A Cat a Man and Two Women Read online

  ‘Tanizaki is a very brilliant novelist.’

  – Haruki Murakami

  ‘A really great writer… Tanizaki has got this warm ticklishness to his strangeness.’

  – David Mitchell

  ‘Even his lighter-hearted fictions… make us hold our breath, and the endings don’t let us quite exhale.’

  – John Updike

  ‘The outstanding Japanese novelist of the century.’

  – Edmund White, New York Times Book Review

  A CAT, A MAN,

  AND TWO WOMEN

  Junichiro Tanizaki

  Translated by Paul McCarthy

  DAUNT BOOKS

  Contents

  Title Page

  A Cat, A Man, And Two Women

  About the Author

  Selected works by Junichiro Tanizaki

  Copyright

  Dear Fukuko,

  Please forgive me – I had to borrow Yuki’s name for the return address on this letter. But it’s not really Yuki, I’m afraid. From what I’ve said, I’m sure you’ve already guessed who it is – or rather, you must have known from the moment you opened the envelope. ‘Oh, it’s her,’ you said to yourself – then, getting angry, ‘How rude! She’s got some nerve, using a friend’s name so I’d read the letter.’ But just think for a moment, Fukuko. If I’d used my own name, he would have seen it and intercepted the letter. I’m sure of that. And I wanted to be sure you’d read this. So, you see, there was no other way. But please set your mind at rest – I have no intention of blaming you for what happened, or playing on your sympathy. If I wanted to, a letter ten or twenty times as long as this wouldn’t be enough. But that wouldn’t serve any purpose now, would it? Ah-ha-ha-ha – no indeed. Why, I’ve really become quite strong, after all I’ve been through. I don’t spend all my time crying, you know – even though I have plenty of reasons to cry, and to be angry. But I decided not to think about things like that any more – just carry on with my life as cheerfully as I know how. After all, only God knows what will happen to anybody in this life, so it’d be foolish to let yourself hate and envy other people because of their good fortune, wouldn’t it?

  Of course I know it’s rude of me to write to you directly like this – I may not have much education, but I know that much. But I’ve had Mr Tsukamoto mention this to him lots of times, and he just won’t listen. So the only way left was for me to ask you for help. Put like that, it sounds like I’m going to ask you to do something difficult, but it won’t be any trouble to you at all, really. There’s just one thing I want from you. And of course by that I don’t mean I want you to return him to me. No, it’s something much, much more trivial than that. It’s Lily I want. From what Mr Tsukamoto says, he wouldn’t mind giving her to me, but you keep saying no.

  Oh, Fukuko, could that be true? Are you actually interfering with the granting of my one and only wish? Please consider, Fukuko: I gave you the man who meant more to me than life itself! And not only that – I gave you everything from that happy household we’d built together as a couple. I didn’t take so much as a broken teacup away with me. I didn’t even get back most of the things I brought with me when I married him! Of course it may be better not to have things around that would bring back sad memories of the past, but don’t you think you could at least let me have Lily? I won’t make any other unreasonable demands. I’ve put up with everything – I’ve been beaten up, knocked down, and trampled on. Considering all I’ve sacrificed, is it too much to ask for one little cat in return? To you it’s just a worthless little animal, but what a consolation it would be to me! … I don’t want to seem like a cry baby, but without Lily I’m so lonely I can hardly stand it … Why, there’s nobody in this whole world who’ll have anything to do with me now, except for that cat. I’ve been completely defeated, and now do you really want to make me suffer even more? Are you that cruel, that you don’t feel even a grain of pity for me in my loneliness, my unhappiness?

  No, no – you’re not that kind of person. I understand that perfectly. It’s not you who won’t give Lily up, but him. Yes, I’m sure of it. He loves her. ‘I might be able to do without you,’ he used to say, ‘but do without Lily? Never!’ And he always paid much more attention to her than he did to me at the dinner table, and in bed. So why doesn’t he just come right out and say he doesn’t want to let her go? Why does he put the blame on you? This is something for you to think about, Fukuko …

  Well, he got rid of nasty old me and has started a new life with you, the girl he loves. As long as it was me he was with, he needed Lily. But why should he now? Isn’t she just a bother to have around? Or could it be that even now, without her, there’d be something missing? And does that mean that he looks on you, like me, as something a little lower than a cat? Oh but forgive me, I’ve gone and said more than I meant to! … I’m sure he wouldn’t be as stupid as that. Still, the fact that he’s trying to hide his feelings for Lily and blame everything on you might mean that he’s a little worried … Oh dear – silly me, going on as if it was my business. But anyway, do be careful, Fukuko dear. Don’t think ‘Oh, it’s just a cat,’ or you may find yourself losing out to it in the end. I would never give you bad advice – I’m thinking of you, not myself, in all this. Get Lily away from him just as soon as you can. And if he refuses to let her go, won’t that seem even more suspicious? …

  Fukuko stored all this away and began to observe Shozo and Lily’s behaviour more carefully. She watched Shozo enjoying his saké, with a dish of marinated horse mackerel to go with it. He took a sip, then put the small cup down and said ‘Lily!’ Picking up a fish with his chopsticks, he held it high in the air. Lily had been standing on her hind legs with her forepaws resting on the edge of the oval dining table and staring, motionless, at the fish lying on the plate in front of her master. She looked like a customer propping himself up against a bar somewhere, or like one of the gargoyles gazing down from the spires of Notre Dame. When the piece was lifted from the plate, Lily’s nostrils began to quiver and her large, intelligent eyes grew quite round, as if with human amazement, as she gazed up at the longed-for morsel.

  But Shozo was not inclined to give in so easily. ‘Heeere it goes!’ he teased, dangling the fish right in front of Lily’s nose before suddenly snatching it away and popping it into his own mouth. Then he noisily slurped away at the dressing that covered the mackerel, crunched through the brittle bones, and began the whole process again with the next piece. Bringing it close, then withdrawing it to a distance, raising it, then lowering it, he tantalised the cat. Lifting her paws from the table and bringing them up high on either side of her chest in ghostly fashion, Lily began to pursue the fish, tottering after it on her hind legs. If the prey was brought to a standstill just over her head, the cat would fix it intently with her eyes and then make a leap for it, darting out with her front paws to seize it. She would just fail to get it, fall back, then leap again. It took her five or ten minutes of such frantic activity to secure one mackerel.

  Shozo repeated the same thing over and over again. He would give her a fish, then himself a little drink, and calling ‘Lily’ would raise the next prize high. There must originally have been some twelve or thirteen mackerel on Shozo’s plate, each about two inches long, of which he himself had actually eaten perhaps three or four. For the rest, he had simply sucked out a bit of the vinegar dressing before giving the flesh to Lily.

  ‘Ohh-ohh … owww! That hurts!’ Shozo let out a shriek: Lily had leapt onto his shoulders and dug in her claws.

  ‘Get down! Get down from there!’

  It was past the middle of September, and the last traces of summer heat were fading away; but Shozo, who, like most fat people, disliked the heat and was prone to sweating, had brought a low table out to the edge of the back veranda, now muddy from a recent flood. He sat on top of it, wearing only linen half-drawers, a short-sleeved undershirt, and a woollen stomach band. The shoulders Lily had jumped onto were fleshy and round like little hills; and to keep from sliding off she naturally had to use her claws. As they dug through the thin cotton undershirt and bit into Shozo’s flesh, he gave another cry of pain.

  ‘Get down from there, you—’ he shouted, shrugging his shoulders violently and leaning to one side to encourage her to leap off. But the cat, determined to maintain her perch, just dug her claws in deeper until Shozo’s undershirt began to be dappled with spots of blood.

  Yet, though he grumbled about her ‘wildness’, he could never bring himself to be really angry with her. Lily seemed to be fully aware of this as she gently rubbed her face against his cheek with little flattering noises and, if she saw that his mouth was full of fish, boldly brought her own right up to her master’s. If Shozo interrupted his chewing to poke out a piece of fish with his tongue, Lily would nimbly dart her head forward to seize the morsel. Occasionally she would devour it all at once; at other times, she would lick the remnants from around Shozo’s mouth, carefully and complacently. There were even times when cat and master would contend for the same piece, each tugging at one end. Then Shozo would put on an angry act, complete with grunts and cries, frowns, grimaces, and a little spitting. Actually, though, he seemed to be enjoying himself just as much as Lily was.

  Resting a bit from these exhausting games, he casually held out his saké cup for a refill. ‘Hey, what’s wrong?’ Suddenly anxious, he looked up at his wife, who had been in a sunny mood until just a while ago but was now fixing him with a steady gaze, her hands thrust into her sle
eves instead of offering the expected drink.

  ‘There’s no more saké?’ he ventured, looking with wary surprise into his wife’s eyes and slowly withdrawing the cup. She had a calm, unflinching look about her as she announced ‘There’s something I want to talk about,’ and then settled into a rather gloomy silence.

  ‘What? … What about? …’

  ‘I want you to give that cat to Shinako!’

  ‘But … why?’

  To make a demand like that out of the blue, why, it was outrageous, thought Shozo, blinking furiously for a few moments; but his wife looked in no mood to be trifled with, and he was at a loss what to think or do.

  ‘But why this, all of a sudden?’

  ‘Never mind why – just give her the cat! Call Mr Tsukamoto over tomorrow and be done with it.’

  ‘But what’s the point of all this anyway?’

  ‘So, you refuse?’

  ‘Now hold on a minute! How can I agree when you won’t even tell me why? Are you angry about something? Something I did?’

  Could Fukuko be jealous of Lily? He considered this possibility for a moment but then dismissed it as making no sense. After all, Fukuko herself was basically fond of cats. When Shozo was still living with his former wife, Shinako, he had sometimes mentioned her occasional jealousy of the cat to Fukuko, who had always made rather scornful fun of this sort of silliness. Obviously, then, she had known all about Shozo’s fondness for cats before she came to live with him. Moreover, since coming, she too had shown affection for Lily, though not to Shozo’s extreme extent. She had never said a word against Lily for barging in on the couple’s daily meals together as the cat had just done today. And when, like today, Shozo took time over his evening bottle of saké to play with Lily, Fukuko usually enjoyed watching their circus-like performance and sometimes even tossed the cat a scrap or two herself, or made her jump for one. Thus, Lily’s interposed presence had the effect of binding the newly-wed couple more closely, making their suppers together times of laughter and relaxation; certainly she had caused no trouble or bother. But what was the problem, then? Everything had been fine up to yesterday – or, rather, up till just now, until Shozo’s fifth or sixth cup. Had some little slip of his upset his wife, to make the situation suddenly change so completely? Or was she starting to feel sorry for Shinako? Was that why she demanded that he hand over his cat to his ex-wife?

  It was, of course, true that when Shinako left she had asked for Lily as part of the settlement, and afterwards she had dispatched Tsukamoto several times with the same request. But Shozo had decided it was best not even to discuss the matter, and steadily refused to do so. The point of Shinako’s message via Tsukamoto was that, though she should really have no regrets about leaving a man heartless enough to drive his own wife from her home and then drag in some other woman to take her place, yet somehow she couldn’t forget him. No matter how hard she tried to hate and resent him, it was simply impossible. That’s why she wanted something to remember him by. Couldn’t she perhaps have Lily as a kind of souvenir? It’s true that when they were living together, she had resented all the love that Shozo had shown the cat and had sometimes mistreated her a bit on the sly; but now every single thing from their old house was filled with memories – and Lily especially! Shinako wanted at least to have Lily, in place of the child they’d never had, so she could lavish her affection on her. That would, to some extent, make up for all the sadness and loneliness of her life …

  ‘So you see,’ Tsukamoto would conclude, ‘it’s just a matter of that cat, Mr Ishii. You can’t help feeling sorry for her, can you, when you hear how she feels and all.’

  But Shozo’s reply was unvarying: ‘You can’t trust a word that woman says.’

  Shinako specialised in driving hard bargains; and she was crafty – there was no reading her. Whatever she said was to be taken with a large quantity of salt. In this case, for example, her tender words about missing Shozo and loving Lily were very suspicious, coming from such a tough, stubborn character. Love Lily, indeed! Why should she? Probably she just wanted to take her off somewhere and torment her, out of spite. Or maybe the aim was just to get back at Shozo by taking something he valued away from him. No – that was too childish a revenge for her. At any rate, the rather simple-minded Shozo was unable to guess her real intentions, which made him feel all the more uneasy and resentful. Who was she to make all these selfish demands on him, anyway? Of course, he had been in a weak position, especially since he wanted to get her out of the house as soon as possible. That’s why he’d accepted most of her requests. But he’d be damned if he would let her take Lily now, on top of everything else! And so Shozo continued to evade, with his characteristic variety of roundabout arguments and excuses, even Tsukamoto’s most insistent pleadings. Fukuko naturally was in complete agreement with this policy, and indeed took an even harder line than did her husband himself.

  ‘So tell me the reason! I haven’t a clue what this is all about.’ Shozo reached out for the saké bottle and helped himself to another cup. Then, giving his thigh a smart slap, he glanced nervously around the room and said, half to himself, ‘Don’t we have any mosquito coils?’ It was getting dark, and a small cloud of mosquitoes was advancing towards the veranda from below the wooden fence nearby, with a high-pitched hum. Lily had been curled up beneath the table, with an air of having slightly over-indulged. But when the couple’s talk began to turn to her, she slipped down into the garden, insinuated herself beneath the fence, and disappeared, as if out of a feline sense of delicacy. The effect was comical, though in fact Lily always absented herself for a while after eating a really large meal.

  Fukuko went into the kitchen without saying a word and returned with a mosquito coil, which she lit and placed under the dining table. Then, in a gentler tone than before she asked, ‘You gave all the mackerel to the cat, didn’t you? You couldn’t have had more than two or three yourself.’

  ‘I really don’t remember.’

  ‘I was counting. There were thirteen fish on that plate. Lily ate ten, so that means you ate three.’

  ‘What if I did?’

  ‘You think there’s nothing wrong with that? Well, think again. Now, I’m not going to get jealous over some cat. But you insisted I make marinated mackerel because you like it, even after I told you I can’t stand it myself. Then you hardly touch it, and give it all to that cat!’

  This was the burden of Fukuko’s complaint …

  In the towns along the Osaka-Kobe railway line – Nishinomiya, Ashiya, Uozaki, Sumiyoshi – horse mackerel and sardines taken from the ocean nearby were brought for sale almost every day, ‘fresh-caught’, as the fishmongers called out on their rounds. The price was from ten to fifteen sen per bucket, which was just enough to feed a family of three or four. When sales were good, several fishmongers would appear each day. During the summer, the fish were each only about one inch long; and, though they gradually grew in size as autumn approached, in their smaller state they were unsuitable for either frying or broiling with salt. They had to be roasted plain, marinated in a soy and vinegar sauce, and eaten bones and all with some shredded ginger on top. But Fukuko had objected to preparing them this way, since she disliked the soy-vinegar marinade. She liked warm, oily foods; it depressed her to have to eat cold, stringy dishes like horse mackerel. Confronted with this all-too-typical fussiness on Fukuko’s part, Shozo told her to make what she liked for herself. He wanted mackerel, and he would fix it on his own. When a fishseller came around, he called him in and bought some.

  Now, Fukuko was a cousin of Shozo’s; and, given the circumstances under which she became his wife, there was no need for her to worry about pleasing a difficult mother-in-law. So from her second day of married life, she did just as she pleased in everything. All the same, she could hardly stand by and watch her husband trying to wield a kitchen knife, so in the end she made the marinated fish for both of them, though under protest. To make matters worse, they had been dining off mackerel for five or six days running. Then, two or three days ago, it had struck her: Shozo wasn’t even eating the food he’d insisted on having, ignoring his wife’s complaints; instead, he was giving it all to the cat! The more she thought about it, the clearer it all became: the mackerel were small, with little bones, easily chewed; there was no need to fillet them, and they could be served cold; and one got a lot for one’s money – in other words, they were an ideal food to serve to the cat on a daily basis. They weren’t Shozo’s favourite dish, but that cat’s! In this household, the husband, ignoring his wife’s preferences, planned the evening menu with his pet alone in mind. Fukuko had been prepared to sacrifice her own tastes for her husband’s sake, while in fact it was for the cat that she cooked; she had become a companion to the cat.