Kakemono

O Mmé San looked into her son’s eyes and saw that they were sad.

It was in the month of the plum-blossom, when throughout the length and breadth of Japan the soldiers of the Empire were daily leaving for the front; for the war with Russia had been declared, and the rich were giving of their wealth, the poor of their poverty, and every one of his sons. In Tokyo the rival newspapers had agreed to bury their political differences until the war was over. An Osaka merchant had offered his priceless art treasures for sale. On the western coast the poor fishermen, forbidden to fish in the sea of Japan because of the danger, sent a petition to the Government asking to be allowed to go out “as scouts.” Noble students on the far-off banks of the Sungari were risking an ignominious death as they crouched beneath dark bridges with dynamite in their hands. Everywhere, every one was giving, giving, giving. Even in this remote country town each day mothers saw their sons march away, and bid them a last “Sayonara.”

O Mmé San had been waiting many days, expecting, hoping, dreading, and to-night in the sad eyes of her son she read the long delayed summons. “He has heard at last,” she thought. And for one moment her heart grew very tender over this, her fatherless son, her only boy.

Then she put away her weakness, for she was the wife and the daughter of samurai, and she knew that it was the proudest privilege of a warrior to fight for his lord, that it was the most sacred duty of her race to give her life and her son’s life to the Emperor. So, looking towards the curved swords of the family, which lay on the tokonoma, she began to talk of her husband, of the grim old samurai his fathers, and to tell old tales of battle and of death that made her boy’s eyes glisten, and then look sadder than before. But he said nothing, and O Mmé San wondered. She knew that he had been down to the Prefecture that morning. O Kiku San’s two sons had left last week, O Hana’s eldest was going to-morrow. Surely her boy must know when he was leaving, or why did his eyes look so sad?

Then she began to tell him of all the plans she had thought of for managing without him, for they were poor. And at last her son looked up, and said, very gently as he took her hand:

“Honourably trouble not; as for leaving, it is not for me.”

And this time it was O Mmé San’s turn to be silent.

When dinner was over her son went out to his work, and O Mmé San wondered and wondered. The wife and daughter of a samurai she was eager to give, give even her only son for Dai Nippon, and the Son of Heaven. And yet her boy was not going, what could it mean?

It was O Hana San who brought the answer. O Hana came in, very proud and pleased to tell all the last news about her eldest and his regiment.

“They say these Russians are seven feet high,” she said, as they sat opposite one another on the kneeling cushions sipping tea, “and that they never wash. And, just think, over there in Chō-sen (Korea) everything is still frozen.”

O Mmé San listened. “A warrior is always warm enough when he fights,” she said, looking at the long curved swords which lay on the tokonoma.

O Hana San followed her glance. There were no swords at home on her tokonoma.

“Oh! fighting’s very different nowadays,” she said. “My boy hasn’t got a sword at all. They only carry guns now.”

For O Hana was not above a certain feeling of pleasure at getting even with a samurai.

O Mmé San bowed, and gently offered more tea.

“That is the Emperor’s will,” she said, in her soft, low voice. “My son will also carry a gun.”

“But your son isn’t going,” cried O Hana San. “Didn’t you know? The Prefect said yesterday something about the law of the Emperor forbidding it. I forget why.” And she gave a little giggle of pride at the idea of her son going to the war when the son of a samurai must stay at home.

O Mmé San’s hands trembled as she poured more tea into the tiny bowls, but her voice was as low and as gentle as ever, and she did not abate one bow or one word of politeness; but how glad she was when O Hana was gone! She sat back on her heels after her last bow, her face flushed with anger. The Emperor would not take her son! O Hana must be mistaken. It could not be true. But “the Prefect said.” Then she would go and ask the Prefect. And O Mmé San got up resolute.

The Prefect was very busy, and refused at first to see her, but, with the softest and gentlest politeness, O Mmé San still persisted, and at last she was admitted into the ugly “foreign” room where the Prefect, in a frock-coat and tweed trousers, sat on a “foreign” chair. O Mmé San sat on the edge of hers and held her kimono tightly with both hands. She was not used to chairs.

“You wish to know when Suzuki Tetsutarō leaves for the front. Honourably please to wait a moment.”

O Mmé San waited. The Prefect, deep in his work, almost forgot her. Something in the tremulous way in which she had spoken made him think she was afraid for her boy; and he was a stern man, with the sternest ideas of duty to the Emperor. So when the answer came back to him, he turned to her somewhat coldly.

“Suzuki Tetsutarō is exempt from service. It is the will of the Emperor that the only son of a widow shall stay and take care of his mother.”

A great light sprang into O Mmé San’s eyes. “Honourably please to say is that the reason?” she asked, bowing low.

The Prefect looked at her, at the strange light shining in her eyes; and in his heart he regretted the old stern times when samurai mothers sent out their sons to fight to victory or to death.

“That is the reason,” he said, and he bowed her out.

That night O Mmé San did not sleep. She sat up looking at the curved swords of her fathers and thinking.

She knew now why her son’s eyes were sad. The Son of Heaven, in his graciousness, had wished to spare the widow’s son, but—but a subject’s duty was to give, give all, give himself, give everything that was most precious to him; above all, a samurai boy must not stay at home when peasants’ sons went out to fight. And in the quiet night, with the blossoming plum-tree stretching like a white wing above the house, Mmé thought.

This gentle, soft-voiced woman, tender as the white blossoms overhead from which she took her name, was delicate as they; but in her soul there dwelt that subtle, untouched fragrance, the sense, of sacrifice and duty, which, like the scent of the blossoming plum-tree, penetrated all things. Brought up on the “greater” and “the lesser learning,” in the strict rule of the three obediences—to father, husband, son—O Mmé San had lived her simple life, a loving, tender woman, exquisite in grace and courtesy; but in her heart there burned that ecstatic faith and fealty which we have never truly known, but call by the cold name of loyalty. So she sat there and thought in the still, dark night, and all the thoughts and feelings of the dead, all their resolutions and impulses, stirred back to life in her all the long line of her samurai fathers, who had fought and died, the yet longer line of patient mothers, who had endured and given their sons, husbands, fathers, called to her. They were not dead nor sleeping. They were alive in her. She sat and listened as their lives thrilled through her in the silence, and their voices spoke aloud within her soul. It seemed a simple thing to sacrifice herself. She had no fear of death, rather a great desire. No haunting fear of Purgatory or Hell beset her. Even the all-loving Buddha was forgotten; she trusted to the older gods to-night—Amaterasu, the great Sun-Goddess, from whom the Son of Heaven himself descended. Beyond the shadow of this life the great gods lived, and all the long line of her fathers stood waiting to welcome her. When she slipped into that light her son’s father himself would stoop to take her hand, content that she had proved herself worthy to be a warrior’s wife.

The snow-white mmé, the blossoming plum-tree, stirred in the cold night wind. “Chastity, purity and strength, womanly strength,” it whispered, and its pale soft blossoms sighed. The fragrance of them floated by in the chill spring air; floated wide from end to end of Great Japan.

“Strength, womanly strength,” it said, and O Mmé San looked up and smiled, a little sad, sweet smile. For the strength of a woman lies in the sacrifice of herself. And getting up she went to look at her boy tossing in his sleep.

Then she too slept, for she knew what she had to do; and Shinigawa, the Lord of Death-Desire, drew near and touched her as she slept.

It was nearly dusk the next evening before everything was prepared. All her son’s clothes mended and ready, the house put straight, the letter written, telling her boy quite simply that, having learned the reason why the Emperor in his graciousness would not take him for his soldier, she had taken her own life that he might be free to fight. On her knees she thanked the gracious Tenshisama, but her son and her son’s life were his not hers.

Then she sharpened her dagger, and when O Mmé San felt its edge was keen enough, she knelt down on the matting, took off her long silken under-girdle, and tied it carefully around her knees, for a samurai woman must lie modestly even in death. Then she felt in her throat for the artery, and with one quick thrust drove the dagger home.

The Prefect was sitting with his family that evening when Suzuki Tetsutarō came to the house. He carried a paper in his hand, and he was trembling.

“Honourably please to take notice,” he said, “that I am qualified to serve, for my mother is dead.” And he handed the Prefect the paper.

When he had read it the stern official turned to the lad.

“The detachment has not yet left for headquarters,” he said, writing rapidly as he spoke. “Go straight to the station. Give this card to the officer in charge. I will bury your mother and perform the rites.”

Then he laid his hand on the boy’s shoulder. “Suzuki Tetsutarō,” he said, “your mother was worthy of her race. Go, that her spirit may have peace.”

So Suzuki Tetsutarō went straight to the front.