A True Novel

by Minae Mizumura

  WHEN THEY TROOPED into the dining room, the oval table he remembered from before had been extended to half again its original length and was covered with a lustrous white tablecloth. A pair of lit candlesticks was in the center, one on either side of a small floral arrangement, and in front of each person’s chair were two matching plates of edged chinaware, one on top of the other. Harue seated herself at the head of the table and said, while spreading in her lap a napkin that matched the tablecloth, “Instead of the usual high tea, I had the table set formally for once. Our young ones are all gone this year, and there are so few of us left.” At this, Fumiko began to serve, looking like a consummate maid. Ami, whose role at mealtimes was evidently behind the scenes, did not make an appearance.

  The conversation began at first with discussion of the Thai beach resort where the others in the family had all gone; how absurd it was that in this heat anyone should have a wedding in Thailand; how they wouldn’t have wanted to go even if Masayuki hadn’t suddenly died. From there the topic moved on to Masayuki himself. People’s voices grew hushed. The forty-nine days of mourning were not yet over. How young he’d been, how brilliant, what a doting husband. Yes, someone said, but he doted on his wife too much, that was behind the tragedy. Someone else suggested that since both his parents had died of cancer the disease must run in the family. In a voice that signaled imminent tears, Natsue remarked that at least Masayuki never lived to see the Karuizawa property pass into strangers’ hands; in that sense he was lucky, like Yoko.

  “This might be the last high tea here, for all we know!” she said, not for the first time, her eyes now actually glistening; then she looked at Yusuke. “Oh yes, this young guest of ours!” she suddenly remembered. She opened her eyes wide, as if to banish tears, and smiled winningly. “We invited him so we could tell him about Peter Jansen.”

  “Oh, that’s right. Peter Jansen.” Harue too looked at Yusuke as if just remembering. “Everyone else knows the story.” She looked around the table before turning back to Yusuke and saying proudly, “It’s a very romantic story.”

  Fuyue added in a slightly flustered tone, “But one we concocted ourselves, mind you.”

  “And what’s wrong with that?” retorted Harue. “Oh, put on the Clarinet Quintet again someone, would you please?”

  “Yes,” agreed Natsue. “It’s practically the theme music for it.”

  “Fuyue, do put it on.”

  “Yes, do! This may be the last time, after all.”

  “All right, all right.”

  As Fuyue got up, Harue began to relate the succession of misfortunes that had befallen them.

  CANDLELIT TABLE

  The sisters’ father had lived to the age of ninety-seven before dying in 1990, when the economy was at the peak of what came to be known as the bubble. That was the first misfortune. The second was that the land they possessed in their father’s name was in Seijo and Old Karuizawa, two areas where land prices had lately gone through the roof. They had been forced to sell one home or the other to pay the inheritance tax, and since Seijo was right at the heart of their lives and Karuizawa a summer luxury, they had decided very reluctantly to let go of the latter. Just by coincidence, in that same year of 1990, Yayoi, who had inherited the Shigemitsu property next door, passed away, leaving the Shigemitsus in much the same circumstances. In 1991 the Saegusas and Shigemitsus spent a last summer in Karuizawa for old time’s sake before putting their respective properties on the market.

  “It was exactly like something from Chekhov’s The Three Sisters,” said Harue.

  “You mean The Cherry Orchard,” Fuyue corrected.

  “Not The Three Sisters?”

  “No. The Cherry Orchard.”

  Natsue cut in. “But then a savior came along.” Her wide eyes blinked.

  A mysterious buyer had turned up, working through a Tokyo lawyer. This was a foreign company with its main office in The Hague, in the Netherlands. The deal was that until it decided at some point to use the land for its own purposes, the Shigemitsus and Saegusas could go on living there, as long as they paid the local property tax between them. All communication with the company was to take place through the lawyer. When they heard about it, the sisters decided that the purchaser might actually be the Dutchman Peter Jansen—a young tycoon who used to come to Karuizawa regularly before the war to escape the heat of Indonesia, and had become a friend of both families. That Peter Jansen.

  “He was a wonderful violinist,” Natsue commented. “He and the Shigemitsu heir next door and a few others often played this piece together.” She turned toward the parlor, from which music could be heard.

  It was not entirely unreasonable that the three Saegusa sisters should have assumed the mysterious buyer was Peter Jansen. Back in the summer of 1991, when they were getting ready to bid Karuizawa a sad farewell, Jansen’s son had come sightseeing to Japan with his wife and made a special trip to visit them, having been encouraged to do so by his father. It was a good thing he had come then, as they were just on the point of having to leave this place, they told him, and he had responded sympathetically: “My father will be so sad to hear that. Because of the war, a lot of Dutch people have a grudge against Japan, but thanks to Karuizawa my father has nothing but romantic memories of it.”

  “ ‘Nothing but romantic memories,’ he said, in such beautiful English,” sighed Natsue.

  “Naturally there’s no proof whatever that Peter heard about it and bought the property on our behalf, but there are some pretty eccentric people in the world, so you never know. We think it’s possible.”

  Wondering what sort of company it was, they had had one of Harue’s sons-in-law, a banker, do some investigating using the bank’s internal network. He found out that it was a joint-stock company, but the director listed was someone no one had ever heard of, and since the company wasn’t on the stock exchange, its business dealings were not disclosed.

  Fuyue, who alone had a rather skeptical look, spoke up. “But a company’s main motive is profit making, isn’t it? It doesn’t make any sense, as far as I can see.”

  “It’s precisely because it makes no sense that we think it possible,” said Harue.

  Natsue chimed in. “You were so young at the time, Fuyue. You can’t imagine what it was like when there was still some Taisho romanticism in the air, before the country became so militaristic.”

  “Taisho romanticism would mean nothing to a Westerner. They wouldn’t even know what the Taisho period is!”

  “Oh, you just don’t know. Westerners too were much more romantic back then.”

  That winter they had written to Peter Jansen for the first time in decades, sending him a Christmas card at the address his son provided, with a few lines that could be read as an expression of their gratitude, only to hear some months later from the son that Peter had died. Even then there was no word from the lawyer about the Karuizawa property—to their great relief—and they had gone on as they were throughout 1992, 1993, and 1994. Now this summer, just when things were rather hectic because of Masayuki’s death, word had finally come from the lawyer that the Dutch company needed to sell off the property. He would fix it so they could stay on through the summer and, depending on who the new owner was, they might or might not have to leave soon after that. In any case the company wanted to move quickly, and so even though it was the middle of the Bon festival holidays, the lawyer would be arriving in Karuizawa from Tokyo tomorrow evening.

  Having explained this much, Harue looked around as if she were only just facing up to the reality of their situation.

  “To see all of you when we knew for certain that it was the last time would be altogether too sad. That’s why I asked you to come now, before we know exactly what is going to happen.”

  BY THE TIME high tea was over, it was past ten.

  Fumiko, who had promised to drive Yusuke back to Mitsui Woods, disappeared shortly before they were to leave and emerged from the house next door carrying a department store shopping b
ag. Yusuke offered to carry it for her but she said that it wasn’t heavy, so she could manage. When they reached the car she raised the paper bag slightly and, after catching Yusuke’s eye, said, “The urns—with their remains. They were on the mantelpiece at the sisters’ villa, remember? These are the small ones for the separate burials. That’s why the bag’s so light.”

  She opened the back door of the car and put the bag casually on the back seat, as if it contained groceries.

  Masayuki’s will had stipulated that he wanted his bones and those of his wife ground together and scattered on their property in Karuizawa, but the three old ladies found the idea gruesome and had asked Fumiko to do the honors, if she didn’t mind.

  “I think it’s pretty gruesome too, actually,” she said, although to Yusuke she didn’t sound particularly bothered. Her car, bearing two people in ashes and two people still alive, rolled out of the dark woods and onto the main road. Yusuke felt prompted to ask a question. The shadow of something that had flitted through his mind the other day was taking clearer shape.

  “Who really bought the Karuizawa land?”

  Fumiko answered in a heartbeat. “Of course it was Taro.” She was looking straight ahead, her eyes squinting slightly as if the lights of the oncoming cars were too bright. “I’m glad there’s no fog. When the fog rolls in you can barely see the car right in front of you.”

  Yusuke said nothing, waiting for more. Fumiko drove along in silence for a while and then, without turning her head, explained.

  “Oiwake he bought for himself … for the sake of the memories he and Yoko shared there. As for Karuizawa, when the inheritance tax problem came up, he decided to buy it for Masayuki and Yoko. I didn’t know it at first either, but when I heard that a company based in The Hague had made the purchase, it all fitted together. I knew Taro had set up a holding company there to save on corporate taxes.”

  After glancing in the rearview mirror, she looked at Yusuke for the first time. Her face was expressionless. “He probably intended to keep it indefinitely, but then Masayuki died. That must be when he made up his mind to sell.”

  That was all. After a brief pause Yusuke said, “A pity about the old ladies.” He quickly corrected himself. “A bit of a pity, I mean.”

  “A huge pity,” she told him, eyes forward. “I wish he could just have let things go on the way they are until they got too old for it.” She then gave a mocking sort of laugh. “But I suppose Taro doesn’t owe them anything to that extent.”

  They rode along in silence.

  “You know, I’ll miss it. Ever since I was just a girl … it’s hard to believe, but starting when I was seventeen I’ve been going there nearly every summer of my life. Even Ami. She’s been going there since she was a baby, so I know she’ll miss it too. I suppose both houses will be torn down …” As if she had suddenly come to herself she added, “Well, in any case … it’s all over.”

  The highway that had been so crowded earlier in the day was clear. The car’s headlights swept smoothly over the road, and in no time they had arrived in Middle Karuizawa.

  “Would it be all right if I go over to Oiwake again tomorrow?” he asked.

  “Yes. Come in the afternoon. He’ll be gone overnight tomorrow.”

  When Taro reserved a room in the Prince Hotel for the Tokyo lawyer, he had made a reservation for himself as well. The two of them would dine together that evening, and in the morning Taro would play a solo round of golf before coming back to Oiwake, she said.

  “Does he often stay in a hotel?”

  Fumiko shook her head. “Heavens, no. This is a first.” Her lips curved in a smile. “Maybe he’s afraid that when the three sisters find out the truth from that lawyer, they’ll come flying down on Oiwake like the Furies,” she said, and laughed.

  THE FIRST-FLOOR LIGHTS were on in Kubo’s parents’ place. Lined up in the entryway was a pair of pink sandals with heels. Making a clatter without being too obvious about it, he entered the living room and found the little sister stretched full-length on the sofa, winding her fingers in Kubo’s hair as he sat by her on the floor. In front of them the television was on with the sound turned down.

  8

  Career Woman

  AFTER TARO’S RETURN for the first time in fifteen years, the long winter stretched on. It was April by the time the snow melted, the black ground thawed out, and spring arrived. Soon even the snow on top of Mount Asama sparkled and began to run down in rivulets. From that late Nagano springtime into the summer, I took time to ensure that the Oiwake cottage was brought from the brink of ruin to something like its original condition. I knew from the start what might lie ahead. I felt alarmed, and wished I could make time stand still. All the same, it was not without a certain satisfaction that, as tree buds swelled and the woods turned lush all around, I watched the little house, whose life had all but ended, begin to revive again.

  “How I’m going to use the place I don’t exactly know, but would you at least see to it that it’s livable?” That was Taro’s request. Once I inspected it with this in mind, I realized that any house neglected for so long naturally needs more than a thorough cleaning, and indeed problem after problem with the roof, doors, windows, and plumbing turned out to require the attentions of skilled workmen. My husband and I could have paid the cost of labor in advance and asked for reimbursement, but since I didn’t want to get ahead of myself, I copied out Taro’s address on an envelope, struggling with the unfamiliar alphabet, and sent him a note asking for instructions. I almost immediately received a phone call from a capable-sounding Japanese woman who lost no time in transferring the large sum of five million yen to my account at Ueda Credit Bank. That was when I first learned that Nakada Associates in Tokyo’s Akasaka district was the law firm representing Taro in Japan. I opened an account in his name so that I could pay for the cost of restoration work out of it. I also arranged for telephone and other utility bills, including propane, to be paid from there. My family hadn’t heard anything about Taro after I had lunch with him at the Prince Hotel back in January, so I told them he was a distant relation of the family I used to work for in Tokyo, someone who had made his fortune in America, and left it at that. Since I already worked summers at a villa in Karuizawa, no one thought anything of it if this Taro Azuma person asked me to be the caretaker of his place in Oiwake. I complied with his wish to leave the cottage looking as close as possible to the way it used to be, and all I personally did inside was dust and scrub. Of the futon covers that still seemed salvageable, I had the original materials washed before stuffing them with fresh cotton. When old Mrs. Utagawa’s tea chest turned up in a closet, I checked the contents, saw there was nothing particularly worthwhile inside, and left it all there. The house key that I sent Taro by airmail was an old one—purposely so.

  THAT SUMMER, SOON after I went to work in Karuizawa, Natsue asked me out of the blue one day, “Whatever happened to that Oiwake property?”

  I felt a pang of guilt and tried to cover it up. “The cottage is still there …,” I said.

  She smiled ingenuously, her dimple showing. “My, after all that rush to buy, they certainly are taking their time about rebuilding!”

  I thanked heaven that she didn’t have a mind inquiring enough to suggest that we go over and have a look. Whether Taro would ever actually use the place, I was still not entirely certain, and there was no point in my upsetting her with information she had no need to know.

  Taro’s next visit came a few days after Natsue brought up the subject of Oiwake. The telephone rang while my daughter-in-law and I were clearing the supper dishes. She answered it and handed me the receiver, murmuring “Mr. Azuma” in a voice that showed she now knew who he was. He was calling from the Hotel New Otani in Tokyo and would arrive in Oiwake the following afternoon to stay a week. I had already explained that I worked for the Saegusas in the summer so my time was limited, but before hanging up I agreed to see him at the cottage on my way home the following evening. In the morning I too
k advantage of the fine weather to go to Oiwake and lay out Takero’s reconditioned striped futon in the front tatami room, where the sun would reach it and fluff it up, before going on to Karuizawa. A slight alteration of my customary route was all it took. I did my morning work as usual, but by afternoon, around the time when Taro had said he would be arriving, I found myself getting nervous. Perhaps he was already in Karuizawa and was driving around and around this block. I kept leaving off whatever I was doing to crane my neck, trying to see beyond the hedge. Surely he knew that Yoko was married to Masayuki. My eyes also strayed toward the Shigemitsu garden, where Yoko was puttering about with a trowel.

  I had intended to slip off early, but on that day of all days, just as I was leaving I was asked to do one thing and another, so that by the time I arrived in Oiwake it was past six. What looked like a rental car was parked inside the gate, and the yellow porch light was on as if waiting for me. The sound of my car brought Taro out onto the porch, and when he saw it was me his face lit up with pleasure. He said he would make us a pot of tea. My son got home at all hours from the bank where he worked. But my husband, who had retired from the town hall and was now helping in our daughter-in-law’s family pickle business, was always home by six, waiting for me to get back and join the rest of the family for supper. I really had no time, but stayed with Taro just to keep him company. I was braced for the inevitable question, but he didn’t say a word about Yoko. You might almost have thought he had traveled all the way from America just to escape the heat in this small, run-down cottage in the mountains.