Pathway to Japanese Literature

Author: Shimazaki Toson

Among my four children, not a single one remembers their late mother.
Only the oldest child faintly remembers Mother.
And even that is only a child’s faint memory.
It’s merely a faint childhood memory from when Taro was around six years old.

The mementos of Mother gradually dwindled, and now not even a single keepsake kimono remained. Old dressing tables, old chests of drawers—such tools alone endured, and every morning the youngest daughter of my household would go to comb her hair before that mirror, but over the long years, even various memories faded.

That era of Mother’s had now become such a distant past.
And that was only natural.
Not only Taro and Jiro, but even Saburo had matured so rapidly that they could no longer be made to wear things like coarse-striped kasuri kimono sleeves with straight hems.

It became clear that the four children required more and more money.

“You only know how to receive—do you even understand what it means to give?”

I often made such jokes, which sometimes perplexed the children.
I called them children, but Taro and Jiro were already working in their own ways in our rural hometown, and Saburo, for his part, had formed new bonds with friends and was about to embark on the path he desired.
For this, he proposed that he and one of his friends each contribute fifteen yen, rent a house in the suburbs for about thirty yen, and begin a self-supported living.
The deposit alone cost sixty yen.
When Saburo first proposed this idea, it seemed to me like nothing more than a fairy tale.

I said.

“Even you had experience living on your own when young,”
“ending up eating rice with boiled beans three times daily.”
“Self-supported living’s troublesome work.”
“Could you all have kept that up?”

As for me—I’d wanted longer to keep this child under my care, making him endure constrained days—yet I’d always known such time would come.
Merely sooner than expected.
I weighed too how harmful it was forcing siblings—now clearly aware of their clashing temperaments—into this cramped nest-like space.
No use resisting—so I concluded.
Recalling my own youth at Saburo’s age striving for modest independence—even his heart now pulling away struck me endearingly pitiable.

To send this Saburo off to the suburbs, our household made a commotion akin to half a move.
In accordance with Saburo’s preferences, we had two zabuton cushions made with bright chintz patterns.
We also divided old chairs and clocks of uncertain utility that were in the house.
The items we gave him to take were nothing but tools that were barely better than having nothing—yet when gathered and packed as luggage, from laundered futons to everything else, they reached such a volume that transporting them by a single automobile through early spring roads whitened with snow blanketing the towns became necessary.

When I looked back at that time，my three sons had left me one after another，and only the youngest remained by my side.
After sending Saburo off，our house suddenly grew quiet，and the dining table felt lonely.
I began spending my days with my daughter and the maid，but gradually，my life seemed to change.
Like bees leaving the nest，the day would surely come when the youngest too would follow her brothers and leave me.
This now appeared to be merely a matter of time.
I came to envision my elderly，solitary self in my mind’s eye.

However, this was rather what I had desired.
I—yes, I am nothing more than one who had lived a writing career as unchanging as a single day over thirty years.
I had heard there were those who, upon reaching their seventies in later life, still sought to simplify their existence—detaching from home, family, and all possessions to become utterly alone. But I, having lost my wife early, walked the opposite path: remaining at home while gradually sending forth my growing children one by one, treading a road that left me increasingly solitary.

Death had already visited my surroundings several times. Recently, I received news that yet another young nephew of mine in Hongō had suddenly passed away from nephritis. At that very time, Jiro had come from our hometown to our house in Tokyo, his registered domicile, to undergo a conscription examination as he had reached the eligible age. Jiro had come carrying several oil painting studies he painted while helping his older brother’s farm but remained as spirited as ever. Since the deceased nephew from Hongō was the same age as him and they had been childhood playmates, it was decided that Jiro would attend the farewell ceremony.

“It’s the saddest thing to die young.”

So saying, I had a box of sweets for the newly deceased delivered.
Again, with Jiro and Sueko watching, I wrapped a token sum of money and tied it with a black ceremonial cord,

“Even in these hard times, I can’t bring myself to offer just two yen for condolence money anymore.
When your mother was well, two yen used to be enough.”

I made sure to say.

Jiro went out with a solemn expression that suggested he could now act as his father’s proxy.
When Jiro—usually so affable and sensitive—returned from that farewell ceremony, he brought back a story: amid the crowd of familiar and unfamiliar faces gathered at the relatives’ house in Hongō—old acquaintances from Aoyama and Shinjuku seated in rows—an unknown woman had unexpectedly called out to him.

“Who might you be?”

“Oh, you awful Jiro! Have you gone and forgotten me?”

This sounded like an exchange between two people, but Jiro performed it alone for us.

“Awful Jiro—that’s what she said!”

And again, Jiro mimicked the woman’s way of speaking to show his sister.
When she heard this, Sueko let out a girlish voice as though hurling her entire body forward and collapsed into laughter right there.

The reason this woman became such a topic of discussion among us was that she had been the spouse of one of my nephews who died eighteen years prior and, from my children’s perspective, was their mother’s friend. Katsumi-san had been close to that nephew during his days of health. That nephew had been the only son of my biological sister who married into the Tsuchiya household, being just three years my junior. He felt more like a younger brother than a nephew. Moreover, the house where Jiro and Sueko were born and the house where Tsuchiya’s nephew had temporarily resided both stood on the same bank of the Sumida River within walking distance—a proximity that had fostered frequent interaction between our families in earlier times. When Jiro was small, Katsumi-san would often visit their mother’s home to converse at length by the long hibachi. Even this friend of Mother’s had changed so profoundly that Jiro would scarcely recognize her now.

Before long, Katsumi-san came to visit my house accompanied by Aoyama’s niece.
It had been seventeen years since I last welcomed this old acquaintance among female guests.
The reunion after such a long absence left me gazing at Katsumi-san’s face without truly seeing it, words refusing to form easily on my lips.
We had changed even in the shape of our faces.

Katsumi-san was no longer a Tsuchiya but someone who now went by another surname.
Both her marriages had ended unhappily, and now she had settled into a third household—or so I’d heard.
As for how much hardship this ill-fated yet tenacious person had endured in this world before entering her current quiet life, even I did not know the details.
Katsumi-san told me she had long wanted to see my children but until now found no opportunity, and that she had finally come accompanied by Aoyama’s niece.

“If Jiro and the others’ mother had stayed healthy all this time, how old would she be now?”

The reason I had brought up such a thing was that I remembered Mother and Katsumi-san had been nearly the same age.

"Aunt?"
"This year, she should have turned exactly that age."

The words that came from Katsumi-san’s mouth were the old-fashioned “Uncle” and “Aunt.”
At that moment, Aoyama’s niece took issue with Katsumi-san’s “exactly,”

“When you say ‘exactly’—”
“It’s fifty.”

This “fifty” startled me.
I, forgetting even my own aged state, tried to imagine—had Mother been alive and well until today, would she have become such an old woman?

That Mother’s longtime friend had come to visit our house after seventeen years seemed to surprise even Jiro deeply.
Jiro wore an expression as though belatedly searching for his deceased mother and listened intently to our conversation.
Around the time I tidied my room—bringing out a small desk to the center of the narrow four-and-a-half-tatami space and draping over it that French souvenir tablecloth I rarely used even on ordinary days, hoping its pale blue woven pattern might brighten the room for our rare guests—Sueko returned from school.
Sueko came behind Aoyama’s niece in her schoolgirl uniform and sat down quietly.
She greeted these first-time visitors with some awkwardness.

“Is this Sue-chan?” Katsumi-san said in a tone thick with nostalgia though not quite tearful.
“My, you look just like Auntie.”

“Well now—haven’t my children grown?”

“Oh yes,”
“What might Auntie think if she were still here to see Sue-chan and the others like this?”

The year Tsuchiya’s nephew died was the same year my children’s mother passed away.
That Mother died at thirty-three, and the nephew at thirty-seven.
Though it was in front of Katsumi-san, I inadvertently brought up the matter of my nephew.

“It’s strange, isn’t it? Those who died in their thirties—I always feel they remain forever in their thirties. I simply can’t picture them being in their fifties now.”

“But Uncle, those who die young are the least fulfilled. If they’d lived longer, days like this—when they could see you again—might have come.”

That day, conversations like these were endless.

My fifty-sixth year was beginning to pass vainly.
Even when someone like Katsumi-san came to visit, I couldn't converse as we used to in those days when Tsuchiya's nephew and the children's mother were still well.
We simply thought of those bygone times and realized how far we had drifted from one another.

Amidst all the talk of recession, recession, it was a time when prices showed no signs of falling, and in the valley-like town where I lived, the sound of drums arose nearly every day.
They emanated from houses resembling branch offices of some such-and-such cult, and the colder the winds of recession blew and swirled, the higher those sounds reverberated.
It was said that many people went to receive blessings due to greed, superstition, and financial hardship.
The sound of those drums resonated through the air of the sunken valley-like town, reaching even the shoji screens of my room.

Impoverished people who came to stand at our entrance also increased in number.
Yesterday one person came.
Today two came—there was no telling how many people in distress might arrive.
After the earthquake, there were those who came seeking help saying they wanted to work but had no jobs, and those who claimed they hadn’t eaten for two days before reaching our house. Each time I saw such people, I would sometimes take out a coin purse from the folds of my obi and share money, or retrieve old books from my room’s closet and let them take them.
Among them were not a few people who grew accustomed to such begging, yet conversely protested societal injustices, leaving behind pent-up frustration with nowhere to direct it.
I placed as much money as I could manage before such people,

“If you’re truly in trouble, come to me,”
he would often add.
And after those people had left, I suffered from the contradiction of a society where a young man—still in his youth and seemingly robust—would come seeking salvation from someone like me: frail, sickly, and old.
Justice emerged, and great bandits and wretched beggars appeared.

The maid of our house would always become indignant whenever she saw my attitude during such times.
This maid, who seemed to want to say that even working every month her wages amounted to no more than eighteen yen, did not overlook the one or two yen that unknown young men took from me.

In our household, while it was true that we never had a day without rice for tomorrow, that did not mean we lived with any particular affluence. The more the children grew, the more money it required—I still sent thirty yen each month to Taro’s household, paid from my own pocket the wages of the maid working at Taro’s place, and since Saburo began his self-supported living in the suburbs, that cost me another sixty yen monthly. Jiro and Sueko also had to be accounted for. It wore me down. But I looked forward to working together with the children, and no matter how far apart we lived, not a single day did that thought leave my mind.

A matter of unexpected income came to be presented before me.

The idea of compiling our works into a series and publishing them through subscription wasn’t something publishers had entirely failed to plan until now.
The new series planned by a certain publisher this time had cast a wide net for authors—among them I saw names of my seniors and friends—but what truly defined it was their bold approach: offering volumes of three to four hundred pages in chrysanthemum-sized format, set in 6-point type with full ruby annotations, all at a strikingly low fixed price for subscription applicants.
We found the boldly advertised price displayed in newspaper ad sections, on bookstore frontages, and even on the backs of advertising men parading through the city.
This bold advertising campaign, amplifying the momentum of cheap publishing, led to an outcome where—contrary to initial projections that had been pegged at twenty or thirty thousand copies at most—when the lid was finally lifted, it unexpectedly garnered a readership ten times that size.

The “matter of unexpected income” I had mentioned resulted from this mass production; even after deducting the publisher’s withheld portion from the promised twelve percent royalty—meant to equalize each author’s earnings—a sum exceeding twenty thousand yen was due to enter my hands.
For me, who had raised four children through the labor of a slender brush, this was money I had never before held in such consolidated form.

Even before I had received it, I began thinking about that money.
In our household, it took a full ten days just to have the certification seals stamped through others’ assistance.
My children knew full well this publishing plan was steadily coming to fruition.
Yet I kept both Jiro and Sueko unaware that such a consolidated sum would enter my possession.

I recalled the old adage "Wealth is theft" as I approached the shoji screens of my room facing the garden.

By mid-April, spring had arrived even in the narrow garden.

I asked myself.

"Is this theft?"

To that question, I wanted to answer no.
Just as those thirty years would never return within my lifetime, neither did I possess duplicate copies of my works meant for inclusion in that series.
Born from long labor and effort, it did not strike me as a reward I should feel ashamed to accept at my age—this age where my hair grows ever whiter.

But I had grown old indeed.
Since my youth up until then，I had been relatively indifferent to money，and retained no memory of ever entertaining thoughts of hoarding extra things.
This very time，that thought occurred to me.
Perhaps I too had finally reached an age where one seeks to save money and live out their remaining years quietly.
Perhaps I had reached that age where one thinks it better to build a house of one’s own liking and quietly convalesce，rather than linger in this rented home deep in the valley—where sunlight was poor，ventilation worse；where by four o’clock on winter afternoons downstairs shoji screens grew dim；where summer’s western sun beating on the second floor became unbearable.

Nowadays we rarely interacted anymore, our relationship reduced to exchanging New Year’s cards—but among my old acquaintances was an artist.
I knew well of that artist’s era of grueling hardship, yet before I knew it he had come to reside in an enviable grand mansion.
To me who remembered the past, this seemed so strange that I was left with a lingering question: where had the man who once embraced desolation as his companion vanished?
Having grown old, I too came to read others’ hearts.
I realized this was no mere mansion of wealth—it was the home of one who had tasted more poverty than most in his youth.

Keeping Jiro and Sueko by my side, I grew disheartened by the temptation of savings—something my children in their youthful prime knew nothing of. To those with excessive money, twenty thousand yen might seem trivial. Yet to those with next to nothing, even that substantial sum loomed large. But I had no intention of stowing away idle money as if burying it in the ground. I wondered how to use it.

No matter which period I look back on, there has never been a day I could consider easy for me. Long ago, intending to lay the groundwork for my writing career, I once lived in complete silence on a mountaintop for about three years. By then I was already in my third year of marriage, and the family were growing weary of our monotonous rural life—their expressions asking when any reward might sprout from such circumstances—and since we lived so frugally up there on that mountain, barely scraping by, I had to contend with those hardships alongside the five-month-long winters stretching from November through March each year. In that room facing a garden buried under snow that once fallen wouldn’t melt until spring, listening to house pillars creak and splinter from the cold as I sat alone at my desk late into the night—that state of mind remains unforgettable. Yet every time I descended from those mountains to Tokyo, I couldn’t help thinking: here were publishers maintaining shops and livelihoods through staff labor, all while relying on authors who supplied their raw material—yet those same writers (with few exceptions) had no choice but to starve.

It was around that time that I attempted to transition entirely to a life of writing.

In my eyes still remains the six-mat room with its two-mat loft.
There was a wall.
There were shoji screens.
Beyond the cluttered town streets, a fishmonger’s shop displaying its wares could be seen outside those shoji screens.
Across the neighboring area, windows of downtown style fitted with white shoji screens were also visible.
That was the second floor of the house I had moved to for the second time from that mountain—a place where the urban air felt dense.
Katsumi-san and her husband would take turns visiting and often came up to that second floor.
I set up my desk there and immersed myself in writing again. What I had written during that time apparently became gossip among the children’s mother’s friends from her girls’ school days. Every time I returned from visiting those old acquaintances’ homes, friends would tease me about various things—remarks like “Ofuku-san (the children’s mother) must be too kind-hearted; what wife would stay silent after having such things written about her?”—and that mother would recount all this to me.
But when those women, satisfied merely that my writings had become talk among old friends, suddenly began regarding their own husbands with renewed appraisal, even I couldn’t help but offer a wry smile.
As for the authors I found around me at that time—they were all involved with newspapers, teaching at schools, or working on magazine editing—it was said that someone like me trying to stand solely on writing was rare.
I often thought:
This was not yet an era when one could support a family through writing.
I had been layering stoicism upon stoicism, but even producing sixty or seventy yen a month for living expenses—supporting four children and keeping one maid—proved arduous.
At that time, we endured living in a house with sixteen yen rent—yet even that felt too expensive.

Even the three-year journey abroad felt like a lonely time in my life.
Admittedly, during that period, I trod upon soil I had never stepped on before, interacted with people I had never met, and experienced both shadow and sunlight—so those complex feelings were a bit beyond words.

Indeed, I embarked on that journey with such nonchalance.
That nonchalance felt akin to simply relocating my study to a foreign town.
When I found myself in utterly unfamiliar lands, my traveler’s heart grew restless, and I could no longer use my pen as intended.
I—who had meant to continue writing while journeying—failed to fulfill even one-tenth of my long-standing commitments.
“No one who comes to foreign lands ever produces written work,” a traveler once laughed at me.
Yet among all the works I had resolved to write upon leaving home, there was one I desperately wished to complete—only to abandon the manuscript halfway through.
Correspondence with home became my sole manageable task.
Moreover, exchanging letters took weeks, and after the Great War began, this frustration of murky circumstances worsened—compounded by unforeseen events and mishaps back home over those three years that further complicated my travels.
I had steeled myself for life abroad’s inconveniences, yet never imagined travel costs would bring such hardship.
At times, thoughts of the future would constrict my chest until sleep became my only refuge from loneliness.

Looking back on the past, it seemed almost miraculous that I could manage to support my children without hardship even now. When I thought of those children’s mother’s time, even this rented-house living felt more than enough for me.

"Wealth is nothing other than life itself."

This phrase encouraged me.

I wanted to continue my utterly ordinary life as before, with a traveler’s heart.
The house was my inn, and the children were my travel companions.
As long as each day brought no hardship, then this worldly journey sufficed.
What was essential to me was not money that might secure my remaining years, but strong legs and a sturdy frame.

The new joy of working alongside my grown children—this thought somehow seemed fitting for me, who had raised four little ones by a father’s hand alone.
I began to think of directing this unexpected income toward the needs of the coming era rather than spending it on myself.

I said to myself.

“I might as well divide that money among the children.”

The second floor was hushed.
When I listened from the four-and-a-half-mat room downstairs, Jiro’s voice would sometimes reach me.
Sueko’s laughter too came drifting down.
Sueko—having an older brother studying art—was often asked to serve as a portrait model in that way.
This was when Jiro devoted himself wholly to his painting.

Before long, Sueko came down from the second floor.
At the foot of the ladder stairs, she gave me a brief smile.

“I’ve gotten so sleepy today.”

“It’s early spring, after all.”

I laughed too and tried to comfort the daughter who seemed worn out from posing.

Soon Jiro came downstairs holding a practice sketch.
He brought the newly painted portrait of his sister to my room and positioned it where I could see it well.

“Father.
What do you think?”

“You’ve created a daughter with an alarmingly tall nose there.”

“Does this nose really appear that prominent?”

“Just kidding.”
“Father was just joking around.”
“That sort of thing doesn’t really matter.”
“Whatever you end up creating—that’s entirely up to you all.”

The canvas still wasn’t dry.
The new paint shone as if wet.
The scent of oil emanating from it was also a pleasure for me.
Jiro stood by my side and gazed intently at his own painting for a while, as though he’d forgotten everything else.

“Look—this is the painting you brought from the countryside,” I said.
“If it were you, Father, you’d choose that one.”
“After all, the paintings I did while feeling lonely out there are different, huh?”

“It’s not entirely like that.”

“But there’s something vaguely compelling about that painting, you know.”

It had been last autumn when we sent Jiro off to our hometown. From that mountainous area where Mount Ena could be seen, Jiro had emerged carrying paintings redolent of earth. Having come up to Tokyo, this Jiro now stayed with us awhile longer—visiting spring exhibitions, calling on old friends—testing his countryside-refreshed self against the city’s dense stimuli.

I still had not told the children anything about dividing the money. I had not even hinted at it. Yet for my part, I thought that even this faint stirring of intention within me might bring them joy. I could almost see their faces when they received it from me—eyes round with surprise. Forgetting that I was even called indulgent toward my children, forgetting that I was becoming utterly alone, I wanted nothing more than to make them happy.

It was a time when even I was in high spirits.
I went from the four-and-a-half-mat room to the tearoom and took out the sweets that remained only enough to nibble when my mouth grew lonely.
They were remnants of souvenirs left behind by a relative who had returned from Manchuria’s distant reaches.
They were bonbons that even children in Russia or such places would delight in.
In the tearoom, Sueko had spread out her needlework with the maid.
I distributed those bonbons—each one twisted in paper—to my daughter, to the maid, and even went back to where Jiro was to give him his share.

“Jiro, there’s an interesting saying,” I said.
“There’s a saying that retreating to the countryside isn’t about distancing yourself from society—it’s about distancing yourself from our own vanity.”
“The countryside is where one can study effectively, you know.”
“Staying in the countryside like you and battling loneliness—isn’t that good training?”

“However, my mind isn’t truly developed enough to endure that yet.”

“That’s why you come out every now and then.”
“That’s why you come out every now and then—you even come to listen to stories like those from Bancho’s teacher.”

“That’s right.”

“Try reading all sorts of things—as much as you can.”

“That’s right.”

When I looked at them then, Taro had already settled into a new farmhouse back home and was beginning preparations for that year’s cultivation, while Jiro, taking his time, sought to nurture his innate painterly qualities. Saburo, for his part, was attempting to tread the path of urban proletarianism through modernist art alongside his quick-acting group of friends. The three of them, each taking their own direction, were striving to navigate the same era.

When I looked at Sueko, she too was already nearing the end of her third school year and striving to channel her remaining academic time into the sewing and handicrafts she always favored. When it came to dividing the money among these four siblings, I found myself perplexed about the distribution method.

The promised items would be delivered by the thirtieth of the month.
Special edition: X copies.
Regular edition: X copies.
Royalty rate: 10.2%.
Of that, fifth installment of company-retained book distributions: 3%.
Such reports from the company’s accounting department had already begun reaching me.

In truth, I had already resolved in my heart to divide the money equally between Jiro and Saburo. However, how should I divide it between Taro and Sueko? Even if I gave my daughter a smaller share, should I give my eldest son a larger one? Or should I have divided it equally among all four siblings? I hadn’t yet steeled myself to go that far.

When I thought about my daughter’s preparations like any ordinary parent would, clothing emerged as the foremost expense.
There might be no limit to such preparations—"Marrying off just one daughter inevitably costs a thousand yen," an old friend had once told me.
With that rough estimate in mind, I questioned whether preparing such an exorbitant sum for my daughter was truly necessary.
Taro was different.
That child bore countless worries.
As a young farmer during his first autumn harvest experience last year, Taro had single-handedly produced eighteen bales of rice.
To sustain an independent farmhouse required making him yield five or six more bales than before—forcing him to sow wheat too—and imposing a policy of selling expensive rice while living on wheat.
To ease Taro’s labor burden, I had provided him with a horse.
Sericulture as supplementary work also lay ahead for him.
Yet Taro remained young—not yet married.
An ordinary farm typically needed at least two or two-and-a-half workers.
Considering this reality became clear—Taro’s household critically lacked helping hands.
My consideration of giving less to my daughter stemmed from wanting to use those funds to compensate for her older brother’s labor shortage and somehow establish that new farm independently.

I forgot to mention—initially, I allotted Taro about two tan and seven se of rice fields.
From there, eighteen bales of rice were harvested.
However, as Taro had written in his letter, this was a special case in agricultural work and could not serve as an example of annual harvests.
The second time, I allotted him a rice field of approximately one tan, nine se, and nine bu.
Since managing this much would be beyond Taro’s capacity alone, I made this one a two-person joint operation with a friend from that child’s village.
After deducting expenses for land tax, fertilizer, seed rice, and such, and having them pool their labor as a two-person team, it had been arranged for the harvest to be split between them.

Before we knew it，roses in our narrow garden put forth their first yellow buds.
The pieris japonica also began emitting its vigorous fragrance.
Since these flowers began blooming in the garden，bees started visiting daily outside the shoji screens of my room.

As a bright ray of light reached the tatami mats in my room, I found myself reminiscing about many things.
Among six sisters, the mother of my children had been the third-born, though there had also existed her eldest brother.
The Hakodate grandfather had been the biological father of these seven siblings.
This grandfather—a prudent merchant who built multiple storehouses within his lifetime—evidently placed greatest weight on his heir apparent, painstakingly transferring everything from the net wholesaling business he’d managed himself to shop inventories and even client networks entirely to this eldest son.
Yet this son proceeded to lose everything received from Grandfather.
When people witnessed his eldest son’s household crumbling around him—it was said Grandfather had been driven half mad.
Ultimately the estate too passed into others’ hands, and the son met a miserable end akin to disownment.
I knew that era when I moved to the household of the son-in-law Grandfather had welcomed through his daughter’s marriage, living on a paper wholesaler’s second floor.
I remember Grandfather spending his twilight years with merchant-like resignation, gazing from that second-floor window at buildings now belonging to others.

Compared to this eldest son, the third daughter didn’t receive much of a share at all.
Even the mother of those children never lacked for clothing throughout her life, thanks to Grandfather’s care.
Not only that, but Grandfather’s care even extended to clothing for his grandchildren like Taro, Jiro, and Saburo in their younger days.
However, I have never heard any account of Mother receiving a share of money.
Only once did she ever produce a hundred yen before me.
I was still living my meager life up in the mountains, leading a rather taxing daily existence, when I received a telegram from my brother—the father of what is now Aoyama’s niece—requesting a hundred yen.
At that time my brother was in Taiwan—he must have been in dire straits during his travels—but since this was his second request for money, I found myself placed in an exceedingly difficult position.
At that time, unable to bear watching my worried state any longer, Mother took out the money she had carefully saved up.
This was something Grandfather had given her with strict instructions not to use it unless her husband faced dire circumstances—Mother later told me this story herself.
That Mother was said to be Grandfather’s most cherished daughter among his six sisters.
Even she was no exception.
When I consider such cases, the notion of giving less to daughters while giving more to eldest sons seems to have been something thought up by someone like the Hakodate grandfather after all.
Except in cases like Mother’s—where she would produce every last yen she had before her struggling husband—I now find myself realizing many things: had women’s lives been more economically secure...

“Is this all I can do for my daughter’s preparations?”

I had come to realize this as well.
In the end, I reconsidered and decided to give that youngest child an equal share of whatever could be divided among her brothers.
The fact that I too had never held a lump sum like twenty thousand yen was proof enough that I’d ended up obsessing over money like this.
Before long, a single check arrived at my hands two days earlier than the promised thirtieth.
I couldn’t rest easy until I had properly disposed of it.

“Jiro, today I’m taking you and Sueko downtown.”
“Go arrange for a car.”

“Father, where are we going?”

“Well, if you just come along with me, you’ll see.”
“Today there’s something I have to give you.”

Jiro made a face that said I had come out with something unusual.

The day I had been waiting for had finally arrived.
I told my daughter as well.

“We’ll leave after an early lunch. You’d better get ready too.”

Around the time Jiro returned from arranging a car in town, Sueko and I were in the tearoom changing clothes. With our departure time approaching, I had finished lunch earlier than usual and thought—

“Sueko, changing into a haori would suffice. We’re going on an errand today.”

“Then I’ll wear hakama.”

As Sueko and I were getting ready, Jiro—who from morning had been wearing a suit that doubled as work clothes and thus hadn’t bothered to change—sat sprawled out there making all sorts of remarks.

“Hey, Sueko—you’re going in that hakama?”

“That’s right.”

Sueko, who had answered thus, still couldn’t tightly fasten the wide obi by herself without even the maid’s assistance.
Sueko stood near the old dressing table her Mother had left behind and tied the cords of her black hakama, which suited her now that she had grown taller.

Jiro gazed at me while,

“Looking at you like this, Father, your shoulders are really broad.”

“Well, that’s true,” I said.
“It’s these shoulders that have carried me through.”

“So you’ve been hauling all four of us on those shoulders?”

Jiro laughed.

Soon, the meal was ready.
We sat down to the simple meal the maid had prepared.

"I thought we'd go downtown today and get treated to Western food or something."

Jiro, looking as though his expectations had been dashed, wore an expression that nearly said, "Oh."

“We’re going on an errand, aren’t we? It’s not as if we’re going out for fun. Well, just come along with Father. There’s something better than mediocre Western food.”

It was only then that I briefly explained about the distribution to my two children for the first time, but both Jiro and Sueko wore expressions of half-doubt.

The car was waiting at the top of the slope.
We exited from the stone steps in front of our house onto the street below the slope, then climbed that narrow hill along a path as steep as a cliff.
The gravel spread there made it even harder to walk.
Midway up the slope, I looked back at my daughter climbing up behind me and continued treading the path.
The fact that the three of us—parent and children—went out together like this was enjoyable enough in itself for me.

“Please take us as far as just before Shinbashi.”

With that, I called out to the driver waiting at the top of the slope and soon found myself seated in the car. The plump Sueko took a seat next to me, while the lean Jiro sat down across from me.

“Today’s an errand day. I’ll have Jiro help out too.”

“I’ve got it.”

In the moving car, we roughly settled the arrangements.

“Sueko, you didn’t forget the furoshiki, did you?”

When I said this, Sueko took out a black furoshiki from beside the car window and showed it.

The car carrying us descended from the hill terrain that had survived the earthquake disaster, then rushed in one breath toward the wide, cluttered town still crowded with barracks-style houses.
Whenever something—like the car suddenly stopping at a town corner or lurching forward again—jostled our ride, Jiro and Sueko would exchange light, sibling-like smiles each time.
When we passed by the shop where Jiro had bought the shoes he wore every day, that area was already just before Shinbashi.
In front of a certain bank, I had the car stopped.

For a while, we spent time inside a barracks-style building dominated by a large safe.

“Would you like to receive it in cash?”
“Or shall we prepare it in another form for your convenience?”

When the bank clerk asked this, I decided to have the check converted to cash.
The banknotes I received at the payment window were wrapped in a furoshiki bundle, which Jiro and I divided between us to carry.

“Looking at it like this, it’s quite heavy.” After getting into the car they had kept waiting, Jiro said this to his sister. “Let me see.” With that, Sueko stretched out her hand too. The car we were riding in took the direction just before Nihonbashi and continued driving through the bustling town. I untied the furoshiki bundle and tried to separate from the stack of banknotes—so large I was handling them for the first time—just the portion to be sent to Taro. For someone as inexperienced as me, even just counting five-thousand-yen bills in the car was no easy task. When they saw me like that, both Jiro and Sueko laughed. Before long, Jiro—as if struck by an idea—adopted a slightly half-crouched posture and positioned himself to shield me from the bustling comings and goings of cars and pedestrians outside.

We were about to pass through a certain town.
An advertising tower in front of a bookstore—decorated so lavishly it could be mistaken for festival regalia—caught my eye.
I pointed it out to Jiro and Sueko.

“Look—the competition’s begun.”

Red banners and shop curtains flickered across the car window like passing specters.
Spurred by this momentum of mass production—as if cheap book series too were now sprouting in competitive frenzy—we hastened toward a regional bank branch just before Nihonbashi.
To remit funds to Taro in our mountainous hometown, securing a money order from this branch proved simplest.
Within another barracks-like structure along Nihonbashi Street, we again surrendered time to bureaucratic ritual.
Having descended its stone steps, I turned to my companions Jiro and Sueko and spoke.

“Well now—I’ve sent money to Mr. Taro.”
“Next comes Jiro and Saburo’s turn.”

Every time the car moved, what I had told my children was becoming true.
"There are better things than mediocre Western meals"—the meaning behind my invitation finally dawned on Jiro at that moment.
I had the car turn back toward Kyobashi and deposited five thousand yen each for Jiro and Saburo at a branch bank in that town.
The elder brother under his name, the younger brother under his.

I said to Jiro:

"You can't withdraw this whenever you want."
"That time only comes around once every six months."

“I’ll leave that part to you, Dad.”

I looked at my watch.
By three o’clock in the afternoon—when all banks would close—there was still time to spare.
I wanted to divide everything that needed dividing among the four siblings that very day and settle the handling of the money I’d received.
It was a bustling part of town, convenient for shopping.
Sueko, saying they were souvenirs for home, had bought sweet bread and such in town and was waiting for us in the car while wrapping them in a furoshiki bundle.

“Sueko, now it’s your turn.”

With that, I had the car hasten toward the town near our home.

Exhausted, I arrived home.
Having spent nearly the entire day rushing about on errands and settling the handling of the received money, when I finally relaxed in my own room, a fatigue akin to setting down a heavy load from my shoulders came over me.

I called Jiro and Sueko, who had returned with me, to my side.
I took out the certificates for the money deposited in the bank and showed them.

“Jiro, look.
“This is yours now.”
“How you use this is entirely up to you.”
“With this much, you might just be able to go take a look at France or somewhere.”
“Well, you should go see the world at least once.”
“This money should be used for that purpose.”
“Until then, I’ll keep it safe for you.”

To raise children—cold and hungry—a certain person once told me; those words remain etched in my memory as unforgettable. Not giving too much, yet letting the children stretch their limbs as far as possible. Remembering my own youth that seemed an unending succession of hardships, I resolved to make at least these preparations for them. That I had grounded my life in labor as a father was no recent thing—that it traced back to when I went up those mountains and lived seven years among farmers; that considering a life of ease on monetary interest was never our family’s wish—these truths too I laid before the two children.

At that time, Sueko was quietly beside her brother, listening to our conversation with her usual downward gaze, but she did not try to open her own certificate. I took that as my daughter’s reserve,

“Sueko, you take a look too.”
“Take a better look.”
“Your name is properly written there too.”

With that, I had her check her share.

Joyful laughter arose among us.
Jiro, waving both hands, walked back and forth repeatedly along the corridor marking the boundary between the four-and-a-half-mat room and the tearoom.

“Well, now I’m a rich man too!”

When I heard Jiro’s playful words, I panicked and scolded, “You idiot. That’s exactly why you all are hopeless.”

All that remained before me now were the tasks of sending the money order addressed to Taro that I had prepared at the bank and informing Saburo of this as well. I too, out of habit from being engaged in writing, had come to make wielding the brush my work, so much so that when it came to letters, I found myself unbearably reluctant. But it wasn’t another letter either. I wrote the one addressed to Taro the following day.

Remittance.

5,000 yen.

This is money from an unexpected income that I am dividing among you, Jiro, Saburo, and Sueko.
I’m well aware that your household is short on hands.
Since I can’t help in any other way, I’m sending this as a substitute for assisting your farming.
By depositing this money, you should gain a surplus of about three hundred yen each year.
Please use this to supplement your farm’s finances going forward.

Do not consider this merely as money received from Father; regard it instead as proof that I labor alongside you.
Never forget this heart of Father who sends funds to your farm.
Further details—when Jiro returns home.
To Taro

Just then, Saburo came to visit with talk of the outskirts.

“Oh, Saburo, you’ve come at just the right time. I have something to show you too.”

With that I said, and after taking out and showing the certificate I had prepared for this child in the same manner,

“You should go see the world at least once.”

I added.

“If you would do that for me, I would be happy.”

That was Saburo’s reply.

I felt as though I had given parting gifts to three boys, and I also wanted to laugh at what I had done.
At times, Sueko would step out onto the warm veranda beyond the tearoom and let the wind toy with her bangs. Sometimes she would stretch out her legs—those of a girl in white tabi socks—there.
That too was visible from my room.
I thought I wanted to share my thoughts with her as well, and so I told her about the transience of women’s lives that had always relied on others.

Even so, as one who wields the brush, I found it impossible to believe that our publishing world—so intimately tied to us—had walked any smooth path since that Great War. Its future too weighed heavily on my mind. There were times when Jiro would be gone from home, Sueko gone too—even the Maid absent—and beneath our familiar roof all would feel hollowed out. It was precisely during such stretches that I lived with such stillness you might doubt my very presence. Before me still stretched a world of old age whose contours I’d scarcely glimpsed. For these four children I’d shepherded this far—thinking perhaps a day might come when each found some use for it—I resolved to leave quietly by their long road’s edge this unexpected income.