Pathway to Japanese Literature

I

On the evening of August 31st, as the master and his wife returned to Tokyo with the young children whose school was to begin on the first, nine people remained at the Magaribuchi villa in Yuigahama.
There were the eldest son Ichirō; the eldest daughter Kinoe; the second daughter Otsuko; Yōshi—a daughter from a distant branch of the wife’s family who cared for Kinoe and Otsuko; Ichirō’s classmate Sawa; the maids Nobu and Tetsu; and the villa caretakers Jiiya and Baaya.
Outside, there was an old English-bred Pointer, tottering with age.

With the departure of the nervous, fussy master—who valued proper behavior above all else—everyone’s spirits seemed to align in becoming delightfully free and uninhibited.

On his way back from seeing them off at the station, Ichirō parted with the others, invited the Okabe siblings waiting by the first torii gate, and made his way to the hotel.
Throughout the summer at that dance hall, Ichirō's crowd had danced with American women and Japanese young ladies, but now guests were scarce. The musicians from the Philippines who had come to earn their summer wages had saved their modest earnings and returned home, leaving no one seated at the tables arranged across the broad wooden floor where cool breezes drifted through.
Even so, Ichirō felt exhilarated.
He held a conviction that he had at last firmly captured the heart of his friend's bright-faced sister before him.
His youthful, healthy, and restless heart pulsed with a vivid hope—that whatever he desired would be readily granted if only he reached for it—and indeed, with the faint unease that inevitably accompanied such hope.

The others who had parted with Ichirō emerged from the sand hills along Namekawa River to the seaside, and as the setting sun sank, walked across the distinctly autumnal, cold shore, leaving behind footprints from geta sandals and bare feet.

Sawa, who had been Ichirō's classmate since middle school and far surpassed the pampered heir in both academics and worldly wisdom, had been forced to drop out when his father died years earlier due to tuition difficulties—until Ichirō's father, recognizing him as his son's worthy companion, began providing monthly support covering everything from living expenses to school fees.
Upon graduating school next year, Ichirō was supposed to study abroad, while Sawa had been decided to be employed at the company headed by the master.
He had carried the pride of an honor student since elementary school.
He also had confidence that he was a model student.
In his hometown, his family had been known as an old established household, but his mother died early, and his father—a political fanatic—having spent everything from mountain forests to rice fields on campaign expenses, having been propped up as a candidate in numerous parliamentary elections yet never once knowing the joy of being elected, passed away leaving his only son with nothing.
Even when summer vacation came, as the home he should have returned to had passed into others’ hands, he had no choice but to attach himself to the Magaribuchi family and remain at their villa.
What had once been a friendship between equals had now become a relationship where he felt somewhat inferior—if not quite master and servant—and so his heart was perpetually clouded by uneasy shadows.
Ichirō, who—though not devoted to his studies—was a handsome athlete good at everything he tried, spent his summers with wealthy friends viewing the season as one for romantic adventures, enthralled by rumors of beautiful girls flocking to the resort. Yet Sawa alone remained excluded, harboring both envy and contempt for their carefree ways.
He secretly consoled himself by clinging to the pride that he was fundamentally different from such carefree sons.

However, even within his heart, the figure of a woman had recently begun to take clear shape. That was Yōshi.

Yōshi was a daughter from a branch of Madame Magaribuchi’s family, and hers too was an unfortunate lot. After her father—who had failed in his business and faced allegations of check forgery—took his own life, her stepmother remarried elsewhere, her brother was assigned as a hospital doctor in a colony, and with no one else to turn to, she came under Magaribuchi’s care. Though she was twenty-one this year—four years older than Kinoe and seven years older than Otsuko—she had been placed in a position akin to a tutor for the sisters and even burdened with the role of a nursemaid for the particularly frail Otsuko. During her time at the prefectural girls' school, she had been a women’s athletics competitor and a record holder in sprinting. Large-framed, fair-skinned, and with sharply defined features, she stood out among crowds and in open spaces to catch young men’s eyes. Even among Ichirō’s circle of friends, they had not infrequently made her a topic of discussion, but Yōshi dismissed such people outright as fools.

Sawa had long held genuine sympathy for Yōshi, who shared similarly unfortunate circumstances as himself, but until recently he had felt nothing resembling romantic affection. One reason lay in his innate tendency toward self-aggrandizement—while this disposition allowed him to pity the less fortunate, it prevented him from considering them as equals or superiors. Rather, he secretly wished that if possible, he might take as his future wife a daughter from some upright and presently prosperous family. Unlike Ichirō who resembled their mother, Kinoe took after their angular-faced father; there had even been a time when he had harbored deep within his heart the hope that should someone from such proper stock recognize his talents, he would gladly make them his own.

As for why he had come to yearn for Yōshi, it could only be attributed to their similar circumstances binding them together. Moreover, on another front, as Kinoe matured into womanhood, her attitude toward him grew increasingly distant, which naturally became the cause for what might be called his ambitious—or rather, not merely ordinary—feelings toward her to wane.

As one example, there was an incident where Sawa had unwittingly passed by a room overlooking the garden of the Magaribuchi main residence in Kōjimachi, where Kinoe’s friends had gathered.
Nervously under the gaze of the gaudily dressed young ladies, his ears turning red all the way to their backs as he hurried past—but no sooner had he sensed them whispering among themselves than—

“Oh, that’s not it. He’s just our scholar-like person.”

The sound of Kinoe’s cracking voice refuting them was heard.
Sawa, who had fled as if chased by the sound of boisterous laughter that followed, could not endure the sense of humiliation.
The fact that they were people from an entirely different world than himself became clearly understood, without particular strain, within the common sense-honed mind of this young man aspiring to become a businessman.

“I’m just a criminal’s daughter after all.”

Though she spoke in this dismissive tone, Yōshi—who seemed to harbor unshakable convictions deep within—gradually grew more endearing. For Ichirō and the daughters were merely drifting through each day in idle amusement without a single settled thought between them, while Yōshi at least maintained some understanding of both academics and real-world issues. Even when reading the same newspaper—while the siblings pored over articles about concerts and sports meets—her conversations with Sawa were adult ones.

“You’re so enviable.”
“Once you graduate from school, everything after will depend on your own abilities.”
“Men truly have it good.”

Yōshi habitually lamented the purposelessness of women’s existence.
The combination of her pitiable circumstances, her determination as a woman to achieve something through her own efforts despite societal constraints, and her straightforward demeanor—all while nursing an unconsoled heart that whispered “if only the world were different”—had gradually come to feel comforting to Sawa.

Particularly, their month and a half in Kamakura had deepened their intimacy.
The care Yōshi provided when Sawa lay bedridden with food poisoning for five days left an indelible impression on the young man who had never known maternal warmth.
Before he realized it, Sawa had developed an aching fondness for Yōshi.
For someone like him who had never experienced love’s adventurous thrills, romance immediately translated to marriage prospects.
He even entertained the overly earnest notion that two rootless individuals like themselves would make ideal lifelong partners.
Above all, he yearned for the right moment to confess his feelings and receive clear affirmation in return.
His mind brimmed with sentimental fantasies reminiscent of novels—visions of pure companionship between man and woman whose hearts had mutually opened.

There, after the stifling master and his wife had departed, a liberated, expansive feeling steadily welled back up.
Though the sight of Ichirō inviting friends and heading off to the hotel would normally have filled him with bitterness, that day he saw them off with a sympathetic smile.

The number of people strolling along the evening beach had dwindled markedly, with Kinoe at the forefront, followed shortly after by Otsuko and Yōshi, while Sawa walked last, observing with interest the retreating figures of the three ahead.
Passing under the hotel’s shaded area and reaching the Inase River’s edge, the villa’s roof came into view.
Having gone that far, the women sat down on the sand.

“Sawa-san, take a break.”

When Yōshi gave a loud command, the sisters laughed in unison.

“Heave-ho!”

Sawa, also in a cheerful mood, joked while stretching out both legs on the sand that still retained the day’s warmth.

By the shore, the sun wanes as midnight deepens

The sound of waves crashing on rocks rises solitary and loud.

Even if composed, the sailor sleeps,

To whom can we speak the traveler’s heart?

The thin, high-pitched voices of the three began to sing, with no one in particular starting it.
Sawa sat beside them, breathing in the clear autumn sea air while his eyelids burned with loneliness—a loneliness that yearned for anyone, anyone at all he could feel truly close to—as he stared fixedly at the star-studded sky above the sea.

The four of them returned to the villa only after night had fully fallen. Under the light, each read whatever magazines they pleased or did their knitting; stretched out on the veranda's rattan chair, Sawa pretended not to watch while observing them. Beyond the pine forest in the garden, the bright hue of the rising moon gradually deepened, and as they watched, the perfectly round moon rose steadily into the sky.

"Oh, I dropped my comb."

It was well into the night when Yōshi suddenly closed the magazine she had been reading and cried out. She placed her hand on her slightly old-fashioned large chignon and tilted her head, but—

“It must be where we rested earlier.”
“Because it was definitely there before that.”
“What a waste to lose three yen and fifty sen.”

Joking as she stood up, she went out to the veranda and looked at the sky.

“It’s such a lovely moonlit night—I’ll go take a quick look.”
“Otsuko-san, please wait here.”
“I’ll be right back.”

“Yōshi-san, are you sure you should go alone?”

Kinoe stopped her knitting and called out.

"It's all right. It's so bright out here."

With a casual reply, her retreating figure started walking.

"Shall I go?"

Sawa jumped down from the chair with the nimbleness of a gymnast and followed her out into the garden.

"No, it's quite all right."
"I'll go myself."

The woman's voice reached the sisters' ears clearly, but after that, there was no sign of either of them anymore.

When they exited straight through the gate along the ditch where pampas grass and wild chrysanthemums grew among weeds to reach the sea, the brightness of the moonlit night grew even more distinct, but enormous clouds piled up in the western sky and the wind proved unexpectedly strong.
Mindful of her white robe’s hem—now wrapping around her legs, now being whipped about by the wind—Yōshi walked ahead.

The Western-style comb inlaid with mother-of-pearl was something even Sawa recognized.
Convinced she must have dropped it there, they searched together at the spot Yōshi mentioned where everyone had sat in a row a few hours before, but they couldn’t find it.

“What’s going on? I was sure it was here—maybe someone picked it up.”

Yōshi circled the same spot repeatedly, unable to let go. The comb was a memento her father had bought during one of their rare walks together before his suicide. For Yōshi—who clung stubbornly to this relic from a man who’d died unusually—losing it felt unforgivable.

“Maybe it’s really gone?”

Unable to give up, she stood casting a long shadow on the sand and let out a lingering sigh.

“Oh, I wonder if it’s rain.”

A single drop—chilling against his cheek—Sawa pressed his palm there and looked up at the sky behind him.
The earlier clouds were breaking apart and flying toward the moon.
“It’s raining.”
There was no time for such words.
A fierce evening shower lashed down upon the sandy ground.
The two of them dashed into the reed-screened tea shop beneath the sandhill—the one that looked after the clothing of people entering the sea during the day.

The moon was still perfectly round and clear high in the sky, yet half the sky had darkened, and the rain showed no sign of stopping.

“What strange weather this is—it feels eerie, don’t you think?”

“Is tomorrow the 210th day?”

“No, it’s the day after tomorrow.”

Huddling from the raindrops falling through gaps in the reed screens, the two of them stood watching that strange evening’s scenery with separate thoughts.

Suddenly, across the sand before their eyes, they saw the figures of a man and woman running hand in hand.
With nowhere to escape the rain pouring down on their heads, the woman let out a faint cry as she was pulled along by the man’s strength, but soon they vanished from sight behind a large fishing boat.

“That was Mr. Ichirō just now, wasn’t it?”

Even without Yōshi pointing it out, Sawa had to acknowledge it was Ichirō and his friend Okabe’s sister. His heart raced as if he’d witnessed some grave incident, leaving him unable to respond.

The moon kept hiding behind clouds or peering out reluctantly, but the rain refused to let up. From head to shoulders, both were drenched through. To Sawa, Yōshi’s profile seemed more luminous than ever.

“Yōshi-san.”

The voice Sawa forced out trembled mercilessly despite his utmost effort.

“There’s something serious I need to ask you…”

At his uncharacteristic tone, Yōshi stiffened and turned—her piercing gaze left him speechless. This won’t do, he thought desperately, yet every gesture and phrase now struck him as absurdly theatrical. His lips parched completely.

For a short while, in silence, feeling each other’s breaths, the two of them gazed at each other’s faces.

“Sawa-san.”

Yielding to exhaustion, seizing the moment when Sawa lowered his gaze to the sandy ground beneath his feet, it was Yōshi who finally broke the silence after a considerable time had passed.

"I am a criminal's daughter."

When Sawa looked up in surprise, Yōshi seemed to try forcing a smile but, lacking the composure to even laugh, suddenly dashed out into the downpour toward the villa.

Thinking "Damn it," Sawa too dashed out right after.

When they passed through the villa's gate, the rain had stopped abruptly, and the perfectly round moon—wearing an unperturbed expression—was being blown by the wind across a flawlessly clear midair sky.

“Yōshi-san, do you have the comb?”

“You took so long—now you’re soaked.”

When the sisters who had been waiting came out to the veranda to greet them, both were drenched through, their kimono clinging to their skin as if suctioned tight, panting heavily.

II

The morning of September 1st brought a south wind blowing head-on—closing the veranda's glass doors made the air stiflingly humid, while opening them sent everything in the room whirling about uncontrollably.

Yōshi and Ichirō were entertaining the sisters, forming a circle and playing cards.
Ichirō kept getting carried away, repeatedly shouting "No Trump," but his mind was far from calm.
Last night, after Okabe had intentionally vacated their seats for the two of them and gone to the billiards hall, he had invited Midoriko out to the beach.
They walked along the moonlit shore to Reizan-ga-saki, but when crossing the rippling Inase River along the way, he insisted on carrying Midoriko—who hesitated somewhat—on his back to get across.
When the evening shower began to fall, they had just been about to head back toward the hotel—but seizing on the rain's relentless downpour as their cue, he suddenly grabbed her hand and broke into a run.

With no small measure of mischievous intent, paying no heed as the slow-footed woman nearly collapsed, he kept running recklessly toward the hotel’s reed-screened hut.
By the time they reached that hut beneath the dark sandhill, even Ichirō was breathing so hard he couldn’t speak. Midoriko, drenched from head to hem, struggled for breath as she—
“This is awful.”
Even as she tried to speak, the words wouldn’t pass her lips.
Hot sweat steamed up across her rain-soaked body.
She had not a shred of strength left to take another step, her appearance suggesting that if released, she would collapse to her knees right there.
Ichirō discarded the geta he had removed and held in his left hand onto the sandy ground, and at the same time spread both arms and embraced her petite frame.
When he hugged her tightly, he felt the wetness of his own kimono all the more intensely.
Pressing the forehead of her perfumed bobbed hair against his chest and feeling wholly reassured by Midoriko’s deathly still form, he lightly kissed the faintly pale neck visible before him.

Whenever he recalled that moment, playing cards to entertain his sisters felt utterly absurd. When he thought about how he was scheduled to play tennis with Okabe in the hotel garden again that afternoon, and how Midoriko had sworn she would definitely come, he could think only of wishing for the hours to pass faster. Naturally, he found himself dealing the cards with reckless abandon.

Sawa lay on the rattan chair with a slight fever, pinching his nose against the cold symptoms.

“Mr. Sawa, you’re such a coward.”
“Even I got soaked last night, but I’m perfectly fine.”

With a cheerful expression as if nothing had happened, Yōshi kept pausing her card game to tease him, but Sawa could only manage bitter smiles while watching the Taiwanese reeds beyond the veranda, their white leaf undersides flipping in the wind as they grew thick and abundant.
With a feverish, dull, and heavy head, he kept thinking about nothing but unpleasant matters.

The main source of this was his regret over not waiting for the opportune moment with Yōshi. It was true that she, among the Magaribuchi family, had been twice as kind to him as anyone else, but whether that held any special meaning was unclear. Perhaps she was simply sympathizing with his unhappy circumstances out of her own unfortunate background. Sawa suddenly recalled the story of a certain famous wealthy man’s rise to success that he had read in a magazine just the other day.

A young man who had lost his parents at a tender age and been raised by his grandmother became a live-in laborer for a wealthy farming family in the area. At that time, the maid of that house had been twice as kind to him as she was to the other men. He could no longer believe her kindness was mere goodwill, so one night he stealthily crept to her room. The woman suddenly slapped him across the cheek and hurled words to this effect: “I took pity on you for having no family and looked out for you—and now you get all high and mighty, acting above your station!” When he scrambled away in such disarray, he resolved that very night to set his sights on Tokyo, and after enduring great hardships, became a millionaire—or so the story went.

Sawa’s face burned with a shame that made it feel as though the story were about him. But when considered from another angle, there had been no slap-across-the-cheek insult in Yōshi’s attitude. Perhaps she had meant to admonish him—he was still a student, wasn’t he? This wasn’t the time for such talk. Recalling this, he could feel somewhat relieved, but no matter what, he couldn’t erase his own sense of inferiority.

“Ten of Hearts!”

When Yōshi’s excited voice suddenly rang out, Sawa too turned his head toward the parlor—

“No Trump, Ten!”

Immediately surpassing Ichirō’s play came a triumphant voice.

In that instant—before they could even process the strange, deep, resounding thud echoing from afar—the earth shook with a vertical earthquake.
The house creaked and groaned, and the tatami mats surged up like waves.

Sawa frantically raised himself up and leapt out through the slightly open glass door onto the garden lawn. As his feet touched the ground, he was thrown off balance by the heaving force of the earth and fell—but when he looked back at the house, tiles were flying, glass was shattering, and in the parlor now on the verge of complete collapse, he could clearly see four figures scrambling about. Ichirō was just staggering out, carrying Kinoe as if dragging her along while ducking under the collapsing lintel. The moment the two of them jumped down from the veranda, the house let out a tremendous crash as it broke its pillars and collapsed. In that instant of the house collapsing, Sawa saw Yōshi shielding Otsuko—who had been too slow to escape—as she threw herself down onto the tatami mats.

“Otsuko-chan! Otsuko-chan! Otsuko-chan!”

Screaming with all her might, Kinoe—frantic with worry for her sister—ran about madly.
Sawa and Ichirō could only exchange glances with deathly pale faces, unable to utter a single word.
The old dog—it was unclear where it had come from—ran circles around the collapsed house in terror, wagging its tail.

“Otsuko-chan! Otsuko-chan! Otsuko-chan!”

Kinoe continued screaming, on the verge of fainting, and clung to Ichirō’s chest.

From the rear, Jiiya and his wife along with the maid rushed over.

“What about the young miss?”

“It’s no use.”
“Yōshi-san and Otsuko-chan—both of them were crushed.”

Not wanting Jiiya scrutinizing his face up close, Ichirō handed the wailing Kinoe to the maid before abruptly climbing onto the collapsed house’s roof and starting to rip off tiles.

The flattened structure offered no gaps.
He grabbed and flung tiles wherever his hands found purchase, but recognized the futility almost immediately.
With tremors still rocking the ground beneath him, Ichirō retreated back to the lawn.

“Jiiya, go get a large number of laborers here!”

“What are you dawdling for?!” he roared in a fury.

“It’s no use, Young Master.”
“There ain’t a single house left standing in this whole neighborhood.”
“We’ll just have to all bring hoes or mattocks or whatever and try prying it open—ain’t no other way.”

Jiiya swayed his bent back and headed toward the storage shed at the rear.

Ichirō and Sawa too realized for the first time that theirs wasn’t the only house that had collapsed.
They were so shocked by the utterly unexpected major earthquake that they had no time to think about others.
When they realized this and looked around, the two-story houses that had been standing until now were gone, and the deep blue sky spread out clearly before them.
Ichirō suddenly began to worry about the safety of Okabe’s villa at the First Torii in addition to Otsuko and Yōshi.

Everyone thought the two who had been crushed were dead, but aside from Kinoe, none shed tears.
Under the threat of the earthquake that shook ceaselessly with undiminished force, they lacked even the leisure to mourn.

While remorseful about having fled first, Sawa had nearly lost all strength and could do nothing.
Though he had been troubled by the heavy-headedness from his cold and fever, those feelings had vanished as he stood clutching his violently pounding chest.
In his mind swirled relentless thoughts of the two who lay buried.
When he imagined Yōshi having become a horribly mangled corpse, it seemed impossible both realities could coexist—either her moonlit figure from last night and drenched form were falsehoods, or this present earthquake was a dream; one of these must hold true.

The earthquake never ceased.
Using the hoe and log that Jiiya had brought, the men kept trying to pry open some part of the collapsed house, but the house—having fallen in a tightly interlocked state—didn’t budge an inch.
Beside Kinoe, who had collapsed on the lawn and was crying, the old dog was howling mournfully at the sky.

“Oh, there’s a strange sound.”

In reckless frustration, Ichirō—who had been striking the roof tiles with a log—kept his raised hand suspended and glanced back at Sawa. From the direction of the sea came a sound like countless roof planks being scattered—clattering, clattering, clattering.

“That’s a tsunami!”

They recalled the folklore that tsunamis follow earthquakes and the historical record of a great tsunami in ancient Kamakura that had swept away even the Great Buddha’s hall.

“Tsunami! Run!”

Ichirō, who had been listening intently, screamed in a shrill voice.
The women all bolted toward the gate at once.

Supporting Kinoe as he followed them, Ichirō crossed the half-collapsed stone bridge and emerged onto the main road—but by then, the narrow path was already packed with people desperately fleeing from the coast toward higher ground. Some were half-submerged in water; others had faces and limbs dripping blood from injuries.

Not a single shop in town remained intact.
They stepped over what had collapsed from both sides blocking the road, fleeing to the nearest pine forest on the mountain behind.
Before their eyes came swarms of people taking refuge there.
Having carried Kinoe—who nearly fell to her knees multiple times along the way—Ichirō found himself short of breath and sat down at the base of a large pine tree.
Collapsed sideways on weeds still damp from last night’s rain, Kinoe hid her face in her sleeve and began crying again.

“Otsuko-chan... Otsuko-chan... Otsuko-chan...”

As if murmuring a prayer, she kept repeating her sister’s name.
Ichirō sat helplessly silent, knees hugged to his chest.
The scattered group reassembled with Sawa at the front and Jiiya trailing last.
Though certain Otsuko and Yōshi must be dead, having abandoned them made everyone feel unforgivably guilty.
Even now they feared a tsunami might still come, leaving them speechless.
They imagined the mountain foothills where the villa stood had already been swallowed whole by the sea.

The mountain behind them collapsed as if sheared off, its raw red flesh exposed vividly, while the ceaseless sound of rocks cascading down remained terrifying.
To the east and west, flames shot up, and the rapidly tolling alarm bells echoed through the mountains.
People driven by water and people driven by fire, treading on soil that threatened to bury all humankind should a great fissure split open at any moment, gathered in the pine forest.
Some swiftly brought door planks and straw mats to set up temporary spaces, while others laid out the injured and children.

“Well now, we’d best go find some straw mats too.”

Jiiya, who had been moving about here and there—finding unfamiliar faces to whisper furtively with—peered into Ichirō’s face as if seeking counsel.

“It’s no use.”
“By now, our neighborhood must have become part of the sea.”

A voice suddenly overcome with sadness trembled violently.

“Well, they say the sea’s pulled back something fierce.”
“They say eight to twelve kilometers have turned into tidal flats.”

“It’s receding?”
“So does that mean the tsunami didn’t come?”

“It did come, they say, but receded right away.”
“I’ll go take a quick look.”

With a look of complete resignation on his face, Jiiya dismissively declared and started walking.

“Wait, I’ll go with you.”

With an attitude that showed tremendous determination, Ichirō stood up.

“Please don’t go.”
“It’s still shaking violently.”

The elderly maid hurriedly grabbed him to stop him.

The elderly maid hurriedly stopped him.

“Nonsense, if Jiiya can go there, then so can I.”

“Then I’ll go too.”

Sawa, too, feeling guilty about being the only one remaining in a safe place, immediately started walking shoulder to shoulder with Ichirō.

“I’ll be right back.
“It’s safe.”
“The big one won’t be coming anymore.”

When she thought that all the men would leave, her heart grew faint, and Kinoe’s weeping grew louder again.

When they exited the pine forest, the single slope they had climbed earlier stretched straight toward Hase town, now stripped of any recognizable form.
The three descended in silence.
When a heavy thud like collapsing earth sounded in the distance, even the rumbling earthquakes that soon followed no longer frightened them by then.
Both Ichirō and Sawa—furious at Otsuko and Yōshi’s merciless deaths, furious too at how casually natural phenomena had overwhelmed humanity—felt such reckless despair that dying seemed no loss at all.

Around the collapsed houses along the town’s main street, those who had once fled had returned again, and both men and women were frantically trying to retrieve their household belongings. Ichirō and Sawa both thought bitterly of how these people clung so fiercely to their possessions that they would even venture into half-collapsed houses that seemed ready to crumble at the next tremor. When they thought that two young women lay dead in the place they were now heading to, they felt that if only those two were safe, they could leave everything else to heaven.

As they turned onto the path leading to the sea—a narrow stretch no wider than six feet—they found stone walls and fences collapsed on both sides, with ground split open in places. But the water hadn’t reached the heights they’d feared; near the villa, it appeared only the wave crests had barely grazed the area, leaving the sandy ground sullied and damp.

“The tsunami didn’t come after all.”

They had imagined that the two who had been crushed to death had also been swept away by the tsunami, but they learned they had at least been spared that fate. Sawa nodded silently while growing despondent at the thought that beneath the collapsed roof before him lay Yōshi—wearing a white yukata patterned with autumn grasses—dead while holding Otsuko, who was dressed in a purple arrow-patterned meisen kimono with a red Chinese crepe obi.

The flowerbed that Jiiya had painstakingly tended, being at a lower elevation, appeared to have been reached by the tide’s final surge—some areas still held murky water. The tall dahlias, chrysanthemums, and early-blooming cosmos had their roots washed out and lay toppled, while creeping portulacas and low-growing knotweeds were half-buried in sand. A pet cat from somewhere—one with a red ribbon tied around its collar—lay dead, its soiled belly exposed.

The three circled around to the front garden where a thicket of Taiwan miscanthus formed a natural hedge.
The lawn on that sunny afternoon stretched vast and blue under the sunlight, but at its very center—visible through the reeds’ leaves—a dazzling purple hue shone with mirror-like intensity.
As if gasping their last breath, they screamed and broke into a simultaneous dash.

It was Yōshi who had risen.
At her feet crouched Otsuko in her purple arrow-patterned kimono, deathly pale and clutching tufts of grass.
Though she turned her eyes toward them, she lacked even the strength to lift her face from the ground.
But when Ichirō realized she lived—his voice thick with joyful tears—

“Otsuko, Otsuko.”

Repeating her name over and over, he dropped to his knees as if collapsing and lifted his sister’s body onto them.
Otsuko clung to her brother’s chest, her back heaving in waves as she began to cry.

Beside them, Yōshi—her eyes still bloodshot from terror—suddenly filled with tears and reached out toward Sawa.
Sawa took the hand without hesitation and clasped it tightly.

“How on earth did you get out?”

He started to say he’d actually thought they were dead but stopped himself.

“I don’t know.
There was just one spot where light was shining through, so we came out from there—but in the frenzy of escaping, even now I can’t make sense of it.”

As Yōshi spoke, Sawa had been first to rush into the garden. When Ichirō helped Kinoe up, she’d meant to lift Otsuko too, but her unsteady footing left her strength wanting. By the time she realized it was hopeless, the ceiling had already crashed down, plunging them into darkness.
She’d groped through that blackness, crawling every which way, but lumber blocked her path wherever she turned.
She’d believed someone would come rescue them, though she couldn’t tell how many hours had passed.
Then sudden outside light pierced through—when they finally reached that spot, there was a gap just wide enough to squeeze through.
After pushing Otsuko out first and scrambling after her herself, she’d been so overwhelmed by survival’s joy that coherent thoughts about their escape route vanished entirely—she’d simply run to the lawn’s center and felt momentary relief, or so she explained.

They searched eagerly around the area Yōshi indicated as where the life-saving sunlight had streamed in, but the timbers were tightly kissed together, leaving not even an inch-wide gap.

Yōshi had sustained minor abrasions on her limbs, but they were nothing serious; Otsuko, pathologically terrified by the extreme horror, was pale from anemia, though only the hem of her kimono was torn.

“At least you’re safe. If we dawdle around and get taken out by another tsunami, that’d be pointless, and since the fires are downwind from us here, let’s just take whatever we can carry and get moving.”

Ichirō handed Otsuko over to Yōshi and went around to the storage shed with Jiiya and Sawa.

Carrying straw mats, door planks, logs, and rope, they returned briskly to the pine forest shelter, but Ichirō’s thoughts were wholly occupied with Okabe.
Since Otsuko and Yōshi had been saved, he felt relieved, but at the same time, he now had to confirm the safety of his friend’s household.
When he imagined himself in the heroic role of rescuing Midoriko from peril, he couldn’t bear not putting his athletically trained body into action.

“I’m going to check on Okabe’s place.”

Just as they reached the top of the slope beneath the pine forest, Ichirō resolutely said to Sawa.

“Please stop.”
“Running off far would be dangerous.”
“I’ll go check later.”

Jiiya tried to stop him with those words, but Ichirō’s heart had already raced ahead.

“It’s fine. I’ll be right back.”

Abruptly thrusting the assorted items he’d been holding into Jiiya’s hands, he spun around to show his back and dashed off with a stance honed through formal training.

**Three**

On the straw mat spread over the ground, Sawa, Yōshi, the nanny, and the maids surrounded Kinoe and Otsuko—shifting from talk of the catastrophe to celebrating their mutual survival, then agonizing over what might come next—repeating similar phrases over and over. Jiiya had gone to search for provisions and did not return for a long while.

The earthquakes kept coming without pause.
Each time they struck, the sisters clung together and wept.

The fire to the east spread toward the station, but the flames to the west were gradually drawing closer, and black smoke began reaching even the pine forest.
Sawa and Yōshi both thought that if by any chance this mountain were to catch fire, there would likely be no escape route left.

Yōshi tucked up her kimono to shorten it, exposing her legs from the knees down to the sun.
As might be expected of a footrace athlete, her legs—long for a woman, with their naturally pale, smooth skin through which faint blue veins showed—lay alluringly before Sawa's eyes.
They were likely sustained when escaping from the collapsed house.
Her scraped knees aside, numerous abrasions left traces of blood.

“Does it hurt?”

Staying silent and watching only made him feel more guilty, so Sawa deliberately furrowed his brows and asked.

“No.
They’re just scratches.”

“A badge of honor?”

He thought he had said something flippant—but Yōshi ignored this and pressed on:

“Mr. Sawa! You didn’t even try helping us! You just ran ahead!”

And with her usual lively tone, she pressed the attack.
Sawa tried to think of a way to deflect it, but couldn't respond immediately due to the quip's sting.
He had been tormenting himself since earlier - feeling ashamed about being first to flee while making excuses and suffering alone.
In that situation he'd been on the veranda and resolved to jump straight into the garden; had he been with everyone else in the tatami room he surely would've helped Yōshi.
He sank into deep dejection thinking his proximity to escape routes had been mere misfortune.

“Whether we lived or died, all you cared about was saving yourself, wasn’t it?”

Though likely without any malice, Yōshi pressed on relentlessly.

“How could there be such a thing?”

Sawa finally grew slightly irritated. While looking directly at Yōshi, he still struggled to find words of apology. In Yōshi's eyes that had been intently watching him, a mischievous smile surfaced. Sawa averted his gaze as if fleeing, only to find the old dog stretched out exhaustedly where he looked. Suddenly he envied beasts—even through earthquakes or fires, he thought dogs wouldn't suffer like humans did. Partly to distract Yōshi, he tried whistling lightly. The dog half-opened its eyes to glance at him before falling asleep again.

Having stocked up on canned goods and bread, Jiiya returned with a triumphant look.
While recounting stories he'd gathered from all around to everyone, he smoked a single hand-rolled cigarette—one he'd just begged off someone—with evident reluctance.

As the sun shifted westward and the pine forest began growing dim, Ichirō—the one they'd been worrying about—returned utterly exhausted.
When they saw his abnormally tense face, their hearts thudded.

“What’s wrong?”
“She was safe.”

When Sawa asked, Ichirō shook his head and—

“The siblings died…”
“The house collapsed, caught fire, and they burned to death.”

He had intended to give a detailed account, but his lips trembled and he couldn’t speak.
Ichirō fell facedown on the straw mat and remained motionless for some time.

“Oh, the siblings…”

Yōshi had barely said this much when everyone’s mood turned somber.
Kinoe and Otsuko began to sob and cry.

Yōshi had never liked those flashy modern-minded siblings—children of a Yokohama merchant.
She had found Ichirō’s undignified attempts to win Midoriko’s favor irritating, but now that she thought how cruelly Midoriko had died, the image of her vibrant expression rose painfully to mind.
Lowering her tear-filled eyes, she saw the day’s last pale sunlight shining on her outstretched legs—and there, where the scrapes had oozed blood, two flies had settled.
She gently brushed them away with her hand, but they returned.
Toward these small creatures, Yōshi instead felt a sense of kinship, watching their delicate movements—legs rubbing together, wings fluttering—but this time, though she didn’t shoo them away, one suddenly flew off only to land on the other’s back.
After twirling and tangling two or three times, they became fully joined.
Yōshi suddenly noticed Sawa’s gaze resting on her legs and flushed crimson.

Sawa also noticed and blushed.
Even so, while his heart was filled with sympathy for Okabe's tragic death and pity for Ichirō—who had finally found love only to lose it—he remained keenly aware in his mind of the happiness that he and Yōshi, both unharmed, were sitting here side by side.