The Woman in the Dunes - Machi Abe [62]
But anyway, there was no reason for him to feel any obligation or responsibility for her smile. By his disappearance she would lose only a fragment of her life, one that could be easily replaced by a radio or a mirror.
“You’re really a great help,” she had said. “It’s so different from when I was alone. I can take it easy in the mornings, and the work is finished at least two hours sooner. I think I’ll ask the village association to give me some kind of extra work to do at home. I’ll save the money. And someday, maybe I’ll be able to buy a radio or a mirror or something.”
(Radio and mirror … radio and mirror.…) As if all of human life could be expressed in those two things alone. Radios and mirrors do have a point in common: both can connect one person with another. Maybe they reflect cravings that touch the core of our existence. All right, when he got home he would buy a radio right away and send it off to her. He would put all the money he had into the best transistor on the market.
But he couldn’t promise the mirror so easily. A mirror would go bad here. The quicksilver on the back would peel off in half a year; even the surface of the glass would get cloudy with the constant chafing of the sand in the air. Just like the mirror she had now: you looked in it with one eye, and you couldn’t see your nose … and if you could see your nose you couldn’t see your mouth. No, it didn’t matter to him how long it lasted. A mirror was different from a radio; for it to be a means of connection she would first have to have somebody else there to see her. What use would a mirror be to someone who no longer could be seen?
She would be feeling surprised about now. She’d prick up her ears. Wasn’t he taking too long about his business? He certainly was … the rascal had been clever enough to get away! Would she set up a howl? he wondered. Would she collapse? Or would her eyes just dim with tears? Whatever she did, it was no longer his responsibility. He was the one who had refused to recognize the necessity for a mirror.
—It’s a story I read some place.… Leaving home is all the fashion now. I thought it was because of bad living conditions, but that doesn’t seem to be the only reason. They mentioned a middle-class farm family that had recently added land to its holdings, bought machinery, and was doing quite well, when the eldest son suddenly left home. He was a quiet, hard-working young man, and his parents were completely puzzled; they didn’t know why. In country villages you have social obligations and reputation to think of, so there really must have been a reason for the heir of the family to have left home.…
—Yes, certainly. An obligation is an obligation.
—Then, it appears that one of the relatives took the trouble to find the young man and hear his story. He wasn’t living with a woman, and he didn’t seem to be driven by debts or pleasure; there was no single concrete motive. Then whatever was the reason? And what the young man said made absolutely no sense at all. He seemed unable to explain it very well himself, beyond saying he just couldn’t stand it any longer.
—There really are foolish people in the world, aren’t there!
—But when you think about it, you can understand his feelings. When farmers increase their workable land they have that much more to do. In the final analysis, there’s no end to their labor, and they only wind up with more to do. However, the farmer at least has a return on his potatoes and rice. Compared with a farmer’s work, shoveling away the sand is like trying to pile up rocks in the River of Hades, where the devils cart them off as fast as you throw them in.
—Well, what happens with the River of Hades in the end?
—Not a thing. It’s an infernal punishment precisely because nothing happens.
—Well then, what happened to the son after that?
—He had planned the whole thing in advance and had probably even settled on a job beforehand.
—And then what did he do?