And Then

  His father first removed his glasses. He placed them on the book he was reading, then turned to face Daisuke. He simply said, “You’re here.” One might almost have said his tone was milder than usual. Placing his hands on his knees, Daisuke wondered if his brother had not been pulling his leg. As usual, he was forced to drink some bitter tea and spend a little time in small talk: the peonies were out early this year; it was the season for dozing off to tea-picking songs; at some place there was wisteria with clusters over four feet long.... The conversation went far afield. Since this was very much to his advantage, Daisuke did his best to prolong it by adding to whatever his father said. Finally, the old man seemed to sense that things had gotten out of hand and launched out with a by the way, Daisuke, I had you come out today because . . .

  After that Daisuke did not utter a word. He listened respectfully to what the old man had to say. With Daisuke adopting this posture, his father had no choice but to continue at length by himself, as if he were giving a lecture. Over half of what he said was a repetition of previous deliveries, but Daisuke listened as attentively as if he were hearing it for the first time.

  He even spotted two or three new points in his father’s lengthy sermon. One of them was a serious query as to what he, Daisuke, planned to do from now on. This was a familiar demand that Daisuke was accustomed to sidestepping with equivocations. But when the question was put so solemnly, he could not blurt out the first thing that came to mind. One reckless word and he would ignite his father’s wrath. Yet, if he were to be honest, he would have to spend two or three years educating his father’s mind before he could make himself understood. Moreover, he had no clear declaration to make about his future in response to such a solemn question. He felt that this was only reasonable for him. But to tell his father that and bring him around to the point of saying “I see’’ would require an enormous expenditure of time. There was also the possibility that he would never understand. All Daisuke had to do to please him was to say something about serving the country or serving the world—something grand that could not be linked to marriage. But no matter how inclined he was to self-ridicule, this was simply too stupid; he did not have the courage to let such words fall from his lips. So he had no choice but to reply that in fact, he had a number of ideas, but he planned to sort them out first and then consult his father. After delivering this reply, he found it terribly comical, but there was nothing to be done.

  Daisuke was then asked if he did not want an income sufficient to make him independent. Daisuke answered that of course he did. His father then proposed that in this case, he should marry Sagawa’s daughter. It remained exceedingly unclear as to whether Sagawa’s daughter was bringing the money with her or whether his father was going to give it to him. Daisuke tried to find out, but could confirm nothing. He quit, thinking that there really was no need to investigate the point.

  Next, he was asked if he would not just as soon go abroad. Daisuke agreed that that would not be bad. But again, marriage seemed to be the prerequisite.

  “Is there really such a pressing need for me to marry Sagawa’s daughter?” Daisuke ended up asking. His father’s face reddened.

  Daisuke had not the slightest intention of angering his father. His current philosophy was that to quarrel with others constituted a species of human degeneracy. To anger another human being, which was one aspect of quarreling, was not so much damaging in itself, but insofar as the angered party’s countenance presented an unappealing spectacle to one’s own eyes, it was clearly an injury to the precious moments of one’s own existence. Daisuke also had his own views about sin. But he did not for a moment believe that because of this he would escape punishment so long as he acted in accordance with his nature. He firmly believed that the punishment dealt one who had killed another human being was contained in the blood that flowed from the dead man’s flesh. This stemmed from his conviction that no one could look upon the color of blood spurting forth without experiencing violent turmoil in the sanctum of his heart. Daisuke’s nerves were sensitive to this degree. Therefore, when he saw his father redden in the face, he found it singularly unpleasant. But he had no intention of doubly atoning for his sin by doing as his father wanted. This was because, in certain ways, Daisuke paid enormous respect to his own mental faculties.

  Meanwhile, his father was heatedly explaining that he was growing old, that his son’s future weighed on his mind, that it was a parent’s duty to provide a son with a bride, that a parent paid far more scrupulous attention to such matters as the bride’s qualifications than the groom himself possibly could, that parental kindness might seem like unwanted interference at the time, but the day was sure to come when he would long for such meddlesome advice. Daisuke listened seriously. But when his father’s words ceased their flow, he still showed no signs of assenting. Then his father said in a deliberately restrained tone, “Then don’t take Sagawa. Go ahead and marry whomever you like. Is there someone you want?”

  This was the same question that Umeko had posed. Daisuke could not put his father off with the ironic smile he had used with her. “There’s no one in particular I want to marry,” he answered clearly.

  Then his father, in a fit of passion, burst out, “In that case, why can’t you think a little about my position instead of thinking about yourself all the time?”

  Daisuke was surprised that his father had suddenly jumped from his son to the question of his own interests. But the surprise was only over the illogicality and the abruptness of the shift.

  “If it is so convenient for you, then let me think it over once more,” he answered.

  His father’s humor only worsened. There were times when, in his dealings with others, Daisuke was incapable of abandoning his sense of logic. Because of this, people often felt that he was deliberately trying to corner them. Actually, there were few who disliked cornering others more than Daisuke.

  “I’m not saying that you should marry just for my convenience,” his father revised. “If you’re going to be so argumentative, let me say, just for the record, that you are thirty, are you not? You can guess pretty well what society thinks of a man who won’t get married even when he reaches the age of thirty. Oh, of course, nowadays it’s up to the individual if he wants to stay single, but what do you plan to do if your father and brother are embarrassed on account of it, or if, in the end, something happens that could even touch upon your own honor?”

  Daisuke looked at his father’s face blankly. He could not tell where the old man thought he had stabbed him. Eventually, he said, “I do have my vices, of course, but . . .”

  His father cut him short. “That’s not what I’m talking about.” After that, the two were silent for some time. His father believed the silence to be a result of the blow he had delivered. Presently, softening his words, he said, “You think it over carefully.” Daisuke said he would and retired from his father’s room. He went to the living room to look for his brother, but he was not there. When he asked where Umeko was, a maid told him that she was in the parlor, so he went there and opened the door to find that Nuiko’s piano teacher had come. After greeting the teacher briefly, Daisuke called Umeko to the door. “Are you sure you didn’t say something to Father behind my back?”

  Umeko laughed out loud. “Why don’t you come in? You’ve come at a good time,” she said, and pulled him over to the piano.

  CHAPTER X

  IT WAS THE SEASON for ants to crawl indoors. Daisuke poured water into a large bowl and filled it with snowy white lilies-of-the-valley, their stems still uncut. The delicate, swarming flowers hid the rim’s dark pattern. They spilled over at the slightest motion. Daisuke placed the bowl on top of a large dictionary. Then he put his pillow beside it and fell on his back, his black head lying just in the shadow of the bowl, so that the scent from the flowers traveled easily to his nostrils. He dozed off smelling the fragrance.

  At times, the ordinary physical
world affected Daisuke with inordinate severity. In extreme cases, he could not even tolerate the sunlight on a clear day. When this happened, he tried to reduce his contacts with society to a minimum and to sleep, whether it was morning or noon. He often employed a faint, lightly sweet floral scent as a part of this stratagem. If he lay still with his eyelids shut to block out the light, breathing quietly through his nose, the flowers beside his pillow would gradually lure his restless consciousness into the world of dreams. When this tactic succeeded, Daisuke’s nerves were renewed, and it became easier than before to maintain his contacts with society.

  For two or three days after his father’s summons, Daisuke had been bothered by the red roses in a corner of his garden; whenever he noticed them, they seemed to prick him in the eye. At such times, he always turned to the leaves of the stone leek flowers at the side of the washbasin. Each of those leaves contained three or four white streaks that meandered indulgently. Every time Daisuke looked at them, the leaves seemed to have grown longer, the white streaks growing unhampered with them. The flowers of the pomegranate were gaudier and even more oppressive than the roses. Their color was so strong that they seemed to glitter through the green. And they, too, were unsuited to Daisuke’s present mood.

  His present mood, as sometimes happened, had taken on an overall tone of darkness. Consequently, when he was exposed to overly bright objects, he found the dissonance difficult to endure. Even the stone leek leaves repelled him if he looked at them long enough.

  Moreover, Daisuke began to be beset by a kind of anxiety peculiar to modern Japan. This anxiety was a primitive phenomenon arising from lack of faith between individuals. Thanks to this psychological phenomenon, Daisuke experienced severe discomposure. He was a man who disliked putting his faith in gods, and, as an intellectual, was by nature incapable of doing so. He believed that if people had faith in one another, there was no need to rely on gods. Gods acquired the right to exist only when they became necessary to deliver men from the anguish of mutual suspicion. Accordingly, he concluded that in those countries where gods existed, the people were liars. But he discovered that present-day Japan was a country having faith neither in gods nor men. He attributed it all to Japan’s economic situation.

  Four or five days ago, he had read in the newspaper about policemen who colluded with pickpockets to commit thefts. It was not a question of one or two cases, either. According to other papers, if the matter were pursued to the bottom, Tokyo risked becoming unpoliced. Reading the article, Daisuke had only smiled cynically. It stood to reason, he thought, that the meagerly paid police, who had to contend with the hardships of existence, should turn to petty crime.

  Daisuke had had a similar cynical feeling about his father’s marriage proposal. But that was no more than a misgiving—an unfortunate one for Daisuke—, which arose from lack of faith in his father. Daisuke could not feel it dishonorable to harbor such repugnant thoughts, because he fully intended, should his misgivings be borne out by fact, to support his father’s behavior as only reasonable.

  Daisuke had similar thoughts about Hiraoka. But in Hiraoka’s case, he allowed that such behavior was the only natural one. He simply could not bring himself to like Hiraoka. Daisuke loved his brother. Yet, he could not have faith in him either. His sister-in-law was a sincere woman. But Daisuke thought that it was easier to be close to her than to his brother only to the extent that she did not have to face the vicissitudes of existence.

  Thus Daisuke had always dismissed society lightly. And thus, in spite of his extreme sensitivity, he was seldom seized by anxiety. He was himself fully aware of this. Now, for some reason, anxiety had been set in motion. Daisuke guessed that it resulted from physiological changes. That was why he had undone the bouquet of lilies-ofthe-valley someone had brought him from Hokkaido, immersed them in water, and fallen asleep beneath them.

  One hour later, Daisuke opened his large, black eyes. For some time, those eyes were fixed upon one spot. Neither his hands nor his feet had stirred from their position in sleep. He looked for all the world like a corpse. At that moment, a black ant threaded its way up his flannel collar and fell on his throat. Wrinkling his forehead, he pinched the small animal between his fingers and brought it above his nose for inspection. The ant was already dead; Daisuke flicked the black thing from his index finger with his thumb. Then he sat up.

  There were still three or four others crawling about his knees; he beat them to death with a thin ivory paper knife. Then he clapped his hands.

  “Are you awake?” said Kadono as he came in. “Shall I serve tea?” Tugging his clothes over his bare chest, Daisuke asked quietly, “Didn’t someone come in while I was asleep?”

  “Yes, as a matter of fact. Mr. Hiraoka’s wife. How did you know?” Kadono’s tone was matter-of-fact.

  “Why didn’t you wake me?” “You were sleeping so soundly.”

  “But if it’s a guest, it can’t be helped.” Daisuke’s tone had become more emphatic.

  “Yes, but since it was Mr. Hiraoka’s wife herself who said it was better not to wake you . . .”

  “And did Mr. Hiraoka’s wife leave?”

  “No, it’s not really that she left. She had a little shopping to do in Kagurazaka, so she said she’d take care of that, then come back.” “Then she’s coming again?”

  “Yes. Actually, she even came into this room thinking she’d wait till you woke up, but when she saw your face—the way you were sound asleep, she must’ve thought you’d never wake up.”

  “So she went out again?”

  “Yes, that’s about the way it was.”

  Daisuke laughed and patted his freshly awakened face with his hands. Then he went to the bathroom to wash it. When he came out to the verandah with his head streaming and looked out at the garden, he found that he felt considerably refreshed. The sight of two swallows flying in the cloudy sky struck him as immensely cheerful.

  Ever since Hiraoka’s visit the other day, Daisuke had been waiting expectantly for a visit from Michiyo. But Hiraoka’s words had failed to materialize. Daisuke did not know whether Michiyo had particular reasons for not coming or if Hiraoka was just being conventionally polite when he said that she would come; in any case, he had been feeling an emptiness somewhere in his heart. He had simply viewed this emptiness as one experience among others in his daily life and made no attempt to do anything about its cause. This was because he thought that if he peered deep into the experience itself, he might find dark shadows flitting about.

  Therefore he had avoided taking the initiative to visit Hiraoka. On his walks, his steps had often turned in the direction of the Edogawa River. When the cherry blossoms began to fall, he had crossed the four bridges, blown by the evening wind, then crossed back and threaded his way along the long bank. Now the cherry blossoms were long since gone, and it was the season for shady trees. At times, Daisuke would stand in the middle of one of the bridges, leaning his elbows on the parapet, his face cupped in his hands, and gaze into the light of the water that flowed straight through the thick leaves. Then he would look in the distance where the light narrowed and the woods of Mejirodai loomed high. But he would come home without crossing the bridge and climbing the hill of Koishikawa. Once, at Ōmagari, he recognized Hiraoka’s form about sixty yards ahead of him. He was getting off a streetcar. Daisuke was sure it was Hiraoka. And he immediately turned away toward the wharf.

  Daisuke cared about Hiraoka’s welfare. He was probably still in the uneasy position of eating without working. Daisuke tried to imagine that Hiraoka might have discovered the key to opening a path for his future. But he did not feel like running after him to find out. He had come to anticipate an inexplicable sort of unpleasantness from his encounters with Hiraoka. Nevertheless, he did not hate him so much that he worried about his situation only for Michiyo’s sake. There was still something in his heart that prayed for Hiraoka’s success for his own sake.


  So Daisuke had come upon this day, still carrying that empty spot in one corner of his heart. It was but a few hours ago that he had asked Kadono to bring him a pillow, and he had ravenously partaken of sleep. If it were possible, he would have submerged his head—which could no longer tolerate the stimuli emitted by a universe brimming with life—deep into a blue pool. Daisuke was too acutely conscious of life. At the time he rested his hot head on the pillow, Hiraoka and Michiyo had barely existed for him. Fortunately, he had been able to sleep pleasantly. But in the middle of that peaceful sleep, he had felt as if someone had noiselessly slipped into the room and as noiselessly slipped out. The feeling lingered even after he had awakened and sat up, and he could not erase it from his mind. That was why he had called Kadono.

  With his hands at his forehead, Daisuke had been standing on the verandah following the movement of the swallows as they swooped gaily through the faraway sky. After a while it became dizzying and Daisuke went inside. But the expectation that Michiyo would soon come had already broken his composure, and he could neither think nor read. In the end, he brought down an art book from the bookshelf and began flipping the pages on his lap. But this, too, was just a matter of his fingertips turning one page after another. He could not even halfway appreciate a single painting. He came to Brangwyn. Daisuke had always had great interest in this decorative painter, and for a moment, his eyes acquired their usual light as they rested on the painting. It was a representation of a harbor somewhere. In the background ships and masts and sails were depicted on a large scale, and the remaining spaces were filled in with clouds in a brilliant sky and bluish-black water. In the foreground were four or five naked laborers. As he looked at those men, their muscles swelling like mountains, with mounds of flesh between shoulder and back that dipped and met to form eddy-like valleys, Daisuke experienced some pleasure in the power of the flesh; but soon, with the volume still open, his eyes left the page and his ears pricked up. The old woman’s voice sounded from the direction of the kitchen. The milkman went out with hurried footsteps, rattling his empty bottles. With the house as quiet as it was, the noise echoed painfully on Daisuke’s sensitive auditory nerves.