CHAPTER 58
Left alone in the world as I was, I could only do as my mother said and throw myself on my uncle’s mercy. For his part he took over all responsibilities and saw to my needs. He also arranged for me to go to Tokyo as I wished.
I came to Tokyo and entered the college here. College students in those days were far wilder and rougher than they are today. One boy I knew, for instance, got into an argument with a working man one night and struck him with his wooden clog, leaving a gash in his head. He had been drinking. As they fought, the man seized the boy’s school cap and made off with it. His name, of course, was clearly printed on a white cloth patch inside the cap. This all produced such a ruckus that the police threatened to report the matter to the school, but luckily the boy’s friends stepped in and managed to keep it out of the public eye. No doubt tales of this sort of wild behavior must sound utterly foolish to someone of your generation, brought up in more refined times. I find it foolish myself. But students in those days did at least have a touching simplicity that present-day students lack.
The monthly allowance my uncle sent me was far smaller than the amount you now receive from your father. Of course things were cheaper then, I suppose, yet I never felt the slightest lack. Furthermore, I was never in the unfortunate position of having to envy the financial good fortune of any other classmate. More likely they envied me, I realize now. Besides my fixed monthly allowance, I also applied to my uncle quite often for money for books (even as a student I enjoyed buying books) and other incidental expenses, and I was able to use this money just as I liked.
Innocent that I was, I trusted my uncle completely, indeed I felt grateful respect for him. He was an entrepreneur and had been a member of the prefectural government—no doubt this was behind the connection with one of the political parties that I also recall. He was my father’s full brother, but they seem to have developed very different characters.
My father was a true gentleman and managed his inheritance with great diligence. He enjoyed elegant traditional pursuits such as flower arranging and ceremonial tea-making, and reading books of poetry. I believe he had quite an interest in antique books and such things as well. Our house was in the country, about five miles from town, where my uncle lived. The antiques dealer in town would sometimes come all the way out to show my father scrolls, incense holders, and so on. The English expression “a man of means” probably sums up my father; he was a country gentleman of somewhat cultivated tastes.
He and my bustling, worldly uncle were thus of very different temperaments. Yet they were oddly close. My father would often praise him as a professional man, much more capable and reliable than himself. People in his own position, who inherit their wealth, often find, he told me, that their native abilities lose their edge. His problem was, he had had no need to fight his way in the world. My father said this both to my mother and to me, but his words seemed specifically for my benefit. He fixed his gaze on me and said, “You’d better remember that.” I did as I was told, and remember his words to this day. How could I have doubted my uncle’s integrity, then, when my father had praised him so highly and trusted him so thoroughly? I would have been proud of him even had my parents lived. Now that they were dead and I was left entirely in his care, it was no longer simple pride I felt. My uncle had become essential for my survival.