Having no want of money, I came to feel that I might leave the noisy boarding house and try setting up a household of my own. But then there would be the trouble of buying furnishings, the need of a housekeeping old woman, and worry if she were not honest, or anxiety if the house could not be left safely unattended—so it seemed doubtful that I could carry it out in any casual way. One day, with a wandering fancy that I might at least look for a house, I strolled down the Hongo plateau westward and climbed the slope of Koishikawa straight toward Denzūin. Since the place became a tram thoroughfare, its aspect has changed entirely, but in those days the left side was the earthen wall of the Artillery Arsenal, and the right was an open lot, neither field nor hill, where grass grew all over. I stood in that grass and gazed absentmindedly at the cliff opposite. It is not a bad view even now, but then the character of that western side was quite different. Merely seeing green spread deep and lush as far as the eye could reach was enough to soothe the nerves. I wondered if there might be a suitable house somewhere around here. So I immediately crossed the meadow and went north along a narrow street. That row of houses, which even now has not quite become a decent quarter and remains rickety, was in those days exceedingly shabby. I slipped through alleys, turned corners into side streets, and wandered round and round. At last I asked the mistress of a candy shop if there was a small house for rent around there. The mistress said, “Well, now,” and tilted her head for a while, then said, “A rental house, hm…,” seeming to have no idea at all. I resigned myself to having no hope and was about to go home. Then the mistress asked, “Would a private boarding house not do?” I wavered a little. I began to think that lodging alone in a quiet private home might be rather fine, without the trouble of keeping a house of one’s own. Then I sat in the candy shop and had the mistress tell me the details.
It was the home of a military man’s family—or rather, his survivors. The master, the mistress said, had died in the Sino-Japanese War or some such, she believed. Until about a year before, they had lived near the Officers’ Academy at Ichigaya, but there were stables and such, and the house was too large, so they sold it and moved here; yet finding it lonely and empty, they had asked that a suitable person be found for them if there were one. I confirmed with the mistress that in that house there was no one but the widow, her only daughter, and a maid. I thought to myself that it would be quiet and quite agreeable. But I also feared that if one such as I suddenly appeared among such a family, under the label of a student of unknown background, I might be refused outright. I even considered giving it up. Yet I was not dressed as a student in any shabby way. And I wore a university cap. You will laugh, saying what of a university cap. But university students of that time, unlike now, were held in considerable public trust. On that occasion I found a kind of confidence in that square cap. And so, just as the candy-shop mistress had directed, with no introduction or anything, I called at the house of the military man’s survivors.
I met the widow and told her my purpose. The widow questioned me at length about my background, my school, my field of study. And having somewhere grasped that I would do, she at once gave me her word that I might move in whenever I liked. The widow was an upright person, and a clear-minded one. I admired her, thinking that perhaps all soldiers’ wives were such. I admired her, but I was also surprised. With such a temperament, I doubted where the loneliness could be.
