Pathway to Japanese Literature

Author: Yosano Akiko

The repeated station announcements—Hamamatsu, Shizuoka, then Yamakita and Kōzu as they drew closer—failed to register distinctly on Kyōko's dulled nerves within her utterly exhausted body, but when she heard "Hiranuma," she felt a faint flutter in her heart.
It was precisely like when, after passing Port Said and Colombo before the ship reached Singapore, her heart had quickened with the hope that letters from her beloved children might await; here too she had expected relatives to come this far to meet her.
Kyōko's companions were Hatano, proprietor of Bun'eidō Booksellers, and Araki Eiya—a literature scholar who was her husband Shizuka's nephew, five or six years her junior.
Hatano inquired something of Eiya.

“Yes, that’s right, that’s right.”
“He should be here by now.”

He said with a nod and stood up abruptly to open the train door and step outside; Eiya appeared to have followed after him. The pale hem of a long coat that had just passed before her vision must belong to that person, Kyōko thought while remaining lying on her side. Half of her eyes were blocked by the towel-wrapped ice compress pressed against her forehead.

“Ah! The young master has arrived!”

Hatano's voice, having uttered this from afar, reverberated in Kyōko's ears. The tears came bursting forth at that very instant. Some time later, when Kyōko—having raised herself just enough to rest a hand on the ice—glanced about with an air of self-consciousness, neither the new arrivals nor her two original companions remained visible. The newspaper reporters who had joined them at Kōzu sat across the aisle; since they'd been told she couldn't converse due to illness, Kyōko reasoned that suddenly appearing vigorous would surely stir unpleasant feelings. Keeping her body—which longed to rise—utterly still, she felt a frigid wind rush through the open doorway.

“This puts my mind at ease.”
“Though to be honest, I wasn’t exactly worried about how things were going.”

“Since he went straightaway, it worked out well even with the ship arriving a day early.”
“You must be tired too.”

“Not at all—Mr. Araki came all the way to Kobe for us, then accompanied us here as well.”

“I see—so it was Eiya.”

Outside the train, Kiyoshi and Hatano were having such a conversation.

“Ah.”

“A pleasure to see you.”

Beginning with this exchange, Eiya and Kiyoshi—the uncle of Ki—drew their bodies close together and conversed nostalgically for the first time in four or five years.

“Young master. What time did you rise and come here?”

After circling around where the two stood, Hatano then spoke to Mitsuru.

“Five o’clock.”

Mitsuru said energetically.

“Five o'clock? That's early, isn't it? Are the other young masters and misses waiting at Shinbashi?”

“Shin and Eiko are at home.”

“The others are coming too, aren’t they?”

“Not sure.”

Mitsuru tilted his head slightly and said.

“They’re coming too, isn’t that right?”

“Yes, Mr. Hatano.”

Mitsuru said in a feminine, plain voice.

“You must be happy, young master.”

“Hmph, where’s Mom, Mr. Hatano?”

Mitsuru said with apparent concern.

“She is over there.”

Having said that, Hatano pointed to the second car across.

“I’m so happy, Mr. Hatano!”

Mitsuru said, but he made no move to rush into that place.

Kyōko had closed her eyes as if utterly worn out from waiting when those people entered, and the train immediately started moving.

“Thank you for coming so early.”
“Thank you also for all you’ve done looking after the children during our absence.”
“Your kindness is deeply engraved in my heart.”

Kyōko had somehow gotten her feet on the floor, and the ice that had been on her forehead was now resting on the palm above her knee.

“Well, it’s fortunate that Madam’s illness wasn’t too serious after all.”
“We had feared you might be more weakened—we were quite concerned.”

Then Kiyoshi, standing before Mitsuru—who was smiling while looking at his mother—
“Mitsuru, aren’t you going to greet her?”
Kiyoshi said gently.
“Mother, welcome back.”
Having said this, Mitsuru’s face flushed bright red.

“Mitsuru.”

As she spoke these words, a beautiful flush rose to the mother’s face as well.
Mitsuru went straight over to Hatano’s side without another word.
Kyōko lay down again.

“At home, it seems Oteru has been worried too, you know. The letter that came from Paris to Mr. Hatano’s place must have been written in such an exaggerated way, you see. That’s why.”

Kyōko said, gasping for breath.

“Why don’t you rest quietly? I will listen to your story properly later.”

Unable to bear it any longer, Kiyoshi said that.

“Yes.”

After bowing silently for two or three minutes—or perhaps less—Kyōko once again,

“I, you know—there were times I resented you too.”
“Over there, when I wanted to return, you know.”
“You know!”
“The very first letter came saying ‘Come back from Paris,’ you know? When that arrived, you happened to be here and approved of it, so I think that’s when my heart started to go wrong, you see.”

She began speaking in the same tone as before.

“Ah, is that so? Heh heh, is that so?”

Kiyoshi continued his half-hearted replies of concern, like those of a hospital visitor.

“Please call Mitsuru.”

Suddenly, Kyōko said.

“Mitsuru, you must come to your mother’s side.”

“Oh, nothing.”

Uncle vacated a bit of his seat and had Mitsuru sit down.

“Everyone came to Shinbashi.”

Kyōko took Mitsuru’s hand.

“Shin and Eiko didn’t come, though.”

“Those people didn’t need to come.”
“Because they’re small.”

Having said that, Kyōko looked at Mitsuru with a gaze meant to confirm he was the eldest and most important among her children.

“Mizuki and Hanaki haven’t been crying lately.”

“I don’t really know—I’m at school all day.”
“Auntie—I’m third.”

“Mitsuru. What is it?”

“I’m third.”
“Auntie, Ken is fourth.”

Mitsuru kept making mistakes in what he said, and his complete unawareness of them pained Kyōko.
The tears now were cold.

“Eiya, look at Kitano Maru.”

Mitsuru spoke to his cousin across the way.

“Ah, I saw it.”

“Which one’s bigger—the Ariyoru or the other?”

“That one? The Kitano Maru is bigger.”

From her child's words, Kyōko envisioned the phantom of a shadowy, lonely woman who had departed from a northern Japanese port aboard a Russian ship on that chilly evening at spring's end. She was pitifully reminded that even at the moment of departure, she had already deeply yearned to return from this place. The desire to wash her face before arriving at Shinbashi seemed difficult to fulfill; having left it untouched since boarding the Kitano Maru yesterday and having struggled through the night, she could not even manage to redo her hair. The current state of her—as if all her strength had been drained—was something she couldn't help but feel utterly miserable.

The two reporters had disappeared from their seats before anyone knew it.
Hatano and Eiya were counting the number of pieces of luggage and discussing which items to have delivered.

Kyōko envisioned the impending meetings with Mizuki, Hanaki, Ken, and the others that would come some time later, and tried to distract herself from the urge to cry.

"I'm in such distress, you see, that I still haven't washed my face."

She spoke to Kiyoshi.

"Oh, not at all. It's perfectly alright."

“And how are your Kaoru and Chieko doing?”

After saying this, Kyōko blushed slightly, wondering if she might be thought to have never considered her brother’s children until now.

“They are all in good health.”

“They must have grown so big by now.”

Kyōko herself could not be satisfied with how affected her own words sounded.

“I truly do like Chieko-san.”

She tried saying it, but this too felt as awkward as joining wood to bamboo.
After living in a world where communication failed beyond her husband—after thirty-eight days aboard ship speaking only to give orders to cabin boys and stewardesses without any proper conversation—Kyōko thought it dreary that she would likely utter foolish things even in ordinary talk for some time.
The sensation came over her that if a silver needle were to prick the corner of her eye now—as she had been told would release permissible tears—they would flow endlessly until they equaled that terrifying sea in volume; yet this suppression carried no sorrow born of joy nor anything akin to it, but rather the clear-cut grief of having been unable to return with her husband to their children’s side.
When she compared the joy of seeing the child she had thought of as something rare with how effortlessly that joy now approached before her eyes, Kyōko could no longer perceive it as having any particular worth.

“Auntie.”
“Mom—it’s already Shinbashi.”

Having said that, Mitsuru came to his mother’s side.

“We have arrived,” said Kiyoshi.

Kyōko found herself unbearably relieved that Mitsuru hadn’t grown as much as she had imagined, though Mizuki and Hanaki were larger than she had expected.
Thus tears of sorrow spilled forth.
Beneath her purple lined meisen robe lay a scarlet monpa underrobe—double-layered with cotton padding—and rather than wearing the hifu coat, she had donned a mantle instead, her figure striking others as an uncanny and pitiful sight.

“Ken?”

Kyōko looked around before speaking.
“Ken—where could he have gone?”
Oteru, separated by people, went to pull Ken’s hand where he stood a couple of ken ahead and brought him over.
“Ken.”
“Uu... welcome home.”
Neither her face nor her voice had changed the least.
Kyōko gradually came to realize that the woman in black glasses to whom she had been occasionally speaking without conscious intent was Minami’s Natsuko.
“You’ve stayed just the same, and Ms. Minami too.”
“Minami was also supposed to come, you see, but there was a lecture she simply couldn’t miss, so it’s just me who came. Everyone was so overjoyed—it was quite something, Madam. Well now, congratulations are in order.”

Though speaking quietly, Natsuko continued without pause.

"Might I trouble you for a photograph?"

The reporter who had shared their carriage earlier reappeared with a photographer in tow.

"This is impossible—I haven't even washed my face yet."

Kyōko uttered this neither distinctly to Oteru nor to the reporter, then rested her hand on Natsuko's shoulder and turned her face into shadow.

"Here—like this."

she whispered.

"How terribly inconvenient this is."

Natsuko declared in tones meant to carry to the photographer.

Oteru watched Kyōko’s emaciated profile with a coldness that made her very body shudder.

At the ticket gate were Kyōko’s acquaintances—the Hirai couple and Mr. Toyama, the scholar—and Ōtsuka, Shizuka’s disciple who worked as a clerk at the stock exchange, had also come.
Kohara—an old acquaintance whom they had met only once when Shizuka and Kyōko started their new household in Shibuya over ten years ago—had also come.
Everyone remarked on how unexpected Kyōko’s homecoming had been and how glad they were that she at least appeared less weakened.
Kyōko had been making sluggish greetings that even she herself found frustrating, but suddenly produced a cheerful voice and—

“Mr. Hirai’s novel is receiving such high praise, I hear,” she said.

“I’ve been wanting to write recklessly lately, you know.”

Hirai said with a smile.
That person’s wife was covering her mouth and laughing.

“I have had the car brought.”

Kiyoshi guided Kyōko toward the car port.
The passengers directed their eyes suspiciously toward this thirty-year-old woman.

“Mitsuru keeps mistakenly calling me ‘Auntie,’ you see.”

As she tried to board the car, Kyōko said this to Toyama standing beside her; the ends of her words trailed off unsteadily.

“Oh, is that so?”

Toyama said with a face brimming with a smile.
Mizuki got on in front of Kyōko.
Hanaki also had a face that seemed to want to get on, but was in the aunt’s car behind.
The car carrying Mizuki ascended toward Kōjimachi.
How many times Kyōko must have indulged in such fantasies when she was in the West.
That Kyōko had always told her husband she worried about the children in the order of Mitsuru, Mizuki, Ken, Hanaki, Shin, and Eiko was because Mizuki—though biologically the younger twin—had grown taller and shown such precocious mental development that her parents regarded her as their eldest daughter.
Her features were also good.
From the time she was a baby, the two maids would say they wanted to hold Mizuki and even quarrel over her.
Because Kyōko thought that among her children, only Mizuki had eyes exactly like her own, she also felt that eternal inheritable life clearly resided in Mizuki.
It absolutely had to be Mizuki who was first held by her mother today.

“You were being quite clever.”

Peering down at the girl’s face from above, Kyōko said.

“Yes.”

Mizuki spoke this with apparent unease.
Tears had pooled in her large eyes.
Seeing this, Kyōko too began to feel sorrow welling up within her.
The towel wrapped around ice brought from the train still lay clasped preciously in Kyōko’s hand at that moment—the coldness of its droplets seeping into her fingers became clear as their car moved through Hibiya’s desolate groves at October’s end.

“Big brother, when Father returns, I’m going to Kobe too.”

“I’ll take you along.”

“Even if I don’t get you to take me along, I’ll go with Mom.”

“Then go ahead.”
“I’m not going to school with you anymore anyway.”
“It’s fine if I just go ahead whenever I want.”

“No way, Big brother.”

“Stop it already.”
“Quit your squawking, Big shot!”

The two in the second car were having such an argument as they turned at Miyakezaka.
When passing through the newly opened road from Kōjimachi Street to Ichigaya, Kyōko felt memories seep from her heart like melting ice droplets—recollections of how, each time she had taken this road to accompany the children to the public bathhouse about a month before her departure, the anticipated sorrow of coming days would fill her chest until it brimmed.
Speaking of that matter, she also recalled the one she had complained to in Paris.
When they turned the corner at the carriage house, the Mishizaka family's kitchen gate came into view.

“Mamaaa!”

The sound of "Mamaaa!" being called out in a loud voice could be heard over the fence. A low voice speaking the same words in the same melody could also be heard. The loud one was a girl’s voice, and the low one was a boy’s voice. At this moment, Kyōko realized that in every letter from Oteru, it was only ever written how Eiko had grown dearer, with never a word about Shin—and when she herself tried to hold him, he would arch away,

“Nooo!”

Thinking of Eiko’s fierce persistence in having repeated "Nooo!" countless times, her chest tightened at the thought that as that child expanded her presence before Aunt Oteru’s affection, Shin had become a shadowed figure. Kyōko’s body moved forward unbidden with the urgency to take Shin into her arms.

“Welcome home.”

The gate door was opened with a heavy sound.
As the rickshaw man helped Mizuki down, Kyōko stumbled through the gate.

In the dirt-floored entranceway, Shin stood shaking his head with downcast eyes while smiling.
Eiko glared at her mother with bluish-tinged eyes where white predominated, then hid herself behind the shoji screen while keeping her mouth twisted.
She did not appear to have grown particularly larger.
Shin seemed to have truly grown about three sun.
A round-faced maid of seventeen or eighteen had also emerged.

“Shinbo.”

Hearing his mother say this, Shin thrust forward his hands in their tube-shaped sleeves like a rifle barrel, pursed his mouth into a small shape, and ran into the depths of the house.

“Let me hold you, Shinbo.”

Kyōko chased after Shin and went up into the house.
Watching him run about from the sitting room to the next room amused her.

Amid white chrysanthemums, yellow chrysanthemums, and pink dahlias stood seven or eight cockscombs tinged blackish crimson.
There was also a single stem of white cosmos like a widow.
The large tree sheltering them had leaves resembling laurel—a broad-leaved species where coral-red berries clustered thickly at every leaf base.
Having seen summer flowers blooming profusely in Singapore and Hong Kong, Kyōko felt an unavoidable loneliness as she looked at these plants—as though she had returned to some modest country at the world’s eastern edge.

“The flowers have bloomed quite well.”

“Yes.”

Oteru said cheerfully.

“Weren’t Kiyoshi-san and Eiya-san in the car?”

“That must be how it is.”
“Elder sister, why don’t you go change your clothes?”

“Oh. I... well, I must properly express my gratitude to you once like this.”

“There’s no need for you to say that.”

Oteru went to the next six-mat room. Kyōko gazed nostalgically at the study’s shoji screen.

Entering the six-mat room and intending to change her clothes, Kyōko looked around,

“Oteru-san, truly thank you.”
“You’ve kept everything so perfectly in order.”

The tatami mats were new and refreshing.

“Elder sister, you’ve truly become so haggard.”

Oteru spoke as if she had long wanted to say this.

“Truly though.”
“Oh my—you bought such a collar! It’s lovely but rather odd-looking.”
“After all—this face was burned by the Indian Ocean.”

Kyōko said while adjusting the collar—adorned with large light-blue chrysanthemums on a purple ground layered over her meisen silk everyday wear.

“Please return to your old self soon.”

“I just don’t have the courage anymore to even wash with boric acid.”

“Such a thing.”

“I still haven’t washed my face, you know.”

“That’s right.”
“I’ll have the water heated right away.”

Kyōko felt tears welling up at having someone in the house who spoke with such warmth.
After tying her komon-patterned haori cords, she moved toward the four-and-a-half-mat room with its mirror.
Passing through the tearoom, she found herself thinking how comforting it was to have a place called home.
Something that had seemed nearly faded into shadow now revealed itself not to be so after all.
Settling briefly before the mirror, she saw how her purple collar gleamed beside her sun-darkened face like an actor striking a dramatic pose.
With her husband absent, Kyōko rose in resentful resignation.
The memory of daily fussing over half-collars and kimono pairings before three full-length mirrors in their Paris home now stabbed her chest like some jealous hag’s spite.

The desk in Sei’s study and Kyōko’s own had both been neatly tidied, and not a trace of cloudiness remained on the glass doors of the bookshelves. Small chrysanthemums were arranged in the alcove. Gazing at the tarnished silver foil of that person’s hanging poem card, Kyōko thought it was as sorrowful as the decline that had come upon herself. The sound of the gate opening rang out; then Kiyoshi and Eiya came around from the garden entrance while Hatano and Natsuko came up through the front entrance.

After two or three newspaper reporters had come and gone, Kiyoshi and Oteru consulted in whispers; then, using the inkstone Oteru had brought, Kiyoshi wrote on paper: "We are not receiving visitors."
Oteru pasted it outside the entrance with rice grains.
Oteru went to the study in a manner that suggested she could now be completely at ease.

“Elder sister, Brother said so—‘We are not receiving visitors’ is what he wrote and we pasted at the entrance.
“We can rest easy now.”
“When they crowd in like that, it makes outsiders nervous—Brother in Paris also said he was concerned about that, you know.”

“Oteru-san, there haven’t been any letters from Paris for me.”

“No.”

“I see.”

“It’s already about time for him to return home.”

“I just kept thinking he must be coming.”

Kyōko said listlessly, pressed her chin flat against her collar, shaped her mouth as if to whistle, and let out a sigh.
Oteru was wondering what to say to comfort her when suddenly Kyōko—

“Oteru-san, people will resent you if you leave something like that written up.”

“she said.
Because her voice had been slightly raised, Oteru was momentarily flustered.”

“Is that so?”

“Take it down for me.”

“Mr. Hatano, a moment.”

Kyōko also called out to Hatano, who was playing with Mitsuru on the veranda.

“Yes.”

Hatano immediately came to Kyōko’s side.

“Well, Kiyoshi-san wrote that we shouldn’t receive visitors out of concern,” she said, “but I feel it’s too pitiful, so I will meet them. Please go take it down.”

“I see.”
“Very well.”

Hatano stood up and left.

"Mom."
"Our souvenirs still haven't come?"

With that, Ken came.

"Well, Mom doesn't know."
"Which luggage arrived first, I wonder."
"Hey, Oteru-san."

"There are only about three."
"They're in the tatami room."

"Let's leave that for later."
"When they all come, Mom will give them out right away."

"How boring."

With that, Ken left.

“Brother, apparently the souvenirs still haven’t been given out.”

When Ken’s voice telling this to his brother reached her ears, Kyōko—as if remembering—stood up and went to retrieve the two bundled paint boxes that Hatano had brought and placed in the alcove of the tatami room, their shadows visible.

“Mitsuru, come here and see.”

“What is it, Mom?”

“This larger one is your paint box.”
“This one goes to you.”

She said as she untied the string.

“Yes, Mom.”

“I’m so happy, Mitsuru.”

“Hmph, how wonderful.”

“It’s fine. You can use it until you’re grown up.”

“Hurry up and show me what’s inside, Auntie.”

“Auntie has gone away, hasn’t she?”

“Hmph, you’re Mom.
“I messed up.”
“Ugh, I hate this.”

Mitsuru said.
He tried to open the box with the key he had received from his mother’s hand—the one tied to its side with thread—but the metal fittings had corroded from the salt in the sea winds encountered during the voyage, and the key wouldn’t turn in any direction.

“Oh, Brother.”

“Let me see too, please.”

With that, the twins came out.
Shin also quietly followed along from behind.

“Let me hold Hanaki once, okay?”

When she said that, the composed child showed boundless joy on her face and sat on her mother’s lap. Mizuki also came near and leaned against her mother.

Shin stood leaning against the fusuma. Mitsuru took the box out to the veranda and had Natsuko open it.

“Mom, I had a scary dream in Paris.”

Hanaki said, looking down and staring at her own feet. This was something the children had learned from their aunt—how Kyōko, grieving over an ominous dream she had seen about her child at some point, had written about it and sent it to them.

“I had a bad dream.”

“They say Hanaki just cries and cries endlessly, Mom.”

Mizuki said in an amused tone.

“What a horrible dream. Truly, truly horrible.”

Hanaki said.
Kyōko, recalling how in that dream holding her like this had made the crying stop, hugged her tightly once more.
Kiyoshi’s child Chieko came in through the garden entrance.

“Oh, Chieko.”

Kyōko said, forgetting herself.
Seeing their cousin’s figure, the twins left together.
Shin also left.
Oteru brought Eiko, carrying her.
Eiko’s cheeks twitched faintly, as if she had been crying.
There being someone in the household who spread rumors about Eiko being the most beautiful—and Oteru having written to Paris about this matter while asserting that she herself certainly thought so too—the couple in Paris had given wry smiles at such claims; yet Kyōko couldn’t help wondering whether Eiko’s face had indeed begun changing in that manner. Still, from the very moment she first laid eyes on the child earlier, one could only imagine how absurd Kyōko found this notion of “the most beautiful” to be.
Eiko possessed, for a child, an exceptionally high nose flanked by deep lines resembling a heraldic motif of rising steam and eyes that a Futurist might have painted.
Her hair also had the same unruly curls as her aunt’s.

“Go to your mother’s side.”

As Oteru said this and placed Eiko on the tatami mat, the youngest child edged sideways toward her mother, lips and cheeks trembling even more intensely.

“Let me carry her for you.”

Kyōko reached out her hand but kept her eyes fixed on Chieko, who had just entered.
Chieko wore a long-sleeved haori coat of black merino cloth patterned with peonies.
“Welcome home.”
Quietly placing her hands on the floor, Chieko bowed her head.
“You’ve grown so much—your hair has gotten so long.”
Kyōko spoke cheerfully.
The twins in Genroku sleeves sat flanking their cousin who was a year younger.
The tremors in Eiko’s cheeks, which had subsided momentarily, grew violent again as she was drawn onto her mother’s lap.
Kyōko had left on her journey about half a month after returning from the country house where Eiko had been fostered, so regarding this child’s recent past there remained only memories of the girl who had accompanied them from the countryside—the one Eiko called “Nanny” and refused to let hold her no matter how she tried—

“It’s Nanny!”

Kyōko had only memories of being screamed at through tears.
In the distant past—when Shin, born a full eleven months earlier and raised on cow’s milk, had been a frail child—it became necessary that this newborn be either entrusted to a wet nurse or sent to relatives to raise. Though Kyōko wished for the wet nurse option, the required monthly expense of over twenty yen proved impossible due to deference toward Kiyoshi’s benefactors, leaving sending the child away as the sole recourse. On that day when Kyōko—still barely seventeen days postpartum—went to Ogawamachi in Kanda to buy bibs and hats for Eiko to take along, she was left with sorrowful, lonely memories.
It was Kyōko who, while feeling glad the foster parents were well-dressed people of means surpassing their own, could only imagine Eiko’s future home as a wretched country house—Kyōko who wept as she fastened the nightgown collar.

“Shall I nurse Eiko?”

Kyōko opened her white bosom.
The breasts that had not been touched by a child’s mouth for about six years were only slightly raised, like those of a virgin.

“No, no!”

Eiko shook her head.

“Well then, I’ll give it to you when you want it again.”

With that，Kyōko fastened her collar.
Before she knew it，Chieko had also come to lean against her aunt’s knee.
As Oteru was about to say a few words to Chieko and leave，Eiko burst into tears.
Kyōko let go and made the child stand.
Oteru ran up to Eiko，

“No.”

shoved her away，and left.
Eiko immediately got up and ran off.

“You’re quite clever，Chieko-san.”

Saying this, Kyōko rubbed her cheek against her niece’s, but her heart remained lonely.
Chieko kept her mouth slightly parted, wearing an expression as adorable as a little bird’s.
Kyōko found herself remembering how Shinda—the Kyoto high school teacher she thought of as a younger brother—had once said he always found others’ children far more endearing than his own daughter, that such feelings were perfectly ordinary.

“Sister, the water has boiled—please wash your face,” Oteru said as she approached.
When Kyōko returned to the study after neatly redoing her hair, two or three reporters were waiting.
There were people she didn’t recognize at all, but Kyōko kept up a buoyant conversation that ran contrary to her heart.

It was around two o'clock when Kyōko sat down for the midday meal in the family dining room.
In the six-tatami room across the way, Kiyoshi, Eiya, Akiko, and Chieko were eating in a row.
Eiya had, without anyone noticing, layered a lined undergarment of meisen silk with quail-patterned crepe sleeves and was wearing an Oshima haori coat.
They were all Sei’s belongings.
The realization that neither those who wore them nor those who handled them were themselves anymore brought a shallow pang of pity to Kyōko’s heart.
The maid called Sue referred to Oteru as “Madam.”
Hatano had gone out to two or three houses to deliver greetings regarding the matter he had been asked to handle earlier.

All the luggage had been delivered, and Kyōko divided the toys among the children.
The twins and Chieko received matching dolls; Mitsuru, Ken, and Kaoru got Baron’s balls; Shin received a bear toy; and Eiko was given the same doll as her sisters’, just a bit smaller.

“I still have more, but since they’re wrapped among other things in the suitcase, I’ll take them out for you later.”
“There are also clothes for Chieko, Mizuki, and Hanaki.”

Kyōko said.

“What do I have, besides?”

Ken said.

“Hmm, what was it now?”

“Mom, Brother doesn’t need it anymore—he has a paintbox.”

“That’s not true at all, Mom.”

“It’s fine. It’s fine.”

“Quiet, Ken.”

As Mitsuru said,

“Noo!”

Ken started crying.

“Mizuki’s doll is better, you know. Let’s swap!”

“Let’s swap!” Hanaki said.

“No! No!”

Mizuki said in a tearful voice.
Kyōko returned to a chaotic world and watched the children with a breath like one waking from a dream.

“I will call again later.”

Kiyoshi took Kaoru’s Baron and left, leaving only Chieko behind.

Kyōko suddenly began to wonder what had become of the keys to the trunks and suitcases and went to the study.
And she checked inside the red brocade pouch she had taken from the staggered shelf, but it wasn’t there.

“Oh.”

She muttered to herself and tilted her head, but beyond that, she had no recollection.

“Oteru, I must have dropped my suitcase keys somewhere.”

As if mustering the resolve to voice something shameful, Kyōko called out to her sister-in-law in the adjacent room.

“Couldn’t they be somewhere here?”

The face of Oteru, who had entered, had lines at the corners of her eyes and upward curves at both sides of her closed mouth.

“They weren’t where I took off my kimono.”

“No, they aren’t there.”

“Then they must be in the train.”

“How awful.”

“Indeed.”

“What a bother.”

“It’s fine.
It’ll sort itself out.
But you might try calling Shinbashi Station to ask.
They said it’s the box in front of the dining car.”

“I’ll do that.”

As she stood to leave, Oteru gave her collar edge a slight tug, adjusted the upper hem of her kimono, and went out.

As Kyōko stood dazed, Minami appeared.

“Oh, Minami-san.”

Tears spilled softly down Kyōko’s cheeks.

“Congratulations.”

Minami remained bowed over just like that, only her slender fingers were held out over the brazier.
Kyōko did not welcome Natsuko’s entrance into this silence.
Eiya also came and was exchanging first greetings with Minami.

Oteru came to show a tiered sushi box from Kikuya, their regular caterer, saying it had arrived for the Madam. With one arm looped behind her back, she carried Eiko, who had been crying since earlier.

“Why is Eiko crying like this?”

“Earlier, when I told her she must sleep with you tonight—that’s when she started crying.”

Oteru curled her mouth as she said this.

“You don’t have to say such things.”

Having said this, Kyōko looked at Eiko’s face and slightly furrowed her brows.

“Eiko-chan, this won’t do.”

With that, Natsuko picked up Eiko, and the two women stood and left together.

“You’ve gotten sunburned.”

Minami was gazing intently at Madam’s face with a look of pity.

“How pitiful I am. But Mr. Araki said in Kobe that I’ve become younger, didn’t he?”

Kyōko looked at Eiya’s face and said with a laugh.

“At least two or three years.”

Eiya said dubiously.

“That’s not the case at all.”

“Minami-san’s assessment is more truthful. Minami-san, you know—my husband in Paris said I must have looked about ten days younger when I first arrived here. ‘If you’d sent me back first,’ he said, ‘you’d look five days younger by the time I returned.’ But I got angry and called him a fool for dismissing it as just my imagination.”

Eiya looked down laughing while smoothing the ashes in the brazier.

The Minami couple and Kyōko had Kikuya's sushi brought to the study, the children ate it in the six-tatami room, and dinner was thus settled.
Eiya the sake drinker, with two or three dishes Oteru had prepared in the dining room, was being served from a sake decanter.
Since Kiyoshi's wife Tsugako had come, Kyōko talked for a while in the sitting room.
Tsugako was two or three years older than Kyōko and a refined Edo woman.

“Up until now, Oteru-san’s duties must have been quite demanding.”

She also did not forget to have the younger sister who had come out carry flowers.

Kyōko returned to the study and,

“I even quarreled at times, all because I wanted to come home.”

Having said that, she stared fixedly at the Minami couple.

“Hm, hm, hm.”

Natsuko laughed.
Composing herself, Minami said,
“I see.”
Kyōko found something lonely in how Minami’s gaze regarded her with pity.
She grew sad at the thought she might not write the Paris letter today, then longed to see the photograph taken with her husband last summer that ought to be in the bookshelf drawer.
Hearing Eiko fussing again, Natsuko stood and left.

Eiko stood beside Oteru—who was seated across from Eiya—her sleeves puffed out from multiple layers of cotton padding spread like servant kites,
“Auntie, I wanna sleep with you! Auntie, I wanna sleep with you!”
she kept repeating.
“What’s the matter, Eiko-chan? Let’s go to sleep with Miss Natsuko.”

With that, Natsuko sat down.
Oteru had Eiko sit on her lap,
“It would be best if she slept with Mother, but...”
Oteru said.
“Starting tonight, that will be impossible.”
“Come here, Eiko-chan.”

Eiko came into Natsuko's outstretched hand.

“Now let’s get changed into nightclothes.”
“Otsue-san, where are you?”

“Coming!”

Otsue came out wiping her hands on a white apron and pulled out a medium-sized trunk from the dark closet in the six-tatami room—the trunk that contained all the children’s nightclothes.

“Miss Eiko seems quite settled then? Will she be sleeping with you, Miss Natsuko?”

“It’s perfectly fine.”

Natsuko, who had carried Eiko there, briskly changed the child’s clothes. Then laying the small body down on the futon Otsue had laid out, she too rested her head on her arm,

“Sleepy-time, sleep, sleep.”

she was saying.

“Everyone should go to bed now.”

The mother in the study called out like this to the children playing in the sitting room.

“We never go to bed this early, Mom.”

Mitsuru said in a discontented voice.

“But you must have woken up early this morning.”
“That’s why.”

“Okay.”

Mitsuru answered.

“I’m sleepy now, Mom.”

Hanaki, who had come to her mother’s side, said this.
“Otsue, prepare the beds.”

As he said this, Mitsuru headed to the tearoom,

“Isn’t it still too early?”

“Isn’t it still too early?” Oteru said.

“Mom said to go to bed.”

The mother thought this voice—speaking while biting the end of the white woolen cord of his haori—already sounded too grown-up for his age. She also thought she saw a gaze that seemed on the verge of tears.

“Is that so? Otsue, go prepare the bedding.”

Oteru again said, “Kishiyū would be the one, don’t you think?” and directed the conversation to Eiya.

“Yeah, yeah, yeah, that one’s perfect.”

Nodding as he answered his aunt in this way, Eiya took the cup.
As Hatano came again, passing each other by, Minami left, taking Natsuko—who had put Eiko to sleep—with her.

“I’ve gone and lost the keys to my suitcase and such.”
“At the inn in Kobe, perhaps?”

“Is that so? How dreadful.”

“Yes.”

Though she said this, Kyōko did not feel nearly as strongly that she had done something wrong as when Oteru had earlier called it dreadful.

“Please call Mitsukoshi and ask them.”
“They’re sure to have them there.”

“Ah, yes indeed.”
“I’ll see to it proper-like.”

And then their conversation—resembling the continuation of the travel story begun yesterday in Kobe—dragged on at length.

Kyōko kept stored in her heart the matter of her husband's concerning financial arrangements that she wanted to discuss with this person, for her timid heart made her think it was still too early today.

Oteru came out,

“Mr. Araki said he would excuse himself first and went upstairs.”

she said.

“Yes.”
“You must be exhausted today too.”

“No.”
“There’s no such thing!”
Oteru said.

That Kyoto woman was expressing her gratitude to Hatano with well-considered words.

"I shall call again."
"Goodbye."

As was his custom, Hatano abruptly said this and left.

“Sister, when I think about how I lived so wastefully those first four months or so, I feel unbearably sorry—unbearably sorry toward you. I just can’t help it.”

Oteru rotated her right wrist with her left palm as she looked at her sister’s face and spoke.

“It’s done with.”
“I don’t feel anything about it at all.”

Because it was something she hadn’t wanted to discuss, Kyōko spoke the words in haste.

“Eiko’s medicine alone cost quite a lot, you know.”

“I suppose so.”
“That must be so.”

Kyōko said with a tinge of desperation.

“You’ve no idea how much was spent just on Eiko.”

“Ah—when did the last letter from Paris arrive?”

Kyōko asked.

“About ten days ago, perhaps?”

“Let me see it.”

“Yes.”

Oteru took out the letter in an envelope bearing a blue stamp from the wax-colored box atop the bookshelf. When Kyōko took it in hand and saw the address, she became aware of an unexpected flicker of jealousy rising in her chest.

The children are all safe, and everything has been managed through your thoughtful consideration—for this I am most grateful.

So it began, followed by many tender words. When Kyōko had been in Paris, her husband's sister would report their monthly expenses far exceeding those from their time in Japan, prompting him to send letter after letter rebuking her poor household management. Though Kyōko herself had repeatedly begged him to show more kindness—to find some better way—now that she was no longer at his side, now that this estranged version of herself had disappeared, he could write such letters to his sister. This thought filled Kyōko with unnameable discomfort.
Though there were even concerns expressed about whether she might return safely to Japan, a wife long accustomed to her husband's affections found no particular joy in such sentiments.

“It’s closer news that it came through Mr. Hatano, isn’t it.”

Kyōko said this casually.

“I think I’ll go to bed now.”

And again, Kyōko’s voice sounded plaintive as she spoke.

“You should rest now.”

“Goodnight.”

Kyōko went to the bedroom. In the center of the eight-mat room lay her merino futon with its plover pattern; to its right side were three boys' beds lined up, while on the left slept Mizuki and Hanaki. The children's breathing—like a tender breeze through new grass—should have been the spring air Kyōko had yearned for, yet sleeping within it left her desolate. That she would leave her husband behind to sleep alone beside these people—never, not once during those sorrowful nights before departure, had such a thought crossed Kyōko's mind. Now she caught herself imagining—if only Oteru were five or six years younger, if only that face weren't so forbidding—then perhaps there might be some comfort here.

From around five o'clock, Mitsuru and Ken were already awake—tugging at hands and feet emerging from each other's futons while letting out explosive shouts.

Kyōko managed to sleep for about twenty or thirty minutes the previous night, but even that felt uncertain—whether it was real or imagined—and then morning came.
This was likely due both to six months of sleeping on train berths and the discomfort of her first night back on tatami mats.

“Mom, Mom.”

Mitsuru tried calling.

“What is it?”

“Mom, please tell me a story about France.”

“Do it! Do it!”

Ken also said.

“Mom, tell us.”

Hanaki also spoke.

"Mom."

Mizuki too said it as though compelled.

"Fox Mama, won't you give me some milk?"

Shin woke up and added his voice.

"What are you talking about?"

"The school kid said it."

This was something Shin had heard and remembered—a story about how Ken's friend's younger brother had said that.

"Mom, tell us."

Following Mitsuru’s words, the others all called out, “Mom! Mom!”

“Mom didn’t sleep well last night, so she has a headache.”

“Right.
Then never mind.”

Mitsuru said.

“How tedious.”

Ken said.
That Ken was a child with disagreeable traits—Kyōko also thought of how difficult it was to alter the feelings she had long held toward him.
In the neighboring room, Eiko’s crying voice could be heard.

“The water is boiling now.”
“Mitsuru.”

Oteru came to wake her nephew.

“Oh! Auntie’s already awake.”

As Kyōko tried to raise her head from the pillow, Oteru pressed down with a restraining touch,

“Oh, please do rest.”

Oteru said.
Mitsuru and Ken clattered through their futons and dashed off.

“Since I can’t sleep anyway.”

The deep blue waves with plovers surged mightily, and Kyōko sat up from her futon.

“Did you rest well last night?”

“Not at all.”

Her disheveled bedhead hair hung long down her back, giving her the appearance of a girl from behind.

“Brother used too much hot water.”

Hearing Ken’s crying, Oteru went toward the washroom. Eiko once again cried out at the top of her voice.

Kyōko came out from the mirror room.

“Oteru, there’s also this way of tying it.”

Having said that, she tilted her head that way to demonstrate. The roots of the hair were bundled at the lower part, and both those roots and ends were all folded back to the underside and neatly arranged.

“It looks refreshingly light.”

“But even this lonely hairstyle that makes me look like a nun—my husband dislikes it.”

“Now that you mention it, that’s true.”
“Please return to yesterday’s style.”

“But this is fine.”
“Now I am a nun.”

Oteru watched her sister-in-law, whose cheeks had reddened slightly as she walked away, with a sense of displeasure.

Two boys,
“We’re off.”

After the two boys said this and left through the garden entrance, the rest of the family sat down to breakfast.

“Eiya-san’s portion was set aside separately.”

“That’s right.”

When Oteru stood up, Eiko burst into tears with a wail.
Immediately, the aunt returned and lifted Eiko onto her lap,

“What’s wrong?
What’s wrong? What’s wrong?”
“Let me nurse you now.”

Having said that, she loosened her collar.
Eiko thrust her small hand in impatiently, pulled out her aunt’s breast, and put it into her mouth.

“Oh, are you nursing her?”

Kyōko said this, though in her heart she found the old maid’s mentality utterly incomprehensible.

“Yes.”

Oteru turned again to the child,

“Your mother’s milk is real milk—you should take it.”

she said.

“I don’t want to.”

Kyōko retorted defiantly.
“And,

“Why must that be?
“Even in Tamagawa, I had stopped breastfeeding after just a year.”

As she said this, she placed the bowl painted with clematis flowers onto the red tray that the youngest had brought out.

“Now, let’s have our meal.”

Oteru pulled her breast away and placed Eiko down.
As she was crying again,

“Quiet now!”

As the child swallowed her sobs in unison with her aunt’s command, Kyōko found it so amusing she nearly burst into laughter.
Hanaki, who had arrived late,

“Oh Aunt, you lied—you said it was potato soup.”

Having said that, she stirred inside the soup bowl with her chopsticks.

“This is called cluster taro—it’s also a type of taro,” said the mother.

“Aunt is a liar indeed,” said Oteru, tears welling in her eyes.

Kyōko thought that since even a brief explanation wouldn’t make people understand how Kyoto natives’ casual use of “cutting corners” offended Tokyo sensibilities, nor how Tokyoites’ flippant “little lies” grated on Kyoto ears, silence was her only recourse now.

And though she could foresee future troubles ahead, during her absence she had avoided dwelling on past matters. After all, throughout those six months abroad, there hadn’t been a single day when she hadn’t knelt in her heart to beg forgiveness from the children.

Eiko made them change her rice three times—too hot first, then too cold—before finally starting to eat. She kept her eyes closed as if avoiding her mother’s gaze while moving her mouth mechanically.

“You’re closing your eyes because you can’t stand to look at me, aren’t you?”

“Heh heh.”

Oteru laughed,

“Eiko-chan, put on a nice face now.”
“You’re someone who can make such a truly adorable face, aren’t you?”

Oteru had been saying.

Having come to the study and attempted to look at the newspapers, Kyōko—who noticed that her own affairs were mentioned in them—placed the three or four newspapers just as they were on Shizuka’s desk behind her.

“Good morning.”

Mizuki came to greet her.
Hanaki and Shin also came.

“Why can’t you go greet them properly?”
“With that chatterbox mouth of yours.”

Oteru’s voice suddenly rang out next to the study, followed by the sharp smack, smack of someone striking a child’s head—sounds that reached Kyōko’s ears.

“Nooo! Won’t do it! Won’t!”

“Still? You’re still like this?”

“I won’t do it!”
“Nooo! I don’t want to!”

As if scrubbing cluster taros, Oteru rubbed Eiko’s head against the tatami mat again and again, then went out to the tearoom and shut the sliding door.

“Auntie! Auntie!”

Eiko was wailing at the top of her voice.
Kyōko was shedding tears.
“I’ll take Mizuki-san and Hanaki-san to the avenue on their way to kindergarten.”

Kyōko rose to her feet and said this.
“The two of us can go by ourselves.”
Mizuki said.

“Then just to the back gate.”

The youngest brought the twins’ lunch boxes wrapped in red merino.

“Mizuki-san, Hanaki-san, let me give you some nice handkerchiefs.”

Oteru fastened white handkerchiefs to the two’s cream-colored obi sashes.

“Thank you.”
“Thank you, Aunt.”

When Mizuki spoke, Aunt showed a satisfied smile and,

“Take care now.”

Oteru said.

“We’re off now, Aunt.”

The two went out through the garden entrance after saying this together. Kyōko walked some distance behind. When they reached the corner of the carriage house, they turned back to look at their mother who they thought had likely forgotten,

“Goodbye.”

The two said together.

“Mommy will walk with you a bit more.”

They started walking hand in hand again, but at the bend two or three ken ahead,

“Goodbye.”

The two said.

“I’ll go as far as the slope.”

Having said this, the twins gradually moved away from their mother who followed behind and walked briskly along the road beside the Girls' School. Kyōko thought her feelings toward that person had been pure when she went to meet Oteru from Shinbashi and walked here. But even now, she did not think ill of that person in the slightest. Because the children had suddenly returned to their mother's care, that person had tasted an indescribable loneliness since yesterday—which was why she spoke in such a sharp voice and struck dear Eiko. Because she thought with such sympathy, all the more she couldn't help worrying about what would come after—both for that person's sake and her own—Kyōko walked on with her head mostly bowed while thinking these things. Before she knew it, she came out in front of Kaihei Hospital.

“Goodbye.”

This time, it was the mother who called out loudly.

“Goodbye.”

The twins turned around and gave a slight bow but immediately tried to dash down the slope.
About ten ken ahead, they suddenly split to left and right.
And then burst into tears.
Needless to say, Kyōko still stood on the slope.
Kyōko stumbled to her children’s side.
She pulled them both close with both hands.
Kyōko plopped down on the ground—mother and children wailed aloud by the roadside as if reliving their sad parting at Shinbashi half a year ago.
Four or five elementary students passed by watching curiously.

“Mom, Mom.”

Of course，the mother knew that behind Mizuki’s incessant “Mom，Mom” lay the unmistakable voice of “I don’t want to go.”

“Then I’ll walk you to kindergarten，okay?”

The two fell silent while crying.
Even as they started walking，their sobbing showed no sign of stopping.

“If you cry，people will laugh.”
“See，Mom won’t go anywhere anymore and will stay home，so it’s all right，okay?”

When she said this，the two would fall silent，but their crying grew even louder.
When they tried to part at the kindergarten gate，

“Mom! Mom!”

Hearing them say this again—if only Oteru weren’t at home—Kyōko thought she could have taken them back with her.
Even when comforted by the old servant, they wouldn’t listen and brought their mother into the corridor all the way to their classroom.

“Now let’s go to the playground—you’re her big sister now aren’t you?”
“Wouldn’t it be silly if Big Sister cried?”
“And Miss Mizuki will stop crying too now.”

Told this by their nursery teacher they fell silent again while crying.

When Kyōko, bearing the silver-colored weight of remorse upon her chest, entered through the garden entrance, Eiya was sitting on the study's threshold reading a newspaper.
On the veranda of the tatami room, Oteru was still letting Eiko suckle at her breast.

“Welcome home, madam.”

“Good morning. I overslept.”

Unable to respond even to Eiya’s words, Kyōko merely bowed before rushing to the flowerbed, turning her back on them as she tapped the cockscomb tips.
Kyōko suddenly wondered what had become of Shinbo, her chest resounding violently.
When she reached the veranda’s edge, she noticed Shin standing in a recessed corner beside the bookshelf—a space measuring five sun by one shaku.

“Shinbo, come here.”

Kyōko moved toward the veranda.

“What?”

The words Shin spoke still came from that cramped space.

“Does Shin always stay in such a place?”

“It’s not exactly like that...”

Oteru said.

“Come here.”

Shin narrowed his red lips into a thin line as he came to his mother’s hand.
Kyōko placed it on her shoulder and went back to the flowerbed.

“Pretty flowers, aren’t they.”

While showing the child, she thought that if she could take this child out like this one more time, there would be no regrets left. The home I so desperately wanted to return to—was this what it truly was? she thought.

“Eiya, are you going out today?”

After saying this in such a cheerful voice, Kyōko came upstairs a short while later.

“There.”

“Go on ahead.”
“To an exhibition or something.”

“Go then.”

“You shouldn’t underestimate Tokyo like that.”
“I was truly impressed seeing Tokyo yesterday.”
“Kōjimachi is a lovely area, don’t you agree, Oteru?”

“That’s true.”
“Some places surpass even Kyoto.”

This time Oteru spoke in a thoroughly deflated tone.

“There’s someone perfect to guide you around Kabukiza, but being employed, I doubt he’s free today.”

As Eiya said this with a smile, Kyōko briefly wondered if he might be a shadow of her husband’s youthful prime—something she had never truly known.

“When I see you smoking, I can’t help wanting to smoke again.”

Kyōko said while gazing at Eiya’s profile.

“Why don’t you smoke then?”

With those words, Eiya made his aunt hold an Iris cigarette—one he had held over the hibachi—between her fingers.

“I went to the trouble of quitting, you see.”

Kyōko said.
Though he was her nephew and younger, this person’s ideology was fully formed, and he undoubtedly believed that merely calling her “Aunt, Aunt” constituted doing his utmost—as Kyōko was thinking such things, the cigarette had entirely crumbled into dust atop the ashes.
When she noticed the cigarette, Kyōko thought she had done a good thing.
It was a cigarette she had quit—one her husband had so praised—and yet when she saw the pale blue smoke wafting before her nose, it became unbearable, and she rose from her seat.

At lunchtime too, Eiko ate with her eyes closed.
When Oteru scolded,

“Act like the youngest.”

she said.

“You don’t like Mother? Then maybe I should just go away somewhere else.”

When Kyōko said with a laugh, Eiko, for the first time, opened her eyes, looked at her mother, and nodded.

“You’re such an unpleasant child.”
“If Mother opens her suitcase today, there’s another doll—but Eiko doesn’t want it, does she.”

“I don’t want it! I don’t need it!”

Eiko turned toward the aunt and said in a low voice.

Around one o'clock, Eiya left.
Kyōko was trying to write to her husband about her experiences since Colombo.
Hatano came.
Hatano was recounting various rumors about Kyōko that he had heard here and there yesterday—Kyōko found herself thinking his persistent Osaka accent only made him more endearing—whereas Oteru really ought to use Kyoto dialect properly—considering how often she used all those obscure proper nouns that bewildered the maids.
Oteru came carrying Eiko.

“You’re laying it on thick, aren’t you.”

“Yes.”

With that, Oteru continued,

“This child must take after Elder Sister’s disposition quite strongly.”
“It’s like two equally strong-willed people sharply rebounding off each other, you see.”

Oteru said.

“Oh, come now—am I really such a strong person?”
“Well, Mr. Hatano.”
“I don’t know if going alone and returning alone makes me look like the sort of person who’d say such things, but that’s not the case, Mr. Hatano.”
“Not at all, Mr. Hatano.”

she imploringly looked at Mr. Hatano and said.
Hatano half-opened his mouth, working his cheeks as he showed an expression of boundless pity.

“Even so.”

Still Oteru persisted.
Kyōko resentfully thought of this woman—so different from herself who hesitated to mention how Eiko’s brow-to-eye spacing, high nose, and mouth resembled Oteru’s—as Hatano made his exit. Mizuki and Hanaki returned home with faces showing no trace of their morning tears. Mitsuru and Ken came back too. Then Ken—who knows what moved him—approached his mother as she wrote her letter with tears falling,

“Mom, keep living forever.
“Huh? Mom?”

“he said.”

“Go on to Mom’s place already.”
“I said go already.”

Frantic voices could frequently be heard amidst the sounds of thumping.
Kyōko started to stand up to go but changed her mind and took up the brush.

“Eiko’s no good.”
“Idiot.”
“Acting all high and mighty won’t work, you know.”
“Even if you hit Brother, I won’t listen anymore.”

Whether it was when Mitsuru’s cursing voice sounded, Kyōko went out to the parlor, and Oteru was holding Eiko tightly, tightly in the four-and-a-half-mat room.
(End)