From Shiriuchi to Herai they took a bus whose front end stuck out rather like a hippopotamus head. It inched forward near full capacity, carrying many locals and their large bags. Everyone stared curiously at Totto and her family.
“Otsuru, otsuru!” passengers called out at their stops as they made their way from the back of the bus to the front. At first, Totto thought they were saying “ochiru,” as a warning that they or something else was about to fall, but then she realized it was the locals’ take on the word “oriru,” which means “to disembark.” Another fright came when the bus attendant announced, “Please wait for passengers to die before boarding the bus”—but that was only because the local term for “pass” sounded similar to the word Totto knew for “die.”
No matter how deep into the mountains they went, there always seemed to be another rice paddy or vegetable field around the next bend. Totto was still reeling at the discovery that there were people farming at such great heights when she saw a horse plodding along, led by its reins, carrying vegetables that hung from both sides of its body.
“Look! A horse!”
Horses were Totto’s third-favorite animal, right after dogs and foxes. She had once ridden in a horse-drawn carriage with her grandfather who was a doctor in Hokkaido, but this was the first time she’d seen a horse hauling goods on its back.
She poked her head out of the window to watch the creature, only to see what looked like large round dumplings plop to the ground from its rear. “Ew!” she blurted out. The man who sat behind her laughed uproariously. “What, never seen a horse before?” When she looked again, she spotted a trail of droppings, first big, then small, in the horse’s wake. They looked rather like balls of straw that had been hardened with dirt.
Totto kept wondering as they traveled along why people in the olden days had thought to live so deep in the mountains. It puzzled her every time the bus went up and down another hill, every time another passenger disembarked. Many of her fellow riders were elderly and bent over at the waist. Everyone wore the loose-fitting monpe work trousers, and some had hand towels around their necks while others had them wrapped around their heads. Their hands were all brown and wrinkled, with thick fingers—the hands of people who knew hard labor.
Totto and her family stepped off the bus at the stop that was said to be closest to the Tomb of Jesus. Not knowing where to go from there, they knocked on the door of a nearby house.
“Hello! Pardon me. We’re hoping to visit the Tomb of Jesus. Can you show us which way to go?” Mother called out at the entrance. A deeply sunburnt man trudged toward them from the back of the house.
“My, you came all this way with these children! The tomb’s close by. Here, I’ll show ya,” he offered, apparently quite used to such requests, and kindly suggested that they leave behind their bulky belongings.
Mother put her bags down and fastened Mari-chan to her back. Totto and Noriaki-chan took each other by the hand and started up the hill. As they walked, the man explained how before the war, visitors used to come from all around the country to pay their respects. He also told them about some local customs in Herai that shared similarities with Christianity.
“See, o’er there,” he pointed.
Following his finger, they saw a long, winding path leading up a small hill.
“There’re two burial mounds up there. One on the right’s for Christ, an’ the one on the left is for his younger brother Isukiri.”
Mother walked slowly up the stone steps. Someone had placed wildflowers on the mounds. She gazed at the one on the right, clasped her hands together in prayer at her chest, closed her eyes, and whispered, “Amen.” The sun shining on her back made her hair, which she’d pulled into a ponytail, appear to glitter. Beyond the graves was a cliff and they could hear a brook flowing nearby. The chirping of many little birds filled the air.
It was a moment of true peace. Totto stopped caring whether they were standing in front of the real tomb of Jesus Christ. A war had started, Meiji-chan had died, Daddy had been called up for duty, and they had been forced to leave their beloved house in Kitasenzoku with all the memories it held. They were not allowed to pray, complain, or cry, no matter what difficult circumstances befell them. But here in front of the grave, Mother looked totally serene.
The war would end one day. And they would all be able to live together as a family again.
Watching Mother pray, Totto felt a surge of energy she couldn’t quite explain. She wondered if Jesus Christ had in fact come to Japan. Totto had attended Sunday School since she was a child, but she had never heard of such a thing. She didn’t say anything to Mother about it, though.
As they descended the hill, they saw the kind man and a woman who must have been his wife waiting for them at the bus stop. The woman waved. At her feet were Totto and her family’s luggage. Clearly, the couple had estimated how long it would take for the four to return and carried their bags to the stop so they wouldn’t miss the bus.
“Thank you very, very much,” Mother bowed. Totto took it as a sign of good things to come that the first people they encountered in this unfamiliar place had been so generous. She, too, bowed to the smiling couple, then hopped aboard the bus.
As it happens, the tombs of Jesus Christ and his brother still exist in Herai today and have evidently become a popular tourist destination.