Pathway to Japanese Literature

(I)

After meeting in the theater corridor, Hajime—for reasons unclear even to himself—began frequenting Chiyoko’s residence with Atsushi, whom he’d introduced during that encounter.

Chiyoko did not pay any special attention to the young men who visited her so frequently and capriciously in this manner.

Yet she let slip sentimental words potent enough to unconsciously command considerable attention.

He possessed a slender, tall frame and eyes that burned with intensity, while above them lay long, thick eyebrows that spread widely.

Her thin voice—like peeling lacquer—slid out evenly from small red lips, the smile that briefly revealed teeth aligned like tiny white grains appearing so shy one wouldn't think her past twenty.

Without ever using the surname Sasahara, Chiyoko always called him Hajime-san.

――○――

The spring warmth stirred the blood within them so intensely that remaining still indoors felt impossible—such was the splendor of that day’s weather.

Hajime awoke and immediately—
"Ah, what perfect weather to go out somewhere,"
he thought.
And the first thing that came to mind was Chiyoko’s residence.
Yet Hajime, aware that he had been visiting Chiyoko too frequently of late, felt that going again today made it seem as though he were being drawn to one place alone, making inviting Atsushi feel awkward, and moreover, that it betrayed a certain weakness of will.

"If you wanted to go somewhere, then just go!"

Thinking such thoughts, Hajime applied himself diligently to his translations throughout the morning.

Around two o'clock, Hajime finally invited Atsushi and set out for Chiyoko’s place.

As they walked, Hajime said: "Today, you know—I truly meant not to go. But here I am anyway."

"Is that so?" Atsushi replied. "You’ve been visiting there an awful lot lately. She’s not one for formalities—if we were intruding, she’d tell us straight out!"

“So it’s fine then.”

“But isn’t it too much to keep going until she actually says we’re a bother?”

The two walked in silence through the wide mansion-lined street, their footsteps plodding steadily.

After a while, Hajime peered at Atsushi’s face and lowered his already quiet voice further as he spoke.

“Why on earth does she carry herself that way?”

“That way?”

“Her hair is styled like that too—it’s somehow different, isn’t it? And she always wears a small opal ring on her right pinky, no matter the occasion.”

“Because she likes it,”
“her hair and that ring—she probably does all those things because she prefers them,”
“if they trouble you so much why not ask her directly?”

The two walked quietly while murmuring about Chiyoko.

When they reached Chiyoko's house, the two paused briefly.

After passing stealthily by a garden where some stray cat lay sleeping, they entered the subdued study only to find Chiyoko absent, an open book on the table by the bay window glowing pale and forlorn.

“Where did she go?”

“What! She’ll be here soon!”

The house was hushed, with no sign of anyone present.
The two men peered at the bookshelves and picked up open books to read.

Even after a considerable amount of time had passed, Chiyoko did not appear.

"This has gotten rather awkward, hasn't it."

"There's no way she'd go out leaving everything wide open like this."

"But given how carefree she is, one never knows."

"She's a woman."

"As if she'd do something like that."

They remained silent for a while,

"What on earth could have happened?"

Atsushi said as if yawning at a recollection.

Hajime kept silent, listening intently.

“What is it?”

“What do you hear?”

Through the dense layers of leaves came the sound of Chiyoko singing.

“So she was outside after all.”

“Absolutely right.”

Hajime slid open the glass door, leaned out, and peered through the tree trunks into the backyard.

Under clusters of deep green magnolia leaves, Chiyoko placed a wicker chair and sat with a book resting on her knee, singing something that resembled a soft, melodic folk song.

“Can you see her?”

Atsushi leaned over Hajime’s head to observe Chiyoko.

“She looks more beautiful than usual.”

“Ah.”

“Why is that?”

“With women, even the way sunlight hits them can make them look beautiful or plain, you know.”

“She looks quite young.”

Chiyoko wore a tawny meisen silk kimono that clung closely to her body, the pale obi neatly demarcating the boundary between her chest and torso.
The tightly fastened obi swelled softly above, her outstretched hands clasped on her knees taking on a pale red hue at their edges, the opal on her little finger smiling modestly.
Drawn to Chiyoko’s relaxed, radiant figure, the two stared intently.

Indeed, she must have been beautiful once more.

Chiyoko herself felt as though all the world’s happiness was enveloping her, bestowing upon her twice as many blessings as anyone else.

The song, nearly spilling forth, seemed to gently cradle her heart and carry it off to some distant place.

The vigorous, cheerful spring sunlight was dancing wildly around Chiyoko.

The two who had been silently watching suddenly pulled back their heads.

“She found us, huh.”

“You bet!”

“She looked over here and laughed, you know.”

Though their actions had merely been a childish prank lured by the splendid weather, Hajime—with his oversensitive nature—became certain that Chiyoko must find their peeping from such a place thoroughly disagreeable.

When Chiyoko entered through the garden door wearing an expression as if she knew nothing,

“Good day,”

“We do come up here rather often.”

As Atsushi spoke, Hajime listened with a flushed face.

Chiyoko did not seem particularly bothered.

Smiling, Chiyoko said to Hajime.
“Have you been here since earlier?”
“Yes.”
Hajime felt as though his face were hot.
“Why didn’t you come outside,
even though the leaves feel nice,

“It’s twice—no, many times over—more pleasant than staying in a place like this, truly—”

“I suppose so,
But since I walked through such glaring areas, a place like this with quiet, indirect sunlight is better.
If you walk briskly enough to break a sweat, you know.”

“Even though you didn’t come in any hurry…”

Hajime laughed as he looked at Atsushi’s face, which was animatedly recounting how he’d practically rushed over.

“Since you’re so busy, you can’t afford to waste even a moment,

“Atsushi-san.”

When Chiyoko laughed like a blooming flower, it seemed to the two as if light suddenly flooded the room.

When they removed their haori jackets, complaining of the mugginess, their shoulders and hips appeared even narrower than before, while the waistboards of their hakama trousers looked unnaturally stiff.

“You’ve grown thin,”
“But being sturdy-boned, you’re still different from women after all,”
“You must be rather light in weight, I imagine.”

Chiyoko said, swaying her body side to side with her hands alternately crossed over her own well-fleshed, rounded shoulders.

The three chattered more than usual, not even glancing at the steaming tea the maid had brought.

The normally taciturn Hajime,

“I don’t know what’s come over me today—I feel truly light-hearted,”
“I feel like I could talk endlessly,”
“It’s truly such fine weather, I tell you.”

With eyes glistening as if moistened and lips quivering faintly, he spoke without pause—recounting various matters at such length that he left no opening for the two to interject.

“I became such a shadow-filled person,” he claimed, “partly because I was terribly sickly—always separated from my parents, growing up in Grandmother’s retirement room looking at nothing but picture books—and partly because of that damp storage-house dwelling that shaped me so.”

"My uncle often says," he continued, "that when he saw that pale-necked, slender child sitting wordlessly by the hard-of-hearing old woman, flipping through worm-eaten old picture books without even smiling—it was truly pitiful."

"But all I can recall now is the garden of the neighboring house I peered at through the storage shed’s skylight."

"I grew up quietly, just like a woman, you see."

"Then you really should have received a more graceful name,"

"Isn’t that a rather rugged name?"

Chiyoko said, laughing.

He mentioned that the protective charm pouch he now carried had been made from the brocade of his grandmother’s ceremonial sword, and that his grandmother—with her narrow eyes and melon-seed face—had been a beauty worthy of Utamaro’s brush.

Hajime leaned his thick-maned head against the blue chair’s soft cushion, staring fixedly at one spot as he kept speaking, his face flushed as if intoxicated by his own words.

Chiyoko silently gazed at Hajime’s long "eyelashes."

Given that Hajime was attempting—however imperfectly—to fashion his own past and present into something artistic, there might have been some exaggeration in what he was saying.

Yet Hajime's account of his upbringing was no distasteful fabrication—whether deemed a "lie" or outright "nonsense."

When pressed to "be sensible" about trivial certainties, Chiyoko would erupt in fury; yet these artfully crafted falsehoods, tinged with beauty, compelled her willing immersion.

Before her sat this youth barely past twenty-one—Chiyoko wove elaborate fantasies binding his person to his tales, utterly absorbed.

Hajime, who had been silently tracing his old memories, said in a voice that seemed on the verge of tears.

“April will be over soon—”

“That’s true,

"The cherry blossoms have scattered."

"Even dandelions won’t have long before they turn to fluffy down."

Chiyoko had unwittingly become extremely delicate in her feelings.

She repeated it once more in her mind.

"Even dandelions won’t have long before they turn to fluffy down."

And covering her ears as if weaving those rather gentle-toned words into her hair, she kneaded her puffed-up locks between her index finger and thumb.

Atsushi, who had been made to feel like an outcast, asked Chiyoko about her hairstyle.

“What are you doing with my hair?”

“My hair?”

“It’s nothing really, but—”

“It’s just not a style you see very often.”

“Then it would be better to leave it just as it is, don’t you think?”

Chiyoko gave a mischievous smile and made no attempt to speak. And then, tapping her feet rhythmically, she softly sang a lullaby.

“That’s such a lullaby-like song,”
“Is it difficult?”
Hajime said quietly.
“No, it’s really nothing,

“Shall I teach you?”

“But I’m afraid that won’t do,”
“I have absolutely no aptitude for it, you see.”
“With music, if you’ve got genius, you could become a master just by listening to birdsong.”
“That genius is nowhere to be found.”
The three of them laughed with disjointed, nervous chuckles.

After that, a discussion about music began among the three of them.

“As for me,
I just can’t help but think those flame drums and koto are truly splendid,
that certain appealing color when you strike it—the one with that lovely shape, you know,
the era when beautiful children would sit before them playing courtly dance and music comes to mind,
it even makes one feel like people could live without eating meals in those days, don’t you think?”

Chiyoko said, narrowing her eyes.

“On days when the rain falls in a gentle pitter-patter, you know,

When she heard the notes of a shamisen in some unexpected corner, her feet halted unbidden.

“When I come across a girl holding ‘Tsubakuro,’ I can’t help feeling envious,”

“Those intricate melodies resonate with my heart perfectly.”

"What about you, Atsushi-san?"

"It's nothing really—"

"I just like everything."

“That’s your secret weapon—but that’s not such a good thing, you know.”

Chiyoko said in a rather serious tone.
Atsushi's face tensed slightly.

But Chiyoko immediately laughed and said in an exaggerated, playful tone,
"You handle everything in that manner, don’t you?
Not at all, not at all."

"Such a thing!"

Atsushi laughed with an awkward expression.

“It’s entirely different though—since we’ve been calling too often these days, we decided to space out our next visits. We were just discussing that today too.”

Hajime said while looking toward Atsushi.

“Is that so?”

“Such things hardly matter at all, you know—if you feel inclined to come, then come; if not, then you should refrain; so long as it’s not merely out of obligation—‘reluctant courtesy,’ as one might say—it makes no difference whatsoever.”

“Just passing time, I suppose.”

“Not precisely,”

“I always attend to what must be done.”

“But you know, I’ve been thinking of going somewhere for a short while soon.”
“Where to?”

“The sea.”

“Don’t you care for the mountains?”

“When it comes to mountains, unless they’re near a hot spring or something, they’re just too quiet.”

“I don’t particularly care for dingy hot springs up in the mountains, you know.”

“How could anyone possibly endure staying at a hot spring unless they go with compatible friends?”

“I enjoy listening to clumsy gidayu ballads and koudan tales among the farmers.”

Atsushi recounted the time he went on a walking tour and visited all the hot springs in the area.

He said that when he saw pitch-black-bodied men and women soaking in natural hot spring holes resembling shallow mountain wells—clamoring loudly—the mingled novelty and eeriness made him hurry back as if he'd ventured to the South Seas.

When Chiyoko had gone to Yamagata’s Goshiki Hot Spring with her grandmother, she recalled the bluish-white eyeballs peering from the bathhouse and felt a shudder rise.

“Among the hot springs I’ve visited, Iizaka Hot Spring felt quite pleasant, you know.
“I’ve oddly only ever gone to hot springs in Tohoku.
“Wakuyu—you know the place—
“they say it used to be a brothel back in the day.
“The architecture was quite different too—those well-polished wide staircases and those queenly women with their delicate mastery of performing arts made it distinct from other places.
“When it rained, I was treated to duets of koto and kokyu played by a housewife and her daughter.”

“But I suppose hot springs aren’t really suitable for going alone.”

As he said this, she suddenly grew uneasy.

They said things like how staring at the sea these days could strain one’s eyes so she must be careful, and that she should definitely let them know because they’d see her off.

“I intend to treat you as a younger brother, and you seem intent on treating me as a younger sister.”

“Even though I haven’t firmly decided to go yet, when you say such things, I end up having no choice but to go.”

“If you go, you’ll have to leave Saki behind alone—I somehow feel uneasy.”

“If there were a fire or something, that would be trouble.”

“We could ask Kiyo to come check on things regularly though.”

“But well—since health comes first—you ought to go for about twenty days.”

“Really.”

Chiyoko spoke haltingly, her words disjointed.
"No matter how nonchalant I may be—"
"Even so—I am the mistress here after all—"
"I have to think about the maids too."

She said such things as well.

After the two had left—having repeatedly told her to be sure to notify them when she departed—Chiyoko seemed to waver for some time over whether she would go or not.

It would be better to go away for even a short while than stay here pale-faced and taking bitter medicine; though it wasn't that she particularly disliked doing so, consolidating all the time she'd waste with those two coming around frequently like this would create ample opportunity.

Since she couldn’t remain this carefree forever, she also thought she needed to muster a bit more vigor.

At dinner, half-jokingly,

“Well—by the end of this month—”

“I’ve been thinking of going to Odawara.”

“I know it’s hard on you, but it’s only about twenty days—you’ll bear with me, won’t you?”

she said something like that.

(II)

Leaving such a young woman all alone to mind the house while she herself went off traveling was something Chiyoko found somehow awkward to do. She thought of the loneliness of women, and also felt that entrusting someone so fragile with watching over everything she owned seemed too precarious—Chiyoko found herself hesitating to depart. She even considered asking for an old woman from the Hayashimachi house to come help, but she also felt it would be rather heartless to impose on those who were already short-handed and busy as it was, which only made her hesitate all the more.

While she was occupied with this, another marriage proposal for Saki arose, and Chiyoko found herself detained indefinitely.

First came a letter from Saki's father written in thick, bold strokes.

He wrote at such embarrassing length about his gratitude for her care of his daughter that it verged on discomfort, then explained that since a match had been arranged through certain connections to a particular household, he would soon come in person to discuss the details and formally request her leave.

About six days after that letter arrived, the father truly came to Chiyoko’s house.

While blinking his bleary eyes frequently, he spoke in a polite tone with a deep rumble.

“We’ve had our daughter marry twice before, Madam—not without their complications—

“None of them settled down properly.”

He went on to explain that the first marriage proposal had come when Saki was eighteen, but at that time it was the wife’s family who took a dislike to him and dissolved the union; though the second came when she was twenty-two, he had declared her barren and left of his own accord.

The elderly father of this unfortunate daughter explained to Chiyoko in a tearful voice that after she had suffered terribly under that man’s treatment, she had resigned herself to never taking another husband and had remained single until now—but given her advancing age, he had resolved to accept this new proposal as soon as its terms became clear.

After repeatedly emphasizing that he was a naval officer on leave with modest savings and domestic comfort,

“I just want to see my grandchild’s face as soon as possible,”

he said through tears.

Chiyoko spoke emphatically, enunciating each word for the hard-of-hearing elderly man as she explained details of her daily life,

“Since this is such an auspicious occasion, I’d truly like to send her back immediately...

But living alone like this, I simply can’t manage even briefly without a maid,

“So I’ve already arranged for a replacement maid—once she arrives, I’ll send her back right away,
“That should be satisfactory.”

She spoke in a tone so ludicrously overbearing—even she found it comical—that it seemed to bear down on the listener.

The old man repeated for the third time that he wanted to settle things posthaste, insisting on nothing else.

Chiyoko—
It wasn’t that he meant to refuse sending her back; she had made herself clear once already.

With a sullen face, he silently tugged at the limp waterhimo cord on the persimmon yōkan he’d brought as a gift.

Having said everything he wanted until satiated, the father declared he had matters to discuss with his daughter and went off to the maids’ quarters.

Chiyoko stayed rooted in place, staring at the persimmon yōkan box while her thoughts wandered aimlessly.

For Chiyoko, who now lived alone with just a maid, a maid was not merely a servant.

Chiyoko didn’t bother with household chores, so she entrusted everything from meals to all other matters to the maid.

What she needed was someone attentive, without a servile mentality, and whom she could feel at ease around.

Saki was somewhat close to the kind of woman Chiyoko desired.
She was remarkably attentive and utterly easy to be around—truly without equal in those regards.

Left in charge once or twice, and having been a homemaker, she managed things quite skillfully. When it came to cleaning desks or knowing preferences, she had come to understand them completely, such that Chiyoko no longer needed to throw a tantrum even once every seven days. Parting with that was quite difficult. After all, Saki might stay up late at night but didn’t rise particularly early in the morning, and wouldn’t be scolded as long as she avoided tasks she disliked—even occasionally opening up to chat like a friend—so it wasn’t as if she felt particularly unpleasant about it.

If a new maid came, they would spend some time feeling each other out; she would do things that grated on her,

She had to suppress her irritation and teach every minute detail one by one.

When she thought of such things, Chiyoko became truly fed up.

“Should I keep saying ‘I’ll send her back’ over and over and just make her stay after all?”

She even found herself thinking such things.

Still, she couldn’t possibly do such a thing, so to distant relatives she made her usual request—
a twenty-two or twenty-three-year-old who was somewhat educated and not unattractive
she had requested one.
She had done so thinking it would be improper not to have also secured the other party she had previously requested.

After her father left, Saki came to Chiyoko’s study with tearful eyes, sat down right beside Chiyoko’s chair, and spoke in a heartfelt tone.

“I truly don’t know what to do, Madam.”

“What about?”

“It’s about this current proposal,

“My family is quite enthusiastic about it, but I just don’t feel inclined at all.”

“But if your father says it’s fine, then shouldn’t it be all right?”

“What could my father possibly know? He’s so trusting he gets fooled all year round and constantly ends up at a loss.”

“He said it’s settled.”

“Yes, they’ve gone and decided it,”
“They only spoke to me about it once, briefly—a military man seems so terrifying.”
“He’s just a human being like anyone else,”
“He isn’t going to gobble you up or anything.”
“But how could they possibly know what’s what?”
“Men are...”
“They’re in the business of deceiving women,”
“I truly don’t know what to do.”

“You should go,”
“If you were still in your teens, then maybe—”
“You’re already twenty-five.”
“Yes.”
“In that case, no matter what, that’s still better for you,”
“And he’s quite an older person.”
“But going to live with someone I’ve never even seen before—my heart can’t feel at ease about that.”
“That man from before—we’d been close since childhood, and he knew full well about my frail health, yet he still acted that way.”

Saki blushed slightly and twisted her mouth as she spoke.

Chiyoko thought that it was only natural for Saki—who had had not-so-good memories with men up to two times—to feel the way she did about marriage.

“But even if you did become independent, what would you do?”

“It’s not like there’s anything particular—”

“Because I’ve never even considered such a thing.”

“That’s right,

So becoming a wife and settling down would certainly be better for you.

I truly believe that.”

“That may be so, Madam,

But Madam probably thinks getting married is like sending someone on an errand to the neighbor’s house.”

“Don’t be ridiculous.”

When Chiyoko thought about how innocent she must appear, remaining unmarried and carefree like this, she found herself oddly amused.

“Someone like me, without any learning, just turning into an old woman—it’s truly a pitiful existence.”

“If I get mistreated again, I’ll run away and come back—so please keep me here, won’t you?”

Saki slumped her body like a deflated balloon, idly poking at the crushed hem of Chiyoko's kimono with the needle she had tucked against her chest.

As they sat in silence, Saki had quietly begun to sob.

“What’s wrong?”

“I’ve somehow become so terribly sad,

“Because I end up thinking about all sorts of things.”

Chiyoko silently watched the woman—her hair neatly tied in a Western-style bun appropriate for her age, her collar faded—as she sobbed pitifully.

“Stop crying,

okay?

"It’s not a bad thing at all, you know,

"I'm happy about it too, you know."

Chiyoko, not knowing what would be good to say, ended up saying such a thing.

Something felt like it was pressing down on her heart as she gazed out the bay window at the vibrant, vigorous trees.

Saki, who had been sobbing convulsively for quite some time, finally pushed up her bangs and,

“I’ve already stopped now. At least let me stay until the new maid grows accustomed, and I’ll prepare as many meals for you as I can.” With that, she forced a lonely-looking smile and went to her room. “She must be crying over there again.” Chiyoko thought this while recalling how Saki, despite her selfish streak, had always tended so diligently to her needs.

Twenty-five. Third time. An unfamiliar man.

Such circumstances seemed truly heartrending.

If she were bullied again…

When she saw how anxious and fidgety she looked, Chiyoko couldn’t help thinking that keeping that woman by her side until death might actually bring her happiness.

About four days later, the new maid arrived.

The person who had been ushered into the study—sitting with restless formality as they brought her along—explained the woman’s background.

She was born in Tohoku, an orphan who had graduated from a girls’ school in Kansai the year before last at twenty-two.

The woman had pale reddish hair tied in a style that cascaded over her head, and a face with an absurdly thin nose that gave off a sharp, peculiar impression. But she wasn’t that unattractive. She wore a crested double-layered haori over a silk crepe kimono. She seemed sharp-witted.

When leaving the woman behind, they said they didn’t care about wages. “Since her family background is quite respectable, they don’t wish to send her off to just any place as a bride. Please do endeavor to help her gradually improve herself.”

With that, they left.

Chiyoko felt as though her shoulders had grown heavy.

Yet this new maid wore an expression that suggested she had no intention of earnestly heeding every little thing said to her by Chiyoko, who was younger than herself.

Her name was Kiyo, and from her manner of speaking, she seemed to have been in □□□□□□□□.

After a day or two there, she certainly grasped what needed attention.

But along with that understanding came the realization of her unduly worldly nature.

She was a bitter pill to swallow.

Chiyoko found herself thinking such things.

Despite busily writing novel-like works during her free time, Kiyo would claim things like never having seen plays or movies because her family had been so strict.

She carried herself with an annoyingly affected air of refinement.

After making some light-hearted joke,

“Ha ha ha ha!” Kiyo laughed in a high-pitched nasal tone.

When Chiyoko saw Kiyo’s face snickering with her nose upturned,

Heh,

she felt like retorting.

Saki was teaching Kiyo every single daily task with meticulous care.

“Put the sheets from the Western laundry here,

and she dislikes starch in her undergarments.”

There were times when she could hear such things being said from the bedroom.

Whenever she heard Saki teaching Kiyo about what she liked and disliked during meals, she even felt something akin to sadness.

"But when her dislikes are just things like natto and salted fish roe, it won't be a problem."

There were times when she could hear such things being said.

About ten days had passed since the new one arrived,

"Since there's no end to it no matter how long we keep at this,

“I believe I shall take my leave tomorrow or the day after.”

Saki stated with uncharacteristic calmness.

When Chiyoko wrapped the meisen silk fabric roll, obi clasp, and half-collar she had prepared beforehand in paper and placed money in the ceremonial envelope, she found it painful to present these items.

“Take care of yourself,”
“Make sure to let me know where you end up.”

Chiyoko, having no experience with such matters, didn't know what would be best to say in such situations.

Saki kept shedding tears and couldn't utter a word. Until the very moment she left, she repeated again and again: "If I am bullied again I will have to return—please let me stay until I die."

Chiyoko accompanied her to the entrance.

When she saw the woman hiding her tear-streaked face as she was finally persuaded to leave lest she miss her train, swaying away in the carriage, Chiyoko felt she wanted to call her back just once and embrace her shoulders.

From the gap in the canopy of the following car, the secondhand small chest of drawers received from the Hayashimachi house remained visible even into the distance.

Two days later arrived a letter from Saki written in firm handwriting - notice of safe arrival, her destination village, and a message from her parents.

Chiyoko stowed that away in a drawer with uncharacteristic care.
As if vaguely conscious of some absence, Chiyoko passed her days writing small portions each day.

After entering the month of May, Chiyoko finally decided to embark on a journey.

Chiyoko, traveling light, found that all she needed was to take a small dress case containing a change of clothes for when the mood struck and make her way to Shinbashi.

When two or three days of calm weather had passed, Chiyoko went to Hayashimachi carrying a vaguely restless heart.

Hurriedly addressing her younger sister,

“You know, I think I’ll go to the seaside for a bit this time,”

“Because I always fall ill.”

“So… Since that woman hasn’t been here long yet—it’s unfortunate—but she isn’t trustworthy. So please have someone come by to check on things whenever you can—and if you could have the old caretaker stay over at night, that would be even better.”

she requested.

“Sis, you’re always so terribly impulsive,”

“How many days will you be going?”

“About twenty days, at most.

“I’m not so carefree either, you know.”

Having secured her younger sister’s agreement, Chiyoko returned home reassured.
And immediately, she told Kiyo about it.

She thought Kiyo’s complete lack of reluctance showed cheekiness, yet also found it somewhat reassuring.

The next morning, after calling the inn, Chiyoko packed two or three changes of clothes and other sundry items.

She handed the maid the household funds for her absence, instructed that urgent incoming letters should be sent there while others were to be placed in this, even taking out a small box specifically for the purpose.
While locking the wardrobe and other unnecessary items and wrapping the key around the front part of her obi sash,

“Don’t leave the bay window open like that, and don’t go out unless someone from Hayashimachi comes by.”

When she said such things, she keenly felt what it meant to be mistress of the house.

Thinking she mustn’t forget, she specifically wrote down the address and had it pasted to the pillar in the maid’s room.

“Even so, if you lose it—if you ask in Hayashimachi, you’ll find out right away. If I say I’m going to the sea, it’s already settled.”

Chiyoko departed all alone on the two o'clock train.

In the train car, she wrote a postcard to those two promise-breakers.

“Though you broke our promise, today I left for Odawara.”

“I’ll be staying at the Yōjōkan in Mihogahama for about twenty days. Since the bookshelf is open, please go check on the house as well—the maid must be feeling lonely.” She wrote both names on a single postcard.

Without attempting to review the slightly trembling fountain pen script, she imagined the faces of the two in Tokyo who would receive this postcard.

What kind of fool would make such a grand production of being seen off by those people only to go off all alone for twenty days right under their noses?

Chiyoko felt her shoulders somehow ease with a cool relief.

The fact that she could spend twenty days gazing at the sea without worrying about anyone else—after that endless jumble of trivial matters—brought such immense comfort that she felt her body had truly become her own.

Seeing a man in the same car strike a match, Chiyoko recalled having forgotten to mention fire precautions and became unbearably anxious.

Yet even that anxiety slipped from her mind unnoticed, and she found herself wanting to be carried endlessly onward by the monotonous yet deeply attentive clackety-clack of the tracks.