autumn night closed in. Jubilant shouts and excited chatter arose from knots of people milling in the narrow lanes. Children swooped and scurried underfoot, feeling the triumph without understanding it. Every house was brightly lit, and the brightest of all was Kisuke’s.

  The largest room was filled with the scent of sake and food and the happy chatting of twenty or thirty drinking men seated at the low tables. Village
women hovered behind them, replacing each sake bottle the instant it was emptied. At the head of the table, nearest the family altar, Kisuke sat with the Amida Buddha staring peaceably over his shoulder. His hands were white-wrapped paws, but he still got plenty to drink, because every time a grateful villager knelt beside him with sake bottle poised to pour him a toast, his mother, who sat next to him, accepted the toast and held the small ceramic cup to her son’s lips.

  Kisuke felt dazed. The day had been full of pain, official documents, pain, congratulations from relatives and neighbors, pain, pain and more pain. He was exhausted from enduring it, but the sake helped a little. When he surfaced for a few moments, he had time to wonder about the strange command of the judge. Why had the shogun commanded them to exchange axes before the trial? Had he been told something? Was the ax he had carried identical to the one he had kept in his house for two months? He couldn’t remember noticing any difference, but then, his agony during the ordeal would have prevented that.

  After the speeches and toasts were concluded and everyone was conversing, old Kurazaemon sat stiffly down beside Kisuke. He raised the cup he was holding and received a measure of sake from the old lady. “Here’s to you, my friend,” he said and downed it in a gulp. Ume helped Kisuke return the toast, then tactfully shuffled back a few inches so that the two men could converse.

  The old man looked Kisuke in the face for the first time. He saw tears squeezing out of his friend’s eyes and wandering down his sake-reddened cheeks. “Is it very bad?” he said in a low voice.

  “I won, Kurazaemon. That is the important thing. I won the contest and the mountain is safe.” After a pause, he added, “That was a strange command, there at the end. The command to exchange axes. Why do you suppose they did that?”

  “Actually, I heard something, and I want to tell you about it. But it’s a secret, and mind you keep it. It could mean both our heads if it were found out. Your victory would be taken away from you and they might have to hold another trial.”

  Kisuke was aghast. For a moment his pain ceased. He felt as if he were falling down a well. “What is it?”

  “The Western faction cheated. Their ax was made with a hollow center so that it would weigh less and the iron would cool faster. They say it was all Kakubei’s idea. He had a notion to win easily and he convinced the ironmasters to make a lighter ax.”

  Kisuke could not say a word. The enormity of this sacrilege took his breath away. He understood that Kakubei, a stranger, was an unknown quantity, but the other members of the Western faction—what could have possessed them to go along with such a dangerous fraud? And it was true what Kurazaemon said. If this secret got out, Kisuke’s own victory would be called into question, since it was the cheating ax he had carried. It would have to remain a dire secret, carried by him and Kurazaemon to their graves. He wondered how many other people knew. Might the secret be leaked by someone else? If so, there would certainly be repercussions from the central government.

  Kurazaemon, who had been watching his face, nodded slowly. “We can keep the secret, and we must, for the sake of the entire Eastern faction.”

  The insistent throb was returning to Kisuke’s hands. He knew he must drink a lot more, otherwise he wouldn’t be able to sleep. He signaled with a jerk of his head, and Ume at once came forward and proffered the sake bottle to Kurazaemon. After downing his toast as it was held to his lips by Ume, he said, “Drink with me, my friend. The mountain is ours forever. No one can take it away.”

  It was only much later, lying in his futon watching the dawn break, that the final question arose in Kisuke’s mind.

  Had the judge known? And how had he known?

  Author’s note: This is a true story. In October 1619, a trial like the one described was won by my husband’s ancestor Kisuke, over his opponent Kakubei. It is the most famous “trial by fire” of the period, and is chronicled in the book “Gamo Gunshi” (History of the Gamo Area). To this day, every year on October 18, two members of our family attend a commemoration ceremony at Watamuki Shrine in Nishioji, Hino Township. The ceremony is called Tekka Matsuri, or Festival of Iron and Fire.

  Love and Duty

  Wednesday

  “Excuse me, Joanne-sensei. A moment please?”

  Joanne looked up from the gray metal desk piled with the English grammar workbooks she was correcting. Standing there, fiddling with an empty teacup, was a woman she knew by sight, a painfully thin math teacher who occupied a similar desk halfway down the long teachers’ room.

  “Yes,” the woman continued, “this is the first time we are speaking, I think. My name is Kikuchi. Nice to meet you.”

  “Nice to meet you too,” answered Joanne. Sounds like my English textbook, she thought.

  “Actually, I have a favor to ask.”

  “Yes?”

  “Well, you know it is Valentine’s Day this weekend …” Joanne nodded. How could anyone miss the huge red and pink displays of chocolate, shelf upon shelf, front and center at every supermarket? Disney chocolate, soccer chocolate, whiskey chocolate. Chocolate golf balls and chocolate sports cars, chocolate wrapped in seductive gold and red like the whorehouse in Gone with the Wind. Joanne was glad that at least she hadn’t heard any ‘official’ Valentine’s Day songs … so far. It was only a matter of time before shoppers got treated to “That’s Amore,” or some even more excruciating selection, on store Muzak from January 5 till February 13. Suppressing a sigh, she turned her attention back to her colleague.

  “I was wondering, would you mind giving a gift of chocolate to my son? He is in the first grade and I just know he would be overjoyed to receive chocolate from an American.” Ms. Kikuchi gave a small, nervous, closed-mouth smile.

  Huh? thought Joanne. She didn’t know this woman and she certainly didn’t know her son. Besides, she had always considered the Japanese Valentine’s Day traditions weird in the extreme. But Ms. Kikuchi was waiting for an answer.

  “Um, can I let you know? Excuse me—I have to return these workbooks after the lunch break.” Joanne knew a fellow teacher would acknowledge that work took precedence.

  “Oh, certainly. Sorry to disturb you. You are so busy.” Having, with no irony whatsoever, awarded Joanne the coveted Medal of Being Very Busy, Ms. Kikuchi moved away, still cradling her teacup. Joanne turned back to her task.

  On her way home from the high school that evening, swaying from a hanging strap in the train, Joanne went over the conversation in her mind. So many things about it annoyed her. First, although a stranger, Ms. Kikuchi had used her first name. Joanne-sensei. Joanne knew it was common practice for foreign English teachers to be called by their given names instead of their surnames, even though no one would think of calling a Japanese teacher by her given name—probably no one would even know it. As a matter of fact, Joanne happened to have a perfectly good Japanese surname. It was Nozaki. She had been married for ten years to a Japanese man and they had two children. So how come she wasn’t Nozaki-sensei to the teachers she worked with? Even her students called her Joanne-sensei. I can’t get no respect, she whispered to herself.

  But that wasn’t all. (Joanne noticed a group of school kids giggling at her and angled them out of her line of vision.) Ms. Kikuchi had tried to co-opt her into a ritual that was ostensibly based on a Western holiday, but was in fact completely Japanese. How thoughtless was that? What did Japanese people know about Valentine’s Day? They had women giving chocolate to men, for heaven’s sake. Joanne sighed. She knew, she remembered, what the day was really about. The fluttery anticipation of wondering what one’s boyfriend or husband had in mind for the day, the roses, the candlelight, the soft music. Valentine’s Day was about love. Romantic love! In Japan it had been made into yet another social obligation. Plus, how come Joanne, a grown woman, was being asked to give chocolate to some unknown first-grade boy? The whole thing was ridiculous.

  By the time she turned the key in her front door, Joanne was fuming.

  Saeko had many names, many titles.
She was “O-mae” to her husband, “Mama” to her son, “Oku-san” to her neighbors, and “Kikuchi-sensei” to her students. The last person to call her by her first name had been her mother, now two years deceased. “Saeko-chan,” her mother had said in her last illness. “Please make sure everything is properly prepared for the funeral. Don’t sit here with me; you should be cleaning the house. Please check the dishes and utensils to see nothing is missing.” And she had.

  Thinking about the past, she stepped blindly off the curb. “Okusan! Be careful!” shouted a nearby shopkeeper, and a car brake screeched. Saeko gasped and pulled up short. A moment later, with a hasty “Sorry” to the shopkeeper, she walked on down the busy, twilit neighborhood street. The memory of her mother gave way to a fast-motion parade of other thoughts and concerns, which accompanied her like importunate children as she hurried along.

  She thought about taking out the garbage that morning. This morning, one of her neighbors had been on garbage detail, standing next to the collection area to make sure everyone brought their bags out on time. It was Saeko’s turn to do this next week, but she wasn’t sure if she could stand there till eight o’clock and still be on time for work. And, speaking of time, did she have time to stop at the market now? Probably not. Tomorrow, then.

  Her thoughts jumped to a different topic. Her husband Masato had telephoned her from work, saying that he needed an envelope of money for a company funeral tomorrow. Was there enough cash in the house? How about his black suit? She would have to get it ready this evening. And she needed to talk to him about her mother’s three-year memorial service, which must be scheduled some time next month. How many guests would there be, and what kind of take-home gifts should she arrange for them?

  Another jump. Work today. One of her second-year students had been asleep almost the entire lesson. This wasn’t the first time, either. Should she contact his parents? Perhaps he stayed up late studying or went to cram school till ten in the evening, as she knew many of the students did. But what if he was hanging around behind the convenience store late at night, smoking (or worse) with some bad kids? Did his hair look any longer than usual, were his pants any baggier than usual? Saeko knew it was part of her job to be observant about these things, but these days she couldn’t seem to concentrate.