Rashomon by Akutagawa Ryunosuke (best book clubs .TXT) 📖

If his craving for yam gruel had not encouraged him, he would probably have left Toshihito and returned to Kyoto 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 sidelocks, 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 ‘Toshihitois 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 slope 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 na•ve 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 about 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 pinetrees. As soon as they neared Toshihito, the mounted men hurriedly jumped down out of their saddles, while those on foot kneeled 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 vassel 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 went 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 Ñ 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 arrived earlier that evening Ñ 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, which 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 Ñ 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 overslept. 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