“Is Jiya awake yet?” Kino asked his father when they had exchanged morning greetings.
“No, but he will wake soon, I think,” his father replied. He was weeding the cabbage bed carefully and Kino knelt down to help him.
“Must you tell him about Old Gentleman today?” Kino pleaded.
“I must tell him as soon as he wakes,” his father replied. “It would not be fair to let Jiya grow used to thinking of this as his home. He must make the choice today, before he has time to put down his new roots.”
“May I be there when you talk with him?” Kino asked next.
“No, my son,” his father replied. “I shall talk to him alone and tell him all the benefits that a rich man like Old Gentleman can give him and how little we who are poor can give him.”
Kino could not keep from wanting to cry. He thought his father was very hard. “But Jiya will certainly want to go away!” he sobbed.
“Then he must go,” his father said.
They went into the house to have breakfast, but Kino could scarcely eat. After breakfast he went back to the field, for he did not want to play. His father stayed in the house, and he could hear Jiya getting up.
For a long time Kino stayed in the field working alone. The warm tears dropped from his eyes upon the earth, but he worked on, determined not to go to the house until he was called. Then when the sun was nearing the zenith, he heard his father’s voice. He got up at once and walked along the path between the terraces until he reached the doorway. There his father stood with Jiya. Jiya’s face was still pale and his eyes were red. He had been crying today, although until now he had not cried at all.
When he looked at Kino his tears began to flow again. “Jiya, you must not mind it that you cry easily,” Kino’s father said kindly. “Until now you could not cry because you were not fully alive. You had been hurt too much. But today you are beginning to live, and so your tears flow. It is good for you. Let your tears come and do not stop them.”
Then he turned to Kino. “I have told Jiya that he must not decide until he has seen the inside of the castle. I want him to see all that Old Gentleman can give him for a home. Jiya, you know how our house is — these four rooms and the kitchen, this little farm, upon which we have to work so hard for our food. We have only what our hands can earn for us.”
Kino’s father held out his two hard, work-worn hands. Then he went on, “Kino, you are to go with Jiya, and when you see the castle you must persuade him to stay there, for his own sake.”
Kino heard this and felt the task laid upon him was very hard. But he only said, “I will go and wash myself, Father, and put on my good clothes.”
“No,” his father said. “Go as you are — you are a farmer’s son.”
So the two boys went down the mountainside, and avoiding the empty beach, they went to the castle. The gate was open and the garden was most beautiful. A gardener was sweeping the green moss.
When he saw them he came over to them. “What do you want?” he asked.
“My father sent us to see the honored Old Gentleman,” Kino faltered.
“Are you the Uchiyama boy?” the gardener asked.
“Yes,” Kino replied, “and this is Jiya, whom Old Gentleman wants to come and live here.”
“Follow me, if you please,” the gardener said. He bowed to Jiya and made his voice polite.
The two boys followed him along a wide, pebbled path. Over their heads the ancient pines leaned their crooked branches. In the distance beyond the forest the sun poured down upon a flower garden and a pool with a waterfall.
“How beautiful it is!” Kino whispered sadly.
Jiya did not answer. He walked along, his head held high. When they reached the house they took off their shoes and followed the gardener through a great door. Inside this the gardener paused, and a manservant came forward and asked what they wanted. The gardener whispered and the manservant nodded. “Follow me,” he said to the boys.
So they followed him through wide passageways. The walls were of fine polished wood, unpainted, but smooth and silvery. Under their feet, fine woven, padded mats were softer than the moss beneath the trees. On both sides of this passageway panels slid back to show beautiful rooms, and in each room were a vase of flowers, an exquisite scroll, a few pieces of dark polished furniture. Neither Jiya nor Kino had ever seen such a house. Kino was speechless. How could he hope now that Jiya would not want to stay in the castle?
Then far in the distance they saw Old Gentleman sitting beside a small table. The table was set in front of the open sliding panels that looked into the garden, and Old Gentleman was writing. He held a brush upright in his right hand and he was carefully painting letters on a scroll, his silver-rimmed spectacles sliding down his nose.
When the two boys came near he looked up and took off his spectacles and laid down his brush. “Would you like to know what I have been writing?” he asked.
Neither Kino nor Jiya could answer. The great house, the silence, the beauty, all of this fell into place as the background for Old Gentleman himself. He was tall and thin, and his hair and beard were white. His face and hands were beautiful. The bones were delicate and the skin was smooth and brown. He looked as proud as a king, but his dark eyes were wise as an old scholar’s eyes are wise.
“It is not my own poem,” he said. “It is the saying of a man of India, but I like it so much that I have painted it on this scroll to hang there in the alcove where I can see it every day.” He took up the scroll and read these words:
“The Children of God are very dear, but
very queer—
Very nice, but very narrow.”
He looked at the boys. “What do you think of it?” he said.
They looked at one another. “We do not understand it, sir,” Jiya said at last. Since he was a little older than Kino, he felt he should speak.
Old Gentleman shook his head and laughed softly. “Ah, we are all the children of God,” he said. Then he put on his spectacles and looked hard at Jiya. “Well?” he said. “Will you be my son?”
Jiya turned very red. He had not expected to have the question put to him so suddenly and so directly.
Old Gentleman saw he found it hard to speak. “Say yes or no,” he told Jiya. “Those are not hard words to say.”
“I will say, — no!” Jiya said. Then he felt this was harsh. “I thank you but I have a home — on the farm,” he added.
Ah, how Kino felt when he heard these words! He forgot entirely about the big wave and all the sorrow it had brought, and for a moment he was filled with pure joy. Then he remembered the small farmhouse, the four little rooms and the old kitchen.
“Jiya,” he said solemnly, “remember how poor we are.”
Old Gentleman was smiling a half-sad little smile. “They are certainly very poor,” he said to Jiya. “And here, you know, you would have everything. You can even invite this farm boy to come and play sometimes, if you like. And I am quite willing for you to give the family some money. It would be suitable, as my son, for you to help the poor.”
“Where are the others who were saved from the big wave?” Jiya asked suddenly.
“Some wanted to go away, and the ones who wanted to stay are out in the back yard with my servants,” Old Gentleman replied.
“Why do you not invite them to come into this big house and be your sons and daughters?” Jiya asked.
“Because I don’t want them for my sons and daughters,” Old Gentleman replied rather crossly. “You are a bright, handsome boy, and they told me you were the best boy in the village.”