He had stepped between them, but not as a referee or a judge.
“I sense some hostility — have you quarreled?” The remark was a caution in the guise of a question. Kobayashi, who had been playing marbles with Makoto, stole a glance in their direction. Tsuda and his aunt fell silent at the same time. In the end Fujii had to assume a mediator’s attitude after all.
“Yoshio, this may be hard to understand for young people these days, but your aunt isn’t lying. She knew nothing about me when she married into this family, but she was already prepared and determined to make a go of it. She was just as serious before she’d even arrived as after.”
“Even I know that without having to ask.”
“But hold on a minute — in case you’re interested in knowing why your aunt had resolved to take a huge step like that—”
The alcohol in Uncle’s system was making its rounds; like someone who feels a duty to provide moisture to his burning face, he lifted his glass again and took a long pull of beer.
“Truth be told, I’ve never said a word about this to anyone until now — would you like to hear the explanation?”
“Indeed I would.”
Tsuda was half serious.
“Truth be told, your aunt had eyes for this old boy. In other words, this was where she wanted to end up from the beginning. So even before she came she was fiercely determined.”
“Such nonsense! Who would have anything like eyes for a man with a face like yours?”
Tsuda and Kobayashi guffawed. Makoto, left alone with his bewilderment, turned to his mother.
“What’s having eyes for?”
“I have no idea, ask your father.”
“Father? What’s it mean to have eyes for?”
Grinning, Fujii rubbed the middle of his bald head tenderly. To Tsuda — perhaps he was seeing things — the skull appeared slightly redder than usual.
“Makoto — to have eyes for someone means — to like them a lot.”
“What’s wrong with that?”
“Who said there’s anything wrong?”
“But everybody laughed.”
At just this point in the dialogue O-Kin returned; Aunt Fujii had Makoto’s mattress laid out and promptly sent him off to his bedroom. Tsuda’s uncle, thoroughly engaged, was just warming up.
“Not that true love didn’t exist in the old days; O-Asa can scowl all she wants, but it did. And there was an aspect even to that you’d never understand as a young person today; it’s a funny thing. In the old days women were smitten with men but never the other way round. Am I right, O-Asa, isn’t that how it was?”
“I have no idea.”
Sitting down in the place Makoto had vacated, Tsuda’s aunt helped herself to a bowl of matsutake rice and began to eat.
“There’s no point in getting huffy. There’s truth in what I’m saying, and there’s also a kind of philosophy. Let me expound the philosophy.”
“I think we’ve had quite enough expounding for tonight.”
“Then I’ll educate the young ones. Listen carefully Yoshio, and you, too, Kobayashi, for future reference. How do you fellows view another man’s daughter?”
“As a woman.”
Tsuda’s reply was an intentional gibe, designed to miss the point.
“Exactly. You think of her as just a woman, not a daughter. Right there is a major difference between you and us. We’ve never once looked at another man’s daughter as a woman independent of her mother and father. In our minds, whenever we’re introduced to a young lady, we conceive of her as a possession of her parents, tethered to them, so no matter how passionately we may feel, we have an obligation not to be smitten. Can you see why? Because to be smitten amounts to possessing that loved one. But only a thief would reach for someone who’s already been tagged as a possession. That’s why men of old with an immovable sense of duty never allowed themselves to be smitten. Women, yes. O-Asa, for example, sitting there with her mushroom rice, was smitten with me. But for my part, I can’t say I ever loved her.”
“Just as you say. But that ought to be enough for now. Let’s have some rice.”
Summoning O-Kin from Makoto’s room, Tsuda’s aunt directed her to fill the rice bowls. Tsuda was obliged to chew away at the gummy sandwich bread reserved for him.
[32]
THE AFTER-DINNER talk was already beyond reviving. Nor did it settle into an easy repose. As if the spine of a topic capable of commanding mutual interest had been broken, people voiced their own thoughts randomly and noticed the absence of anyone willing to integrate their remarks in a central conversation.
Leaning on the low table with both elbows, Tsuda’s uncle yawned drunkenly twice in a row. His aunt summoned the maid and had her take leftovers to the kitchen. Like clouds scudding across the moon, his uncle’s words that night cast from time to time a pale shadow over Tsuda’s heart. These words that, from another’s point of view, should have vanished like the foam on a glass of beer, Tsuda pursued and called back as if they were freighted with significance. Noticing this, he felt disgruntled in spite of himself.
At the same time, he couldn’t help recalling the words he had exchanged with his aunt. Throughout their squabble he had held himself in check, careful to conceal to the extent possible his true bias. It was pride he was hiding, but he knew from his mood now that some kind of unpleasantness was also lurking there.
From this overdue visit that had consumed half a day and which he measured on a monochromatic scale of pleasant and unpleasant, Tsuda turned to contrasting memories of the vibrant Madam Yoshikawa and her beautiful drawing room. In the next instant he beheld the face of his wife O-Nobu, who was at last doing her hair up in the large bun above her neck worn by married women.
Standing, he turned to Kobayashi.
“Are you staying?”
“No, I should be on my way, too.”
Kobayashi stuffed into the pocket of his trousers his pack of Shikijima cigarettes. They were on their way out when Uncle Fujii, as though coincidentally, inquired after O-Nobu.
“I keep thinking I’ll drop over, but you know what they say about a poor man’s work — give her our best. She must have time on her hands when you’re out; what does she do with herself?”
“What does she do? Nothing in particular, I suppose.”
This vapid reply Tsuda quickly, for whatever reason, promptly supplemented.
“She’ll offer to go to the hospital with me as agreeably as you could imagine, and the next minute she’s bossier than Auntie, ‘Get a haircut. Go to the bath.’ You name it.”
“That’s admirable. Who else do you know who’d tell a swell like you what you should do?”
“That’s good fortune I could do without.”
“How about the theater? Do you go?”
“Occasionally — we had an invitation from the Okamotos but unfortunately I have this illness to take care of.”
Tsuda glanced at his aunt.
“What do you say, Auntie — shall we go to the Imperial one of these days? A good play can be a tonic — perk you right up.”
“I suppose—”
“You don’t want to?”
“It’s not that — but I wouldn’t want to hold my breath waiting for an invitation from you.”
Though he knew his aunt didn’t care much for entertainment like the theater, Tsuda chose to take her at face value and made a show of scratching his head.
“If I’ve lost my credibility, I’m done for.”
His aunt snickered.
“Never mind the theater — what’s been going on with Kyoto since we spoke?”
“Have you heard something? Has Kyoto been in touch with you?”