The Makioka Sisters Page 5

  “Oh?” Etsuko still did not seem entirely satisfied.

  9

  “IF TOMORROW is bad, how would the sixteenth be? The sixteenth is a very lucky day.”

  So Itani had said when Sachiko was caught by that telephone call. Sachiko was forced to agree. Two days passed, however, before Yukiko too agreed. Yukiko set as a condition that Itani keep her promise and only introduce the two, avoiding any suggestion of a formal miai. Dinner, then, was to be at six at the Oriental Hotel in Kobe. With Itani would be her brother, Murakami Fusajirō, who worked for an Osaka iron dealer (it was because he was an old friend of the man Segoshi that Itani had first come with her proposal, and he was of course a man without whom the party would not be complete), and his wife. Segoshi would be a sad figure all by himself, and yet it was hardly an occasion to justify calling his family in from the country; but fortunately there was a middle-aged gentleman named Igarashi who was a director of the same iron company and who came from Segoshi’s home town, and Murakami invited him to come along as a sort of substitute for the relatives expected at a miai. Including Sachiko, Teinosuke and Yukiko there would be a total of eight at the dinner.

  The day before, Sachiko and Yukiko went to Itani’s beauty parlor. Sachiko, who meant only to have her hair set and had sent Yukiko in first, was awaiting her turn when Itani took advantage of a free moment to confer with her.

  “May I ask a favor?” Itani sat down and, bringing her mouth to Sachiko’s ear, lowered her voice almost to whisper. She always spoke in the brisk Tokyo manner. “I’m sure I don’t need to tell you, but could you try to make yourself as old as possible tomorrow?”

  “Of course …”

  But Itani had begun again. “I don’t mean that you should dress just a little more modestly than usual. You have to dress very modestly—make up your mind to it. Miss Yukiko is very attractive, of course, but she’s so slender. There is something a little sad about her face, and she loses a good twenty per cent of her charm when she sits beside you. You have such a bright, modern face—and you would attract attention anyway. So could you try at least tomorrow to set Miss Yukiko off? Make yourself look say ten or fifteen years older? If not, you might be just enough to ruin everything.”

  Sachiko had received similar instructions before. She had been with Yukiko at a number of miai, and had been the subject of some discussion: “The older sister seems so lively and modem, and the younger one a little moody,” or, “The older sister completely blotted out the younger.” There had even been occasions when she had been asked not to come at all, and only Tsuruko at the main house had attended Yukiko. Sachiko’s answer was always that people simply did not see Yukiko’s beauty. It was true that she herself had a somewhat livelier face, a face that might be called “modern.” But there was nothing remarkable about a modern face. Modern faces were to be found everywhere. She knew it was odd of her to be praising her own sister so extravagantly, but the beauty, fragile and elegant, of the sheltered maiden of old, the maiden who had never known the winds of the world —might one not say that Yukiko had it? Sachiko would not want Yukiko to marry a man who could not appreciate her beauty, indeed a man who did not demand someone exactly like her. But ardently though she defended Yukiko, Sachiko could not suppress a certain feeling of superiority. Before Teinosuke, at least, she was boastful: “They say I overshadow poor Yukiko when I go along.” Teinosuke himself would sometimes suggest that Sachiko stay home or, ordering her to retouch her face or put on a more modest kimono, would say: “No, you are still not old enough. You will only lower Yukiko’s stock again.” It was clear to Sachiko that he was pleased at having so impressive a wife. Sachiko had stayed away from one or two of Yukiko’s miai, but for the most part she went in Tsuruko’s place. Yukiko occasionally said that she would not go herself if Sachiko was not with her. The difficulty was, however, that no matter how sombre Sachiko tried to make herself, her wardrobe was simply too bright, and after a miai she would be told that she still had not looked old enough.

  “That is what everyone says. I understand completely. I would have tried to look old even if you had not mentioned it.”

  Sachiko was the only customer in the waiting room. The curtain that marked off the next room was drawn back, and Yukiko’s figure, under the dryer, was reflected in the mirror directly before them. Itani no doubt relied on the noise of the dryer to drown out her words, but it seemed to Sachiko that Yukiko’s eyes were fixed on them as if to ask what they were talking about. She was in a panic lest their lips give them away.

  On the appointed day, Yukiko, attended by her sisters, started dressing at about three. Teinosuke, who had left work early, was there to lend his support. A connoisseur of women’s dress, he was fond of watching such preparations; but more than that, he knew that the sisters were completely oblivious of time. He was present chiefly to see that they were ready by six.

  Etsuko, back from school, threw her books down in the parloi and ran upstairs.

  “So Yukiko is going to meet her husband.”

  Sachiko started. She saw in the mirror that the expression on Yukiko’s face had changed.

  “And where did you hear that?” she asked with what unconcern she could muster.

  “O-haru told me this morning. Is it true, Yukiko?”

  “It is not,” said Sachiko. “Yukiko and I have been invited to dinner at the Oriental Hotel by Mrs. Itani.”

  “But Father is going along.”

  “And why should she not invite your father too?”

  “Etsuko, would you go downstairs, please?” Yukiko was looking straight ahead into the mirror. “And tell O-haru to come up. You will not need to come back yourself.”

  Etsuko was generally not quick to obey, but she sensed something out of the ordinary in Yukiko’s tone.

  “All right.”

  A moment later O-haru was kneeling timidly at the door. “You called?” It was clear that Etsuko had said something. Teinosuke and Taeko, sensing danger, had disappeared.

  “O-haru, what did you tell the child today?” Sachiko could not remember having spoken to the maids about today’s meeting, but it must have been through her carelessness that they guessed the secret. She owed it to Yukiko to discover how. “What did you say?”

  O-haru did not answer. Her eyes were on the floor, and her whole manner was a confession of misconduct.

  “When did you tell her?”

  “This morning.”

  “And just what did you have in mind?”

  O-haru, who was seventeen, had come to the house at fourteen. Now that she had become almost a member of the family, they found it natural to address her more affectionately than the other maids. Someone always had to see Etsuko across the national highway on her way to and from school, and the task was usually O-haru’s. Under Sachiko’s questioning, she let it be known that she had told the whole story to Etsuko on the way to school that morning. O-haru was a wonderfully good-natured girl, and when she was scolded she wilted so dismally that it was almost amusing.

  “I was wrong to let you overhear that telephone conversation, but you did overhear it, and you should have known well enough that it was secret. You should know that there are some things you talk about and some things you do not. Do you tell a child about something that is completely undecided? When did you come to work here, O-haru? Not just yesterday, you know.”

  “And not only this time.” Yukiko took over. “You have always talked too much. You are always saying things you should have left unsaid.”

  Scolded by the two in turns, O-haru stared motionless at the floor. “Very well, you may leave.” But O-haru still knelt before them as if she were dead. Only when she had been told three or four times to leave did she apologize in a barely audible voice and turn to go.

  “She will go on talking, no matter what you say to her.” Sachiko studied the face in the mirror. Yukiko was obviously upset. “But it was careless of me. I should have tried to talk over the telephone so that they could not understand. I ne
ver dreamed they would tell Etsuko.”

  “It is not only the telephone. For ever so long I have noticed how you talk with O-haru there listening.”

  “And when have we done that?”

  “Any number of times. You stop talking when she comes into the room, but when she goes out you begin again in the loudest voices, and there she is just outside the door. She must have heard any number of times.”

  Sachiko, Yukiko, Teinosuke, and sometimes Taeko had these last few nights had a number of conferences after Etsuko was in bed. Occasionally O-haru would come in from the dining room with something to drink, and, since the dining room was separated from the parlor by three sliding doors with openings large enough to admit a finger between them, a conversation in the parlor could be heard quite distinctly in the dining room. Late at night, when the house was quiet, it was necessary to talk in particularly low voices to avoid being overheard, and there was no doubt that they had not been as careful as they might have been. Yukiko was perhaps right. But if she had been so upset, and if the point seemed worth mentioning now, why had she not warned them at the time? She had such a low voice that, unless she especially called their attention to it, they were not likely to notice that she was being more subdued than usual. It was of course a nuisance to have a gossip like O-haru about, but it could be just as trying to have someone who never said enough, Sachiko could not help thinking. It appeared from Yukiko’s use of the plural “voices,” however, that Teinosuke was the principal object of her criticism, and one could perhaps forgive her for having kept quiet out of deference to him. Teinosuke, it was true, had a very penetrating voice.

  “You really should have told us at the time.”

  “We are not to talk about it in front of them. It is not that I dislike these meetings—you know that—but there they are, watching and telling each other I have failed again.” Yukiko’s voice was choked, and a tear drew a line over the face in the mirror.

  “You know perfectly well, Yukiko, that we have always been the ones who do the refusing. You know that. The other side has always been ready and waiting, and we have not been quite satisfied ourselves.”

  “Do you suppose the maids think so? They will only think I have failed again, and even if they know the truth, they will say… .”

  “I think we should talk about something else. We were wrong, and it will never happen again. See what you are doing to your face.” Sachiko wanted to retouch the face, but she was afraid she would only invite more tears.

  10

  TEINOSUKE had fled to the garden cottage that served as his study. He was beginning to worry about the time. It was after four, and there was no sign that the sisters were ready. Something struck the dry foliage in the garden outside. Leaning across his desk, he slid open the paper-panelled window. An autumn shower had suddenly clouded a blue sky. Here and there a raindrop traced its line over the greenery and fell rustling on a leaf.

  “It is raining!” He ran into the main house and called up the stairs.

  “It is raining.” Sachiko looked out the window. “Only a shower, though. It will be over in no time. You can still see the blue sky.”

  But the tiled roofs were already wet and glistening, and the pounding suggested more than a shower.

  “You ought to reserve a cab. Have it here at five-fifteen. And I will not wear a kimono in the rain. How would blue serge be?”

  There was hardly a cab to be had in Ashiya when it rained. They telephoned immediately, as Teinosuke suggested; but five- fifteen came, and five-twenty, and no cab. The rain only became more violent. Every garage in the city gave the same answer: it being a lucky day, there were scores of weddings, all of which needed cabs; and the cabs left over had unfortunately been taken when the rain began. As soon as a cab came in, however, it would be sent around. Leaving at five-thirty and going straight to Kobe, they could be at the Oriental Hotel by six. The half-hour too passed. Teinosuke telephoned the hotel and was told that the party was present in force and waiting for them. At five minutes to six a cab finally arrived. Safely inside after the driver had come with an umbrella to escort them one by one through the downpour, Sachiko felt a cold drop run down her neck. She remembered that it had rained at Yukiko’s last miai too, and at the one before that.

  “Here we are a half hour late.” Teinosuke apologized to Itani almost before he said hello. She came out as they were checking their coats. “There are weddings everywhere, and then it began to rain. We just couldn’t find a taxi.”

  “I saw bride after bride on my way here,” said Itani. While Sachiko and Yukiko were checking their coats, she signalled that she wanted to talk to Teinosuke alone.

  “I’ll introduce you to Mr. Segoshi in a minute. First I wanted to ask whether you had finished investigating him.”

  “As a matter of fact, the people in Osaka have investigated Mr. Segoshi and are very happy with what they’ve found out. At the moment they’re looking into the matter of his family. There is just one more report due. Might we have another week?”

  “I see …”

  “We should try to be quicker, I know, with you going to all this trouble. But they’re so old-fashioned, and they will take their time. We’re grateful for all you’ve done, though, and I must say that I approve completely myself. I told them as strongly as I could that it would do no good to go following all the old forms —that it would only mean putting Yukiko’s marriage off still longer. I said that if there was no objection to the man himself they shouldn’t worry too much about the family. As a matter of fact, I think everything will go off very well if they like each other this evening.”

  Teinosuke and Sachiko had agreed upon the excuses they would make, but Teinosuke was quite sincere on at least this last point.

  They exchanged only the simplest greetings in the lobby and hurried to the elevator for the second floor, where Itani had reserved a private dining room. Itani and Igarashi were at the head and foot of the table, and Segoshi and the Murakamis on one side. Yukiko, Sachiko, and Teinosuke sat in that order on the other side, with Yukiko opposite Segoshi. Itani had suggested the day before that Segoshi and Yukiko sit in the middle, the one between the Murakamis and the other between her sister and brother-in-law. Sachiko had objected, however, that that would be too reminiscent of a formal miai.

  “I can’t help thinking I don’t belong here.” The soup had come, and Igarashi chose a suitable moment to open the conversation. “I come from the same town as Segoshi, it’s true, but you can see how much older I am. He really ought to have a schoolmate here to help him. All we have in common, you might say, is that our families happen to live near each other. Not that I’m not glad to be here—don’t misunderstand me—as a matter of fact it’s too fine a party for me. But I argued all the way, and this man Murakami told me I had to come. Mrs. Itani is a good talker, I’m told, but I don’t imagine her brother here has ever lost an argument even with her. Do you mean to refuse this important invitation? he said. Think what that would mean, he said—the whole affair would be ruined. We need one old man there, he said, and we can’t let that bald head get away. So here I am.”

  Murakami laughed. “But the director doesn’t seem to mind being here, now that we’ve made it.”

  “The director—no more of that. I’m here to enjoy myself, and I don’t want to hear a word that reminds me of business.”

  Sachiko remembered that there had been just such a bald, clowning chief-clerk in the Makioka shop. Today, with the larger of the old shops for the most part reorganized as joint-stock companies, “chief clerk” had become “director.” The old cloak and apron had been changed for the business suit, and the Semba dialect for standard Japanese, but the “director” himself was even now less an executive than an old apprentice, a man who had come as a boy to learn the business. Every Osaka shop had one or two of them, the bowing, bald-headed, talkative clerks who knew how to keep the master happy and how to make people laugh. It seemed likely that Itani had decided to invite Igarashi lest
the conversation lag.

  Segoshi sat smiling through this exchange. He was very much as Sachiko and the rest had imagined him, though younger than in the picture—they would have taken him for no more than thirty-six or thirty-seven. The features were regular, but quite lacking in charm and distinction. It was, as Taeko had said, a most ordinary face. Indeed there was something very ordinary about the man in general—the height, the frame, the clothes, down to the choice of necktie. One searched in vain for the Parisian influence. Still he looked like a good, honest office worker, likable enough in his way.

  He could be worse, thought Teinosuke. “And how long were you in Paris, Mr. Segoshi?”

  “Two years exactly. It was a long time ago, though.”

  “When was it?”

  “Fifteen or sixteen years ago. Just after I finished school.”

  “You were sent to the main office when you graduated, then?”

  “No, the trip had nothing to do with the company. I didn’t go to work until I was back in Japan. My father had just died. The estate didn’t come to very much, but I did have a little money to spend, and off I went. If I had any aim in mind, I suppose it was to improve my French. And then I had a vague idea that I might find work. It turned out to be nothing more than a pleasure trip, though. I accomplished nothing—my French was no better afterwards, and of course I didn’t find work.”

  “Segoshi is a very unusual person,” Murakami put in. “Most people hate the idea of coming home once they’re in Paris, but Segoshi was so homesick he had to come back.”

  “Really? And why was that?”

  “I hardly know. I suppose I expected too much.”

  “You went to Paris to find how good Japan was—there’s nothing wrong with that. And is that why you want a Japanese-style wife?” Igarashi’s manner was joking, but he shot a glance at Yukiko, who was looking at her plate.

  “I suppose your French has improved a great deal since you’ve been back,” said Teinosuke.