The Makioka Sisters Read online

Sachiko went off to the women’s room and was gone for twenty minutes. When at length she came back, paler than ever, Mrs. Jimba called her again.

  “Let me take it,” said Teinosuke. “My wife is not feeling at all well, and perhaps you could talk to me instead.”

  “I see. As a matter of fact, it’s about the taxi. I’ve called two, and I wondered if we might not put Yukiko and Mr. Nomura and myself in one, and my husband in the other with you two.”

  “Is that what Mr. Nomura would like?”

  “He hasn’t said. I only thought it might be a good arrangement.”

  “Oh.”

  Teinosuke had trouble hiding his annoyance. Mr. and Mrs. Jimba had been told yesterday that Sachiko was braving considerable physical discomfort and even endangering her health, and the Makiokas had given hints enough this evening that she was not well; and yet neither Jimba nor his wife had bothered to ask after her or give her a word of comfort. Perhaps they thought it bad luck to refer to her illness at such a time. Still they could have tried unobtrusively to see that she was made comfortable. Or perhaps he was being unfair. Was it not possible that Mr. and Mrs. Jimba, for their part, felt that after they had undertaken all the arrangements and been put off time after time, Sachiko could be expected to make some sacrifice? Did they not think that, inasmuch as the meeting was to help no one if not Yukiko, Sachiko could bear a little physical discomfort, and that she was quite mistaken if she expected them to feel obligated? Perhaps he was being too sensitive, but it occurred to him that they might agree with Itani: Yukiko, having passed the marriageable age, was in serious trouble, and they were only trying to help—and Sachiko and her family should feel in debt to them. On the whole, however, it seemed most reasonable to conclude that they were too intent on pleasing Nomura to think of the others. Jimba worked for the Kansai Electric Company, of which Nomura’s cousin Hamada Jōkichi was president.

  Whether Mrs. Jimba was determined to do her duty by Mr. Hamada, or whether she was only echoing Nomura’s wishes, it simply was not good sense to suggest that Yukiko ride with Nomura. Teinosuke wondered if she might not be trying to make a fool of him.

  “Will it be all right, then? If Yukiko has no objection …”

  “Yukiko is Yukiko, and she’ll have no objection, I’m sure. But if everything goes well, there should be plenty of opportunities later.”

  “I see.” Mrs. Jimba studied the expression on his face for a time, her nose wrinkled in a sardonic little smile.

  “And then I think it would only make Yukiko stiffer than ever. It would not have at all the effect we want.”

  “I see. It was only a thought.”

  But Teinosuke found more to annoy him. When he heard that the Peking was in the hills, he was careful to ask whether the cab could go to the gate. He was assured that there would be no difficulty. Although the cab did indeed stop at the gate, however, there was a long, steep flight of stairs to climb before they arrived at the restaurant itself, and once inside they were shown to the second floor. Sachiko, leaning on Teinosuke’s arm, fell behind the others. In fine spirits and quite indifferent to her distress, Nomura was praising the view when they reached the second flood.

  “How do you like it, Mr. Makioka? One of my favorites.”

  “What a fine spot you’ve found.” Jimba nodded his agreement vigorously.

  “And when you look down on the harbor from here, there is something exotic about it. A little like Nagasaki.”

  “Very true. It does feel like Nagasaki.”

  “I often go to Chinese restaurants on Nanking Street, but I had no idea there was a place like this in Kobe.”

  “It’s near the office, you know, and we often come here. And the food is rather good.”

  “Speaking of exotic things, look at this building. Very unusual, like something you might see in a harbor in China. Restaurants run by Chinese are generally ugly, but this one has a quality all it own—the railings and the carvings and the decorations and everything.”

  “See the warship.” There was nothing for Sachiko to do but muster her strength and try to be polite. “What flag is it flying?”

  Mrs. Jimba came upstairs looking perplexed.

  “Really, I cannot tell you how sorry I am, Sachiko, but the Japanese rooms are all full. They want to put us in a Chinese room. Over the telephone they assured me they would have a Japanese room for us. But the boys here are Chinese of course. No matter how often you tell them, they will not understand.”

  It had struck Teinosuke as odd that a Chinese room seemed to be ready for them. If the boy had misunderstood Mrs. Jimba, Teinosuke could hardly hold her responsible; but even so, he had to conclude that, since there surely should have been a way to make the point clear even to an unreliable Chinese boy, Mrs. Jimba was showing a certain lack of consideration. And Nomura and Jimba, far from apologizing, were still busy praising the view.

  “You will try to bear it, then?” Mrs. Jimba took Sachiko’s hand in both of her own, and left no room for refusal.

  “Oh, but this is a wonderful room. And such an interesting place.” Sachiko was more worried about her husband’s irritability than about her own discomfort. “We should bring Etsuko and Koi-san some time.”

  “The child might enjoy looking down at the ships, I suppose.” Teinosuke still looked far from happy.

  The hors d’oeuvres were served with Japanese sake and Chinese shao-hsin wine. Sachiko sat across the table from Nomura. Jimba spoke of the Anschluss, about which the newspapers had been excited that morning, and for a time the conversation turned to the resignation of Schuschnigg and Hitler’s entry into Vienna. It tended to be a dialogue between Jimba and Nomura, with the Makiokas only putting in a word now and then. Although she struggled to make it seem that nothing was amiss, Sachiko had inspected herself once at the Tor Hotel and once before they sat down in the restaurant, and found that the bleeding was worse. The hard, straight chair helped little, and soon she was left quite inarticulate by physical discomfort coupled with a fear lest she spoil the party. Teinosuke, who only grew angrier, knew that his wife was hard at work and that her task would only be heavier if he did not try to be pleasant. He undertook with the support of the saké to see that there were no gaping holes in the conversation.

  “Here, Sachiko. You should like this.” Mrs. Jimba, who had been pouring for the men, turned to Sachiko with a decanter.

  “None for me this evening, thank you. But you ought to have a little, Yukiko.”

  “Yes, please do.”

  “I think I might try this.” Yukiko took a sip of the shao-hsin, in which sugar crystals were floating. She was acutely embarrassed at the glumness of her sister and brother-in-law and at the way Nomura persisted in staring at her. Finally she was huddled so low over the table that her slender shoulders seemed quite to disappear. Nomura, excited at having a prospective bride before him, became livelier as he drank. Clearly proud of having Hamada Jōkichi for a cousin, he was careful to keep that gentleman’s name in the conversation, and Jimba too talked incessantly of “the President,” no doubt to suggest how great an interest Hamada took in looking after this cousin. What surprised Teinosuke most was the thoroughness with which Nomura had investigated the Makioka family—Yukiko herself, of course, and her sisters, and their dead father, and the people at the main house, and the misstep that had put Taeko in the newspapers. They invited him to ask questions about any doubtful points, and the detailed interrogation that followed made it clear that his investigation had taken him everywhere. Perhaps Hamada himself had mobilized the investigating forces—in any case, someone had been sent to interview Itani, Dr. Kushida, Mme Tsukamoto, and a piano teacher from whom Yukiko had once taken lessons. Nomura even knew—they could only assume that he had heard from Itani—the reasons for the rupture in the negotiations with Segoshi and for the visit to the Osaka University Hospital. (Itani had told Sachiko that someone had come inquiring after Miss Yukiko, and that, to the extent that there seemed no reason not to answer, she had answ
ered all the questions. Sachiko started at the thought of that spot over Yukiko’s eye. She had not been worried this evening about the spot, which had disappeared since Yukiko’s return from Tokyo. Surely Itani had not mentioned it!)

  Teinosuke, on whom fell the duty of answering Nomura’s questions, soon noted that Nomura was an extremely nervous man. It seemed not at all surprising that the fellow should talk to himself. Nomura’s manner suggested that he went into all the fine points because he was confident his proposal would be accepted. In increasingly good spirits, he had become a different man from the rather dour person they met at the Tor Hotel.

  Teinosuke wanted to cut the conversation off and go home as soon as possible, but as they left another difficulty arose. Mr, and Mrs. Jimba, who were returning to Osaka, were to see the Makiokas to Ashiya in a cab and ride on to Ashiya Station. Teinosuke was startled, therefore, to see that but one cab had been called. Nomura lived in the same general direction—a little out of the way perhaps—and could just as well come with them, someone suggested. Teinosuke knew how far out of the way a trip to Nomura’s would take them. Worse, the roads were rough and the slopes steep in that part of the city. He wanted to look back in alarm each time they hit a new bump or rounded another curve, but he was wedged too tightly into the front seat to turn around.

  Nomura suddenly announced that he would like to have them all in for a cup of coffee. It was a miserable little house, he said, but the view down over the harbor was even better than that from the Peking, and besides, they would want to see how he lived. Their refusals had no effect, and when Mrs. Jimba joined in to support him—they really must, since he had been so kind as to invite them, and there was, she had heard, no one in the house before whom they need feel the slightest constraint; there were only a girl and an old lady who worked for him, and it would surely be helpful to know how he lived—Teinosuke began to give way. Without consulting Yukiko, he could hardly refuse now that the cup of coffee had been tied to the marriage negotiations themselves. It seemed necessary moreover to defer to Mr. and Mrs. Jimba, who might be of help in the future. And after all, Nomura was only being kind. Presently Sachiko suggested that they should at least step inside.

  To reach Nomura’s house, they had to climb some forty or fifty yards up a narrow, steep, slippery path. Nomura was lively as a child. He hurried to have someone open the shutters and he proceeded to show off the view of which he was so proud, and invited them to see his study, and afterwards every room in the house, including the kitchen. It was, they found, a cheaply built two-storey six-room house. Nomura even dragged them to the Buddhist altar, over which hung pictures of his dead wife and children. In the living room, Jimba was praising the view, which he found quite as Nomura had described it, far better than that from the Peking, but Teinosuke and the rest felt that they could never feel safe in such a place: the veranda gave way to a cliff, and it was as though they were being sucked over.

  They hurried off into the waiting cab as soon as they had finished their coffee.

  “Mr. Nomura was in a fine mood tonight,” said Jimba.

  His wife agreed. “He was indeed. I have never seen him talk so much. It was because he had a young and beautiful audience. Sachiko, you can see how Mr. Nomura feels, and everything is up to you now. He has no property, of course, but he has Mr. Hamada behind him. He will never have to worry about a living, that much is sure. And possibly we can get guarantees from Mr. Hamada.”

  “Thank you very much.” Teinosuke did not want to continue the discussion. “We will ask the people in the main house.”

  But as he got from the cab, he began to wonder if he had not been too abrupt. By way of apology he thanked the Jimbas for the evening not once, but three times.

  29

  MRS. JIMBA appeared in Ashiya two days later, on the morning of the seventeenth. She was most apologetic when she heard that the miai had sent Sachiko back to bed, and she left after but a half hour at Sachiko’s bedside. Mr. Nomura had insisted, she said, that she come to plead his case. Having seen his house, they knew well enough how he lived. He was in such quarters only because he was a bachelor, and he had assured her that he would move into a house worthy of the name once he found a wife. He meant to do everything for his new wife, most especially if he should succeed in winning Yukiko. He was not wealthy, he admitted, but he knew at least that Yukiko would not be left wanting. Mrs. Jimba had also called on Mr. Hamada, and, seeing that Nomura was so enthusiastic, Mr. Hamada had urged her to do whatever was to be done to advance the negotiations. The fact that Nomura had no property would of course make the new bride’s position a little uncertain, but Hamada would think of something—they should leave money matters to him. Hamada would be rather at a loss if they asked him what concrete guarantees he was prepared to make, but he could say that while he lived, Nomura would not be left destitute. And since a man of such stature was prepared to say so much, added Mrs. Jimba, ought they not to have confidence? Mr. Nomura, it was true, had a somewhat frightening face, but he also had a human warmth all his own. He was so good to his first wife, people said, that his ministrations in her last illness had brought tears to their eyes. And had he not had her picture out the night they visited him? The Makiokas could go on and on once they set out looking for defects, but inasmuch as the most important thing for a woman was that her husband love her and be good to her, Mrs. Jimba hoped most sincerely that they would look upon the proposal generously and give her their answer as soon as possible.

  Sachiko, preparing the way for a later refusal, tried to answer so that the responsibility would seem to rest with the main house: there would be no trouble learning whether or not Yukiko herself approved—but as for the main house, which after all was most directly concerned—Sachiko and her husband were only acting as agents, so to speak, and the investigation was being conducted by the main house.

  Sachiko’s recovery was slow and Dr. Kushida had ordered absolute quiet. She did not have a chance to speak to Yukiko, then, until perhaps the fifth morning after the miai, when the two of them chanced to be alone in the sick room.

  “What did you think of Mr. Nomura, Yukiko?”

  Yukiko only nodded. Sachiko went on to report the substance of the conversation with Mrs. Jimba.

  “And that is what she said. But you are so young, Yukiko, and he looks so old beside you. It seems wrong, somehow.” She watched carefully for a change in Yukiko’s expression.

  “I do think he would do exactly as I wanted. I could live as I pleased.” Yukiko had nothing more revealing to say.

  Sachiko thought she knew what her sister meant: that she would be allowed to visit Sachiko whenever she liked. In most houses it would not be easy, but she would have this small consolation if she were to marry “the old gentleman.” The average man would find it intolerable that his bride had accepted him only because she thought she could control him, but probably the old gentleman would want to marry Yukiko even knowing her reasons. Once she was married, of course, she might not find it as easy to go out as she had thought. Yukiko being the woman she was, the old gentleman’s affections might bind her more tightly than she would care to say. Perhaps she would soon forget Sachiko’s house—certainly she would forget it once she had children.

  One could, if one chose, be grateful that the man wanted so earnestly to marry this too-long-unmarried sister. It was a little hasty, Sachiko concluded, the great antipathy she had taken.

  “If that is how you feel, Yukiko, perhaps you are right.”

  But Yukiko would come forth with nothing definite, however Sachiko pressed her. “I am not sure I would want to be made too much of,” she said, smiling.

  The next morning Sachiko, still in bed, sent off a note to Tokyo reporting that the miai had taken place. There was no answer. She was in and out of bed through the week of the equinox. One day, lured by the spring sky, she went out to sun herself on the veranda of her bedroom. Yukiko had gone down into the garden from the terrace below. On the point of calling out, Sac
hiko saw that her sister was enjoying the quiet moment after Etsuko had left for school. Yukiko circled the flower bed, inspected the budding branches of the lilac by the pond, picked up the cat Bell, and knelt for a moment under a round-clipped gardenia bush. Sachiko, who could only see her head bob as Yukiko rubbed her cheek against Bell, knew well enough without seeing her face what Yukiko was thinking: that she would soon be called back to Tokyo, and that she hated to leave spring in this garden behind. And she was perhaps praying that she might still be here to see the lilac in bloom. Although no word had come from Tsuruko in Tokyo, it was clear to the rest of the family that Yukiko was waiting in dread and asking to be left here even one day longer.

  The reserved, quiet Yukiko was fonder of going out than one would have guessed. Sachiko, had she been well, would have made it a point to go each day to see a movie or do some shopping. Unable to wait for Sachiko’s recovery, Yukiko was restless each sunny day if she could not call Taeko to wander about Kobe with her. She would set out happily after the two of them had arranged to meet, and it seemed that the marriage negotiations had completely left her mind.

  Taeko, thus summoned time after time to keep Yukiko company, occasionally complained to Sachiko. Just now she was busiest, and it was too much to be called out during the busiest part of each afternoon.

  “Yesterday something funny happened,” she said one day.

  The evening before, when they were buying candy in a Kobe shop, Yukiko had suddenly turned to Taeko in consternation. “What shall I do, Koi-san? There he is, there he is.” Who was, Taeko asked. Yukiko only fluttered about. “There he is, there he is.” An old gentleman Taeko did not know hurried out from the back of the shop, where he had been drinking coffee. “If you have nothing else to do, why not have a cup of coffee with me? I won’t take more than fifteen minutes of your time.” Yukiko, more and more confused, flushed scarlet and murmured something unintelligible. “You really must have a cup of coffee,” the gentleman said two or three times. Finally, seeing that Yukiko would only go on muttering to herself, he gave up, apologized politely for having bothered them, and went back to his table. “Hurry, Koi-san, hurry.” Yukiko pressed the shop girl to wrap the candy faster, and flew out the door. Who was it, Taeko asked. “That man. The man I met the other day.” Taeko at length guessed that it was Nomura.