The Flute

The first anniversary of Kashiwagi’s death had come. Every day Genji felt his loss more keenly. The number of persons with whom he was on easy and informal terms was in any case none too great. But Kashiwagi had been something more than this. They had shared each other’s lives and thoughts—at least until the disastrous episode which Genji now did his best to forget. Besides the masses that on his own account he caused to be said in Kashiwagi’s memory, he set apart a sum of a hundred golden pieces which he spent on services that in his own heart he regarded as being performed in the name of Kaoru, the dead man’s child. But this must of course remain a secret; for he continued to bring up the boy as though he were his. Yugiri not only celebrated the anniversary in the most solemn manner, but was upon this sad occasion so prodigal in his attentions to the ladies in the First Ward* that To no Chujo could not help remarking it. “Yugiri,” he said, “is taking a far larger share in managing my poor son’s affairs than I should ever have expected. Kobai and the rest are not nearly so active. He must have been far more intimate with Kashiwagi than I supposed.” Yugiri’s zeal and all the other marks of the affection and esteem in which the deceased had been held, served but to make his parents feel more bitterly the pang of his untimely loss.

To Suzaku, had not the affairs of this world been by now of shadowy import to him, the tragic outcome of all his paternal solicitude would indeed have been a shattering blow. Here was Ochiba left stranded, after a short experience of a marriage that had from the first been mere mockery; and Nyosan, his beloved Nyosan, for whom he had hoped such splendid things, dead—at least to all the friendly and human part of life. As it was, however, it gave him considerable pleasure to think that his daily occupations—his own round of prayers, penances, and offerings—had now become hers, and he constantly wrote to her upon small matters connected with the religious life. One day he sent her a bamboo sprout taken from a wood near his retreat and some tokoro^† dug up on the neighboring hillside, and in the margin of his letter, which was a very long one, he wrote: “I send you these tokens of a hermit’s life, none too easy to come by, now that the spring mist lies so thick upon the hills. ‘Though far behind me you walk upon Salvation’s path, go boldly on and let my goal be yours.’”* She was reading this poem with tears in her eyes, when Genji entered. What were those strange objects reposing in the lacquer bowls which she usually kept filled with fruit? Then he saw that she was reading a letter from Suzaku, which she handed to him. It was very long, contained many reflections upon his own approaching death, and lamenting the impossibility of their ever meeting again. The passage about the tokoro came oddly from Suzaku’s pen, belonging as it did to pietism rather than to poetry; but Genji read it with a feeling of deep remorse. No doubt Suzaku had suffered great anxiety and disappointment over Nyosan’s marriage; and though Genji could not regard this as his own fault, “I do indeed hope,” he said, “that you have no intention of taking your father’s hint. That you should dream of scaling these mountain fastnesses is a terrible idea.” Now that his relation to her could only be of the slenderest kind, he began to be more than ever struck by her rather childish beauty, the effect of which seemed only to be enhanced by the way her hair was cut at the sides, so that its ends lay flat against her cheeks. It had all been his fault. It was he who had allowed her to drift away from him; and as though in a futile effort to repair the remissness of past years he now came very close to her curtains and spoke to her almost caressingly.

The little boy was asleep in his nurse’s quarters; but presently he was waked, and crawling into the room made straight for Genji and grabbed at his sleeve. He was dressed in a little shirt of white floss, over which was a red coat with a Chinese pattern finely worked upon it. The skirts of this garment were remarkably long and trailed behind him in the quaintest way; but it was (as is usual with children of that age) quite open at the front, showing his little limbs, white and smooth as a fresh-stripped willow wand. There was certainly in his smile and the shape of his brow something that recalled Kashiwagi. But where had the child got his remarkably good looks? Not from his father, who was passable in appearance, but could not possibly have been called handsome. To Nyosan, curiously enough, he could see no resemblance. Indeed the expression that chiefly gave character to the boy’s face (or so Genji contrived to fancy) was not at all unlike his own.

The child was just beginning to walk. As soon as he entered the room he caught sight of Suzaku’s strange-looking roots lying in the fruit-dish, and toddled in that direction. Anxious to discover what sort of things they were, he was soon pulling at them, scattering them over the floor, breaking them in pieces, munching them, and in general making a terrible mess both of himself and the room. “Look what mischief he is up to,” said Genji. “You had better put them somewhere out of sight. I expect one of the maids thought it a good joke to tell him they were meant to eat.” So saying, he took up the child in his arms, “What an expressive face this boy has!” he continued. “I have had very little to do with children of this age, and had got it into my head that they were all much alike and all equally uninteresting. I see now how wrong I was. What havoc he will live one day to work upon the hearts of the princesses that are growing up in these neighboring apartments!* I am half sorry that I shall not be there to see. But ‘though Spring comes each year...’”^† “How can you talk of such a thing?” everyone said with horror. Little Kaoru was cutting his teeth, and thinking that one of Suzaku’s bamboo shoots would be just the thing to press against his swollen gums, he managed to grab at them, and dribbling monstrously, thrust one into his mouth. “Now he’s really enjoying himself,” said Genji. “What depraved tastes children do have! ‘Though there be that in its stem which is bitter to recall, yet from this bamboo-shoot no more my heart can I withhold.’” Reciting this acrostic poem, he took the child by the hand and tried to persuade him to put the thing down. But Kaoru, smiling broadly, took not the slightest notice, and with a great clatter crawled away with his prize as fast as his arms and legs could carry him.

As the weeks went by, the child grew more and more attractive, and before long even the “touch of bitterness” that its existence had been wont to lend to Genji’s thoughts utterly disappeared. He felt that the child, now a source of so much delight to him, was destined to be born in that way and no other. Kashiwagi had but been the instrument of Fate. Among the strange inconsistencies of his apparently enviable lot, none (thought Genji) was more curious than this, that the one lady in his household who was of faultless lineage, young, beautiful, in every way immaculate, should after a short spell of marriage with him declare her preference for the convent! At such moments some of the old bitterness against Kashiwagi would for a while return.

All this time Yugiri had been turning over in his mind what Kashiwagi had said to him on his deathbed. Had he been entirely ignorant of what it referred to, he would probably have discussed the matter with Genji long ago. But as it was, he knew just enough to feel that the subject was a very embarrassing one, and he wondered whether he should ever have the courage to embark upon it.

One melancholy autumn evening when he went to pay his accustomed visit to the ladies in the First Ward, he found Ochiba busily engaged in playing upon her zithern. She did not wish to be disturbed, and he was shown into the southern or side-room. As he took his seat he heard the swish of retreating skirts and caught a pleasant whiff of scent, those things denoting (as he guessed) that a bevy of ladies had, at the news of his arrival, hastened to take cover in the inner room. The visit began by his usual conversation with Ochiba’s mother. While they were talking together of old times he could not help contrasting the utter stillness and desolation of this house with the lively stir and bustle that went on from dawn to dusk in his own palace, teeming as it did with unruly children and their innumerable attendants. There was a dignity, a severity about the place; and looking round him he felt that he who broke in upon this flat tranquility with so much as a hint of common passions and desires, who fluttered this decorous stillness by any coarse vehemence or unwarranted familiarity, would be guilty of a breach of taste, for the condemnation of which no word could be strong enough. He was given a zithern, and recognized it to be Kashiwagi’s. After playing a few chords he said to Ochiba’s mother: “I know the tone of this instrument; it is the one that Kashiwagi used, is it not? How I wish that your daughter would play something on it. They say that a dead man’s touch lingers in the instruments that he played, and can be recognized even after his death.” “I fear that cannot be so in this case,” the mother replied, “for after his death the strings were removed, and those are new ones. Ochiba has played very little lately, and is, I am sorry to say, in danger of forgetting all that her father taught her. Suzaku, who, as you know, took a lot of trouble with his daughters’ music, often said Ochiba was the one that showed the greatest promise. But since all this trouble came, I fear her playing has gone utterly to pieces...” She begged him to play again; but he refused, saying that if any hand could waken the echoes of Kashiwagi’s touch, it would be that of Ochiba; and he insisted upon the zithern being laid near her chair. But she seemed disinclined to comply with his wish, and he did not press her.

The moon was shining out of a cloudless sky; a flight of wild geese passed over the house, wing to wing, in faultless line. How she, companionless, must envy that blissful troop!* At last, moved by the beauty of the autumn evening, with its sudden stirrings of light wind, cool to the skin, she took up a large Chinese zithern and played a few-chords, which by their passionate intensity stirred his feelings far more than mere words could have done. But she showed no inclination to play in concert with him, and as it was now very late, he made ready to depart. Just as he was leaving, the mother handed him a flute. “This had been in his family for years,” she said; “but there is no use in its lying idle in this deserted house. He used to play it as he sat in his coach, and its music blended with the cries of his outriders. I long to hear it played so again, even in another’s hand...” He saw at once that it was Kashiwagi’s familiar flute, and remembered having often heard him express the hope that it would fall into the hands of someone who could make good use of it, and not merely be treated as a keepsake when he was gone. Yugiri played a few runs upon it and then suddenly stopped. “You let me play on his zithern,” he said, “and encouraged by you I felt no compunction. But somehow when it comes to playing on this flute...” He broke off, and Ochiba’s mother recited the poem: “Tonight at last has the voice of the cicada sounded as of old in the dewy bushes round my house.” “Though hole for hole, unaltered are the notes the flute gives forth, what should these fingers conjure from it now, save the choked sound of tears?” So Yugiri answered, and after many hesitations and delays, at last, far on into the night, went back to his own house.

The shutters were closed and everyone was asleep. Kumoi had heard the extraordinary trouble he was taking in arranging the affairs of the two ladies in the First Ward. It seemed to involve his coming home very late at night; and though Kumoi distinctly heard him arrive on this occasion, she felt in no mood for conversation, and pretended to be asleep. “Why have you locked yourselves in like this?” he cried, when he was at last admitted. “I should have thought that with such a moon as this abroad in the heavens no one would have the heart to shut their windows.” So saying he threw back the shutters, and rolled up the blinds of her divan, while he himself took a seat at a point from whence he could see the beauties of the night. “How anyone can lie a-bed when there are such sights to be seen, I cannot imagine,” said Yugiri. “Do come here and look. I hate your not seeing it!” But she was in a bad temper, and pretended not to hear. The apartments seemed to be littered with children, their little faces blank with the vacancy of infant slumber, and wherever he turned were bevies of dames-in waiting, nurses and the like—a perfect tangle of sleeping forms. Again he contrasted this crowded scene with the death-like mansion that he had just left. Taking the flute out of his pocket he played a few notes. Were they already asleep in the First Ward, or was Ochiba at any rate thinking of him, wishing he were still in the house? Perhaps she was at this very instant playing upon the zithern that he had placed within her reach. Had she changed the tuning?* And her mother too, she was a fine player on the Japanese zithern. So his thoughts rambled on as he lay in bed. Why was it, he asked himself, that Kashiwagi had seemed to take so little interest in Ochiba? Though no one could say he had actually ill-treated her. The idea that if one possessed Ochiba one could ever grow tired of her seemed to him preposterous. Yet he knew that such things did happen, and indeed it was rarely enough that any attachment subsisted unaltered through the years—his own relation to Kumoi was the one example that occurred to him. And the result was that by this exclusive fidelity he had spoilt her. She had grown a trifle touchy and exacting... At this point he fell asleep. He dreamt that Kashiwagi appeared to him, and picking up the flute examined it curiously. It occurred to Yugiri even in his dream that it had been unwise of him to play on it, for this had certainly drawn Kashiwagi’s ghost to his side. “Could I, like the wind among the reed-stems, blow where I would, then into the hands of a true heir should fall the music of this flute.” So the dream-figure recited; and Yugiri was about to question it concerning the meaning of this strange verse, when he woke with a start. One of his children was crying. The piercing noise went on and on. It would not take its milk, and the nurses were scurrying about, evidently in great concern. Presently Kumoi took the child in her own arms and sat with it near the lamp, her hair thrown back behind her ears and her dress open in front, showing the pretty curves and undulations of her breast. She did not attempt to feed the child, but let it put its lips to her breasts, and by one device and another had soon stopped its tears. Yugiri was now standing by her side. “Is there anything amiss with the child?” he asked, and to show his concern began scattering handfuls of rice and reciting spells of protection; an activity which, if it did not greatly help the child, served at least to dispel the impression of his own dream. “It is no use your doing that,” she said. “The boy is ill. Probably he caught some infection when you insisted upon opening the window. You come back like this, after amusing yourself I don’t know how or where, and flood the house with unwholesome night air, merely that you may have the pleasure of staring at the moon.” But he saw from her face that she was no longer cross, and was now only teasing him. “I am certainly very much to blame,” he said, “if it is true that ‘infections’ can only enter through doors and windows. Had anyone else suggested this I should have thought it a rather infantile view. But coming from the mother of half a dozen children it must of course be treated with respect.” After that he sat silently watching her in a manner that Kumoi found very disconcerting, and she said at last: “Had not you better go to bed? I am afraid I am not dressed for show.” She was conscious that, sitting in the full glare of the lamp, she did not look her best. So far from being irritated by this coquetry, Yugiri felt touched that she should still care so much what impression she made upon him. The child did indeed seem to be very much indisposed. It continued to cry at intervals all through the night, and no one in the house got much sleep.

Yugiri was worried about this flute. The dream seemed clearly to indicate that it had not reached its right destination. Kashiwagi certainly could not have wanted it to go to a woman. What good could it be to her? And there was no man who seemed to come into question. Recollecting his late interview with Kashiwagi, Yugiri became more than ever convinced that he had died with some desperate entanglement clinging about his soul, some secret or remorse such as might forever hold him back from release; and turning over in his mind what were generally considered the best ways of dealing with such a case, he arranged for all manner of services to be said on behalf of Kashiwagi’s soul at Otagi* and at the various temples with which the dead man’s family had been connected. He thought of dealing with the flute by offering it as present to some Buddhist shrine; but on reflection he saw that this would be less than civil to the lady who had just given it to him, and he determined to consult his father upon the subject. Genji, he was told, was with the Akashi Princess. As he was passing through Murasaki’s apartments Yugiri was greeted by little Niou, now three years old. He was Murasaki’s great favorite, and perhaps the prettiest of all the children in the palace. “Will you pick me up, please,” he said, “and do yourself the honor to carry me back to my mummy?” He still got his words mixed up, and applied to himself the terms of respect that he heard his nurses use when they spoke of him. “Come up then,” said Yugiri, laughing. “But we shall have to pass in front of Lady Murasaki’s screen. Won’t she think that very rude?” “She can’t see you now,” said Niou, covering Yugiri’s face with his little sleeve; and thus, guided by the child, Yugiri arrived blindfold at the Akashi Princess’s door. Here Kaoru was playing along with the other Akashi children. Seeing Niou being deposited upon the threshold, his elder brother, Ni no Miya, rushed up to Yugiri, crying: “Me too, a ride!” But Niou tried to stop Yugiri from taking the other child in his arms. “No, no,” he said, “he’s my uncle Yugiri, not yours. I want him for my own.” “Behave yourselves, children,” cried Genji, who was standing near by. “Yugiri does not belong to either of you. As a matter of fact, he is the Emperor’s gentleman, and if His Majesty were to hear that either of you had stolen the Colonel of his Bodyguard, he might be very angry. As for you, Niou, you’re a little rascal. You are always trying to get the better of your elder brother!” “Ni no Miya,” said Yugiri, “is already beginning to forgo his rights with quite an elderly resignation. In a child of his age such unselfishness is alarming.” Genji thought he had never seen three such charming children, and despite the hubbub they were creating, smiled indulgently upon them all. At last, however, he said: “But this is no place to receive a visitor; let us go somewhere where we can talk more comfortably.” So saying he led the way to his own room. But they had hard work to escape, for the three little princes clung to them tightly and would not leave go. It was of course quite wrong that Kaoru, the child of a commoner, should be brought up with the Akashi Princess’s children. But, as Genji well knew, the slightest sign on his part that he was conscious of this impropriety would be taken by Nyosan as a reproach. He was indeed, as has before been noted, particularly good at guessing what effect his actions would have upon the feelings of others; and he therefore lost no opportunity of showing that the child ranked with him on exactly the same plane as his own grandchildren.

Yugiri had often watched Kaoru from a distance, but had never made friends with him. Seeing the little boy now peeping at him through a chink in the screen, he picked up a spray of cherry-blossom that had fallen to the floor and, holding it out, called the child to him. Instantly he came toddling along, in his dark blue overall, that contrasted so strongly with the even pallor of his skin. He was, thought Yugiri, a far handsomer child than the two Akashi boys. Was it only his fancy—the fruit of a suspicion that had long ago formed in his mind—or did Kaoru really bear a certain resemblance to poor Kashiwagi? In the expression of the eyes and the way they were set (though in the child this peculiarity was far more marked) there was something that he could not remember to have met elsewhere. And that smile too... Was he imagining? No. Surely Genji could not see that smile without at once thinking of Kashiwagi. And if so, what did he make of it all? The Akashi princes were a pair of sturdy, quite ordinary good-looking boys. But Kaoru had about him something refined, distinguished, that would have marked him out among a hundred other well-born children. “What a terrible pity it is,” thought Yugiri, “that To no Chujo, who is so heartbroken at Kaskiwagi not even leaving a child behind to continue his name, should not know the truth about this little one—always supposing that it is the truth...” And despite all To no Chujo’s past hostility, Yugiri felt a longing to give him this great pleasure; though when he came to think how he should do so, he saw that the idea was quite impracticable. Meanwhile, he was making friends with Kaoru, who was not in the least shy, and they were soon having wonderful games together.

Genji listened with a slightly ironical smile to Yugiri’s description of his recent visit to the First Ward, and after a few enquiries about such parts of the story as concerned old friends and acquaintances, he said suddenly: “I hope you are not behaving in such a way as to give Princess Ochiba a false impression. I know by bitter experience that there is a grave risk of this. No doubt you are acting entirely out of regard for the memory of your friend; but anyone who hears of these numerous visits is likely to draw a very different conclusion. For your own sake as well as hers you must be careful to make it clear that you have completely disinterested motives for frequenting the house.” Advice on this sort of subject was, thought Yugiri, his father’s specialty. How high-minded were Genji’s principles, and how unsuccessful he was in applying them! “So far from being censured for my attentions to those two ladies,” he answered, “I should certainly be thought to have behaved very badly if I had not taken their affairs a little in hand. I daresay my description of these visits might easily give the impression that either she or I had not been very discreet. But everything depends upon the circumstances under which things are said or done. A remark that might be very impertinent at one moment may be perfectly harmless at another. Much again (as I am sure you will admit) depends upon the character and age of the people concerned. Ochiba is no longer very young, and I am by no means given to miscellaneous flirtations. If our relation sounds to you to be somewhat too informal, it is because I know that she takes life seriously, and she, that I am to be trusted.” Hence he led on the conversation to a point at which it was quite natural that he should recount his dream. Genji listened without making any comment; but he perfectly well understood the meaning* of the dream. “I know the flute of which you speak,” he said at last. “As a matter of fact it ought, properly speaking, to be in this house, for it belonged to Murasaki’s father. He allowed Kashiwagi to take it away one day after the Lezpideza Concert, knowing that he was such a fine player. Of course, Ochiba’s mother would not know anything of this; it was quite natural that she should give it to you.” This was a mere invention, and Genji was fairly certain that Yugiri recognized it as such, and all the time knew quite well who was this mysterious “heir” spoken of by Kashiwagi in the dream. But until Yugiri made some more definite sign of being in the secret, Genji was not going to give himself away. Yugiri, seeing that his father was not at all inclined to take him into his confidence, thought he had better postpone the attempt (long overdue) to deliver Kashiwagi’s cryptic deathbed message. But the temptation to get the thing over was too much for him, and he said at last, as though it were a casual recollection: “Soon before Kashiwagi died he gave me various instructions concerning the disposition of his affairs, and at the same time charged me with some mission that was connected with his devotion towards you; or so it seemed. But though he made several attempts to explain the matter I never succeeded in discovering what it was, nor on subsequent reflection have I ever been able to make out exactly what he meant.” He rather overdid these protestations of bewilderment, with the result that Genji became more certain than ever of his having learnt the whole secret. But he was still determined not to commit himself. “I certainly know no reason why Kashiwagi should ever have thought that I was cross with him,” he said. “As for the dream, I will think it over quietly and let you know how you should act. There is a saying among old women that dreams should only be discussed by daylight!” It was evident that nothing was to be got out of him. But the story Yugiri had just told must have made some impression upon his father. What precisely was going on in Genji’s mind, he respectfully wondered.

Footnotes

* Kashiwagi’s widow (Princess Ochiba) and her mother.

† A bitter root.

* Tokoro also means “place, destination.” “Seek out the same Tokoro as I have done,” i.e. leave the City and take refuge in a mountain retreat.

* The little daughter of the Akashi Princess.

† “Though Spring comes back each year and fresh flowers bloom, we shall be there to see them only so long as Fate gives us leave.”

* The male and female wild goose were supposed to fly wing interlocked with wing.

* In sign of dislike for him.

* Where Kashiwagi had presumably been buried.

* That the flute should be given to Kashiwagi’s son Kaoru.