Free An Artist of the Floating World by Kazuo Ishiguro

that idiot to hospital. A few broken ribs and concussion." "You mean the Hirayama boy?" Mrs Kawakami asked, with a look of concern. "Is that his name? The one's who's always wandering around shouting things out. Someone really ought to get him to stop. It seems he got beaten up again last night. It's a shame, taking on an idiot like that, whatever he's shouting out." At this point, I turned to the man and said: "Excuse me, you say the Hirayama boy's been attacked? For what reason?" "it seems he kept singing one of those old military songs and chanting regressive slogans." "But the Hirayama boy's always done that," I pointed out. "He's only able to sing two or three songs. It's what he was taught." The man shrugged. "I agree, what's the sense in beating up an idiot like that? It's just callousness. But he was over by the Kayabashi bridge, and you know how sleazy things get there after dark. He"d been sitting up on the bridge post, singing and chanting for about an hour. They could hear him in the bar across the way, and it seems a few of them got tired of it." "What sense is there in that?" Mrs Kawakami said. "The Hirayama boy means no harm." "Well, someone should teach him to sing new songs," the man said, drinking from his glass. "He'll only get beaten up again if he goes around singing those old ones." We still call him "the Hirayama boy" though he must now be at least fifty. But then the name does not seem inappropriate, for he has the mental age of a child. As far back as I can remember, he has been looked after by the Catholic nuns at the mission, but presumably he was born into a family called Hirayama. In the old days, when our pleasure district was flourishing, the Hirayama boy could always be found sitting on the ground near the entrance to the Migi-Hidari or one of its neighbouring establishments. He was, as Mrs Kawakami had said, quite harmless, and indeed, in the years before and during the war he became a popular figure in the pleasure district with his war songs and mimicking of patriotic speeches. Who had taught him his songs, I do not know. There were no more than two or three in his repertoire, and he knew only a verse of each. But he would deliver these in a voice of considerable carrying power, and between the singing, he would amuse spectators by standing there grinning at the sky, his hands on his hips, shouting: "This village must provide its share of sacrifices for the Emperor! Some of you will lay down your lives! Some of you will return triumphant to a new dawn!"--or some such words. And people would say, "The Hirayama boy may not have it all there, but he's got the right attitude. He's Japanese." I often saw people stop to give him money, or else buy him something to eat, and on those occasions the idiot's face would light up into a smile. No doubt, the Hirayama boy became fixated on those patriotic songs because of the attention and popularity they earned him. Nobody minded idiots in those days. What has come over people that they feel inclined to beat the man up? They may not like his songs and speeches, but in all likelihood they are the same people who once patted his head and encouraged him until those few snatches embedded themselves in his brain. But as I say, there is a different mood in the country these days, and Suichi's attitudes are probably by no means exceptional. Perhaps I am being unfair if I credit young Miyake, too, with such bitterness, but then the way things are at present, if you examine anything anyone says to you, it seems you will find a thread of this same bitter feeling running through it. For all I know, Miyake did speak those words; perhaps all men of Miyake's and Suichi's generation have come to think and speak like that.
    I believe I have already mentioned that yesterday I took a trip down to the south of the city, to the Arakawa district. Arakawa is the last stop on the city tramline going south, and many people express surprise that the line should extend so far down