Pathway to Japanese Literature

One afternoon “The view from up high—Ah— (coughing) truly exceptional, that is.” In one hand he carried a Western umbrella; in the other, a folding fan and Japanese hand towel. His cleanly shaven head bore a pith helmet that resembled a cork stoppering a bottle—this old man walked briskly past Shun’s side, having tossed out his remark. Without so much as a glance backward, his gaze still fixed on the distant panorama, he settled onto the bench at the stone wall’s edge with a world-weary sigh.—

For about two *ri* after leaving the town, the land remained a flat stretch of green. The deep indigo of I Bay spreads out beyond that. A cumulonimbus cloud with blurred edges and an indistinct overall form lies quietly above the horizon.—

“Ah, yes, indeed.” The aftertaste of his own voice from when he had answered somewhat falteringly still seemed to linger in his throat and ears, leaving him with a sense that the self from that moment and his current self felt strangely mismatched. With the goodwill toward that old man—who seemed to hold no particular attachment—still etched into his cheek, Shun was once again drawn back into the quiet vista from before. —A breeze blew. It was afternoon.

Partly out of a youthful sentiment—a desire to calmly reflect on his sister who had died in her prime—Shun had left home before the thirty-fifth-day memorial and come to stay at his elder sister’s house in this town. In his daze, until he realized it was another child’s crying, it had felt like his deceased sister’s voice.

"Who was it? Making a child cry in this heat..." He found himself even thinking such things. Compared to when she had passed away or at the crematorium, the sensation of loss etched itself more deeply through these experiences in unfamiliar surroundings. It was only after coming here that the anguish surrounding her death—like when he had written to a friend about insects mourning their dying kin—began feeling veiled behind a thin gauze. As these thoughts settled and his heart acclimated to the new environment, an uncharacteristic calm gradually came over Shun. Accustomed always to city life and recent mental exhaustion, he grew reverent within this stillness. He walked with deliberate care to minimize fatigue. He resolved not to let thorns prick him. He vowed not to lose fingers. The slightest things could sway a day’s fortune. —Such superstition-tinged notions arose. Even that drought-plagued summer saw rains come once, then twice, each shower leaving traces of autumn against his skin.

The tranquility of his mind and the faint harbingers of autumn did not keep him confined to the books and delusions within his room. Setting grass, insects, clouds, and scenery before his eyes to ignite the heart he had secretly suppressed—to Shun, that alone seemed like a worthwhile endeavor.

"There are castle ruins near our house that should be perfect for Shun's walks." Such words were written in the letter Elder Sister had sent to his mother. The night after arriving, Shun, his brother-in-law, elder sister, and her daughter—the four of them—climbed these castle ruins for the first time. Due to the drought, rice planthoppers had swarmed the paddies and were being exterminated with insecticide lamps. Having heard this would only last two or three more days, they had gone to witness it. The plain stretched as a sea of insecticide lamps to every horizon. In the distance they twinkled like stars. Mountain passes glowed faintly, some streaming light like great rivers. He grew exhilarated at this extraordinary sight, tears brimming in his eyes. On that windless night, the castle ruins bustled with townspeople come to cool themselves and watch. From the darkness emerged town girls with thick white powder on their faces, eyes glittering with excitement.

Now, the sky was clear to the point of sorrow. And beneath it, the town spread out its rows of tile-roofed buildings.

A white-plastered elementary school stood. A bank built in the traditional storehouse style stood. A temple roof rose. And here and there, like wood shavings packed between Western pastries, green plants were sprouting from between the houses. Behind a certain house, banana leaves hung down. The curled-up leaves of Japanese cedars were visible. Pine trees pruned into shapes resembling layered cotton were visible. All of them, with their darkened lower leaves and new young foliage, formed a lush green mass. In the distance, a red postbox was visible. A baby carriage labeled something-or-other and a roof painted white with paint were visible.

A board stretched with red cloth catching the sun was visible, small between the roof tiles.—

When night fell, village youths who had come by bicycle would ride in large groups down the illuminated main street toward the pleasure quarters. The young shopworkers too, clad in yukata, would contort their bodies in ways utterly different from how they appeared by day as they teased women caked in white powder.—Even that part of town now lay wedged between roof tiles, the many banners erected there allowing one to just discern the presence of a theater. Blocking the western sun, an inn—its first, second, and third floors all having their west-facing windows completely covered with sunshades—appeared somewhat nearby. From somewhere came the sound of wood being struck—a noise that hadn’t been particularly loud to begin with—but now it echoed through the town’s air: "Clang, clang."

The tsukutsukuboushi cicadas cried one after another without pause. "It seems like they're conjugating verb endings grammatically." Having suddenly thought this, he found his interest strangely kindled as he listened. They would start with a "Chuk-chuk-chuk," then repeat "O-shi, chuk-chuk"—before long switching to "Chuk-chuk, O-shi" or reverting to "O-shi, chuk-chuk," until finally becoming "Suttokochiyo! Suttokochiyo!" before ending with a drawn-out "Zee" and falling silent. Midway through, one starting with "Chuk-chuk" would emerge from the side. Then another would finish its "Suttokochiyo!" and begin transitioning into a drawn-out "Zee." They cried overlapping threefold, fourfold, even fivefold and sixfold.

The other day, Shun had seen a tsukutsukuboushi cicada singing on a cherry tree at the shrine within these castle ruins from just about a foot away. He watched in amazement at how such a small insect—with its delicate frame and thin wings like soap bubbles—could produce such a high-pitched sound. If one were to say what was related to that high-pitched sound, it was solely the expansion and contraction from its abdomen to tail. The densely downy, segmented part moved with the precision of an engine component.—He could recall its appearance at that moment. A firm bulge running from abdomen to tail. A stretch and contraction as if bursting with force into every corner.—And suddenly, he was struck by the thought that a single cicada was an immeasurably precious creature.

From time to time, people would come—much like the old man from earlier—to cool themselves, gaze at the scenery, then rise and depart. The person whom Shun often saw when coming here—the one who would nap in the pavilion or gaze at the sea—had come again, and today was talking amiably with a nursemaid. Children holding cicada-catching poles darted here and there. The child made to carry the insect cage would periodically stop to peer inside it, then glance toward the pole before scurrying after. They didn’t speak a word, yet there was a strangely theatrical amusement to it all.

Over there, girls were catching rice-pounding grasshoppers and making them pound rice while chanting, “Mr. Negi, pound the rice, so-and-so and such.” Negi-san was what this region’s dialect called a Shinto priest. Shun pictured a grasshopper with a benevolent, elongated face tipped with two short antennae—which, when considered this way, did indeed resemble a Shinto priest—yet the image of it being held by its hind legs by the girls and helplessly pounding rice struck him as oddly carefree.

Through the grass where the girls gave chase, grasshoppers—stretching out their two legs, wings filled with sunlight—burst forth in numbers.

Here and there stood chimneys belching smoke, and from around them the fields spread out. Landscapes reminiscent of Rembrandt’s sketches were scattered about.

Shadowy grove. Farmhouses. Highway. And within the green rice fields, a brick chimney of faded russet. A small narrow-gauge train came from the direction of the sea. The wind rising from the sea sent the narrow-gauge train’s smoke billowing landward, in the direction of its travel. As he watched, it appeared not as smoke but rather like a toy train racing along with the smoke’s form frozen in reverse. With a rustling whisper, the sunlight dimmed. The landscape's hue visibly transformed before his eyes.

In the distance, along the coast, an inlet angled inward was visible. —Shun had developed a habit of gazing at that inlet countless times whenever he climbed up to these castle ruins.

For a coastline, large trees grew in dense clusters here and there. In their shade, the roofs of houses peeked out ever so slightly. And in the inlet, boats seemed to be moored side by side.

It was simply that—nothing more than a view. There was nowhere in particular that stood out as especially captivating. And yet, his heart was strangely drawn to it. There was something. There really was something there. If he were to put that feeling into words, it would already turn into something too abstract. Suppose I were to name that feeling—this baseless, faint longing—as such a sentiment. If someone had asked him, "Isn't that right?" he might have agreed with that naming. But he himself felt that there was "still something more."

It seemed like a place where people of a different race lived, leading lives apart from this world.—Yet even so, there was something about it that felt too much like a fairy tale—a quality that didn’t quite fit.

He also wondered if it might be because he couldn’t recall a foreign painting that had depicted a place resembling that over there. In that, he was recalling one of Constable’s paintings. No, that still wasn’t it. What on earth was it, then? This panoramic vista imparted a kind of beauty to everything it encompassed. But the inlet’s vista surpassed even that. Yet precisely there, it pulsated with life. That was how it seemed to him.—

On days when the sky cleared into an autumnal blue, the sea appeared a deep blue slightly warmer than that azure. When white clouds hung above, the sea too shone white. Today, the earlier cumulonimbus cloud had spread across the horizon with the hue of a pomelo’s inner rind, and even up close to the inlet’s edge, the sea mirrored that color. Today too, the inlet lay veiled in its customary mystery, calm and still.

As he gazed, he felt the same urge—as if a beast wanted to emit a mournful growl from the castle’s edge. It struck him as something so peculiar it felt suffocating.

In his dream, he had gone to a strange place and was thinking he felt sure he had been there before. In much the same way as that feeling, elusive memories began to well up.

“Ah, such a day, such a moment.” “Ah, such a day, such a moment.” Words he couldn’t tell when he had readied fluttered and flickered through his mind.— “Hurricane Hutch’s motorcycle!”

“Hurricane Hutch’s motorcycle!”

The same girlish voices from earlier continued to ring out loudly one after another beneath Shun’s feet. The roar of a motorcycle that seemed to be passing along Marunouchi Street could be heard.

It was the hour when a certain doctor from this town would ride it home. Whenever they heard that roar, the girls living near Shun’s house would vie with each other to shout, “Hurricane Hutch’s motorcycle!” “Autoba!” shouted some of the children.

The three-story inn removed its sunshade at some point. The red drying boards of the distant clothes-drying platform could no longer be found.

From the town's roofs—smoke. From the distant mountains—evening cicadas.

Magic Tricks and Fireworks

This was another day.

After finishing dinner and his bath, Shun climbed up to the castle. Against the twilight sky, fireworks could occasionally be seen going off in a city several miles away. When he noticed, a muffled sound—as if wrapped in cotton—faintly reached his ears. Because they were so distant, their reports arrived at hollow intervals. He thought he was seeing something wonderful.

Just then, a trio of boys led by one about seventeen arrived. This too seemed to be their post-dinner cool-off. They were talking quietly, perhaps out of consideration for Shun.

Since he felt too awkward to tell them verbally, he deliberately pretended to be intently watching the direction from which the fireworks rose. In the distant panorama, the fireworks glowed and vanished with the luminous clarity of jellyfish made of starlight. The sea was nearing dusk, but that direction still retained some brightness. After a while, the boys noticed it too. He felt a surge of inward joy. “Forty-nine.” “Ah. Forty-nine.”

As they exchanged such remarks, they counted the time between one firework’s ascent and the next. He was half-listening to their conversation. “X-chan. Flowers—” “Flora.” The oldest one answered readily—

As he was recalling what had happened at the castle, he headed back home. When he neared the house, a neighbor spotted Shun’s face. And then hurriedly— "He’s come back now, he has!" the neighbor called into the house. They had been saying they might go see the magic show at a certain theater, but when Shun abruptly left, they were thrown into disarray.

“Ah... thanks,” the brother-in-law said with a laugh,

“If you say it straight out, it won’t do,” he had his elder sister shoulder the remark. Elder sister also laughed as she began taking out clothes. While he had been at the castle, both his elder sister and Nobuko (brother-in-law’s sister) had applied heavy makeup.

The elder sister turned to her brother-in-law. "What about your folding fan?" "It's in the travel bag, but..." "That's right... That one's gotten dirty too..." As the elder sister nodded understandingly and began slowly searching for it, the brother-in-law—who had been smoking his tobacco with a sizzling sound— "Something like a folding fan doesn't matter at all. "Hurry up and get ready," he said, fussing with his clogged pipe.

In the back room, the mother-in-law who had been helping Nobuko with her preparations said, “How about these?” gathering two or three uchiwa fans and bringing them over. These were uchiwa fans distributed by sugar shops and such.

While watching his elder sister deftly handle various garments, he wondered about Nobuko’s state of mind and the manner in which she was dressing, letting his thoughts drift toward the faint signs of activity from the back room. When the preparations were finally ready, Shun went down first and put on his geta. “Katsuko—your sister’s daughter—is around here somewhere. Go call her,” said the mother-in-law. Katsuko, wearing long-sleeved clothes and mingling among the neighborhood children, continued arguing about something even as she was being summoned.

“I’m going to the place called ‘Ka’!” “It’s ‘katsudō’!” “Katsudō! Katsudō!” two or three girls chanted. “No,” Katsuko shook her head. “I’m going to the place called ‘Yo’!” they started up again. “Youchien?” “How mean! We don’t go to kindergarten in the evening.” The brother-in-law came out.

“Hurry up and come out now! We’ll leave without ya!” Elder sister and Nobuco emerged from the house. Their faces—thickly powdered with white makeup—seemed to float in the evening dimness. Each carried one of the uchiwa fans from earlier. “Apologies for making you wait,” said Elder Sister first addressing the group before turning specifically: “Katsuko.” Then more pointedly: “Katsuko—do you have your fan?” The girl flashed her small folding fan briefly before lunging toward her mother’s sleeves. “Well then... Mother,” Elder Sister formally addressed her mother-in-law at last.

When Elder Sister said that,

“Katsuko, you shouldn’t keep saying ‘Let’s go home’ over and over,” the mother-in-law said to Katsuko. “You shouldn’t say that either.” Instead of replying, Katsuko mimicked their words and slipped her hand into Shun’s. Then Shun took her hand and began walking.

The neighbors who had set out cooling platforms along the main street called out “Good evening, good evening” as they passed by.

“Katchan. What do they call this place?” he asked. “Shōsenkaku!” “Chōsenkaku?” “Nuh-uh, Shōsenkaku.” “Chōsenkaku?” “Shō—sen—kaku.” “Chō—sen—kaku?” “Yeah,” she said, smacking his hand.

After a while, Katsuko started saying, “Shōsenkaku.” “Chōsenkaku,” he responded. As if proclaiming herself the contrarian one, she mimicked him with flawless precision until it became a game. In the end, even when he switched to saying “Matsusenkaku,” Katsuko kept repeating “Chōsenkaku” without realizing it. Nobuko noticed this and burst out laughing. When they laughed at her, Katsuko pouted in protest.

“Katsuko,” the brother-in-law said when his turn came. “It’s not wrong at all—it’s wabbit!” “Nuh-uh,” Snorting, Katsuko pretended to hit her brother-in-law. The brother-in-law pretended not to notice.

“It’s not wrong at all—it’s wabbit!” “What was that all about?” “Katsuko.” “Why don’tcha tell Shun once?” As she began sniffling tearfully, Nobuko took her hand and started walking. “So… what were ya gonna say after that?” “So you were gonna say this ain’t bracken after all, huh?” Nobuko had defended her so insistently. “Just who’d ya go sayin’ that to anyway?” This time he was half asking Nobuko.

“It was Mr. Yoshimine’s uncle, you know.” Nobuko peered into Katsuko’s face while laughing.

“There’s more, ya know. “Another whopper of one!” When Brother-in-Law said that in a mock-threatening tone, Elder Sister and Nobuko both burst into laughter. Katsuko was on the verge of bursting into proper tears.

A large electric lamp was attached to the stone wall of the castle ruins, shining brilliantly on the trees behind. The trees in front, by contrast, were cast in deep black shadows. In that direction, a cicada chirred repeatedly.

He was walking alone at the back. Since coming to this area, tonight marked the first time he had gone out walking together like this. He went out walking with young women. That too, in his experience, was an extremely rare occurrence. He was somehow happy. In her manner of interacting with his elder sister—who had a slightly selfish streak—there was no trace of strain; it wasn’t something she managed skillfully, but rather a peaceful disposition inherent from birth. Nobuko was that kind of girl.

When told by her devout mother-in-law and others to have the Tenrikyo deity pray for her, she obediently complied. It had been an injury to her finger that made her stop playing her renowned koto. She made plant specimens for school. When going to town on errands, she would gather weeds into her furoshiki cloth and bring them back. Because Katsuko wanted some too, she would share portions with her before working diligently on her own. Katsuko pulled out her photo album and brought it to him. Without any hint of awkwardness, she answered his questions calmly and clearly. Nobuko possessed such endearing qualities.

Now, walking ahead of him while holding Katsuko’s hand, Nobuko looked entirely different from how she appeared at home wearing clothes with raised shoulder seams and legs sticking out awkwardly—here, she seemed grown-up. The elder sister walked beside her. He thought his elder sister had become slightly thinner than before and that her way of walking had improved somewhat.

“Come now—you.” “Walk up front...”

The elder sister suddenly turned around and said to him.

“Why?” He could have understood without being asked given his previous state of mind, but he deliberately played dumb. And he laughed in spite of himself. Having laughed like that, he could no longer continue walking from behind.

“Hurry.” “I feel sick.” “Right?” “Right, Nobu-chan?”

"......" Laughing, Nobuko also nodded.

The inside of the theater was as stuffy as expected.

Perhaps what they called a water attendant—an elderly woman with her hair tied in a ginkgo-bun style—carried a number of zabuton cushions and clattered ahead to spread them out. At the very back of the flat seating area, Shun took the left end, the elder sister came to the middle, Nobuko the right end, and Brother-in-Law sat at the rear. It was exactly during intermission, and the lower floor was about seventy percent full. The woman from earlier brought a tobacco tray. The coals had been banked—an inconsiderate gesture given the heat. She lingered without leaving. Wearing that sly expression characteristic of women of her sort and not knowing what to say, she kept darting her eyes about. She indicated the brazier with her gaze one moment and looked away the next while stealing glances at Brother-in-Law’s face. Though certain she knew he was watching him—all while fumbling with silver coins from his wallet inside his sleeve—he grew irritated at her rudeness.

Brother-in-Law had settled into composure, seeming utterly unfazed.

“Oh, the brazier!” The attendant blurted this out restlessly and, while busily rubbing her hands together, looked away again. Finally, he produced the silver coins, and the attendant left.

At last, the curtain rose. A man who didn’t look Japanese, his skin slightly darkened, carried props unenthusiastically and occasionally stared intently at the audience. His manner was careless and unamusing. When that was done, an Indian with a suspicious-sounding name came out wearing a shabby frock coat. He spoke in some incomprehensible language. Saliva sprayed forth as he spoke; white froth gathered at both ends of pallid lips. “What did he say?” The elder sister asked him so insistently. Then the neighboring stranger also looked at his face. He was exasperated.

The Indian descended from his seat and scanned the crowd for a participant. A man, his arm still gripped, wore an awkward, bashful smile. The man was finally led to the stage. His hair hung down over his forehead, a yukata with faded starch clinging to his frame, black tabi socks on despite the sweltering heat. He stood there grinning until the same man from before brought a chair and forced him to sit. The Indian was vicious. He offered his hand for a shake. The man hesitated but steeled himself and reached out. Then the Indian yanked his own hand back, turned to the audience, and grotesquely mimicked the man’s gesture—hunching his neck like a turtle as he jeered. It was grotesque. The man glanced between the Indian and his original seat, laughing with precarious levity. A laugh freighted with unspoken meaning. He must have a child or a wife waiting. Unbearable. Shun thought.

The handshake turned discourteous, and the Indian's pranks grew increasingly malicious. The spectators laughed every time. Then the magic tricks began. There was a string trick that stayed connected even when cut. A metal bottle trick produced endless water—an utterly mundane trick that left fewer items on the glass-topped table. An apple still remained. This being a trick where eating an apple would make fire spit from one's mouth using a piece of the fruit, that man was forced to try it. Because he had eaten it skin and all, this too drew laughter.

Every time the Indian laughed in that absurd, indescribable way, Shun wondered why that man didn’t do something about it. And he himself grew quite uncomfortable. Then, suddenly, he found himself recalling the fireworks from earlier.

“Are the fireworks from earlier still going off?” The thought came to him. Across the twilight plain, fireworks from a distant town pulsed like star-jellyfish - glowing bright only to vanish. The panorama of sea, clouds and open land appeared profoundly beautiful.

“Flower,” “Flora.” She certainly hadn’t said “Flower.” Both that child and that panorama—they seemed like a splendid magic trick that no magician could rival. Such things gradually washed away his discomfort. By his usual habit, he tried to view the unpleasant scene with detachment—doing so made it conversely appear amusing—and that feeling was beginning to take hold.

He thought his earlier self—the one who had gotten angry at a lowly clown all alone—now seemed slightly ridiculous. On stage, the Indian was blowing fire vigorously from his mouth within an atmosphere identical to the poster art. There even appeared an eerie beauty to it.

When it finally ended, the curtain fell.

“That was so fun!” Katsuko said, sounding almost like she was lying, her words tacked on unnaturally. The way she said it was so amusing that everyone laughed.— The Levitation of a Beauty. Feat of Strength. Operetta. Asakusa Mood. Beauty Bisection. With such a program, they returned home late.

Illness.

Elder sister had fallen ill. Her abdomen ached, and she was running a high fever. Shun thought it might be typhoid fever. At her bedside, brother-in-law

“Maybe I should send for the doctor,” he was saying. “Well, it’s probably fine.” “It might just be a stomach bug.” And then, without directing her words to either Shun or her brother-in-law, “Even though it was so hot yesterday, I didn’t sweat at all on the walk home,” she said weakly. The afternoon of the day before, they had seen her returning from afar with a slightly troubled expression, and from the window, he and Katsuko had playfully teased her in unison.

“Katsuko, who’s that person over there?” “Oh! It’s Mommy! It’s Mommy!” “It’s Mommy!”

“No way! “It’s someone else’s aunt.” “Go take a look.” “She won’t come into the house.”

Shun recalled the face from that time. That something had been slightly off was indeed slightly off. Seeing the family members he was so accustomed to observing only within the house suddenly from an outsider’s perspective in the street—Shun had thought it was due to that rare feeling, but there also seemed to be a certain lack of vigor. The doctor came and, just as suspected, said there was a possibility of typhoid fever before leaving. Shun exchanged troubled looks with his brother-in-law downstairs. A pained smile was etched on his brother-in-law’s face.

It was found to be kidney trouble. The doctor explained that due to her tongue’s coating, he couldn’t conclusively diagnose it as typhoid either, then left briskly.

"Since coming to this house as a bride, this makes the second time I’ve been bedridden with illness," Elder Sister said. “Once in Kitamuro—” “That time was rough,” she said. “No ice nearby, see? Around two in the morning, I rode my bicycle four ri down the road—woke ’em up to buy some. That part went alright.” “Wrapped it in a wrapping cloth and tied it behind the saddle. But when I got back, it’d rubbed away till there was barely this much left.”

Brother-in-law demonstrated with that hand gesture. Even regarding Elder Sister’s fever chart—true to Brother-in-Law’s nature of attempting to create something precise with measurements every two hours—the story carried his characteristic flair, and Shun found himself laughing despite himself. “What about that time?” “I’d boiled out the stomach bug by then.” In part due to Shun’s own undisciplined lifestyle, he had once developed lung trouble. At that time, his brother-in-law had made a pilgrimage in Kitamuro praying for his illness to heal. When the illness had somewhat improved, Shun had once gone to that house in Kitamuro. It was a cold mountain village where the villagers were farmers and woodcutters who also engaged in sericulture. When winter came, wild boars would dig for potatoes in the fields near the house. Potatoes had become a staple food for half the farmers. At that time, Katsuko had still been small. A neighborhood granny would come over and, while looking at Katsuko’s picture book, expound on things—calling elephants “trunk-wrapped elephants” and monkeys “mountain lads” or “monkey lads.” When he asked about a child said to have no surname, the villagers replied it was because he was a woodcutter’s child, as if this were perfectly natural. At the elementary school, there had been a teacher named Kaoru—the village headman’s daughter—whom the students addressed dismissively by her given name. She had still been around sixteen or seventeen years old.—

Kitamuro was such a place. Shun found himself interested in the brother-in-law’s stories about Kitamuro. When they were in Kitamuro，Katsuko had fallen into the river. That story emerged from the brother-in-law’s lips.

It was when Brother-in-Law was bedridden with cardiac beriberi. The grandmother, over seventy—Brother-in-Law’s grandmother and Katsuko’s great-grandmother—took Katsuko to the river to rinse bowls. The river ran swift there, narrow but deceptively deep. Though Brother-in-Law always told her to leave Katsuko be, whenever Elder Sister was away, Grandmother would insist on carrying the child. That day too, Elder Sister had gone out. “Ah—she’s left again,” he thought from his sickbed. Then came an odd cry. Before he knew it, Brother-in-Law—still gravely ill—found himself rising as if drawn by strings. The river lay just steps away. When he looked, Grandmother stood making a twisted face. “Katsuko—” she managed, straining to speak further but choking on the words.

“Grandma! What’s happened to Katsuko?!” “...” Her fingertips alone frantically conveyed it.

He could see Katsuko being swept away down the river! The river had swollen with rainwater just after the downpour. Ahead stood a stone bridge, the water nearly level with its slabs. Beyond that lay a bend in the river where whirlpools always formed. The river curved there into a deep, swamp-like area. Had she struck her head on the bridge or bend, or been swept into that swamp to sink, there would have been no saving her.

Brother-in-law suddenly plunged into the river and gave chase. He meant to catch her before reaching the bridge. He was ill. Still, he somehow managed to seize her just short of the bridge. But the current proved too fierce—even mustering all his strength, climbing onto the bridge remained impossible. The narrow gap between stone slab and water barely accommodated Katsuko’s head. Holding her aloft, Brother-in-law ducked beneath the surface and finally clambered out downstream. Katsuko lay utterly limp. She didn’t spew water even when flipped over. Frantic, Brother-in-law kept calling her name as he pounded her back.

Katsuko came to as if nothing had happened. No sooner had she come to her senses than she stood up and began dancing around. Brother-in-Law felt as if he’d been fooled, and it all felt rather odd.

“What happened to this dress?” he asked, tugging at her wet clothes, but she just said, “Dunno.” When her foot slipped, she had fainted, so it seemed she hadn’t actually drowned.

And then, would you believe it, she was dancing with her usual expression.—

The gist of Brother-in-Law’s story was something like this. Because it had been just when the neighboring farmhouses were taking their midday naps, he also said how dangerous it would have been if he hadn’t gotten up then. Both the speaker and listener were drawn in, and when Brother-in-Law fell silent, everything became quiet.

“When I came back, Grandma and three others were waiting at the gate,” Elder Sister said. “She just couldn’t stay put in the house, y’see,” said Brother-in-Law. “Kept changin’ into her kimono and sayin’ she was waitin’ for Mama.” “It was after that when Grandma started goin’ senile,” Elder Sister murmured, lowering her voice as she fixed a meaningful look on Brother-in-Law.

“After that happened, Grandma started gettin’ a bit soft in the head, y’know. “Even years later, she’d point at you here”—he gestured toward Elder Sister—“and keep mutterin’, ‘Ain’t right by Yoshian, ain’t right by Yoshian,’ I tell ya.”

“Oh Grandma… how could such a thing ever happen? I kept telling you that,”

After that, Grandmother visibly declined into senility and died about a year later.

To Shun, his grandmother’s fate felt somehow cruel. That it had happened not in her hometown but deep in the Kitamuro mountains—where she had gone intending to watch over Katsuko—made that feeling all the more profound. Shun had visited Kitamuro before that incident occurred. Grandmother would often confuse Katsuko’s name with Nobuko’s—who by then should have already been attending girls’ school. Nobuko had been here with her mother and others at the time. To Shun, who did not yet know Nobuko, each time Grandmother mixed up their names, a fourteen- or fifteen-year-old girl bearing the name Nobuko would vividly materialize in his mind.

Katsuko.

Shun leaned against the window facing the grassy field and gazed outside.

Gray clouds covered the entire sky. They appeared to stretch far into the depths while also seeming to hang low over the earth. Everything around lost its light and settled into stillness. Only the distant hospital’s lightning rod shone white through some quirk of chance.

In the middle of the grassy field, children were playing. As he watched, Katsuko was among them. There was a boy who seemed to be engaged in some sort of rough play. Katsuko was knocked down by the boy. As soon as she got up, she was knocked down again. This time, she was being pinned down tightly.

What on earth were they doing? They were being rather cruel. Thinking this, Shun fixed his gaze. When that was finished, this time the group of girls—there were three of them—lined up as if at a ticket gate and stood before the boy. A strange ticket-taking began. The boy violently yanked the hand extended by the girl. The girl was thrown to the ground. The next girl also held out her hand. That hand too was yanked. The girl who had been knocked down got up and rejoined the back of the line.

This was what he saw as he watched. The boy began varying the force with which he pulled their hands. For the girls, timidly anticipating that varying intensity seemed to be what made it fun. Just when one thought he would pull hard, he put on a show of strength with his posture but tugged lightly. Then the next one was suddenly slammed down. This time, he merely took their hands with such lightness it barely counted as holding them.

The boy, though small, was the sort of child who at times bore an uncanny resemblance to grown men—woodcutters or stonemasons—and even now he appeared to be going about it while humming some tune. And indeed he looked quite pleased with himself.

As he watched, it indeed seemed that Katsuko alone was being subjected to disproportionately harsh treatment. To him, that came across as malicious. Katsuko must be getting subtly bullied—the reason he thought this was partly because she was willful and never behaved well even when playing with other children. Even so, he wondered if Katsuko didn’t realize that unfairness. No—there’s no way she didn’t realize that. Rather, for Katsuko, the truth seemed to be that she understood full well yet was stubbornly putting on a brave front.

Even as he pondered this, Katsuko was knocked down harshly once more. If she was putting on a brave front, what expression did she make when she was knocked down and found herself glaring at the ground?—Yet by the time she stood up, her face looked just like the other children’s. It’s remarkable she doesn’t start crying.

Thinking that the boy might catch sight of this window by chance, he did not leave its side.

Through the fathomless cloudy sky, something passed by, glinting intermittently.

A pigeon?

Blurred by the color of the clouds, their forms were no longer visible—only the reflection of light from three or so birds dancing through the air in that aimless way pigeons have.

Ahhh. That rascal Katsuko—maybe she was the one selfishly asking them to go harder on her? Such a thought suddenly occurred to him. Once when Shun had hugged her, she had made him squeeze her tighter many times, saying, “Harder!” The memory of that time came back to him. Thinking this, he realized that too was exactly the sort of thing Katsuko would do. Shun left the window and went into the room.

At night, after dinner had finished and some time passed, Katsuko began to cry. Shun was listening from the second floor. Eventually the elder sister's voice trying to calm her grew louder, and Katsuko started wailing uncontrollably. As the voices became too loud, Shun went downstairs. Nobuko was holding Katsuko. Katsuko had one hand pulled beneath the light while the elder sister, holding a needle, tried to bring it to her palm.

“She went outside and came back with a thorn stuck in her.” “She didn’t notice until dinner when the soy sauce stung.” The mother-in-law told Shun. “Hold it out properly!” Elder Sister had grown angry and was yanking at her palm. Each time, Katsuko erupted into louder wails. “I don’t care anymore. I’ll leave you be.” Finally Elder Sister shook free of the hand. “There’s nothing for it now. Let’s just put on some XX ointment and bandage it.” The mother-in-law mediated. Nobuko went to fetch the medicine. Shun retreated upstairs again, overwhelmed by Katsuko’s crying.

Even as they applied the medicine, Katsuko's crying still hadn't subsided. "The thorn must've gotten lodged in her back then." Shun recalled the events of that afternoon. The thought resurfaced—what had Katsuko's face looked like when she'd been slapped face-down against the ground? "Perhaps she was finally letting that stubbornness from back then burst out." As he thought this and listened, those blazing cries began to seem somehow sorrowful to Shun.

Day and Night

One day, he found a splendid well in the shade of a cliff beside the castle.

It seemed like the site of an old samurai residence. On a plot of land that couldn’t quite be called a field or a garden stood an old plum tree here, planted pumpkins there, and shiso plants scattered about. From the castle’s cliff, thick, sturdy tall trees and old camellias formed a green partition, and the well sat within their shade.

A large well frame and imposing stonework were sturdy and splendid.

Two young women were washing laundry in a large tub. From where he stood, he couldn’t see it, but the mechanism appeared to be a lever-and-bucket system; the drawn-up water overflowed into a large wooden well bucket, and the trees’ greenery reflected freshly in it. When the woman by the tub pretended to wait, the woman by the well bucket released the water. Water from the tub leaped out, and a rainbow of droplets rose. There too, the greenery cast its shadow, and the water flowed abundantly over the beautifully washed granite paving stones and over the women’s bare feet.

Enviable—it was a wonderfully blissful-looking scene. In the shade of the cool-looking green partition. Indeed, clear, cool, and abundant water. He felt somehow enchanted.

Today is a blue-sky fine day. Both at the former house and next door Drawing water, washing, hanging, drying. Whether it had been in the national textbooks or the elementary school songbooks, the lyrics of a song he had sung in his boyhood came back to him. Though no cleverness was detected in those words, the genuinely cheerful and fresh imaginings he had nurtured through that song during his boyhood now surged unexpectedly into his chest. Caw caw, the crows go crying, To the temple's roof, to the shrine's forest,

*Caw caw, the crows go crying.* It had an illustration.

Then memories kept surfacing one after another—of illustrations like one titled something like “Shiho” showing a child facing the morning sun with arms spread wide. The printed typefaces in the national textbooks that resembled handwritten regular script. The matter of an illustration—by what painter’s hand it had been created?—whose feel so closely resembled that rounded, cornerless font, depicting a child who, if you were to describe them, had the face of a round-cheeked honor student. “Nantoka Ken Shoyū” (which he’d privately read as “Gonshoyū” in his mind). He never read it aloud as “Gonshoyū” before others but had tentatively settled on that reading in his mind. The name—of that something-something Ken Shoyū—which also seemed fitting for a national textbook when considered, resembling the addressee names in letter examples—a person’s name. Even the colophon’s appearance had been recalled.

When he was a boy, he had felt that somewhere there must exist a place exactly like those illustrations. He’d believed that somewhere there must be such a simple, honest child. Such thoughts came to him.

They had been something like objects of yearning from that time. A simple, unadorned, wholesome world.—Now that world lay before him. Unexpectedly, here in the shade of these rural green trees, that world existed in an even fresher form.

In that national textbook-like sentiment, he felt as though the life he should lead had been suggested to him.

His occasional moments were set ablaze by an attachment to landscapes so captivating he could devour them, by recollections of childhood, and by imaginings of a new life. Again came nights when sleep eluded him. After sleepless nights, even trifles would kindle a smoldering excitement deep within. When that excitement waned, a fatigue would descend so profound he wouldn't have minded lying down right by the roadside. Such fervor could flare even from contemplating maple bark— The maple's bark held a chill. This was behind the bench where he always sat in the castle's main enclosure.

At the base, pine needles lay fallen. Ants crawled purely over them.

As he gazed at the cold maple bark, the lichen-like moss pattern clinging to it appeared beautiful. Memories of playing with woven mats in childhood—particularly their tactile sensation—were revived.

It was indeed under the maple tree. Pine needles had scattered, and ants were crawling. There were uneven patches on the ground. A mat had been laid over such a place. Children indeed know the pleasant sensation of their soles feeling the ground's unevenness beneath the cold goza mat. And then, as soon as they spread the goza mat, they would leap onto it and delight in the freedom to roll around on the ground, clothes and all. While thinking such thoughts, he felt an impulse to press his cheek against the maple bark to cool it immediately.

"I really am tired after all." He realized his limbs held a slight fever.

“I think I’ll give you these things.”

One was jelly. Even the faintest footstep sent ripples spreading outward, and when wind blew across it, small waves formed upon the surface. Its color was that of sea-blue—look, countless fish swam within it.

Another was a window hanging. Though woven fabric, it had become a thicket where autumn grasses grew dense. And though invisible there, you could sense a ginkgo tree beginning to turn gold above that thicket. When wind came, the grasses rustled. And look— an inchworm crawled from branch to branch. "I'll give you these two. Since they're not finished yet, you must wait. And when days feel empty, try suddenly remembering them. You'll surely find delight."

He had written such things on a postcard one day—though of course it had been in jest. And he felt this had somewhat eased that irritating emotional itchiness he would occasionally feel these days, regardless of day or night. At night, when he lay awake unable to sleep quietly, a grey nightjar cried out as it passed through the sky. At times he thought its voice seemed to come from somewhere within his own body. The insects' cries too sounded strangely as if they were inside the room.

"Haa, don’t come," he would think, and then an indescribable feeling would arise. This had become the established course of nights when he couldn’t sleep lately.

The strange feeling made him sense frenetic movement before his eyes in the darkness where he had turned off the light and kept them shut. The presence of something immense would flip and shrink to a mere speck as he watched. It was a motion he felt certain he had once touched somewhere, or perhaps even tasted. Ceaselessly spinning like machinery, if he imagined the tips of his own feet as he lay there, it would immediately become swept into a sensation of immeasurable distance. When reading books, there were times the text would shrink before his eyes, and this feeling somewhat resembled that. When it intensified, a kind of terror accompanied it until he could no longer keep his eyes closed.

Lately, he had sometimes thought that this feeling was akin to being on the verge of wielding sorcery. That was the nature of this sorcery.

As a child, when he slept together with his younger brother, he would often lie face down and form a wall with both hands (intending it to be a pasture).

“Yoshio, I can see cows in here!” he said while deceiving his brother. Surrounded by both hands, covered by his face within the darkness atop the bedding—now that he mentioned it, the forms of numerous cows and horses came to be imagined. ——He now felt that such a thing was truly possible.

Pastoral lands, plains, towns, markets, theaters. Wharves and sea. If only that vast scene—studded with people, carriages, ships, and living creatures—would somehow manifest within this darkness. And it seemed on the verge of appearing before him at any moment. It even seemed as if the clamor was reaching his ears.

The doodling he had done on postcards—his state of mind, too, stemmed from that peculiar, irritating itchiness.

Rain.

August had ended.

Nobuko seemed to be returning to her school dormitory in Asuichi City tomorrow. Since the injury on her finger had healed, her mother told her to go offer thanks to Tenri-sama, so she was taken there by a neighbor and had completed that act of gratitude. That neighbor was the most devoted believer in the area. “Where are the luggage tags?” The brother-in-law, who had been tying up Nobuko’s large trunk, said this. “What’re you standing there watching?” When the brother-in-law teased in mock anger, Nobuko went off with a laugh to search.

“They’re not there.” Nobuko came back after making such a statement. “If I made them from old cuffs...,” he said, and the brother-in-law— “Nah, there should still be plenty left. Did you check that drawer?” Nobuko said she had looked. “Katsuko’s gone an’ stashed ’em away again, hasn’t she? Go check!” The brother-in-law laughed after insisting so much. Katsuko would pick up even the most trivial things and stash them away in her own drawer. “The luggage tags are here.” Mother said this and brought them over with a faint smile that seemed to say, “See?”

“After all, you can’t manage without an elder around.” The brother-in-law said something imbued with such affection. That evening, Mother was roasting beans.

“Shun,” “How about something like this for you?” After saying that, she slid the freshly roasted beans toward him. “These are souvenirs for Nobuko to take back to the dormitory.” “Even if she brings back a whole shō’s worth, they’ll disappear in no time...” As Shun listened while crunching the beans, there came a sound from the back door and Nobuko returned. “Did they lend it?”

“Yes. “I’ve put it in the back.” “It might rain—go on and pull it all the way inside.” “Yes. It’s been pulled in.” “Is it that Mrs. Yoshimine’s aunt is returning home tomorrow…” Nobuko stifled a laugh as she cut her words short. “Is she returning home tomorrow, you say?” Mother asked in return. The story went that when Mrs. Yoshimine’s aunt had been asked, “When are you returning home? Are you returning tomorrow?” Nobuko, flustered, replied, “Yes—I’m returning tomorrow.” When Mother and he laughed, Nobuko’s face reddened slightly.

What they had borrowed was a baby carriage.

“We’ll load the trunk onto the baby carriage and take it to the station to send her off first thing tomorrow,” Mother explained after making this declaration. What a hassle, he thought. “Is Katsuko coming too?” Nobuko asked.

“She says she’s comin’, so she’s goin’ to bed early tonight,” Mother said. He thought since it’d be a hassle hauling out luggage despite the early morning, it’d be better to buy the ticket tonight and send the hand luggage ahead instead.

"I could go take care of that now," I suggested. In part, because he himself was something of a dandy, he had intended to anticipate the feelings of Nobuko, now coming of age. However, since Mother and Nobuko kept saying "Don't worry, don't worry" so insistently, he ended up leaving it to them.

He pictured their departure—Mother, daughter, and niece on a summer dawn, the three of them: one pushing a baby carriage, another being led by the hand by the one who was dressed up, heading toward the station. It was beautiful. “In their hearts, weren’t they all counting on the joy of such a departure?” And he felt his heart being cleansed.

That night, too, sleep did not come easily.

Around midnight came an evening shower. He lay waiting in anticipation of its return. After a while came the sound of it approaching again from afar. The chorus of insects shifted to rainfall. When it subsided, the shower passed onward toward town once more. He tied up the mosquito net, rose and stepped out, then slid open one rain shutter.

Electric lights shone at the castle's main keep. The tree leaves, glossed by the rain, emitted countless fish scale-like glimmers under that lamplight. Another evening shower arrived. He sat on the threshold and cooled his feet in the rain. The door of one tenement house below opened, and a young woman in nightclothes came to draw water from the pump. The rain intensified its downpour as gulping, gurgling throat sounds arose. When he noticed, a white cat was passing under another house's eaves.

Nobuko's kimono remained hanging on the clothesline in the rain. It was a short-sleeved yukata she normally wore—the kimono his eyes had grown most accustomed to seeing. Perhaps because of this, as he gazed at it, Nobuko's figure materialized before him with uncanny clarity.

The evening shower had moved on toward the town again. The sound continued distantly. “Ting, ting.” “Ting, ting.” Amidst the newly risen chorus of crickets, another insect began its song—a sound like the crisp ping of a dense bead struck against hard metal. He, still feeling the heat of his forehead, waited for yet another evening shower to come over the castle.