Read Online Death in Midsummer & Other Stories by Yukio Mishima - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Yukio Mishima
Tags: Fiction, Literary, Japan, Short Stories (Single Author), Mishima; Yukio, Short Stories; Japanese, Japan - Social Life and Customs
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head and urged her to bow. Hamako declined to do so, however. Instead she knelt on the stool and concentrated on the straw. She was too small to reach it sitting down.
It pleased Kawase that the child was not one for ceremony.
Her features were good, resembling those of her mother, and her profile, as she sucked at the straw and brushed away hair with her outspread hand, was very pretty. She was quiet, leaving conversation to her elders.
55
'People are always asking how I could have produced such a quiet child.' But immediately Aska returned to more adult topics.
The shop was filled with a peculiarly American odour, half the hygienic smell of medicines, half the sweet, clinging odour of bodies. The customers were almost all women, middle-aged or older, with proud eyes and heavily painted hps, attacking large sweets and open sandwiches. Despite the noise and bustle of the store, there was something very lonely about the individual women and their appetites. Sad, lonely, like a performance by so many consuming machines.
'I want a ride on the cable car,' said Hamako, who had half emptied her glass.
That's what she wants every day. And we can perfectly well afford a taxi.'
'Oh, the richest tourists ride on the cable car. You won't be lowering yourself.'
'Is that sarcasm? But I'm not surprised. You were something of a needier in the old days.'
It was Asaka's first mention of 'the old days'.
'Well, I'll take you for a ride on the cable car if your mother won't.' Kawase slipped a quarter under the saucer and picked up the bill. He shook his head. He did not have a headache, but now that he was on the way home, all the weariness of travel seemed to collect in one place. He thought that a cable-car ride might clear it away.
Preparatory to helping Hamako down, Asaka squirmed back into her mink coat. Kawase helped her.
'I'm always forgetting. The gentleman is supposed to help.
I'm not used to such kindness.'
'You'll have to learn to be more arrogant.'
To be more dignified.'
Asaka sat up on the stool and arched her back. The young swelling of her suit coat was such as to arouse the envy of the women around the counter. Kawase remembered how in the old days he would stand behind her as she arched her back just so, and help tie her obi. Compared to the stiff, clean austerity of the obi, the softness of the mink coat seemed to evade the grasp.
56
A strange simile came into Kawase's mind: it was as if the great, vermilion-lacquered, black-riveted gate of some noble lady's mansion were suddenly to change into a slick revolving door.
3 They avoided talk of the old days, like a pair weaving in and out among puddles after a rainstorm, so deftly that neither of than found the process awkward. For talk of the present, they had only San Francisco. They were two travellers who had no other life.
The more he looked at her the more he could see behind her Western elegance the influence of that educator, her patron.
The Asaka of old was something of an expert on the Japanese dance, and she would naturally fall into dance poses, her delicate fingers in a formal pattern, when she brought her hand to her mouth to laugh or was frightened or heard something she would rather not have heard. Now everything was changed. Yet she had not really acquired Western elegance in place of the old Japanese elegance. Her movements were remarkably angular.
Kawase could imagine how unceasing had been her patron's labours in correcting all those little mannerisms. It was as if he had sent her off to America with his fingerprints on every part of her body. Only the too-white powder remained as a relic of the old days. Perhaps that was her one gesture of defiance, alone in a foreign country. As a matter of fact, however, it had once been much whiter.
As Asaka stood waiting for the cable car, the child's hand in hers, Kawase looked afresh at the mink coat and wondered where she would be keeping her little packet of paper handkerchiefs. In the old days
It pleased Kawase that the child was not one for ceremony.
Her features were good, resembling those of her mother, and her profile, as she sucked at the straw and brushed away hair with her outspread hand, was very pretty. She was quiet, leaving conversation to her elders.
55
'People are always asking how I could have produced such a quiet child.' But immediately Aska returned to more adult topics.
The shop was filled with a peculiarly American odour, half the hygienic smell of medicines, half the sweet, clinging odour of bodies. The customers were almost all women, middle-aged or older, with proud eyes and heavily painted hps, attacking large sweets and open sandwiches. Despite the noise and bustle of the store, there was something very lonely about the individual women and their appetites. Sad, lonely, like a performance by so many consuming machines.
'I want a ride on the cable car,' said Hamako, who had half emptied her glass.
That's what she wants every day. And we can perfectly well afford a taxi.'
'Oh, the richest tourists ride on the cable car. You won't be lowering yourself.'
'Is that sarcasm? But I'm not surprised. You were something of a needier in the old days.'
It was Asaka's first mention of 'the old days'.
'Well, I'll take you for a ride on the cable car if your mother won't.' Kawase slipped a quarter under the saucer and picked up the bill. He shook his head. He did not have a headache, but now that he was on the way home, all the weariness of travel seemed to collect in one place. He thought that a cable-car ride might clear it away.
Preparatory to helping Hamako down, Asaka squirmed back into her mink coat. Kawase helped her.
'I'm always forgetting. The gentleman is supposed to help.
I'm not used to such kindness.'
'You'll have to learn to be more arrogant.'
To be more dignified.'
Asaka sat up on the stool and arched her back. The young swelling of her suit coat was such as to arouse the envy of the women around the counter. Kawase remembered how in the old days he would stand behind her as she arched her back just so, and help tie her obi. Compared to the stiff, clean austerity of the obi, the softness of the mink coat seemed to evade the grasp.
56
A strange simile came into Kawase's mind: it was as if the great, vermilion-lacquered, black-riveted gate of some noble lady's mansion were suddenly to change into a slick revolving door.
3 They avoided talk of the old days, like a pair weaving in and out among puddles after a rainstorm, so deftly that neither of than found the process awkward. For talk of the present, they had only San Francisco. They were two travellers who had no other life.
The more he looked at her the more he could see behind her Western elegance the influence of that educator, her patron.
The Asaka of old was something of an expert on the Japanese dance, and she would naturally fall into dance poses, her delicate fingers in a formal pattern, when she brought her hand to her mouth to laugh or was frightened or heard something she would rather not have heard. Now everything was changed. Yet she had not really acquired Western elegance in place of the old Japanese elegance. Her movements were remarkably angular.
Kawase could imagine how unceasing had been her patron's labours in correcting all those little mannerisms. It was as if he had sent her off to America with his fingerprints on every part of her body. Only the too-white powder remained as a relic of the old days. Perhaps that was her one gesture of defiance, alone in a foreign country. As a matter of fact, however, it had once been much whiter.
As Asaka stood waiting for the cable car, the child's hand in hers, Kawase looked afresh at the mink coat and wondered where she would be keeping her little packet of paper handkerchiefs. In the old days
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