Three days have passed. Night is closing, in an apartment which has
been mine since yesterday. Yves and I, on the first floor, move
restlessly over the white mats, striding up and down the great bare
room, of which the thin, dry flooring cracks beneath our footsteps; we
are both of us rather irritated by prolonged expectation. Yves, whose
impatience shows itself the most freely, from time to time takes a
look out of the window. As for myself, a chill suddenly seizes me, at
the idea that I have chosen, and purpose to inhabit this lonely house,
lost in the midst of the suburb of a totally strange town, perched
high on the mountain and almost opening upon the woods.
What wild notion can have taken possession of me, to settle myself in
surroundings so utterly foreign and unknown, breathing of isolation
and sadness? The waiting unnerves me, and I beguile the time by
examining all the little details of the building. The woodwork of the
ceiling is complicated and ingenious. On the partitions of white paper
which form the walls, are scattered tiny, microscopic, blue-feathered
tortoises.
"They are late," said Yves, who is still looking out into the street.
As to being late, that they certainly are, by a good hour already, and
night is falling, and the boat which should take us back to dine on
board will be gone. Probably we shall have to sup, Japanese fashion
to-night, heaven only knows where. The people of this country have no
sense of punctuality, or of the value of time.
Therefore I continue to inspect the minute and comical details of my
dwelling. Here, instead of handles such as we should have put to pull
these movable partitions, they have made little oval holes, just the
shape of a finger-end, and into which one is evidently to put one's
thumb. These little holes have a bronze ornamentation, and on looking
closely, one sees that the bronze is curiously chased: here is a lady
fanning herself; there, in the next hole, is represented a branch of
cherry in full blossom. What eccentricity there is in the taste of
this people! To bestow assiduous labor on such miniature work, and
then to hide it at the bottom of a hole to put one's finger in,
looking like a mere spot in the middle of a great white panel; to
accumulate so much patient and delicate workmanship on almost
imperceptible accessories, and all to produce an effect which is
absolutely _nil_, an effect of the most utter bareness and nudity.
Yves still continues to gaze forth, like Sister Anne. From the side on
which he leans, my verandah overlooks a street, or rather a road
bordered with houses, which climbs higher and higher, and loses itself
almost immediately in the verdure of the mountain, in the fields of
tea, the underwood and the cemeteries. As for myself, this delay
finishes by irritating me for good and all, and I turn my glances to
the opposite side: the other front of my house, also a verandah, opens
first of all upon a garden; then upon a marvelous panorama of woods
and mountains, with all the venerable Japanese quarters of Nagasaki
lying confusedly like a black ant-heap, six hundred feet below us.
This evening, in a dull twilight, notwithstanding that it is a
twilight of July, these things are melancholy. There are great clouds
heavy with rain and showers, ready to fall, traveling across the sky.
No, I cannot feel at home, in this strange dwelling I have chosen; I
feel sensations of extreme solitude and strangeness; the mere prospect
of passing the night in it gives me a shudder of horror.
"Ah! at last, brother," said Yves, "I believe,--yes, I really believe
she is coming at last."
I look over his shoulder, and I see--a back view of a little doll the
finishing touches to whose toilette are being put in the solitary
street; a last maternal glance given to the enormous bows of the sash,
the folds at the waist. Her dress is of pearl-gray silk, her _obi_
(sash) of mauve satin; a sprig of silver flowers trembles in her black
hair; a parting ray of sunlight touches the little figure; five or six
persons accompany her. Yes! it is undoubtedly Mdlle. Jasmin; they are
bringing me my _fiancée_!
I rush to the ground floor inhabited by old Madame Prune my landlady,
and her aged husband; they are absorbed in prayer before the altar of
their ancestors.
"Here they are, Madame Prune," I cry in Japanese; "here they are!
Bring at once the tea, the lamp, the embers, the little pipes for the
ladies, the little bamboo pots for spittoons! Bring us as quickly as
possible all the accessories for my reception!"
I hear the front door open, and hasten upstairs again. Wooden clogs
are deposited on the floor, the staircase creaks gently under the
little bare feet. Yves and I look at each other, with a longing to
laugh.
An old lady enters,--two old ladies,--three old ladies, emerging from
the doorway one after another with jerking and mechanical
salutations, which we return as best we can, fully conscious of our
inferiority in this particular style. Then come persons of
intermediate age,--then quite young ones, a dozen at least, friends,
neighbors, the whole quarter in fact. And the whole company, on
arriving, becomes confusedly engaged in reciprocal salutations: I
salute you,--- you salute me,--I salute you again, and you return
it,--and I re-salute you again, and I express that I shall never,
never be able to return it according to your high merit,--and I bang
my forehead against the ground, and you stick your nose between the
planks of the flooring, and there they are, on all fours one before
the other; it is a polite dispute, all anxious to yield precedence as
to sitting down, or passing first, and compliments without end are
murmured in low tones, with faces against the floor.
They seat themselves at last, smiling, in a ceremonious circle; we two
remaining standing, our eyes fixed on the staircase. And at length
emerges, in due turn, the little aigrette of silver flowers, the ebony
chignon, the gray silk robe and mauve sash of Mdlle. Jasmin, my
fiancée!
Heavens! why, I know her already! Long before setting foot in Japan, I
had met with her, on every fan, on every tea-cup--with her silly air,
her puffy little visage, her tiny eyes, mere gimlet-holes above those
expanses of impossible pink and white which are her cheeks.
She is young, that is all I can say in her favor; she is even so young
that I should almost scruple to accept her. The wish to laugh quits me
suddenly, and instead, a profound chill fastens on my heart. What!
share even an hour of my life with that little doll? Never!
The next question is, how to get out of it?
She advances smiling, with an air of repressed triumph, and behind her
looms M. Kangourou, in his suit of gray tweed. Fresh salutes, and
behold her on all fours, she too, before my landlady and before my
neighbors. Yves, the big Yves, who is not going to be married, stands
behind me, with a comical grimace, hardly repressing his
laughter,--while to give myself time to collect my ideas, I offer tea
in little cups, little spittoons and embers to the company.
Nevertheless, my discomfited air does not escape my visitors. M.
Kangourou anxiously inquires:
"How do I like her?" And I reply in a low voice, but with great
resolution:
"Not at all! I won't have that one. Never!"
I believe that this remark was almost understood in the circle around
me. Consternation was depicted on every face, the jaws dropped, the
pipes went out. And now I address my reproaches to Kangourou: "Why had
he brought her to me in such pomp, before friends and neighbors of
both sexes, instead of showing her to me discreetly as if by chance,
as I had wished? What an affront he will compel me now to put upon all
these polite persons!"
The old ladies (the mamma no doubt and aunts), prick up their ears,
and M. Kangourou translates to them, softening as much as possible, my
heartrending decision. I feel really almost sorry for them; the fact
is, that for women who, not to put too fine a point upon it, have come
to sell a child, they have an air I was not prepared for: I can hardly
say an air of _respectability_ (a word in use with us, which is
absolutely without meaning in Japan), but an air of unconscious and
good-natured simplicity; they are only accomplishing an act perfectly
admissible in their world, and really it all resembles, more than I
could have thought possible, a _bonâ fide_ marriage.
"But what fault do I find with the little girl?" asks M. Kangourou, in
consternation.