with your music. You have a by no means indifferent listener.’
“He was very playful indeed. The woman’s voice, when she offered a verse of her own, was suggestive and equally playful.
“‘No match the leaves for the angry winter winds.
Am I to detain the flute that joins those winds?’
“Naturally unaware of resentment so near at hand, she changed to a Chinese koto in an elegant banjiki. Though I had to admit that she had talent, I was very annoyed. It is amusing enough, if you let things go no further, to exchange jokes from time to time with fickle and frivolous ladies; but as a place to take seriously, even for an occasional visit, matters here seemed to have gone too far. I made the events of that evening my excuse for leaving her.
“I see, as I look back on the two affairs, that young though I was the second of the two women did not seem the kind to put my trust in. I have no doubt that the wariness will grow as the years go by. The dear, uncertain ones — the dew that will fall when the hagi branch is bent, the speck of frost that will melt when it is lifted from the bamboo leaf — no doubt they can be interesting for a time. You have seven years to go before you are my age,” he said to Genji. “Just wait and you will understand. perhaps you can take the advice of a person of no importance, and avoid the uncertain ones. They stumble sooner or later, and do a man’s name no good when they do.”
Tō no Chūjō nodded,as always. Genji, though he only smiled, seemed to agree.
“Neither of the tales you have given us has been a very happy one,” he said.
“Let me tell you a story about a foolish woman I once knew,” said Tō no Chūjō.” I was seeing her in secret, and I did not think that the affair was likely to last very long. But she was very beautiful, and as time passed I came to think that I must go on seeing her, if only infrequently. I sensed that she had come to depend on me. I expected signs of jealousy. There were none. She did not seem to feel the resentment a man expects from a woman he visits so seldom. She waited quietly, morning and night. My affection grew, and I let it be known that she did indeed have a man she could depend on. There was something very appealing about her (she was an orphan), letting me know that I was all she had.
“She seemed content. Untroubled, I stayed away for rather a long time. Then — I heard of it only later — my wife found a roundabout way to be objectionable. I did not know that I had become a cause of pain. I had desperately lonely and worried for the child she had borne. One day she sent me a letter attached to a wild carnation.” His voice trembled.
“And what did it say?” Genji urged him on.
“Nothing very remarkable. I do remember her poem, though:
“‘The fence of the mountain rustic may fall to the ground.
Rest gently, O dew, upon the wild carnation.’
“I went to see her again. The talk was open and easy, as always, but she seemed pensive as she looked out at the dewy garden from the neglected house. She seemed to be weeping, joining her laments to the songs of the autumn insects. It could have been a scene from an old romance. I whispered a verse:
“‘No bloom in this wild array would I wish to slight.
But dearest of all to me is the wild carnation.’
“Her carnation had been the child. I made it clear that my own was the lady herself, the wild carnation no dust falls upon.
“She answered:
“‘Dew wets the sleeve that brushes the wild carnation.
The tempest rages. Now comes autumn too.’
“She spoke quietly all the same, and she did not seem really angry. She did shed a tear from time to time, but she seemed ashamed of herself, and anxious to avoid difficult moments. I went away feeling much relieved. It was clear that she did not want to show any sign of anger at my neglect. And so once more I stayed away for rather a long time.
“And when I looked in on her again she had disappeared.
“If she is still living, it must be in very unhappy circumstances. She need not have suffered so if she had asserted herself a little more in the days when we were together. She need not have put up with my absences, and I would have seen to her needs over the years. The child was a very pretty little girl. I was fond of her, and I have not been able to find any trace of her.
“She must be listed among your reticent ones, I suppose? She let me have no hint of jealousy. Unaware of what was going on, I had no intention of giving her up. But the result was hopeless yearning, quite as if I had given her up. I am beginning to forget; and how is it with her? She must remember me sometimes, I should think, with regret, because she must remember too that it was not I who abandoned her. She was, I fear, not the sort of woman one finds it possible to keep for very long.
“Your jealous woman must be interesting enough to remember, but she must have been a bit wearying. And the other one, all her skill on the koto cannot have been much compensation for the undependability. And the one I have described to you — her very lack of jealousy might have brought a suspicion that there was another man in her life. Well, such is the way with the world — you cannot give your unqualified approval to any of them. Where are you to go for the woman who has no defects and who combines the virtues of all three? You might choose Our Lady of Felicity — and find yourself married to unspeakable holiness.”
The others laughed.
Tō no Chūjō turned to the young man from the ministry of rites. “You must have interesting stories too.”
“Oh, please. How could the lowest of the low hope to hold your attention?”
“You must not keep us waiting.”
“Let me think a minute.” He seemed to be sorting out memories.
“When I was still a student I knew a remarkably wise woman. She was the sort worth consulting about public affairs, and she had a good mind too for the little tangles that come into your private life. Her erudition would have put any ordinary sage to shame. In a word, I was awed into silence.
“I was studying under a learned scholar. I had heard that he had many daughters, and on some occasion or other I had made the acquaintance of this one. The father learned of the affair. Taking out wedding cups, he made reference, among other things, to a Chinese poem about the merits of an impoverished wife. Although not exactly enamored of the woman, I had developed a certain fondness for her, and felt somewhat deferential toward the father. She was most attentive to my needs. I learned many estimable things from her, to add to my store of erudition and help me with my work. Her letters were lucidity itself, in the purest Chinese. None of this japanese nonsense for her. I found it hard to think of giving her up, and under her tutelage I managed to turn out a few things in passable Chinese myself. And yet — though I would not wish to seem wanting in gratitude, it is undeniable that a man of no learning is somewhat daunted at the thought of being forever his wife’s inferior. So it is in any case with an ignorant one like me; and what possible use could you gentlemen have for so formidable a wife? A stupid, senseless affair, a man tells himself, and yet he is dragged on against his will, as if there might have been a bond in some other life.”
“She seems a most unusual woman.” Genji and Tō no Chūjō were eager to hear more.
Quite
