Pathway to Japanese Literature

Hearing a voice calling me from afar, I suddenly opened my eyes to find the inn’s landlady standing by my pillow. As I watched her, I began to drift drowsily back into a deep sleep.

“They’re insisting they must meet you—someone’s waiting outside.” “Even when I told them you were asleep, they kept saying it’s absolutely necessary—” I had been listening half-asleep, but at that thought—could it be?—I jolted awake. Then, strangely, my head turned icy cold all at once. “What sort of person is it?” “A sharp-eyed, disagreeable man.” “Why don’t you just see them?” “After all, I did tell them you were here.”

“I’ll go downstairs now.”

I changed into a kimono, and the mud that had clung to the sleeve—now dried, perhaps unnoticed—flaked away in gritty particles.

When I went downstairs, outside the lattice door of the entrance stood a sun-weathered man with a long beard. The moment I saw him, I remembered the blood that had oozed from the forehead. I recalled how, when I staggered back to the inn, the clock there showed 2:00 AM and everyone was fast asleep in utter silence. "Is it you? The one they call Mr. XX?"

Suddenly, he said in a country accent. “Yes. What’s this about?”

“This is who I am,” he said, presenting a business card. It read “Detective So-and-so of Komagome Police Station.” “I need you to come with me immediately. You returned quite late last night, I imagine.” I immediately—

“I returned at two o’clock. They all know. I’ll go change now,” I said.

I went up to the second floor and took out an unsoiled kimono from the closet to put on. I carefully surveyed the room. I put half of the money from the metal cashbox into the desk drawer, but then slipped it between the pages of a dictionary. For some reason, I felt I had to do this. I tossed the crumpled Shikishima pack into the wastebasket and folded the discarded kimono. Seeing that the room wasn’t disordered, I felt a wave of relief.

I went downstairs and immediately stepped out into the street with the man. The man walked beside me, but I kept my gaze averted from his face.

The morning sun had already begun to rise. Apprentice clerks from merchant houses were sprinkling water across the storefronts, while maids wiped down the entrances.

Along the winding path of Komagome Hayashicho's backstreets, we walked in silence. The man's faded indigo sleeve flickered intermittently into view—he was keeping pace on my right side. Beyond a fence in this quiet town abundant with deep green trees, several sunflowers swayed gently under the morning sun, their movement striking me as quintessentially Yamate at dawn. On the main street, a young woman who might have been someone's wife swept with her plump white arms bared, gazing fixedly after us as we passed. Everything brimmed with the tranquil heart of a serene summer morning washed in clear light.

I was reeling from deep drinking and terrible fatigue, my head swaying, yet contrary to this, my mind was tracing every detail of last night’s events with perfect clarity. As if a spider were manipulating threads, it swiftly recreated the scene.

―――――――――――

S Bar was situated in a lane of bird shops and brothels slightly closer to Nezu from Dangozaka, formed from a new building with plain glass doors tightly shut; at the front of its key-shaped table stood various liquor bottles crammed together, where the proprietress always sat. The proprietress had large eyes and a spirited air—her flattery was skillful, though more accurately, because the place served no proper meals and specialized solely in drink, someone as poor as I often found myself visiting from my nearby boarding house before dinner. There was a twelve- or thirteen-year-old girl there, thin as a crane, who often served drinks. At times she appeared so sleep-deprived she would doze while pouring, yet even half-asleep she never spilled a drop. Just as apprentice clerks in bustling Ueno—where crowds and carriages streamed past—could pull carts while sleeping yet avoid being struck by automobiles and fulfill their duties perfectly, so too this girl would sometimes pour drinks while drowsing, even mid-dream.

This girl's large, double-lidded eyes and her delicate smile when it appeared bore a striking resemblance to the girls found in Dostoevsky's works. Even toward regulars like me who came daily, she never spoke beyond things like "Welcome" or "Welcome back"—so quiet was this child that these were her only utterances. If I were to single her out, it would be for the unwavering, gentle girlish smile she always bore. Even when there was nothing truly amusing, it remained simply a peaceful, pure, innate smile she had been born with.

When I looked at this girl, I often thought about her mother. She struck me as a woman wrapped in a kind smile like this child's—or rather, as one fated to be unable to raise even her own offspring. In truth, her mother had vanished the moment she gave birth to her in some drinking establishment. That she had been compelled to endure harsh prostitution in a grimy back-alley room was something I knew well from frequent accounts told by the proprietress.

The proprietress often scolded this girl. But even while being scolded, her innate smile would float onto her face, so often the proprietress would— “This child is just like a little fool.” “No matter what I say, she just keeps smiling.” “What a disagreeable child.” With that, she would often give her a little prod. At such times—this small child— “I’m very sorry,” she apologized.

The large eyes blinked sadly, but when they quickly turned toward us, a kind smile—dimples and all—would surface as naturally as flowing water. I was always drawn to the complex naturalness of those cry-laughing eyes. At times, in the vacant demeanor—which even seemed simple-minded—I felt there was something remarkably pure. The characteristic smile was always directed at me the moment I entered S Bar. When that turned toward me, I—no matter how irritable I felt—would immediately soften into tenderness and reflexively return a smile with my eyes.

One time, “If there’s anything you like, just say so. I’ll buy it for you,” I said, and she blushed while offering her usual innocent smile, hesitating to respond. “Come on. Go on, tell me.” I said while leaning in toward her face. “I really don’t want anything. I truly don’t want you to buy me anything.” Even when wanting something deep down, she would always stubbornly refuse with words. But whenever there was leftover change, if I quietly let this child hold it, she would happily rub and caress it in small hands.

Because of this familiarity, not only I but also the painters in this neighborhood would often drink late into the night.

One evening, as I staggered to the front of this bar, I saw H and O sitting there on chairs drinking. As I hesitated whether to stop and tried to walk past, the regular girl immediately spotted me through the glass door. H and O were quite drunk. O was a man who pretended not to be drunk the drunker he got, and he had a habit of laughing from deep in his throat like a goose.

H would occasionally look at the girl’s large eyes, but “They’re creepy eyes,” he’d say.

A cool wind occasionally blew in from the street, and I ended up drinking heavily.

Then a man came stumbling in from the entrance. He wore a university cap, but clearly had been drinking heavily—his chest thrust out in drunken bravado. “I’ll buy you all a drink. Drinking alone’s no fun.” The medical student grabbed a sake flask and began pouring for us. Such bars naturally bred slovenly drinking companions who formed casually, and that night too, everyone was drunk, babbling nonsense while raising a din.

Then a playboy-like, sunburned man with a demeanor as crude as wooden sandals entered, bringing along a disgustingly fat woman who seemed to be his wife. Before long, he started complaining that the drinks were taking too long or something and began harassing the pitiable girl. At such times, she was quite accustomed to it, but her eyes would take on a sorrowful expression that seemed rather to quietly restrain her adversary.

“Hurry up already. What a sluggish child you are.” The woman who appeared to be his wife also added her remarks. The girl cast a fleeting glance at the wife-like woman but immediately made sorrowful eyes as if whispering, “You shouldn’t speak like that.” Before long, she went to fetch sake from the back with her characteristic smile. “They don’t need to scold her like that.” “What possible wrong has that child done?” I whispered to H.

The man kept looking our way, but bold, somewhat contemptuous glances—common in bars like this—were being exchanged between us. O, whose drunken habits were unpleasant, even clicked his tongue and made a grimace characteristic of him. This O often engaged in such transparently obvious acts. The medical student said loudly enough for others to hear, “There are people who’ll bully anyone weaker the moment they see them.” he said in a voice tinged with venomous intent. Then he glared at our direction with a razor-sharp look.

From the moment that man entered, I knew that something ominous—a kind of mutually challenging emotion—was gradually swelling in the shadows. An unplaceably tense, antagonistic, stifling mood quietly foreshadowed a dangerous atmosphere as time passed. We were talking loudly about something when we all burst into laughter at once. Our laughter must have sounded somewhat pointed, for the man finally exploded as if he could bear it no longer.

“You’re making quite a racket.” The most intoxicated student abruptly raised his head like a snake and shouted. “Whether we make noise or not is our business! You should back off!” When he retorted, “Say that again. I dare you,” “Impudent brat!” The man crouched slightly and glared at the medical student with seething resentment—an audaciously thug-like glare dripping with sarcasm. Before the medical student could even process the thought, he had already hurled the glass cup in his hand at the man.

The man let out a bestial, venomous roar, but the cup merely grazed his head and shattered into fragments against the back wall. The man shouted, “What do you think you’re doing?!” and lunged at the medical student. The two exchanged blows with their fists but soon grappled their way outside while still locked in combat. H followed them out. O did the same.

Then, the woman he had brought—who had been anxious since earlier—suddenly lunged at me upon seeing them grapple their way outside. “What are you doing to my husband?” she shrieked like a madwoman, clinging to my chest. Stunned, I stared at her pallid, stubbornly sharp nose—

“It’s outside. You’ve got the wrong person,” I said, disgusted, and tried to shove her outside. The woman immediately went out. In that moment, I felt a violent pulse throbbing everywhere in my body—so intensely that it seemed some savage, animalistic breath was being expelled from within me. A fierce anger with no target pressed down from above and below as though crushing me. At that moment, I saw the girl huddled in a corner of the bar, trembling like a leaf. Her eyes were opened impossibly wide, a deep sadness I’d never seen before quivering within them. I saw her hands and feet and those eyes—her whole small frame rigid—crouching motionless behind a sake barrel. She appeared to cower like a sparrow yet also seemed to burn with a tiny fury that restrained some solemn, savage force beyond.

Outside the bar came sounds of rough soles trampling dirt, the scuffing of heels against earth, shouts, and the noise of bodies grappling and striking each other. The man’s thick, hoarse shouts, the woman’s piercing screams, and the bar owner’s attempts at mediation—all clashing in a single moment that fanned life’s most brutal animal nature—I rushed outside. The medical student was pushing the lunging woman toward the edge of the ditch. When the man saw this, he lunged at the medical student like raging fire and struck at his skull. The medical student staggered but immediately struck back at his forehead. At that moment, he swiftly hurled the geta lying there and fled into the dark road. H was already gone. He who detested anything disadvantageous to himself was no longer anywhere around here.

O was standing by the glass door. It was as if he couldn’t move from that spot, having been struck so hard by that thug; the thug was not only skilled at fighting but also physically strong. When I suddenly stepped outside the bar, the man abruptly blocked my path. “You’re in on it too,” he snarled with terrifying ferocity, lunging like a wild beast. I slipped past his hands, then grabbed him from behind the head, nearly covering him as I dragged him down onto his back. At that moment, the hem of my kimono was stepped on by the thug’s geta, and I heard the weak yet sharp sound unique to cotton fabric tearing with a rending noise.

I suddenly shoved him toward the edge of the ditch. By chance, there was a ditch there, which gave me a favorable position. However, he was stuck in the ditch and suddenly struck my head hard with his wooden sandal. My head rang dully, and I staggered unsteadily backward as if my legs had been swept out from under me. And I leaned against the bar’s glass window. In that moment, I thought how much better it would have been if I had just stayed in my room tonight reading quietly, but I felt as though I were losing my grip on reality. Thereupon, the man suddenly came lunging toward me. At that moment, someone came from the side and seemed to strike the man’s head with a thick cane. With clear awareness, while clinging to the glass door behind me... I saw dark blood oozing from the man’s forehead. The front was dark due to being an empty lot on one side, but dimly lit by the bar’s light—and there I stared at the dull black substance flowing through every wrinkle carved into his sunburned face. And I thought that if that cane hadn’t split his forehead like this, I would have been done for.

He staggered unsteadily backward, was caught in his wife’s arms, and his face rapidly turned pale.

“Who’s the bastard that bashed my husband’s head in?”

The woman screamed in a high-pitched, frenzied voice.

“Everyone! Please call a policeman!” she shrieked in a shrill voice.

Before anyone knew it, a crowd had formed and surrounded him. At that moment, from within the clamor of this crowd, I slipped through as if I were just another face among them—so dense was the throng of people. Knowing the spring water from Otagahara lay not too far from this bar, I walked briskly through Sendagi-cho’s back alleys, cradling my aching head. Harried by an unceasing sense of pursuit—as though something chased at my heels—I moved like a solitary criminal descending into ruin. At each bend in the narrow lanes, I would press my eyes to the ground and peer back along the path I had taken, meticulously checking for followers. At times I felt certain a hand might reach out from the hedgerow; at others, footsteps seemed to approach abruptly. Though the alcohol had begun to fade, a pain rooted deep in my skull throbbed relentlessly. My ears rang ceaselessly like frantic temple bells while shouts pierced through intermittently. Most vividly of all came the illusion of that woman’s shrill, rending scream crying out behind me.

The night deepened quietly, and with the whispers of damp weeds, each clear blue star was reflected near the spring-fed stream’s flow. I soaked a handkerchief in the cold water and pressed it to my feverish head. As the water’s chill gradually cooled the heat in my head, I began to feel tonight’s events were like a dream—something existing far away. When I considered how that terrifying scene of our confrontation—no matter the reason—could never be forgiven, I felt I had stained my entire life with this intense regret. Just by being involved in those events, I came to know there was something vicious and violent within me.

I remained squatting by the pool of clear water for a long time. Every joint in my body began to ache terribly, and it seemed I couldn't stand to walk right away. In this Otagahara forest—a rarity within Tokyo—voices of early autumn insects rose from both the thickets of young shrubs and shadowed stands of overgrown weeds. With midnight approaching, not a single passerby remained. When I considered how places where thieves and murderers hid must surely exist on nights like this in spots like this—as newspapers reported—I suddenly began feeling the weight and anguish of bearing some great crime. I grew hypersensitive, straining my ears and peering down the faintly whitened road beneath dim starlight, wondering if anyone might come.

I thought about going back to the bar again, but my legs felt unsteady and I couldn't bring myself to go. There was both the conviction that I mustn't recklessly go now and invite pointless trouble, and the growing sense that going at this moment would lead to some terrible misfortune.

After a while, I headed back toward the inn. Every house lay deep in sleep—a blissful and peaceful slumber that seemed utterly disconnected from me. I gazed at the second floor where light seeped through, thinking how I too could have been sleeping quietly like that. A clock somewhere struck two. The fact that it was 2:00 AM settled clearly in my mind. A rooster crowed in the distance.

――――――――――― When we arrived before Komagome Police Station's gate, the detective intentionally trailed behind and forced me to walk ahead. As I passed through the stern granite gate, I felt violent disquiet and humiliation arise almost simultaneously.

I was told “Wait here” near the janitor’s office and sat down there, but soon the man from before came over and

“Come over here,” he said, pointing to a small bench in front of the detention cell. I sat down there. When I suddenly noticed，O was also there. When O saw me，he gave a bitter smile and seemed to say with his eyes，“So you’ve finally come.” When O saw me，he

“I’ve been here since last night. We drew a bad hand,” he whispered hoarsely.

“I was dragged out of bed. You gave them my address, didn’t you?” “But what’s done is done.” His pale, sleep-deprived face showed patches of swelling, eyes weary and dull.

I silently looked around the dim surroundings that I hadn’t been able to see clearly until now. The sides where we were had sturdy iron bars, just like the prison cells you see in plays. To the left was an entrance, and a heavy lock hung there. And then there was another opening for food and water. When I looked closely under the dull light streaming through the window, I could see about two people who were detained, fidgeting restlessly at times within the gloomy interior—not only did they exude a heavy, somber air like beasts in a cage, but their occasional small, restrained coughs somehow felt unnatural. For their robust coughs were far too healthy—I could not imagine such sounds arising from this sickly, dark cage.

In the gloomy, damp, stifling air, an immense swarm of mosquitoes assailed me. The swarm of mosquitoes—seemingly poised to assail any human with mental or physical vulnerabilities at any hour—now targeted my legs, hands, face, and every inch of flesh exposed beyond my clothing, assailing me with a tyrannical ferocity that left no time to swat them away. Moreover, the dimness of the surroundings—which made it impossible to discern these hateful mosquitoes—meant that I could not drive them away until after they had bitten and caused itching. For instance, while swatting at one part of my leg, they would bite near my cheek instead—an infuriating, yet utterly helpless agony.

I did not injure that man. The one who broke that man’s forehead was someone other than me. But had that cane not been used against him then, what would have become of me? I became convinced my own head would surely have been split open. And I gazed at O’s pale face. O had long suffered from beriberi weakening his legs, so he sat flattened against the wooden floorboards.

“These mosquitoes are awful.” O said in a hoarse, sleepy voice. “These mosquitoes are truly awful.” I cursed from the depths of my heart this assault by the small, hateful insects. From inside the cell where they sat nearly defenseless, the feeble patting sounds of attempts to swat mosquitoes could be heard. It was indeed a weak, lonely noise. The police officers in the detention cell changed every hour. Each time, boots clattered noisily. On the blackboard, my name and O’s were recorded. I gazed at it strangely, as if I were someone else. There was also an entry: “Detention: Two.”

The police officer told O to enter the cell. O, making a grimace, began to crawl through the small entrance when— “Take off your belt!” he barked. Even after my belongings had been inspected and I was still not told to enter the cell, I felt it was unjust and pitiable that only O was being made to go inside. “Could you let me in as well? Since both of us are involved in the same incident...”

“We have our considerations.” “You stay right there,” he snapped. I bit my lip. And I realized that the police knew about what O had done with the cane. I stared intently at O. O was sitting there, the pale face turned outward. O and I had been friends for ten years. When I thought about his state of mind, I couldn’t help but imagine how agonizing it must be. While listening to the metallic, unpleasant sound made each time the guards’ swords clattered as they moved their bodies, I glared at these officials with extreme hatred, wondering if even they possessed ordinary, tender human emotions.

From where I sat, the space immediately opened into a corridor where I could glimpse a section of street bathed in bright sunlight. In the mere two hours I had been sitting in that dark place, I began feeling as though street life and the outside world existed in an impossibly distant realm. The rag-and-bone men, students, and young women passing by all seemed so cheerfully bright and happy—as if people like us with such gloomy dispositions didn't exist in their world, as if they'd never once imagined such creatures could exist—that their every step appeared to walk joyfully onward. Particularly the trees swaying above the townhouse roofs, bearing truly refreshing and lush green beauty, seeped deep into my heart's core. That radiant summer morning sunlight—so vividly lively and joyous in its clarity—was gazed upon with a strong, deep love I had never before known or experienced. I leaned my face toward the street as if trying to catch even a whiff of that bright, fragrant sunlight.

I couldn't imagine ever escaping this place. No matter what reasons might exist, we knew the case could be settled out of court, and I myself understood that I hadn't inflicted those injuries—yet in a sense entirely separate from those facts, a nearly pathological gloom of depression swarmed around me, all manner of dark things converging until I felt "I would never escape this place." Above all, the very existence of those bright streets made it feel as though, after sitting here for less than two hours, I could no longer think of them with any cheer again.

I recalled the oak leaves that filled the window of my quiet lodging and myself working calmly there, feeling all the more keenly the suffocating narrowness of this dark, confined world.

There, a young woman who appeared to be a barmaid was brought in by another detective wearing a flat cap. And she was immediately made to sit on the camp stool beside me. “Wait here for a while,” the flat-capped detective barked before leaving. The woman’s refined limbs—fair-skinned and flirtatious with a barmaid’s lustrous quality—appeared plumply rounded. The moment she arrived, though it was cheap perfume, a quiet scent like spring’s arrival drifted through the air. Then a cloying odor—as if steaming from her flesh—came wafting toward me beside her like hurled smoke.

A police officer came and wrote "Prostitute: 1" on the blackboard. When the woman saw this, she muttered something under her breath while pursing her lips into a sardonic smirk. That defiance—or perhaps implacable resolve—could be read even in her intense gaze. From the darkness of the detention cell, two faces that had stealthily crept out like cats emerged persistently through the bars toward the woman, and the motionless glare of hungry eyes was unleashed whenever they found gaps in the guards’ surveillance. Having lived in this dark place for one week or even two weeks, they seemed nothing more than a single crawling creature. (In fact, as O later said, the detention cell had ceilings so low you’d bump your head.) They always crawled on their knees even when receiving water, leaving them perpetually hunched over. The two faces that had emerged to gaze at the woman looked like the most grotesque beasts among all the crawling creatures.

The woman almost instinctively sensed the gleam of several eyes peering through the gaps in the bars, then gave a scornful laugh and stared fixedly back into the cell interior. These scenes shifted with each movement of a guard’s body—some adjusted their demeanor with lightning speed to put on solemn expressions, while the crawling ones hid their forms as silently as rats. No sooner had they hidden than their faces would reappear.

As I found myself gazing at the woman’s bare foot—white as a floating scrap of paper—I sensed O’s sharp gaze upon my forehead and looked at him inside the detention cell. He sat upright and looked directly at me. Unintentionally, we exchanged a cold smile—not meant to mock anyone. It could only be grasped by intuiting the emotions embedded within that exchange. Clearly, O—with his usual bold gaze—seemed to be whispering something about the woman sitting beside me.

After a while, the woman placed her hands on her knees and quietly began to doze off. The tired, limp body—formless like a rice cake—shifted slightly each time she sank into soft slumber. I realized she was a habitual offender who felt little fear even within these walls. To her, it seemed as effortless as moving a single bell cricket between cages—this transition from town life to police custody. In this place where peaceful dreams were scarcely witnessed, her gentle breathing—quietly discernible as such—drifted toward me with soft susurrations. Each clatter of guards’ swords against floorboards made me startle reflexively, willing them not to shatter her sleep. Yet the fleeting vision of heaven that had appeared before her showed no sign of rousing her. By some unseen demonic hand, she slept calm and long—as though spinning a spider’s thread through time itself.

Monotonous, languid hours crept by with unbearable slowness, yet still we remained unsummoned for questioning. The sunlight blazing through the street grew ever more fierce, until the heat within our confines became truly oppressive. The cries of street vendors drifted in at intervals. “Will you be taking lunchboxes?” “Will you purchase them yourselves or not?”

The guard asked me and O. “I don’t want it,” I refused. The woman affectedly flashed a broad smile and, “I have money, so please get me a premium lunchbox,” she said. The guard smiled and, “Very well,” said the guard. I said to the guard, “Could I have some hot water, cold water, or tea if possible?” “Tea’s a luxury.” “Come with me.” “There’s hot water,” he said and led me to the janitor’s room. A large warm tea kettle was boiling there.

“That teapot should still have some left. Go ahead,” he kindly said. I quietly savored the dregs of the tea. It was delicious.

After a while, O was called and left. I felt a slight unease in my chest. However, I thought there was nothing to do but honestly confess what I had done, and so I waited while swatting away mosquitoes.

Before long, I was called.

I passed through white-uniformed policemen without swords who were each engaged in paperwork at their tables and went to the chief’s office. O exchanged places with me as we passed each other. The chief said in a dull, bloated voice that seemed muffled by fog as he spread out a blueprint. “Were you sitting here?” he asked, pointing to a section of the bar’s diagram. “Yes.”

“This cane belongs to O, doesn’t it?”

He produced O’s cane. It had bloodstains on it.

“Yes.” “Do you remember striking anyone?”

I had thought about this problem at length and concluded it would be better to take responsibility myself. H had fled, and since the medical student wasn’t there either, it ultimately came down to either O or me—and O couldn’t stand due to beriberi. Even if someone had swung the cane, I—being in the best health—was still the one most plausibly positioned to be the perpetrator.

“It might have been me who did it. But I was drunk and don’t remember clearly. But since O had bad legs, it’s a fact that it wasn’t O.”

The Chief stared fixedly at my face. And he smiled. “O says he did it himself, and you say you did it too, but since you’re friends, it seems either way is fine…” He smiled again. “In any case, you shouldn’t drink too much. The victim has sustained a wound that will take two weeks to fully heal. So do you intend to settle?” “I do want to settle as well.”

“The charges have a three-day deadline—settle with the other party within that period. And I won’t tolerate any further incidents after this one. Mark my words.” The Chief spoke in a gentle yet weighty tone as he folded the document in two.

“Understood.” “Alcohol really is no good.” “Especially you artist types—your drinking habits are particularly troublesome.” “You may leave now.” I stepped into the hallway feeling lighter-headed. There stood H, summoned like me and now dressed in fresh clothes. The three of us moved to exit together. I turned one last time to look at the detention cell’s darkened interior. A woman stood there staring fixedly in our direction. I met her pale face’s gaze with something akin to kinship.

To eyes that had emerged from the darkness, the street was too bright and dazzling. I took off my hat and basked in the sunlight for joy. The intense summer sunlight scorched relentlessly into the crown of my head, hot as if pierced by needles.

O said with a sarcastic dig at H. “You sure ran off quick last night, didn’t you?” “It was too much trouble.”

“Thanks to you, I got eaten alive by mosquitoes all night,” he laughed deep in his throat.

I said to H, "You did a good thing. I think someone like you needs to spend a night in a place like that too. People like you who enjoy dodging problems," I added with a laugh. "It's a good thing O ended up there instead of me." This carried the implication that O's audacious nature could use some corrective experience. O made a displeased face. "Anyone should go through a place like that just once—only once," he said. "It's not such a bad experience to have stayed there."

I looked at the two of them. Both H and O smiled slyly.

We decided to meet tonight at S Bar to cover the treatment costs for the other man’s injuries and to begin the settlement process, then parted ways.

O and I entered the bathhouse in Komagome and washed ourselves. Because I felt as though my body was saturated with the ceaseless mosquito bites, sweat, and filth.

In the evening, I headed out to S Bar. The road was swept clean and sprinkled with water so thoroughly that no one would have guessed there'd been such a commotion the night before. I stared fixedly at the ground. A desolate regret welled up in my chest. I even felt as though some violent breath still lingered about the place.

When I entered the bar, the landlady came out and,

“Were you not injured last night?” “At one point, I was beside myself with worry about what would happen.”

“Just a slight headache.” “I must have caused you a great deal of trouble.” “Not at all.” “It’s a common occurrence—especially since the other party was the proprietor of a brothel.” “They were quite the unsavory sort.” “I didn’t think they were particularly upstanding people either…” “They’re troublemakers disliked even in this neighborhood.”

“I see. Then reaching a settlement must be quite difficult, I suppose.” “They’ll probably want money, I suppose.” “Apparently they got a doctor’s diagnosis stating two weeks for an injury that would heal in two or three days.” While drinking black tea, I gazed at the well-ordered surroundings, which seemed so immaculate that it was hard to believe last night’s incident had ever occurred there.

When the landlady left, the usual girl came out. “Welcome,” she said as she approached me. While letting out her usual deep smile... “You must have been scared last night, right?” I said in a low voice. “I saw everything.” “Your head could have been badly hurt—”

She looked up at me with upturned eyes. “It hurts a bit, but it’s nothing serious. I won’t get into any more fights like that from now on.”

I said gently, as if to console this small soul,

“Oh. Please don’t do that,” she said sadly.

This small child must have felt how terrifying my appearance was at that time. And I thought she must have realized how humans grow increasingly beast-like in their brutality as they age. I looked at her thin shoulders, hands, and feet. I felt ashamed imagining how violently they had trembled with terror last night. It was truly shameful. "What were you feeling back then? Go on, tell me."

I said gently. “I was praying that everyone wouldn’t get hurt.” “Really.”

“Yes.” She smiled an unclouded, etched smile. Her eyes shone quietly—rather peacefully. Her pale, refined face was clear, with a certain sacred something hovering about it that defied definition. I thanked this girl in my heart. Before this small soul, I felt a pure emotion that made me swear inwardly never to take part in such events again.

“Do all men fight like that?”

“That’s not true.” “Good people never fight at all.” As I answered, I felt my face turn red. In that case, those of us who fought are bad people. I am undoubtedly one of them.

The girl remained silent as she moved the tea set aside, and then O and H arrived. As soon as they faced each other, last night's events surfaced in all three minds. There was something fractured about that smile.

“In any case, it was decided that someone had to go visit him—” “I—”

"I'll go," I said. Knowing that neither H nor O intended to go, I ended up taking a half-dozen beers and heading out for the settlement. I was reluctant, but now that things had come to this, I harbored a desire to extricate myself from the midst of this abhorrent incident. Because even a single day spent troubling one’s head over this incident was both unpleasant and futile. “If possible, make sure they settle for just that beer.” “If it’s money, we’ll get hit pretty hard.”

O said shrewdly. H also agreed with that. "So we're just going to settle things with beer, then," H also said.

“If we can settle it with half a dozen beers after splitting his forehead open, that’d save us the trouble.” I gave a wry smile. I took the beer and visited his eatery—though it was really just a small bar—in the immediate neighborhood. The woman who had snapped at me last night came out, and upon seeing me, her eyes went straight to the gifts I carried. “Please wait a moment,” she said and withdrew into the back.

Before long, the man came out. He had bandages applied from his forehead to his entire head, presenting an appearance that was unpleasant to behold. He had round eyes that gave him a somewhat cunning look. “Well then. Please do come up.” He said with smooth flattery. I asked whether his head was hurting, and then, speaking in as calm and polite a manner as I could manage, “Since it hurts quite a bit, I was lying down. It’s been an outrageous misfortune.”

He shot a sharp sidelong glance at the beer I had presented but immediately— “No need to trouble yourself,” he said by way of greeting, lighting a cigarette. I hesitated to broach the subject, “Actually, since even the police recommended settling this privately, I’ve come to discuss terms…” “Hm.” “Depending on how we talk, I might agree to a settlement—but mind you, I need two weeks of treatment.” His words oozed a coercive pushiness no merchant would dare show—the mark of a seasoned thug. Then he added:

“After all, the man’s forehead was broken.” “If the Police Chief hadn’t told us to settle, we would’ve had our own ideas.” He said in a maliciously cold tone. I began to feel extremely unpleasant, as if I were being vividly insulted.

“Excuse me, but how much should I offer for the treatment costs?”

Before my words had even finished, the other party had apparently long since settled on his position, "I simply must have twenty yen."

With that, he shot me a fleeting glance. That gaze was clearly tinged with the harsh—or rather, venomous—light of a victor. I bit my lip. “If I give you that much, will you agree to a settlement?” “Of course, I too wish to settle this privately, so I’ll gladly agree to a settlement.” Quickly perceiving that I seemed somewhat willing to agree, he lowered his voice and said. Unable to bear the mounting irritation that grew more intense by the moment, I went outside. At the entrance,

“It’s the three-day stipulation, right? As for the lawsuit—” he said, confirming. I walked through the backstreets in silence. I felt both a filthiness—as though even the soul dwelling within me had become servile—and rage simultaneously. When O and H heard this report of mine, O immediately rebuked me. “Twenty yen? That’s absurd.” “What a bungled negotiation you conducted.” He pursed his lips discontentedly. H also took it as though I had come to present the amount,

“You’re inept. Where would you get that kind of money?” he said.

I bit my lip.

“The amount was set by them. Do you all think it’s my fault?”

I inadvertently raised my voice, burning with anger. Though I had been suppressing the explosive mix of disgust and endurance from the depths of my heart, I felt I could no longer contain it. "Don't get so angry. This isn't the time for anger." O assumed his innate, deliberately cold manner. I fell silent.

H and O ordered sake. I didn't take a single sip, both because I didn't want it and because I no longer wished to drink with them.

“You’re stubborn,” O said. “I am stubborn. But I’m not an obstinate fool like you—” I fell silent again.

In my mind, I felt that what had happened last night might occur again tonight. When I considered those ugly conflicts where human souls mutually humiliated each other beyond redemption, those battles inflicting emotional wounds too deep to ever heal—how they carved crude suffering into human character itself, how bitter experiences dragged people further into worse inclinations—I shuddered. To witness such unbearable strife from without—how it must awaken such vile and base instincts in everyone—I gazed at the girl sitting on the camp stool. We had laid bare before even this small child’s heart the moment of animalistic struggle. Who was it that made her tremble like a frightened dove?

"The words 'Everyone carries something foul within themselves' surfaced in my mind. When each person strives to solidify their own character, there remains no space whatsoever to accommodate others."

At that moment, O spoke again.

“That beer was a waste. What a pointless thing we did.” As for H—though by nature he was an indecisive writer who cherished beautiful turns of phrase—the drink in him made him agree at once. “When you think about it, it’s all absurd,” he added. Hearing these words, I felt myself gazing ever more vividly upon those listless, diminished emotions. Yet I too possessed nothing so noble as to condemn these friends. I sensed I must not blame them. It was the ugliness and baseness lying deep within myself that I needed to unearth and denounce.

The next day, we all gathered the money and took it to the restaurant. O and H waited in the back of Sendagimachi, and I went to visit him at the restaurant. When I handed the bundle of money to that man, he suddenly put on a repulsive smile, “With this, I can get treatment too. I must have caused you concern.” With that, he removed the outer wrapping and checked the contents. Inside were four purple banknotes. He counted them out with his sunburned fingertips, then wrapped them back up as they were,

“Then I’ll have the police withdraw the charges,” he said. “Could you write something to serve as proof of receipt?” “Ah, I see.” And he wrote out a receipt for the treatment fee. I parted ways with him. O and H waited in the shade of a tree along a cool fence for me to return. I showed them the receipt.

“This brings things to a close.” O turned his pale, sleep-deprived face toward me.

I too felt as though a weight had lifted from my heart. And so we were left with nothing but exhaustion, each given only fatigue. The three of us stood blankly for a while in our drained state, gazing at the white-glaring road. From outside, we must have looked like a group plotting some mischief. At that moment, we saw a university student trying to pass before us. He too seemed so startled he nearly cried out. That was the medical student from that night. He was the man who had vanished into darkness that evening. We were strangers who had never met before - gentle accomplices whose connection even the police couldn't trace.

“I must apologize for my behavior the other night.”

O immediately stepped right up to him. “I need to have a quick word with you,” he said. Then he recounted what had happened that night. “I see.” “In that case, I do bear some part of the responsibility.” “I’ll pay my share without fail.” This man who had gotten violently drunk and rowdy that night seemed to possess a gentle nature. And, “The truth is, I was in the middle of exams and had been trying to avoid facing this.” “I’ve caused you all such trouble.” He fished out his portion of the settlement from his wallet. O accepted it.

O proceeded to hand over his written address and, “Anyway, since the incident is over, you can rest easy,” he said.

The student left.

O,

“Though we made him shoulder part of it, now that the incident’s settled, why don’t we have a drink?” H too appeared every bit the habitual drinker as he readily agreed, “Very well.” “What about you?” he asked, glancing back at me.

“I don’t feel like it. I’ll take my leave today,” I said as I began to part ways,

“Come along with me,” O called from behind as I returned to my inn with a heavy heart. I spent the afternoon walking through Yanaka searching for new lodgings. Even in my own room, I felt constantly watched and unsettled. Each morning upon waking, I’d sense a man in a hunting cap and faded indigo-patterned cloth lingering at the entrance—so persistently that he haunted even my dreams.

I came to desire to move on from this lodging where I had been subjected to vaguely ominous experiences and find a quiet lodging where I could completely cleanse the stains and weariness of my heart. The thicket of chinquapin leaves and the rain pouring over them were dear to me, but more than that, at night when returning from walks, I would suddenly feel as though a man in a hunting cap were standing out front, and I couldn't find peace.

In Yanaka, on a somewhat elevated area near Nezu-dōri Avenue, atop a certain slope, I found a small detached house. The room was clean and quiet, and the entrance was freely accessible.

Out front, a splendid fence composed entirely of maple trees from large estates continued uninterrupted, while the quiet street curved and wound its way toward Yanaka Cemetery and Ueno.

I promptly moved there. In front of the room’s window was a small garden where several balsam plants bore simple red flowers with a rustic charm. Since there was nothing else to see in the garden, I placed my desk facing it directly. By sunset I had finished sorting my luggage and taken a bath. When I returned, a girl of about ten stood smiling at the gate as she played with her little brother. She had an aristocratic face—ruddy-complexioned and refined. Thinking her a lovely child, I entered the room.

In this house, besides me, two families were living. One was an elderly couple, and the other was the family of the aforementioned girl’s mother.

In the morning, I met the girl’s mother in the kitchen. She was a refined, middle-aged woman with a prominent nose.

When I gave my moving-in greetings, she politely reciprocated them.

“Since I have children, I imagine it must be quite noisy. Please do not hesitate to reprimand us,” she said. “You’re welcome.” I returned to my room. When I—who rose late in the morning—was having a meal together with lunch, she would often call out in a loud, high-pitched voice brimming with girlish exuberance—

“Mom. I’m home,” she’d say, tossing a bundle of books wrapped in cloth onto the veranda—a sound that reached my room nearly every day. At such times, watchless as I was, I always knew it must be precisely around one o’clock. Often I heard voices playing in the garden with the younger brother.

After that incident, I rarely went out. Every time I saw crowded residential neighborhoods or small bars and cafés, I felt a pang in my heart. Like a criminal, I confined myself to my room, struggling with creative work and sorting through old diaries. At times, I would go out front and gaze at the street. Especially given Yanaka's abundance of temples, in the evenings, the time bell of Ueno's Kanei-ji Temple would often reach me through the cool breeze. On quiet nights, its serene tone—unlost amidst the city's noise—could still be heard.

She would tap stones in the garden with her younger brother and another boy while chanting bell sounds. "...Now ringing bells—how many bells? Six bells..." she sang this nostalgic folk song from her homeland in a girlishly innocent yet piercingly plaintive tone. As I sat listening intently in that cool late-summer air tinged with chilliness, I found myself recalling my boyhood's delicate life. No matter how much humans grow, what always fills their exhausted hearts that keep contemplating is precisely that state of mind she now sang with. It was his delightful moment of quietly growing entranced through that recollection.

I saw that small flower-like face. I saw clear, wise, keenly perceptive eyes. When I saw her limbs—as nimble and delicate as a locust’s—constantly moving with such dizzying vigor, they seemed to me like a cluster of flowers blooming freely in the mountains, unafraid of anything on this earth.

The girl and her younger brother came over to me with an air of familiarity. And with all the innocent grace and unselfconscious purity of children raised in middle-class homes, they began speaking to me as I stood there looking lonely. “Uncle, what are you doing there?” “I’m watching you play. You are good at singing.” I said with a smile. “Better than I am. My brother’s good.”

The younger brother clung sweetly to his sister’s hand. “Big Sis sings better than me.” I gazed at these small siblings. I too had once had a kind older sister. Unexpectedly seeing them now brought back vivid memories of my own childhood air. “What do people call you?” she asked at once. “They call me Fujiko. My little brother’s called Keisou.”

She looked up at me with bright, glossy eyes. Everyone has a time when their eyes are as beautifully clear and transparent as this child’s. The beauty of eyes from around five or six years old to sixteen or seventeen—that limpid transparency—seemed to perfectly mirror the purity of their spirits. A beauty unmarred by anything external. It is the radiance of life laid bare at its innermost core. That clarity would gradually—as if seeping into worldly existence—grow clouded bit by bit, come to feel weariness, and grow unable to rest. I now felt as though the eyes reflected within my clouded pupils were being somewhat cleansed by their pristine light, as if receiving an infusion of clarity.

“How old are you?” “Nine. My brother... He turned six now.”

I soon returned to my room. The long days of late summer took on a slight dimness.

“……Now ringing bells—how many bells?……” The singing voice could now be heard from Mother’s room.

I faced the desk.

At that moment, O came visiting. We hadn’t met since that day. The subtleties of various emotions made me averse to this friend, and I felt it would be better not to meet for a while.

O entered and immediately said, “Nice room. And I hear you still haven’t gone to Shiba,” but I couldn’t make sense of it. “You mean Shiba?”

“It’s Shiba District Court.” “Both H and I got summoned and lectured by the prosecutor.” “At that time, you see.” “Since you didn’t show up, they were grumbling about it.” “But since I moved and didn’t receive the notice, there’s nothing to be done—I’ll go tomorrow and see.” “Do that then.” “It’s a hassle,” said O. As I came to realize that incident still lay spread out like a net’s mesh across my path ahead, I was sinking into a wretched, seething, grating irritation.

“What on earth is the prosecutor going to say?”

“It’s just what they call an official reprimand.” “Nothing serious.” “So Komagome must’ve sent the notice.” O wore a desolate expression.

“The prosecutor’s account was precise, wasn’t it?” I said.

“It’s their job, so they’re accurate.”

I had finally settled myself, yet I even felt an ominous foreboding that the work I was about to begin would be destroyed once more by having to go to that place tomorrow. I thought all manner of hardships and hindrances would assail this small growth of mine. Tonight again, I had been contemplating quietly devoting myself to poetic composition. Even as I delighted in trying to express through poetry that sensation of how the human heart interacts with ocular light, O's poison arrow had already pierced straight through my tender heart. And in despair, I let everything churn and seethe violently.

I said to O. “Let’s drink. I’m getting stir-crazy and can’t stay cooped up in this room anymore.” O seemed to perceive this state of mind and laughed coldly. When I sensed this, my heart grew irritated as though screaming with boundless fury in two-fold meaning. “Do you have money?” “Money can be made if you make it. Let’s go out.” I went out carrying two or three books. I entered the pawnshop I always went to. I slammed down the books and stuffed a few bills into my sleeve.

I forcibly took O, who said he disliked S Bar and didn't want to go there. I didn't want to go to this bar either. Even if it would only make me feel unpleasant, dark, and gloomy, I had wanted to go to some other bright café—but tonight I had wanted to come here. We began sipping from our cups. Like a seasoned drinker savoring liquor over long hours, like sinking sip by sip into a deep groove, I gradually softened my consciousness into a rounded mellowness. The liquor tried time and again to lure my consciousness into a certain dreamlike state of mind—variegated with color and confusion. But I could no longer get drunk. As if a stake had been driven into my head, there was something awake and ice-cold.

The usual girl was in her seat, gazing in our direction. ……To ensure there was no mistake, to prevent such a terrible thing from happening again……those large eyes seemed fixed upon a solemn, profound point—anchored there in blackness. Moreover, that smile—which seemed as though it would remain forever thus—would at times surface with a withered quality reminiscent of an old man’s, and with a great sorrowful light too complex to deliberately capture even if one tried to express it, quietly spilling over me. I gave a tight smile, and the girl stood up and came over to us.

Lately, I had stopped having her pour my drinks. In some strange, immoral sense—emotionally distinct as if toying even with this girl’s very soul—I had always ended up drinking by myself. But tonight, I wanted her to pour with those slender hemp-like hands.

The girl poured the sake and stood there silently...These people will keep drinking forever...—words that seemed summoned within her small chest. As I grew drunker, I strangely began sensing shouts and sounds of rough grappling from somewhere distant. My head was struck hard—I struck back against the other’s skull with equal force. Blood streamed down as I kept considering various things under some looming threat.

“Let’s go back.” “Don’t stagger.”

I admonished O. Even as I did so, I staggered. The ground quietly traced a large circle and swayed away like a wave.

“Goodbye.” “That’s dangerous, isn’t it.”

She ran over and tried to support me. The voice of his sacred creature—pure and emaciated like a small locust—resounded through my innermost being like thunder. While vowing in my heart not to get drunk, I thought what wretched human refuse I was.

“It’s all right.” “Go on back.” “You don’t need to worry about me, okay.”

“Right. Goodbye,” she said as she entered S Bar. I tried to give her all the money I had in my sleeve, but I berated myself for such a shallow, transparently pathetic state of mind. Countless times, I pondered this loneliness—a feeling I must never indulge in yet cannot escape.

I went out into the street.

When we parted, O spoke again.

“I’m going tomorrow. See that you don’t forget.”

I walked on without answering this. The jumble of cluttered shops along Nezu Street dazzled my eyes.

I tried to head home by climbing the slope. But immediately, I entered the café that stood at the street corner there.

I drank there in silence. I had become so drunk that any consciousness trying to firmly reconcile a single thought—even if such a thing existed—would scatter into fragments before I knew it. The woman sat facing me. Her white makeup lay dry as chalk across a face utterly devoid of oiliness. To call it ugly would be understatement—it was hideously so. All the other women flirted with customers. Yet this one maintained a gentleness as if she knew me somehow. I felt pity well up precisely because of that ugliness.

When I reached the inn, I tumbled into the room like a beer bottle. A pallid sleep soon descended upon me.

When I woke in the morning with a detestable heart, I changed my clothes and set out for Shiba Ward Court to present myself. The hot, bright, scorching sunlight withered the leaves of the street trees. Even within the city, here and there, the rare sound of cicadas singing could be heard in the distance.

I submitted my business card at the ward court’s reception desk; having moved and not received any notification afterward, today I informed the assigned prosecutor of my appearance upon learning of it. I fluttered my summer haori and leaned against the bench in the waiting room alongside a group in earthy-smelling yukatas. I thought all the people gathered here shared certain backgrounds like mine, with ulterior motives lurking somewhere in their hearts. At the same time, I felt as if nothing but human dregs—cluttered like dust—were swarming like mosquitoes. The smell of sweat and people baring their limbs stood in particularly stark contrast to my intense disgust. I found it unpleasant to discover myself amidst this dust. Though my soul—ever striving toward spiritual work—allowed no one to touch it (indeed none could), there remained no way to dispel the dark melancholy seeping in from without.

I was summoned. The clerk led me before the young prosecutor’s pale table. I tried to “quietly” suppress my trembling heart. Restraining it, I stared at the prosecutor’s face.

“Did you move? No wonder you were the only one who didn’t come,” he said, examining the documents stamped with numerous seals.

“Approximately how much income does a writing profession generate?” he asked on the bus. “If I don’t write,” I answered coldly, “I don’t earn a single sen.” “Then how do you live? Without income—” I steadied myself. “Writers maintain reserves,” I said with bitter clarity. “We build margins during productive periods so we needn’t write constantly.” The words left me tasting irony.

“I see.” “Very well then—it’s been reported you settled this incident through private settlement. Is that true?” “That’s correct.” “Then mark this—if another such incident occurs, I shall prosecute without leniency. Take that to heart.” “Understood.”

The prosecutor soon said I could leave, so I went outside. His brusque manner of speaking—mechanical, as if handling machinery—remained disagreeable. My heart kept heaving, thoroughly defiled and still polluted.

When I returned to the inn, I was exhausted. As I gazed absentmindedly at the weeds in the small garden, Miss Fujiko came along the garden path and said, “A guest came by earlier.” “What kind of person were they?”

“A person with long hair.” “He also had a beard like yours, Uncle.”

“I see.” “Thank you very much.”

Her cheeks—translucent with vitality—were taut as though polished，radiant with girlhood’s luminous sheen. “Would you care to come into your room? Please invite Mr．Keisou along too．”

“I must tell Mother before coming.” “If Mother says it’s alright, I’ll come with brother,” she blinked her clever eyes.

“That would be best.” “Then come over once you’ve gotten permission.” I sensed the good upbringing of that motherly figure. The husband was serving as an interpreter-official and was now in Manchuria, it was said. The motherly figure was always sending newspapers to Manchuria day after day. I would often see Miss Fujiko, upon returning from school, heading to the post office on the street with the opened newspaper in hand.

When I encountered her at such times,

“Where are you sending that?” I asked. “I’m sending them to Father. So I should put the stamp here, right?” Though it was something she always did, she made a small, anxious face like a child’s.

“That’s the right spot.”

Fujiko came to the annex with Keisou. “Did Mother grant permission?”

“Yes. “She said I should behave myself,” she said, glancing at her brother,

“Keisou, you have to behave too,” she said in a sisterly tone. Fujiko looked around the room and fixed her gaze on a framed painting. “What is that painting? I don’t know, Keisou,” she said, glancing back at her brother.

I said. “The part that’s reddened is a brick wall. That’s how it looks...” “Yes.” “There’s someone walking past it—head bowed. Red clouds fill the sky. And grass grows thick everywhere. That’s a field.” “Evening light.”

“Yes, it is.” “That person looks so terribly lonely, don’t you think?” “Right... Where could he be going?” “Who knows where he’s going.” Being at a loss for words, I fell silent and stared at the painting. A man was depicted walking heavily from the edge of town toward where there were fields. It was H’s painting. H often painted melancholy, lonely self-portraits. He always liked to depict himself cast into nature. Fujiko now turned her attention to another painting framed in tarnished gold.

“What are those two doing?”

“They are praying.” “In the evening, after finishing their work in the fields, they pray and then return home.” “...Evening bell... What does that mean?” “It says that here, doesn’t it.” “In the evening, the bell often rings, you see.” “That’s what it refers to.” “The other day, Miss Fujiko was singing… ‘How many bells now toll…’ remember?” “They call those evening bells ‘the evening bell’.” “Oh.”

She said admiringly. She made me explain each and every painting in the room. That attentive, knowledge-hungry girlhood now overflowed through her entire being. "What do you do every day, Uncle?" "What are you writing?" When spoken to so directly,

“Uncle… well…”

I was at a loss. I couldn’t figure out how to put it into words. For some reason, being questioned like this made me feel like I was blushing. “What Uncle writes about will become something you can understand on your own once you’re older, Fujiko.” “So until then, I just can’t understand it at all?”

“Yes.” “It isn’t easily understood.”

She looked at me with a doubtful air but quickly adopted an expression as if she had already forgotten.

When they left, I was leaning vacantly against the window. I found myself deeply pondering the work that could never be made understandable to a child’s soul.

Fujiko sometimes visited my room. And she spoke to me with words as generous as flowers in full bloom. There was something in her innocent smile that quietly calmed me. I no longer went out to town for long stretches. Day and night, I shut myself away in my room, gradually publishing my creative works. Creative work—or rather, immersing myself in the spirit of poetry—was a painful yet singular happiness. Within this realm, nothing could be harmed from without. The free air awakened my new life.

Fujiko often said.

“You’re always sitting so properly, Uncle.”

At times, she would talk about her family home located somewhat away from Kagoshima's city area where she was born. "It never snows in Kagoshima." "It's warm every day and nice." "There are big Bontan oranges growing there!" "There are some really big ones!" "There are ones like this!"

Girlishly excited, she gestured with her hands to show their size. Amidst lush green leaves, she spoke while envisioning the heavy, beautiful golden fruits of glistening Bontan oranges flickering before her eyes. “And then, on the mountain behind our house, there are tons of mandarin oranges and such growing, and there are even low branches that even I can reach.” “So Miss Fujiko must like the countryside. Don’t you want to go?”

“We’re going back soon. Since Father is returning from Manchuria to the countryside, we’ll go ahead and wait there.” “About when?” “It’s not certain yet, but soon. I like the countryside. The garden is spacious and nice.” I had heard from her mother about their return home, but I often found myself imagining this lovely girl going back there. I tried to picture things like new air steeped in the intense, rich aroma of citrus fruits ripening as if crushed across low mountain fields, and the figure of a girl running about there.

“When I go back home, I’ll send you Bontan oranges.” “Big, big ones.” She made an innocent face as if she were about to send them right then. “Really?”

“Yes.” “I’ll tell Dad.” “Dad listens to whatever I say.” “He buys me everything I want.” I sensed the love of that father.

Whenever I felt lonely, I went outside. As autumn approached, a quiet dampness spread over the roads, and there was a certain coolness everywhere. When Fujiko returned from school, often,

“Uncle.” “I’m back,” she would sometimes say with a smile.

“Welcome back.” I also smiled. The mother,

“I’m sorry Fujiko is always coming over and imposing on you,” she said modestly. The mother never came to me, nor did I go to her. Fujiko was inside, and it seemed she would occasionally mention me. On days when I did not see this innocent child, my heart felt lonely. It seemed that some kind of warm, special atmosphere always enveloped her in peace.

One evening, the painter S came to visit. This gentle friend and I had not met for some time, so I spoke earnestly. "When I came the other day, there was a little girl." "She’s a beautiful child."

S said in his usual rapid manner.

“Was it you? I’m sorry I wasn’t home. That child is the neighbor’s child. When I see a child like that... it gives me this indescribably pure feeling.” “She really is a good kid.”

S remained sunk in gloomy silence that day. He seemed to be struggling painfully within his heart—trying to say something while alternately restraining himself and forcing himself to speak. I felt I could quietly comprehend this state.

“Are you still struggling?” I saw my friend’s pale, exhausted face.

“I tried painting signboards too, but it’s still no good.” “No matter what, I just can’t become a house painter.” “You must find it utterly unbearable.” “But you kept at it for a while, didn’t you?” “During the month or so I kept at it, my mind was completely worn down.” “I’m not going back.” “I’m terrified of my own corruption—” He looked at me gently with a lonely expression. This friend was extremely poor, but his spirit always remained pure—almost tender—in nature.

“So things are still hard for you these days.”

“Yeah.” “So it’s still before dinner, huh.”

“Yeah.”

He turned slightly red and smiled. I hadn’t prepared any money either. I opened the closet and looked inside the trunk. Amidst the bills that had been lost one after another, there was still enough for this friend’s meal. I took out one bill. “Why don’t you take this as payment? Will this suffice?” He looked embarrassed, but “That’ll do. Thank you.” “The same here.” I saw him out to the front gate. “Take care of yourself.”

“I’ll borrow it for a while.” “Please keep using it for as long as you need.” The friend walked into the darkness.

My heart sank. It was because I was poor, in the same way as that friend.

Two or three days later, S came. And he took out the money. “You don’t have to return it.” “At times I do feel like returning it. If I don’t return it, I can’t rest easy,” he said. “When I look at that girl Fujiko-san, it feels like she’s a different breed of human from us.” He added these words in a sentimental tone.

“That’s right. The disparity between what’s too pure and what’s too defiled—at times it drives human isolation even further apart.”

The two sat facing each other in silence. I recalled the Sendagimachi days I had suffered through with this S. We often went out drinking.

He always lived in a poor attic in the backstreets, spending many days barely eating. I too often met him there. He was always losing out on work and turning pale,

“Even in situations where you have to work like you do, you manage to stay perfectly composed without working much,” he would often say about me. When it came to work that welled up from within me, I did complete it, but I couldn’t draw any money from that labor. Even when I engaged in such work, I inevitably failed to exert proper effort.

I managed to live on the meager compensation I received for my poetic works and the scant remittances from my hometown. I often faced starvation.

I spent endless hours in my desolate boarding house at sunset. I stayed glued to my desk, rushing to finish my work. Only work gave my soul both comfort and drive... "Things are hard now, but Sendagimachi was hard too."

I said to S. “You were quite something back then. “Back then, you had eyes that always remained utterly still, as if you were staring at a single spot.”

He stared into my eyes. "When you're suffering, your eye color changes right away, you know."

I myself came to clearly understand how my eyes were gradually developing a fixed stare, taking on a rough and fierce—sometimes even cunning—glint. Each time, what remained clear would disappear bit by bit. They were taking on instead a cold, murky sort of clarity. “You can tell most people just by looking at their eyes,” said S. “You can see clear through to their innermost depths.” He too had eyes that seemed to gasp with exhaustion. “Now look at O’s eyes,” he added. “They lay that man’s character bare. They look gentle enough, but don’t you see how that deep cunning shows through all the way to his core?”

O’s eyes—their distinctive expressions that shifted depending on who he faced—always revealed murky emotions. “He’s got it all there in his eyes.” “But what do you think about H?” “H—he possesses a carnal filthiness and lasciviousness.” “But when he smiles, that comes out even more clearly.” “Anyway, eyes that don’t look others straight on are despicable.” “A person who puts on an affected stare is one who harbors falsehood within.” “(O has this trait.) Still, people whose eyes gaze calmly possess a fundamental goodness—” he said, standing up.

“Are you leaving?” “I’ve stayed too long—I should be going.”

We parted. When his footsteps faded away outside, I quietly thought about my impoverished past self. S had rented an attic-like room, subsisted on nothing but bread, and grown gaunt. When I went over, on the Western plate lay several slices of bread—the sole noble indulgence for him—that had been roasted to a golden brown without any butter. “Food?” “Food.”

He began crunching on the powdery stuff. “Will you have some too?”

“I’m driven by necessity too.”

Laughing, the two began to eat in silence. The two found themselves unintentionally contemplating how they were each being pursued by separate lives of anxiety. How could one escape this suffering—this question now reached even me, who had no sustenance for tomorrow. “I can no longer bring myself to laugh at prostitutes these days. I suppose it’s rather natural for women without education to sink to that level of degradation.”

S said. I agreed as well. “That’s true. At the very least, even if we were to cast off our bodies now, we’d still need money.” “For women to derive their sustenance from their own bodies is nearly akin to nature itself. If we dissect humans more primitively and consider them, especially for women, there would be no other way but to do so, wouldn’t there?” “That’s true.” We fell silent together, each friend gazing out a separate window. Despite the ardent affection for life that had always betrayed us, we still yearned to somehow reach it.

“When you see people living comfortably, how does it make you feel?” “That existence is their fate,” I replied. “I feel neither envy nor any special affection. Yet it strengthens my conviction that we who are poor are in no way inferior to them.” One must permit the fact of all existence. Even thieves or murderers—none can eradicate the necessity from which such beings emerge. Still, I cannot love this truth. I cannot welcome it.

S said, “At any rate, it’s something to look forward to until we make it big.” “There must certainly be times when even our present suffering will be rewarded.”

“Happiness seems to come all at once—doesn’t it? Just as everything becomes painful during hard times—when things get better—they can all improve at once.”

I felt a burning, exalted passion within my heart. Just wait and see—I believed with conviction that there would surely come a time when those who tormented me, scorned me, diminished me would have no choice but to acknowledge my worth alone.

We finished our meager meal. …The events of that day now came back to me vividly. Hunger had ceased to be a problem in the face of our blazing desires. When it was time to emerge, emerge it must—it was a fierce era of sprouting.

I soon went to bed. I fell asleep quietly, holding a kind of prayer-like, almost harmonious heart toward my friends and myself.

One morning, I went to the zoo with Fujiko. Fujiko and I walked along the well-swept road lined with cherry trees in the park where leaves had begun turning yellow soon after autumn arrived. Above her light blue summer kimono, her slender neck supported her small head, appearing as translucent as agate. We saw cranes. These long-necked red-crowned animals would occasionally let out piercing high-pitched cries toward the lofty autumn sky. It seemed at once like a prayerful cry and appeared as an eternal tireless reporter ceaselessly whispering of earthly life toward heaven.

One aspect was how the swan’s mythic allure found expression in its immaculately pure, refined, and yet leisurely, stately gait. There, two adorable chicks were playing, fluffing up their soft gray garments.

“Uncle. Do even cranes have children? That’s the crane’s baby, right?” “That’s right. Even cranes—any living thing—has children.” The crane stretched its long neck toward the girl.

"Do they come from eggs after all?" "Yes." The small chicks waddled unsteadily as they clung to the parent bird and played. When fed, they would immediately pick up the food in their beaks and carry it to their own chicks.

We saw elephants. This enormous animal with rock-like coarse skin constantly picked up straw and salt crackers, carrying them to its mouth to eat, and revealed its gentle childlike disposition to the spectators. What caught my attention most was when, in this large room, I saw an extremely precise yet solemn octagonal clock ticking away beyond the elephant's coarse-skinned back, and I immediately felt a strange sensation. Moreover, I saw how the building's brickwork and the elephant's own legendary allure complemented each other, creating a truly harmonious balance.

It reminded me of a clock one might have seen in a fairy tale from our childhood, and in contrast to such a primitive, colossal animal, it evoked an anachronistic sensation—something akin to civilization versus barbarism.

“Do you like elephants, Miss Fujiko?” “They’re smelly, and I don’t like them.” “But they’re gentle, so you must like them, right?” “I hate them.” “Let’s go see the monkeys.”

The monkeys chased each other, ran about, and fought within a fairly spacious cage. Their clever, lively antics amused everyone. Despite there being a sensation somewhat akin to a frustrating kind of hatred, the very innocence of that resentment even made the people laugh.

I felt uneasy imagining what the people surrounding the cage would feel if, despite being separated by just a single wire mesh, it were the monkeys watching them instead. “The monkeys are cute, aren’t they?” Fujiko said. “Why do you say that? Don’t they have such hateful faces?”

“It’s not their faces,” she said. “It’s because they do amusing things.” I couldn’t come up with an answer right away. The Fish Viewing delighted her. She gazed at the beautiful Dutch goldfish—their crimson tails and rippling fins like dear friends—with a love wholly different from what she had felt when viewing elephants, cranes, or monkeys. “They’re really pretty.” She pointed at the resplendently glittering fish. I disliked something morbid and deceitful in the coloring of these goldfish. I hated how their long tails and fins, like those of prostitutes, held something in common with humans—particularly sharing traits with prostitutes themselves. At times, I even found them filthy.

“Uncle, why do you dislike them?” “They’re too glittering, don’t you think? I prefer black carp over those fish.” The carp remained still in the clear water, composed yet quivering its tail and fins. Compared to those glittering goldfish, its dignity stood out all the more, conveying even quietness and loneliness to my heart. Above all, from our human perspective, the profound mystery of fish—that somehow lonely essence—could be fully perceived even in this healthy creature. Those motionless eyes held such strange mysticism in their pale blue clarity, so seemingly contemplative, that they reminded me of a cow’s heavy gaze.

Not only did salamanders and eels disgust Fujiko, she even said, “Uncle, let’s go. I get scared when I see those fish.”

In the shade of a large chinquapin tree, a camel was sticking its long neck out beyond the fence. The red soil there had dried to a whitish color and looked scorching.

We saw lions. We saw tigers. Fujiko was scared. I felt a nostalgic yearning toward the wild beast—a desire to touch the swelling flesh beneath the tiger’s beautiful fur. Yet peering into the cage where no danger could reach me, I felt contemptible for indulging in such fantasies even as I took comfort in their safety.

Two leopards. It was like gazing at endlessly deep velvet within a beautiful carpet—yet with constantly shifting soft luster, they frolicked ceaselessly. Moreover, their long spotted tails coiled freely like snakes or dragged across the floor. In an instant, I pictured plateaus, forests, dark valleys, and vast deserts where these beasts dwelled. Under that lingering mood, I gazed at the gleam in their eyes—unmatched by any precious gem—and their crimson lips that remained closed. There existed an intense living beauty there, one that ceaselessly poured into me through ragged breaths. The essence of my inner life—that ideological core perpetually devoted to work—now seemed to whisper vividly with their souls, quietly filling me with intense joy.

Fujiko hurried me along. From this small hillock just below where something evoked San Francisco, I could see water-dwelling birds of various kinds—their varied cries forming a chorus-like unity as they constantly called out and clamored.

We went there. The dazzling spectacle of various species crying out, swimming, and noisily flapping their wings not only diminished appreciation for each bird's individual beauty but also evoked something human—a crowd one might have encountered on some forgotten night. Or perhaps within this disorder, I grew restless and found myself unable to gaze at any single thing for long.

However, amidst all that clamor, when I caught sight of a heron quietly raising its white crest as it walked slowly along, I found myself considerably calmed. He, who always appears lonesome in the marshes and on water surfaces, seemed to maintain a solemn solitude all his own amidst it all.

We gazed at two polar bears lying quietly on their backs in water with an almost unimaginable state of mind—strange yet wondrous. There was an innocence about them soaking in water akin to children swimming back-downward—a carefree indulgence we observed. Their white fur with arrow-like luster glistened as it soaked through. And when they emerged from water—shaking off droplets—their magnificent pure-white coats stood erect in full splendor.

The feeling that began to stir within me as I gazed upon these animals was, in part, the desolate air of the Arctic. It was a sight rare even in the world—one imagined in dream or waking upon a vast expanse of ice where nothing obstructed the view. There were no green trees at all. There was a cold and austere artistry of nature, deep within its core—devoid of light yet solemnly shaping the expressions of people’s hearts even in thought. There was a desolation as terrible as death and a multitude of drifting icebergs.

And when I saw how this creature was made to live in the human world with such a small water jug, there was—within that countenance that had unwittingly grown gentle—an overly familiar domesticated nature, a natural kindness and warmth shared by all living things.

“Miss Fujiko. This is an animal from the land of ice.” I whispered to her like a child. Anyone gazing upon these animals would find themselves strangely harmonized, sensing a rare animal-like camaraderie and intimacy. We left this ice field behind and climbed a small hill. There stood a bear that bobbed up and down in bows whenever it saw humans. Whether through habitual conditioning or training by handlers, he kept bowing ceaselessly before Fujiko.

“What a clever Mr. Bear!” Fujiko said and fed it. He sat on his hind legs, grabbed the fence with his front paws, and bowed. Just as tigers and lions had made it their job to pace endlessly around their cages, this pitiful bear seemed to spend its days doing nothing but bowing. I let out a bitter smile countless times. I saw a cunning wolf.

I saw a fox. Finally, I smelled a particular stench permeating the zoo—a stifling air that seemed to weigh heavily on the head. Anyone here would undoubtedly feel both an inescapable phantom of tenacious lifeforms and an unceasing fantastical innocence simultaneously. When she began her return journey, I noticed she had grown far more vivacious than during our arrival, her eyes brimming with vitality. It was indeed true they carried an intensely fantastical light.

“Wasn’t it interesting?” I asked. “Mr. Bear’s bowing was so funny! My favorite are rabbits—those red eyes are my favorite,” she said. She spoke with girlish charm. “The thing I hate most is—” “There was that fire-eating bird, right?” “That’s the one I hate most.”

We emerged from the park onto Yanaka’s streets. “Fujiko, when are you returning home?”

“I still don’t know. But it’ll be soon. You’ll stay in that house there, I suppose?” “I probably will be.” “It’d be boring if you moved away. When I go to Kagoshima, I’ll send you a letter. Really.” “Please do. I’ll send some too.” “Yes. I definitely will. And then, after about a year passes, we’ll all come back to Tokyo together this time—Father too.” “That sounds wonderful.” “By then, the train will probably be running to Nezu, I suppose.”

“Since it’ll be completed next year, it’ll surely be running by then.”

We stood on the slope where we could see the valley town of Nezu spread out below and listened to the forlorn calls of vendors rising through the nearing evening bustle. The smoke drifting from the houses of those towns crawled low, making everything appear especially mournful and subdued.

The thought of this girl no longer being in that house made me feel as though I were losing a friend; her being so small and delicate only deepened the loneliness.

“When Father comes out too, let’s all go to the botanical garden together.” “Oh. Definitely.” When we returned home, her mother expressed her gratitude for all the help we had given her today and left. I waited alone for the unappetizing dinner that was delivered. The feeling of waiting for that dinner always made me gloomy. It was nothing but poor fare brought from the town at the appointed time. I often spread it out on the desk alone. Even as I did so, because I had great faith in myself, I believed that my current life would surely improve me. When I thought of the paths of those predecessors—Dostoevsky, who could not even drink tea during his travels; Verlaine, who wandered endlessly between love and hunger; Millet’s poverty; Michelangelo’s suffering—I instead felt brightness, light, hope, and life in the direction they pointed. I felt that I must endure each hardship I must bear to approach the happiness, joy, and birth of art that had yet to come, as if gazing at a mountain range ahead. Night fell.

One day, someone came to visit my house. When I went out to look, it was a policeman. In that instant, the memory of that painful incident from this summer flooded my mind.

However, that was my own mistake. The policeman came to check the census register. When he left, I felt the pain of an old wound. Not only that, but I feared those who came to visit me. As if in response, whenever footsteps sounded beneath the window, every nerve in my body jolted and trembled as though electrified. At the same time, a faint uneasiness surged up within me like a fit of aimless terror. At such times, not only was I startled enough to drop my pen, but even merely considering who the owner of those anxious footsteps might be left me feeling unsettled and desolate.

In such times, I often had Fujiko answer the door.

“Uncle isn’t home right now,” I would often hear her voice carry to where I was. “When is he in?” “He’s never here when I come.” When I heard that gruff voice, I knew he was my creditor. I had thought about it day and night, but this was a debt beyond remedy. For me, circumstances had now made it impossible to fulfill my obligation to pay.

“But Uncle is here when he’s here.” “You can just come again next time.” “Then please tell him this came.” “I’m counting on you.” He promptly left from by the window. “He left a business card.” Fujiko showed it to me. I turned my face away with discomfort as though the creditor’s harsh, cold visage had been thrust before me. I thanked Fujiko.

“Thank you very much.” “I hate people like that—they stare all over the house,” she said, furrowing her brows.

But why did I have to make this guileless girl tell a lie? I should have made a proper excuse myself. Even if she remained unconcerned, from how base a place in my heart did I have to deliver those evasive words for the moment. I apologized in my heart to this girl's soul. Once I pass through this present era of hardship, I will never harm anyone other than myself. I too must surely have a "time" for the rightful fulfillment of a beautiful duty. While thinking this, I thanked Fujiko for her kindness.

But they were people who, as it is written in the Bible, had to exact repayment down to the last penny—and take even that last penny. They visited me repeatedly. I lived with a heart gripped by extreme anxiety.

Fujiko finally got angry and, “If Uncle isn’t home, then he isn’t home! I don’t know! If I open that, Uncle will scold me!” she would shout in a high-pitched voice. Each time, they were driven away for the sake of this kind girl. I leaned against my desk, and whenever I heard her voice like that, tears would well up in my eyes. I couldn’t even fully say words of gratitude to her.

“Uncle. “They’ve already left.” “That should be all right, shouldn’t it?” She peered into my face. At such times, for some reason, she too looked sad. “Thank you.” I said and turned my face away. Tears I could not restrain overflowed.

――One day, S came to visit, bringing a small portrait hand-sketched in form and framed. I looked at it. It was a portrait of Fujiko, drawn with such depth of expression that one could almost sense her gentle breath emanating from within.

“It looks just like her. Having only seen her once, you managed to capture her so well.”

I was amazed at how his fierce insight always pierced through to the soul of objects. “The moment I saw that child’s face, I felt as though something like a flower had been hurled at me.” “For one thing, that soft color is a hue you can’t see except in a child like that.” “It’s a true color with not a trace of adulteration.”

He had eyes that seemed to smolder with intensity.

“You really have a knack for grasping the core of things right away.” “For me, the first impression reflects things most accurately—more than spending a long time observing.”

At that moment, there came footsteps at the entrance as if someone had arrived. The instant I thought it might be them, my chest tightened with unease again. I detested those persistent creditors who came nearly every day. “Hey, sounds like someone’s here,” said S. “Go check.” I replied in a low voice: “Debt collectors. They come almost daily—it’s unbearable.” “Ah—so that’s why you’re grateful Miss Fujiko often chases them off. But do you actually have any way to pay?”

“For now, there’s nothing I can do—it’s hopeless.” “Wait here.” “I’ll go speak to them.”

S went out. A long, stubborn argument could be heard. The sharp voice of S and the other party’s dull, indecisive voice intermingled, but after a while, S returned and, “I’ll be going out for a bit.” “I’ll keep that bastard waiting outside, but don’t meet him.” “But where are you going?” “I’ll take care of it soon, so just leave me alone.” “Well, that bastard says things that get on my nerves.” “Just wait there for now.”

He went outside. While intuitively sensing that S had gone to procure money, I felt pained that I had worried this friend. As a man of S’s temperament—once he set his mind to something, he couldn’t rest until he saw it through nor stop himself—his intensity was undeniable. I spent an uneasy, restless time. Outside, the man stood there, occasionally pacing about. The listless footsteps seemed to tread back and forth in one spot, each one growing heavier, stifling my breath.

S returned. He said something to the man outside, and "If I can just receive what’s owed to me, I won’t say another word," could be heard. "You may go home now. Bear in mind that you must not harm people’s feelings over trivial matters."

S entered my room and,

“I’ve already sent him home. I’ve paid the money, so you can rest assured.”

“I see.” I noticed he was not wearing the haori he had cherished. “Your haori—” He turned slightly red, “I turned it into money. Can I just stand by and watch you being tormented by those bastards?” “You didn’t have to go that far, but I’m truly sorry.” We sat there together, trying to conceal the agitated feelings that often arise after such events. S, with a serene expression of having accomplished what he had set out to do, gazed intently at the portrait on the wall. I felt an oppressive weight in my heart, yet at the same time, I felt deep gratitude.

For a long time, the two of us sat there like that, avoiding each other’s gaze. For fear that he might appear overly sentimental, S would occasionally glance restlessly at the framed painting or look out the window. I felt pained that my heart continued in a state of panicked imbalance due to that friend’s well-meaning yet overly drastic methods.

S suddenly, “It’s been a while—let’s have a drink,” he said. I, too, felt this was necessary to break free from the oppressive silence.

We went out into the streets as dusk approached. A short walk from my house brought me to a slope descending toward Nezu, where cherry trees formed rows along both sides of the road. Around Hongō Heights, the quiet faint light of the autumn day still lingered.

We no longer went to S Bar. At a small café on the street corner, we began sipping from our cups. "If you break into society first, I'll settle into your foothold. You'll take me under your wing then, won't you?" He raised his flushed face. "I'd be glad to." "It'd be the same if you went first." "So one of us must break through." "And besides— "I feel I'll emerge into the world soon enough. The very suffering makes it impossible to stay hidden any longer."

“That’s true.” “We’ve been silent for too long.” “We’ll never forget each other as we go on, right?”

As we talked, I felt our hearts had completely merged into one. “Thinking about what lies ahead fills me with excitement. “You must think so too.” “I want to get out there even a day sooner.”

As we spoke thus, we soon went out into the street. The appearances of all the night streets shone brilliantly, seeming to yearn for whatever touched our healthy bodies. The beautiful, sturdy figures of women strolling also appeared especially serene to my eyes tonight. “Tonight women look incredibly beautiful.” “And not a single disagreeable woman in sight.” “They all have kind faces.” S looked delighted as he admired the white or delicate shoulders and hairstyles of the women passing by. It was as though some commander had sent down all these varied women to earth to distribute ample solace to the lonely—indeed, none of the usual haughty women or those with contemptuous expressions that made one bristle were walking about. The exquisitely harmonized heavenly night, fresh as if newly bestowed, shone on every street we walked through.

It was, as S had said, an evening that made you want to "kiss everyone" and an evening that made you want to "bare your heart and talk with everyone." One person's joy is by no means limited to that person alone. That must be something quietly shared between humans during moments when they remain unaware. Outside of hearts and nerves, there must exist another realm—subtle spiritual entities unknown even to humans themselves—secretly whispering to one another. Just as there is an unseen commander, there must surely be a world where only spirits dwell together.

“Let’s go to S Bar.” “Let’s go see that child’s face there.” S suggested. I immediately felt a gloom come over me, but I also wanted to know how that girl was doing. And we hadn’t gone there for a long time.

As we entered S Bar filled with those ominous thoughts, there sat a young woman we had never seen before. At first glance, she had a shallow, disagreeable appearance. “It’s been quite some time, hasn’t it?” said the proprietress as she emerged. We ordered drinks. But something felt amiss. Of course this was because the girl who usually sat there was absent, but with no other customers either, the place lay utterly quiet.

I asked the proprietress. “What happened to the girl who was here before? She isn’t here today, is she?” The proprietress replied: “That child? She’s fallen ill and is resting.” “What kind of illness is it?” “It seems to be a nasty illness. We’re quite troubled ourselves, I must say,” she said with a frown. Her cheeks looked cold—she didn’t seem inclined to show much care for such a young patient. “That’s pitiable.”

S looked at my face. I immediately felt I could grasp her illness—emaciated like a crane—just by picturing that narrow chest, and all at once my mood sank heavily. "Is it quite severe?" S asked. "She’s been bedridden three weeks now. The doctor says it’s grave."

S and I exchanged glances again. That small soul—it now vividly came to mind. The kind smile she always wore and，in stark contrast，the calmness of his large，sad-looking eyes that always seemed on the verge of breaking. S and I took out money beyond what was owed and said，＂Please buy something that child likes，＂then went outside.

We stepped out onto the street. Both of us walked dejectedly. "That child looks like she'll die." "That child will surely die—" S said with utter conviction.

“I think so too. It’ll surely be soon, you know. She had a certain religious quality—though I couldn’t quite articulate what it was—a solemnity that resided in her very countenance. That is certain.”

Even as I said this, I recalled her figure that always looked sad and would sometimes doze off. Her peaceful naps stolen in the intervals between the proprietress’s scoldings—to me, those seemed to have been her most blissful moments. At such times—the guiltless beauty of her suddenly waking and flashing a smile—. That too came back to me.

“If that child dies, I’d like to send flowers or something.” “But I wouldn’t want to seem too meddlesome.”

“Yes.” “Flowers feel a bit odd, don’t you think?” “But whether it’s you or me, I’d want to pray for that child.” “I don’t like the word ‘pray’ all that much, but I’d want to pray for that child.”

I thought so from the bottom of my heart. For that woman who had walked the flowerless path of a brief, painful life, I wanted to quietly bless that child from my heart.

Before we knew it, the two of us reached Ikenohata. The lotuses had begun to wither, and the moisture-laden wind carried a hint of chill.

At Hirokoji, the two of us parted. After I took a few steps, S suddenly seemed to remember something and hurriedly ran back to me, “Let’s shake hands and part tonight.” “Right? Isn’t that okay?” “Very well.” The two of us shook hands like a key. I had always called Fujiko Bontan, Bontan. Somehow, I came to feel that calling her that better captured this girl’s spirit.

“Bontan.” “Come.”

When I called out to her in the garden，without fail， “Bontan，what is it?”

Over there, she too would call me Bontan over and over. “Mother, Uncle calls me Bontan, you know. Being called Bontan is funny, you know.” She would often laugh and say this to her mother.

Then, when I was studying, she would immediately come to the window, “Bontan, what are you doing?” she would sometimes say. “Uncle. When I return to Kagoshima, I’ll definitely send you some Bontan. Tell Father that. I will.” She promised. “When you peel it, the inside turns purple, and oh, it smells wonderful. You’ve eaten them before—” “I’ve never had one before.”

“Yes.” “I’ll send them soon.” “You promise?” I laughed and made the promise. “You’ll still be here until then, won’t you?” “Of course I will.” “I’m waiting for Bontan to arrive.” While we were chatting like children, Fujiko glanced toward the entrance. “Uncle.” “There’s someone here!” “It’s someone nasty!” “You go over there,” she whispered. “Huh?” “Please come again later.”

I was immediately seized by anxiety. Lately, without fail, I felt uneasy whenever anyone came by. Especially today, it struck me with particular intensity. “Excuse me,” came a deep voice.

I went to the entrance.

There stood a man clad in black cotton haori and hakama—a dark-complexioned figure with eyes set deep in their sockets. When I went out, “Are you Mr. Muroo?” he said. “I—” “That’s correct. And who are you?” When I said that, he produced a business card. Taking it in hand and looking, it read: Komagome Police Station Senior Detective ××. I felt a discomfort as though someone had doused me with cold water from behind. “Did you have some business with me? Anyway, please come in.” “Excuse me,” he said, entering the room. He scrutinized my room. Those eyes constantly swept about, conducting sharp observation. For instance, his gaze would shift with extreme swiftness from one point to another.

“Have you been writing anything lately?” “I haven’t written anything particularly worth mentioning…”

“Is that so? Have you been publishing any magazines yourself?”

“No. I haven’t published anything at all.” “I see.”

He calmly smoked a cigarette. What he had come to investigate was beyond my comprehension. However，it seemed he had come here because of that recent incident at S Bar after all. “Isn’t it your poem that caused magazine ×× to be banned?” I felt a chill. That poem—titled “Express Train”—had likely been prohibited as something corrupting public morals. “Perhaps that is so. I’m afraid I cannot say for certain.”

“What’s the content about?” “It’s a poem that deals with a kind of love affair.” “It’s just a trivial thing.”

I felt uncomfortable. I felt as though I didn’t want these people to understand my poem.

He changed the subject,

“I hear the matter regarding S Bar the other day has been settled out of court.” “Huh? I did something foolish.” He seemed calm and unhurried, so I felt impatient. I wanted to return to my work quickly. I wished he would leave soon.

“Do you drink a great deal?”

“Just a little. I don’t drink every day.” “Mistakes often happen with alcohol. You should show restraint.” “Well—I’ve troubled you enough. You needn’t concern yourself about my visit,” he said as he left. When I saw him out, I felt the events of that night would forever linger around me, constantly looming over my mood and work, casting a shadow over everything.

I remained standing by the window for a long time. I felt a loathsome dread that the unrelenting terror of being a criminal—as though completely ensnared in a net—would assail me even two months hence. To escape from these painful thoughts, I found myself considering travel.

Just then, Bontan arrived.

“The customer has left—” “He left?” “Your friend—?” “That person…?”

“No—that’s not it. He’s nobody important.” “Uncle, you dislike that person, don’t you? Uncle, you were making such an unpleasant face.” “Well, he’s someone I dislike—”

I looked into this sensitive girl’s eyes. I thought these were precisely the eyes that intuitively distinguished truth from falsehood.

I suddenly thought of my sister. I thought of my sister enveloped by a gentle soul. I should just return home. And I need to let my head rest a little.

I thought. That’s right. Now, I will part from everything and go to his verdant country. As I thought this, I quietly looked around the room.

“Miss Fujiko.” “I’ll be returning home before you,” I said.

“Really? It’d be no fun at all if Uncle went back home first.” “But Fujiko-san, you’re returning too, aren’t you?”

“Yes.” “Then it’d be fine if you came back to Tokyo again, wouldn’t it?” “I suppose so. Then will you come back to Tokyo too, Uncle?” “Hmm. In about a year or so.” “Then we can play together again, can’t we?”

When Fujiko left, I went to meet S. S was working in the attic.

“I intend to return home for about a year. I’ve been so terribly tired,” I said and stared at my friend’s face.

S stared back at me intently, “That’s right. You should rest for a while.” “You’ll surely regain your strength.” “It’s a good season now, you know.” “You shouldn’t stay too long.” “You should come back as soon as possible,” he said. “And also, “If I get too accustomed to the countryside, it’ll do more harm than good—so I’ll come back before long.” “Because I can work even in the countryside.” “I think I’ll stay until around next spring.”

“That would be better.” I bid farewell to S and returned.

I wanted to return to the countryside as soon as possible. While packing my small luggage, I tucked away S’s paintings and H’s sketches into my bag as mementos of my life in the capital. Then I did some small shopping at Aokidō in Hongō. In such small busyness and flurry, I felt both the joy of returning to my autumnal hometown before long and, in part, the pain of parting from this city. Bontan came.

“You know,” “Mother said, ‘Please come over without eating dinner.’ That’s what she told me.” “Yes, she’s treating me.” “Oh? Since it’s a farewell—I have something nice for you.” “Well then, please tell your mother I’ll come over without hesitation.” “Oh?” She left.

Checking the timetable revealed a direct train at nine-thirty. I decided I would board it that night and depart. After some time had passed, Fujiko came to fetch me.

“Please come with me.” She happily took my hand and led me to the room. The mother, “You’re leaving tonight.” “It’s quite sudden that you’re returning.” “Since I made up my mind, I decided to return suddenly.” The mother, while arranging various items on the low dining table, “We’ve only just become acquainted, yet it’s truly a shame,” she said.

Fujiko, “Uncle sits here. Next is Keisou, then me—is this alright?” she said to her mother. “Oh, that’s perfectly fine!” she said, then turned to me and added, “It’s nothing much, but we prepared this as a farewell token—please do partake.” She spoke in a quiet, pleasant tone with a faint regional accent.

“Then I’ll partake.”

I moved to the low dining table. During those long periods when I had always eaten alone, becoming part of this small beautiful family and sharing meals together gently warmed and softened my heart. Fujiko too looked delighted as she giggled, sometimes glancing at my face and at others scolding her brother. The mother, "We too will return home by month’s end," she said while giving me their address. "I’ll have my husband write you, so please keep in touch as well."

“I’m the one who received so much kindness from you.” “Please give my regards to your husband.” Fujiko turned, “Uncle. “I’ll send you letters too. “Is that alright, Mother?” she asked, tilting her small face toward her parent. The mother smiled and replied, “You must practice writing properly so Uncle won’t laugh at your letters.” “Oh? I’ll write for sure! “I’ll definitely write! “You’ll send me letters too, won’t you?” “Of course I will.”

We finished a relaxed dinner centered around Fujiko. I soon announced my farewell and returned to my room. The carriage arrived.

At the gate, Fujiko, her brother, and her mother had come out to see me off on my lonely journey.

To Fujiko's mother,

“Then I must take my leave now. Please give my regards to your husband.”

“Please take good care of yourself.”

The mother also wore an expression that seemed to sympathetically see off my difficult life and placed her hand on Fujiko’s shoulder. "Miss Fujiko. I am deeply indebted to you as well," I said as I got into the carriage.

“Uncle.” “Let’s play together again next year, okay?” “Ah, let’s play then. Goodbye.” “Goodbye.”

We parted. Fujiko, who had been cheerful until then, teared up in girlish fashion when the carriage began moving and suddenly pressed her face against her mother’s obi. While letting out low, muffled sobs—

On October 3, Meiji 44 (1911), I left the capital for the first time. When December came, I received a letter from Mr. Yamamoto Tsubakiso. Opening it, I found written there that Fujiko had succumbed to an intestinal ailment. It expressed gratitude for the care she had received during her lifetime, adding that Fujiko had often spoken of "the long-haired uncle." Upon reading this letter, I felt scalding tears rise. Then I pressed my hands together in prayer toward her now-vanished soul - that little savior who had been my salvation.

Elegy

Bontan shall sleep beneath the fruit-bearing tree. When I think of Bontan, tears flow. Bontan died in distant Kagoshima.

Bontan nine. Eyes are pearls Bontan loved by all irohanihohe rarirurero Ah ra ri ru re ro Those lovely hands too have gone to a distant place The celestial mother was sought and departed. Your uncle Seeking you—the sparrow’s lodging Won't you come, Fujiko? Is Fujiko not here? This is a chapter from a mourning poem I wrote for a magazine at that time—