Yôko Ogawa - The Gift of Numbers aka The Housekeeper and the Professor

He looked down for a moment, perhaps trying to preserve his dignity, but he soon began to squirm and finally, unable to contain himself, he danced all around me.

"Yes!" he shouted. "More than anything!" He danced and danced and then hung on my neck. "Thank you!" he said.

It was rainy season, and we'd been worried about the weather, but June 2 dawned bright and sunny. We set out on the four-fifty bus, while there was still a good bit of light in the sky. Some of the other passengers seemed to be heading to the game as well.

Root carried a plastic megaphone he had borrowed from a friend, and, of course, he wore his Tigers cap. Every ten minutes or so, he asked me if I'd remembered the tickets. I was carrying a basket of sandwiches in one hand and a Thermos of tea in the other; but his constant questions made me uneasy, and I found myself slipping my hand into the pocket of my skirt just to be sure.

The Professor was dressed as always: a suit covered with notes, moldy shoes, pencils in his breast pocket.

I'd told him about the baseball game at three thirty, exactly eighty minutes before the bus was due to depart. Root had already arrived from school, and we tried to bring up the game as casually as possible. At first, the Professor didn't understand what we were saying. I don't think he was even aware that professional baseball was played at stadiums all over the country and that anyone who wanted to could buy a ticket and go to a game-not that this was especially odd, since he had only recently learned that you could listen to a game on the radio. Until now, baseball had only existed in the form of statistics and as illustrated cards.

"You want me to go?" he asked, sounding apprehensive.

"You certainly don't have to if you don't want. But we'd like you to come with us."

"To the stadium… on a bus?" Thinking about things was the Professor's special talent, and if we'd left him alone, he might have considered the matter until long after the game had ended. "And will we see Enatsu?" He'd struck us where we were most vulnerable, but Root gave the answer we'd agreed on.

"Unfortunately, he played against the Giants at Koshien the day before yesterday, so he won't be pitching today. I'm sorry, Professor."

"You don't have to apologize. But it is a shame… Did he win the other day at least?"

"Sure he did. His seventh win of the season."

At the time, in 1992, the pitcher who wore number 28, Yoshihiro Nakada, played only rarely due to a shoulder injury. It was hard to know whether it was lucky or unlucky that no one in the dugout would be wearing number 28. If the player wearing Enatsu's number wasn't a pitcher, the Professor would have realized something was wrong, but if he had seen number 28 throwing in the bullpen, perhaps he wouldn't be able to tell the difference. He'd never seen Enatsu play, so he wouldn't recognize his windup. But if the Tigers decided to play Nakada, there would have been no mistaking him from the mound and the Professor's shock could have been terrible. Nakada was not even a lefty, like Enatsu. It would have been easier all around if there were no 28 at all.

"Let's go!" Root urged. "It'll be more fun if you come, too." And that was enough-the Professor decided to go.

He sat gripping the arms of his seat all the way to the stadium, just as he had at the barbershop. When we had to get off the bus he let go of the armrest and held tightly to Root's hand. We were mostly silent as we walked through the grounds to the stadium and stood in the crowded passageway leading to our seats. The Professor was no doubt shocked to find himself in a place so utterly different from his usual surroundings, and Root was overcome with excitement at the prospect of seeing his beloved Tigers. They both seemed to have lost the power of speech and merely stared around in awe.

"Is everything okay?" I asked from time to time, and the Professor would nod and grip Root's hand tightly.

As we reached the top of the stairs that led to the seats above third base, all three of us let out a cry. The diamond in all its grandeur was laid out before us-the soft, dark earth of the infield, the spotless bases, the straight white lines, and the manicured grass. The evening sky seemed so close you could touch it, and at that moment, as if they had been awaiting our arrival, the lights came on. The stadium looked like a spaceship descended from the heavens.

Did the Professor enjoy the game? Later, when Root and I spoke of that remarkable day, we were never sure. And there was always a part of us that regretted putting this good-natured old man through such an ordeal.

But those moments we shared, the sights and sounds of the game, haven't faded with the years. If anything, they seem brighter and more vivid as time goes by, indelibly etched in our minds. The cracked, uncomfortable seats, the egg salad sandwiches with too much mustard, the lights of a plane that cut across the sky above the stadium like a shooting star. We remember every detail, and when we talk about that night, we're able to conjure up and bring back the Professor, as if he were sitting right beside us.

Our favorite part was the Professor's crush on the girl who was selling drinks in the stands. The Tigers had just finished their half of the second inning, and Root, who had already eaten his sandwich, announced that he wanted some juice. I was about to flag down a vendor when the Professor stopped me with a quiet but emphatic "No." When I asked him what was wrong, he refused to answer, but when I started to wave to the next girl, he spoke up again. "No!" For some reason, he seemed to disapprove of Root having a juice.

"Just make do with the tea I brought from home," I told Root.

"I don't want that. It's bitter."

"Then I'll go get you some milk at the concession stand."

"I'm not a baby! And they don't sell milk here. At a baseball game, you're supposed to have juice in a big paper cup-that's the rule." It was typical of Root to have an ideal vision of how things were supposed to be. I turned back to the Professor.

"Don't you think we could let him have just one?"

His expression was still grave as he brought his mouth close to my ear and whispered, "Get it from that girl over there." He pointed to a young woman who was climbing the other aisle.

"Why?" I asked.

At first he refused to explain, but Root's pestering finally wore him down. "Because she's the prettiest," he said simply.

Indeed, the Professor had a good eye. She was by far the most beautiful girl, and she had the sweetest smile. Finally, the girl in question arrived at the row directly below ours, and the Professor called out to get her attention. The fact that his hand was shaking as he passed her the money or that his suit was covered with scraps of paper didn't seem to faze her, and she continued to smile pleasantly as she handed him the juice. Root had complained about how long it had taken to get his drink, but his mood improved when the Professor bought him popcorn, ice cream, and a second juice when the girl came by again. We were so busy scanning the stands for the pretty young vendor and buying treats for Root that we missed the Tigers taking the lead with four hits in the top of the third.

This unexpected distraction aside, the Professor was still a mathematician at heart. As he sat down and looked around at the stadium, the first words out his mouth were: "The diamond is 27.43 meters on each side." And when he noticed that his seat number was 714 and Root's was 715, he began to lecture again and completely forgot to sit down.

"The home run record Babe Ruth set in 1935 is 714. On April 8, 1974, Hank Aaron broke that record, hitting his 715th off of Al Downing of the Dodgers. The product of 714 and 715 is equal to the product of the first seven prime numbers: 714 × 715 = 2 × 3 × 5 × 7 × 11 × 13 × 17 = 510510. And, the sum of the prime factors of 714 equals the sum of the prime factors of 715: 714 = 2 × 3 × 7 × 17; 715 = 5 × 11 × 13; 2 + 3 + 7 + 17 = 5 + 11 + 13 = 29. A pair of consecutive whole numbers with these properties is quite rare. There are only 26 such pairs up to 20,000. This one is the Ruth-Aaron pair. Just like prime numbers, they are more rare as the numbers get larger. And 5 and 6 are the smallest pair. But the proof to show that those pairs are infinite in number is quite difficult… The important thing is that I'm sitting in 714 and you're in 715, instead of the opposite. It's the young who have to break the old records. That's the way the world works, don't you think?"