Chapter XXVI

Toying with his power, a venal official demands a wedding night;

Playing at death, a stubborn father offers an additional drink

Dawn came quickly, and the sound of the temple bell when whaled upon¹ startled the pair awake. They arose as one, made their orderly preparations as always, and then hurriedly quit the inn. But when they were outside they found themselves reluctant indeed to part, so that Gakuzō resolved to accompany Shino toward Koga until the sun had fully risen to see him off, while Shino meant to walk back toward Edo to see Gakuzō off. Affectionate deference one to the other kept them until the heavens had lightened in the east, and now there was no time for seeing off.

As they stood in the shade of the row of pines, Gakuzō lowered his voice and said, “You, milord, will go to Koga, and there the greater part of everything will be accomplished. I once had occasion to ask someone how things stand there, and he said that while the generals Yūki, Satomi, and the rest originally stood with the Koga lord as allies, now each is in his own country, and that lord now musters just enough of a force to support him, as a cauldron on its tripod. One among his men, Yokohori Fuhito Arimura, is the Minister of the Court Nariuji’s chief adjutant, wielding great power. All rewards and punishments, promotions and demotions, go according to his whim, or so I was informed by one who knows. You must set your sights on him.”

Shino nodded. “I myself have heard the same. I shall go there, explain the circumstances, reveal my late father’s dying will, present the precious blade, and, if I am given employ, remain. If, however, a wild cross-current stalls my boat—if voices from either side reject me, or if it proves that powerful retainers, jealous of ability, admit men to employ only on the basis of bribery—then there will be nothing for me to do but leave posthaste. We have not been in service since my grandfather’s generation. In ancient days, wise lords chose carefully their retainers; in the world as it is today, a retainer must also choose his lord well. If I am not employed, then that will be that. If I want to raise myself up, then I must not limit myself to His Lordship of Koga. I propose to leave everything to the appropriate time. What think you?”

Gakuzō was most impressed. “Virile, valiant words! All who harbor lofty aspirations must think even as you do. All I beg is that you send word to me privily to let me know if you advance or retreat. I shall expect to see you again before very long.”

Shino shifted his sedge hat from his left hand to his right, saying, “Well, then, here is where we must part ways. The heat looks to grow only worse—take every care for yourself, I pray you.”

Still unable to unravel all that was in their hearts, they at last parted, one to go east, one west.

We leave them to rejoin Hikiroku and Kamezasa, who, having sent Shino away, knew great relief. Their first act then was to calculate together: “’Tis probable that Shino may never reach Koga, but will be taken care of on the way there by Gakuzō. And even if Gakuzō should fail and be struck down himself, the sword Shino carries is a counterfeit. Suppose he reaches His Lordship of Koga: what can he do? He must be charged with insolence—he will be bound, and his head struck off. One way or another, now that he has once left us, he will not return to us alive; we can rest easy on Shino’s account. Our only worry now is Hamaji’s illness. Only a few days have passed since we received the tokens of her betrothal, but every day Master Nurude sends secret notes to remind us. Now that Shino is gone, he will hardly brook further delay. We must at all costs mollify her—nothing could be better than to marry her off immediately.”

As they colluded in secret, another missive arrived from Gobaiji. Hikiroku hurriedly tore open the sealed wrapper and read it. The letter contained the same reminder as yesterday of the promised bride, the same reproach for the delayed nuptials, the same anger communicating itself through the writing, but it caused Hikiroku to quail more abjectly than before as he showed it to Kamezasa. “His Honor is so impatient—’tis as if he were unsure of my intent. But we have sent Shino away: now, at any rate, we shall do it, and it will be done. I will go for an interview with him—get out those trousers of mine, please. Go, go,” he said, heading for his closet.

Kamezasa preceded him, removing the lid of the clothes chest and pulling out various pairs of hempen trousers; she held a pair up for him while Hikiroku tied the cords and thrust his legs into the garment. Then, slinging his sword from his waist, he stepped outside, where he thanked Gobaiji’s messenger for his labors, saying, “I shall deliver my response to your master in person. Let us go, I pray you.” He allowed the messenger to lead him to where Nurude dwelt.

Kamezasa, meanwhile, was left to pass the time with wondering if “this or that might happen,” and to grow with every passing minute more disturbed—as the quenchless summer sun began to sink, she waited expectantly for her husband, who had not yet returned. She gazed up at the heavens, at the clouds dispersing now to visit evening storms upon some other place; she saw the slanting rays of evening sun and knew that it was now the hour of the monkey, always shunned for giving brides away. And though he had not hung his liver out to dry,² here came her husband Hikiroku, hurrying back, his face besmeared with dust and perspiration; he came in through the back, and Kamezasa quickly looked him over. Finally out she stepped to welcome him: “And why are you so late? When I can hardly stand to be indoors, I can imagine well the heat you have endured. And what of that you went to do—did all end well?

Then Hikiroku smiled at her and said, “The council that we had was passing strange: and I will tell you of it at our leisure. ’Tis hot, indeed.” He undid his sash and flung it aside, and then changed his sweaty hempen robes for new and sat on the veranda, near the eaves. His wife picked up a fan and took her place standing behind him, fanning him. Hikiroku looked back at her and continued.

“Kamezasa, put that down. That council instilled in me a renewed sense of urgency, such that we can no longer afford such security as this. But first let me give you cause to rejoice. Just now I went to our go-between and told him that as of this morning we have at last rid ourselves of Shino; I whispered to him of our previous sufferings on this account; I also informed him of Hamaji’s ailment. I left nothing out, and Master Nurude, having heard all this, said: ‘That is reassuring for both of us. As for the bride’s ailment, it does not sound serious. I can neither hasten nor delay the nuptials on my own initiative. I would inform Lord Hikami: wait here a while, I pray. I go, but shall return.’ Bowing, he departed with a servant in tow.

“I waited and I waited, until some two hours or more had passed. Then Master Nurude returned, and this is what he said: ‘I related the particulars of the affair to Lord Hikami, and he was uncommonly joyful. His bride is bedridden with illness, but given that this is a development of the last day or two, may it not be a simple cold? This being the case, we should welcome her to our midst immediately, that she may be given proper treatment and nursing, and that the groom himself might administer unto her medicinal draughts. This will produce the greatest effect on her, we are sure. However, His Lordship is not in the castle at present, and so we have not yet submitted our formal request that the marriage be recognized. Furthermore, my father recently passed away, not a month since, and we have compunctions regarding a gala ceremony; in all things we are making simplicity and restraint our guide. The diviners say that tomorrow is a very auspicious day, celestially speaking, for any undertaking—therefore, while we shall forgo the groom’s visit, I myself shall call at the Estatesman’s dwelling tomorrow evening in the hour of the boar,³ and bring the bride back here in secret. A few days will not be too long to wait to request license for this wedding. It will be what is commonly called an underling marriage. Tomorrow at twilight we shall send her the raiment and effects, only what she will require immediately. All of this I was earnestly bidden to tell you at once, and to obtain your agreement thereto. Should anything go wrong tomorrow night, then not only you, milord, but I myself as go-between, shall have no alternative but to slit our bellies. Therefore acquiesce with me in forgoing the exchange of cups tomorrow night. The bride’s conveyance shall be prepared according to the forms, and shall not be late.’

“I could hardly refuse him. ‘I undertake to do as Your Honor says,’ I said. ‘But ’tis all so sudden. I cannot predict whether Hamaji will have arisen by then, but unless she absolutely refuses to gird herself and make herself up, then come what may I shall serve Your Honor.’ Accepting this charge, I left. But should Hamaji, confused and lost, say she will not go, then our happiness is overturned, and calamity come upon our house. My uneasiness is all upon this score. Go to her and arrange things, I pray you.”

Kamezasa nodded. “I have long been concerned about the expenses to be incurred in providing her with raiment and effects beyond her station—after all, the Estatesman’s daughter though she is, she is to have His Lordship the Lieutenant to husband—I was sick at heart about it, but so impatient is the groom that he has alleviated us of the need for capital. But will Hamaji be convinced? I have misgivings. If I cannot persuade her, then you must threaten her that”—and she whispered to him what he must say.

But Hikiroku did not allow her to finish. “I have been prepared to do that all along. Now go, go quickly!” Kamezasa needed no more urging; she went to Hamaji’s bedroom.

Meanwhile, Hamaji’s every thought on Shino turned: she bound him in her breast, e’en as she shut herself up in her room; the summer day to her and her alone was autumn’s dusk; a locust husk, she, hollowed out by grief, did raise her cries e’en as she sank behind her waist-high screen; she lay a while, and then she sat a while, and then she leaned a while upon her bedclothes.

Kamezasa then the sliding door slid open and stepped in: she nearer came and said, “The dog days are not past—yet what is this? We cannot let you droop and hide like this! Are you displeased with anything?” she asked, while peering at Hamaji’s face.

“You are awake, my dear. That I can see. And have you eaten yet? If there is anything you fancy, I shall have it brought, whatever it may be. Even a little sake, in which you normally never indulge, might be as medicine to you on such an occasion. Pray, will you not lift your spirits? I have been so busy these last three or four days with things connected with Shino’s departure—this morning I was so fatigued that I simply dawdled in bed—but when I thought of you so ill you could not get up, nor even raise your head, I simply could not rest. But since I last looked in on you, it seems the medicines have done their work—your color is quite good. Tomorrow you will have recovered, I think.

“Many of the illnesses from which we suffer, you know, proceed from our minds. Physician I am not, and yet I think your symptoms I have rightly diagnosed. It is a person, and yet it is not: ’tis Shino who sticks in your throat like a lump, I think. You love one-sidedly and emptily as any abalone shell tossed aside. It is true that you were affianced to one another when you were both very small—but what are we to do? He so resents his father’s untimely death that for years he has regarded His Eminence [meaning hikiroku] as his enemy—long has he been honing the blade of his heart. The great evil inside him has started to show itself: the people everywhere begin to talk, the villagers avoid him now, and so he cannot any longer live in Ōtsuka. And this is why he says he goes to Koga, but he lies—in truth, he but absconds.

“From just these motives he yesterevening slyly pushed His Eminence out of a fishing boat on the River Kaniwa. Shino himself leapt in after him and tried to hold him under the water, and it was only through the assistance of the oarsman that His Eminence escaped without harm. Was this not a case of what the proverb calls killing two birds with one stone? If you think your mother speaks idly—if you doubt me—then ask Gakuzō when he returns. What must such a stupid villain, who would aim his bow at his aunt, his own flesh and blood, and at his aunt’s husband, to whom he owes such a debt of gratitude—what must he think of one who is his wife in name only, with whom he has never spent a single night? To remain chaste and faithful to a false man more fearsome than tiger or wolf, and to lay sufferings on her parents’ heads by making herself ill—is this the behavior of a virtuous woman?

“Understand this principle, and think no more of him from this moment on. We shall marry you to a fine man, one a hundred times worthier of admiration than that beast. I have not told you yet, but you are to have as your husband none other than the Lieutenant, Master Hikami Kyūroku, who when he stayed with us last month was so taken with you that he decided to stretch a point and take you to wife, in spite of the unworthiness of the father-in-law he will be gaining. He sent a go-between to tell us all this: Master Nurude, who himself holds a dignified post. The disparity in their respective stations makes the Lieutenant and the Estatesman rather like the proverbial paper lantern and temple bell, similar in form but different in every way that matters. Nevertheless, fervent discussion brought about this happiness for our house.

“This will allow your parents to remain abreast of the waves of age that begin to wash over them—surely your sense of filial piety will not allow you to refuse—but your father is old-fashioned, and he could not guess what feelings might lurk in your breast, particularly while Shino was here, hateful though he was; he hesitated—he refused twice, thrice—but somebody has already told the Lieutenant of Shino’s absconding, and Master Nurude has redoubled his prodding, and now we have no way to evade them. We have been forced to undertake the marriage—the wedding will be soon. For this reason, too, I wish that you might quickly recover from your illness, that you might set your parents’ minds at rest. There is hardly a three-year-old in the world today who does not know desire—lose not your way, do nothing you will regret later.”

With cunning words did Kamezasa thus seek to win Hamaji over, but her arguments instead crushed her daughter’s spirits. No longer could the girl support herself—beneath the weight of pent-up sobs she sank. The pain that filled her breast welled o’er in tears that fell like balls of hail that crush themselves against the shingles, rain that soaked her sleeves that never dried—and if they rot, she thought, then let them rot! Oh, why should my dear husband’s name be muddied with these false and baseless accusations? Then she braced and lashed her wav’ring heart that she might strive to pick apart the cords that hemmed her in: at length she raised her head and spoke.

“How truly unforeseen this marriage was, these nuptials that unite me with a foe, how difficult for me to understand! Yet saying so makes me unfilial, as if I for my parents nothing cared. You may, for all I know, berate me for a child that knows not how a child should act, and yet, ’tis for my parents’ very sake that I refuse this match: ’tis this child’s part. You only speak of Master Inuzuka so ill because you fear that he has not forgot his ancient grudge against you two. But he and I for nearly ten years now have grown up together, under one roof, and I have never seen nor heard evil in him, but only the most conscientious of conduct toward you both. What reason could there be for anyone to say his heart is set on anything besides the welfare of this house? And who could say such things, I know not—they seem to me the calumny of those who nurture hatreds. And though even such a man as he so failed to accord with your hearts that you chased him hence, our fates were once bound together: never can there be a man for me other than Master Inuzuka. And even if he has, for whate’er cause, absconded, ne’ertheless without a writ from him divorcing me, another man can only be to me a dalliance, illicit in appearance—and then should I be called seductress—tell me, is’t not so? No word from parents is needed to make the road of marriage harder yet: ’tis heavy bedclothes, layered on at night. And if I add another layer,⁴ how and for whose sake could I desire such wealth and glory gained unrighteously? You say he was my husband only in name, who never shared my bed nor nuptial day, yet when you first gave me to him as wife and said you would yield post and pay to him, ’twas not a matter of your parental will alone, but also of the villagers’ mediation, of which there are many proofs, are there not? Therefore, although we were never wed, who shall say we are not man and wife? Until Master Inuzuka himself hands me a writ of divorcement, I cannot follow your instructions in this, mother. Forgive me, I pray you.”

The persistence of her reasoning, the intelligence of her argument, the manly bravery of her words, like glistening jewel-like dew on leaves of speech, had overwhelmed the glare of authority in her mother’s face. Kamezasa could not get a sentence out—her rising irritation was expressed in incoherent mumblings—helplessness was evident in every glance. But then the door burst open, and Hikiroku, who had been listening outside, came in and sat down heavily beside his wife.

He blew his nose most tearfully and said, “Kamezasa, say nothing further. Hear me, Hamaji: I heard everything from there, all of this constancy of yours so embarrassing for your parents. Your mother surely feels, and so do I, an impotent regret at causing you to say such rash things. And I can understand how you might feel, in ignorance of reasons why, that we in growing old had sunk deep in our lusts, forgotten gratitude and righteousness, and thus engaged you to what is for you a wayward marriage. But have you never heard the proverb that says a child cannot know its parent’s heart? Were Shino, whom we have raised from an unshorn youth, a true man, as you say, then how could he conceive such worldly passions and desires? Evil you mistook for good: in this you were deceived in your reliance on him as your husband.

“Think you your parents have but woman’s wit? ’Tis pointless to resent him now, when his absence makes it impossible to refuse His Lordship the Lieutenant’s entreaties, the hard marriage bargaining of one who encompasses us like the longest of ropes, overshadows us like the greatest of trees. Were I to refuse him then reprisals would swiftly visit not only myself, but my wife and child also. And so, although I knew not what you felt, this afternoon I accepted him—I never could have left otherwise—and the dowry has already arrived—he urgently desires the union, and has specified the day—he says he shall welcome you as a guest, at first. Think you that any alterations will be allowed at this point, solely on account of your feelings? Your groom is the Lieutenant! The go-between is one of his officials! If we provoke their ire, they could easily turn this village into an empty nest. Most likely it is fate that after sixty years this house should fall, but what profit is there in seeing my wife killed, my child killed, and then dying myself? And this is why I have made up my mind. ’Twas this shriveled belly of mine that persuaded me to rashly intromit his dowry; I have no other course than slitting it. Hail Amitabha Buddha!”

Even as he intoned the Name, he drew his blade with a flash and set its point against his belly. Kamezasa cried, “Oh, oh!” and clung to his elbow to stay his hand, while Hamaji, in a fluster, said, “You are quite right to be so angry. But first put away from you the blade, I pray you!”

He shook his head and said, “No, no, I will not put it away! Kill me, kill me!”

At last Kamezasa had embraced him, subduing his madness. She looked back over her shoulder and said, “Hamaji, you think a little moxa on the right node will solve things, but it will not! You can kill your father or not—it is entirely your choice. Is staying his hand the limit of your sense of duty? Dullard!”

Thus scolded, Hamaji wiped away her jewel-like tears and said, “Yea, though I am known for a chaste woman, if it only makes me an unfilial daughter, I shall still have failed to do what is proper to a person. I will do as you tell me.”

Kamezasa nodded. “Intelligently spoken. Listen to me,” she then said to Hikiroku. “She has said she will forget Shino and accept Lord Hikami. Now sheathe your blade, I pray you.”

Hikiroku unclenched his fists. “Then Hamaji has heard my arguments? If you lie, I would die this instant—if you mean to alter your resolve later, better not to stop me now—kill me!” He pressed his advantage.

“Needless are your doubts. I will do as you say,” she said. Her voice with tears was choked: it died within her as she sank down to the floor.

“Then it is finished,” Hikiroku said, a smile of satisfaction on his face as he exchanged glances with Kamezasa and put his blade away.

“A precarious thing,” said Kamezasa, as Hikiroku drew his open collar closed again. She stood and left her husband’s side to return to Hamaji, who had collapsed in sobs. Kamezasa stroked her back and offered her again a medicinal draught. With cunning words she comforted the girl with blandishments unsolicited, delivered with an obvious intent.

Her parents took it in turn to watch over her and nurse her through the night, so that Hamaji, who had made up her mind to die, had not the opportunity: she greeted the dawn under guard, and now, so soon, it was the nineteenth. Shiftless servants proudly repeated their master’s mutterings that “His Lordship the groom comes this night”; their mouths would not stay shut as they wiped the doors and screens, cursing and calling for “a nail! some paper!” Their voices and the sounds of starch-spreading and hammering pierced through to Hamaji—as the saying goes, a hammer stroke will not be silenced. “Oh, wretched am I!” she thought. “’Tis to be tonight! My parents concealed it from me, the better to maneuver me into accepting the nuptial cup. But I shall not live long enough to be taken to wife by another man!”

But neither did she raise a fuss: she assumed a somewhat pleasant expression for the day, pressed into place her unruly sidelocks, and then, in the solitude of her bedroom, rearranged her hair with her comb of parting⁵—only her parting was with the world.

It would be like counting a comb’s teeth to enumerate the exigencies that kept the household scurrying about, examining Hamaji’s effects in preparation for sending her away at dusk, preparing food and drink for the banquet. Time and time again Kamezasa stopped by Hamaji’s bedroom to inquire in comforting tones after her welfare; when she saw that her daughter had put up her hair of her own volition, she inwardly rejoiced. “We never told her that the wedding was tonight, and yet she overheard somehow, and does it not appear that she now anticipates it? This eagerness belies her prior word, but even that is maidenly in her. Some reassurance at last.”

She whispered these things to her husband, and Hikiroku, too, was glad. After a time he went to her bedroom for a look, and indeed, with her hair tied up she had the air of an ailing Xi Shi⁶—her hairline was a perfect image of Mount Fuji in the summer, unadorned—he looked at her in wonder, daughter of his though she was. “Perhaps she knows she will be getting the best groom in Japan, China, or India,” he pondered, “but still, I shall not tell her until the moment arrives.” Then he lost himself in trivial matters, running outside and calling, “You there, do this—do that,” cursing and railing, with no time to rest eyes or mouth in his efforts to erect, by ordering his servants, a human bridge to the night’s event.

End of Book III of Volume III of the Lives of the Eight Dogs of the Satomi

1. Bakin writes the characters for “whale sound” but glosses them “bell’s voice.” “Whale sound” was a Chinese idiom for the sound of a temple bell; it had been explained by a Tang-era commentator as deriving from legends of the pulao, an aquatic dragon-like creature that, when attacked by whales, made a mighty cry. Temple bells often had pulao decorations, and bell strikers were thought of as whales. See Wen xuan, commentary on “Dongdu fu” (J. Tōto fu).

2. In the legend of the jellyfish and the monkey, the undersea Dragon King’s daughter becomes sick, and the king lures a monkey into his kingdom in order to remove its liver and feed it to his daughter; the monkey tricks a jellyfish into telling him why he has been captured. The quick-thinking monkey then tells the jellyfish that he left his lever on a tree to dry, so the jellyfish takes the monkey back to the land; in this way the monkey escapes. The Dragon King punishes the jellyfish by removing his shell and bones. The hour of the monkey is late afternoon, just before sunset.

3. Late at night, just before the midnight hour.

4. Reference to poem #1963 in the early thirteenth-century collection Shin Kokin wakashū, which plays on the homophonic pairing of tsuma (“mate”) and tsuma (“hem”), as of a robe used as bedclothes. The poem, composed on the theme of “the prohibition on adultery,” holds that the weight of one tsuma (mate or layer of bedclothes) is enough without adding another.

5. A “comb of parting” (wakare no kushi) was a farewell gift given by the emperor to the princess chosen to serve as the vestal priestess of the Ise Shrine.

6. A legendary beauty of Spring and Autumn–era China. King Goujian of the conquered state of Yue gave her as a gift to King Fuchai of Wu, his conqueror; Fuchai became so engrossed in her beauty that Wu’s power declined, and Goujian was able to conquer it. Xi Shi’s frailty was thought to be particularly alluring.