CHAPTER 94
One day I paid a rare visit to the university library. My supervisor had instructed me to check on something related to my field of study for the following week. Settling myself at a corner of one of the large desks, where the sunlight from the nearby window fell across me, I flipped through recently arrived foreign journals. I could not find what I wanted, however, so I had to keep going back to the shelves. Finally I came across the article I was after and set about avidly reading. At this point someone on the other side of the desk softly called my name. Raising my eyes, I discovered K standing there. He leaned forward over the desk toward me, his face close to mine. It is library etiquette not to disturb nearby readers, so K’s action was perfectly reasonable, but on this occasion it strangely unnerved me.
“Are you studying?” he asked in a low voice.
“I have to look something up,” I replied.
His face still hovered close to mine. In the same low voice he asked if I would come out for a walk.
Yes, I replied, if he would wait just a little.
“I’ll wait,” he said, and sank down on the chair directly in front of me.
This had the effect of distracting me so much that I found it impossible to concentrate anymore. The conviction seized me that he had something up his sleeve and had come to discuss things with me. I was driven to lay down my journal and rise.
“Finished?” K serenely inquired, seeing me begin to get to my feet.
“It’s not important,” I answered. I returned the journal, and we left the library together.
We had no particular destination in mind, so we walked through Tatsuoka-chō to Ikenohata and on into Ueno Park. There K suddenly broached the subject that lay between us. All things considered, it seemed obvious that he had invited me out for a walk for this purpose. But he still showed no evidence of moving toward a plan of action. “What do you think?” he asked. What he wanted to know was how I saw him, knowing the depths of love to which he had succumbed. He was, in other words, seeking a critical evaluation of his present state.
I could tell from this how unlike his usual self he was. Let me remind you that he had none of that weakness of character that makes most people concerned with what others are thinking. He had the kind of daring and courage that would simply press ahead once he’d decided something. I had all too vivid memories of this characteristic from the time of his family troubles, so the difference in his present behavior was quite clear to me.
Why was my opinion so important now? I asked him. The fact was, he was ashamed of his weakness, he replied in an unusually dejected voice. He was at a loss, no longer had a clear sense of things, so all he could do was seek a fair assessment from me. I cut in with a question—what did he mean by “at a loss”? He didn’t know whether to proceed or retreat, he explained. I pressed in another step, and asked whether he thought himself capable of retreat, if that was what he decided. Words now failed him. “It’s agony” was all he managed. And indeed he looked racked. If the person at issue had not been Ojōsan, I could have poured such a balm of soothing reassurances upon those poor tortured features. I flatter myself that I was born with a compassionate sympathy for others. Just then, however, I was a different person.