Pathway to Japanese Literature

The background hue of the stars that wove a tapestry of light was the deep blue of the vast sky glowing from within. That vast sky stretched from one end of the earth to the other.

A lonely clump of golden corn stood thoroughly withered; thin vines—those vines already frost-withered—from which had grown, as if by miracle, a large crimson pumpkin. A grove of yellow-leaved trees stood in silent rows like those awaiting the Last Judgment's trumpet. The color of the earth that quietly bore these autumn symbols while wrapped in darkness was a dull purple tinged with black. That night at autumn's zenith.

We approached her house. Caroline, the youngest sister, pushed aside the persistent Saint Bernard Rex and swiftly opened the door, whereupon the amber light of the kerosene lamp cast a single streak of dazzling brilliance like a flaming sword across the veranda. Her brothers and sister who had accompanied me forgot about the solitary guest and rushed like moths toward the light and their parents. I hesitated, somewhat perplexed. Wondering why the spring-loaded door didn’t close naturally, I suddenly noticed her standing there with a smile, quietly holding the handle. I told her to come in. She remained silent, shaking her head lightly, and though blushing shyly, kept staring fixedly into my eyes without attempting to move. I felt genuinely happy and entered first. From that moment, I loved her deeply.

Frances—but people called her Fanny out of affection.

That night soon shifted to spirited conversation. The time came for Fanny and Caroline to sleep. Caroline with her blond curls had already fallen asleep. Fanny—her chestnut hair straight-parted like an American Indian’s and bluntly cropped below the ears—still stared wide-eyed. Fanny stubbornly insisted she wouldn’t sleep yet. The aged yet cheerful Mother feigned anger. Fanny threw a beseeching look at Father but finally buried her head obediently in Mother’s lap. Mother rested her hands lightly on both girls’ heads and murmured a short benediction; in return she first received their goodnight kisses. Then Father and the brothers received their kisses. As they tried to dash upstairs, Mother stopped them and gently chided that they must greet the guest too. Caroline scampered back to shake hands with me. Fanny—Fanny tilted her head slightly from the shadowed corner where only her lace collar showed clearly and sent across a smile. Then they clattered up the narrow stairs jostling each other. Through the racket came Father’s muttered aside: “That bashful Fanny—such an imp beneath it all.”

＊　　　　　　　＊　　　　　　　＊

Coldly, lonesomely, calmly—the dawn of late autumn’s countryside arrived. A haze-thin layer of frost had formed on the windowpane. As I stood by the sturdy wooden bed attempting to change my clothes, Fanny’s lively voice conversing casually with Caroline outdoors reached my ears. While fastening my suspenders to the button, I leaned against the window frame and looked outside.

It was a blanket of frost. Beyond the lawn that resembled a garden in front of the house stood a wooden fence, and across a road—wide enough for horse-drawn wagons to pass, running parallel to the fence—rose a rather large harvest shed. Behind the harvest shed spread a field that had been roughly plowed, littered with large clods of earth and tinged with purple like wasteland. In scattered patches, leafless willows stood lined up like brooms turned upside down. On the harvest wagon, its wheels caked with mud baked hard in the ruts, the leftover hay hung down in disarray like a witch’s hair. Over all these things, the morning sun began to cast its rays sideways, sharply etching shadows and sunlight. The crows' caws and the chickens' clucks reached my ears through the glass, carried from afar across the taut air. Nature, worn out from postpartum exhaustion, lay quietly sleeping in her childbed.

The loneliness and the farmer’s abundance lay spread before my eyes like symbols of generosity and meticulousness.

I tried to find Fanny. No sooner had I thought she was nowhere in sight than the back door of the harvest shed opened, and two young girls emerged alongside a flock of chickens—their mottled white wings half-spread as they clambered over one another’s backs in their scramble forward. The two stood in the sunlight. Chickens gathered around them, stretching their necks upward and bowing. One chicken even landed on Fanny’s arm. When Caroline gave a swift shake to the apron she had been holding up, oats scattered across the frozen ground like golden sand. A rooster stood slightly apart from the flock and crowed resoundingly to mark the hour.

Inside Fanny’s apron were chicken eggs gathered from every corner of the shed. She carefully extracted them one by one, exchanging words with Caroline as she opened the wooden gate and drew near the main house. The morning chill had painted her cheeks crimson, and her white teeth emerged beautifully from the threshold of her smile as if they’d cast off all shyness. I transferred my suspenders to my left hand and flicked the windowpane lightly with my right middle finger. Fanny lifted her face—still fixed in that smile—and looked toward me. The smile she had given to nature now she bestowed upon humans too. My fingertips forgot the pleasant cold transmitted through the glass and grew warm.

＊　　　　　　　＊　　　　　　　＊

When summer came, I visited this farmhouse again.

In the train, I had been thinking about Frances’s house—isolated as if crouching on the midsection of a gentle slope with the apple orchard behind it. The harvest shed with its whitewash mottled to reveal bare wood; half-hidden behind it, the old-fashioned stone main house with a low second story that might be called an attic; small windows lining its walls like watchful eyes fixed on anyone approaching; gaunt elms and ash trees slouching in the forward-tilting garden; shrubs thrusting upward sharply enough to prick one’s gaze; the withered remains of thistles clad in cotton and thorns; frost-withered vines sprawled like wire across the ground, their seedpods clattering dryly in the wind; nine Ayrshire dairy cows smeared with their own filth; puddles frozen to candy-colored ice; and field soil hunched sullenly under the sunlight—like an ailing child eyeing milk it refuses to drink…

However, as I approached the house, my eyes were pleasantly betrayed by my imagination. Where on earth had this small paradise—wrapped in a pleasant green as if strung with emerald jewels—sprung from? The mouse-gray of the main house’s walls and the mottled ash-white of the harvest shed seemed to skip lightly within the interplay of green shade and sunlight. The wooden gate opened lightly without making a creaking sound. I stepped onto the velvety grass underfoot and ascended to the wide veranda. I opened the insect screen door and knocked on the door. Once. Twice. Three times. There was no response. I stood quietly, smiling for no particular reason, and looked around. Across the wire netting stretched taut from the veranda railing to the eaves, nasturtiums and honeysuckle intricately intertwined in bloom, casting an egg yolk-hued golden light upon patches of boards and walls. From that dark green curtain, a sweet fragrance and the hum of bees gushed forth from nowhere in particular and, swayed by a quiet wind, enveloped me.

Suddenly, from the direction of the backyard, a clamor of laughter erupted. Still smiling in my intoxicated state, I wound my way through the fluttering cascade of elm blossoms and circled around to the kitchen entrance. Except for the heap of coal ash burned away during winter, clover had grown so thickly that there was no place to set a boot down, its flowers blooming in profusion. A well-fed cat crouched without shying away from people, licking the cow’s milk that had spilled abundantly among the grass.

When I exited the kitchen entrance, the sweltering rose fragrance—so dense it was stifling—assailed me all at once. The thirty-square-meter patch of ground that had been a labyrinth of thorns when I visited for Thanksgiving now lay completely buried in flowers, enveloped in summer sunlight’s most resplendent glow. I walked past its edge, ashamed of my own unsightliness. Suddenly the rose blossoms swayed with their full weight. As I turned back, Frances’s face appeared reflected in my eyes. She stood smiling, merged with the roses.

From the wooden basket hanging on her arm, scattering picked flowers in her wake, I followed Frances as she dashed out. Her shapely legs—now barefoot—lightly vaulted over the fence rail into the apple orchard. I hastily gathered the cluster of blossoms scattered where she’d leaped across. When I looked up, Fanny was clinging to Mother—reclined in her armchair—planting kiss after kiss indiscriminately on her face. Father—petite in his skullcap—had pushed aside his half-read newspaper and peered through wire-rimmed glasses in astonishment as Mother tried to shake her off like someone ensnared in cobwebs. Here too an intoxicating fragrance like wine overwhelmed me. Between the brothers—stripped to shirtsleeves rolled above their biceps—stood a massive apple press; from its silver spigot flowed raw cider juice that sparkled in sunlight like distilled summer itself, dripping steadily into a soot-blackened trough. Beside it lay windfallen unripe apples heaped in mounds. Spotting me, the brothers cried out in unison. Bees swarmed about them like living halos as each approached to crush my hand in their large palms—hands scorching hot from labor’s fire. When I’d steadied myself somewhat, I turned toward Fanny. She stood with cheeks blazing crimson and bare feet neatly aligned beneath her skirt—a study in demure posture. Those eyes—what eyes they were! What did that gaze question? What marvel did it find beneath this summer light that bared all things?

＊　　　　　　　＊　　　　　　　＊

One morning, the parents had their heavy draft horse pull the usual old Wapparo light cart as always, carefully packed into wooden boxes the eggs Caroline had gathered that morning and placed them beneath a lap robe, then set out for the village with a rattling clatter of wheels. The returning carriage would bring necessary meat, newspapers, and a bundle of letters.

I grew weary of my morning reading and went out to the garden with Caroline. When we approached the flower garden, Fanny—who was in charge of it—darted out from among the flowers and beckoned us over. And she took me into the apple orchard. Her eyes, after whispering something with Caroline, shone with a mischievous glint. After running past me a little ways, she turned toward me, stopped, and told me to halt. I stopped. She said I must look straight at her and not let my eyes wander elsewhere. Why would there be any need for me to look elsewhere? “One, two, three—march toward me in military step,” she commanded sternly. I obediently started walking with such vigor that I might have bowled her over. When I thought I’d taken about five steps, I involuntarily leapt up. For I felt pain as though ten syringes had been plunged all at once into the shins of my now-bare legs. While glaring resentfully at Fanny and Caroline doubled over convulsed with laughter, I looked down to see a single large thistle with purple flowers standing there, its holly-like leaves spread wide. I was suddenly seized by a strange impulse. Like Bacchus pursuing a nymph fleeing into the woods, I chased down Fanny and embraced her from behind. Fanny kept laughing like champagne fizzing in a goblet, her body writhing. From the cherry leaf canopy overhead, a flock of starlings clinging to the fruit startled and flew off en masse with raucous cries. I came to my senses with a start and released Fanny from my arms. My chest throbbed with faintly painful palpitations, trembling equally from excitement and dread. Fanny knew nothing of human hearts’ treachery.

She continued laughing nonchalantly, gesturing as if in a dance.

＊　　　　　　　＊　　　　　　　＊

With bookshelves,a piano,a organ,and chairs too stately for someone of his standing as a part-time farmer,Father's study-dim even at noon-was bustling with rare guests from the city.In one sooty corner of this room where everything appeared smoke-stained,the lady dressed in pure white linen resembling piled snow was praising rural life with urbane eloquence befitting her city origins.Today even Caroline wore socks and shoes,a rare sight.Suddenly,Fanny hurried into this space,barefoot still,cradling a single rose in her hands.When she noticed your presence there,Fanny froze awkwardly at loss.You and Fanny appeared like two opposing poles within that chamber.As Mother rose with maternal authority intending to scold her impropriety and send her upstairs for grooming,the lady herself stood from her chair restraining Mother.She then lavishly extolled Fanny's unadorned charm and wild-nurtured innocence.Fanny had already recovered her usual vivacity;without any bashfulness she approached Father and placed rose blossom within his wrinkled palm.

“Papa, this is the biggest and most beautiful flower that bloomed this summer.”

Father smiled as if ticklish and, pinching the stem between his fingertips, twirled it around. Why did you let slip this opportunity for city dwellers to praise country folk? “Fanny, you are the very image of a little angel.”

With those elegant words extending toward Father. Father nonchalantly handed you the flower; you lightly sniffed its scent and kissed it before gazing at it with an astonished expression. Fanny looked toward you for the first time with cheerful smiles gracing her cheeks. And she took seat showing only from waist up where legs might hide. You continued sniffing flower-scent while engaging Fanny and glancing around gathering with intelligence-air.

“This rose is red, don’t you think? Why do you suppose there are red ones and white ones in this world?” she asked, tilting her head with elegant flourish. “I don’t know,” Fanny answered honestly, shaking her head. “In that case, I’ll tell you then. In return, let me have this one.” “Once upon a time,” she began in that manner, and started recounting Oscar Wilde’s little tale of how a nightingale had its breast torn by a thorn, staining white petals red with its blood. Not only Fanny but even her mother was moved and enthralled by her smooth storytelling. Before the story could conclude, the chickens behind the kitchen raised a raucous clamor. Caroline, who was entrusted with the chickens’ care, jumped up with eyes as wide as saucers. The entire household also pricked up their ears as if a great crisis had occurred. As Caroline dashed out of the room shouting, “Rex has done mischief again!”, Fanny—who loved dogs—retorted indignantly in a loud voice, “Rex would never do such a thing! It must’ve been the cat!” she exclaimed vexedly. “Mimi did it?” retorted the shrill-voiced younger sister, her voice already audible from the direction of the kitchen entrance.

When the gathering settled, you cast aside the rose topic and began discussing Rostand’s Chantecler with Father and Mother. Fanny was no longer included in the conversation. While deftly mimicking the gestures of Barimore—an opera singer then rising to prominence—you unconsciously tucked the rose you held into your breast.

Fanny, who had been listening in silence for a while, suddenly called out vehemently, “Papa!” I looked at Fanny. Her cheeks were puffed out with an affected seriousness. Father looked reproachfully at his daughter. Fanny didn’t back down. When you, having briefly paused your words, tried to resume speaking, Fanny again vehemently cried, “Papa!” Father had to pretend anger in your presence. “What a rude child you are, huh?”

“That rose was given to you, Papa dear!”

“I know it.” “You don’t know it!” When Fanny uttered her final words，her lips were trembling. It wasn’t that tears had welled up. However，her eyes were shining. Father was making a wry smile，as though his own weakness had been betrayed. You smiled and fell silent for a moment，but then coolly resumed your earlier conversation as though nothing had happened. Father and Mother，as if trying to make amends for the impropriety of the situation，listened even more attentively to your words. Your heart，which always seemed to tremble with delicate sensibilities，appeared not to have drawn out what lay within Fanny’s breast. You didn’t even seem to think that a country girl was just a country girl. I felt sorry for Fanny and looked at her. At that moment，she too looked at me. I tried to offer her a well-meaning smile，but it was crushed by her irritated and angry glare. Fanny never looked back at me again，as if in scorn. And after a short while，she suddenly stood up and went outside. Caroline came in just as someone was leaving and ceremoniously reported that the chickens were unharmed. You，as if taking the parents’ place，put on a smile and nodded in response to Caroline’s report.

After a while, when the door opened again, Fanny slipped in quietly. With gestures showing the restraint and humility of a dog that had served loyally only to be scolded by its master, she approached Father’s side and quietly placed another single rose in his hand. Waiting obediently for a lull in the conversation, “This is the second most beautiful rose, Papa,” she said with a gentle expression and looked at you. The small effort of trying desperately to be gentle was clearly visible even to onlookers.

“I see.” The taciturn father said with a face that seemed to smother a smile into a wry grimace. “Shall I give this to Mrs. ○○?”

Father simply nodded.

“This is yours.”

Fanny handed it to you. You gave a slight greeting and received it, then tucked it into your breast alongside the previous one. Fanny seemed to have convinced herself that you would exchange it for the first rose, yet you appeared oblivious to this expectation. Perhaps because Fanny remained rooted in place, making it impossible to properly exchange greetings—

“Thank you once more, dear.”

she bowed lightly again. Since Fanny also bowed lightly in accordance with the situation’s etiquette, there was nothing more she could do. She left the room again, her face still downcast.

The heartrending sight of her figure did nothing but pierce my heart.

I remained still for some time, enduring it all, but growing unbearably sorry for Fanny, I quietly slipped out of the room. She wasn’t in the adjoining room that served as both dining and living quarters either. Guided by faint clinking sounds from the quiet kitchen, I opened its door to find Fanny standing with her back turned, washing dishes. When she noticed someone approaching and spun around, her eyes blazed like fire. Then, as if maddened, she flicked what little water she held in her hand straight at my face.

When you rose to take your leave, Father gently apologized for Fanny’s rudeness and had the most beautiful rose returned. Having realized that the guest had left, Fanny emerged from the kitchen. When she caught sight of the rose in Father’s hand, she rushed over as though unable to bear it any longer and buried her face in his chest. When Father began to admonish her,

“This rose is yours anyhow, Papa,” Fanny said in a trembling voice. And for a little while, her suppressed sobs could be heard like a melody from between Father’s chest and her face.

＊　　　　　　　＊　　　　　　　＊

In the spring of the following year, I visited this one house again. It was around the time when cherry blossoms had turned white as snow and begun to scatter, when lilacs adorned the field ridges with their waxy purple clusters and fragrance, when apple trees clad their rugged branches thickly with delicate pale-pink buds like a country girl’s blush, when violets and dandelions turned barren soil into a throne, when soft pasture grass sprouted evenly like the down on a young Bacchus’s face, and when cuckoos began calling intermittently to weave stillness into the forest. In the sky were doves. In the trees were tree squirrels. On the ground were young turtles.

A merciful spring rain was falling warmly and quietly over all things. The soft soil, sticky as plaster, clung to my boots.

In the combined dining and living room that had been empty when I visited last summer, all the family members were present. When they saw me, the whole group sprang to their feet and shouted, “Hello!” Fanny came flying over with her usual liveliness and opened the door for me. Having shed my reserve, I began taking off my shoes at the entrance in the Japanese manner. Three beautiful kittens with fur like woven rugs immediately arched their backs and began playing with my bootlaces. I shook hands with Mother. She remained exactly as she had been last year. I shook hands with Father. He looked noticeably older. Fanny’s brothers had each grown to match what their elder brothers’ statures had been the previous year. Caroline had outgrown any suitability for being called “baby.” Fanny—the Fanny who ought to have been present—was nowhere visible. My somewhat impatient father called her name loudly but received no answer. Father and I spent some time discussing matters since our last parting until his lingering concern manifested again through another loud call for Fanny. To this booming summons came Fanny’s “Here you are,” rebounding from behind the upstairs door as though thrown back by its force. And the door opened.

I realized Fanny had been standing by the door all along waiting for the right moment to emerge, and felt a peculiar sense of dislocation. Her entire face flushed crimson yet baring her white teeth in a smile that strained to conceal embarrassment, Fanny marched up to me and delivered a stiff handshake. “You’ve gone and dressed up!” This simple taunt from her brother proved enough to overturn Fanny’s composure. Her face burned scarlet as she shot him a glare before wheeling back toward the doorway. Roaring laughter billowed through the room. Tears already glistened in Fanny’s eyes.

Fanny never showed her bare feet to anyone anymore. And her hair that had grown long over the year was parted in two and braided down like Faust’s Margarete. Nevertheless, from the very next day onward, she became last year’s lively, unreserved, genuinely kind-hearted Fanny. We often went out into fields and mountains with Caroline, the three of us playing silly pranks. On the third day after we went there, the parents’ birthday that had been set by this household arrived. The brothers slaughtered chickens and turkeys. The two daughters and I went to gather fern leaves and wildflowers from the mountains to decorate the room.

When we opened the gate and stepped onto the path, the dairy cows that had gathered in the sunny spot by the harvest shed, squinting their eyes as they basked in sunlight, quietly approached us along the edge of the wooden fence. Their glossy coats, as if dressed in woolen garments, glistened strand by strand. The newborn calf watched people with perpetually startled round eyes while stretching its neck over the fence, skillfully wrapping its rough tongue around two proffered fingers to suck with noisy slurps. We distributed handfuls of green grass to each cow before resuming our walk. Caroline kept singing loudly throughout. Her voice became a faint echo that returned from both mountains and woods.

Caroline suggested playing telegraph again. Fanny said she didn’t want to. The youngest child, Caroline, immediately burst into tears and insisted they absolutely had to do it. Fanny relented like an older sister should, and the three held hands. I stood between them, passing messages from Caroline to Fanny and back again. Whenever Caroline squeezed my hand firmly, I had to squeeze Fanny’s just as tight. Until last year she’d always squeezed back with equal force, but now her grip remained limp. Her hand felt unnervingly cold. With Fanny’s responses perpetually half-hearted, Caroline grew cross and started complaining. “Then we’ll stop,” Fanny declared, releasing my hand at once. However Caroline stormed or cajoled after that, Fanny wouldn’t take my hand again.

When we entered the forest, the scent of the woods came and enveloped us. The leaves of the oak, elm, and maple alike were all as soft as lilac leaves, suffused with a pale green hue. The tree trunks ostentatiously exposed their peculiar bark textures to the dappled sunlight filtering through the leaves, and from their old wounds, sap like wine oozed slowly. Where sap was oozing out, small insects that had just emerged from their holes turned black and swarmed. Spiders too began spinning their webs, but as yet there were no winged insects ensnared as victims in those silken traps. Only dew lingered.

When we stood quietly and listened intently, a faint sound could be heard. Whether it was fallen leaves decaying, roots absorbing water, curled leaves unfurling, insects whispering, or wind passing through—amidst these quiet sounds and sonorous silence—a woodpecker could be heard rat-a-tatting while a flying squirrel made chittering cries. When I raised my head, steam-like clouds skimmed the high treetops and raced across the windless sky. Ahead stretched a blue sky luminous as light, endlessly drawing one’s gaze upward into its boundless expanse.

The three of us scattered to compete in gathering flowers. When we were too far apart, the voices calling out to each other had such a beautiful roundness that they no longer sounded like our own. I grew intoxicated, chose a sunny slope, spread out ferns, and sat down. From the direction of the village came a faint, cheerful sound—like hearing festival drumming from very far away. I felt as though I were smelling with my ears the grassy scent of ferns trampled underfoot. I felt a superficial, sentimental sorrow. And time passed—indeterminable whether long or short.

Suddenly I sensed someone approaching through my left ear. When I realized they were muffling their footsteps, I felt a peculiar anticipation. And I prayed that those footsteps might belong to Fanny. As they drew near from slightly behind and to one side, a familiar wooden basket stuffed with enough wildflowers to seem excessive came flying before my eyes. Slowly I looked up to the left. There stood Fanny, her face flushed crimson while her whole body seemed to smile.

After hesitating for a while，Fanny eventually sat down near me as I commanded．When we were alone，she seemed rather not to feel any inner awkwardness．While talking of this and that，we had imperceptibly melted into a sibling-like familiarity．She pulled the hand basket closer and，while extracting flowers，told me their names：“Saffron crocus，buttercup，Solomon’s seal，bloodroot，balloon flower，Chinese bellflower，pokeweed… Bloodroot—you see，it bleeds like this．” “Saffron crocus roots become medicine．” “Pokeweed sprouts can substitute asparagus，but you mustn’t eat the roots—they’re poisonous．” “Aren’t buttercups lovely？They’re also called King’s Wine Cups．” “Balloon flowers mean fickleness．” Having said this，she suddenly fell silent．Then she stared intently at me．I lay propped on my elbows at her feet，looking up at her face．An ingratiating expression I’d never seen before now hovered there．She wore it unconsciously—this I could tell．Yet I couldn’t help feeling discomfort．

There’s Fennel for you, and Columbines…… Suddenly she hummed the mad Ophelia’s little song and flung a balloon flower at me. Fanny had finally crossed beyond the boundary of girlhood. I felt a bitter sense of having been betrayed by nature and grimaced. I lifted my face once more and called out, “Fanny!” Fanny eagerly answered “What?” right away—but upon noticing how both my face and voice now carried an unfamiliar tone—she too assumed an unnaturally composed expression.

“You’re no longer a girl—you’ve become a virgin now.” Fanny’s face flushed crimson up to her hairline in an instant. As though unsure how to handle the shame of exposing her limbs before my eyes, she kept her face deeply bowed, refusing to lift it. She trembled with shame, shrinking her hands, feet, and torso as much as possible to keep them from meeting my gaze. A fiery sensation shot through my head. Fanny must have misunderstood my words. When I realized that wasn’t what I’d meant to say, I found Fanny unbearably pitiful and endearing.

“It’s because you’ve grown your hair so long and started doing things like braiding it that this happened.” “Go back to how it was before.” But those words slipped past her heart without making contact, like autumn leaves slipping from tree branches.

On the way back, Caroline immediately noticed our utterly altered demeanor and began to wonder. In her childish mind, she must have thought we’d had a quarrel; she bustled back and forth between us trying to mediate.

From that day on, I could no longer see Fanny’s face that had once blazed with the purity and joy of girlhood.

＊　　　　　　　＊　　　　　　　＊

The day had come when it was time to bid farewell to this house forever. Fanny had not shown herself before me at all since morning. Around noon, when the carriage was ready, I shook farewell hands with the family members, but Fanny was still not there. The brothers stood on the veranda and called her name in loud voices. It was futile. I went down into the garden and headed toward the harvest shed. Leaning against the front door and basking in the spring sunlight, she stood gazing vacantly toward the fields. When she saw me approaching alone, she seemed to reconsider and strode over. I thought that at least I wanted to make my previous excuse and part ways. The two of them shook hands. Fanny’s icy-cold hand firmly grasped mine. Before I could say anything, Fanny, with a perfunctory smile at the corner of her mouth, said, “Farewell!”

“Fanny.”

Without giving me a chance to continue, Fanny pressed on, saying again, “Farewell!” And once more she firmly grasped my hand.