4
There we stood, Daio and I, leaning against the big meteoric rock. The sun was sinking in the west, and the new growth on the trees around the Saya was shrouded in a rosy-hued haze. As I gazed at the forest I was picturing a faraway scene in Frazer’s ancient Forest of Nemi, where there wouldn’t yet have been any sign of the multifarious foliage we associate with modern-day Italy — no bay laurels, no olives, no oleanders, no citrus trees — and only the beeches and oaks would be growing in abundance. I thought with pleasure of the charmingly archaic language Frazer used to describe those trees: the beechwoods and oakwoods, with their deciduous foliage. …
Daio, meanwhile, was pointing toward the bottom of the hill. “Hey, look, Ricchan’s waving at us,” he observed. “Akari’s standing up as well, putting his cast back on by himself. I’m glad we were able to have this long chat, Kogito; I’ve been wanting to tell you some of these things for the longest time. When I heard from your mother that you were going away to college in Tokyo, I thought, Well then, I’d better study really hard and make sure I become the kind of person who can carry on an intelligent conversation with Kogito when he comes back, so I started taking correspondence courses right away, after you left. The tuition wasn’t terribly expensive, but the students were also required to go up to Tokyo once a year for some classroom time, and your mother helped me with the fees. Of course, after the war ended I wanted to keep the training camp going as a tribute to your father’s memory — after all, I was his number one disciple. As a result I was never able to live a normal life, and your mother was kind enough to sympathize with my situation.”
Daio and I quickly traversed the grassy downhill slope below the Saya, which was now completely in the shade. When we reached the sandy shore of the river, Daio used his one sturdy arm to grab a large bag that Ricchan had just finished packing and hoisted it onto his shoulder. Akari, who had clearly benefited from his rehab exercises, picked up the Boston bag and started to walk toward the van, with Ricchan by his side to lend support if needed. I brought up the rear of our little procession, trudging along in silence and carrying nothing except the immeasurable weight of the things Daio had just told me.
Daio had no reason to share in my wordless reverie, and after a few moments he spoke. “Kogito, it occurred to me that more than half a century has passed since Choko Sensei died prematurely, at the age of fifty. Most of the people who knew your father are gone as well, including your mother — who was larger than life in her own right — but she died without ever having said anything regarding her husband, as far as I know. I mean, seriously, not a single word! Asa told me how disappointed you were when you finally got to open the red leather trunk, which should theoretically have contained the papers and correspondence your father left behind, and didn’t find anything you could use. But on the bright side, as an indirect result of your discovery of the three volumes of The Golden Bough, I got to talk to you about some serious matters that have been weighing on my mind for years.
“I know I usually start blathering every time I meet up with you, while you seem to mostly listen in silence, and I’m always left with the feeling that I don’t really know what’s going on in your head. Actually, that’s been the case ever since you were a high school sophomore, when you brought Goro Hanawa to visit us at the training camp. Even after the intense conversation you and I just had, I still have no idea what you’re thinking, or feeling. Even so, it looks to me as though we’re both remembering the events of the night your father drowned, over and over again … and of course you keep reliving it in your dreams as well.
“Oh, that reminds me. I know your mother told Asa that she thought your father had become frightened by what he’d gotten himself into, and that was why he tried to run away. (I gather you’ve listened to the recording she made?) Obviously, that isn’t how I see it, and I was there. I guess you’ve been processing everything in your own silent, inscrutable way, but I have finally come to the conclusion that no matter how much we speculate about your father’s motivations, no one will ever know for sure why he behaved as he did on that night. Maybe it’s one of those riddles that can never be solved.
“Well, here I am rambling on again, but I remembered just now that the officers were saying some rather rude things behind Choko Sensei’s back during those highly charged days before he died. And a word that cropped up more than once during those surreptitious conversations was mononoke (you know, in the sense of a supernatural spirit that possesses a living person). I wasn’t familiar with the word at the time, but when I encountered it later I remember thinking, Ah, so that’s what those officers were whispering about.
“Actually, on reflection, I used to hear that word in the officers’ private conversations even during the earlier time when they were getting along relatively well with your father. In the beginning, your father rarely participated in the officers’ discussions. But then he suddenly got very gung ho and vocal about everything, and he even went so far as to make the trek to the Kochi Sensei’s house to talk things over with him.
“I remember what one of the officers said: ‘As someone who was born and raised deep in this forest’—your father had deliberately given them that impression—’Old Man Choko gets all fired up about things to a degree that seems alarming to guys like us who were raised in cities and towns. It’s almost as if he’s been possessed by a spirit or a demon or a fox or something.’ The officer added that a person like your father could get totally carried away by his ideas and turn into a loose cannon. During that meeting your father and the officers had a difference of opinion about their plan, and they reached an impasse. By the next morning everybody knew he was planning to run away in his little rowboat, but while he was making the preparations for his departure none of the military guys made any effort to stop him. It wasn’t much past noon when they got into party mode and started drinking themselves silly, and they ordered me to fetch the red leather trunk. As I mentioned before, they somehow knew your father was planning to take it with him when he fled, and they obviously wanted to censor the contents and remove anything that might have incriminated them. Then around midnight you came over to the storehouse to retrieve the trunk.
“After your father left, I got a very clear sense that the military guys were all thinking that if your father rushed off in a panic and ended up drowning in the flooded river, it would be good riddance from their point of view, as long as he didn’t leave any evidence behind to implicate them. That’s why they didn’t try to stop him from going. They even made a point of warning me, as a very junior member of the group, not to do anything to dissuade Choko Sensei from his rash plan, so I just had to watch him go. After I assured them he really had taken off in his rowboat, it seemed to set their minds at ease. They even went with me to look for Sensei’s remains once it got light, since no one really expected him to survive his trip down the flooded river in the flimsy little boat.
“I’ll never forget what one of the officers said to one of his young cohorts right about then. He was talking about your father’s plan to steal a kamikaze bomber from the Yoshidahama airfield (an idea everyone had pretended to be enthusiastic about when it first came up) and he said, ‘Of course, to us, the plan seemed like a big joke all along!’ And then they both gave kind of a weak, mean-spirited laugh — I guess you’d call it a snigger. I still can’t forgive those two officers, although I suppose both of them are probably long since dead and gone.