Lafcadio Hearn's Japan (31 page)

Immediately to Shinzabur
ō
's memory there recurred, with another and sinister meaning, the words of O-Yoné:—
“We went away, and found a very small house in Yanaka-no-Sasaki. There we are now just barely able to live—by doing a little private work. . . .”
Here was indeed the very small house,—and in Yanaka-no-Sasaki. But the little private work . . . ?

Terror-stricken, the samurai hastened with all speed to the house of Yusai, and begged for his counsel and assistance. But Yusai declared himself unable to be of any aid in such a case. All that he could do was to send Shinzabur
ō
to the high-priest Ry
ō
seki, of Shin-Banzui-In, with a letter praying for immediate religious help.

VII

The high-priest Ry
ō
seki was a learned and a holy man. By spiritual vision he was able to know the secret of any sorrow, and the nature of the karma that had caused it. He heard unmoved the story of Shinzabur
ō
, and said to him:—

“A very great danger now threatens you, because of an error committed in one of your former states of existence. The karma that binds you to the dead is very strong; but if I tried to explain its character, you would not be able to understand. I shall therefore tell you only this,—that the dead person has no desire to injure you out of hate, feels no enmity towards you: she is influenced, on the contrary, by the most passionate affection for you. Probably the girl has been in love with you from a time long preceding your present life,—from a time of not less than three or four past existences; and it would seem that, although necessarily changing her form and condition at each succeeding birth, she has not been able to cease from following after you. Therefore it will not be an easy thing to escape from her influence. . . . But now I am going to lend you this powerful
mamori
.
¹⁰
It is a pure gold image of that Buddha called the Sea-Sounding Tathâgata—
Kai-On Ny
ō
rai,
—because his preaching of the
Law sounds through the world like the sound of the sea. And this little image is especially a
shiry
ō
-yoké,
¹¹
—which protects the living from the dead. This you must wear, in its covering, next to your body,— under the girdle. . . . Besides, I shall presently perform in the temple, a
segaki
service
¹²
for the repose of the troubled spirit. . . . And here is a holy sutra, called
Ub
ō
-Darani-Ky
ō
,
or “Treasure-Raining Sutra:”
¹³
you must be careful to recite it every night in your house—without fail. . . . Furthermore I shall give you this package of
o-fuda;
¹⁴
—you must paste one of them over every opening of your house,—no matter how small. If you do this, the power of the holy texts will prevent the dead from entering. But—whatever may happen—do not fail to recite the sutra.”

Shinzabur
ō
humbly thanked the high-priest; and then, taking with him the image, the sutra, and the bundle of sacred texts, he made all haste to reach his home before the hour of sunset.

VIII

With Yusai's advice and help, Shinzabur
ō
was able before dark to fix the holy texts over all the apertures of his dwelling. Then the
ninsomi
returned to his own house,—leaving the youth alone.

Night came, warm and clear. Shinzabur
ō
made fast the doors, bound the precious amulet about his waist, entered his mosquito-net, and by the glow of a night-lantern began to recite the
Ub
ō
-Darani-Ky
ō
. For a long time he chanted the words, comprehending little of their meaning;—then he tried to obtain some rest. But his mind was still too much disturbed by the strange events of the day. Midnight passed; and no sleep came to him. At last he heard the boom of the great temple-bell of Dentsu-In announcing the eighth hour.
¹⁵

It ceased; and Shinzabur
ō
suddenly heard the sound of
geta
approaching from the old direction,—but this time more slowly:
karan-koron, karan-koron!
At once a cold sweat broke over his forehead. Opening the sutra hastily, with trembling hand, he began again
to recite it aloud. The steps came nearer and nearer,—reached the live hedge,—stopped! Then, strange to say, Shinzabur
ō
felt unable to remain under his mosquito-net: something stronger even than his fear impelled him to look; and, instead of continuing to recite the
Ub
ō
-Darani-Ky
ō
,
he foolishly approached the shutters, and through a chink peered out into the night. Before the house he saw O-Tsuyu standing, and O-Yoné with the peony-lantern; and both of them were gazing at the Buddhist texts pasted above the entrance. Never before—not even in what time she lived—had O-Tsuyu appeared so beautiful; and Shinzabur
ō
felt his heart drawn towards her with a power almost resistless. But the terror of death and the terror of the unknown restrained; and there went on within him such a struggle between his love and his fear that he became as one suffering in the body the pains of the
Sh
ō
-netsu
hell.
¹⁶

Presently he heard the voice of the maid-servant, saying:—

“My dear mistress, there is no way to enter. The heart of Hagiwara Sama must have changed. For the promise that he made last night has been broken; and the doors have been made fast to keep us out.
. . . We cannot go in to-night. . . . It will be wiser for you to make up your mind not to think any more about him, because his feeling towards you has certainly changed. It is evident that he does not want to see you. So it will be better not to give yourself any more trouble for the sake of a man whose heart is so unkind.”

But the girl answered, weeping:—

“Oh, to think that this could happen after the pledges which we made to each other! . . . Often I was told that the heart of a man changes as quickly as the sky of autumn;—yet surely the heart of Hagiwara Sama cannot be so cruel that he should really intend to exclude me in this way! . . . Dear Yoné, please find some means of taking me to him. . . . Unless you do, I will never, never go home again.”

Thus she continued to plead, veiling her face with her long sleeves,—and very beautiful she looked, and very touching; but the fear of death was strong upon her lover.

O-Yoné at last made answer,—

“My dear young lady, why will you trouble your mind about a man who seems to be so cruel? . . . Well, let us see if there be no way to enter at the back of the house: come with me!”

And taking O-Tsuyu by the hand, she led her away toward the rear of the dwelling; and there the two disappeared as suddenly as the light disappears when the flame of a lamp is blown out.

IX

Night after night the shadows came at the Hour of the Ox; and nightly Shinzabur
ō
heard the weeping of O-Tsuyu. Yet he believed himself saved,—little imagining that his doom had already been decided by the character of his dependents.

Tomoz
ō
had promised Yusai never to speak to any other person— not even to O-Miné—of the strange events that were taking place. But Tomoz
ō
was not long suffered by the haunters to rest in peace. Night after night O-Yoné entered into his dwelling, and roused him from his sleep, and asked him to remove the
o-fuda
placed over one very small window at the back of his master's house. And Tomoz
ō
, out of fear, as often promised her to take away the
o-fuda
before the next sundown; but never by day could he make up his mind to remove it,—believing that evil was intended to Shinzabur
ō
. At last, in a night of storm, O-Yoné startled him from slumber with a cry of reproach, and stooped above his pillow, and said to him: “Have a care how you trifle with us! If, by to-morrow night, you do not take away that text, you shall learn how I can hate!” And she made her face so frightful as she spoke that Tomoz
ō
nearly died of terror.

O-Miné, the wife of Tomoz
ō
, had never till then known of these visits: even to her husband they had seemed like bad dreams. But on this particular night it chanced that, waking suddenly, she heard the voice of a woman talking to Tomoz
ō
. Almost in the same moment the talking ceased; and when O-Miné looked about her, she saw, by the light of the night-lamp, only her husband,—shuddering and white with fear. The stranger was gone; the doors were fast: it seemed impossible that anybody could have entered. Nevertheless the jealousy of the wife had been aroused; and she began to chide and to question Tomoz
ō
in such a manner that he thought himself obliged to betray the secret, and to explain the terrible dilemma in which he had been placed.

Then the passion of O-Miné yielded to wonder and alarm; but she was a subtle woman, and she devised immediately a plan to save her husband by the sacrifice of her master. And she gave Tomoz
ō
a cunning counsel,—telling him to make conditions with the dead.

They came again on the following night at the Hour of the Ox; and O-Miné hid herself on hearing the sound of their coming,—
karan-koron, karan-koron!
But Tomoz
ō
went out to meet them in the dark, and even found courage to say to them what his wife had told him to say:—

“It is true that I deserve your blame;—but I had no wish to cause you anger. The reason that the
o-fuda
has not been taken away is that my wife and I are able to live only by the help of Hagiwara Sama, and that we cannot expose him to any danger without bringing misfortune upon ourselves. But if we could obtain the sum of a hundred
ry
ō
in gold, we should be able to please you, because we should then need no help from anybody. Therefore if you will give us a hundred
ry
ō
,
I can take the
o-fuda
away without being afraid of losing our only means of support.”

When he had uttered these words, O-Yoné and O-Tsuyu looked at each other in silence for a moment. Then O-Yoné said:—

“Mistress, I told you that it was not right to trouble this man,— as we have no just cause of ill will against him. But it is certainly useless to fret yourself about Hagiwara Sama, because his heart has changed towards you. Now once again, my dear young lady, let me beg you not to think any more about him!”

But O-Tsuyu, weeping, made answer:—

“Dear Yoné, whatever may happen, I cannot possibly keep myself from thinking about him! . . . You know that you can get a hundred
ry
ō
to have the
o-fuda
taken off. . . Only once more, I pray, dear Yoné!—only once more bring me face to face with Hagiwara Sama,—I beseech you!” And hiding her face with her sleeve, she thus continued to plead.

“Oh! why will you ask me to do these things?” responded O-Yoné. “You know very well that I have no money. But since you will persist in this whim of yours, in spite of all that I can say, I suppose that I must try to find the money somehow, and to bring it here to-morrow night. . . .” Then, turning to the faithless Tomoz
ō
, she said:— “Tomoz
ō
, I must tell you that Hagiwara Sama now wears upon his body a
mamori
called by the name of
Kai-On-Ny
ō
rai,
and that so long as he wears it we cannot approach him. So you will have to get that
mamori
away from him, by some means or other, as well as to remove the
o-fuda
.”

Tomoz
ō
feebly made answer:—

“That also I can do, if you will promise to bring me the hundred
ry
ō
.”

“Well, mistress,” said O-Yoné, “you will wait,—will you not,—until tomorrow night?”

“Oh, dear Yoné!” sobbed the other,—“have we to go back to-night again without seeing Hagiwara Sama? Ah! it is cruel!”

And the shadow of the mistress, weeping, was led away by the shadow of the maid.

X

Another day went, and another night came, and the dead came with it. But this time no lamentation was heard without the house of Hagiwara; for the faithless servant found his reward at the Hour of the Ox, and removed the
o-fuda
. Moreover he had been able, while his master was at the bath, to steal from its case the golden
mamori,
and to substitute for it an image of copper; and he had buried the
Kai-On-Ny
ō
rai
in a desolate field. So the visitants found nothing to oppose their entering. Veiling their faces with their sleeves they rose and passed, like a streaming of vapor, into the little window from over which the holy text had been torn away. But what happened thereafter within the house Tomoz
ō
never knew.