CHAPTER 16

I arrived at dusk, about the time the lights are beginning to be lit. Sensei, ever punctilious, had already left. “He didn’t want to be late, so he set out just a moment ago,” his wife told me as she led me to the study.

The room held a Western-style desk and a few chairs, as well as a large collection of books in glass-fronted cases; the rows of beautiful leather-bound spines glinted in the electric light. She settled me onto a cushion before the charcoal brazier. “Feel free to dip into any book you like,” she said as she left.

I sat there stiffly, smoking, feeling awkward as a guest left to while away the time until the master of the house returns. Down the corridor in the parlor, I could hear Sensei’s wife talking to the maid. The study where I sat was at the end of the corridor, in a far quieter and more secluded part of the house than the sitting room where Sensei and I normally met. After a while her voice ceased, and a hush fell on the house. I sat still and alert, half-expecting a burglar to appear at any moment.

About half an hour later Sensei’s wife popped her head around the door to bring me a cup of tea. “Good heavens!” she exclaimed, startled to find me sitting bolt upright, with the formality of a guest. She regarded me with amusement. “You don’t look very comfortable sitting like that.”

“I’m quite comfortable, thank you.”

“But you must be bored, surely.”

“No, I’m too tense at the thought of burglars to feel bored.”

She laughed as she stood there, the teacup still in her hand.

“It’s a bit pointless for me to stand guard in this remote corner of the house, you know,” I went on.

“Well, then, do please come on into the parlor. I brought a cup of tea thinking you might be bored here, but you can have it there if you’d rather.”

I followed her out of the study. In the parlor an iron kettle was singing on a fine big brazier. I was served Western tea and cakes, but Sensei’s wife declined to have any tea herself, saying it would make her sleepless.

“Does Sensei often go off to gatherings like this?” I asked.

“No, hardly ever. He seems less and less inclined to see people recently.”

She seemed unworried, so I grew bolder. “You are the only exception, I suppose.”

“Oh, no. He feels that way about me too.”

“That’s not true,” I declared. “You must know perfectly well it’s not true.”

“Why?”

“Personally, I think he’s come to dislike the rest of the world because of his love for you.”

“You have a fine scholar’s way with words, I must say. You’re good at empty reasoning. Surely you could equally say that because he dislikes the world, he’s come to dislike me as well. That’s using precisely the same argument.”

“You could say both, true, but in this case I’m the one who’s right.”

“I don’t like argumentation. You men do it a lot, don’t you? You seem to enjoy it. I’m always amazed at how men can go on and on, happily passing around the empty cup of some futile discussion.”

Her words struck me as rather severe, although not particularly offensive. She was not one of those modern women who takes a certain pride in calling attention to the fact that she is intelligent. She seemed to value far more the heart that lies deep within us.