The Emissary

by Yoko Tawada

  Falling out of the chair when it turned over didn’t frighten him at all. He wasn’t heavy enough to break the glass, and was so adept at curling up to take the impact that he had never broken a bone. The moment the chair fell, its warning buzzer automatically contacted the Women’s Rescue Brigade, bringing a squad of young-elderly aunties to help him. While waiting for them, he reveled in the pure joy of having been tossed out onto the earth’s surface. Unwilling to let him go, gravity tugged at him so he wouldn’t float off into space. Gazing up at the sky, he breathed in and out. There was nothing to worry about. Mumei’s generation was equipped with natural defenses against despair. As always, it was the elderly they had to feel sorry for. At the age of 115, Yoshiro was still spry enough to rent a dog for a run every morning, then squeeze an orange for Mumei’s juice, cut up his vegetables, stroll through the market with his knapsack, wipe the window sash and on top of the dresser with a wrung-out mop-up cloth before the dust had time to settle, write a picture postcard to his daughter, briskly scrub the underwear he’d left to soak in a pail overnight, then take out his sewing basket in the evenings to fashion smart new clothes for his great-grandson. Why this frenzy of never-ending work? To stave off an endless stream of tears.

  Mumei took a long ticket with a picture of an ocean liner out of his pocket. Having skipped over several years, he wasn’t quite sure what he was doing with it, though it seemed familiar in a way. He closed his eyes and steadied his breathing, trying to remember. In time, wisps of memory came back from the future. Having been chosen as an emissary, he was to stow away on a ship bound for Madras, India. There, an international medical research institute would be waiting for him. Data about his health would be used for medical research that would help people the world over as well as, perhaps, making it possible for Mumei to live longer.

  It was Mr. Yonatani, his homeroom teacher in elementary school, who had approached him about becoming an emissary. Mumei hadn’t heard from him for years when sometime after his fifteenth birthday, his old teacher suddenly appeared on their doorstep. Yoshiro had been as surprised as Mumei; after the three had chatted a while, Yonatani had taken only Mumei out for a meal. Shown to a small room without windows in a high-class restaurant specializing in walnut cooking, they had sat and talked for three hours. Yonatani began by telling Mumei about his own childhood.

  Mr. Yonatani’s father’s, whose surname was Yonatan, had disappeared soon after his marriage. Though his mother was so attached to the name Yonatan that she wanted to keep it as her own, at a time when having non-Japanese relatives was enough to bring you under suspicion, such a foreign-sounding surname was sure to be a strike against her. She did, in fact, often feel she was being watched. She would come home to find signs of a break-in; even when nothing had been taken, the police would come round to investigate. She changed her name to Yonatani, writing it in Chinese characters, and raised the boy on her own, shielding him with her strong arms, never mentioning his father. Hearing this made Mumei notice certain things about his teacher’s face for the first time. His prominent nose descended directly from a high ridge between his eyes. His cheekbones, on the other hand, were not particularly conspicuous. He had deep set eyes, and a long, thin face, with hollow cheeks and a long jaw.

  It was during this conversation that Mumei first heard the word emissary. In hushed tones, Yonatani explained that even though it couldn’t be made public, the plan to send emissaries abroad was not so forbidden as to be considered a crime, so he shouldn’t let it scare him. People caught stowing away on ships sometimes spent several days in custody, but so far, none had actually been punished. Officially, the purpose of the isolation policy was to suppress any attempt to sway the public toward opening the country, not to place legal restrictions on individual travel. Even if this was true, however, government policy could change overnight. A person might be sentenced to life in prison next week for doing something no one would even notice today. That was why members of the “Emissary Association” Yonatani belonged to were determined to find a suitable candidate and send him or her abroad now, before the government changed its mind. This would make it possible to thoroughly research the state of Japanese children’s health, yielding information that would prove useful if similar phenomena began to appear in other countries. It was clearly necessary to think of the future along the curved lines of our round earth. The isolation policy that looked so invulnerable was actually nothing but a sand castle. You could destroy it, little by little, with those plastic shovels kids use at the beach. The Emissary Association planned to start the process as private citizens, sending promising young people overseas, one after another.

  The Emissary Association was unknown to the general public: there was no newsletter, nor did its members gather for large conferences. At most, three or four would meet at someone’s house. There were no dues or membership cards. Headquarters was on the small island of Shikoku, spread out over eighty-eight different sites, making it extremely difficult to determine the exact location. Was there a way to tell members by sight? Mumei wanted to know. No, not really, Yonatani told him. Yet there was a ritual members performed by themselves to reaffirm their sense of membership. They all got up before dawn to light a candle which they took with them when they entered the darkness before beginning their day’s work. The candle had to be exactly two inches in diameter and four inches tall.

  According to Yonatani’s explanation, at the appointed time Mumei was to go to the pier at Yokohama Port that had a sign saying “International Traveler’s Terminal.” A border patrol boat with a green stripe along its belly would be waiting for him; when a man in uniform appeared he was to show him his ticket and ask where to go. If the man said, “Board this boat for the time being,” he was to do so without hesitation. The boat would carry him out to sea, where he would be transferred to a foreign ship. Certain that of all the pupils he’d taught none was more suitable to be an emissary than Mumei, Yonatani had kept his eye on him since he had finished elementary school, asking about him, and watching him grow up from afar.

  Sure that at age fifteen Mumei was psychologically mature enough, and knowing he would soon have to breathe through a machine, which would complicate matters, Yonatani had decided to approach the boy directly. Of course he could refuse, or wait a little longer, Yonatani assured him, blue veins standing out at his temples.

  “I understand. I’ll go right away.”

  Mumei’s voice, which would never change, was high and clear.

  They agreed to meet at the same place the next day, but on the way home, thinking of his great-grandfather, Mumei’s resolve began to waver. Through the years, they had grown even closer than before. Fragments, scenes from that time he was supposed to have skipped over now came back to him. The Silver-Headed League, for instance. What would become of the Silver-Headed League if he were to leave? It must have been three years before that Mumei’s hair had lost all its color, turning a gleaming silver almost overnight.

  Looking at himself in the mirror, Mumei had said, hoping to make Yoshiro smile, “We’re like twins with hair the same color!” But Yoshiro had wept, holding his great-grandson tightly to his chest, gently stroking his head. When Mumei quickly blurted out, “Great-grandpa, let’s form a Silver-Headed League, just the two of us. Our hair will be our membership card. You’ve done just fine with silver hair for over fifty years, so I’ll be fine, too, for at least another fifty,” Yoshiro’s tears had stopped like a miracle as a silver smile flashed in the corners of his eyes.

  One day the Nemoto woman from next door had suddenly moved away, taking Suiren with her. Mumei, though still a child, had known for some time that Yoshiro was in love with her. She didn’t leave an address, nor did she contact him, not even once. Though he had looked down in the mouth for a time, Mumei vaguely remembered him saying, “Must have had to go into hiding. Special circumstances . . . It’ll be lonely without them, but I’ve still got you . . .” Yoshiro’s weary-looking
back gradually straightened up again, and the color came back to his cheeks. Mumei, too, felt empty when Suiren disappeared, as if there was a hole somewhere inside him, but, spreading his fingers, he released the despair burning the palm of his hand. Or perhaps without really understanding them, he simply accepted the special circumstances that surrounded them all like a spider’s web.

  That morning when Mumei, still in second grade, first became aware of Suiren, Yoshiro was heading for home, pushing the handlebars of his bike like the horns of a stubborn water buffalo. Having angrily thrown off its veil of thin clouds, the sun now pounded down on his forehead. Everything he saw seemed to exude pain or trouble; even innocent telegraph poles cut the sky up with meaningless vertical lines just to defy him. Some terrible mistake he had made long ago — the memory of it eluded him — kept scratching at his insides. That deadly error had landed them all in prison, and the telegraph poles were bars on the windows, telling him every morning that he would never reach the magical land beyond. How wonderful it would be to leave his grandson to his daughter, his great-grandson to his grandson, and fly there, across the sky. This was not hope, it was anger. To keep his rage from splitting his heart open, he opened his mouth and laughed as loud as he could, but even that failed to cheer him up.

  In the old days, everyone strolled across the street as soon as the traffic light changed from red to green. Back then people used to call the green light “blue.” Blue was the color of fresh vegetables, of grassy fields. Oh, and sometimes even Sundays. Not green. Blue. Azure. The color of the sea, the fields, the sky. Not green. Or clean. Green, clean. Clean politics? No, never! “Clean” means antiseptic, some chemical they use to kill off whoever they decide are no better than human germs. City Hall officials are offal, the way they skulk around, messing up laws. I’d like to scoop them up like dog shit. My great-grandson wants to have a picnic, in a field. Whose fault is it that I can’t make even a little dream like that come true, why are all the fields contaminated? And what’re you going to do about it? Wealth, prestige, none of it has the value of a single blade of grass. You hear me, listen, LISTEN, get a Q-tip, dig all those lousy excuses out of your ears, and hear me out! Yoshiro’s thoughts were interrupted by a stone that flew up from the front wheel of his bicycle to catch him in the shin. “Ouch!” On the verge of screaming “Shit, shit, shit,” he swallowed hard, forcing the words down along with his saliva, then realizing too late that Mumei wasn’t there, making it all right to spew out foul language if only he hadn’t lost the heart by that time. “How short my fuse has gotten,” he thought, “I’m covered in verbal filth.” Without Mumei in his life, everything would be stinking from all the rottenness.

  When he got home, he saw the house next door, outlined sharply against the sky. He went around to the south side, only to find all the curtains shut. He gave up and went home, where he sat down on a folding chair to work on the piece he was writing. That was when he heard the disturbing sound of wings flapping outside. Must be a carrier pigeon, he thought, getting up to open a window. Seeing a dark shadow cross the yard, he ran outside barefoot. The solar-powered carrier pigeon flew as it was programmed to, circling Yoshiro’s house three times before landing in the entrance way. The bird’s eyes, shiny as black pearls, were terrifying. He took the letter out of the small gold tube attached to its thin leg, spread it out, and read it: Mumei had fainted in class and was now being examined by the doctor.

  Fifteen-year-old Mumei saw another wheelchair, coming this way. In it sat a girl about his own age, with shining silver hair. Thinking of asking her to join the Silver-Headed League, he smiled at her, the sweetest smile he could manage. The girl stopped in front of him, blinking at him with a puzzled sort of look. He inched toward her at the speed of a snail. The nearer he got, the more deeply mysterious her face became. Her eyes were further apart than most people’s. Though probably dark, depending on the angle of the sun they could take on an azure shine. Noticing that she was looking at the area around his stomach, Mumei quickly glanced down. Nothing seemed to be out of the ordinary. Yet though he couldn’t see it, through his loose-fitting clothes he felt something like a warm ball in his lap.

  Mumei passed the girl, then immediately changed direction so that their wheelchairs were side by side, facing in the same direction. Facing each other, it seemed to him, they’d be too far away to talk.

  “It’s been a long time,” the girl said. Eh? Startled, Mumei stuck out his chin and turned his head to stare at the girl, who now had her head turned at exactly the same angle; as soon as their eyes met, he felt himself being drawn into the space between hers.

  “Are you the girl who used to live next door?”

  “You remember me?”

  “You went away so suddenly, I was wondering what happened to you.”

  “There were special circumstances.”

  There was a brief pause.

  “Do you have some time? Let’s go down to the sea.”

  Suiren nodded, and the two propelled their wheelchairs smoothly down the glass road side by side. Why was the ocean this close? Mumei wondered. Had the island of Honshu gotten this narrow? These doubts faded from his brain almost as soon as they entered it. When a steep slope appeared on their right, Mumei put on some speed, heading straight down without putting on the brake. The chair sank into the sand at the bottom, falling over, throwing Mumei out onto the beach. Breathing heavily, he shouted to the girl, still at the top of the hill, “Come on, try it!” Suiren’s wheelchair started rolling down the slope. It picked up speed, and as soon as the wheels hit the sand, Suiren threw her weight over to the side so she’d fall beside Mumei. The waves broke several times before her breathing returned to normal.

  “If I were to cross the sea, would you come with me?” asked Suiren. Mumei was too surprised to answer right away. Her brow furrowed, Suiren sighed, “I was thinking that you were as curious about the world as I am, but I guess I’m wrong. You’re scared. Well, never mind, I’ll go alone.”

  Mumei quickly blurted out, “Oh, of course I’ll go with you, but . . .”

  For the very first time, Mumei cooked up what you might call a strategy. He quickly buried the words “I was planning to go alone, too” deep in the sand. If he didn’t tell her that, Suiren might think he had made up his mind to leave his old life behind just for her.

  The hot sand smelled like seaweed, and when the moist air sticking to their skin mixed with their sweat, touching their lips, it tasted salty. The waves sounded so close, yet lifting their heads, they saw the sea was further away than they’d thought. Mumei’s consciousness traveled downward; the moment it reached his crotch, warmed from beneath by the sand, his heart stopped. Something between his legs was changing. He was turning into a woman. Sand made of bits of broken seashells stuck to Suiren’s forehead, shining in the sunlight. Was she still a girl? Or was she turning into a boy? She had the face of a beautiful woman, but these days there were plenty of boys who looked like that. Pursing her lips, raising her eyebrows ever so slightly, she gave him a come-hither look. He couldn’t hear what she was saying, but when he tried to sit up for a better look at her lips, he was held back by the sand, unable to move. Thrusting first his left shoulder out, then his right, he tried to get up. Suiren was already in a sitting position, her back straight. Her face blotted out Mumei’s sky. There was a space between her eyes. Her right eye, her left eye. They blurred, spreading out into blotches. The two big spots side by side weren’t eyes but a pair of lungs. No, not lungs, they were two huge broad beans. No, not beans, but human faces. The one on the left was Mr. Yonatani; Great-grandpa was on the right. Both faces were twisted with worry. He wanted to say, “I’m all right. I just had a really nice dream,” but his tongue wouldn’t move. If only he could smile at least, to reassure them. That’s what he was thinking when darkness, wearing a glove, reached for the back of his head to take hold of his brains, and Mumei fell into the pitch-black depths of the strait.


  * * *

  1 The Japanese word made (pronounced mah-day) means “to” or “until,” so Iwate made would mean “to Iwate.”

  2 “Buying,” coupled with “throwing” and “drinking” would normally mean “buying a prostitute”; “throwing” means “throwing dice” (i.e., gambling).

  Copyright © 2014 by Yoko Tawada

  Translation copyright © 2018 by Margaret Mitsutani

  All rights reserved. Except for brief passages quoted in a newspaper, magazine, radio, television, or website review, no part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying and recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the Publisher.

  Originally published in Japanese as Kentoshi by Kodansha

  Manufactured in the United States of America

  First published as a New Directions Paperbook in 2017

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Names: Tawada, Yōko, 1960– author. | Mitsutani, Margaret, translator.

  Title: The emissary / Yoko Tawada ; translated by Margaret Mitsutani.

  Other titles: Kentoshi. English

  Description: New York : New Directions, 2018.

  Identifiers: LCCN 2017041786 (print) | LCCN 2017048878 (ebook) | ISBN 9780811227636 | ISBN 9780811227629 (acid-free paper)

  Classification: LCC PL862.A85 (ebook) | LCC PL862.A85 K4613 2018 (print) | DDC 895.6/35—dc23

  LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017041786

  eISBN: 9780811227636

  New Directions Books are published for James Laughlin

  by New Directions Publishing Corporation

  80 Eighth Avenue, New York 10011