Masks (3 page)

“You mean to say the man’s ghost came to see the robe he’d made?” Mikamé’s voice was loud.

“Supposedly, yes. In those days even the best Nishijin weavers barely made a living, so it’s hardly any wonder Yoriyasu thought the man looked out of place.” Yorikata seemed to enjoy the tale, smiling quietly as he spoke.

“Since this one is not so old, the vermilion is much less faded, but even so, you’ll notice it’s much brighter on the inside.” He slid the tip of a stubby finger along a side seam, deftly exposing a patch of cloth where vermilion and indigo gleamed richly.

Mieko glanced at the shiny bit of cloth, then turned to Yasuko. “Think of that,” she murmured.

“Yes, I know,” Yasuko whispered in reply, bending entranced over the brocade.

Ibuki sensed the passing of a private and wordless communication between the two women. They were thinking of neither the robe’s design nor its weave, he was certain, but rather of the man who had died in its making—and of the man’s ghost, watching the dance from the emperor’s box.

“Were any other stories told about the robe after that?” he asked.

“Yes, I wonder,” said Mikamé. “If the weaver went all the way to the palace to see that performance after his death, obviously the robe had deep meaning for him. Did his ghost appear when other people wore it, too?” He made the query with an earnest air—one that had enabled him, as a researcher, to uncover the secrets of many an old rural family.

“Nothing of the sort ever happened again.” Toé sounded put out, as if she thought it poor taste on her brother’s part to bring up such a story at a time when their own father lay dying. “Yoriyasu personally took the robe to the Kiyomizu Temple and ordered services held for the repose of the dead man’s soul. Whether that had anything to do with it I certainly don’t know, but the ghost never came back. And even now we consider it taboo to wear this costume in that role.”

“I’d say the weaver was satisfied, wouldn’t you?” Still greatly in earnest, Mikamé was not to be deterred. “The memorial services were one thing, but after all, the robe he had died to finish had been worn by a great master, in a performance seen by the retired emperor, the regents, and all the priests of the Honganji. He must have thought there was nothing more he could ask for. Don’t you think so?”

“Yorikata, shall we move on to some of the others now?” said Toé, as if to put a stop to Mikamé’s speculations. Several other rare old silks and brocades were accordingly taken up and admired before Yorikata stood and led the way to the stage. There, in contrast with the cramped and dingy living quarters, the paneling and floorboards were of the finest Japanese cypress.

Yorikata seemed particularly proud of the stage, and he told them a number of things about it. For the opening
performance he had danced Sambasō with his father as Okina, the old man, in the ancient sacred dance.

“Four jars are buried underneath the stage, one on each side, for each of the four seasons. In the fall, for example, the actors stamp the floorboards by this pillar to get the proper sound for that time of year.” He demonstrated by stamping firmly at the spot indicated, to produce a clear and resonant sound.

“Everything about the masks is different,” he told them, “when you actually see them being worn. Since I was going to put them on for you anyway, I thought it would be best to do it here on stage.”

“And Father says that Mrs. Toganō, being a woman, would surely like to see some of the best female masks,” said Toé, drawing one from its black lacquer box and handing it to her brother.

Yorikata placed the mask lightly on one palm, holding it out for them all to see.

The mask’s forehead and cheeks were well rounded; the suggestion of a smile hovered around the eyes, their lids curved and drooping, and the lips, half parted to reveal a glimpse of teeth. By some extraordinary artistry in the carving of the mask, that smile could change mysteriously into a look of weeping.

“This is Magojirō. A young woman, like Ko-omote,
^*1
but one with greater femininity and the fully developed charms of someone older, a young woman at the very peak of her beauty. When you know the masks as well as we do, they come to seem like the faces of real women. And this, of all the masks handed down in our family, is the one I love best.” He handed the Magojirō mask carefully to Yasuko.

“But I’ll show you another mask that I couldn’t love if I
wanted to, one that won’t even let me near, one that makes me feel only a kind of irritation—even hatred may not be too strong a word. Its name is Zō no onna.
^*2
It’s used for characters of exalted rank—the court lady in
Burden of Love
or the celestial being in
Robe of Feathers.
”

Yorikata picked up the mask and slowly extended his arms up and out, holding it level with his own face. It was the visage of a coldly beautiful woman, her cheeks tightly drawn. The sweep of the eyelids was long, and the red of the upper lip extended out to the corners of the mouth in an uneven and involved line, curving at last into a smile of disdain. A haughty cruelty was frozen hard upon the face, encasing it like crystals of ice on a tree.

Yorikata lowered his outstretched arms; then in one smooth sequence he raised the mask to his face, tied the cords behind his head, and quietly stood up. Above his sturdy, muscular shoulders, the swarthy male neck and jowls plainly in view, the face of a highborn woman with long, slanting eyelids floated, solitary in space.

Yasuko covered her eyes with one hand.

“What’s the matter?” asked Mikamé.

“It’s nothing. Just that mask…it’s so overpowering it frightened me.”

“You look pale. Let me check your pulse.” Mikamé took Yasuko’s hand from her lap and looked at his watch with his best medical air.

The next morning, Kyoto was wrapped in a soft drizzle, but by early afternoon, as the noon express neared Yonehara, the weather had cleared and auburn sheaves of rice standing in the harvested fields shone warmly in the late autumn
sun. In a pair of second-class seats sat Ibuki, by the window, and Yasuko, at his side. He had planned to take the night train home that evening, but at the last minute Mieko had decided to stay an extra day in order to attend a poetry gathering in Nara, and had given him her ticket.

“I’m afraid this won’t be convenient for you, but I know that Yasuko would appreciate the company.” She had made the offer with evident hesitation, but to Ibuki the prospect of traveling alone with Yasuko half a day was far from an imposition.

“I’d welcome an express ticket,” he had said. “Tomorrow morning I have a class, so really it’s better that I get back to Tokyo tonight.” Quickly he had canceled plans to attend a meeting in Kyoto that afternoon.

Now, side by side with Yasuko on the train, he found her rather more subdued than she had been with Mieko the day before, and disappointingly taciturn. He remembered the sudden faintness she had exhibited the previous afternoon. Mikamé had found her pulse to be normal, and moments later she had seemed herself again, watching eagerly as Yorikata demonstrated the mask’s ability to change expressions. Ibuki had forgotten the incident until now.

“How are you feeling today, Yasuko?” he asked casually. “What about that dizzy spell you had yesterday while we were looking at the masks?”

“I don’t know what came over me then. I’m fine now.” She smiled at him.

“The closer you are to those masks, the more uncanny they are,” he said. “Usually after a trip to Kyoto my head is full of temples and gardens, but this time I keep thinking of those masks. This morning, while I was lying half-awake in bed, I had a vision of my dead mother’s face. Something about it seemed strange, and then I realized I was seeing
the face on one of those masks we saw yesterday. The more I thought about it, the more it seemed that my mother used to look exactly like that. But I suppose Nō masks have such symbolic properties that everyone sees in them the faces of his own dead. Only the faces of the dead wear such frozen expressions.”

“And yet the expression was transformed the moment Yorikata put each mask on, wasn’t it?” said Yasuko. “When he stood up wearing the Zō no onna mask, it took my breath away. It was as if something dead had come to life, or as if male and female had suddenly become one…it was almost as if Akio’s spirit had taken over the mask.” Yasuko stared straight ahead, breathing quickly; she seemed even then to be seeing the mask float up before her. Could it be that once again, as at the séance when the medium first spoke, she was caught up in the illusion that Akio had returned from the dead? Not wanting to encourage her in the notion, Ibuki led the conversation onto other ground.

“At least that mask had a certain beauty. For me the most chilling mask was the one called Ryō no onna.
^*3
It seemed almost on the point of speaking—and likely to say something more substantial than that medium did the other day.”

Ryō no onna, the finest mask in the Yakushiji collection, was a national treasure of such value that it was ordinarily kept hidden from view, but yesterday, according to Toé, old Yorihito had insisted from his sickbed that it be shown to Mieko and the rest. On the way back in the car, Mikamé had laughingly suggested that some sixth sense must have told the old man of his visitors’ interest in spirit possession.

Still rejecting the idea, Yasuko glanced now at Ibuki. “No one but a few of the pupils has any idea we’re doing that sort of research. And Toé Yakushiji, of all people! She sends us her draft poems by mail, without setting foot out of Kyoto.”

“Yorihito must have had his own reasons. His greatest roles, the son said, were in
The Fulling-Block
and
Lady Aoi.
I can’t help thinking that each of the female masks we saw—Zō no onna and Ryō no onna, Deigan
^*4
and the rest—was somehow transfigured by the sensation he had, while wearing it, of actually becoming a woman. Or does that sound too fanciful?”

“Nō is his whole life, they say, and very little else enters in. So it’s hard to imagine he’s ever read Mother’s poetry, even if Toé does take the magazine. But he must have sensed something—mustn’t he, to have made such a point of showing us the Ryō no onna, even though none of us had said a word about it. The sight of it rather frightened me. I couldn’t help thinking that the one person meant to see those masks must be my own mother-in-law, not because she sees No performed so often or because she can appreciate the artistry of the masks, but because of that look of utter tranquillity they have—a deeply inward sort of look. I think Japanese women long ago must have had that look. And it seems to me she must be one of the last women who lives that way still—like the masks—with her deepest energies turned inward. I’d sensed something of the sort all along, in a vague way, but yesterday, as I watched her studying those masks and costumes, it came to me more clearly than ever before.”

Resting her shoulders against the seat cover, hands folded in her lap, Yasuko turned her head toward Ibuki
and fixed him with such a look that he started; with her chest thrust slightly forward, her head twisted at an odd angle, she had a look of cruel eroticism, like a woman wrapped in chains.

“Do you know what I’m thinking?” she asked.

“Sorry. I’m not psychic, I’m afraid.” To cover his confusion, he bent forward and lit a cigarette. “You do seem awfully quiet. I wondered if something made you feel awkward around me today.”

“If you can tell that much, you’re doing well.” She unclasped her hands and smiled at him, the dimple showing in her cheek. “To tell the truth, I’ve decided to leave the Toganō family, and Mieko, if I can. I’ve been thinking it over for some time. And I’m afraid that if I don’t act soon, it will be too late.”

“I can understand why Mieko would be sorry to lose you. She’s already lost Akio. Apart from that, she could probably never find another secretary who would be so devoted to the magazine and the poetry circle.”

“Is that what you really think?” She smiled.

“Well, it’s true, isn’t it?”

“No. If that were all, any number of people could take my place. Mother’s pupils idolize her. Lots of them would gladly slave for her. That’s not why she thinks she needs me.”

“Ah, I know. It’s because she’s so determined that you take up where Akio left off, and finish his research. You were forced into it by the strength of her determination, and lately the whole thing has become a burden. Am I right?”

“Only partly. Even if it was mainly her idea in the beginning, by now the project is part of me; I would keep on with it even if I left and married again.” Yasuko spoke flatly, then reclasped her hands with a sigh. “Oh, I’m not expressing myself well. But I did want to ask your advice today.”

“My advice? You mean about leaving Mieko?”

“I suppose I do mean that.” She stretched out her arms, hands inverted, the fingers still clasped, so that her small palms turned delicately back; the round pink flesh appeared directly beneath Ibuki’s eyes as he sat bent forward in his seat. The way she sat, her way of using her hands were unusually flirtatious.

“You know,” she said, “Toyoki Mikamé says certain things to me now and then. I’ve never given him any encouragement, but do you suppose that if I did make up my mind to leave the Toganō family, he’d marry me?”

“Mikamé?” Struck momentarily dumb, Ibuki stared at Yasuko’s face, at once guilty and coquettish, as she sat with arms outstretched before her. “Of course. Gladly, I’m sure. He’s a bit of a ladies’ man, and he enjoys a good time; but he has strong likes and dislikes, and his taste is good. I’ve known him a long time, and I have no doubt he’s head over heels in love with you.” Ibuki became silent so abruptly that it was as if a lamp had gone out. After a pause he said, in a different, quiet voice, “But why?” Then he added peevishly, “I’m against it.”

“Against it? You are?”

“Mikamé is no better a man than I am, I happen to think, and what’s more, I happen to think you care more for me than you do for him.”

“It’s true, I do…I do, but…” She floundered. “It wouldn’t work. Because if anything happened between you and me, I…that would only make it harder for me to get out of the situation I’m in.”