Season of Violence Read online

  "I wonder who sent them?"

  "Don't you have any idea?"

  "No, no idea at all!"

  Once he was in the ring Tatsuya picked out in the crowd the three girls he had met recently. They were sitting ostentatiously in the third row. All were gaily dressed, which made them stand out, and Eiko was wearing a kimono.

  "Wearing a kimono at this place like she was going blossom-viewing!" said Tatsuya.

  Eda winked at him. "That's her, isn't it?"

  When the referee called out his name, the three girls shouted it again in unison. It was a completely new experience for Tatsuya. He frowned and felt rather annoyed, but acknowledged their support with a wave of his hand.

  He outboxed his opponent easily, with the result that the match was a dull one. Each time Tatsuya got in a blow or avoided the other's punches, he heard Eiko's scream of encouragement. Her voice spurred him on and put him in more of a fighting mood than was really necessary. Sitting in his corner, he became conscious of the spectators for the first time in his career. He began to look like a card player worried about a bystander. The end came in the second round, but as his opponent fell, he tried to steady himself by grabbing at Tatsuya's head, opening the old cut over his eye.

  The referee separated them and announced a TKO and a victory for Tatsuya. Tatsuya stood and watched his opponent for a moment, at the same time putting his hand unconsciously on the injured eye, which was now swimming in blood. Eda shouted at him not to touch it. Tatsuya got out under the ropes with one eye closed. He heard Eiko and the other girls call out his name. He tried to smile in their direction.

  After first aid, he changed and left with Eda for the hospital before the others. He found Eiko and her friends waiting for him outside the main entrance.

  "Are you badly hurt?" Eiko asked him.

  "No, he just opened up an old cut," said Tatsuya.

  "You're sure you're all right?"

  "Yes, but I'm afraid I can't go out with you today. Got to go to the hospital."

  "Then I'll give you a lift in my car," she said quickly. "It's parked just around the corner. Which hospital is it?"

  "Good," said Eda who accepted the offer before Tatsuya could answer. "If it's really all right, we'd appreciate it. Hop in, Tatsuya. I've still got a lot to do here."

  Eiko unlocked the car and opened a rear door. "You'd better lie down in the back," she said.

  "No, I'm all right. But are you sure you can drive in a kimono?"

  "Yes, of course I can!"

  He sat in the front, and the other two in the back. Eiko started the car and set off for the hospital.

  "Thanks for the flowers," said Tatsuya suddenly, without looking at Eiko. "But I wish you girls wouldn't make so much noise during the fight. I don't like it—it makes me nervous."

  "Why, how can you accuse us of making noise?" said Eiko, and the three girls laughed.

  "Tatsuya, you're kind of touchy, aren't you?" said Eiko after a while. "You didn't look like that type at all the other day."

  "Who, me? You've got me all wrong. I couldn't be impudent with you," he replied.

  The previous Saturday, five days before, he and his friends had gone into town dressed in their best clothes, as they often did on weekends. Between them they could only raise eight thousand yen, which was not enough for what they wanted. In the end they decided to try and pick up some respectable girls instead of spending their money on bar hostesses. Rather than ask girls they already knew, they would pick up the first girls that came along.

  But no one wanted to make the first approach. They were usually much bolder and more "men-of-the-world" than their ages would indicate when it came to prostitutes and hostesses, but in this case they were all a little hesitant. In the end they drew lots by picking out thousand-yen notes and comparing the serial numbers. Tatsuya and Nishimura had the lowest numbers.

  They were both very experienced with women and had highly developed tastes, but in spite of this, they had to walk along the main street and down a side street before they could work up enough courage. Finally at a milliner's on Namiki Avenue, Nishimura spotted three girls, all about the same age and all smartly dressed.

  "Let's have a look at them from the front and see what they're like," he suggested.

  When the girls came out of the shop, he sized them up quickly. He recognized in a moment that they all had clear-cut features. One of them had unusual eyes. Their noses looked alike, and someone remarked, "They're probably plastic surgery specials'."

  Sahara noticed that one girl was trying to hail a cab and laid claim to her.

  "If you guys let her go, it's no drinks for you tonight," he said.

  The girls walked towards the main street in search of a taxi and Nishimura and Tatsuya ran after them, but as they drew close Nishimura suddenly stopped.

  "Your number was the smallest, Tatsuya, you do the talking."

  "Okay. But don't run off."

  They set off again and soon overtook the girls.

  Tatsuya's voice was rather weak as he said: "Excuse me," but the girls stopped and looked round.

  "What is it?" said one girl, shifting her parcel from one hand to the other.

  Tatsuya was already beginning to lose his nerve.

  "My name is Tsugawa—Tatsuya Tsugawa," he stammered. "I'm a member of the boxing club. I'm sorry if . . ."

  "A boxer? Well!"

  He almost added that he was in the featherweight class. For a moment he wondered if this was going to work— the odds were against it. He began to feel a little more at ease. He told himself he didn't mind if they turned him down. It was too crazy to work out, but now that he had given them his name, he had to win.

  The atmosphere was still a little tense, and for Tatsuya it was something like being challenged by a young tough on the street—both pleasant and ticklish. A faint smile came to his lips.

  By this time Nishimura had slipped away.

  "I'm all out of breath," he went on. "I had a job catching up . . . we're college students . . . we wanted to go out tonight . . . but we had no girls to go out with. We don't want to embarrass you, but if you're not doing anything else, we'd like you to join us. There are five of us. We've been trying to find some girls for a long time, but up to now we haven't found any worth talking to. Would you like to join us?"

  "Well, it's very nice of you, but there are only three of us."

  "Oh, don't let that worry you. As a matter of fact, it's safer that way," replied Tatsuya.

  The girls withdrew a little, whispered together, and began to laugh at something. While this was going on, Tatsuya waved vigorously to his companions, who were watching developments from the corner. Nishimura was jumping up and down excitedly.

  "My mother's in the hairdresser's over there," said one of the girls. "We were going to meet her, so I'll ask her to take home the things we got shopping. It's a nuisance carrying them around with us. Can you wait here a few minutes?"

  "It's a lot of stuff for her to carry."

  "Oh, no. She has a car."

  "Well, be sure and come back."

  "We'll come back. I'll tell you what, Sachiko can stay with you as a hostage."

  "That's all right, but we'd like to know the rest of your names too."

  He went back to the others feeling very pleased with himself.

  "What do you think of that, boys. Pretty smooth, eh? You nipped off very smartly, Nishimura!"

  "I'm sorry, I haven't got your nerve."

  "What! As a punishment, you'll have to do as we tell you tonight. Well, they're called Eiko, Sachiko, and Yuki. I tell you now, Eiko's mine. I guess I deserve her, after all."

  "What! The one with the funny eyes?"

  "Yeah, she's got one single eyelid and one double, one, two, one, two—she's a boxer's kind."

  "Yeah, and you're jealous. Little imperfections make her better."

  When the girls were all gathered, introductions were made and they went off to a night club, a good one that was not too expen
sive.

  "I hope we've got enough cash," said Matsuno, who was acting as treasurer.

  "How about if Nishimura and the next lowest number hock their watches in a pawnshop to be on the safe side. It'd be bad if we couldn't pay the bill."

  "Eight thousand yen won't be enough," said Tatsuya. "But let's spend that first, and then Sahara can use his influence. He said this place let him chalk up a bill once before. But don't overdo things with the girls because I promised them we wouldn't give them any trouble."

  "Okay, but listen to who's talking!"

  Tatsuya managed to keep Eiko to himself the whole evening. About eleven, the girls said they should go, but Nishimura persuaded them to stay another half hour.

  Tatsuya went to the dance floor with Eiko. When the music ended, Eiko stopped him on the way back to the table.

  "Here's some money. Please keep it. It's just the taxi fare." She handed him something wrapped in a handkerchief.

  "Ahh . . . ?"

  But she cut him short: "Don't worry. We've had a lovely time, Tatsuya. All quite unexpected."

  "Well, as a matter of fact, we are a bit short of money."

  "I thought so," said Eiko with a smile.

  Tatsuya remembered Eiko saying as they were leaving the night club that she wanted to see him box one day.

  "By the way, you remember the handkerchief you gave me with the money in? Well, anyhow, Matsuno was sick in it on the way home that night and we had to throw it away," Tatsuya said.

  "How unromantic!" said Sachiko.

  Eiko dropped Tatsuya at the entrance to the hospital and they said good-bye. She turned, gave a toot of the horn, and drove off; Tatsuya found himself staring vacantly at the disappearing car.

  "Don't be a fool! Did you expect her to come into surgery and bandage you up?" he told himself.

  As he slowly made his way up the stairs to surgery he met a friend of his, a soccer player, coming down with his arm in a sling.

  "Well?" he looked inquiringly at his injury.

  "I won on a TKO," replied Tatsuya.

  "Congratulations," said his friend and shook his free hand warmly.

  Tatsuya's cut was not serious but they made him lie down for an hour while they treated him. A nurse came in and said there was a call for him. The doctor told her to take a message and leave it at the reception desk.

  When they had finished, he asked about the call and was told that someone had rung up to find out if he was still in the hospital. Tatsuya figured it was Eda. He was surprised and a little annoyed to hear a big car honking just behind him as he walked out of the gate. He jumped aside and looked round. The car was moving along slowly and Eiko was waving at him from inside.

  "Well! What's going on here?" he asked puzzled.

  "I've got rid of the others."

  "How did you know I was still in the hospital?"

  "I phoned just now."

  "So it was you!"

  Tatsuya got in beside her. She was now wearing Western clothes. He was delighted at her quick and efficient ways, and it made up for whatever annoyance he had felt in the afternoon.

  He drank a lot that night and his cut began to hurt, but with Eiko there it did not seem to matter.

  After that he went out with her a lot. Each time he was amazed at the number of people she knew. Wherever they went, at least one or two people would nod to her. At first she introduced him to her friends, but he always looked awkward and hardly spoke to them, so she soon stopped.

  Tatsuya once wondered but could not decide whether her friends were mainly men or women. Anyhow, the men were not his business; their relationship wasn't close enough for him to complain if she had been in love with them.

  Up till then Tatsuya had only been interested in sensual pleasure. The women he knew best were those of the red light districts. In the confusion of modern life, love was out of the question for Tatsuya. No matter what kind of girls he might have been in love with, they always shattered any romantic illusions quickly enough, and he had no way of telling whether Eiko might not do the same.

  Among his friends, emotions, and love in particular, came to be looked at from a materialistic point of view; the word "love" was only used with contempt. To them it was a word used to tease or ridicule someone ignorant of women. A popular remark was: "He's in love, so we know he hasn't had a woman yet."

  To them the relationship between father and son was that of mutual friendship. But with their mothers—even with the mothers of their close friends—they behaved like spoiled children. When they got disillusioned by women who at first had attracted them, they came running home to their mothers. They only thought of their women as "things" as time went on, and this nursed the overly-indulgent nature of their mothers' love. There was a case of a young mother who, out of spite for her husband's having taken a mistress, took on a lover herself. Her son found out and kicked her in the face. His friends heard of this and treated him with the greatest respect. He was looked up to as a matured man.

  All the group were very good friends, but theirs were not the generous friendships each had had in his high school days. There was no element of self-sacrifice in their relationships, but instead a carefully balanced system of debit and credit. If the debit column grew too long, the friendship would break up. Everything they did and said was calculated; they never risked a wild venture that might drastically upset their accounts. In a sense, there were certain standards which had to be adhered to and which served as a basis for their special morality. Their conception of friendship was that of being accomplices in crime. There was a common bond formed by their savage or immoral acts—acts which were not wholly attributable to their youth—and this welded the bonds of their friendships.

  This group of young men was mixed up in all sorts of sleezy doings—with women, questionable businesses, fights, and even blackmail. These involvements occurred frequently and were always considered the result of youthful mistakes. Their elders would either ignore their faults or else excuse them because they were "young."

  If the adult world feared them as a dangerous force, second only to communism, this fear was groundless. A new generation brought forth new sentiments and a new code of morals, and these youths were growing up in such surroundings. They stood erect, like cactus, without looking down to see that they were blooming in barren soil.

  The young unconsciously tried to destroy the morals of their elders—morals which always judged against the new generation. In the young people's eyes, the reward of virtue was dullness and vanity. While the older generation thought it was growing ever more broad-minded, but actually grew narrower in outlook, the young looked for something broad and fresh to build on. And besides, who started measuring naked human feelings in terms of material things?

  Tatsuya was no exception. He behaved like a spoiled child with his mother, but with his father it was quite different. One day, soon after he had joined the boxing club, he happened to see his father in a first-class railway car between Tokyo and Yokosuka. Tatsuya was on his way home from a training session. He got on and came home in the same car as his father. Sitting still on a roomy seat beside his father, he was the picture of the dutiful teenager next door who went to school every morning on the same train as his father.

  That evening after supper he felt thoroughly worn out. He stretched himself out and muttered: "I can't stand it. I think I'll get a first-class train pass during training. It's so much more comfortable."

  His father heard him and lowered his paper noisily.

  "What's that? Where do you get such silly ideas? You're still in college, you know. If your training tires you so much, you'd better give it up. In any case, I haven't got money to waste on a pass for you."

  "Money to waste?"

  For a moment Tatsuya felt nothing but hatred for his father.

  Sunday about a month later he was watching his father training for the annual alumni boat race.

  "Your old man's still pretty fit. Just look at these muscles," his father call
ed out. "Training was training in my day. Go ahead, punch me, boxer!"

  He felt his father's muscles. His stomach was still lean and solid. His father tensed, and Tatsuya punched him as hard as he could in the stomach, sending the older man reeling backward.

  "Hey, what are you trying to do. I didn't mean for you to take me so seriously," his father said as he slowly picked himself up, a shocked, cold look in his eyes.

  The next day when his mother told him that his father had spit up blood, Tatsuya said nothing, but a few days later, after some hard sparring, he returned home with his face horribly swollen. He went straight into his father's study.

  "I got a real work-out today," he said, "Look at my head."

  This was Tatsuya's rather peculiar attempt to make amends to his father, and he was disappointed when all his father did was look worried and ask if he was all right.

  Tatsuya had long given up on love as well. His only notion of it was limited to an image of himself and a woman in a forest somewhere, where they played about naked among the trees. He had no clear picture of the woman either; whether she was the younger or was innocent did not matter.

  With this attitude, it was natural that he should not have expected anything special from Eiko over and above simple sex. But for some reason when he danced with her for the first time he did not immediately try to imagine how she looked under her clothes. Generally Tatsuya was not very demanding of the women he dated. When he had gotten to know them intimately, he had inevitably been disappointed, so that now he acquired girls just as a woman would add a dress of the latest style to her wardrobe. Tatsuya was always picking up some new girl, dropping her, and finding another.

  On certain occasions, he and his friends regarded women as indispensable accessories. They enjoyed showing up sporting a new girl friend. If someone appeared with a girl everybody knew, it was like wearing an old suit that everyone had seen many times.

  If they can say that changes in fashion mirror the history of women, they could change it around to say that changes in women mirrored the history of the young man Tatsuya, and it would have been true. But though his attitude to women was one of changes, it was also one of simple repetition, because Tatsuya would end up bored by each successive girl. Each affair started out hot but soon cooled off until Tatsuya simply dropped the unfortunate girl.