added, ‘most regretful, sir.’”
“Ha-ha-ha! So that’s the point of the story? How very funny!” and the master, quite unlike his usual self, roars with laughter. His knees shake so much that I nearly tumble off. Paying no regard to my predicament, the master laughs and laughs. He seems suddenly deeply pleased to realize that he is not alone in being gulled by Andrea del Sarto.
“And then, as soon as we were out in the street, he said ‘You see, we’ve done well. That ploy about the moat-bells was really rather good, wasn’t it?’ and he looked as pleased as punch. I let it be known that I was lost in admiration, and so we parted. However, since by then it was well past the lunch-hour, I was nearly starving.”
“That must have been very trying for you.” My master shows, for the first time, a sympathy to which I have no objection. For a while there was a pause in the conversation and my purring could be heard by host and guest.
Mr. Beauchamp drains his cup of tea, now quite cold, in one quick gulp and with some formality remarks, “As a matter-of-fact I’ve come today to ask a favor from you.”
“Yes? And what can I do for you?” My master, too, assumes a formal face.
“As you know, I am a devotee of literature and art. . .”
“That’s a good thing,” replies my master quite encouragingly.
“Since a little while back, I and a few like-minded friends have got together and organized a reading group. The idea is to meet once a month for the purpose of continued studying in this field. In fact, we’ve already had the first meeting at the end of last year.”
“May I ask you a question? When you say, like that, a reading group, it suggests that you engage in reading poetry and prose in a singsong tone. But in what sort of manner do you, in fact, proceed?”
“Well, we are beginning with ancient works but we intend to consider the works of our fellow members.”
“When you speak of ancient works, do you mean something like Po Chu-i’s Lute Song?”
“No.”
“Perhaps things like Buson’s mixture of haiku and Chinese verse?”
“No.”
“What kinds of thing do you then do?”
“The other day, we did one of Chikamatsu’s lovers’ suicides.”
“Chikamatsu? You mean the Chikamatsu who wrote jōruri plays?” There are not two Chikamatsus. When one says Chikamatsu, one does indeed mean Chikamatsu the playwright and could mean nobody else. I thought my master really stupid to ask so fool a question. However, oblivious to my natural reactions, he gently strokes my head. I calmly let him go on stroking me, justifying my compliance with the reflection that so small a weakness is permissible when there are those in the world who admit to thinking themselves under loving observation by persons who merely happen to be cross-eyed.
Beauchamp answers, “Yes,” and tries to read the reaction on my master’s face.
“Then is it one person who reads or do you allot parts among you?”
“We allot parts and each reads out the appropriate dialogue. The idea is to empathize with the characters in the play and, above all, to bring out their individual personalities. We do gestures as well. The main thing is to catch the essential character of the era of the play. Accordingly, the lines are read out as if spoken by each character, which may perhaps be a young lady or possibly an errand-boy.”
“In that case it must be like a play.”
“Yes, almost the only things missing are the costumes and the scenery.”
“May I ask if your reading was a success?”
“For a first attempt, I think one might claim that it was, if anything, a success.”
“And which lovers’ suicide play did you perform on the last occasion?”
“We did a scene in which a boatman takes a fare to the red light quarter of Yoshiwara.”
“You certainly picked on a most irregular incident, didn’t you?” My master, being a teacher, tilts his head a little sideways as if regarding something slightly doubtful. The cigarette smoke drifting from his nose passes up by his ear and along the side of his head.
“No, it isn’t that irregular. The characters are a passenger, a boatman, a high-class prostitute, a serving-girl, an ancient crone of a brothel-attendant, and, of course, a geisha-registrar. But that’s all.” Beauchamp seems utterly unperturbed. My master, on hearing the words “a high-class prostitute,” winces slightly but probably only because he’s not well up in the meanings of such technical terms as nakai, yarite, and kemban. He seeks to clear the ground with a question. “Does not nakai signify something like a maid-servant in a brothel?”
“Though I have not yet given the matter my full attention, I believe that nakai signifies a serving-girl in a teahouse and that yarite is some sort of an assistant in the women’s quarters.” Although Beauchamp recently claimed that his group seeks to impersonate the actual voices of the characters in the plays, he does not seem to have fully grasped the real nature of yarite and nakai.
“I see, nakai belong to a teahouse while yarite live in a brothel. Next, are kemban human beings or is it the name of a place? If human, are they men or women?”
“Kemban, I rather think, is a male human being.”
“What is his function?”
“I’ve not yet studied that far. But I’ll make inquiries, one of these days.”
Thinking, in the light of these revelations, that the play-readings must be affairs extraordinarily ill-conducted, I glance up at my master’s face.
Surprisingly, I find him looking serious. “Apart from yourself, who were the other readers taking part?”
“A wide variety of people. Mr. K, a Bachelor of Law, played the high-class prostitute, but his delivery of that woman’s sugary dialogue through his very male mustache did, I confess, create a slightly queer impression. And then there was a scene in which this oiran was seized with spasms. . .”
“Do your readers extend their reading activities to the simulation of spasms?” asked my master anxiously.
“Yes indeed; for expression is, after all, important.” Beauchamp clearly considers himself a literary artist à l’outrance.
“Did he manage to have his spasms nicely?” My master has made a witty remark.
“The spasms were perhaps the only thing beyond our capability at such a first endeavor.” Beauchamp, too, is capable of wit.
“By the way,” asks my master, “what part did you take?”
“I was the boatman.”
“Really? You, the boatman!” My master’s tone was such as to suggest that, if Beauchamp could be a boatman, he himself could be a geisha-registrar. Switching his tone to one of simple candor, he then asks: “Was the role of the boatman too much for you?”
Beauchamp does not seem particularly offended. Maintaining the same calm voice, he replies, “As a matter of fact, it was because of this boatman that our precious gathering, though it went up like a rocket, came down like a stick. It so happened that four or five girl students are living in the boarding house next door to our meeting hall. I don’t know how, but they found out when our reading was to take place. Anyway, it appears that they came and listened to us under the window of the hall. I was doing the boatman’s voice, and, just when I had warmed up nicely and was really getting into the swing of it—perhaps my gestures were a little over-exaggerated—the girl students, all of whom had managed to control their feelings up to that point, thereupon burst out into simultaneous cachinnations. I was of course surprised, and I was of course embarrassed: indeed, thus dampened, I could not find it in me to continue. So our meeting came