Spring Snow

  As the road entered the mountains, the pace of the rickshaw men slowed down. Both of them were old men, and their legs were evidently not what they had been. However, there was no reason to hurry. On the contrary, thought the Countess, she and Satoko were fortunate to be able to have such a leisurely view of the countryside.

  They were approaching the outer stone gate of Gesshu, and once they had passed through it, the scenery became limited to the gently sloping path itself, a broad expanse of pale blue sky partially obscured by the tall, white-bearded grass along the path, and a low range of mountains far in the distance.

  The rickshaw men finally stopped for a rest, and as they talked and wiped away their sweat, the Countess raised her voice to carry over theirs and called back to Satoko: “You’d better take your fill of the scenery from here to the convent. People like me can come here at any time, but you will soon be in a position where you won’t be able to go on outings so easily.”

  Her daughter did not reply, but she gave a slow smile and nodded her head slightly.

  The rickshaws moved on again, and the path continued to slope upwards, which slowed the pace still further. After they had entered the convent grounds, however, the trees on either side of them grew denser, lessening the heat of the sun.

  The Countess’s ears still echoed faintly with the autumn midday humming of the insects she had been listening to while the rickshaw men were having their rest. But then the persimmon trees that had begun to appear on the left-hand side of the road caught her eye and enchanted her with their clear, glowing fruit. Flashing in the sunlight, some of the persimmons that weighed down each branch were casting lacquered shadows on the others. One tree was rich with orange-red fruit which, unlike flowers, resisted the wind and left only the dry leaves to stir. Its mass of ripe fruit was thus spread out against the sky as if fixed firmly to the spot against a field of blue.

  “I don’t see any maple leaves at all. I wonder why,” she called back to Satoko, nearly shrieking with the effort but not drawing any response.

  Even scrub maples were scarce along the road. There was little to catch the eye now but the green of radish fields to the west and bamboo thickets to the east. The radish fields were covered with a thick growth of leaves that filtered the sunshine into subtly complex patterns. Then they gave way to a line of tea bushes separated from the road by a marsh. Red-berried vines of magnolia covered this tea hedge, and beyond appeared the still waters of a larger marsh. A little farther on, the road darkened abruptly as the rickshaws passed into the shade of some ancient cedars. The sun spilled down in flecks of light on the bamboo grass beneath the trees, and one tall, isolated stalk flashed with a singular intensity.

  She felt a sudden chill in the air. Turning again toward the rickshaw behind her, she mimed the clutching of her shawl about her shoulders. Although she hardly dared hope for a response, when she glanced backward a few minutes later, she caught the iridescent colors of Satoko’s shawl in the corner of her eye, fluttering in the breeze. Although her daughter still had no inclination to talk, the Countess could at least take consolation in her obedience.

  Once the rickshaws had passed through a black-painted gate, the scenery around them took on the more formal aspect of a garden, as might be expected of the immediate surroundings of the convent. Its red maple leaves—the first she had seen along the way—caught the Countess by surprise, and she gasped with admiration.

  There was nothing gaudily charming about the colors of these maples here within the black gate. Their deep scarlet was a shade that was blended only in the depths of the mountains, a color that seemed to speak to the Countess of sins as yet unpurged. She suddenly felt a chill edge of anxiety cut into her, and thought of Satoko in the rickshaw behind.

  The screen of slender pines and cedars that formed a backdrop to the maples was not thick enough to shut out the broad, bright expanse of sky. Its brilliance flooded through them, striking the maples from behind and turning their extended red-leaved branches to scattered clouds caught in the radiance of the morning sun. As she looked up at the sky from beneath the branches, she admired the subtly delicate way the leaves were interwoven, and imagined that she was seeing the heavens through a tracery of deep scarlet.

  Finally the rickshaws stopped and the Countess and Satoko stepped down in front of a Tang Dynasty gate, behind which was a stone-paved lane and the main entrance to the convent of Gesshu.

  44

  A FULL YEAR HAD GONE BY since Satoko and her mother had last paid their respects to the Abbess on the occasion of her trip to Tokyo. And now, as they waited in a large parlor, the senior nun assured them that Her Reverence had been delighted at the prospect of this visit. She was still speaking as the Abbess herself entered, the junior nun leading her by the hand.

  After the Countess had imparted the news of Satoko’s engagement, Her Reverence congratulated her, saying, “The next time you are kind enough to honor us with a visit, it will not do for you to be lodged anywhere but in the pavilion.” The pavilion was a villa in the convent grounds reserved for members of the Imperial Family.

  Now that she was here at Gesshu, Satoko could not very well keep silent any longer, and she answered, however briefly, whenever she was spoken to. Her withdrawal might have been taken for mere shyness. The Abbess, of course, being a woman of immense discretion, gave no sign that she noticed anything amiss.

  “A man in the village who cultivates them brings some every year,” said the Abbess in response to the Countess’s lavish praise of the potted chrysanthemums that were standing in rows in the courtyard. “He gives us such a lecture about them.” Then she made the senior nun repeat the chrysanthemum enthusiast’s explanations—this was a crimson single-fold chrysanthemum, bred to blossom in a pattern of parallel stripes; this a yellow tubular chrysanthemum bred in the same way, and so on. Finally Her Reverence herself led Satoko and her mother into the drawing room.

  “Our maples seem to be late in turning this year,” she said after the senior nun had pulled open the sliding door to reveal the beauty of the inner garden, with its simulated mountains and its now fading grass. It contained several huge maple trees that were crowned with red, but as one looked down at the lower branches, this paled to an orange that gave way to a yellow that finally merged into a light green. The red at the very top was dark, with a quality suggestive of congealed blood. The sasanquas had already begun to bloom. And in one corner of the garden, the smooth curve of a dry branch of crape myrtle added a beautiful touch of luster.

  They returned to the parlor, and while Her Reverence and the Countess engaged in polite conversation, the short autumn day drew to a close.

  Dinner was a festive affair, complete with the rice and red beans reserved for holidays, and the two nuns did their best to enliven the company, but nothing seemed able to lighten the mood of the evening.

  “This is the day of the fire kindling at the Imperial Palace,” said the Abbess. The fire kindling was a court observance built around the kindling of a huge flame in a hibachi while a court lady stood in front of it chanting an incantation. The senior nun, who had seen it during her years of service at the palace, chanted it from memory.

  It was an ancient ritual that took place in the presence of the Emperor on the eighteenth of November. After a flame was struck in the hibachi and soared almost to the ceiling, a court lady, swathed in white ceremonial robes, would begin the chant with the words: “Upwards! Upwards! Let the holy flame be kindled! If these tangerines and these manju should please you . . .” The tangerines and bean-jam dumplings were then thrown onto the fire, heated through, and then offered to the Emperor.

  One might well feel that the nun’s reenactment of so solemn an observance was bordering on the sacrilegious, but the Abbess realized that the old woman’s sole intention was to provide some badly needed cheer, and she did not utter a word of reproof.

  Night came early at Gesshu. By five in the evening, the front gate was already bolted. Shortly after dinner, the nuns
retired to their sleeping quarters, and the Countess and her daughter were led to their room. They would stay until the following mid-afternoon, allowing for a leisurely farewell. Then they were to board a night train that evening for Tokyo.

  The Countess had intended to reprimand Satoko once they were alone together for having let her sadness affect her good manners during the day. But after some reflection on her state of mind after the Osaka experience, she decided against it and went to bed without a word to her daughter.

  Even in the unrelieved darkness of the night, the sliding door’s paper paneling loomed white and insistently mournful in the guest parlor of Gesshu. It was as if the frost air of the cold November night had penetrated the thin skin of the paper. The Countess could easily distinguish the paper patterns of sixteen-petal chrysanthemums and white clouds that decorated the door catches. Up in the direction of the darkened ceiling, metal rosettes of six chrysanthemums grouped around kikkyo blossoms masked each of the pegs, accentuating the blackness around them. Outside there was no wind at all, with not even the sound of a breeze stirring in the pines to be heard. Nevertheless, one was distinctly aware of the expanse of forest and mountain.

  The Countess was overcome with a sense of relief. Whatever the cost, she and her daughter had faithfully carried out the painful duty that was their lot, and now she felt that everything would be calm and serene. And so, despite her consciousness that her daughter was tossing and turning beside her, she soon fell asleep.

  When she opened her eyes, Satoko was no longer at her side. Stretching out her hand in the pre-dawn darkness, she came upon her daughter’s nightgown neatly folded on top of the quilt. Anxiety surged through her, but she told herself that Satoko had merely gone to the lavatory, and she determined to do nothing for a few moments. But although she tried to wait, her chest was tight with a dull coldness and she got up to make sure. The lavatory was empty. There was no sign of anyone else about. The sky was now tinged with an uncertain blue.

  Just then she heard the sound of movement coming from the kitchen. A few moments later, an early-rising serving maid, startled at the Countess’s sudden appearance, went down on her knees.

  “Have you seen Satoko?” she asked her, but the maid was terrified and could do nothing but shake her head frantically, nor would she budge an inch to help in the search.

  After this, however, while the Countess was pacing the convent passages in aimless desperation, she happened to meet the junior nun. The nun was startled at her news and began at once to guide her in her search.

  At the far end of a connecting corridor, the flickering glow of candles came from the main hall of worship. It was hardly likely that a nun would already be at her devotions at this hour of the morning.

  Two burning candles traced with the flower-wheel pattern were illuminating the image of Buddha before which Satoko was sitting. Seeing her daughter from the rear, the Countess did not recognize her for some moments. For Satoko had cropped short her hair. She had placed the shorn strands on the sutra stand, as though in offering, and, beads in hand, was lost in prayer.

  Her mother’s first reaction was relief at finding her daughter alive. She then realized that until that moment she had been certain that Satoko was dead.

  “You’ve cut off your hair,” she cried as she embraced her.

  “Yes, Mother. There was nothing else to do,” Satoko answered, finally looking her mother directly in the eye. The small, wavering candle flames flickered in her pupils, but the whites of her eyes already held the brilliance of the dawn. Never had the Countess seen so fearful a daybreak as she now saw mirrored in her daughter’s gaze. And the same white glow, growing stronger by the minute, shone in each of the crystal beads of the string wrapped around her fingers. Like a force of will so intense that it transcends mere willing, the dawn light seemed to flow with equal force from every one of the cold crystals.

  The junior nun hurried off to break the news to her senior. And then, having completed her report, she withdrew, leaving it to the senior nun to conduct Countess Ayakura and her daughter to the Abbess.

  “Your Reverence, have you arisen yet?” she called from outside the door of the Abbess’s quarters.

  “Yes.”

  “Please forgive us.”

  The old nun then slid open the door to reveal the Abbess sitting upright on her quilted mattress. The Countess began haltingly.

  “What has happened, Your Reverence, is that Satoko, just now, in the chapel, cut off her hair.”

  The Abbess gazed out into the corridor as her eyes absorbed the change that Satoko had worked on herself. But her features betrayed no sign of surprise.

  “Well, well. I was wondering if things might not turn out something like this,” she said. After a pause, as if a new thought had just struck her, she went on to say that as the circumstances appeared to be rather involved, she thought it best for the Countess to be kind enough to leave her daughter alone with her so that she and Satoko could have a heart-to-heart talk. The Countess and the senior nun acquiesced, and withdrew.

  The nun, left alone with Countess Ayakura, did her best to entertain her, but the Countess was so distraught that she could not eat a bite of breakfast. The nun could well imagine her distress and was unable to think of any topic of conversation that might divert her. A long time passed before a summons finally came from the Abbess’s quarters. And there, in Satoko’s presence, the Abbess informed the Countess of a piece of news of shattering significance: since there was no mistaking the genuineness of Satoko’s desire to renounce the world, Gesshu Temple would receive her as a novice.

  For most of the morning so far, the Countess’s mind had been wholly involved in concocting a variety of stopgap measures. She could not doubt that Satoko’s decision was firm. And then some months or even half a year would be required to restore her daughter’s hair to normal, but if only she could be dissuaded from taking the tonsure, these months could be accounted for a period of convalescence from some illness incurred during the trip, and the Ayakuras could thus obtain a postponement of the betrothal ceremony. Then the persuasive powers of her father and Marquis Matsugae could be brought to bear on her in the interval, and perhaps she could be induced to change her mind.

  And now, hearing the Abbess’s words, her determination, far from weakening, became all the more set. The usual procedure, when one was to be accepted as a novice, was to undergo a year of ascetic discipline before receiving the tonsure at the formal induction ceremony. Whatever else, the restoration of Satoko’s ravaged hair was of prime importance. Then, in the event that she could be persuaded fairly soon to reject her vocation . . . the Countess’s mind was filled with marvelous ploys: if events quickly took a favorable turn, perhaps Satoko could get through the betrothal ceremony safely with the help of a carefully made wig.

  Countess Ayakura came to her decision: for the present, her only course was to leave Satoko here and return to Tokyo as quickly as possible to work out a plan of action.

  “I appreciate the sentiments expressed by Your Reverence,” she said in reply. “However, not only has this come up suddenly in the midst of a journey, but it is also a matter that involves disturbing the Imperial Family. I therefore think it best to beg your indulgence to return temporarily to Tokyo to consult my husband before coming back here. And in the meantime I will entrust Satoko to your care.”

  Satoko heard her mother out without so much as a raised eyebrow. The Countess was now afraid even to speak to her own daughter.

  45

  UPON HIS WIFE’S RETURN, when Count Ayakura learned of this astonishing development, he let an entire week pass without doing anything at all, a procrastination that was to provoke the wrath of Marquis Matsugae.

  The Matsugae household was resting secure in the assumption that Satoko had already returned to Tokyo and that due notice of this had been conveyed to Prince Toin’s family. A miscalculation of this sort was out of character for the Marquis, but once his wife had come back from Osaka and told hi
m that his meticulous planning had been carried out without a hitch, complacency got the upper hand, and he felt assured of a successful conclusion.

  Count Ayakura’s abstraction persisted. He believed that only a vulgar mentality was willing to acknowledge the possibility of catastrophe. He felt that taking naps was much more beneficial than confronting catastrophes. However precipitous the future might seem, he learned from the game of kemari that the ball must always come down. There was no call for consternation. Grief and rage, along with other outbursts of passion, were mistakes easily committed by a mind lacking in refinement. And the Count was certainly not a man who lacked refinement.

  Just let matters slide. How much better to accept each sweet drop of the honey that was Time, than to stoop to the vulgarity latent in every decision. However grave the matter at hand might be, if one neglected it for long enough, the act of neglect itself would begin to affect the situation, and someone else would emerge as an ally. Such was Count Ayakura’s version of political theory.

  Once back at the side of such a husband, the Countess became daily less concerned with the anxiety that had oppressed her at Gesshu. In the present circumstances, it was lucky that Tadeshina was away and unable to act blindly on one of her rash impulses. The Count had been kind enough to send her off for a leisurely convalescence at the hot springs of Yugawara.

  After a week, however, there was a phone call from Marquis Matsugae, and even Count Ayakura could no longer keep the matter secret. The Marquis was temporarily struck dumb when he heard the Count tell him that as a matter of fact Satoko had not yet returned and he felt the stirrings of all sorts of nasty premonitions.

  The Marquis and his wife lost no time in paying a visit to the Ayakuras. At first the Count offered one vague response after another as he was questioned. And then when the truth finally came out, the Marquis was so furious that he struck the table in front of him with his fist.