Chapter 5 — Arima Hell (Part 3)

The night carried on there in Arima, and the Faux Denki Bran continued to flow.

At length Bishamon staggered to his feet and cried, “My friends, a toast to Ebisugawa, the newest member of the Friday Fellows!”

Cries of “Hear hear!” echoed around the room, and glasses of wine were taken in hand.

But here at last was the signal for Professor Yodogawa, that irrepressible tanuki lover, to begin his rebellion. There at the foot of the table he clanged on a platter and shouted, “Objection!”

“What’s this?” Jurōjin glanced at him sharply from the other end of the table.

“I have something I wish to say to Mr. Ebisugawa. I tell you, it is not too late to withdraw from the Friday Fellows. The eating of tanuki stew is a most barbaric act!”

Ebisugawa Sōun didn’t seem to have expected this, but soon replied, his voice dripping with sarcasm, “But my dear professor, have you not eaten plenty in your own time?”

There could be no denying that, and Bishamon and the rest joined in with cries of approval.

“That’s right, Yodogawa. You’ve eaten more than I have!”

“And haven’t you been expelled? What right have you to object?”

“Leave it to an Old Sophistrarian to complain about everything!”

“After sitting in _our _hot spring, drinking _our _coffee milk, gorging on _our _banquet, how dare you call us barbarians! Surely we have been more than hospitable enough to deserve a reprieve from your accusations!”

Despite the shower of censure, none of it seemed enough to budge Professor Yodogawa an inch.

“It’s true: I did sit in your hot spring, I did drink your coffee milk, I have gorged myself on this feast. But what has any of that to do with this? For you see, all of that is a question of gluttony, but tanuki stew is a question of love!”

The Friday Fellows let out sighs of indignation, or maybe resignation.

“At last, Professor Sophistry shows his true colors!”

“We’re not interested in more debate!”

“And enough with scattering around all those silly flyers! Aren’t you ashamed of yourself?”

“If you don’t want to eat tanuki stew, Yodogawa, you are free not to do so. But if we want to eat tanuki stew, are we not also free to do so? Why must you impose that love on us?”

Professor Yodogawa stood up boldly, and waving his right hand in the air began his impassioned speech.

“Why? Because love is something that must be imposed! What kind of love can be explained by rational analysis? Food transcends all boundaries, and love transcends all reason. I impose my love of tanuki on you all, so that your inner tanuki love may awaken. True, I have eaten tanuki. At the time, that was how I showed my love. But now I apologize, for I was mistaken. Now, all I can do is oppose the foul tradition of the Friday Fellows as an evangelist. You say that having eaten tanuki myself, I have no right to persuade you. Then in return I say to you: I do not seek to persuade you. I seek only to inspire you!”

As a tanuki I was overcome with emotion by his stirring oration, but everyone else remained unmoved, finding this love far too heavy. They all sat around the table, their mouths agape.

“His ideas are dangerous, don’t listen to him,” Ebisu warned. “Now you just calm yourself, Yodogawa. You’re on thin ice, in more ways than one!”

Only Benten, leaning forward resting her face on her palms, laughed with approval. “Love is illogical. Isn’t that what you mean, Professor?”

“Exactly, Benten! If no one else will, perhaps you would come around?”

Jurōjin silently raised a hand. An electric tension raced around the table, and the banquet hall went as quiet as if someone had doused the proceedings with a bucket of water. A smile came to Jurōjin’s face as he addressed Professor Yodogawa on the other side of the table.

“You mean to say that you will not stand down.”

“I will not stand down,” Professor Yodogawa shook his head, a comely expression on his face, flushed with his love for tanuki.

“That is most disappointing. Three generations of Yodogawas have I shared a table with to savor tanuki stew.” Jurōjin scowled at the professor. Then he abruptly barked, “Tenmaya!”

Without a sound Tenmaya appeared behind Professor Yodogawa and swiftly bound him to his chair, then produced a red daruma from within a wicker basket and placed it on the professor’s head.

What’s he doing? I was wondering, when from behind me I heard a metallic sound like something being screwed in. I turned around and immediately recoiled in horror. With a coldblooded look on his face Jurōjin was pumping the lever of the German air rifle, getting it ready to fire. Around the table we all looked at the glittering gun, our eyes wide, as Jurōjin wordlessly rested his elbow on the table, took aim, pulled the trigger. A dry bang echoed through the interior of the train, and the daruma atop Professor Yodogawa’s head went flying.

The stunned Friday Fellows turned towards Jurōjin in unison.

“Now, Jurōjin, just hold on a moment!”

“Surely this doesn’t call for a gun!”

“Not blood! I can’t stomach the sight of blood!”

“Is any tanuki really worth throwing your life away?” Jurōjin threw back his head and laughed, swiftly loading another round into the rifle.

“I wholeheartedly concur, sir!” said Tenmaya, setting up a second daruma. The synchronization movements of Jurōjin and Tenmaya were mesmerizing, like watching craftsmen pounding mochi in tandem on New Year’s Day.

Professor Yodogawa stared down the barrel of the gun, his face white.

Jurōjin took aim at the daruma once more. “There is no shortage of ammunition. I can keep shooting all night!”

　　　　　　　◯

As a fellow member of the Thursday Fellows, I couldn’t bear to sit back and watch Professor Yodogawa be subjected to this William Tell farce. Without thinking I crawled onto the table and interposed myself between Jurōjin and the professor, raising my hands in the air.

“A moment, please!”

Jurōjin pointed the rifle up towards the ceiling, narrowing his eyes. “What is it you want, young Yasaburō?”

“There’s something I’d like to say to Professor Yodogawa.”

I stood up on the table and looked at the professor. He looked up at me, mystified, bound to the chair and balancing the daruma on his head.

“We ran thick as thieves in the Thursday Fellows, you and I,” I told him. “But I’m going to be honest with you now: I’m sick to death of your tanuki love. I only ever went along with it so I could get free grub. Ramen and sukiyaki, French and Italian, chicken and turtle and pufferfish stew, anything and everything I could ever ask for! But as delicious as it all was, I just can’t put up with your sick, twisted love anymore, and today I’m bringing it all to an end!”

“…Et tu?” Professor Yodogawa murmured. “Say it ain’t so!”

“I hereby declare my resignation from and sever all ties with the Thursday Fellows. As of today, I have decided to declare my allegiance to the Friday Fellows. If Professor Yodogawa persists in his unreasonable harassment of this respectable assembly, I pledge to do everything in my power to stop him, as contrition for all the trouble I’ve caused you fine folks. Enough of your ridiculous sophistry and imposition of your love, I say! I have my own definition of love!”

I delivered this spiel all in a single breath, and when I was done Bishamon and the others rose to their feet and burst into applause. They probably just wanted to make as much commotion as they could to distract the incensed Jurōjin from waving around his gun any further.

“There’s a boy with a head on his shoulders!”

“Hear hear!”

“Very modern of you, well said!”

In contrast to the Friday Fellows’ desperate cheering, Professor Yodogawa’s expression was one of heartrending sorrow.

“How could you!” he cried. “Weren’t we friends? Didn’t we spend all those hours talking about how adorable tanuki are?”

“…Actually, I’ve been dying to try tanuki stew.”

“What!?” Professor Yodogawa gasped.

“Aren’t you the one who said eating is love? I agree with you completely. Ever since last fall when Benten was kind enough to invite me to one of your banquets, I haven’t for a moment been able to get the thought of tanuki stew out of my mind. I think it’s absolutely fantastic, this esoteric tradition of yours. The modern world may frown upon it, and yet still you bravely dare to eat this taboo cuisine, flying in the face of their censure. It’s just all so magnificent, I can’t help but to admire it…”

I was starting to worry about where to go with this ridiculous speech next, when Benten, who had been listening attentively the whole time, made a very drastic proposal.

“Why don’t you join the Friday Fellows, then?” she smiled innocently, looking around the room at our stunned faces.

No one was more shocked than Ebisugawa Sōun. He stood up and staggered away from the table, looking thunderstruck by this nightmarish turn of events. He stared at the Friday Fellows as they whispered amongst themselves, then turned towards the head of the table. Jurōjin seemed to be deep in thought, his eyes closed, the rifle pointed up at the ceiling.

Benten raised a hand in the air and loudly snapped her fingers.

“Tenmaya!”

“Right away, ma’am.”

With a great deal of pomp Tenmaya carried a paulownia chest and a bottle of Akadama port wine to the table.

Benten motioned me to get off the table, then took out a chagama from the chest and set it on the table. There was no mistaking the copper glistening beneath the light of the chandelier: that was Master Akadama’s flying chagama engine.

“Benten, that’s—” I blurted out.

She glanced at me sharply, her gaze all but saying, be silent.

With the doubtful stares of the Friday Fellows upon her, Benten uncorked the bottle, and poured its contents glugging into the chagama.

Jurōjin, who had this whole time been deep in thought, slowly rose to his feet. Setting aside the air rifle, he leaned forward over the table, his eyes glinting as he stared at Benten’s hands.

With a shuddering groan, the entire triple-decker train lifted into the air.

The hose which supplied the hot springs water detached, golden water trailing through the air as the nozzle fell past the window. In panic, Bishamon rushed to the window and yelped, “We’re flying!” drawing all the other Friday Fellows to the windows as well.

The train rose up from the rear garden of the sanatorium into the sky, bringing the nightscape of Arima into view, nestled in the hills. As we rose higher and higher, Mount Rokko and the other peaks came into sight, and in the distance I could even make out the twinkling lights of Kobe. Jurōjin came to the windows as well, and exhaled softly in approbation.

Benten sat alone, looking at the flabbergasted gaggle.

“Yasaburō and I offer this, as a gift.”

“A fine gift, for my 120th birthday.” Jurōjin looked at me. “You are hereby granted the seat of Hotei. Welcome to the Friday Fellows.”

I looked at Benten, who put a finger to her lips.

That was either a warning to keep silent, or a challenge to open my mouth and stir things up.

　　　　　　　◯

After burning through the fuel the train lost altitude and came to rest in the garden of the sanatorium once more. There was a silence for a time, the occupants of the train stricken with amazement.

The Friday Fellows eventually all came up to me to shake my hand.

Ebisugawa Sōun finally seemed to wrap his mind around this horrible turn of events. His face was so pallid that I half expected him to keel over at any moment, and his gaze was murderous. His clenched fists trembled with rage, and blue veins throbbed in his temple. If he wasn’t careful his tail might come shooting out.

“What is this farce!”

His bellow rang throughout the room, which immediately went quiet. Everyone shrank from him.

“What’s this, Ebisugawa?” said Jurōjin. “Does something displease you?”

“This is outrageous! Was it not I who was to be brought into the Friday Fellows this night?”

“Plans may change.”

“Even so! Even so! Why must it be him?” Sōun thrust a quivering finger at me as spittle frothed at his mouth. “Lady Benten’s prejudice cannot be denied. You are being deceived. I repeat, you are being deceived. I tell you he is a most monstrous blackguard!”

But this didn’t seem to perturb Jurōjin in the slightest. “That is quite splendid. I do so enjoy keeping the company of blackguards.”

Without a word Sōun stepped backwards, sweeping his gaze around the table at each of us with unbridled fury. Daikoku averted his eyes apologetically, while Bishamon muttered, “Tonight simply was not meant to be.” Tenmaya clapped Sōun’s shoulder and murmured, “Cheer up there. You ever need someone to listen, I’m your man.”

But Sōun roughly shook Tenmaya’s hand off.

“I would like you to return the dragonstone,” he said. “If this is how I am to be treated, there is no sense in offering any present.”

“I gave it to Benten,” Jurōjin said.

“What’s mine is mine,” demurred Benten, balancing the dragonstone on her palm.

“There you have it, Ebisugawa,” declared Jurōjin. It was astonishing how casually unreasonable they could be.

“You devil!” Sōun stamped his feet on the floor, having reached the end of his tether. “How much of your egotism have I suffered through!? Who was it that made your purchase of this sanatorium possible—me! Who was it that trekked all the way to Mount Iwaya and dug through the earth for this dragonstone to present to you—me! Do you understand how much I have suffered!? What effort that prating fool Yasaburō has done, I have done a thousand times over and more!”

His eyes flashed at me.

Jurōjin said, quite calmly, “Why is it you wish to join the Friday Fellows so?”

Sōun stopped cold. The light faded from his eyes, and his mouth hung open uselessly as the blood drained from his face. “I…I only…wish to get my vengeance on those accursed tanuki…”

“You wish to become a demon?”

“Vengeance…vengeance…” Sōun panted to himself. The transformation in his appearance was almost horrifying. It was as if the fires of Hell had burned away his fur, leaving only a naked tanuki sitting amongst the ashes. Though he had been spending his days squandering his wealth at hot springs, in reality his mind had been bent this whole time on joining the Friday Fellows and getting his revenge on the tanuki world that had cast him out.

“Raagh!” Sōun suddenly howled, flipping over the table and sending the remnants of the feast flying. “Yasaburō! Why must you always thwart me thus!”

He sprang at me and seized my collar, attempting to wring my neck. The surrounding Friday Fellows attempted to drag him off, but he continued to scrabble at me, his expression deranged as he pinned me down. His face was so close that our noses were practically touching, spraying spittle all over me.

“I am always being thwarted!” he screamed. “I finally rid myself of my brother and yet now you—!”

His twisted features began to bulge and turn red, and a horn pushed its way out of his forehead.

“Don’t!” I yelled, but Sōun was beyond hearing. He transformed into a red ogre, so tall he almost pierced the roof. Swinging me around the room he trampled the fallen food and silverware and let out a roar. Fragments of glass rained down from the shattered chandelier and the room was plunged into darkness, as the terrified Friday Fellows milled around trying to make their escape.

While I was pinned against a window having the air crushed from my lungs, I heard Jurōjin sharply call out, “Tenmaya!” and the sound of the air rifle being cocked.

“Don’t shoot! Don’t shoot!” My strangled voice was hardly audible.

A dry bang rang out, and at once a terrible howl shook the room. The massive ogre’s hand that was pinning me against the wall shrank away, and I rolled down into the shattered glass and silverware that was scattered on the carpet. I pulled myself up to find that Sōun had vanished. Jurōjin lit a small lamp, illuminating the devastated train compartment, which looked as if a tornado had just blown through.

The Friday Fellows were cowering along the windows.

“Who would have guessed he was such a monster?” Daikoku quavered.

“Here be monsters,” muttered Jurōjin, looking out the windows into the darkness. The look on his face was half mirthful, and half stony with cold fury. “After all, beneath the hot springs lie the caverns of Hell.”

　　　　　　　◯

I exited the train into the garden, looking for Ebisugawa Sōun.

Relying on the light that shined from the windows to search the brush, I found a fresh trail of spattered blood leading into the darkness of the overgrown trees. I looked back as I followed the trail, to see the Jurōjin’s triple-decker train looming there, silently throwing off light. Everything that happened inside there felt like it had been a dream.

“Sōun, where are you?” I whispered into the darkness.

Right then, Arima felt a long, long way from Kyoto. I remembered what Sōun had said: I do what I must to survive in this terra incognita.

By the time I was old enough to understand the world around me, Father was already the Trick Magister, and Ebisugawa Sōun was already the manager of the Faux Denki Bran distillery. Even as a young pup I sensed the animosity between the two. Yet if you went back in time, even Sōun had once been a tiny furball rolling around in the Tadasu Forest, playing happily with Father. Crossing hill and dale in search of tsuchinoko, playing shogi, walking side-by-side to Master Akadama’s classroom—they must have been just as close-knit as my brothers and me. How had Sōun become so alienated from the tanuki world as to come to this?

I came to a place very deep in the trees. Here was a chilly darkness where the light from the train did not reach. It was almost surprising how cold it had gotten, and I could feel the warmth from the outdoor bath being stolen from my body.

Ebisugawa Sōun had fallen on the ground, his furry body unable to transform. Hearing my approaching footsteps, he exhaled a laboured breath.

“Witness my disgrace. It seems I did not even have what it took to become a demon.”

I reached out my hand to touch him, but he snarled menacingly like a rabid dog. His torso was covered with an appalling quantity of blood. The pellet from the air rifle seemed to have gone straight through the old tanuki’s belly. Ignoring him I tried to stanch the wound with my hands, both of which were immediately drenched in blood.

“Hero or villain, in the end all are merely furballs,” Sōun groaned.

“Don’t die here, I’m taking you back with me.”

“…You have avenged your father. You ought to rejoice.”

In his tanuki form, Sōun exuded astonishingly little dignity. There was little to show for all of the wealth he frittered away going around all those hot springs; his emaciated backside protruded through the stiff, scraggly fur on his bottom. On the ground before me was nothing more than a scruffy-looking tanuki, and it was hard to believe that this was the very same Ebisugawa Sōun who had once been regarded as the head tanuki in all of Kyoto. In his face I could just make out the faint resemblance to Father.

“What’s the matter with you, Uncle? You can’t just let it end like this.” Despite myself I found tears springing to my eyes. All the anger that I had built up for him scattered like dandelions blowing away in the wind. That made me terribly frustrated: once, that anger had been so real that I could almost feel it in my body, and now it was all just…gone.

A moment later Sōun let out a loud moan, his bloody nose glinting. His eyes shone bright, opened wide as if he had been startled by something in the darkness. But those eyes no longer saw the light of the triple-decker train, or the cold gloom of Arima far from home, or the face of his detested nephew who had foiled his plans so often. Now he was seeing a new light, a light that came from a place far beyond the edge of this bustling, living world.

“Ebisugawa Sōun, may you find your way to the other side.”

I exhaled a long breath and shut his eyes.

Hero or villain, in the end every furball returns to dust.

　　　　　　　◯

I knelt beside the motionless Sōun, bowing my head.

The cold of this autumn night chilled his body, and mine.

I’d wanted to hunt him down, but I never wanted things to end this way. To be honest, I hadn’t known what I wanted to do. All I knew now was that I felt dreadfully sad. Father’s murderer was dead, yet here I was crying as if it was Father who lay dead before me.

Suddenly I heard a voice coming from the shade of the trees. “Is that my dad?”

I looked up and sucked in my breath. And after a while, I answered. “Kaisei?”

“How come you’re crying, Yasaburō? That’s my dad, isn’t it?”

“He was shot by Tenmaya.”

“Is it bad?”

“Yeah…but he’s not in pain anymore.”

Kaisei gasped and went quiet. I didn’t say anything.

That was the moment I realized that Kaisei hadn’t come to Arima for a vacation. She’d realized that Sōun was hiding out here and had come to find him.

“Can you give me some time alone with my dad?” she said quietly at last. “Thank you, Yasaburō.”