by Naoya Shiga
February and March passed, and with the coming of April all of Kyoto, like the flowering trees, burst into activity. The people flocked to Gion to view the cherries by night, or to Saga to view them by day; and later, when the double cherries began to bloom, to Omuro. When such annual festivities as the dance of the Gion geisha, the procession of the Shimabara geisha, and the mime of Mibu were over, and the lines of red lanterns in the streets of Gion were no more to be seen, it was already May. By the time the fresh foliage on Higashiyama had become more beautiful than the flowers, and the red-tinged leaves of the camphor trees had begun to show in gently outlined clumps behind the pagodas of Yasaka and Kiyomizu, even the citizenry of Kyoto seemed ready for a rest.
Certainly Kensaku and Naoko had had a surfeit of gaiety in celebration of the coming of spring. And it was at about this time that he learned of her pregnancy.
June and July were tolerable enough, but by August the notorious Kyoto heat had become quite intense, and in her condition Naoko was particularly affected by it. Signs of fatigue were detectable even in her plump cheeks; and occasionally Kensaku would find her sitting forlornly in the room, seemingly too tired to do anything. It was a relief to Kensaku, then, that at this time Naoko’s aged aunt should have decided to come to stay with them for a while. Large-bodied, her craggy face covered with deep wrinkles, she was a somewhat frightening woman to look at. But she turned out to be an unusually open sort of person, who began behaving with utter ease as soon as she stepped into their house. Toward Kensaku she was kind but firm, and all in all treated him as though he were a child. She was like a true aunt to him, he soon began to think, and found himself being increasingly drawn to her.
When the heat became unbearable, it occurred to Kensaku that they might go to some hot spring resort up in the mountains for two or three weeks. Having never gone to such a place in his life, he was enchanted by the prospect of doing so in the company of Naoko and this likeable old lady.
Excitedly he communicated his idea to the two women. “I wonder,” said Naoko’s aunt. “A train journey may not be good for her.”
“Surely it would still be all right?”
“No, you’re wrong. This heat won’t hurt her—after all, it’s not so terrible—but riding on a train might. Besides, constant bathing in that hot water might make the baby inside grow too fast.”
And so in the face of this opposition Kensaku had to drop his well-intentioned plan. In the meantime, however, Naoko had begun to show more liveliness in her demeanor, and the three of them passed their time together pleasantly enough. Occasionally they played cards, albeit simple, old-fashioned games. After a sojourn of about a month Naoko’s aunt went home.
With the coming of September Naoko’s condition showed much improvement. Often, late at night, when Kensaku came downstairs from his study, he would find Naoko with her big belly sitting under the electric light, sewing baby clothes.
“Isn’t it pretty,” she once said as he came into the room, pointing at a red padded vest she had just finished. She had devised a makeshift coat hanger for it by tying a string around the middle of a ruler, then hanging it on a pull on the chest of drawers. The distance between the outstretched sleeves of the vest and the floor was about what the height of a baby would be.
“Yes, it’s very pretty,” Kensaku answered, experiencing a new and joyous sensation as he imagined the tiny, living thing standing in the room. It had its back turned toward him. It had plump little buttocks—it was plump all over—and its head barely showed above the high, tucked collar of the vest.
“Do you want a boy,” he asked, “or a girl? Which really would you prefer?” He was of course asking himself the same question.
“Whichever it turns out to be,” was her reply. She put a thread through the eye of the needle, then ran the thread through her hair a time or two. Her manner was very calm and assured. “That, after all, is a matter for the gods to decide.”
Kensaku laughed. “Why, you sound just like your aunt!” No doubt, Naoko had heard her aunt saying precisely that.
Other baby clothes arrived, sewn by Naoko’s mother. And from her aunt came a large number of diapers, made out of old cotton, limp and faded from numerous washings. Naoko, who had expected to find more baby clothes in the parcel, was much embarrassed. “What does she think she’s doing, sending me these shabby things!”
“You’re being ungrateful,” said Sen. “You can never have too many diapers. Besides, these are better than the ones made out of new cloth, which would be much rougher on the baby’s skin.” Kensaku said, “I suppose these were made out of an old summer kimono of yours?” He imagined Naoko as a young girl wearing such large-patterned and coarse clothes, and was touched.
“Yes, and that’s why I’m ashamed. I hate to think that I had to wear my clothes until they got this shabby, even if I was a simple country girl.” She was clearly upset. “My aunt should have had more sense.”
“It was very thoughtful of your aunt,” Sen said. She was smiling, but her smile was not altogether friendly.
The baby was due, they were told, in late October or early November. The delivery would be at home, they decided; but if by any chance it was early and coincided with the harvest, and for this reason Naoko’s mother could not come, then it would be at the hospital. Either way, Naoko’s aunt would be present.
One sunny and pleasant morning Kensaku and Naoko went out for a walk. They cut across the fields behind their house and walked almost as far as the temple. When they returned, they found Nobuyuki waiting for them by the gate. He was smoking a cigarette; and though still in his Western clothes, he had taken his shoes off and put on a pair of their garden clogs.
“Hullo,” he said to Kensaku, giving him a quick nod. He then turned to Naoko. “As well as ever, I trust?”
“When did you come to Kyoto?” Kensaku asked. “This morning?”
“Yes. Something suddenly came up that I thought we ought to talk about.”
Kensaku led the way through the gate and into the house. Nobuyuki looked around the living room and said, “It’s a nice house, this.” He picked up the cushion Sen had put out and put it down nearer the verandah. “It concerns Oei, as a matter of fact,” he said as he sat down. “Can you spare three hundred yen or so?”
“Yes, I can.”
“Very good. We’ll send her the money right away, shall we?”
“Is she in some sort of difficulty?” Kensaku understood why Oei would now want to go to Nobuyuki for help and not him, but he felt a little slighted nonetheless.
“It turned out that Osai—that’s her name, isn’t it?—had no interest whatsoever in Oei’s welfare. You were quite right about that woman. Anyway, Oei left Tientsin in June—she didn’t tell you that, I gather—and lived in Mukden for a while, then moved to Dairen. She’s there now.”
“What’s she doing there?”
“Nothing. She lives in rooms above a seal maker’s shop, and has some young girl from the neighborhood coming in daily to help her with the chores. She says she was managing all right until burglars broke in about a fortnight ago and took just about everything she owned.”
“When did she tell you all this?”
“In a letter I got from her the day before yesterday.”
Unable to contain himself any longer Kensaku cried out, “What an idiot she is! Why didn’t she come home at once?”
“I feel as you do. But she apparently owes the seal maker some money, and besides, she hasn’t any money for the fare. I thought three hundred yen would probably cover her debt and the fare, but unfortunately, I haven’t a penny right now. I could have borrowed from father, but I really didn’t want to tell him about Oei. Of course, I haven’t come all this way just to discuss Oei’s plight with you. The rectory of our temple is in need of repair, and I’m going around trying to collect money for it.” Nobuyuki then mentioned a certain abbot in Kyoto. “Is it true that he’s a painter?” he asked.
“I suppose so. All I can tell y
ou is that I’ve seen his things for sale at the Shirokiya Department Store.”
“I’m told they fetch very high prices. Anyway, our rector thought he might give us a half dozen or so of his things in lieu of a cash contribution, and asked me to go and see him. That’s another reason why I decided to come down so suddenly.”
“I trust Oei has no other worries besides money?”
“Well, she did say she had the ague. By that I suppose she meant malaria. I never realized you could get malaria in that part of the world.”
“I should imagine you could get it anywhere. But it’s not a particularly dangerous disease, is it?”
“She says it’s not all that serious. Oh yes, she did say that it was the indirect cause of the burglary. She had taken her medicine at the wrong time, as a result had had a very bad attack of the fever, and was lying in bed exhausted and in a near-delirious state when she saw two Chinese coming in through the window. It was night, but she had left it open, you see, because of the heat. In the corner of the room were three trunks containing those kimonos for the geisha that she collected in Tokyo, and these the burglars took away. She was obviously hoping to start up another business, you know, with the kimonos as her capital. So she watched the two men carrying her trunks out of the window, thinking they must be burglars. But she was too exhausted to do or say anything, and simply fell asleep.”
“Well, one misfortune leads to another, as they say,” Kensaku said lightly. With the realization that he would soon be seeing Oei again, his mood had suddenly become quite cheerful. “But if she comes back immediately, her misfortunes will have been a blessing in disguise.”
“Perhaps so,” said Nobuyuki, grinning back at Kensaku. Kensaku had never approved of Oei’s going to China. If she had not known this in the beginning, it was because Nobuyuki, in reporting his thoughts to her, had not been entirely candid. He felt quite smug now, and if Oei had appeared at that very moment, his first words of welcome would have been, “See, what did I tell you?” The next day Nobuyuki, having finished his business in Kyoto, left for Osaka where also he was to see some potential donors. He then returned to Kinugasamura to spend another night with Kensaku and Naoko.
“How about a contribution from you two,” he said the following morning, pulling a notebook out of his imposing briefcase. The pages, Kensaku noticed, were of stout, high-quality Japanese paper; it was bound with what looked like cloth from a priest’s surplice.
Kensaku picked it up and looked at the entries. “Two hundred yen, two hundred and fifty yen, thirty yen, ten yen, five hundred yen—I say, people are generous. And I see here an entry for one hundred and fifty yen under your name. Am I correct?”
“Yes, yes, but I haven’t given it yet, you understand. I couldn’t, you know.”
“Do you mean to say you can put your name down for an amount like that and not have to pay up?”
Nobuyuki laughed. “Hardly. Of course I shall give them the money sometime.”
Naoko said, “Forgive me, but will a little sum be acceptable?”
“Yes, indeed. Two yen, three yen, it doesn’t matter how little.”
“Really? In that case, I’ll contribute five yen.”
“That’s very nice of you,” Nobuyuki said. “Will you please write your name down in the book?”
Naoko stood up and went to fetch the ink box lying on top of the chest of drawers. As she sat down, she said to Kensaku, “And you?”
“Your contribution will be enough,” Kensaku answered. “I’m entirely in favor of maintaining temples, but I’m against the idea of my contributing toward their support. That’s the job of the government. They ought to be more responsible about such things.”
“Aren’t you being a little inconsistent?” said Naoko.
“Not at all. But all right, if the amount doesn’t matter, put me down for ten yen.”
Kensaku’s handwriting was atrocious; and when he wrote with a brush, even he was appalled by the result. Naoko’s handwriting was very much better, so that he had got into the habit of asking her to write whenever the brush was required.
“Thank you very much,” Nobuyuki said, and when the ink had dried, put away the notebook in his briefcase.
In the evening Kensaku and Naoko took Nobuyuki for a walk around Teramachi and Shinkyōgoku, then later accompanied him to Shichijō Station, where he caught the train to Kamakura.
17
On a certain day in late October Kensaku, Suematsu, Mizutani, and a friend of Mizutani’s named Kuze went to Kurama to see the fire festival. At sunset they walked northward from the edge of Kyoto along a road that went gradually uphill. They had walked perhaps eight miles when they saw a red glow in one of the mountain valleys, still far from where they were. They could see, too, a veil of smoke hanging over the valley and its environs. The mountain air, scented with moss, became chillier as they proceeded; and Kensaku began to wonder how it was that a nighttime festival should ever have come to be held in such a remote place. There were others on the road—men, women, and children—all carrying lanterns. Occasionally an automobile would pass them, sending shafts of bright light into the woods and mountainsides ahead. From the mountains night herons flew toward them, uttering their sharp cries. Then, as they approached Kurama, they became aware of the smell of smoke lingering in the air.
In front of every house along the street a small wood fire was burning. Each fire was surrounded on three sides by large tree roots and logs the size of a grown man. Because the street was narrow, the fires in front of the houses looked like a continuous line of flickering flames right down the middle of it. They were an eerie sight, like cave fires in ancient times.
The street led into a fairly open area on one side of which was a flight of wide stone steps. On top of the steps was a great red-lacquered gate. In this open area, surrounded by enthralled spectators, were young men carrying huge torches made of brushwood tied together with wisteria vine. They wore loincloths, leggings and straw sandals, and skimpy protective coverings on their shoulders and the backs of their hands. “Chōsa, yōsa!” they shouted to each other as they moved, or danced, heavily yet skillfully under the weight. Some would pretend to totter, bringing the torches dangerously close to the spectators, and some would go under the eaves of the houses, then come away before any damage was done. When the flame got weaker, or the shoulder too painful, one young man would suddenly let his torch, which was an armful in girth, fall to the ground. A vine band would snap, the brushwood open up, and the flame revive. The young man, wiping the sweat off his face and breathing deeply, would then bend down, and with the aid of someone standing by, pick it up and place it on his other shoulder.
The torch carriers now left the open area and went into the street on the other side. Here there was no line of fires. “Chōsa, yōsa!” cried the young men to one another as they staggered back and forth in the narrow space. Children, carrying appropriately smaller torches, mingled with the young men and imitated their stagger. There was a thin mist of smoke everywhere in the town; and the mountain air, so chilly earlier, had become pleasantly warm.
It was a moving experience for Kensaku to watch this fire festival under the clear, star-filled autumn sky. Behind the single row of low-roofed houses ran a deep mountain torrent; and all around him were high mountains, whose stillness in the night seemed to mute even the noises of the festival. Kensaku had never seen such a festival as this; all he had seen before were those raucous affairs in the city. Here, all the participants seemed so serious. There was not a drunk to be seen, despite the fact that it was an all-male festival, and the only ones who raised their voices were the young men crying, “Chōsa, yōsa!”
In the middle of a small, fast-flowing brook under the eaves a young man sat chanting some wordy prayer, his eyes closed, his hands placed together before him. The pure, icy-looking water dashed against his chest and swirled past him. By the brook, waiting for him to come out, were a girl holding a strangely dim lantern with a crest on it and a woman h
olding out with both hands a plain-colored, hemp kimono. At last the prayer was over. As the man stood up and stepped into the clogs lying on the ground beside him, the woman silently draped the kimono over his wet body. Without waiting for the girl to precede him with the lantern, the man shuffled into the dark, earth-floored entrance hall of a nearby house. Kensaku and his companions learned that he was one of the men who would carry the portable shrine down the hill.
Soon afterward these men gathered together at the foot of the stone steps in the open area. On either side of the steps stood a thick bamboo pole, and stretched between the poles was a rope. The rule was that until this rope had been severed by fire from the torches, no one could go up the steps. But it was more than twenty feet from the ground, and even when the torches were held upright the flames by no means went near it. A great number of torches were gathered under the rope, and their flames, like a great bonfire, lighted the upturned faces of the expectant crowd.
At last the rope caught fire, then split in two, scattering sparks through the air. Immediately a man brandishing a naked sword rushed up the steps. With a roar the crowd ran up after him. Stretched across the open gate was another rope, placed lower than the first, a little above a man’s height. The man ran under this, holding up his sword. The rope cut easily, allowing the crowd to go through the gate and run farther up the hill toward the inner shrine.
Kensaku turned to Suematsu and said, “Shall we go home now?”
“Let’s wait and see the dance of the fires around the portable shrine.”
At the first stop of the procession of the portable shrine, men carrying even larger torches than those already seen—each required four or five men to carry it—were to dance around the shrine to the festival music.
“We have a pretty good idea of what that’s going to be like,” said Kensaku. “Don’t forget, we’re going to the recital tomorrow, and we’ve got to get some sleep before then.”