"WHAT a dreadful smell!"

As they came into the room, Misako began fanning the air with her kimono sleeve. Her face buried in her arm, she hurried around to open the windows.

"A dreadful smell, really—you still eat the stuff?"

"I do. And then I smoke expensive cigars to cover up."

"But it's even worse all mixed up with tobacco smoke. The room is a horror. If you must go about making smells like this, I shall have to ask you to return the nightgown I lent you."

"It'll wash right out. No trouble at all. Besides, if I were to take it off and return it now, the damage would already be done."

It had not been so noticeable outside in the garden, but here in the tight Western-style room the combined smell of garlic and tobacco, stagnant through the night and morning, assaulted the nose with a strangling intensity.

"You have to follow the Chinese and eat lots of garlic. Then you don't catch Chinese diseases." That was one of Takanatsu's favorite theories, and he never passed a day in Shanghai without his garlic-loaded Chinese food. "It doesn't seem like Chinese food," he was fond of adding, "unless it smells of garlic." Always when he came back to Japan he had a supply of dried garlic with him, and he took slivers of it like a habitual tonic. Besides strengthening his stomach's defenses, he said, it gave him energy, and he was quite unable to do without it. "His wife ran away because he reeked of garlic," Kaname liked to say.

"I should be forever grateful if you would stand just a bit farther off."

"Hold your nose if you don't like it." Takanatsu puffed away at a cigar he held in one hand while with the other he opened his suitcase out flat on the bed. The suitcase was battered to a point where one could have given it to a ragpicker with few regrets.

"What a supply! You look like a clothes-peddler."

"I have to give some presents in Tokyo this time. Do you see any you like? But I suppose I'll be sneered at again."

"How many can I have?"

"Two, possibly three.... How would this one be?" Takanatsu took out one of the strips of brocaded sash cloth.

"It's much too drab."

"Too drab is it? How old are you? The man said it would suit a girl or a married woman of maybe twenty-two or three."

"But you can't trust a Chinese salesman on things like that."

"It's a store where a great many Japanese go, and he should be well up on Japanese tastes. My woman, as a matter of fact, always asks his advice."

"Well, it's not the sort of thing I would buy. And the material's not as good as it might be. Mohair, isn't it?"

"You have your eye on the other, I see. Well, if you have to have the satin, I can only let you have two. You can have three of the mohair."

"I'll take the satin, thank you. Two satin are better than three mohair. How about this one, for instance?"

"That one?"

"What do you mean, 'That one'? Do you have other plans for it?"

"I was saving that one for the youngest of the girls in Tokyo."

"Oh, no! Poor Suzuko could never wear this. You amaze me."

"On the contrary, you amaze me. Put on these gay robes and you'll look like a loose woman."

"Oh, but I am a loose woman."

Takanatsu regretted his remark as soon as he had made it, but Misako's show of candor turned it off smoothly.

"A lamentable slip of the tongue. This member was in error and would like to retract his statement. He requests that it be stricken from the verbatim record."

"Too late. It's already in the record."

"This member had no malicious intent. He apologizes most humbly for having sullied the reputation of a pure woman and for having disturbed the order of the session."

"She's not such a pure woman, you know," Misako laughed.

"It's all right then not to retract?"

"It doesn't make much difference—it's a reputation that rather tends to get itself sullied anyway."

"Come, now. I thought special pains were being taken to see that it did not."

"So Kaname says, but it seems useless to me. Did you talk about it yesterday?"

"Yes."

"What does he think?"

"It was all as usual very vague and not much to the point."

They sat one at each end of the bed, the suitcase and its overflow of bright cloth between them.

"And what do you think yourself?" Takanatsu asked.

"What do I think? I can't really tell you in a word."

"Take two or three words."

"Do you have anything to do today?"

"I'm quite free. I purposely took care of all my business in Osaka yesterday so that today would be open."

"What does Kaname have planned?"

"He said he thought he would take Hiroshi to maybe an amusement park this afternoon."

"Let's get Hiroshi's homework done. You will take him to Tokyo, won't you?"

"I'd just as soon, but he seemed so upset. Wasn't he crying?"

"He certainly was. He's that way.... To tell you the truth, what I want to do is see how I get along without him. Two or three days even would be enough for a trial."

"That seems like not a bad idea. And in the meantime you could have things out with Kaname."

"I'm afraid not. I'll have to ask you to tell me what Kaname thinks. When the two of us are alone face to face, we simply are not able to say what we would like to. We go on well enough to a point, but beyond that one or the other of us is sure to break down in tears."

"It's fairly definite, is it, that you can go to Aso's?"

"Quite definite. The only problem is making up our minds to it."

"Do you suppose his family knows?"

"In a vague sort of way they seem to."

"How much?"

"That I am seeing Aso now and then with Kaname's permission. That much they probably know."

"And pretend they don't?"

"Very probably. There's not much else they could do."

"And if matters were to go further?"

"I don't think there would be any difficulty once Kaname and I were cleanly separated. Aso says his mother understands perfectly how he feels."

The barking began again in the garden below. The dogs had resumed their feud.

"More of that!" Misako threw down the cloth she had been fingering in her lap and went over to the window. "Hiroshi, suppose you take the dogs over there. We can't talk for the noise."

"I was just going to."

"Where's your father?"

"On the veranda. He's still reading."

"How would it be if you stopped playing and began your homework?"

"Where's Uncle Hideo?"

"You needn't wait for him. Uncle Hideo, you say, as though he had come specially to see you."

"But he said he'd help me with my homework."

"He will not. What is homework for if you're not to do it yourself?"

"I see." They could hear Hiroshi clattering off with the dogs.

"He seems more afraid of you than of his father," said Takanatsu.

"Kaname never says anything to him. I wonder if it won't be harder for him to leave me than it would be to leave Kaname, though."

"When the divorce comes? But you'll be going out into the world stripped and alone, and his sympathies naturally will be with you."

"Do you really think so?... I think myself that most of the sympathy is going to collect around Kaname. On the surface at least it will be as though I am abandoning him, and people will blame me for it. I wonder if Hiroshi won't be bitter against me too when he starts hearing rumors."

"But later on he'll understand. Children retain a great deal, and when they grow up they start going over things and rejudging them from a grownup's point of view. This must have been this way, and that was that way, they say. That's why you have to be careful with children—some day they grow up."

Misako did not answer. She was still by the window, absently looking out. A small bird flitted from one branch to another of the plum trees. A thrush, she wondered. Or a lark? She followed it with her eye for a time. Beyond the plum trees Jiiya had the lid off a nursery frame and seemed to be transplanting shoots in the vegetable garden. The sea was not visible, but as she looked off into the clear sky over the harbor, she heaved an involuntary sigh.

"You don't have to go to Suma today?"

Misako laughed, shortly and a little bitterly, her head still averted.

"But you go almost every day now, don't you?"

"That's right."

"If you want to see him, why not go?"

"Am I so obviously the hussy?"

"I wonder if she wants to be told she is or she isn't."

"Tell me the truth."

"Well, we did agree yesterday that you had become a woman of the world and we could expect you to go even farther."

"I quite admit it—but, really, you needn't worry about today. I told him you would be here and I ought to stay at home—and it would hardly be polite to run off and leave you after all these presents."

"—she says. And yet she was away all day yesterday."

"But I thought Kaname would want to talk to you yesterday."

"And today is lady's day?"

"Anyway, let's go downstairs. I'm hungry. You can watch even if you don't want anything to eat."

"Which of these are you taking?"

"I haven't made up my mind. Leave your shop open and I'll look them over at my leisure. You may have had your breakfast, but I'm almost faint from hunger myself."

From the foot of the stairs they glanced into the room below. Kaname had come in from the veranda and lay face-up on a sofa, still immersed in his book.

"Did you find anything good?" he asked mechanically as he heard them pass.

"It was most disappointing. He sends off elaborate notices on the presents he's bringing, and then when he gets here we find he's as closefisted as ever."

"Your wife is hopelessly greedy."

"But you said three of the cheap ones or two of the good ones."

"Please don't feel I'm forcing them on you. Think what I save if you don't take any at all."

Kaname laughed politely. They could hear him still flicking over the pages.

"It looks as though he'll be occupied for a while at least," said Takanatsu as they turned a corner to the Japanese wing.

"Almost anything can keep him occupied while it's new, but when the novelty wears off he'll have no more of it. He's like a child with a toy."

As they came into the breakfast room, Misako motioned Takanatsu to the cushion Kaname would normally have used at the head of the low sandalwood table, and took a place herself to one side.

"O-sayo, would you bring some toast, please?" She turned to the mulberry tea cabinet behind her. "Would you like black tea or green?"

"Either will do. And maybe you could offer me something sweet."

"How about a German pastry? I have some good ones from Juchheim's."

"Fine. I hate to sit and watch other people eat."

"Oh, dear, I thought I'd escaped, but I can smell something odd even here."

"Probably I've passed some of it on to you. Go to Suma tomorrow and see what Aso says."

" 'As long as you're seeing that individual Takanatsu, please stay away from me.' "

"But when two people are really in love, a slight smell of garlic makes no difference. If it does, they're only pretending."

"This with reference to your own successes? And what do I get for being your audience?"

"Aren't you quick with your conclusions! Possibly I do owe you something, though—how about a piece of toast?"

"I wonder if anyone ever really learned to like the smell of garlic."

"Indeed someone did. Yoshiko."

"It's not true, then, that she ran away because you smelled of garlic?"

"Kaname's invention. I'm told that even now she thinks of me when she smells garlic."

"And do you ever think of her?"

"I can't say I don't. But she's the sort of woman to go drinking with, not the sort to marry."

"A loose type?"

"Yes."

"Like me."

"Kaname says you really aren't at all. He thinks it's a surface you cultivate, and underneath you're a chaste wife and a virtuous mother."

"I wonder." Bending her full attention to the food before her, as though to cover a certain embarrassment, Misako put together a sandwich of sausage and chopped pickles and brought it delicately to her mouth.

"That looks good."

"It is good."

"And what are these little objects?"

"Liver sausages. From a German shop in Kobe."

"Your guest got nothing as fine for his breakfast."

"Of course not. This is reserved for my breakfast."

"I've concluded I would rather have that than a German pastry."

"What greed! Open your mouth and say 'Ah.' "

"Ah.' "

"That smell again. Be careful not to touch the fork, now. Take it delicately by the bread—that's right. How did you like it?"

"Delicious."

"I'll not give you any more. There will be none left for me."

"But you could have had O-sayo bring a fork for me too. Handing people things on your own fork—really, that is a little like a loose woman."

"If you have these objections, perhaps you should refrain from demanding other people's food."

"But you never used to have such bad manners. You used to be so quiet and ladylike."

"If I've changed, I've changed."

"Have you really changed, or are you only making a show?"

"Making a show?"

"Yes."

"... I don't really know."

"Kaname says he's tried to change you. He says the responsibility is all his. I doubt if that's the whole truth."

"I'd as soon not have him taking the responsibility. It's only a hidden part of my nature finally coming out."

"I suppose there's always a little of the loose woman even in the most proper wife. But in your case aren't you pushed on by this difficulty with Kaname? You don't want people to see you as a lonely and unfortunate woman, and you deliberately try to seem gay."

"And that's what you call making a show?"

"I'm afraid you'd have to call it a sort of show. You don't want people to see that you're not loved by your husband—or am I saying more than I should?"

"It makes no difference. Please say exactly what comes to you."

"You try to be gay and lively to cover your weakness, but now and then the loneliness underneath shows through. Kaname sees it, I imagine, even if no one else does."

"But I'm so unnatural when he's around. Haven't you noticed a difference in me when I'm with him and when I'm not?"

"I'd say you seem less under control when you're away from him."

"You see? Even you have sensed it. Think how unpleasant it would be for him. And so I always find myself being very severe and proper in front of him. I simply can't help it."

"With Aso you're the loose woman? That side of you comes to the fore?"

"I'm sure it must."

"But once you're married again, you may be surprised at how that too changes."

"I don't think so, at least if it's Aso I'm married to."

"It's remarkable, though, how often women do change after they're married. Right now you're playing a game."

"And it's not possible for marriage to be a game?"

"It's splendid if it can be."

"I intend mine to be. I think people take marriage much too seriously."

"And then when you're tired of him you get another divorce?"

"That's a reasonable conclusion, I suppose."

"I'm not talking about reasonable conclusions. I'm talking about your own intentions."

Misako's fork, on the point of taking up a pickle, stopped dead in her plate.

"The time will come when you'll be tired of him?"

"I don't intend it to."

"And Aso?"

"I don't think he expects to be tired of me either,

but he says it wouldn't help to have to make prom-*

lses.

"And is that enough for you?"

"I understand well enough how he feels. He could promise never to get tired of me. But this is the first time he's been in love, and no matter what his intentions are, he can't know how his feelings might change. No matter how much he may intend now never to change, he can't really be sure what will happen. He says it would be meaningless to promise something he can't be sure of, and he says he doesn't like telling lies."

"But that's quite the wrong attitude. If he's not in love seriously enough to go ahead and promise without a thought for the future..

"Doesn't it depend on the individual, though? He's always analyzing himself, and it's simply not possible for him to make a promise with reservations, no matter how serious he might be."

"I think I would go ahead and make the promise even if there was a chance it might turn out to be a lie."

"But with Aso it's different. If he were to make a rash promise it would have exactly the wrong effect. 'Am I getting tired of her?' it would make him say. That's what he's afraid of—he know's how he is. It would be much better not to make any promises, to get married in the mood we've been in all along. He says the marriage will have much more chance of lasting if he can go into it without tying his feelings up in promises."

"He may be right, but it's somehow a little too-"

"Yes?"

"A little too much like a game."

"I feel much more secure when I know he's being frank. I understand him."

"Have you mentioned this to Kaname?"

"I haven't had a chance to. And, besides, it would do no good."

"But you're being much too reckless. Leaving your husband when you have no real guarantee for your future." Takanatsu, trying to control a rising sharpness in his tone, stopped for a moment as he noticed that Misako was blinking rapidly, her hands folded tightly in her lap. "I certainly hadn't thought it was as bad as all this.... I shouldn't say so, I know, but I'd have expected you to be calmer, more sober. After all, you're discarding a husband."

"But I am being sober.... It's only that, either way, I have to get out of this house."

"And so you should have thought everything over more carefully before you let yourself come to this impasse."

"What good would it have done? You don't know how hard it is for me to stay on here now that we're not really married...."

Misako's shoulders were straight and her head was bowed. She tried hard to hold back her tears, but a shiny drop fell to her knee.