barely able to paste two bags in the time everyone else made ten. Sometimes it seemed that all his wild complaints were designed to hide his embarrassment at the fact that his complete lack of self-sufficiency was so abundantly clear. Chieko saw a cynical heroism in the clownish pose he assumed voluntarily lest he fall into it involuntarily. She took pride in her ability to be as quarrelsome as he, yet she extended to her husband whole-hearted adulation. She recognized that as a good wife she should share her husband’s anger against her father-in-law, and along with her husband she despised Yakichi in her heart. While she folded her own share of bags, she quietly and ingeniously lent a hand to complete her husband’s allotment. Etsuko’s mouth unconsciously fell into a smile as she watched Chieko’s unobtrusive self-abnegation.
“You’re fast, Etsuko, aren’t you?” said Asako.
“Half-time score!” said Kensuke, and went around counting the bags each had completed. Etsuko was first, with 380.
Etsuko’s skill was lost on the insensitive Asako and on the unreflectively admiring Saburo and Miyo, but to Kensuke and his wife it was vaguely unsettling, a fact Etsuko herself perceived. To Kensuke in particular the very number she had attained was the index of her ability to survive, and at the same time it was a patent slur, on which he commented sarcastically: “Well, it looks like Etsuko’s the only one of us that could live off folding bags.”
Asako took him literally and asked: “Have you had experience folding envelopes, Etsuko?”
Etsuko found nothing appealing in the cloying class prejudice these people seemed to derive from their pitiful, niggling, country respectability. As one who had the blood of a famous general of the civil wars, Etsuko could not pardon their upstart pride. She struck out against it with a deliberately combative reply: “As a matter of fact, I have.”
Kensuke and Chieko exchanged looks. That night the subject of their intense bedtime conversation was the ancestry that permitted Etsuko such coolness.
At that time Etsuko paid no attention worthy of the word to Saburo’s existence. Later she could not remember clearly what he looked like. That was natural enough, since Saburo said not a word, smiled only occasionally at the prattle of his employer’s family, and clumsily applied his fingertips to the task of pasting up the paper bags. Over his usual patched shirt, he wore one of Yakichi’s old, overly-roomy suit coats, and sat respectfully in his brand-new khaki-colored trousers, head bent down in the dim light.
Up until eight or nine years earlier, the Sugimoto family had used Blanchard lamps. Those who remembered back that far said the rooms had been brighter then. Since the electricity had been installed, unfortunately, they had to light hundred-watt bulbs with a piddling forty watts of power. The radio was audible only at night and, under certain weather conditions, not even then.
Yet it wasn’t true that she did not pay any attention to him. As she folded her bags, Etsuko at times noticed how clumsy Saburo’s fingers were. Those stubby, ruggedly honest fingertips irritated her. She looked to the side and saw Chieko helping her husband fold his quota. The vague notion came to her that she might do the same for Saburo. She perceived, however, that Miyo, sitting over beside Saburo, quietly helped him when her assigned lot was complete. This relieved her.
I felt relieved then. Yes, without the slightest jealousy or anything like it. In fact I felt a faint joy at being divested of responsibility. I tried not to watch what Saburo was doing. That was easy enough. My bent back, my silence, my application to the task—all without seeing him—aped Saburo’s silence, Saburo’s bent posture, Saburo’s application to the task.
. . . yet there wasn’t a thing.
Eleven o’clock came. Everyone withdrew to their rooms.
What did she feel, then, when at one in the morning
“You’re fast, Etsuko, aren’t you?” said Asako.
“Half-time score!” said Kensuke, and went around counting the bags each had completed. Etsuko was first, with 380.
Etsuko’s skill was lost on the insensitive Asako and on the unreflectively admiring Saburo and Miyo, but to Kensuke and his wife it was vaguely unsettling, a fact Etsuko herself perceived. To Kensuke in particular the very number she had attained was the index of her ability to survive, and at the same time it was a patent slur, on which he commented sarcastically: “Well, it looks like Etsuko’s the only one of us that could live off folding bags.”
Asako took him literally and asked: “Have you had experience folding envelopes, Etsuko?”
Etsuko found nothing appealing in the cloying class prejudice these people seemed to derive from their pitiful, niggling, country respectability. As one who had the blood of a famous general of the civil wars, Etsuko could not pardon their upstart pride. She struck out against it with a deliberately combative reply: “As a matter of fact, I have.”
Kensuke and Chieko exchanged looks. That night the subject of their intense bedtime conversation was the ancestry that permitted Etsuko such coolness.
At that time Etsuko paid no attention worthy of the word to Saburo’s existence. Later she could not remember clearly what he looked like. That was natural enough, since Saburo said not a word, smiled only occasionally at the prattle of his employer’s family, and clumsily applied his fingertips to the task of pasting up the paper bags. Over his usual patched shirt, he wore one of Yakichi’s old, overly-roomy suit coats, and sat respectfully in his brand-new khaki-colored trousers, head bent down in the dim light.
Up until eight or nine years earlier, the Sugimoto family had used Blanchard lamps. Those who remembered back that far said the rooms had been brighter then. Since the electricity had been installed, unfortunately, they had to light hundred-watt bulbs with a piddling forty watts of power. The radio was audible only at night and, under certain weather conditions, not even then.
Yet it wasn’t true that she did not pay any attention to him. As she folded her bags, Etsuko at times noticed how clumsy Saburo’s fingers were. Those stubby, ruggedly honest fingertips irritated her. She looked to the side and saw Chieko helping her husband fold his quota. The vague notion came to her that she might do the same for Saburo. She perceived, however, that Miyo, sitting over beside Saburo, quietly helped him when her assigned lot was complete. This relieved her.
I felt relieved then. Yes, without the slightest jealousy or anything like it. In fact I felt a faint joy at being divested of responsibility. I tried not to watch what Saburo was doing. That was easy enough. My bent back, my silence, my application to the task—all without seeing him—aped Saburo’s silence, Saburo’s bent posture, Saburo’s application to the task.
. . . yet there wasn’t a thing.
Eleven o’clock came. Everyone withdrew to their rooms.
What did she feel, then, when at one in the morning
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