Kusamakura

“Both of them?â€

“Yes.â€

“You’re amazing.â€

“There’s nothing amazing about it. It’s perfectly obvious.â€

“Yes, I see—in that case you wouldn’t have to commit yourself to either the flea world or the mosquito world, would you?â€

“One can get by in life without having to think like a crab, after al .â€

At this moment the half-forgotten bush warbler, its ful energy restored, bursts out with a startlingly splendid high-pitched cal . Hooo-hoKEkyo!

Once revitalized, the lilting cal s begin to flow forth again seemingly of their own accord. “Body flung upside down,†as the famous haiku has it.8 The base of its swel ing throat atremble, its “smal mouth†almost split open with the ful ness of its song, as the bird cal s again and again.

Hoo-hoKEkyoo! Hooo-hoKEkkyoo!

“Now that is real poetry,†she says firmly.

CHAPTER 5

“Pardon my asking, but I’m guessing you’re from Tokyo, are you, sir?â€

“I look like a Tokyo man, do I?â€

“Look like it? Why, a single glance . . . First off, I can tel just from hearin’ you speak.â€

“Can you tel whereabouts in Tokyo?â€

“Yees, wel , Tokyo’s awful big, ain’t it. But I’d make a stab it’s not the downtown part. Uptown Yamanote area, I’d say.

Maybe Kojimachi? No? Wel then, Koishigawa? Wel , it must be Ushigome or Yotsuya, then?â€

“Not too far wrong, yes. You certainly know your Tokyo, don’t you.â€

“You wouldn’t know it to look at me, but I’m an old Tokyoite myself.â€

“So that’s it. I could tel you had some style.â€

He chuckles. “Not a bit of it! Just look at me now, misery that I am. . . .â€

“So how did you end up spending your days in a place like this?â€

“No kidding, you’ve hit the nail on the head there, sir. End up here is exactly what I’ve done. Just couldn’t make ends meet. . . .â€

“Have you always been boss of a barbershop?â€

“Not a boss, a worker. What’s that? Where, you say? I worked in Matsunaga-cho in Kanda. Tiny filthy little place it is, Matsunaga-cho, not even room to swing a cat. The likes of you wouldna heard of it. You know Ryukanbashi Bridge? What? Don’t know that either? Ryukanbashi, famous bridge.â€

“Hey, could you soap that up a bit more? It’s hurting.â€

“Hurts ya, does it? I’m the fussy type, ya know, not happy til I can dig right in and get every hair on yer face, like this, shavin’ against the grain, see? Not something your barber of today does, oh no, he just strokes, he does. You just put up with it a bit longer.â€

“I’ve been putting up with a lot for quite a while now. Come on, add a bit more hot water or soap, can’t you?â€

“Can’t take it, huh? It didn’t oughta be that painful. Yer whiskers have gotten too long, that’s what the problem is.â€

Reluctantly, he lets go of the pinch of flesh he’s been gripping on my cheek. Then he takes down a wafer of red soap from the shelf, dips it briefly in cold water, and without further ado quickly runs it al over my face. I’m not at al used to the experience of having raw soap rubbed over me like this; nor am I too impressed with the water he dips it in, which looks as if it’s been sitting there who knows how long.

My rights as a barbershop customer compel me to face a mirror. For some time now, however, I must admit I have felt the urge to forgo this privilege. A mirror fulfil s its al otted purpose only if it has a flat surface that reflects the human face without distortion. If you set up a mirror that fails to meet these requirements and force a man to face it, you are committing wil ful damage to his features quite as much as does the bad photographer. The destruction of a man’s vanity is no doubt a valuable aid to the cultivation of character, but there’s no need to show a man a face that does less than justice to his own, then insult him by asserting that it is himself.

The mirror that I’m at present compel ed to gaze into has been thus insulting me for some considerable time. If I turn to the right, my face is al nose, while the left profile splits my face from mouth to ear. When I raise my head, my features are squashed flat, with an effect reminiscent of looking face-on at a toad. If I lower my face a little, my forehead suddenly towers like some freakish faery child of the long-headed god Fukurokuju.1

So long as I sit before this mirror, I am forced to double as al manner of ghoulish monster. Of course there’s no getting around the fact that my own face is far from a thing of beauty, but the glaring defects of this mirror—its poor color, and the mottled patches of light where the reflective backing has peeled off—surely make it a supremely ugly thing in its own right. Granted that only a fool wil take to heart the abuses heaped on him by an obnoxious child, nevertheless no one enjoys spending any length of time in the presence of the insulting brat.

And it’s not only the mirror; this barber is no ordinary barber, either. When I first peered into the shop, I found him sitting there cross-legged, looking mildly bored, drawing at his long-stemmed pipe and sending a constant stream of smoke over a toy flag set celebrating the Anglo-Japanese Al iance that hung on his wal .2 But now that I’m inside and have entrusted my head to his ministrations, this benign impression has received a shock. He wrenches and mauls so mercilessly, as he scrapes away at the whiskers, that I’m almost at a loss to decide whether I stil hold any right of possession to my own head or whether al such power has now official y passed to him. At this rate, even were my head nailed firmly to my shoulders, it wouldn’t survive intact for long.

During the time he is wielding the razor, this man becomes not barber but barbarian, quite beyond the accepted rules of civilization. Even while the razor is merely going over my cheeks, it rasps and grates; when it sets to work by my ear, the artery in my temple leaps in panic; and as the fearsome blade flashes at my chin, it produces an extraordinary crunching sound, like ice being crushed underfoot. And this is a barber who fancies himself the most consummate in the land!

To top it off, he’s drunk. An odd smel envelops me whenever he drawls his “sirs†at my ear, and from time to time my nostrils are assailed by a peculiar vapor. When and how his razor may slip, and where it wil fly when it does so, only fate can decide. I’m in no position to be able to guess myself, having yielded my face to his ministrations—even he who wields the blade has no clear idea of his razor’s aim, heaven knows. I’ve surrendered myself to him on a mutual understanding, so I don’t intend to complain about the odd nick I might receive, but if matters suddenly took a nasty turn and I were to have my windpipe sliced open, that would be quite another matter.

“Only a greenhorn’d shave this way with soap, but it can’t be helped, with your tough whiskers, sir,†he remarks, tossing the wet bit of soap unceremoniously back onto the shelf. The soap, however, refuses to obey and instead slithers off and tumbles to the ground.

“Haven’t seen you around much, sir,†he continues. “Come here recently, did you?â€

“Just a couple of days ago.â€

“That so? Where’re you based?â€

“I’m staying at Shioda’s.â€

“A guest there, eh? That’s what I thought. Matter of fact, I’m here thanks to the old gentleman meself. See, he was down the road from me when he was up in Tokyo, that’s how I got to know him. Good fel ow. Knows a thing or two. His lady wife died last year, and he spends al his time messin’ about with his col ection of stuff these days. Got some fantastic things, they say. They’d fetch a fine price if he sold them, the story goes.â€