Pathway to Japanese Literature

In the mountains, autumn arrives earlier than anywhere else.
From late August onward, amidst lingering summer dayflowers, pampas grass and maiden flowers began releasing their fragrance through pale veils of dew.
The air hung clear, and the peaks lining the blue sky's edge seemed to press down heavily even upon their own summits.
The cries of birds seeking fruits that had just begun reddening grew sharper with each dawn.

Amidst the clamor of "Obon here, Obon there," even in these small villages scattered through the mountains—where the Bon Festival stood with New Year's as one of only two annual celebrations—the festivities had ended just yesterday.
The drums that had startled valley mists and mountain echoes during Bon dances could no longer be heard from tonight onward.
Men labored deep in the mountains felling trees and burning charcoal, while women tended buckwheat fields and harvested soybeans; all closed their doors early and slept exhausted.
Even Tokuji's house across the river—whose light had burned brightly until my late bedtime last night—now stood dark.
Only the mountain stream's current sent clear echoes through the crisply chilled ravine air, while stars glistened like parched things in desiccated light.

I wearied from reading left the desk and leaned against the window while stretching my back. The night's scent flowing over the mountains chilled through me, pressing upon my weary body and mind after I had left the lamp's side. It felt indescribably pleasant. Though familiar, I surveyed the mountain stream, peaks, and azure sky there as if seeing them anew with a glad heart. Truly chilling—the night air pierced through my unlined kimono and undergarment yet remained impossible to resent. I glanced at the clock, blew out the lamp, and walked across the wide room's old tatami mats—their faint creaks echoing—toward the staircase.

When I went down to the lower room and looked inside, the ten-tatami space already had its bedding fully laid out. Yet only Father slept there, the faint glow of the small oil lamp quietly illuminating his balding head. I slipped into the corridor without a sound, where insects chittered relentlessly in the garden's overgrown grasses. My feet met cold floorboards as I moved toward the kitchen. The sliding door normally left open stood firmly shut tonight - likely against the chill. Seeing this filled me with a quiet loneliness that settled heavily in my chest.

When I slid open the door, the interior was unexpectedly bright—the lamp’s glare stabbed my eyes.
When I looked, I was startled; though I had assumed it would only be Mother and Okane, Yone and Chiyo had come, with Chiyo massaging Mother’s shoulders by the hearth.

“Ah!”

As I involuntarily let out a shrill cry and smiled, everyone smiled in unison and looked up at me.
When I surveyed their faces, I immediately sensed they had been engaged in some prolonged conversation beforehand.

Having sunk into profound loneliness only to encounter these two young women’s unexpected smiles, I felt an uncommonly intense joy.
Since Okane, seated beside Mother, promptly straightened a cushion for me, I sat down energetically upon it.
Though modest in size, the hearth had a fire burning crimson.

“What’s going on?”

Still smiling, I looked between Mother and the two of them and called out.
They remained silent, smiling.
No one responded.

“You’ve stayed up very late tonight.”

Mother, without answering that, said in her usual frail voice,

“We were just about to call you.”

she continued.

“Oh, I was just reading an interesting book... So, what brings you here? Visiting? Or business?”

I said, looking between the two of them.
"What? Just visiting!"
Chiyo responded with a smile from behind Mother.
"What a rare sight - both of you together."

I said.

“Since both of you didn’t come during Obon… And tonight’s the Seventeenth-Night Moon.”

Having said this to me,

“That’s enough now—truly, that’s quite enough!”

While tucking her shoulder into her kimono and forcibly cutting off Chiyo, Mother began tending to the fire.

The two were sisters a year apart in age and were my second cousins.
Yone, the elder sister, was two years younger than me—twenty-one that year.
Though they lived within the same village, reaching this house from their home required crossing a nearly four-kilometer desolate mountain pass, making their nighttime visits rare occurrences.

“Ah, that’s good. It’s been quite a while—you’ve really holed yourselves up deep in the mountains, haven’t you?”

As I said this from behind Mother, looking toward my sister who had come to the hearth across from me,

“Oh, it’s such a remote mountain place!”

She answered with a laugh, furrowing her brows with odd earnestness.

Though I had met her briefly since returning for vacation—when she had appeared in dirty work clothes—tonight she wore a simple white yukata, her hair freshly combed with visible teeth marks from the comb, her face and lips lightly perfumed, appearing unusually beautiful and delicate.
Even a mountain village girl, when she comes of age, inevitably emits the undeniable charm of a maiden.
Moreover, until just two or three years ago, my mother had taken them in and raised them in this house, so they bore not a trace of the vulgar appearance common among other mountain village girls.

“It must be lonely!”

“Well, someone like me’s grown used to it… but Brother, you must be lonely!”

“Hmm, it’s exactly like death.”

“Oh, stuck in a village like this!”

She exclaimed in exaggerated surprise,

“But you’ve come back from Tokyo now!”

With eyes that somehow seemed to flirt, she stared into mine—a girl of sturdy build, with healthy flesh-tints and beauty of complexion, though undeniably carrying a rustic charm. She was likely considered first or second in looks within this village. Such rumors had reached me too.

“Ah, truly—thank you ever so much for the souvenir.”

And she bowed politely.

“Did you like it?”

“I sure did!”

She inadvertently slipped into her local dialect and immediately flushed crimson.

“Ha ha ha ha! Is that so? That’s good. Is that so? You sure did like it, huh? Ha ha ha!”

My uncontrollable laughter made Mother laugh, and Okane joined in.
Then Mother said,

“Oh, Yone, what’s wrong with you? Sitting all alone over there… Come closer over here.”

I too noticed and turned around to see that my sister had been pressed against the windowsill, having hardly spoken a word since earlier.

“Oh, right—what’s wrong, Yone? Come closer over here. It must be cold there.”

“Ehh...”

She gave a long, dull reply,

“The moon…”

Without finishing her sentence, she was starting to rise.

“The moon?”
“Ah, right—it was the Seventeenth-Night Moon.”

And so, without any particular thought, I stood up and went to look by the window. Even when I stuck my neck out and looked up, the sky remained pitch-dark. Only the stars were scattered and shining brightly.

“This isn’t a joke—it’s still pitch black out!”
“It must have come out by now.”

And saying this listlessly, she stood up, went over to the hearth, and sat down quietly beside her younger sister.
When I noticed their matching yukatas—something quite unusual for their household—I thought with some surprise.

“I hate this! Sister, sit further away!”

Straightening her knees, the younger sister snapped at her older sister.

Then Mother interjected,

“You come over here. There’s plenty of space.”

she said to the younger sister, pulling closer the hem of her own nightgown draped over her.
Chiyo slightly scooted closer in that direction.
Okane, understanding Mother’s intention, added water to the kettle and placed more firewood.

“The elder sister is much smaller, isn’t she?”

I said while comparing the two.

The younger sister looked back at her elder sister and simply laughed.

“It’s because Chiyo worked so diligently.”

And the elder sister replied to me demurely,

“Thank you ever so much for the souvenir to me as well.”

And with that, she pressed both hands to the floor demurely.

“Ha ha ha ha ha! You must’ve taken a liking to this one too, huh?”

Before long, Mother’s usual habit brought forth kuzuyu as a treat.
Mother herself, claiming her chest needed support, had the wine she used medicinally brought over and urged each of us to take at least a cup.
Instead, I took out a sake flask from the cupboard shelf, shook it, and finding it surprisingly full, plunged it into the kettle with great delight.
Okane astutely retrieved simmered taro root and seasoned nori from the shelf for us.
That nori had been sent all the way from Tokyo by a friend.

After drinking two or three cups in quick succession by myself, I then held out the cup in one hand and looked around at everyone.

“Won’t someone take me up on this?”

As I laughed, Mother also laughed, and

“Chiyo, you be Brother’s drinking partner.”

“Oh my!” Saying this, she smiled in her usual coquettish yet bashful manner and looked equally at Mother, me, and the cup with lively, shining eyes. “Well then, one cup—by all means!”

I might have already been drunk; I became incredibly lively and was having fun.
Without even a show of refusal, Chiyo took my cup.
It was a large, plain cup that both Father and I were particularly fond of.
Okane steadily poured into it.

As I watched, though her face twisted as if in pain, she drank it down beautifully and immediately handed it back to me. Then I took the sake flask from Okane and steadily poured again. I next tried to pass it to my elder sister Yone, but she wouldn’t take it. Making herself small and hiding behind her younger sister’s back, she kept saying she couldn’t drink a drop. Chiyo deliberately moved aside, “Take a cup—it’s Brother’s.”

she repeated.
Because it was amusing, I did not withdraw the cup at all.

“Well then, just a little.”

She finally accepted it. And though she acted as if drinking was difficult, she eventually transferred a small amount of sake into another bowl and handed it back to me with apparent relief. She was already bright red, pitifully so.

I drank it dry and offered it to Chiyo again. Putting on a brief coquettish act, she accepted it. Contrary to expectations, we managed three or four more cups after that. I could not help but be inwardly surprised.

But being a woman after all, she eventually became thoroughly drunk, and an indescribably beautiful cherry-blossom hue came over the flesh of her fully developed form. Her eyelids especially possessed a dewy beauty, and within them shone keenly intelligent eyes—sharp as swords—like precious jewels. It must have grown hot; she kept wiping sweat from her forehead and pushing back her hair. Though there was normally a certain dignified air about her somewhere, now that tension had completely relaxed, and her body seemed entirely at ease. Naturally growing more talkative, she began asking me one thing after another. Though she spoke of various matters, they were almost entirely about Tokyo—in a manner of “Ah, Tokyo must be...”—doing little more than vehemently expressing to me her longing for the splendor of that distant metropolis hundreds of miles away, which she had never seen. For this young woman, born in mountains where even reaching a town of ten thousand people required traversing fourteen ri of mountain paths, and who in her lifetime had come to read newspapers and magazines like Fūzoku Gahō (Illustrated Customs), such feelings were surely only natural.

I, emboldened by drink, launched into an exuberant and exaggerated monologue.
Taking as my first topic the spring exhibition that had been held until just before my return, I expounded on the beauty of the city, the beauty of flowers, the beauty of people, the beauty of life—on all matters—nearly losing myself in my own fervor as I spoke.
It was my peculiar habit to become strangely eloquent when in the mood, and that night—with sake flowing freely, facing young women no less, and ones connected by blood at that—there was no need for reserve or restraint, so I chattered away boundlessly.

The listeners had of course been thoroughly intoxicated from the outset, and though Mother and Okane had already heard it two or three times before, they still seemed to find it engaging as they leaned in attentively.
Chiyo especially, who had been my conversation partner from the beginning, was completely spellbound; her trademark eyes shone ever brighter as she fidgeted with knees on the verge of buckling, inched forward bit by bit, wiped away sweat, and listened with desperate concentration.
Yone, true to her nature, appeared to be listening with the same look of interest, yet her silent, sunken demeanor remained unchanged—depending on one's perspective, she might even have seemed utterly detached.
Her face was pale, her eyes dull and large with a somehow profound depth.
Her eyelids opened and closed heavily at intervals.
Noticing this girl sitting so silently in the deepening lamplight of our mountain home, I felt an odd loneliness well up within me, unable to shake the sensation that some meaningful riddle had been posed.

Having finished speaking, I felt intensely fatigued.
The listeners too seemed to have let out a breath, and all at once the surroundings fell completely silent.
The few logs were nearly burned out, the oil lamp sputtered noisily, and through the window a cold mountain wind streamed in thickly.

Mother noticed and asked her two daughters whether they would sleep in the middle room or the adjoining tatami room.
“Anywhere,” said the elder sister.
“Let’s all sleep together in the middle room—it’s too lonely if just us two sleep apart,” insisted the younger sister.
With that settled—futons taken from the closet and laid out however they pleased—the two went to prepare bedding in the tatami room.
Having seen them off,

“They came about that matter, didn’t they?”

I asked Mother in a low voice.

“Ah, yes.”

“How did it turn out? Does Chiyo really have to go?”

“It seems that old creditor won’t consent unless it’s exactly like that.”
“That girl keeps saying she absolutely hates it, even throwing a tantrum demanding her sister take her place... Her sister says it’s fine either way... But that old man insists it has to be Chiyo.”
“That heartless old miser, I tell you.”

“He’s just like a beast.”
“Since he’s that kind of bastard, as long as she’s a young woman, anyone would do, I suppose.”
“Isn’t there someone else who could substitute—a village girl?”

“But you see—if it comes to that, it’s all about the money first and foremost.”
“Since he’s that greedy, it’s precisely because he can’t collect on the debt that he keeps insisting on Chiyo this, Chiyo that.”

It was a perfectly reasonable explanation, and I could no longer respond to it.

The two sisters’ family had originally been a samurai-class household in a castle town some fifteen or sixteen ri away, but during their grandfather’s generation, the entire family relocated to this village and established a prosperous life.
But when their grandfather died, his son’s reckless ambition squandered all their hard-earned house, fields, and mountain forests into others’ hands. Abandoning his two daughters at my family’s house, the father absconded to Taiwan—then a trend of the time.
And two or three years ago, he returned to the village, staggering his frail, ailing body, and brought along a deaf old man from Shikoku—someone he supposedly befriended in Taiwan—and began felling camphor trees for making camphor and hollow trees used as raw material for paper-making paste from the surrounding mountain forests.
And so they set up huts in a place secluded one or two ri from the village, dragged out even the two daughters who had been growing up obediently at my house, and had them help with the work.
However, recently that old creditor had begun persistently pestering the two daughters—particularly directing fervent attention toward the beautiful younger sister—and, wielding their outstanding debt as his ultimate weapon, he further lured their father with money until the two men joined forces to press them like fire.
Thus, whenever they found even a brief opportunity, they would come crying to my mother, desperately seeking some way to escape their fate—but our family, which had declined just as theirs had, could not possibly repay that debt, and so we could only offer hollow words of comfort like “Ah, well…” Yet now it had come to this: by tonight’s end, beginning tomorrow evening, the younger sister would have to be taken to the old creditor’s hut.

Even so，it seemed that tonight she had finally resigned herself—though when the matter was first broached，she had indeed wept—but now she neither spoke ill of her father nor sulked as usual，instead putting on a show of cheerful energy，and seeing this，Mother kept wiping her runny nose，finding it all the more pitiful.

As all three of us sat silently facing the hearth, the sound of two people’s footsteps soon approached, and the sliding door opened. As if she could no longer endure it, the younger sister burst out laughing, “Uncle—hohohoho—mistook Elder Sister for you, Brother—hohohoho.” Standing carefree as she laughed, she seemed about to continue speaking further, but upon realizing that talk had immediately turned to her own affairs after ours, and perhaps noticing our demeanor, she abruptly stopped mid-laugh and silently returned to her original seat. When I saw that, I couldn’t help but feel pity, but not knowing what words could comfort her, I deliberately called out to Elder Sister standing behind her,

“What’s this? You’re looking awfully cold, aren’t you? Come over here.”

As I said this while smiling and shifting aside, she smiled back and gazed at me with those characteristically heavy eyelids, but soon fell silent and returned to her former seat.

“Well then, I’ll go to bed now. You all can sleep in tomorrow morning.”

Mother stood up and went into the back room. Okane also stood up to see her off, leaving just the three of us young ones remaining.

“Brother.”

Chiyo suddenly called out,

“They say steamships are terribly uncomfortable... Is that true for everyone?”

“That depends on the person, of course. I’ve never even gotten seasick myself—”

I began, but she interrupted,

“What will you do?”

“There’s nothing to be done... But ever since Haru-san from Honmura went to Beppu in Bungo, she’s been sending so many letters...”

I said resolutely, though my thoughts were elsewhere.

“To Beppu? To take the waters?”

“No, there’s a large weaving shop there where… She’s only recently become able to weave silk… She used to come to me sometimes to learn…”

The conversation was intermittent and distracted.
And I pressed further.

“Are you planning to go too?!”

“No!”

She recoiled in exaggerated surprise,

“How could I possibly go!”

As if she had abruptly choked back a sob, her wide-open eyes were already brimming with tears.

“Hmm… It’s turned into something terrible, I hear… Truly… How dreadful it must be!”

She remained silent, bowing her head.
The shoulders of her gaudy new yukata drooped limply, appearing inexpressibly forlorn.
A faint flush from the lingering drink still colored her nape and earlobes.

“But really—there’s no helping it.
“There’s truly no other way but to steel yourself and resign.
“But look—even if it comes to that, if your own heart stays resolute, something may yet change. Then the time to thrive, like you always said, might still come.
“First of all—it’s an extraordinary act of filial piety...”

I was about to speak when I noticed her pressing her sleeve tightly against her face as she broke down in tears.

Seeing this, I felt intensely ashamed of my own words—forced utterances that were neither consolation nor lesson.
For her—a girl who had burned so fiercely with ambition to restore her family's former status and revive their household—this incident must have been not merely the ordinary suffering of a maiden becoming an old man's prey, but a far more excruciating kind of pain.
She was a woman of painfully sharp intellect, for whom the prayer never ceased in her heart—not even for a moment—that she absolutely must become someone who would astonish her hometown within her lifetime.
As for this so-called intellect—it was, after all, merely what the world deems modest cleverness, given that she was a young girl raised deep in these mountains.
But undeniably, she possessed talents far beyond what one would expect of a mere seventeen- or eighteen-year-old girl—a reality made evident by how skillfully she manipulated the local youths.
Part of this stemmed from her status as a local beauty—or perhaps it amplified her natural tendencies—for she would seize upon me whenever I returned on holiday, constantly employing coquettish gestures that silently pleaded for affection beneath their playful surface.
However, perhaps because I feigned ignorance too persistently, she must have finally given up, as such behavior had ceased since around last year.
And after that, she had become strikingly transformed into someone prudently obedient in my presence.

She wept ceaselessly without raising her face.
I too remained silent.

The hearth fire had nearly burned out, and the thick, pure white ash seemed about to be scattered by the mountain wind from the window, leaving only embers in the shape of firewood. From the sitting room came the sound of a tobacco tray being tapped. Mother and the old maidservant must have been exchanging unreliable rumors about this pitiable girl.

Yone sat beside her younger sister, who was weeping uncontrollably, showing no sign of deep emotion—vacantly, or rather coldly—gazing down at the nape of her neck. As I watched this scene unfold, I could not help but feel an inexplicable sense of foreboding—a creeping unease that defied rational explanation.

While all this was happening, Okane entered with muffled footsteps.
I stood up, stepped down to the dirt-floored area, and then opened the door to go outside.

Outside was as bright as daylight; the seventeenth-night moon, which had just left the mountain ridge, bathed all four corners of heaven and earth in its abundant fresh autumn-like light.
To the right of the doorway, the bluish light flowed unreservedly over every single leaf in the potato field that now occupied the site where a large storehouse once stood—the broad potato leaves and the rough, long corn leaves lining the edge of the field swayed glisteningly as they bore dew while catching faint whispers of wind.
Having exited the room I had been in until now and immediately facing the moonlight over this field, I felt a solemn stillness come over my chest.
The sound of insects rose softly from somewhere on the ground.

Continuing along the field, I soon passed through the half-rotted earthen wall gate on my left and descended leisurely for four or five ken before reaching the village’s sole thoroughfare.
Even calling it a thoroughfare, it was merely a lush grassy path barely a ken wide; beyond it stretched a sparse mixed grove meandering down the slope until finally becoming a valley.
The valley, now bathed directly in this piercing moonlight, flowed pure white as it scattered countless tiny silver jewels with a rustling sound.
Beyond the valley lay deep forests, then a hill, and finally a certain mountain range that stood solidly, piercing thousands of shaku into the sky.
The mountains and forests, all of them, slept within the moonlight, their outlines like water droplets clearly revealed in the quiet early autumn night sky.

I stood at the side of the road, endlessly gazing out over these mountains and streams. After drinking, after having my mind thrown into disarray, standing suddenly in such tranquil nature, an indescribable emotion—perhaps what one might call sorrow—seeped into my chest from nowhere. In the end, I closed my eyes and stood as if turned to stone.

Then from behind at the middle gate—when had they come?—

“Brother.”

Chiyo called out to me.

Without replying, I turned around to find the familiar yukata-clad figure standing half-illumined by moonlight, drooping listlessly.

“Brother, let’s all go to bed now.”

“Hmm… I’ll come now.”

Having said that, I remained motionless, looking up at Chiyo.
Chiyo too remained silent, not leaving her spot as she looked down at me.
For some reason, the two remained standing face to face like that for a while.
My chest felt clear yet already somewhere within, a great serpentine coil had begun to writhe.

Before long, I was startled. Behind Chiyo, Yone quietly approached and stood wordlessly for a moment; then,

“What’re you doing?”

Yone said to Chiyo.

“Oh!”

Suddenly startled, Chiyo,

“What do you think you’re doing?!”

she snapped irritably. Yone neither laughed nor replied. Thus, Chiyo, Yone, and I all entered the house together. And after entrusting the kitchen lamp to Okane, who was sleeping there, we went to the sitting room where bedding had been laid out.

On one side was Father at the end, next Mother, then my bedding. And facing those pillows, on one side was the sisters’ bedding—a wide sleeping quilt spread beneath them, arranged so the two of them could sleep together.

Father was sound asleep. The sick mother also slept well lately. One reason was likely the cooler climate. As if not noticing that, we quietly prepared for bed and got in. As for me, being a man, I changed into my sleeping clothes with ease and lay down immediately, but for women, such simplicity wouldn’t do. After going to the next room once—since there were no nightclothes prepared—they remained in just their undergarments, and while hurrying so as not to be seen too much by me and exchanging whispers in low voices, they got into bed. Since their bedding lay slightly diagonal to mine, when I opened my eyes, I saw two fresh ginkgo-leaf chignons tied with red cords lying side by side on their pillows within the lamplight. The disheveled hair and the rounded flesh around the shoulders—Chiyo was lying on this side.

As I gazed at that, various thoughts were stirred up once more; my chest grew so turbulent it ached, and I could not sleep at all.
Chiyo too tossed restlessly in kind; whenever our eyes met by chance, she would offer a lonely smile.
Ah, that gentle, beautiful, lonely smile—each time I saw it, my chest would well up afresh.
Likely because Chiyo was in such a state, Yone too seemed unable to sleep; she fidgeted restlessly until finally, at her proposal, we decided to extinguish the lamp by our pillows.

When we extinguished the lamp, my eyes grew even more alert.
The sounds of Father’s snoring, Mother’s sleeping breaths, and the sisters continuing to shift about all reverberated in my chest, until before I knew it, my head had begun to throb dully.
At this rate, I thought, and so I employed one after another the hypnotic techniques I had grown accustomed to, barely managing to sink into a hazy state between sleep and wakefulness in a dreamlike trance.
How long had that state continued?
Suddenly,

“Aunt.”

A voice faintly reached my ears—Chiyo’s. When I strained my ears further, again,

“Aunt.”

in an extremely low voice.

After a short pause, in a voice lowered further still to near inaudibility,

“Brother.”

She said.
I started violently and deliberately held my breath.
After that, I said nothing more.
Just as I wondered if I’d imagined it, this time I could unmistakably hear the sound of someone moving.
I involuntarily opened my eyes wide and stared in that direction, but in the pitch-black darkness, I could make out nothing. Then, after a moment, came the sound of tatami rustling.
When I wondered if she was coming this way, I was suddenly overcome with a hot rush and, without thinking, threw off my pillow and covered myself with the futon.

Before long, Chiyo came to my pillow side and, in a trembling voice,

“Brother! Brother!” she called twice. And when she finally placed her hand on my futon, just as I felt a fiery shudder coursing through my entire body—

“Chiyo-bō! What do you think you’re doing?!”

In a clear voice that made little commotion, Yone suddenly spoke up.

“Ah!”

she cried out in a small, sharp voice with flustered panic as if about to vanish, but immediately shifted her tone and composed herself,

“It’s nothing, nothing… I need to light the lamp… because I want to go to the bathroom… Where are the matches?”

She gradually began speaking more coherently, then sat up again and started searching for matches.
Yone said nothing more.
I kept pretending to be asleep, but my heart surged like crashing waves as cold sweat drenched my entire body.
Soon enough, Chiyo went to use the bathroom and returned.
While muttering something about the futon to her sister, she extinguished the lamp once more and settled back onto her pillow.

After that, for a while, I too was unable to fall asleep, but whether due to extreme fatigue, before I knew it, I slipped into unconsciousness.

When I next awoke at dawn, roused by Mother’s frantic voice to look, I turned nearly deathly pale. Chiyo was already no longer in her bedding at that time.

There was no note or anything left behind—whether she had fled or died somewhere, even that remained unclear. “That girl—she’d never kill herself! If she were to die, she wouldn’t do it without thrusting her corpse right before someone’s eyes! She must have escaped without a doubt—if she fled, it’d be toward a certain port! With a woman’s legs, she couldn’t have gone far yet! Send someone after her immediately—anyone!” Mother was already in a half-crazed state.

However，I thought—that girl would never commit such a half-baked act as fleeing only to be caught red-handed；she had finally escaped．To cast off the suffering that had befallen her and satisfy those ambitions she had fervently nurtured day and night，that frail girl had staked her very being and plunged into society’s turbulent currents．

“Above all else，we must inform that father immediately，” Mother fretted，promptly dispatching a young messenger．
Her old father—now half-invalid and nearly mad—arrived breathlessly，his obstinate eyes brimming with furious tears．
Rather than concerning himself with his missing daughter’s whereabouts，he first seized Yone，the remaining sister，and bellowed：

“Fine! Then you’ll be her replacement! This time for good!”

With blood-like eyes, he glared down at his daughter.

Amidst the many people who had gathered, I too stood among them, staring with bated breath, when unexpectedly the daughter—Yone—

“Yes.”

she said in a low voice, closed those large, dull eyes of hers, and then opened them again.