Why did I have such an agonizing experience?
On his way home from viewing cherry blossoms at the Arakawa Wharf, the pain had struck with no warning, its cause a mystery to him. It wasn’t strange so much as terrifying. There’s no guarantee that a change won’t occur in this body of mine at any hour of any given day. For that matter, some sort of change could be taking place even now. And I myself have no idea. Terrifying!
Having proceeded this far, his mind was unable to stop. With the force of a powerful blow to the back it jolted him forward. Abruptly he called out silently inside himself:
It’s the same with the mind. Exactly the same. There’s no knowing when or how it will change. I’ve witnessed such a change with my own eyes.
Pursing his lips, he glanced around him with the eyes of a man whose self-esteem has been injured. But the other passengers were oblivious of what was happening inside him and paid no heed to the look in his eyes.
Like the streetcar he was riding, his mind merely moved forward on its own tracks. He recalled what his friend had told him a few days ago about Poincarré. Having explained “probability” for his benefit, his friend had turned to him and spoken as follows:
“So you see, what you commonly hear described as chance, an accident, a chance occurrence, is really just a case where the actual cause is too complex to grasp. For a Napoleon to be born, an extraordinary sperm must unite with an extraordinary egg; but when you start considering the circumstances that were required to create that necessary union it boggles the imagination.”
He was unable to dismiss his friend’s words as merely a fragment of new knowledge that had been imparted to him. Thinking about how closely they fit his own circumstances, he seemed to become aware of a dark, imponderable force pushing him left when he meant to go right or pulling him back when he meant to go forward. Until that moment, he would have felt certain that his actions had never been subject to restraint by others. He had been certain that he did whatever he did of his own accord, that everything he said he intended to say.
Why would she have married him? Because she chose to, no doubt. But she couldn’t possibly have wanted that. And what of me, why did I marry the woman who is my wife? No doubt our marriage happened because I chose to take her. But I have never once felt that I wanted her. Chance? Poincarré’s so-called zenith of complexity? I have no idea.
Alighting from the streetcar, he walked ruminatively home.
[3]
TURNING THE corner and entering a narrow street, Tsuda recognized the figure of his wife standing in front of the gate to their house. She was looking in his direction. But as he rounded the corner she turned back to the street in front of her. Lifting her slender, white hand as if to shadow her brow, she appeared to be looking up at something. She maintained the stance until Tsuda had moved to her side.
“What are you looking at?”
As if surprised by his voice, Tsuda’s wife quickly turned to face him.
“You startled me — welcome home.”
As she spoke, she turned her sparkling eyes on him and drenched him in their light. Then, bending forward slightly she dipped her head in a casual greeting. Tsuda halted where he stood, half responding to the coquette in her and half hesitating.
“What are you doing standing here?”
“I was waiting — for you to come home.”
“But you were staring at something.”
“A sparrow. You can see the sparrow nesting under the eaves across the street.”
Tsuda glanced up at the roof of the house. But there was no visible sign of anything that appeared to be a sparrow. His wife abruptly extended her hand toward him.
“What?”
“Your stick.”
As if he had just noticed it, Tsuda handed the cane to his wife. Taking it, she slid open the lattice door at the entrance and moved aside for her husband to enter. Close behind him, she stepped up to the wooden floor from the concrete slab for shoes.
When she had helped him change out of his kimono, she brought from the kitchen a soap dish wrapped in a towel as he was sitting down in front of the charcoal brazier.
“Go and have a quick bath now. Once you get comfortable there you won’t feel like going out.”
Tsuda had no choice but to reach out and take the towel. But he didn’t stand right away.
“I might skip a bath today.”
“Why? You’ll feel refreshed. And dinner will be ready as soon as you get back.”
Tsuda stood up again as he was told. On his way out of the room he turned back toward his wife.
“I stopped in at Kobayashi’s on the way home from work and had him take a look.”
“Goodness! What did he say? By now you must be mostly better?”
“I’m not — it’s worse than before.”
Without giving his wife a chance to question him further, he left the room.
It wasn’t until early that evening, after dinner and before he had withdrawn to his study, that the couple returned to the subject.
“I can’t believe it, surgery is horrible; it scares me. Couldn’t you just ignore it as you’ve been doing?”
“The doctor says that would be dangerous.”
“But it’s so hateful, what if he makes a mistake?”
His wife looked at him, bunching slightly her thick, well-formed eyebrows. Tsuda smiled, declining to engage her. Her next question seemed to have occurred to her abruptly.
“If you do have surgery won’t it have to be on Sunday?”
On the coming Sunday his wife had made a date with relatives to see a play and bring Tsuda along.
“They haven’t bought tickets yet so you needn’t worry about canceling.”
“But wouldn’t that be rude? After they were kind enough to invite us along?”
“Not at all. Not under the circumstances.”
“But I want to go!”
“Then do.”
“And you come too, won’t you? Won’t you, please?”
Tsuda looked at his wife and forced a smile.
[4]
AGAINST THE fairness of her complexion her well-formed eyebrows stood out strikingly, and it was her habit, almost a tic, to arch them frequently. Regretfully, her eyes were too small and her single eyelids were unappealing. But the shining pupils beneath those single lids were ink black and, for that reason, very effective. At times her eyes could be expressive to a degree that might be called overbearing. Tsuda had experienced feeling helplessly drawn in by the light that emanated from those small eyes. Not as if there weren’t also moments when abruptly and for no reason the same light repelled him.
Glancing up abruptly at his wife’s face, he beheld for an instant an eerie power resident in her eyes. It was an odd brilliancy utterly inconsonant with the sweet words that had been issuing from her lips until now. His intention to respond was impeded a little by her gaze. In that moment she smiled, exposing her beautiful teeth, and the look in her eyes vanished without a trace.
“It’s not so. I don’t care a bit about going to the theater. I was just being spoiled.”
Tsuda was silent, unable for a while longer to take his eyes off his wife.
“Why are you frowning at me that way? I’m not going to the play so please have your surgery on Sunday, won’t you? I’ll send the Okamotos a postcard or drop in and tell them we can’t come.”
“Go if you want to, they were nice enough to invite us.”
“I’d rather not — your health is more important than a play.”