“I hear she’s quite a lady.”
“Quite a horrible lady, yes. She moved right in with her son, and she practically told me to get out.”
No doubt he was prejudiced, but he really hated his father and stepmother.
“I wish you’d talk about me to someone you know, Auntie. Could you possibly do that?”
“I suppose I could, but I wouldn’t want to embarrass your father.”
“He won’t care! He doesn’t want me around—it’ll be a relief for him,” he said, giving her a pleading look.
“I’ll do anything!” he went on. “I’ll polish the floors, or whatever else anyone wants me to do. Just the thought of going back to Kanda makes me capable of anything. Please think about it. You understand—this other woman is now sitting on the cushion that used to be my mother’s.” His speech had dropped to a whisper. The faintness of his voice spoke volumes: the more deeply he loved his mother, the more he detested his father. Oriku could see why.
“All right, stay a few days. You can help with the garden, and meanwhile I’ll think it over.”
With that, she kept him at Mukōjima. Once properly bathed and dressed in the clothing Oriku happened to have on hand, he made a very fine young fellow. Sleeping under the temple’s main hall had accustomed him to a frugal life, and he never just sat around indoors. Sweeping and tidying the garden, helping the maids with the heavy chores—it was a big place, and there was always plenty of work. The maids were glad to have him. “Shū-chan,” they called him, and they looked after him very nicely.
“If Mr. Bandō doesn’t want him, Mistress Oriku, why don’t you adopt him?” This was Ofune’s suggestion.
“He wants to be a better dancer than his father, so I’m thinking about who might take him on.” A teacher for Shūsaku: that was the one thing on her mind.
“I found you at Kannon’s temple, so you should probably have an Asakusa teacher.”
“I’ll leave it up to you,” Shūsaku replied. He seemed in no particular hurry. Instead he went around looking quite relaxed. Everybody liked him. There were no other men at the Shigure Teahouse, so he was everyone’s darling, and he never acted as if any task was beneath him.
The place suddenly became very busy, as it did every year when the cherries started coming into bloom and an avalanche of blossom-viewers filled every room. With the women working at a frantic pace, Shūsaku was caught up in the same whirlwind. No dance study for him! He became the restaurant’s general servant. He never complained, though.
“We can’t ask Shū-chan to do that!” Oriku would say about some task or other that he then did gladly anyway. “I’m here to help till the blossom-viewing season is over,” he would say.
“I’ve never known such a nice boy!” Ofune could hardly get over it. “What can Mr. Bandō possibly have against him? He’s wonderful!”
“It’s because this Omura, his mistress, has a son of her own. Shūchan has a stubborn streak, and it seems he refuses to call her ‘Mother.’”
“Why should he? He can hardly start calling her ‘Mother’ at his age.”
“You’re quite partial to him, aren’t you? You didn’t like him much at first, though.”
“When he first came he wasn’t well, and you couldn’t tell just what he was like, but now it’s Shū-chan this and Shū-chan that—everyone thinks the world of him. Just yesterday the ceramic drainage pipe was blocked. He dug three feet down to it, got himself covered in mud, and fixed it.”
“You really mustn’t have him do things like that! He’s not a common laborer, you know.”
“That’s why everybody is so happy to let him have his bath and bring him fresh clothes.”
“It’s just not right, though, when he’s the natural successor to the position of head of the Bandō house. You really mustn’t do it anymore.”
Oriku spoke severely, but all this meant nothing to Shūsaku himself. Easygoing by nature, and rendered confident by an excellent upbringing, he had what it takes to remain cheerful through adversity. Oriku knew she should not go on putting him to work this way, but she had no idea whom to approach. His being Mitsunojō’s son made it unlikely that any of her countless acquaintances would take him on, and the old title of Dancing Master that had honored his fore-bears now worked against him. As a result, no school of Japanese dance bore him any goodwill.
When the cherry blossoms had fallen and the crowds were gone, Oriku made an early morning pilgrimage to the Kannon of Asakusa. She had no idea what to do about finding a teacher for Shūsaku. She felt things might work out if she brought the matter to Kannon in person, since it was at the temple’s main hall that she had first found him. And so, late in April she climbed the temple steps. It was still too early for there to be many visitors, and the air inside the hall felt cool and fresh. There was a desk to solicit contributions for redoing the roof. Oriku made her contribution and then went to stand before Kannon’s main altar. The great chest containing Kannon’s image was imposing, and many candles were burning before it.
Oriku clapped her hands, as always, and prayed, “Please bless Bandō Shūsaku with a good teacher.” That was her only prayer. She felt certain Kannon would help the boy, since he had slept for some time in the darkness of Kannon’s main hall, and she repeated her petition over and over, till she at last felt she had done all she could. Then she pressed her palms together in salutation, made a low bow, and left. Of course, a suitable teacher was hardly likely to fall into her lap just because she had prayed to Kannon, but nonetheless she felt a bit better as she started back down the steps.
Just then someone called out to her. “Mistress Oriku!” It was a man’s voice. She did not even have to stop; he descended the steps beside her.
“You seemed quite absorbed,” he said. “Was there some special urgency to your prayer?” His dignified voice sounded kind.
“Goodness, it’s you!” Oriku cried out in astonishment. “You were here too?”
She halted right there. The man on the steps with her was the kabuki actor Ichikawa Danshirō, whom she had known since her Yoshiwara days. She owed him a debt of gratitude for having brought a large number of guests with him to the opening of her Shigure Teahouse. At present he was living in Senzokuchō, Asakusa.
“What a surprise to run into you this way! You’re quite right. I was asking Kannon for something.”
“I thought so.You looked ever so serious. Is some lover of yours ill?”
“No, no, nothing like that. I’ve ended up looking after a boy, and I’m worried about him.”
She paused on the flagstones below the steps. She had had a sudden idea. Danshirō was especially famous among kabuki actors for his dancing. No, he was not the head of a school, but in pieces like Kisen, Utsubozaru, or Tsurionna he displayed a lightness and grace quite out of keeping with his clumsy build. It was just a fleeting inspiration, but if she asked Danshirō to take on Shūsaku, would he really say no? Surely Kannon had brought her to Danshirō for just this. Such were the thoughts flitting through her head.
“Actually, I was just thinking about calling on you with a request,” she said. “Are you off to work now?”
“No, I’m just back from Osaka. The show at Dōtonbori is over, and I took the night train back to Tokyo. I’ve just arrived, and I came to greet Kannon before going home.”
“I see. You didn’t go straight home, but came by the temple instead?”
“Well, you know, I just don’t feel right if I don’t make a little pilgrimage here