Pathway to Japanese Literature

I

My father died in the spring when I was eight years old. Moreover, he died by suicide.

II

That year's spring was an unseasonably warm early spring, unlike typical Shinano. Along the Chikuma River's bank that washed Ueda Town's edge where we lived, mugwort had begun tentatively sprouting through pebbles, while Mount Tarō - tracing a gentle curve across the town's sky - already showed purple-tinged haze. Clear days had continued relentlessly, making it a parched spring. Despite being snowmelt season, clear waters had dwindled; on Ueda Bridge's white-painted water gauge stake at the riverside, desiccated winter debris clung obstinately. At intervals Asama's smoke would bend and trail as glittering winds swept the horizon, stirring sparse spring dust through these small-town streets. To repeat - it was a dry spring.

That day, unlike usual, I cut my play short early and returned home. Wherever I went, I had two or three friends. And many of those friends were invariably older children. This was partly because I was remarkably precocious—able to read primers freely even before entering school, with a tendency to scorn the ignorance of children my own age—and partly because my father served as principal of the local elementary school. Under the label of “the principal’s son,” I had earned a respectful allowance into their group wherever I went; this handicap paradoxically granted me special admission. The principal’s son broke away from his playmates and returned home today. The combination of a fleeting gloom that arose without cause and a dull pain felt in his lower abdomen compelled him to make that decision.

If I get diarrhea, I'll be scolded again. I thought to myself in my small heart as I walked home. If I go home and stay quiet for a little while, it should heal. That way no one will notice, and I won't get scolded either. That's it. I'll keep quiet. If it heals while I keep quiet, I won't have to take that horrible medicine again. If I return early like this, my stomachache will surely heal right away. Playing outside until the evening chill sets in is always what makes me sick...

While turning these thoughts over endlessly in my chest, I found myself before our house before I knew it. When I suddenly noticed and raised my head, Father was just returning from the opposite direction, about to enter through the gate. He turned and looked at his small second son’s pallid, somewhat sunken complexion and those eyes faintly apprehensive of something. The son likewise stood staring at his father’s broad, faintly pockmarked face where paternal warmth and an educator’s severity blended strangely. Between them lay a vague love and vague fear spread quietly across the ground—or so the son perceived.

“Tatsuo, your stomach doesn’t hurt, does it?” Father asked me. I looked at Father’s face again in stunned astonishment. And in those eyes that restrained their usual benevolence, I felt I had perceived something like a mysterious power. Like the protagonist of some fairy tale, Father had instantly seen through what I’d tried so desperately to conceal. Realizing hiding it was utterly futile, I made up my mind in an instant and answered quietly.

“Y-yes… A little….”

“I see.” “Does your stomach hurt too?” “The truth is... mine hurts too.” “That’s why I came back,” Father said. “Yesterday we went to Shinohara together, didn’t we?” “That eel must have been bad.”

While saying this, Father took my hand—which had been anticipating a scolding—and led me into the house. I had given no thought to the cause of my stomachache. Even if I had considered it, I would have tormented myself solely as my own responsibility. But now through Father’s words I had come to fully understand. And when I realized this wasn’t solely my own problem—that Father, the very focus of all my trust, was sharing the same distress—a sudden sense of relief, almost indolent in nature, sprouted within me. So I desperately concluded in my little heart that exaggerating my stomachache as much as possible was now the best strategy. And when he saw Mother come out, making a deliberate effort, he suddenly clung to her hand and began complaining of a stomachache in a tearful voice.

“My goodness, what’s happened to this child?” Mother said. Mother failed to notice that behind these innocent tears lurked a desperate stratagem, crafted with all the cunning his young mind could muster. “It seems Tatsuo and I were poisoned by last night’s eel from Shinohara.” “Have him take the medicine and put him to bed.” “I’ll sleep too,” Father replied. “My, to think you were poisoned by eels—this is your punishment for going off alone like that.” “Tatsuo,” “Tatsuo, you must stop going off alone with Father like this.”

While directing such warm scolding at Father and me, Mother took me away and put me to bed in the back room. The sun was still brightly filtering through the shoji screens. Outside, there was a bright and lively late afternoon. That was the very heart of the time when children became most engrossed in their play.

I was left alone in the tatami room. Several times I lifted my head from where it lay buried in the bedding, thought of the sunlight shining outside, and compared it with the darkly shadowed depths of the tatami room at the back. Mother had slid two or three of the storm shutters closed, casting a chill dimness in broad daylight. Dark fusuma panels, soot-stained pillars, blackened walls—in the indistinct boundaries between these things, some large, indistinct presence sat waiting with closed eyes.…

I suddenly wondered whether I might die like this. I thought perhaps I would be led away forever from this bright world together with Father sleeping in his study across the way, taken to where that sallow-complexioned figure dwelled. As I thought this, the person with closed eyes in the darkness seemed to press down upon me even more heavily. I resolutely opened my eyes wide and stared fixedly into that gloom. At first, it seemed whoever was there appeared faintly pale against the blackness. But looking closer, it rather seemed to form an even darker shadow within the dark. In the end, I could no longer tell what it was. Yet my childish heart sensed something was there. That's it. Something was holding its breath, watching me from every dark corner. My moment of vulnerability! My death!

At that moment, a fine shudder suddenly welled up from my feet. "If I’m with Father, I won’t be scared." While thinking this, I valiantly tried to suppress it with reason. However, the small deduction that arose next—that since Father was an adult, he might not die like this—threatened me. And I would be left all alone. Then what would become of me after that? I thought that praying to the god Grandmother often spoke of was meant for times like this. And straightening myself in bed, I prayed with all my might. Please, God—if I must die, let me die together with Father. If we are to live, please let us live together. No—even if Father dies, please let me live. That’s not right. Even if I die, please let Father live.…

As I continued praying like this, I somehow lost the logical thread of my words, repeatedly making mistakes in the phrases and reversing them until I abruptly stopped. And in the next moment, it occurred to me that God might have heeded the flawed parts of my prayer—that Father alone would die while I survived, or that I alone would perish while Father lived on. If only Father were to die, what would become of me? That broad face with faint pockmarks, that somber solemn complexion, those eyes that would sometimes transform into an expression of profound gentleness. What would happen if all those things suddenly vanished from around me now? I would no longer need to go to the entrance every morning and say, "Have a safe trip." At noon, I would no longer need to deliver the lunchbox wrapped in purple furoshiki cloth to school. And I would no longer need to run Go game errands all the way to Mr. Kakeyama in Koshomachi. And then… And then… And then. Beyond that lay utter uncertainty. I grew frustrated that my reasoning could only grasp such trivial matters. Beyond such things, there must surely exist some vast sorrow if Father died. What could that be? Would I stop being the principal’s child and become a beggar? That wasn’t it. There existed some vague, sorrowful unknown world…

I lay motionless on the bedding with eyes wide open, thinking. But no matter how much I thought, I couldn't comprehend it. The terror of my own death had quietly slipped away. Yet that formless unease pressed against the small chest.

“But no—Father won’t die.” “And I won’t die either.”

Those who had been in the dark had vanished without notice. And a thin yellow line streaked swiftly through where they had been. The tilting sun, through a vertical gap in the storm shutters, cast its light diagonally into the room.

This boy now continued staring at that line of sunlight while contemplating—with tears pooling in his eyes—the chain of anxieties stretching endlessly onward and the darkly gleaming thing lying at their ultimate end. Before he knew it, he grew drowsy. The slight mental fatigue lured him into a hazy few minutes of light sleep.

At that moment, “The whole house is full of sick people!”

As he said this, the elder brother entered. When I opened my eyes, neither the giant nor the thin line remained on the wall. A dusty dimness filled the entire room, and my brother’s face appeared faintly white. The elder brother had returned exhausted from playing in different places with different friends than this younger brother. Strangely, the two never played together. Even when they occasionally played together, he was so intent on demonstrating his authority as the elder brother to others in front of the younger one that he would deliberately treat him harshly. And yet at home, he was extremely kind.

“How are you feeling, Tatsuo? Does it hurt?” The elder brother brought his face closer, brotherly sympathy shining in his boyish eyes. “Mother says it’s your punishment for having your own way.”

"I still feel like it hurts a little," I said deliberately in a timid voice, thinking this approach would best elicit Brother’s sympathy. "But what about Father? How is he doing?" I asked while recalling my earlier vague fears and anxieties as if they belonged to some distant past. “Hmm,” he replied. “Father says that after two trips to the toilet, he’s completely recovered now.”

“So he’s already up?” “No—he’s still in bed. Lying down reading a book.”

I thought everything had passed and everything had returned to calm. Relieved by this, I asked about Sister without truly meaning it. “What about Sister?” “Sister, huh? Sister’s still lying quiet as ever. When you said you got sick from the eel, she apparently said ‘I wouldn’t mind getting poisoned too if I could try eating it.’” My thoughts had already left Father and shifted to my lonely, quiet sister. Sister’s death was not far off. She had been attending Nagano Higher Girls’ School but developed a lung condition and returned home; now she lay quietly and pale in the room two doors down from where I slept, adjacent to Father’s study. Yet this anticipation of her quiet death left no anxiety in my small heart. Death’s terror lies in arriving suddenly and snatching away without warning. I felt as though I had clearly seen Sister’s white deathly face. Yet there was nothing there to threaten me.

“Brother, go to Sister’s room. I’m fine now.” “I’m fine now, so...” The elder brother left the room, his round face showing no emotion. Afterwards, only a calm, purplish darkness remained.

“I’m all right now.”

"I muttered to myself," I said. And then, in the trance-like state that had arrived after the fever and pain had somehow subsided, I closed my eyes. In that world, there was neither anxiety nor terror anymore. Before long, a deep sleep overcame me.…

III

Around midnight, I was roused from sleep by a clamorous alarm bell. Outside, the night wind blew. The ceaseless tolling of bells mingled with it, transforming my mind—which had awoken in irritation—into immediate unease. My elder brother was already gone from bed. In that instant, I understood only one thing: fire. People rushed past toward the main street, their voices sounding as though squeezed through a press. I hurriedly retightened my sash and climbed to the second floor. When I reached the top, there against the railing leaned all our family except Father and Mother, silently transfixed by the burning spectacle.

“Tatsuo? Did you just wake up now?” my elder brother said, looking at me. “Look—Father’s girls’ school has caught fire.” I looked where my elder brother pointed, at the crimson-scorched sky below. Beyond layers of black rooftops and trees, a mass of flames swelled and shrank. From those fires surged countless red embers—straight upward they shot before scattering sideways—and where those glowing cinders fell, where the blazing clouds dissolved into nothingness, there stretched an eternal sky holding its breath in silence.

Where the flames rose, there was a sound like blowing through seashells and the crackling pop of things bursting open. Every so often, the fire would flare up suddenly, each time brightly illuminating several figures standing on the roof across the way. The clanging bells of hand pumps being hauled from the countryside clashed with alarm bells tolling near and far, filling every heart with pathos. Yet none seemed to think they had truly heard those sounds. It felt as though I were simply watching the silently burning red mass before my eyes with my hands clasped.

A violent trembling through my torso had begun. However, it did not seem to be fear. Within it, the pleasure of witnessing something abnormal had mingled to form a peculiar blend. After some time, I finally returned from a state of merely watching to one where I could think. Immediately, what came to mind was the hexagonal clock tower at the center of the girls’ school. So I asked. “Brother, “Has the hexagonal tower already burned down?”

"I don't know for sure, but it might have burned down," my elder brother replied. Now, the hexagonal tower rose clearly in my mind. And I simply couldn't bring myself to believe it would burn away to nothing. The white-plastered hexagonal tower that overlooked Ueda Town. It was what made this school appear more beautiful than anything else, the central point that unified all the rows of houses in this town. And in a sense, it was both a source of pride for Father, who served as principal there, and an object of longing for the attending students. In my childish heart, I had been convinced the entire school belonged to Father. How could I now imagine this building—his possession—especially that hexagonal tower, being consumed by flames? I thought of Father. And wondered whether he still suffered from stomach pains and hadn't even witnessed this spectacle.

“What happened to Father?” I asked. “Father went out in a hurry earlier,” my aunt, who stood nearby, answered without ceremony. I fell silent and stared again at the fire. Something collapsed there, making the flames’ glow grow more ghastly. “How it burns!” came a voice from some nearby roof. “Truly how it burns!” Before I noticed, Mother had climbed up and laid her hand on my small shoulder. Then in a voice forcibly made calm,

“Come now, you’ll catch cold. Off to bed,” she said. I silently looked at Mother’s face. Illumined by the flames to a pale red tinge, her face showed unmistakable unrest that could not be suppressed. Mother, like her child, was at this moment envisioning Father’s figure dashing toward the mass of fire, driven by anguish and dread in the darkness.

IV

The next morning when I awoke, Father still had not returned. I gazed at Mother’s face—pallid with anguish—and read everything in her silence. While washing my hands at the kitchen basin, I learned from the murmurs around me: rumors that the janitor’s negligence caused the fire; how the hexagonal tower had burned down in moments, taking with it both the Imperial Portrait and vital documents stored upstairs. At first, I couldn’t grasp what this “Imperial Portrait” meant. Though I came to understand through the man’s repeated explanations, I still couldn’t fathom why its loss mattered so profoundly. (O callow ignorance!)

After finishing breakfast—though I still had diarrhea, my stomachache had somehow subsided—I slipped out of the house to see the site of the fire. Despite steeling myself with childish determination, when I turned the street corner and looked ahead, the hexagonal clock tower that always stood there gleaming in the sunlight was gone. And the street trees that normally framed the view now traced the sky with desolate branches.

As I approached the scene of the fire, a strange smell first assailed my nostrils. And in what seemed to be its vicinity, whitish smoke mottled with yellow billowed thickly, within which shadowy figures flickered in and out of view.

I joined the several people standing in a row and stood by the charred school gate that remained. Above the smoke rising from below, the remaining black walls and a few pillars stood wretchedly.

“What do you think? It really went up, didn’t it?” One of the spectators looked back and said to another. “Well, what can you expect? It was bone-dry to begin with, and the new building had just been painted.” “There was no stopping it,” one of them answered. “In the blink of an eye, it spread to the main school building, didn’t it?”

“Well, they must’ve wanted to leave just that hexagonal tower standing.” “But doesn’t the skeleton remain there as if reluctant to leave?” Having said this, the two of them looked at the wreckage once more. However, their faces clearly showed nothing but interest. To me, their indifferent attitude was utterly detestable.

In another group, they were discussing such matters. And there, I clearly heard and came to know the rumors about Father.

“They say he didn’t retrieve a single thing.” “That’s what they’re saying.” “He couldn’t even retrieve the Imperial Portrait, they say.” “What became of the person on night duty?” “By the time they noticed that and tried to go, the fire had already spread to the staircase area, they say.” “It was pure negligence through and through.” “Even so, they say the principal rushed over and tried to dash into the spreading flames, but everyone restrained him.” “Hmm.”

“Mr. Principal went clean mad—wouldn’t listen to a soul trying to hold him back—but they finally pinned him down proper.” “Course he would’ve died sure as sunrise if he’d gone in.” “Still, letting that Imperial Portrait burn makes it all his fault now, don’t it?” “Might do.” “Shouldn’t a man stake his life to save such a thing?” “Aye, that he should.”

I strained my ears, determined not to let a single word escape. However, the conversation did not progress any further. In short, they too were unrelated people. But even among them, I perceived that the destruction of the Imperial Portrait had become some manner of issue—one bearing grave significance for Father.

From within the crowd came a voice: “The Principal has come.” “It’s the Principal!” another voice called out. At that moment, I saw Father’s figure emerging through the smoke beyond, stepping over crumbled wall debris as he approached with an official. The crowd by the gate parted of their own accord, creating a passage for them both. Father’s usual prestige and his pallid face’s solemnity at that moment naturally appealed to their sympathy. The two walked forward through the gap. Then I could see Father’s face clearly – his broad features with faint pockmarks now bore a gloomy pallor, bloodshot eyes gleaming darkly beneath their lids. He wrinkled the right side of his mouth slightly and glanced at his companion as if to speak, but stopped himself.

I stepped forward and called out in a small voice, “Father.” Father carried on his back something anguished that needed to be said to him. Father silently surveyed his surroundings, and when he finally located me—the source of the voice—he wore an expression more akin to suspicion than recognition. Without uttering a word in reply, he hastily departed with his companion. I agonized over whether Father had truly recognized me as his son. Yet I found no courage to call out again. Standing alone, I watched Father’s receding figure while biting my finger until tears welled in my eyes.

The old crowd dispersed, and a new crowd filled their place in even greater numbers. And there too, fresh rumors about the Imperial Portrait and talk of Father could be heard. Some people noticed this young son standing there for a long time. However, they did not take enough interest in this boy to notice his eyes brimming with tears.

V

After some time, when I returned home, Father had also come back. However, having entered his study, he refused to emerge even when well-wishers came, saying it would be disagreeable. I heard from Brother that Father was in profound anguish. And from Mother, I learned she had prohibited anyone from entering the study and that he was intently scrutinizing some writings.

An anxiety like held breath filled the entire house. Everyone came and went through the rooms as if walking on tiptoe. All tense attention was directed toward the study. The entire house was hushed. And every sound from the study—even the rustle of a single sheet of paper being handled—carried an abnormal resonance. The only thing that occasionally disturbed this bleached silence was the empty cough of the bedridden sister.

When noon came, Mother stood before the sliding doors—since entering was forbidden— “It’s noon—won’t you have your meal?” Mother called out to Father. On the other side of the sliding doors, in the study, there was a sharp, ripping sound of paper being torn. And in the next moment, Father’s hoarse, weighty voice reverberated. “I don’t want to eat yet. “I’ll have it later.” Mother clearly detected in that voice both resentment toward something and conviction toward something. Moreover, I felt sorrowful at how his voice—somehow restless and impatient—now resembled that of an old man.

Mother silently lowered her head before the sliding doors. Father did not emerge even when three o'clock came and went, nor when four o'clock arrived. And in the study, not even a single click could be heard. Even when dinnertime came, there was no sign of him emerging. The people of the house even became hesitant to exchange glances. They did not want to see the throbbing anxiety in each other's eyes.

Finally unable to bear it any longer, Mother devised a plan with motherly wisdom to ascertain Father’s condition. Mother called me to a corner and imparted this plan. It was a plan where I would breach the strictly forbidden boundary, innocently invade the study, and come back after observing Father’s condition. “If it’s you... Father certainly won’t get angry. Just pretend you don’t know anything and go in.” Mother said. To Mother, Father was in some instances far more terrifying than he was to his children. I dimly listened, the plea of something fragile within Mother’s eyes as she spoke these words seeping into my heart. And in my heart flashed first the joy of fulfilling a great duty toward Mother and the thrill of acting under the mask of innocence. And so, while feeling a strange sense of valor, I resolved to follow her instructions.

I stood before the sliding door of the study and hesitated for a moment. A consciousness of guilt regarding the deceitful plan I was about to carry out flitted through my head. But it soon vanished. Yet even greater emotional courage and curiosity overwhelmed it. I adjusted my posture slightly, then—with great confidence that I could feign complete innocence—smoothly pulled open the sliding door's handle. In the center of the eight-tatami study, before a lacquered desk, Father sat upright. And his eyes remained fixedly gazing into the far distance. On the desk lay a single Japanese-bound book and a stitched manuscript. I immediately thought Father must be composing a poem. And I even felt disappointed that not a trace of the agitation I had expected showed in Father's demeanor. Father's entire body held nothing but composure. However, how could this boy possibly discern the eternal anguish pleading within those eyes fixed upon infinity? I had recognized a clear change between Father this morning and Father now. Yet I did not know that this change—one being movement and the other stillness—were equally expressions of the same inner torment.

“Father, why don’t you eat your meal?” In that instant, I asked. Father quietly turned his face toward me. His wide, white face with faint pockmarks remained fixed in my direction for a while, filled with deep suspicion. “I’ll go eat when I want to,” Father said. And with a softness that pleaded rather than scolded, he added, “Tatsuo. You mustn’t come in here either.” When I heard that calm rebuke, I could no longer muster the courage to say another word and fled the room as if escaping. I reported to Mother only the calm I had witnessed. Even Mother could not feel reassured by Father’s composure to the extent her son vehemently insisted upon; instead, she tilted her head several times.

VI

The next day, Father suddenly committed suicide. Such a thing had indeed been feared, but what they had dismissed as unthinkable had now become reality, manifesting itself before the very eyes of the family. The family members, sensing something amiss, had taken every possible precaution and even hidden away any blades in the house as if unaware of their existence. However, no one had known that Father had secretly stored a Yoshimitsu dagger deep within the bookshelf stacked with poetry books and writings.

The first to discover Father’s suicide was my sister, who had been sleeping in the next room. In a sense, Sister had been tasked with monitoring Father’s movements and had remained constantly attentive to any sounds from the study. At that very moment, she had needed to relieve herself and left the room. However, while in the toilet, she was abruptly struck by a sudden foreboding. While she was occupied like this, something was happening in Father’s study—the vague thought suddenly surfaced and swirled in her mind. When she hurried back, the study beyond the sliding door maintained its usual quietness, until the faint rustle of Father’s clothing escaped through it. Relieved by this, Sister let out two light coughs and went to bed.

Two or three minutes later, Sister heard a low moan. And no sooner had she thought “Oh?” than an abrupt, bestial scream erupted. Sister, jolted by realization, unsteadily stood up and slid open the partition door—there lay Father in his formal black kimono, writhing facedown, fresh blood spurting from his neck in a straight diagonal line stretching about three shaku.

And so Sister let out a wordless scream and stood frozen in stunned silence for a moment.

Hearing these two voices, Mother was the first to rush over—

At that time, I was out playing far away. Some time had passed before the housemaid found me in front of Matsudaira Shrine.

The housemaid, “Young master, it’s terrible!” she said, gripping my hand tightly. I detected something abnormal in the face of the housemaid who had uttered those words. And I immediately understood what that abnormality was. The two of us rushed headlong home.

Arriving home and entering the study, the first thing that struck my eyes was, above all else, my mother’s figure. I stopped dead in my tracks upon seeing that.

“Mother was weeping with her entire being!” My young mind formed this thought. Mother cradled Father’s bloodied upper body on her lap, bending over him as though to smother him completely, her face pressed close as she stared into his. I too drew near and looked at Father’s face. Yet upon that same broad, pallid countenance I had seen the night before, there now clearly showed something beyond yesterday’s composure—something imploringly addressing an unseen listener. It seemed precisely to be uttering: “Not my doing.” “Not my doing!”

I looked back and surveyed my surroundings. Under Mother’s knees, black blood that seemed to glisten in places had pooled and flowed across half a tatami mat. And at the edge of that blood, a single fly—unseasonable for the time of year—was voraciously lapping at the blood. (Even now, I remain puzzled as to why in such a situation such a thing caught my eye.)

I looked at Father, then looked at Mother. And I thought that if I could cry, I wanted to. But in my eyes, the tears had dried up. I could no longer remain still. I had to do something, but I could do nothing. And so, without thinking, I stood up and tried to go to the next room. When my foot crossed the threshold, finally the consciousness that had been numbed until now returned, and for the first time, ordinary sadness welled up. And so I let out a loud wail. Aunt followed me and said something incomprehensible to comfort me. However, the continuing sobs would not stop. And in the end, I myself fueled those sobs, even seeking intoxication in my own weeping.

At that time, people who had heard the urgent news began gathering at the study. They took Father from Mother’s lap and laid him down properly. The elder retainer from former domains—Father’s Go companion who had hurried over—entered and immediately spread open Father’s kimono to examine his left abdomen. There lay a relatively shallow cut about two inches long, soaked in blood and left gaping. The man pointed at it and shouted in a voice quivering with what seemed both tears and exultation. "As expected of samurai stock! He knew the proper form!"

Father had positioned the dagger in his left abdomen as the initial cut, then pressed that same blade to his throat and plunged it through, cleanly severing the carotid artery. The people now raised voices of admiration for that first cut. Even Mother, steeling herself with heroic resolve amidst tears, nodded several times at the elder's words. However, I couldn't understand why this was considered admirable. But I convinced myself it must indeed be remarkable. The teacher who had been on night duty that evening also came. This man prostrated himself before Mother and me, weeping as he apologized. The school janitor knelt in the entranceway, repeating "I beg your forgiveness. I beg your forgiveness," unable to lift his face.

A profound emotion permeated every corner.

Before long, as this news spread from door to door through Ueda’s townhouses, beneath the quietly burning lamps of that night, all the people forgot every reason and spoke together of Father’s splendid deed.

VII

The day of the funeral was pale and clear.

At the front of the funeral procession was a band. I was immensely pleased by that. I wore a black crested haori and, listening intently to the rustling of its lining, followed behind the coffin holding the incense burner. Ahead, my four-year-older brother walked with childlike dignity, holding the mortuary tablet. Behind us stretched an exceedingly long funeral procession that had gathered nearly the entire town's educated class. Male and female students made up half of their number. Among the female teachers and female students, there were those with reddened eyes.

Along the roadside, women and others were pointing at us and exchanging words. For some reason, I found the awareness of being observed strangely pleasant. And so I walked as best I could, maintaining my decorum. What strange happiness Father’s death had brought! I was already utterly intoxicated, heart and soul, by the emotion conveyed through the shadow of something great…

The funeral procession left the town and approached the rice field path. Ahead, the large temple roof came into view. And from there, amidst the clamor, the lonely toll of a bell came flowing quietly. I tried imitating "clang-dong" in my mouth. However, the bell did not actually ring that way. When the funeral procession had fully arrived at the temple grounds, sutra chanting began in accordance with the rites. And I performed the incense offering together with Mother. Then long, long eulogies were read by several people. Many of them contained largely the same content, with only the attitudes of those reading them differing slightly each time. And each and every person read "Alas, how tragic!" with emotion, repeating it over and over.

Midway through the eulogy, I suddenly needed to relieve myself. And I tried to scold myself for ending up in this state under such circumstances. But how could a small boy’s efforts possibly overcome this physiological force? The eulogies no longer reached my ears. I nearly forgot I was attending Father's funeral. And so I finally resolved to quietly slip away and find somewhere to relieve myself.

At that moment, finally, a certain person finished reading. I nonchalantly stepped back using that as an opportunity, and once I was out of everyone’s line of sight, I dashed toward the grove at the temple’s boundary. I thought someone might be watching there too, but resolved myself and relieved myself.

With a renewed sense of being, as I started returning to my place, I looked over the entire temple grounds for the first time. There stood a densely packed crowd of silent people in black, their massed forms utterly still. An unspoken sorrow seemed to hang between each person. I pressed a finger to my lips and stared at this strained, silent black gathering. Before I knew it, tears had begun rising quietly to the surface.

At that moment, a man in a black Western-style suit tapped my shoulder. Before I could turn around, he firmly grasped my hand and shook it up and down several times as he spoke. “You must become great like Father.” “You must become great like Father.”

I stared fixedly at the man’s face. Bright tears glistened in his eyes. So I firmly gripped back his hand and nodded.

Bathed in the yellowish light of the tilting evening sun, the unfamiliar man and I remained silent for a while, our hands clasped together.

I think how I wish I could have lived eternally under such emotion at this moment.