Pathway to Japanese Literature

“Did your shoddy novels stop selling, so you became a Storyteller?”
“I see right through you.”
“Learn some shame!”

“A Communist Party member.”

Ango’s Storyteller Part 3: "Lieutenant Nosaka and Sergeant Nakanishi" received an enormous response from Communist Party members across the country.
This, too, was one of them.
Concise and to the point—it was a masterpiece.

“Your face...”
As for what came next, I didn’t want to write it down.
Though criticizing my face missed the mark entirely—“The idiocy of your dialogue with Hayashi Fumiko! Two Uglinesses Without Permission...”
“Two Uglinesses Without Permission...”
It was unfortunate for Ms. Hayashi, but this sort of thing arrived too.
The Two Uglinesses were concise.
They knew the character for ugliness well.
I didn’t understand the “without permission” that followed.
However, their decisiveness—akin to cutting through complexity with a single stroke or condemning the unspeakable—was fully manifested in this slashing style; had they studied literature, they might have become writers of some standing.

Communist Party letters were either extremely short (postcards with about three lines) or extremely long (ten to twenty sheets of stationery). Letters from would-be apprentices were typically as lengthy as those from the Communist Party and carefully included reply stamps and self-addressed envelopes, but occasionally still got hit with postage due. One wouldn’t think apprentice applicants would skimp even a penny’s worth, but when writing lengthy letters, their measurements seemed to go awry. However, the Communist Party’s lengthy letters (I’d received at least fifteen) had never been charged postage due. There existed a clear combative spirit determined to hammer their lethal prose into the Storyteller’s very eyes.

In apprentice letters, about two-thirds of the addresses used "Sensei," around a third used "-sama," and rarely "-dono." In letters using -sama or -dono, it was common for there to be repeated statements along the lines of "it’s strange to call you Sensei." Through their shared sensibility—though I didn’t fully grasp what this sensibility entailed—it became apparent that they considered the title *Sensei* to be hollow, applying it to relationships like those with schoolteachers, while interpreting me as something more intimate.

The Communist Party used 'dono' for everyone. However, in several cases—limited to postcards here—they omitted even *dono* and addressed me bluntly. The postcard authors seemed to be of the Beranmē-type; unable to convey subtleties with a brush, they vented their frustration by dropping honorifics instead of using their fists. The authors of lengthy letters, confident in their lethal prose, graciously bestowed honorifics upon me.

As for what these lengthy letters contained, critiques of my works—primarily *Decadence Theory*—formed their core, though some went so far as to have read about half my output and taken issue with each piece individually. Now, the former group—those who took up *Decadence Theory* and a scant few other works to dismantle them from all angles—maintained a measure of composure, their critiques exuding a certain dignity as they strove to throttle the Storyteller through sheer logic. The latter group, however—those who skewered more than half my output—had once mistakenly adored my works, only to erupt with volcanic fury at this perceived betrayal, their letters overflowing with a hundredfold hatred born of smothered affection and restless agitation. Yet these same writers abruptly adopted an eerie calm by their closing lines, typically sealing their missives with icy prophecies: “You [or ‘bastard’] will soon face judgment in a people’s trial—that day draws near.”

However, I found it hard to accept that there were two letters asserting, “The people’s resentment rests upon you.” I thought they might have mistakenly repurposed language intended for Prime Minister Yoshida—or perhaps within the Communist Party, this was the only official terminology they reserved for arch-villains. That such resentment should be directed at a mere Storyteller like myself seemed excessive—yet confronted with this accusation, I couldn’t help imagining my pen harbored a spectral quality akin to Hitler’s, leaving me not entirely displeased by the notion.

Since *Lieutenant Nosaka and Sergeant Nakanishi* appeared in the March issue—released in mid-February—one would expect an even greater flood of responses around that time. In reality, however, the majority arrived en masse between late May and June.
The reason for this remained unclear for some time.

However, by chance, I was able to solve this mystery through a single postcard.
This postcard had initially been sent to Bungei Shunju Publishing in Tokyo, then been forwarded, arriving late—hence the delay in uncovering the mystery.

“Having been impressed by your *Lieutenant Nosaka and Sergeant Nakanishi*,” it demanded urgently, “inform me of the publishers of your other essays”—such was the postcard.
It bore masterful penmanship that conveyed a distinctive style.
From our perspective, there exist two distinctions in handwriting.
There are two categories: that of literature enthusiasts and that of those who are not.
The handwriting in apprentice applications and Communist Party letters falls into an indeterminate state defying classification—in other words, their very penmanship reveals them as unfinished products.

The handwriting on this particular postcard displayed an especially masterful penmanship even among non-literary correspondences, indicating an age of forty or above.
In other words, it spoke of the dignity of a seasoned expert among practitioners.

Given that it was the height of election season, I suddenly realized. The sender might be someone’s election campaign manager, I thought. In any case, I surmised they urgently needed it as source material for campaign speeches. Having long heard that Lieutenant Nosaka and Sergeant Nakanishi was being used in politicians’ speeches, I discerned the situation with an “Ah, so that’s it!”

Campaign orators were generally part-timers who hastily sought out source materials and worked the circuit for thirty days, but Lieutenant Nosaka and Sergeant Nakanishi proved convenient for these freelance speakers. It moderately satirized the Communist Party while being crafted to make about seven out of ten people nod in understanding. Given this was an era when freelance orators were guaranteed applause for passionately attacking the Communist Party in speeches, it stood to reason that many non-Communist orators favored this Storyteller’s work.

That must be why the Communist Party’s literary youths (I label them as such because their handwriting, like that of apprentice applicants, remained similarly half-baked) flew into a rage.
When election season reached its peak, letters addressed to “Mr. Ango” and “Ango Yobisute” came flooding in.

The repercussions of storytelling began at this time.

Last month, I spoke ill of the incident involving Ms. Matsutani Tenkōkō, but the Labor-Farmer Party and Democratic Party, holding the law in high regard, refrained from raising disputes over freedom of speech.

To be fair, while they didn’t come to the author’s doorstep, there were signs they had raised a dispute with the magazine company.
This was my deduction—there existed no concrete evidence.
Bungei Shunju Publishing proved surprisingly a haunt for gentlemen and ladies; their sense of decorum blossomed fragrant from its sprouting, and they refrained from any verbosity that might momentarily disturb the author.
Yet having been born with exceptional insight and a certified deductive eye, I had never erred in such judgments.
I could have cited numerous subtle proofs, but as doing so would encroach upon others’ confidences, I resolved to keep silent.

However, while I cannot clearly grasp the rules of free speech, I find it utterly incomprehensible why the author should have freedom while the magazine company does not. All responsibility for what's written lies with the author; should the magazine company refuse to publish it, they've already snatched away the manuscript fee upfront while incurring the author's wrath (his imposing frame notwithstanding)—there's no merit to this arrangement. The Storyteller had a prior incident where that magazine company slammed him with a severance letter over having cut two pages from an overlong manuscript, thus cementing his reputation as a loudmouth.

And so, until I received the Communist Party literary youths’ full counterattack, my storytelling had been walking a smooth and quiet path.

The one who first called me “Storyteller” was a Communist Party youth’s postcard included at the beginning—it was not a title of my own choosing.
However, I love this title.
Because it somehow feels fitting for me.

I am a Storyteller this year, but until last year I was a spectator journalist.

A spectator journalist was a profession that involved observing all manner of competitions and writing spectator reports. Similar to this existed veteran experts like Fukumen-ko, Hokutosei, and Noren; but unlike me, they did not write spectator reports out of pretense or whimsy—what you might call a meddlesome mentality—but rather were people who expounded profound secrets through the sharp insight of their honed expertise. They ought to have been termed battlefield observers. Mine was unambiguously that of a spectator journalist.

I had no particular skills. Therefore, for all manner of competitions, I observed whichever ones clients preferred upon their request. Shogi Meijin matches, Honinbo Go tournaments, every kind of sport—I covered them all.

All I knew was how shogi pieces moved. According to a certain 8-dan’s theory in a shogi magazine I’d once read, this apparently qualified as the 62-kyū rank. They say it takes three years for Yogācāra and seven for the Abhidharma-kosa—that monks require seven years to master the Abhidharma-kosa because it classifies human consciousness into seventy-five categories through divisions so minute you can’t grasp a single one, hence needing seven years.

In shogi’s case, there were nine dans above the 62-kyū rank, making seventy-one total. This fell four short of the Abhidharma-kosa’s count. Even by nomenclature alone, shogi proved impenetrably complex.

I found myself plodding along at that 62-kyū rank.
The seventy higher ranks could only be vainly glimpsed—utterly impossible to master—and were said to go by another name: “three pawns.”

If we applied the 62-kyū rank to Go, it would mean giving a 62-stone handicap to a first-dan player.
No such Go game exists.
However, it could exist.
There is nothing as pitiable as a beginner in competitive games.
Even if I sharpened my mind’s eye to its utmost, I could not comprehend.
Since it’s a waste of the mind’s eye, those like me who follow it must not pointlessly cloud it but simply grieve.

When someone of the 62-kyū rank like myself wrote a spectator report on a Meijin match, it felt as though the mind’s eye was exacting its revenge.
Even if I watched shogi, I couldn’t understand it.
I could only grasp the outcome.
And then, I watched it.

In other words, what vendetta spectators comprehended began with observing the vendetta’s cause, dispute, both parties’ stances, and martial demeanor—then when Matagoro inched forward with a red demon’s face and Kazuma dripped with greasy sweat—that was how it went.

A 62-kyū spectator report could only grasp the same things.
While grandly proclaiming it to be the mind’s eye exacting its revenge, all I could manage to write was Matagoro inching forward step by step and Kazuma dripping with greasy sweat—which was why the mind’s eye wept.
But no matter how much it cried, that was all I could write.

The spectator journalist’s despair.
Putting it that way isn’t bad, but I don’t go in for despair.
However, I had somehow grown sick of being a spectator journalist.
I shouted, "Enough already!"

And so, this year I opened my storyteller business.

It wasn’t that competitive events were the only things worth observing in human affairs.
In the underworld, at erotic shows, among thieves—even in love suicides—there were things to witness.

First of all, holing up in some rural place like Ito and refusing visitors—though I wouldn’t call it pursuing refined pleasures—if one immersed themselves in that sort of cloistered existence obsessed with spiritual perfection, they’d end up completely disconnected from society.
Though occasional trips to the capital were advisable, merely riding the train to Shinbashi, getting drunk, and stumbling home wouldn’t let the city’s essence seep into one’s bones.

So with the magazine company’s assistance, when I first arrived in Tokyo, a car was waiting.
Once aboard, I would be whisked off to places like the underworld, erotic shows, or the scenes of thieves’ double suicides, shown things not easily glimpsed by casual observers at my leisure, then smoothly ferried by car to a bar next.
This was it.
There was such a slick trick to it.
That became the confidential tale that led to solidifying the “grave resolution” (this phrase being used in such a manner) to open my Storyteller business.
Moreover, with everything covered by public funds—it was hard to grasp just how flawlessly coordinated this all was.

I opened my Storyteller business.
Right after opening, it became a huge sensation; because of that, newspapers big and small, all general-interest magazines (including King) came rushing to me demanding, “Give us your stories!”
Not a chance.
I couldn’t possibly observe and write that much.
A month has thirty days; this Storyteller had but one body—it couldn’t be helped.
It was a grandiose launch.

The Communist Party literati’s total counterattack marked the Storyteller’s first ordeal, but of course I wasn’t surprised.
Given that I was sucking up such sweet nectar, I’d already resigned myself to facing some ordeals—taking pistol bullets in the underworld or getting chased around by cops at erotic shows.
As for something like the Storyteller’s proper mindset—it was fully in place.

However, the Communist Party neither knew words nor understood how to use them.

“You’re still alive?!”

This was written.
Having determined I still lived, they seemed ready to finish me off.

“Are you even Japanese?!”

They raged in perfect unison.
I couldn’t fathom why I was being denounced.

“The people’s hearts have abandoned you.”

It was not untrue.
Indeed, some of them were hurling such statements—or things of this meaning—at me in this manner.

People outside the Communist Party would understand this: such phrases were meant for sitting prime ministers or party leaders—not for some storyteller.
There was no rule forbidding its use, but for a storyteller and Hitler alike, the words employed had to naturally suit their respective stations.

The Communist Party that made this declaration consisted of residents from some village in Fuji District, Shizuoka Prefecture.
I hadn’t gone to see for myself, but it was probably Heki Village at the foot of Mount Fuji.
Even while living in such a place, they clearly saw that the people’s hearts were turning away from the Storyteller.

“We know your fate.”

I see.
So they’d seen through my fate too, had they?
By all means determined to see through my fate, their intent to subject me to a People’s Trial was evident.
They seemed to be thoroughly solidified by a punitive spirit down to their very marrow.
They were a difficult breed to deal with.

In Western fairy tales, forest witches appeared.
These were the Communist Party’s ancestors casting fearsome curses.
They prophesied his downfall.
While they muttered under their breath, they were more wicked and lawless than the wolf that devoured Little Red Riding Hood—enemies of humanity.
Unlike hunched-back witches, the vigorous Communist Party cast its curses more ostentatiously, loud enough for all to hear.
I didn’t know if they were modern or militaristic, but as enemies of humanity, they remained unchanged.
Even among forest witches, there occasionally existed “good witches.”
The fairy godmother who aided Princess Cinderella was one such example.
No such Communist Party would ever side with me.
And so I would inevitably be subjected to a public denunciation in the name of the people.

However, the Storyteller didn't only receive such gloomy letters.

★

“Hey, hey!”
“Wait, wa-it!”
“Waaait! Mr. Sakaguchi!”

There was a girl who came chasing after the Storyteller on a bicycle, shouting loudly from behind him.
This hot spring town was famous for its pom-pom girls venturing onto the main street to pull in customers, but I had yet to hear any tales of them giving chase by bicycle.

At first glance, she was indistinguishable from the prostitutes and appeared to be about the same age.

“You’re Mr. Sakaguchi, the Storyteller? That’s right, isn’t it?”

“...”
“Right?”
“I said it.”
“Mr. Sakaguchi, right?”

“Yeah.”

“C’mon, let’s go together.
“They’re waiting.”

“Who are you?”

“It’s the ×× Hall. A customer asked me to. That person said ‘Go fetch Mr. Sakaguchi the Storyteller’.”

“Who’s this customer?”

“I don’t know. You’ll understand if you come see.”

“A woman?”

“Heh.”

With that, the girl laughed.
He was terrifyingly looked down upon.

“It’s the ×× Hall. Over there. You know it, right?”
“You know it, right?”

The girl got on the bicycle and started riding away.
They say it’s in his nature to obediently tag along if a woman is beautiful, but being looked down upon by an unattractive one meant he couldn’t afford to have his spirit drained for long.
If he wasn’t careful, he’d be hit by a car, so he turned around and started walking.

The girl returned at full speed, furious.

“What’s with you!”
“Didn’t you hear me?”
“What I said—”

Her eyes spewed flames.

“They’re waiting.
“Didn’t I just say that?!”

“A woman?”

“Still on about that?”

The girl let out an exasperated bitter smile, though it was simultaneously suffused with an affectionate warmth that said she’d grasped his intent.

“Does someone like that even exist?
“Heh.
“You shouldn’t daydream.
“Poor you.
“Want me to be her for you?
“Ahahaha!
“It’s a lie.
“Don’t you go taking that seriously.”

With that, she blushed somewhat.

When she laughed, it became clear her mouth was as wide as a toad’s.
The Storyteller took a liking to this phrase and ended up following along obediently.

The ×× Hall was a third-rate inn.
It was just like the boarding houses in student districts.
In a dimly lit small room, a man was waiting for me.

He was a rude fellow who’d laid out the futon and still lay sprawled across it. A neckerchief wrapped around his neck gave him the air of a hoarse-voiced traveling balladeer. His scraggly little mustache seemed to laugh along with him as a faint, amiable smile played about his lips.

“I spotted you passing by from the toilet window,” he said.
“Didn’t know you myself, but the guy sharing the john—nasty business, eh?—said that was Mr. Ango the Storyteller out there.”
“So I rushed to call the maid and have her fetch you.”
“Ahaha!”
“Well now, you—c’mere.”

The man was half-sitting up on the futon, supporting himself with one elbow.
With the hand gripping a cigarette, he beckoned me—a gesture meaning I should come to his bedside and sit on the far side of the ashtray.
Given how worn-out the futon and the man looked—likely crawling with bloodsucking bugs and germs—I politely leaned against the desk instead.

“I read your Storyteller piece.”
“Keirin.”
“The way you lose is magnificent, but that won’t do.”
“Keirin’s something you bet 500 yen per race on—well, about 5,000 yen a day.”
“Then you double your money.”
“That’s the way of it, see?”
“That’s just how it works.”
“So here I am living easy like this.”
“That guy said you were Mr. Ango.”
“It hit me sudden-like.”
“Figured I’d teach you keirin’s tricks.”
“All because I like that losing style of yours.”

It was an unceremonious warrior-like bearing. He didn’t introduce himself, nor did he say welcome. He didn’t say anything like “Thanks for coming.” He didn’t seem to particularly look down on me either. Because he didn’t seem to be putting on airs either. I couldn’t tell what sort of conman he was, but it was certain he held no regard whatsoever for the Storyteller of the realm.

“If it were tonight, it would’ve been better still, but will you come back again? Around eight in the evening, a messenger’ll come here, see? They’re running keirin in Odawara now, right? The second segment starts tomorrow. Tomorrow’s race list’ll reach me by eight-thirty. I’ll look it over and teach you. For beginners, this is the way to go. You can’t swallow complicated theories quick-like. Not theory—climb times and past records. Know those inside out and you’re still half-baked. Judging their track legs—that’s basic smarts too. Plenty more where that came from—I’ll leave it there.”

The man grabbed a hefty handful of papers from his bedside and tossed them over.
They were keirin newspapers from various regions.
In addition to Kantō regions, there were ones from places called Gifu, Naruo, Suminoe, and the like.
Each page was densely covered in red markings so fine they were nearly illegible.

“Are you in the keirin business?”

When asked, he looked bored and lowered his gaze.

“Well...”
“Even if you say that, there’s no helping it. I’m not yakuza, though.”
“I’ve thought about becoming a tipster or something, but with legs like this...”

He pulled aside the futon and showed me.
One of his legs was prosthetic.

“With my disposition that can’t do anything crooked, I probably wouldn’t get any customers as a tipster.”
“Don’t put it like that.”
“Don’t go for the long shots.”
“Don’t bet on every race.”
“When you don’t understand, you should fold.”

“Was it a war injury?”

I asked.

The man shook his head,

“At the factory, you see.
“Apparently, it was my own carelessness.”

He grinned wryly.
He might be resigned to his fate.

I reassessed him. Even a wound received at a factory—in times like these, it’s human nature to pass it off as a war wound. Because he was in the midst of bringing in a complete stranger—me—and holding forth with his idle chatter. When I thought about it, this man’s talk might not have been idle chatter after all.

He, perhaps tired, plopped down with a “heave-ho” and propped up a pillow,

“Come back tonight. That’s the way to go, you know. I’ll look at the race list and teach you. Only the sure bets. Avoid the long shots. Be here at eight-thirty, you hear?”

I also stood up,

“Since I’ve lost interest in keirin, I probably won’t come.”
“But if I change my mind, I’ll have you teach me then, you know.”

He nodded.

“If you spot me at the keirin, call out to me.”
“I’ll teach you.”

He closed his eyes and murmured.

I silently left the room.

This too was a repercussion of the storyteller’s work.
The repercussions from keirin surpassed even those from the Communist Party in their intensity.
Keirin’s cutthroat nature imbued these repercussions with a ferocious edge.
Though letters containing the utmost ferocity were few, that very ferocity stood in a class of its own.

I couldn’t write about it explicitly—this was out of consideration for the individuals’ families and acquaintances who might learn of it—while on the other hand, the storyteller found himself receiving missives that sent shivers down his spine.

There was an old man who had enclosed two photographs (of himself) and a resume.
A man who had studied in England, served as president of two or three companies, and traveled to Europe several times on official business—now reduced to ruin.
The path to his ruin was laid out in the letter—a tale of sheer misery—but this, too, I cannot write about.

He had read about how I'd lost tens of thousands of yen at keirin without batting an eye and set his sights on me. He knew nothing about keirin. However, ever since watching the Derby during his stay in England, he had become addicted to horse racing and was now trying to recruit me into it. "Since I don't have a single penny to my name, you bring fifty thousand yen," he wrote. "I'll turn it into five million yen in three days, so I want my cut"—such was his reasoning.

This outlined the gist of it, but his words about his past glory and present poverty and family were indeed imbued with an eerie aura. I found myself invited by him to some distant horse race in Tohoku—so much so that I even imagined being poisoned in some mountain pass.

Unlike the Communist Party members, he was making an effort—striving not to frighten me but to put me at ease. His inclusion of both recent photos and ones from his prime might have served precisely that purpose.

And throughout the letter, he emphatically asserted that he was not a madman and that his mind remained unsound, urging me to rest assured.

If one set aside the weakness being crushed by extreme poverty, then as he insisted, he did not appear to be a madman.

Yet with fifty thousand yen in my pocket, were I obliged to attend the races with someone, I would have chosen to accompany a true madman over him.

He concluded his letter by writing that, while he stressed such an outcome was highly unlikely, should things go awry and I end up losing the 50,000-yen principal contrary to expectations, he would then share his life story so I could write it into a novel and use it to make up for the loss.
He knew that I was a novelist.

However, generally speaking, readers of the Storyteller’s works seemed largely unaware that I had another profession as a novelist.
In other words, I was simply the Storyteller.

“Hey. You’re Ango the Storyteller?”

While I was drinking with a friend, a drunkard pushed aside my friend and demanded a handshake from me.
It was when I occasionally came up to Tokyo and was drinking at the market.

“Just came back from Keiō-kaku.”
“Today, I hit it big.”
“Targeted C-class.”
“When I first saw him, it hit me like lightning.”
“This is it!”
“I thought.”
“It’s a racer nobody’s predicting.”
“Bought ten tickets.”
“Hell yeah!”
“Thank you!”

He took my beer and gulped it down.

“So you’re Ango the Storyteller, huh?”

He placed both hands on my shoulders, shook them vigorously to gush affection, and stared intently—

“Hmm! I see!”
“You’re awesome!”
“You really do have the face of a rich man!”
“That’s it!”
“Go for it!”
“You’ll make it big soon too!”

After giving me a rousing pep talk, he suddenly burst into boisterous laughter.

“But, you.
“Hey, Ango the Storyteller! C’mon, let’s drink!”

He had me pour him a beer, gulped it down, and shook my hand again.

“That’s good! Ango the Storyteller. Yeah. You’ve got a sharp eye. You’ve still got that beginner’s softness, but you’re watching closely. Everyone’s praising you! Go with that!”

He praised and encouraged me. On days when I lost money, they didn’t seem to praise me—though perhaps that was just my jealousy.

Unlike the Communist Party, keirin letters—aside from a few eerie exceptions—were generally lively and bright.

However, when I read the letters, I could not understand why they had sent them to me. Because they barely touched upon *Ango the Storyteller*—and even that cursory mention felt like a perfunctory gesture, something tossed in merely for letter-writing courtesy—their negligent attitude became glaringly obvious. They did not agree with the winning strategies I advocated in my storytelling. Yet they neither refuted me nor harbored even a shred of malicious irony. In other words, they were treating me as a close friend.

The reason they sent me letters was to tell me about their winnings.
They enclosed about ten copies of keirin newspapers from races they’d won, and excitedly wrote about their exploits—how they’d targeted medium payouts and struck at unnoticed weak points that others had missed.
That was all there was to it.
They were simply bursting with the joy of wanting to tell me all about it.
There seemed to be no reason for them to specifically choose me as their audience.
First of all, to tell me about it, they would have had to inquire everywhere and track down my address.
However, they brushed off such troubles and sent me letters anyway.

There was a gap between my winning strategies and theirs (they were all veterans), and this gap was absolute—there appeared to be no reason to feel any sense of mutual understanding.
However, from their perspective, they might have felt a sense of mutual understanding.

There are no letters sent after losing.
People who gamble seem to be endowed with the spirit of bards—when they lose, they fall silent and become amnesiacs, yet they can never forget the memories of their victories until the day they die.
In other words, they might be in that delightful state of mind where they want to impart their epic tales to me—the Storyteller who serves as the modern representative of those ancient bards.

The complaints were about *Tokyo Jungle*.
If you fell for it and went on an Ueno excursion expecting to find some mute girl overflowing with zeal to safeguard the jungle's peace while cherishing customers, not only would you fail to encounter her, but you'd even get your wallet stolen by the girl you stayed with—what a nuisance, eh? Ahahaha! That's how it played out.

As noble souls refined enough to cultivate poetic sentiments through Ueno excursions, even when voicing complaints, they bore no malice and kept things breezy.

While I wasn’t particularly conscious of it when writing, these refined literati had gone searching for the mute girl as if by prior agreement.
And though my text mentioned something about there being as many as twelve people, they now suspected the storyteller’s realism was a lie.

O noble souls of refinement.
Doubt resides in people.
A storyteller may be somewhat of a fraud, but he has never committed such lawless acts as deceiving noble souls at their vital points.

However—though this may go unchallenged—I wrote without much thought, yet if I were to name what captivated me most during my Ueno excursion, it was the mute girl.
With a policeman standing guard in full armed solemnity, I couldn’t very well make advances.
Truly and utterly regrettable… Unbearable.
And so it seemed my very soul had poured itself into that trivial anecdote.
The noble souls saw through it.
Yet considering this, I too must be a noble of some sort.

The other day, when my opponent at the go club asked,

“What’s your profession?”

“I’m a Storyteller.”

“Hah.”
“A lecturer, then?”

“No, a Storyteller.”

“Ah.
“Storyteller.”
“How unusual.”
“Hmm, I see.”

He looked at my face with admiration.
Since I couldn’t figure out what sort of misconception had occurred, I decided to consult a wise man of sorts—some reservist in the fountain of stories—and when I asked him,

“Hah.”
“Idiot.”
“You were laughed at, I suppose.”

“I wasn’t laughed at at all.”

“How naive you are.”
“You’re just...”

“You think so?”

“You think calling yourself a ‘Storyteller’ gets through to anyone?
“People are bound to go for a handsome man, aren’t they?”
“In Japanese, that’s all there is.”
“Remember that.”

“I see.”

“Even if you now think ‘Damn it all,’ it’s too late.
You’ve got foolishness dangling from your face as you walk around. Ahaha!”

What—as if I’d think “Oh no”!

Storyteller = Handsome Man.
It’s becoming more and more appealing by the minute.
In other words, it’s as if heaven itself has decreed that this profession belongs to no one but me.