“Ladies!” called a middle-aged fishmonger from behind the counter, his eyes locked on the mackerel he was speedily filleting. “Haai-welcome! How about some nice chilled sashimi slices? Take a little home for lunch!” He cast his voice out over the street in controlled, far-reaching arcs of sound, as a fisherman flings out his nets. Its reverberation reminded Sarah of the So-Zen priests who came chanting each morning.
A young man working beside him, probably his son, chimed in. “Baby octopus! Cockles for clear soup! Everything fresh fresh fresh!” His energetic bellowing made up in volume what it lacked of his father’s practiced resonance. At the far end of the counter, a woman in a white frilled apron stood over an open grill of eel fillets, using two battered cardboard uchiwa to fan the fragrant smoke out toward prospective buyers. The provocative aroma of glazed soy sauce and sugar hung in the air and made Sarah’s mouth water, even though she had just eaten breakfast.
The housewives succeeded each other with quick, efficient footsteps that were at odds with their peaceful expressions. Mrs. Rexford wove through the crowd with nimble expertise, not bothering to look back. Sarah lurched after her mother, clutching her wicker basket and string bag and trying to avoid the sharp points of the women’s parasols.
The produce booths were crowded too. Sarah’s mother and grandmother usually made her wait on the sidewalk while they darted in to make fast, efficient transactions. Huge bundles of freshly picked edamame boughs were piled high on tables, the hairy pods still attached to the branches. Small green yuzu, or citrons, were in season but expensive. All booths featured carrots that were bright red instead of orange, a variety native to the Kyoto area. There were seedless kyuuri cucumbers, delicious when sliced and dipped in a mixture of Worcestershire sauce and sweet Japanese mayonnaise. “Let’s get some of those!” Sarah suggested.
“Do you hear that jingling?” asked Mrs. Rexford as they walked toward the pickle shop. “Isn’t it pretty?” The sound of countless tiny bells pervaded the street. It came from the stall owners’ money bags, which hung overhead from rubber cords. Working the abacus with one hand, a vendor would pull down the bag with his free hand when he wanted to withdraw or deposit loose change. Omamori-religious charms with little bells attached, sold at local temples and shrines-hung from each money bag. When the vendor released his bag after a transaction, it bounced up on its rubber cord, and the omamori bells-as well as the coins within-continued jingling for a minute or so until the bag stopped moving.
“It is pretty!” said Sarah.
“People call that the sound of prosperous commerce.”
After the street bustle it was a relief to enter the cool, restful shade of the pickle store. The pickle store wasn’t a stall like the others, but an extension of a private home. When the proprietor emerged from the back of the store to serve them, they caught a momentary glimpse of tatami mats and white floor cushions through the open sliding door. There was a timeless, prewar quality about this place, due to the blackened wall boards and the wooden shipping barrels stacked against them.
“Welcome back, miss,” the proprietor greeted Sarah. He was an elderly man with a thin strip of white cotton tied around his head, the traditional sign of a man ready and eager to work. “Remember how you used to stick your hand in the pickles when you were a little girl, before your mother could stop you?” Sarah giggled, embarrassed but also pleased that he had remembered. To hide her sudden shyness, she leaned over to inspect the lacquered display boxes. They held a large array of pickled items: long fat daikon radishes, cucumbers, scallions, lotus roots, Japanese eggplant, gourds, greens, seaweed. They lay limply within various fermented pastes, whose pungent aroma stirred up in Sarah some memory from her early childhood that fell just short of definition.
“Pickles are Kyoto ’s most famous commodity,” Mrs. Rexford informed her daughter, primarily for the shopkeeper’s benefit. “They’re a cultural treasure, you know, with all the subtleties of wine. Visitors from other cities always stock up on these to take home as gifts.” Sarah had received similar “lessons” in the presence of other vendors, for her mother and grandmother were skilled in the subtle flattery that resulted in spontaneous markdowns.
The proprietor beamed as he scooped up Mrs. Rexford’s order: sweet red pickle relish to serve with the curry Mrs. Kobayashi was making. “You both look very cosmopolitan today!” he said admiringly. “Simple elegance-now that’s what I like!” He too was good at flattery. But it was true that Mrs. Rexford and her daughter made a striking pair.
Mrs. Rexford wore a new blouse of lipstick red. Few other women could have carried off such an intense color. Sarah wore a wide-brimmed straw hat with a big green ribbon tied off-center beneath her chin. The green of the ribbon brought out the green-gray tints of her eyes. Naturally, Mrs. Rexford had chosen it. The girl hadn’t resisted. She had no clue as to what was acceptable in this country, and she trusted her mother’s judgment here as she did not in America. Yielding to her mother had filled her with a surprising rush of happiness.
During the course of their shopping, they ran into several acquaintances.
“I see you all the time with your mother,” one woman told Mrs. Rexford. “But I can never bring myself to intrude…you always look so close and intimate…”
“You’re far too polite!” scolded Mrs. Rexford.
“It’s so touching,” the woman continued wistfully, “to see the way you scrub each other’s backs at the bathhouse.”
Some women from the weaving class, whom Mrs. Kobayashi would have regarded with some social reserve, took this opportunity to draw near and chat.
“Do you live in San-Fran City?” they asked admiringly, looking them both over. “Do you wear trousers?” “Your girl’s grown so big…so pretty…”
With a wide American smile, Mrs. Rexford chatted back.
Sarah watched and listened in silence. Among American women back home, her mother would have been the picture of Oriental demureness. Her attitude was one of wide-eyed fascination: “How smart and funny you are!” Privately, Mrs. Rexford considered the Fielder’s Butte women her intellectual inferiors, and had the playing field been level, she would have considered them her social inferiors as well. So her stories at home, while observant and witty, were not always kind. But some American women were flattered and charmed. Nurturing instincts aroused, they went out of their way to offer tutelage and protection. “Honey, your mama’s a real doll!” they would tell Sarah, handing her recipes for potato chip casseroles and Jell-O molds. “Give this to your mama, I know she’ll enjoy it. She’s an absolute sweetheart, such an adorable little Chinese lady!”
Mrs. Rexford now stood in the crowded market, her red blouse like a flame attracting the pale, mothlike shades of the local women’s dresses. This flamelike quality was also in her face. Watching her, Sarah felt that same deep joy as when her mother had picked out her hat.
Their final encounter was at the poultry stall. They approached two other customers who were standing under the red-and-white-striped awning, peering down at a straw-lined display of eggs in various sizes and colors. “Auntie Sasaki!” Mrs. Rexford called out to one of them, in the breezy voice that came so easily to her in this country. “What dish are you going to make with those eggs?” The elderly woman turned around to see who had spoken. Her face brightened with pleasure, and they fell immediately into conversation.
“Just look at you, Yo-chan,” the woman said at one point, patting Mrs. Rexford’s shoulder in the overfamiliar manner of the weaving class. “I bet you’re the queen bee over in America too, aren’t you? Just like you were here. Oh yes, I know you are-don’t deny it! Anta, I’m very perceptive! I can tell, just from looking at your face.”