An Exquisite Sense of What Is Beautiful (14 page)

CHAPTER TWELVE

Japan
•
1956

When Edward first arrived in Japan, he imagined himself as this tiny, isolated dot of a soul lost among millions of other souls. And after eighteen months, that was how he remained, not joining the dots, but carving out a lonely existence for himself between his little box of an apartment and the offices of Tokyo Autos. Japan
happened
all around him, and he wondered at it, absorbed it, learned from it as he added another perspective to his way of thinking. But he kept apart from it. And he found he liked it that way. When he wrote to Aldous about his propensity towards contented isolation, he received the comment: ‘You are very fortunate to possess the most important quality for being a writer.’

The First Tokyo Motor Show propelled Edward slightly more into the limelight. The show was a great success with over half a million people attending, and he enjoyed his assignment dealing with the few English-speaking customers at the Tokyo Autos stand. He felt proud of his contribution as a bridge of cultural
understanding
, his edited brochures in both English and Japanese outlining “the outstanding co-operation in licensed technology between Tokyo Autos and Argos Motors as a cornerstone for the future
development of the Japanese automobile industry”. Although Tokyo Autos still manufactured many of its passenger vehicles
simply
by welding car bodies on to the chassis of small trucks, “the company was seriously committed towards producing cars
according
to international standards and held a long-term belief that it could compete in the global export market”. He reported these views back to Digby in London who replied with the letter he now held as he leaned back in his chair, feet up on his desk, in the small office allocated to him by his Japanese hosts. “International Officer” was the sign on his door, ostentatiously describing his position as an English copywriter. The room’s tiny window allowed him a view over the skyline of a central Tokyo that seemed to be growing by the minute.

“I am delighted to hear of the contribution our beloved Argos is making to domestic production in Japan,” Digby wrote. “But I dismiss as totally fanciful the idea that Tokyo Autos might be able to come up with its own car to compete in the export market. Such a thought is madness, but humour your hosts anyway.”

Edward didn’t think the idea was madness at all. The American army of occupation had departed, leaving the Japanese to fall back on their boundless capacity for hard work, their resourcefulness at adapting the inventiveness of others to their own ends. They even had a phrase for it.
Wakon-Yoshi.
Japanese spirit, Western ability. And what a combination those qualities were proving to be. He just had to look out of the window to see the result. High-rise office and apartment buildings, department stores, nightclubs, pachinko parlours, all springing up like wild mushrooms in the humid streets below while underfoot new subway lines were being hacked out of the scorched earth. He could even walk out of the front door of Tokyo Autos, cross the road and order an American-style pizza and a half-bottle of Chianti at a newly established Italian restaurant. A new Japan was rising out of the ashes and debris. It was already beginning to hold its own in the global shipbuilding and textile industries and the automobile industry would be next. The country was experiencing strong economic growth, the demand for good quality cars was increasing. Only the lack of paved roads dampened
enthusiasm and with a new national highway construction plan underway Edward expected even that obstacle to expansion to fade away rapidly. The success of the motor show had shown that
consumer
confidence was on the up and up. Digby would be proved wrong. He was sure of it.

A knock on the door. Ah, the tea girl, Edward thought,
providing
her customary round of green-leaf refreshment. He relished the cleansing taste of her brew as he called out for her to enter. But it was not the delightful kimono-clad Mie who appeared, but the grim and very male Kobayashi, the English translator whose formally worded texts Edward spent all his working days revising. He hurriedly whipped his feet off the desk, knocking over a pile of brochures in the process.

Kobayashi smirked at the chaos, his tiny caterpillar of a
moustache
twitching above his upper lip. The translator bowed, then ceremoniously held out an envelope balanced on open palms. ‘
Specific
delivery.’

‘Special delivery,’ Edward corrected. He felt he could easily be employed editing Kobayashi’s whole being, not just his
translations
. The moustache could go for a start. And something needed to be done about the bad breath, the dirty fingernails and the
ill-fitting
suit. Yet this was an unusual interruption. Edward normally collected his mail from his pigeonhole in the main staff room. And this envelope that Kobayashi proffered was not made from the usual flimsy onion-skin material either, but from thick brown paper stamped all over by some enthusiastic postal worker. Edward plucked it from the man’s outstretched hands and turned it over. It was from his Aunt Cathy in Edinburgh. He thanked the retreating Kobayashi and hurriedly slit open the envelope with the Japanese knife his mother had given him.

They had gone quickly, one after the other, like a pair of
dominoes
flicked over by the fingernail of God or whoever else was responsible for masterminding these events. First his father, then his mother three days later. “
A blessing in disguise
” his aunt wrote in a small, tight script that immediately conjured up her mean lips,
bitten hard into concentration over her composition.
“I do not know how she would have coped without him to look after her. After your father died, I was just about to telegram you to come back but then when your mother passed away so soon after I felt it was pointless. A letter is so much more comforting than a telegram anyway, I think. And there was nothing really you could have done, so far away from home.”
It was strange to find Aunt Cathy in such a consoling mood towards him. She had been far from compassionate when he had taken up the educational legacy provided by her late husband, his Uncle Rob. “
You can be reassured that both your parents passed away quickly and with little pain.
” His father had died of a sudden heart attack, while his mother “
had just given up on life. Her memory had deteriorated so much recently that I am not even sure if she knew who your father was. I took care of all the
necessary
funeral arrangements. That solicitor chap, Wilson Guthrie, who was also your Uncle Rob’s lawyer, is the executor and will administer the estate. No doubt he will get in touch with you in due course about the sale of the house and its contents. I have given him your address. I’m so sorry. I have enclosed a few keepsakes for you in the meantime. There are some valuables – watches, jewellery and the like – but I did not want to entrust these items to the international post. Love…
” Included in the bulky envelope were two handkerchiefs, one embroidered with his father’s initials, the other with his mother’s. A photograph of his parents on their wedding day. Another with him sitting between them on a
spread-out
picnic blanket.

He stared out of the window. Dark clouds were pushing in quickly from the east. It was the rainy season. The Japanese had officially decreed it thus and it was so. Just as there were days that marked the beginning and end of summer, irrespective of whether the sun was actually shining or not. He could see the delineation of the weather front quite clearly, bright sunshine on one side, a sheet of rain on the other. Workmen who had been padding across
girders
on a building site in front of his office began scurrying down from their positions, skipping across planked walkways, sliding down ladders, hardly touching the sides as they went. He didn’t really know what to do with himself. Except to sit there on the corner of his desk, the edge biting quite uncomfortably into his left
buttock. His parents had died. One after another. On the other side of the world, so remote from where he was now, that he felt as if the fact of their deaths must surely be within the domain of another person and not his own.

The day grew blacker and he observed the first streaks of rain cut across the windowpane. It would be both wet and warm
outside
. An interesting combination so unlike the damp coldness of the British weather. Such an odd thing for his aunt to do, sending these two handkerchiefs. He picked up his father’s. Plain white linen, except for the blue-stitched initials in one corner. He imagined his mother doing the stitching, nimbly working her fingers and the needle, then a quick cut of the thread with her teeth. ‘Done’ she would have said. He put the material to his nose. Freshly laundered. Nothing of his father. No pipe tobacco. No hair oil. No shaving lotion. No starched shirt. No hidden sweets in the pocket. No towel rub-down at the swimming pool. No waiting by the
window
for the hand upon the gate. No footstep on the stairway. No Scottish burr overheard from the bedroom darkness. He put the handkerchief aside and picked up his mother’s. Cream silk with a pale green border. He brought it to his nose and smelt it also. His mother’s perfume. And then he felt the tears on his cheek, hot like the monsoon raindrops on the other side of the pane. They came quickly in a sudden burst, then they were gone. He wiped his face with his mother’s handkerchief, sat down behind his desk.

Tokyo Autos supplied Edward with an office and secretarial support, commissioned work and organised his apartment, but in actuality he was an employee of Argos Motors. Argos paid his salary, his rent, his transportation and his bonus. It was to Argos he owed his allegiance. He expected nothing from the Japanese firm, yet when news of his parents’ death spread throughout the company, he became the
recipient
of a tsunami of sympathy and kindness from his co-workers. It was the miserable Kobayashi who had been the conduit. The
translator
had returned to the office later that afternoon with the rain
hammering
against the window to enquire politely whether the package of special delivery had contained any important news. When he had
told Kobayashi what had happened, the black-bordered cards of
condolence
began to arrive almost immediately. They were followed by small gifts. Boxes of chocolates. A selection of soaps. A set of
hand-towels
. Bundles of incense. All accompanied by the corresponding business cards of the senders. People he didn’t even know. Two days later he was led by a solemn Kobayashi to the office of Mr Tanaka, the company’s general manager.

‘We just wondered whether you wish to return to London in consideration of your recent tragic loss,’ Kobayashi told Edward in a translation of his superior’s words. It was an unnecessary role for Kobayashi to play, given that Edward understood very well every word Tanaka had said. But he also understood that the proper
procedures
had to be acted out. That the foreigner could not be seen to speak better Japanese than his boss could speak English. Tanaka sat behind his desk, pulling at his brilliant-white shirt-cuffs as he waited for his reply.

‘That will not be necessary,’ Edward responded, with a short bow towards the general manager.

Tanaka nodded then asked in Japanese. ‘Perhaps a few days’ compassionate leave?’ Again Kobayashi translated.

The deaths of his parents still seemed far off in another time zone and all Edward wanted to do was keep on working, keep up a rhythm, keep up his emotional guard. But Tanaka’s question
presented
an interesting cultural dilemma to which he did not know the correct answer. Was it more important to continue working, thereby exhibiting the proper stoicism and loyalty to the company, or was it better to take time off in order to show the proper
mourning
and respect towards his deceased parents? Edward chose the former.

Tanaka sucked in his breath, quickly conferred with Kobayashi.

‘In that case,’ the translator said, ‘we wonder if you would like to join us tomorrow on the company’s summer coach trip to Hakone? The colourful hydrangeas will surely lift your spirits.’

‘I am sorry about parents,
sensei
,’ Mie the tea girl told Edward in a practice of her English as their motor-coach, the leading one in a
convoy of three, moved away from the coastline. Mie was also one of his students in an English conversation class he taught one night a week for some of the staff under a private arrangement with the company. She was a bright young woman, far more adept at
picking
up the language than her male classmates, but unlikely ever to rise above the level of tea girl. One hand half-covered her mouth as she spoke, the fingers of the other fluttered over the fan in her lap. Edward had always imagined the Japanese fan to be some kind of fashion accessory until he experienced the first few days of
summer
in this country. The humidity was unbearable. Even now, at nine in the morning, he could feel his shirt cling to the seat fabric as he turned to speak to her. Mie with her round face and very flat features, almost no contours at all, no shadows, no secrets. Just this wide openness waiting for his reply.