Here Kandata was rising and sinking with the other sinners in the Pond
of Blood on the floor of Hell.
It was pitch black everywhere, and when sometimes a glimpse was caught
of something rising from that darkness, it turned out to be the gleam
of the needle of the dread Hari-no-Yama, so it was inexpressibly
forbidding. Moreover the stillness of the grave reigned everywhere, and
the only thing that could at times be heard was the faint sighing of
the sinners.
This was because such sinners as had come down to this spot had already
been tired out by the other manifold tortures of Hell and had lost even
the strength to cry aloud.
So, great robber though he was, Kandata, also suffocated with the
blood, could do nothing but struggle in the pond like a dying frog.
But his time came. One day when Kandata lifted his head by chance and
looked up at the sky above the Pond of Blood, he saw a silver spider’s
thread slipping down toward him from the high, high heavens, glittering
slightly in the silent darkness just as if it feared the eyes of man.
When he saw this, his hands clapped themselves for joy. If, clinging to
this thread, he climbed as far as it went, he could surely escape from
Hell.
Nay, if all went well, he might even enter Paradise. Then he would
never be driven on to Hari-no-Yama nor sunk in the Pond of Blood.
As soon as these thoughts came into his mind, he grasped the thread
tightly in his two hands and began to climb up and up with all his
might.
Because he was a great robber, he had long been thoroughly familiar
with such things.
But Hell is nobody-knows-how-many myriads of miles removed from
Paradise and, strive as he might, he could not easily get out. After
climbing for a while, he was finally exhausted and could not ascend an
inch higher.
So since he could do nothing else, he stopped to rest and, hanging to
the thread, looked far, far down below him. Now since he had climbed
with all his might, the Pond of Blood where he had just been was
already, much to his surprise, hidden deep down in the darkness. And
the dread Hari-no-Yama glittered dimly under him. If he went up at this
rate, he might get out of Hell more easily than he had thought.
With his hand twisted into the spider’s thread, Kandata laughed and
cried out in a voice such as he had not uttered during all the years
since coming here, “Success! Success!”
But suddenly he noticed that below on the thread countless sinners were
climbing eagerly after him, up and up, just like a procession of ants.
When he saw this, Kandata simply blinked his eyes for a moment, with
his big mouth hanging foolishly open in surprise and terror.
How could that slender spider’s thread, which seemed as if it must
break even with him alone, ever support the weight of all those people?
If it should break in midair, even he himself, after all his effort
in reaching this spot, would have to fall headlong back into Hell. It
would be terrible if such a thing happened.
But meanwhile hundreds and thousands of sinners were squirming out of
the dark Pond of Blood and climbing with all their might in a line up
the slender glittering thread. If he did not do something quickly, the
thread was sure to break in two and fall. So Kandata cried out in a
loud voice,
“Here, you sinners! This spider’s thread is mine. Who on earth gave you
permission to come up it? Get down! Get down!”
Just at that moment, the spider’s thread, which had shown no sign of
breaking up to that time, suddenly broke with a snap at the point where
Kandata was hanging.
So he was helpless. Without time to utter a cry, he shot down and fell
headlong into the darkness, spinning swiftly round and round like a top.
Afterwards, only the spider’s thread of Paradise, glittering and
slender, hung short in the moonless and starless sky.