Free Death in Midsummer & Other Stories by Yukio Mishima

she had always had a supply in her obi.
    The paper made itself felt in many delicate ways when they spent the night together. Kawase was in the habit of dancing with his hand on the bow of the obi, and he would come on the warm swelling of the paper, and deliberately rustle it as they danced. A smile, intimate and wary of being seen, would come to her lips. Sometimes, seated languidly with her legs curled 57

    beneath her, she would start to untie her obi, and there Would be a soft gesture as she first took out the paper and laid it on the tatami matting. A certain heaviness in the motion told of the dampness of late night in the rainy season. On such a night, Kawase would slip his hand into the bow of the obi, and it would be as warm and moist as the inside of a tight closet. Hie could scarcely imagine that when, later, the obi was untied it would give forth that clean, cool, silken sound. And then, as the first morning light came through the frosted-glass window of the inn, the paper on the floor would light up, and he would watch daybreak from the white square. Asaka never forgot to take out the paper when she undid her obi, but sometimes she would forget to put it back when they dressed the following morning. And sometimes when they were quarrelling, the paper would be there, a clear, white sign on the matting. As these memories passed through his mind, Kawase concluded that nowhere on the mink-coated figure was there room for that swelling packet. A little white window had been painted over.
    The cable car came and the three got on. With a nostalgic clang of its bell and a noise like a chest of drawers - such, too, the old streetcars of Tokyo had been - the cable car began to push its way industriously up Powell Street.
    The rear half of the car was an ordinary closed trolley, but the front half had an open roof with benches, pillars, and standing-room on both sides of the motorman, who was grandly manipulating two long iron handles.
    The old-fashioned car delighted Hamako. The three sat on one of the benches and watched windows slide down the hill before them. 'Isn't it fun,' said Hamako time after time. 'Isn't it fun.'
    'Isn't it,' said Asaka, half to Kawase. It was as if the remark were to conceal the pleasure she felt herself. He sensed in the exchange her comradely way of making it appear that they were no ordinary, respectable mother and child.
    At the top of the hill they got off the car and, since they had no business there, took another car down. The steep descent was even more interesting. Five or six middle-aged women, apparently tourists, shrieked and squealed as if they were in an 58

    amusement park, and looked round at the cool faces of native San Franciscans, seeking the reaction to their coquettishness.
    They were large women with faint moustaches, in coats of red and green.
    Back at the square from which they had started, Asaka politely took her leave. She had an appointment for lunch, she said, but would like to have dinner with Kawase if he was free.
    Kawase took Hamako's hand and walked with them to his hotel, which was very near the square.
    They stopped before a show window full of picnic things.
    The picnic set, all in Scotch plaid, was quite blinding, but the contrast with the artificial grass was very pleasant. The arrangement was done with careful casualness. It could have been left scattered by picnickers who had gone down to the river to wash their hands, and whose bright laughter came back up from the river.
    'You'd never find a set like this in Japan,' said Asaka, her nose almost against the glass. It occurred to Kawase that she had probably gone through childhood with no knowledge of picnics. Sometimes she showed an intense longing for childish things. Once he had been unable to pry her from a window full of festival dolls. Either her patron, so intent on educating her in the Western way, had not noticed this side of her nature, or he was ignoring it. Kawase felt confident in his own