And Then

  Daisuke had skin that glowed in a way that made others envious, and muscles so supple that it would have been hard to find their like in a laborer. He was so blessed with health that since birth he had not experienced what could be called a major illness. Since he believed that this was the only way that life was worth living, health was at least twice as valuable to him as it was to most people. His head was as sound as his body. Of course, he was constantly plagued by his sense of logic. There were also times when the center of his head felt like a longbow target—a series of two or three concentric rings. Since that morning, he had suffered more than usual from this feeling.

  At such times Daisuke would silently ponder to what end he had been born into this world. He had often grappled with this problem and held it before his eyes. Sometimes he was motivated by simple philosophical curiosity; at other times, the social forces surrounding him pressed to imbue his brain with their all too complex hues, or, like today, the thoughts came as a result of ennui. Each time, however, he came to the same conclusion. But this conclusion was not a solution to the problem; in fact, it amounted to a denial of it. According to his thinking, man was not born for a particular purpose. Quite the opposite: a purpose developed only with the birth of an individual. To objectively fabricate a purpose at the outset and to apply it to a human being was to rob him at birth of freedom of action. Hence, purpose was something that the individual who came into this world had to make for himself. But no one, no matter who, could freely create a purpose. This was because the purpose of one’s existence was as good as announced to the universe by the course of that existence itself.

  Starting from this premise, Daisuke held that one’s natural activities constituted one’s natural purposes. A man walked because he wanted to. Then walking became his purpose. He thought because he wanted to. Then, thinking became his purpose. Just as to walk or to think for a particular purpose meant the degradation of walking and thinking, so to establish an external purpose and to act to fulfill it meant the degradation of action. Accordingly, those who used the sum of their actions as a means to an end were in effect destroying the purpose of their own existence.

  Therefore, Daisuke had lived to this day making it his purpose to actualize whatever fancies and desires entered his mind. It was the same when two incompatible desires or fancies battled in his heart. He viewed it merely as the consumption of a purpose that had arisen from contradiction. What this boiled down to was that Daisuke had always conducted himself with so-called purposeless acts as his purpose. And he understood that insofar as it deceived no one, it was the most ethical form of conduct.

  Daisuke, who lived to actualize this principle as much as possible, was at times unwittingly beset by the question he had long ago rejected: he would begin to ask why he was doing what he was doing. This was precisely what had happened as he strolled through Banchō and wondered why he was strolling. . . .

  In such instances Daisuke noticed the undernourished state of his vitality. A starved act contained neither sufficient courage nor interest to be executed in one blow; that was why he found himself questioning its significance midway. This he labeled ennui. He believed that his bouts of confusion in logic were brought on when he was beset by a case of ennui. For him to stop in the middle of an act to inquire its purpose—putting the cart before the horse—could only be the work of ennui.

  Inside the closed room, he clasped his head in his hands and tried shaking it once or twice. He could not bear to drag out and ponder once again the meaningless doubt that countless thinkers had repeatedly experienced throughout the ages. When its form flickered before his eyes, he thought, not again, and shut it out immediately. At the same time, he felt acutely the inadequacy of his vital energies. He did not have enough interest to peacefully execute an act for its own sake. He stood alone in the midst of a wilderness. He was at his wits’ end.

  Daisuke ardently desired the satisfaction of his highly refined life appetites. And in some ways, he also tried to buy the satisfaction of the demands posed by morality. He expected that there would come a point when the two would clash and set off sparks. He therefore maintained his life appetites at a low level and tried to rest content. His room was an ordinary Japanese-style room. There was nothing of note in its furnishings. As far as he was concerned, there was not even a single decent frame. All that was beautiful enough to catch the eye in the way of color was concentrated in the Western books arranged in the bookcase. He now sat vacantly amidst those books. It was no small thing that had lured his consciousness into such heavy torpor, he thought, and to rouse it to its full sharpness, he would have to do something about his surroundings. His eyes traveled all around the room. Then, they again stared vacantly at the wall. In the end, he thought that only one thing could save him from this diluted existence. And he said to himself, “I must see Michiyo-san after all.”

  He regretted having set out walking in a direction where his feet were reluctant to carry him. He was just thinking of leaving again and going to Hiraoka’s when Terao came from Morikawachō. He was wearing a new straw hat and a modest summer cloak and complained repeatedly about the heat as he rubbed his red face.

  “What did you come here for now?” Daisuke greeted him inhospitably. He had always conducted his relationship with Terao on such terms.

  “Right now is about the best time for visiting you, isn’t it? You were taking a nap again, weren’t you? People who don’t work just get too lazy. I wonder what on earth you were born for,” he said, fanning his chest with the straw hat. Since the weather was not yet that hot, his exaggerated gesture was rather amusing.

  “What I was born for is no business of yours. What did you come here for, anyway? Is it another case of ‘Just for ten days or so’? If it’s got anything to do with money, I don’t want to hear about it,” refused Daisuke bluntly in anticipation.

  “You really don’t have any manners, do you,” was the only reply Terao could make. But he showed no sign of being offended. Actually, words like these could never sound rude in Terao’s ears. Daisuke watched his face silently. The face made no more impression on him than on a blank wall.

  Terao pulled out a dirty, roughly stitched-together book from his kimono. “I have to translate this,” he said. Daisuke was still silent. “Don’t look so lazy just because you don’t have to worry about your next meal. Wake up, will you? It’s a matter of life and death for me.” With these words he twice slapped the small book against the corner of his chair.

  “By when?”

  Terao rustled the pages back and forth. “Two weeks,” he announced firmly. “If I don’t get this cleared away one way or the other by then, I can’t eat. So there’s no two ways about it.”

  “Such ambition.” Daisuke was sarcastic.

  “That’s why I came running all the way over from Hongō. Oh, you don’t have to lend me any money—though it’d be even better if you did—but anyway, there’re some places I don’t understand so I came to ask your opinion.”

  “What a bother. My head doesn’t feel right today, I can’t sit around doing that. Just go ahead and fudge it—what difference does it make? They’re paying you by the page anyway, right?”

  “Look, even I can’t be that irresponsible. It’ll mean a lot of trouble if people point out mistranslations.”

  “You’re such a pain.” Daisuke was still being lazy.

  “Look here,” said Terao. “It’s no joke. You’ve got to do something once in a while. A guy like you who’s always loafing around must get so bored that he doesn’t know what to do with himself. Now, if I’d wanted to find someone who could really read this stuff, I wouldn’t have bothered to come all the way over here. But such people aren’t like you, they’re all busy.” Terao was utterly nonplussed.

  Daisuke made up his mind that he either had to have a fight or give in. Although he was capable by temperament of being contemptuous of a person like Ter
ao, he was not capable of working himself up to anger. “Then keep it as short as possible,” he warned, and turned only to the marked passages. He did not even dare ask for a synopsis of the story. And he could not resolve many ambiguous points in the passages Terao asked about. Eventually, Terao said “Thanks” and turned the book over.

  “What are you going to do about the places we didn’t understand?” asked Daisuke.

  “Oh, I’ll do something—no matter who I ask, there’s probably no one who would understand it completely. And anyway, there’s no time, so it can’t be helped.” Terao took it for granted that his livelihood was a far more important concern than any mistranslation.

  The consultation being over, Terao, as usual, launched into literary topics. A dramatic change took place now that he was no longer talking about his own translation, and he became his usual impassioned self. Daisuke thought that among the works bearing the names of leading writers of the day, there must be many that had the same significance for their authors as Terao’s translations had for him, and he smiled to himself at this contradiction in Terao; But because it was too much trouble, he did not say anything.

  Thanks to Terao, Daisuke never got to Hiraoka’s that day.

  At dinner time, a small package arrived from Maruzen. Daisuke put down his chopsticks and opened it to find two or three books that he had ordered from abroad quite some time ago. He put them under his arm and went to his study. One by one he picked them up and, although it was dark, flipped through two or three pages; but there was nothing to draw his attention in any of them. He had even forgotten the title of the last book. Thinking he would read them eventually, he left them bundled together and got up to put them on top of the bookcase. When he peered out from the verandah, he discovered a beautiful sky on the verge of losing its brilliant colors; above the paulownia next door, now conspicuously dark, a pale moon had risen.

  Then Kadono came in carrying a large lamp. It had a green shade with vertical markings like crinkled silk. Kadono placed it on the table and went out to the verandah, remarking on his way out, “It’s getting to be about the time for fireflies, isn’t it?”

  Daisuke looked puzzled and answered, “They wouldn’t be out yet.”

  “Is that right?” Kadono asked, then immediately continued in a serious vein, “Fireflies used to be quite a thing, but the literary gentlemen these days don’t seem to make much of a fuss over them, do they? I wonder why. Nowadays, you hardly even see things like fireflies and crows.”

  “That’s true. I wonder why.” Daisuke, playing it straight, was equally solemn.

  “It’s probably because they’ve been overwhelmed by the electric lights; they’ve begun to retreat,” said Kadono, and with a ha, ha, ha, as the finishing touch to his own joke, he went back to his room. Daisuke followed to the entranceway. Kadono looked back. “Would you be going out again? Fine, I’ll watch out for the lamp—the old woman’s been lying down for a while; she says her stomachaches. It’s probably nothing serious. Please enjoy yourself.”

  Daisuke went out the gate. When he got to the Edogawa, the river’s waters were already dark. Needless to say, he intended to visit Hiraoka. Therefore he did not follow the bank as usual but crossed the bridge directly and went up Kongōjizaka.

  As a matter of fact, Daisuke had recently seen both Hiraoka and Michiyo two or three times. The first time was after he had received a comparatively long letter from Hiraoka. The letter first expressed thanks for Daisuke’s help since Hiraoka’s return to Tokyo. This was followed by something to the effect that he had received invaluable assistance from many friends and superiors, but recently, thanks to the good offices of an acquaintance, he had been urged to become the head reporter in the financial section of a certain newspaper. He himself felt that he would like to try it. But since he had also asked Daisuke for his help in this matter shortly after arriving in Tokyo, he did not think it right to proceed without asking his leave, and he was therefore writing for advice. Daisuke had done nothing more about Hiraoka’s request to recommend him for a position in his brother’s firm; he had simply let the matter go, not even refusing. Therefore he took this letter as Hiraoka’s way of pressing him. He decided it would be much too cold to refuse by mail, so he visited Hiraoka on the following day, and, carefully explaining the situation in his brother’s company, asked him to give up on that idea for the time being. Hiraoka said that he himself had been thinking that something of the sort was probably the case, then turned to Michiyo with an odd look in his eyes.

  On another occasion, he had received a postcard from Hiraoka saying that the newspaper job was final at last, he would like to relax and drink with him some night, would Daisuke come on such and such a date? Daisuke stopped by on a walk to tell him that unfortunately, something else had come up and he would not be able to make it. Hiraoka was sprawled out on his back in the middle of the room, asleep. He had gone to a gathering the night before and had too much to drink, he said, repeatedly rubbing his red eyes. Then he looked at Daisuke and suddenly declared that human beings had to be single, like Daisuke, in order to do any work. He complained loudly about the inconveniences of marriage, claiming that he would go anywhere—Manchuria, America—if only he were single. Michiyo was working stealthily in the next room.

  The third time, Daisuke had visited while Hiraoka was away at work. That time, he had not gone on any business. He spent about half an hour there, sitting on the verandah talking.

  Between that time and this evening, he had tried to avoid going in the direction of Koishikawa. Daisuke went to Takehayachō, cut through, and two or three hundred yards later, came out right in front of a door lamp bearing the name Hiraoka. When he called from outside the grating, the maid came out with a lamp. Both husband and wife were out. Daisuke left immediately without even asking their whereabouts and, catching the streetcar, rode to Hongō, changed for Kanda, got off, went to a certain beer hall, and gulped down some beer.

  When he awoke the next morning, he still felt as if rings with unequal radii partitioned his brain into two layers. Whenever this happened, Daisuke could not but think that his brain was a piece of patchwork whose inner and outer surfaces were of different material. He would often shake it, trying to mix the two together. Now, with his head against the pillow, he curled his right hand into a fist and hit above his ear two or three times.

  Daisuke had never attributed this dysfunction to excessive indulgence in alcohol. Since childhood he had always been able to hold his liquor. No matter how much he drank, he never departed noticeably from his normal behavior. Moreover, once he had slept soundly, his body showed no signs of impairment. Once, he had somehow gotten into a drinking bout with his brother and managed to put down thirteen three-cup bottles. The next day he had gone to school looking just as usual. His brother complained of a headache and looked wretched for two days. Seigo had said it was a question of age.

  Compared to that occasion, the beer he had drunk the night before was trifling, thought Daisuke as he hit himself on the head. Fortunately, even when his head felt layered like this, his brain continued to function normally. True, he did become reluctant at times to use his head. But he was confident that if he but made the effort, he was equal to any complex task. Therefore, there were no grounds for worry that changes in his brain tissue might bring about mental disorders. The first time he had experienced this sensation, he was surprised. The second time, he rather welcomed it as a novel experience. These days, this experience most often seemed to accompany a decline in mental vigor. It had become a symptom of those periods when he ventured to persist in substanceless acts. This was the sore point for Daisuke.

  Sitting up in bed, he shook his head once more. At breakfast, Kadono had tried to talk to him about the story in the morning paper recounting the battle of the serpent and the eagle, but he had not responded. Kadono, thinking one of those periods had begun again, left the morning room. He went to the kitch
en and said solicitously to the old woman, “It’s not good for you to work so hard, Auntie. I’ll clear off Sensei’s tray, so go over there and rest.” Daisuke remembered for the first time the old woman’s indisposition. He was on the verge of saying something kind, but decided it was too much trouble and stopped.

  As soon as he put down his knife, he picked up his teacup and went into the study. It was already past nine when he looked at the clock. For a while he sat gazing at the garden as he slowly sipped his tea. Then Kadono came in and announced, “Someone from your home has come to fetch you.” Daisuke did not recall that anyone was to have been sent for him from home. When he asked about it, Kadono would only mumble something about the ricksha driver, so Daisuke got up and went to the entranceway, shaking his head all the while. There he found a man named Katsu, who pulled his brother’s ricksha. He pulled the rubber-wheeled vehicle sideways to the door and bowed politely.

  When he asked, “Katsu, what’s this about sending you to fetch me?” Katsu answered apologetically, “The mistress said I was to take the ricksha and bring you back.”

  “Is it something urgent?”

  Katsu of course knew nothing. He simply said, “She said you would understand when you got there—” and would not finish his sentence.

  Daisuke went back into the house. He was about to call the old woman and have her get out a change of clothing, but not wanting to use her when she had a stomachache, he scurried through the drawers himself and dressed hurriedly, then stepped into Katsu’s ricksha.

  There was a strong wind blowing that day. Katsu’s movements were labored as he bowed forward and ran. Inside, Daisuke was so windblown that the two layers of his brain spun around and around. But it was pleasant to feel his numbed self, still in a state of half sleep, be lifted into space by the wheels that spun beautifully, without sound or echo. By the time he arrived in Aoyama, he felt considerably more refreshed than when he got up.