“Because I’m pushy and say whatever comes into my head? I’ve no idea whether I’m being praised or scolded — when I see a reserved person like Tsugiko-san I so wish I could be like her.”
As she spoke, O-Nobu reviewed with an unpleasant feeling of dissatisfaction last night’s gathering, which, in her view, had ended in failure for herself precisely because it had provided her with no room to exhibit what her uncle had chosen to call her moxie.
“I’m wondering why I had to be there.”
“You’re Tsugiko’s cousin.”
If the only reason was that she was a relative, there were any number of others who should also have attended. Moreover, the prospective groom had come alone; with the exception of the Yoshikawas, there was no one representing the other side.
“I still don’t understand. Does that mean that if Tsuda hadn’t been sick, he would have been obliged to come too, as a relative?”
“That’s another matter. There was another reason.”
O-Nobu’s uncle explained that one of his objectives had been to provide Tsuda and O-Nobu with a new opportunity to socialize with the Yoshikawas, which he assumed would be good for them. Hearing this as a revelation of his kindly nature as she liked to imagine it, O-Nobu was grateful; at the same time, she wondered with a certain resentment why, in that case, he hadn’t done more to promote a deeper acquaintance with Madam Yoshikawa. To be sure, he had seated them at the same table with that end in mind, but he seemed unaware of the possibility of a result that might be worse psychologically than before he had acted to bring them together. No matter how painstaking they might be, O-Nobu felt moved to conclude, men were, after all, just men. On the other hand, she thought more generously but with a sigh, no one who didn’t know about the subtle something that lay between Mrs. Yoshikawa and herself could have been expected to do better.
* A miai is a meeting arranged and attended by the families of two people considered likely candidates for marriage.
[64]
ALLOWING THE thought to drop by the wayside, O-Nobu pursued the point that continued to trouble her. “I understand what you intended, and I know I should be grateful. But there must be something more to this.”
“Maybe, but even if there weren’t, I think you can see from what I’ve already said that inviting you was more than worthwhile.”
“I suppose—”
O-Nobu felt obliged to concur. But it seemed to her that the manner of the invitation had been too urgent to be entirely explained by this. It turned out that her uncle had characteristically retained one final element.
“Actually, I wanted your assessment of the prospective groom. I’m asking because you have a gift for seeing into people. What did you think of him? A good bet for Tsugiko? A bad idea?”
O-Nobu was uncertain, in view of his typical behavior, how seriously he intended his question.
“Such an important role for me. I’m honored.”
Laughing as she spoke, O-Nobu glanced at her aunt and, observing her to be unexpectedly somber, changed her tone at once.
“I don’t see how someone like me is qualified to assess anyone. Besides, all I did was sit there for an hour. No one could learn much from that — unless they were clairvoyant.”
“Well, there is something clairvoyant about you. That’s why everyone wants to hear your opinion.”
“I hate it when you mock me.”
O-Nobu pretended to dismiss her uncle. But the taste of a certain pleasure was flirting with her. It was self-satisfaction with its source in her certainty that people did apparently think of her in that way. But this was a fragile pleasure easily damaged by undeniable facts that were an occasion for disappointment. Her husband’s case came to mind as damning evidence to the contrary. Before her marriage, O-Nobu had been confident that she had seen through to her husband’s nature with a clarity that exceeded clairvoyance, but in the time that had since elapsed, her confidence, as a lucent sun is mottled with dark sunspots, had been tarnished by misapprehensions and misplaced feelings. Having learned from her experience as time passed that her intuition regarding her husband might well require emendation, O-Nobu, who was just now beginning to bow her head in acknowledgment of this dolorous truth, was not so young that a little flattery from her uncle could restore her to good spirits.
“There’s no way to know much about anyone without spending time with them—”
“Nobody needs you to teach ’em that.”
“I’m just telling you I have nothing to say after just one meeting.”
“You sound like a man. A woman will have something to say after one look, and often she’ll hit the mark. I’m asking you to give me something for future reference. I’m not going to hold you responsible, so give it a try.”
“But how can I? I’m not a fortune-teller, right, Auntie?”
Her aunt didn’t support her as she normally did. Neither did she take her uncle’s side. Though it didn’t appear she wished to push O-Nobu for a prediction, she did nothing that might have inhibited her husband from pressuring her. Her attentive expression suggested she was eagerly interested in anything, however insubstantial, in the nature of an evaluation of a potential husband for her precious daughter now preparing for the first time to marry.
O-Nobu felt obliged to deliver herself of one or two anodyne remarks.
“He seems very respectable. And very poised for his age.”
Her uncle was waiting for more; when she added nothing, he prompted her with a question.
“Is that all?”
“I was sitting two seats down — I could barely see his face.”
“I guess it was foolish of me to put our oracle in that seat — but you must have something more than those clichés, something more in line with your special gift that would catch the essence of the man.”
“But I don’t — not after one meeting.”
“But what if you absolutely had to say something after just one meeting? You’d find something to say.”
“I have nothing.”
“Nothing at all? What’s happened to that intuition of yours?”
“I lost it when I got married — now I’m numb.”
[65]
ALL THE while she was engaging at length in verbal head-butting with her uncle, different thoughts were playing incessantly across her mind.
She didn’t doubt that Okamoto acknowledged her and Tsuda as a prime example of matrimonial harmony. She also understood, however, how unlikely it was that he had revised the dislike he had felt for Tsuda from the time of their first meeting. Accordingly, she felt certain that he must be observing skeptically the intimacy she and her husband appeared to share. To put it another way, beneath his surprise that a woman like O-Nobu should succeed in loving a man like Tsuda, he maintained his confidence in the astuteness of his own vision. His conclusion, that it was O-Nobu and not himself who had misjudged the man, seemed to have sifted down to the bottom of his heart like a fine powder, ready at any time to diffuse itself into the surrounding air.
Then why does he persist in pushing me for my thoughts about Miyoshi?
O-Nobu failed to understand. She was aware that he regarded her privately as a wife who had misjudged her husband, and to put her awareness aside and respond to his request without hesitation would have taken more courage than she possessed. In the end, her only choice was to hold her tongue. But to someone who had grown accustomed over the years to her immoderate lack of reserve, her silence on this occasion was hard to comprehend. Her uncle turned away from her to her aunt.