The Painting

by Nina Schuyler

Where are Ayoshi’s things? asks Sato.

  The maid brings them tea.

  Hayashi looks at him curiously and slightly alarmed.

  Sato tells him she had a beautiful tansu and a lovely oak writing table. I can’t remember what else. Oh yes, a tall vase that sat in their hallway.

  The air in the house shifts. Hayashi looks out the window at the bare space where the teahouse once stood. She arrived with almost nothing, says Hayashi.

  Sato’s hands twitch. Maybe I was wrong.

  Hayashi smiles faintly, trying not to think of those early, dark days when she was so miserable, nothing could console her. Why wouldn’t she bring her precious things? Didn’t she think he was deserving? Or perhaps she thought she wouldn’t stay?

  The maid carries in the bucket of ice water. He tells her to set it in the bathroom. Not here, he thinks, weary of this man, Sato.

  Sato scoots his chair closer to Hayashi’s. I’d also like to try to sell Ayoshi’s paintings, says Sato.

  A shadow passes over Hayashi’s face. You’ve seen her work?

  Only the piece in the temple. Do you have any objections?

  What? No. I’ve never said she could or couldn’t sell her work.

  Pain shoots up his leg. After the maid massages his feet, he will go into the studio. Distract himself with his next order. A shipment to China. Hayashi excuses himself and heads down the hallway to the bathroom. The maid brings out Sato’s supper. There is a place setting for only one.

  SHE WALKS TO THE baths at the far side of town. The maid, at her request, has stayed behind to tend to her husband and Sato. What does Sato think he’s doing? Arrogant, bold, insistent, barging into her life to tell her what to do, and in front of her husband, reciting that awful poem; she’ll speak to him later, but now, now she doesn’t want to think about him. She is alone, walking in a web of tree shade. She prefers to walk alone so her mind can roam. The shadows from the trees, she turns them into shapes, a dog, a bony hand, an old woman’s face, and always she sees the hands of the man from Hokkaido.

  When she reaches the town, her calm is destroyed by the noise. From what she can see at the edge of town, at least five shops have been torn down and two new, taller buildings are rising up from the ground. She glances at a posted drawing of one of the new buildings. Imposing white pillars guard the front. She shudders. Men pounding nails, sawing boards, and driving in tall posts, the noises crowd her, she covers her ears with her hands. Where is the little grocery store? And the shop where she took her sandals to be repaired?

  She hurries by one of the dusty, loud construction sites, ducking her head under her parasol, her eyes watery; not here, she tells herself, why should you weep about such things? Silly old buildings being torn down, but the tears hover an inch from the surface, suspended, and her chiding only makes her feel worse.

  With a quickened pace, she rushes to the older of the two bathhouses. She prefers this one, over two hundred years old, surrounded by tall, thick mulberry trees and long grass. Its wood is weather stained a dark brown and black. She steps inside, closes the heavy door, and sinks into silence. Inside, old wood carvings of Buddha and bodhisattvas peer at her through the thick, watery air. She loves the bathhouse in spite of its slippery, sloped floors and warped walls and lingering smell of mold. An ancient beauty, she thinks, one that will endure forever.

  Down the narrow hallway to the dressing rooms, she removes her clothing and steps naked along the wet tile to the main room, which sways with scorching steam. The sound of running water, the heat, like a cupped hand. The insides of her nostrils burn. Her skin warms and turns pink, as if she’s sat for hours in the sun. Droplets of sweat gather on her upper lip. Through the mist, she sees naked women soaking in the big center bath. Occasionally, a voice drifts over to her through the thick air. A line of women are sitting on wooden stools along one wall. They are scrubbing themselves with hard brushes and throwing buckets of water on their backs. Black hair streams down their arms.

  She joins the line of women and turns on a faucet. With the water running, and the mist encasing her, she suddenly collapses her head in her hands and begins to cry. For what reason? She doesn’t know. She feels a hand on her shoulder. It’s the woman whose husband owns the shoe shop.

  Are you all right?

  She nods, still crying.

  I can get the masseuse, says the woman.

  No. No thank you.

  She has helped me many times.

  No. Please.

  The woman nods uncertainly and returns to washing her calves. Across the room, the old woman masseuse is rubbing a woman’s back. Ayoshi watches the woman’s big, sturdy hands pull and tug at the woman. Warm water drips on Ayoshi’s toes. She feels soft now, after the tears, as soft as a new leaf. If someone touched her, her body would fold around the compression. Slowly something stirs inside, teetering and knitting itself tighter and tighter, growing thicker as the minutes tick by. It lurches to the right and she grips the edge of the bench. She knows what this is, though it has been a while since it felt so insistent and unyielding. Closing her eyes, she makes room in her softened, open body, shuttling her stomach up and back and cinching up her lungs. Her body feels heavy, bloated, and leaden. Sweat trickles down her sides and thighs.

  The masseuse comes over and asks if she wants a massage.

  No, she says. No, thank you.

  The old woman touches her shoulder.

  She flinches. Please. Not today.

  The old woman looks at her curiously.

  Please. Ayoshi wants to scream at her, push the crone to the other side of the room, repulsed at the idea of hands massaging, her mind crowded with days of her own hands pulling and grabbing his flesh. The woman shrugs and leaves. The image inside lurches, demanding that it be delivered.

  SHE RUSHES TO THE studio and is about to open the door when she hears the whir of the potter’s wheel. Her heart is pounding. Where can she go? She must paint. She feels as if she might burst. She opens the door. Hayashi is deep into his work and doesn’t look up. She walks quickly to her desk and pulls out a sheet of blank paper. With efficient motions, she mixes her paints. The image is pressing up through her spine, spiraling down her arms. The wheel stops.

  You smell wonderful, says Hayashi. Like fresh flowers. A garden of flowers.

  I didn’t mean to disturb you.

  He asks about her bath.

  Fine, she says. She can’t stay here. Where is Sato?

  I don’t know, he says wiping his hands on a towel, frowning.

  I’ll go look for him, she says.

  He stands and steps toward her. Lavender, he says.

  No, she says. It was the usual bath. She backs away, shaken.

  It’s been so long. His fingers trace her waist. I am sorry for that.

  His touch feels like a betrayal. No, please don’t apologize. It’s no one’s fault.

  Is everything all right? he asks.

  I’m distracted. I’m sorry.

  He steps awkwardly to his side of the studio. Sato is an interesting character, he says.

  She feels him retreating, as if he touched a fingertip to a hot stove and now must cradle the injured hand to his chest. She doesn’t care. She must hurry. Yes, she says, reaching under her desk and grabbing some paper. In her pocket, she stuffs her brushes. She’s about to reach for her palette of fresh paints, but leaves it. She’ll start over.

  Interesting fellow. Yes, quite interesting. You knew him as a girl?

  Yes. A long time ago. Yes, she says. She excuses herself and scurries to the house. With rapid steps, she walks down the long hallway, listening to the fabric of her kimono brush against her thighs, and into the Western room.

  The room is filled with blue smoke. She doesn’t see him at first, but when she steps farther into the room, there he is, stretched out on the plush, red velvet couch, a long pipe cupped in his hands.

  She has seen men in town sunk into themselves, their bodies wrapped around their pipes. Sato, she says.
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  He sets the pipe down and picks up the koto and strums his fingernails through the strings, the room pulsing with haunting music.

  I’ve been reading some of your husband’s Emerson. Your husband, by the way, is in love with Emerson. Listen to this. Every ship is a romantic object, except that we sail in. Embark, and the romance quits our vessel, and hangs on every sail in the horizon.

  Please, Sato.

  He’s quite charming. Your husband. You should let yourself fall in love with him. He picks up the pipe again. She sits in a chair far in the corner. He looks as if he’s holding a baby, the way it’s nestled up against his chest. For the first time, she notices his yellow fingernails.

  He has changed, she thinks, sighing, and so have I.

  Sato, she says again, not certain what to do.

  He burrows farther into the cushions. Proceed with whatever you came in here to do.

  She waits for a while, watching the smoke swirl above his head. Her heart pounds. She pulls out a sheet of paper, glances at him once more. Sato closes his eyes. She retrieves her set of paints from the cupboard. He does what he wants, I’ll do what I want. As she mixes her colors, the room begins to disappear. She pours more water into the paint and red comes alive. In another bowl, she mixes yellow and white.

  Her lover’s hand begins to appear. Then the other. His body, his face, the image is coming fast, as she knew it would.

  The brush blusters along the paper. Sato has fallen asleep on the couch, a gentle smile on his face, his hands folded on his chest, and now he’s snoring.

  Black fire, he said, as he undid her bun. He pressed into her hand a poem. In any season, your black hair unbound, I long to touch it.

  She feels his pulse now, his scent in each pore of her skin. The heat of desire has its own sense of time.

  They went down the hill and swam in the river. Her body floating in warm water under the deepening sky, the stars spilling out from the moon. Looking up, she sees him through the river’s mist. She smiles, but her expression suddenly twists and fades as the current pulls at her, as if a person crept underneath. She screams. It grabs her around the ankles. Her mouth fills with brine water. He rushes over from the side of the river, jumps in, clutches her by the waist, and yanks her to the surface. She spits out water and sobs. But the current seizes her again. She wraps her hands around the back of his neck; he can’t seem to release her. Frozen in this pose, the water gripping her backside, the pull of his body clutching her front. She feels like her insides are ripping apart.

  She sets down her paintbrush and pushes aside the painting. It’s not how it happened. What an awful image and it isn’t even true. Why did he make her paint such a thing? She was pulled to the bottom, and he jumped in, swept her up, and pulled her out of the water. She was so cold. Since that day, she’s always hated the cold.

  A whisper of air stirs behind her. She is suddenly aware of someone else in the room. For a moment she stiffens. Sato puts his hand on her shoulder.

  You’re crying, he says.

  She reaches up and touches her face.

  He stares at her painting. Ayoshi. It’s beautiful.

  Don’t.

  She holds herself tighter.

  He looks at the two figures in the painting. The woman is floating in the water. Her long black hair streaming out from her like a fan. Her kimono is falling off, her legs bare, the skin pale white. The man has wrapped himself around her like two large wings. Tall and striking, the man has a strong profile and a full head of hair. He is poised between saving her and falling in.

  Is this him? The man you love?

  She doesn’t say anything.

  Where is he now?

  I don’t know.

  Sato is about to say something.

  Don’t.

  FRANCE

  SO LIKE HIM, Natalia thinks, finding Pierre in the hallway gazing lovingly at a bronze vase.

  What do you think it’s worth? he asks, his shrewd eyes flashing. He looks squarely at her. Silly me. Why ask you? You don’t even acknowledge the material world.

  How is he doing? she says, glancing discreetly toward Jorgen’s office. Unbuttoning her coat—how steamy this hallway—she’s just come from the hospital, and she won’t admonish Pierre about visiting Edmond, they’ve argued about it enough, and Pierre will only become irascible and refuse to speak to her for days, or just to spite her, he’ll fire Jorgen. But she knows Edmond would love to see Pierre. He asked about him today.

  I haven’t decided if I’m going to keep him, says Pierre. I tell you, though, he’s an odd one. He hardly speaks. Seems almost comatose at times. Maybe he’s sipping away at absinthe, who knows? I’m usually a good judge of people, but he doesn’t reveal much. He works and works, barely says a damn thing.

  He sounds like an ideal worker. How fortunate for you.

  Why are you so happy? he asks, his permanently dissatisfied mouth tightening. You look like something marvelous has happened. Did you save someone’s life today? Did you finally become a saint?

  I’m just happy. Every day is a blessing.

  He waves his hand in front of him. Please. No sermons. When I have a thousand francs in my sweaty hands from this vase, I will be very happy, and not before then.

  She shakes her head and walks down the hallway, then stops. Before I forget, she says, I must ask for some extra blankets.

  Pierre is about to protest.

  Not for me. For Edmond.

  He hesitates.

  Pierre.

  He sighs heavily and tells her there is a stack in the back office. He relents further and tells her to take as many as Edmond needs. And for her, too. But don’t bother my new employee. I want every last franc out of him, which is my God-given right as his employer, so don’t tell me otherwise.

  She’s almost to the inventory room, when she stops again. You know, Edmond would love to see you. Why does she insist? she wonders. Pierre will never go again. Too busy, too self-absorbed, selfish, really. After he went his one and only time, he said the stench was overwhelming, the misery too great. How stupid this war. Any war. Such a pathetic waste of lives, he said, and she held her tongue, almost lashing back, Your pathetic life, Pierre.

  Pierre looks at her squarely with flat eyes and strides away.

  She’s about to say more, but turns and walks to Jorgen’s office.

  Hello, she says. Oh, don’t get up. No, please.

  Hello, says Jorgen.

  She asks how he is doing.

  He gestures weakly toward the tall stack of books; the pencil in his hand is perfectly still.

  Oh, look at those terrible books. My brother must have had the work pile up before you arrived. And now he has you. What a blessing.

  He perches above his carefully written numbers, each neatly situated in its column. He looks horrible, she thinks. A trace of a man. Almost as ill as the men in the hospital, and she wonders if his leg might be infected and when did he last eat? His face has become more gaunt; his sallow skin presses against his high cheekbones and his eyes appear feverish and sunken.

  She wasn’t planning to tell anyone what she has done. Not even Edmond, who would most likely try to stop her. Her secret, this new deed, but she feels she must do something; why, look at the way his head droops, as if struck by an insoluble, deathly question.

  You mustn’t tell anyone. Please, swear that you won’t. She comes and stands by his desk.

  He sets down his pencil.

  She leans over. There’s a group of women. We’re training to be soldiers, and we’re going to fight for France.

  He shifts in his chair and strains to understand what she just said.

  She leans closer and says in a hushed tone, Yesterday, two soldiers met with us and they’re teaching us how to shoot. If I learn quickly, I may get to join the fighting in a week or two. She doesn’t tell him how a group of National Guardsmen stood by mocking them, pretending to be hit by a stray bullet.

  Her eyes are watery bright, and she
tells him when she fired the gun it threw her back three feet, nearly knocking her against a stone wall, and though it was terrifying, she felt a tremendous surge of energy rip through her body. The air smelled of smoke and bitterness. Her hands, blackened from the powder.

  Look, she says, extending her hands. Some of the black marks still smudge her cuticles.

  He looks from her hands to her blue eyes, wide and childlike, void of life experiences.

  One of the women gave her a pistol; she pulls it out of her bag and hands it to him. He turns it over and over, studies the barrel, the trigger. It does what she hoped; his eyes flicker and dart. Now he holds the gun in his palm, as if he might caress it. The hard-edged lines of his face evaporate, and his rigidly held jaw relaxes. He puts his other hand on top of it, and she can’t help but smile; of course he would react this way; he is a soldier who is principled and strong, who is aching to fight again for France.

  He runs his hands over the pistol, his fingertips tingling as he recalls his first pistol, a single-shot cap-and-ball pocket pistol, a gift from his father. Engraved scrollwork was etched on the barrel, a silver inlay on the finished walnut stock. When he cocked the gun, the sound was precise and final. Holding that pistol, he felt bigger and more powerful, as if he could shape things, as if he could turn and shift the world the way he wanted to, as the pistol is making him feel right now. His heartbeat quickens and he extends the gun in front of him, aiming at a box of books. He sets the pistol down, picks it up again. Maybe I can help you, he says. I can teach you.

  Her face lights up, as if she’s just won something grand and is proud of her effort.

  Yes, she says, her bright voice insists, yes, that would be wonderful.

  He nods severely.

  She tells him rumors are flying that if the Prussians win, they will destroy everything in the city, all the beautiful buildings, the precious statues, and the French people will be turned into servants, she says, her voice urgent. The Prussians want to take over the world.

  I don’t know about any of that, he says. Dark hints of despair settle again on his brow.

  Let’s begin today, she says, clapping her hands together.