五重塔 English

Part One

A long brazier of solid, rugged build, its keyaki-wood body handsome in grain, its rim deliberately fitted with red oak — before it sat, facing no one, with no companion for talk, a woman of about thirty, sitting a little forlornly and alone; her eyebrows, once as fine and bold as a man's, showed the pale green trace of a recent shaving, keeping still the color of a mountain after rain, a green so vivid it caught the eye and stirred it; her nose ran straight and fine, the corners of her eyes turned up sharply; her washed hair was wound round and round into a hard, plain knot, dressed with nothing but a strip of torn paper and pinned through with a single hairpin, in a manner meant to look utterly without allure — and yet a lock or two of hair, black and glossy enough to vex one with envy, had come loose and fell astray; and the look this gave her sallow but clear-toned face was such that even a man who disliked women past their first youth could not help but praise it; a man of loose habits, seeing her, might well have appraised her in secret, uninvited, thinking what fine clothes he would dress her in were she his own — and yet, for all that,

her dress cared nothing for appearances and prided itself on plain honesty — the pattern she had chosen was not unrefined, but she wore no more than a quilted robe of futako cotton with a satin collar sewn on, nowhere a touch of rouge-bright color about her; only the nursing-jacket she had thrown over it, a coarse striped silk that must once have been something finer, showed signs of having been through the wash more times than could be counted.

Just then, from the kitchen came only the sound of the maid washing dishes, the house otherwise quiet, with no sign of anyone else about; and the woman, who a moment before had been idly toying with a blackwood toothpick, rolling it on the tip of her tongue, now bit it clean through, spat it away, raked the ashes of the brazier smooth, banked the coals neatly, drew a small cloth from her basket, polished the trivet till it shone like silver, wiped away the soot, and cleaned even the lid of the copper water-jar; then, having set the great Nambu-glazed iron kettle properly in place, she drew toward her, with a tortoiseshell-mouthed pipe held in her right hand, a small and elegant marquetry tobacco box — the kind of gift some man might have brought her sister-in-law from Hakone on the way back from a pilgrimage to Sekison — and, drawing a slow, unhurried puff, let the smoke drift out gently as incense-smoke, and, before she knew it, heaved a sigh: the work would most likely fall to her husband after all, but that hateful lump of a man, Nossori, on the other side—

had gone round to the Superior himself, forgetting the favor done him only last year, and had wormed his way into the old man's good graces, and, not knowing his own place, had put in a bid to take on this next commission after all. By Seikichi's account, even if the Superior did feel some partiality toward him, still it would go hard with the temple, before the parishioners and the donors both, to entrust so grave a work to a nobody like Nossori whose name carried no weight at all — so it was sure to come to her husband in the end. And even supposing it were given to Nossori, the work was beyond him, and no one would consent to labor under him, so that a botched, shameful failure was as good as certain — or so it was said; but still, she only wished her husband would come home soon with a smile, having got the commission at last. It was work of a kind so rare that she wanted with all her heart to see him try it, to see him take it on; profit or loss did not matter to her at all. Of the five-storied pagoda at Kanno-ji in Yanaka—

"Genta of Kawagoe built the five-storied pagoda — ah, well done, what a fine piece of work" — that was what he longed to hear said of him, and it delighted him so that these days he threw himself into his trade with an eagerness quite unlike his usual self; and if this work should be snatched away from him by another, there was no telling how furious he would be, what a fit of temper he would fly into — and reasonable enough it was too, so that there was nothing she could do from the sidelines to comfort him. Ah, whatever came of it, if only he would come home soon with good news — this she thought but did not say, being a wife through and through, and she was worrying over the man she had sent off that morning in the haori she herself had sewn and slipped over his shoulders from behind, when the sturdy lattice door out front was flung open roughly. "Sis, is the boss—" "No, he's off to Kanno-ji." "Well, there's nothing for it, then — sis, I'm sorry to trouble you, but I drank a bit too much last night—" and, leaving the rest unsaid, he made some odd gesture instead of finishing; whereupon she, wrinkling her brow, said with a laugh,

"There's no 'nothing for it' about it — you ought to pull yourself together a little," and, rising as she spoke, handed him some money; with which he went out to the door and, after some long, muttering back-and-forth with someone there, came back in, pressed a fist to his forehead, and said, "I'm really sorry — thank you very much," bowing his thanks so clumsily that it was almost funny.

Part Two

"No need to light a fire elsewhere — come sit here," she said, lifting down the heavy kettle, and, gracious even to an underling, poured him a cup of cherry-blossom tea with easy charm; a welcome with flowers in the heart means more than one with a mouth full of empty pleasantries, and when she went further and heard out his shameful request without a murmur, treating him just as she always did, without the least trace of resentment, Seikichi felt only the more abashed — something deep in his soul seemed to itch — and his hand, reaching for the teacup, hung back timidly, unable to move. After repeating his apology some two times over, he had scarcely had time to wet his parched tongue when she went on: "Coming home at this hour — you must be spoiled rotten. Ho ho. It's all very well to enjoy yourself, but if you go neglecting your work and making your mother worry, that's no way for a man to behave, is it, Seikichi? These days you—

have been sent straight from the work at the Koshu-ya's main house in Nakacho over to the tea room at the Negishi villa, haven't you? My husband himself likes his fun well enough, and is often enough the one leading the rest of you into mischief, but he can't abide anyone who neglects the work for it — you know as well as I do that if he so much as caught sight of your face right now, he'd have those veins standing out on his forehead again in no time. Well, you're a little late as it is, but you can always make some excuse or other, your mother's old complaint acting up or some such — go on to Negishi quickly now. Gosaburo-sama is an understanding man, and he'll cover for you before the master even if he sees through it, in return for the one day you shirked and no more. Oh — you haven't had breakfast yet, I suppose. San, fix him something to eat, whatever's at hand — it won't run to hot tofu and clam stew, but pickles and boiled beans will do well enough. Bolt down two or three bowls and then straight

off to work with you, off with you. Ho ho, sleepy as you are, think of last night and you can bear it well enough — don't stint your effort, put up with it. There, I'll have Matsu carry your lunch box for you." Her words, an unbitter but effective medicine of good counsel thoroughly applied, brought out a sweat on honest Seikichi, ashamed of his own carelessness.

"Sis, then, thanking you kindly, I'll go tearing off to work now," and, wiping his forehead with a towel snatched up in one fist, he made for the kitchen — and no sooner had he than he was bolting down five or six bowls of tea-rice, shoveling it into his mouth in great rough gulps, and out again in no time. "So long, I'm off," he said, ducking his head in a quick bow that took in his whole shoulders, put away his pipe, tucked his Tsuboya tobacco pouch into his three-foot sash — every inch the quick-tempered true son of Edo — and, slipping on his sandals, was out the door, when the woman, silent till now, suddenly called him back. "Have you run into Nossori these past two or three days?" she asked, the words striking out of her like sparks off flint; and Seikichi, turning back, said, "I have, I have — in fact just yesterday, on Goten Slope, I saw that same old Nossori, more of a lump than ever, drooping his head like a chicken about to expire,

shuffling along as I watched. Setting himself up now against our boss, of all things, when a lump like him has no business hoping for such a thing — and though there's no real danger of it, still, the way his mug goes on causing worry for the boss and for you too, sis, made me so mad I couldn't stand it, so I let fly at him straight off — 'Hey, Nossori!' — but being who he is, he didn't even notice, so the third time I went right up close and hollered it — 'Hey, Nossori, Nossori!' — and that finally startled him, and he stared at me with those owl-like eyes of his and said, sleepy-voiced, 'Oh — Seikichi, is that you?' 'Hey, you've turned into quite a fine fellow lately, haven't you — climbing up into the dyer's drying yard in your dreams or something, wanting to put up something so almighty tall, and worming your way into the old priest's good graces at Kanno-ji, so they say — is that in your right mind, or are you still half asleep?'

That's the jibe I threw at him straight to his face. Ha ha ha, sis, but isn't it true that dull fellows are at least honest? — because you'd never guess what he answered: 'I'm working plenty hard at the flattery too, but with Master Genta set up against me, it's tough going to get anywhere with it — if only the boss would say, "Nossori, go on and give it a try," and hand it over, that'd be nice,' he says, the fool, as if the world owed him a favor. Ha ha ha, even remembering it now — the way he said it, dead serious and worried-looking, was too funny for words. It was so funny I couldn't even stay mad at him, so I just called him a blockhead and left it at that."

"Was that all?"

"Yes."

"Is that so. Well, you're getting late — go on now, never mind about it."

"So long, then," and Seikichi went off to his work; and she was left alone with her thoughts, while outside the innocent children shrieked at their spinning-top battles, shouting, "One killed! Two killed! Look at him now! Revenge is mine!"

It occurred to her that this, too, was the way of a world where all things, in their turn, must strive and contend.

Part Three

Those who flourish and prosper in this world change into their winter dress at the first frost-month without a care, wearing pongee or figured silk, whatever pleases their fancy, knowing nothing of the anxieties of the poor as the cold sets in; they cry, now the hearth must be opened, now the new tea must be broached, and for that, the tea room must be finished in a rush, the eaves of the waiting arbor mended, and they say, with such extravagance, that a late-night passing shower is no pleasure to hear pattering on the shutters unless one is sipping tea the while — and so they take even the harsh winter, when the wind blows bitter and the temple bell seems to freeze in the striking, for a thing to be enjoyed. But the artisan sort, whose hands go numb sharpening the plane that smooths the tea-room floorboards, who stand exposed to the wind weaving the bamboo fence beneath those very eaves until they are seized with colic — what wickedness can they have done in some former life, that they alone, in the very same season, must be made to suffer and to labor so differently from other men? And of all the tradesmen, there was one in particular, unversed in the ways of the world, good at heart—

such was her own husband. His skill was sure enough — Master Genta himself had praised it as fine work, back when he had taken him under his wing and helped him along last year — but, being of an easygoing, unambitious temper, he was forever letting jobs slip through his fingers, and the good work always went to someone else, so that month after month, year in and year out, he passed his days in a joyless, thankless sort of living. That she should let her own husband go about in nothing but a pair of patched work-trousers, barely mended where the knees had worn through, was shameful enough before other people's eyes for a wife to bear, but poverty made everything so, and there was no help for it. Even the padded robe she was sewing now for little Ino was made of washed-out, faded Matsuzaka stripe; sew it with all her devotion as she might, it would not only fail to look well on him but was so coarse-stitched as to be almost unsightly. And yet, only a little while ago, with a child's innocent heart, he had asked her, "Mother, whose robe is this? Since it's small, is it mine?" and, delighted, had run straight out of doors—

with a little pole in hand, giddy over the unusually warm weather, off to swat at the red dragonflies flitting through the sky — heaven only knew what part of town he'd wandered off to by now. Ah, brooding over it like this made even the sewing wearisome to her. If only half her husband's skill had been matched by some worldly cunning, they would never have come to such poverty as this; but, as the old saying goes, skill without opportunity is a treasure buried and wasted, and there was no telling when, if ever, his ability would come to light and catch the world's eye. A slap-dash carpenter, a hole-borer, saddled even with the hateful nickname Nossori and looked down on by his own fellow tradesmen — it galled her, it grieved her, that he himself seemed so maddeningly unbothered by it all, quite unlike her own secret fretting. But now, of all things, no sooner had he heard that a five-storied pagoda was to be built at Kanno-ji than he had suddenly, inexplicably, worked himself into a fever to take on the job himself, regardless that the very master to whom he owed so much—

wanted the very same work — that even she, married to him, thought it a shade too grasping for a man of their station to be reaching after such a thing; what must other people be saying of it? And surely the master himself must be raging this minute over that hateful Nossori, and O-Kichi, his wife, all the more resentful, calling him an ingrate with no sense of obligation. Today, most likely, the Superior would settle with a single word which of the two the work should go to — he had gone out that morning for just that purpose and had not yet come home. Oh, if only, for this one job at least — however much her husband longed for it, it was above their station, and there was a debt of obligation to the master besides, so that she half hoped the Superior would give it to the master after all; and yet, if the master, being so generous of spirit, would not be angered by it, then she half hoped her husband might be given the work and see it through to a triumph. Ah, how it fretted her — how would it—

turn out, she wondered. Most likely the work would never be entrusted to her husband at all, but if it should somehow come to that, there was no telling how angry the master and O-Kichi would be. Ah, the worry made her head ache; and if he found out about this worrying of hers, he would only say it was needless fretting, the kind only a woman would indulge in, and scold her, gently but unreasonably, for always being so delicate — that was why she was forever being told she was weak in body. Enough, enough of this, she thought — ah, it hurts — and, wincing, her sallow, faintly pockmarked face drawn tight, she dropped her sewing and pressed both hands to her temples, where medicated papers were already stuck. She was twenty-five or twenty-six years old, her features not unlovely, but going without good food had left her skin dull and rough, a pitiful sight, and her ragged clothes and unkempt hair made her look sadder still. And it was just as she sat there, deep in her lonely lament, that the torn paper door dividing off the kitchen slid open with a clatter, and, "Mother, look at this,"

said Ino, startling her. "When did you get in there?" she said, looking over — and there she saw a five-storied pagoda, built in vivid miniature from scraps of thin board stacked one on another. Her eyes filled with tears before she knew it; "Oh, what a good boy," she said, her voice thick with feeling, and threw her arms around Ino at once.

Part Four

Kanno-ji in Yanaka, which the renowned master builder Genta of Kawagoe had taken on contract and built, had not a single fault to find anywhere in it: the main hall with its coffered ceiling fifty mats wide, the long corridor that put a bridge to shame, the several guest halls, the great abbot's own chambers, the tea room, the quarters where the student monks were to live, the kitchen offices, the bath house, even the entrance hall — some built to the height of splendor, some to the utmost solidity, some pure and clean, some touched with a fitting austerity, each suited exactly to its purpose, the whole construction leaving nothing at all to be desired.

Now, who was it that had raised so great a temple from such humble old foundations?

Ask his religious name, and even a three-year-old of those days would know it well enough to press his palms together in reverence: the Venerable Roen of Uda, a monk past seventy who in his younger days had studied with the diligence of one who reads by firefly-light and snow-glow on Mount Minobu, who in his middle years had wandered as a pilgrim monk through more than sixty provinces, honing on the three contemplative practices the keen sword of tranquil wisdom, and making the teaching-voice of salvation resound through the four modes of doctrine. His very bones, shunning the meat and rank odors of the secular world, had grown thin as a crane's; his eyes, weary of the tangled confusion of human life, seemed half asleep; and having long since accepted the truth that all things arise and pass away, he never let the flame of desire rise up in his breast, nor, having grasped the truth of nirvana, did he let his heart be dyed with the colors of attachment — so that he had never set out to raise halls and towers or to found a great monastery. And yet so many students, drawn by his virtue and looking up to his example, came to gather about him that the old quarters no longer sufficed to shelter them from the wind and rain,

and it was from his simply murmuring to himself, "If only the hall were a little larger," that the whole thing took root: word spread in all directions that the high-minded and virtuous Superior meant to enlarge the scale of things and build a new temple. Among the disciples, some of the shrewder ones took it upon themselves to hasten off in every direction, soliciting donations for the founding of Kanno-ji; and among the lay believers, some, putting on a busy, self-important air, went about extolling the Superior's lofty virtue and urging the wealthy to give in charity. And on top of a following already numerous as clouds and mist, ever carrying with it a rapture of devout longing, this new momentum was added, so that from great lords above to townsmen below, all vied to cast their wealth into the offering, each eager to be first to sow his seed in the field of merit and secure ease in the life to come; the rich gave gold and silver, the poor a hundred or two hundred coppers, each according to his means, until, like a hundred rivers pouring into the sea, in no time at all a startling sum of money had gathered together. From that point

on, men skilled in worldly affairs took charge as stewards and managers, saw to every last detail, and in due course brought the whole to splendid completion — a tale that is a pleasure even to hear told.

But when, at last, everything had been completed, and Tamemon, the chief steward, closed the books on every expense and outlay of the construction without a single oversight, it turned out that a considerable sum of money still remained over.

What was to be done with it? — the monk-official Endo put his head, tonsured, together with a layman's untonsured head, and the two of them consulted, but no particularly wise plan presented itself. Should they buy paddy land? Should they buy dry fields? But there was already more than enough paddy and dry field from donations, so it seemed pointless to spend this consecrated money on any more of the same, and they were quite at a loss what to do. They knew well enough what the Superior's answer would be if asked — "It's troublesome, arrange it as you see fit," in that dry, cracked old voice of his — but Endo, plucking up his courage, asked him once whether he had any particular use in mind, and the old man said only, "Build a pagoda," one word and no more, without so much as turning his head, and went on reading, in silence, some sutra or treatise or other, a faint light in his eyes behind the great tortoiseshell-rimmed spectacles. So it was settled, then, that a pagoda should be built, and Endo gave orders to the same Genta to submit an estimate for it — but whether he knew of this or not,

Nossori had come asking to be granted an audience with the Superior, some two months before this.

Part Five

A man wearing a happi coat once indigo blue but so faded by sweat and weathered by wind into some nondescript color, and so many times washed and rinsed that it scarcely looked indigo at all, the lettering of its collar-mark grown too faint to read, and a pair of old, patched-up work-trousers below it; his hair dusty and grayish, his face sunburned, his whole bearing, already without a shred of refinement, made only the more graceless still — this man came shuffling and shambling toward the great gate of Kanno-ji, whereupon the gatekeeper, in a sharp voice, challenged him, demanding who he was. Startled, the man stared wide-eyed for a moment, then finally bent low and said, with foolish over-politeness, "I am Jubei, a carpenter. I have come with a request concerning the construction work." There was something not quite convincing in his awkward, hesitant manner, but the gatekeeper, hearing him say "carpenter," supposed him most likely to be some errand-boy sent by one of Genta's apprentices or the like, and, with a single high-handed word — "Pass" — let him through.

Encouraged by this, Jubei went on, looking about him as he went, until he came before the solemn, imposing front entrance, and called out, "I beg an audience," two or three times, until a pretty little acolyte, gray-robed and blue-shaven of head, answered "Yes?" and slid open the paper door — but, being well used to such visitors, he took one quick look and, without so much as stepping down to the entrance step, said coldly, "If it's business, go round to the kitchen quarters," and shut the door again with a bang, and left him standing there. After that, nothing but the cry of a bulbul somewhere in the treetops; not a sound, not an echo.

"I see," Jubei muttered to himself, and went round to the kitchen quarters and again asked to be shown in, whereupon Tamemon, the steward, came out looking every inch the man of consequence, and, seeing the shabbiness of his clothes, addressed him at once with a slighting, contemptuous air: "An unfamiliar sort of master-builder — where do you come from, and what business brings you here?" Jubei, quite unbothered, said, "I am but a carpenter, Jubei by name. I have come with a wish to be granted the honor of an audience with the Superior. I beg you to convey my request to him," bowing his head low as he pleaded. Tamemon looked him over from his grimy head down to the tips of his sandals, once white-thonged but now gone grey, and said, "No, no. The Superior does not concern himself with worldly matters. I don't know what this request of yours might be, but say it here — depending on what it is, I may see to it myself," with all the airs of a

steward who fancied himself a shrewd man of affairs.

But the man, artless and unheeding, pushed this offer straight back at him: "No, thank you kindly, but unless it's put directly to the Superior himself, there's no use in saying it. I only ask you to pass on my request, please," he said, pressing his point without a thought of how it might rub the other man the wrong way, so pure was his own intent. Tamemon, nettled inwardly at being passed over and not relied upon, took offense, and said, "You're a hard man to reason with. I've told you the Superior lends no ear to fellows like you — if there's no use in passing it on, then I'll see to it myself, that's all" — the sort of talk that only grows more insolent the more kindly it is met. "I'll hear no more of it. Go home, go home," — his tone, as is the way with petty men, turning suddenly rough, and he made to walk off, brusquely dismissing him; and Jubei, flustered, got no further than "But surely—" before being cut off with "Enough! Be quiet!" and

with that Tamemon retreated into the back rooms and was gone, leaving Jubei standing dumbfounded on the earthen floor, feeling as though a firefly had just slipped out of his cupped hands. There was nothing for it but to call out again and ask once more to be shown in, but whether there was a living soul about at all in the chilly, hushed vastness of the great temple, only an echo fell back to his own ears, not so much as a single cough to be heard. He went round to the entrance again and asked once more, and that same disagreeable, clever-looking little acolyte from before poked his head out just long enough to mutter, "I told you to go to the kitchen quarters," and slammed the door shut again.

Round to the kitchen quarters again, then to the entrance again; to the entrance again, then round to the kitchen quarters again; until at last, forgetting all restraint, he raised his voice loud enough to ring through the main hall, crying, "I beg you, I beg you, hear me!" — at which Tamemon came storming out, bellowing louder still, "Fool!" and ordering, "Servants, drag this madman outside the gate! If the Superior, who hates all this commotion, should hear of it, we'll be the ones scolded on his account!" "Understood!" said the temple menservants, who had been lying about idle in the servants' room until now, and they set upon Jubei to drag him out; and Jubei sat himself down flat on the earthen floor, determined not to be put out.

"Grab his arms! Lift his legs!" the crowd of servants shouted, jostling and cursing all together — when, just at that moment, the Venerable Roen, who had been strolling here and there about the temple grounds meaning to cut two or three sprigs of flowers from the back garden for the alcove, came, quite by chance, upon the scene, wearing a plain robe the color of magnolia bark, a bunch of maidenflower and bellflower in his left hand and a pair of vermilion-handled shears in his right.

Part Six

"What is all this shouting and commotion about?" — at the Superior's single word, dropped like the cry of a crane among a flock of chattering sparrows, the whole crowd fell silent at once, with nowhere to hide the fists they had raised; some stood as though caught mid-shout in a Zen dialogue and struck dumb by a single roar, their fighting spirit knocked clean out of them, while others sheepishly let down their tucked-up sleeves and slunk off to hide behind their fellows.

Even Tamemon, whose arrogant anger had risen high enough to send fire and smoke, it seemed, out of his nostrils turned skyward, felt a touch of shame now, and, bowing his head and wringing his hands, since he himself had been the one to start it all, told what had happened, twisting the account, of course, to favor his own side as he went. The Superior, deepening still further the long, deep furrows already worn into his thin, wrinkled face, gave a slow, gentle smile, and said, in a voice small and soft as a woman's, "Well then, there was no need for all this uproar. If you, Tamemon, had simply been obedient and passed on his request, there would have been nothing to it at all. Now then, Jubei, is it — come along this way with me, old monk that I am. What a shame, to have put you through such an ordeal." A man beloved and revered by all has, indeed, a way of heart quite apart from other men's: he does not look down on the unlearned, nor scorn the humble, but leads the way himself, kindly and gently, in quiet guidance. Following after him,

went Jubei, so thoroughly steeped even his careless, unlettered heart in the Superior's compassion that he could not hold back tears of gratitude; and they wound their way past a stretch of moist red earth, past a place where stepping-stones were laid out with a painter's eye, past a place shaded deep by a paulownia tree where slender bamboo grew in graceful profusion, until, passing through a small wicket gate, they came upon a little garden with no flowers to speak of, wearing nothing but a quiet air of age — a Uraku-style stone lantern scattered over with fallen pine needles, a square well-curb washbasin grown over with moss, a sight that seemed to wash away even the dust from the eye that beheld it.

The Superior kicked off his garden clogs and stepped up onto the veranda, saying, "Come, you too, this way," and, without more ado, tossed the flowers he had been carrying into a hanging flower vase. Jubei, quite unabashed and unafraid — being a man who never thought to do so much as brush the dust from his feet with a towel — did nothing of the kind, but simply took off his sandals and shuffled his way into the small tea room, sat down close enough to the Superior to nearly bump noses with him, and bowed once in silence; and in this there was, for all his ignorance of proper manners, ample expression of a heart entirely without pretense. Several times he seemed on the point of speaking out at once, yet each time his mouth would not quite open; and when at last he did open it, his tongue faltering, he blurted, in a voice pitched all wrong and rising at the end like something thrust out of nowhere, "The five-storied pagoda — what I've come to beg is for the five-storied pagoda," and, barely managing to squeeze out what was in his heart, along with the sweat on his brow and under his arms,

he trailed off; and the Superior, unable to help a smile, said, "Whatever it is, don't think of this old monk as anything to be afraid of — forget your restraint and speak at your leisure. From the look of you, sitting yourself down on the earthen floor of the kitchen quarters and refusing to budge, it must be something you've thought long and hard about. Come now, put your reserve aside, don't hurry yourself, and speak to me as you would to a friend," — a gentleness of care that never once failed him.

Jubei's bell-shaped eyes, the very ones so often mocked as owl-eyes, welled up with tears at once, easily as they did. "Yes, yes, yes, thank you kindly. I've come with something weighing on my mind. This five-storied pagoda — I'm this kind of fellow, you see for yourself, the one they've saddled with the wretched nickname of Nossori. But, Your Reverence, it's the truth — I'm not bad at the work. I know I'm a fool, I know I'm made fun of, I know I'm a spineless sort of man — but I never tell a lie. Your Reverence, I can build. I've known the Osumi school since I was a child, and I understand both the Goto and the Tatekawa schools besides. Let me — please let me do the work on the five-storied pagoda. That's what's brought me here. I heard that Genta of Kawagoe had made an estimate for it, five or six

days ago. Since then I haven't slept, Your Reverence. A five-storied pagoda isn't a thing that gets built often — no, it is exactly that, once in a hundred years, once in a lifetime! I don't mean to take the work away from Genta-sama, who's done me kindnesses — but ah, how I envy a clever man. Genta-sama gets to do the one great work of a lifetime, of a century; he'll leave his name behind him splendidly even after he's dead. Ah, how I envy him, how I envy him — that's what makes it worth living, being a carpenter! And here's this Jubei, by contrast — take up a chisel or an adze, and against Genta-sama or anyone else, my chalk-line might come out crooked now and then, but never, never once would I fall behind — that's what I believe. And yet, year in and year out, it's nothing but patching up tenement wall-boards or odd jobs on stable troughs and gutters. Heaven never saw fit to give me brains, so it can't be helped, I tell myself, giving up again and again — and then I see clumsy

fellows build shrines and take on halls, and every time I see one of them put up something so poor a job that anyone looking on would feel sorry for the man who commissioned it, I go and weep in secret over my own bad luck. Your Reverence, sometimes it makes me so bitter I even come to hate fellows who have no skill at all but are clever with words. Your Reverence, I envy Genta-sama — clever in the head and skilled with his hands both — ah, what enviable work he gets to do. Me, and Genta-sama, and me, this pitiful me — the envy got the better of me so much that I went to bed one night without a word even to my wife, crying — and that same night, a terrifying figure commanded me, 'Build the five-storied pagoda, build it now,' and I leapt up in a panic and thrust my hand into my toolbox, half in a dream and half awake; and when I came fully to my senses, I found I'd caught my fingertip on a mortise chisel and cut myself, clinging to the toolbox,

having somehow got clean out of the bedding without knowing it — how wretched that was. Sitting there blankly in front of the lamp, thinking, ah, how pitiful, how wretched — that feeling, Your Reverence, do you understand it? Do you? If only that much could be understood by anyone at all, I wouldn't even need the pagoda built. A fool like Nossori Jubei might as well die anyway — I don't even want to go on living, like some useless, blunted saw. From that night on, truly, truly, Your Reverence, whether I looked at a clear sky or into some dark corner of a room the lamplight didn't reach, a plain white-wood five-storied pagoda would rear up before me, looming over me, looking down on me. In the end I got it into my head that I wanted to build it myself, and, knowing full well it was beyond me, every day the moment my work was done I'd shut myself in through the night

and make a model at one-fiftieth scale, and last night I finished it at last. Please come and see it, Your Reverence. The bitterness of being able to do work no one asked for, and unable to do the work I want — ah, there's nothing so wretched as bad luck, I lamented, and my wife, Your Reverence, rocking the model back and forth, said, half to herself, 'If you couldn't do it at all, you wouldn't even know your own bad luck' — and because it didn't sound like an unreasonable thing to say, it made me cry all the harder. Your Reverence, in your mercy, please let me build this five-storied pagoda. I beg you. Here — like this," and he pressed his palms together and bowed his head to the mat, his tears stirring up the dust there.

Part Seven

The Superior, who had been sitting silent as a wood-carved arhat, telling the beads of his bodhi-seed rosary while he listened to Jubei's rambling confession, now checked him as he bowed his head, saying, "I understand. I understand very well. Ah, what an admirable disposition you have, what fine thoughts you keep stored up in you — I could almost hold you up as an example to my own students. This old monk could not help but shed a tear himself. That model of yours, at one-fiftieth scale — I must certainly come and see it. But it would hardly do for this old monk to make so rash a decision on his own authority, simply because I've been moved by you, and hand you the pagoda work here and now — so let me be quite clear on this one point: whether the work is to be entrusted to you or not, that announcement will come formally, not from this old monk, but from Kanno-ji itself. In any case, as it happens I have some free time

today, so I'd like to see this model you've made. Would you show me the way and take this old monk straight to your house now?" This he said, a man who put on no airs at all, plainly and reasonably and without a moment's hesitation, and Jubei, his face wreathed in smiles, bowed his head over and over like a man pounding rice, answering, "Yes, yes, yes," until at last he burst out, "You'll take up my request? Ah, thank you, thank you! You'll come to my house — ah, I don't deserve it! I'll bring the model right away myself. Excuse me!" and, saying this, even Nossori, for once, was so wild with joy that, quite unlike his usual self, he made one great exaggerated bow and dashed off at once, stumbling over the stepping-stones, and ran home; and without so much as saying "I'm back" to his wife, he pulled out the model straightaway and, getting someone to help him

carry it, the two of them rushed it, breathless, straight to Kanno-ji, set it down before the Superior, and left. The Superior looked it over closely: the proportions from the first story to the fifth, the pitch of the roofs and eaves, the height of each lower story, the spacing of the rafters, even the design of the finial rings, the lotus-shaped support, the dew basin, and the sacred jewel at the very top — nowhere was there a fault to find, and the workmanship was so exquisite, so finished to the last detail, that it seemed hard to believe it had come from the hands of that clumsy-looking man. He marveled to himself, quietly: that a man could possess such skill, and yet lie buried and wasted, passing through the world without ever making his name known — pitiable enough even to an onlooker, how much more bitter must it be to the man himself. If it was his fate to be such a one, how he wished he might let him win his due honor, and not betray the long-cherished hope he had carried all these years. A man's body, doomed to decay along with grass and trees, is after all no more than a temporary union of cause and condition,

and even if one grieves over its loss, the grieving is of no avail, nor can what must pass be halted. But take, for instance, a craftsman's calling, small a thing as it may seem: to devote to it a heart of single-minded sincerity, to stake one's very life upon it, to forget almost all desire and harbor no mean or petty thought, thinking only, with the chisel in hand, to bore truly, and, with the plane in hand, to shave truly — the nobility of such a heart is beyond comparison with gold or silver; and to think of it lying with no means of leaving any trace behind, buried uselessly in the earth of the northern burial-ground, carried off as nothing more than a keepsake for the road to the underworld — the thought of it was pitiful in the extreme. The sorrow of a fine horse that never finds its master, the resentment of a man of high worth never accepted by the world — in the end, these come to the very same thing. Well then, well then — it was surely no accident that I chanced to notice the faint glow of this priceless jewel that Jubei carries in his breast. Let this work be entrusted to him, and let him have at least some small reward for the sincerity of his heart, the Superior thought — but then, all at once, a thought

occurred to him: that Genta of Kawagoe, too, wanted this work exceedingly, and there was, besides, the old connection of his having built the main hall, the kitchen quarters, and the guest halls; and what was more, he had already drawn up his design and estimate and shown it to him only four or five days before. His skill, too, was by no means inferior; and in the world's estimation he stood far above Jubei.

One piece of work, and two master builders — he wanted to let this one do it, and that one do it too — and which should it be? Even the Superior, for once, found himself at a loss.

Part Eight

"You are to present yourself at this temple tomorrow, in person, by around the hour of the dragon. Concerning the matter of the five-storied pagoda, which you earlier petitioned to be commissioned to build, the Superior himself will speak with you directly, so mind your dress and comport yourself without discourtesy when you appear" — such was the solemn message delivered by Enchin, a monk proud of his own eloquence, a comically minor temple functionary whose fondness for chili peppers, indulged without restraint, showed itself in the red tip of his nose.

On an ordinary day, this was a fellow with whom Genta would have traded jokes freely, calling him by his nickname, "Father Nanban" — but their easy familiarity, which had come naturally from seeing each other's faces morning and evening all through the building of the main hall, had grown thin of late, and now, playing the part of an official messenger, he composed himself with great gravity, even tucking away, as if with pious modesty, into the sleeve of his robe, the hand with whose forefinger and middle finger he had a habit of scratching the crown of his helmet-shaped head. Genta received him with respect and deference, bowing his head as he answered that he understood. But the ever-so-thoughtful O-Kichi, perhaps meaning to make sure her husband was well spoken of even by so worldly a monk as this, wrapped up a little money along with the tea and sweets she had already served him, and pressed it on him as he was leaving, insisting he take it — an unseemly sort of alms-giving, when one comes to think of it.

Enchin called at Jubei's house as well and delivered the same message before going back. And so, the next day, Genta shaved his beard and the crown of his head and put on fresh clothes, and, full of confidence that today the Superior himself would surely give him the commission at last, went in through the kitchen quarters and was shown to a certain room, where he sat waiting, upright and composed.

His manner was different, but Jubei's heart was strung just as taut, and he too, led along, passed through the corridors and sat, all alone, motionless, in a room with no one else about, cold with an empty chill, wondering — would the Superior call for him now? Would he command that the whole work of the five-storied pagoda be entrusted to him? Or had he perhaps not been chosen at all, and had it already been settled that Genta should have it, and was he called only so that the refusal could be delivered to his face? And if it should be so, what then — the hope that any flower might yet bloom for a rootless, sunken log of a man like himself would be gone forever. His only prayer was that the Superior might take pity on his foolishness and give him the command after all; and, his eyes not even resting on the beautiful gold-leaf pattern of golden phoenixes and silver phoenixes soaring and dancing across the nine-foot double sliding doors, he let his thoughts drift vacantly into the void, groping about as if in a dark, unending road, for a good while — until that same clever-looking little acolyte came out and said, "The Abbot summons you,

please come this way," and led the way ahead of him; and now, thought Jubei, the time has come when it will be decided whether my wish is granted or not, and even this slow-witted man felt his heart pound as he followed where he was led, straight into the room — only to find, glaring at him the instant he entered, a pair of eyes sharp with contained fury, fixed on him sidelong: Genta, of all people, unexpectedly there, and not a trace of the Superior in the room.

So unexpected was this that Jubei stopped short and stood there stock-still, exchanging not a word but only a hard stare with him for a moment; but there was nothing for it, and he sat himself down at last some two mat-widths away, his head hanging listlessly, his eyes, seemingly drained of all spirit, fixed on his own knees. Genta, by contrast, had the air of a fierce eagle perched on a thousand-foot crag, looking down on a puppy; brimming with an inward confidence, he neither stooped his back nor let his shoulders slump, but held himself crisp and upright, a figure and a face alike so striking, so handsome a man, that there could hardly be a soul among ten thousand who would not warm to him — a truly splendid, admirable fellow.

And yet the Superior, whose heart was a clear mirror untainted by common, worldly judgments, loved them both alike and was never mired in outward beauty or ugliness, so that up until yesterday he had been quite unable to choose between them; but today, having thought of something, he had gone out of his way to summon the two of them and keep them waiting together in one room. And now he came quietly out of his own chambers, his footsteps light upon the mats, and, following behind the acolyte who went ahead to slide open the door, entered swiftly and took his seat; whereupon the two men bowed reverently, both alike, their heads lowered, and for some time could not bring themselves to raise them again. Ah, how touching — when Jubei at last managed, with an effort, to lift his face, it showed the flush and the shy confusion of an unworldly country boy standing before some great personage for the first time, the many furrowed lines of his brow brimming with the sweat that had oozed out there, beads standing on the tip of his nose, and beneath his arms, surely, a positive rain.

The thick-boned fingers he had laid upon his knees, gnarled and sturdy as the branches of a withered pine, trembled even so, one after another, as he waited with his whole heart for the Superior's single word, as though it were the one great matter of his entire life — a sight both touching and, in its way, almost comic.

Genta, too, said nothing, but listened intently, waiting for the command. The Superior, who understood the feelings of both men well enough to be unable to decide between them, likewise found no easy way to open his mouth, and for a while all was silence; but at last he spoke: "Genta, Jubei, hear me both. There is to be but one five-storied pagoda built, and you two are the ones who wish to build it. I would gladly grant both your wishes if I could, but that, of course, cannot be done; if it is entrusted to one, the other will grieve, and there is no fixed standard by which to decide, once and for all, whom to command. It is beyond the judgment of the monk-officials and the stewards, and beyond this old monk's judgment as well, so I leave this decision to the two of you to settle between yourselves. This old monk will have no part in it. Whatever agreement the two of you reach, I will take it up just as it stands — so go home now and talk it over well between yourselves. That is all this old monk has to say, so

bear that in mind and go home now. There, I've told you plainly. You may leave whenever you like. But this old monk happens to be at leisure today, and rather bored, so stay a while and keep me company over tea. Won't you tell me a bit of worldly gossip? In return, I'll tell you two or three amusing old tales I came across just yesterday," he said, with a gentle smile, treating the two of them as though they were old friends of his own. And now, what would he say next?

Part Nine

The Superior himself poured out the tea the acolyte had brought and pressed it on them, and both men accepted it with awed reverence, whereupon he said, "If you're so reserved with me, the edges never come off our talk and it can't go smoothly. Come, I won't serve you the sweets myself, so help yourselves," pushing the stand of confections toward them, and, lifting his own bowl to wet his throat, he went on: "An interesting story isn't something an old renunciant monk like myself has so very many of, but there's one thing in a sutra I read recently that struck me, thinking it over, as truly remarkable. Listen, it goes like this. Long ago, in a certain country, a rich man took his two children out with him, and on a fine, mild day, they wandered pleasantly together over a broad meadow where fragrant flowers bloomed and soft grasses grew thick, when they came upon a great river — its waters, being early summer, had shrunk a good deal, but still it flowed clear, washing its banks—

as they went. In the middle of this river there was a beautiful sandbar made of pebbles like jewels and sand like silver, and the rich man, caught up in the pleasure of it, leapt without a thought over the one-fathom stretch of water, and, looking about him this way and that, found that the far side of the sandbar too was cut off from the mainland by another stretch of water about a fathom wide — a world entirely apart, a place of purity utterly removed from the rank, worldly ground beyond, and, all alone there, he leapt and danced for joy. But his two children, unable to cross though they longed to, cried out enviously, calling to him, and he, taking pity on them, said, 'This is a place of purity you two cannot come to — but since you want so badly to come, wait, and I'll let you cross. Look, look, this gravel beneath my feet is shaped, every stone of it, like a lotus flower, gravel the like of which is rare in this world; this sand before my eyes shines, every grain of it, with the glow of the five metals, sand beyond

compare.' So he told them, and the two children, seeing it from a distance, grew all the more impatient to cross; the rich man calmed them gently, and, bringing over a palm tree, a good fathom long, that seemed to have been uprooted in some flood, laid it across as a bridge for them. Whereupon the brothers fell to quarreling, each crying 'me first, you after,' and in the end the elder, being the stronger, threw the younger down and, flushed with pride at having had his way, hurried to cross the bridge, and had just reached the middle of it, when the younger, springing up in his vexation, shook the bridge with all his strength, so that the elder at once fell into the water and, struggling and floundering, managed to reach the sandbar; and now, seeing the younger about to cross the bridge easily in his turn, the elder gave the end of the bridge a shake as well, and, being nothing more than a bridge of round logs, the younger too was pitched helplessly into the water, and came dripping and streaming

up onto the sandbar, barely able to crawl up to where the rich man stood. Then the rich man sighed and said, 'How does it look to you now? The moment you two set foot upon it, this sandbar changed at once from what it was before: the gravel has turned black and ugly, and the sand has become nothing more than common yellowed sand. Look, look, see how it is,' he told them, and the two, astonished, opened their eyes wide and looked, and found it exactly as their father said, not the least bit different — mere sand and gravel. 'Ah, was it for a thing like this that I tormented my dear younger brother, that I let my honored elder brother nearly drown?' the two of them said, ashamed and grieved together, and the elder wrung out his brother's sleeve and the younger wrung out his brother's hem, and they comforted and cared for one another. Then the rich man brought that same bridge round again and laid it across the stream on the far side of the sandbar, saying, 'Since we have no more use for this sandbar, let us go wandering on further that way — you two cross first.' At these words the brothers looked at each other, quite unlike before, and said, 'Elder brother, you cross first,' 'No, younger brother, you go

first,' each yielding to the other — but, being the elder by age, the elder brother crossed first, and, mindful of how easily one might stumble, the younger held the end of the bridge firmly so it would not shake; and then, when the younger crossed in his turn, the elder held it steady for him just the same; and the rich man leapt across without any trouble at all, and the three of them walked on together, quite leisurely and at their ease. And in the course of this, the younger brother happened to look at a stone the elder had picked up without thinking, and found it a beautiful stone shaped like a lotus flower; and the elder peered at some sand the younger had gathered up, and found it dazzling to the eye, giving off the glow of the five metals; and the two brothers together rejoiced and delighted in it, and praised each other's good fortune deeply and warmly. Then the rich man drew from his bosom a true jeweled lotus and gave it to the elder, and from his sleeve brought out true gold dust and gave it to the younger, telling him to treasure it well. Told like this, it may sound like a tale to fool children, but there is no falsehood in the Buddha's teaching — it is by no means a mere child's tale. Chew

on it a while and see — isn't it a story with real savor to it? Well now, does it strike you two as interesting as well? This old monk finds it very interesting indeed," he said lightly, and yet it sank in deep; for even his parables and skillful means sprang from the truth that he carried always within his own breast.

Genta and Jubei — the two of them — could only stare at each other, dumbfounded.

Part Ten

On the way home from Kanno-ji, half dead within himself, Jubei walked along with his arms tucked into the sleeves of his coarse cotton coat, ambling on in a daze: that what the Superior had said meant, in its riddling way, that one of the two of them should quietly step aside — even a dullard like himself could see that much. Ah, but he did not want to yield it. After all his devotion piled on devotion; after snapping at his wife, 'Quiet, none of your business,' even when she fussed over him so kindly, telling him he must surely be chilled through and should go to bed and rest; after lying with his eyes open through the night, contrivance heaped on contrivance, until he had come to think that this time, this once in a lifetime, if he could but raise something worthy of the whole of his skill, he would have no regret even in death — and now, how sad, the Superior's counsel today. It was reasonable enough; it was, no doubt, a thing that had to be. But if he yielded this, was there any prospect left

of ever seeing another five-storied pagoda built — none whatever; was Jubei, then, a man fated all his life never to make his way in the world? Ah, how wretched, how bitter — bitter against Heaven itself. He understood well enough the Superior's noble compassion, and it was not that he felt not the least gratitude for it; but ah, there was nothing, nothing at all to be done. The other man was Master Genta, to whom he owed a debt, and there was no way even to turn his resentment against him; however he looked at it, was there nothing for it but to step meekly aside himself? Ah, was there nothing? And yet how galling, now, at this late hour — if only he had never taken it into his head to hope for such a thing, and had gone on being nothing but Nossori, he would never have known a grief as bitter as this; it was his own fault, forgetting his place, that had brought it on — ah, his own fault, his own fault. And yet — well — and yet — well — he must not think it, must not think it: that if Jubei, being Nossori, became a thing for the clever people of this world

to laugh at, that alone would settle it. That he should live out his life like a dream and die like a dream, while even the wife who shared his bed complained in private that he was a husband good for nothing — that alone would settle it. Resign himself to it, and it was wretched all the same; the world, when he thought it over, was a paltry thing, cruel almost beyond bearing — but perhaps that too was only complaint, only self-pity. Complaint it might be, but it was too pitiful all the same. And yet, if he tasted the true meaning of what the Superior had told him, unspoken though it was — how his compassion, deep beyond measure, soaked through to the very marrow, leaving no room even for a lingering grievance to rise; how he had judged between the two quarreling men so that neither should be wounded, wishing them both well down to the very last, and had unraveled, likening it to two brothers, so precious a sutra, chewing it fine and feeding it to them like children — set beside that story, he himself was, after all, the younger brother, and all the more

if he did not yield it to the other, he would be something less than human. Ah, how hard a thing it is to be a younger brother — and so, hardly able to make out the road before him, his troubled eyes clouded with tears, he went trudging on, forgetting himself like a puppet drawn along by a string, toward his own house where no pleasure of any kind awaited him — when all at once, 'You blasted fool, you madman, what are you doing to what I've just washed, you idiot!' came a sudden snarl, biting at him out of nowhere, and, his heart chilled by the shrill voice, he gave a start and went sprawling all at once, having, without knowing it, put a foot or two upon the drying-board that stood propped against a wash-tub as a pillow, and knocked it clean over — a sorry, unsightly business.

As he sat there in the dirt, startled, 'You're fox-possessed, you nuisance,' scolded — all brute strength and nothing else — this Omi no Okane of a girl, a maidservant, evidently from Boshu, with a face like the clumsily painted, cross-eyed mask in a children's game of Blind Man's Buff, her rage flaring as she raised her fist, struck him a blow, and, stretching out her long monkey-arm, shoved him flying; Jubei, unable to bear it, went sprawling in the dust, saying only, 'Yes, yes, I've been bewitched by a fox, forgive me,' and, letting her abuse and curses go unanswered, bore the pain and fled, and when at last he made his way home, 'Oh, you're back. It was so late I was wondering what had happened — my, you're covered in dust, whatever's happened to you?' said his wife, moving to brush him off, only to be cut short with a single 'Never mind,' spoken in a voice devoid of spirit.

Seeing his wife peer into his face, so plainly worried, he felt, for no reason he could name, an unbearable sadness well up, his eyes going moist and still; 'Ugh,' he let slip, unawares, as if scolding himself, and, rolling a bit of tobacco between his fingers, made some show of composure without meaning to — but no words came with it.

His wife, guessing more or less that something was amiss from his manner, so different from usual, had no way to comfort him, and, unable to bring herself to ask outright whether it was better to ask or not to ask about the day's outcome that so weighed on her mind, warmed the tea in the earthen pot over a bit of banked charcoal, its feeble heat propped up, none too effectively, between cedar chopsticks doing service as tongs — when Ino, who had gone out to play, came running back in: 'Hey, Father's home! Are you going to build one too, Father? I built one, look at this!' he said, sliding open the paper door with such spirited pride, his face brimming, all unknowing, with the wish to be praised, breaking into a smile as he pointed to the little model of a pagoda he held out.

His mother bit down on the sleeve of her undergarment and, unable even to find her voice, burst into tears; Jubei bared his round eyes, brimming now with tears of his own, and, without so much as a blink, glared at it hard for a moment — then, 'Oh, well done, well done, you've done it beautifully! I'll give you a reward!' he cried, his choked laughter ringing out loud enough to reach the ridge of the roof, and, turning his face straight up toward heaven all the while — ah, how hard a thing it is to be a younger brother.

Part Eleven

The sound of the lattice door sliding open rang out, cheerful as ever, and no sooner had she heard her husband's voice, in good spirits, calling, 'O-Kichi, I'm back,' climbing up into the house, than she flung down, none too gently, the pipe she had been drawing on, worry curling up in smoke after smoke, and rose in a bustle to meet him, saying, 'You're terribly late, aren't you,' and, circling round behind him, helped him out of his coat, and, standing, with his chin lending a hand, folded the sleeves quickly and set it aside in the corner of the room, then hurried straight back to the brazier and had the kettle singing like a pine cricket in no time, and, casting one glance at the man settling himself down cross-legged, said, 'The sun's warm enough, but the wind's cold, you must have been chilled on the way — shall I warm you a bottle?' — her hands finding every itch before it was scratched — and, while her mouth was busy with all this, she had the tray laid out without so much as a rattle, the three-wheel pickles fragrant with yuzu, and the salmon roe served over grated daikon, offered with no fuss at all, yet was somehow

just right.

Genta, though there was a weight upon his heart, found some small comfort in this, and, taking up his cup, drank two or three in quick succession and a fourth more slowly, then held it out, saying, 'You have some too,' and O-Kichi touched it to her lips and set it down, folded up a half-toasted sheet of nori, and murmured to herself, as if speaking of the fishmonger, 'Sabu-chan ought to be along soon,' then, handing the cup back, poured for him in turn — and, thinking to herself, all's well so far, she found her tongue running smooth: 'That reminds me, how did it go today? I've told myself it's a sure thing for us, but until you tell me, I only worry for nothing. What did the Superior say? And what became of Nossori? With you sitting there so grave and silent, I can't help worrying and worrying,' she said, and Genta gave a great laugh.

'There's nothing for you to worry about. The Superior, in his deep compassion, is going to make a fine fellow of me no matter how it turns out. Ha ha ha. Now, O-Kichi, isn't a man a good elder brother if he's kind to his younger brother? There are times when a man must share his rice with someone who's hungry, even if it costs him something himself. There's not a soul in the world I'm afraid of, but being strong isn't all there is to being a man. Ha ha ha. Holding yourself in check, forcing yourself to be weak — that too is manly. Ah, what a fine man. The five-storied pagoda is work of real honor; I'd like, all by myself, to leave behind, for ten thousand eyes to see, a famous thing that won't crumble in a thousand years — I'd like to leave it by the skill of Genta of Kawagoe alone, with not one hair's breadth of another man's hand or wit mixed in — ah, but holding my temper in check, ah, that too is manly, manly. Indeed, quite the fine man. The Superior tells no lies. To give away half of the very work I'd set my heart on is a bitter

thing to swallow — ah, it stings — well — but a fine elder brother all the same. Ha ha ha. O-Kichi, I mean to give Nossori a half-share and build the pagoda between the two of us. A fine, weak man, aren't I — praise me, go on, praise me — it's a poor sort of business if even you won't praise me for it, ha ha ha,' he said, laughing without any real cheer in his face, only forcing out a hollow sound of mirth, and O-Kichi, unable to fathom her husband's mind, said, 'I don't know what the Superior said, but as far as I can tell, it's not the least bit interesting. Why on earth give that block-headed Nossori a half-share? It doesn't suit your nature at all. If you mean to give it to him, you might as well hand over the whole thing without a shred of regret; and since it was rightfully coming to us in the first place, calling in help nobody asked for and splitting one man's commission between two — it's a shabby thing to do, and it doesn't become you at'

all, does it? You, who've always been said — and always said of yourself — to have a heart as clean as if it had been washed in cold water: what sort of wishy-washy judgment is this, of all days? Even I, a mere woman, can see it's a spineless, dithering sort of plan. I won't praise you, I won't praise you — however you look at it, I simply cannot praise you. The man's nothing more than Nossori, who owes us a debt of gratitude; by rights you should have laid down the law and told him plainly he was a shameless wretch trying to steal a march on our own work, and shut him up so he couldn't say a word back — and instead you go coddling that same Nossori and taking on some sickening joint commission with him — what call is there for that? Is being soft the mark of a fine man? Is being weak the mark of a good one? My gut won't swallow it. If you like, shall I run over to Nossori's place myself and make him'

grovel, make him apologize, and bring him back here with both hands pressed to the floor?' — so spoke this clever wife who loved her husband dearly.

Genta heard her out and only laughed coldly. 'What would you know about it? All I want is for you to think well enough of what I do — that's all there is to it.'

Part Twelve

Cut off flat, with a single word — 'be quiet' — O-Kichi, no less strong-willed than he, raised her face as though she had more to say, but she knew from experience, having a husband more strong-willed than herself by half, that to push back against him, however much she said, would only cost her his good humor and gain her nothing at all for the talking back; and so, though she could not help resenting a husband who would not open his heart to her and take counsel with the wife who shared his life, being a clever woman she recovered herself quickly and said, 'It's not that I mean to push in and speak out of turn, being only a woman — it's just that, the work being so much on my mind, I couldn't help wanting to hear how it stood, and let my narrow heart run on with things better left unsaid,' making light, quite deliberately, of words she had spoken in dead earnest, and putting on, outwardly, the air of one who would defer to her husband's judgment in everything — all this from a true wish, in some part, to ease the

turmoil that lay at the bottom of her husband's heart.

Genta too, at this, softened his face, which had begun to harden, and said, 'It's all fortune's turning, every bit of it. If only I keep my own mind gentle and mild, good luck will come round again — think of it that way, and giving Nossori his half-share turns out to be rather a pleasant thing after all. The world grows hateful or delightful by turns, just as one's own temper takes it, so as long as I keep from letting any mean, shabby rust settle on my character, and go through life clean and easy, that's all that's needed,' he said, breaking off to tip back his cup, and after that fell to gossip of the theater and talk of his apprentices' doings, harmless chatter enough to go with his drink, and, though he drank no more than was good for him, drank it pleasantly, and, however coarse the manners, finished his meal in cheerful harmony with her, each from a separate tray; and, thinking Jubei ought to be along by now, they sat waiting, doing nothing else, but the time passed emptily, and the sunlight on the paper doors crept a foot along and still he had not come, crept two feet and still he had not come.

By rights the other man ought to have come humbly bowing his head, drawing himself small, to talk it over here, clinging, even in tears, to the Superior's own deeply compassionate words spoken that day, and begging that at least half the work be given to him — so why was he so late? Had he given up hope, resigned himself, and abandoned even the thought of talking it over, and now sat smoldering alone in his own house? Or was he waiting, instead, for Genta to come to him? If it were that he was waiting to be come to, that would be an overweening notion indeed, but surely he would never put on such airs — no doubt it was only that same old Nossori, taking his ease at his usual leisurely pace, but even so, what a slow-witted fellow, careless beyond all reason — and so, smoking one idle pipe after another, the day, short as it should have been for such waiting, dragged on and on, and even that at last drew to a close, until, by the time the crows in their flocks were making for their roosts, he could no longer

keep his temper sweet, and, his irritation rising bit by bit past bearing, at the very height of it, he sat down to the supper laid out for him and, taking up his chopsticks only as an excuse, without even drinking his tea at leisure, said, 'O-Kichi, I'll just step over to Jubei's for a moment — if he comes here while we've crossed paths, have him wait,' the words themselves sharp and thorny with anger as he rose and went out, and his wife, though it weighed on her mind, could do nothing but see him off and, once he was gone, could only heave a sigh.

Part Thirteen

The rain-shutter, stubborn and slow to open, only made Genta's temper flare the higher, and, wrenching it back by main force with a great clatter, he stepped straight in, saying, 'Is Jubei home?' — and O-Nami, recognizing the voice at once, felt it hard, married as she now was to Jubei standing in opposition to the very man to whom he owed his debt of gratitude, to face that man at all; her woman's heart faint with a fluttering dread, she managed only 'Oh — Master,' the words slipping out unbidden, and, flustered even in her greeting, could find no second word to follow before Genta had already passed straight by her and caught sight of Jubei sitting there disconsolate in the dim light of a lamp whose sooty paper was pricked with needle-holes and blotched with oil stains, so that only belatedly, in a fluster, did she think to show him to a seat by the brazier — a slowness that came, no doubt, of a nature honest through and through but ignorant of the world's ways.

Jubei bowed awkwardly and, opening his mouth as though it weighed on him, said, 'I had meant to call on you tomorrow morning' — at which Genta, with a sidelong glare, and with a deliberate show of composure, said, 'Oh, so that was your plan, was it? Being of the short-tempered sort myself, I'd been waiting till just now, but there was no telling when you'd finally show up, so I came out myself — was I a fool for it? Ha ha ha. But listen, Jubei, how did you take the Superior's words today? After telling us to talk it over well between ourselves, he gave us that tale of the rich man's two children — and so I've come especially to talk it over, and I expect you've more or less made up your mind already yourself. I'm a hot-tempered man too, but thinking it over, it's just as that parable says: it's a useless thing for the two of us to go on being sharp with each other. We're not exactly enemies, after all, and I won't say I'm all for having my own way'

either. In the end, all I want is some settlement we can both live with in harmony, and so I've come here having done my best to bend and break my own greed and think the matter through carefully — but I still want to hear your own mind, with nothing held back, and then decide, between the two of us, what's to be done. Being a man, I carry no dirty scheme in my belly; this is truly how I've come to feel,' he said, and, pausing there a moment, looked into Jubei's face — but Jubei only sat with his head bowed, answering nothing but 'yes, yes,' again and again, the five or six white hairs among his disheveled temples catching, now and then, a flicker of the trembling lamplight.

O-Nami had already gone and seated herself close by the pillow of Ino, who was asleep, and, holding even her breath, sat likewise perfectly still — a silence with a loneliness all its own.

So still, indeed, that the far-off cry of a peddler hawking pot-baked udon came seeping, faint, from outside into the house.

Genta, growing calmer still, went on explaining, his tone now gentle: 'Well, I'll speak plainly, with no false modesty and no putting on airs — how would it be, Jubei, if we did it this way? You've set your heart on this, hoping to show, in splendid and honorable work, the full light of the skill you carry, to fulfill, magnificently, a craftsman's true ambition — not for profit's sake — and to leave behind, for generations after, the thought: see for yourselves the design and the workmanship of a man called Jubei. I can well imagine it, for it's the very same with me. There'll never be a piece of building like this again, and if I let it slip through my hands, I can hardly hope to meet with its like again in this lifetime, so I too, Genta that I am, want above all to leave behind my own design, my own workmanship. To put the reasoning in words that favor myself — well, I'm the one who does the work at Kanno-ji, and you have no connection to it at all; I came first, you came after; I was the one asked to'

draw up the plans, and you were never asked at all; if it were left to others to say, they'd tell me I was well suited to take on the commission, and you, given your standing, were not — no one would find fault with that. But it's not that I mean to make an ally of that reasoning now, nor of public opinion either. I know well enough that you have the skill and yet go on ill-favored by fortune; I know well enough that, though you never speak of your hard luck in ordinary times, there's no telling how much you weep over it deep down; I know well enough that if I were in your place, I could hardly bear a life as bitter as yours. That's exactly why, last year and the year before, for all the good it did, I did what I could for you, such as it was — though I'd ask you not to think I hold it over you as a debt. Even the Superior himself, surely, saw clean through to the honesty of your heart, and it was because he pitied your hard luck that he gave us the counsel he gave us'

today. If you were the sort of man who turned against me out of greed or the like, I'd call you a low, meddling wretch trying to spoil another man's work, and split your skull with a single stroke of the adze without a second thought — but when I think it over, and think of your circumstances, I find myself half wishing I could simply hand the whole work over to you outright. And yet, I can't quite let go of my own greed either — I truly want, however it turns out, to do this work myself. So, Jubei, here's a proposal that's hard for you to hear and hard for me to take back once I've said it, but hear me out, and consent to it if you can. Let the two of us build the five-storied pagoda together. Let me be the master builder — it may not satisfy you, but will you not lend your strength as my second? It may not satisfy you, it may go against the grain, but Genta is asking you — will you not hear him out? I beg you, I beg you, I beg you. Does your silence mean you won't hear me? O-Nami, if you understand what I'm saying,

won't you add your own voice and help me persuade him?' he said, appealing even to the wife, who by now was dissolving helplessly into tears. 'Oh — oh, Master, ah, thank you, thank you so much — where else could there be a man who would offer such a kind and generous proposal as this? Why won't you thank him?' she said, her left sleeve growing heavy with a shower of tears, tugging at her husband's knee with her right hand and pleading with him again and again — but Jubei, who had sat like a silent Buddha all this while, said nothing at all, and though she pleaded with him a second time, a third time, he only sat there mute, saying nothing still — until at last he lifted his bowed head and, baring his round eyes, let fall, in a voice quite without grace, a single sentence: 'I'm afraid, no — that I would rather not' — and his wife, struck to the heart, could only stare in astonishment.

'What did you say?' burst out Genta in a single sharp, fierce cry, his neck drawing back an inch or two, his eyes flaring, glaring straight down at Nossori from above.

Part Fourteen

Never once letting the flower of human feeling wither, and keeping the trunk of duty planted firm, Genta had offered him a proposal of such kindness as an ordinary man could hardly have made, and only because his sincerity ran deeper than the ordinary; and yet, however much it might be Jubei's own cut-and-flung nature that produced such an answer, still, 'I would rather not' was too much of a reply — even a clay doll with no understanding at all of another's kindness could hardly have said such a thing. It was, when one came to think of it, so heartless as to be almost resentful, so thoughtless as to be almost maddening — what could possibly bring a husband to so senseless a state of mind? — and O-Nami, astonished and appalled at once, felt as though her own body had suddenly been clamped and wrung in a press, and, quite beside herself, drew close to her husband: 'Why, what a thing to say! When the Master has thought so far ahead, for the good of us both, when he might, if he chose, kick this poor pair of us aside in a single stroke and think nothing more of it'

and yet instead he shows this pair of us — with nothing to recommend us — a kindness beyond all measure, saying he'll divide even the work he wished to do all by himself, saying he'll let us take on half of it — a kindness so moving it goes straight to the marrow, and coming, what's more, all the way here himself to say it, unsummoned, to a place so poor we can't even offer him a cushion to sit on. To let such a thing go for nothing, how wasteful, how wrong! To say "I would rather not" is willfulness that has used up every last scrap of grace. There's no way you could fail to understand the Master's kindness — there's a limit even to being grasping, even to being inconsiderate. Look — even the very clothes I have on now, from last winter, when he pitied me shivering in a thin unlined robe, were given to me by O-Kichi herself, made over for me to wear — can't you even see that? After a debt of gratitude as great as that, that you should even stand now in opposition to the Master at all

and that he, instead of calling you insolent or ungrateful for it, should go on protecting the weak with such deep, compassionate judgment, and that you should refuse even to lean on it, to cling to it, and say flatly that you would rather not — even if you truly meant it from the bottom of your heart, is that a thing a man with any memory of kindness in him could bring himself to say? Think, please, just once, carefully, of what O-Kichi must feel, standing there before the Master. How could I ever again, after this, show my face to O-Kichi without shame? The Master may be broad-hearted enough to think, "Ah, Jubei and his wife are foolish people who don't know their own minds, there's nothing to be done about it," and simply let it go, thinking no more of it — but what will the world say of you? "Ungrateful wretch, a man with no sense of duty, a brute who understands nothing of human feeling — that fellow's no better than a dog, a crow

and become a thing every soul in the world snaps at with their fingernails — that's certain. What honor is there in doing your work as a dog or a crow? Aren't you ashamed, even before your own words, when you've always told me not to be greedy, not to fret and scrape after things? Please, please, give in gently to the Master's counsel. If it's said, far and wide, that such-and-such two men together raised that cloud-piercing pagoda soaring into the sky, and you stand shoulder to shoulder with the Master, praised together by the whole world, then your hardship will have been worth it, and the Master's precious kindness will be known for what it is — and how happy, how glad I would be too! If that came to pass, you'd have no cause whatever to call yourself dissatisfied — and yet are you so possessed by some demon from heaven that you still think it not enough? Ah, how heartless — have you forgotten your own place in the world, the very thing I need not even tell you?' — pleading and

weeping, his wife's head hung low, and even the single thread hanging from the needle stuck in her hairknot swayed with a tremor that betrayed a heart shattered into a thousand pieces, pitiful to see; and Jubei, who had kept his eyes shut through all of it, now let out his usual gravelly voice: 'Noisy, O-Nami — be quiet, you're getting in the way of what I'm saying. Master, please hear me out.'

Part Fifteen

As though some passion within him had flared up, Jubei pressed his trembling knees firmly together, planted both hands upon them, and, holding himself rigid, said: 'How heartless, Master — that we should do it together is a heartless thing; that you should offer to give half the work to Jubei — kind as it seems, it is a heartless thing. I would rather not, I would rather not. However badly I wanted to build the pagoda, Jubei has already given it up. From the moment I heard the Superior's counsel, all the way home, I gave it up completely. It was a mistake to hold thoughts above my station — ah, I was a fool. Nossori is Nossori through and through, and it's only right that I stay a fool to the end; I'll go on knocking gutter-boards for the rest of my life. Master, forgive me, I was the one at fault — I'll say no more about building the pagoda. I never even'

knew you, and it's not that some stranger is doing it, but the Master himself, to whom I owe so much — I'll watch from a distance and rejoice as you build it splendidly, all alone,' he said, his spirits low — but Genta, quick to act, would not hear him out patiently, and, pushing himself forward, said, 'Don't talk nonsense, Jubei, you're being far too unreasonable. The Superior didn't give his counsel to you alone to hear — it went into my ears too. If your heart heard it, my heart took it in just the same. Are you going to shoulder the whole weight of it by yourself and sink under it like this, and let Genta be no kind of a man for it? To draw back into some useless resolve and stay a fool for the rest of your life — you can't call that sound judgment, however much it dresses itself up as one. Oh, if it comes to that, then I'll go and take the whole commission myself, gladly, as though I'd got exactly what I wanted — but that would shame me before the Superior, and worse, it would be the ruin, right there, of the chivalrous spirit Genta has spent his whole life polishing

and it would leave you having caught neither the moth nor the wasp, which is foolishness beyond all reason — and neither of us would come out of it any the better for it. That's exactly why I want us to do this handsomely, the two of us together — even if there's some awkwardness between us, that's only natural; it's plain enough that I find it just as little to my liking as you do, so there's no reason at all why the two of us, bearing with each other, shouldn't be able to bear it. There's no call to go to all this trouble just to make a fool of yourself, to turn days of worry to smoke, and let a fine skill like yours lie down and die unused. Now, Jubei, if what I've said makes sense to you, change your mind about it completely. Genta doesn't mean to ask anything unreasonable of you. Now then — why are you silent? Is it dissatisfaction, or refusal? Won't you consent? Ah, haven't you taken in yet what I'

mean? Jubei, isn't this too heartless of you? Say something, won't you? Is it refusal, refusal? Ah, how heartless — I can't tell anything if you just sit there in silence. Is what I say unreasonable, or are you angry because it's not enough?' — Genta, a true son of Edo, strong in matters of duty but weak in matters of the heart, one who saw both stubbornness and kindness through to the very end, asked this gently, and O-Nami, listening, felt the joy soak into her very bones, and though the words 'Master, oh, thank you' never left her lips, her eyes brimmed with tears that spoke truer than any tongue; anxious over her husband, who gave no answer, she looked toward him and found him not moving so much as a hair's breadth, silent, his head bent low and heavy in thought, and then, drop by drop, tears began to fall and scatter on his knees, and with them, at last, a voice.

Genta too fell silent now, and, thinking to himself alone for a while, said: 'Jubei, don't you understand even now? Or do you think it's not enough? To be sure, it must gall you to do together a thing you'd hoped to do alone — and it must gall you all the more to take Genta as the head and yourself as the second. Well then — I'll give in, I'll do this instead: Genta will be the second, and set you up as the head, since that suits you better. Now then, consent to it cleanly, and agree that we'll do it together,' he said, forcing down his own wish and casting it aside, speaking now with sudden, resolute decision.

'No — no, that could never be, Master! However mad Jubei might go, how could such a thing ever be done — it would be too much, too much,' he said in a fluster, and, cut off with a single word — 'Then you'll fall in with my judgment?' — he found himself at a loss, and, pressed harder still — 'Shall I set you up as the head, or is even that not enough for you?' — pressed so fiercely that he lost all composure, while beside him his wife, her heart in a fever, urged him on with reproachful, pleading words: 'Why won't you fall in with the Master's judgment sooner, why?' — until Jubei, driven at last to the very end of his rope, slowly raised his bowed head, bared his round eyes, and said: 'For one piece of work to be done by two men — whether Jubei is the head or the second, if I don't want it, I simply cannot do it. Let the Master build it alone; I'll end my days a fool' — and before he could finish, Genta burst out in fury: 'You mean to say'

you'll throw away even this much kindness, spoken with such care to spare your feelings?'

'Yes — I'm grateful, truly, but I cannot tell a lie. If I don't want it, I cannot do it.'

'Well said, indeed. So you won't fall in with Genta's word, no matter what?'

'It cannot be helped, Master.'

'Ha! Remember this, Nossori — a man who understands nothing of another's kindness. What right have you to say such a thing? Fine, fine — I'll never speak another word to you. Go on and grub in gutters your whole life through. The five-storied pagoda — sorry as I am for you — I won't let you so much as lay a finger on it. Genta will build it alone, splendidly — and if you like, go put a mark of triumph on it yourself.'

Part Sixteen

'Ah, thank you kindly, I'm dead drunk, past drinking any more' — offering these tiresome, hollow protests while never once drawing his cup-holding hand back, the absurd habit of a born drinker — Seikichi, thoroughly drunk already on the master's generous sake, kept back three parts sobriety out of deference and sat there with an air of great propriety, saying, 'It won't do for me to get this blind drunk with the master away — it wouldn't do for me to go dancing the evening away drinking one-on-one with you, sis, either. Aha ha, I've gotten absurdly happy. I ought to be going now. Getting out of line means a scolding from the master — but you know, sis, even if I get scolded by our master, I'm glad of it. It's not that I'm just flattering you because you're here, but truly, I think our master is more precious than a bag of tea leaves. That time, too, with the work at Ryoun-in, with Tetsu and'

Kei — a stupid quarrel broke out, and Tetsu took a bad wound to the shoulder, and afterward Tetsu's parents came weeping and pleading to us, and, sorry as we felt about it, ashamed of what had happened, we were poor as we were and had no way in the world to make it right, and we'd gotten so desperate we were even thinking of running off — when, without a word, the master had him treated and paid for it himself, and never once said so much as half a word of scolding to me, only spoke gently: 'Kiyo, a fight's just the heat of the moment, there's nothing to be done about it, but if you're sorry, go apologize — it'll do Tetsu's parents' hearts good, and it'll let you sleep easier too' — and when he said that, ah, how could a man be so deeply kind, I wondered, and I was grateful, so grateful, that I wept. I had no real cause to apologize to Tetsu, but for the master's one word I swallowed my pride and went and apologized anyway'

and, strangely enough, from that time on, before I knew it, Tetsu and I became fast friends, and now we're on such terms that if anything ever happened to either of us, the other would gladly gather up his bones — and it's all thanks to the master. Compare that with the tea-bag, who does nothing but scold and scold, nagging in my ear about not fighting, not going out carousing, and all sorts of tiresome nonsense. Ha ha ha, it's really beyond anything, I tell you. Eh, the tea-bag is my mother, that's what I mean. No, it's not too harsh — tea-bag suits her well enough, and a cheap steeped one at that, aha ha ha. Thank you kindly, I really ought to be going now. Eh, you've warmed another bottle and you want me to stay and drink it? Ah, how kind — if it were the tea-bag, she'd tell me to stop after just this one, the very opposite of'

what you're saying — ah, I'm feeling wonderful now, I feel like singing. What, can I sing, you ask — how heartless. Why, that Matsuzukushi song of mine was praised even by her,' he said, letting slip something quite innocent, and O-Kichi, holding back a laugh, teased him — 'Now, now, that's getting dangerously close to lovesick talk' — when Genta came home just then. 'Ah, good timing — Seikichi, are you here? O-Kichi, let's drink. Get things ready. Seikichi, drink yourself under the table tonight — I'll even sit and listen to that braying voice of yours sing Matsuzukushi.'

'Oh — Master, you were listening in on us, were you!'

Part Seventeen

Once drunk, Seikichi lost all restraint, and, carried along by Genta's easy, open way of talking and O-Kichi's deft, gracious hospitality, forgot before he knew it even to hold himself back, and, offered a cup, never once refused, downing it in a gulp each time, so that as the count of his cups mounted, his usually endearing, ruddy face grew ever more flushed and glistening, red as a fully ripened Tamba ground-cherry, and he fell to laughing loudly over nothing at all, striking poses of bravado at no one in particular, gossiping about this fellow and that among his companions, boasting of the times his own imitations of others' voices had won him rounds of applause at such-and-such a place, and, out of some quarrel over who had gotten the better of whom, telling the story of how his friend Sen had made a great blunder trying to steal the lion-face brazier from some restaurant, and how he himself had once struck down a local rowdy at Gojukken — and, carried along and getting more and more carried away, chattering on from one thing to the next, until, when the talk happened to catch fire on the subject of Nossori, his bleary eyes suddenly went sharp, his slack shoulders squared themselves, and, twisting his lips oddly, he drained off the sake in his cup, gone cold now, and

said: 'I've never once been able to understand why the master should be so fond of a blockhead like that. When it comes to work, he's absurdly careful and never gets anywhere — put up a single post or lintel wrong and he'll go and sharpen his plane three times over, that slow-witted fool; there's never been a single time he's finished anything he was asked to do on schedule; taking three days over just one red-pine hearth-frame — it's no wonder Sen laughed and said that's about the sort he must be. And for the master to favor a man like that — well, honestly, for a while there, me and Kin and Sen and Roku, we all felt, I'm sorry to say, that the master's generosity was simply too great, that he was overvaluing something not worth so much. If being over-careful is all it takes to please him, we said, we might as well take our finishing planes to the wall boards too, and slowly, painstakingly, scrub them down smooth as the face of a

go board — that's the kind of sour grumbling we used to indulge in. And besides, that fellow doesn't even know how to keep company — never once come along with us to the brothels, never once shared a chicken hotpot with us, a real block-headed churl. Once, when we all went to visit Daishi together, thinking it wasn't right to leave just one man out of the group when he's around the master all the time, I kindly invited him myself, and all he said was, 'I'm too poor to go' — and that was that. Isn't that about as graceless, as ignorant of decency, as a man can be? If you haven't got the money, you pawn your wife's one good robe if you have to — that's what keeping company with friends means — but the fool doesn't even understand that much, and yet, bit by bit, he's taken on the master's kindness, and now, just like me and Kin, he's set up on his own — and to think, not so long ago, snot running shamelessly down his face, he was nothing but a brat carrying lunch boxes and staggering home with an armload of scrap wood, tagging along at the master's

heels — not like me and Sen, who've stuck close to the master since we were kids like that; he's a drifter who came from who knows where, and by rights, he ought to feel the master's kindness twice as deeply, twice as gratefully, as we do. Master, sis, I'm getting sad just talking about it — if anything ever happened, I'd throw myself into a blazing fire for the master's and your sake, and I mean it — but that wretch! Ah, that heartless brute, that Nossori — he'd never go into the fire, not even carrying the debt he owes; he can't have any decent spirit in him at all — ah, what a heartless brute,' he said, his drunken grumbling sliding, unbidden, into tears, and he began sniveling and sobbing outright, and O-Kichi, watching her husband's face, looked troubled, as though thinking, there goes his usual habit again — but since she too harbored some dislike of Nossori in her own heart, she was somewhat inclined to think Seikichi's words not

unreasonable.

Genta, no fool by any means, held his cup out toward him with a great laugh. 'What's this you're going on about, Seikichi — don't talk in your sleep in front of me. Bringing out act three won't get you anywhere here — save that trick for wooing some girl, it'll probably work wonders on her. This isn't the room of your beloved Kocho, you know,' he said, joking, but Seikichi only grew more serious still, and, wiping away tears the size of prayer-beads with a hand that then went and plunged straight into the sashimi dish, he burst into sobs and wailing: 'Ah, how heartless, Master — to treat me like a mere drunkard is heartless. I'm not drunk. I haven't touched Kocho at all. Now that I think of it, that fellow's face looks something like Nossori's, and it makes me furious, it's heartless. Nossori is a hateful wretch — setting himself up against the master, so outrageously, so impudently trying to build the five-storied pagoda — a hateful, hateful wretch,'

'and it's because the master's too kind that he's grown so bold — a traitor. Hakuryu the storyteller once explained that even a traitor like Akechi had his reasons — but that wretch is pure wickedness, nothing more. When has the master ever struck Nossori's head with an iron fan? When has he ever said he'd give Nossori's domain to some Ranmaru? If that fellow ever presumes on the master's kindness and puts his name up alongside his to build the pagoda, I won't stand for it — I'll beat him to death and throw him to the dogs, like this — like this!' — and with that he suddenly smashed the side of an empty sake bottle, sending shards flying and plates and small bowls clattering and leaping with a great crash.

'You blasted fool!' the master roared at him, and, though he seemed to slump obediently down at that, in the next moment he had pressed his forehead against a scattered pile of soaked, reconstituted nori and was already snoring.

Genta laughed at this and said, 'Throw a quilt over the lovable fool,' and, pouring for himself, tipped back cup after cup for some while, breathing out the fumes of drink; he had come home angry enough, but seeing Seikichi like that, no better after all than Seikichi himself, he found there was still some thinking left to be done.

Part Eighteen

After Genta had gone home in anger, O-Nami peered into her husband's face as he sat there with folded arms, utterly blank, and, heaving a long sigh, lamented: 'The Master's own commission has slipped through our fingers after all — and after wasting all those nights without sleep, all those days of labor making even the model, in the end to sour the Master's feelings toward us and have people going about calling you an ingrate, a man without human feeling — it's too heartless a thing. I know you'll only say it's not my place, a woman's, to speak up, but honesty and diligence have their limits too. Even if you'd agreed and worked together, going along with the counsel the Master gave so generously, it wouldn't have brought you any shame — what foolish, stubborn pride is this, holding out so pointlessly? Who would ever praise you for it, who would call it admirable? If you'd fallen in with the Master's judgment, the Master, to whom we owe so much, would have felt easy in his own heart first of all, and your own name would have risen, and all your hardship and labor would have counted for something —'

good on every side, every way you look at it — why can't you bring yourself to it? Your reasoning makes no sense to me at all, not the least bit. Won't you think it over again, and follow the Master's counsel after all? If only you'd change your mind, I'd go to the Master's place myself this very moment, and however I could manage it, I'd apologize, with all my heart and strength, resolved not to budge even if I were struck or beaten — apologize and apologize and keep on apologizing until, surely, so kind-hearted a man as the Master couldn't go on being angry forever; surely he'd forgive a moment's misjudgment. Won't you reconsider, set aside your stubbornness, and bring yourself to do as the Master said?' — she pleaded, thinking only of her husband, and reasonable enough as a woman's plea — but Jubei did not so much as move his eyes, and said: 'Ah, say no more of it. Ah, say no more of the five-storied pagoda'

to me. It was a foolish notion to have taken up in the first place, and I daresay people will call me an ingrate for it, a man without feeling — well, that too came of my own want of good sense, and there's nothing to be done about it now. But to change my mind the way you say — that I will not do, no matter what. Jubei may use other men's hands under him in his own work, but he'll take no man's advice; he may let himself be used as another man's hand in another man's work, but he'll give no advice of his own. When it comes to the bracket-work and the rafter-spacing, if it's my own doing, then it's my own affair, and I won't take another man's direction on it, not by so much as an inch, from one end to the other; whatever comes of it, good or bad, I'll carry the whole weight of it myself. If I'm used in another man's work, then I'll do nothing more than what's given me to do, an honest hired hand and no more, and never, not even in a dream, put in some impudent word of my own. A parasite vine, proud of its own showy leaves though it has no claim to be master of the tree —'

that's a thing Jubei's stomach won't stand, whether it's Jubei clinging as a parasite to another man's work or letting a parasite cling to his own — my gut won't have it, and there's nothing to be done about that either. Kind Master Genta chewing fine the meaning of duty and human feeling and going out of his way to urge it on me — I understand that well enough, and I'm grateful for it; but for him to take pity on me out of the goodness of my own heart and treat me like a parasite vine — that's a heartless thing. Jubei may be a fool, may be Nossori, but he hates the thought of thriving as a parasite vine. Better to be some stunted undergrowth that withers away — at least, leaning on some great tree, I'd be some use as fertilizer to it. But those fellows who become parasite vines and perch high up on another's strength — I've seen plenty of them in my time, and always despised them in my heart as low, contemptible creatures; and now, to have myself, out of nothing but the Master's own natural kindness, become just such a thing — however I look at it, I can't bear the shame of it. If only he'd simply order me, 'cut this, saw that apart,' and use me plainly according to his direction, I'd be glad enough

of it — but this kindness of his, coming of itself, is all the sadder for being kindness. No doubt you'll resent me too, thinking me a man who understands nothing — but forgive me. Ah, there's nothing to be done about it. This is exactly what makes Jubei Jubei — this is what makes him Nossori, a fool, a blockhead — whatever anyone calls me, there's nothing for it. Ah, the fire's grown small, it's gotten cold — let's go to bed now,' he said, and every word of it, heard through, made a kind of sense.

O-Nami, finding no words to answer, fell silent, and the lamp lighting the already cold little room grew dimmer still as its wick burned low.

Part Nineteen

That night Genta, once in bed, could not fall asleep for a long while, and, hearing the first cockcrow and then the second quite clearly, rose the next morning earlier than usual, and, having washed away whatever dream he had not seen in his rinsing and gargling, was just clearing the last trace of last night's drink with a cup of hot tea when Seikichi, rousing himself with a great heave, sat up rubbing his sleep-swollen eyes and looking utterly bewildered, so that both Genta and O-Kichi burst out laughing; teased with, 'Seikichi, whatever happened to you last night?' he suddenly went stiff with formality and bowed his head over and over in a fluster, saying, 'I'm afraid I let myself be treated far too generously and fell asleep before I knew it. Sis, did I do anything wrong last night?' — asking so anxiously that it was almost comical, and told gently, 'Never mind, it's all fine — go have something to eat and get to work,' he grew only the more abashed, and sat there for a while, arms folded, lost in a dazed, absent sort of thought — an honest fellow, and endearing for it.

After sending Seikichi off, Genta remained sunk alone in thought, quite unlike his usual brisk, easygoing self, hardly speaking a word even to O-Kichi, turning the matter over and over in his mind, until, 'Ah, I've got it,' he seemed to mutter to himself — and then, the next moment, sighing, 'Poor fellow' — and the next, 'Ah, shall I just throw it all over?' — so that, watching him beside herself with worry over his evident irritation, unable to tell what he meant to do, O-Kichi found it painful to see, and when she ventured a word to comfort or question him, was cut short with 'Be quiet,' and could do nothing but silently ache in her heart, at a loss.

Genta paid no mind to any of it, mulling it over all through the day until evening, and at last, having come to some decision, rose at once, changed his clothes, went to Kanno-ji, and, presenting himself before the Superior, told him the whole of what had passed the night before, hiding nothing, and in the end said: 'At first I was angry, I confess, at an answer from Jubei I could hardly make sense of, but going home and turning it over carefully, I saw that even if I alone were to build the pagoda splendidly, that would make a mockery of the very counsel you gave us, and would only show Genta clinging stubbornly to his own greed after all — hardly a manly thing to do. And yet Jubei seems, by every sign, a man unlikely ever to give up his own wish. If he is only to yield by suppressing himself entirely, then in fairness Genta too must suppress himself and beg to let him do the work — such is the duty and feeling of the matter. After turning over every foolish notion I could think of, I finally hit upon something, but it comes to nothing unless Jubei

agrees to it, and there's no help for that; there's no use being angry or resentful over it either. There's no cleverer plan left in me now. All I ask, Superior, is this: even should you command that Jubei alone do it, I will truly think nothing ill of it — so please, command as you see fit, whether it be Jubei, or myself, or the two of us together, however you judge best. Since it comes from your own mouth, there'll be no quarrel between Jubei and myself either way — we've both set aside all wish to contend with one another, so there's not the least obstacle in it now. This is beyond what the two of us could settle between ourselves, and so I've come to ask it of you,' he said, his sincerity plain upon his face, and the Superior, beaming, said: 'Just as I thought, just as I thought — you truly are a fine man after all. Good, good — with a heart like that alone, you've already built something finer than the cloud-piercing pagoda itself. Jubei came just a little while ago and said the very same thing,

and went home again. Isn't he too a lovable fellow? Well, Genta — be kind to him, be kind to him,' he said, with meaning in his words, and Genta, quick to grasp it, answered brightly at once: 'Why, of course I'll be kind to him,' and the Superior's whole face creased with delight at this, saying, 'Good, good — ah, what a fine, admirable man,' praising him from the very bottom of his heart; and Genta, overcome though he felt himself unworthy of it, could not help raising his head and, in a single phrase heavy with boundless feeling, said, 'Have I become a man at last, thanks to you?' — weeping tears of joy.

And it must have been at this very moment that the wish rose up in Jubei's heart, beautiful for all the world to see, to lend his help to Genta's work in turn.

Part Twenty

How bitter that day was for Jubei, after he had gone to Kanno-ji, presented himself before the Venerable Roen, and, in tears, spoken his refusal, and gone home again — he had not even the heart left to draw on his pipe, and sat blankly turning over, again and again, thoughts of his own hard luck and how difficult the world was to get through, and the more he turned them over the less joy he found in them; when mealtime came, it was not that the rice tasted any different than usual, but his very hand hesitated over his chopsticks, and his tongue would not accept it as good, so that where he usually ate six or seven bowls with pleasure, he finished with only one or two, and drank all the more tea instead — the unfailing habit of a man with something troubling his heart.

With the master of the house so downcast, his wife too, and even little Ino, who was in the thick of his mischievous age and had no fault in any of it, could not help but fail to lift naturally into his usual high spirits, and the already lonely poor household grew lonelier still, the days passing with no hope and not a shred of pleasure in them, the nights spent through dreams with no warmth in them at all — until O-Nami, waking at the temple bell before dawn, rose quietly from the bed she shared with Ino, thinking, with a mother's tender heart, not to wake him yet in the cold morning air before there was a fire lit, better to let him sleep a little longer — when, quite unlike his usual innocent, untroubled sleep, he suddenly, for some reason, sprang bolt upright, and, clad only in his undergarment, went bounding this way and that over the bedding, crying, 'No, no, don't hit Father, no!' pressing his small fern-shoot hands to his eyes and, for some reason unknown, bursting into tears, so that, startled, crying, 'Why, Ino, what's the matter?' she caught him up in her arms, held

him close, but still he would not stop crying.

'No one's hitting Father — did you have a dream? Look, there, Father's still fast asleep right there,' she said, turning his face toward him to show him, and he peered over uncertainly, and though he seemed somewhat reassured, a lingering trace of doubt still showed in him.

'It's nothing at all, Ino, you only had a dream — now then, it's cold, you mustn't catch a chill, get back in bed and sleep,' she said, laying him down almost by force, drawing the quilt up and pressing it snug from above so no chill could creep in; and, watching his mother's face, he opened his eyes wide and said, 'Ah, it was so scary — just now a scary man from somewhere else—'

'Oh — oh, what happened, tell me.'

'With a great, great iron hammer, he struck Father's head, over and over, again and again, while Father just sat there in silence, and Father's head broke half apart, and it frightened me terribly.'

'Oh, hush, hush, what a horrible thing to say, what an unlucky thing to say,' she said, knitting her brow — and just then, from outside, passing by, came the shivering cry of the natto-seller, a voice she recognized, muttering to himself, 'Tch, my wretched sandal strap's snapped,' and her spirits soured all the more at it, so that when she went to the kitchen and set about lighting the stove, even the firewood, refusing to catch as it should, made her angry, and the smoke-vent, sliding open none too smoothly, irritated her now more than ever before, and though she knew well enough in her own heart that it was only her own mood making the day seem so hateful to her, she went on fretting all the more over things that would otherwise be nothing at all — and, scolding herself for it, thinking she'd be laughed at if she said as much aloud, she put on a brighter face than usual and livelier words, tending to husband and child alike with a show of cheer — but since it was, at root, a put-on thing, the trailing note of her every laugh could not help but leave behind, as it faded, an echo of sorrow, a sad sight to see —

when, into the midst of it, came a young temple page, walking in with a presumptuous, grown-up air, saying, 'Is this Master Jubei's house?' and, seating himself with an insolent little perch upon the doorstep, delivered, without preamble, a blunt announcement: 'You are wanted at once on business, and are to come without delay.'

O-Nami was mystified, and Jubei too could make nothing of it, but there was no refusing, and, thinking to himself that even passing through the gate of Kanno-ji now seemed a useless thing, he went and asked what business it might be — and heaven and earth turned upside down: what was this, was it a dream, was it real, was it truth? There sat Endo on the right, Tamemon on the left, and the Venerable Roen in the middle, and Endo, in solemn tones, declared: 'Whereas the entire construction of the cloud-piercing pagoda now to be raised was to have been entrusted to Genta of Kawagoe, the Abbot has, upon further reflection, through a special deliberation and an exceptional act of compassion, resolved that it shall be entrusted firmly to you, Jubei. There is to be no talk whatever of declining it. Accept it at once, with all gratitude' — and, as if that were not enough, the Superior himself, in his aged, cracked voice, added: 'Now then, Jubei, do it to the very limit of your powers. I shall be glad indeed if you finish it well' — words of grace far beyond what he could bear to carry.

Nossori, with a gasp, threw himself prostrate at once, his whole body shaking like a wave, and, saying only, 'Th-th-this life of Jubei's I offer up to you,' his throat closed and no more words would come, and in the hushed, silent hall, the faint sound of his labored breathing, saying something no one could quite make out, reached, all the same, the ears of everyone present.

Part Twenty-One

The lovely fragrance of red and white lotus, once wafting into every sleeve and hem, and the charming summer sight of dewdrops trembling on floating leaves and a breeze rustling through the upright ones, had vanished entirely now that the first frost had touched the treetops of the hill across the way, dyeing them with color; only the ruddy-brown lotus stalks stood on, forlorn, in the water, and among them a heron, as though hiding itself from the world, paced along at its leisure, an amusing sight, while overhead, in a sky darkening to indigo where stars had just begun to glimmer, wild geese flew past, brushing the stars with their backs, their cries as they passed adding a certain charm — and, with the whole view of Shinobazu Pond for a relish beyond any relish on the table, in the upstairs back room of the Horaiya, a place that could make a guest drink like a turtle drinking up the sea, sat a single man, waiting for someone, a look of pleasant anticipation on his face.

Dressed plainly and tastefully all in striped Tozan cloth, his quiet silver pipe with its Sumiyoshi lacquer showing a refinement that, for all the chivalrous, workman's air of his speech and manner, was never once coarse — this was, in fact, Genta, the sort of man the many called 'master,' 'master' — and when Oden, a woman he knew well, said, setting down the tray, 'You must have been waiting so long,' meaning it as mere flattery, he seized on it out of sheer boredom with waiting and said, 'Waiting, waiting, I can hardly bear it — really, whoever it is has no thought for how a man feels, keeping him waiting like this, what can she be doing,' to which she answered, 'Well, it's only natural her makeup should take some time,' and laughed lightly — the practiced parry of a woman well used to the game.

'Ha ha ha, that's fair enough — well, when she comes, take a good look at her, there can hardly be anyone else like her around here, I'd wager.'

'My, how frightening — what extravagant praise! And, master, is this person — a teacher of yours?'

'No.'

'A young lady, then?'

'No.'

'A widow?'

'No.'

'An old grandmother, then?'

'Don't be absurd, poor thing.'

'A baby, then?'

'Now you're just teasing me, ha ha ha ha ha.'

Just as she was laughing away, 'Ho ho ho ho ho,' at nothing much at all, a voice from outside the sliding door called Oden's name, announcing that her guest's companion had arrived; and, rising to slide open the door, she turned back for a moment with a sly, knowing look toward Genta and smiled without a word — a jest meant to tease and torment him a little, letting him savor a private glee, thinking, won't he be pleased — but little did she know Genta found it privately amusing for quite the opposite reason, and, when she slid the door open, the guest who shuffled slowly in was, far from any woman of charm, a rough, graceless man with neither fragrance nor allure about him, his hair a wild, unkempt shock, his jaw bristling with stubble, his face grimy, his clothes soiled and torn, altogether so dismal a sight as to make one shudder at a glance — so that even she, seasoned as she was, could only stand there flustered, at a loss for a greeting.

Genta, smiling broadly, said, 'Come now, Jubei, come sit here, don't stand on ceremony, sit yourself down cross-legged and be easy,' and, seating him almost by force where he stood hesitating, and, once the food and drink had all been set out, took up the cup he had just drained and offered it, and, turning to Jubei, who sat there in silence, said: 'Jubei, the reason I sent Tomimatsu to fetch you out here just now is nothing more than this — truly, I wanted us to make up. I want the two of us to drink together, plainly, and let our hearts soften toward each other, and have you forget the things I said that went too far, the other night. Listen, here's how it was. That night, I confess, I thought you altogether too unreasonable, and I was angry — I'm ashamed to say I even flew into a temper and worked myself into such a fury that I could have split your skull open with my own hands. But—'

fortunately for me, Genta's head isn't so thoroughly possessed by its own bad angel, and when Seikichi came to my house drunk and started spouting all sorts of nonsense, I thought to myself, ah, what a shallow, small-minded fellow, to say such foolish things as though they were reasoned argument, and not even be ashamed of it — it was almost comical to listen to; and just at that moment, it struck me — turning over in my mind the very things I myself had gone on arguing, that night at your house — that they were, when I looked at them squarely, not so very different from what Seikichi had said. Ah, had I let myself be swept up in some momentary, mistaken fit of temper — how galling! It would have been the ruin of Genta as a man, the loss of all my own pride, and I'd have had good cause to fear the Superior's contempt besides — to twist my own stubbornness against a man who was giving up everything, refusing it all outright, would have been a grave mistake — but even thinking all that, I was still too irritated at how unreasonable you seemed, and turned the whole matter over from every angle, this way and that, thinking: press it here, and a wrinkle appears there; set it

straight there, and there's some strain here — and, having exhausted every last bit of my own wits and judgment, thinking not only of my own advantage but truly weighing the matter fairly, and having had it all so brusquely dismissed, it galled me, it galled me terribly, and I could hardly bear it for a while — but then, once I had truly settled my own mind and gone before the Superior and laid out what I meant to do, at that single word of his, 'good, good,' all the murk and mist in me cleared away at once, and I felt as though a cool wind were blowing across the wide open sky. And then, yesterday, the Superior went out of his way to summon me again, and when I went, he had nothing but praise for me, over and over, and, on top of that, he told me that the whole commission has now been given to you outright, and that I am to help you from behind the scenes — that it will all count as merit and good fortune for my own soul. Jubei has no crew of workmen of his own, he said, so when the day comes for him to begin, however many hands he hires, some of your own men are sure to be among them

— and he told me, in careful detail, to make certain none of them fall into envy or spite, and to see to it myself that they understand it well. Everything seen through, down to the smallest detail, by the deeply compassionate Superior — I came home, humbled through and through, moved by his kindness. So, Jubei, forgive me for what I said too far, the other night; and if you understand this feeling of mine now, let's go on as we always did, cleanly, warmly, on good terms with each other. Now that everything's settled this way, whatever I thought or you thought before was all just some dream-bound quarrel, and there's nothing to be gained by dwelling on it, only trouble left behind — let's wash it all away, clean, into the waters of this pond, and I'll forget it, and you forget it too, Jubei. As for negotiating for timber, or dealing with the porters and laborers, that'll be hard going for you at first, not having made your own name known yet — for all of that, I'll lend you my own face and my own hand. Marucho, Yamaroku, Enshuya — all the good wholesalers

— you have to be on familiar terms with them all, or they won't give you an inch, so use me freely as your go-between in all of it, so nothing ever leaves you feeling helpless. Eiji, the head of the Me-gumi brigade — you know him, short-tempered as he is — his bones are iron and, if I may say so, his very soul's a ball of fire, that's what people always say of him; but press him properly and he takes hold of a job and never lets go, a truly dependable man. For a pagoda, nothing matters more than the foundation work — have him settle the groundwork that must bear up against wind, rain, fire, and flood, and just Eiji's fiery spirit alone will see it laid firmer than bedrock beneath an immovable Buddha, stripped to the waist and giving it everything he's got, that much is certain — I'll introduce him to you before long. Now that it's come to this, there's only one thing Genta wants: that you, Jubei, do it splendidly, magnificently — that alone, and nothing more. As long as the pagoda comes out well, there's nothing else in the world that could make me happier

than that. Even if it's only for the sake of appearances — a hundred, a thousand years from now, when it's still standing, and the eyes of what we might call our own disciples' disciples fall on it, wouldn't it be a sad thing, a heartless thing, if there were some blunder in it? If the day ever came when people said, 'In the days of Genta and Jubei, they say folks wept and laughed over some worthless building or other' — why, Jubei, both our very bones and souls would be ground to powder and blown away in shame. To fail, and never come before the world at all, brings less shame in a way — but to leave something behind only to have our own disciples laugh at it someday is worse than a father being lectured by his own son — far more shameful, in fact, than a son being lectured by his father. Better a living crucifixion than to be salted down after death and crucified all over again — that's a fate to be avoided at all costs. At first, I confess, I hadn't thought it through so deeply myself, but when you set yourself up in opposition to me with such fierce resolve, I began to wonder — was it that you wanted to prove yourself no less than Genta by getting to build the pagoda?

— that you thought, 'let's see if Genta could have built it any better than this'? Deep down, in the fire struck from flint before flint, I could see clean to the very bottom of it, and now there's not a shred of self-will left in me — as long as it comes out well, it's honor for you and joy for me both, that's all I wanted to say today. Ah, Jubei — have you heard me out with those big eyes of yours grown wet? I'm glad, truly glad,' he said — pure, unadulterated Edo spirit, polished and honed down to nothing sticky left in it, all or nothing, a six or a one, the gentleness beneath his anger every bit as strong as the anger itself in these words of Genta's — and Jubei, who had listened without so much as stirring, said nothing at all, but pressed himself flat against the mats and said, 'Master, forgive me, I can't speak, Jubei can't find the words, th-this — this is all I can — ah, thank you, thank you,' and, foolish as it looked, in true earnest, could only prostrate himself and weep.

Part Twenty-Two

Genta rejoiced at the sight of Jubei's manner, in which the truth of his heart showed plainly enough without any words at all, his face taking on a warmth like a spring breeze passing over a lake, or mist steaming beneath the sun, and, his voice growing gentler and smoother still, he went on: 'Now that we've come to this understanding, there's nothing awkward left between us, and it fits with the Superior's own wishes besides, and both our honors are upheld — ah, whatever else, what a fine feeling this is. Jubei, drink your fill too — I mean to get thoroughly drunk myself today,' he said, and, rising, took down a bundle wrapped in cloth from the shelf above, untied the knot, and drew out two bundles of papers, setting them before Jubei. 'These are of no use to me now — one is an itemized estimate I spent several nights working out, down to the last detail, of the troublesome timber costs and the wages for laborers and porters and all the rest; and the other is—'

drafted this way and that, worked and reworked — some no more than the roofline division for the skirt-roof alone, some only the ground-plan, some only the design of the first story, some no more than the bracket-arms projecting two or three steps out, some nothing but drawings of cloud-shapes and wave-shapes and arabesques and carved creatures; and, most troublesome of all, calculations for the central pillar down to the lintels, the skirting rails, the sill rails, the half-rails, the veranda boards and coping, the turtle-belly plinth, the balustrade posts, the rafters, the bracket-blocks and arms, the through-tie beams and hip-rafters, all worked out and set down without the least thing left unrecorded; and among them, too, drawings not his own but treasured heirlooms of his family, never meant to leave the house, and others copied from the halls and pagodas of Kyoto and Nara — 'all of this I'm leaving in your hands; there may be something in it of use to you when you look it over,' he said, giving away, without the least reluctance, things into which he had poured his very heart and soul — the breadth of

such generosity was not lost on him, and it was not that he failed to appreciate how much he could rely on it; but Nossori too had his own temperament, and disliked wetting his own mouth from another man's purse, and said, 'Master, I'm truly grateful, but I've as good as received your kindness already just in the offer — please keep these for yourself,' a reply that, though he meant no unkindness by it, came out with far too little warmth in the words — and Genta was greatly displeased by it.

'You mean to say you don't want this?' he asked, hiding his anger beneath the surface, and Nossori, not even sensing the danger of it, carelessly answered, 'Well, if there's ever some particular need, I might borrow it—' whereupon Genta, quick-tempered as he was, could bear it no longer: 'To pile kindness on kindness and then offer you even the drawings I worked my own wits and judgment into, and have you toss it back so casually — that's insolence. However skilled your own hand may be, is that reason enough to throw another man's goodwill to the wind? To tell the truth, I was angry enough even at the very start, when you set yourself up against me, but I held it in and didn't quarrel; an ordinary man, taking on work of his own while living under my protection, would have earned nothing but a beating and my everlasting anger — but because I thought well of you, I never said so much as half a harsh word, and simply let matters take their natural course. Have you forgotten that? Even after the Superior's counsel,

I wracked my brains dry with thinking it through and went out of my way to offer to talk it over for your sake, and you met that with nothing but your own stubborn pride — a thing that, by rights, no ordinary man could have borne. Do you have any idea how much I had to hold myself back, simply because I cared for you so much? Do you imagine it was your good fortune alone, your skill alone, your honest heart alone, that won you this commission from the Superior? Do you think that if I give you this, this Genta means to hold it over you as some debt? Or has some conceit crept into you by now, so that from the very start you've thought lightly of another man's drawings as worthless things? I won't force it on you if you refuse it — but this is heartless beyond all reason. By rights you ought to have taken it gladly, saying, 'Ah, thank you,' used a piece or two of the method somewhere in the midst of your own work, and come to me afterward to say, 'that part went well, thanks to you' —

— that much would only have been natural — but not even to open it, not even to glance inside, to refuse it as though its worthlessness were already too plain to need looking at, without so much as a shred of grace — Jubei, how dare you throw it back like that! Do you imagine there's nothing in these drawings of mine that you don't already know? Do you imagine Genta never once leaps beyond the circle of your own little contrivances? If you think it not worth looking at, then I know well enough the measure of your own hand — the pagoda's not even half raised, and already, sorry as I am to say it, I can see the faults coming. Now my patience has run clean out. I won't stoop to any low revenge, but is Genta the sort of man to let a fierce grievance like this go unanswered when the time comes? I've spoken to you pleasantly enough, sick of it as I've grown, but I'll speak no more. Once I've cast a thing aside, I'll hold no lingering fondness for talk. Three years, ten years, however long it takes — I'll keep a sharp eye on you from the shadows, watching, waiting in silence, until'

the day comes when I've had my fill of settling the score' — and, their temperaments being what they were, what had once or twice already gone astray between them now, on this third occasion, came to a truly wretched collision; and Genta, very quietly, lowering his voice, suddenly began addressing him with an oddly formal courtesy: 'Master Jubei, I won't draw up any more drawings you don't want. The pagoda you build alone will surely turn out splendid — I only wonder whether it will still be standing if an earthquake or a strong wind ever comes,' he said lightly, but with a deep mockery underlying it, and Jubei, displeased, struck back with quiet force: 'Even Nossori knows what shame is.' 'Very well said indeed — I'll remember that, so I don't forget it,' Genta said, driving the words home like a nail, glaring at him with terrible intensity, and then said nothing more, but stood up all at once: 'Ah, I've just remembered something dreadful I forgot. Jubei, take your ease here a while — I have to go, I just remembered—'

and, like the wind, was gone from the place; and, in the time it takes to say so, having reckoned some sum in his head, he left some money behind and walked straight out, and, without so much as pausing, marched from there directly to the threshold of a certain house in the same district, and no sooner had he crossed it than: 'No, no, I hate it, hate it, this is worthless, stupid nonsense — don't dawdle, bring the sake! What good's fiddling with a candle going to do me for a meal? Can a dolt like that make decent company for drinking? Fetch Kokane, Harukichi, Ofusa, Choko, no argument, drag them here if you must — someone with sturdy legs, go — and you, go by my house and send Kiyo, Sen, Tetsu, Masa, anyone, everyone, straight over here to play,' he said, and, hardly pausing between all this and tipping back cup after cup, when the women came filing in he threw an impatient fit at them straightaway: 'Tonight of all nights is no time to go easy on me. Drink, drink — pass the cups round and round like a wheel, keep them going! Ofusa, don't put on airs. Old Haru, don't act so grown-up. Hey, Choko, is there even any blood running in that head of yours

— shall I set a firework off on top of it and see? Come on, sing, make some noise! Kokane's got a lovely voice — Aguri, dance, dance, jump higher! Ah, Seikichi's here, Tetsu too? Never mind what, just make a racket, tonight's a happy night for me, no manners tonight, let loose, let loose!' — and, with their leader in such a wild, unruly humor, even Sen and Masa, arriving late, were swept up in the smoke of it and carried away, thinking, if the ceiling comes down, if the floor gives way, that's our business, not yours — and they leapt and danced and howled, making a mockery of the pretty airs of the Itako-Dejima ballad, whipping up war-cries with the Jinku song, slipping and tumbling over each other doing the Kappore, Tetsu drumming out a conjurer's beat on the cup-rinsing bowl, while Seikichi sprawled beside Ofusa and practiced, with her silver hairpin, some line about drinking nothing but vinegar for her sake — and in the middle of this foolish uproar, Masa, looking as though he had some scheme of his own, put on a voice like a rolled-up work-song and began

belting out something odd about steep green mountains to the north, going entirely his own way; and by the time the wild carousing had run its course, even the finger-guessing games had gone coarse, and one of the girls, her breasts swelling free, had a paper screen strung up below her navel for a joke, at which point Genta said, 'All right, that's enough of that for now,' — and whatever became of them all after that, no one could say.

Part Twenty-Three

When a hawk takes wing, it never lets its eyes wander elsewhere; fixed single-mindedly on the crane, or whatever else it means to strike, it pierces the very clouds and beats against the wind toward its chosen prey, and will not rest content until its talons have closed around the throat of the thing it hunts.

Once it was settled that Jubei would take on the work of the five-storied pagoda, he lived and breathed nothing else, waking or sleeping; even eating his morning rice, his heart was gnawing at the pagoda in his mind, and even in his dreams at night his very soul went circling round the crowning finial, so that once he set to work in earnest he forgot entirely that he had a wife, forgot entirely that he had a child, gave no thought at all to the man he had been yesterday and no thought to the man he would be tomorrow; when he raised his single adze and cut into the wood, he poured the whole strength of his body into it, and when he drew out a single drawing, he poured the whole sincerity of his heart into it, and though his five feet of flesh still dwelt, in this common world, where a dog barks and a cock crows and there is rejoicing in one house and mourning in the next, his spirit was seized by no such tangled worldly cares, and he threw himself into his labor as though his very life depended on it; and though it was not that the unpleasantness with Genta that night did not weigh on him at all, still, day by day, the Nossori in him only grew the more pronounced,

until, before long, it had settled into something as easy and unremarkable to him as a passing breeze, and before long more he had forgotten it altogether, and gave himself over entirely to his work — foolish, perhaps, and dull of feeling, but not unlike the simple, single-minded plodding of an old ox who will run down no path but the one straight ahead.

With gold leaf, silver leaf, lapis, pearl, and crystal making up the five treasures, and cloves, aloeswood, white resin, frankincense, and sandalwood making up the five incenses, and the five medicines and five grains besides all duly prepared, the ground-pacifying rite was completed, invoking Otsuchi-mioya-no-kami and Haniyamahiko-no-kami and Haniyamahime-no-kami and all the tutelary gods of protection; the earth-breaking and soil-clearing passed without incident; and then the foundation stones were laid in order, beginning from the direction of that month's vital energy and proceeding to the right, with the Five Planets duly honored, and at the great ceremony of the First Stroke of the Adze, seven gods were worshipped in turn — the God Ama-no-Mahitotsu, who first opened the way of the smith; the Gods Tetokihoi and Hikosachi, who opened the way of the carpenter; and, after them, the Gods Omoikane, Amatsukoyane, and Futodama, down to the God Kukunochi, god of trees — and after that the rite of the First Purifying Plane was duly and smoothly performed, and then, in the name of the Four Heavenly Kings — Taitoradaijikoku of the east, Birosha-komoku of the west, Biruroksha-zocho of the south, and Bishamon-tamon of the north — the Pillar-Raising ceremony was held, praying that the four pillars, standing for the four quarters, might never waver in a thousand years, ten thousand years; and to the

three jade goddesses of Tensei, Shikusei, and Tagan, and to Tanro, Komon, and the rest of the Seven Stars of the Northern Dipper, prayers were offered for eternal, undying protection, and, in order, Jubei drove three temporary wedges into each pillar, having his assistants secure them fast; and, having borne so much hardship and having come this far at last, so great was his joy that even his grimy face seemed to shine with light, and even the old verse chanted in the ceremony — of the great pillar rooted unmoving in the lower bedrock — struck him, somehow, as deeply moving, and, reciting the closing line — that it stands as a model for how one should raise oneself up in this world — he found himself smiling and repeating it a second time, and, turning reverently toward the altar to bow, clapped his hands with a clear, ringing sound to close the rite of purification marking the whole undertaking's completion — a scene in sharp contrast to the loneliness settling now over Genta's house.

The master himself, being a man, kept his feelings from showing outwardly, however strong they ran; but O-Kichi, clever as she was in her own way, had, after all, a woman's narrow heart, and every time she heard from someone coming and going that the earth-breaking for the pagoda at Kanno-ji had been completed that day, or the pillar-raising the day before, it galled her, and the flame of jealousy leapt up in her: 'You ungrateful wretch, Jubei — taking advantage of my husband's generous heart, growing bold on it, making your name and your fortune so smoothly, so easily! And if your name is made and your fortune is set, shouldn't you have come round by now with your thanks, instead of going about, feigning ignorance, nose in the air, day after day?' And, blaming her husband too, for being too good-natured by half, and that detestable Nossori all the more for being Nossori, she let her temper fly this way and that at every turn, and, even lifting a loose strand of hair at her own temple, would cry, 'Ah, how maddening,' and tear at her own innocent hair for no reason at all, and even turned away a beggar come to ask for a single coin with a harsh, shrill

refusal — until, one day, while Genta was out, a talkative, familiar doctor named Doeki came by to visit, and, after a great deal of idle chatter, let slip, half as flattery and thinking nothing of it, 'The other day, I was taken along by someone to the Horaiya, and I heard the whole story, start to finish, from a woman there named Oden — my, what a different sort of man our master is, what a fine man, that's just how a man ought to be, I was quite struck by it,' and, drawing out the details of that night bit by bit, O-Kichi found it galling enough not knowing, but knowing it now, Jubei seemed doubly, triply hateful to her, and her anger flared up worse than ever.

Part Twenty-Four

'Seikichi, you're a spineless fellow, a man with neither backbone nor a lick of sense — why didn't you tell me what happened that night until now? Did you hold back out of some odd notion that it would upset me to hear it? That's a shabby, small-minded thing to do. Even if I had heard the whole of it, it's not as though I'd have gone into a panic and lost my head over it. Whatever my own husband's reasons for treating me like some woman too weak to be told anything, keeping it hidden from me — but for even you to leave me deaf and blind to it and think nothing of it, that's too much to bear. And what's more, you knew perfectly well what was in the master's heart, and yet here you are, cool as anything, drinking your fill and playing escort to brothel-house girls, as if that were the sum of a man's worth, and coming round here so carefree, wanting to be entertained — Seikichi, you're a happy fool, aren't you. Normally I'd pour you a drink even with the master away, but not today, I won't be bothered. If it's too much trouble even to toast you a bit of nori—'

'— or to sit and be your idle-talk companion, my gut won't stand it. If you want a drink, go help yourself at the kitchen tap; if you want conversation, go talk to the cat,' she said — and Seikichi, who knew nothing of any of it, having happened by just after Doeki had left, found himself the sudden target of all O-Kichi's ill humor, and, bewildered, at a complete loss, stammered and fumbled his way, bit by bit, to asking what it was all about — and, hearing it, though it was news even to himself until that very moment, found, once he heard it, that his hatred of Nossori was, after all, past all bearing: that Jubei, a man who owed his very life, so to speak, to the master he swore by, should treat him with such reckless disregard, should trample so heartlessly on the face of a master whose kindness had been nothing but honest and true — it was hateful, hateful past enduring, and what was to be done about it?

'Hmph — the master and Jubei are too far apart in standing to be any kind of match; for the master to quarrel with Nossori would be like flinging a jewel that glows in the dark at a common pebble, so however furious he must be, he's holding it in, holding it in with all his strength, and won't let his grudge slip out to a single soul, won't let anyone know at all, that must be it. Ah, how heartless of the master — other men aside, he might at least have told Seikichi. Between the master and Jubei, it's the master who stands to lose by staying silent; but between me and Nossori, there's no such loss to worry about. Right then, Jubei — I won't just sit on this,' he thought, his mind racing ahead of itself in a fit of impulsive resolve.

'Sis, there's nothing to be done about it while I didn't know — forgive me for that; but now that I do know, I won't be scolded again for it, if I may say so. Just watch and see whether Seikichi's only good for playing escort at the brothels or not — well then!' he flung out, his voice sharp and fierce at the last, and, throwing the lattice door wide open, without even stopping for his sandals, without looking back, he was off faster than the wind, and O-Kichi, suddenly anxious, ran after him calling out two, three times, but by the fourth call even his shadow had vanished from sight.

Part Twenty-Five

The sound of axes hewing timber, planes shaving boards, chisels boring holes, hammers driving nails, all ringing out busily together, wood chips flying like leaves tossed in a whirlwind, sawdust swirling like snow falling from a clear sky — such was the lively bustle of the construction site within the grounds of Kanno-ji, where men in indigo chest-cloths cinched tight at the neck, their close-cropped work trousers cut jauntily up at the thigh, their sandals flapping loose, moved about with a spirited, workmanlike air, some laboring with visible cleverness, others — old men, grimy of dress, a dirty towel slung over one shoulder — squatting at their leisure in some sunny corner, calmly whetting a chisel, while young boys fumbled about hunting for tools and day laborers sawed away at wood without pause, each man toiling and fretting after his own fashion, sweating and straining in the midst of it all — and there, overseeing the whole of it, moving among every man's work, ink-pot and marking-cord and square in hand, was the master builder himself, Nossori Jubei, giving orders and instructions to turn the joinery he carried whole in his own breast into solid, physical fact.

'Cut here, bore there, do this here and do that there, give it just this much slope' — telling them by word of mouth, showing them with the marking-cord, and, for anything too troublesome to explain, sketching the very method on a scrap of board and holding it up to show — his eyes as sharp and watchful as a cormorant's, a hawk's, missing nothing, driving himself desperately, unsparingly, at his own labor — and just as he was, absorbed in nothing else, sketching out a carved design for one of the young workers, Seikichi came flying up, kicking up dust faster even than a wild boar.

His face burning with fury like a ball of fire, his eyes rolled back and glaring, he threw them open still wider and roared, 'Damn you, Nossori, drop dead!' — and Jubei, startled, spun around only to have, aimed straight down at his skull with force enough to split a boulder, an adze honed to a gleaming edge and fitted lengthwise to its handle, a craftsman's blade turned weapon; there was no bearing such a blow, no time to dodge it fully, and it sliced his left ear clean off and gashed his shoulder besides — and, thinking he had botched the stroke, Seikichi lunged in again to strike once more, and Jubei, fleeing, hurled at him whatever came to hand — a box of nails, a mallet, an ink-pot, a square — but, having no proper weapon of his own, could find no way to defend himself, and, twisting aside in his retreat, caught his foot in a toolbox and drove a five-inch nail clean through it, and, stumbling, all but fell — and Seikichi, seizing the chance, pressed his advantage, the raised adze in his upswung hand catching, for an instant, a gleam of the evening sun like a bolt of lightning unseen against the sky — whether it came too soon or too late, in that very instant, from behind, a young tiger's roar of a voice cried out, 'You fool—'

and, without a word of argument, swept both his shins from under him with a two-ken length of round timber, felling him flat; and Seikichi, only the angrier for being thrown down, sprang up again at once, snarling — until the man seized him by the collar: 'It's me, you idiot — don't lose your head, you fool,' he said, wrenching the adze from his grip without the least effort and thrusting his face down close from above — a face with great eyes that seemed to glare in every direction at once, a straight, furious mouth, a flaring nose, both temples a mass of tight, curling waves, a visage fierce enough to shame the Immovable One himself.

'Ah — the boss, the fireball himself! There's a reason for this, let me go, boss!' he cried, struggling and thrashing with all his strength to break free, only to be pinned down by a fist like a coiled turban shell: 'Now, now — keep thrashing and I'll knock the life out of you, you fool.'

'Boss, please — let go, let go of me here.'

'Fool.'

'Ah, you don't understand, boss — I can't let that man go on living, I can't.'

'You blasted fool, blubbering now, are you? Keep still or I'll hit you again.'

'Boss, that's cruel.'

'Fool. Quiet down, or I'll knock the life out of you.'

'You just don't understand at all, boss.'

'Fool. There, take that.'

'Boss—'

'Fool.'

'Let go—'

'Fool.'

'Boss—'

'Fool.'

'Let go—'

'Fool.'

'Boss—'

'Fool.'

'Let—'

'Fool.'

'Oh—'

'Fool, fool, fool, fool — look at you now, that's calmed you down, hasn't it. You, come to my place. Hey, what's wrong with you, hey! Ah, this one's dead to the world — pathetic, weak thing he is. Hey, someone, come here — where were you all when it mattered, hanging around Jubei like ants now, what good's that? Fools, we've got a corpse in the making over here! You dolt, go fetch some water and douse him with it. Who goes and picks up a dropped ear? You idiot. Got the water? Never mind being careful, throw the whole bucket at his face at once — a fellow like this won't die so easily. There, that's got him. Seikichi! Pull yourself together, you spineless — well, well, I'll carry this one back myself. Jubei's shoulder wound's not deep, is it? Mm, good, good. All right, you

fools, I'm off.'

Part Twenty-Six

'Genta about?' said Eiji, walking in, and O-Kichi rose to greet him — 'Oh, Boss, this way, this way' — and, without ceremony, he strode straight in and planted himself cross-legged before the brazier, and, taking the cherry-blossom tea she poured him and draining off about half of it, looked at her face and said, 'You look pale — what's the matter? Has Genta gone off somewhere? No doubt you've heard by now, but Seikichi went and did something foolish, and I came round to talk it over with him about it. Hm, so he's already gone to Jubei's place, has he? Ha ha ha, quick, quick — that's Genta for you, all right, his body already moving before my own thinking caught up — that's a reassuring thing. Now, O-Kichi, there's nothing to worry about — Genta will apologize to Jubei and to the Superior himself, saying his own discipline wasn't strict enough and one of his men made a terrible mistake.'

'A few bows of the head, three or four of them, said just right, and it'll all be settled — no need to fret yourself over it. And if the other side keeps grumbling about it even after that, why, Genta can take the quarrel head-on himself and settle the whole business outright. From what I've heard, even Jubei can hardly hold much of a grudge over losing an ear or half of one — it might even come to be seen as one of Seikichi's rash little jokes, in a way, ha ha ha. But the poor fellow's had quite a taste of my own fist, groaning away in pain, and when I told him — what do you suppose would have become of you, if you'd gone and killed Jubei? — it seems that finally brought him to his senses, and, ah, how sorry he was, saying he'd gone too far, done something terribly wrong, made the master himself have to go bow his head over it, ah, how unforgivable — and the tears rolling down his face over that regret, more than over his own pain, ah, isn't that rather'

a lovable thing about the fellow? Now, O-Kichi, Genta may scold Seikichi harshly, harshly enough even to tell him to go apologize to Jubei himself, I wouldn't know — that's the outward face of duty, and there's no help for that; but here's where you come in and earn your keep — you know, that — well, you understand. Ha ha ha, a woman like you, who sleeps snug beside Genta every night, surely knows what I mean without my spelling it out. Ha ha, well, there's no point talking with Genta not here — I'll be off then, I'll leave the treat for another time, come find me any time you need me,' he said, rambling on in his blunt way before taking his leave — and, thinking it over afterward, she found nothing but cause for shame.

Out of a woman's shallow, thoughtless heart, she had gone and vented her spite on Seikichi — but it was a young man's rash impulse that had led him astray, poor fellow, narrowing his own world by it, and it was, in the end, her own words that had set in motion this state of affairs, in which even her own precious husband was now forced to apologize to that hateful Nossori — a thing brought on by the chance turn of a moment, but a fault, all the same, that had first come out of her own mouth — and, turning it over and over in her mind, quite beside herself, until her elbow, propped against the rim of the brazier, slipped and nearly gave way beneath her, she at last came to a decision, rose with an 'ah, that's it,' and, going to the great drawer of her chest, opened it, and, along with a whiff of musk, drew out and cast aside one by one the treasures of her modest hoard — the obi she had worn, of all things, on the very day she first came to this house, that joyful, bashful, fearful day — ah, that one—

— she had once begged and had bought for her, this sash of Hakata silk-satin, but there was no fondness left in it now; three sashes layered together, each recalling some innocent, dreamlike memory of the past, now nothing more than a striped tussore-silk burden of care; the one she'd sent flying so lightly, a Tobi-Hachijo, her more recent fancy for fine, thousand-lined weaves; a thousand lines, a hundred lines, however much her own heart might be in turmoil, there was only one thread that ran true to her husband — and that one true thread, her Tang brocaded obi, a treasured keepsake left her by an aunt who had once served in a great household, she treasured it dearly, but why should she hesitate now to part with it — and, taking out all manner of things like this, she had her maid wrap them up, and, before her husband could return, deftly gathered her combs and hairpins into a small box besides, and, cruel as it seemed, had them all taken off and pawned at some stranger's storehouse, and, with a little money in her sleeve and a pale indigo hood on her head and a small lantern in hand, unafraid even of the darkness of the night, set off for Eiji's house.

Part Twenty-Seven

Ever since that chance meeting by the edge of the pond, the very bottom of Genta's heart had turned itself clean about; the man he had once thought so lovable had become, now, nothing but a source of galling irritation to him — and how bitter, then, that he should have to bow his head and press both hands to the floor in apology to this very Jubei.

And yet, if he let the matter lie, Seikichi's violence might well be suspected as something done at his own order, and it galled him to think of being saddled, quite innocently, with so unpleasant an accusation; already unsettled enough these days, some malign spirit seemed to have crept in and forced upon him this needless burden of care, all thanks to that foolish blunder of Seikichi's, and his heart grew all the more troubled for it — but there was no way to settle the matter without settling it, and, telling himself it had all come about naturally enough and there was nothing to be done about it, he made his way, however reluctantly, to Jubei's house, to inquire after the sudden misfortune and offer his sympathy, and to apologize for having failed to keep proper discipline over Seikichi; and, looking over the pair of them, he found Jubei sunk in his usual silence, while O-Nami, with a woman's gentle grace, said, 'Fortunately the wound to his shoulder is shallow, nothing serious at all, so please don't trouble yourself over it; it's truly more than we deserve that you should come all this

way to visit us yourself,' speaking with perfect propriety, and yet with a certain formal edge to her words that betrayed, without needing to be asked, what lay beneath: that she suspected, plainly enough, that Genta might have quietly put Seikichi up to it himself.

'Ah, how galling — Jubei must think much the same of me, most likely. Well, the time will come — I'll show this Genta's own way of settling scores yet. What could I possibly have in common with the low, shabby thing Seikichi did? Would I ever stoop to something as worthless as slicing off a man's ear with an adze? My own anger is a splinter's flame — flares up bright and dies out fast; but I won't let it end there, won't stand for being taken for a man with neither restraint nor pride over this. Today's incident is today's incident, my own temper is my own temper — the two have nothing whatever to do with each other. As for what Genta means to do, he'll know it when he knows it, and be made to understand it when the time's right for understanding it,' he thought, harboring his resentment ever deeper within, and yet betraying not a speck of it outwardly, and, having handled the formalities of duty and courtesy without a flaw, he turned his steps at once toward Kanno-ji, asked an audience with the Superior, and offered his apology there for the misconduct of one of his own men; and, returning home, thought to himself, now I must go see Eiji

and thank him for having restrained Seikichi at the time, and hear the full circumstances of it from him, and, on top of that, give Seikichi a thorough scolding and tell him he's not to set foot in my house from now on — and, setting out with this in mind, and finding O-Kichi not at home, he asked where she'd gone, and the maid answered, plainly enough, 'She said she was just stepping out somewhere for a moment,' — not knowing herself that she'd been sworn to secrecy — 'Ah, is that so — very well, tell O-Kichi, when she gets back, that I've gone to visit my brother the fireball,' he said, and, slipping on his sandals, ran straight into an old woman, hobbling toward him, a mottled bamboo cane in one hand and a scorched, singed lantern in the other, her aged gait so wretched-looking it was almost comical, her face pinched into a grimace.

'Ah — isn't that Seikichi's mother?'

'Oh — is that you, Master?'

Part Twenty-Eight

'Ah, what luck to run into you — and where might you be off to, if I may ask?' the old woman asked hurriedly, and Genta, giving her a light bow, said, 'Never mind that — come in, don't stand on ceremony. You've made your way out here on the road at night, so it must be something urgent — let's hear it,' and turned back inside; and, 'Yes, yes, thank you kindly, I'm terribly sorry to trouble you when you were just going out, forgive me, yes, yes,' she said, following behind him through the lattice door — 'You must have been cold, coming all this way — it's a shame O-Kichi's out too, so I can't offer you much, but don't sit there all curled up, come closer to the fire and warm yourself,' Genta said kindly, and, at his kindness, she only drew herself in tighter and smaller still — 'Oh, please don't trouble yourself over me, yes, yes — I've got a hand-warmer tucked in here, this is quite comfortable enough as it is'

— she said, wiping helplessly at the runny nose dripping down her face with the ragged sleeve of her work-jacket, and crouched down some distance off, near the entrance, with the look of someone wanting to say something but hesitating; and Genta, quickly guessing the old woman's heart well enough, felt an unbearable pity for her — even as he had been on his way, just then, to Eiji's, meaning to scold and put a stop to Seikichi's rash meddling and tell him he was barred from the house for the time being — but looking at her now, he saw a frail old woman for whom, aside from her own child, there was likely no one dearer in this world save Amida Buddha himself, and he thought: if I cast Seikichi off now, it will be to her like the snapping of a bowstring on a weak old bow, leaving what little life remained to her with no tension in it, no purpose left to aim for — how much sorrow and lamentation would she bear, living out what little of her life was left in a ceaseless drizzle of helpless tears, with never one more day of clear, untroubled

feeling to know before the end — and the more he imagined it, the more his pity grew, and he sat there simply rolling his tobacco, when the old woman edged a little closer and said: 'Coming at this hour of the night, I'm truly sorry, but there's a small favor I've come to ask — yes, yes — you must know by now, but it seems that fool Seikichi has gone and done something terrible — yes, yes, I heard the gist of it from Master Tetsugoro — he's always been a hasty sort, always brawling and slashing about at the least thing, giving me one fright after another. Thanks to you, he's grown into a man now, but he's still like a child at heart in some ways, so single-minded — he'd never do anything wicked or dishonest, never, but once he gets carried away he loses all sense, a troublesome fellow — yes, yes, there's not a shred of real malice in him, not the least, yes—'

'yes, you must know that already — yes, thank you kindly — I don't know what the quarrel was about, but they say he went and swung around some outrageous hand-adze, and when I heard that, it felt to me as though I'd been struck by the very blade myself. It's a mercy the head of the Me-gumi, or whoever he is, happened to be there to hold him back — that alone is something to be thankful for. If the other man had died, my boy would be a murderer, and I couldn't go on living with him gone, not for one more day — yes, thank you kindly. When he was small he had terrible fits, and gave me no end of trouble over it, more than I can say, and it was only through the grace of the Kishimojin at Nakayama that he finally grew up sound and whole — but I'd promised, if he recovered, to have him set foot on her sacred ground and give proper thanks before he turned seven, and somehow, caught up in this and that, I never did take him there for it'

'and perhaps this is her punishment for that — he grew up strong enough, but reckless as you see, always giving trouble to good people. And today, of all days, when Master Tetsugoro came and told me the gist of it, how frightened I was — and when I heard he'd even gone so far as to arm himself with a blade, ah, not again, I thought, my heart nearly split clean in two with the shock. Knowing that the head of the Me-gumi has taken him in gives me some ease, but when I asked whether Seikichi himself was hurt, Master Tetsugoro gave me such a vague answer, only saying not to worry, nothing serious — and that only made me worry all the more, and when I asked where I might find this boss's house, he just said, I don't know whether you ought to go there or not, better go and ask the master first, and left it at that and went home, and my heart's been aching so ever since that I couldn't sit still another moment'

'so I asked the umbrella-mender next door to mind the house, and finally made my way here. Please, would you tell me where I might find this Me-gumi boss's house — yes, yes, I mean to go straight there. I keep wondering what state he's in, whether he might even be badly hurt himself — if he's all right, I want to see him quickly and set my mind at ease, and hear how the quarrel came about. I'm sure, sure he'd never do anything truly wicked, but he's young, and if it should turn out, by some twist, that he acted out of some misplaced grudge, then this old woman means to go, with all her heart, and beg Master Jubei's forgiveness herself — an old, worn-out thing like me is nothing to lose, whatever becomes of me, but he has his whole life still ahead of him, and I can't let him go on bearing another's resentment,' she said, her

story trailing off into helpless tears.

Not knowing the whole of what had happened, thinking only, single-mindedly, of her own son, the old woman's rambling plea left Genta at a loss for how to answer.

Part Twenty-Nine

'Hachigoro, are you there? Someone's come, go let them in,' he was told, and, muttering to himself, 'Strange — sounds like a woman. Who'd come calling on a woman-hating boss like ours at this hour?' he said, sliding the door open with a clatter — 'Come on in' — 'Hachi, sorry to trouble you,' came a light greeting, and, blowing out her lantern and starting to take off her hood, Hachigoro suddenly recognized her — O-Kichi, who always slipped him a little something at Bon and New Year's — and, flustered, quickly tried to hide the gray, worn loincloth showing through the loose front of the single quilted robe he wore over bare skin, and called back hastily toward the inner room, 'Boss, it's, uh, it's, well — it's sis!' — a true son of Edo, needing no further explanation to understand.

'Ah, is that so — O-Kichi's here, is she, well come in, come in — sit somewhere over there where it doesn't look too dusty, mind the cockroaches crawling about, a house full of nothing but men can't help being filthy, that's just how it is, if I ever get myself as fine a wife as you I'll keep the place spotless too, ha ha ha,' he laughed, and O-Kichi laughed along with him, saying, 'And then he'll go scolding you all the more sternly for being filthy, filthy, I shouldn't wonder' — and, after a bit of idle back-and-forth between them, O-Kichi grew a little more serious and said, 'Is Seikichi asleep? I wanted to see how he's doing — it's been on my mind, so I came,' and Eiji nodded. 'Kiyo's sleeping soundly right now, doesn't look like he'll wake anytime soon, but there's no real wound to speak of, and it's not as though his skull's been cracked open — the bonesetter said a little while ago that he'd been beaten

absolutely senseless while in some wild fit of temper, and fainted clean away from it for a time, but assured me there's nothing seriously wrong. If you'd like, go take a peek at him,' and, leading the way, with O-Kichi following behind, they came to a room of about three mats where Seikichi lay sound asleep, dead to the world, his face and head swollen so badly that it was a pitiful sight, pitiful enough to make her resent Eiji's cruelty in having beaten him so — but there was no arguing with what was already done, and, returning to her seat, she said to Eiji: 'My husband's sure to be furious at Seikichi for this needless meddling of his, and, for the sake of propriety toward the Superior and toward Jubei both, he's bound to scold him severely, or bar him from the house, or something of the sort — but the truth of it is, Seikichi didn't do this out of some grudge of his own; it was, in the end, all for our sake, some misplaced anger that welled up in him on a sudden impulse — and I can't simply stand by and watch my husband do as he sees fit

about it. There's a particular reason, too, why I feel I must do something myself about this, or my own heart won't rest easy — and, turning it over every which way, what came to me was this: to have Seikichi keep away from here for half a year, a year, until the talk has died down and my husband's temper has cooled, by which time there'll be plenty of ways to smooth things over. Until then, I'd like to have him go off somewhere toward the Kansai to pass the time, and I've brought a little travel money for it — not much, but I'd like to leave it in your hands. Please see that it's given to Seikichi, with whatever words of guidance you think fit. My husband is exactly as you know him, a man with no duplicity in him at all, and however he truly feels at heart, he's certain to come down hard on Seikichi at first, and scold him without mercy, without the least softness — and whatever Seikichi might say for himself at such a time, it's plain enough he won't be heard; and if I speak up for him from the side, duty is still duty, and it won't do any good either'

and yet, it's not as though he did this out of any greed or wicked intent, and I simply cannot bear to stand by and pretend not to notice while a man is left with nowhere at all to turn. As for his mother — as long as he himself isn't around, my husband will surely raise no objection to helping her, and I doubt he'd ever be so unreasonable as to refuse; so there's no need to worry on that account. But please, for the time being, keep it secret from my husband that I came here tonight, or that I've been quietly looking after Seikichi behind his back.'

'I understand, well done — there's nothing more to be done here now. Go home, go home — Genta's likely to come by before long, and it would go badly if you were caught here,' he said, words without much warmth in them but sincere all the same, and O-Kichi, glad to have left her request in his hands, went home; and, crossing paths with her almost at the door, Genta arrived soon after, and, sure enough, delivered to Seikichi his verdict: he was barred from the house, and the bond between master and apprentice was severed.

Eiji only laughed and said nothing, and Seikichi wept and begged forgiveness; but that night, after Genta had gone home, Eiji made him weep all over again, growling, 'Even if I have to become a dog, I won't leave the gate of sis and her husband.'

Four or five days later, Seikichi, sent off by Hachigoro, left Edo bound, or so it was said, for the hot springs of Hakone — but of all the roads one might follow down the Tokaido to Kyoto or Osaka, his dreams, surely, would always turn back toward the eastern capital.

Part Thirty

The morning after Jubei came home wounded, he rose early as usual, and O-Nami, startled, tried at once to stop him: 'Why, that's out of the question — please, lie down and rest, rest a while longer. The morning wind's especially cold today, and what if it turned to tetanus? Please, stay lying down — the water will be hot soon, and I'll wash your face and rinse your mouth for you right here,' she said, anxiously tending the fire beneath the cracked earthen stove with its dented, half-broken kettle — but Jubei, entirely unconcerned, only laughed. 'There's no need to treat me like an invalid. Just wring out a cloth for me, and I'll wash my own face — it feels better that way,' he said, drawing water himself into a little basin with its hoops gone loose, and behaved, showing no sign of suffering at all, exactly as he always did, so that O-Nami, half astonished, half worried, watched Nossori carry on quite unconcerned,

finish his morning rice, rise, and, without further ado, strip off his clothes and start pulling on his work trousers and chest-cloth — 'Why, that's out of the question, where do you think you're going? Whatever the work means to you, the wound's barely a day old, the cut won't have closed yet, the pain won't have left you — stay still, don't move about. It's nothing serious, but even the doctor himself said rest was the first rule of all until it's healed — do you mean to force yourself all the way to Kanno-ji regardless? That's too much. Even if you went, you couldn't do any real work there. And who would blame you for staying home? If you feel you simply can't bear not to go, then let me run over myself, see the Superior, and ask him directly for three or four days' rest for you. There's no fear he'd refuse — a man of such deep compassion. I know already what he'd say: take good care of yourself, don't act rashly. Come now, put this'

back on and stay shut up at home, and please, at the very least, stay quiet and still until the wound has fully closed,' she pleaded, coaxing and soothing him with all her heart, and, taking up the clothes he had shed, tried to put them back on him — 'No need to fuss over me so, put on the chest-cloth — no, I don't need this,' he said, batting her hand away with his good right arm.

'Now, don't say that, please just stay home,' she said, trying again to dress him, only to be brushed off again; the man's stubborn pride against the woman's tender feeling, the argument going back and forth without end, until Nossori, for once, grew a little angry: 'What business has a woman with no sense of these things interfering like this — how maddening. Fine, fine, I won't ask for your help, I'll dress myself. Do you think I can stand over the workmen as their head after taking even a single day off for a scratch no worse than a worm-bite? You have no idea, do you — because this Jubei is a man people always call a dullard, a fool, the workmen look down on me; right in front of my face they follow my instructions well enough, but behind my back they slack off and mock me and make an utter joke of me, and however I keep up appearances, there's not one of them who works with any real heart, any real will to do a good job. Ah, how heartless — if only, somehow, I could get them to put real effort into it,

to put real feeling into their work' — but scold them for it, and they bow their heads while sneering behind their noses; correct them, and they apologize with their mouths while their faces burn with resentment; the harder I bend myself down and humble myself, the more they take advantage of it — how galling, how sad, how bitter that is. Every day, being set up before the men as 'master builder, master builder' sounds grand and fine enough, but underneath it all it's nothing but things that make me want to weep — I'd almost rather be worked as a common hole-digger, it would trouble me less. And after all that, having somehow managed to bring things this far, if I take today off, it's a fatal stumble; they'll say, 'my chest hurts, I'm going home early,' 'I've got a headache, that's why I'm late,' and slack off, every one of them, sure as anything, and if I'm the one absent then, there'll be nothing I can say to stop it, and the work will fall into a fitful, dripping rhythm, and even what should have gone well is bound to go wrong. And if, by some misfortune, it does go wrong, how could Jubei ever show his face again to the Superior, to Master Genta?

Listen — if the pagoda isn't finished, then this Jubei might as well be dead even while he's alive; but if the work gets done, even after I'm dead, your husband will go on living. Can I lie in bed over a two- or three-inch adze wound or can't I? Is it tetanus I'm afraid of, or being unable to work that frightens me more? Even if I'd lost a whole arm, I'd go by palanquin if I had to, and not stay home, not until the whole thing's finished — how much less over a scratch like this,' he said, reaching with his left hand to take back the chest-cloth O-Nami had snatched from him, wincing at the effort — and, seeing this, his wife could argue no further, and, giving up the fight, tended his wound instead, and, in the end, helped him into his work-jacket and trousers and saw him off — what was in her heart at that moment could hardly be put into words.

The workmen, who had never imagined Jubei would come at all, drifted in one by one, two by two, from around the hour of the dragon, and were astonished to find him there already; and, the moment they heard from Jubei himself, 'I'm glad to see you working so hard,' every one of them broke into a cold sweat, and from that day on, all of them together threw themselves into their labor with a diligence quite unlike the day before — told to do one thing, they did three; told to do two, they managed four — so that Nossori, lacking the full use of one arm, found himself, in effect, with many more hands than before, and the work went forward day by day, and by the time his shoulder wound had healed, the pagoda itself was very nearly finished.

Part Thirty-One

It was toward the end of the first month; Nossori Jubei's hard labor and toil had not gone for nothing, and the cloud-piercing pagoda of Kanno-ji stood at last, splendidly, magnificently complete, and as the scaffolding was gradually taken down, story after story after story was revealed one by one, until all five stood towering there, majestic, like the Vajra guardian kings glaring down some army of demons, their sixteen-jo forms manifest, planting their feet so firmly as to shake the very axis of the earth, standing rooted upon the rock — 'What a splendid, magnificent thing it's become! What exquisite craftsmanship! A rare thing, unheard of, never to be matched again' — even Tamemon and the very gatekeepers, forgetting how they had once slighted Nossori at the start, joined in the praise, and Endo and every monk of the mountain leapt for joy: 'Now this is the five-storied pagoda of Kanno-ji! How wonderful — the master we look to has no equal in this age; among the great and worthy teachers of the eight or nine schools, tigers and leopards, cranes and egrets all excelling in their own right, he stands utterly unmatched, beyond

comparison — like a lion king among beasts, a peacock king among birds — and just so, this pagoda of our own temple, that we look to, stands unmatched, beyond comparison; Nara and Kyoto aside, in all of Ueno, Asakusa, and the Shiba precincts, in all of Edo, there is nothing to surpass it. And how moving, too, that our master should have plucked up out of the dust a man who might otherwise have ended his days buried there, his light never shining forth, and drawn out into the world the radiance of the jewel hidden in his heart — such was our master's virtue; and how admirable, too, that Jubei, never once bowed down by his hardships, should have repaid the one who knew his worth and, in the end, brought the work to completion — a rare and wondrous chain of causes, a marvel of fate. Was it heaven's doing, or man's, or was it, perhaps, all worked in secret by the guardian gods themselves? There are tales of the Venerable Tanika, skilled in the building of halls, but never, even in the Buddha's own lifetime, has such a delightful thing been heard of, not even in China — come, if there is to be a completion ceremony, let me compose a verse for it, an essay for it; let me write a poem, compose a song, sing its praises, celebrate it, chant it, record it!' — they said, one and

all, talking it over among themselves, and this human feeling of theirs, however much self-interest might mingle in it too, was, in itself, a gentle and admirable thing; but how unfathomable, by contrast, was the heart of heaven. Endo and Tamemon together made the arrangements, and the day for the grand completion ceremony was nearly fixed — a day on which all, high and low, men and women, would be allowed to come and view the pagoda, alms would be given to the poor from whatever funds remained, Jubei and the others would be honored and rewarded, and, besides all this, sacred music would be performed for a dedication ceremony the like of which the world had rarely seen — and just as the various preparations were under way, the sound of the midnight bell came muffled and strange, unlike its usual note, striking the ear with an ugly foreboding; and, indeed, little by little, an eerie wind began to rise, the air growing so unnaturally warm that even sleeping children, without knowing it, kicked free of their bedding, and the rattling of the rain-shutters grew fiercer and fiercer, until, among the pines and cypresses thrashing in the darkness, there rose the ghastly howling of demons of the sky: 'Steal the peace from the hearts of men, steal their peace!' —

'Break open the guts of those who preen themselves on the glories of this fleeting world, throw their sleep into chaos! Make the blood surge and pound in the breasts of fools! Strip the false blush from painted faces! Let those who hold axes swing their axes, let those who hold spears swing their spears — your keen blades are starving, feed your blades! Human blood and fat make good food — glut your blades on it, glut them to the full! Feed your blades human fat, and go on feeding them!' — and no sooner had this fierce command rung out than a savage gust of wind rose up all at once, and the axe-wielding yasha, the spear-wielding yasha, the starving sword-wielding yasha, all together, all at once, broke into a wild, howling rampage.

Part Thirty-Two

Roused from their long night's dreams, old and young, men and women, across the full four-mile compass of Edo, cried out in alarm at the coming of the evil wind, bolting fast the crossbars of their rain-shutters, bracing tight every wedge-pole, house by house, in a great scramble of panic — and the flying demon-kings of the sky, unmoved to pity by any of it, roared on in savage, thunderous voices: 'You need show men no fear — let men fear you instead! Men have made light of us, despised us for long ages, forgotten the offerings owed to us of old — dogs that walk upright in place of crawling, birds that build their nests of pride and luxury, tailless apes, talking serpents, foxes' whelps without a shred of honesty in them, sows who know nothing of their own filth — how long must we bear their scorn, how much longer let them go on preening themselves at our expense? We have borne all that could be borne, let them preen as much as they were ever meant to preen — sixty-four years have already passed. The iron chains of fate that once bound us,

the cave of forbearing mercy that once held us captive — by our own divine power we have torn it apart, brought it crashing down! Rage now, rage as you have never raged before — return to them, all at once, the poison of decades of grudge! Seize the stench of their arrogance and fling it beyond the very rim of the world! Force their heads down to the earth! Try the keen edge of a merciless axe upon their breasts! Turn them into the leavings of a savage spear, a wrathful sword! Give ice to their throats and make them shudder in mortal cold! Give needles to their livers and let them writhe past enduring in secret pain! Slay before their very eyes the many pampered children they themselves have raised, and bury their fondness for playthings in a river of ash and lamentation! They have stolen the homes of silkworms — steal their homes in turn! They have laughed at the wisdom of silkworms — go now and praise their wisdom, praise every last bit of cleverness they think their own!

Praise the ambitions they think so grand! Praise the tender feelings they think so beautiful! Praise the reasoning they think so sound! Praise the strength they think so mighty! All of it is nothing but fodder for our spears, fodder for our swords, fodder for our axes — praise it well, and then feed it to your blades! Mock them for having made such fine fodder of themselves! Torment them as much as torment allows — do not slaughter them quickly, torment them to death! Strip their skin from them alive, layer by layer! Strip their flesh! Kick their hearts about like balls! Whip their backs with thorns of the trifoliate orange! Sighs of grief, tears like rain, the pounding of frightened blood, the cries of anguish — wring out every drop of it from mankind! There is no pleasure but in cruelty — if you cannot be savage, die at once! Rage on, press forward, dwell in lawlessness, run wild in shameless, reasonless excess — rage on, rage on, press forward, press forward! Make war even on the gods, strike down even the Buddhas! Break every principle of reason, shatter it utterly, and the world beneath heaven shall be ours!'

— and with every roared command, earth and stone went flying, and from the hour of the ox through the hour of the tiger, on into the hour of the hare and the hour of the dragon, the fury never once let up, urged on and on without ceasing, until the countless thousands of the yasha-king's own kindred, emboldened, went crossing the waters kicking the waves aside, running over the land kicking up the sand, staining heaven and earth a dull yellow with dust until even the light of the sun was all but blotted out — some swinging their axes, felling with a single savage stroke, and with a mocking sneer, some fine old pine tree tended for years by a devoted connoisseur; some whirling their spears and boring holes clean through wooden roofs; some, with monstrous strength, shaking sturdy houses and swaying bridges to and fro, to and fro, to and fro.

'Too soft, too soft — not cruel enough! Follow me!' cried the yasha-king, gnashing his fangs in fury and leaping about in a fit of impatience, and the countless kindred filling the void, shrieking their sharp war-cries, unleashed their violence without the least restraint, so that even the trees standing before the shrines and temples, even the trees tended in the gardens of the wealthy, wailed and lamented aloud in voices wrung from their very depths, and, before their eyes, every hair upon the earth's own head seemed to stand on end in terror, willows toppling, bamboo splitting apart — and just then, black clouds streamed across the sky, and rain began pattering down in drops larger than acorns, and the yasha, seizing on this as their chance, raged on all the fiercer, tearing down fences, kicking over walls, smashing gates, peeling back roofs, crushing the tiles along the eaves underfoot, scattering some junk-dealer's shack with a single twist, wrenching an upper story clean off with a second, and with a third utterly crushing and collapsing some temple or other, and at every triumphant war-cry that rose with each such feat, they chilled the hearts and

set the breasts pounding of the people below, and, watching the wretched sight of men fretting over this and worrying over that, they delighted in it; watching those left with no home at all to return to, weeping, they delighted in it still more, and, growing bolder and bolder, gave full and unrestrained rein to their violence, until, across all eight hundred and eight districts, a million souls felt as though they had lost every trace of the will to live, their faces drained utterly of color.

None was more alarmed among them than Endo and Tamemon: the five-storied pagoda, only just completed after such labor, was buffeted and buffeted again, its crowning ring trembling, the jeweled finial at its very peak tracing letters in the sky that no one could read, and, at every gust of wind fierce enough to send boulders rolling, at every blast of rain hard enough to pierce a shield, the whole structure bent and swayed, the timbers groaning, righting themselves, bending again, groaning again, looking now as if it might topple over entirely at any moment — 'Ah, look, look, it's in danger, isn't there something to be done? If it topples, it will be a catastrophe — is there truly no way to stop it? With the rain on top of it all, and no trees around it to break the wind, can this pagoda, so narrow at its base and so tall above, possibly withstand a storm as unprecedented as this? Even the main hall shakes this badly — how much worse must it be for the pagoda? Is there no incantation that can calm the wind? Has Genta not come, in all this terrible storm, to see how it fares? Jubei too, who surely cannot fail to come given how new

he still is here, and how weighty his obligation — has he not come either? How negligent of him. If even outsiders are this worried, does he feel nothing at all for the pagoda he himself built? Ah, look, look, it's bending again — someone go and fetch Jubei!' — but with tiles and boards flying through the air and gravel swirling up from the ground, there was no one willing to go, until at last, tempted with a generous reward, old Shichizo, the cleaning man, was sent out.

Part Thirty-Three

His head wrapped in a ragged old hood, a broad bamboo-bark hat pulled down over it against the rain, a hawk-billed rain-cape cinched tight at the waist, a sturdy walking-stick in hand, old Shichizo, trembling with fear, dashed through the raging wind and driving rain, and at last reached Jubei's house — and what a miserable sight met him there: half the roof already torn clean away by the wind, a pitiful thing even to look at, the family of three huddled together in one corner, sheltering as best they could beneath an old straw mat from the spray dripping down from the ceiling — and Shichizo, thinking to himself once more, what a hopelessly slow-witted man Nossori is, called out: 'Now, master builder, this won't do at all, sitting here like this in a storm like this! Tiles flying, trees snapping, it's like a war out there — and what do you suppose has become of that pagoda you built? So tall, nothing around it, such a narrow base — whichever way the wind comes, it takes it'

— square on, and shakes and shakes, bends like a flagpole, with that ghastly creaking groan of straining timber, looking for all the world as though it might collapse or topple at any moment — Master Endo, Master Tamemon, they're both beside themselves with worry, hearts frozen with fear, and for you, of all people, not to come running without even being fetched, when it's a matter of this magnitude — that's overweening courage indeed. Thanks to you I've been sent out on this dangerous errand — look at this lump I've got now, my hat was nearly blown clean off, I'm soaked through, and a scrap of flying wood struck me square on the forehead, curse it — what a fool's errand this has been for me. Come now, come along with me, come along — Master Tamemon and Master Endo have ordered that you be brought. Ah, how it startled me — did a shutter just blow clean away? At this rate, how could any pagoda possibly hold? While we're standing here talking it may already have fallen or snapped, who knows — quick, get yourself ready, hurry, hurry!' he pressed, urging him on.

and, from beside them, his wife, anxious too, said, 'If you must go out, the road will be dangerous — worn as it is, let me bring out that old fire-hood, wear it, there's no telling what might come flying at you; better to think of your own safety than how you look — and, ragged as it is, put this quilted work-jacket on over everything too,' and began rattling open the cupboard doors — but Jubei, watching her with a look of displeasure, said only, 'Ah, don't trouble yourself over me, I'm not going out. There's no cause to make such a fuss just because the wind is blowing. Shichizo, I'm grateful for your trouble, but the pagoda's in no danger of falling, it won't. It's not so flimsy a thing as to collapse or snap from a storm like this, however fierce — there's no need at all for Jubei to go out there himself. Tell that to Master Endo and Master Tamemon both — it's fine, it's perfectly fine,' he answered, sitting perfectly composed, without so much as stirring.

and Shichizo, his face souring a little at this, said, 'Well, whatever the case, come along with me anyway, come and see for yourself — see how that pagoda sways and creaks, back and forth. It's easy enough to talk big sitting here where you can't see it with your own eyes — if you saw it swaying its head back and forth like some temple-festival banner, even a man as easygoing as you, Master Jubei, would find his own soul going faint and wobbly, I daresay, forgive me for saying so. Being brave from a safe distance does no good at all — come now, come along, come along — ah, there it goes again, how frightful, this wind shows no sign at all of letting up. Master Endo and Master Tamemon must be worrying themselves sick over it by now — hurry and put on that hood, or that jacket, whichever you like,'

'and get yourself out here,' he shot back.

'It's perfectly fine, I promise you — go back and set your mind at ease,' Jubei pushed back.

'That's not so easily done, setting my mind at ease,' Shichizo grumbled on, tiresome as ever.

'It's perfectly fine,' Jubei said again, the very same words.

In the end Shichizo grew thoroughly exasperated: 'Whatever the reason, when I say come, you come! Don't think it's just my own idea — this is Master Endo's and Master Tamemon's own order!' he said, his tone turning rough, and Jubei too grew a little heated at this: 'I was never given any order to build the five-storied pagoda by Master Endo or Master Tamemon. And surely the Superior himself would never say, just because the wind is blowing, go call Jubei here — he'd never say anything so heartless to me. If the day ever came when even the Superior said the pagoda was in danger and Jubei must be called, that would be the one great crisis of Jubei's whole life, a crossing between life and death, and I would resign myself to whatever heaven willed and come running at once — but so long as the Superior himself has not spoken so much as half a word doubting Jubei's workmanship, there is nothing at all for me to worry about. Whatever other people may say, Jubei has never once treated wood as though it were mere paper, has never once played some sleight of hand, never once cut a corner in his work —'

'and so, rain or shine, storm or calm night, I sit here perfectly at ease, exactly as I would on the finest day. Tell Master Endo that I'm not afraid of a storm, and I'm not afraid of an earthquake either,' he said, cutting the conversation off without warmth, so that Shichizo had no choice but to dash back out through the storm to Kanno-ji and report all this to Endo and Tamemon — whereupon, 'What a witless fellow, with no wit at all for the moment at hand — why didn't you simply tell him the Superior himself commanded Jubei to come? Look, look at how it sways! Even you seem to have caught Nossori's own negligent way of thinking — there's no help for it, go back once more and deceive him if you must, tell him it's the Superior's own word, and don't let him argue, just bring him,' Endo scolded him fiercely, and Shichizo, grumbling to himself in bitter irritation, went out through the temple gate once more.

Part Thirty-Four

'Now then, Jubei, this time you must come, no argument allowed — it's the Superior's own summons!' old Shichizo bellowed from the doorway, quite worked up, and Jubei, hearing this, rose at once. 'What — the Superior himself is calling for me? Shichizo, is that truly so? Ah, how heartless — however fierce the wind may be, has even the Superior, the one man I trusted above all, come to think that this pagoda, which Jubei built with his whole heart and soul poured into it, might so easily be destroyed? How bitter that is. Has even he — the one person in all the world I thought looked on me with truly compassionate eyes, the one I thought of as god and Buddha both — never truly believed, in his heart of hearts, in the sureness of my own hand? What a hopeless, faithless world this is after all — there's no more reason left for Jubei to go on living. That I, of all men, should once have been known to so peerless and revered a teacher of our age — I thought it the great honor of my whole life, and rejoiced in it, foolishly, emptily —

and that, too, was nothing more than a fleeting, empty dream, it seems, if a mere gust of stormy wind is enough to make him doubt whether that pagoda, into which I poured every ounce of my devotion, might come tumbling down. Ah, how it enrages me, how it makes me want to weep — am I really so spineless a fool, then? Do I look like a man with no sense of shame at all, the sort who could let his own work be disgraced and go on living, brazenly wiping his own face clean as if nothing had happened? If that pagoda fell, tell me — could I go on living, would I even want to? Ah, how bitter, how maddening — O-Nami, am I really so contemptible as all that? Ah, ah — I have no more use for my own life now, I'm sick to death of my own body. Jubei, abandoned now by this whole world, has nothing left to gain from living but the shame and torment of it. Ah, let the pagoda fall then, let the storm rage harder still — let it suffer even the smallest damage, if that's how it must be. The wind that blows through the sky, the rain that beats the earth — they show me

no less mercy than men do, so if the pagoda is smashed, if it's brought down, I'll only rejoice at it, never resent it. Even if a single board is torn loose, a single nail pulled free, I have no attachment left to cling to in so bitter and joyless a world — let me die a clean, honorable death and be done with it, rather than let it be said afterward, in mourning me, that this fool called Jubei, disgraced by his own negligence and carelessness, clung to life out of nothing but a coward's fear of dying — that I was ever a man with such a heart in me. Once a man means to throw his life away, there is a right place and a right moment to do it, and this is both. It's an offense against the sanctity of a Buddhist temple, I know, but if the very thing I built with my own hands has fallen, how could I take even one step away from that spot alive? Forgive me, all you Buddhas and Bodhisattvas — I will leap this instant from the very top of the cloud-piercing pagoda and cast my body down. This five-foot sack of skin I throw away will burst and look hideous enough, no doubt, but there is nothing foul stored up inside it — pity, if you will, a

man's pure, single-minded devotion, the clean, unstained blood he means to spill — look on him, if you will, with pity and compassion' — whether he truly thought this, or did not, even Jubei himself scarcely knew, walking as if half-asleep down some dreamlike road, and, having lost even Shichizo somewhere along the way without knowing it, found himself here — ah, yes, there — there stood the pagoda.

Climbing all the way to the fifth story, he pushed open the door and, just then, thrust the upper half of his body out into the open, where the driving rain, hard as flung stones, struck his face too fiercely even to let him open his eyes, and the raging wind blew so hard it seemed it would tear off even his one remaining ear, leaving him no breath to draw — and, involuntarily, he drew back a single step, but, undaunted, roused himself and stepped boldly out again, gripping the balustrade and glaring fiercely about him; the sky was blacker than the darkness of a night in the Fifth Month, filled with nothing but the roaring, tumultuous howl of the wind, and, sturdy as the pagoda was, standing so high in the empty air, it swayed and shuddered with every furious gust, looking for all the world like some small, unstable boat tossed on wild waves, on the very point of capsizing — and, resolved as he had been, he felt, even now, a fresh wave of dread wash over him at the thought that this was the one great crisis of his whole life, the very crossroads of life and death, and, every one of his eighty-four thousand hairs standing on end, he clenched his jaw and stared wide-eyed into the storm, gripping, ready for whatever might come, the handle of a six-bu chisel he had brought with him

so tightly that he seemed to forget it was even in his hand — and whether he waited there in silence for heaven's decree or not, no one could say, but round and round the pagoda, heedless of wind and rain, there paced one strange, solitary man.

Part Thirty-Five

'That storm the other day was the worst upheaval any of us have seen in our whole lives,' people said, talking it over among themselves with real, heartfelt feeling — even old men of the sort who, whatever happens, always drag out some precedent from twenty or thirty years before, making the old days sound grander and dismissing anything new without a second thought. And all the more so among the light-hearted, frivolous young people who treat even natural disasters as nothing more than amusing gossip, thinking nothing of it, glad only that the aftermath brought them no pain of their own: 'Such-and-such a fire-watch tower collapsed, so-and-so's upper story got blown clean away,' making a snack of other people's misfortunes, saying, 'Serves him right, greedy fool, backing that play with his money, no wonder he came to grief,' or, 'What a laugh, the way that shack of his caved in,' or, of the upstairs room belonging to that flower-arranging teacher down the side street everyone found so irritating, 'Well, it was worth about as much as a bit of theater music anyway, good riddance' — and, more than any of that, they made much of how one of the two or three great temples said to be the finest in all Edo had come crashing down so wretchedly, with

all sorts of hints and rumors attached to it — that in truth the monk in charge had been skimming a good deal of the donations gathered from the parish, that the contractor had played some sleight of hand of his own, that there was more to it than met the eye — and, remarking that even that great stout pillar of the main hall was probably no more than a hollow tub after all, they went on and on with talk of this and that sort; but every one of them, without exception, was left utterly astonished, tongues clicking in admiration, that at Kanno-ji's cloud-piercing pagoda, not a single nail had come loose, not a single board had peeled away. 'Say, isn't that Jubei fellow who built it something else, really? They say he was resolved not to live if that pagoda came down — came within a hair's breadth of leaping headfirst, chisel clenched in his teeth, from sixteen ken up — and instead he planted his feet right there on the railing and glared straight into the wind and rain, standing perfectly firm through all that terrible thrashing about, so they say. No wonder the thing didn't come down, with a resolve like that behind it — even the god of the wind must have shown some restraint, being glared at with such bloodshot eyes. A master craftsman the likes of which hasn't been seen since Jingoro's day, a true master builder,

that's what he is — the pagodas at Asakusa and at Shiba each took some damage of their own, but this one didn't shift or warp by so much as a hair's breadth — what fine work that must have been.'

'Ah, now there's a story to that too — they say that Jubei fellow's own master was something else again, an outrageously fine man in his own right. He'd told him: if this pagoda comes down even a little, it'll be a disgrace to every man in your trade, a black mark on everyone who knows you — could you go on living after that? — and scolded him so fiercely that Jubei could never again bring himself to pick up a hammer or an adze, as though he'd been made to commit seppuku over it, in a manner of speaking — and, they say, all through the storm, that master of his went round and round the pagoda in the pouring rain himself.'

'No, no, that's a mistake — it wasn't his master at all, it was a rival in the trade, so I hear' — and so the story passed from mouth to mouth, each teller certain he knew the truth of it.

On the day the completion ceremony, thrown into disarray by the storm, was finally held after all, the Superior went out of his way to summon Genta, and climbed the pagoda together with him and Jubei both; and, having in mind some purpose of his own, he had a young acolyte bring him a brush well soaked in ink, and said, 'I shall inscribe this pagoda myself, in honor of you both — Jubei, watch, and Genta, watch too,' and, in bold strokes, wrote: built by Jubei, a resident of the eastern capital; brought to completion by Genta of Kawagoe — and the date, year, month, and day; and, his whole face brimming with a smile, he turned to look back at them both, and the two men, unable to say a single word, could only prostrate themselves upon the ground in grateful worship — and from that day the jeweled pagoda has soared, unchanging, into the heavens forever after: seen from the west, its flying eaves, at times, seem to breathe forth the plain, pale moon; seen from the east, its balustrade, at evening, seems to swallow the red, sinking sun — and even now, more than a hundred years later, the tale lives on.