At the time, Enchō I was already old and had lost the vocal power of his youth, but his art itself continued to gain in refinement, and his sentimental pieces had something so special about them that he never failed to move his audience to tears. Particularly in the highlight section of his own Shiobara Tasuke, he gave a quiet, convincing intensity to the long scene—almost half an hour—between Tasuke and his beloved steed. Menaced by his entire family, Tasuke is about to leave his home forever when he bids farewell to the faithful horse that has long served him so well. The horse, Ao, sadly seizes Tasuke’s sleeve in his mouth and will not let him go. Tasuke, overcome, embraces Ao’s muzzle. “You’re the only one who wants me to stay!” he cries; at which the Silver Flower girls all burst into tears, and Oriku too.
“Talk about mastery, that’s the real thing!” the Silver Flower proprietor exclaimed after the performance. “Kikugorō V was so impressed by Enchō’s Shiobara that he adapted it for the stage, but even his rendition of it didn’t come up to Enchō’s. Genuine mastery has frightening power.” He simply could not get over it.
Oriku was swept along too. “What happens to Tasuke after he says goodbye to Ao?” she asked.
“I’m not sure, but he eventually finds himself a position in Edo, serves out his apprenticeship, and becomes a successful shop owner. That’s how the piece ends, but a lot goes on in between.”
“I’d love to hear the whole thing.”
“Then you’ll have to go to the theater where Enchō performs. I’ll put in a word with him and have him do Shiobara, if you like.”
“Where is Enchō’s theater?”
“I hear next month he’ll be at the Hakubai in Kanda.”
“Oh no! It’s quite a way from here to Kanda.”
“It is not! By rickshaw you can be there in an hour, and if you go seven days in a row, you can hear the whole thing.”
“But I can’t do that, just to suit myself! I can’t be away for a whole seven days!”
“Of course you can. It’s all right. You work so well, you deserve a rest. Enchō’s sentimental stories aren’t just fun; they can teach you something, too. You’ve been with me since your teens, and there’s a lot about the world you don’t know. You’ll learn all sorts of things.”
So, at the proprietor’s insistence, Oriku traveled daily, for seven days, from the Yoshiwara to Renjakuchō in Kanda to hear Enchō do Shiobara Tasuke.
The star of the Hakubai Theater was then Enchō’s disciple, Enshō, and Enchō appeared there as a guest artist. This was about 1896. Kanda was indeed a long way from the Yoshiwara, but Oriku refused to give up. It meant something to Enchō, too, to be doing Shiobara by special request from a fan, and he put his heart into it more than ever. Each day’s performance was a masterpiece. Oriku assumed at first that three days would do her, but once she began, she could not bear to miss the rest. Enchō’s heyday was past, and physically he had visibly weakened. The beautiful voice that had once filled the hall was uncertain now, and sometimes difficult to make out. However, its defects only deepened its appeal, and it communicated poor Tasuke’s suffering directly to the heart. Evening after evening Oriku forgot herself under its spell.
When Oriku was in her late twenties, having not long before become the mistress of the Silver Flower, Renjakuchō was Kanda’s liveliest quarter and boasted no fewer than three music halls. The Tachibana Theater, near Sudachō, offered performances by such masters of the Yanagi school as Ryūshi, Kosan, Bunji, Bunraku, Tamasuke, and Shinshō; while at the rival Hakubai Theater you could hear Enchō and other San’yū-school stars like Enshō, Enkyō, Enkitsu, Enba, En’u, or Ensa. The competition was intense. However, the Yanagi artists eschewed any instrumental accompaniment, while the San’yū side offered, in addition to Enchō and his disciples, the colorful En’yū, who started the suteteko dance craze, the belly-laughing Mankitsu, Entarō with his horse cart, and other such madcap players, with the result that the Hakubai Theater was always far ahead. The ever-serious Ryūshi, who was the mainstay of the Yanagi side, clove to the straight-and-narrow in his art and accepted no one who deviated from it. The Tachibana Theater performances were as a result quite somber, and despite all this loyalty to the highest principles of the storyteller’s art they could not compare in popularity with those at the bustling Hakubai. On top of that, the fact that Enchō was appearing at the Hakubai as guest artist meant that the theater was sold out every day, with the audience overflowing into the lobby and even a row of people standing all the way at the back.
Oriku had her seat reserved, of course, complete with a cushion and an ashtray, just to the right of the storyteller’s dais. She entered through the greenroom before Enchō came on. All the San’yū artists knew who she was, and those who had warmed up the audience for the master would greet her politely. She tipped all the attendants and artists and was honored accordingly. Leaving the Yoshiwara at sunset, she reached Kanda about seven. Enchō mounted the dais only at eight, and after a bumpy hour in the rickshaw she was hungry. Except for one vegetable market, behind the Hakubai it was all restaurants: Kinsei, Miyoshi, Iroha, Hinode—one after another, offering everything from sea bream to chicken stew at Botan, or soba at Yabu. Soba being a favorite of hers, Oriku alighted daily just before the theater and went straight around the corner to the Yabu soba restaurant. She had filled out since coming to the Yoshiwara, and in her striped kimono and black haori jacket she looked older than her years. All heads turned her way when she came in alone. A flagstone path led straight in from the entrance, with a long, narrow tatami-floored space on either side for the patrons—the effect was quite elegant. Since she was by herself she sat down in a corner, and almost every day she ordered tempura soba. In flavor, the Yabu soba was a cut above that served elsewhere, and it was correspondingly expensive. Around town, plain soba generally cost two sen, but at the Yabu it cost three, and the tempura soba eight. The bowl of soba was served with a great big kuruma prawn, and the dish left a pleasant aftertaste. Once you had finished, you poured the hot liquid from the soba pot into your bowl and drank that too. Oriku was doing just that when two boys came in and sat down beside her. One was about ten, the other perhaps thirteen. They had on striped cotton with simple Kokura obi, and they had taken off their aprons, to carry them instead. With their pale, youthful faces they did not look like shop boys from some merchant establishment. Side by side they sat, right next to Oriku. Oriku still had plenty of time, so she took out her tobacco pouch and had a smoke.
“I’ll have one tempura and one plain.” The elder of the two placed his order. Oriku thought it quite extravagant, for a boy.
“Just plain for me,” the younger added in a low voice, hunching his shoulders forlornly. The two might have come in together, but they did not order in at all the same way. The bigger called for two whole servings; the smaller for just one. The bigger boy spoke confidently; the smaller boy with embarrassment.
Smiling, Oriku continued to enjoy her smoke. Her pipe was fine bamboo from Laos, with silver fittings, and her tobacco pouch was gilded Dutch leather.
The place was crowded, and the soba the boys had ordered never seemed to come. They did not talk. The small one sat there in gloomy silence, while the big one looked sharply around him. At last their orders arrived. The big one ate his tempura soba with gusto, while the small one picked forlornly at his plain soba.
Oriku began to feel quite sorry for him. Clearly, his pocket money would not cover tempura soba; plain was the best he could do. She could bear it no longer.
“Young fellow!” she abruptly addressed him. He looked at her in surprise.
“I see your friend is eating tempura soba. What’s the matter, then? Don’t you have the money for it? I’ll treat you if you don’t. You must have some, too.” She called the waitress over and ordered him tempura soba before he could regain his composure, then paid for his and hers together.
Eyes wide with astonishment