Part 3 (1/2)

After walking for about an hour he stepped into the forest. The treetops were swaying wildly, but there was no wind inside the grove and the dank smell of bark hung in the air. He stopped beside a young linden tree and untied the hatchet and twine from his back frame. His father had taken him collecting linden bark twice in the past and, just like his father, Isaku sank the hatchet blade low into the tree, down near the roots. He cut a branch off the next tree, fas.h.i.+oned it into the shape of a spatula, and inserted the point under the bark, which lifted enough for him to grab and pull. The bark peeled away up the trunk.

He moved from one young tree to another, stripping away bark as he went. Drops of rain fell noisily onto his hat. The water streaming down the trunks of the linden trees glistened.

His stomach told him it was time to eat. He opened a little package of bamboo sheath and dug into the large millet dumpling wrapped inside. Last year he hadn't collected any linden bark, but this year he would be able to get his mother to make some cloth for them. As he stared at the bark he had peeled from the trees, he felt that he had become the grown-up head of the family.

He worked for a little while longer before finally collecting all the peeled bark, folding it in half, tying it up with twine, and las.h.i.+ng it onto the carrying-frame, which he then swung onto his back. It was heavy, around sixty or seventy pounds.

Using his stick for support, Isaku cautiously threaded his way through the trees and out of the forest. The rain had grown heavier, throwing up spray as it pelted his hat and shoulders. The wind bore down on his load, and he felt his body moving with it. Isaku walked on down the path, stopping occasionally to steady himself against the gusts of wind. The stormy sea came into view below him. He was soaked to the skin with rain and sweat.

His mother started preparing the bark that night. She trimmed off the outer part with a knife and laid out the inner layers on the floor. Isaku repaired his fis.h.i.+ng-tackle on the dirt floor as he watched his mother, who seemed to relish her task.

The next day she soaked the inner layers of bark in the stream near their house. The pieces of outer bark were bundled up in a corner, ready to be used as kindling. Five days later she pulled the bark out of the stream and boiled it in a potful of water mixed with ash. Then she soaked it in the stream once again, rinsed it thoroughly, and hung it up to dry in the shade before pulling it apart to make into thread. His mother spun the thread on the spinning-wheel and then sat in front of the loom, weaving it into cloth. It was tiring work; occasionally she stopped to rub the sleep from her eyes.

The wet season started and sheets of rain fell on the village. The villagers had seen the last of the squid, and now they caught nothing but small fry.

In the evening an old fisherman came back to the sh.o.r.e to report that the saury were starting to come in.

Isaku felt himself losing his composure. His father was gifted at catching saury, but for Isaku it was a trick he could not master for the life of him. The previous rainy season he had tried to fish as he remembered his father doing, but had caught nothing at all. Isaku's family had to stand by helplessly as the smoke from other houses grilling saury floated up day after day, and everywhere people could be seen packing salted saury into barrels. This year, he thought, he had to catch some fish, even if it wasn't a lot, for his family.

Since the saury season provided the most important catch of the year for the village, the men tried their best to catch as much as they could; they had no leisure for teaching fis.h.i.+ng techniques to others. The previous season, the other villagers had taken pity on Isaku's family and had each brought them a few fish, but this year he didn't want to depend on such charity.

The only person Isaku could rely on was his cousin Takichi, but now that he had his own household to look after it was doubtful that he would teach Isaku how to fish. Besides, Isaku was concerned that Takichi had changed since getting married. But Isaku knew there was no way he could let his family starve, so that evening, after hastily eating his dinner, he hurried along the moonlit path to his cousin's house.

'h.e.l.lo?' Isaku said as he poked his head through the straw matting hanging at the entrance. Takichi looked towards the door from where he sat on the earthen floor, his wife kneeling beside him. There were several pieces of thick straw matting laid out on the floor, as well as some stout lengths of rope. Seeing that Takichi was starting to prepare his fis.h.i.+ng tackle, Isaku walked towards him.

'You said you'd tell me how to catch saury. I want you to teach me. My family's gonna starve. I hope you haven't forgotten what you said that night,' Isaku said.

'I haven't forgotten. I thought you'd turn up before long,' Takichi said. A faint smile appeared on his face.

Isaku felt relieved. He sat down beside his cousin and turned his gaze toward Takichi's busy hands.

When fis.h.i.+ng for saury, a fisherman would tie together three or four pieces of thick straw matting and attach a heavy rope to it, letting this drift up to about forty yards behind the stern of the boat. At the same time, over the gunwale, he would float a piece of straw matting with seaweed hanging underneath. After dropping the anchor, he would lie flat so as not to be seen by the fish. Eventually, when he sensed that a school of saury had come under the matting, he would gently pull the matting closer with the rope. The fish would move with it and also swim under the matting attached to the gunwale. The seaweed hanging down and the floating matting would excite the saury, and they would suddenly start to lay eggs. The fisherman would put his hand through one of the several holes in the matting and move his fingers in the water. Attracted by this, the saury would slip in between the man's fingers and be caught in an instant.

Though Isaku knew the basics of the procedure, he had never managed to catch anything. He had come as close as getting the fish between his fingers, but then they would get away. Also, the saury seemed to shun his boat, unlike the others.

The straw matting that would trail from the stern of the boat lay on the floor, finished, and Takichi was now making the holes in the matting that would be hung over the side of the boat.

'When I was at your house, I said you could bring your boat up alongside mine and watch from there, but, come to think of it, I can't let you do that. It'd scare the fish away. Ask me anything you like, and I'll tell you, though,' Takichi said as he worked on the matting.

Isaku had thought this might happen. Once the saury season started, the men became very sensitive and would yell at other fishermen if they brought their boats within a certain distance. A keen second sight was necessary with saury fis.h.i.+ng, and the slightest distraction could ruin a day's catch, so there was nothing strange about Takichi's refusing to let Isaku bring his boat in too close.

'Tell me how to grab the fish. They always get away from me,' Isaku said, looking up at Takichi's face. Takichi stopped what he was doing and lifted one hand, moving his fingers slowly in the air before suddenly clenching them together.

'You grab the fish when you feel its head between your fingers. They get away because you grab too low.'

'The head,' said Isaku, moving his own fingers in the air.

'If you let one get through your fingers, they won't come back again. And when you go to grab them, make sure you don't dig your fingers in. They'll scatter if they smell their blood in the water.' Isaku nodded as Takichi started working again.

'One more thing. Why is it the fish don't come near my boat?'

Takichi looked up and replied, 'They can see your shadow on the water. Lie down flat inside the boat and just poke your arm over the side. Saury get scared when they sense someone there.'

Isaku knew all this, but he obviously wasn't being careful enough.

Takichi looked down at the straw matting. Isaku stared at him, impressed that his cousin was a full-fledged fisherman at the age of seventeen. Clearly, looking after his mother and now being a husband to Kura had imbued him with a strong sense of responsibility. Isaku could not help but see his cousin in a new light.

Anxious to get home to start putting together his fis.h.i.+ng-gear, Isaku thanked Takichi and Kura and left. He started working that night and resumed early the next morning. It was almost midday by the time he finished.

Isaku and his mother carried the gear down to the beach through the light rain and loaded it into his boat. Dusk was said to be the best time for fis.h.i.+ng, so there were no boats out on the water yet.

He went down to the sh.o.r.e again after lunch, and found the men getting ready to take their boats out. The saury would come in from the west; the men would fish around the tip of the headland protruding on the left, about two and a half miles from the beach. Boats were leaving the sh.o.r.e one after another, so Isaku, too, put his headband on and pushed his boat into the water. Grasping the oar, he worked his way out through the reef. The sea was so calm that the waves barely lapped onto the cape. The rows of houses in the village faded into the distance as the expanse of mountains unfolded behind them. The rain had stopped, but clouds of mist clung to the wooded slopes.

Isaku worked the oar with all his strength, but one by one the other boats overtook him. Sahei's was the only one he could see behind him.

His boat started to pitch and roll as he approached the cape and the open sea behind it. The men ahead of him had already started fis.h.i.+ng by the time Isaku pulled in his oar, dropped anchor, and let the straw matting out into the water over the stern. The mats bobbed up and down with the swell of the sea as they drifted farther out, pulling the rope tight. Isaku put the last piece just over the side of the boat, recalling Takichi's advice as he pressed his body flat and looked out astern toward the floating pieces of matting. According to Takichi, he should slowly pull on the rope to bring the matting in toward the boat once he sensed that a school of saury were underneath, but he could see no sign of any fish. Other men were already hauling in the ropes as they lay flat in their boats.

He kept a close watch on his matting but saw no noticeable change. Yet, he thought, there may be a school of saury under there after all. He grabbed the rope and started to pull. The matting came slowly in towards the boat. It was heavy.

When the matting reached the boat, he tied the rope to the stern. Isaku reached out toward the matting floating from the gunwale, put his hand through one of the holes, opened his fingers, and slowly moved them in the water. He focused on the area under the matting. He could see silvery, s.h.i.+ning flashes darting by. They're here all right, he thought.

The silvery s.h.i.+ning things gradually increased in number and began to seethe below the surface. Some even seemed to stop for an instant. Saury brushed against his fingers and then were gone. He remembered Takichi's advice that if he missed the first fish, the whole school would scatter. Saury started to flit through his fingers. He could clearly see the heads. Several times he thought, Grab it! but his fingers did not move.

When he saw a saury's head pa.s.sing between his fingers, he clutched at it hastily, but the fish did a s.h.i.+mmy and slipped away. The school of saury seemed to disappear in a flash, as did the silvery luminescence.

Isaku took his hand out of the water and rubbed his face roughly. Once again he had been reminded that fis.h.i.+ng for saury was not going to be an easy job and that catching them by hand would not be something mastered quickly. He tried to console himself, thinking that he hadn't done so badly after all, that the previous year he had hardly ever managed to get the fish to come under the matting, let alone have them swarm around his fingers.

Around him he could see men grabbing fish and dropping them in the bottom of their boats. Light rain started to fall. Isaku let out the rope and the straw matting once more, waited what he judged to be the right length of time, then hauled it back in, but there was no sign of saury under the matting.

A short while later the sea began to turn a dark murky colour, and the men began to turn their boats back to sh.o.r.e. Isaku pulled up the matting, grasped his oar, and followed behind them. Threading his way through the reef behind the boat in front of him, he worked his way to the fire lit on the beach. Night was settling in and the people standing on the beach looked red in the firelight.

Isaku guided his boat up onto the beach, then pulled it farther up the sh.o.r.e with his mother. She said nothing as she ran her eyes over the bottom of the boat.

That night he went to see Takichi again. The smell of grilled saury and smoke from the cooking-fire still hung in the air in Takichi's house.

'Not even one,' sighed Isaku as he sat down on the edge of the bed, but Takichi merely smiled faintly from beside the fireplace.

'How do you know when the fish have come under the matting out behind the boat?' asked Isaku.

'Instinct, experience ... Water changes colour slightly. Seems to move, too,' replied Takichi.

Isaku said nothing. His cousin stood up and said, 'Eat this,' holding out some grilled saury on skewers. Isaku shook his head frantically, got to his feet, and left the house without saying a word.

Except on days when the sea was rough, Isaku took his boat out every day with the other fishermen. The saury season was approaching its peak, and the catch increased day by day. It seemed that Sahei had been taught by his father, too, and almost without fail he brought back ten fish a day. The other men came back with the bottoms of their boats covered with saury.

Isaku was ashamed to be heading back to sh.o.r.e without having caught anything at all. His mother said nothing about his fis.h.i.+ng and made a thin vegetable and rice porridge for his younger brother and sister. The fact that he couldn't catch any fish for them tormented Isaku.

About two weeks after he'd started going out after saury, Isaku noticed a faint hint of spray in the water near the straw matting. Not only that, but he felt he could just make out a difference in the colour of the water at that spot. Maybe his eyes were playing a trick on him, he thought. The sea was calm, with only the slightest of swells and no suggestion of any change. He thought there was no way he would ever be able to judge whether or not fish were there.

Isaku grasped the rope and gently started to reel it in. He thought, There's nothing to lose if there are no saury there. The matting came closer, at last lining up alongside that tied to the gunwale. Tying up the rope, he sneaked a look under the matting.