Beauty in Disarray. Harumi Setouchi

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СКАЧАТЬ I sarcastically and severely asked how on earth a person like her could live, thinking only of herself and never paying any attention to her family or parents, she arrogantly declared our parents were poor out of their own choice and so it wasn't our responsibility. Nevertheless, with total indifference she continued to inconvenience others. Oh yes, as for me, she gave me lots of trouble until she died, and I never received a single world of thanks from her.

      "Later on I settled down in Shimonoseki, and when she was on her way back home from Tokyo, she'd stop off at my place. She always bought her ticket only as far as Shimonoseki. And when she was returning to Tokyo from Imajuku, without fail her ticket was bought only to Shimonoseki. She had decided the remaining portion of her ticket would be handed to her by me, and as for some extra spending money, she had decided that I, of course, would hand that out too.

      "Each time she came home, my mother had to work like a horse. Yes, whenever my sister gave birth to a child, whether by Tsuji or Osugi, she came back to Imajuku. You're asking why? Of course, it was because she had made up her mind that the cheapest way of having a baby and getting a rest before and after the birth was at home. My mother, who was already old, often complained about being forced to wash diapers even while having to watch Noe's other small children. Though I told my mother it would be all right to abandon a daughter who had never once since childhood helped her, the fact was my mother was a gentle person, and saying, 'Still, she is my daughter,' continued to look after my sister's needs. Even during the time of a birth, Noe would be reading her books whenever she had a moment to spare, and during that period when she came home, she never washed any diapers or anything else.

      "Everyone in our neighborhood whispered about how such a good mother had ever given birth to such a daughter. To make matters worse, there were many times when she came either with Tsuji or Osugi as her husband. When she turned up with Osugi, our father was angry and for a long time broke off with them with the remark that he couldn't show his face to the world, but finally he gave in, and she again began bringing Osugi with her.

      "Yes, well, she was lucky with men, wasn't she? Both Tsuji and Osugi were quite kind, and they thought highly of her, referring to whatever related to her by saying 'my dear Noe-san' this or 'my dear Noe-san' that. Both of them were good men, but I guess Osugi was much the better after all. He was more of a man, kinder, more dignified.

      "In a way, Tsuji was somewhat feeble and gave one the impression of shilly-shallying. My sister finally complained he was a nincompoop, a good-for-nothing.

      "Even now I can remember Osugi with his big body bent down by the side of our well as he washed their babies' diapers. Whenever he came, he worked hard doing this kind of thing, even washing Noe's undergarments for her.

      "As for Tsuji, of course, she loved him very much at the beginning. He was quite an expert on the shakuhachi bamboo flute, and I remember how they often played together, my sister accompanying him on the samisen.

      "She played it quite well, and she was also good at singing, since she'd been trained in both by our father. After she married Tsuji, she was taught how to sing and play the long epic songs of Japan, thanks to Tsuji's mother, who was quite accomplished in the arts, especially in these epic songs, because she was the daughter of wealthy rice distributor at Kuramae in Asakusa. You see, what my sister learned at home were short ballads and love songs, things like that. You can probably imagine how my mother felt, constantly having to take care of either Tsuji's children or Osugi's. My father and mother were rural people, and no matter which man came they said he was, after all, their daughter's husband, so it seemed they worked as hard as possible.

      "After Noe lived with Osugi, our small quiet village came to be thrown into a turmoil. Up until then the police officials stationed in our village had nothing to do after they came to live here, and they were quite happy to come and just go fishing, but the moment my sister began living with Osugi, the officials were put to much trouble. Each time they went to our house, they complained it was just their bad luck to have been ordered to be stationed in such a town. Well, every three days without fail they had to appear at our house to ask us what letters had arrived from Tokyo or if any strange things had occurred. And if at that moment while they were questioning us, my sister and her husband happened to turn up, the police were quite alarmed. For a whole day they would have to loiter around our house as they stood watch outside. And besides that, since my sister and Osugi openly accompanied each other on quiet walks, the police were ready to drop with fatigue from following them. In the long run, my sister won these constables over, and she sent them off on errands and made them watch her children. She always had them carry her luggage from the station.

      "As usual, she didn't care about her appearance in the least, and when she came back home, she'd be wearing her shabbiest kimono, intending to have it mended by our mother, and so Noe wore it nonchalantly, the cotton bulging out of the kimono seams. The strings for tying her haori half-coat were always twisted pieces of paper. When our mother, unable to look on with indifference, said, 'At least why not set your hair when you come back to the village, since every soul is looking at you!' Noe would declare arrogantly, 'Before long, women will be wearing their hair like mine! Just wait and see.' When I think back to that now, my elder sister's prophecy has actually come true, hasn't it?

      "Yes, about the time she was killed, she was often wearing foreign-style clothing. Her hair was bobbed, and she even wore a hat. Osugi was a born dandy, and it being his way to be finicky about clothes, he was extravagant in appearance. I guess my elder sister was influenced by him. Osugi was quite particular about their children's clothing, and Mako-san was made to wear the kind of stylish outfit Osugi liked. So even when we looked after the children here, he made them wear only European dress and brought them wearing the latest fashions. In those days no children in the rural districts wore European clothes, and girls with a Dutch bob were even rarer. Certainly it was quite unusual for a woman to wear European dresses in 1923, even in Tokyo, don't you think? But there was something becoming about my sister in her European attire. She was exceedingly confident that whatever she wore or whatever she did was suitable, so it seems everything and anything became her.

      "Oh yes, I just remembered something very interesting about Tsuji. When I returned home after escaping from the family I had married into, my first marriage having failed, it was just then that Tsuji first came to our house and I happened to meet him. At that time he said he would take me up to Tokyo to make me an actress in the Imperial Theatre, and he kept insisting he could definitely turn me into a success. Even Noe was in earnest about it and encouraged me. It sounds strange to remember that now, but when this was told to me, I somehow felt it wouldn't be a bad thing to appear on the stage, having always liked singing and dancing, and I came to want to go. But for some reason or other my father was against it and wouldn't let me. In those days Sumako Matsui, who acted the parts of Nora and Katucha, had created a sensation all over the country, not to mention the actresses at the Imperial Theatre, so I couldn't deny I had a longing to become an actress. Though my father was fond of singing and dancing and even forced his daughter to dance on the stage as one of his favorite diversions, he nevertheless felt that being a professional actress was worse than being a geisha, obsessed as he was with the old-fashioned idea that no woman should degrade herself by becoming an actress, the word for actress, kawarakojiki, equivalent to beggar.

      "Oh, is it my marriage you're asking about? The first was when I was seventeen and married a very wealthy man from a neighboring prefecture after he took a fancy to my looks. But since he was a person who had never had to worry about money, he was deceived by a swindler just after our marriage and went prospecting for gold with him after he had told my husband they could find a gold mine in Kagoshima.

      "The moment they arrived there, they indulged in all luxuries regardless of expense. They continued their foolish diversions by being spectators at the theatre from morning till night after reserving box seats for a full month and by having geisha parties at teahouses, even asking me to join them, and then when they finally went into the mountains, there was nothing to take out because it was all nonsense from the first, СКАЧАТЬ