slope seemed like a face lighted by quiet rays.
Etsuko looked scornfully at the middle-aged parents, walking along talking and smiling, oblivious to the children. In her romantic way of looking at things, husbands were always unfaithful, wives always suffered; middle-aged couples all ended up not speaking to each other for one of two reasons: either they were sick of one another or hated each other. This gentleman in stylish striped sport coat and slacks, however, and his wife in her lavender suit carrying a shopping bag out of which a thermos bottle protruded seemed to be utter strangers to the romantic tale. They seemed to belong to that class that turns the romances of our world into topics for afterdinner conversation and forgets about them.
When they got as far as the bridge, the couple called their children. As they did so, they looked uneasily up and down the road otherwise devoid of humanity. Finally, the gentleman approached Etsuko and asked politely: “I wonder if you can tell me where we turn off this road to get to the Okamachi station of the Hankyu line.”
As Etsuko told them about the shortcut through the ricefields and the government housing, the parents gaped in amazement at her precise Tokyo Yamate speech. The four children soon crowded about and looked up at Etsuko. A boy, about seven, quietly extended his closed fist before her. Then he relaxed his fingers just a little and said: “Look!”
In the cage made by his little fingers the bent light-green body of a grasshopper was visible. In the shadow of the fingers the insect slowly extended and retracted its legs.
The oldest girl smartly slapped the boy’s hand from below. He released the grasshopper, which flew clear, hopped twice on the ground, and plunged into the bushes on the side of the road and disappeared.
A brother-sister quarrel ensued, quelled by laughing parents. All nodded respectfully to Etsuko; then they took up their leisurely procession again, and stepped onto the grassy path between the ricefields.
Etsuko suddenly wondered whether the automobile so long awaited by the Sugimoto family had come up. She turned and looked up the highway, but again, as far as she could see, no car was visible. Shadows were accumulating gradually on the road surface; it was twilight.
It was bedtime, and the guests had not arrived. The household was beaten down by a heavy, oppressive mood; yet, taking their lead from the silent, irritable Yakichi, they had no choice save to act as if the visit would still take place.
Since Etsuko had come, nothing had brought the family together in anticipation comparable to this. Yakichi didn’t say a word about the Equinox—he seemed to have forgotten it. He waited. Then he went on waiting. He was torn alternately by hope and disappointment. His demeanor was like that of Etsuko waiting for her husband to come home—hopeless and abandoned.
“He’s still coming; it will work out”—it is horrible to say these words. After you say them it seems to you that, really, no one is coming.
Even Etsuko, who knew how Yakichi felt, could not believe that the hopes he had been filled with all day were simply hopes for worldly advancement. We are not wounded so deeply when betrayed by the things we hope for as when betrayed by things we try our best to despise. In such betrayal comes the dagger in the back.
Yakichi was sorry that he had shown the telegram to the union executive. Thanks to this he had given those people the opportunity to pin on him the label of a man cast aside. The executive insisted that he wanted to take just one quick look at the minister’s face, and he hung around the Sugimoto home until about eight p.m., diligently helping wherever he could. Thus he saw everything: Yakichi’s concern, Kensuke’s half-teasing verbal digs, the whole family’s preparations for a concerted welcome, the approaching night, the misgivings, the first definite signs of waning hope.
As for Etsuko, the events of this day
Etsuko looked scornfully at the middle-aged parents, walking along talking and smiling, oblivious to the children. In her romantic way of looking at things, husbands were always unfaithful, wives always suffered; middle-aged couples all ended up not speaking to each other for one of two reasons: either they were sick of one another or hated each other. This gentleman in stylish striped sport coat and slacks, however, and his wife in her lavender suit carrying a shopping bag out of which a thermos bottle protruded seemed to be utter strangers to the romantic tale. They seemed to belong to that class that turns the romances of our world into topics for afterdinner conversation and forgets about them.
When they got as far as the bridge, the couple called their children. As they did so, they looked uneasily up and down the road otherwise devoid of humanity. Finally, the gentleman approached Etsuko and asked politely: “I wonder if you can tell me where we turn off this road to get to the Okamachi station of the Hankyu line.”
As Etsuko told them about the shortcut through the ricefields and the government housing, the parents gaped in amazement at her precise Tokyo Yamate speech. The four children soon crowded about and looked up at Etsuko. A boy, about seven, quietly extended his closed fist before her. Then he relaxed his fingers just a little and said: “Look!”
In the cage made by his little fingers the bent light-green body of a grasshopper was visible. In the shadow of the fingers the insect slowly extended and retracted its legs.
The oldest girl smartly slapped the boy’s hand from below. He released the grasshopper, which flew clear, hopped twice on the ground, and plunged into the bushes on the side of the road and disappeared.
A brother-sister quarrel ensued, quelled by laughing parents. All nodded respectfully to Etsuko; then they took up their leisurely procession again, and stepped onto the grassy path between the ricefields.
Etsuko suddenly wondered whether the automobile so long awaited by the Sugimoto family had come up. She turned and looked up the highway, but again, as far as she could see, no car was visible. Shadows were accumulating gradually on the road surface; it was twilight.
It was bedtime, and the guests had not arrived. The household was beaten down by a heavy, oppressive mood; yet, taking their lead from the silent, irritable Yakichi, they had no choice save to act as if the visit would still take place.
Since Etsuko had come, nothing had brought the family together in anticipation comparable to this. Yakichi didn’t say a word about the Equinox—he seemed to have forgotten it. He waited. Then he went on waiting. He was torn alternately by hope and disappointment. His demeanor was like that of Etsuko waiting for her husband to come home—hopeless and abandoned.
“He’s still coming; it will work out”—it is horrible to say these words. After you say them it seems to you that, really, no one is coming.
Even Etsuko, who knew how Yakichi felt, could not believe that the hopes he had been filled with all day were simply hopes for worldly advancement. We are not wounded so deeply when betrayed by the things we hope for as when betrayed by things we try our best to despise. In such betrayal comes the dagger in the back.
Yakichi was sorry that he had shown the telegram to the union executive. Thanks to this he had given those people the opportunity to pin on him the label of a man cast aside. The executive insisted that he wanted to take just one quick look at the minister’s face, and he hung around the Sugimoto home until about eight p.m., diligently helping wherever he could. Thus he saw everything: Yakichi’s concern, Kensuke’s half-teasing verbal digs, the whole family’s preparations for a concerted welcome, the approaching night, the misgivings, the first definite signs of waning hope.
As for Etsuko, the events of this day
Similar Books
