Memoirs of a Geisha (18 page)

“They need their fun more than ever now,” Mother said. “But you were saying . . .”

“Yes, what was I saying? Well, it makes no difference. I mustn’t take any more of your time. I’m pleased that Chiyo is quite healthy after all.”

“Very healthy, yes. But, Mameha-san, wait a moment before you leave, if you don’t mind. You were saying you’d almost considered taking on Chiyo as your younger sister?”

“Well, by now she’s been out of training so long . . .” Mameha said. “Anyway, I’m sure you have an excellent reason for the decision you’ve made, Mrs. Nitta. I wouldn’t dare second-guess you.”

“It’s heartbreaking, the choices people are forced to make in these times. I just couldn’t afford her training any longer! However, if you feel she has potential, Mameha-san, I’m sure any investment you might choose to make in her future would be amply repaid.”

Mother was trying to take advantage of Mameha. No geisha ever paid lesson fees for a younger sister.

“I wish such a thing were possible,” Mameha said, “but with this terrible Depression . . .”

“Perhaps there’s some way I could manage it,” Mother said. “Though Chiyo is a bit headstrong, and her debts are considerable. I’ve often thought how shocking it would be if she ever managed to repay them.”

“Such an attractive girl? I’d find it shocking if she couldn’t.”

“Anyway, there’s more to life than money, isn’t there?” Mother said. “One wants to do one’s best for a girl like Chiyo. Perhaps I could see my way to investing a bit more in her . . . just for her lessons, you understand. But where would it all lead?”

“I’m sure Chiyo’s debts are very considerable,” Mameha said. “But even so, I should think she’ll repay them by the time she’s twenty.”

“Twenty!” said Mother. “I don’t think any girl in Gion has ever done such a thing. And in the midst of this Depression . . .”

“Yes, there is the Depression, it’s true.”

“It certainly seems to me our Pumpkin is a safer investment,” Mother said. “After all, in Chiyo’s case, with you as her older sister, her debts will only grow worse before they get better.”

Mother wasn’t just talking about my lesson fees; she was talking about fees she would have to pay to Mameha. A geisha of Mameha’s standing commonly takes a larger portion of her younger sister’s earnings than an ordinary geisha would.

“Mameha-san, if you have a moment longer,” Mother went on, “I wonder if you would entertain a proposal. If the great Mameha says Chiyo will repay her debts by the age of twenty, how can I doubt it’s true? Of course, a girl like Chiyo won’t succeed without an older sister such as yourself, and yet our little okiya is stretched to its limits just now. I can’t possibly offer you the terms you’re accustomed to. The best I could offer from Chiyo’s future earnings might be only half what you’d ordinarily expect.”

“Just now I’m entertaining several very generous offers,” Mameha said. “If I’m going to take on a younger sister, I couldn’t possibly afford to do it at a reduced fee.”

“I’m not quite finished, Mameha-san,” Mother replied. “Here’s my proposal. It’s true I can afford only half what you might usually expect. But if Chiyo does indeed manage to repay her debts by the age of twenty, as you anticipate, I would turn over to you the remainder of what you ought to have made, plus an additional thirty percent. You would make more money in the long run.”

“And if Chiyo turns twenty without having repaid her debts?” Mameha asked.

“I’m sorry to say that in such a case, the investment would have been a poor one for both of us. The okiya would be unable to pay the fees owed to you.”

There was a silence, and then Mameha sighed.

“I’m very poor with numbers, Mrs. Nitta. But if I understand correctly, you’d like me to take on a task you think may be impossible, for fees that are less than usual. Plenty of promising young girls in Gion would make fine younger sisters to me at no risk whatever. I’m afraid I must decline your proposal.”

“You’re quite right,” said Mother. “Thirty percent is a bit low. I’ll offer you double, instead, if you succeed.”

“But nothing if I fail.”

“Please don’t think of it as nothing. A portion of Chiyo’s fees would have gone to you all along. It’s simply that the okiya would be unable to pay you the additional amount you would be owed.”

I felt certain Mameha was going to say no. Instead she said, “I’d like to find out first how substantial Chiyo’s debt really is.”

“I’ll fetch the account books for you,” Mother told her.

*  *  *

I heard nothing more of their conversation, for at this point Auntie ran out of patience for my eavesdropping, and sent me out of the okiya with a list of errands. All that afternoon, I felt as agitated as a pile of rocks in an earthquake; because, of course, I had no idea how things would turn out. If Mother and Mameha couldn’t come to an agreement, I would remain a maid all my life just as surely as a turtle remains a turtle.

When I returned to the okiya, Pumpkin was kneeling on the walkway near the courtyard, making terrible twanging noises with her shamisen. She looked very pleased when she caught sight of me, and called me over.

“Find some excuse to go into Mother’s room,” she said. “She’s been in there all afternoon with her abacus. I’m sure she’ll say something to you. Then you have to run back down here and tell me!”

I thought this was a fine idea. One of my errands had been to buy some cream for the cook’s scabies, but the pharmacy had been out of it. So I decided to go upstairs and apologize to Mother for having come back to the okiya without it. She wouldn’t care, of course; probably she didn’t even know I’d been sent to fetch it. But at least it would get me into her room.

As it turned out, Mother was listening to a comedy show on the radio. Normally if I disturbed her at a time like this, she would wave me in and go right on listening to the radio—looking over her account books and puffing at her pipe. But today, to my surprise, she turned off the radio and slapped the account book shut the moment she saw me. I bowed to her and went to kneel at the table.

“While Mameha was here,” she said, “I noticed you in the for- mal entrance hall polishing the floor. Were you trying to overhear our conversation?”

“No, ma’am. There was a scratch on the floorboards. Pumpkin and I were doing what we could to buff it out.”

“I only hope you turn out to be a better geisha than you are a liar,” she said, and began to laugh, but without taking her pipe out of her mouth, so that she accidentally blew air into the stem and caused ashes to shoot up out of the little metal bowl. Some of the flecks of tobacco were still burning when they came down onto her kimono. She put the pipe down onto the table and whacked herself with her palm until she was satisfied they’d all been snuffed out.

“Now, Chiyo, you’ve been here in the okiya more than a year,” she said.

“More than two years, ma’am.”

“In that time I’ve hardly taken any notice of you. And then today, along comes a geisha like Mameha, to say she wants to be your older sister! How on earth am I to understand this?”

As I saw it, Mameha was actually more interested in harming Hatsumomo than in helping me. But I certainly couldn’t say such a thing to Mother. I was about to tell her I had no idea why Mameha had taken an interest in me; but before I could speak, the door to Mother’s room slid open, and I heard Hatsumomo’s voice say:

“I’m sorry, Mother, I didn’t know you were busy scolding the maid!”

“She won’t be a maid much longer,” Mother told her. “We’ve had a visit today that may interest you.”

“Yes, I gather Mameha has come and plucked our little minnow out of the aquarium,” Hatsumomo said. She drifted over and knelt at the table, so close that I had to scoot away to make room for both of us.

“For some reason,” Mother said, “Mameha seems to think Chiyo will repay her debts by the age of twenty.”

Hatsumomo’s face was turned toward mine. To see her smile, you might have thought she was a mother looking adoringly at a baby. But this is what she said:

“Perhaps, Mother, if you sold her to a whorehouse . . .”

“Stop it, Hatsumomo. I didn’t invite you in here to listen to this sort of thing. I want to know what you’ve done to Mameha lately to provoke her.”

“I may have ruined Miss Prissy’s day by strolling past her on the street, perhaps, but other than that I haven’t done a thing.”

“She has something in mind. I’d like to know what it is.”

“There’s no mystery at all, Mother. She thinks she can get at me by going through Little Miss Stupid.”

Mother didn’t respond; she seemed to be considering what Hatsumomo had told her. “Perhaps,” she said at last, “she really does think Chiyo will be a more successful geisha than our Pumpkin and would like to make a bit of money off her. Who can blame her for that?”

“Really, Mother . . . Mameha doesn’t need Chiyo in order to make money. Do you think it’s an accident she’s chosen to waste her time on a girl who happens to live in the same okiya I do? Mameha would probably establish a relationship with your little dog if she thought it would help drive me out of Gion.”

“Come now, Hatsumomo. Why would she want to drive you out of Gion?”

“Because I’m more beautiful. Does she need a better reason? She wants to humiliate me by telling everyone, ‘Oh, please meet my new younger sister. She lives in the same okiya as Hatsumomo, but she’s such a jewel they’ve entrusted her to
me
for training instead.’ ”

“I can’t imagine Mameha behaving that way,” Mother said, almost under her breath.

“If she thinks she can make Chiyo into a more successful geisha than Pumpkin,” Hatsumomo went on, “she’s going to be very surprised. But I’m delighted that Chiyo will be dressed up in a kimono and paraded around. It’s a perfect opportunity for Pumpkin. Haven’t you ever seen a kitten attacking a ball of string? Pumpkin will be a much better geisha after she’s sharpened her teeth on this one.”

Mother seemed to like this, for she raised the edges of her mouth in a sort of smile.

“I had no idea what a fine day this would be,” she said. “This morning when I woke up, two useless girls were living in the okiya. Now they’ll be fighting it out . . . and with a couple of the most prominent geisha in Gion ushering them along!”

  chapter twelve

T
he very next afternoon Mameha summoned me to her apartment. This time she was seated at the table waiting for me when the maid slid open the door. I was careful to bow properly before coming into the room and then to cross to the table and bow again.

“Mameha-san, I don’t know what has led you to this decision . . .” I began, “but I can’t express how grateful I am—”

“Don’t be grateful just yet,” she interrupted. “Nothing has happened. You’d better tell me what Mrs. Nitta said to you after my visit yesterday.”

“Well,” I said, “I think Mother was a little confused about why you’ve taken notice of me . . . and to tell the truth, so am I.” I hoped Mameha would say something, but she didn’t. “As for Hatsumomo—”

“Don’t even waste your time thinking about what she says. You already know she’d be thrilled to see you fail, just as Mrs. Nitta would.”

“I don’t understand why Mother should want me to fail,” I said, “considering she’ll make more money if I succeed.”

“Except that if you pay back your debts by the age of twenty, she’ll owe me a good deal of money. I made a sort of bet with her yesterday,” Mameha said, while a maid served us tea. “I wouldn’t have made the bet unless I felt certain you would succeed. But if I’m going to be your older sister, you may as well know that I have very strict terms.”

I expected her to tell them to me, but she only glowered and said:

“Really, Chiyo, you must stop blowing on your tea that way. You look like a peasant! Leave it on the table until it’s cool enough to drink.”

“I’m sorry,” I said. “I wasn’t aware I was doing it.”

“It’s time you were; a geisha must be very careful about the image she presents to the world. Now, as I say, I have very strict terms. To begin with, I expect you to do what I ask without questioning me or doubting me in any way. I know you’ve disobeyed Hatsumomo and Mrs. Nitta from time to time. You may think that’s understandable; but if you ask me, you should have been more obedient in the first place and perhaps none of these unfortunate things would ever have happened to you.”

Mameha was quite right. The world has changed a good deal since; but when I was a child, a girl who disobeyed her elders was soon put in her place.

“Several years ago I took on two new younger sisters,” Mameha continued. “One worked very hard, but the other slacked off. I brought her here to my apartment one day and explained that I wouldn’t tolerate her making a fool of me any longer, but it had no effect. The following month I told her to go and find herself a new older sister.”

“Mameha-san, I promise you, such a thing will never happen with me,” I said. “Thanks to you, I feel like a ship encountering its first taste of the ocean. I would never forgive myself for disappointing you.”

“Yes, well, that’s all fine, but I’m not just talking about how hard you work. You’ll have to be careful not to let Hatsumomo trick you. And for heaven’s sake, don’t do anything to make your debts worse than they are. Don’t break even a teacup!”

I promised her I wouldn’t; but I must confess that when I thought of Hatsumomo tricking me again . . . well, I wasn’t sure how I could defend myself if she tried.

“There’s one more thing,” Mameha said. “Whatever you and I discuss must be kept private. You are never to tell any of it to Hatsumomo. Even if we’ve only talked about the weather, do you understand? If Hatsumomo asks what I said, you must tell her, ‘Oh, Hatsumomo-san, Mameha-san never says anything of interest! As soon as I’ve heard it, it slips right out of my mind. She’s the dullest person alive!’ ”

I told Mameha I understood.

“Hatsumomo is quite clever,” she went on. “If you give her the slightest hint, you’ll be surprised how much she’ll figure out on her own.”

Suddenly, Mameha leaned toward me and said in an angry voice, “What were you two talking about yesterday when I saw you on the street together?”

“Nothing, ma’am!” I said. And though she went on glaring at me, I was so shocked I couldn’t say anything further.

“What do you mean, nothing? You’d better answer me, you stupid little girl, or I’ll pour ink in your ear tonight while you’re sleeping!”

It took me a moment to understand that Mameha was trying to do an imitation of Hatsumomo. I’m afraid it wasn’t a very good imitation, but now that I understood what she was doing, I said, “Honestly, Hatsumomo-san, Mameha-san is always saying the dullest things! I can never remember a single one of them. They just melt away like snowflakes. Are you quite sure you saw us talking yesterday? Because if we talked at all, I can hardly remember it. . . .”

Mameha went on for a time, doing her poor imitation of Hatsumomo, and at the end said I had done an adequate job. I wasn’t as confident as she was. Being questioned by Mameha, even when she was trying to act like Hatsumomo, wasn’t the same thing as keeping up a facade in front of Hatsumomo herself.

*  *  *

In the two years since Mother had put an end to my lessons, I’d forgotten much of what I’d learned. And I hadn’t learned much to begin with, since my mind had been occupied with other things. This is why, when I went back to the school after Mameha agreed to be my older sister, I honestly felt I was beginning my lessons for the very first time.

I was twelve years old by then, and nearly as tall as Mameha. Having grown older may seem like an advantage, but I can assure you it wasn’t. Most of the girls at the school had begun their studies much younger, in some cases at the traditional age of three years and three days. Those few who’d started as young as this were mostly the daughters of geisha themselves, and had been raised in such a way that dance and tea ceremony formed as much a part of their daily life as swimming in the pond had for me.

I know I’ve described something of what it was like to study shamisen with Teacher Mouse. But a geisha must study a great many arts besides shamisen. And in fact, the “gei” of “geisha” means “arts,” so the word “geisha” really means “artisan” or “artist.” My first lesson in the morning was in a kind of small drum we call
tsutsumi
. You may wonder why a geisha should bother learning drums, but the answer is very simple. In a banquet or any sort of informal gathering in Gion, geisha usually dance to nothing more than the accompaniment of a shamisen and perhaps a singer. But for stage performances, such as
Dances of the Old Capital
every spring, six or more shamisen players join together as an ensemble, backed by various types of drums and also a Japanese flute we call
fue
. So you see, a geisha must try her hand at all of these instruments, even though eventually she’ll be encouraged to specialize in one or two.

As I say, my early-morning lesson was in the little drum we call
tsutsumi
, which is played in a kneeling position like all the other musical instruments we studied.
Tsutsumi
is different from the other drums because it’s held on the shoulder and played with the hand, unlike the larger
okawa
, which rests on the thigh, or the largest drum of all, called
taiko
, which sits edgewise on a stand and is struck with fat drumsticks. I studied them all at one time or other. A drum may seem like an instrument even a child can play, but actually there are various ways of striking each of them, such as—for the big
taiko
—bringing the arm across the body and then swinging the drumstick backhand, you might say, which we call
uchikomi
; or striking with one arm while bringing the other up at the same moment, which we call
sarashi
. There are other methods as well, and each produces a different sound, but only after a great deal of practice. On top of this, the orchestra is always in view of the public, so all these movements must be graceful and attractive, as well as being in unison with the other players. Half the work is in making the right sound; the other half is in doing it the proper way.

Following drums, my next lesson of the morning was in Japanese flute, and after that in shamisen. The method in studying any of these instruments was more or less the same. The teacher began by playing something, and then the students tried to play it back. On occasion we sounded like a band of animals at the zoo, but not often, because the teachers were careful to begin simply. For example, in my first lesson on the flute, the teacher played a single note and we tried one at a time to play it back. Even after only one note, the teacher still found plenty to say.

“So-and-so, you must keep your little finger down, not up in the air. And you, Such-and-such, does your flute smell bad? Well then, why do you wrinkle your nose that way!”

She was very strict, like most of the teachers, and naturally we were afraid of making mistakes. It wasn’t uncommon for her to take the flute from some poor girl in order to hit her on the shoulder with it.

After drums, flute, and shamisen, my next lesson was usually in singing. We often sing at parties in Japan; and of course, parties are mostly what men come to Gion for. But even if a girl can’t hold a tune and will never be asked to perform in front of others, she must still study singing to help her understand dance. This is because the dances are set to particular pieces of music, often performed by a singer accompanying herself on the shamisen.

There are many different types of songs—oh, far more than I could possibly count—but in our lessons we studied five different kinds. Some were popular ballads; some were long pieces from Kabuki theater telling a story; others were something like a short musical poem. It would be senseless for me to try describing these songs. But let me say that while I find most of them enchanting, foreigners often seem to think they sound more like cats wailing in a temple yard than music. It is true that traditional Japanese singing involves a good deal of warbling and is often sung so far back in the throat that the sound comes out from the nose rather than the mouth. But it’s only a matter of what you’re accustomed to hearing.

In all of these classes, music and dance were only part of what we learned. Because a girl who has mastered the various arts will still come off badly at a party if she hasn’t learned proper comportment and behavior. This is one reason the teachers always insist upon good manners and bearing in their students, even when a girl is only scurrying down the hall toward the toilet. When you’re taking a lesson in shamisen, for example, you’ll be corrected for speaking in anything but the most proper language, or for speaking in a regional accent rather than in Kyoto speech, or for slouching, or walking in lumbering steps. In fact, the most severe scolding a girl is likely to receive probably won’t be for playing her instrument badly or failing to learn the words to a song, but rather for having dirty fingernails, or being disrespectful, or something of that sort.

Sometimes when I’ve talked with foreigners about my training, they’ve asked, “Well, when did you study flower arranging?” The answer is that I never did. Anyone who sits down in front of a man and begins to arrange flowers by way of entertaining him is likely to look up and find that he has laid his head down on the table to go to sleep. You must remember that a geisha, above all, is an entertainer and a performer. We may pour sake or tea for a man, but we never go and fetch another serving of pickles. And in fact, we geisha are so well pampered by our maids that we scarcely know how to look after ourselves or keep our own rooms orderly, much less adorn a room in a teahouse with flowers.

My last lesson of the morning was in tea ceremony. This is a subject many books are written about, so I won’t try to go into much detail. But basically, a tea ceremony is conducted by one or two people who sit before their guests and prepare tea in a very traditional manner, using beautiful cups, and whisks made from bamboo, and so forth. Even the guests are a part of the ceremony because they must hold the cup in a certain manner and drink from it just so. If you think of it as sitting down to have a nice cup of tea . . . well, it’s more like a sort of dance, or even a meditation, conducted while kneeling. The tea itself is made from tea leaves ground into a powder and then whisked with boiled water into a frothy green mix we call
matcha
, which is very unpopular with foreigners. I’ll admit it does look like green soapy water and has a bitter taste that takes a certain getting used to.

Tea ceremony is a very important part of a geisha’s training. It isn’t unusual for a party at a private residence to begin with a brief tea ceremony. And the guests who come to see the seasonal dances in Gion are first served tea made by geisha.

My tea ceremony teacher was a young woman of perhaps twenty-five who wasn’t a very good geisha, as I later learned; but she was so obsessed with tea ceremony that she taught it as if every movement was absolutely holy. Because of her enthusiasm I quickly learned to respect her teaching, and I must say it was the perfect lesson to have at the end of a long morning. The atmosphere was so serene. Even now, I find tea ceremony as enjoyable as a good night’s sleep.

What makes a geisha’s training so difficult isn’t simply the arts she must learn, but how hectic her life becomes. After spending all morning in lessons, she is still expected to work during the afternoon and evening very much as she always has. And still, she sleeps no more than three to five hours every night. During these years of training, if I’d been two people my life would probably still have been too busy. I would have been grateful if Mother had freed me from my chores as she had Pumpkin; but considering her bet with Mameha, I don’t think she ever considered offering me more time for practice. Some of my chores were given to the maids, but most days I was responsible for more than I could manage, while still being expected to practice shamisen for an hour or more during the afternoon. In winter, both Pumpkin and I were made to toughen up our hands by holding them in ice water until we cried from pain, and then practice outside in the frigid air of the courtyard. I know it sounds terribly cruel, but it’s the way things were done back then. And in fact, toughening the hands in this way really did help me play better. You see, stage fright drains the feeling from your hands; and when you’ve already grown accustomed to playing with hands that are numbed and miserable, stage fright presents much less of a problem.