“I don’t especially care for all this talk about whatever we do, we’re in danger, that this is a time of crisis, and so on,” said Viscount Matsudaira. “Everything has started to take a turn for the better. The May Fifteenth Incident was a tragic event, of course, but it has given the government the strength to act decisively so that Japan can be pulled out of this economic slump. And in the last analysis, I think that it will have the effect of putting Japan upon the right course. It will be this affair that changes our fortune from bad to good. Isn’t it in such a manner, after all, that history moves forward?”
“We will indeed be happy if it turns out as you say,” answered Kurahara plaintively, a quiet gruffness to his voice. “I, for one, have no such expectations. What is this reflation, after all? It can be termed a controlled inflation, the idea being that although the fierce beast of inflation is let out of his cage we can still breathe easily because he has a chain fastened to his neck. But that chain is not going to hold long. The vital thing is not to let the beast out of the cage. I can well imagine how things might go—save the farmer, rescue the unemployed, introduce reflation—all of which seem splendid at first, and no one wants to sing a contrary tune. But soon reflation will turn into an inflation based on the demand for military supplies. The fierce beast will snap his chain and run wild. And once he starts, no one will be able to stop him. When the military itself finally awakes to the peril, it will be too late to catch him again. The wise course, therefore, is to keep him shut in the shiny cage of gold reserves. For nothing could be more secure than such a golden cage. It has a tough flexibility. If the beast grows larger, the space between the bars grows larger. If he grows smaller, it narrows. If we keep our specie reserves adequate, we prevent a falling off of our exchange rate, and we gain the confidence of other nations. That is the only way for Japan to get along in the world. If you let the fierce beast out of his cage as a means of bringing about a recovery, you achieve only the most transitory of results and you dash Japan’s long-range hopes. However, even though what should be done, given this enactment of a second gold embargo, is to adopt a vigorous policy of strengthening the currency by supporting it with specie, with the aim of promptly returning to the gold standard, still, the government has been scared out of its wits by the May Fifteenth Incident and is rushing in the opposite direction. That is why I worry.”
“This is merely my opinion,” said the Viscount, unwilling to be shaken off, “but if the hardship of the farmers and the discontent of the workers continue as they are, it won’t be a matter of anything as mild as the May Fifteenth Incident. A revolution may well break out, and then it will be too late for all remedies. Did you see the farmers who pushed their way into the special session of the Diet in June? Are you aware of the strength embodied in the groups that presented the petition demanding an immediate moratorium on farmers’ debts? Furthermore, when they didn’t get what they wanted from the Diet, they went to the Army, and the result was that a joint petition of farmers and military men was drawn up and a report of it carried to the Throne itself by a regimental commander.
“And then you said, sir, that attempting recovery through reflation would offer only a temporary advantage, but if the economy does become inflated, effective domestic demand will increase. Then with the drop in the interest rate, small businessmen and manufacturers will get a new lease on life. By opening up Manchuria, our development will proceed on the continent. With the increase in military expense, the construction of heavy industry and chemical plants will be stimulated. The price of rice will go up, and the rural communities will be saved and the jobless farmers put back to work—all in all, a multitude of good effects, don’t you think? Wouldn’t it be well for us, while taking pains to avoid the danger of war, to advance our industrialization step by step? If I were to propose the plan I thought ideal, this would be it.”
“The young are optimistic,” said Kurahara. “But older men, because of the knowledge that the years have brought them, find it hard to entertain such bright expectations. I hear ‘the farmers, the farmers,’ from you, but that’s mere sentimentality and has no bearing on the nation’s plight. At a time when every citizen must grit his teeth and endure hardship, these complaints that disrupt the national unity—‘Oh, the villainy of the upper classes! Oh, the villainy of the financiers!’—all come from the mouths of self-seeking men.
“Just think for a moment. The rice riots of 1918 made us aware that the Country of Abundant Rice could be imperiled by want, but now, with the increased yield from the crops of Taiwan and Korea, there’s more than a generous supply of rice throughout the country, is there not? And since all our citizens, aside from the farmers, have benefited from the sharp drop in farm prices and so have no worries about buying what food they need, there’s been no upsurge of the revolutionary spirit preached by the left wing, despite the high unemployment rate that this severe depression has brought about. As for the farmers themselves, they’re not at all the sort to listen to the blandishments of the left wing, no matter how much threatened they are by starvation.”
“But aren’t incidents always begun by military men?” the Viscount retorted. “And isn’t the Army an Army sprung from the farming villages?”
Though the young man’s assertive manner might well have struck the onlookers as somewhat lacking in deference, Kurahara was not one to be provoked into an emotional response. His words, ever controlled, ever preserving the same inflection, flowed from his lips like the white pennants issuing from the mouths of the saints and sinners in medieval religious prints. Since Kurahara was drinking a Manhattan, the moisture that wet his lips served to smooth and sweeten his hoarse voice. A smile seemed to be on the verge of flickering over his stern features, and when he put the red cherry on its toothpick between his lips, he seemed to be swallowing with it the batch of concerns that were then troubling society.
“But on the other hand,” said Kurahara, in gentle rebuttal, “isn’t the Army feeding the able-bodied sons of poor farmers? Comparing last year’s disastrous crop with the record harvest of two years ago, I cannot help but suspect a touch of sabotage on the part of those farmers vehemently opposed to the use of foreign-grown rice.”
“If they did anything of the sort, wouldn’t they risk starving themselves to death?” the smooth-cheeked Viscount asked.
“Well, at any rate,” said Kurahara, not answering the question put to him, “however one may analyze the present situation, I have been talking with an eye to the future. The citizens of Japan—what sort of a people are they? I imagine that, depending upon whom you ask, you would receive all sorts of definitions. But as for me, I would reply that the citizens of Japan constitute a race blind to the dire perils of inflation. A race that, when inflation strikes, lacks even the wisdom to turn its money into property to protect itself. It behooves us never to forget for a single moment that this people with whom we have to deal constitute a naïve and ignorant, a passionate and emotional citizenry. There is a certain beauty in a nation’s lacking even the wisdom to preserve itself. Indeed, an undeniable beauty. And because I love the people of Japan, I cannot help but hate those who would exploit this beautiful ignorance in order to gain popular favor.
“Stringent economic measures are never popular, and any government policy that embraces inflation is sure to gain the favor of the people. For our part, however—we who know what is the ultimate happiness of this ignorant race of ours—we must strive with this ever in mind even if a certain number of people unavoidably are victimized.”
“The ultimate happiness of the people, you say. What is that?” asked the Viscount aggressively.
“Don’t you know?” asked Kurahara tantalizingly, tilting his head slightly to one side as a smile lit his features. His intent listeners, under his spell despite themselves, tilted their own heads. The trunks of the white birches outside seemed restless in the long twilight, like the pale shins of a row of young boys. The evening darkness was a huge throw-net cast over the lawn. At
that moment all present confronted the glittering phantom of ultimate happiness like men about to receive a revelation. When Kurahara spoke, it was as though, before their very eyes, a giant fish leapt up vigorously from the tightening net of evening, its golden scales flashing.
“You don’t know, eh? Well . . . it happens to be a stable currency.”
So struck was his audience that they stood speechless as shudders of uncertain dread ran down the backs of their necks. Kurahara took no notice of the reaction that he had provoked. Like a thin varnish, a light coat of sadness seemed to spread gradually over his compassionate expression.
“It’s peculiar about secrets. For the very reason that certain things are so simple, so well known, they become secrets. Be that as it may, those of us who know this secret have, indeed, a heavy responsibility laid upon us.
“And though we lead this ignorant people, persisting in their ignorance, step by step along the path that leads to the ultimate happiness, they become disheartened by its steepness. They give ready ear to the devil that whispers: ‘Look here, see how much easier this path is.’ And when they look and see how delightful a path the other is with a profusion of flowers blooming along it, they make a headlong rush for it and end by plunging down into the abyss of ruin.
“Since economics is not a benevolent enterprise, one must foresee that some ten percent will become victims while the remaining ninety percent will be saved. But if we take no hand at all, the full hundred percent will go happily to their destruction.”
“I presume, then,” replied Viscount Matsudaira, “that the ten percent who are the farmers must reconcile themselves to death by starvation?”
The Viscount had been rash enough to speak of starving to death, and such a choice of words before such a gathering was not likely to have the effect he wished. Certain words seem empty but forbiddingly moral. Even without an adjective, they contain an intrinsic element of exaggeration. From the standpoint of taste, they leave much to be desired, being far too strident and having by their very nature the ring of radicalism. As well he might, the Viscount felt embarrassed for having been so imprudent.
While Kurahara had been eloquently holding forth, the French maître d’hótel had come to whisper in the Baroness’s ear that dinner was ready to be served, but the Baroness had no choice but to wait until Kurahara’s zest for his own conversation began to pall. When she was at last able to break in, Kurahara rose from his chair. And there on the seat, visible despite the thickening darkness, was a silver cigarette case which lay open to reveal its contents arrayed like a row of white teeth, thoroughly crushed, however, by Kurahara’s bulk.
“Oh no! Not again!” cried his wife when she saw this, and everyone laughed heartily, as they always did at Kurahara’s idiosyncrasies.
“Really,” said Mrs. Kurahara, picking up the crushed cigarettes, “how could you!”
“I’ve had trouble before with its coming open so easily.”
“But, my goodness! Couldn’t you feel it underneath you?”
“That’s the sort of thing only Mr. Kurahara could carry off, I believe,” said Baroness Shinkawa teasingly as she made her way through the patches of brightness that spilled out onto the lawn from the windows.
“I still don’t understand. Surely it must have hurt you, open like that,” said Mrs. Kurahara.
“I thought it was just the rattan chair.”
“Yes, yes, that’s true. Our rattan chairs do cause some pain,” exclaimed the Baroness, provoking more laughter from the guests.
“Still and all,” offered Baron Shinkawa, his manner abstracted as ever, “they’re far better than the ones in that motion picture house.” There was an old movie theater in Karuizawa in a converted stable.
Marquis Matsugae had no place in such conversation. And when he had taken his seat at the dinner table the wife of the Minister of State, who sat beside him, found herself short of suitable topics.
“Have you spoken recently,” she ventured, “with Marquis Yoshichika Tokugawa?”
The Marquis thought for a moment. It seemed that he had not talked to Tokugawa for a very long time. Then, again, it seemed that he had spoken with him just two or three days before. And in any case, Marquis Tokugawa had never at any time discussed anything significant with Marquis Matsugae. Whenever they had met, either in the lobby of the House of Peers or at the Peers Club, they had never done more than exchange a few words about wrestling.
“Well,” replied Marquis Matsugae, “I haven’t seen too much of him recently.”
“He’s been rather active lately among the veterans, getting together groups like the Moral Light Society,” said the lady. “He’s quite fond of that sort of thing, Marquis Tokugawa.”
“Yes,” agreed a gentleman across the table, “he seems to take great delight in letting right-wing malcontents use him as a figurehead. Bit by bit his playing with fire is turning into something earnest.”
“If a man must play with fire, women are preferable, I suppose,” declared Baroness Shinkawa in a voice that seemed loud enough to split the petals of the flowers that decorated the table. When she spoke of playing with fire, without a trace of feeling of innuendo, it was immediately obvious that she was a woman incapable of misconduct.
Once the soup course had been served, the conversation turned to the kind of topic that the upper classes were more accustomed to talk about. A discussion arose as to what sort of costumes would be suited for incognito participation in the villagers’ Bon Festival that year. In Karuizawa the Bon Festival was celebrated in August in accordance with the old calendar. Marquis Matsugae was reminded of the Bon Festivals at his mansion in Tokyo when the eaves outside the parlor were hung with Gifu lanterns. And then he remembered how his mother had been vexed by something up until the moment of her death. It had been she who had bought the hundred and twelve acre Matsugae estate in Shibuya for three thousand yen which she had obtained from the sale of stock. Midway through the Taisho period, about 1920, she sold seventy-five acres of it for five million yen, but the buyer, the Hakoné Realty Company, was extremely tardy in making good the money due, a cause of grief that stayed with his mother until she drew her last breath.
“Have they paid yet? Do we have the money?” she asked again and again during her final illness. Those who were with her, wanting to put an end to such a scandalous show of concern, told her that the payment had indeed been made, but the woman on her deathbed would not be deceived.
“It does no good to lie,” she said. “If all that money came walking into this house, the floor would creak and groan under its feet. I haven’t heard anything like that, have I? I want to hear its footsteps so that I can die in peace.”
After his mother’s death, with the passage of time and after many vicissitudes, the account was at last paid in full. In 1927, however, at the beginning of the Showa period, the Marquis lost more than half of this in the failure of the Fifteenth National Bank. The lame steward, Yamada, oppressed by his sense of responsibility, hanged himself.
Because his mother had said not a word about Kiyoaki but had spoken of nothing but money, her death, as far as the Marquis was concerned, was robbed of all that was lyric and exalted. In his heart, he could not avoid the presage that there would be little noble afterglow left to light his own decline and death.
Since the Shinkawa household was governed according to the English manner, the male guests remained in the dining room after dinner to be presented with cigars, while the ladies retired to the parlor. Furthermore, according to Victorian custom the gentlemen did not rejoin the ladies until they had enjoyed their postprandial drinking to the full. This was a source of acute distress to Baroness Shinkawa, but, since it was an English custom, she accepted it as something that could in no way be amended.
Rain had begun to fall halfway through dinner. And since the evening had grown more chilly than normal, the servants quickly kindled a fire of white birch logs in the fireplace. The Marquis then had no need of his blanket. The lights in
the room were extinguished, and the men relaxed around the fireplace.
The Minister of State began to speak, addressing Kurahara and returning to a topic that excluded Marquis Matsugae.
“With regard to what you were saying before, I’d like very much to see you give so exhaustive an explanation to the Prime Minister. Though he would like to remain above such matters, he cannot help but find himself under pressure from the flow of events.”
“Exhaustive explanations are my forte,” replied Kurahara. “And I haven’t spared the Prime Minister. What a bother I must be to him.”
“Ah, but it’s not by being a bother to prime ministers that you run risk,” replied the Minister of State. “There was something I had to refrain from saying before out of consideration for the nerves of the ladies, but really, Kurahara, I’d like to see you have a proper regard for your safety. Since you are a pillar of our economy, it would indeed be catastrophic if you were to go the way of Inoué and Dan. However much you take precautions, there’s no possibility of your being over-careful.”
“Since you’re kind enough to tell me this, I presume that you’re well acquainted with the actual circumstances,” replied Kurahara in his hoarse voice, his features without expression. Even if a wave of distress had swept over his face, the restless flames that made the shadows dart across his fleshy cheeks would have concealed it. “All sorts of declarations from would-be assassins come to my home, and the police show much concern. However, having lived as long as I have, I am not the least worried about my personal safety. What fears I have pertain not to myself but to the future of our nation. I take the greatest delight, just like a child, in slipping away from my guards and doing whatever I like. There are those who are so fearful they urge bothersome measures upon me, and there are also those who tell me to use money to protect myself, offering to act as go-betweens. But I have no inclination to do anything of the sort. At this late date, I’m not going to start buying life.”