To the Spring Equinox and Beyond (23 page)

"But I have to if Mr. Taguchi looks at me that way."

"It's not you alone he regards in this way. It's the way he is—he looks at everybody like that. He's been an employer for a long time, so he must have many cases of deception. Even if a man pure as nature happened to turn up, Taguchi could not be relaxed with him. You should take it as the fate of such men. While it may sound improper to praise one's relative, I can honestly say that my brother-in-law was born with some good qualities. He's basically not a bad fellow at all. Only for years he's been battling his way through the world, thinking only of success in business as his main object in life. So he has an odd bias in his view of man. He cares only whether someone will be useful or reliable on a job, I guess. Once you get that way, even if you're loved by a woman, you can't help doubting whether she really loves you or your money. And if a beautiful woman is in for that kind of treatment, a man ought to take it for granted that he's going to be treated with constraint. That's what makes Taguchi Taguchi."

This comment seemed to give Keitaro an even greater understanding of Taguchi's character. But what sort of person was Matsumoto himself?-—tossing off such judgments one after another, each of which struck into Keitaro's head as though it were being driven by an iron hammer. As far as this aspect of Matsumoto was concerned, Keitaro still felt as if he were confronting a vast mass of cloud. And he felt that even the Taguchi that existed before Matsumoto's elucidation was more of a human being.

As Keitaro observed this Matsumoto, who the other night had been saying something about a coral with Taguchi's daughter at a restaurant in Kanda, he thought that the earlier Matsumoto had moved with much more life in him. The man sitting before him now merely gave him the impression of a wooden statue with a large pipe in its mouth, a statue endowed with spirit and speech, and as such it baffled his attempt to get an image of his real substance. Filled with admiration for Matsumoto's lucid criticism on the one hand and thinking on the other about his personality, Keitaro began having doubts about himself, that his intelligence was below average and his intuition dull, when the vague Matsumoto spoke up again.

"And yet Taguchi's folly is after all bringing you luck, isn't it?"

"How could that be?"

"I'm certain he'll get you a position. If he doesn't, he's neither Taguchi nor anyone else. I'll vouch for that. I'm the one who's the loser, having been spied on and receiving nothing in return."

They looked at each other and laughed. When Keitaro rose from his circular calico cushion, his host took the trouble to accompany him to the front door. His tall thin body paused before the screen depicting the crane drawn in India ink, and he looked down at Keitaro from behind as he was putting on his shoes.

"That's a queer-looking cane. Let me see it," he said, taking it from Keitaro's hand. "My, a snake's head. And very well carved. Did you buy it?" he asked.

"No, it was done by an amateur who gave it to me."

Flourishing his walking stick, Keitaro again went down Yarai Slope toward Edogawa.

  A Rainy Day

A long period of time passed without Keitaro's receiving an opportunity to learn from Matsumoto himself the reason for his refusal to see visitors on rainy days. It had even slipped from his own mind, much too busy as he was to concern himself with it. Only after he had gained a position through Taguchi's assistance, which led to free access to the Taguchi household, did he by chance hear about it.

By that time his experience at the streetcar stop had begun to lose the freshness it once had. When Sunaga occasionally brought up the subject, all Keitaro could do was shrug off the entire incident with a smile. Sunaga would demand why Keitaro had not taken him into his confidence before he had even attempted the scheme. And he would also chide him that since his mother had informed Keitaro about his Uchisaiwaicho uncle's habit of tricking others, he certainly ought to have known about it. And finally Sunaga began badgering Keitaro for having too much interest in women. Keitaro braved it out by telling Sunaga to keep quiet, but each time there came to his mind the image of the woman he had seen from behind at Sunaga's gate, the woman who he had realized was the same one he had seen at the streetcar stop. And in some remote way he felt ashamed. That her name was Chiyoko and that her younger sister was called Momoyoko were items of information that no longer held any novelty for him.

After learning all the inside information through Matsumoto at their first encounter, Keitaro had felt embarrassed about putting in an appearance at Taguchi's, but because the conclusion of some business demanded his presence, he had passed through Taguchi's gate prepared to be laughed at, and Taguchi, as Keitaro had expected, did just that. However, Keitaro interpreted in Taguchi's laugh not so much the sound of haughty pride in his resourcefulness as that of triumphant joy in having put on the right path a man who had gone astray. Taguchi did not use any condescending words and thus imply the trick had been done for admonition's sake or as a means of education. Instead, he asked only that Keitaro not be angry because no harm had been intended and immediately gave an on-the-spot promise that he would have a considerable position available for the young man. Taguchi then clapped his hands to summon his older daughter, the one who had been waiting at the stop for Matsumoto. He formally introduced her to Keitaro, thus confirming her as his daughter. He also told her that Keitaro was a friend of Ichizo's. She gave a cold though polite greeting, apparently a little confused at being introduced to a stranger. It was then that Keitaro had learned her name was Chiyoko.

This first opportunity for him to come in contact with Taguchi's family led to frequent visits on business and other matters. Sometimes he even entered the houseboy's room beside the entrance to gossip with the one he had once bickered with over the phone. There were even occasions in which he had to go into the back part of the house, sometimes to talk with Taguchi's wife about something connected with the running of the household. He was frequently at a loss about questions concerning English put to him by the Taguchis' only son, a middle school student.

As the frequency of his visits increased, it was natural that he had more opportunities to come in contact with the two daughters. However, his slow response on the one hand and the comparatively vivacious behavior of the two girls—which seemed to be a family trait—on the other, as well as the very few chances they had to sit down face to face left them under conditions whose reserve was not easily broken through. The words they exchanged were of course not limited to rigid formal pronouncements, but most were taken up with mere day-to-day matters that required less than five minutes to dispose of. There was thus not enough time for any degree of intimacy to develop. Only at a New Year's poetry-card party given a little after the middle of January did he have the chance to sit knee-to-knee with them for an unusually long time. They were up late into the night engaged in unreserved conversation. Chiyoko had said to him, "You're really slow at this game!" And Momoyoko had scolded, "If you're my partner, we're bound to lose."

One Sunday about a month later, when news of blossoming plum trees began appearing in the newspapers, Keitaro was spending the afternoon with Sunaga in his upstairs study after a long interval in which he had not visited him. Chiyoko had also come for a visit, and as the three chatted over one thing and another, she happened to mention something about her uncle.

"He's quite cranky," she said. "For a while he refused to see visitors on rainy days. I wonder if he still does that?"

"Actually, I was one of the ones he wouldn't let in on one of those rainy days."

As soon as Keitaro began his confession, both Sunaga and Chiyoko, as though it had been prearranged, burst out laughing. "Well, well, isn't that too bad," Sunaga said. "Perhaps it was because you didn't take that cane of yours with you."

"You can't expect someone to carry a cane in the rain. Right, Tagawa-san?"

At this reasonable defense from Chiyoko, Keitaro too could not but smile.

"This cane of yours—really, what's it like?" Chiyoko asked. "I'd like to have a look at it. Show it to me please, Tagawa-san. May I go downstairs to see it?"

"I don't have it with me today."

"Why not? When it's such a fine day."

"Because it's a very precious stick," said Sunaga. "I hear Tagawa doesn't take it out on ordinary days."

"Really?"

"Yes, I guess so," said Keitaro.

"Then do you carry it only on holidays?"

Keitaro found it somewhat difficult to fight the two of them, so he warded off Chiyoko's persistence by promising to show it to her on his next visit to Uchisai-waicho. In return he got Chiyoko to tell him the reason Matsumoto refused visitors on rainy days.

One cloudy November afternoon after a spell of fine weather, Chiyoko had gone to Yarai at her mother's request to bring Matsumoto one of his favorite foods, seasoned sea-urchin eggs. Chiyoko wanted to spend the day with his family, since she had not been there for some time, so she sent back the rickshaw she had come in and decided to stay on.

Matsumoto's children included a girl of twelve, the eldest, followed alternately by a boy, a girl, and a boy at two-year intervals, all growing up quite normally. In addition to these lively adornments that added such a bright aura to their home, the Matsumotos had a two-year-old girl named Yoiko, whom they held in as tight an embrace as a jewel set in a ring. On the eve of the Doll's Festival the preceding year, they had been blessed with this daughter, whose skin was as lucid as pearl and whose large pupils were dark as lacquer.

Of the five Matsumoto children, Chiyoko was most fond of this infant. Whenever she came to visit, she always brought her a plaything of some sort or another. Once, scolded by her aunt for giving Yoiko too many sweets, Chiyoko took the precious child in her arms and went out to the veranda. "My dear, dear Yoiko," she said, as if to purposely show her aunt how intimate the two were. Laughing, her aunt said, "Why, you'd think I'd been quarreling with my own baby." And Matsumoto teased Chiyoko, saying, "If you're so fond of her, we'll give her to you as a wedding gift to take to your husband."

On that day in late autumn as well, Chiyoko, the minute she sat down in the Matsumoto home, began playing with the child. Yoiko had never had her hair cut in front, so that it was soft, long, and curly, and when shone on by the sun, it had a dark violet tint, perhaps from the reflection against the pale scalp beneath. "Yoiko, I'll do up your hair," said Chiyoko, carefully combing the child's curls. Separating a tuft of the scanty sidelocks, Chiyoko tied at its roots a red ribbon. Yoiko's skull was broadly flat on top yet round like a piece of layered ricecake offering. With an effort, the infant lifted her short arm to touch a corner of the "offering" and, putting her tiny hand at the ribbon's edge, tottered over to her mother and lisped, "Ibbon, ibbon!"

"Oh, you've done it up quite nicely," her mother said, and Chiyoko, quite pleased as she looked at Yoiko from behind, instructed the child, "Now go to your father and show it to him."

Yoiko tottered to the entrance of Matsumoto's study and got down on all fours. Whenever she went in to see her father, she would greet him in this way. She raised her hips as high as she could, and lowering her ricecake-offering-like head a few inches from the threshold, again said, "Ibbon! Ibbon!"

Matsumoto turned his eyes from the book he was reading. "Ah, your head is very pretty," he said. "Who made you up?" With her head still bowed, Yoiko replied, "Chii, Chii." The lisping child usually called Chiyoko by this name. Standing behind the girl, Chiyoko heard her name coming from the tiny lips and laughed aloud in delight.

Meanwhile, the other children returned from school, suddenly adding their own varied colors to the scene hitherto centered solely on the red ribbon. The six-year-old came back from kindergarten with what looked like a war drum with a crest of three commas shaped into a circle painted on it. He led Yoiko away, promising to let her beat on it. Chiyoko gazed at the shadow of Yoiko's red woolen socks, which looked like two money pouches moving along the corridor. The round tassel at the end of the string binding each sock skipped with every jumping step of her tiny feet.

"I believe that's the pair you knitted for her."

"Yes, they do look cute on her, don't they?"

For a while Chiyoko sat talking with her uncle. A dreary rain, suddenly falling from clouded skies, splattered down and rapidly drenched the bare paulownia trees. Matsumoto and Chiyoko turned their eyes simultaneously toward the dreary color of the rain beyond the glass doors of the veranda, their hands held over the small brazier.

"The plantain really makes the rain sound noisy," Chiyoko said.

"It certainly holds on. I've been watching it every day, thinking it would wither this day or the next, but it's still fresh. The flowers of the sasanqua are gone, and the paulownia are bare, yet the plantain still has its green leaves, as you can see."

"You do wonder about funny things, Uncle. That's why a certain somebody says that Tsunezo's an idler."

"Your father would never be able to study the plantain all his life like an idler."