Quicksand Read online

  Forgive me all this foolishness.

  Is it odd of me to write letters, when I see you every day? But at school I feel embarrassed to come up to you, I’m strangely self-conscious! To think we used to flaunt our intimacy in front of everyone, before we were like this, but now that the rumors are true, we seem to be afraid of letting anyone see us! Does that mean I’m timid after all? Ah, how I wish I could be strong! Stronger and stronger—strong enough not to be afraid of the gods, of Buddha, of my parents, my husband . . .

  Are you having your tea-ceremony lesson tomorrow afternoon? Won’t you come to my house at three? Please give me your answer, yes or no, at school tomorrow, with the usual signal. Do, do come! Even now the white peony blooming in the azure vase on my table breathes a tender sigh as she waits for you, just as I do. If you disappoint her, I’m afraid the pretty little peony will weep. And the mirror on the wardrobe cabinet says she wants to reflect your image. So do come!

  Tomorrow during the noon recreation period I’ll be standing under the plane tree in the schoolyard. Don’t forget our signal.

  Sonoko

  (May 11, from Mitsuko to Sonoko. Envelope length, 5½ inches; width, 3 inches. Centered on a ground of dusky rose, a checkerboard pattern two inches wide is scattered with four-leaf clovers; below it are two overlapping playing cards, an ace of hearts and a six of spades. The checkerboard and the clovers are silver, the heart card red, the spade black; and the letter paper is a plain dark brown, the text written on a slant, by pen with white ink, sloping down to the lower-right-hand corner. The writing is less skillful than Sonoko’s and seems to have been rapidly scribbled, but the large, bold characters give an agreeable impression of uninhibited liveliness.)

  Ma cbére soeur Mile Jardin,

  Dearest elder sister, today, Mitsu bas been in a bad temper all day long! Plucking the flowers out of the alcove, scolding poor innocent Ume (that’s the name of the maid who always waits on her)—whenever Sunday comes around, Mitsu’s temper is bad. For a whole day she can’t go to see her sister! Why can’t she come when that awful Mr. Husband is there?

  At least I’ll make a phone call, I thought, but when I tried just now it seems you were off to Naruo with Mr. Husband to pick wild strawberries!

  Well, do have fun!

  It’s mean! mean!

  I can’t put up with it! I really can’t!

  Mitsu is crying, all alone.

  Ab, ab—

  I’m too bitter to say another word.

  Ta soeur Clair

  (Ta soeur is of course French for “Your sister,” and Clair, or “light,” comes from the literal meaning of the name Mitsuko. Ma cbére soeur, “My dear sister,” and Mlle Jardin, “Miss Garden,” similarly refer to Sonoko. The reason for writing “Mlle Jardin” rather than “Mme Jardin” is explained as follows in a postscript.)

  I won’t call my elder sister “Madame.”

  Or “Mrs.”—how disgusting! The very thought of it makes me shudder!

  But it would be terrible if Mr. Husband heard about this, wouldn’t it?

  Be careful!

  Why do you sign your letters Sonoko?

  Why don’t you say “Your sister”?

  (May 18, from Sonoko to Mitsuko. Envelope length, 5 inches; width, 2 7/8 inches. The design is crosswise on a crimson ground dotted in a silver splash pattern: above the tips of three large cherry blossom petals appears the upper half of a maiko dancing girl, seen from the back. This is an exceptionally rich five-color print of crimson, purple, black, silver, and blue; and the address is on the other side, since any writing on the face would be difficult to read. As for the letter itself, a sheet of paper 8½ by 5½ inches bears an almost 10-inch-long design of a white lily with a curved stem stretching off to the left, against a shaded border of faint pink, leaving only a third of the space ruled. Minute, delicate handwriting, its characters smaller than 8-point type, covers the page.)

  It finally happened, what I’ve been expecting for some time . . . it finally exploded.

  Last night was truly violent. If you’d been there, Mitsu, how it would have shocked you. My own husband and I—oh, forgive me for talking about us that way—that awful husband and I had our worst quarrel in ages. And not just in ages—in our whole married life! We’ve had our differences before, but never a shouting match like the one last night. To think that a mild, docile man like that can get utterly furious! But I suppose it was natural, now that I think of it. I really did say some terrible things. Why am I so stubborn when I’m with him? And why was I especially strong-minded last night? . . . Not that I feel I was in the wrong. That man himself behaved outrageously, calling me a loose woman, shameless, corrupted by reading trashy novels—and as if that wasn’t enough, he accused you of being a home-breaker, of intruding into our bedroom. I could put up with his attacking me, but I couldn’t bear to hear him talk about my dear Mitsu.

  “If I’m such a loose woman, why did you marry me?” I lashed out at him. “You’re no real man—did you marry a woman you despise just so her family would pay for your education? You knew what I was like, didn’t you? You’re a spineless coward!”

  All of a sudden he had grabbed up an ashtray, brandished it threateningly, and dashed it against the wall. But he didn’t dare touch me; he just turned pale and stood there glaring.

  “Go ahead and hit me—I don’t care what you do,” I taunted him, but even then he didn’t answer back. I haven’t spoken to him since.

  . . . Now I’d like to tell you more about the quarrel I described in that letter. Maybe I’m repeating myself, but my husband and I were basically incompatible; it seemed to be physiological too. We never enjoyed a happy marital life. According to him, I was too self-centered. It’s not that we’re incompatible, he said; you just won’t make an effort. Even though I’m trying my best, it’s impossible, with your attitude. There’s no such thing as a perfect marriage. That’s how it may look from outside, but do you suppose anybody has no complaints, if you really knew them? I wouldn’t be surprised if people envied us too; maybe we are happy, compared with most. You’ve been so spoiled by your sheltered upbringing that you expect too much, you don’t know how lucky you are. A person like you would never be satisfied, even if she had an ideal husband.

  That’s the kind of thing he kept saying, but his worldly-wise, know-it-all manner only provoked me all the more. “I don’t think you’ve ever felt deeply about anything,” I told him scathingly. “A man like you is simply not human.” Maybe he was trying to get along with me, but our temperaments clashed. He treated me like a child, as if he was humoring me, and that always got on my nerves. Once I even said: “No wonder you think I’m childish, since you were so brilliant at college, but to me you’re a living fossil!”

  Did that man have any passion in his heart? I asked myself. Did he ever cry or show anger or astonishment, like other people? My husband’s cold nature didn’t just make me feel miserable and lonely; before long it stimulated a kind of spiteful curiosity in me. And that was what led to my earlier love affair, and to the one with Mitsuko, and to everything that happened afterward.

  8

  ANYWAY, that earlier affair began right after we were married. I was an innocent young girl, still a little timid and naive, and I felt guilty toward my husband. But by this time, as my letter shows, I had no such feeling. To tell the truth, I’d gone through so much, all unknown to him, that I myself had become quite worldly and more than a little clever at concealing what I was up to. He was blind to that and kept on treating me like a child. At first I could hardly bear his condescending manner, but when I got annoyed he made fun of me even more, until finally I thought: All right, if I seem childish to you, I’ll encourage it, I’ll pull the wool over your eyes! I can put on a show of being a horribly spoiled little girl, and fret and coax whenever I want to get my own way. So just go ahead, if it pleases you to consider me a child, I said to myself, but aren’t you the gullible one? Getting around a man like you is the easiest thing in the
world!

  Mocking him became more and more enjoyable, and I amazed myself by own own skill at playacting. After even a few words from him I would burst into tears or begin shouting angrily. . . .

  I’m sure you know this better than I, since you’re a novelist, but our state of mind does seem to change completely, depending on circumstances, doesn’t it? Before, I would have felt a pang of regret, and thought: Ah, I shouldn’t have done that. But by then I was rebellious enough to ridicule my own faintheartedness, asking myself why I was so weak, how I could be so easily intimidated. . . . And even if it was wrong to be secretly in love with another man, what was so bad about being in love with a woman, someone of my own sex? No matter how close we became, a husband had no right to interfere—that was the kind of argument I used to deceive myself. The truth is, my feeling for Mitsuko was ten times, a hundred times stronger than what I had felt for that other man.

  Another reason for my boldness was that from his student days my husband was such a dreadfully fussy, proper person that he had no trouble winning my father’s confidence. He was so devoted to “common sense,” so incapable of understanding anything the least strange or out of the ordinary, that I was sure he would never question my relations with Mitsuko. He would think we were just friends. That’s how it was at first—he had no idea how intimate we were—but as time went on he must have begun to be suspicious. No wonder, since I always used to stop at his office on my way home from school, but lately I’d go back alone, ahead of him. And then, about once every three days, Mitsuko would be sure to come over, and the two of us would spend hours closeted together in that upstairs room. It was only to be expected that he’d find it curious, what with the picture never getting done, although I said I was using her as a model. Of course I occasionally went to Mitsuko’s house, after I warned her that he seemed to suspect something.

  “We have to be careful, Mitsu,” I’d say. “Today I’ll come to your place, shall I?”

  . . . No, Mitsuko’s mother didn’t have any qualms about me. She knew it was the city councilman who was behind those rumors at school. And I didn’t want to stir up any doubts either, so when I visited them I always tried to ingratiate myself. She became a great admirer of “Mrs. Kakiuchi” and told Mitsuko: “I’m glad you’ve made such a good friend.” As things stood, nothing kept me from telephoning or visiting their house every day . . . but besides her mother there was her maid, Ume, the one mentioned in the letter, and other prying eyes. It wasn’t the same as being at my house.

  “This won’t do after all,” Mitsuko declared. “Now that my mother trusts you, it’ll be a shame if we spoil it.” Then she had a suggestion. “I know! How about the new hot-spring resort at Takarazuka?”

  So we went off to Takarazuka. As we were going into one of the private baths there, Mitsuko said: “You’re so unfair, Sister! You always want to look at me naked, but you never show yourself to me.”

  “I’m not being unfair,” I protested. “Your skin is so beautiful I’m embarrassed to let you see how much darker mine is. I just hope it won’t disgust you.”

  And in fact when I bared myself completely to her for the first time, I did feel uncomfortable beside her. Not only was Mitsuko’s skin a flawless creamy white; she had a slender, superbly proportioned body. By comparison, my own body suddenly seemed ugly. . . .

  “You’re beautiful yourself, Sister!” she told me. “We’re really no different.” Later I came to believe her and thought nothing of it. But that first time I felt myself shrink back.

  Well, as you saw in Mitsuko’s letter, I went to pick strawberries with my husband one Sunday. Actually, I’d been hoping to go to Takarazuka again, but he wanted to take me out to Naruo, since it was such a fine day. Thinking I’d better humor him for once, I reluctantly agreed. But my heart was still with Mitsuko, and I couldn’t enjoy the outing. The more I longed for her, the more my husband’s efforts at conversation irritated me, even angered me, to the point that I would hardly reply to him. I spent the whole day moping. Apparently that was when he decided he’d have to do something about the situation. As usual, though, he only looked glum, and since he wasn’t the kind of person to show his emotions, I had no idea he was so infuriated with me.

  When we came home that evening I learned I’d missed a telephone call, and began fuming at everyone in the house. The next morning Mitsuko’s reproachful letter arrived. I called her up immediately and arranged to meet at the Hankyu Umeda station. We went directly to Takarazuka, without even stopping off at school. Every day from then on, for the rest of the week, we went to Takarazuka. That was when we got our matching kimonos, and had the souvenir photo taken that I showed you. . . .

  Then one afternoon a little past three, while we were talking together in the bedroom again, almost a week after the strawberry-picking excursion, our maid, Kiyo, came rushing upstairs to announce that the master had just returned.

  “Really, at this hour?” I exclaimed, all in a fluster. “Hurry, Mitsu!” I’m sure we both looked nervous as we went down to greet him.

  Meanwhile, my husband had changed from his suit into a light serge kimono. He frowned slightly when he saw us, but then remarked casually: “I had nothing to do today, so I left the office early. You two seem to be cutting classes yourself.” And he added, to me: “How about a cup of tea and some cakes, since we have a guest?”

  With that, the three of us settled down to polite talk as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened. But I was startled when Mitsuko absent-mindedly called me “Sister.”

  “Don’t be too intimate,” I used to tell her. “It’s better for you to call me Sono, rather than Sister. If you get into the wrong habit, you’ll come out with it before other people.”

  Yet whenever I said that, she took offense. “I hate it when you’re so distant! Don’t you like to have me think of you as my big sister? . . . Please, let me call you Sister—I’ll be very careful if anyone else is around.” But that day it finally did come out.

  After Mitsuko left, there was an awkward silence between my husband and me. And the next evening, as if it had just occurred to him, he suddenly asked: “Isn’t there something funny going on? I have a hard time trying to understand your behavior lately.”

  “What’s there to understand?” I shot back. “I’m not aware of anything.”

  “You’re on awfully good terms with that girl Mitsuko,” he went on. “What exactly is she to you?”

  “I’m very fond of Mitsuko! That’s why we’re such good friends.”

  “I know you’re fond of her, but what does being fond of her mean?”

  “It’s just a feeling! It isn’t something you can explain!” I was purposely defiant, thinking I mustn’t let him see any weakness in me.

  “Don’t be so sensitive,” he said. “Can’t you just tell me calmly? Being ‘fond’ has all kinds of meanings—besides, there were those rumors at school. I was only asking because I think it’s to your disadvantage if people misunderstand. Suppose talk like that gets around; you’ll be the one to blame. You’re older, and you’re a married woman. . . . How could you face her parents? And it’s not just you—I’d have no excuse myself if people thought I’d condoned your behavior.”

  What he said cut me to the quick, but I remained stubborn.

  “That’s enough,” I told him. “I don’t like your meddling in my choice of friends. You can have any friends you want, and I hope you’ll let me do as I please! Surely I’m responsible for my own actions.”

  “Well, if you two were ordinary friends, I certainly wouldn’t meddle. But taking off from school nearly every day, doing things behind your husband’s back, shutting yourselves up alone together—it just doesn’t seem healthy.”

  “Oh? So that’s the way you feel about it. With your nasty imagination, aren’t you the one that’s behaving badly?”

  “If I’m at fault, I’ll apologize. I only hope it’s my imagination. But instead of accusing me, shouldn’t you search your own conscience? Are
you sure you have nothing to be ashamed of?”

  “There you go talking like that again! You know I find Mitsuko attractive—that’s why we became friends. Didn’t you yourself say you wanted to meet her, if she’s so beautiful? It’s natural to be attracted to beautiful people, and between women it’s like enjoying a work of art. If you think that’s unhealthy, you’re the unhealthy one!”

  “All right, but you could enjoy a work of art in front of me; you needn’t shut yourselves up together . . . and why do you both look so nervous when I come home? Another thing: it bothers me to hear her call you Sister, when you’re not even related.”

  “Don’t be absurd! You haven’t the faintest idea of schoolgirl talk, have you? Girls often think of each other as older sister and younger sister, if they’re good friends. You’re the only one who finds it strange!”

  That evening my husband was oddly persistent. Usually as soon as I seemed irritated he would give up and say: “You’re impossible.” But this time he kept after me.

  “Don’t try to lie your way out of it: I’ve already heard all about it from Kiyo.” And he added that he knew I wasn’t just painting—he wanted me to confess what I was up to.

  “There’s nothing to confess. I’m not a professional painter hiring a model—it’s a diversion for me. I don’t have to be so serious and businesslike.”

  “Then why not work down here, instead of always staying upstairs?”

  “What’s wrong with working up there? Go and visit an artist in his studio—even a professional isn’t always grimly slaving away. You can’t make a good painting unless you take your time and work when the spirit moves you.”