Pathway to Japanese Literature

Author: Okamoto Kido

I

T-kun begins his tale.

At that time, Karuizawa lay completely desolate.
It was autumn of Meiji 24 when that region too appeared to have reached its peak of decline.
For you see, the old Nakasendo post stations had all withered away; the land yielded no produce whatsoever, survival had grown nearly impossible, and some were abandoning it for other regions.

I too got off the train at Yokokawa with Father, jostled up and down along the old Usui Pass road in a rickety horse-drawn carriage, and when we arrived at that bleak Karuizawa inn, it truly felt lonely enough to unsettle the heart.
How different it is today!
It has opened up as though the world itself had changed completely.
The inn we stayed at back then charged twenty-five sen per night—given that, you can well imagine what it was like.
That inn has now become a splendid large building called something like a hotel.
To explain why we went to such a place at all—it began with Father's poetic inclination to view the autumn foliage from Myougi to Usui, but having grown thoroughly weary at Myougi, we ended up riding a rickety horse-drawn carriage for the Usui section. I was startled when it nearly overturned two or three times on the mountain road.

I found it utterly uninteresting, but since Father claimed the quiet solitude was pleasant, we ended up staying about four days in that large, dimly lit room in Karuizawa. Looking back, we were quite eccentric. Then on the second day, it poured down from morning. Since it was the end of October, it suddenly turned bitterly cold here in Shinshu. Father and I were sitting before the large hearth built into the inn's main room, listening to the innkeeper talk about local matters when, as dusk began to fall, a large man nearing fifty came lumbering in. The man’s trade was that of a lumberjack who had spent about five years in the Kiso region, but even his desolate hometown must have felt dear to him, for he had returned there from early this summer.

Since we were bored ourselves, we called the man over to the hearthside and listened to various stories, during which the lumberjack began his tale of when he was in the depths of the Kiso Mountains.

“If you were in such deep mountains, there must have been frightening things now and then,” I asked, spurred by a kind of curiosity.

“Well.”
“Even deep in the mountains，there’s nothing particularly strange,” he replied with unexpected calm.
“The only fearsome things are great storms—though hunters do say monsters sometimes pester them.”

“What’s an etemono?”

“Hard to say exactly.
“Some claim they’re creatures that slipped through a monkey’s shell，but no one’s ever seen their true form.
“Put simply：say there’s a duck waddling yonder.
“You think it queer and try catching it—that cursed duck darts off like it’s mocking you.
“Flustered，you give chase.
“Others see nothing，yet there goes the hunter chasing empty air.
“That’s when folks shout，‘Ho！An etemono！Beware！’—only then does he snap out of it.
“See，there was never anything there—just what that hunter alone fancied he saw.”

That’s why hunters entering the depths of Kiso Mountains never go alone. They always make sure to take two or three people along. There was once such an incident, so they say. Two hunters who had gone deep into the mountains drew water from a mountain stream, cooked rice, and when one of them thought it must be about done steaming and opened the pot lid, a woman’s large head suddenly popped out from inside. The hunter panicked and closed the pot lid, pressing down firmly while shouting “It’s an etemono! An etemono! Get rid of it quick!” Then his fellow hunter immediately grabbed his gun and fired two or three shots in rapid succession, blasting blindly into nowhere. When they opened the pot lid again, the woman’s head was no longer visible. “Well, they say these kinds of things are the work of etemono,” he concluded, “but those who encounter such creatures are limited to hunters—in loggers’ huts like ours, we never once had that kind of experience.”

He was puffing away at his thick pipe with an air of composure, so I felt disappointed.

In a desolate, decaying old post town, on an evening when the cold late-autumn rain fell relentlessly, that expectation—of trying to draw out some mysterious tale from a man who had long dwelled deep in the mountain wilderness—was splendidly betrayed.
Still, I persisted in asking, almost pleadingly.

"But after five years in such deep mountains, there must've been some strange happenings once or twice."
"No—you folks're used to it, so you mightn't think much of it, but others hearin' would find queer things... mysterious things...."

“Well,” he frowned as if smoke from the brushwood had stung his eyes. “Now that I think on it proper-like, there were one or two queer happenings over all them years.”
“’Mongst ’em all, just once there was somethin’ that sat uneasy with us—couldn’t rightly say why at the time.”
“Didn’t think much of it then, mind. But lookin’ back after… left a crawlin’ feelin’ under the skin.”
“What d’you reckon that was about?”

He was a man named Juubei who, at that time, led a solitary existence in a loggers' hut deep in the Kiso Mountains with only his six-year-old son Taikichi.
The place was situated about one ri (four kilometers) further into the mountains from the Kurozawa entrance leading up Mount Ontake, so climbers and porters rarely appeared there.

Now, please consider what follows to be the main story itself.

“Papa, I’m scared.”

Taikichi, who had been playing quietly until now, suddenly changed his complexion and clung to his father’s lap.
Since it was just parent and child living deep in these mountains year-round, they were accustomed to loneliness.
They thought of monkeys and wild boars as friends.
Storms that could blow away the hut, thunderclaps that seemed to crumble mountains—such things rarely startled this boy to any significant degree.
Yet today of all days, he turned pale, trembled, and made a fuss.
Father gently told him while patting the head.

“What’s there to be scared of? Papa’s here, so it’s okay.”

“But I’m scared, Papa.”

“You coward! What’s there to be scared of? Where’s anything scary?” Father’s voice grew slightly rougher.

“What’s… that sound…”

In the depths of the forest beyond where Taikichi pointed, hidden among a thicket of large firs and hemlocks, a strangely song-like, sorrowful voice could be heard intermittently.

The late September sunset had long since sunk behind distant peaks, and in the pale blue, lake-like sky visible between the trees floated the faint shadow of a crescent moon, like a silver boat.

“You fool,” Father sneered. “What’s so scary about that? It’s just some lumberjack or hunter heading back to the village at sunset, singing.”

“No, that’s not it. Scary, scary.”

“Yeah, you noisy brat. You coward—how do you expect to live in a place like this? How can a coward like you ever become a man?”

Scolded harshly, Taikichi immediately cowered, but his terror showed no signs of abating as he crawled into a corner of the hut and hunched over small.
Juubei was by nature a doting father, but compared to his own ruggedness, his child’s cowardice grated on his nerves terribly.

“Hey, hey! What’re you makin’ yourself so small for?
“This here’s our home.
“Ain’t nothin’ scary here no matter who comes.
“Straighten up and act tough!”

Taikichi remained silent and continued hunching over small, so father grew increasingly irritated; yet finding no sufficient reason to strike his own child, he merely clicked his tongue in frustration.

"You hopeless idiot! There’s nothing in this world to be afraid of! Come on out, then! Tengu, mountain gods, Etemono—whatever you are, show yourselves here! I’ll thrash every last one of them!"

Driven both by a desire to embolden his son’s timidity and secondly by an inexplicable irritation that had become unbearable, he grabbed a thick branch from the bonfire and recklessly swung its still-burning end about. With a demeanor suggesting he’d strike down any opponent who appeared, he stomped out toward the hut’s entrance.

When he rushed out, there stood a man outside, and the instant they met, the sparks from Juubei’s wildly swung branch scattered across the man’s face.
The traveler must have been startled, but Juubei was equally shocked.
Both remained silent for a while, glaring at each other, until finally the traveler let out a loud laugh.
He involuntarily burst out laughing.

“I must apologize for my terrible rudeness.”

“Oh, not at all—” The traveler responded with a courteous nod. “I should be apologizing for intruding so suddenly. The truth is, I’ve been crossing mountains since dawn and am utterly exhausted.”

The source of the eerie song that had frightened the boy was none other than this traveler. Having lost his way in the mountains of Kiso Ontake—where people say it stays cold even in summer—he had likely come seeking the smoke of this bonfire to rest his weary legs. He had sung to forget his fatigue. He had come drawn by the fire’s warmth. This was typical traveler behavior and nothing unusual. As this hut stood alone in the area, lumberjacks and hunters would sometimes stop by for a smoke break. Wayfarers who’d lost their path would occasionally come asking for hot water. Such occurrences being commonplace, the kindhearted Juubei welcomed this traveler too, seating him before the smoldering fire of green wood.

The traveler was a young man of about twenty-four or twenty-five—slightly pale-complexioned, with thin, pointed cheeks, yet his round eyes brimming with warmth gave him a gentle appearance. On his head he wore a light brown fedora with a wide brim; his high-collared striped Western suit wasn't particularly shabby; dressed in short trousers with tabi leggings and straw sandals for mobility, he carried a brown knapsack like a schoolboy's slung over his shoulder. Judging by appearances, Juubei secretly assessed he was likely either an official from the prefectural office here to inspect the Imperial forest or, less charitably, a regional peddler selling medicines—something along those lines.

In such situations, the master's questions to the traveler followed an age-old formula.

“From which way did you come?”

“From Fukushima way.”

“Where you headed next…?”

“Over Ontake and toward Hida…”

While they were saying such things, it seemed night had fallen. The lamp-less hut interior was dimly illuminated by the blazing bonfire's reddish glow, through which Juubei's angular face and the traveler's sharp-featured face appeared faintly floating amidst swirling smoke.

II

“Thanks to you, I’ve warmed up considerably,” the Traveler said.
“It’s still late September, yet it gets bitter cold around here.”

“Night brings the chill,” Juubei answered as he fed branches into the bonfire.
“Why, up on Komagatake they had a man freeze to death come August.”

At these words, the Traveler hunched his coat collar about his neck and nodded as if chilled anew.

Nearly half an hour had passed since this man’s arrival, yet throughout it all Taikichi remained motionless in his corner like a crab cornered by children, curled tight and small.
But he couldn’t hide forever.
The one he feared had found him at last.

“Oh! There's a child here.”
“It being so dimly lit, I hadn't noticed until now.”
“Well then, I've something nice here.”

He opened the knapsack hung around his neck and took out a newspaper-wrapped bamboo sheath package. Inside were many nori-wrapped sushi rolls.

"When crossing mountains, I thought it would not do to go hungry, so I bought plenty of provisions—but one cannot possibly eat so much..."
"Look here."
"There is still more like this over here."

Another bamboo sheath package contained leftover rice balls and what looked like shredded dried squid.

“Now then, please give this to the children.”

For those who lived year-round in these parts, even nori-wrapped sushi remained quite a rarity.
Juubei gladly accepted the offering.

“Hey, Taikichi.
“The guest’s given us something real nice here!”
“Get over quick and say thanks.”

Normally Taikichi would come bouncing out all smiles, but tonight he didn’t even turn his head.
He stayed frozen stiff like some invisible awful hand had grabbed him by the scruff.
What with that business earlier and having company too, Juubei couldn’t let this slide without some scolding.

“Quit your dawdlin’!
“Get over here!
“I said get over here!”

“Yeah,” Taikichi answered faintly.

“That ain’t no ‘yeah.’ Get over here!” Father barked.
“You’re being rude to our guest.”
“Hurry up and come here.”
“Ain’t ya comin’?”

The short-tempered father took a green branch that happened to be nearby and struck his child’s back.

“Ah! That’s dangerous!”
“He might get hurt!” the Traveler hastily interjected.

“What—whenever he don’t listen, I give him a whack.”
“Come on, brat! Get over here!”

There was no helping it now. Taikichi, like a snake emerging from its hole, made his already small body even smaller and stealthily crawled closer behind his father. Juubei opened the bamboo sheath package and thrust it before the child’s eyes; the red ginger accentuated the bluish-black seaweed, looking so delicious to the child’s eyes.

“See? It looks tasty.”
“Say thank you and eat up quick.”

Taikichi remained hidden behind his father and stayed silent.

“Please eat up,” the Traveler also urged with a laugh.

Hearing that voice, Taikichi trembled again. As if assailed by some invisible force, he clung desperately to his father's back, holding his breath entirely for moments. Why did this traveler fill him with such dread? While childhood shyness might explain it ordinarily, Taikichi had never been a timid boy by nature. Raised far from human settlements, he typically craved companionship intensely. Lumberjacks, hunters, unknown wanderers—all who entered this hut became friends to little Taikichi. Whoever crossed his path would be greeted with an affectionate "uncle." Yet tonight alone, his fear surpassed mere wariness of strangers, becoming visceral revulsion toward this particular man. Though the Traveler dismissed it as childishness, his father—knowing the boy's usual temperament—couldn't shake an uncanny suspicion.

“Why aren’t you eating?
“The guest went through the trouble of giving us this delicious food—why aren’t you eating it?”
“Stupid kid.”

“Oh, please don’t scold him so.”
“Children can sometimes get suddenly contrary depending on their mood, you know.”
“Well, we can just let him eat later,” the Traveler said soothingly with a hint of laughter.

“If you don’t eat, Father will eat it all up.”
“You hear me?”

When Father looked back and asked, Taikichi nodded slightly.
Juubei spread out the leather wrapper on a nearby stump and, in the blink of an eye, stuffed five or six nori-wrapped sushi rolls—like rusted iron rods—into his mouth.
Then he poured hot water from the kettle, offered it to the guest, and guzzled it down himself.

“By the way,”
“Do you drink sake?” the Traveler asked with a laugh.

“Sake?
“I do drink...”
“Love it, but times like these make it hard to come by.”

“Then I’ve got just the thing here.”

The Traveler opened his knapsack and produced a large bottle of sake.

“Ah, sake!” Juubei said, drool dripping from his mouth.

“How about it? A drink to ward off the cold….”

“Perfect! Let’s heat it up right away.”
“Yeah, you’re in the way.”
“Get the hell outta here!”

Pushing away his child clinging to his back, Juubei hurriedly took out a sake flask from the nearby shelf. Then he added branches to the bonfire and transferred the liquor from bottle to flask. Taikichi—shaken off by his father—wandered like a baby monkey abandoned by its handler, but when through the smoke he glimpsed the traveler’s face, he immediately began trembling violently and stayed facedown on the straw mat without looking up again.

“Good evening….”
“Mr. Juubei, you there?”

Someone called out from outside.
A hunter around the same age as Juubei was leading a large black dog.

“Mr. Yashichi? Come on in,” Juubei answered while preparing the heated sake.

“Looks like you’ve got a guest here,” said Yashichi as he lowered the gun from his shoulder and moved to step into the hut—when the black dog suddenly began growling at something it saw.

“What’s this! What’s this! This here’s Mr. Juubei’s home! Hahaha!”

Yashichi laughed while scolding, but the dog refused to settle. It dug all four paws into the earth like claws gripping soil—ears pricked forward, eyes glaring wide—as it kept unleashing savage growls.

“Blackie! What’re you barkin’ at? Scat! Scat!” Juubei shouted from inside too.

Yashichi moved closer to the bonfire and greeted the Traveler. Outside the hut, the dog still growled.

“You came at a good time.”
“Truth is, I just got this from our guest here,” Juubei said boastfully, shaking the sake flask.

“Oh! We’ve got ourselves some sake?”
“Mighty fine luck this is! Thank ye kindly, sir.”

“No need for such thanks—it’s barely enough to matter. But do have some to take the chill off.”
“Pardon the leftovers, but let this serve as your snack...”

The Traveler took out wrapped rice balls and shredded dried squid.
There were still a few nori rolls left.
Juubei and Yashichi, who couldn’t resist alcohol, drank and ate without reservation.
Though still early in the night, the depths of the mountains were silent, save only for the occasional mountain wind sweeping over the peaks that sounded like great waves crashing ashore.

The sake wasn’t exactly top-shelf, but for these two men accustomed to local brews, it was nothing short of divine nectar.
Feeling increasingly awkward about being the only ones drinking, they occasionally offered the Traveler a cup as well, but he would always smile and shake his head.
Outside the hut, the dog kept barking as if it couldn’t wait.

“What a noisy brute,” Yashichi muttered. “That brute must be hungry. Shall I give this brute one of these rice balls?”

He took a rice ball and tossed it lightly, but it didn’t roll all the way outside—instead, it fell onto the earthen floor at the entrance and stopped there.
The dog, seeing the food, stuck its head into the entrance, but as soon as it saw the Traveler’s face, it suddenly began barking madly, baring its sharp fangs and trying to leap at him.

“Shoo! Shoo!”

Both Juubei and Yashichi tried scolding and driving it away, but the dog only grew increasingly frenzied as if possessed and leaped into the space before the bonfire.
The Traveler remained silently glaring.

“I’m scared,” Taikichi burst into tears.

The dog barked even more wildly.
The child cried; the dog barked; inside the narrow hut was utter chaos.
Feeling too sorry for the guest’s sake, even the normally indifferent Juubei frowned slightly.

“Ain’t nothin’ to be done.”
“Yashichi, you’d best take your dog and head home now.”
“Hmm, overstaying my welcome would just cause trouble.”

Yashichi thanked the Traveler several times and hurriedly drove the dog out as he departed.
No sooner had he done so than he turned back slightly and called Juubei outside.

“There’s something strange going on,” he whispered to Juubei.
“Don’t you think tonight’s guest might be a monster?”

“Don’t talk nonsense!”
“Since when do etemono treat people to sake and sushi?” Juubei scoffed.

“Well, that’s true, but…” Yashichi said, still tilting his head in doubt.
“Ain’t nothin’ we can see with our eyes, but maybe Blackie here’s seein’ somethin’ strange with his.”
“This one’s far smarter than any human, after all.”

Juubei had long known well that Yashichi’s bear-like black dog was exceptionally clever.
Earlier that spring, when a large monkey had come sneaking around this hut, Blackie—though sprawled by the bonfire—had instantly sensed it, given chase, and finally killed it.
That Blackie should now be barking and lunging so fiercely at tonight’s guest might mean there was some reason behind it.
Remembering how his own child kept trembling in fear of that traveler, Juubei found himself filled with an unpleasant feeling.

“But there ain’t no way that’s an Etemono.”

“I think so too, but…” Yashichi said, still wearing an expression that suggested it didn’t sit right with him. “No matter how you look at it, it’s strange that Blackie’s barkin’ so wild at that guest for no reason. Ain’t nothin’ triflin’ about this, if you ask me. How ’bout we try lettin’ off one shot?”

With those words, he took up the gun again and fired a shot into the air.
The gunshot's report echoed through the area, and the forest's sleeping birds startled awake.

When Juubei quietly turned back and peered inside, the Traveler remained sitting without the slightest change in posture, still calmly before the smoky bonfire.

“Nothin’ happenin’?” Yashichi asked in a low voice.
“How strange.”
“Well, ain’t nothin’ to be done.”
“I’ll be headin’ back now, so you’d best keep your guard up.”

Driving off the still-barking dog, Yashichi headed down toward the foothills.

III

Until now, he hadn’t noticed anything unusual, but ever since Yashichi had startled him, even Juubei had begun to feel an inexplicable unease. He must not be an etemono—Juubei told himself even as he found he could no longer feel the same familiarity toward the traveler as before. When he silently turned back inside, the Traveler asked him.

“What was that gunshot just now?”

“The hunter just fired a warning shot.”

“To scare…”

“We get etemono showin’ up around here from time to time, see. Even if some beast gets ideas above its station and tries to mock humans, that just won’t fly,” Juubei said, peering into the other’s face as if probing, but the man listened unfazed.

“What is an Etemono?”
“Is it a monkey?”

“That’s right. No matter how thick their shells get, they’ll never match humans.”
“No matter how thick their shells get, they’ll never match humans.”

Even as he spoke, Juubei cast his eyes toward the large hatchet lying there.
If it came to blows, he had secretly prepared himself to split the man’s skull with that hatchet—but since his target seemed utterly oblivious, Juubei felt his own tension ebb away.
As suspicions of this being an etemono gradually faded, he reconsidered that this must simply be an ordinary traveler after all.
Yet this respite proved brief, for the Traveler began speaking anew.

“Since crossing the mountains now would be quite difficult, might I trouble you to let me stay here tonight?”

Juubei was at a loss for a reply.
Had he been himself an hour earlier, he would have gladly consented without hesitation; now, however, he found himself faltering over that reply.
Though he thought it impossible, he couldn't bring himself to let this traveler—who seemed shadowed by some dark aura—remain in his hut until morning.

He refused apologetically.

“I appreciate your offer, but I’m afraid that won’t be possible.”

“Is that not possible?”

Whether real or imagined, the Traveler’s eyes glinted sharply.
His eyes, which had been full of charm, suddenly changed to look as fierce as a beast’s.
Juubei shuddered but refused once more.

“I’m afraid if I let strangers stay, the police will make quite a fuss about it.”

“Is that so?” The Traveler nodded with a mocking laugh.
His face felt uncannily eerie again.

The bonfire was gradually weakening, but Juubei no longer tried to add fresh branches.
A mountain wind sweeping down from dark peaks rattled the hut’s door, while somewhere a monkey cried out.
Taikichi had been huddled in a corner with a mat over his head since earlier.
Juubei became gripped by indescribable terror and began suspecting this traveler anew.
He mustered his courage and attempted to drive out this unsettling traveler.

“After all, if we keep sitting here like this, night’ll only get deeper. You’d best decide quick—either turn back toward Fukushima or make your way up through Kurozawaguchi Pass overnight.”

“Is that so?” The Traveler laughed again.

His pale face, faintly illuminated by the dying bonfire’s light, seemed nothing like that of a living human, and Juubei could bear it no longer.
However, thinking that perhaps his own fearful eyes were making him see such strangeness, as he repeatedly hesitated to reach for the hatchet lying there, the traveler abruptly stood up.

“Then I shall turn back toward Fukushima.
“And tomorrow I’ll hire a mountain guide and make the climb.”

“Do that then. That’s the safest course.”

“I must apologize for intruding.”

“No, I’m the one obliged for your company,” said Juubei, half-pitying and half-resentful, as he courteously saw him out to the entrance.

"If he were a genuine traveler, it would be pitiable."
"If it were an etemono trying to deceive people, it would be a detestable wretch."
With an anxiety that settled into neither pity nor resentment, he watched the Traveler’s retreating figure become enveloped by the vast darkness.

“Papa. Did that person go away somewhere?” Taikichi crawled up as if revived to life. “That scary person’s gone away. Good riddance.”

“Why was that person so scary to you?” Juubei asked his son.

“That person’s definitely a ghost. Not human at all.”

“How’d you know it was a ghost?”

Taikichi lacked the knowledge to give a proper explanation, but he kept trembling and insisting the traveler was a ghost. Juubei remained half-convinced.

“Anyway, let’s just go to sleep.”

Juubei was about to close the front door when a man in a lined kimono with narrow sleeves and straw sandals entered again.

“Did a man in his mid-twenties wearing Western clothes come here just now?”

“He did come.”

“Which way did he go?”

Pointing in the indicated direction, the man hurried out—and almost immediately, the sound of gunshots rang out one after another from the forest a few hundred meters ahead.
Juubei immediately went out to look, but the sound stopped after two or three shots.
As he stood there uneasily wondering whether some conflict had arisen between the previous traveler and the current man, the man in narrow sleeves soon hurriedly returned.

“Give me a hand—there’s an injured person.”

When I ran with the man through the forest, there lay the Traveler collapsed on the ground.
He was gripping a pistol in one hand.

“What was that traveler?” I asked.

“He was from Kofu, I heard,” Mr. Juubei explained.
“Then, about a week prior, there’d been a young man and woman staying at a hot spring inn in Suwa. According to the inn maid’s account, the woman—her face pale—had been weeping softly every day, while the man seemed to be scolding and threatening her in some manner. Despite the woman’s evident reluctance, he’d apparently forced her to leave with him.”
“Even so, nothing unusual happened during their stay. But after they left—no one knows exactly where or how it occurred—the woman was found by the roadside, her face to chest brutally hacked to pieces.”
“Naturally, suspicion fell on the man accompanying her, and a police detective had pursued him all the way to the Kiso Road.”

“So, the man in the narrow sleeves who came afterward was that detective, then.”

“That’s right.”
“The man in Western clothes from before was the culprit who murdered the woman.”
“Finally cornered, he fired two pistol shots at the detective but missed. Seeming to think it was all over, he then shot himself in the throat and died.”

When Father and I exchanged glances and remained silent for a while, the innkeeper interjected.

“So was there a woman’s ghost clinging to that man’s back? Seeing how even the child and dog carried on like that…”

“That’s exactly why,” Mr. Juubei said, gulping as if to elaborate. “I suddenly got chills too. But I didn’t see a damn thing. Yashichi apparently didn’t see anything either.” But the child trembled in fear. “The dog howled like a madman. There must’ve been something strange going on.”

“Of course,”
“Even things adults can’t understand, children can.”
“And what humans can’t comprehend, other animals might perceive,” Father said.

I wondered if this applied to me too.
Yet whether what frightened them was the shadow of the Traveler’s heavy sins or the ghastly form of the murdered woman remained impossible to determine for certain.
Either way, with the sensation of being watched from behind, I gradually edged closer to Father.
Just as that boy Taikichi had clung to his father…

“Even now, when I think about that time, it doesn’t sit right with me,” Mr. Juubei said again.

Outside, a dark rain continued to fall.
The innkeeper silently added brushwood to the hearth.
—The scene from that night remains vividly etched in my mind to this day.