Read Online The Sailor Who Fell from Grace with the Sea by Yukio Mishima - Free Book Online Page A

determined not to submit, though she knew Ryuji would try to make her speak. She understood that he was staking a simple man’s pride on the tears of a woman lamenting the farewell. And what a simple man he was! Their conversation in the park the night before was proof of that. First he had misled her with his pensive look into expecting profound observations or even a passionate declaration, and then he had begun a monologue on shreds of green leaf, and prattled about his personal history, and finally, horribly entangled in his own story, burst into the refrain of a popular song!
    Yet she was relieved to know that he was not a dreamer, and his plainness, a quality more durable than imaginative, like a piece of sturdy old furniture, she found reassuring. Fusako needed a guarantee of safety, for she had pampered herself too long, avoided danger in any form, and her unexpected and dangerous actions since the night before had frightened her. Feeling up in the air as she did, it seemed vitally important that the man with whom she was involved be down-to-earth. There were still things to learn of course, but at least she was convinced that Ryuji was not the sort of man to burden her financially.
    On their way to a steakhouse at the Bashado, they passed a little café with a fountain in the garden and small red and yellow lights strung along the awning over the entrance, and decided to go in for a drink before dinner.
    For some reason, the mint frappé Fusako ordered was garnished with a cherry, stem and all. She deftly tore the fruit away with her teeth and placed the pit in a shallow glass ashtray.
    The glow that lingered in the sky was sifting through the lace curtains on the large front window, suffusing the almost empty room. It must have been due to those delicately tinted rays of light: the smooth, warm cherry pit, just perceptibly beginning to dry and ineffably pink, appeared incredibly seductive to Ryuji. He reached for it abruptly and put it into his mouth. A cry of surprise rose to Fusako’s lips, then she began to laugh. She had never known a moment of such peaceful physical intimacy.
    They chose a quiet neighborhood for a walk after dinner. Captives of a tenderness that might have bewitched the summer night, they walked in silence, holding hands. Fusako brushed at her hair with her free hand. That afternoon she had watched for a lull in business at the shop, then dashed to the beauty parlor for a quick hairdo. Remembering the puzzlement on the beautician’s face when she had declined the perfumed oil she always had her comb lightly through her hair, Fusako blushed. Now her whole body threatened to unravel into a sloppy heap amid the smells of the city and the summer night.
    Tomorrow, the thick fingers twined in her own would plunge over the horizon It was unbelievable, like a ridiculous, spectacular lie. Fusako blurted, as they were passing a nursery that had closed for the day: “I’ve sunk pretty low thanks to you.”
    “Why?” Surprised, Ryuji stopped.
    Fusako peered through the wire fence at the trees and shrubbery and rose bushes all tightly packed together in the nursery garden. It was pitch dark, the luxuriant foliage was unnaturally tangled and involuted: she felt suddenly as though a terrible eye were looking into her.
    “Why?” Ryuji asked again; Fusako didn’t answer. As the mistress of a respectable shore household, she wanted to protest being forced into a pattern of life which began with waving goodbye to a man, a pattern familiar to any harbor whore. But that would have been only one step away from giving utterance to those other words: you’ll be leaving in the morning, won’t you? . . .
    A solitary life aboard ship had taught Ryuji not to probe matters he didn’t understand. Fusako’s complaint he interpreted as typical, a woman whining: his second “why” was therefore playful, teasing. The thought of parting with her the next day was painful, but he had a maxim to countermand his