Rashomon and Other Stories (Tuttle Classics) Read online

“It’s still farther off, isn’t it, sir?” Goi asked, looking up into Toshihito’s face and hunching his round shoulders all the more.

  Toshihito smiled. It was the sort of smile that a child who has done mischief gives his parent when he has nearly been found out. It seemed as if the wrinkles at the tip of his nose and the slack muscles at the corners of his eyes were deciding whether or not to burst into laughter.

  “As a matter of fact, I plan to take you as far as Tsuruga,” Toshihito said cheerfully at last, and, raising his whip, he pointed to the distant sky. Under his whip the limpid waters of lake Biwa shone in the light of the afternoon sun.

  “Oh, Tsuruga?” Goi asked in consternation. “The Tsuruga in the Province of Echizen?”

  He had often heard that Toshihito had lived in Tsuruga for the most part, since he married the heiress to Fujiwara Arihito, but till that moment he had not had the least idea that Toshihito was going to take him so far. First of all he wondered how, with only two servants, he could ever get safely to distant Echizen across the many mountains and rivers. And then he thought of the frequent rumors that travelers had been killed by robbers. He raised an imploring face to Toshihito.

  “Lord bless me!” Goi blubbered out. “First I thought our destination was Higashiyama, but it turned out to be the Mie Temple. Finally you tell me you’re going to take me to Tsuruga in Echizen. Whatever do you mean? If you’d told me so at first, I’d have brought my servant with me at least. . . . Tsuruga, Lord bless me!”

  If his craving for yam gruel had not encouraged him, he would probably have left Toshihito and returned to Kyōto alone.

  “Consider one Toshihito a thousand men strong. You needn’t worry about our trip.” Toshihito scoffed, frowning slightly as he saw Goi’s consternation. Calling his valet, he slung on the quiver which the valet had carried on his back and, fastening on his saddle the black lacquered bow which the valet had carried in his hand, he rode on at the head of the party. Now there was no course left for the dispirited Goi but blind obedience to Toshihito’s will. So, helplessly looking at the desolate wilderness all around, he made his weary way. The footsteps of his horse were unsteady; and his own red nose was bent toward the saddle-bow as he chanted the sutra of the Merciful Goddess, which he remembered faintly.

  The bleak wild fields echoing the rattle of their horses’ hoofs were covered with a vast expanse of yellow pampas grass, and the cold puddles lying here and there seemed as if they would freeze that winter afternoon, with the blue sky mirrored in them. Far on the horizon, a range of mountains, out of the sun, lacked even the glitter of the lingering snow, and painted the horizon with a long streak of dark violet. But in places, dreary clumps of dead pampas grass cut them off from the view of the servants trudging along.

  “Look!” Toshihito called out to Goi suddenly, turning. “There comes a good messenger. I’ll have him send word to Tsuruga.”

  Unable to understand what had been said, Goi timidly looked in the direction to which Toshihito had pointed with his bow. Of course there was not another soul in the whole extent of the plain. But in a clump of bushes entangled by a wild vine, a fox could be seen walking slowly, his fur exposed to the declining sunlight. Instantly the fox sprang up hastily and began to run away at full speed. For suddenly Toshihito had whipped up his horse and galloped toward him. Goi also ran for his life, as if in delirium, after Toshihito. Nor could the servants afford to lag behind them. For some time the clatter of their horses’ hoofs striking against stones broke the silence of the wilderness. But it was not long until Toshihito stopped his horse, and dangled the fox, which he had caught before the others knew it, head downwards by the side of the saddle. He must have run him down under his horse and caught him alive. Wiping off the drops of perspiration which were clinging to his side-locks, Goi rode pantingly up to Toshihito.

  “Now listen, fox!” Toshihito said in a purposely dignified voice, holding the fox high up before his eyes. “Run to Toshihito’s mansion in Tsuruga tonight, and tell them ‘ Toshihito is coming down just now, along with a special guest. Send some men to meet him as far as Takashima about ten o’clock tomorrow morning, and bring two saddled horses. ’ Be sure, will you?”

  When he finished talking, Toshihito gave the fox a swing and threw him away toward a clump of grass.

  “Oh, how he runs! How he runs!” The two servants, who had barely caught up to Toshihito, cheered and clapped their hands as the fox scampered away. The autumn-leaf colored animal was seen running full tilt to the end of the world across stones and over the roots of trees in the evening light. They could see him clearly from the little height where they were standing. For while they had been running after the fox, they had come to the top of an easy slop of the wild fields which merged into the dry river bed.

  “He’s a messenger of the gods, isn’t he, sir?” Giving vent to his naive wonder and admiration, Goi looked up, all the more respectfully, into the face of the fierce knight who commanded the willing service of even a fox. He did not think of what a gulf lay between him and Toshihito. He merely felt with greater assurance that, since he had now fallen more and more under the sway of Toshihito, his own will had become all the freer in the broad embrace of this hero’s will. Probably flattery has its natural birth on such an occasion. Therefore, even if the reader should hereafter find the red-nosed Goi something of a sycophant, he should not indiscriminately doubt his character.

  The fox, which had been thrown away, rushed down the sloping field as if rolling along, jumped nimbly over the stones in the dry river bed, and ran obliquely up the opposite slope with vigor and agility. Dashing up the incline, the fox looked back and saw the party of samurai that had caught him still abreast on horseback on the far-off top of the easy slope. They all looked as small as fingers standing together. Especially the sorrel and the roan, bathed in the splendor of the setting sun, were in sharp relief against the frosty air.

  Turning his head forward, the fox started running again like the wind through the dead pampas grass.

  The party arrived at the outskirts of Takashima abut ten o’clock the next day, as had been expected. It was a little hamlet facing Lake Biwa, with only a few straw-thatched houses scattered haphazardly in the fields. Threatening clouds filled the sky, unlike the summery sky of yesterday. The rippling surface of the lake mirrored the dappled picture of pine trees growing on its bank. Presently the travelers stopped. Toshihito turned to Goi and said, “Look! Over there some men are coming to meet us.”

  Of the twenty or thirty men who were bringing two saddled horses, some were on horseback and others were on foot. Their silk robes fluttering in the cold wind, they all came rapidly toward them along the bank of the lake and through the pine-trees. As soon as they neared Toshihito, the mounted men hurriedly jumped down out of their saddles, while those on foot knelt down on the ground, and they all waited respectfully for Toshihito.

  “Indeed, the fox seems to have done a messenger’s service,” said Goi.

  “Yes,” Toshihito replied, “the fox is an animal that has a natural ability to disguise itself. So it’s quite easy for it to perform such a service.”

  While Goi and Toshihito were talking in this vein, they and their party came to where Toshihito’s vassals were waiting.

  “Thank you for coming,” Toshihito called out to them. The vassals, who had all been kneeling on the ground, stood up at once and bridled the horses of Toshihito and Goi.

  The two had scarcely got off and sat down on fur cushions when a gray-haired vassal in a brown silk robe came before Toshihito and said, “Last evening a mysterious thing took place.”

  “Well, what was it?” Toshihito asked in a lordly manner, offering Goi the food and drink which his vassals had brought.

  “Please, my lord. Last evening about eight o’clock Her Ladyship fell unconscious and said, ‘ I am the fox of Sakamoto. I will give you a message my lord has sent today. So step up to me and listen.’ All of us got together before her. Then she said, ‘ My husband is coming just now with a special guest. Around ten o’clock tomorrow morning send men as far as the outskirts of Takashima and take two saddled horses. ’ That was the message she gave us.”

  “That’s very mysterious,” Goi chimed in importantly, with a remark, pleasing to everyone.

  “Her Ladyship told us in no ordinary way,” the vassal want on. “Trembling with terror, she said, ‘ Don’t be late. If you are late, I will be punished by my husband .’ While talking, she wept incessantly.”

  “What did she do after that?”

  “After that she fell asleep. When we left, she seemed to be still asleep.”

  “What do you say?” Toshihito asked, turning his proud look to Goi when his vassal had finished talking. “Even animals serve Toshihito.”

  Bobbing his head and scratching his big red nose, Goi answered theatrically, “I’m filled with admiration beyond words.” He then rolled his tongue over his upper lip to lap up the drops of the rice wine left on his mustache.

  It was the same evening. Goi was passing a long sleepless night in a room in Toshihito’s mansion, his eyes casually fixed on a rush light.

  Then the picture of the pine-grown hills, the brooks, withered fields, grass, leaves, stones, and the smell of the smoke of field fires—all these things, one after another, passed through his mind. The pleasant relief he had felt on seeing the red glow of the charcoal in the long brazier when they had arrival earlier that evening—it, too, could only be considered an event of the distant past.

  Stretching his legs out under the luxurious yellow ceremonial robe, which Toshihito had lent him, Goi tried to patch together the events of the evening. His liquor-filled brain made it almost impossible. Beneath the ceremonial robe, he was wearing two thickly wadded garments of a russet color, w
hich Toshihito had also lent him. Under this comfortable warmth Goi realized that now he lay in the lap of wealth. The night was bitter cold, he imagined. The meager events of his life compared to the ones he had experienced tonight seemed like those of a coolie compared to a prince. But for all that, there was a curious uneasiness in his mind. Above all, he was impatient for time to pass. Yet, on the other hand, somehow he felt that dawn, that is, the eating of yam gruel, must not come too soon. Nervousness from this sudden change in circumstance lurked at the back of his mind, chilling his heart and keeping him awake.

  By and by he heard someone shouting in the large yard outside. To judge from the voice, it was the gray-haired vassal who had come part of the way to meet Toshihito. It sounded as if he were making some kind of special announcement.

  “Listen, all you servants. His Lordship wants each of you, young and old, to bring a yam three inches wide and five feet long, by six o’clock in the morning. Remember, by six o’clock.” The old man’s dry voice resounded through the frosty air, and his very words seemed to penetrate to the marrow of Goi’s bones. Unconsciously, he drew his ceremonial robe tight around him.

  The command was repeated. Then human noises ended, and all was again hushed into the dead silence of the winter night. The servants had gone to obey the order—probably in fear of their lives, Goi imagined. Alone with his thoughts once more, he tossed and turned. Finally he lay still. An oppressive silence filled the room, broken only by the sizzling oil in the rush lamp. The red light of the wick was wavering.

  So after all he was to have yam gruel. When he thought of this, the old uneasiness which had left him because of the distraction of what was happening outside, came back again. His perverse reluctance to being treated to yam gruel too soon grew stronger than ever, and it continued to dominate his thoughts. Such an early realization of his heart’s desire seemed to turn years of patient waiting into a vain endeavor. If possible, he wished that something unexpected would happen to keep him from eating yam gruel for a while. Such ideas spun round and round in his mind like a top. At last, overcome by fatigue from his long journey, he fell fast asleep.

  The next morning when he wakened, the thought of yam gruel was on his mind. He must have over-slept. It was past six o’clock. He jumped out of bed, crossed the floor, and opened the window. Outside he saw stacked roof high what at first glance appeared to be huge piles of corded logs. Rubbing his sleepy eyes, he looked a second time, and with a sharp gasp he realized what they were. Yams! Yams! Yams! Tremendously large yams three inches wide and five feet long, enough to feed the whole town of Tsuruga. Set out in the broad yard, five or six caldrons were placed side by side on new spikes driven into the ground, and dozens of young maids in white-lined garments worked as busily as bees around them. Some of the servant girls were lighting fires, some were raking ashes, and others were pouring sweet-arrow root juice into the caldrons from wooden pails. Volumes of smoke rose from under the caldrons, and bursts of white vapor shot up from them to mix with the still lingering haze of dawn and form a gray pall which hung all over the large yard, obscuring everything but the red flames of the blazing fires. The wide yard was in such a state of confused excitement as is witnessed only on a battlefield or at the scene of a fire. These huge caldrons boiling yams into gruel filled Goi with blank amazement and dismay. They made him remember only too clearly that he had made the long journey to Tsuruga all the way from Kyoto for the express purpose of eating yam gruel. The more he thought, the more miserable he felt about everything. By this time he had already lost half of the appetite which had hitherto commanded our sympathy for him.

  An hour later he sat at breakfast with Toshihito and his father-in-law, Arihito. In front of him was a huge vat filled to the brim with a tremendous sea of yam gruel. Earlier he had seen dozens of spirited young men deftly wield kitchen knives to slice up that pile of yams which reached high up to the eaves of the house. He had seen the maids run here and there past one another, scooping all the yam slices into the caldrons. When all the yams piled up on the large mats were gone, he had seen clouds of steam, reeking with the smell of yams and arrow-root, rise from the caldrons into the clear morning air. Naturally enough, when Goi, who had watched these things, was served yam gruel in a huge pitcher, he felt satiated even before tasting the delicacy. Sitting in front of the pitcher, he wiped his perspiring brow in embarrassment.

  “I hear you haven’t had your fill of yam gruel,” said Toshihito’s father-in-law, “please help yourself without reserve.” And he ordered the servant boys to bring several more large pitchers of yam gruel. Goi put about half of the yam gruel from the pitcher into a big earthen vessel, and closing his eyes, he reluctantly drank it off, his red nose becoming all the redder.

  “As my father said, you needn’t be hesitant,” grinning maliciously, Toshihito also pressed Goi to have another pitcherful of yam gruel. Goi was in a terrible plight. Frankly, he had not wanted to eat even one bowlful of yam gruel even at the beginning. With great endurance he managed to do justice to half a pitcherful of it. If he took any more, he thought he would throw it up before swallowing it. But to refuse to eat any more would be to spurn the kindness of Toshihito and Arihito. So closing his eyes again, he drained off a third of the remaining half. He could not take another mouthful.

  “I’m more than obliged to you,” Goi mumbled incoherent thanks. He was in such pitiful embarrassment that drops of perspiration formed on his mustache and the tip of his nose, as if it were midsummer instead of winter.

  “How sparingly you eat!” said Arihito. “Our guest seems to be reserved. Boys, don’t be idle.” At his words, the servants tried to pour more yam gruel from the new pitchers into the earthen vessel. Waving both his hands, as if to drive off flies, Goi expressed his earnest desire to be excused.

  If at this time Toshihito had not unexpectedly said, “Look over there,” pointing to the eaves of the house opposite, Arihito would still have continued to press the yam gruel on Goi. But fortunately Toshihito’s voice drew everyone’s attention toward the eaves. The morning sun was shedding its light on the cypress shingle roof. An animal sat quietly on the eaves, its sleek fur bathed in the bright sunshine. It was the fox of Sakamoto which Toshihito had caught with his hands in the withered fields two days before.

  “The fox has also come from a desire for yam gruel. Men, give him his feed.” Toshihito’s orders were promptly executed. The fox jumped down from the eaves and immediately began to feast on yam gruel.

  Watching the fox eat its meal, Goi looked back with fond longing on his past life before the time he had come to Tsuruga. What he remembered was that he had been made a fool of by many warriors, and reviled even by Kyōto boys with “What? You Red Nose!” and that he was a pitiful, lonely being, with faded silk robe and nondescript sword, who wandered about Sujaku Avenue like a homeless mongrel. But at the same time he had been happy, treasuring up his desire to gorge himself on yam gruel. With the reassurance that he need not eat any more of it, he felt the perspiration all over his face dry up gradually, beginning at the tip of his nose. The early morning in Tsuruga was fine but cold, and a biting wind was blowing. Hastily grasping his nose, Goi emitted a loud sneeze toward the silver pitcher.

  THE MARTYR

  Even if one liveth to be three hundred years of age in excess of pleasure, it is but as a dream compared with everlasting pleasure. — Guide do Pecador.

  He who walketh the path of goodness shall enjoy the mysterious sweetness which pervadeth the doctrine. — Imitatione Christi.

  One Christmas night some years ago a young Japanese boy was found exhausted and starving at the entrance to the Church of Santa Lucia in Nagasaki. He was taken in and cared for by the Jesuit brothers who were coming into the church. He was given the name Lorenzo, and was thereafter brought up in the church under the wing of the Jesuit missionaries.

  When the brothers asked him about his birth and parents, he never revealed his history, but gave such evasive answers as, “My home is paradise,” and “My father is the Father of all.” His disarming smile dispelled further questioning as to his past.

  It was, however, evident from the blue rosary on his wrist that his family had not been heathens. Perhaps that was the reason why the kindly fathers and brothers took Lorenzo to their heart.