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Exploring the Variety of Random
Documents with Different Content
The Project Gutenberg eBook of A spring-time
case
 This ebook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United
States and most other parts of the world at no cost and with
almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away
or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License
included with this ebook or online at www.gutenberg.org. If you
are not located in the United States, you will have to check the
laws of the country where you are located before using this
eBook.

Title: A spring-time case

(Otsuya koroshi)

Author: Jun'ichiro Tanizaki

Translator: Z. Tamotsu Iwado

Release date: March 10, 2024 [eBook #73132]

Most recently updated: July 14, 2024

Language: English

Original publication: Tokyo: The Japan Times, 1927

*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A SPRING-TIME

CASE ***
 Transcriber’s Notes
Cover created by Transcriber and placed into the Public Domain.
Table of Contents added by Transcriber and placed into the Public Domain.
Corrected text is marked with a dotted underlined. A list of corrections can be
found at the end of this eBook.
Other notes may be found at the end of this eBook.
 MASTERPIECES
OF
CONTEMPORARY JAPANESE FICTION
The Japan Times’ Series

A Spring-Time Case
(OTSUYA KOROSHI)

BY

JUN-ICHIRO TANIZAKI

TRANSLATED
BY
ZENCHI IWADO

THE JAPAN TIMES

 INTRODUCTION
DURING the eras of Meiji and Taisho (1868–1926) the literary life of
Japan was enriched by a wealth of many notable productions,
worthy of a place in the atheneum of the world; but strange to say,
no attempt has, as yet, been made to embody them into any part of
the works forming an international library. It is true, that some
Japanese novels have been rendered into English, but such ventures
have been few and far between, and in any case, they have been of
a fragmentary nature and cannot be considered as a part of any
systematic attempt.
Literature is the mirror of a living age in which is reflected the life
of a people. It is through literature, more than any other medium,
that students of the present and future eras may more readily gain
an insight into the characteristics and life of a people. The publishers
are convinced that the placing before the world, of representative
Japanese writings and fictions, will render an inestimable service by
bringing to it fuller and better understanding of Japan and the
Japanese.
“Masterpieces of the Contemporary Japanese Fiction” comprises a
few of the most representative works of the age, embodying as it
does, the favourite productions of those authors, and which have
been rendered into English as faithfully as it has been within the
power of the translators to do so.
In this present undertaking, the publishers are not actuated by
any other motive but to allow the world to understand, and to see
Japan, as she really is.
THE PUBLISHERS.
Tokyo, June, 1927.
 TRANSLATOR’S NOTE
JUNICHIRO TANIZAKI, the author of “O-Tsuya Koroshi,” presented
here under the title of “A Springtime Case,” is a man just turning the
age of forty. His appearance on the literary stage of Japan some
eighteen years ago, made with a sensational, because so sudden,
burst into fame, and his steady climb since to the pinnacle of a
literary career, where he maintains himself to this day, with the
unchallenged glory of Phœbus’ own orb,—will preclude argument
against singling him out as one of the most popular, and even
remarkable, authors of present-day Japan.
He is remarkable for a two-fold reason. First, because his
popularity and fame have shown such endurance as rarely seen in
this country, where the mind of the people is so fleeting and fickle as
the very God of Fortune they are wont to bewail of in their life and
literature. A new artist on the stage to fawn upon the smile of the
public,—for a moment,—only to slink off as swiftly never to return.
Not the fault, perhaps, so much of the artist himself as of the public
which is riding upon a tide too fast to catch its breath or pause to
scan whither it is bound. It has been swept on into an eddy that
occurs where the inexorable in-flow out of the West meets against
the thought-current of its own, still flowing on its course with a force
out of its many centuries. Under the sway of its own mind divided
betwixt a mad rush for the new and a guard over the old, it scarce
knows yet where to plant its feet and cast for bearings for the
course for its mind to pursue for the future. And the artist who
wishes to cull his fortune amidst such existing orders of life, is left all
to himself to cast about and make shift for himself the best he
knows how; and his judgment proves as often in error as his effort
turns out futile. The position Tanizaki has held for a period of nearly
two decades with unwaning power, is in itself an eloquent tribute to
his own achievement, if the mass is any judge of literary quality.
 He is remarkable also for the perspicuity and independence of his
mind, which has absorbed the manifold light of the new age only to
flash back a light, all its own, that takes in its clearness the colour of
all that upon which it falls, in its sweeping flight of imagination, and
exalts it with touches of exquisitely variable play and radiant depth.
His achievement is the work of a mind wherein the true artist of his
race rules with predominant force the domain of beauty over which
he has come to hold empire; it is a voice out of the past and a voice
to the new, raised in the praise of that romance which his people
have treasured since their time-old days. Influence of the Western
art which has been accepted by the younger writers of the country
only to swamp out their own creative effort, has in his case served
to broaden his outlook on life and quicken his appreciation of life,
often in such aspects as had had to remain screened from his
forbears.
Himself a wide reader of Western literature, a student of Poe,
George Moore, Baudelaire, Gautier, Balzac, and other masters, he
has always shown a capacity for range and depth; a quality excelled
only by his faith in the tenets of the school of which he is the
creator. Such influence as he has gleaned out of the West, appears
to have been hitched to his vehicle, a servant of his work and
purpose, scarcely discernible save in a happy blending with the
colourings of his own.
Earlier works of Tanizaki came forth when the literature of his
country was passing through the most dismal period in its recent
history. Against a school of writers who were desperately holding
together against the inroad of new influence, there was a section of
younger minds which was daubing in imbecile imitation of the worst
that the canons of Continental literature had to offer. The public had
turned its back upon this tribe of writers, slow to think and clumsy of
hand. It was in those days of the country’s literature at its lowest
ebb that Tanizaki stalked forth and proclaimed to set up what he
conceived to be new deities in art.
 Many of the writers who find themselves to-day in the fore rank
of Japan’s literary activity owe their success, directly or indirectly, to
the stimulation, and even inspiration in not a few cases, given by
Tanizaki’s work; and some of these were amongst those who were
the first to rally under the standard hoisted by the new prophet of
the hour. Indeed, he is due for a large measure of credit for the new
age on which the literature of Japan has now entered with a fair
spurt of vigor and a supreme confidence, an age of not a few
achievements of intrinsic value, with promises of even greater things
for the future. This accrediting is but fair acknowledgment of the
work of the writer who has been a decidedly predominant force
amongst those helpful in ushering in this new age.
Beyond this, it would perhaps be difficult to go in estimating the
position of the writer who is now at the zenith of his career, and has
still “so many springs and autumns,” as the native phrase goes, to
turn out the work of his maturing mind, as even he continues to do.
Broad of sympathy and versatile of mind, Tanizaki has turned his
hand to more than one form of literary work. Scarcely less successful
in drama than in novels or tales of smaller scope, it would probably
be best to turn to his dramatic work to seek for his expression on
life. However, it is in his briefer stories that his artistic self seems
more congenial with itself, and certainly more enticingly attractive.
The subject of the present translation, chosen from such a point of
view, may not be precisely typical of his mind, but typical certainly is
it of his art.
A work of a dozen years ago, “O-Tsuya Koroshi” has been
followed by products where the author has excelled himself at his
own method, where his artist hand created characters of more
compelling force, where his imagination has woven tapestries of
finer colours,—works of deeper feelings and more polished
craftsmanship; yet, amongst such an array of brilliant records, does
the present story stand out, for the artistry of its own no less than
for the sustaining power of popularity it has displayed. A happier
selection of the subject may have been possible for the introduction
of the present author abroad; but scarce none, I am almost
convinced, wherein to show to better advantage the artist Tanizaki.
The plot of the story develops under circumstances that must be
those of strange unfamiliarity to the Western reader, and the
characters are sometimes concerned with problems that must be of
no less peculiarity, if not lacking in a quaint appeal of their own.
These are, however, details slightly to be treated, certain not to be
an obstruction in following the thread of the narrative, making
almost negligible demand on the imagination of the reader.
For the translation itself, many apologies are due, no doubt; but
less explanation will be necessary, I trust. If it has not been done
with the deftness of one “to the manner born,” of which I am more
than convinced, it has at least been kept faithful, so much so as to
present the process of thought and the mode of expression in the
order it was originally conceived and expressed by the author. The
translation in itself is an acknowledged defeat in its purpose, for it
falls below the artistic heights attained in the original.
Departures from the original text, which are not so many, have
been made only where the translator deemed such to be necessary
as inevitable considerations for a right, if not an exact, presentation
of the tone conveyed in the Japanese, or where,—and these are few
indeed, —a literal translation would result in such ludicrous
incongruities as never meant by the author.
In the face of such obvious difficulties, the present undertaking
has been pursued, and perhaps, with more or less the proverbial
courage of one who treads where the angel dreads, in the conviction
that modern Japan, which has forced itself into a worldly recognition
in the armed profession, should be weighed for achievement of its
mind along some different path, where its passion of a more
peaceful sort, though no less strong, and where aspirations of its
living mind, are concerned; where its people feel its true honour to
be weighing in the balance.
And it is my prayer to the Eight Million Deities that are told to
guard over the shores of Japan, that the present work may speed on
its way overseas, and, though seen through a filmy screen brought
on its face of beauty in the process of recasting in a strange
language, may meet with such reception as it merits in those
countries where the people have shown themselves so ready with
their sympathy in the cases of Hiroshige and Hokusai, of whom
Tanizaki, different as the mode may be, chosen for the expression of
his artistic soul, is certainly a disciple of no mean distinction.
ZENCHI IWADO.
Kamakura, May, 1927.
 AN INTRODUCTION
THE scenes of the present story are laid in the town of Tokyo which
in those days was still known as “Yeddo”—a name to-day seldom
mentioned save in connection with that period of some two hundred
years leading close up to the dawn of the Modern Age of Japan,
generally known as the Restoration, when the fine arts and literature
of the country, with their centre at Yeddo, reached a state of
splendid activity, with few parallels in the history of the country. It
were not going too far, in fact, to say that the name of “Yeddo” to-
day conjures up a period of peace, with the whole nation glorying in
a free and full enjoyment of life, following the dictates of their own
hearts and minds, in a complete deliverance of spirit from the black
reign of the War God. The nation which had returned to peace some
eighty years since, and claimed the rightful heritage of life which had
been denied them under war-like conditions prevailing throughout a
period of some three hundred years, had by this time developed a
civilization quite unique for its romantic fervour. Not a civilization to
be considered in terms of “steam whistles and bicycles,” to be sure;
but a state of artistic emancipation where the soul of man was
honoured and the aspirations of mind exalted. Under the
administration of the Shogun Government, the country fared well,
and even waxed rich in so far as the welfare of the people was
concerned. The piper piped; the people danced. The blade hitherto
kept whetted sharp was now allowed to rest rusting in its sheath.
The hand hardened in war-like training had now turned to the
plough or to the brush and the chisel. Art grew rich and literature
advanced. In the age of the Genroku, the new spirit of the country
had reached a state of ripened mellowness; its name carries to this
day visions of vivid colours and brilliant freedom.
It is back to those times of the “Yeddo” period, deep into the life
of that age, that Tanizaki takes us in his present story. If he has
treated the subject with a modern touch in some aspects, his canvas
is nevertheless done true to the tradition which masters of the age
have left in their supreme understanding of colour and line. Tanizaki
consistently displays himself an unerring judge of the tools at his
service, and is ever sure of the effect to be attained. His colours are
striking, if often bold; his lines always forceful, because simple.
The story concerns a great deal with one particular side of
Japanese life, as it existed in those days of old, and even continues
to this day with but slight changes in certain aspects. It is just the
side where the impassive mask of the Japanese stoic is thrust aside
in a true enjoyment of life; where the best and sweetest in the
Japanese woman is brought forth for the benefit of man. It is a
world of the “geisha” which is generally translated as “singing girls,”
an epithet so misleading, because whatever vocal talent they may be
called upon to display is given not on the stage or in the public, as it
suggests, but is given for the entertainment of men who have
elected to confine themselves in their private company. Not a
community where licensed vice is trafficked; but an institution where
the woman’s artistic attainments and wits, no less than her
personality, are thrown in direct touch with men within encompassed
society,—a system born out of a moral notion that disfavoured open
association between men and women.
Here one particular class of girls and women enjoying social
freedom in much the same sense as we understand it to-day. So
different from their sisters, more honoured but more unfortunate in
many points, the geisha are trained in full consciousness of social
opportunities, developing such qualities as make their personalties
attractively pleasing, and often make possible their own
advancement in life marrying into fortune or position. If the men of
the country, warped in their view of womanhood by the dictates of
certain moral schools, have failed to appreciate their women more
fully than they have done in the past, they have here, at least,
developed a society of unique arrangement to do more justice to
their women, limited though they are in number, and offer them
such opportunity as is denied to the ordinary woman. Nor would it
be too sweeping a statement to say that much of the best in
Japanese womanhood has been brought out only in the girls and
women of the geisha class, who are, at the least, the real moving
spirit of social life of the country.
Those are generalities; not an attempt to deny the existence of
two sides to anything. There are geisha who cheapen or even
disgrace their profession, beside those who grace it, make it dear
not only to the hearts of men, but even of women. If wine flows too
freely where geisha are present, it is not so much their fault as the
men’s. If there are paramour loves where they are concerned, those
things are but incidents, for which the geisha should no more be
censured than the men.
Brief reference to what is generally known as “tea-house,” “ryori-
ya” or restaurant, and “geisha house,” will not be out of place here,
though not exactly essential to the intelligent following of events in
the story. The geisha are almost in all cases brought together to live
within some particular parts of town. This is more for the reason of
convenience than from any other consideration. It is necessary for
them to be within a circumscribed area so as to keep themselves
within easy reach of the “kem-ban,” or the call station which receives
the calls for geisha from “tea-houses”, or restaurants, and transfers
them to the geisha houses.
Girls of the profession, as a rule, live or register themselves at the
houses which are officially known and approved of as places for the
conducting of such business. It is often a case that a house of this
description advances money to a girl just entering on her
professional career, an event involving considerable outlay mostly in
lines of dresses and personal ornaments. The house which charges a
certain rate for the girl’s registration, and often for board, too, takes
for itself a certain percentage on her earnings, toward liquidation of
such advanced accounts as there are.
The geisha herself is paid by the hour while she is present at any
social party where her attendance is called, and such gatherings
take place at tea-houses or restaurants. Whatever she may receive
from guests, or her particular patron, as often the case, through her
own charm, is accounted to her house which also shares in the
benefit. When she has paid off her account to her house, she is
financially free either to establish herself in the trade on her own
account, or remain under the same registration to dispense with
time and care to be claimed as mistress of such place, or quit the
profession if she be so disposed. It is no rare occurrence that a
geisha, smiled upon by fortune, ingratiates herself into sufficient
capitalistic support to maintain her own house with several younger
ones working under her. It is this kind of house that Tsuya, the
heroine of the story, begins to manage, after she has gone a little
way along her career in the geisha business which she espouses
under the sway of her impelling heart as much as through certain
circumstances thrust upon her life.
The party to which a geisha is called in takes place at such a
restaurant, when not at a “tea-house,” as has special working
arrangements with the “kem-ban,” or the call station. A “tea-house”
which in many respects partakes of the character of a restaurant, is
a name as vague as it is misleading; for it is a place for the sole
purpose of holding geisha parties, and what is taken there is of more
vigorous power than the green leaves beverage.
In addition to receiving and dispatching calls for geisha, the
duties of the “kem-ban” include that of keeping track of their
movements, from one place to another, and the work connected with
keeping straight all their accounts receivable from tea-houses and
restaurants. It sends out a man attendant to escort a geisha on her
way to and back from tea-houses and restaurants. It is the character
of such a man escort that Shinsuké, the hero of the present story,
assumes in going out to the country villa of the military officer.
The liking that Tsuya seems to display for the geisha profession,
even while living in comfort and apparent happiness under her
father’s roof, is but an instance of the sentiment shared by so many
of her sex. Always originators or forerunners in fashion, freely
adored by men, independent of thought and aloof from cumbersome
considerations of the conventions, it is no marvel that the geisha
should appeal to so many tender hearts of the country. Tsuya’s
partiality for the gay profession is in no wise to be accounted as a
weakness arising from that particular side of her nature which is
brought out in such glaring colours later in her life. Hers was
decidedly a romantic temperament. Once placed in that life, which
had ever held out to her alluring promises, she was drunk with her
own brilliant success. In the mad whirl of joy and happiness, she
allowed herself to be carried off until she lost sight of her own soul
at some moments. She was too young and too inexperienced to
fight against the temptations besetting her path. She was even
pathetic in her impetuosity to pursue what she fancied to be the
rightful guerdon of beauty and wit.
Her cup of joy was poisoned, and she knew it not. Blinded by her
own brilliance, flattered by the homage so willingly offered at the
alter of her beauty, she chose what she took to be a road of spring
and glory, but to be deceived. For the way led not to a queen’s
garden, but strayed off and trailed into a mist, such as oft seen
across the face of the sky at the time of the cherry blossoms. Her
own life is a song of the cherry,—beautiful, but for its beauty doth
God grant it a spring of but a few fleeting days of glory.
THE TRANSLATOR.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
PAGE
INTRODUCTION
TRANSLATOR’S NOTE i
AN INTRODUCTION ix
PART I 3
PART II 27
PART III 67
PART IV 117
PART V 135
A BIOGRAPHICAL NOTE
Transcriber’s Notes
Part I
 PART I
IT was around the tolling of the fifth hour in the early evening that a
fish monger, of the next street, in a flush of drink and a rush of self-
imposed urgency, sped into the pawn-broking shop of Suruga-ya on
one of his visits, which were more regular than his financial
programme ever seemed to be. He jingled money in his breast
pocket, singled forth two silver pieces, quite bright and new, just
given him, as he explained, by an officer living in the Ginza way, and
asked back such of his dress things as he was evidently to need for
the New Year’s holidays,—livery coat, outer gown, and so forth, now
neglected for three months in pledge. After he left, the business part
of the Suruga-ya, usually so lively, was again to remain quiet without
a single more caller to break the stillness, a thing probably
accountable by the bad weather that evening. Shinsuké who had
been buried in reading, his face between his hands, just behind the
counter railing, literature served in a yellow paper cover of no more
importance than its author, now remembered the little brazier under
his nose and, trying to stir up the fire, well-nigh gone out, muttered
to himself, “What a cold evening!” Then, reaching out his hand to
the apprentice boy, sitting two or three feet off, dozing away in an
undisturbed nap, Shinsuké pulled his ear.
“Shota, wake up for a moment. Sorry to send you out in this
sleeting miserable weather, but I want you to run over like a good
boy to the macaroni house, on the Muramatsu-cho[1], and tell them
to bring two bowls of hot boiled macaroni with fried fish for me,—
and take for yourself whatever you like, too; it’s our bargain.”
“That’s fine! Now that I’m awake, I feel cold and a little hungry.
Before the Master comes back, I’ll let you treat me to something
warm and nice.”
 The youngster bestirred himself, tucking up the lower part of his
clothes and, snatching down a broad-brimmed rain hat hung near
the entrance, sailed out into the sleet and cold.
In the meantime, Shinsuké straightened up the things on the
counter, put the padlock on the store-house, and closed the main
entrance door on the street. “We shall be late coming home to-night,
may even have to stay over till to-morrow morning;—see carefully
that the doors are all fastened, and everything is in order”: said his
master in the early evening, when he was leaving with his wife, on
their visit to a relative over in Yotsuya, just gone into mourning.
Remembering this parting order, Shinsuké, a lantern in hand, set out
looking carefully around, from the kitchen door to the back entrance
gate, up the flight of steps leading from the maids’ quarters, to the
doors on the balcony perched on the roof for clothes line, making
sure of bars and bolts everywhere. As he retraced his way down the
steps, his lantern threw its dim light bringing out of the darkness the
faces of two servant maids, slumbering away so comfortably under
heavy bed-clothes.
“Are you already asleep, O-Tami don[2]?” His query, though voiced
in a tone raised above the ordinary, received no response. Softening
his footfalls even more carefully, through the hallway, whose wood
floor was so cold for his bare feet to hug, he came round to look
over a train of sliding panels that screened the verandah from a
space of inner garden.
The verandah led to one of the best rooms of the house, where a
bed-room lantern shed an elfish light upon the paper doors. It was
generally used by the master and mistress for their living room,
fitted as it was, with the family mortuary shrine, a large sized
brazier, a tea cupboard, and other articles of household
paraphernalia. To-night, Tsuya, the young mistress, had evidently
taken it for herself and gone to bed there.
“Ah, how warm and snug it must be in that room there!” As the
thought flashed through his mind, suddenly he seemed to find
himself face to face with the miseries of his own wretched self, of
the life meted out to a man in menial servitude; his eyes, aglow with
envy, lingered on the soft glow on the paper.
He had now for a full year nursed a deep love for Tsuya whose
feeling toward him was as tender and enduring. However madly they
might love one another, his master’s daughter was out of his reach.
Had he been born to a family of name and means, he would claim
this beautiful Tsuya as his own. It was his wont thus to lament his
own misfortunes in life.
It must have been close upon midnight. The cold air relentlessly
oozed its way into the house. While at a pause in the verandah hall,
Shinsuké shivered as he had to feel the cold draughts coming in
between the sliding doors. Out of the warm depths of his bosom, he
pulled out his hand to take the lantern and relieve his right hand,
which was now chilled to the aching point, and on which he kept
blowing his warm breath. He could feel his thighs so bare and chilly
in their touch against each other, as if they were not his own. His
shivers, however, may not have been accountable by the cold only.
“Is that you. Shin don?” hailed Tsuya, just as he was going past
outside the sleeping room. She either awoke just then, or had been
awake throughout. Then, she apparently opened the shade over the
globe-shaped lantern to turn it toward the hall, for the glow on the
paper outside was thrown into a brighter light.
“Yes, it is myself. The master’s late, and I thought I should go
around to make sure about the doors.”
“You’re ready to turn in, now?”
“No, I shall just stay up all night until the Master comes home.”
As he spoke those words, he lowered himself on his knees outside
the room, placing his hands down, correctly putting himself in an
attitude of respect due to the daughter of the family. Almost at the
same instant, the screen doors were pushed back, opening about a
foot wide.
 “It is cold out there; come in and shut the doors behind.”
Combing back her stray hair, she sat up amidst the silk quilts, her
long-lashed eyes fixed, in open adoration, on the face of the man,
which, even in a subdued light, appeared so white and handsome.
“They have all gone to bed, I suppose?”
“No, young mistress, I expect Shota back from his errand every
second. As soon as he comes, he shall be sent to bed, and until then
—”
“Oh, patience and more patience until I shall have no more!—
When we have got to-night such a chance as we can ever hope for!
Now, listen, Shin don, I hope you, after all this time, are ready to-
night, with your mind made up?”
Tsuya, covered only by her under-robe of bright red dappled
crepe which clung close to the lines of her form, sat unmindful of
her white feet peeking out, in their dainty arrangement, from under
the quilts, as she put her hands together, as in the manner of prayer
offering.
“Whatever do you mean by being ready and so forth, my young
mistress?”
Overcome by the force of the beauty before him, a force that
seemed to sweep away his soul, the man lifted his eyes in a stare
almost too frank and childlike for his twenty years, and waited for
the very answer he was afraid to give to himself.
“Run away with me to Fukagawa, to-night. That’s all I’m going to
say. See how I pray you!”
“Impossible,” he said; but he was really troubled to think how he
might steel himself against what seemed to tempt him with a
stupendous force of voluptuous bewitchery. Since he came into the
service here, as a young lad of fourteen, he had got on so well that
his master had come to repose in him so much confidence as he
would do in few young men. A year or two more of patience and
good work, and his master would set him up in business and, if he
could not have the happiness of marrying the lovely Tsuya, he would
be on his way to whatever fortune and name he might desire. What,
then, would be the happiness of his old parents who were living only
in hopes of such time? The idea of taking advantage of a girl still too
young, the daughter of his own master, was preposterous; he could
not—he should not do it; repeatedly he told himself.
“So, Shin don, you’ve forgotten what you promised me the other
day, have you? Yes, now I see it all through. It was only a plaything
you meant to make of me. And when it came to that, you would
throw me away. It is as plain as I would ever care to see it.”
“It is nothing of the sort that—”
He was about to extend his comforting hands to Tsuya who was
heaving her shoulders with half-stifled sobs, when there came a loud
and persistent knocking on the front door. Taken aback by the
youngster’s announcement of himself, Shinsuké suddenly sprang to
his feet, lantern in hand, a picture of consternation.
“Later, then, I shall be sure to come when Shota has been sent to
bed, and we shall talk it over, as you please. If you are of so strong
a mind as you say, I will think once again, and—”
It was after some moments of a tender struggle that he could
detach himself from Tsuya’s clinging hands. Returning to the front
part of the house, again fully composed, he hastened to open the
small side-door.
“Oh, I’m frozen!” cried the boy, as he darted in, almost head over
heels.
“It’s turned to snow. Shin don,” he reported, brushing off the
snow on the broad hat. “It looks sure like going to pile up thick to-
night.”

It was about an hour later that the young apprentice, having

done justice to his share of the mid-night repast, crawled into bed
and fell asleep. The wind seemed to have blown itself out; but the
snow was evidently going on, for a dead stillness had settled outside
on the streets whence all life had been driven off to slumber.
Shinsuké came back with a few lumps of charcoal which he had
taken out of the trap in the kitchen floor. When they were fed to the
fire in his brazier, he crouched down because he knew no better, a
helpless, lone figure in a corner of the shop. Even as he remained at
such a pause, his thoughts went out to the back quarters of the
house where the young mistress must be awaiting him, with no
thought of sleep. With those things racing through his mind, he felt
himself besieged by the force of his own fate—a fate that seemed to
come on and over him now to determine the course of his life for all
time. If only his master would come back soon, this dreadful
temptation would of itself pass away; his thoughts would, in some
moments, take on such complexion.
There was in back a faint noise of screens being slid, to be
followed by what seemed to be a stealthy tread in the verandah hall.
Shinsuké suddenly leapt to his feet and stole his way toward the
room where he had left her. It was done out of his fear lest the
young mistress, petulant as she was, should make a scene that was
to be averted at all costs. The two found each other where the hall
had a turn.
“Are you all ready, Shin don? I have brought with me enough
money to carry us on for some time. I’ll let you take care of this
purse and everything.”
Tsuya pulled her hands back into her sleeves, and, bulging out
the black satin trimmings across her breast, took out of the depths
of her bosom a purse of yellow cloth which was almost thrust into
his hands. Its weight could not be of less than ten large gold
pieces[3].
“To take not only you away, but even my master’s money;—God’s
vengeance would be heavy!” His protest, however, went no farther;
for he was easily to succumb to her wishes.
 “But it seems to be snowing, unfortunately—I shouldn’t mind; but
you would be frozen to death, if you were to walk all the way out to
Fukagawa, in this terrible weather. So, I say, Tsu chan[4], why not
some other time as well?—and a chance there sure will be yet!”
In speaking of Fukagawa, they had in mind the home of a certain
boatman living in that part of Fukagawa which is called Takabashi.
Seiji, the boatman in case, had been patronized by the Suruga-ya
family for ten long years. What with clam-gathering picnics to the
sand-bars around the forts of Shinagawa and the customary parties
at the river festivity of Ryogoku, he had made himself familiar with
Tsuya and Shinsuké. In addition to the calls he was in custom to
make at the time of the “Bon”[5] holidays and just before the New
Year, he would occasionally pay his respects to the Suruga-ya. It was
his wont as much as his privilege to seat himself, on such occasions,
in a corner of the kitchen over a treat of drinks, and plunge into an
open admiration of the beautiful daughter of the house.
“Talk of a picture of prettiness, I’ve seen nothing to beat our
young lady here,” he would glibly start off. “I don’t care what people
say, I say there isn’t anybody in this big town to match with this
beautiful thing here. Asking for pardon for me saying this, if she
were a geisha girl, I would never stay behind, such as I am, yet not
without a stretch of time ahead of me to be as old as fifty.”
As he would harp away in his droll fashion, he would sometimes
even allow himself so much liberty as to lay his hold on Tsuya’s
sleeve, saying: “Be good, O-Tsu chan, and grant me the wish of my
life,—bless me with a cupful from your own hands. Not for a long
time—just one cupful, and never more than that—”
And the folk would laugh at what they looked on as a good
natured mimicry of one who might make bold to advance on her
attention.[6]
A man trading on river traffic, running wherries to carry fares
going up to and coming from Yanagibashi, Fukagawa, Sanya,
Yoshiwara, the gay quarters clustered along and about the only
watercourse of the town, and living mostly within the pale of a world
where wine flowed and folks feared not to talk of sins, the
boathouse master Seiji was a man of enough understanding, and he
may well have sensed, for some time now, the love that had secretly
been growing between the young lady of the family and the young
man. However, he breathed never a word about it, in any way, if he
did know, strangely enough of a man who enjoyed so much to talk.
The first time that he ever came out with his knowledge of the affair
was about a month ago when he paid one of his casual visits, after
what he said had been a trip to Yanagibashi, and gave airing to what
had lain in the back of his head. For that day, the family had planned
a theatre party, from which Tsuya excused herself under a feigned
pretext of illness; for a chance to be alone in the company of
Shinsuké was too precious. Not to disappoint the whole family on
her sole account, her parents took their two maids instead, and went
out to the theatre in the early morning.[7] The shop had been left in
charge of the little Shota alone, while Shinsuké had been spending
most of his time at the bedside of Tsuya, charged with what was
termed as nursing the ill young lady. It was just at one of such times
that the boatman Seiji tripped in, his face florid and jolly, as usual,
from drinking. He ahemed, smirked, and went straight in to slap the
young man on the shoulder.
“Shin don, I wish you all the luck and pleasure! You thought I
knew nothing about this, didn’t you? It’s a long time, believe me,
since I smelt a rat. People are blind, but mighty hard to pull the wool
over my eyes. Not that I mean to speak to our master about it. So,
you might as well own up to it, now. And, why couldn’t I be of some
help to you, some time? Only natural, I say, that it should come to
this, when a beautiful young lady is living in the same house as a
boy as handsome as those we see only on the stage. And me,—a
funny thing,—for, if I see a young pair like yourselves, madly in love
with each other and in trouble, I want to do something just to help
them out,—somehow,—I don’t care how much trouble it means,—so
I may see them happy together, always. It’s some queer thing in me
that does it, I suppose.”
 Taken quite off their guard, the young pair helplessly looked at
one another, as they felt cold shudders run down their backs. Seiji,
however, framed himself in an air of so knowing assurance and
worked himself up into voluble exuberance, for the reason he
seemed to know the best.
“A man who means to love must never be so weak-kneed. Might
as well come out with the whole thing, and why not? You shouldn’t
keep such a thing in your young hearts and suffer. It would be a far
sight better—a short cut, too, if I were to take the whole thing up
with the master and reason him into allowing you both to marry. No
flattery, but Shin don ought to be a good enough man, what of his
handsomeness, clean mind, and cleverness. I should be surprised if
our master wouldn’t agree to it.”
“If that were possible, we should ask him ourselves, without
giving you the trouble.”
The young Shinsuké was inveigled, in spite of himself, into giving
a full account of the situation they were in. Tsuya was the sole
heiress of the family, and he was the only child his old parents had;
each was bound to remain in his or her own family. However much
they might think, there was no way in which to make their marriage
possible.[8]
“I would kill myself, if we couldn’t be together!”
Tsuya broke down on this, after she had followed the rueful
account of her beloved one; she sobbed as one no longer able to
fight down her rising emotion.
“Calm yourself, young lady, calm yourself,” consoled the boatman.
“Now, I know what I could do. Listen to me. You will run away from
here and come to my place. It will be just a way to get round the
trouble, and I know what I talk about. You can leave the rest to me.
I will see the old folks of both sides, and, depend on it, I shall
reason it out with them and get them to agree to it!”
 In fact, the young lovers had talked of eloping earlier in the very
same evening. Seiji’s suggestion came to prompt Tsuya in her ready
decision, right then and there. Shinsuké, however, had not been able
to see his way quite so clear in his decision to this day, and even to
this moment.
“Do you mean to back out, now?”
As she spoke, she clasped the wrists of the man who still lingered
in a pensive attitude, his hands folded and his head drooped low.
With her form bent over, like a bamboo bough under a heavy
weight, she leaned herself against him. She fidgeted, fretted, and
shook him, threatening with “I’ll kill myself, if you don’t come.”
“I give way! I can’t be firm! And let things take care of
themselves, for I go with you, as you say.”
Shinsuké quickly went back to the shop, and pulled his own
wicker box out of the deep recess of the closet. He took out of it a
heavy cotton dress and changed it for the one he had on. It was a
gift out of his father’s old wardrobe and the only piece of clothing
that had not been given him during these years of service. He felt he
could not go off in any of these clothes without his thanks to his
master. Then, going to the case at the side entrance, he noiselessly
picked out Tsuya’s lacquered pair of rain-clogs which he hugged
tightly under his arm, as if he treasured them, in retracing his way to
the verandah.
The sight of the girl at a pause there. He was almost aghast to
think that she meant to go out in this bitterly cold weather in such
attire; her hair bared to be seen in its freshly made coiffure, silk
checker dress of bright gold and black, heavy sash of brocaded satin
girt just below the breast,—and nothing to cover her feet.[9] She
who had always shown, with a woman’s instinct, a partiality for the
piquant manner of the geisha, would assert her taste even before
such a venture.
“Come, here is our way,” said Shinsuké, as he dropped into the
garden, by pushing the doors open two or three feet at the end of
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