Light and dark

[105]

O-NOBU WAS able to read her husband’s mood distinctly. In her heart she feared yet another upheaval. And she had her doubts about her husband’s real intention. His normal behavior as she observed it was testimony in all things to self-control. Beyond self-control, there was also an accompanying coldness when he was looking down on someone deep inside himself. She believed there was also something more lurking inside this special quality of his, beyond her ability to manage. This was still an unknown quantity, but she was convinced that if only she could bring it to light she would be able to handle him to her satisfaction easily enough. Characterizing him as he revealed himself on the surface was a matter of no great difficulty. He was a person not easily angered. But why would someone who didn’t, in the English phrase, lose his temper begin to crack open this way in front of his own sister? Properly speaking, why had he already cracked so unequivocally before O-Nobu had entered the room? In any event, she would have to interpose herself between them before they summoned back the wave that had begun to recede. She attempted to make herself a party to the argument.

“Did you receive a letter from Father as well?”

“From Mother.”

“I see — about this same matter?”

“Correct.”

O-Hide said nothing more. O-Nobu pressed ahead.

“I suppose they have their own expenses in Kyoto. And it’s not as though this wasn’t our fault to begin with.”

The jewel on O-Nobu’s finger had never appeared so dazzling to O-Hide as at this moment. She spoke.

“I doubt it’s about that. Old people are set in their ways; they believe in Brother. They assume he’ll figure out a way to manage a minor problem like this.”

O-Nobu smiled.

“Of course we’ll manage somehow if it comes to that. Won’t we, Yoshio!”

O-Nobu looked at Tsuda with eyes that appealed, Say right away that we’ll be fine. Tsuda saw that he was being signaled, but he couldn’t comprehend the message in O-Nobu’s eyes. He said again what he repeated constantly.

“It’s nothing we can’t manage, but I can’t help thinking that what Father says is weird. He rebuilt a fence, the rent is late — those expenses add up to nothing.”

“I don’t think we can assume that, Yoshio-san! Until we have a house of our own.”

“We damn well have a house!”

O-Nobu smiled in her singular way, this time at O-Hide.

O-Hide responded, returning unstintingly the same degree of charm.

“Brother suspects there’s a plot behind this.”

“That’s mean of you, Yoshio, to be suspicious of Father. Father has no reason to be plotting anything. Don’t you agree, O-Hide?”

“It’s not Father and Mother; he thinks there’s a plot elsewhere.”

“Elsewhere?”

O-Nobu looked surprised.

“Yes — he’s definitely thinking it’s someone else.”

O-Nobu turned back to her husband.

“Yoshio, what does that mean?”

“O-Hide said it, ask her.”

O-Nobu smiled uncomfortably. O-Hide’s turn to speak had come round again.

“Brother thinks that I secretly provoked Kyoto.”

“But why?”

O-Nobu was unable to say more. And what she had said was meaningless. O-Hide promptly stepped into the emptiness.

“That’s why he’s been in such a foul mood. Not that we don’t fight whenever we get near each other. Especially since this affair.”

“How awful,” O-Nobu exclaimed with a sigh and turned to Tsuda yet again.

“But can that be true? I can’t imagine you thinking something so unmanly.”

“I wouldn’t know, but it seems that’s how it appears to my little sister.”

“But why would Hideko-san do something like that?”

“To punish me, maybe. I don’t really know.”

“For what? What have you done that deserves punishment?”

“I couldn’t say.”

Tsuda was clearly annoyed. O-Nobu looked at O-Hide as if she had no one else to turn to. The expression that furrowed her brow above her small eyes might have been an appeal for help.