Light and Dark: A Novel by Natsume Sōseki (chapter 10-15)

[ 10 ] THE IMPOSING door at the entrance was closed as always. Tsuda glanced carelessly through the thick lattice bars set into the upper half of the door as though carved there. Just inside, a large granite platform waited quietly for shoes. Beyond, a cast-iron lamp shade was suspended from the center of the ceiling.

Tsuda, who until now had never once set foot inside this entrance hall, circled to the side of the house and announced himself at the inner entrance immediately adjacent to the student room.* “He hasn’t returned as yet.”

The houseboy in student hakama who kneeled in front of him answered simply. His attitude, which seemed to suggest an expectation that the visitor would now take his leave, was a little disconcerting. Finally Tsuda followed his first inquiry with a second.

“Is the lady of the house at home?”

“Yes. Mrs. Yoshikawa is here.”

To tell the truth, it was his wife more than Yoshikawa himself with whom Tsuda was on intimate terms. On the way to the house he had been largely animated by a desire for a meeting with her.

“Please let her know I’m here.”

To this new houseboy, seeing him for the first time, he addressed an amended request. The youth withdrew again into the house with what appeared to be equanimity. When he reappeared he said, in a slightly formal tone, “Mrs. Yoshikawa says she will see you if you’ll please follow me,” and led Tsuda to the Western-style drawing room. No sooner had he taken a seat, before tea and a cigarette tray had been brought in, than Yoshikawa’s wife appeared.

“You’re on your way home?”

Tsuda had taken a seat and had to stand again.

“How is your wife doing?” Settling herself into a chair, having responded to his greeting with a mere nod of her head, Madam Yoshikawa asked her second question at once.

Tsuda’s smile was strained. He didn’t know how to reply. *A student room, usually adjacent to the kitchen, is a room made available to a university student in exchange for houseboy duties.

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“Now that you’re a married man, we rarely have the pleasure of your company.”

There was no hint of reserve in her voice. She regarded steadily the younger man before her. Younger and, now as before, beneath her in social standing.

“I imagine you’re still happy.”

Tsuda held perfectly still, as though enduring the fine sand kicked up by a wind.

“Although it’s certainly been a while.”

“I suppose—half a year and a little.”

“How time flies! It seems like yesterday—and how is it going these days?”

“How’s what going?”

“How are you getting along with your bride?”

“No complaints in particular—” “So the honeymoon is already over? I don’t believe it.”

“There never was a honeymoon.”

“Then it’s coming. If you weren’t happy in the beginning then happiness is on the way.”

“Thanks—I’ll be sure to look forward to that.”

“By the way, how old are you?”

“Am I on trial?”

“Of course not. I asked because I want to know. Please give me a straight answer.”

“As you wish—I’m actually thirty.”

“So—thirty-one next year?”

“If things go according to plan, yes.”

“And O-Nobu?”

“Twenty-three.”

“Next year?”

“Now.”

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[ 11 ] YOSHIKAWA’S WIFE often chaffed Tsuda in this manner. When she was in high spirits it was even worse. On occasion Tsuda teased back. However, he perceived occasionally in her attitude the glitter of something neither quite jesting nor serious. In such cases his natural tenacity prompted him to halt in the middle of the conversation.

Circumstances permitting, he would attempt to burrow down to the root of what his partner was saying in quest of her true feelings. When the necessity of reserve prevented him from going so far, he stopped talking and closely attended her countenance. At such times his eyes, as an inevitable consequence, appeared to cloud lightly with mistrust. Or perhaps it was cowardice. Or caution. Or perhaps it was light emitted by nerves tensing in self-defense. His eyes also assumed in those moments a hint of what might have been appropriately described as “well-considered anxiety.” Every time Tsuda encountered Madam Yoshikawa, she could be counted on to drive him once or twice into this place. Though he was conscious of being dragged, it happened nonetheless.

“You’re a hateful lady.”

“How so? Is asking your age hateful?”

“It’s how you ask, as if you’re implying something, but you leave your thought unfinished.”

“There’s nothing to finish. Your problem is you’re too thoughtful. Reflection may be essential to a scholar, but it’s taboo in social intercourse. If you could break that habit, you’d be a better man, better liked by others.”

Tsuda was a little hurt. But the pain went to his heart, not his head. In his head he responded to this ungloved blow with cool disdain. Madam Yoshikawa hinted at a smile.

“If you think I’m mistaken, try asking your wife when you get home.

I know O-Nobu will agree with me. And not only O-Nobu—there’s someone else too, for certain!”

Abruptly Tsuda’s face tightened and his lips quivered. With his gaze adamantly fixed on his lap, he said nothing.

“I’m sure you know whom I mean?”

Mrs. Yoshikawa sought to peer into Tsuda’s face as she spoke. Of course he knew perfectly well to whom she referred. But he had no intention of confirming her prompting. Lifting his head again, he directed his LIGHT AND DARK

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silent regard in her direction. Madam Yoshikawa failed to understand what his eyes were saying in their silence.

“Forgive me if I’ve offended you. That’s not what I intended.”

“It doesn’t bother me—” “Truly?”

“I’m not in the least concerned—” “I’m so relieved.”

Madam Yoshikawa’s voice was buoyant again.

“There’s still a little boy hiding inside you, isn’t there! He comes out when we talk this way. Men seem to be having the rougher time, but it turns out you’re the lucky ones. Here you are thirty, and O-Nobu turning twenty-three this year, a big gap in years. But judging by your behavior, it’s O-Nobu who seems older. Maybe ‘older’ sounds impolite—how shall I put it?”

Madam Yoshikawa appeared to be deliberating about a word to describe O-Nobu’s manner. Tsuda awaited her choice with a degree of curiosity.

“Evolved, maybe? She’s certainly very clever; I’ve rarely seen such a clever person. Take good care of her.”

Her tone of voice suggested that Madam might as well have been saying “Watch out for her!”

[ 12 ] JUST THEN the electric light hanging above their heads came on. The student who had greeted Tsuda on his arrival padded into the room, carefully lowered the blinds, and left again without a word. Tsuda, who had been watching carefully as the color of the gas heater gradually deepened, tracked in silence with his eyes the youth’s departure. He had the feeling it was time to terminate the conversation and be on his way. He sipped the tea that remained in the teacup in front of him, avoiding the slice of lemon floating coldly at the bottom. Replacing the cup, he revealed the nature of the errand he had come on. It was a straightforward matter. It was not, however, the sort of thing that could be approved on the spot at Madam Yoshikawa’s discretion. Certainly 44 L I G H T A N D D A R K

she had no idea where in the month he should take the week or so he said he would require for personal reasons.

“I doubt it matters when. As long as you’ve made arrangements.”

Her expression of good will toward Tsuda was ever so effortless.

“I’ve made sure everything is in order.”

“Then it shouldn’t be a problem—why not take off beginning tomorrow?”

“I’d better check first.”

“I’ll speak to Yoshikawa when he gets home. You needn’t worry about a thing.”

Madam Yoshikawa volunteered her services cheerfully. She appeared pleased to have stumbled on yet another excuse to act on someone else’s behalf. It made Tsuda happy to see before him this spirited and sympathetic lady. It was additionally pleasing to realize that her generosity had its source in his own attitude and behavior.

Tsuda enjoyed being treated like a child by Madam for the particular reason that he was able to experience a certain intimacy created between them as a result. When he dissected this, it turned out to be that special variety of intimacy possible only between a man and a woman. It was if anything akin to the pleasurable feeling a man enjoys when, for example, he receives a clap on the back from a young hostess at a teahouse.

At the same time, he held in reserve an abundant portion of himself that neither Yoshikawa’s wife nor any one else could treat as a child. He was careful to prepare for coming into her presence by hiding this place away. And even as he allowed himself a superficial sense of amusement at being taunted, he was leaning against the thick wall he had constructed inside himself.

Having completed his errand, he was rising from his chair when his hostess spoke up.

“I hope you won’t cry and moan like a baby again, a big brute like you.”

Tsuda involuntarily recalled his agony the previous year.

“Last time it was more than I could bear. Every time the door slid open or shut I felt it in the incision and my whole body went into spasm.

This time I’ll be fine.”

“Truly? You have a guarantee? It sounds iff y to me. When you sound so confident it makes me feel I’d better look in on you.”

“It’s not the sort of place I could allow you to visit. It’s cramped and not that clean—it’s a nasty room.”

“I couldn’t care less.”

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It wasn’t clear from her tone whether the matron was serious or teasing again. About to explain that his doctor’s specialty was in an area somewhat tangential to his particular illness and that as such his offices were not the sort of place that ladies would find inviting, Tsuda, at a loss how to begin, faltered. Mrs. Yoshikawa seized the opportunity his hesitation afforded to bear down.

“I’ll definitely look in on you. I have something I’d like to discuss that’s hard to talk about in front of O-Nobu.”

“Then why don’t I drop over again.”

Tsuda rose as if to flee, and Madam Yoshikawa, laughing, saw him out of the room.

[ 13 ] EMERGING ONTO the main street, Tsuda gradually put distance between the Yoshikawa house and himself. His mind, however, was unable to leave behind as quickly as his feet the drawing room where he had just been. As he made his way through the dusk of the relatively deserted neighborhood, pictures of the bright interior flashed in front of him. The chilly gleam of the cloisonné vase, the colors of the bright pattern splashed across its glossy surface, the silver-plated tray that had been brought to the table, the sugar and milk bowls of the same color, the heavy drapes, blue-black with a lighter pattern in brown of Chinese grasses, the table-top album with gilt-edged pages—the strong impressions created by these objects, already distant from the night lamps in the room, unfurled randomly across his vision in the gloom of the street.

He was of course unable to forget as well the phantom of his hostess sitting amid this whorl of colors. Walking along, he recalled bits and pieces of their conversation. And when he came upon a certain portion of it he sampled its flavor, chewing, as if it were a mouthful of toasted soybeans.

It might just be that she still has a mind to say something to me about the incident. The truth is, I don’t want to hear it. Yet I’m eager to hear.

Instantly, proclaiming to himself both tenets of the contradiction, he colored in the middle of the dark street, like a man who has exposed his 46 L I G H T A N D D A R K

own weakness. Hoping to get beyond his red face, he forced himself to proceed.

Assuming the lady does have something to say to me, I wonder what her point will be.

For the moment, he was unable to resolve his own question.

Does she intend to mock me?

He couldn’t say. She had always been a woman who enjoyed needling others. And their relationship provided her with an abundance of the freedom she needed for that activity. Beyond that, she had become over time, without noticing, a result of social privilege, imprudent. To sample the simple pleasure it gave her to aggravate him, she might well overstep the boundaries of decorum.

And if not that, could it be sympathy? Or because she makes me too much a favorite?

Another question he couldn’t answer. Until now she had been truly kind to him and, more than kind, a patron.

Coming to a thoroughfare, he boarded a streetcar. Outside the window glass as it proceeded along the moat, there was only dark water and a dark embankment with a darker tangle of pine trees atop it.

Taking a seat in a corner of the car, he glanced momentarily at the chilly scenery in the autumn night and had at once to return to other thoughts. Last night he had set aside the irksome subject of money, but his circumstances required that he raise some one way or another. His thoughts returned to Yoshikawa’s wife.

It would have been so easy if I’d revealed my situation to her when I had the chance.

He began to regret having come away so quickly, thinking that was the tactful thing to do. Even so, he lacked the courage to return now with nothing but this errand in hand.

Alighting from the streetcar, he was crossing a bridge when he saw a beggar squatting in the darkness beneath the railing. Like a moving shadow, the beggar bowed darkly as he passed. Tsuda was wearing a light overcoat. He had moreover just left the warming flame in a gas heater that was, if anything, still early for the season. Yet there was no room in his head for appreciating the gap between himself and the beggar. He felt like a man caught in a vice. It was a terrible inconvenience that his father hadn’t remitted his regular monthly stipend.

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[ 14 ] HE ARRIVED home in the same mood. He reached for the lattice in his front gate, and before it opened the shoji slid quietly back and he became aware that the figure of O-Nobu had appeared before him. He gazed at her profile, lightly made up, as though in surprise.

Since his marriage he had often been surprised by his wife in this way. Her actions were capable of making him feel preempted, but there were times when her swiftness proved extremely useful. Sometimes as she went about the business of daily life, he observed her movements, which manifested this special agility of hers, as if he were watching the glinting of a knife as it passed before his eyes. The feeling was of something small but acute that was at the same time somehow repellant.

At this particular moment it occurred to Tsuda that some power of O-Nobu’s had enabled her to foreknow his return. But he couldn’t bring himself to ask how this could be. To request an explanation and be turned aside with a laugh would feel like a defeat for the husband.

He went inside as if he hadn’t noticed and changed out of his kimono at once. In front of the brazier in the sitting room, a black lacquer tray with feet attached had been covered with a cloth as though awaiting his arrival.

“You stopped off somewhere again today?”

It was a question O-Nobu could be counted on to ask if Tsuda failed to return at the expected hour. He was obliged accordingly to offer something in reply. Since it wasn’t necessarily the case that he had been delayed by an errand, there were times when his response was oddly vague. At such times he avoided looking at O-Nobu, who would have put on makeup for him.

“Shall I guess?”

“Go ahead.”

This time, Tsuda had nothing to worry about.

“The Yoshikawas.”

“How did you know?”

“I can usually tell by how you seem.”

“Is that so? Not that it was hard to figure out today—I said last night that I intended to set the date for surgery after speaking with Yoshikawasan.”

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“I would have guessed even if you hadn’t said anything.”

“Really? You’re so clever.”

Tsuda related to O-Nobu only the gist of his conversation with Yoshikawa’s wife.

“And when are you planning to go in?”

“It seems I can go anytime.”

Tsuda didn’t mention the oppressive urgency he was feeling to do something about money before he had his surgery. It wasn’t by any means a large sum. But for precisely that reason a simple solution to raising it was evading him and causing additional aggravation. Briefly his thoughts turned to his younger sister in Kanda, but he had no heart for presenting himself at her door. In consideration of swollen household expenses since his marriage, his father had been helping make ends meet by sending money from Kyoto every month with the understanding that Tsuda would repay a portion of the loan out of his year-end and summer bonuses. This summer, circumstances had prevented him from keeping his end of the bargain, and as a consequence his father was already in a disagreeable mood. His sister, who knew all about this, tended to sympathize with their father. From the beginning, in consideration of her husband, he had felt that broaching money matters to his sister was somehow unseemly; now he was more than ever put off by the thought.

It appeared, assuming it couldn’t be avoided, that the only thing to do, as O-Nobu had urged, was to write again to his father with an appeal. It occurred to him that including a somewhat exaggerated description of his illness would be a good tactic. Embellishing the reality to a degree that wouldn’t worry his parents excessively was a manipulation that ought to be manageable without suffering the pangs of conscience.

“I think I’ll take your suggestion last night and write my father again.”

“I see. But don’t—” O-Nobu stopped and looked at her husband. Paying no heed, Tsuda went upstairs and sat down at his desk.

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[ 15 ] TAKING FROM his desk drawer the Westernstyle stationery he normally used, lavender paper and matching envelope, he had written several lines absently with his fountain pen when a thought occurred abruptly. His father didn’t normally expect, nor was he likely to be pleased to receive, a letter from his son scrawled with a fountain pen in colloquial Japanese. Conjuring his father’s face halfway across the country, he put down his pen with an uncomfortable smile. Once again he was struck by the feeling that sending a letter would accomplish nothing. On a scrap of thick, scratchy parchment similar to charcoal paper, he sketched carelessly his father’s long, narrow face complete with goatee and considered what to do.

Presently he rose resolutely, slid open the fusuma, and called down to his wife from the head of the stairs.

“O-Nobu. Do you have any Japanese paper and an envelope?”

“Japanese?”

To O-Nobu the adjective sounded oddly comic.

“Do you mind ladies’?”

Tsuda unscrolled across his desk the rice paper imprinted with a stylish flower pattern.

“I wonder if he’ll like this.”

“As long as the letter is clearly written so he can understand, I don’t think the paper matters.”

“You’re wrong about that. You might not think so, but he can very particular.”

Tsuda peered intently at the narrow page, his face serious. The hint of a smile appeared at the corners of O-Nobu’s mouth.

“Shall I send Toki out for something better?”

Tsuda grunted distractedly. It wasn’t as if plain rice paper and an unpatterned envelope would ensure the success of his request.

“She’ll be only a minute.”

O-Nobu went directly downstairs. A minute later Tsuda heard the maid’s footsteps leaving the house. Until the required articles reached him, he waited idly, smoking a cigarette at his desk.

There was therefore nothing to distract him from thoughts of his father.

Born and raised in Tokyo, he had never missed an opportunity to deni50 L I G H T A N D D A R K