Pathway to Japanese Literature

In a warm southern town, there was an elderly wooden shoemaker who always worked in sullen silence. His eyes were as small as an elephant’s and droopy, but in contrast, his nose and palms were twice as large as anyone else’s, and moreover, they were ill-proportioned. But those ill-proportioned hands of his must have produced such splendid wooden shoes, one after another. It was as if a magician’s hands had created them, giving birth to tiny living creatures.

The children always squatted under the shop’s awning, watching the old man work. Because they were crafted so skillfully, the children sometimes couldn’t help but let out sighs. But could even those dexterously moving hands have carelessly made a mistake at some point? For there was no nameless finger on the old man’s left hand. Back when the old man was still an apprentice wooden shoemaker, working late into the night while fighting off sleep, the tip of his chisel must have slipped and taken that finger away.

“Old Man Matan. “It’s hard to become a wooden shoemaker.”

A child who wanted to become a wooden shoemaker but feared losing a finger one day asked this question. Then Old Man Matan asked in return: “Why?” “Your nameless finger—you cut it off with a chisel, didn’t you?” “Yeah, this one?” Old Man Matan said as he spread out his left hand to show them. “This one wasn’t cut off by a chisel.”

Upon hearing this, the children realized that what they had firmly believed until now was wrong, and were overcome by a strange feeling, but along with that, a new curiosity welled up within them.

“Well then, why did you lose it?”

asked the same child eagerly. “Hmm.” Old Man Matan, with a faint smile playing about his lips, spread out his large hand missing the nameless finger and clenched it into a fist two or three times. Then he turned his face toward the children,

“You all, try holding out your hands.”

he said.

The children had grown somewhat uneasy, and not a single one made a move to comply.

“What’s this? It’s nothing to worry about.” Being told this, the eager child from earlier quietly extended one hand. Old Man Matan took the small hand in his large one, “Ah, yes. The time I lost my nameless finger was when this big hand of mine was about the size of this small hand. Now it’s become gnarled like a tree root, but back then, it was as beautiful and soft as this hand.”

While saying this, Old Man Matan gazed at the child’s hand nostalgically. “Shall I tell you how I lost my nameless finger?”

Having said that, he gripped the chisel again, leaned forward, and began hollowing out the wooden shoes.

Old Man Matan had been a rosy-cheeked, adorable boy about fifty years earlier. At that time, Matan was being raised in an old small village in the north by his mother alone. The village had many apple trees; in bright summers white flowers bloomed, and the scent of apples filled the village. And those flowers would become beautiful fruits like pearls when cold weather came. It was around the time when apples ripened that young Matan one day found a single walnut by the roadside.

"Oh, how lame." Matan threw away the walnut he had picked up. For the walnut was empty—nothing but a hollow shell. However, even though he tried throwing it away, when he saw it lying there, he wanted it again and picked it up once more. As he thought 'I wonder if this could become something' and kept twisting it this way and that, the walnut shell perfectly fit over the tip of his left nameless finger.

“Ah! A hat! A proper little hat!” Matan found this absurdly funny and laughed alone at his own joke. Then, *Nameless finger oh nameless dear,* *What fine chapeau adorns you here,*

“Tra-la-la!” Singing such a nonsensical song and bending and straightening the walnut shell-covered nameless finger as he went along, there under an imposing stone wall sat a girl all alone, looking dejected. “Hey, Julie, look at this!” With that, Matan approached. “Look, this finger’s bowing. Here, Julie. Hello.” The girl smiled sweetly as the nameless finger wearing a walnut shell bowed to her. But those large green eyes were misty with tears. However, Matan did not ask why she was crying. For Matan knew full well that Julie’s mother had been bedridden with illness for a long time; that her father was a drunkard who rarely returned home; that Julie sometimes had to make do with just water instead of bread; and that on the rare occasions when her drunken father did come home, Julie would be thrown out of the house.

Today too was likely just another instance of her father coming home and throwing Julie out. Matan, as usual, wanted to comfort Julie. But just how on earth was he supposed to comfort her? If only I had a biscuit—even just one—we could split it in half.

Suddenly, when Matan looked up, four or five crimson-ripe apples appeared in his view. The trees were growing inside the stone wall, but only their fruits showed above it.

Matan thought to pluck one of them and give it to Julie. Why did Matan think to pick someone else’s apple like that? If only he had gone home, splendid apples were growing in his own garden—as many as he wanted. Even Matan knew full well that stealing someone else’s apples was wrong. But perhaps his heart was so full of wanting to comfort Julie that he had no time to think of anything else.

“Wait here.”

Having said that, Matan ran toward the wheelwright’s shop. Beside the wheelwright’s shop, many old wheels with fitted hoops were propped up. Matan rolled one of them clattering over and propped it against the stone wall.

Julie, her round cheeks wrapped in a white hood, silently watched what Matan was doing. Matan climbed onto the propped-up wheel frame. And he reached his hand toward the apple.

“Oh, you mustn’t!”

Julie cried out in alarm. “Matan, you mustn’t!” “Don’t do that!” And she pulled Matan’s right hand, but by then his left hand was already clutching an apple. Inside the wall, a wealthy man holding scissors had been moving about for some time now, having his daughter hold a basket as he selected beautifully colored apples and snipped them off one after another. And just as Matan reached for the apple, the wealthy man happened to be standing right beneath that very tree.

“Matan, I told you not to!”

When Julie pulled his right hand, Matan let himself be pulled down. But what had happened? Clutching his left hand, he sank down on the spot. His complexion was deathly pale. “Ah, Matan!”

Julie let out a sharp, frightened cry and covered her face with her apron. “That’s how I lost my nameless finger.” With that, the old man finished making one shoe. The children listened wide-eyed.

“It was lost still wearing the walnut shell.”

“It was lost still wearing the walnut shell,” said the old man while brushing off the wood shavings that had accumulated on his lap. “Did it hurt?”

asked one of the children. “It hurt,” “If it were you all, you’d jump up and vanish.” “Didn’t your mother scold you?” asked one of the children. That child had asked such a question because whenever they returned home injured from outside, their mother would inevitably scold them. “My mother? “I was scolded. “I was scolded a lot. "But after scolding me, Mother would always press my hand to her chest, sobbing, ‘Poor thing, poor thing. Who did such a pitiful thing to you?’”

“Did the rich man come to apologize?”

asked the oldest boy among them. “He’d never come to apologize. They say he claimed that trying to take another family’s apple was the real wrongdoing.” The children fell silent. Indeed, trying to take an apple from someone else’s house was undoubtedly wrong. However, even if someone tried to take one apple, cutting off a finger and claiming it was only natural could also be seen as excessively cruel.

“So, what happened to that nameless finger?”

The child who wanted to become a shoemaker, squatting at the very front, asked. Moved by the child’s earnest manner, Old Man Matan was swayed. “Do you still want to hear?” “Well then, shall I let you hear it?” “Wait a moment.”

Since the sun had already shifted westward, Old Man Matan raised the sunshade curtain that had been covering the children. Then he sat down at his workbench and began carving the other piece. After finishing elementary school, Matan wanted to become a wooden shoemaker. In truth, his wish had been to go to Switzerland—that beautiful mountainous country—and become a shepherd, but sadly, he had to abandon that dream. That was because young Matan believed shepherds needed to play the flute skillfully. However, how could someone without a nameless finger ever play the flute properly?

There was also a reason why Matan wanted to become a wooden shoemaker. It was because he felt sorry for Julie, who wore nothing but her mother’s old wooden shoes and walked with such difficulty—clomping unsteadily, only to have the shoes go flying whenever she tried to hurry even a little. Matan had thought of making properly fitting wooden shoes for Julie himself. In a large town overlooking a river mouth several kilometers from the village lived a skilled wooden shoemaker. The boy Matan went to that wooden shoemaker as an apprentice.

“Since he’s missing a finger, this one might not become a proper wooden shoemaker.” Thinking so, the Master took Matan’s left hand in his own and examined it. But Matan proved astonishingly diligent. While working, those small eyes gleamed like blue gemstones. Until the lamp’s wick on the wall grew faint and thin, on the verge of sputtering out, Matan kept steadily working in the corner of the workshop.

“Matan. “Time to sleep.” the Master would say. “Master, I’m still not sleepy.” Matan lifted his face and replied. “Even if your eyes aren’t sleepy, the lamp’s are.” It was three years after coming to this town that Matan first carved a pair of wooden shoes entirely by himself.

The first thing he ever created. Could there be something in this world so nostalgic, so beautiful, so good? Matan would hug the wooden shoes to his chest, place them neatly on both outstretched hands, tilt his head while extending his arms fully, arrange them properly by his pillow at night—and still worry they might get dragged away by mice. Carving the name "Julie" into them, Matan sent those first wooden shoes he had made to Julie in the village.

Julie must have shed tears of joy. A long thank-you letter arrived at Matan’s place. “When I think these were made by Matan, wearing them on my feet feels almost wasteful,” “I’ll only wear them on market days, festivals, and Sundays when going to church,” “I’ll cherish them as dearly as your own hands”—such things were written at length, with “Thank you, thank you” repeated again and again.

However, even if she only wore them on market days and festivals, wooden shoes wouldn’t wear down that easily.

Then one day three years later, a letter arrived at Matan’s from Julie that said: “Matan. What should I do? Even though my feet keep growing little by little, those wooden shoes won’t grow for me. Even though I endured wearing them to church yesterday, two bean-sized blisters formed.”

"Oh, poor thing. I had completely forgotten that Julie’s feet were growing." By that time already a fully-fledged splendid craftsman, Matan promptly selected knot-free, straight-grained wood and began crafting new wooden shoes. And when he had finished them, he received from his Master a long-awaited release from his apprenticeship.

“Matan. “When you first came to my shop, I looked at your hand and thought, ‘With a finger missing, you’ll never make a proper craftsman.’ But you worked with all your might, and now you’ve become a better craftsman than me, your Master. “It pains me beyond measure to let you go.” The Master said this, gave Matan a large sum of money, and reluctantly bid him farewell.

Matan carefully carried the money and wooden shoes and left the bustling town by the riverbank. It was late autumn when a chilly wind blew from the east, the fields lay completely empty of any human presence, and Matan, though feeling loneliness, yet with joy bubbling deep within his heart, made his way briskly along the road. He passed through countless hills. On every hilltop stood windmills with four arms beneath the endless autumn sky, creaking as they spun. And as though beckoned by the windmills’ arms, clouds streamed forth from the eastern horizon like tattered cotton tufts, flowing away to parts unknown.

As he passed beneath one of the windmills, a man emerged from its shadow.

“Hello there.”

the man called out to Matan.

“You seem to be a traveler—where might you be headed?” Matan thought what a disagreeable fellow this smooth-faced man was, but he honestly stated the name of his village where he was heading back to.

“Oh, is that so?” the man said in a manner as if he had heard something delightful.

“How fortunate! Actually, I’m heading back to that village myself. They say travelers should share the road. Well then, let’s journey together.”

“Where are you from?” “I was born in that village.”

“What?” Matan looked the man over again. But he didn’t recognize him at all. Then the man continued, as if fully aware of the doubt blossoming in Matan’s mind, “Born there I was, mind—but seeing as I fled that village over thirty years back and never returned, I scarcely know a thing about it now.” “Dozens must’ve been born there since that I’d never lay eyes on.”

the man said glibly. And after the two of them walked in silence for a while, “Since I left over thirty years ago, I might just know the time when your mother was young.” “What was your mother’s name?” the man asked. Matan felt interest welling up within him.

“My mother’s name is Rosa.”

“Rosa?” Muttering this, the man fell deep into thought, as if trying to recall something from the distant past. And after a while,

“Ah, that’s it! I remember now. I remember now—Rosa, Rosa.”

he said nostalgically, then glanced at Matan’s flaxen hair peeking from under his hat’s brim, “Your mother must have had flaxen hair.” he said. “No. Blonde.” Matan answered. Then the man hurriedly,

“Ah, right, right—it was blonde. I meant to say that, but carelessly said the wrong thing.”

he made excuses. And this time, noticing Matan’s small eyes, “I think your mother had small, lovely eyes.—”

Having said this, he stared at Matan’s face as if confident he hadn’t made a mistake this time.

“That’s not true. “She had large, wide eyes.” Matan answered. “Ah, right, right. “They were large, beautiful eyes. “I meant to say that, but ended up saying the wrong thing. “My mouth seems to be acting strange today.”

And in that manner, the man dissembled. And finally, “Your mother must be the kindest, most wonderful mother in the whole world.”

he said.

Indeed, that was undoubtedly true. For Matan, there was no one in the entire world as kind as mother. Anyone would surely feel happy to have their mother praised. Matan thus ended up trusting the man.

Thus, the two of them ended up staying together at the roadside inn they had reached that evening. Apparently exhausted from a day’s journey, the man crawled into bed and immediately began to snore loudly. So Matan, intending not to be outdone, also began to snore loudly. However, the only one who truly fell asleep was Matan; from the very beginning, his companion had been faking his snores.

Around midnight, the moon, resembling a silver frying pan, watched from on high as a figure pushed open the inn window from within and fluttered down like a bat. The figure, as if fearing bright places, fluttered in and out of sight while seeking out dark spots like hedges, thickets, stables, and fence shadows, until finally being swallowed up by the deep darkness of the forest.

When morning came, Matan noticed that the wooden shoes and money were gone along with his companion.

What terrible people there are in this world. To think that after working so diligently for so long and earning precious money through sweat and toil, someone would sneakily steal it away like a demon!

However, lamenting what was lost forever would have been foolish. Matan still hadn't paid the inn charges. Though it was a modest sum, now that the thief had completely robbed him of even that meager amount, Matan could no longer pay the inn fees. He therefore devised a plan—borrowing a chisel and hammer from the innkeeper, he would make wooden shoes and use those instead of money to settle his debt.

When he made wooden shoes for the lean innkeeper, wooden shoes for the wife with her balloon-like belly, and wooden shoes for the small cute daughter—three pairs in total—the innkeeper was overjoyed and said, "This will do splendidly." However, since there were no shoemakers in this village and the villagers had been greatly inconvenienced, when they heard rumors of a skilled young shoemaker staying at the inn, they came one after another to place orders for wooden shoes.

Evening came, yet the work remained unfinished. Thus Matan ended up staying another night at the inn. When night deepened and it came time to sleep, Matan said to the innkeeper: "Last night's room feels too spacious for me alone. If there happens to be a smaller, more compact room available, I'd appreciate being moved there."

“Certainly.” “A small room at the end of the hallway just became available. Move there.” With that, the innkeeper said and handed Matan the candle. Matan said “Good night” and went to the room at the end of the hallway he had been directed to.

In the small room with a low ceiling and a single window, Matan worked for a while longer before going to bed. On the oak panel, a single cricket had perched and was chirping as if speaking to Matan.

Now, when Matan decided to finally rest and opened the table drawer to put away his chisel and hammer inside, he discovered one plump, bulging wallet within the drawer.

It was unexpected. Matan was left dazed. Whose wallet was this? Could it be that the person who stayed in this room last night had hurriedly forgotten and left it? Then, if Matan were to take this wallet, what would happen? If he were to silently slip it into his own pocket, wouldn't that be the end of it? But even now, the person who had forgotten it might come back to retrieve the wallet. He should push open the window right now and escape.

As Matan stared vacantly at the wallet, countless voices chattered frantically in his mind, debating every conceivable thing. Even the cricket that had fallen from the panel to the floor seemed to be saying something.

"That's wrong." "That's wrong." And so sang the cricket. Then inside Matan's head arose a single voice—

"In this world, everyone does bad things," "Since you had your money stolen by someone, now it's your turn to steal someone else's." A voice whispered. "Exactly." Matan thought. There, Matan's left hand came to rest hesitantly upon the wallet.

The cricket fell silent. The candle’s flame had burned out like spent oil. The kitchen area that had been bustling with card games until just moments ago was now completely still. The only sound emerging from this deep silence was the gentle babble of a stream’s water.

Just as Matan’s left hand hovered over the wallet in the drawer, he heard a tapping sound. It ceased at once. Thinking he’d misheard, Matan reached for the wallet. Then the tapping came again. Who was tapping where? It didn’t resemble door-knocking nor window-tapping from outside. Could someone still be awake this late?

Matan quietly looked around his surroundings. He shifted his gaze from one to the next—the fireless hearth, the old plate on the mantelpiece, the ceiling, black knot holes, the Christ figure carved into a wall recess, his own shadow split in two where the wall met the floor, the silent cricket beside the shadow. Those things silently accused him of what he was about to do, yet once he were to do it, they also seemed to promise they would keep it secret for him. At that, Matan tried to take the wallet a third time. Then once more came that tapping sound.

“Who could that be?”

Matan muttered to himself. Then, an answer came to Matan’s ears.

“It’s me.”

“Me?” Matan was startled. “Me? Who am I?” Then, the voice answered.

“I have no name. I have been nameless since the day I was born.” “There’s no such thing as such a preposterous story. Even cats have names—like Pusu or Mii.” Matan said.

“Truly, it’s a strange story. I had four siblings. They all had their own names, but I alone had none.”

And so the voice spoke. “Are you standing outside the door? Was it you who’s been knocking all along?”

Matan asked.

“I have been knocking since earlier.”

And the voice answered. “However, I cannot knock hard. When I’m with my four siblings, I can knock much more strongly though.” “By the way, you—what business brings you here now?”

(Unfinished)