Transcription
Chapter 7.
While I was eating breakfast the next morning, Ekichi called to me from the street. He was wearing a crested black hottie. Apparently, he had dressed formally to send me off. There was no sign of the women. I felt sad.
Ekichi came up to my room. "Everyone else wanted to come see you all, but they went to bed so late they couldn't get up. They won't be coming," they said. "They'll be waiting for you this winter, so please do come."
The morning autumn breeze blew chill in the town. Along the way, Ekichi bought four packs of Shikishima cigarettes, some persimmons, and a mouthwash called Kaoru for me. "Because my sister's name is Kaoru," he smiled faintly. "Mandarin oranges aren't the best thing to eat on a boat, but persimmons are good for seasickness, so you can have these."
"Here, you take this." I pulled off my hunting cap and placed it on Ekichi's head. Then I dug my skull cap out of my bag, and we laughed as I smoothed the wrinkles.
As we approached the dock, I was struck by the sight of the dancing girl crouching near the water. She remained motionless until I reached her. Silently, she lowered her head. Her makeup, the same this morning as it was the previous night, made me feel even more sentimental. The rouge at the corners of her eyes bestowed a youthful strength, as though she might even be angry.
"Are the others coming?" Ekichi asked. She shook her head. "Are they still asleep?" She nodded.
Ekichi went to buy my ticket for the boat to Tokyo and our passes for the launch. While he was gone, I tried to make small talk, but the dancing girl said nothing. She just stared down at the water pouring from a drain pipe into the sea. She just kept nodding over and over.
Before I even finished speaking, "Granny, this fellow looks nice on my approach. To look like a laborer, you're a student, aren't you? Going back to Tokyo? I think I can trust you. Would you accompany this old lady to Tokyo? She's had some hard times. Her son was working at the silver mine at Rendezi, but he and his wife both died in the flu epidemic. They left three children behind. We couldn't think of anything else to do, so he talked it over, and we're sending them back to their old hometown. That's Mito, in Ibaraki Prefecture. But this old woman doesn't understand anything, so when the boat gets to Reiganjima in Tokyo, would you put her on a train to Ueno? I know it's a lot of trouble, but we're begging you. Just look at her, don't you think it's pitiful?"
The old woman stood there with a blank expression. An infant strapped to her back, two girls about three and five held her hands. I could see big rice balls and pickled plums in her dirty bundle. Five or six miners were looking after the old woman.
"I was pleased to accept the task."
"Thank you, we're counting on you. Thank you. We really should see her all the way to Mito, but we can't," the miners expressed their gratitude.
The launch rocked violently. The dancing girl kept her mouth shut tight, staring at the same spot. When I grabbed the rope ladder and looked back, she tried to say goodbye but gave up and merely nodded one last time.
The launch headed back to the wharf again and again. Ekichi waved the hunting cap I had just given him. As the launch receded in the distance, the dancing girl began to wave something white.
The steamship left Shimura. I leaned against the railing and gazed at Oshima in the offing until the southern tip of the Izu Peninsula vanished behind me. It already seemed long ago that I parted from the dancing girl.
When I glanced into the cabin to check on the old woman, I saw a group of people gathered around her in a circle and soothing her. I felt relieved.
I entered the cabin next door. The waves were choppy on Sagami Bay. I tossed left and right as I sat. A crewman passed out small metal bowls. I lay down, using my bag as a pillow. My head felt empty, and I had no sense of time. My tears spilled onto my bag. My cheeks were so cold.
I turned my bag over. There was a boy lying next to me. He was the son of a factory owner in Kawasi and was on his way to Tokyo to prepare to enter school. The sight of me and my first upper school cap seemed to elicit his goodwill. After we talked for a while, he asked, "Have you had a death in your family?"
"No, I just left someone," I spoke meekly. I did not mind that he had seen me crying. I was not thinking about anything. I simply felt as though I were sleeping quietly, soothed and contented.
I was not aware that darkness had settled on the ocean, but now lights glimmered on the shores of Ajiro and Atami. My skin was chilled, and my stomach empty. The boy took out some sushi wrapped in bamboo leaves. I ate his food, forgetting it belonged to someone else. Then I nestled inside his school coat. I felt a lovely hollow sensation, as if I could accept any sort of kindness, and it would be only right.
It was utterly natural that I should accompany the old woman to Ueno station early the next morning and buy her a ticket to Mito. Everything seemed to melt together into one. The lamp in the cabin went out. The smell of the tide and the fresh fish loaded in the hold grew stronger. In the darkness, warmed by the boy beside me, I let my tears flow unrestrained. My head had become clear, water dripping away drop by drop. It was a sweet, pleasant feeling, as though nothing would remain.