Authors: Natsume Soseki
“That sounds interesting. What sort of story was it?” Waverhouse becomes enthusiastic, though he appears less sympathetic to her predicament than prompted by sheer curiosity.
“It seems there was in ancient Rome a king named Tarukin.”
“Tarukin? That sounds odd in Japanese.”
“I can never remember the names of foreigners. It’s all too difficult. Maybe he was a barrel of gold. He was, at any rate, the seventh king of Rome.”
“Really? The seventh barrel of gold certainly sounds queer. But, tell me, what then happened to this seventh Tarukin.”
“You mustn’t tease me like that. You quite embarrass me. If you know this king’s true name, you should teach me it. Your attitude,” she snaps at him, “is really most unkind.”
“I tease you? I wouldn’t dream of doing such an unkind thing. It was simply that the seventh barrel of gold sounded so wonderful. Let’s see.
. . a Roman, the seventh king. . . I can’t be absolutely certain but I rather think it must have been Tarquinius Superbus,Tarquin the Proud. Well, it doesn’t really matter who it was. What did this monarch do?”
“I understand that some woman, Sibyl by name, went to this king with nine books and invited him to buy them.”
“I see.”
“When the king asked her how much she wanted, she stated a very high price, so high that the king asked for a modest reduction. Whereupon the woman threw three of the nine books into the fire where they were quickly burnt to ashes.”
“What a pity!”
“The books were said to contain prophecies, predictions, things like that of which there was no other record anywhere.”
“Really?”
“The king, believing that six books were bound to be cheaper than nine, asked the price of the remaining volumes. The price proved to be exactly the same; not one penny less. When the king complained of this outrageous development, the women threw another three books into the fire. The king apparently still hankered for the books and he accordingly asked the price of the last three left. The woman again demanded the same price as she had asked for the original nine. Nine books had shrunk to six, and then to three, but the price remained unaltered even by a farthing.
Suspecting that any attempt to bargain would merely lead the woman to pitch the last three volumes into the flames, the king bought them at the original staggering price. My husband appeared confident that, having heard this story, I would begin to appreciate the value of books, but I don’t at all see what it is that I’m supposed to have learnt to appreciate.”
Having thus stated her own position, she as good as challenges Waverhouse to contravert her. Even the resourceful Waverhouse seems to be at a loss. He draws a handkerchief from the sleeve of his kimono and tempts me to play with it. Then, in a loud voice as if an idea had suddenly struck him, he remarked, “But you know, Mrs. Sneaze, it is precisely because your husband buys so many books and fills his head with wild notions that he is occasionally mentioned as a scholar, or something of that sort. Only the other day a comment on your husband appeared in a literary magazine.”
“Really?” She turns around. After all, it’s only natural that his wife should feel anxiety about comments on my master.
“What did it say?”
“Oh, only a few lines. It said that Mr. Sneaze’s prose was like a cloud that passes in the sky, like water flowing in a stream.”
“Is that,” she asks smiling, “all that it said?”
“Well, it also said ‘it vanishes as soon as it appears and, when it vanishes, it is forever forgetful to return.’”
The lady of the house looks puzzled and asks anxiously “Was that praise?”
“Well, yes, praise of a sort,” says Waverhouse coolly as he jiggles his handkerchief in front of me.
“Since books are essential to his work, I suppose one shouldn’t complain, but his eccentricity is so pronounced that. . .”
Waverhouse assumes that she’s adopting a new line of attack. “True,” he interrupts, “he is a little eccentric, but any man who pursues learning tends to get like that.” His answer, excellently noncommittal, contrives to combine ingratiation and special pleading.
“The other day, when he had to go somewhere soon after he got home from school, he found it too troublesome to change his clothes.
So do you know, he sat down on his low desk without even taking off his overcoat and ate his dinner just as he was. He had his tray put on the footwarmer while I sat on the floor holding the rice container. It was really very funny. . .”
“It sounds like the old-time custom when generals sat down to identify the severed heads of enemies killed in battle. But that would be quite typical of Mr. Sneaze. At any rate he’s never boringly conventional.”
Waverhouse offers a somewhat strained compliment.
“A woman cannot say what’s conventional or unconventional, but I do think his conduct is often unduly odd.”
“Still, that’s better than being conventional.” As Waverhouse moves firmly to the support of my master, her dissatisfaction deepens.
“People are always saying this or that is conventional, but would you please tell what makes a thing conventional?” Adopting a defiant attitude, she demands a definition of conventionality.
“Conventional? When one says something is conventional. . . It’s a bit difficult to explain. . .”
“If it’s so vague a thing, surely there’s nothing wrong with being conventional.” She begins to corner Waverhouse with typically feminine logic.
“No, it isn’t vague, it’s perfectly clear-cut. But it’s hard to explain.”
“I expect you call everything you don’t like conventional.” Though totally uncalculated, her words land smack on target. Waverhouse is now indeed cornered and can no longer dodge defining the conventional.
“I’ll give you an example. A conventional man is one who would yearn after a girl of sixteen or eighteen but, sunk in silence, never do anything about it; a man who, whenever the weather’s fine, would do no more than stroll along the banks of the Sumida taking, of course, a flask of
saké
with him.”
“Are there really such people?” Since she cannot make heads or tails of the twaddle vouchsafed by Waverhouse, she begins to abandon her position, which she finally surrenders by saying, “It’s all so complicated that it’s really quite beyond me.”
“You think that complicated? Imagine fitting the head of Major Pendennis onto Bakin’s torso, wrapping it up and leaving it all for one or two years exposed to European air.”
“Would that produce a conventional man?” Waverhouse offers no reply but merely laughs.
“In fact it could be produced without going to quite so much trouble.
If you added a shop assistant from a leading store to any middle school student and divided that sum by two, then indeed you’d have a fine example of a conventional man.”
“Do you really think so?” She looks puzzled but certainly unconvinced.
“Are you still here?” My master sits himself down on the floor beside Waverhouse. We had not noticed his return.
“ ‘Still here’ is a bit hard. You said you wouldn’t be long and you yourself invited me to wait for you.”
“You see, he’s always like that,” remarks the lady of the house leaning toward Waverhouse.
“While you were away I heard all sorts of tales about you.”
“The trouble with women is that they talk too much. It would be good if human beings would keep as silent as this cat.” And the master strokes my head.
“I hear you’ve been cramming grated radish into the baby.”
“Hum,” says my master and laughs. He then added “Talking of the baby, modern babies are quite intelligent. Since that time when I gave our baby grated radish, if you ask him ‘where is the hot place?’ he invariably sticks out his tongue. Isn’t it strange?”
“You sound as if you were teaching tricks to a dog. It’s positively cruel. By the way, Coldmoon ought to have arrived by now.”
“Is Coldmoon coming?” asks my master in a puzzled voice.
“Yes. I sent him a postcard telling him to be here not later than one o’clock.”
“How very like you! Without even asking us if it happened to be convenient. What’s the idea of asking Coldmoon here?”
“It’s not really my idea, but Coldmoon’s own request. It seems he is going to give a lecture to the Society of Physical Science. He said he needed to rehearse his speech and asked me to listen to it. Well, I thought it would be obliging to let you hear it, too. Accordingly, I suggested he should come to your house. Which should be quite convenient since you are a man of leisure. I know you never have any engagements.
You’d do well to listen.” Waverhouse thinks he knows how to handle the situation.
“I wouldn’t understand a lecture on physical science,” says my master in a voice betraying his vexation at his friend’s high-handed action.
“On the contrary, his subject is no such dry-as-dust matter as, for example, the magnetized nozzle. The transcendentally extraordinary subject of his discourse is ‘The Mechanics of Hanging.’Which should be worth listening to.”
“Inasmuch as you once only just failed to hang yourself, I can understand your interest in the subject, but I’m. . .”
“. . . The man who got cold shivers over going to the theatre, so you cannot expect not to listen to it.” Waverhouse interjects one of his usual flippant remarks and Mrs. Sneaze laughs. Glancing back at her husband, she goes off into the next room. My master, keeping silent, strokes my head. This time, for once, he stroked me with delicious gentleness.
Some seven minutes later in comes the anticipated Coldmoon. Since he’s due to give his lecture this same evening, he is not wearing his usual get-up. In a fine frock-coat and with a high and exceedingly white clean collar, he looks twenty per cent more handsome than himself. “Sorry to be late.” He greets his two seated friends with perfect composure.
“It’s ages that we’ve now been waiting for you. So we’d like you to start right away. Wouldn’t we?” says Waverhouse, turning to look at my master. The latter, thus forced to respond, somewhat reluctantly says,
“Hmm.” But Coldmoon’s in no hurry. He remarks, “I think I’ll have a glass of water, please.”
“I see you are going to do it in real style. You’ll be calling next for a round of applause.” Waverhouse, but he alone, seems to be enjoying himself.
Coldmoon produced his text from an inside pocket and observed,
“Since it is the established practice, may I say I would welcome criticism.”That invitation made, he at last begins to deliver his lecture.
“Hanging as a death penalty appears to have originated among the Anglo-Saxons. Previously, in ancient times, hanging was mainly a method of committing suicide. I understand that among the Hebrews it was customary to execute criminals by stoning them to death. Study of the
Old Testament
reveals that the word ‘hanging’ is there used to mean ‘suspending a criminal’s body after death for wild beasts and birds of prey to devour it.’According to Herodotus, it would seem that the Jews, even before they departed from Egypt, abominated the mere thought that their dead bodies might be left exposed at night. The Egyptians used to behead a criminal, nail the torso to a cross and leave it exposed during the night. The Persians. . .”
“Steady on, Coldmoon,” Waverhouse interrupts. “You seem to be drifting farther and farther away from the subject of hanging. Do you think that wise?”
“Please be patient. I am just coming to the main subject. Now, with respect to the Persians. They, too, seemed to have used crucifixion as a method of criminal execution. However, whether the nailing took place while the criminal was alive or simply after his death is not incontrovertibly established.”
“Who cares? Such details are really of little importance,” yawned my master as from boredom.
“There are still many matters of which I’d like to inform you but, as it will perhaps prove tedious for you . . .”
“ ‘As it might prove’ would sound better than ‘as it will perhaps prove.’ What d’you think, Sneaze?” Waverhouse starts carping again but my master answers coldly, “What difference could it make?”
“I have now come to the main subject, and will accordingly recite my piece.”
“A storyteller ‘recites a piece.’An orator should use more elegant diction.”Waverhouse again interrupts.
“If to ‘recite my piece’ sounds vulgar, what words should I use?” asks Coldmoon in a voice that showed he was somewhat nettled.
“It is never clear, when one is dealing with Waverhouse, whether he’s listening or interrupting. Pay no attention to his heckling, Coldmoon, just keep going.” My master seeks to find a way through the difficulty as quickly as possible.
“So, having made your indignant recitation, now I suppose you’ve found the willow tree?” With a pun on a little known
haiku,
Waverhouse, as usual, comes up with something odd. Coldmoon, in spite of himself, broke into laughter.
“My researches reveal that the first account of the employment of hanging as a deliberate means of execution occurs in the
Odyssey
, volume twenty-two. The relevant passage records how Telemachus arranged the execution by hanging of Penelope’s twelve ladies-in-waiting. I could read the passage aloud in its original Greek, but, since such an act might be regarded as an affectation, I will refrain from doing so. You will, however, find the passage between lines 465 and 473.”