To the Spring Equinox and Beyond (13 page)

Of those characteristics Taguchi had described, the only one inseparably connected to the man's person was the mole between his eyebrows. But it would not be easy to be absolutely certain such a tiny mark on the face belonged to the right person, especially when, at four or five in the afternoon during this time of the year, the winter light was scant and many passengers were busily getting on and off streetcars. Indeed, great numbers of rush-hour commuters would be heading home from Marunouchi by the only line across Kanda Bridge. And there was something else. He had to take into account the streets, which would be even more congested at this time of the year-end sales when shops on both sides of Ogawamachi would be trying to attract chance customers with bunting, bands, and gramaphones, not to mention the usual electric illuminations.

When Keitaro considered these points in relation to the probability of the success of the task at hand, he felt extremely uncertain about his ability to do it alone. Nevertheless, since it was definite that the person he was to look for would be dressed in a salt-and-pepper cloak and a black fedora, there seemed to be a ray of hope. Of course he ought not to expect much of a clue only from the cloak, whatever its style might be. But since the man would be wearing a black fedora, he could easily be spotted because nearly all men nowadays wearing fedoras preferred colors other than black. If he looked carefully for this sign, he just might succeed.

Reasoning in this way, Keitaro came to the conclusion that successful or not, he should at least go to the streetcar stop. He looked at his pocket watch and found it was just one o'clock. To reach his destination half an hour before four, there would be plenty of time if he left at around three. He still had two hours. He remained in his room sitting quietly, thinking about how to put those two hours to the best use. Yet before his eyes only the congested crowds at the T-shaped concourse where Mitoshirocho and Ogawamachi met seemed to come and go all jumbled together without bringing him any plan conducive to success. The more he thought, the more his mind stuck fast to the same spot, completely unable to move. And a fear that he might never be able to meet the man he was looking for crept in to disturb him.

The thought occurred to him that he might as well pass the time walking until the appropriate hour. He put his hands on the edge of his desk and was about to rise vigorously to his feet when he suddenly recalled the words of caution the old fortune-teller at Asakusa had given him: an event would occur one of these days and he ought not to forget to bring along with him a "something." Although he had allowed the old woman's words on that occasion to almost slip out of his mind, he remembered having taken the trouble to write them down on a slip of paper and having put them in his desk drawer for future reference. So he took out the scrap and untiringly perused the phrasing: "Something which seems your own and at the same time another's, something long and short, something which goes out and comes in."

At first, as before, he could find no meaning in it, but as he read it over and over again, he began to think that if he concentrated patiently on the words, an object with these queer properties might turn up. What was more, he remembered the old diviner's advice that since the thing was in his possession, he should not forget to use it when the occasion arose. He began to think that if only he could hit on something, anything, no matter what, something having these properties within the narrow range of his own surroundings, he might be able to solve the question—and in a shorter time than he had thought it would take. He decided to make good use of the two hours before him by solving the riddle.

He began with objects around him—his desk, books, towels, cushions-—and then proceeded in turn to his wicker trunk, suitcase, and socks, but already an hour had elapsed without his lighting upon anything even closely resembling the puzzle. He became irritated, confused. His thoughts rushed around the room restlessly until disregarding all restraint, they forced themselves out the door and ran wildly in every direction.

Presently appearing distinctly before him with all the authority of the person Keitaro was in search of was a tall, lean gentleman in a salt-and-pepper cloak and a black fedora. And all at once the face was transformed into Morimoto's in Dairen. The instant Keitaro visualized in his imagination the visage of Morimoto with its loosely hanging moustache, he uttered a cry like that of someone who has just been jolted by an electric shock.

The name Morimoto had long been a medium through which strange sounds came to Keitaro's ears. And lately it had grown into a kind of perfect signal. Although the man's name had inevitably associated itself with the walking stick from the beginning (whether the stick was interpreted as a connection between Morimoto and Keitaro or whether it was regarded as something standing between them), there had been a certain gulf between Morimoto and the stick itself which had prevented Keitaro from going from one to the other at a leap. But of late the two had become so closely joined that the name Morimoto instantly called up to Keitaro's mind the walking stick, and vice versa.

As Keitaro's thoughts were carried away by the warm flow of blood under the stimulus that Morimoto's name had given him, he hit on the idea that the walking stick was something whose ownership was not settled as being Morimoto's or his own. The moment this occurred to him he exclaimed, "That's it!" and laid firm hold of the cane among the dark and disordered phantoms scurrying away from him.

He was pleased with himself, believing the first part of the old woman's riddle, "something which seems your own and another's," was solved. But he had not yet considered the remaining parts, "something long and short, something which goes out and comes in." And so he began with renewed endeavor to try to find these two remaining properties in the same stick.

At first he thought the angle at which one looked at the stick might make it seem sometimes short and sometimes long, and he followed that line of reasoning. But he felt this was too commonplace an interpretation. So he retraced his way and started anew, repeating any number of times the phrase "long and short." It seemed unlikely, however, that he could reach a solution in so brief an interval. His watch showed he had only thirty minutes left of the two hours he had started with.

He began to doubt his reading of the riddle—wondering if he were not struggling hopelessly in a cul-de-sac he had mistaken for a through street. If he couldn't get past, he thought it best to return to the point at which he had started and try to find a new path. But the time remaining was too limited for that.

Since he had partially succeeded, it would be more reasonable to take his success as a good omen and to follow the original line of reasoning as far as he could. In the course of the confused, meandering search, in which he grasped at anything that offered even a faint hope, his image of the stick was suddenly transferred from its entirety to only the head of the snake carved at the handle. In that instant, almost unawares, he compared a snake's short, spoon-bowl head to its long, thin torso covered with glittering scales and realized that because the head of the snake on the cane had been cut short at the neck from the long torso to which it ought to have been connected, the thing was something both long and short at the same time. This answer, flashing through his mind like lightning, made him leap for joy.

The rest of the riddle, "something which goes out and comes in," did not require much thought, only about five minutes' worth. It occurred to him that what was half-hidden in the snake's mouth and half out of it— whether intended as an egg or a frog he couldn't be certain—and neither swallowed nor escaping, could be determined as going out or coming in. At once he concluded that was it.

Keitaro, thinking he had solved the entire riddle perfectly, sprang from his desk. He secured his watch by twisting its chain around his kimono band. With hat in hand, he was about to leave without even putting on his
hakama
when the question of how to take out the walking stick made him pause for a moment.

A long time had elapsed since Morimoto had left it in the umbrella stand. Keitaro might touch it or even remove it without any fear of reproach or suspicion from the landlord, even if nothing were told to the man beforehand. But it would take some planning to make off with it at a time when the landlord's family were not nearby, or, if they were, to do so without their noticing it. Having been raised in a superstitious family, he had often heard his mother tell him that if someone wanted to acquire something to be used right away in a spell, that object would lose its efficacy unless it were stolen without being seen by others.

He went halfway down the stairs from the second floor and peered below, pretending to look at the board-inghouse clock in the front hall.

As usual, the landlord was sitting by the big round porcelain brazier in his six-mat room. His wife was not present. While Keitaro was leaning over from the middle of the stairway to look into the room through the glass panes in the sliding doors, the bell above the landlord's head suddenly began its noisy ring. The landlord glanced up at the number of the room asking for service and called into the adjoining room, "Hey, anyone there?" Keitaro crept back to his quarters on the third floor.

He opened the closet door and took out his serge
hakama,
which he had thrown over the wicker trunk. As he walked about the room putting the
hakama
on, its backstay dragged behind him along the
tatami.
He then pulled off his
tabi
and changed into a pair of socks. With that much done, he again went downstairs.

Glancing into the parlor, he did not see the landlord's wife or the maid. Nor did the bell ring this time. All was quiet throughout the house. But the landlord, as earlier, was still leaning against the big round brazier, his eyes toward the entrance. Keitaro, from the angle at which he was looking before reaching the foot of the stairs, could see the landlord's bent back. He knew that the time was not yet ripe. Nevertheless, he ventured down. As he feared, the landlord asked him if he was going out and at once called the maid to take his footgear out of the box in which the shoes and clogs were kept. Keitaro, with troubles enough dodging one man's notice, did not want to add to the problem by having the maid present. "Don't worry about me," he said and raising the wooden lid promptly lifted out his shoes. Fortunately the maid failed to appear by the time Keitaro was standing on the earthen floor at the entrance. But the landlord was still observing him.

"Would you do me a small favor?" Keitaro said. "This month's issue of the
Law Society Journal
is on my desk. Could you get it for me? I've already put my shoes on and, well, I don't want to have to take them off again." Keitaro knew the man had a smattering knowledge of law, so the request had been deliberate.

"Certainly," the landlord replied. Seeing that only he could carry out Keitaro's request, he rose promptly and started up the stairs.

In that spare moment Keitaro pulled the walking stick from the umbrella stand and held it tight against his arm under his
haori.
He stole out of the house before the landlord returned.

He hurried to Hongo Street with a feeling of pressure under his right armpit caused by the curving angle of the snakehead. On reaching the street, he removed the stick from under his cloak and gazed at the head of the snake. He took a handkerchief from his kimono sleeve and wiped the dust off the cane from top to bottom. This done, he held the stick in his right hand as if it were any ordinary cane and walked on wielding it vigorously.

On the streetcar he sat with hands folded over the snakehead, his chin resting on them. He sighed with relief as he looked back over the great pains he had been taking but which had now come to a brief halt. At the same time, his misgivings began again about the undertaking at the carstop he was now heading for. On reflection it was totally beyond his reasoning power how a walking stick he had exerted so much effort to carry off— almost as if committing a theft—could be useful in identifying a mole between a pair of eyebrows. He had merely followed the old woman's words and had sought as best he could something that was at once his own and another's, was long and short, and apparently went out and came in, and he was now carrying it with him as she had advised.