The Tale of Genji

  She had a little house for the times when she might need to respect a directional taboo. It was in the Sanjō district and very pretty, but it was not fully furnished yet because it was not quite finished. “Oh, dear, what a time I am having with you!” she said. “What is the point of living at all when absolutely nothing goes right? If I had only myself to look after, I would just disappear somewhere and be a nobody. As for this connection with Her Highness, people will think us perfectly ridiculous if we get too close to her, when her father used to make me so angry, and then something really dreadful happens. Oh, it is awful! This place is not very nice, I know, but please stay here, and do not let anyone know where you are. I will manage something for you somehow.” She prepared to go.

  Her daughter burst into tears and made a very sad sight as she reflected despondently on her dwindling prospects in life. The mother was of course even sorrier to imagine her going to waste and longed to see her safely settled after all, but after that dismal incident she worried that the whole world might now call her daughter shameless. Despite understanding a good deal, she tended still to be irritable and to act on her own whim. She might manage to keep her out of sight at the Hitachi residence, but she hated to hide her that way and had chosen this course instead. Still, they had never been apart for all those years, and both were now disconsolate. They had always been together day and night.

  “The house is not really safe yet in this state,” she said. “Remember that. Have all the things brought out and use them. I have left orders for guards to be on duty at night, but I am quite worried even so. It is just that it is so unpleasant at home, with the Governor furious and fed up with me as he is.” She left in tears.

  The Governor took the Lieutenant for a priceless jewel, and as he prepared to receive him in that spirit, he was angry with his wife for failing most deplorably to join in the effort. To her, however, the Lieutenant was the detestable cause of all her troubles. She reviled the man, considering the present plight of her priceless jewel, and she was very little help indeed. He had looked like nothing beside His Highness, and that had so lowered him in her esteem that despite having once meant to treat him as a treasure, she was now quite finished with that idea.

  I wonder what he looks like in my house, she thought; I have never seen him at his ease. She therefore went to peer in at him in the middle of the day, when he was quietly there with his new wife. He was near the veranda, looking into the garden and wearing plum red over soft white silk twill. He looked quite handsome. What was wrong with him?

  Her daughter, not yet fully grown, lay innocently beside him. They made a disappointing pair beside her memory of Their Highnesses side by side. He was joking with the women nearby. Relaxed like this, he was not the insipid embarrassment that she had seen, and she had just decided that that Lieutenant must have been someone else when he said, “His Highness of War of course has especially beautiful hagi. I wonder where he got the seeds. The fronds are just like these, but they have exceptional charm. I was there the other day, but I never managed to pick any because he was just on his way out. He was humming ‘when one mourns just to see them fade’;35 I wish I could have let you young women see him! Then he made a poem of his own.”

  Well, well, she found herself whispering, so that is what he has to say for himself! Why, he is worthless, and yes, he does make a pathetic spectacle. How dare he spout poems? Still, he seemed not to be completely illiterate, and she thought that she might try him. She sent him,

  “You claimed for your own a little hagi plant whose fronds, above, keep their grace;

  tell me, then, what sort of dew has wilted the ones below?”36

  This gave him a pang of guilt.

  “Alas, had I known the young hagi plant to spring from Miyagi Moor,

  not for anything at all would I have aspired elsewhere.37

  I should like very much to explain myself to you in person,” he replied.

  He must have heard about His Highness, she said to herself; and she could think of nothing but making her beloved daughter the equal of her half sister. Somehow the figure of the Commander kept returning fondly to mind. She had thought him as splendid as His Highness, for whom she no longer had any use at all; it infuriated her to think how contemptuously the man had imposed himself on her daughter. The Commander, on the other hand, had refrained from making any hasty approaches, even though in truth he was keen on her. What remarkable discretion! She was impressed, and now that he was always on her mind, she reflected, A young woman would, then, obviously think of him even more. I should be ashamed of myself for ever having wanted that horrid fellow! Nothing mattered to her but her daughter, and she lapsed easily into reverie, during which she imagined everything turning out well after all—a thoroughly unlikely prospect, for, she reminded herself, he is of lofty birth and of very great personal distinction, and the lady he has accepted is no more commonplace than he. What could possibly attract him to my daughter? Judging from what I gather of the way people are, worth or lack of it, distinction or vulgarity, all depends on birth, and likewise looks and wit. Look at my own children! Are they anything like this one? Everyone in this house thinks the Lieutenant a wonder, but now that I have seen him after His Highness, I know all too well how dreary he is. And she—what could she do but feel awe and shame in the sight of someone who now has the Emperor's cherished daughter? Her mind was wandering.

  The unfinished house offered little to do, the greenery in the garden was depressing, the only people going in and out had uncouth, Eastern accents, and there was not a single flower to look at anywhere. The days and nights followed one another amid these untidy, cheerless surroundings, and meanwhile the young woman dwelled on the memory of Her Highness, whom she missed in her youthful way. Impressions of that most importunate presence came back to her, too. What were all those things he was saying? He had talked on so long and so sweetly! And the delicious smell he left behind him—she felt as though it was with her still. The frightening memory came back as well.

  Her mother wrote her a most touching letter. She seemed extremely anxious about her and very sorry, but her daughter could hardly believe that anything would come of it. She began to cry. “You must feel so bored there and so out of place!” her mother had written. “Please put up with it a little longer, though”; in answer to which she wrote, “Why should I be bored? It is very nice here.

  A pure joy to me it would be, and nothing else, if I only knew

  that the place where I am now was not in the world at all.”38

  At these lines, so like a young girl's, she burst into tears. It was hard, having to send her away like this and make her so unhappy! She replied,

  “Seek out if you will somewhere very far away from this sorry world,

  yet I would still wish to see honor for you and just praise.”

  This exchange of quite commonplace sentiments gave comfort to both.

  The Commander often lay awake at night, as was usual for him when late autumn approached, filled with sad thoughts of one whom he could never forget, and the news that the temple was finished therefore prompted him to go to Uji in person. He had not been there for so long that the colored leaves on the hills were a wonder to him. The main house, at first dismantled, had been magnificently rebuilt. He remembered how frugally His Late Highness had lived there, and he missed him enough to wish that he had changed nothing. This left him in a more than usually thoughtful mood. The original, thoroughly sober furnishings as well as the daintier, more feminine ones, all quite unusual, from the sisters' part of the house had gone to serve in the monks' lodges together with such larger, more practical items as palm-leaf screens. He had had new furnishings nicely made, in a style suitable for a mountain villa, and now that they were in place, the house looked very handsome and elegant.

  He sat on a rock beside the garden brook and sighed.

  “Why should this clear stream, running on so forever, not even retain

  the insubstantial image of dear faces long since gone?”

  He brushed away his tears and went to talk to the nun Ben. At the sight of his visible distress she, too, looked as though she would weep. He sat for a while leaning on the lintel, and they talked with the edge of the blind between them raised. Ben remained out of sight behind a standing screen.

  “I gather that a young woman you know has been at His Highness's recently,” he said when their conversation gave him an opening to do so. “I felt too awkward to go and visit her there, though. Please continue to convey my messages.”

  “I had a letter from her mother the other day,” Ben replied. “Apparently she has been moving here and there because of a directional taboo. Lately the poor thing has been in hiding in a curious little house. She would bring her here, where she feels that she would be quite safe, if only the place were a little closer; but the steep mountain trails on the way give her pause. That is what she wrote.”

  “People are always afraid of those mountain trails, but I never tire of coming here! I am overcome when I think what sort of tie from past lives may explain it.” As so often, there were tears in his eyes. “Very well, then,” he went on, “please get in touch with her at her refuge. You do not plan to go there yourself, by any chance?”

  “I can easily send her a message from you there, but I am quite reluctant to see the City; I never even go to call at His Highness's.”

  “But why? It would be all very well if your trip were likely to start people talking, but surely even the holy men of Mount Atago39 leave the mountain now and again. What is holy is to break a great vow to assist a layman in need.”

  “Saving someone else is too much for me, and besides, there would certainly be unpleasant talk.” She was clearly troubled.

  “But this is the perfect tim
e!” He was unusually insistent. “I shall send you a carriage the day after tomorrow. You must find out exactly where she is. I promise not to misbehave.” He smiled.

  I do not like this, she thought. What does he intend? Still, he was not a man to do anything rash or ill considered, and she knew that he would be discreet for her sake, too. “Very well, then, I will do it. She is apparently not far from where you live. She must have a letter from you first. Otherwise, if she gets the impression that I started all this, she may think me an officious old Iga matchmaker,40 and I would not want that.”

  “A letter is easy; the trouble is the way people talk. For all I know, they may decide that the Right Commander now aspires to marry the daughter of the Governor of Hitachi. I gather that the man likes to assert himself.” Ben sympathized with a bitter smile.

  He left at dark. On the way he had autumn leaves and woodland flowers picked so that he could give them to Her Highness his wife. He was quite good about such things, but he treated her with formal constraint, and it does not appear that he and she were very close. He granted her the highest respect, however, since His Majesty had spoken to Her Cloistered Highness about the matter, as any father might have done. It made things difficult for him to have so many tricky private concerns on top of all that he had to do to satisfy these two.

  Very early on the appointed day, he sent off a favorite junior retainer and an ox driver chosen because no one knew him. “Get some country people from my estates to fill out the escort,” he said.

  The nun got ready and boarded the carriage, despite her very great reluctance, since he had told her that she simply must go. Seeing the hills and moors brought all sorts of old memories to mind, and she arrived at the end of a day spent lost in thought. Her carriage was drawn in to a thoroughly deserted spot, and she announced her arrival through the man who had guided her to the house. A young person who had been on the pilgrimage to Hatsuse came out and helped her to alight.

  After dreary days and nights in this distressing place, the young woman she had come to see was delighted by the arrival of someone with whom she could talk over the past, and she readily invited her in; after all, the nun had served her father, and she had no doubt that they would soon be close. “I have treasured the memory of our first meeting, and you have never been out of my mind,” the nun began, “but since I have renounced the world, I do not even call on Her Highness. Nevertheless, the Commander insisted so strenuously that I made up my mind to come after all.” The young woman and her nurse, whom he had so impressed, were grateful for this evidence that he had not forgotten, but they were startled nonetheless by his swiftness to act.

  The evening was all but over when a discreet rapping at the gate announced the arrival of a messenger from Uji. Ben suspected who it was, but she nevertheless had the gate opened. To everyone's surprise a carriage was led in.

  “I should like to speak to my lady the nun.” The man had been instructed to announce himself as the steward of one of the Commander's nearby estates. Ben slipped out to the doorway. A light rain was falling, and an icy wind blew in raindrops accompanied by an indescribably delicious fragrance. Ah, so it was he! He was a figure to make a girl's heart beat fast, and they felt caught out not to be ready for him; in fact, his arrival was so unexpected that they were quite upset. “What is going on?” they asked each other.

  “I have come to tell you, undisturbed, all the feelings that have so filled my heart for months now.” Such was the message he gave the nun for her.

  What can I possibly say to him? The young woman was plainly at a loss, and her nurse took pity on her. “Now that he is here, you cannot possibly send him away again just like that,” she said. “I shall secretly inform your mother. It is no distance, you know.”

  “That is silly!” Ben interjected. “Why do that? Just because two young people want to talk, that hardly means that all of a sudden they are going to be everything to each other! His lordship is an extraordinarily patient, circumspect man, and he would never take any liberties that had not been granted him.”

  Meanwhile it was raining somewhat harder, and the sky was very dark. The guards were making their rounds, calling to each other in their strange accents.

  “The wall there to the southeast has collapsed—it's a spot to watch.”

  “If we're going to get that carriage in, let's do it and shut the gate.”

  “The men in the visitor's escort are so slow!”

  To the Commander all this sounded quite strange and rather alarming. He sat at the edge of the rustic veranda, humming “there is not one house at Sano ford!”41

  “Are the weeds so thick that they wholly bar your gate, O eastern cottage—

  too long, too long I waited while the pouring rain came down!”42

  The little breezes he made as he brushed off the raindrops carried a striking scent that must have astonished the country folk from the East.

  Sliding door

  He could not possibly be put off with excuses, and they therefore admitted him after preparing a seat in the southern aisle. When their mistress turned out to be reluctant to receive him, they made her move forward toward him and then slightly opened the locked sliding door. “I deplore the Hida carpenter who made this door. Never before have I been on the wrong side of one like this,”43 he complained; and then, somehow, in he came. He never mentioned seeking the doll image of someone else. He only said, “I have wanted you, you know, ever since to my surprise I glimpsed you through a crack. This must be destiny at work. It is extraordinary how much you mean to me!” This seems to be the sort of thing he told her. She was so very sweet and gentle that he was deeply touched and found her thoroughly worthy.

  In no time it felt as though day must have broken, but no cock crowed, and all sorts of drawling voices passed in the nearby avenue, hawking things that meant nothing to him. They looked to him like demons, bearing their wares on their heads that way in the first light of dawn, but the novelty of a night spent among these weeds was delightful as well.

  There came sounds of guards opening the gate and leaving. When he heard the other men come in and lie down, he called for his carriage to be brought to the double doors. Then he picked her up and put her in it. Her women were aghast. It was all so sudden! “But, my lord,” they protested, “it is the ninth month!44 This is not right! What are you doing?”

  The nun Ben had not foreseen this, and she felt very upset, but she did what she could to calm them. “Obviously his lordship has his own plans,” she said. “Please set your minds at rest. Ninth month or not, tomorrow, I hear, is the equinox.”45 It was the thirteenth of the month.

  “I cannot come with you now,” she told him. “Her Highness might learn that I have been in the City, and it would then be extremely tactless of me to go back again without telling her.”

  “I would prefer you to make your apologies later,” the Commander insisted, embarrassed to think of anyone telling Her Highness quite yet. “Besides, I will need your help when we get there.”

  “Would someone else please come, too?” he added. The nun got in with Jijū, who was particularly close to her mistress. The nurse, the page girl who had come with Ben, and the others remained behind, feeling quite stunned.

  Ben assumed that they had not far to go, but it turned out that they were off to Uji. The Commander had provided for a change of oxen. By daybreak they had left the bank of the Kamo River and reached Hōshōji.46 Now that Jijū could see him a little, she forgot every demand of decent manners and gave in to rapt and longing wonder.