CHAPTER 102
I realized that two days or more had passed since Okusan had told K about our engagement. Nothing in K’s manner toward me had hinted that he knew anything, so I had remained unaware of it. I was now filled with respect for his composure, even though it was no doubt only superficial. By any standard, he was by far the better man. Though I’ve won through cunning, the real victory is his was the thought that spun in my head. How he must despise me! I said to myself, and I blushed with shame. Yet it mortified me to imagine going to K after all this and submitting to the inevitable humiliation.
Floundering in indecision, I finally put off the question of what to do until the next day. This was Saturday evening.
That night, however, K killed himself.
I still shudder at the memory of finding him there. I usually slept with my head facing east, but for some reason—fate, perhaps—that evening I had laid out my bedding to face the opposite direction.1 I was awakened in the night by a chill draft blowing in on my face. Opening my eyes, I saw that the sliding doors between our two rooms, which were normally closed, stood slightly ajar, just as they had when he appeared there some nights earlier.
This time, however, K’s dark figure was not standing in the doorway. As if with a sudden presentiment, I propped myself on one elbow and peered tensely into his room. The lamp had burned low. The bedding was laid out. But the edge of the quilt was thrown back. And there was K, slumped forward with his back to me.
I called out to him. There was no response. “Is something wrong?” I called again. But his body remained motionless. I leaped up and went to the doorway. Standing there, I surveyed his room by the lamp’s faint light.
My first feeling was almost the same as the initial shock his sudden confession of love had given me. I took in the room with a single sweeping glance, and then my gaze froze—my eyeballs stared in their sockets as if made of glass. I stood rooted to the spot. When this first gale of shock had blown through me, my next thought was Oh god, it’s all over. The knowledge that this was irredeemable shot its black blaze through my future and for an instant lit with terrifying clarity all the life that lay before me. Then I began to tremble.
But even in this extremity I could not forget about myself. My eyes fell on a letter lying on the desk. It was addressed to me, as I had guessed. Frantically, I tore open the seal. But I was not prepared for what I read there. I had assumed that this letter would say things deeply painful for me to read, and I was terrified at how Okusan and Ojōsan would despise me if they saw it. A quick glance instantly relieved me, however. Saved! I thought. (In fact, of course, it was only my reputation that was saved, but how others saw me was a matter of immense importance just then.)
The letter was simple and contained nothing specific. He was committing suicide, he wrote, because he was weak and infirm of purpose, and because the future held nothing for him. With a few brief words he thanked me for all I had done for him. As a final request, he asked me to see to his affairs after his death. He also asked me to apologize to Okusan for the trouble he was causing her and to inform his family. The letter was a series of simple statements of essential matters; the only thing missing was any mention of Ojōsan. I read it to the end and understood that K had deliberately avoided mentioning her.
But it was the letter’s final words that pierced my heart most keenly. With the last of the brush’s ink, he had added that he should have died sooner and did not know why he had lived so long.
I folded the letter with trembling hands and slid it back into its envelope. I replaced it carefully on the desk so that it would be clearly visible to the others. Then I turned and at last I saw the blood that had spurted over the sliding doors.