Юкио Мисима - The Frolic of the Beasts

Just then, the half-naked quarry workers hurriedly divided into two groups and dodged a large rock fall. The stones kicked up a cloud of dust as they rolled down the cliff—revealing a fresh section of rock that glittered in the sunlight—and reached as far as a clump of tall-stemmed summer grasses before subsiding inelegantly.

The muscular, sweat-soaked backs of the workers were lightly covered in white dust from the stones.

Having witnessed the rock fall, an almost indescribable expression of delight surfaced on Ippei’s face. His eyes brimmed with ecstasy, while his nose seemed to detect the invigorating stench of death; a faint flush came to his suntanned cheeks. In that instant, Ippei’s trademark smile, which revealed his white teeth, appeared quite beautiful to Kōji.

As if to spur himself on, Kōji continued to speak. Ippei’s silence, while Kōji was quiet, disoriented him, and he fancied that Ippei, not grasping at all what he was saying, had afforded him a glimpse of the uncanny abyss within him.

“To tell the truth, thanks to me taking that wrench to your head, your thoughts are now complete; you’ve found a pretext for existing. What does life mean? Life for you is the inability to speak. What is the world to you? The world is your inability to speak. What is history? History is your inability to speak. What about the arts? Love? Politics? Everything and anything is your inability to speak, and so everything is coherent. The things you have been thinking about all along have come to fruition. But that was in the days when I imagined that all that was left intact within you was your intellect, and that, like a clock that has lost its dial, only the mechanism moved with vigor, ‘tick tock’—ticking away time with clockwork precision. But now I realize there is nothing inside you at all. I know it, because I have sniffed it out—like the people of a country who have long been unable to mourn their lost king, his death having been kept a closely guarded secret.

“Our household has begun to revolve around the hollow cavern that lies inside you. If you try to imagine a house that has a deep and empty well with its mouth agape right in the middle of the parlor, that would be about right. An empty hole. A hole so large it would swallow up the world. You safeguard that dearly, and not only that, but you arranged Yūko and me around the periphery in a manner that suits you and took it into your head to create for yourself an entirely new family of the kind that wouldn’t have occurred to anyone else. An ideal, splendid family centered on that empty well.

“When you moved your bedroom next to mine, you were at last close to achieving your objective. Before long, three empty holes or wells had been completed, and you intended to create an intimate, happy family that was the envy of others. Even I felt seduced by it. I almost wanted to lend a hand and make it happen. If I’d wanted to do it, it would have been easy. We could have discarded our troubles, dug ourselves a hole as big as yours, and, right in front of your very eyes, Yūko and I could have had done with it and slept together like a pair of frolicking beasts without a care in the world. We could have writhed around in front of you moaning with pleasure and then, finally, fallen asleep snoring. But I couldn’t bring myself to do that. And neither could Yūko. Do you understand? We simply couldn’t do it—afraid as we were of turning into sated beasts and seeing your plan succeed. And what makes it all the more unpleasant is the fact that you are aware of this.

“I’ve gradually come to realize this since the picnic at the waterfall. When I was talking to you just now, I suddenly felt sure of it. Yūko fell victim to your machinations, and while she came dangerously close to helping you realize your plan, after everything even she couldn’t bring herself to do it. You knew that.

“What on earth are you hoping for? While realizing we can’t do it, you still seek to entice us. You corner us, knowing that we have nowhere to go. A common spider is better than you. At least a spider spins its own web and tries to ensnare its prey. You, on the other hand, don’t even spin out your empty existence. You don’t expend any effort at all. The vacuous being that you are wants to be at the sacred center of your empty world.

“What did you expect? Tell me! What do you want?”

Kōji’s line of questioning became increasingly fervent as he found it more and more difficult to tolerate this monologue that Ippei would never comprehend. He once again fell victim to his own irritation in trying to make Ippei understand his questions, as before, and when this happened, his eager voice faltered and took on a mean-sounding tone again.

“What is it you want? Well? What do you really want to do?”

Ippei had been silent for a long while.

Just then, the western sky above the harbor started to glow with the setting sun, and the pebbles on the road cast their long shadows across its surface; as they did so, the first tears Kōji had seen Ippei shed spread thinly over his eyes.

“Home… I want to go… back home.”

Kōji felt betrayed by this childlike supplication and was seized with anger.

“That’s a lie. Tell me the truth. I won’t let you go back until you do.”

Once again Ippei fell into a long silence. Then, still sitting diagonally across the stone handrail, he gazed fixedly at the radiant western sky. Normally uncommonly dark and agitated as he tried to express many differing emotions, his eyes—more animated than in the past but not as vivid as those of a healthy person—were now completely still as they regarded the sunset, his irises openly reflecting the radiant western skies. The tightly congealed clouds were edged with yellow and crimson as a yolk-colored blaze of light streamed across the heavens.

Due to the sun, which had yet to go fully down, the promontory on the opposite side of the inlet appeared unnaturally bright green; the distance across the bay became impossible to gauge, and black protrusions—the ships’ masts and the ice-crushing tower, which were only slightly more prominent than the rows of houses on this side—appeared to directly touch the promontory. The crimson reflection extended unexpectedly far into the distance, like sprinkled droplets of ink, and a section of the clouds directly overhead was also faintly tinged with red. The light from this magnificent sunset, which was at once intense and at the same time strangely calm, converged precisely in Ippei’s unmoving pupils, and that minute melancholy image was not only projected into his eyes but also passed through his pupils and seemed to occupy every recess of his hollow interior.

Thrusting his walking stick into his right hand, he described something like characters in the air with the index finger of his unencumbered left. But the strokes were unduly confused, and try as he might, Kōji was unable to follow the invisible letters being traced in front of him.

“Why don’t you try saying it,” said Kōji, this time with the deliberate consideration of a doctor speaking to his patient.

With a dry, rasping voice that passed through his teeth, and with great concentration, Ippei spoke, expressing himself two ways—as he always did when he was afraid of being misunderstood:

“Death. I want to die.”

As they followed the way home, they saw Yūko coming toward them on the path that went between the green rice paddies. Concerned that they were taking so long to return, she had sent the postmaster’s wife on ahead and come back to meet them. With Yūko’s back to the sun, which had almost gone down, her shadow soon reached their feet as she slowly drew near. The closer she came, the more attractive her heavy lipstick was against her face—the paleness of which was accentuated by the dark blue material of her cotton robe.