Pathway to Japanese Literature

Dedicated to Hokkaido

I

It was the end of October.

That day, a cold rain drove sideways across the vast plain of Ishikari. No matter where one looked, there was nothing. A line of telegraph poles stretched endlessly onward like a row of matchsticks, and even after they disappeared from view, the plain remained flat, with nothing to obstruct the eye. Here and there, poplar trees standing like brooms received the rain and wind, swaying. The clouds hung low across the sky, making everything strangely dim. Crows occasionally flew in flustered patterns, two or three trailing off toward the horizon where a faint light still lingered.

Genkichi shouldered a large bundle and returned from the town with the station, about three ri away. The house belonging to Genkichi and his family stood among some twenty others scattered across this wind-battered plain in clusters of two or three. These were arranged along the village road or else set deep within the fields. Save for the elementary school at the center, every dwelling bore a thatched roof. Roofs tilted at odd angles, mud walls spiderwebbed with cracks, and interiors so dim one could scarcely make them out from outside. Each house had windows cut only to the minimum required for pretense. Behind the homes or across from their entrances stood stables and cattle sheds.

From behind the farmhouses, the land sloped gently away toward the Ishikari River. It had been made into fields, but here and there, rocks lay exposed and scattered among the red soil and sand. The Ishikari River flooded once a year—always in May—and whenever that happened, the entire area would fill with water. Therefore, they couldn’t plant crops there unless the May flood had first subsided. When the fields ended, there was knee-high grassland. And that continued into a mixed forest lined along the embankment of the Ishikari River. From there, it was immediately the Ishikari River. It was wide and deep enough to feel ominous, bending in multiple places, flowing silently without a ripple on its surface, undulating as it went. The opposite bank of the river formed a sandy embankment, and fields continued there as well. On this side as well, the chocolate-colored roofs of farmhouses appeared sporadically floating up from the horizon. When a rooster crowed over there, the chickens here would sometimes answer and call back.

Genkichi returned home deep in thought, his steps heavy. Every house he passed seemed to have fires burning, with smoke rising from windows, entrances, and gaps in thatched roofs. But the smoke, unable to rise straight through the rain-laden air, drifted sideways and spread low across open fields. As he passed before a house, a cow suddenly let out a broad low. The pastured beast worked its mouth and raised its head to watch him. When Genkichi reached his house, the interior hung thick with haze. The mother’s shouting carried outside. Then Yoshi emerged—younger brother clutching a lamp chimney while rubbing smoke-stung eyes. Dirty rings encircled his eyelids.

“Yeah right, damn you, old hag!” He snapped. Genkichi silently turned and went around to the back.

Yoshi leaned against the mud wall riddled with cracks and crumbling away, and set about polishing the lamp chimney. He pressed the edge of the chimney with his palm, blew a breath into it, then inserted a rolled-up piece of newspaper and polished. He repeated the process again and again. The kerosene-smelling soot clung to Yoshi's hands. Yoshi absolutely detested this daily chimney polishing. Before Yoshi could begin polishing it, Mother Seki had to scold him dozens of times. Then she had to slap Yoshi’s cheek once.

“Yeah right, damn you, old hag!” Yoshi muttered to himself while polishing the chimney. “Yoshi! Where the hell’ve you been all this time? What’ve you been doin’?” “I’m goin’ now!” He replied like that. “Yeah right, damn old hag!”

Mother squatted before the hearth, puffing at the fire. Her hair tangled wildly, and each time smoke stung her eyes, she wiped them with her apron. In the dim smoke, Seki seemed not human but some other "creature" crawling on all fours. The way the hearth fire made only half of her face flicker with light was all the more terrifying. When Yoshi entered, “Hurry up and light the lamp!” she said.

Yoshi, choking on smoke and his usual irritation, climbed up while half-crying and took down the lamp from atop the cupboard. Tears and snot streamed out one after another. When he shook the lamp base, there was no kerosene in it. “Mother, there ain’t any oil.” “Idiot! Want it? Go get it from the neighbors, damn brat.” “What ’bout money?” “Get it from your brother.” “Neighbor’s dog’s scary, I tell ya.” Yoshi stood there still holding the lamp base, lingering behind his mother.

Seki took the rice in the basket that was in the kitchen and put it into the pot. "If you're going, then go."

Yoshi went outside thinking he'd be hit. "Brother—!" He called out like that. Then, circling around to the back door, he called again: "Brother—!" Genkichi was mending a brown net by the rear entrance. He fixed weights to the net at regular intervals.

“Brother—the money... I’m gonna go get the oil.”

Genkichi silently took out a ten-sen coin from his hip pocket and handed it over. Yoshi stopped for a moment and watched what his brother was doing.

“Brother, Irie no Bō was saying people from the government office are here.”

“What time?” “Just now, at school.”

“Where are they staying?” “I don’t know…” “Idiot.” Genkichi gave a slight shake of his body. “Bō said they hid the nets since the officials were around somewhere.” “Brother, if people from the government office come here, that’s why.” Yoshi twisted his hands behind his back to demonstrate. “Idiot… Go on, get!”

When Yoshi had gone, Genkichi spontaneously grinned wryly to himself. Then he shook his broad, thick shoulders and laughed.

As dusk began to fall, the wind grew slightly stronger. And it grew colder. If one were to even glance up, they could see the endlessly spreading plain and the horizon. The vast plain darkened entirely, and layered clouds streamed thickly across the sky.

After it grew dark, Genkichi entered the house while brushing off dirt from the front of his kimono with both hands. Yoshi lay on his stomach under the lamp, flipping through an illustrated magazine with only two or three pages still bound together. “Sis, read this here for me.”

Yoshi said that and pulled his sister’s sleeve as she mended tabi socks by the hearth. “You idiot!” His sister brought her finger to her mouth and sucked on it. “You idiot! Didn’t you make me stick the needle in my hand?” “Hey, you, what’s gonna happen to this dog?” “How should I know?” “Hey—”

“I said quit your noise.” “Then I’ll make trouble!”

Genkichi was washing his feet at the entryway and asked Ofumi, “Was Masaru from Yoshimura here?”

Ofumi looked up at her brother but remained silent for a moment. “What’d he do?”

Genkichi also didn’t say what came next.

“He was here.” Then Ofumi said that.

“Hmm… Did he say anything?”

“Nothing.” “Nothing? ……He didn’t say he was going anywhere tonight, did he?”

“I don’t know.” Genkichi went up and settled into a cross-legged position by the hearth. The house interior had turned jet black from years of hearth fires—ceiling, wainscoting, every surface soot-blackened and dully gleaming. From the ceiling hung long strands of soot, fluttering and swaying in the fire’s heat and drafts.

The kitchen had an earthen floor that connected directly to the stable. That was why the stable's smell always seeped straight into the house. In summer, it ripened into something stifling. Large flies from the stable swarmed in. The horses occasionally let out low whinnies. There were sounds of bodies rubbing against wainscoting and forelegs clomping as they scraped the boards. Inside the house, a single oil lamp burned at the center. Its shadow fell upon the log-built ceiling beams. Each time the lamp moved, the shadow swayed gently.

Mother Seki brought out the table while asking, “Gen, you got some business with Masaru?” “Nothing.” “Then who’s your net partner?” “Hmm… Anyone’ll do.” “I heard Hokkaido Government officials’ve come. You hear?” Genkichi gave a slight shrug of his shoulder. “Officials, huh…” He laughed. “Hey Brother, what’re we gonna do with this dog?” Yoshi brought the picture book over to Genkichi’s side this time. “Is this dog gonna take revenge now…?”

“Mother, get the doza (indigo, silk-stitched garment) ready.”

“Hey Brother, this dog’s gotta be strong. They say in the neighboring village this dog’s weaker’n a wolf or somethin’—but I ain’t never heard that. That’s a lie, Brother.” “We ain’t had fish for two or even three months now, Mother. They’re mockin’ us!” Genkichi let out a hoarse voice. “They say they’re even pullin’ such foolish stunts…” “Damn fool!”

The mother grumbled something to herself like a soliloquy. “Come on, eat up.”

The mother ladled out miso soup with leafy greens to everyone from the pot hanging over the hearth fire. “Come on, Ofumi—quit that and eat your meal.” Yoshi liked to imitate his brother. He would sit cross-legged as widely as possible, spread his elbows out, and eat—occasionally glancing at his brother to adjust his own posture. “Hey Brother, which is stronger—dogs or wolves?” “Dogs, huh.” “Shut up and eat your damn food already.” Seki blew on the steaming porridge—a mix of potatoes and red beans—to cool it as she scolded him. She sniffled back her runny nose repeatedly in quick succession.

After finishing his bowl of porridge, Yoshi clattered his chopsticks against the empty bowl and took it to Seki.

“Brother, there was a letter from Yoshie-chan.”

“Hmm.” “She wrote something like, ‘I miss when I was here.’” “Hmph! What’s so great about this shithole anyway?” Ofumi made a truly scornful face.

“Again!” “What they say might not be true at all.” Mother interjected.

“Lies.” “Big fat lie! What part of this godforsaken place is supposed to be any good?” “No matter where you look, there’s nothin’—just endless empty space. Goin’ to the neighbor’s feels like some damn excursion. No electricity, no telegraph, never even seen a train… And everyone’s all shabby-lookin’, every last one of ’em good-for-nothin’…” “Brother, dogs are stronger, I tell ya.” “And then,” she said, “whenever I realize how filthy the city is, it makes me remember those days working along the Ishikari River.”

“Guess that’s how it is.” “What nonsense. Slappin’ horse rumps in this godforsaken place, workin’ reekin’ of manure—hmph!”

“Hey, Brother, Ofumi’s been no good lately.”

Seki looked toward Genkichi and said.

Genkichi remained silent. "If I said I wanted to go to Sapporo too, there'd be nowhere to come back to—yet you've forgotten how you yourself were the one who wanted to go there!" Outside, the rain lashed sideways with sounds like someone hurling beans against the walls. Each time, the oil lamp swayed, making their large shadows on the rear shoji screen stretch and shrink—elongating then contracting. Yoshi finished eating, planted both legs by the bonfire, and looked at his picture book. His little penis—no bigger than a pinky tip—remained exposed.

“Brother, have you ever seen a wolf?” “I ain’t never seen one.” “I saw one in a picture, I tell ya.” “Hmm.” “Which one’s stronger?” “Strong’s strong, I tell ya.” “No, no—that’s not right…”

Genkichi let out a loud laugh. The stove fire, fed with tree roots, perhaps having reached a knot in the wood, crackled and popped, sending sparks flying out of the stove.

One landed on Yoshi’s “morning glory bud.” The spark flew to his little pecker. “It’s hot! Hot…!!”

Yoshi threw the picture book aside, flipped backward, and flapped his kimono wildly.

“Look here! You had that thing pointed out, so Lord Fire got angry at ya.” “Idiot.”

“Damn… ugh… uhn…!!”

Yoshi looked about to burst into tears and shook his body.

In the kitchen, Seki and Ofumi lit candles and washed dishes. Rain pattered against the window set there. And then flowed smoothly sideways across the glass surface. "It's getting worse." "Brother, you should quit already," Ofumi said. "When I first came here, folks took all the autumn salmon they wanted." "At night, if you kept quiet, you could hear 'em poking their heads above the river's surface—crying like babies."

Ofumi stifled a laugh.

“Hmph, you idiot. That’s the truth. The world’s gone all twisted, I tell ya.”

In the distance, a cow lowed. Then, another one lowed from a different direction. But with the wind's force, it became inaudible midway.

Yoshi lay on his back singing something like a song, “Ma, what’s an Itako?” asked Yoshi. “An Itako came and tried to summon Yoshikawa’s father’s spirit; she said he’s dead now suffering in the ritual fires, I tell ya.” “An Itako’s an old woman, I tell ya.” “We were talking about an Itako woman, I tell ya.” “So... like a granny?”

“They were making fried tofu in Yoshikawa to give to the Itako woman, I tell ya.” “It’s Inari-sama, I tell ya.” “Inari-sama’s a fox, I tell ya.” “Right.” “When Masaru and Yoshie here took a dog to Yoshikawa to play, they got scolded, I tell ya.”

“Right.” “Foxes ain’t no match for dogs.”

Genkichi remained silent. “Yoshikawa’s mother was sobbing pitifully, I tell ya.” “Her eyes were all red, I tell ya.”

Ofumi lit a lantern and entered the storage shed out back. She reached into the straw bags piled in the corner by the entrance and pulled out potatoes. She put them into her own apron. A rat scurried off toward the back. The lantern's shadow moved in a circle on the pitch-dark storage shed ceiling. “Here, potatoes.”

Ofumi returned and emptied potatoes from her apron by the hearth. “Potatoes—damn, these ain’t tasty.” Yoshi lay on his back, using his toes to roll them about mischievously. “Hmph, you little sinner!” Seki whacked his foot with the fire iron. Yoshi pulled his foot back and stuck out his tongue. “Over at Yoshikawa’s, they were eating sweet potatoes, I tell ya.” “Just you wait—that foot’ll rot clean off.”

Genkichi stretched both arms straight up in parallel with a jerk and yawned. His shadow on the shoji paper looked just like a demon. “Scary...” Yoshi pulled in his neck and looked that way. Genkichi turned to look back. “What’s this, you idiot!” Having said that, he took a couple of potatoes and buried them in the hearth ashes. “Yoshi, don’t go saying later you wanna eat ’em after they’re burned.” Yoshi deliberately looked away and, staying like that, rolled his body sideways.

Ofumi brought the half-sewn kimono under the lamp. Then she buried her own potatoes in the ashes.

“It’s gotten cold.” “It’s already snowing.” “I can’t stand what Hokkaido has in store!” “It’s like being a bear holed up in a den. For six months or more, you can’t even step outside—it’s unbearable.” “What good does complaining do?” “Because there’s nothing we can do about it.” “Then you’d better keep quiet.” “……” With a snort: “I’m keepin’ quiet—” Yoshi lay sprawled out, fiddling with a ruler—poking it here, prodding it there—until he started messing with his sister’s body. At first, Ofumi was too absorbed in her sulking to notice. Unconsciously, she reached for the spot where she’d been pranked. That amused Yoshi. He did it again and again. Then he pressed the end of the ruler to the back of her neck. Ofumi noticed this time,

“You!” she snapped.

He did it again. And then, “Hey, there’s a stiff spot right here on your neck!” he said, poking the spot.

Ofumi suddenly turned around and snatched the ruler away with all her strength.

The mother, who had been sitting cross-legged by the hearth, had at some point begun shaking her head. Under the lamplight, as clear shadows fell across her face, it suddenly became apparent how aged the mother had grown. “If I end up just like Mother, that’d be for the best.”

Ofumi looked toward the mother and said. The house brightened and darkened depending on the lamp’s flame. The squelching sound of straw sandals passing through the muddy path outside could be heard. The clock with a loose screw slowly struck four times at the eight o'clock mark. Yoshi had fallen asleep facing away from the hearth. Genkichi stepped outside for a moment to check the rain. Then Genkichi prepared himself. Ofumi worked while occasionally glancing at the older brother.

“Is it really okay?” But Genkichi remained silent. Genkichi finished all his preparations, shouldered the net, and left the house.

The rain had stopped. Yet the night remained pitch black. He kept stumbling into hollows, caught unawares each time. These depressions pooled with muddy water that splashed violently whenever he stepped in, spattering his face with filth. Stars pierced through the sky. From somewhere distant came an unceasing eerie noise—like wind lashing through a scrub forest or something akin to it. No lights shone anywhere he looked. Far to the southeast along the horizon’s edge glimmered the faintest suggestion of brightness. Iwamizawa.

As he walked, he thought about what he was about to carry out. Genkichi cursed at something under his breath: “Damn it!” He spat repeatedly. He couldn’t stay still. And somehow, like this, the very act of walking became unbearably frustrating. “Damn it!”

The road curved.

When he turned that corner, a light became visible about two chō ahead. It was the light from an oil lamp in a small window. Then, seven or eight ken behind him, the grass clump suddenly rustled loudly—and just as he thought that, the rain began to fall. In an instant, the sound of rain enveloped him from all sides. Only within the square of light from the small window could the rain streaks be seen. When Genkichi approached the side of the house, he suddenly heard the low growl of a dog in the darkness. He abruptly recalled the dog’s name, aimed his voice toward it, and called softly. Then, as it stopped, something struck his leg—this time, the dog had come clinging to his leg. He said the dog’s name two or three times.

Just as the sound of falling rain seemed to thin slightly, it gradually began to let up. When he stayed still, he could clearly discern that the sound had come from the west and was now shifting eastward. Though the rain had completely stopped where Genkichi stood, there came the sound of rainfall from the direction of the Ishikari River. It became clearly audible—the sound crossing the field again, wave after wave of rainfall gradually coming to a stop.

Genkichi circled around to the back entrance and called, “Masaru! Masaru!”

Inside the house, Genkichi heard someone stand up, hastily slip into clogs on the earthen floor, and approach. The door rattled noisily before swinging open with a clatter. Light suddenly spilled out. It came straight at Genkichi standing in the entrance.

“Gen-san?” “Yeah, let’s go.”

“I’ll go. Wait a moment.” “How about it,” he said, lowering his voice slightly. “Didn’t your father say anything?” “Nah,” Masaru replied evasively.

Genkichi grinned slyly and sniffed. Earlier that morning, Genkichi had forced the terrified, reluctant Masaru to agree. When he thought of that, he found it amusing. “Well then, hurry up and get ready.”

A short while later, the two walked along the dark path.

“Around where are we doing it?” “We’re headin’ up ’bout a third of a mile.” “Then we’ll be near Kitamura.” “And if we get caught there, they’ll raise hell for sure.” “Heard Docho officials are posted there.” “Damn right they are.” “That’s what makes it fun!” “……” “Ain’t lettin’ those Docho pencil-pushers catch us.” “Those bastards’re hungry too—prob’ly snorin’ away by now.” Genkichi laughed loud. But the endless plain swallowed the sound whole, leavin’ nothin’ but an eerie silence.

Genkichi walked ahead, practically dragging along Masaru who followed in silence, his heavy footsteps pounding through the night. After about five minutes of walking, the rain started again. Trudging through the pitch-black expanse of the plains amid this roaring downpour without even a lantern made Masaru increasingly uneasy. "I hate this..." "Huh?" Genkichi turned back, raising his voice over the drumming rain. "This ain't right."

“What of it?” Masaru laughed sheepishly.

After a while, “Where’re the officials stayin’?” Masaru asked Genkichi, who walked ahead with his sturdy shoulders set firm.

“Kitamura, I reckon.” “Kitamura’s inn must be.—Soakin’ in hot water, feelin’ good and waitin’ it out, I bet.” “Three ri from here—they wouldn’t come pokin’ round in this pissin’ rain on purpose.” “This mornin’, when I went down to my home river, they said five-six autumn salmon had their backs breakin’ the surface headin’ downstream.” “Hell yeah! That’s prime!” After that, the two walked silent for a spell. Masaru kept hurry-steppin’ to match Genkichi’s long-legged stride.

Suddenly, beside them, a cow mooed in a broad voice. Because it was so unexpected, both of them were startled. “Damn it! Scared the shit outta us. Stupid damn cow!”

Then, far off in the distance, another cow mooed as if answering back. A house came into view to the side. As they passed by that place, Masaru—as if suddenly remembering—

“Have you heard about Yoshie?” Masaru called out as they walked ahead. Masaru had known about Yoshie and Genkichi’s relationship from before she left for Sapporo. “Yeah,” Genkichi replied, blatantly showing his displeasure. “Ofumi’s a real problem too.” “……” The two of them fell silent there as if they’d butted heads.

“Masaru, you’ve been sayin’ unnecessary things to Ofumi, haven’t you.”

“Me?” “Yeah. You ain’t lettin’ Ofumi get to you either, huh. She’s gotten sick of farming, ain’t she.” Masaru still hadn’t said anything.

“After seein’ Sapporo’s streets, she’s probably got her head fulla dreams.” “If a damn farmer like this doesn’t get good and sick of it, they’d have to be an idiot.” “Hmph.—Guess I’m the idiot here.” After saying that, the shoulders blocking Masaru’s view relaxed, and he burst into laughter. “I’m a farmer’s kid.”

Masaru was somehow startled. “Not that it’s anything to boast about,” he said quietly. “Masaru, you know what Yoshie’s doin’ in Sapporo?”

Masaru reluctantly said, “They say it ain’t such a good place.”

“She’s probably whorin’ around or somethin’.”

The rain had nearly ceased, leaving only the sound of their footsteps squelching through the mud.

“...She didn’t wanna become no whore or nothin’.” Genkichi muttered as if to himself. To Masaru, walking behind, it wasn’t audible enough. They walked along the pitch-dark path through the open plain at night for nearly thirty minutes.

“This here’s where we hit the riverbank.”

Genkichi stopped and turned from the main path into a small side road. “We’re almost there.”

It was a narrow path between fields. As they walked, the rain-soaked grasses on both sides brushed against their work pants with each step. And their work pants became unpleasantly soggy and clinging in no time. “Alright, better watch out.” Genkichi said this and hitched up the net on his shoulder. “Ain’t no way officials’d be out in this damn rain.”

“I—”

“Huh?”

“……” “What’s up?” Genkichi turned around. “Huh?” “If we get caught, it’ll be a disaster.” “What’s this—you’ve gotten scared after all?”

“……” “What’s wrong?”

“Ain’t too good.” “Idiot, snap out of it!”

The two entered a small grove. Through the treetops, the sky was visible. Black clouds skimmed the tops of slender branches as if flying away. The branches swayed, their colliding sounds merging into an eerie, ominous hum. Before they had gone even fifty meters, the surface of the Ishikari River came into view below them. In the stormy dark night of late autumn, the river flowed with a dull yet unsettling light that carried an ominous undertone. The Ishikari River was never pleasant, even in daylight. Near its center, two or three whirlpools swirled silently in the water. Sticks and paper-like debris drifted by. At the whirlpools, they would swirl round and round until something in the riverbed seemed to pull them down, the wood scraps getting "sucked into" the vortex. Even in daylight, these sights unsettled viewers. Now seeing the soundless, unnervingly sinister Ishikari River below him, Masaru's body shuddered violently in an instant.

“This here’s the ferry landing?”

Masaru closed the distance between himself and Genkichi and asked.

The two descended to the riverbank. Genkichi heaved the load on his back into the small boat tied to the bank with a thud. Then he sat on the edge of the boat and spent a moment looking around. “Hey, Masaru! Why don’t you belt out a song or somethin’?” Genkichi said while taking out tobacco. Masaru, finding this strange, turned his attention back. “Anything’s fine.—Well, maybe I’ll sing one first.” “—Just make it loud.” Thump-thump, thump-thump, let it through—

“Now saying you hate it—that’s impossible, I tell ya—, If ya hate it, shoulda said ya hated it from the start ya—, If ya say it, thump-thump, can’t let it through—, Thump-thump, thump-thump” Genkichi sang in a gravelly voice, loudly and without rhythm. It vanished abruptly without making the slightest echo. Masaru felt creeped out, or rather frozen stiff. “What’s wrong?”

Genkichi suddenly burst out laughing. He shook his large frame and laughed boisterously without restraint. “Huh?”

He didn’t stop laughing. “Hey, cut it out.” Masaru grimaced and stood as if pleading. “Hahahahaha.” “Then I’ll sing another one, I tell ya,” he said. Even birds don’t pass through… Hmm… *(Ah, my voice won’t come out—but even so,)* Flower—Aaa sakura tree eee— A person is Aa—a samurai—?

Genkichi stopped midway, urged Masaru on, and turned back down the path they had just come. After walking about fifty meters, they entered the forest again. Then, Genkichi came to a stop and,

“We’ll stay like this for a while,” said Genkichi, then strained his ears and kept still while staying alert to their surroundings. The two men remained like that for twenty minutes. “Alright now, we’re good.” With that, he added, “C’mon, let’s move.” Once more they made their way down to the boat. “Get aboard,” he said. After loading Masaru in, Genkichi put his strength into pushing the boat toward the river’s center before nimbly leaping onto its stern in one fluid motion. The gunwale reared up like an agitated horse’s neck from the force. Then the boat lurched violently.

“I can’t tell shit from nothin’.” Masaru said this when Genkichi lowered his body onto the net.

“Huh.” “Nothin’ at all.” “Just thought there might be officials, so I tried playin’ it safe for a bit.” “You’re new to this, so ya don’t get it yet.” “We’ve handled all that already.”

“From now on, you’ll behave instead,” he said. Masaru’s body trembled uncontrollably. Masaru had begun inwardly regretting coming with Genkichi.

It was said there was a “Master” in the Ishikari River—one that would drag boats whole into its swirling vortex. Masaru couldn’t shake this dread. By daylight, such tales might seem absurd, but now they consumed him entirely. For in truth, no one knew why those who drowned in this river never surfaced again. The water felt more sinister than any midnight sea. At any moment, something might burst forth—something seemed poised to emerge from the depths, yet never did. The boat drifted erratically, sometimes stern-first, sometimes bow-first. Beneath their feet came the wet slap of water against the hull. Both banks loomed black—sheer cliffs in places where the earth rose high—while elsewhere the land dipped so low they could see clear to the horizon. Trees crowded right up to the river’s edge, their branches trembling in the wind. Where shadows fell thickest on the water’s surface, even the faint glimmers that had let them see each other’s faces vanished when the boat passed through.

“Hey, Masaru—listen up. You watch this side here. If there’s anybody around, you let me know.”

Having said that, Genkichi kept watch on the opposite side.

They had gone downstream for about ten minutes. Because it had rained for two days straight, the water level had risen by about fifteen centimeters, and the current had grown swifter. Before long, they came to where the Ishikari River curved broadly and gently. Then Genkichi grabbed an oar and, fighting against the considerably strong current, tried to bring the boat to shore. Masaru took hold of the rudder and did likewise. Every time the two men rowed with all their might, the small boat rocked violently. And the rudder arched like a bow. In putting too much force into it, they ended up staggering from their own exertion. Masaru lost his balance awkwardly two or three times. Despite their efforts, the boat kept being carried toward the center of the curve. “Ugh! Ugh!” Genkichi planted his feet wide like a wrathful temple guardian, groaning as he rowed. The boat gradually began responding to their efforts.

“There!” “Do it!”

Masaru’s entire body began to sweat. When the boat cut through about six feet at the river’s center, the rest now became easier, as if borne along by its own momentum.

“This’ll do! This’ll do!”

When the boat thudded into the sandy bank, Genkichi staggered from the recoil and wiped the sweat from his face with his kimono sleeve.

“Before we start work, go up and keep watch for a bit.” When Genkichi said this to Masaru, he rummaged through the net and pulled out a club that looked exactly like a baseball bat, handing it over. Masaru received it with apparent curiosity and gave a bitter smile. “That’s something.” He began climbing the sandy cliff while toying with it like some plaything. Genkichi then climbed up from behind, holding the rope attached to the end of the net. The two of them stuck only their heads above the flat ground and first carefully looked around once. It was too dark to make anything out clearly. The wind swept across the distance—and they could clearly discern how it shifted. The sky couldn’t be distinguished from the ground. The rain, driven sideways, would occasionally flash white before their eyes.

“Like officials would show up at a time like this.”

Genkichi left Masaru standing there and wrapped the rope around the tree trunk he had previously chosen. The trunk was slick from the rain, and when Genkichi pulled the knot tight with all his strength, chunks of bark crumbled away. After securing the knot, he planted both hands on the trunk, stomped his foothold firm, and shook it with full force. Suddenly leaves rustled overhead with a pattering sound as raindrops cascaded down. Masaru, who had been standing a short distance away, startled and ran to where Genkichi stood. Genkichi instinctively tensed and whirled around.

“What is it?” Genkichi lowered his voice but asked sharply. “What was that just now?” Masaru stammered in panic.

“Huh?” “That rustlin’ sound just now.” Genkichi laughed. “What’re y’on about?” “Nah—hell you mean? I’m the one near jumped out my skin here.”

“What was that? I got scared there.” “I shook the tree to test it. ’Cause the current’s so swift—wanted to make sure it’d hold, so I tested the trunk. In that case, that damn club wouldn’t be any use anyway.” Genkichi laughed.

The two men returned to the boat once more. After neatly restowing the net in the boat, Genkichi decided to row himself while having Masaru lower the net. The boat was rowed straight toward the opposite bank with all his strength. But when they did so, it ultimately ended up landing diagonally downstream at the curve on the opposite bank.

Genkichi said while rowing, “Alright, got it set.” Masaru threw the net into the water with heavy thuds. When they reached the opposite bank, Genkichi had Masaru help him shoulder the rope at the net’s end backward against the river’s flow and, resisting the current’s pull, tied it to a tree on the bank. Even with their combined strength, both men staggered backward unsteadily at times. Then they hauled the boat onto shore. That was it. The two agreed to return around four the next morning, then left through the farm path and headed home.

When Genkichi entered the house, the lamp had been turned off and everyone was asleep. He groped his way to the kitchen and drank two or three cups of water in quick succession straight from the jar using the ladle, his throat making loud gulping noises. In the stable came sharp cracking sounds of the horse swishing its tail against its own body.

II

Four in the morning was as pitch dark as nine or ten at night. Rather than pure darkness, it carried a bluish tinge—a cold that seeped into one's bones. The river’s waters had swollen, and under their force, the tree they’d tied the rope to bent and swayed. Although the rain had stopped by the time the two men left home and reached the spot, no sooner had they begun working than it started pouring again. They immediately set to pulling in the net. Pulling the net against that current was, however, no easy task. The two men repeatedly staggered. Just like that, they were nearly pulled into the middle of the river. The two men panted heavily, and after about twenty minutes, their entire bodies were drenched in sweat that rose as steam. Still, they finally managed to get it pulling. Right—once they made even a little progress, the two men’s spirits lifted, and they began pulling in earnest, chanting “Enya! Enya!” After that, they pulled with heavy, rhythmic thuds. The strength required was no longer as great.

After resting his body briefly, Genkichi asked, “Masaru, you got the club?” When Masaru said “Yeah,” Genkichi chuckled roughly—eh-heh, eh-heh. “Can’t take this anymore! Damn it all, you bastard!”

The rain pounded the ground as if a water bucket had been upended from the heavens, splashing back up with a thunderous roar as it rushed onward. Despite the pitch darkness, the rain conjured an eerie pale brightness that hung in the air. Then came a splash-splash-splash of churned water, only to cease abruptly. After a moment, the splashing resumed - splash-splash. Then immediately after, louder this time - SPLASH-SPLASH. The net was steadily drawn closer.

Pull it in! Pull it in! Pull in the girl’s ****, pull it in! Pull it in! Pull it in! Pull it in! The old hag’s ****, pull it in! Pull it in! Ohhh, heave-ho now! Heave-ho now! Heave-hard! Heave-hard! Genkichi gasped for breath as he chanted rhythmically, swinging his massive frame like someone performing a ritual dance. Slightly bending his waist while shaping his inner thighs into a "sickle," he matched his body to the beat. This made Genkichi seem like nothing more than a small child. As they steadily tightened the net, the salmon began slapping the water's surface with sounds like wooden planks being struck.

“Gen! Gen! Gen!” Masaru called out. “Huh?” “Whoa! “Look!”

The night was pitch black—so dark it felt like being blindfolded with a black cloth. When they looked, within that darkness, a glimmer of scales flickered so abruptly it made them doubt their eyes. Immediately after that came a powerful sound of water being struck. “Autumn salmon!” Genkichi shouted loudly. “It’s huge! Whoa!” The splish-splash of water grew increasingly violent. It was as if children were splashing water at each other. Before long, two or three salmon seemed to leap onto the sandy shore, thrashing about as their thick bodies slapped against the ground. Genkichi had Masaru pull in the net while he himself descended to the riverbank with a club. When he reached the net, Genkichi realized by rough estimate that over ten salmon were caught inside. Suddenly, as if slapped across the cheek, water and sand came flying as a tail fin flicked out.

“Bastard!”

Genkichi wiped his face with his rain-soaked sleeve and raised the club. He took aim and struck the salmon's snout. *Thwack!* The fish stretched out its body, tail fin pointed skyward. It remained frozen like that for an instant. Then the tail fin sank downward. When it touched ground completely limp, the body twitched two or three times. After that, it moved no more.

Genkichi called Masaru. When Masaru arrived, Genkichi struck another on the nose without a word. Masaru jolted rigid. Genkichi laughed through clenched breath. Genkichi kept clubbing them one after another. Masaru grabbed at gills each time, yanking fish into the boat's oil drum. With every pull came twitching bodies—some still breathing through gill-flutters.

As Genkichi continued this way, a strangely violent feeling had taken hold of him. He struck them one by one—"Bastard," "Damn it," "Bastard," "Damn it"—biting his lips and grinding his teeth as he went. The muscles of his face twitched unnaturally, stiffening into rigidity. And like a man possessed, he rained down blow after indiscriminate blow. Then, as if seized by sudden recollection, he began striking them one by one while reciting the names of all those he'd long thought of as "Bastards!" This too dragged him forward with uncanny force.

Abruptly, something lukewarm would come flying at his face. When it stuck, it turned clammy immediately—disgusting. Blood. Each time Genkichi bludgeoned a salmon dead, he counted them off—one, two. As seven became eight then nine, the thrashing sounds of large fish gradually dwindled. At ten counts, only one distant splash remained. Genkichi moved toward it and stepped on a salmon’s slippery body. Unintentionally, even he shuddered—like stepping on a rail-crushed corpse in midnight darkness. “Eleven——.” He said it aloud and strained his ears. Silence now. Only rain drummed against his hearing. Eleven, he reckoned.

“It’s over now. Eleven,” Genkichi said to Masaru. Masaru put them into two oil drums and readied himself to carry them on his back. “What about the net and boat?” “The boat? I’ll leave it here,” Genkichi replied. “Come morning, the motorboat’ll pass through—they’ll tow it along then. The net? I’ll take care of it.”

“This ain’t no joke.” “If water gets in that net, it’ll be too damn heavy to handle.” “What’s your damn problem?!”

*

The two emerged onto the farm path; Genkichi, having never imagined catching so many, was in as good a mood as a child. But Masaru kept twitching nervously. On this return path—what if they encountered officials right at a meeting point?—Masaru’s heart felt as though seized by the scruff of its neck over that very possibility. Everywhere was still thoroughly dark. When a cow abruptly rose from the pitch darkness right beside them, Masaru nearly cried out. A lantern had been visible ahead for some time.

“Gen, lantern!” Masaru called out to Genkichi from behind. “Yeah.” Genkichi immediately veered off the path and entered the field. When he had moved about eighteen meters away from the path, he stopped. In that manner, the two let the lantern pass them by. When they stared fixedly, wherever they looked was uniformly pitch-black; however, only the portion reached by the lantern’s moving flame became visible. The brush flickered with light, and then immediately parts of the fields on both sides of the path became visible, or puddles on the path appeared; when the lantern swayed, the visible areas would expand to the left or right, then contract.

Once it had passed, the two returned to the path.

“Officials? They come carrying lanterns, huh,” Genkichi laughed. “Then we oughta be even more cautious!” “You wouldn’t even notice ’em till they’re right up in your face, would ya?” “Then how ’bout this?” Having said that, he twisted his body halfway back and thrust the club right in front of Masaru’s nose. “Here.”

Masaru felt the bloody stench from the club reach him at that moment and simultaneously flinched. “That’s crazy!” Masaru stammered out so haltingly that even he found it strange. “In this village, we ain’t had a single fish to eat for three whole months now." “You know this kinda story, don’t ya?” “Even if you go down later and look at the river—those autumn salmon bastards swimmin’ with their backs out—how the hell can we go three months without eatin’ a single fish?” “Damn bastards!” “With that goin’ on, you think there’s any damn reason we shouldn’t take ’em?” “That’s right—look! If you head down to the fishin’ grounds, those rich bastards are catchin’ loads of ’em!” “Licenses? Ain’t worth a damn!”

Masaru remained silent.

Whenever things came to this, Genkichi felt a strange anger welling from deep within—a gnawing irritation that crept through him. If he encountered an official at such a moment, he might have smashed that bastard’s skull with the same club he’d used to kill salmon. “If you think I’m doin’ this shit ’cause I want to, you’re dead wrong!” Masaru knew there was something unnervingly “bottomless” in Genkichi’s terror—the thought of it made him afraid. He prayed they wouldn’t meet any officials. Because he believed—truly believed—that if they did, Genkichi would beat those officials to death.

Masaru had known something about Genkichi; that now came to mind. Long ago, after Genkichi’s father had crossed over from mainland Japan to this bear-infested land of Hokkaido and bent his body like a shrimp over the soil, working himself to the bone until the land finally became viable—that very land had been seized by a wealthy man. When that day came, they could no longer hold out, and it had to be handed over to that wealthy man. Father slumped and said he had a headache.

When wealthy men and officials—two or three of them—came stomping in, they made the father press his seal on a certain document. The father, utterly dazed, was about to enter the back room to retrieve the seal when—right before the sliding door—he paced restlessly as if he’d forgotten something. It was exactly when the father pressed the seal. Bent over the document, wholly focused on it, the wealthy man let out a "Hmph!" Having said that, he leaned back arrogantly. Everyone was startled and leapt up. And then, at that moment, everyone saw Genkichi—eleven or twelve years old at the time—clinging to the wealthy man’s leg while biting down on his hairless shin. Convulsively trembling, his eyes wild, Genkichi clung ferociously. The father and officials were shocked; no matter how much they tried to make him let go, he wouldn’t release his grip. The large wealthy man thrashed his body convulsively like a rabbit caught in a trap. He let out a loud cry and wailed at the top of his lungs—

Until then—until that day—Genkichi had never once spoken about the fields, and even when his father was anxious, there had been nothing different about him. However, he had instead grown even more silent and subdued than usual. That’s what had happened! This incident had grown wildly exaggerated and spread throughout the hamlet. Masaru had also heard about it. Genkichi remained still even when some incident occurred. If it were anyone else, they would have said something about it or discussed it among themselves. Genkichi did not do such things. When the others, despite their usual ways, ended up doing nothing and just making a fuss, he would slip out quietly and pull off some unimaginably huge feat all by himself. He would return and, without uttering a single word about it, remain sullen—there had been countless such instances. It wasn’t that he was dim-witted—Masaru thought there was something deep and solid within him that made him that way.

Therefore, if Genkichi were to unexpectedly encounter officials now, Masaru immediately thought of Genkichi as the same boy who had once bitten the wealthy man's shin—and could only think that Genkichi would surely do something drastic with that club. That clung to Masaru’s heart like a scorpion of terror.

The two walked in silence. Only the squelching of footsteps in the muddy road persisted. The rhythm only faltered when they occasionally stepped into hollows, their bodies lurching forward. All the while, Masaru—and Genkichi too, of course—kept their attention strained toward what lay ahead. When Masaru reached his house, he realized he’d been so tense that his strength had drained away, leaving him utterly limp. He thought he was relieved.

“It’s been a year, huh.” “Come on, make Mother happy.”

Having said that, Genkichi was already out of Masaru’s sight. Only the sound of footsteps remained in the darkness; they were briefly audible but then vanished completely. He turned onto a path through grassy fields.

Then Masaru went around to the back door. As he unloaded his load into the shed beside the back door, he heard footsteps approaching through the mud. Masaru felt his body turn to solid timber in an instant.

“Masaru.” It was Genkichi.

Masaru understood, but still, the words wouldn’t come out right away. “Genkichi…?”

“Yeah.” Having said that, his large body lumbered closer, tracing the words “Genkichi…?” “Listen—when mornin’ comes, you’ll take these from here to the riverside houses. One by one.” “Yeah.” “Ain’t nobody been eatin’ ’em.” “Just say you bought ’em—that’ll do.” “I’ll handle distributin’ as far as Ishida.” “That’s only natural!” “Ain’t that right?”

“Yeah.” “You got it. Then let’s move.”

And then he returned. To Masaru, the footsteps seemed somehow forceful—each one heavy and deliberate—and he listened intently as Genkichi walked away.

Three

The weather, which had been thought to bring snow at any moment, passed.

Then came a succession of late autumn days with clear, high skies and pleasant weather.

The fields, the grasslands, Inamura Village, the forests, even the low mountain range visible far off to the west—all turned a tawny hue. Seeing how it spread out endlessly under the clear blue sky, starkly contrasted, the farmers somehow felt as though they were being shown something unfamiliar and sudden.

For the winter that would truly come this time, the villagers began preparations by going out to their fields. To sell the mixed grains carried on their backs—first going to the town with the railway station then making rounds through its vicinity—four or five girls set out early in the morning on a horse-drawn cart. Ofumi joined them too. Chattering noisily atop the cart, they called out from outside each time they came before a farmhouse, addressing every single one. After dark returned those women who had gone to buy cloth for underskirts and underrobes. Because several came back singing in clear voices, those inside the houses could immediately tell—

“Ah, they must’ve just come back now,” they realized. From the town with the station, the errand boy from the hardware store often came riding his bicycle along the country roads. Each time, the farmers working in the fields would straighten their backs and look. The errand boy occasionally called out as he passed by. The women preparing pickles went down the embankment of the Ishikari River and scrubbed the freshly pulled daikon radishes, still caked with soil, using makeshift scrubbers made from rope scraps. There, at bends in the river where the current flowed, sandbars had formed. From there, various women’s songs reached the farmers working on the embankment.

To transport agricultural products from the mountain regions—primarily green peas—engine boats noisily clattered upstream against the river’s current. Whenever the children heard even faint traces of that sound from afar, they would come pounding down the riverside path. Perching on the riverbank embankment and swinging their legs, they waited for the engine boat to pass. The children did this whenever weather permitted. When heading upstream, an engine boat made noise long before becoming visible. But because the river twisted and turned, it would sometimes pop unexpectedly into view. The children waved excitedly and shouted “Banzai!” From the boat, someone in blue oil-stained clothes would occasionally wave a hat back. Yet even when they kept shouting “Banzai” repeatedly with no response from the vessel, there were times they just sat silently watching it go, looking thoroughly dejected. When hauling a loaded barge, the engine boat clattered incessantly while lurching heavily with each laborious advance—moving so sluggishly it hardly seemed to progress—as it passed before the children. “Look! The motor’s sweating and panting,” they exclaimed.

Yoshi grabbed the hand of the companion sitting next to him, pressed it against his own chest, and said, "Can you feel it? It's going thump-thump." "That motor's clattering sound is the same as humans'—that's what my sister said." "Hmm? Hmm?" they said, each placing their hands on their own chests to check. "Yeah," they said. "Yeah," they said. When the engine boat passed by, the children scampered off in all directions to help their parents working in the fields.

Two or three days later, there was a sermon at the elementary school by a Buddhist monk specially summoned from town. This was something the landlord who owned all the land in this area made sure to hold twice yearly for the peasants' spiritual cultivation. The elderly peasants had been waiting for this. And they spoke of this landlord who arranged such things as a benevolent master, delighting in him. Each time, the landlord would insist that even the young women must attend "without fail." Thus young men too would sometimes be lured into going along.

When that day arrived, elderly people—wrinkled like cloth bundles and bent like rusty nails from decades of farming—went out from morning onward, inviting one another. Even elderly women who couldn’t go outside to urinate had come to accept that they must go. Girls of seven or eight and women of seventeen or eighteen took them by the hand and led them. And so people with sun-darkened faces, wearing incongruously beautiful red kimonos that stood out garishly, could be seen on the paths between the fields.

Since her husband’s death, Genkichi’s mother had never missed a sermon. Each time, she tried to take her daughter Ofumi along as well. But Ofumi paid no heed. “You damned fool,” Mother said.

By the time the sermon began, the school classroom—cleared of desks and chairs—had filled completely. Every peasant who gathered bore some part of themselves that had been violently warped by their long, hard lives—each was somehow misshapen. The elderly resembled toads that had crawled up from the earth. They were all people who hadn't met face-to-face in ages. Despite living in the same place, they never gathered like this. Various conversations broke out. Some brought out smoking implements and puffed on tobacco. Grandchildren who had come along played pranks on each other and noisily vaulted over the elders' rounded backs. The classroom grew stifling in the strangely sweet-and-sour air.

The Buddhist monk was supposed to come from a village about four ri away (it was a more quintessentially village-like place than this Higashi-mura). The monk would sometimes come by bicycle still wearing his robes, or spread a zabuton cushion in a freight wagon with a box attached and ride in that. This time, since the rain had just let up, he came by freight wagon. He was a short-statured man over forty with sunken eyes, thick eyebrows, and a conspicuously bald head. He preached loudly in a gravelly voice. While preaching, he had a habit of constantly darting his sunken eyes about restlessly. It was the same monk who had come before.

The village peasants responded to each word the monk spoke by chanting “Namu Amida Butsu” and clapping their rough, thick, calloused palms together with their prayer beads. “Everything is the heart of Lord Amida.” “Everything is the heart of Lord Amida.” “You must never forget that, do you understand?” “…You must never voice complaints—that is what Lord Shakyamuni taught us.” “Everything is the heart of Lord Amida.” “In this world—in this very existence—those who have suffered can only attain the Great Pure Land when they come to stand by Lord Amida’s side.” “When you go to the afterlife and properly sit upon a lotus, you will be able to chant ‘Namu Amida Butsu’ from the heart.” “You must never voice complaints, I tell you.”

The Buddhist monk said in a practiced tone. The peasants had heard those phrases many times before. Yet no matter how often they heard them, they still considered them gracious words. As if realizing it anew, they bowed their heads and repeated, "Namu Amida." The elderly peasants looked back on the long, arduous lives they had lived until now. When they realized they had never once complained, they sighed in relief. Having endured such suffering—and thus being able to go to Lord Amida's side in the afterlife—the elderly peasants thought of nothing beyond that. But why must we endure everything in this world? they wondered. The monk then brought up Shakyamuni's ascetic practices, applying them directly to the peasants' harsh lives as he spoke. This moved the peasants deeply from their hearts.

When the Buddhist monk finished this sermon, he stayed at the most devout household before making rounds from house to house preaching. In peasant homes with elderly members, they summoned the monk even when patching split tabi socks instead of buying new ones. If they failed to do this, they feared their afterlife would turn wretched. That was what terrified them most—these peasants who had been driven to labor without respite all their lives thought it unbearable if they must keep toiling even after death. Every peasant had grown sick of this world demanding endless work. More than anything, they wanted escape. For them, this was no trifling matter like tabi socks or miso. Though not consciously dwelling on it, the peasants always carried thoughts of “the afterlife” somewhere in their hearts.

On the day the Buddhist monk was to come, Genkichi's mother had been preparing something in the kitchen since morning. And when the Buddhist monk came, she brought it out. When the weather turned cold, Genkichi's mother's lower back and ankles began to ache. The long years of excessive labor had steadily taken their toll on her body. Genkichi's mother persistently had Yoshi, who disliked it, massage her shoulders and lower back. The Buddhist monk recited the sutra rapidly—almost declaiming them—with exaggerated care, then shook the prayer beads roughly against Seki's shoulders and lower back, rubbing and stroking her with them. And this was true in every peasant household. Even if they appeared sturdy, peasants would invariably suffer through sleepless nights with their lower backs acting up or shoulders stiffening. So when the Buddhist monk went around house to house, that also brought in a good amount of money.

The Buddhist monk stayed for two days, finished visiting every single house, and left to return home. He had pocketed a considerable amount of money. When Genkichi was returning from the fields, he encountered the monk. The Buddhist monk gave a brief greeting in a merchant-like manner that seemed somewhat cunning. But Genkichi remained sullen and stayed silent. After walking a little further, he met the school principal.

The elementary school principal was a thirty-seven or thirty-eight-year-old man with an unlikable, stern face. He served as principal, teacher, and janitor all in one. The school had only one classroom with about twenty desks arranged. From first to sixth grade, all the boys and girls were together there. The classroom had maps hanging on the walls, a cabinet containing science specimens (inside which was a stuffed crow), and an organ with white keys worn down shoved into a corner. The principal detested the monk most of all. No one knew why this teacher had come to the village. And though he had a stern face that made people dislike him, he was respected as a "great man" for that very reason. It was also said he had come to this place because he had quarreled with the principal at a city's elementary school. The teacher's room—separated from the classroom by a hallway and immediately adjacent—had books piled up in great numbers.

Genkichi said to the principal, “That monk’s gone back.” The principal pressed his face! He moved it as if mashing it down and said, “If only someone had stuffed him into a manure pit. Every time that guy comes to the village, the peasants get more half-baked by the day and turn into utter fools—damn it!”

*

The village festival happened to coincide with this fine weather.

“When something like this happens, it’s always decided that we’ll take the lead,” [47-9] Kiku and Maruyama’s Onko—businesses indicated by their shop signs—erected tall, vertically long “Dedication” banners in front of the shrine and had children help build a creaking stage. They wore new workman’s coats, their forelocks slightly grown out and oiled, using bicycles to borrow festival curtains and transport various tools from the town with the train station—until at last, everything had finally taken on a properly festive air. From early morning, four or five children in new kimonos were playing beside where young people were making preparations. The shrine stood near the school in a wild field, surrounded on three sides by a small mixed forest. By evening, it was arranged that merchants would come shouldering their wares of rubber balloons and such, and that the Hokai-bushi troupes from the town with the train station would come to perform Yasugi folk songs and hand dances on that stage.

Ofumi and her mother prepared festival dishes. No matter how wretched a life the peasants lived, they had to do such things—they had always thought so. Genkichi lay sprawled beside the large hearth where a fire burned, teasing Yoshi with his feet. “There!” Yoshi, who had been clinging to Genkichi’s leg, was flung down moments later. Determined not to lose, Yoshi planted his legs and pushed forward with all his strength. But the harder he struggled, the more easily his body went flying.

“Again!”

“Damn it!” “Brother, you’re twistin’ your legs!” “Idiot.”

From the dim kitchen, Mother shouted, “Yoshi, get yourself to the festival!”

Genkichi, amused, entertained Yoshi with his legs until his grip began to falter. Yoshi, sensing he might win now, grew even more fired up. Genkichi recalled last year's festival. He remembered it had been the night Yoshie—the one he'd kept thinking about—left for Sapporo without notice. Since that incident, Genkichi had become even more withdrawn. "Agh— Brother! I lost! I lost!"

Yoshi knocked down Genkichi’s legs and pinned them onto the tatami mats.

Genkichi abruptly snapped back to himself and inadvertently put too much strength into his legs, causing him to fling back. Losing his balance from the momentum, Yoshi was flung and hit his head against a log piled by the hearth. Yoshi deliberately let out a loud cry and burst into tears. “Brother, that’s cheating! You cheat, cheat!”

Genkichi forced a wry smile as he stroked Yoshi’s head with his large palm. “You’ve got a hard head.” “Here?” “Alright, I’ll do a spell for you.” “Fu ento ka fuekashi koramiyo no daimyoujin.” Genkichi repeated it many times and rubbed Yoshi’s head vigorously. At first, Yoshi had been silent, but upon realizing it was a prank, he started wailing again. Genkichi grabbed Yoshi’s head in one handful, “Hey, hey!” he shook him.

“If you’re gonna make such a damn fuss with that brat, just go ahead and raise hell!” Mother shouted. Yoshi, now crying, “Brother, money! Money!” he started saying. “If you give me money, it’s fine. Just give me money!” “Damn cheating brat. You think if I give you money, it’ll fix everything?” “Money! Gimme money!” Yoshi, getting worked up, thrashed his legs and started saying that. “Hooo! Even Ken from Masaru’s place got ten sen, and even a stone gets some! C’mon, Brother, gimme money, gimme money, gimme money, yeah!”

Genkichi remained perfectly still this time, not even twitching an ear in response. When Genkichi was told that Yoshie had gone to Sapporo, he recalled how he had truly been left feeling "lonely" in another sense as well. In the village, because they simply couldn’t make a living, women went off to the cities to become maids or factory girls—even men who should have been working the fields left. Gradually, the villagers were disappearing—he thought. Genkichi felt an unpleasant feeling.

“Gimme money, gimme money! Yeah!” “Yeah!” Yoshi shook Genkichi’s body. Genkichi remained silent and suddenly twisted his body. Yoshi tumbled helplessly. He burst into even more violent tears.

“Raise hell all you want, you little shit!” Mother shouted again, as though she could bear it no longer.

Genkichi felt something unpleasant welling up in the pit of his stomach, surging relentlessly. Outside, about two children came to call Yoshi. “Look, Yoshi, they’re calling for you.”

Yoshi abruptly stopped crying, wiped his entire face with his sleeve, put on a strange, forced smile that looked terribly awkward, and went outside.

Genkichi lay on his back staring vacantly at the soot-blackened ceiling that gleamed dully, thinking he wouldn’t go out tonight. When evening came, seven or eight people passed noisily by the front. They were a hand-dancing troupe from the town with the train station. There were men carrying large indigo furoshiki bundles with coarse textures and wearing tinted glasses; a thin man with powdered white makeup on his protruding cheekbones; a woman also wearing tinted glasses with a shamisen hung from her shoulder; along with a seventeen- or eighteen-year-old girl caked thickly in white powder and about three girls aged seven or eight. Following behind them were four or five village children.

Genkichi lay sprawled vacantly. Right beside him, Ofumi sat facing a mirror whose red backing was peeled in places. Where she had gotten it from, she would shake the white powder bottle upside down into her palm and dab it on her face. Genkichi hadn’t said a single word to anyone since earlier. “I wonder what kind of hand dances they’ll have this time?” Ofumi said without taking her eyes off the mirror. Perhaps Genkichi hadn’t heard; he remained silent. For Ofumi, it wasn’t something that particularly required a response. While muttering something to herself, she remained completely absorbed in the mirror. Since she hadn’t been waiting for a reply in the first place, she didn’t notice Genkichi.

“Mr. Ishida Roku is going to perform naniwa-bushi...” And then, after a moment, “I wonder how Mr. Roku’s naniwa-bushi will be. “It’s sure to be funny,” she said. “Where’d Mother go off to—”

Genkichi was still staring at the ceiling. He kept his legs raised. He occasionally moved only the toes of the leg he had placed atop the other. He moved them absentmindedly. "I told you I was going to the festival, but where's Mother gone off to—really." Even so, she did not pull her face away from the mirror. "Brother, are we going to the festival?" Genkichi slowly turned his head and looked toward Ofumi. Ofumi had thrust her face so close to the mirror it seemed about to stick, desperately trying to squeeze out something near her nose. She twisted her mouth strangely. Genkichi returned his head to its original position and said nothing in response to that either.

“Troublesome.” This time, Ofumi wiped her face with a hand towel. “I’m supposed to take Haru-chan, but I can’t go out if Mother isn’t here.” “Brother, are we going to the festival?” For the first time, she pulled her face away from the mirror, looked at Genkichi, and said that. Because she had taken a proper bath for the first time in ages out back, Ofumi’s face was smooth, pale, and clean. When Genkichi looked at Ofumi’s face, she flushed slightly and said awkwardly, “What should we do?”

Genkichi turned his head back again and, as if speaking toward a different direction, said for the first time, "You can go." Ofumi went into the back room. Then she changed into her kimono and went outside. "Hmph! Damned beast!"

Genkichi stood up. But he himself didn't know what he intended to do. He looked out the window. But it was pitch dark, and (with the inside being bright) he couldn't see outside at all. Genkichi went to the kitchen and drank about two cups of water. Genkichi returned to the hearthside, but he couldn't decide whether to sit down or not. Genkichi stood there vacantly for a while. The surroundings were quiet. The oil lamp flickered—sometimes brightening, sometimes dimming abruptly as if being sucked away somewhere. Even the horse in the stable by the back door made no sound—neither the swish of its tail nor the clatter of hooves against the floor. The festival grounds were quite far away, so nothing could be heard. Genkichi began to feel a slight, inexplicable irritation. Someone passed by the front. Someone was talking. At first, Genkichi couldn't make sense of it.

“Looky here—shootin’ star!” “Right there—hole in th’ sky.” “That ’un turns t’powder ’fore hittin’ ground.—Sometimes goes boom when they fall.” The other muttered something back. Then came a voice sticky-sweet through puckered lips:

“If we don’t go soon, the dancing’ll be over!” came the voice of an eleven or twelve-year-old child. “Ah—Again!” “Mother’s takin’ forever!” The complaint carried a half-sob. The voices grew distant and soon faded entirely. The silence returned. Genkichi became aware of his own breathing, the unnatural quiet now feeling ominous. He considered sitting down. Just then, his eyes caught a letter half-protruding from the mirror stand’s small drawer. He guessed it must be from Yoshie.

That you want to go to Sapporo—considering my own circumstances at the time—isn't unreasonable. ……Life here, however, has turned out completely different from what I'd imagined.……So please forgive me—I said those things because I didn't want to let you down. ――Truth be told, this wretched existence feels more than enough for me alone. Of course here, unlike there, we needn't go about in grubby clothes working like that year-round. “……But in exchange, there are countless 'terrifying' things here you could never comprehend no matter how hard you tried.……”

Anyway, if you absolutely cannot change your mind about coming, then there’s nothing to be done—I’ll wait.…… When I told my master about it, he said it’s perfect timing since we’re short-handed. (And finally) Please give my best regards to Gen-san.

That was the gist of what had been written. Genkichi vaguely read it over again from the beginning.—“Please give my best regards to Gen-san.”—After reading, he remained still, holding the letter in his hand.

Mother returned home.

“Brother, what’re you doing? Go on—go see.—I just met Ofumi.”

Genkichi put the letter back where it had been and, without replying to his mother, went outside. Mother snorted repeatedly in the earthen-floored entryway.

“On your way back, bring Yoshi with you,” she called after him. When he stepped outside, he was struck by a sudden chill. The sky stretched high and clear, stars scattered like flung grain. Genkichi hadn’t particularly wanted to go to the festival. Yet staying home felt unbearable. After walking a short way, tall trees stood spaced five or six *ken* apart on his left. Through their gaps, the Ishikari River’s surface came into view. Though stars shone above, the surroundings lay pitch-black. There alone, the river glowed blue. Nearby tree trunks stood in stark black contrast. Peering closer, he saw countless stars mirrored in the water. The air bit with deepening cold. Genkichi shivered repeatedly. During festivals, young men and women always gathered here on the riverbank rather than at the shrine. He remembered meeting Yoshie there many times—Genkichi spat toward the river with visceral disgust.

The road curved. As he turned there, the festival lights became visible far ahead. Only that illuminated area remained clearly distinguishable even from this distance. Suddenly a commotion rose up. There came the rhythmic pounding of drums. From within the human clamor pierced occasional shrill bursts - rubber balloons popping and flutes trilling. Along the way before a farmhouse stood one of its elders gazing toward the festival.

“Good evening,” an elder called out to Genkichi in the dim light. “Good evening.” Genkichi replied. “Headin’ out, are ya?”

“Ah…” As Genkichi was about to pass by, the elder said, “Take your time now.” On the festival stage, about ten lamps were lit. In front of it, straw mats had been laid out, and the villagers sat watching. They were mainly young women, children, and elderly people. That area remained nearly dark. Along both sides of the road beyond stood about four stalls with lit lamps—rubber balloon vendors among them. The cotton candy vendor kept stepping on his machine’s pedal as he wound strands around split chopsticks, thrusting them before children while muttering something.

Children stood in front of a single stall, in groups of two or three. Behind the shrine was a small sumo ring where young men wrestled. Genkichi had no interest in anything. Thrusting his hands into the front of his obi, he stood back and watched. On the stage was a hand dance. With every footbeat, floorboards creaked. They danced by simply moving their hands and feet with thuds and clatters. But being distant, he couldn't see their faces or garment flaws; bathed in lamplight, the dancers appeared beautiful to Genkichi. Here and there, women called “Hah!—Hah!” while singing in unison: “That one—I didn’t know—ah!”

Genkichi’s chest grew tight with irritation. As he watched for a moment, everything seemed foolish. He slipped past the balloon stall’s rear and moved toward the sumo ring behind the shrine. The thump of sumo drums reached his ears. But halfway there, Genkichi changed course, turning back until he stood outside the shrine grounds. Earlier, when he’d first arrived, Genkichi had stepped toward the roadside grass to relieve himself. There—right before his eyes in the darkness—a woman straightened up, having just hitched her kimono hem and finished her own business. Genkichi’s attention lingered elsewhere. The ambush came without warning. They both froze—startled—as strange urgency surged through him. Even he couldn’t explain it. His hand shot out. Caught the fleeing woman’s obi. Genkichi’s throat clenched. She fought silently in the dark. No match for his strength. In moments she pressed against his chest. Her nails scrabbled at his hand gripping her sash. “Bastard!” He rasped the word and crushed her body against his.

The woman suffered as her swollen breasts were pressed flat. The pungent scent of fresh oil from her traditional chignon struck Genkichi's nostrils. His heart pounded so violently he could feel it through his own flesh. Now he fully sensed her body beneath him. Though pinned by Genkichi's weight, she twisted violently against him. He felt every movement of her solid frame grinding directly against his own. This time Genkichi hoisted her up without resistance and carried her onto a dark path trailing into the fields. At first she thrashed as if to scream aloud - kicking wildly at his shins, raking nails across his bare chest through torn cloth. Then abruptly she went still for reasons unknown. Her face pressed against Genkichi's exposed pectoral muscle where his shirt hung open. Hot exhalations washed over his skin.

Genkichi walked three chō while gasping for breath. Then he stomped into the fields. Many corn stumps remained, and Genkichi scraped the skin off his feet multiple times against them. He stepped into a depression and staggered. But Genkichi, now resembling a demon, charged forward heedlessly in wild abandon. The woman, as if suddenly remembering, resisted violently again. However, the more she resisted, the more energized Genkichi became. And he felt his entire body begin to quiver up.

IV

The rain came again. The day grew steadily dimmer, chilly-looking clouds hung low, and sleet began falling intermittently. This time, winter would truly come—so everyone thought. When they woke in the morning, ice had formed on the surface of the water-filled ditches.

When the farmers finished their winter preparations, they would crawl into thatched houses, lay straw mats on the earthen floor, and set about braiding ropes and making straw sandals. For a whole year they went out to the fields, bent at the waist and worked themselves raw in the dirt—yet even that wasn't enough for farmers. The young women shouldered their harvests and legumes and set out for the town with the train station. The farmers produced all manner of things without knowing who they were for. Yet more than half were taken away down to the last grain. Tenant farmers' yields became landlords' rent; owner-farmers' crops turned into annual payments for the Colonial Bank. On top of this came fertilizer shops and farm tool stores. Farmers who grew rice and beans and corn and eggplants had nothing to eat each day but dried vegetable leaves and potatoes. They couldn't get anything better. What's more, when mealtime came around they felt it wasteful to eat even those plain provisions. So they watered down rice until it turned thin and sludgy—three parts water to one part grain—then threw in potatoes or mixed beans through it before eating.

They ate dozens of pumpkins all winter that they had dried under the eaves in summer. Because they ate those pumpkins day after day, every farmer turned completely bright yellow—from their faces to their palms to their feet. Even the whites of their eyes developed yellow streaks.

As winter approached, mending the tabi socks worn ragged through the year became the task of each household's elderly. They applied multiple patches to make them last through another winter. Shirts, undergarments, and waistcloths followed the same pattern. Genkichi's mother pulled out assorted rags from the closet, heaped them like a mountain by the hearth, secured the broken glasses—one lens missing—to her ear with thread, and brought her face close to the lamp as she worked.

After the harvest ended and before winter arrived, many peddlers came around several times a day counting on the farmers having money. Beggars carrying tools that looked like toys also came around. But considering the long winter ahead, the farmers couldn’t afford to carelessly buy even a scrap of cloth. Medicine sellers from Etchu Toyama came carrying paulownia medicine boxes with many small drawers on their backs. They gave the children medicinal-smelling flyers illustrated with horses and such, and no matter how much people said they didn’t need them, they sat down at the entrance and wouldn’t move. And they left behind medicine packets. Yoshi carefully kept the horse flyers and copied them whenever he had free time.

Nevertheless, the farmers hitched up their horses and went to the town with the train station to buy miso, soy sauce, and other necessary items. At that time, several farmers’ carts were hitched to the telegraph poles in front of the hardware store near the station. There were many mares. Whenever a stallion occasionally passed by, they would neigh and thrash about. Then, a red-faced, drunken farmer came flying out from inside the hardware store and dragged the mare off to the side. At the hardware store, there were two or three chairs on the earthen floor where farmers sat, pouring cold sake into cups meant for ice water and drinking while tearing off pieces of dried fish.

Among the farmers, there were those who ended up completely drunk here. “No matter how drunk I get, that guy takes care of everything.” Then, carried by the shop clerk along with miso and soy sauce barrels, they were loaded onto the cart as if they were mere luggage. Still loaded on the cart, they sang songs they had learned in their youth and were in high spirits when the horse began retracing its path back along the road it had come. Genkichi drank two or three cups of motsukiri and, perhaps because it had been so long, became completely drunk. Genkichi swung his large frame about, making innocent dance gestures, squinting his eyes and laughing in a strange voice while rambling about nonsensical things.

Around eight o'clock when he left the hardware store, Genkichi went to the horse hitched nearby and, swaying unsteadily, clung to its neck for support. While stroking its muzzle, he muttered something to himself. Even as he did this, his body kept swaying unsteadily. When he moved away from the horse, he stood still for a moment. Yet he began walking with faltering steps. The streets were already empty of people. Genkichi stuffed both hands deep into his pockets and, as often happens after getting drunk, walked alone while shivering violently and muttering to himself.

“No matter how much I work, what’s it even get me? Damn it all.” “Shithead.” He repeated the same words over and over this way. After walking a short distance, there was a soba shop with low eaves. Genkichi thudded his body against the entrance pillar. Still leaning against it with eyes closed, he growled, “Who’s there? Damn it! Who’s there?” Inside, a woman wearing white powder called out, “Brother, come on in. Come upstairs and have a drink.” She immediately stood up and came out.

“Well, aren’t you cheerful.” Genkichi thrust his face right up to the woman’s, forced open his drunkenly bleary eyes, and stared at her. The scent of cheap white powder and the woman’s sweaty odor assaulted his nostrils. “You got a cute face there, girl.”

"I'll warm you up. C'mon, come upstairs—" “C’mon, come upstairs—” Genkichi staggered into the earthen floor.

Genkichi’s horse, which had been tied in front of the hardware store, remained there until the next morning, its head hanging low as it stayed tethered.

*

During the long autumn nights, with a lamp hung in the earthen floor as they beat straw and twisted rope, the farmers reflected on the lives they had lived. Autumn nights were such times for the farmers. The soft humming that had lingered would suddenly cease, and before they knew it, the farmers found themselves thinking of times past. In the mainland, they had been able to eat nothing but sweet potatoes. What they harvested from the fields sold cheaply, while fertilizers and tools cost twice as much. When tenant rents piled up endlessly for the landlords, the standing crops were seized; the land was taken away.

“If we go to Hokkaido...” Thinking this way and driven out, yet clinging to grand dreams, they came to Hokkaido—where bears roamed. They crossed the Tsugaru Strait and pressed ever northward. When parents and children carrying wicker baskets were unloaded at a desolate Hokkaido station—remote beyond reason, lacking even a platform, utterly exposed to the winds—they were forced to trudge snowbound roads stretching beyond sight. No matter how far they went, it remained snow-covered and flat. The wind raged so fiercely it threatened to strip the skin from their faces. And when they finally settled, signs stood everywhere. Not a scrap of claimable land remained—nothing beyond the lid of a lacquered lunchbox. Even when they occasionally 'snatched up' cheap land, they lacked funds to cultivate it. In the end, after working borrowed money for two or three years—when that wasteland finally resembled fields—it had vanished from their hands by then.—There too proved no better place to live.

“How’s it going back home, I wonder.” For farmers like these, even if they had lived in Hokkaido for twenty years—or thirty—they had never forgotten about the mainland. They had silently believed that when they died, it must be in a mainland village—one that had never treated them well in the past—and nowhere else. At all times, they had been thinking that someday they would return to the mainland. When the farmers would suddenly speak up during breaks in their work, they would surely say, “How’s it going back on the mainland?” The mainland now, strangely enough, had revived in their hearts with a peculiar allure. Somehow, it had come to be imagined as something beautiful and joyful. They would talk in a measured tone about such things—whether someone from the tofu shop was doing well, if the money from [shop name marker] might still be around, how the daughter on the corner lot had taken a husband, or that the stonemason’s master had gone off to Karafuto… These topics surfaced in halting fragments, trailing off only to resume again, always circling back to stories of their own past selves.

At first, when leaving the "mainland," the farmers had thought that if they went to Hokkaido, they would work hard for a spell, make heaps of money, return to the mainland, and live in comfort. Everyone had been like that. Genkichi’s father too had been like that. But not a single one of those farmers had ever managed to pull it off. In the end, it proved no different at all from their old life on the mainland. Yet the farmers made no move to grasp this truth. But in reality, though every last farmer knew full well such a thing was hopeless, somewhere deep in their hearts they still clung—vaguely yet stubbornly—to the thought of returning to the mainland with money in hand. The farmers of Hokkaido all carried themselves with this same resigned composure.

Occasionally, if there was someone who went to the mainland even for a month—(though such cases were exceedingly rare)— —for instance, if a relative had fallen critically ill—such cases were strictly limited to those combined with circumstances like that.) People from the same homeland would gather and go, entrusting their relatives with various errands or having things delivered. They would promise to have them bring back news about how the village fared. When Genkichi’s father and mother first came to Hokkaido and were made to walk through the snow-covered wilderness (Genkichi was clinging to his father’s back at the time)—just before entering the village where they now lived, they saw a single stake standing by the roadside. It was near dusk, and in that vast, desolate field, only that stake stood all alone—a solitary post. The father, mistaking it for a distance marker and wondering how many *ri* lay ahead, squatted before it and brushed off the snow. On it was written: “Echigo Province—[—] District—[—] Village—[—] died here.” The father told the mother about it. Both of them felt such profound helplessness in that moment that a chill ran through them—“No matter what, we mustn’t end up like this.” Genkichi had been told this many times and knew it well.

In that way, the farmers remained forever bound to the soil of their "hometown." Autumn in the rural village grew ever deeper.

As winter drew near, Genkichi’s mother’s lower back began to ache. Descending to the earthen floor and making rope, she had Yoshi rub her lower back and shoulders. Each time Yoshi resisted and tried to walk away, “I’ll give you a sen for the whole thing,” she’d say, but if even then he didn’t come, “Then I’ll give you two sen,” she said. Yoshi circled behind his mother, massaged her shoulders two or three times, and immediately— “Do the whole thing!” “That’s enough!” “You started it—now you can’t back out!”

“More.” “That’s cheating!” “Damn it, Mom! Even if it’s you!”

“That’s cheating!” “You little shit!” The two of them got serious. And then—suddenly,

“Hey, Gen… I wanna go back to the mainland this winter… Gen.” He said while rubbing his own throbbing waist. And with a dark expression, he looked at Genkichi.

Five

Genkichi’s mother had grown somehow weaker since Ofumi ran off to Sapporo during the festival night. While doing some work, she suddenly brought up Ofumi. And then she went on chattering about it endlessly, as if talking to herself. Whenever his mother started talking like that, Genkichi would silently stand up and go outside.

It was a quiet evening in late autumn. Around the river flowing behind, birds occasionally cried. Genkichi and his mother had lowered the lamp, laid out a straw mat on the earthen floor, and were making straw sandals. He thought someone had called from outside.

“Hah—” Genkichi strained his ears toward the front and called out. “It’s me.”

The school principal shouldered open the creaking door and entered. “I was bored and came to talk,” he said. By the hearth, Yoshi was taking a nap. The lamp had been brought to the earthen floor, leaving that area too dark to make out clearly. “How’s Ofumi doing?” The principal had heard about it from some conversation. As always, Mother repeated the same things she’d said countless times to the school principal. Genkichi kept silent.

“Why haven’t you brought her back?” “No matter how much I tell him, Gen won’t listen.” “He doesn’t want to go.—He’s got work in Sapporo, I tell you.” “Genkichi, what’s wrong?” “It’s no use.” Genkichi said that. “Even if you brought her back, she’d just go again.” “That’s how it is.” The mother looked at the principal’s face in dismay. From there, the principal began talking about his time in Sapporo. And he said such things. “If one were to experience city life even once, they could never stay in a countryside like this.” “There are telephones—you can talk to someone far away right then and there about your business.” “There are countless cars.” “There are trains.” “And the women always walk around looking like dolls, beautifully powdered and wearing long-sleeved kimonos.” “There are movies every day, plays you can watch, and concerts.” “There are parks.”

“And even the men walk around town dressed exactly like people in foreign photographs, their shoes polished shiny and clicking as they go.” “Oh, I mean―” Mother looked startled. “And what about farmers?―” The principal paused briefly. “Buried in manure year-round, turning coal-black till you can’t tell men from women.” “The skin on women’s hands here—isn’t it just like rags?” “From morning while it’s still dark until night.” “Then there’s night work besides.” “―Well, if that left them rolling in money, that’d be fine.” “Don’t you think, Mother?”

The principal laughed in an odd tone. “Wealthy city folks—they do their clean, elegant work in those fine Western-style buildings, finish with a flick of the wrist, and that’s their whole day done. And piles of money roll right in. It’s not even worth discussing, I tell you.” Having said that,

“What do you think?” the principal said to Genkichi.

Genkichi remained silent. "That must be how it is!" Mother said admiringly. "They're such fine city folks, after all."

“Genkichi-kun, do you understand—this logic…” “……” Genkichi looked at the principal’s face but said nothing. He took water into his mouth, sprayed it like mist, and struck the straw with a wooden mallet. The principal smoked his cigarette while staying silent for a moment. Then, as if suddenly remembering, “Ah—did you hear Masaru joined Naeo’s railway factory?”

“Is that so?” Genkichi’s interest sharpened abruptly. “Just as I figured. That’s how it goes.”

“Masaru’s household was saying that.” “Masaru-kun is also having a hard time.” “That Masaru tried to put Ofumi up to it!” The mother said angrily. “Hey, Genkichi-kun—if just one farmer works, they can feed their own family, let landlords live in luxury on top of that, and even share benefits with those surviving through those landlords.” “Something else, isn’t it?” “Whether to let people live or not—only farmers and factory workers can decide that as they please.” “Isn’t that something?” The school principal smiled a smile he had never shown before. Then in a jocular tone: “They’re something else.” “The greatest in the world would be farmers and factory workers—wouldn’t you say?” “Ha ha ha…” “But here’s the kicker—those same farmers and factory workers are the poorest, filthiest, most mocked, and most overworked of all! Isn’t that delightful?”

Genkichi found himself inadvertently drawn into the principal’s tone and laughed. Mother wore an expression that seemed to both grasp and not grasp what was being said. “Funny when you think about it,” he continued. “Back in June, when the landlords gathered everyone for that big speech of theirs.” “‘Your poverty comes from some sin of your own’—that nonsense about poverty never catching those who work hard enough.” “And everyone kept nodding along—‘That’s exactly right,’ they agreed.” “But here’s the joke—they make you sweat your guts out, then those landlords swoop in to pocket all the good bits themselves! That’s what makes it funny!” “Not a damn thing ever catches up to landlords.” “Strange part is—strange as it gets—none of ’em realize they’re being played for fools by those landlords.” “So they keep whining ‘Still not enough! Still not enough!’ while breaking their backs working.” “Those bastard landlords are back there licking their chops and laughing their heads off!” “Even now you farmers are up at four or five in the morning, working till seven or eight at night.” “Make you start earlier? Work later? Like goddamn plow horses? You’d drop dead in three days flat!” “Who works without rest like farmers do?” “That whole ‘you’re poor ’cause you don’t work enough’ line? Biggest lie ever told!”

“Mr. Principal! What in God’s name are you saying?” Mother cried out in shock. “No—you lot should work harder too,” retorted the school principal. “Then the landlords’ storehouses will overflow with rice bales while your own mouths turn parched.” He let out a booming laugh. Genkichi wore a rigid, troubled expression like someone who’d been shoved forward mid-stride. His wooden mallet occasionally froze mid-swing. “What baffles me,” continued the principal, “is how everyone stays this poor without understanding why they’re poor. Eh, Genkichi-kun? The landlords spew nonsense while those monk bastards—fat with landlord bribes—prattle about Buddha’s will until confusion breeds more confusion.” He leaned closer, eyes glinting. “But scrub it clean and look—everything becomes clear as day. Farmers... Maybe clarity terrifies them. Leaves them paralyzed.” He chuckled again before muttering to himself: “Terrified indeed. So terrified... they’d rather wallow in ignorance.”

The school principal looked toward Genkichi. He assumed a posture as though waiting for Genkichi to say something. But Genkichi still wore a grim expression, his brows furrowed. “Oh my, oh my, Mr. Principal! If such things were to reach the landlord sirs’ ears, it would cause a terrible uproar.” The school principal remained silent for a moment. But then he began talking about something else entirely. Yoshi, who had been sleeping by the hearth, jumped up as if startled by something. And he stood there blankly. Everyone looked that way.

“Yoshi! What’re you doing sleep-dazed?!” Yoshi looked around restlessly at his surroundings and shook his body several times. Yoshi’s body was crawling with lice. “Look, the principal’s here.” When Yoshi saw the school principal, he lowered his head. But without saying anything, he immediately sat back down by the hearth. And then, curling up as if his knees and chin were clamped together, he fell fast asleep. “He’s having nightmares.” The school principal, after a while, left for home while vigorously scratching his chestnut-burr head. While opening the door, he said, “Brr, it’s cold,” and pulled his hands into his sleeves. Immediately after the door closed, the sound of the school principal urinating by the house could be heard.

“Good evening.” Someone said this as they passed by. The school principal answered while urinating in his usual gravelly voice: “Evenin’.” After finishing work, Mother boiled the potatoes she’d peeled earlier in a large pot. When they were fully cooked, she transferred them to a bamboo strainer and sprinkled salt on top. Mother and Genkichi sat by the hearth eating them. Good potatoes developed a powdery texture when boiled this way. They blew on the hot potatoes as they ate. Mother sat cross-legged across from Genkichi. But soon, while bringing a potato to her mouth, her hand stopped short of her lips... She was dozing. When her hand jerked involuntarily, she startled awake enough to shove the potato into her mouth. Chewing mechanically without swallowing, she began dozing off again.

The wood burning in the hearth snapped and popped intermittently. At that sound, Mother would occasionally return to herself a little. Genkichi was eating the potatoes without saying a word. As if he were thinking about something, he only moved his mouth mechanically. The pillar clock struck four times, languidly. Startled, Mother truly opened her eyes this time. And then, she shook awake Yoshi, who was sleeping curled up in a ball. Yoshi opened his eyes and began to twist away sullenly.

“Look! Mr. Principal!” Mother shouted. Yoshi looked around as if startled. “Lies! Lies! “Lies!!! Lies!!…”

At last, Yoshi began crying in earnest. “You brat! Hurry up and go take a piss. Go outside.” Yoshi did not readily stand up. Having been told three or four times, he stood outside. But when he opened the door just a crack, he stuck out only his penis and energetically let it go outside.

“Don’t go outside again. What a disgusting habit!—Stinking up the place from behind!—You’re not some damn baby anymore. You hear me? Later, Brother’s gonna give you a good whack!” “I won’t go out! It’s freezing! I won’t! It’s freezing!” Yoshi said in a half-crying voice. “Alright now, properly—just do it like that!”

Mother laid out three futons. “Hey Gen, that school principal—he’s definitely... that. “What an outrageous thing to say! “Don’t listen seriously. “Yeah.” While laying out the futons, Mother said.

Genkichi, having eaten his fill of potatoes, held the fire tongs and stared into the hearth. With the fire tongs, he tried arranging the embers in various ways, then scattering them, continuing like that for a while. Yoshi and Mother had gone to sleep. Genkichi took a piece of wood from beside the hearth and added it to the fire. Then he sat like a tarnished bronze statue until it had finished burning through. The lamp's oil was running out too, its flame gradually growing thinner.

“Gen, still up? Fuel’s runnin’ low. Get to bed.” Mother woke, lifting her head slightly from the pillow as she spoke toward him. Genkichi noticed the fire had dwindled to embers and he’d grown cold. “Yeah.” He stood up.… His figure loomed large as a shadow on the back window. “Namu Amida Butsu, Namu Amida Butsu—” Genkichi heard Mother’s broken muttering.

Six

A long winter had come. The farmers had to make up for this year's poor harvest. Genkichi had decided that once the snow fell, he would set out into the mountains of Asari with five or six villagers to be hired for stripping linden bark. Once that was finished through February, they were supposed to go to the Yoichi herring grounds. And then around the end of April, they would return to the village. That was what most farmers did.—And so their lives hardened into a rigid routine.

Day after day, the blizzard raged on relentlessly. The farmers spent that entire time without taking a single step outside the houses. Even if they peered out the window, there was only pure white, and nothing could be seen. At times, the house groaned and creaked as it shook. And finally, the blizzard let up. When the door was opened, the snow piled outside collapsed and came into the house.

The snowy Ishikari plain now stretched endlessly white in every direction. The farmers' houses were buried here and there, only their roofs visible. The neighboring house, which they'd thought was quite far away, now appeared clearly close enough to call out to. The sky was still covered by low, dark clouds lingering after the blizzard, merging with the pure white ground at the horizon. That direction seemed engulfed in a fresh blizzard now, turned pitch black. The wind blew at times with a shrill whistle. Each time, snow billowed up like smoke, whirling into vortices as it swept in from afar. The whirlwinds spun violently in place one moment, raced across the plain with astonishing speed the next, then abruptly changed course. A massive snowdrift had formed at the corner of the house.

When the cold grew severe, even in the dead of night inside the house, there came crack after crack—sounds like something splitting apart. The elderly farmers, their bodies stiffened from the cold, became unable to move as their backs ailed and shoulders ached. Confined indoors and having run out of food, farmers going to buy provisions in the town with a train station—the jingling of horse bells could be heard. The jingling bells echoed through the still, freezing air, lingering until they had traveled a considerable distance. And then that horse-drawn sled could be seen winding its way through the snow-covered, boundless plain, dashing off in a rush.

After ten days had passed since the snow began to fall, the farmers began thinking on their own about how they would get through this winter. When the farmers saw the snow, it was as if they had suddenly been struck by an idea. Even when their food ran out, they couldn’t bring themselves to touch what they had to pay the landlords and had run out of money to go into town for supplies. When farmers met each other, they would mutter intermittently about their lives and say they had to do something about it. Everyone was suffering. And so before anyone knew it, that matter kept spreading further and further.

When Masaru’s father, who had returned from handling business in the village across the river, met Genkichi, he said that over there too, various such discussions were coming up. Because the Ishikari River had frozen solid, they could now freely cross over to the opposite side.

Because they could no longer pay the tuition fees, the number of students attending elementary school suddenly decreased. They said they couldn’t spend money just to let their children play all day. The children, wherever they were, all had listless, dazed faces and sat plastered by the hearth. The baby’s belly alone was swollen like a sack stuffed full of sand, and it kept whimpering weakly. Even the baby, who knew nothing of this, was always furrowing its brow. Only its head had grown unnaturally large, its neck lacked strength, and depending on how its body was positioned, its head would loll limply in that direction and couldn’t right itself. Before winter came, they made miso soup as thin as hot water using only the greens they had hung under the eaves, and ate it day after day—three days, four days, five days—morning, noon, and evening. And then there were pumpkins and potatoes. They could only eat rice about once a day. The vegetable leaf miso soup had finally lost all flavor, and their throats gagged.

Gradually, the farmers grew serious.

As they continued talking in this way, their plans began to take shape. Genkichi heard from someone that the school principal was working behind the scenes. However, once it became known that a certain farmer in the same village was being forced to vacate his land for the landlords, such matters suddenly became more active.

A young man came from the other side of the river. He said it would be better if they worked together when dealing with the landlords. They set a date to gather once at the elementary school and discuss what to do there.

A blizzard raged that day. The wind whirled recklessly in wild gusts. The falling snow ran parallel to the ground one moment, blew upward from below the next, then slanted diagonally—and when it did, everything before their eyes turned pure white and vanished from sight. When they strayed from the path, they sank into snow up to their knees. The snow infiltrated every crevice of their coats until the backs of their hands and toes throbbed with piercing pain. For the farthest houses, the elementary school lay nearly a full ri away.

Every farmer who entered looked as though they had emerged from a sack of flour, their entire bodies covered in white. Pressing their numb hands to their mouths, they blew haa-haa breaths into them. Their beards, eyebrows, even each individual eyelash had frozen white and stood stiffly rigid. Those without coats had come wearing thread-sewn makeshift hoods pulled over their heads. There were men in faded persimmon-colored military coats from decades past, others in tattered double-layered wraps, still others in coats with straight cylindrical sleeves—a motley assortment. When they entered the classroom, the lit stove made it warm despite everything. From their eyebrows and beards, thawing ice formed droplets that streamed down their cheeks.

The farmers' faces were all strangely swollen as if recovering from colds, with sooty, lifeless expressions. There were those with rounded backs; men whose sturdy frames showed uneven proportions; shaggy-haired figures; others completely bald-headed, their scalps sun-baked year-round to resemble red gourds—all varieties. Such men formed clusters of two or three, each group discussing their own affairs. An elderly farmer sat alone catching kiseru pipe ashes in his calloused palm, brooding over something. Others stood before five or six companions, waving their hands while speaking in loud voices.

After a while, what appeared to be a farmers' gathering filled the air with an odd, stifling stench of crowded bodies. In a corner, five or six people began clapping. Those who had gathered joined in clapping. Yet there were also those who watched blankly, silently applauding.

When the applause ended, Ishiyama—a farmer of twenty-five or six with a sturdy build, thick eyebrows, and a bristly short beard on his cheeks—ascended the podium. He was related to the school principal. “I’ll explain things on everyone’s behalf,” he began. With this preface, Ishiyama spoke in an unusually clear manner for a farmer—though he did employ the awkward Chinese-derived terms common when peasants try sounding formal. He laid out their wretched lives compared to dogs and pigs: Had they ever slacked in their work? Then why? No matter how desperately they labored, their poverty only deepened because of the landlords. Paying tenant fees now meant death itself. They suffered under loan sharks’ exorbitant interest and the Colonial Bank’s installments while taxes kept mounting. “What we produce can’t even cover fertilizer and tools,” he continued. “Can we stay silent when reduced to this?” “We ask everyone to gather and decide our course,” he concluded before stepping down. Whenever unfamiliar terms surfaced, farmers turned toward Ishiyama with furrowed brows. Yet as he laid bare their hardships, they felt their own misery dragged before them like some newfound revelation. The moment Ishiyama left the podium, clamor erupted. Conversations about his speech broke out everywhere. While descending, he heard an elderly farmer at the front mutter: “Outrageous—spoutin’ such dangerous nonsense.”

When Ishiyama stepped down, another man immediately ascended the platform. He was a lanky man of about twenty-one or twenty-two, with only the front of his hair grown out slightly. But with a voice brimming with unexpected force, he spoke emphatically and concisely. “On the whole, acknowledging Ishiyama’s points—how about we immediately request a reduction in tenant fees, gather all signatures, and submit a ‘petition’ to the landlords?” he said. He was Saitō, a young man returned from military service.

Next was a farmer around forty years old. Upon ascending the platform, he suddenly began waving his hands around wildly, fixing his drunken eyes on everyone as he sputtered fragments like, “We…” and “Therefore…” and “And we must…” “It must be done.” He kept saying things like that. He was dead drunk. Everyone laughed. Someone shouted things like, “Get him down!” and “Get down!” That farmer struck a pose on the platform, then staggered down unsteadily. He was a man who had once been a traveling actor, and everyone knew that when he got drunk, he would imitate old kabuki roles.

An elderly farmer stepped up. “I’ve heard all sorts of arguments here, but they’re all just talk of ‘disloyalty and treachery’,” he said. His words seeped through his teeth with a hissing sound between each syllable. “Landlord-sama and us—we’re like parent and child. You youngsters mustn’t forget that. If you dare...” “You mustn’t do anything to oppose Landlord-sama. What’ll you do if they take your fields away?” he concluded. “Old man, we get it already!” someone shouted from the back. When the elderly farmer finished and stepped down from the podium, they broke into uproar again.

Just when everyone’s resolve had solidified considerably and they were steadily pushing forward, the elderly farmer’s words made them jerk back like a cow emerging from darkness. In such circumstances, the farmers were cattle.

“What kinda damn bastard! Yeah, damn bastard!” The same drunken farmer from earlier staggered unsteadily and climbed up onto the platform again. “What’re you sayin’? Old fart. Then how the hell are you gonna fix our poverty?”

“Uh-huh,” came some voices. “Get down!” “That’s right!…”

At that point, Ishiyama left.

“What we gotta do’s already decided! If we don’t do it, come tomorrow we’ll have no rice left—then we’ll just have to die. So if any of you really think dyin’s better than this—go on, raise your hands!” he said.

The clamor subsided. Ishiyama remained standing for a while. "No one," he observed. "Then we'll go on living." "And we'll carry out our own methods!" There was no other path left but that. This decisive tone thrust their resolve forward once more. Ishiyama resolved to present "Saitō’s proposal" and steer the debate toward it. "Those with opinions on this matter," he declared, "raise your hands and speak."

Another uproar broke out. Those who spoke ill of the landlords and those defending them in some quarters argued back and forth. Among them were men so agitated they stammered through halting speech as they spoke. But while voicing all manner of opinions, when it came to deciding what to do, the farmers seemed utterly clueless. Ishiyama kept standing on the platform, silently listening to their chatter. He noticed the school principal leaning against the wooden plank wall at the very back. A little distance away by the window, he realized Genkichi stood planted firmly with arms crossed. The farmer named Kataoka near the crowd's center - waving his arms while talking incessantly - was the man who'd once jumped into the Ishikari River to save the landlord's daughter when she fell in during a visit, nearly drowning himself in the process. But most farmers stood gaping vacantly, taking turns listening raptly to whoever spoke.

“Does anyone have any ideas?” Ishiyama shouted loudly. This brought a momentary hush.

Then one person spoke up— "We shouldn't pay landlords nothin' at all—that'd be better."

However, that opinion was immediately met with opposition from everyone. Such a thing was utterly impossible and should not be done—so all the farmers thought. “Then, is everyone’s opinion a reduction in the tenant fee rate?” “Is that the petition?” Ishiyama asked. Then they broke into an uproar again. That continued for a while. “Those who oppose this opinion, please raise your hands.” No one raised their hands.

“Is there no one?”

Silence. No one did. "So, we'll be following Saitō's proposal then... right?"

Everyone looked around at each other. Then seven or eight hands rose uncertainly. "That's exactly the kinda crap that keeps farmers poor!"

Afterward, someone shouted in a wild, brazen voice. It was such a moment that everyone turned to look in that direction—it was Genkichi. “Well then, Genkichi-kun, what do you propose we do?” Ishiyama asked. “You know damn well what we should do.” “Take back the fields from the landlords!” A silence fell, pressed down. The next moment, however, Genkichi’s opinion was crushed without a moment’s resistance beneath the farmers’ torrent of curses.

After that, Genkichi did not say another word. He kept his arms crossed the entire time.

First, the fundamental matter was decided. Then came the question of how exactly to carry this out. This was because the landlord's agent was scheduled to make his annual rounds in two or three days, so they decided to explain their circumstances to him and immediately begin negotiations with the landlord. At this point, someone brought up the question of what to do with the tenants' rice during these various negotiations. Since this was also a considerable matter, their opinions were slow to align. Moreover, the farmers could not carry it out with a sure—flawless—plan even after having mapped out its prospects to the very end. They had recently consulted the school principal for his opinion. The school principal said that first, they should sell all their own crops to the merchants in town and, by burning their ships in that way, confront the landlords. To this he added two conditions. The first was if the initial negotiations with the landlords ended in failure; the second was if it became clear that, as a result, the landlords would forcibly seize the crops—those were the conditions. If they kept them individually by household, they would be quickly suppressed, and there was also the risk that their unity would collapse as a result. The principal said this method was crucial to prevent such risks. For the farmers, this was quite a drastic measure, but they were so pressed that it came to seem like the natural course of action.

As for putting these decided matters into practice—the personnel needed, detailed regulations, concrete methods—such things were to be decided by three or four key individuals (among whom was included the School Principal) and promptly notified to everyone. Thus, that day’s gathering came to an end.

The farmers gathered in twos and threes and made their way home, talking about the day’s events as they went. Outside, the wind still had not died down. The farmers rounded their thick shoulders forward, tucked their necks into their coat collars, and headed outside.

As Genkichi was about to leave and slipped his arms into his coat, the principal’s child came out and tugged at his coat, insisting he stay to play, then led him toward the living room. Having no choice, Genkichi spent some time entertaining the child. Genkichi was always carefree when playing with children, which made him well-liked. But now he found himself utterly unable to summon that indescribable rough-hewn innocence that endeared him to children. Genkichi grew restless and couldn’t keep still. When he’d had enough, he came out. As he tried to go outside and opened the classroom door, the remaining four or five people were deep in discussion.

“Genkichi-kun，why not stay and join us for a discussion?” said one of the young men. Genkichi gave an indecisive reply under his breath and went outside. Far from it—that was what Genkichi thought.

Genkichi thought his ideas would inevitably draw criticism from everyone. The farmers were like oxen bracing backward. Even when they understood things logically, they still couldn't bring themselves to act readily. But Genkichi thought—what use were such miserly, half-measure methods? Why couldn't they push just one step further? he wondered.

Genkichi had held a certain thought since childhood, though he couldn't quite put it into words. Genkichi's father had brought his family to Hokkaido—a place that in those days was scarcely different from marching to their deaths—and while being battered by blizzards across a snowy wilderness where they couldn't tell which way to go, they had found their hut and entered it with the resolve to die. At that time, bears roamed nonchalantly through the neighborhood. Horses would often vanish, and fields would get trampled. There had been an instance when Genkichi's father, on his way to wash horses at a bend in the Ishikari River, saw a bear catching salmon there, turned ashen, and came bolting home. When night fell and food-deprived bears emerged, every farmhouse built roaring fires indoors. Bears feared fire above all else. From childhood Genkichi remembered trembling at night, convinced bears were peering through the window—and for nearly twenty years since then, Genkichi's father and the others had worked themselves raw.

Genkichi had heard this from his mother—in those days, his father would sometimes open the storm shutters and go outside in the dead of night. At first, Mother thought he must have gone to take care of some errand, but he did not return for quite some time. There were times when he wouldn’t return for as long as an hour or two. Mother gradually found it strange and asked Father about it. Father laughed and said, “I go to check the fields.” He didn’t say anything more. One night, Mother found it so strange that she followed after him. Then she saw Father trudging into the pitch-dark field. At that moment, Mother too felt a shiver run through her body. Mother squatted slightly and peered in that direction, while Father stood stock-still in the middle of the field. Ten minutes, twenty minutes. Then, when he went to his own neighboring field, he again remained standing there for a while. Then, this time, he walked to his own field a short distance away from there. Mother did not understand that at all.

Later, when Mother finally spoke of that night, "You fool," she said with a laugh. “My fields—they’re so precious to me. So precious. I worry they might catch a cold or somethin’.” “So precious.” “The fields... I fret they might take ill.” Then he said earnestly, “You too—when you wake up fussin’ over whether Gen or Ofumi’ve caught chill, I’ll be coverin’ ’em with their nightclothes proper.”

But before they knew it, the land that had been the very foundation of their lives had passed into the hands of those called landlords. Father, especially in the time before his death, had spoken of nothing but that and been tormented. Every time Genkichi heard this, even as a child, he felt he understood his father’s feelings. Genkichi’s clinging to the landlord’s leg had not been for such a meaningless reason. "The fields must belong to the farmers." Even if not as literally clear, this was something Genkichi had been thinking about since he was eleven or twelve, alongside his father’s long experience.

However, Genkichi—just like the other farmers—had only vaguely thought about such things (though it could hardly be called thinking), but this vague thinking... But now, through Genkichi’s own experiences, it had gradually begun to take shape. And it seemed that what had pushed that matter to take a more decisive leap forward was what the school principal had said. Such a simple, obvious thing—yet the farmers took a lifetime to understand it, and there were even those who never understood at all. In fact, there were far more cases where they ended up never understanding at all.

“You get it—we’re taking back the fields from the landlords!” That Genkichi said this wasn’t logic. Genkichi was feeling his father’s emotions urging him on from behind! As he walked, Genkichi grew truly furious at these farmers who couldn’t grasp such things and wouldn’t even try to go that far. Do whatever the hell you want—I’ll do things my way, he thought.

Seven

Genkichi returned home drunk in the middle of the meeting. A letter had come from Masaru, who was in Sapporo. ——Snow had fallen in Sapporo too. It was still cold. For us, winter is the hardest to endure. At six in the morning, we go to the factory. When it comes to six in the morning on a winter day, even us young folks feel such cold that every joint in our bodies starts to ache. They don oil-chilled hats, hunch their backs, and head out with lunchboxes dangling. In front of and behind me too, those folks hurry along in a listless manner. In the factory, they can’t afford to dawdle around. From six in the morning until five in the evening, they must keep their nerves as taut as a bowstring. Since I came here, two young men from our group have already been swallowed up by the machinery. The person who came out from the rollers emerged looking like a large, wrung-out rag of flesh.

I heard rumors that one of their wives had turned to prostitution to raise her children. The factory roared with the sound of massive machinery turning. For about the first week, even when I returned home, my head and ears kept roaring just like at the factory—I couldn't read even a single newspaper. I thought I'd turn into an idiot this way. At five in the evening—now pitch-dark—the whistle would blow. Then they'd be allowed to leave the man-eating machinery, their bodies and minds suddenly going limp. They grew so exhausted they dreaded returning. So exhausted they wanted to collapse right there on the spot. I thought—even if farmers live lower, more absurd, wretched lives than these factory workers, no matter how overworked you say they are laboring in those wild fields—at least the air's good there. Pure air, clean like crystal water. Not a speck of dust tainted that air. They could sing while working. At noon, they could lie on their backs in field centers, staring vacantly at the sky or even nap. But here—what a difference! I want to show you this factory's insides, but I can't figure how to explain it right. You might as well say we're working inside some back-alley dustbin—huge and squalid. The factory interior stank darkly, trash flying about, stuffy and roaring... beyond words. Those finishing work emerged with faces blackened by grime, eyes gleaming like drunkards' as they swayed unsteadily.

The people working here—though poor like farmers—lacked their sturdy build; they were pale, sickly-looking, and always coughing. Thinking about that left me feeling gloomy. Lately, that same old grumble—how it was better when we were on the Ishikari River's great plains—had started surfacing again. Though truth be told, life there hadn't been good either. Unlike you, I'd never been able to settle down since my village days. I kept thinking there must be some better, truer life than this one. Not understanding what it might be, I fixated on that idea endlessly. But now I'd come to realize—no matter where we tried to go, our destinations were predetermined. Forced to understand. You'll surely laugh at me for talking like this now. I'm someone who deserves that laughter. Yet since coming here, I've finally begun grasping what we all truly are—what we do, what roles society gives us, what treatment we receive. Farmers need to understand this too. There are people here quietly studying these matters. Since I started showing up occasionally, things have begun making vague sense. And I'm stunned—realizing for the first time how this world's built on vast, intricate machinery. Every piece clicks into place in "our" heads so perfectly it's like they've taken root.

However, I intend to write about that in detail eventually. How are you getting by over there? If possible, I would be grateful if you wrote me a letter. Your sister is also complaining about having come to Sapporo; I don’t want to make her just a waitress and am thinking of having her go into service somewhere.

This was the gist of the letter.

“Brother, Yoshie-san has come back, they say.”

When Genkichi was drinking water in the kitchen, Yoshi, who had come from outside, saw him and spoke. Genkichi had brought the second ladleful to his lips when he froze mid-motion and turned around with a “Huh?!” His eyes flared wide. “Why don’t you ask Mother?” “Huh?” Genkichi, holding a ladle filled with water, searched for his mother with wandering eyes. “Where’d she go?” Yoshi went out through the back door. When he opened the door, snow suddenly blew in. Genkichi still stood holding the ladle at mouth height, his eyes vacant.

“Where’d she go? She ain’t here.” Yoshi returned. As if suddenly remembering, Genkichi gulped down the water with a throaty sound and went outside. However, he returned in less than two minutes. He set his glazed eyes. He stood on the dirt floor. Then he glanced briefly toward the front. And he was lost in thought about something. But—tsk! He clicked his tongue and went up into the house. Genkichi immediately took out a grimy tanzen padded robe from the closet, pulled it over his head, and went to sleep. Yoshi, in a corner, watched his brother like that—half in fear, yet staring fixedly.

When night fell, Mother said of Yoshie, "That's shocking." Genkichi had reverted to his usual sullenness and sat silently listening while eating his meal.

While Yoshie was in Sapporo, she became involved with a wealthy student from Hokkaido Imperial University. And when it became known that Yoshie was pregnant, that student neatly cast her aside. The student's family back on the mainland were landlords owning vast tracts of land. Yoshie went clinging to the student again and again. "How should I know whose child that is?" In the end, those were the words said to her. Eventually, owing to her physical condition, things at the café became unmanageable too, and she returned home with a belly swollen to ten months.

In truth, she had returned ten days earlier, having done so "secretly." Yoshie’s father said he wouldn’t let her into the house. To poor farmers, she was nothing but a burden who lay around eating their rice, and in a little more time, there would be yet another mouth to feed. She had turned into an outrageous burden. And he declared that they couldn’t keep such a shameless "harlot" in their house either. Yoshie was kicked down into the dirt floor. “Even a corner of the storage shed would be fine.” Yoshie collapsed into a heap on the dirt floor and pleaded through her tears—

When Yoshie’s father met Mother Seki, he said, “That girl—can’t do farm work no more, came back with this weak, flabby body… Hands gone all pale and shriveled up… Just brought us another useless mouth to feed.—Ain’t this mess what ya call a parent’s punishment?” When Mother said, “Now, now…,” “Ain’t there anythin’ good that could come of it?” he asked. When Mother asked him back,

“Get rid of that belly-child.” “You!” Mother was shocked.

Then Yoshie’s father restlessly brushed it off, pressed his hands to his head and shook it as he left. “I can’t make heads or tails of nothin’ no more,” he muttered… Mother said to Genkichi, “Don’t go pushin’ yourself.” “Keep this up and you’ll be in trouble.” Genkichi sat without answering or nodding. Mother lowered her voice: “Truth is—for all Yoshie’s ‘I wanna go to Sapporo, I wanna go’—she never made it there at all.”

Genkichi looked at Mother’s face. “Huh?” “Well y’see, if Yoshie stayed ’round here, there’d be more mouths t’feed ’n no fields left t’work. An’ lookit how things turned out—musta been hard on ’er at home—” “That true?” “Yoshie—neighbor’s... what’s ’is name... Ishi? Yeah Ishi they call ’im—that’s how ’twas.” When Genkichi heard that, he let out the breath he’d been holding in one long slow sigh before turnin’ away silent.

“How pitiful! They ain’t got no money to show her belly to a midwife, and on top of that, they’re too ashamed to let anyone see it.—Yoshie’s younger brother’s been sending letters to Sapporo every day, they say.” “So whenever that mail carrier comes around, she’s always standing at the entrance waiting, but not once has a reply come.” Mother’s words, spoken haltingly, one after another, were literally digging into Genkichi’s chest, deeper and deeper. At first, when Genkichi heard that Yoshie had returned, he jolted! He tensed. He clenched his fists tightly and thought, “Damn it!” He even thought to rush out on impulse.

But as Genkichi listened to his mother talk about it, he found himself unable to tell whether he hated Yoshie or pitied her. Genkichi thought he could see Yoshie—her cheeks hollowed and gaunt—standing at the entrance waiting for the mail delivery. Feeble, brooding eyes—they simply wouldn’t leave him. With her large belly—but when it came to that, Genkichi shook his head violently and tightly shut his eyes. His chest felt strangely tight—it began to pound, and he found it unbearably painful.

The next day, Genkichi heard a rumor that Yoshie was finally taking the medicine she had stubbornly refused to take, no matter what. They said this meant she had finally started taking the medicine after considering her future prospects—despite having sent letter after letter without receiving a single reply. Genkichi felt a sense of panic, as though it were his own affair. But he remained silent and endured it.

“That’s a lie,” he said.

“It’s true! It’s true!” Mother spoke as if she’d witnessed it herself. “Poor thing—she takes it with her eyes brimming with tears.” “And once she’s taken it all, poor dear, she buries her face in the futon and cries with muffled sobs.” “Bullshit!” Genkichi barked the words roughly, then stood up violently from beside his mother.

During dinner that evening,

“Did she… get rid of the baby?” he asked abruptly. Mother silently looked at Genkichi’s face, then said, “Huh?” Genkichi realized he’d blurted it out without any prompting and turned red. Flustered, he said, “Yoshie.” “Yoshie? —Yeah, Yoshie.” When Mother understood, she said, “That—hasn’t been taken care of yet. If her body doesn’t turn bad, that’d be best,” she said.

* The farmers had gathered and decided on that course of action, but when it came time to actually confront the landlords and their agents, something about their collective momentum felt off. Unconsciously, they had come to a point where they either resolved to endure somehow or seemed on the verge of reverting to such measures. Even if it had come to that, however, the farmers had grown so accustomed to their long-standing poverty—to the bottom of a swamp-like mire—that they might have continued enduring their lives without finding it the least bit strange. Genkichi sat cross-legged by the hearth, even more silent than before, and sneered inwardly: See that?

"The things you all do are just pathetic like that," Genkichi thought. Two or three days later, the agent finally came to Kawabuchi’s Sawa, who was facing eviction for being unable to pay his tenant fees. They said that since they would dispose of Sawa’s fields, he should vacate the house once the snow melted. When the women and children wailed at him, Sawa became completely flustered and went to tell his comrades from the previous meeting about it. The cadre farmers suddenly began making a commotion over it. And then, immediately gathering at the school, they began rehashing the same discussion as before, as if it were something new.

“Do we really have to do this?” the elderly one said. But even when hearing such things now, the other cadre farmers did not think to tell him to stop joking. Instead, they tilted their heads together and pondered. And, “Well, guess we gotta do it,” they concluded. Then, after repeating the same points endlessly, they decided: “We’ll stand our ground and fight!” And so everyone finally parted ways.

The agent had come to the village regarding this year's tenant fees and was staying at Maruyama's house—a man of some standing in the village who had saved a bit of money—so Ishiyama, the youngest and most spirited of the cadre farmers, set out carrying a petition drafted under the principal's guidance. It was a document crammed with so many kanji that even Ishiyama himself couldn't fully grasp its wording or meaning. The agent listened while eating his meal as Ishiyama, stammering and flushed crimson, repeated the same points over and over. Then he took out his glasses from his sleeve and began meticulously wiping each lens with his sleeve. "What're you here for?" he barked. "You wanna get thrown to the cops?!"

Then, after taking five or even ten minutes to read through the petition, he barked, “Idiot! You’re two days too late!” and hurled it back into Ishiyama’s lap. “Since when did you farmers get so damn uppity?” Maruyama—who had been sticking his hand in his mouth to remove something caught between his teeth—interjected from beside him.

When spoken to like that, Ishiyama suddenly, strangely, found his usual bold vigor returning.

“Just you remember that!” He wheeled around and barked.

"Farmers shouldn't do such things," Maruyama said calmly. "Landlords are our parents—we're like their children. To endure hardships and work diligently is noble. "When you return, tell everyone that. I'll personally plead properly with Mr. Agent on your behalf," he said. "Go eat shit!" Ishiyama stormed out just like that.

After walking a short distance, he realized he had forgotten his hat. Ishiyama stopped abruptly just then with an irritated huff but kept running toward where the cadre members awaited news without turning back. And so—the farmers finally began seething with rage, or so it seemed. Naturally, that fervor spread gradually from one person to another through the cadres' ranks. Even without explicit discussion, farmers started deliberately visiting Ishiyama's house to learn developments. Though sparing with words, even the most taciturn farmers spoke up tersely in irritated tones as they came and went.

Genkichi and the others should have headed into the mountains now that the snow had compacted, but they couldn't go until this matter was settled. Moreover, by now everyone had grown so agitated that they felt things had reached a point far beyond that state. While gathering at Ishiyama's house and listening to various discussions, especially the young farmers began exclaiming, "Landlords are so unscrupulous!" The logical foundation for such arguments began taking shape. At first, those who had wavered uncertainly while thinking "Is that really true?" started cursing with phrases like "Those bastards!" Whenever large groups assembled, the School Principal would recount tales of righteous peasants like Sakura Sōgorō and Harada Denzaemon, employing elaborate gestures as he spoke. Yet without any rational basis, these stories seeped into the cracks of the farmers' stubborn, rock-like hearts. Then in jestful tones he added, "Wouldn't be so bad if some Hokkaido version of Sōgorō showed up from somewhere." At this, the guileless farmers grew solemn and sank into deep contemplation.

They realized that negotiating with the agent would ultimately be futile—and then, confronted by his arrogant attitude there—Snap! With that sudden burst of energy, they immediately finalized arrangements to confront the landlords. The School Principal’s “Hokkaido’s Sōgorō” had struck at precisely the right moment—so much so that three individuals from among the farmers had stepped forward to take on that weighty role.

So, with two cadre members added to them, it was decided that the five would go to the landlord’s house in “the town with the train station.” Then, the remaining cadre members, along with two or three farmers, decided to go around every farmer’s house in the village to explain how things had progressed thus far. Finally joining hands together, they would declare as they went: they would all press forward resolutely—so that not a single person would betray them to the landlords. When they got caught by old women, they were lectured at length about life’s hardships and their own past struggles. And they were entreated, “Please don’t do anything rash to the Lord Landlords.” “Tell our son not to go to any more o’ them damn meetings and come home right away!” There were even places where they got yelled at from the get-go. “It’ll come to nothin’.” In such places, no matter what they said, it was futile. Then came fears about what everyone was doing—mutterings like “Ain’t nothin’ good gonna come o’ this,” or warnings of “If we fail, we’ll end up with nothin’ to eat.”

However, when one of their lot went to the house of a girl he had his eye on and was suddenly yelled at in her presence—"Good-for-nothings!"—it left him utterly dejected. Conversely, there were also those who, under the pretext of business, would sit down at the entrance of such girls’ houses and delight in lengthy conversations about other matters.—But in any case, they all returned to Ishiyama’s house utterly spent. The group that went to the landlords’ house were driven out from inside like stray dogs— they were driven out without even being allowed to sit at the entrance—just like that—and returned.

“You bastards! I’ll skewer you all like dumplings on a stick and hand you over to the police—you’ll starve soon enough! Not a crumb left for you!” “I’ll bring officials and seize every last scrap of your belongings—down to the final rag!” He cursed them as if clubbing their retreating backs with a log.

All five of them had their eyes filled with tears and were worked up. The cadre farmers and the School Principal immediately discussed how they must inform all the village farmers of this outcome as soon as possible, drive everyone into a state of extreme agitation, and use that surging momentum to carry out what needed to be done. “Strike while the iron is hot!” And on the other hand, it was of course an urgent necessity for the School Principal to go to town and complete the sales negotiations in advance. “Solidarity! Solidarity! Solidarity with every last one of us!” “Solidarity!” “Solidarity with every last one of us!”

Two or three farmers used the familiar word “solidarity”—the same term employed by the School Principal—and shouted.

Eight

That morning, while it was still dim, the village farmers (including those from across the river) loaded horse-drawn sleds with assorted grains. Genkichi brought his hands—numb from the cold—to his mouth and blew on them as he led the leather-geared horse from the stable. The horse emerged clattering its gear while lightly swishing its tail against its body. Yet when attempting to exit outside—perhaps due to the cold—it balked repeatedly. “Clop… clop… clop…” Genkichi yanked the bit. The horse stretched only its elongated face forward while pulling its body backward, clattering the floorboards with its hooves. “Clop… clop… clop…” Then curling its tongue, it snorted sharply through flared nostrils.

Genkichi hitched the horse to the sled, and once everything was ready, he went inside the house to wait until everyone arrived. The mother was cleaning up after breakfast in the kitchen, wiping red-rimmed eyes with the back of her hand as she worked. Yoshi stood on both feet by the hearthside, gazing outside through the open doorway. When Genkichi entered, the mother, “If it’s something like that… I think you should just quit,” she said in a half-choked voice. That was something the mother had been saying daily, triggered by any little thing, ever since this decision had been made. No matter how much she said it, the mother would say it again as though it were something new. “Defying the Lord Landlords—doing something so reckless—won’t lead to anything good.”

The elderly farmers had always believed that no matter what happened—truly, no matter what—there was simply "no way around it." That way, for years—no, for decades—they had been thinking. Therefore, such an audacious act had never even crossed their minds. However, in response to Mother’s words, Genkichi neither said anything that could be considered a rebuttal nor did anything. He was brooding. Ever since this incident, Genkichi’s usual brooding had grown far more intense. Mother understood that. Genkichi would start brooding intensely, and after that, there was never anything good. Before undertaking any major action, Genkichi would remain silent as a hunk of iron. Mother had been thinking only of how things might be if none of this had happened. So, the usual complaint spilled from Mother’s lips.

“Back in the day, there weren’t any of these troubles… But now you mean to start something this terrifying?” Genkichi sat down at the entrance step and scratched his head fiercely. “Ain’t like anything’s gonna improve.” Yoshi kept his feet near the fire as he watched Mother and Brother. He couldn’t grasp what they were talking about. “Nothing good ever comes of it.” Mother sniffled back her snot. “Then we’ll truly see times when we can’t even eat.”

“You shouldn’t go sticking your neck out too much. Hmm, Gen.” “Hmm, Gen.” Mother continued to speak in fits and starts, her words redundant and nagging.

Genkichi was looking at his aged mother’s back. Beneath her disheveled hair—streaked with white and matted with filth—the sagging skin of her lifeless neck showed through. Her shoulders had completely hunched forward, her spine bent. She had tied a cord around her waist instead of an obi. Her entire body appeared no larger than a clenched fist. Genkichi realized it now as if for the first time: “She’s gotten old!” That’s what he thought.

Genkichi felt no real enthusiasm on his own part regarding this matter from the start. On the contrary, he had even thought something like Just wait and see how this indecisive affair turns out. Every now and then, the sound of horse-drawn sled bells could be heard in the distance.

“Look, Brother.” Yoshi said, straining his ears toward the front.

Genkichi stood up with a heave-ho motion and went outside. Mother sighed and muttered something under her breath. Then, straightening her back, she looked outside. “Be careful out there.” She called after Genkichi. Genkichi briefly turned back to look at his mother, but closed the door and left. The sharp clack of someone taking a horse’s reins carried through the air. He was talking with companions who had arrived afterward. The horse that came galloping reared up, thrusting its head high as it neighed. Bells rang out one after another until twelve or thirteen sleds had stopped. Yoshi peered through the window, dutifully reporting to Mother how many had come and who they were. The commotion outside swelled steadily louder. Horses neighing, bells jangling, farmers calling to comrades ahead and behind—all merged into a rumbling roar. Yoshi pressed his face gleefully against the windowpane, watching intently. Mother muttered curses to herself—“Damned fool”—“Worthless wretch.” She didn’t step outside to look.

Soon, the sleds all began to move at once. The bells resounded brightly through the frigid air—so cold it seemed the very atmosphere might freeze solid—yet their chimes carried a biting chill that made you shudder. To these sounds were added farmers shouting at their horses, the sharp cracks of leather whips, and equine neighs—all merging into an ominous, visceral clamor that made it seem some momentous event was about to unfold. Sled after sled passed by. Someone called out to Genkichi’s house as they went past. Mother finally opened the door and stepped outside. Just then, as things seemed nearly finished, Suzuki no Ishi spotted her and called, “Hey there, Granny! We’re off!”

When she looked, there appeared a line of sleds charging vigorously along the winding path through the endlessly spreading snowy expanse—nothing but snow—where numerous horse-drawn sleds traveled. From afar came the clear, rhythmic jingling of the sled bells. Occasionally, snowdrifts shot up in sharp bursts. Just when the lead sleds had disappeared from view of those behind, upon reaching a bend in the road that curved back the other way, they would appear as small as toys. The line each time looked like a black thread stretching, shrinking, and twisting. Against the snowy plain, it stood out starkly. And the jingling of bells was heard now distant, now suddenly near. Mother stood motionless, as if possessed by some spirit, watching it. Suddenly coming to herself, she muttered, "Namu Amida... Namu Amida..."

In the town with the station, the leading farmers were supposed to be waiting. They reached a point where the narrowing snow-covered path ahead revealed a line of snowbreak forests, beyond which telegraph poles and utility poles stood like several upright pencils, while stove smoke—no thicker than cigarette wisps—drifted feebly upward into the sky. They were almost there. “How’s this for spirit!”

Bokō, who was in front of Genkichi, turned around and said. “You think this’ll work?” Genkichi replied ambiguously. Every horse was emitting frothy sweat like soap bubbles from their mouths and where the harnesses touched their bodies. Their tongues lolled out, nostrils flared wide, and emaciated legs moved like sticks. Genkichi’s underfed horse had become utterly exhausted; when its legs suddenly sank deep into the snow-covered path, it would begin to collapse listlessly right there. He was thinking that before long, he would have to dispose of the horse—whether by selling it off or some other means.

As twelve or thirteen horse-drawn sleds raced desperately across the snowy expanse, their bells ringing in unison and their drivers occasionally calling out to those ahead or behind, an extraordinary thing happened—this ominous procession began dragging the furtive farmers' spirits into a belligerent state of mind, a collective resolve that seemed to shout, *Bring on anyone or anything!* Even Bokō—who had long passed forty and was usually quiet— "Damn landlords—if they screw this up, we'll beat 'em to pulp!" He bellowed this at Genkichi. And this momentum, unspoken yet palpable, bound everyone's feelings into a single thick cable stretching taut across their resolve. Had any obstacle stood before them then—no matter what—they might have charged through like cavalry plunging into enemy ranks, trampling everything beneath their horses' hooves in one furious assault. This was no exaggeration.

When they emerged from the snowbreak forest, there was a railway crossing. The man at the very front, pulling with all his might on the reins of a rearing horse while leaning his body backward, asked the crossing guard about the train.

“That’s a hell of a lot. What’s going on here?” “The train hasn’t come yet.” “Yeah, go on through.”

The crossing guard who recognized them came out holding a white flag wrapped around a pole. “All right, let’s do this!” With that, the horse-drawn sleds that had temporarily halted began moving forward once more in order. Once past the railway crossing, they only needed to follow the road running alongside the tracks for seven or eight *chō* to reach the town. “Now, let’s press forward with everything we’ve got!” These words passed from front to back through the ranks of farmers.

At the town entrance, they caught sight of seven or eight people standing there. They couldn't clearly make out who the people were. However, the one at the front shouted loudly and waved his hat as a signal. The seven or eight people at the entrance remained motionless, seemingly watching this side. Couldn't they understand? It seemed there was no sign of response to the signals from this side. In an instant, those people all seemed to come running toward them.

Two or three farmers at the front shouted “Ah!!” in unison. They abruptly reined in their horses. A horse from behind lurched forward and struck its forelegs against the sled ahead. From the rear came shouts of “What’s wrong? What’s wrong?” “There they are!” The farmers pitched forward on their sleds, leapt into snowbanks, and kept shouting while staring ahead.

“Big trouble!” “It’s the police!!” “Huh?!” “Everyone, whoa!” At that moment, they froze like expressionless dolls and stared ahead. —It was the police! It was indeed the police.

But constables?! The farmers were unaccustomed to constables. Utterly disoriented and unable to comprehend what was happening, the thirteen farmers were effortlessly flanked by constables on both sides and taken away by the police without resistance. The police had also brought in the farmer leaders. The landlords burst into loud laughter upon seeing everyone enter, remaining seated in their chairs. Until that night, they were confined in a small room behind the police station, trembling violently all over. With three constables present, they couldn't exchange a single word among themselves. From outside came the sounds of multiple horses whinnying and stamping their hooves. They thrust arms deep into sleeves, tucked chins into chests, stood alternately on one leg like herons—pressing one foot against the other's shin or thigh—trying to prevent their toes from losing sensation in the cold.

One by one, they were called out from there and interrogated. Through the door came clear sounds—the sharp cracks of open-handed blows, and the unnaturally dull thud of what seemed like a large body being thrown somewhere, flesh hitting something directly. Low groans and screams like those of a rat being stepped on could also be heard. Each time, everyone involuntarily held their breath. But all they could do was exchange uneasy glances with one another. When the door was flung open violently, a staggering farmer stumbled in as if hurled.

Some had nosebleeds smeared across their faces, looking like railway track victims risen from the dead. Others entered with faces swollen purple and eyes rolled back unnaturally, or lips twitching in convulsions. They waited for their turns with stiffened bodies, yet harboring a strangely hollow feeling. Genkichi suddenly—suddenly felt his face being struck. His body contracted instantaneously like a rubber ball.

"You bastard, you incited everyone, didn't you?!" Genkichi reflexively covered his cheeks with both hands. Then came the next blow. When a piercing sting shot through his nose—as if he'd sniffed potent chemicals—he... collapsed hard onto his backside. His vision swam. He braced himself against the floor with both hands. Tepid blood from his nose dripped onto the back of his hand pressed against the boards. "You bastards are all tougher than I figured!" "For a bunch of dirt farmers, you're putting on airs—"

The constable standing nearby, while saying this, took the sheathed sword at his waist and struck Genkichi repeatedly. Then two or three constables gathered around and began stomping and kicking him. Genkichi was in a dazed state. Then they eased their grip slightly. "How about it?" Genkichi didn't understand it himself, but for some reason, his eyelids felt heavy and he couldn't open them properly. His entire face felt as if smeared with clay; even when he pressed it with his own hand, he couldn't feel any sensation in his face. It was as though he were grasping something else entirely.

“Confess you’re the one who egged everyone on!” The constable’s voice still seemed to reach him as if through a layer of separation. “Damn you and your hulking frame, bastard.”

At that moment, Genkichi’s body was lightly lifted up. “Huh?!” With a shout—when Genkichi was thrown to the floor, he groaned, “Ugh.” He felt his lungs rapidly constricting, suffocating him. Then came the sensation of his body sinking straight down from the floor, deeper and deeper... until everything went dark.

After being kept at the police station for three days, come evening, it was decided that twelve or thirteen of them could return, and they were brought out front. The leaders were to be sent to Sapporo, so they remained behind. They had been tied up at the corner of the police station; hunching their backs, they mounted the empty horse-drawn sleds and set out. After being beaten, when the cold wind struck, the spots throbbed with pain. A blizzard raged. When they reached the edge of town, the blizzard raged without restraint. They covered themselves with straw mats and rush mats over their coats and hunched their bodies as much as they could. One by one, they plodded homeward through the deepening cold of dusk, their bells jingling listlessly. No one said anything. They did not even look at each other's faces. They did not even try to look.

When they crossed the railroad crossing, the entire area ahead was shrouded in blizzard, as if a great white curtain had been drawn down, leaving nothing visible. From the east, darkness was gradually encroaching. The solitary path across the plain had been utterly obliterated. When passing alongside the snowbreak forest, the swirling powder snow and gale-force winds striking it made a menacing howl reverberate from there. And in that domain where both heaven and earth were pure white, the snowbreak forests appeared like a smudged ink painting - their heads shaking uniformly and their bodies swaying through varying shades of density. By the time they reached a plain completely devoid of obstacles, only Genkichi's horse-drawn sled remained far behind at the rear. Yet even this lagging position seemed beyond Genkichi's awareness.

Genkichi was grinding his teeth. He was furious. He hated them! He was just so humiliated! He was simply filled with hatred—an unbearable, all-consuming hatred. For the first time, Genkichi understood what they—these "farmers"—truly were. ——"Even if I die, you bastards!" he thought—— Genkichi clearly understood their "enemy." The enemy! Even if he tore them apart with his teeth, split their heads open with a hatchet, or clawed their faces to shreds with that sickle right down the middle—it still wouldn't be enough—he saw their "enemy" with crystalline clarity. That was the "constables" and the "scheme" they were hand in glove with! Grr, I hate them! Landlords, you bastards! Genkichi ground his teeth.

“You’ll pay for this!!” The snow blew head-on one moment, shifted left the next, then drove in from behind. The horse—its entire body turned pure white—moved its legs in jerky motions that made its gaunt rump bounce like an elderly farmer’s. The tail hair cracked sharply against its flanks at intervals. Yet with shifting winds, it sometimes streamed sideways instead. The whitened mane swayed rhythmically with each gust. Through the blizzard’s veil, only two or three sleds ahead remained visible. Those further forward flickered into sight through snow gaps only to vanish moments later. The bells’ jingles vanished completely when winds roared head-on yet rang startlingly near when gusts relented. A primal howl rose from nowhere yet everywhere across the plain. Dusk deepened steadily.

"You’ll pay for this!" The cold gnawed through—from atop the straw mat, through the coat beneath, through his clothes, through his shirt—straight into his skin. The fine powdery snow clinging to his coat sparkled faintly, each tiny flake crystallizing individually as it stuck. His fingertips and toes grew numb with aching cold. His nostrils burned sharply—if he moved his mouth, ears, or nose even slightly in their frozen stiffness, they felt ready to crack with a stinging pain too intense to bear. Their horse-drawn sleds emerged where a row of mixed trees continued. It was a forest along the Ishikari River’s banks. Only then did they realize they hadn’t lost their way. Sometimes those caught in blizzards returning from town would wander lost until morning, half-dead and headed completely backward. The land lay uniformly flat, offering no bearings.

The mixed forest let out a piercing scream as though being deliberately provoked, swaying violently. When this subsided, they realized the snow-laden wind had shifted toward the plain's heart with battering-ram force. But right behind came an even stronger gust. Beside the sled moving ahead of Genkichi, the blizzard formed a massive whirlwind like a tornado—maintaining its marble-like cylindrical shape as they watched—then merged with another fierce wind and surged over the sled. Then the straw mat worn by one farmer was suddenly ripped away, soaring high into the sky. The wind blew unrestrained, growing ever stronger.

“You better remember this, bastards!!” Genkichi’s chest was filled to bursting, raging just like the blizzard itself.

Genkichi cast his eyes forward. When he saw the farmers huddled in round bundles on the horse-drawn sled like cloth-wrapped parcels, it struck him that this was the unvarnished representation of their entire existence. The farmers who neither understood nor tried to understand this mantis-like "enemy," living wretchedly like ants or mole crickets, came into sharp focus. They too must have finally realized who the enemy was and what sort of beasts they were. But could these good-hearted farmers who had been so thoroughly crushed rise up once more—yes, this time for sure—with sickles and hoes in hand and stand their ground?! Could they aim for the enemy's skulls and plunge their hoes with a sickening thud?!

——No good, no good, maybe no good—Genkichi thought. But—damn it!—it was so infuriating. “You’ll pay for this!” Genkichi ground his teeth. He was consumed, as though intoxicated by something.

Nine

Genkichi slept for two days after returning to the village.

The village appeared spiritlessly desolate, like trash bins abandoned here and there in the snow. As if black kites had snatched their fried tofu away, everyone stood gaping vacantly. Genkichi lay in bed yet couldn't keep still, his body vibrating with restless agitation. Mother brought rice to Genkichi's bedside, dragged through her usual tearful litany of complaints, then—as if struck by sudden recollection—said: "Yoshie came by, I tell you."

“That bastard—we should just kill him.” he said bluntly, without moving a muscle in his face. “Somehow, she said she had something she wanted to talk to you about.” “She’s completely worn out.” “She’s all swollen and blue.” “She’s all frail and shaky.”

“That pale, boot-licking son of a rich bastard—!” “Coming here to talk, she has to hold onto the doorframe with her hand just to keep herself up—that’s how bad it’s gotten.” Mother then muttered intermittently about Yoshie—Yoshie had still not completely given up on receiving letters from the university student. In her dreams, a letter would be delivered, and she would cry out involuntarily, waking herself up with her own voice. But now, the feeling with which she waited for those letters had gradually become different from before. Before, she had still longed for that man. That had been what mattered most above all. And so she had been waiting for that letter. But when she realized no letters would ever come from the man, she began waiting for his letters for a different reason—for the sake of the child that refused to be miscarried no matter how much medicine she took or spells she tried, the child that insisted on being born.

Yoshie worked desperately hard in that condition. Whenever labor pains struck, she would run to the storage shed and curl up there like a shrimp, moaning. This was because once before, when labor pains had suddenly struck her at home, Yoshie had pressed a hand to her stomach and lain there facedown moaning—and at that time, the sister-in-law had called her "this disgrace." While working, she would sometimes feel dizzy. Suddenly, the interior of the house warped and lurched upward before her eyes. Then a wave of dizziness washed over her. Having prepared the meal herself and laid it out completely finished, Yoshie sat motionless in a corner of the house. And after everyone had finished eating—if there were leftovers remaining—she would furtively eat them herself this time.

It was a cold day. Yoshie abruptly set aside her work and stared blankly, lost in thought. At that moment, the sister-in-law came in from the front, carrying a bucket filled to the brim with water. Fetching water in midwinter was an extremely harsh task. However, when she entered, the sister-in-law saw Yoshie staring vacantly at something.

“Ugh, you waste of space slut!” Suddenly she doused Yoshie’s body with water from a ladle. “What the hell’re you doing?!” Yoshie snapped upright and whirled around.

“With that flabby body of yours, do you think you can even be of any use? You waste of space.” While listening to Yoshie recount her story, Genkichi burned with hatred—no, this wasn’t nearly enough! Every feeling he had ever held toward her had completely vanished.

“So? Me?” “She asked when she should come.” “When she said she didn’t understand, she just left without saying another word.” Yoshie first! Genkichi, still feeling the pain of his swollen face as though it weren’t his own, single-mindedly clung to that thought. As if mocking us all—she’s a traitor who sold her body to that enemy of ours! That whore—strip her naked, hang her upside down, and twist her to death like a candy stick! This one first!

Two or three days passed.

Rumors spread through the village that the landlords would confiscate the fields of farmers who typically acted defiantly—all because of this incident. The overseers appeared to be making rounds to spread this news. Farmers who had been utterly crushed and left adrift now spent each day trembling in fear. Of course, having their land taken would mean life or death for them. Against this threat, they needed to truly solidify their unity and confront the landlords. But with their leaders seized and subjected to cruel treatment, the farmers found themselves completely powerless.

Yoshie stood in the dimly lit kitchen washing dishes. The house stood empty—everyone had gone to town or a nearby wake. "If you go to the wake, you'll lose face from all the gossip," she kept recalling what her father had said when leaving. "It hurts." Yoshie involuntarily held her breath, her face tightening as she twisted her mouth. The thought "Again..." brought a wave of wretchedness. She stopped washing dishes, gripped the kitchen edge, and bent double while groaning through clenched teeth. With each recurring surge of pain came fresh dizziness. Greasy sweat seeped across her forehead. She pressed her forehead against her arm. She stayed like that for some time. The pain showed no sign of relenting—each ebbing wave returned fiercer than before.

“Ah—unh, unh—unh,” Yoshie’s lower body went numb, and before she knew it, she sat down right there. She could clearly feel the fetus moving inside her. In an instant, a premonition struck. Yoshie gasped and frantically crawled through the kitchen like a lizard. The terrible pain strained her black pupils strangely, leaving her unable to make out anything around her. “Ah—it hurts… Unh… Ah—it hurts…” Yoshie clenched her teeth with a grating sound, her body contorting as if seized by convulsions. She crawled from the dirt-floored kitchen toward the connected storehouse.

The inside of the storehouse was dark. The sweet-sour smell of piled-up straw, the odors of potatoes and beans, the toilet-like stench of rotten takuan pickles and herring preserves all mingled chaotically, making Yoshie feel nauseous. Yoshie faintly sensed, somewhere in her awareness, a mouse scurrying away from the straw right beside her with a rustling sound. Yoshie, like a discarded caterpillar, drew her body into a perfect circle and waited for the pain to subside. Various things from the past came to mind. Those thoughts swirled frantically around inside her head.

After some time had passed, Yoshie's brother and sister-in-law returned from town carrying a lantern along the snow-covered night road. The house entrance remained half-open, with no one inside. They knew their father had gone to the wake. Yoshie should have been there. The sister-in-law clicked her tongue with a tsk and made a face that said, "What a nuisance." Around nine o'clock, their father came back. "Where's Yoshie?" "When we got back around seven, she wasn't here."

“Around seven o'clock—”

The three of them suddenly grew uneasy. They searched every corner of the house. Then they lit a lantern and combed through the outhouse and stable. She wasn't there. Chattering her teeth from both cold and an ominous premonition, the sister-in-law pressed herself against the two men's backs as they moved. When they opened the barn door—the last possible place left to check—an uncanny chill ran through all three. They pushed the door wider and thrust the lantern toward the earthen floor. The circle of light settled across the packed dirt. No one. Pickling barrels and straw lay heaped together in the gloom.

"Maybe a bit further in?" When the father said that and entered the barn, his head struck something heavy - something that hung suspended yet yielded softly.

“Ah!” He stood rigid, like someone suddenly struck on the cheek without uttering a word. They had been shining the lantern only on the dirt floor, so everything above halfway up remained unseen. The three, still huddled together as though someone had shoved them back with full force, staggered out through the door.

The brother and sister-in-law ran breathlessly to a nearby house. And then they had the people of that house inform other houses. After a short while, twelve or thirteen villagers gathered.

Genkichi had also come. While everyone was talking all at once, they entered the barn with many lanterns.

Yoshie was hanging by the neck a short way inside the entrance. Perhaps because her father had collided with it earlier, the suspended body swayed gently through the air with its full weight, tracing imperceptible circles around its vertical axis—first to the right, then to the left. To the villagers who covered their mouths and held out only their lanterns to look, this faint movement evoked an eerie sensation. Yoshie's complexion had turned purple, her face contorted unnaturally. Straw fragments clung thickly to her body.

Later, when they searched the house, two suicide notes that she had apparently written and prepared beforehand were found. One was addressed to her parents, the other to Genkichi. It was unexpected that no others could be found no matter how much they searched. Yoshie had left no suicide note for the university student she had been involved with. When he heard this, Genkichi felt as though his heart had been seized by something.

I will die hating the rich—hating them, hating them. There had been times when I thought that as long as I was alive, I could not die without taking enough revenge on those rich people to sate myself. And I think that is true. But I am a woman—if that were all, there’d be no problem—but among women, I am the most worthless, a traitor. That seems impossible. I blame my mistaken, filthy nature—now, of all times—for thinking how happy I could have been had I stayed with you. And finally, I will spit in the Sapporo university student’s face and die. was written.

Yoshie was just like us after all—whenever someone gets deceived, it's always us without fail! When Genkichi thought that, he felt his entire body tingling with excitement.

X Genkichi thought he would finally do it. That resolve had become more deeply rooted than he had previously thought—due to the police incident and now Ofumi's hanging death. The villagers might say they were trembling under police torture, but how thoroughly those very tormentors inflicted suffering upon them had seeped into the very marrow of their bones. That was undoubtedly so. Therefore, if strong-willed individuals were to relentlessly—relentlessly—press forward with that sentiment, then this time, since the farmers had been placed in an extremely precarious position regarding their fields—their very lives—it seemed possible that they could rise up again, and moreover, even more powerfully than before. Now that the "leaders" were gone, at first Genkichi had thought he would take it on himself and try to do it. If that had gone well, it would have been splendid indeed. If that were the case, Genkichi thought, he wouldn't have done such a clumsy, half-hearted thing. His resolve had been there since that previous decision took hold. Set fire to the landlords' houses and torture to death those bastards—like lice, no—rather, lice through and through—fattened on others' blood!

Genkichi couldn't wait for it to reach that point. Of course, he understood that if things reached that stage, there would be more impact than acting alone. But in this situation, even having to do that chafed at Genkichi's spirit. Strictly speaking, Genkichi hadn't thought about what would happen next or other distant matters. More than that, he was trying to carry out what he intended without even knowing whether it was possible. It was just like when they'd poached salmon before—back when everyone else had gone two or three months without eating fish, just muddling along, and Genkichi had briskly gone ahead and done it himself without paying them any mind. "Father's will, Yoshie's suicide note, and my plan—these three will do it."

However, on the other hand, Genkichi did not think his actions were futile. Rather, his decisive act would surely jolt those sluggish farmers—like a bull charging through darkness—with such force that it would spark them all to unexpectedly unite quickly and rise up together, hoes and sickles in hand, shouting "Charge! Charge!!" If that happened, they might just wrest the fields right into their own hands—Genkichi even imagined such an outcome. But more than anything—the hatred! "Damn you! Just you wait!" Genkichi shouted, rubbing his still-swollen cheeks and body where the pain lingered.

That night, Genkichi filled a kerosene can—about the size of a Dropps tin—with oil, wrapped it in a tattered zabuton cushion, and went outside. He had told his mother he was entering the Asari mountains this time for bark-stripping and would consult Ishida about the spring herring grounds before returning.

Outside was a starless, pitch-black night. The snow-covered road was frozen rock-hard. Genkichi’s body trembled in small shivers, even though he thought it tightly clenched. Abruptly, his teeth began clattering on their own. Genkichi hurried along the road. However, as he walked, the area around the water outlet became strangely ticklish, making him feel so impatient he couldn’t stay still. Finally, Genkichi broke into a trot. The frozen air split to both sides and flowed backward. He emerged into a desolate expanse where nothing remained no matter which way he turned. Before he knew it, Genkichi returned to his usual speed. When he looked back, a few lights flickered feebly on the dark plain, seeming ready to vanish at any moment. Genkichi started running again as if struck by a sudden thought. When his breathing grew fierce, the cold air made his nostrils sting sharply. After a moment, Genkichi was walking again.

He encountered no one on the night road.

When he reached where the lights of "the town with the station" literally dotted far ahead in the black curtain-like darkness, Genkichi suddenly stopped. He felt a tautness in his chest like bracing against something.

When he entered the town, Genkichi walked cautiously along the backs of houses rather than using main streets. The town's streets were completely empty of people. Most houses had turned off their electric lights. Genkichi walked carefully along a narrow uneven path where snow had piled up like a horse's back. Occasionally a door would clatter open. The sound echoed back more loudly than expected through the silent town on the plain. Genkichi flinched each time he heard that noise.

Someone came running frantically through the town streets, shouting at the top of their lungs. The front doors of two or three houses clattered open. "What's goin' on?" neighbors asked one another, clutching the fronts of their coats.

The town suddenly grew noisy. Then,

“Fire! Fire!” Two or three people shouted as they ran toward the station. The townspeople standing out front all turned to look in unison. The dark sky had grown slightly brighter. But in the blink of an eye, a pillar of fire ten feet high erupted upward. The crackling roar of flames reached their ears. As they watched, every house and tree in town—without exception—had one side bathed in flickering crimson light, sharp contrasts between brightness and shadow. The faces of people running through the streets appeared splattered with red ink, each one murderous.

All the people in the town rushed out of houses. The women and children stood watching, teeth chattering as they huddled together.

“Where could it be?”

“Hmm… Maybe the station?” “If it’s the station, the direction’s off.” “A bit more to the right.”

“Where could it be?”

They called out to the people across the street. "Could it be the landlord's place?" "Might be... Could be—"

“Well, well.” When they asked the person running by,

“Landlords! It’s the landlords!!” they shouted as they ran past. “Let ’em burn!” Someone muttered low. “They were beaten.” “That’s right.” “—Arson maybe?” Someone blurted out. They fell silent for a moment. “This’ll bring hell down on us.” Suddenly above their heads, the alarm bell clanged with a broken sound. It echoed through the air with eerie force, sending chills crawling up spines.

The landlord's house stood apart from the station grounds. But its surroundings had grown scorchingly hot, blazing with a white glare that revealed every wrinkle on the firefighters' faces and each strand of beard on the bystanders. Each time a train entered the station grounds, it blew its whistle long and hard. The sound resembled the ominous death throes of some living creature. Since the landlord's house was an imposing structure built with lavish funds—one that disdained sharing eaves with vulgar, rotting townhouses—it had been constructed particularly isolated from the town's rows. With no wind blowing besides, there was no fear of flames spreading elsewhere.

The firefighters were saying that since the fire had spread too quickly, everyone in the house must have burned to death—there was no sign of anyone having escaped. When the storehouse—crammed full of mixed grains and other goods seized from the tenant farmers of Kitahama Village just days before—burned and collapsed, they all involuntarily cried out. With a terrible noise, it collapsed, and from there, sparks and demon-like smoke swirled upward into the sky in thick vortices.

The water they drew from the frozen river was utterly useless. The firefighters and youth group members shouted orders as they ran about here and there, brandishing their lanterns. “When more than half had already burned and it had become utterly hopeless, they say that from inside the house came such bone-chilling screams—those kinds of screams that made you shudder just to hear them, those kinds of—indescribable screams!” “That person was saying how the screams kept lingering and lingering in their ears—it was so awful.” “They said it was like the sound of a chicken being strangled—screams being wrung out with blood gushing from their throats.”

The woman was whispering in hushed tones to people who seemed to be acquaintances standing lined up.

"They were beaten for sure." The other person said in an even lower voice. Then both of them fell silent.

Genkichi ran all the way to where the snowbreak forest stood lined up along the railway line, unnoticed by anyone. One side of the snowbreak forest glowed from reflecting the fire's light. When he looked back, the entire sky had been dyed red. The houses near the scene and people standing on their roofs waving their hands—along with each utility pole—could be seen clearly, every detail black and distinct. At times, the shouts of those clamoring there reached him as clearly as if they stood right beside him. The alarm bell groaned faintly, "Boo-oon... boo-oon..."

"Still not enough."

After muttering to himself, Genkichi began walking with firm steps along the dark snow-covered path of the Ishikari Plain.

"Still not enough yet, damn it!" (1928.4.26)