Pathway to Japanese Literature

I

When Shūkichi visited the Akayama household in the mountains of northern Echigo, he first inquired about the Buddha statue as though he had traveled all that way expressly to see it.

The Buddha statue was said to be Miroku.
That statue bore a feminine countenance reminiscent of Kannon—gentle in aspect, seated in a half-lotus posture with its right hand lightly propping its cheek, a figure one might interpret as either serene contemplation or tranquil repose.
Regarding the mysterious smile carved into this Miroku statue’s gentle visage, he had frequently heard accounts beforehand from his friend Nozawa.
Nozawa’s sister had married into the Akayama household as the wife of its head.

Tamaki Shūkichi was neither a researcher nor a collector of Buddha statues, nor did he possess any particular expertise in ancient culture, so he had rarely felt interested in talk of this Buddha statue.

When summer approached, he spoke with Nozawa about traveling.
At that moment, Nozawa suggested spending a summer at the Akayama household.
Since it was in the mountains, it would be cool—and moreover, there was said to be a village in a nearby valley where hot springs bubbled up.
It was a large house where about ten guests wouldn’t stand out at all, and given how remote it was with few entertainments to speak of, they welcomed casual visitors.
“If you can endure minor inconveniences like no beef or seafood,” Nozawa said, “it’s better than putting up with shamisen music and noise from next door at some mountain hot spring inn.”

“The household with the Miroku statue bearing that strange smile,” Shūkichi said as the thought struck him.

“That’s precisely the household,” Nozawa replied. “Now then—” he continued, launching into his account. “The daughter there—my niece, that is—do you dislike such forced interpretations? As she matured, she began taking on the Miroku statue’s temperament.”

“Two years back, when she turned nineteen, she had an arranged meeting with the son of a wealthy farmer from a neighboring village to discuss marriage. They say when she returned from the meeting, she laughed while remarking, ‘I’ve never seen such a handsome man! He was prettier than the male actors in girls’ operas!’ as if she’d been observing someone else’s prospective groom.”

“When asked if she fancied him, she declared she adored him, so they proceeded with the engagement. Yet when the wedding was mere days away, she secretly called the groom’s family and announced she’d decided to cancel it.”

“The marriage arrangement dissolved, but her attitude remained utterly blasé—she showed no sign of considering her actions consequential. Her parents found themselves at a loss over how to reprimand her.”

“This marked her first eccentric act. Next came sneaking out of the estate at night to vanish into the mountains. She claimed she’d suddenly thought dying would be more beautiful.”

“A girl who’d never shown interest in reading even one literary work—so carefree you couldn’t picture her weeping—though perhaps I’m partly responsible, being one who fixates excessively on feminine mysteries. Yet sensing something secretive in her eyes reminiscent of Miroku’s smile... she’s the sort who leaves you vaguely uneasy about how things might end.”

When midsummer arrived and the day finally came for their departure to the Akayama household, an unavoidable matter arose that prevented Nozawa from accompanying them.
Since preparations had already been made at their destination, it was decided Shūkichi would go ahead alone.
Nozawa was supposed to settle his affairs and follow within four or five days.
—yet ultimately he found himself consumed by obligations all summer long, never once appearing throughout Shūkichi’s extended stay.

Even after hearing several stories involving the daughter, Shūkichi had never seriously contemplated the mysterious smile of the Buddha statue.
Indeed, spending a summer at a hot spring inn would have been equally mundane.
Even if it was somewhat stifling, spending a summer at a mountain mansion might hold some novelty.
Shūkichi had thought that way and ended up half-heartedly deciding to go.

Shūkichi asked the seventeen- or eighteen-year-old maid who had shown him to his room where the Buddha statue was located.
The maid had fair white skin and features so foreign one might even suspect her eye color was blue; he thought that had she worn suitable clothing, she would have stood out even in the city.
He found himself thinking that this one was better than the Buddha statue.

“It’s right there.”

Surprisingly, the maid indicated the room’s alcove with her gaze in an extremely nonchalant manner.
Indeed, there was the Buddha statue.
It was a wooden statue of human-like proportions—so much so that having asked about it without noticing its presence felt embarrassingly conspicuous.

“Do they always keep it in this room?”

The maid, unable to comprehend Shūkichi’s question, stared vacantly at his face for a moment. It was apparently a special guest room rarely used ordinarily, but since Nozawa favored the Buddha statue, they had specifically allocated this room for the two of them’s use.

Thus, before he had seen the daughter’s face, he first laid eyes on the Buddha statue.

Indeed, it was the Miroku statue.
It was seated on a pedestal, with its right foot placed atop its left knee.
Then, propping its cheek with the light touch of its right fingertips and assuming an air that was neither pensive nor restful, it seemed to be smiling faintly.
If it were to stand up, it would likely take on the form of a woman as agile as a young deer four feet seven or eight inches tall.
The torso and limbs were somewhat slimmer compared to the face, resembling Asuka-Tenpyō period Buddha statues and diverging considerably from realistic bodily lines; yet the remarkable thing was how an overflowing, dewy sensuality emanated from those unrealistic curves.
The bodily lines of Asuka-Tenpyō period statues typically symbolize inner serenity, transcending mere sensuality.
In Kannon and Jizō statues from the Kamakura period, there is something that leaves viewers dumbfounded by the troubling sensuality—as if the craftsmen had sought their idealized bodies there.
However, the lines of those bodies differed from the symbolic techniques of Asuka-Tenpyō, employing a realistic approach that typically resembled actual female forms.
This Miroku distorts reality in a dreamlike manner akin to Asuka-Tenpyō works, but from its profoundly unrealistic physique, when observed, it radiates a dewy sensuality that seems ethereal.
When one stared, that sensuality—which seemed to exist in an immeasurable distance—pressed in so close that one was overcome by an eerie feeling.

When one returned to the facial expression after noticing this sensuality, the mystery of the smile began to become much clearer. It differed from the Mona Lisa’s smile as well. It was a more genuine and understated smile. And unless one consciously looked for the smile, it was nothing more than a faint shadow of a smile that one might easily overlook. Yet once one became aware of it, it became as though one had been captivated by the smile, entwining itself deeply within. Moreover, the beauty of that face was profoundly calm and pure. It was a serenity surpassing the coldness of a gemstone sated with blood. Moreover, it was tranquil.

II

The village was called Kigure.

Measured by eye from the river’s surface, it was no more than an unremarkable mountain hamlet surrounded by small hills two to three hundred meters here and four to five hundred meters there—yet the one place he found beautiful was when he descended into a rather deep valley and saw the stillness of a small, deep pool.

That was probably an event that occurred five or six days after arriving in this village.
Guided by the daughter of the Akayama household, Shūkichi left the lingering chorus of cicadas overhead and descended into this dim valley bottom even in broad daylight.

The daughter’s name was Katsurako.
It was read as Katsurako, apparently.

From the moment he arrived in Kigure Village—first taken aback by the maid’s beauty—whenever he walked through the village afterward, he would often encounter beauties who made him involuntarily turn his head: girls drawing well water under thatched roofs, women descending mountains with firewood on their backs, or others drying gourd strips in the sunlight along the thoroughfare.
Of course, in such mountain settings, not having anticipated such beauties resulted in an excessive sense of wonder—but the litheness of women clad in gaiters and arm covers, who emerged abruptly from the evening haze in the mountain shadows into his very presence, evoked the pleasing elasticity of a panther and imparted fresh associations never before felt on city streets.

Among these, what remained particularly vivid in the mind was that maid’s foreign-looking face, reminiscent of ancient Greek women.
Being too perfectly composed, it somehow felt as though its presence was significantly diminished.
This maid was called O-Tae.
In this village, she was apparently a daughter from an upper-class family.

Katsurako did not possess the orderly beauty of O-Tae.
What was alive were her eyes.
Because of this, her forehead and cheeks were vividly animated, and even the shadows around her eyes and nose seemed perpetually in motion.
And her movements were agile; each motion carried an air of abruptness, making the space she occupied seem to flicker with constant shifts emanating from her very being.

To put it plainly, while keeping O-Tae in mind, Shūkichi somehow felt a sense of resistance to the fact that Katsurako’s fresh presence had already erased the illusion of O-Tae. He felt a sorrow for the illusion that had been erased. He also felt a sorrowful compassion.

It might have been those feelings that caused this act.

One day, Shūkichi spoke to Katsurako about the beauties he had seen here and there in the village, and then particularly about O-Tae’s rare beauty.

“I saw women descending from the mountains with a beauty as supple as panthers.”
“There was also a girl drawing well water in twilight mist whose form felt like vital essence born of nature.”
“I even encountered a sunlit woman who seemed ready to challenge the sun itself, her will forged through some wild beast’s reason for being.”
“These people enchanted me through their distinct beauties.”
“This village’s scenery appears utterly ordinary—but that’s because it’s merely the shell left after birthing those vital essences of beauty. Yet when those beauties grace it, even this plain landscape revives like fresh life.”
“Now that you mention it, cities work similarly.”
“There are women embodying architecture’s vital essence, others radiating speed’s vital force.”
“But urban nature never revives itself through its beauties like this mountain does.”
“If anything, city nature seems to prop up those women instead.”
“Your village’s beauties dazzle as if perpetually resurrecting their homelands.”
“But your maid O-Tae’s beauty astonished me most.”
“Yet that sculpted perfection alone appears rootless.”
“This village’s nature contains no womb that birthed her beauty—no thread connecting O-Tae to these mountains.”
“Her beauty carries rootless emptiness and sorrow.”
“Stare too long and her form dissolves into nothingness—a helpless void consuming all.”
“Thus this summer squandered on idle travel seems destined to become my most indelible memory.”

It was then that Katsurako responded.

“In this village, there is another girl more beautiful than O-Tae, you know.”
Her voice held not a trace of affectation. She laughed.
Though one couldn’t ignore the fiery light in her eyes, this was simply how an innocent child—one who clung fiercely to play above all else—would always look.
“A girl named Shiono, exactly my age.”
“Come now,”
“Let’s go meet her at once.”
“Go get dressed up.”
“And steel yourself to never return to Tokyo.”
“You wouldn’t find a beauty like hers even in the city.”

Katsurako had already fluttered to her feet, behaving as though she harbored no doubt that Shūkichi would rise to follow her. That said, there was no air of presumption about her. Nor was there any air of domineering about her. Children always have such a way of innocently deciding things on their own like this.

And so, the two ended up setting off together. It was on this day that they saw the dimly lit deep pool at the valley bottom.

The two went to Shiono’s house.
However, Shiono was not there.
She had gone out for a swim, it was said.
So the two turned their steps toward the bathing spot—which was precisely this valley bottom.

The valley bottom was surrounded by granite cliffs on all sides. The cliff face ahead must undoubtedly have exceeded two hundred meters in height. Both upstream and downstream, the flow abruptly bent and vanished beyond the rock walls, so the deep pool lay hushed like an ancient marsh at the base of the cliffs, cradling a deep azure hue. When one saw the water’s thick coloration, it was only natural to think of guardian deities or fairies; even water scooped into one’s palm seemed to take on that same viscous, deep azure tint. It was a carpet of deep-stagnant color with such density that one could almost walk upon the water. Had one come down to this valley bottom alone, the eeriness would have been too intense—being solitary, one couldn’t bring oneself to even dip a foot into the water.

However, the actual water depth was at most up to an adult’s chest, appearing just right for swimming.
The sky overhead was small, and looking up while swimming seemed to bring an inexplicable happiness.

Shiono was there.
Three naked women were resting on a rock.

III

Descending to this valley bottom was no ordinary effort.
They collided with tree trunks, clung to them, found themselves unexpectedly hanging from branches, and broke into a sweat trying to keep from falling.
When they finally emerged from between the trees, descending without slipping on the rocks became another ordeal.
He couldn’t fathom why girls would deliberately descend such a treacherous path just to bathe. However, when they finally reached a point where the water’s surface became visible and he saw the deep, hushed color quietly pooled below, even Shūkichi found himself momentarily forgetting his weariness.
It was indeed beautiful.
It was a beauty that felt different from the world where we live.

However, what surprised Shūkichi as much as the water's color was Katsurako's form along the path descending to the valley bottom.

Of course, she too collided with tree trunks and perilously clung to branches—no different in that regard—but even in these labored movements, her execution remained remarkably composed. But this was not the practiced ease of someone familiar with the path. Even in moments when averting a fall demanded her utmost effort at the precipice of danger, it signified she had never forsaken the natural will to preserve that beauty. Yet there was no trace of contrivance betraying any awareness of it. Everything was profoundly nonchalant, free yet natural. Even her stumbling form held beauty. The sight of her planting her foot precariously and seizing a branch was equally comely. Her flashing legs, flowing hands, darting hips—none ever lost their capacity to stir fresh emotion.

Shūkichi could not help but doubt. How could Katsurako herself remain unaware of this beauty? The utter absence of any trace that she was conscious of it grated on him all the more. He tried to recall that natural expression of hers—utterly devoid of affectation—when she had answered that there existed a beauty surpassing O-Tae named Shiono. There was not a shadow of scheming in her. Even the fire burning in her eyes only served as proof of her innocence. Precisely because there was no room to extract ulterior motives, he felt all the more incensed—and then began to hate her slightly. She instinctively knew her own charm. Worse still, her instinct had fully grasped that Shūkichi could no longer extricate himself from that charm. The beauty of O-Tae and Shiono—who had declared herself the village’s foremost beauty—she likely had no memory of ever comparing them to herself. She seemed to have placed herself on an entirely separate plane. Shūkichi found himself wanting to believe it was so.

Yet the moment one's gaze inadvertently caught even a single part of Katsurako—her flashing legs, her flowing hands, her darting hips—all anger and hatred would instantly scatter without a trace, every thought swept away by that piercingly lucid emotion permeating their vision.
Look at Katsurako's poised stance—kicking away the root she'd stumbled over with a grunt, glaring at the next steep slope.
Shūkichi found himself swallowed by this pleasant radiance, unable to banish distractions from his daze.
He teetered on the brink of releasing a sigh laden with awe.

In the end, she was a girl devoid of both ulterior motives and schemes.
When one stood before her, one’s heart would inevitably be left with no other recourse.
She was utterly innocent and radiant.
She would instantly grow close to people; knew no boundaries; was unaccustomed to reservations; bore no malice.
She was generous and kind.
Even if there were thorns that wounded people in the end, that was not her will.
She was a lovely, natural-born witch.
Even with secrets nestled within her being, there was an air of transparency that granted others a sense of purity.
People might be able to capture her fragrance from this girl, but not her body odor, he thought.

“My, how gorgeous!”
“Shiono!”
“Don’t you dare put on that kimono!”

Katsurako shouted as she descended the rock.
The sharp cry reverberated through the valley’s silence, echoed off the surrounding rock walls multiple times, then faded into the depths as its lingering notes vanished.

Katsurako jumped down onto a rock at the water’s edge.
Then she moved to Shiono’s side and placed a hand on her bare shoulder.
She pressed her palm against Shiono’s cold skin as though savoring fresh vitality flowing from within her body.

“My, what skin—it makes me want to devour you!”
“Like freshly churned ice cream.”
Katsurako pressed her cheek lightly against Shiono’s back as she spoke.
“How vexing that you alone received such beautiful skin.”
“They say Tokyo guests want to see the Queen of Kigure Village.”
“Now—put on the kimono.”

The moment those words crisply ended was precisely when Katsurako swiftly stepped away from Shiono’s side.
Katsurako was already at the water’s edge, gazing at the color of the stagnant pool.

Indeed, this quiet deep jade might have been suitable for reflecting Katsurako. If, just as one could find a beautiful woman born from each of this village’s landscapes, the valley bottom’s essence were to take form as a maiden, then Katsurako would be the most fitting incarnation. Shūkichi thought. He wanted to strip this girl completely naked and let her frolic in this water. At that moment, Katsurako looked at Shūkichi and spoke.

“The color of this valley has a bit too much ominous intensity, don’t you think? With this aqua hue’s tinge, I simply can’t bring myself to swim. Besides, I’d sink like a stone.”

Katsurako squatted at the water’s edge, dipped her fingertips into the water, and flicked them with a splish-splash.

“Cold water.”
“If I stayed in a place like this for even a minute, my frail body would waste away.”
“Shiono’s a literary girl, so she likes swimming in places like this.”

“Isn’t it that all the villagers come to this valley to swim?”

“Not at all.”
“It’s exclusively reserved for the three esteemed guests who are here.”

Indeed—Shūkichi thought. In Katsurako’s words there was something that vividly conjured before one’s eyes the lives of certain people in this village. It evoked in him both a quiet elegy and a pleasant humor.

To draw out a particular aspect of this village’s life from Katsurako’s words, one needed only to set the term “literary girl” alongside Shiono’s character—that alone sufficed. Therefore, to understand Shiono’s character, one had first to envision the anemic literary girls of urban areas and then imagine the exact opposite type—this would already come somewhat close to the mark.

If one were to have Shiono wear gaiters and arm covers, make her carry firewood, and then have her walk through the evening mist’s mountain air, she might well take on the form of a beauty wrought by this village’s vital essence—one perfectly suited to captivate the village youths. Her hips possessed the suppleness of a wild beast; her feet stepped lightly yet with springiness; there could be no doubt they evoked the keen senses of a leopardess. Have this person sit by the hearth, have the young men surround her, and place them amid blossoming idle talk where their ambitions were concealed yet their passions clumsily laid bare. Shiono’s face shone vividly, her spoken words all seemed brimming with wit, and her wild movements and high-pitched laughter—more delicately than those of any gorgeous beauties—undoubtedly aroused and captivated the youths’ passions. She was indeed the very image of a queen.

However, pairing Shiono with literature merely created a farcical effect. Already, aligning her with urban sensibilities felt unnatural. If one were to juxtapose her with culture and intellect before asking others about this girl’s impression, that resplendent radiance she exhibited when seated by the hearth surrounded by youths could no longer have existed there. People would likely have answered that they perceived dullness of the senses, a low level of spiritual beauty, vulgarity—things of that nature. Were this woman called a literary girl, ordinary people would surely have burst out laughing upon hearing it.

However, in these remote mountain hinterlands, the existence of such literary girls did not necessarily invite derision.
First, it was absurd to impose urban literary standards upon life in these deep mountains.
In this realm where one had to cross range after range just to reach a train, life unfolded without fluctuation—so uneventful that encountering someone whose name you didn’t know felt akin to witnessing a miracle.

In such an abandoned existence, one could hardly imagine there being any place for literary youths—those delicate young men—to dwell. There were likely none in reality. Therefore, since the logic that if something is lacking, there must be something else to compensate for it holds true, it followed that girls who compensated for the existence of delicate men must appear. While there was little room to cultivate delicate young men, since the girls were inherently delicate to begin with, the emergence of literary girls was no miracle.

They would pour forth simple sentiments long forgotten by urban girls—gazing up at the moon those city dwellers now ignored—and weep. With no delicate men present, the village altogether lacked the sensibility to laugh such displays to death. To the youths, these were the supreme beauties. This was how literature endured.

Though this valley bottom was said to be reserved for the three esteemed guests, even having them frolic fully nude upon its rocks with their whip-like elasticity would fail to evoke the poetic profundity of them descending the mountain in work attire of arm covers and gaiters. They stood far removed from the pure, transcendent beauty of some water spirit emerging from the valley’s depths.

The unexpected sentiment that girls with animalistic vitality—utterly disconnected from the valley’s emotions—would willingly come to bathe in this otherwise deserted pool was delightfully amusing.
In the city, this matter would be comical, but here in these mountains, it is simply natural.
It is indeed an unaffected way of life.

The youths found mystery in their lifestyle, felt awe, offered admiration; and they too accepted this with utmost sincerity and endlessly cherished their own way of life.

Shiono did indeed have well-proportioned features.
It was a face as though health and common sense drew its features.

“The village youths make it such a point of pride just to be spoken to by Shiono, you know—they become so dazed they can’t even respond.”

On the return path, while climbing that steep slope by clinging to small branches, Katsurako said to Shūkichi, who followed behind:

"Because Shiono's a literary girl, all the young men in this village apparently began turning into literary youths, and our Papa—the village mayor of Kigure—is in quite the predicament."

IV

In the north-facing detached residence of the Akayama household, a sickly boy relative had come for recuperation.
It was to escape the city’s sweltering heat.

The boy’s illness was tuberculous arthritis.

Pus would break through the flesh and emerge from around his waist and abdomen.
The boy had one leg encased in a cast.
Even when clinging to crutches, walking remained severely impaired.
He was seventeen years old.
However, due to his long convalescence, his growth had nearly ceased, and he appeared to have the youthful look of a twelve- or thirteen-year-old.

Coming to these mountains for about three months each summer to escape the heat had, over the past several years, become the sick boy’s custom.
During that period, he would go to Tokyo about once to have his cast changed.
Around the time four or five weeks had passed after changing the cast, the pus’s foul odor gradually began drifting about him.
Before long, days arrived when merely stepping into the room made the stench unbearable.
That was why the cast had to be changed.

The boy was Katsurako’s cousin.

This boy never displayed human emotions except for pain.
His parents and siblings would sometimes come to visit.
They never offered greetings upon arrival nor farewells when leaving.
Even after they had departed in this manner, he showed not the slightest hint of sorrow.
Apparently he would suddenly ask someone, "I wonder if they’ve already reached Tokyo?"—so it wasn’t that he didn’t think of those close to him.
Thus when considering the boy’s sorrowful heart, if someone were to make a compassionate reply it would prove utterly misplaced—as if declaring he wasn’t listening to any response at all, he would adopt a deathlike expression and refuse to even glance their way.

One day, Shūkichi encountered Katsurako and the boy resting under the wisteria trellis in the backyard. The boy and Shūkichi lived at opposite ends of the large building, and since the boy rarely left his room, that was the first time they had seen each other’s faces.

“Hey,” Shūkichi greeted the boy.

The boy acted as though he hadn’t noticed.

“It’s no use.”
“There’s no point engaging with someone like this.”
“He’s even less responsive than sutras recited to a horse’s ears.”

As she said this, Katsurako tickled the boy’s throat.

“Learn some human-like greetings already! Hey!”

The boy remained utterly unresponsive.
He merely moved his head with mild annoyance to avoid Katsurako’s hand tickling his throat.
He lay on a platform he had fashioned beneath the wisteria trellis.
The cast made sitting up impossible.

His complexion held a translucent waxen pallor.
He was beautiful like a doll.

“You should ask Uncle here to tell you something.”
“Use a little flattery,” Katsurako said, pressing her finger against the wax doll’s cheek.
“With that face of his, he insists on reading nothing but these ninjutsu pamphlets.”

They say dealing with the boy’s pus was a daily ordeal.

The wound protruded in such a way that it resembled rotten intestines exposed. And then there was the stifling stench of pus enveloping his face, like the smell of death. The nurse also found it repulsive. Though it was a sentiment that never surfaced, the sick boy was acutely aware of it. He disliked the nurse’s care. Therefore, at home, his mother was the one who primarily changed the gauze for him.

However, it was only during their annual stay in these mountains that his mother’s care became unnecessary. It was because Katsurako changed his gauze every day. The boy never showed any aversion to this.

Katsurako’s method was rough.
She used the tweezers like fire tongs, clattering them.

“Ugh.”
“It stinks!”
Katsurako would likely say such things.
Shūkichi daydreamed while watching the two of them.
“Put yourself in someone else’s shoes and think about it.”

As she said this, she attempted to thrust the old gauze right under the boy’s nose.
She scowled and threw it away.
Even as she acted this way, he thought of the sick boy’s heart that only grew fonder of Katsurako.

Again, Shūkichi thought.
Even as this went on, he stared at the wax doll’s cold face that never blinked.
After all, Katsurako’s actions were nothing but caprice—but had the boy not possessed that translucent wax-doll beauty, he wondered how many days this nursing would have lasted.

Shūkichi had not forgotten how Katsurako had said this while pressing her cheek against the sick boy.

“Because you’ll never grow up, it’s perfect, isn’t it?
“The year before last, last year, this year—there’s been absolutely no change at all, I tell you.”
“Because you’ll soon grow up, and I hate that.”

After such incidents, Shūkichi realized he had developed a habit of absently gazing at the Buddha statue several times a day.
If one were to link Katsurako’s character to the Buddha statue’s secretive deep stillness, there was no reason it couldn’t be done.
However, when looking at the Buddha statue, there was almost no room for such awareness to intrude.
The outstanding individuality of art creates a unique world.
That unique character did not require Katsurako’s existence.

However, after seeing the sick boy and Katsurako standing side by side, he would often gaze at the Buddha statue’s serene smile and its ethereal sensuality through special imaginings.

In front of Shūkichi’s room was a waterfall.
Rocks of various sizes piled upon one another, heaping higher and higher.
There were tree roots clinging to the rocks.
Those trees spread their branches densely overhead and never allowed the chilly shade in the waterfall basin to disappear.
Cicadas were always singing incessantly.
Even when he raised his eyes, weary from reading, his heart remained far from refreshed.

Suddenly turning around, he found himself looking at the Buddha statue.
He would rise to his feet, make his way to the Buddha statue, and end up sitting down before it.

“After all, art is a splendid thing.”

This sentiment Shūkichi felt whenever he sat down before the Buddha statue had recently become a habit.

The Buddha statue was serene.
There was none of that sharp emotionality akin to Katsurako’s flashing form intruding into Shūkichi’s vision day after day.
Nothing pierced through.
Everything was profoundly gentle.
A vast and tranquil presence pressed in upon him from afar with an overwhelming force.

It was as though he had been engulfed by endless layers of boundless transparent waves.
Vast and elusive, it offered nothing to grasp.
And yet—carved flawlessly and laid bare before his very eyes—was there not a face imbued with jewel-like beauty, a sensuality crafted from supple vitality, and a serene smile that hinted at every secret?

"When faced with something like this creature, even what we call reality’s beauty can’t hold a candle."

More than anything, it brought him a sense of peace.
As if he had shed a layer of weight, a relieved, restful repose washed over him.
In the surging harshness of reality, there was no room for such tranquil ease.
There was no doubt that this surging harshness was the allure of reality—yet here, spread out before him, lay something vast and insatiable, something that reveled in its own existence.

Shūkichi found himself pondering while mentally placing the wax-doll-like sick boy before the Buddha statue he stared at so intently. The finger Miroku pressed to his cheek glistened with pus. A thick stench of stagnant pus saturated the air. Yet Miroku’s face—propped upon that soiled finger—retained no shadow of impurity, no matter how violently his thoughts raged.

He once again imagined Miroku’s mouth sucking pus from the sick boy’s wounds.
Around the sick boy’s abdomen, there were said to be close to ten wounds.
They protruded like rotten intestines and oozed pus.
He imagined Miroku putting those protrusions into his mouth and sucking the pus.
Miroku gulped down the pus.
Then he just raised his face.
With an air of feigned ignorance, he lightly propped his cheek and smiled faintly.
The area around his mouth was thickly wet with deep decay-colored pus, fluid flowing down to his chin and dripping.

The quiet smile was radiantly beautiful.
The deep secret served only to heighten purity.
Not even the milky scent of the Virgin Mary cradling an infant to her breast existed.
"Is it because the Virgin Mary has an impurity born of having no secrets?" Shūkichi thought.

In the end, there was no other way but to think of it as supreme silence and beauty.

However, when one closed their eyes, all this striking beauty—this sensuality imbued with every subtle nuance of life—vanished without a trace.
It was a fact without the slightest exaggeration.
The beauty of this Buddha statue became impossible to depict once one averted their gaze.

At first, that had been what Shūkichi found most unsatisfying, but as days passed, it eventually became something quite pleasant. When he turned around and directed his gaze to the green shade, the green shade would become everything. That simplicity, that plainness—they had come to provide an unceasing sense of pleasure. And so he would occasionally find himself detesting the sharpness of Katsurako’s glistening emotions.

One day, O-Tae entered his room carrying tea and sweets.

Shūkichi found the waterfall somewhat noisy, closed the shoji, and was reading.
It was midsummer, but the mountain coolness meant that even in a room shuttered during the day, one felt no heat.
The room was hazy with cigarette smoke.

“Sir.”
“What if I were to open the shoji a little?” O-Tae said in a soft voice.

“Ah.”
“I see.”
Shūkichi finally understood the reason behind O-Tae’s words and exclaimed.

Shūkichi stared at O-Tae as she opened the shoji wide.
Indeed, the revealed scenery outside was refreshing as well.
However, O-Tae was beautiful.
The beauty of O-Tae’s profile; the whiteness of her complexion drawn with elegant lines.
The green shade across from her brought out O-Tae’s whiteness and was quiet.

A beauty such that not a speck of impurity existed.
It seemed to impart a vivid coolness to the eyes—crisp and clear.
When one closed their eyes, it was a beauty that could not be grasped afterward.
Beauty so striking it seemed to awaken the senses would vanish the moment one averted their gaze—gone without a trace.
That transience, too, was beautiful.
It was as though the multitude of garish impressions in this reality existed solely to obliterate the phantom of O-Tae.
That very wretchedness made O-Tae seem all the more utterly pure—without a speck of dust.

“O-Tae,” Shūkichi addressed her.
“Who do you think this Buddha statue resembles?”

O-Tae immediately smiled charmingly and answered.

“It’s the spitting image of the young mistress, wouldn’t you say?”
“Everyone shares the same thought, I assure you.”

O-Tae, too, believed without a shred of doubt.

"I see, indeed. Ah, haha."

When stated outright, it was indeed precisely so.
The resemblance he had perceived to O-Tae lay solely in this: that if one were to look away, their respective beauties would vanish in an instant.

O-Tae did not possess such a deeply secretive smile.
Nor did she possess this bewitching sensual passion.
And so, O-Tae's lips could not be soiled by pus.
The sight of O-Tae audibly gulping down pus was inconceivable.

“These sweets are from Tokyo, so I’ve been told.”

Having probably recalled the instructions she had been given, O-Tae opened the shoji wide and, while pouring hot water into the teapot to brew the tea, said this.
Immediately before his eyes came a pure white nape.
And then came a moving wrist.

Shūkichi continued gazing at that exotic, youthful face—standing there with an enchanting smile after finishing the tea preparation—as though it were nothingness.
It was about to vanish now.
Were she to leave, it would become a face that no longer dwelled even in illusions.

V

Before long, such an event occurred. Soon after, it became the prelude that would close one summer with tragedy.

The Akayama household was situated on the mountainside, overlooking the village thoroughfare below. Exiting through the back gate led to a mountain path that wound along the slopes toward the neighboring hamlet. This path cut through a dense beech forest. Where the forest seemed about to merge completely with the mountain, it opened onto the edge of a small marsh. The oily green of the mountainside vegetation hung over the marsh while beech trees encircled its flat perimeter, creating an atmosphere perpetually gloomy and damp.

Beech trees stood as towering arboreal giants. Being considered useless except as firewood and therefore rarely cut down, any mention of beeches in these mountains conjured images of unrestrained giants—beneath their canopy, even at midday’s height, not a sliver of light penetrated, leaving the stagnant depths below in constant quiet dampness.

The marsh’s surface was thickly overgrown with water chestnuts, so the color of the water could not be seen.
The edge of the marsh, with weeds growing unchecked to suggest reptiles lurking within, was gloomy, slightly sullied, and eerie.

Extending from the edge of the marsh into the mountains, crossing over one mountain brought one to a small hamlet in the neighboring settlement where O-Tae’s house stood.

O-Tae’s grandmother had been Mr. Akayama’s wet nurse. For these reasons, O-Tae’s parents also frequently visited the Akayama household, and O-Tae’s grandmother—though already over seventy—came to the Akayama house nearly every day, sitting by the kitchen hearth in what seemed like a hundred-tatami-mat space. She was spry and exceedingly cheerful. When she saw people, she would approach them with a greeting, giggling merrily; when a banquet began in the hall, she would seize the chance while serving to show off a dance. She was something like the master of the Akayama household.

For these reasons, Shūkichi quickly grew close to O-Tae’s family.

Shūkichi liked to exit through the back entrance of the Akayama household, take the mountain path, pass by O-Tae’s house, and climb up to Natsutōge—a place with an open view.
On clear days, he usually went there for a walk.
And on his way back from these walks, there were occasions when he would get engrossed in conversation with O-Tae’s parents.

One evening, when he dropped by O-Tae’s house on his way back from a walk, there she was.
O-Tae had come to her parents’ house on an errand and was just about to return.
The two of them walked back together along the mountain path at dusk.

Until that time, Shūkichi had not known what the water plants covering the marsh’s surface were called.
Having asked O-Tae, he had finally come to understand that they were water chestnuts.

The fruits of the water chestnut are said to be edible.
Shūkichi, too, had seen water chestnut fruits resembling an oni’s horns sprouting in all directions, and he had retained a memory of being startled by their bizarre shape.

“So this is the water chestnut,” Shūkichi mused fondly as he regarded the aquatic plants he had grown accustomed to seeing day after day without ever knowing their name.

“Let me see.” Shūkichi parted the weeds and attempted to descend to the marsh’s edge. He had thought to pick a water chestnut and gaze at it.

"Oh． Sir．
"That water chestnut—" O-Tae called out softly from behind．
"You mustn’t do that．"

“Hmm.”
“Is there a reason I can’t pick them?”

“Yes.”

To Shūkichi, who had come back, O-Tae smiled sweetly and said.

“Because it’s an ominous marsh, no one takes these water chestnut fruits.”

“I see.”
“So there’s an ominous legend, isn’t there?”

“Yes.”

O-Tae’s face was calm.
The face showed neither intensity in trying to emphasize the ominous story nor any fear.
It was guileless and serene.
In the twilight forest’s darkness, it floated up as beautiful as a dream.

“There are many people who threw themselves into this marsh and died.”
“Because the water is polluted, no one touches these water chestnuts.”

When he inquired about it, there turned out to be no particular legend.
The suicide victims of this village often chose there as their place of death.
It was, so to speak, this village’s Mount Mihara.
That was all it meant.

Even in such a village, there were suicides.
——Mountain, forest, valley.
And then, sky.
Villagers who came to think of themselves as no different from that same nature.
However, it was said that suicides never ceased occurring at a rate of one or two per year.
There was poverty.
There was illness.
There were also lonely people who had abandoned hope.
In this village, it was said that suicide victims were rather predominantly elderly people, and love-suicides were on the contrary rare.
Village life had few flowers and was steeped in darkness.

However, Shūkichi had swiftly forgotten the curse of this gloomy marsh.
What remained vividly were only the resplendent memories.
And what he would recall during his aimless wanderings through the beech forest was O-Tae’s face floating in the twilight mist.
A familiar feeling welled up—that her face must still exist somewhere in the forest even now.
The dark forest was now a path ablaze with flowers.
The lingering presence of O-Tae’s “Yes” seemed to hover by the marsh’s edge.

However, it was from the edge of this marsh that the dark tale truly began.

One day, as Shūkichi was taking his usual walk along the path to Natsutōge and approaching the marsh’s edge—it was again near twilight—he unexpectedly caught sight of the sick boy.

The sick boy leaned against a beech tree at the marsh’s edge and watched the marsh as dusk approached.
There was no sign of the attendant woman nearby, nor could Katsurako be seen anywhere.

It was a figure he had never seen outside the gates before, and the fact that he was completely alone was strange, but Shūkichi walked up to the boy and said, “Well now.”
The sick boy’s expression showed not the slightest hint of movement.
He didn’t even attempt to cast a glance—as usual, it was the same as always.

No matter what he was asked, he maintained an air of ignorance and did not respond.
Since this was not the first time such a thing had occurred, there was not a single clue for speculation, and it was as if the beech tree itself were speaking.
He suggested they return, but he maintained an air of ignorance.

Yet since there was no sign of an attendant, he couldn’t simply abandon the sick boy in the forest and return alone. Shūkichi reluctantly settled himself atop the thicket. Assuming this low posture made him aware of the marshland’s dampness creeping coldly inward, and the marsh’s unpleasant murkiness grew vivid.

After a while, the sick boy readjusted his crutch and detached his back, which had remained as motionless as part of the beech tree. And then, without saying a word to Shūkichi, he began bouncing lightly back along the forest path. Shūkichi also followed after him and returned.

At the Akayama household, a commotion had already arisen.
They had just begun searching for the sick boy.
He had vanished without anyone noticing.
First, they had apparently ransacked the sick boy’s private toilet.
It seemed everyone’s first thought had been that he’d fallen in there.

In any case, he had returned safely, but since he maintained his usual air of ignorance no matter what he was asked, no one dared question him.
Asking would only deepen their foolish suspicions.

“He wanted to try walking, I bet.”
“This child’s longing is to walk.”

Mr. Akayama said this.
That certainly made sense.
Mr. Akayama was exceedingly jovial and simple.
To think that someone like Katsurako—a daughter as agile as she—could have been born from him: corpulent with twenty-four or twenty-five kan of fat, there in the cool mountain depths, all alone sweating profusely, always naked and puffing away.

“My longing is to walk as well.”
“Same as the boy.”
“It occurs to me.”

Mr. Akayama shouted "Sake! Sake!" while flapping a fan against his chest and went off.

Shūkichi also promptly forgot the incident and welcomed the night.

When night came, Mrs. Akayama visited Shūkichi’s room.
Mrs. Akayama was Nozawa’s elder sister.

“It seems he was at the edge of the marsh.”
“That peculiar child—how was he behaving?”

“If you ask how he was, that boy’s condition remains unchanged regardless of time.”
“In any case, he leaned against the beech tree with that usual expression.”

Mrs. Akayama’s suspicion was suicide.

Katsurako had once attempted it too.
Mrs. Akayama could no longer take the children’s childlike innocence at face value.
Everything present in an adult’s heart exists equally within a child’s.
It was vigilance born of affection that made Mrs. Akayama harbor such fears.

“Could even a child like that ever become suicidal?” murmured Mrs. Akayama, appearing half-convinced of her own suspicions.

That many people had committed suicide in that marsh—the sick boy had also heard such stories and knew of it.
“If he were to become suicidal, then there would likely be no other recourse than heading to that marsh,” Mrs. Akayama said.

Indeed, suicide could be possible even among children.
Moreover, since the hearts of sickly children were pathologically warped, even adults’ hearts could conceive of things beyond their imagination, Shūkichi thought.
But there must be a reason.
Though he was sickly, he couldn’t believe one would commit suicide out of some abstract sense of pessimism.

Mrs. Akayama also did not speak about the basis for that concern.
It may have been a groundless anxiety with no clear basis to speak of.
Shūkichi also did not attempt to inquire.

Katsurako and the boy.
Shūkichi considered them side by side and came to understand something he hadn’t noticed before.
That was human fragility.
Its eerie allure and beauty.
It seemed ready to shatter at any moment.

Katsurako appeared to have shattered the sick boy.
Like breaking a doll.
And Katsurako herself seemed poised to shatter too.

There is a term called "playing with fire."
However, while fantasizing about this concept in relation to the two of them, Shūkichi did not truly believe it.
The boy was an invalid whose very movements proved arduous.
His heart too lay sick and exhausted—a darkness permitting no space for playful words to take root.

Consolation, and sweet words.
Even adult hearts, grown accustomed to wounds over time, found it no easy task to completely escape the sweet pleasure of pretense.
Those who had spent their entire lives in cynical speculation still retained a sweetness that reason alone could not cut through.
Only aged philosophers like Voltaire and Shaw—so it seemed—through the erosion of their vitality and physical forms, finally shed that sweetness to reveal cynicism's perfected aspect.

This boy, owing to his frail body, appeared to dwell in the hearts of aged cynics without ever traversing speculation's domain.
They said he had never offered a greeting or farewell, even during his parents' visits.
They said he had never displayed anything resembling sentimentality.
Even when gazing at Shūkichi, his eyes held the same indifference as one might show toward wood or stone.

Shūkichi could not bring himself to see any playful brightness within this boy’s heart.

Indeed, there had been room for him to be played with.
And then, eventually, he could have been broken as well.
Shūkichi thought for the first time.
That unfolded like a picture scroll.
Even so, he couldn’t bring himself to even slightly entertain the thought of suicide.

The boy’s body had already drawn so near to death that contemplating suicide was impossible.
Both arms and neck looked as though they would snap and break if someone were to grip them with a bit of force.
To kill this boy, there was no imagining any resistance, agony, or rush of blood—it seemed that simple.
Like a doll, he seemed only capable of being broken.

There, Shūkichi thought.
Katsurako must have been most aware of this boy’s fragile beauty, he thought.
Even so, he found himself wanting to reject this affection—lingering even after subtracting the pus’s foul stench—precisely because of its ghastly secret. Yet he could not refuse how, piercing through that repulsion’s surface layer, a crystalline illusion quietly seeped inward.

In the Akayama household’s backyard, there was a large persimmon tree stump.
One time, when he was walking in the backyard, one of the maids told him about the origin of this stump.

There was a manservant called Chōji at the Akayama household.
He was a small-statured man of forty-five or six.
This manservant fell from the persimmon tree, broke his leg, and became crippled.
It is said to have been last autumn.
Since then, this tree had been cut down.

Katsurako was under the persimmon tree.
Chōji had climbed the persimmon tree to pick its fruit after agreeing to Katsurako’s request.
He kept climbing higher and higher until the branch snapped and he fell.
Chōji writhed under the persimmon tree.
He desperately stared at each face of the people who had rushed over, groped for one of the persimmons that had fallen beside him, and while holding it out said, “For the Young Mistress, for the Young Mistress,” or so it was told.

Chōji was still employed by the Akayama household.
He took care of the chicken coop, but the maids said he kept drinking the eggs without permission—it was a problem.
When he saw Shūkichi, he would halt his crutch-assisted gait and, despite his small stature, put on a condescending expression.
He apparently did this with everyone.
He tried to carry himself like a philosopher, but there was an undeniable charm to it.
The maids would tease him with chants of “Gimp, gimp,” and indeed one could see why they felt compelled to mock him.
Then he would raise one of his crutches, though his demeanor lacked any real menace.
He apparently had a simpleton-like wife and seven children.

Here, too, there was a victim.
This, too, was another broken one.
The broken person knew nothing, like a wooden statue.
The broken figure so vividly recounted that time—so vividly that even now, in the soil around the stump, one could almost see the claw marks Chōji had gouged while writhing.
When he heard Chōji’s story as well, Shūkichi once again felt hatred toward Katsurako.

More than anything, what Shūkichi found most enviable was Katsurako’s elusive lightness—the kind that would surely slip away if one tried to grasp it.
It constantly made one feel secrets and betrayal, and conjured anxiety and fear of exclusive possession.
Shūkichi could not help but hate that.
Without being able to love, he had already been worn out by jealousy.

It was one thing to corrupt sages and high priests or strip ascetics of their supernatural powers—the true peril lay in being conquered by the strength of the most foolish man.
And could anyone claim she hadn’t already transformed into a hollow shell of a woman, stripped of both spark and lightness?
Shūkichi hated that too.

There existed words like a window Mrs. Akayama had opened.
It was the word “death.”
It abruptly kindled fresh thoughts within him.
This girl’s peril must have contained the hatred and jealousy of a million people.
To rescue Katsurako from that required either killing her or letting her die.
One had to break her now before it was too late.

He thought such things, but when this crisp vision of Katsurako surfaced, there was no resisting it.

O-Tae said the following to Shūkichi.

“Sir.”
“Young Mistress must seem quite adorable to you, don’t you think?”

“Well,” Shūkichi answered pompously, puffing out his chest.
“I prefer O-Tae more though.”

O-Tae did not respond at all.

“Young Mistress says she wants a photograph of a man.”
“A photograph that never grows tiresome no matter how many times you look at it.”
“Sir.”
“Please give her one.”

“I’d really like to have a photograph of O-Tae too.”

“Oh!”
“That doesn’t suit a Tokyo gentleman either.”
“My, my—you’re putting on such a bashful act.”

And so, O-Tae teased Shūkichi.

Six

Shūkichi left the Akayama household for the Zen temple nestled in the mountains and discovered before dawn the pleasure of losing himself in zazen meditation.
The temple's main hall in the early morning was wondrous.
Imbued with Sanki Hall's mountain air, it transported him to a distant realm wholly removed from the spiritual coarseness of domestic life.
It was profoundly quiet; his mind felt unlike its ordinary state yet remained placid.
This drowsiness differed from everyday sleepiness—even when monks chanted sutras, it only deepened and settled into carefree tranquility.
After sitting awhile and stepping outside where morning sunlight streamed down, he experienced a bracing clarity.
Before a week of sitting had passed, he already seemed on the verge of attaining enlightenment.

One time, as usual, he settled into the main hall where the morning sun streamed in and basked in carefree tranquility when he sensed someone who had entered late take a seat behind him. Before long, an unexpectedly vivid fragrance of perfume wafted through the mountain temple. That was unmistakably Katsurako’s—a scent he had long recognized. Shūkichi was indignant and could not help but be utterly dumbfounded. Time and again, she disrupted his enlightenment.

When he went outside, Katsurako teased him.

“You were putting on such airs of enlightenment.”
“Our guests, after spending one summer here, almost all end up taking up zazen, you know.”
“When there are no movie theaters or bars, the mountain temple becomes their substitute, it seems.”

Katsurako took Shūkichi’s hand.
While holding it with both hands, she said with a laugh.
The absence of any affectation was refreshing, and Shūkichi found himself being drawn all too effortlessly into that crystalline reality—his own figure seeming somewhat foolish to him.

“I suddenly had something I wanted to talk about, you see.”
“I must be quite the late sleeper, don’t you think? It was so hard getting up early and coming here.”
“It’s still too early for breakfast, don’t you think?”
“Let’s walk to your favorite Natsutōge, shall we?”

However, when they came to the edge of the marsh, Katsurako stopped.

“Which tree was it that Boy was leaning against?”

Upon hearing Shūkichi’s reply, Katsurako leaned against the beech trunk and gazed intently at the marsh.

“You understand, don’t you? That child was gazing at the marsh intending to die. If only he had died.”

“That’s your own fabrication, isn’t it?”

“Think nothing of it. It’s something adults wouldn’t understand,” Katsurako replied with composure. “Adults must think about dying in all sorts of complicated ways. We aren’t like that, you know. We don’t have any logic, you see. Even if I were to commit suicide, I don’t think I would actually die—that’s how it is with me, you know. It’s too utterly foolish for adults to understand. But Mama understood, didn’t she? I consulted you that night, didn’t I? Mama’s different, isn’t she?”

“What made you want to tell me that story?”

“Enough about that.”
“Mama would get angry.”
“But we rolled dice every day, didn’t we?”
“If sixteen came up five times in a row, we promised we’d die, didn’t we?”
“It’s a promise from four years ago.”
“When autumn came and it was time to part, it never came up this year.”
“This year too?”
“This year too.”
“So that day—it finally came up?”

“Then you’ve decided to stop pursuing death.”
“I suppose so.”
“That’s best.”

Katsurako did not answer that, but took Shūkichi’s hand and smiled.

“Let’s go to Natsutōge. I haven’t climbed it in about three years.”

The morning at Natsutōge was refreshing.
The gentle grassland sloped down into the mist far below, and at its base, the quiet marsh glowed.

When they descended the pass and came before O-Tae’s house, an old woman was doing laundry.

“Good morning, Granny.”

Katsurako picked up the laundry that the old woman had wrung out and laid out, and began hanging each piece to dry.

“My! Young Mistress.”

“Back when you were young, Granny, did the villagers farm terraced fields wearing topknots?”

“You must be joking. With their seven-three parted modern hairstyles—why, Sir’s head looks exactly like those young men from back then. They were quite the handsome bunch. What’s declined are the young men and the taste of local sake. The village girls and drunkards these days are pitiable creatures indeed.”

“They tied Papa to a pine tree so Granny could have her little tryst, I hear.”

“Ahahahaha!
“Young Mistress, you’ll have your own before long, I assure you.”

As for the talk of this bunch, it was truly carefree.
Katsurako slipped effortlessly into the villagers’ conversations.

Laughing as she threaded each piece of laundry onto the pole, Katsurako’s figure was unrestrained and refreshing.
There was no constricting feeling or gloominess ingrained in household labor.
To watch her was to be swept unresistingly into that crystalline passion—resistance proved impossible.

The girl who had just been speaking of suicide moments earlier was one and the same.
That one could no longer fixate on talk of suicide must have been unavoidable.
She simply slipped freely wherever she willed herself.
To attempt freezing any single instant of her in stillness would only lay bare the absurdity of such an endeavor.

VII

However, Katsurako truly threw herself and died.

It was the end of summer.

Apart from the fact that she had died, there was nothing that Shūkichi could understand.

Katsurako’s whereabouts could not be ascertained.
She might be dead.

And when people began making an uproar, Shūkichi more than anyone refused to credit their anxiety.
“It must be a joke.”
“There’s no way she’d do something like kill herself.”

Yet the people churned up that marsh.
Water chestnuts snagged their poles—nothing rose from below but turbid water breaking the surface.

If Katsurako had died, it would have been in that deep pool at the valley’s bottom.
Shūkichi entertained such thoughts.
The notion was exquisitely beautiful.
Then he ventured to share his idea with the others.
Sure enough, Katsurako’s corpse floated there.
Though Shūkichi—who had conceived this—remained entranced by the thought’s beauty, he’d scarcely believed it might prove true.
But when he heard how that beautiful thought had become fact, its loveliness evaporated at once, leaving him to gaze into desolate emptiness.

It was said that Katsurako had died having barely taken in any water.
Shūkichi remained convinced she had lost consciousness before ever plunging in.

Having completed the overnight vigil, Shūkichi departed for Tokyo the following day.

When time came to leave, O-Tae brought those crudely made sake flasks and teacups her grandmother had promised to pass along.
With nowhere left to pack them, the two rummaged frantically through the trunk.

"So I won't be seeing Miss O-Tae anymore either."

“Please do come visit again.”

“Next time I come, Miss O-Tae will have become a bride, right?”

“That may be so,” Miss O-Tae replied clearly.

“If you have a boy, Miss O-Tae, what do you intend to raise him to be?”

“A naval officer.”

“Huh.”

"My uncle is a naval sailor.
"There must be times when he receives letters and gifts from abroad."
“I grow so attached that I can’t bear to part with them even when sleeping.”

O-Tae’s heart was remarkably sincere.
The hearts of mountain people all appeared sincere.
One of the keys to understanding Katsurako might lie somewhere around there.
For Shūkichi, even conceiving such thoughts was the utmost he could manage.

He had come to know three beautiful things—O-Tae, Katsurako, and the Miroku statue—but he wondered which one would leave the deepest impression and live on in his memories.

And yet, it was before the Miroku statue that he found himself lingering.

When he stood before the Miroku statue, Katsurako too seemed to be within it, and O-Tae as well.
And within it lay all the secrets of humanity, yet not a trace of trivial life and death.

This village was a place where gambling thrived.
Generally speaking, mountainous regions in snow country are said to be mostly like that.
It was because there was no work in winter.
Mrs. Akayama would do battle with the regulars each winter—so it was said—putting on a splendid show of spectacular defeat, but what proved unexpected was Katsurako; when a match began one evening and Shūkichi watched on, she showed little attachment to the outcome.
She never became engrossed in anything.
That discovery surprised Shūkichi.
At that moment, he thought that this Katsurako most resembled the Buddha statue.

This Buddha statue seemed to possess neither remorse nor emaciation.
While the profound secret of this Buddha statue elevated its stature, it was also that very secret which diminished its presence.
There was not a trace of anything truly profound.

Even if made to suck the boy’s pus, it harbored no remorse.
Even if it killed a person, it harbored no remorse.
This Buddha statue was just so.
A countenance that showed no sign of saving people.
It was a noble countenance that tormented people, wounded them while elevating them, and brought them relief—such was its nature.

No matter how bright and transparent one may be, a living human cannot be like this.
Even Katsurako was not entirely without shadows of remorse and weariness.
If he were to search hard enough, there were things he could think of.

“How nice,” Shūkichi thought. When looking at this Buddha statue, there was no room for distracting thoughts to arise—that was what saved him.

“What happened to that boy?”

During the wake, Shūkichi asked someone.

As usual, they were said to feign ignorance.
They did not so much as change their expressions; dismissing it as if it were strangers' talk, they showed no inclination to probe into details.

Why did Katsurako die?
Why doesn't the boy die?
Shūkichi resolved to forget all those whys and strove to avoid deliberate contemplation.

I will forget that Katsurako died.
Such was his wish.

Once there was a delicate girl in these mountains.
The fact of her existence was all that remained.
This truth he learned from the Buddha statue.

When he was finally leaving the village, O-Tae came to see him off to where the bus stopped.

“Beyond that mountain, you can see another tall one, can’t you?”
On the highway, while waiting for the bus, O-Tae pointed at a mountain.
“In that mountain, long ago, there lived an ogre, it is said.”
“One time, when the ogre kidnapped the princess, a god took pity and turned her into the form of a lily, it is said.”
“They couldn’t tell which lilies were the princess, and even now, it’s said that the ogre curses those who pick them.”

“So that mountain has many lilies blooming, then.”

“They say that, but no one has actually seen it.”

And then, as the bus began to move, O-Tae said.

“Farewell.”
“Please come again around June next time.”
“The mountain greenery is most beautiful then.”

O-Tae’s pure white face grew smaller and smaller as he watched.

From the train window, while gazing at the mountain where the ogre was said to have lived, Shūkichi thought. It seemed O-Tae might be the lily spirit of that mountain, he thought. Thus, it seemed the village’s beauties had all finally determined their rightful homelands. Katsurako, too, must have been born from that valley bottom and returned to that valley bottom. Well, thinking in such a way was just the fitting conclusion to this summer’s sentimentality. Shūkichi thought.

At the light railway station, Shūkichi happened to meet Nozawa.
He had hurriedly rushed there.

“Hmm.”

“Is that so?”
“Would a girl her age just die for no reason?”
“I just can’t wrap my head around it.”
“There must’ve been a man involved, don’t you think?”

“Ahahaha.”
“That even you can’t help but think that way—how truly petty urban sentiments are.”
Shūkichi laughed boisterously.

“When you go to the mountains, try asking that Miroku statue of yours.”
“What it’s been telling you is the truth.”

“Hmph. In the span of a single summer, you’ve gone and stolen my thunder, haven’t you?”

The two of them drank sake for about two hours in the dimly lit tatami room of an inn that resembled a shady establishment.

“In that village, there’s a soba-making master named Morishita no Senzō.”
“You must’ve had that soba too.”

“Hmm.”
“In fact, I was just treated to it for my departure breakfast this morning as well.”

“Then there’s something called Kuranosuke’s bracken starch cakes.”

“I don’t know about that one.”

“They’re all masterpieces, aren’t they?”
“Rural sensibilities have bold strokes but are surprisingly delicate things.”
“And it’s the real thing, isn’t it?”

The end of summer was when the mountains all began to grow wild.
Just when it seemed to be clearing up, black clouds came rushing in, and rain started pattering down.
The cicadas' pulsing surged like waves, only to ebb away again.

Even among mountain villages in the same range, when one reached a village with a train station, they ended up feeling as if they had significantly descended to the lowlands. And then, once they had gathered around a table with Nozawa and assumed the posture of viewing things through urban sensibilities for the first time in ages, Kigure Village—from which they had just parted—attempted to be reborn in Shūkichi’s heart with a vastly different visage.

O-Tae and Miroku had already flown off to a surprisingly distant place.

The one who came vividly to life was Katsurako. Her death truly seemed such a profound loss. That deeply emotional figure cannot be forgotten. When he had been in those mountains, he had sympathized most with Katsurako’s death, but...

People’s hearts are unreliable.
In the time it took the car to traverse just twenty kilometers of mountain road, it had already come to this.
Uncharacteristically getting up before dawn to sit in meditation at the mountain temple—when I recall it now, I can’t help but want to laugh.

“I see.”
“Miss Katsurako too might have had an unexpected secret longing for death in her heart, you know.”

“Ha ha ha.”
“You were deceived by Miroku and carelessly spent the whole summer, I suppose.”

The thoughts of the two seemed to naturally settle into the same darkness of mourning the deceased Katsurako.