LITMIR.BIZ

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terrible... to be hated," he said, stopping momentarily to regulate his breathing. Then he recounted the dream he had the night before.

      He had become a leper. The offensive odor given off by his mouth and body made him unbearable to his wife. Seeing her frightened face fill with hatred, he felt he was losing his mind. She ran away and he pursued her, catching her, holding her tight, that terrible odor coming out of his mouth and from his body so that he had finally become aware of his own stench. She spat at him, cursing him, then fled. His loneliness had made him cry out.

      "When I woke up and found I'd only been dreaming, I felt I was lucky not to have leprosy. I really felt relieved my sickness was just ordinary."

      "That's all you dream about, isn't it?" she said. She looked tense as she prepared our tea. She was trying to smile but couldn't.

      "My dream's about Karajima. I murder him in my dream."

      She spoke casually, but her words sounded theatrical, melodramatic. They had the false ring of something feminine. Her husband's eyes became even more dismal.

      "Mr. Sugi!" he suddenly cried out in a high thin voice. "I can't believe her! While Karajima's alive, I can't believe anything she says!"

      Again he began crying. This time he didn't try to stifle it, crying openly, strange sounds in his throat mixed in with his words.

      "You shouldn't talk like that in front of Mr. Sugi! It's too cruel! It's too much!"

      "You keep on lying, that's why!"

      "No matter what I say, you take it as a lie! I can't go on living like that!"

      "You're living, aren't you? Aren't you living without a care in the world?"

      His crying, staccato-like voice was a sick man's. But her tearful voice, even as she tried to suppress it, was bursting with the vigor of youth. Those two sobbing voices continued, sometimes intermingling, sometimes separating.

      I took out one of the imported cigarettes I had received the day before. I had no matches, and she quickly pulled out a box of foreign-make from her pocket. She smiled, embarrassed by the tears on her cheeks.

      "Oh, your tea's cold! Well, I'll serve you a nice lunch!"

      I begged off since I wasn't feeling well. "It's my stomach."

      "You're not going home!"

      Her husband stopped crying, his expression changed, I imagined, since he thought I was about to leave at that moment. The look of sadness in his eyes seemed to indicate he didn't know what to do. It was as if I had suddenly struck him.

      "I guess it's unpleasant to see something like this. But please stay. Just a little longer. We've no one to rely on. You're the only one we can trust."

      "Oh, it hasn't been that unpleasant. It's just that I—" I wanted to say I couldn't stand being trusted. But I stopped for that would have sounded phony. In a situation of this sort, no matter how seriously I might have used such words, they would have been superficial. I had long stopped being in dead earnest about anything.

      The couple recovered their composure and reverted to small talk. I sat ten more minutes before standing up.

      "Can I join you for lunch next time? Frankly, the oysters I ate last night didn't agree with me."

      The invalid was resigned, yet satisfied. A gentle expression was on his face.

      "Please come again. I'll be waiting."

      "I will. I'm glad I came. I like you both, more than I thought I would. I've really felt close to you."

      That was true. I had sensed that they had been ashamed of themselves, that they were grappling, however hopelessly, with life in all seriousness. They had suffered between themselves long enough. After my words I saw a genuine look of pleasure light up the man's eyes. It wasn't an exaggeration to call it that. For quite a while I hadn't seen anything that simple and straightforward. He automatically offered me his thin hand, but he pulled it back fearfully.

      She came with me when I was going downstairs. As she went alongside me, she was almost touching me.

      "I was delighted you came today," she said, turning at once to face me before opening the downstairs door.

      It seemed odd to hear her say, "Don't desert us, please. If you do, we won't forgive you! My husband will hold a grudge against you, and so will I!" Her words didn't sound that flippant, for apparently she had really given some thought to not being taken lightly. In fact, I found her words strangely profound.

      "Don't be disgusted with me. Please protect me. Lend me some of your strength, and I'll come back to life again." She suddenly lowered her voice. "He may even die tomorrow. Understand?" Her eyelids narrowed over her eyes, which, ablaze with fever, were riveted on me.

      As I went out the iron gate, firecrackers were going off everywhere, ringing in my ears. The next day would be the old calendar New Year. Red streamers were posted on the pillars and doors of every house. Some of the streamers had already been torn to shreds and were fluttering in the dust along the streets. Those fluttering scraps looked strangely vivid among the withered leaves and trash. A mother with her baby bundled up in a red cloth rode by on a rickshaw. Somehow those red colors seemed warm, mystical. As I walked back, I saw only the vivid reds of the festival. Men and women sat or walked or gathered in groups, their hands and faces dirty, their blue clothing worn out, filthy. Those men and women were trying to greet the New Year in some small way. For the first time apparently, I discovered that all these Chinese were living together, indifferent to me and other Japanese.

      When I knocked at the back door, my landlady opened it. She smiled and then brought out a bottle of sake for me. If was a gift from the Japanese Self-Governing Council.

      "You can celebrate the New Year," she said.

      I took the bottle and went up to my room. The sake was sweet and thick. That night I had to finish a detailed report on a confiscated Japanese factory. I had to write in English or Chinese the name, serial number, and value of at least two hundred different kinds of precision machines. A catalogue and dictionary were on my crate. I made up my mind to buy some navel oranges with part of my fee. I would bring them as a gift when I visited the invalid.

      By evening I was half-finished. I was drunk and tired. I felt a pain in my side, and my fingers could hardly move. My eyes kept getting weaker. Some men came into the alley to sell bread. A few came with pastry. All of them were Japanese reduced to becoming peddlers. No one bought anything from them.

      Aoki dropped in. He wrote editorials for a Japanese newspaper.

      "Why haven't you been to the Art Association meetings?"

      "I haven't felt like it."

      "The day after tomorrow the Cultural Division of the Chinese Control Office is calling everyone together. How about coming with me?"

      "Can't. I've got documents to do." I couldn't help feeling how superficial the word "culture" was. Aoki kept on talking about the Chinese People's Court and other topics. They didn't interest me either. All I could think about were those yellow oranges I had seen, lustreless, piled high.

      When Aoki left, I crawled into bed and tried to doze off. It was windy out, and someone kept knocking at the back door. I had a hunch it was for me. It was annoying to be plagued with callers. I heard a woman's voice. The thought rushing through me that she had come drove away my heavy, uncomfortable drowsiness. I sat up in bed. She was coming, coming! I was drunk. There was no telling how callous or even violent I would become.

      She opened the door, and I heard her brown raincoat rustling, her outer clothing visible through it. Small drops of water sparkled minutely on her coat. "Just a second!" she said. She stepped over my bedding on the mats, unfastened the window, and quietly opened it. The dark grating was drenched with rain. "It's all right. He didn't follow me." She closed the window after peering down into the alley. "I bumped into Karajima on the street. I told him I was going to your place, and he said he'd come with me. I broke away from him and ran here."

      Her wet cheeks were pale. She

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