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

For a few weeks, the Professor had been working on an extremely difficult problem, one that would pay the largest cash prize in the history of the Journal of Mathematics to the reader who solved it. Indifferent to money, the Professor took pleasure in the difficulty of the problem itself. Checks from the journal were left unopened on the hall table, and when I asked him if he wanted me to cash his prize money at the post office, he shrugged. In the end, I asked the agency to forward them to his sister-in-law.

Just by looking at the Professor, I could tell that the new problem was especially hard. The intensity of his thought seemed to be near breaking point. He would vanish into the study as though he were literally retreating into his mind, and I imagined that his body might actually vaporize into pure contemplation and disappear. But then the sound of his pencil scratching across the paper would break the stillness and reassure me-the Professor was still with us and was making some progress with the proof.

I tried to imagine how he could work through a problem like this over such a long period of time-he basically had to start again from the beginning every morning. To compensate for the loss of his thoughts from the day before, he had only an ordinary notebook and the scribbled notes that covered his body like a cocoon. Since the accident, math was his life, so perhaps it was also what led him to sit down at his desk each day and return to the problem in front of him.

I was considering all of this while making dinner when the Professor suddenly appeared. Usually, when he was wrestling with a problem, I hardly saw him. I wasn't sure whether I would be interrupting his thinking if I spoke to him, so I continued seeding the peppers and peeling the onions. He walked over, leaned against the counter, folded his arms, and stood there staring at my hands. I felt awkward with him watching me, so I went to get some eggs out of the refrigerator, and a frying pan.

"Did you need something?" I asked at last, no longer able to stand the silence.

"No, go on," he said. His tone was reassuring. "I like to watch you cook," he added.

I wondered if the problem had proven so difficult his brain had blown a fuse-but I broke the eggs into a bowl and beat them with my chopsticks. I went on stirring after the spices had dissolved and the lumps were gone, only stopping when my hand had grown numb.

"Now what are you going to do?" he asked quietly.

"Well…," I said, "next…, uh, I have to fry the pork." The Professor's sudden appearance had disrupted my usual routine.

"You're not going to cook the eggs now?"

"No, it's best to let them sit, so the spices blend in."

We were alone, Root was off playing in the park. The afternoon sun divided the garden into patches of shadow and dappled light. The air was still, and the curtains hung limply by the open window. The Professor was watching me with the intense stare he normally reserved for math. His pupils were so black they looked transparent, and his eyelashes seemed to quiver with each breath. He was gazing at my hands, which were only a few feet away, but he might have been staring off into distant space. I dusted the pork filets in flour and arranged them in the pan.

"Why do you have to move them around like that?"

"Because the temperature at the center of the pan is higher than at the edges. You have to move them every so often to cook them evenly."

"I see. No one gets the best spot all the time-they have to compromise."

He nodded as if I had just revealed a great secret. The aroma of cooking meat drifted up between us.

I sliced some peppers and onions for the salad and made an olive oil dressing. Then I fried the eggs. I had planned to sneak some grated carrot into the dressing, which now proved impossible with the Professor watching me. He said nothing, but he seemed to hold his breath while I cut the lemon peel in the shape of a flower. He leaned in closer as I mixed the vinegar and oil, and I thought I heard him sigh when I set the piping hot omelet on the counter.

"Excuse me," I said at last, unable to control my curiosity. "But I'm wondering what you find so interesting."

"I like to watch you cook," he said again. He unfolded his arms and looked out the window for the spot where the evening star would appear. Then he went back to his study without a sound. The setting sun shone on his back as he walked away.

I looked at the food I had just finished preparing and then at my hands. Sautéed pork garnished with lemon, a salad, and a soft, yellow omelet. I studied the dishes, one by one. They were all perfectly ordinary, but they looked delicious-satisfying food at the end of a long day. I looked at my palms again, filled suddenly with an absurd sense of satisfaction, as though I had just solved Fermat's Last Theorem.

The rainy season came to an end, Root's summer vacation began, and still the Professor struggled with his proof. I was eagerly looking forward to the day he would ask me to mail it to the magazine.

The weather had turned hot. The cottage had neither airconditioning nor a cross breeze. Root and I tried not to complain, but we were no match for the Professor's stoicism. At noon, on the hottest day, he would sit at his desk with the doors closed, never removing his jacket-as if he were afraid that all the work he'd done on the proof would crumble if he slipped out of his coat. The notes on his suit had wilted, and he was covered in a painful-looking heat rash, but when I came in with a fan, or suggested a cold shower, or more barley tea, he would chase me out in exasperation.

Once his summer vacation started, Root would come with me to the cottage in the morning. Given my recent run-in with the widow, I thought it best not to increase the amount of time he spent with me at work, but the Professor wouldn't hear of it. He was absolutely convinced that a child on vacation had to be where his mother could watch over him. Root, however, much preferred to be at the park playing baseball with his friends or at the pool, so he was almost never with us.

On Friday, July 31, the proof was finished. The Professor didn't seem very excited, nor did he seem especially exhausted. He calmly handed me the pages, and I ran to the post office to be sure to catch the mail before the weekend. I watched as they stamped the envelope and put it in the bin; then, feeling both excited and relieved, I wandered home slowly, shopping along the way. I bought the Professor new underwear, some sweet-smelling soap, ice cream, jelly, and sweet bean paste.

When I reached home, the Professor no longer knew who I was. I checked my watch-it had only been an hour and ten minutes since I'd left. The Professor's eighty-minute timer had never failed before. His head had always been more accurate than any clock. I took off my watch and held it up to my ear.

"How much did you weigh when you were born?" the Professor said.

At the beginning of August, Root went camping for four nights. The trip was only for children over ten, and Root had been looking forward to it for a long time. It would be his first time away from me, but he showed no signs of fear. When I dropped him off at the bus, clusters of mothers and children were saying their good-byes. The mothers were all issuing last-minute instructions and warnings, and I had a few of my own for Root, telling him to wear his jacket and to hang on to his insurance card-but he never gave me a chance to finish. He was the first one on the bus, and he barely waved good-bye as they pulled away.

The first evening, I lingered at the Professor's, reluctant to go home to my empty apartment after I'd finished washing the dinner dishes.

"Would you like some fruit?"

"That would be nice," the Professor replied, turning to look at me from his easy chair. Though the sun would not be setting for some time yet, thick clouds had gathered, and the light in the garden was mottled, as though the world had been wrapped in lavender cellophane. A gentle breeze blew through the kitchen window. I cut up some melon and took it to the Professor. Then I sat down beside him.