The Devil's Disciple by Shiro Hamao Page A

kind of letter. Idiot that I was, I kept them with me always and even caressed them as I slept. She was particularly good at writing postscripts and could skilfully pack thousands of words worth of feeling into a two – or three-line ‘P.S.’. Before long I had made it a habit to skip straight to the postscript before I even looked at the main body of the letter.
    Towards the end of the year two years ago she would come to visit me every time she left ‘K’ and we would go out for a walk in the Ginza. She never said much during these walks. For my part, I kept the feeling of being in love with another man’s wife tightly wrapped in the sentimentalism of youth and remained silent, hoping my feelings would somehow reach her by osmosis.
    When I think back on it now I marvel at how pretentious I was. I had purchased the Reklam edition of
The Sorrows of Young Werther
and carried it with me everywhere in my pocket. With my beginner’s German I couldn’t read a word of it but I would open it from time to time and let out a sigh.
    Oh how the Werther of those days curses his Lotte now!
    One evening, as we walked through a certain neighbourhood in Tokyo Michiko said the following to me.
    â€˜I love people like you Ichirō. Really I do. How lucky the woman will be who marries you!’
    In my mind I cried out, ‘It’s too late! Why didn’t you tell me this sooner?’, having interpreted her words in a truly stupid fashion. But how else were these unexpected and craftily formulated words to resonate in the mind of the young man that I was?
    There was also the following incident.
    I had been invited to play bridge at a friend’s home and Michiko was also there. At around five o’clock she said, ‘It’s time for me to go,’ and stood up from her chair.
    I was ready to go myself and as I was saying so to our host and about to get up, Michiko interrupted me midsentence and said, looking straight at me, ‘I don’t mind taking Ichirō with me but lots of people are watching today so maybe that’s not such a good idea.’
    Being told this in front of so many people, all I could do was stand there in silence, blushing furiously. I had not asked to go with Michiko in her car.
    But I couldn’t understand if these words of hers were meant as a joke or whether she was serious.
    She only began to speak to me seriously about six months before the incident.
    It was a conversation on a winter night at the beginning of last year that I once remembered with a sweet yearning but that I now recall with bitterness and extreme discomfort.
    On that day Michiko had called me from the Ginza saying she had just come to Tokyo. We went to see a moving picture and afterwards had tea on the first floor of a cafe. Perhaps moved by the unhappy family in the film we’d seen, she said to me, ‘Ichirō, do I seem happy?’
    â€˜Well…’
    I am not very eloquent in situations like these and as I struggled over what to say she said, with a coquettish look in her eyes, ‘Well I’m not. I’m not happy actually. Seizō is so mean to me. My husband doesn’t love me.’
    I had of course heard rumours that Seizō didn’t love her. But this was the first time I had heard her complain of it herself.
    â€˜But is that really such a problem? At least Seizō doesn’t play around with other women behind your back.’ I finally managed to produce these words.
    â€˜But that’s not enough for a woman! What about you Ichirō-san? If you were my husband you wouldn’t act like Seizō does, would you?’
    I felt my heart leap up into my chest. It was beating furiously. I felt like that ancient Spartan youth with the stolen fox hidden beneath his cloak, allowing it to devour his heart rather than risk discovery. All I could say was, ‘Well…’ and gaze silently into her eyes. I was entranced by my own amorous