Chapter 5

"Boss, it has been a while." 

Called out to by Seishin, Shimizu Masaji who was working in the plantation spread out behind his house turned to look. "Ah--Junior Monk!"

"You are putting your energy into work, I see."

The old man stood up, taking his hat in hand and bowing his salt-and-pepper haired head. At Masaji 's feet were a line of green seedings for some sort of plant. 

Shimizu Gardening also did landscaping and took part in wholesale sales of young trees. If asked by villagers, he would also sell them directly. Seishin's own mother Miwako sometimes came to buy seedlings for the garden. 

"It is still hot these days, isn't it. What may I do for you today?"

"Actually, the other day, I had belatedly heard that Ryuuji-san had died."

Ah, Masaji's expression clouded. "That's, well, thank you very much." He put down his plow in the bucket and motioned towards the house. "Well first, please, do come inside."

Seishin bowed his head slightly and followed after Masaji after he stood. 

"I was surprised. The last time I'd seen him he seemed healthy..."

You said it, Masaji said while climbing up onto the porch with a sigh. As guided Seishin entered into the tatami room and continued in front of the family altar. The altar was decorated with a new photo and mortuary tablet. His son Ryuuji was according to the records 41, and worked, he believed, at an accounting office. As he offered the incense and folded his hands together, Masaji brought in the barley tea.

"It isn't much but, please. You'll have to forgive me, today my daughter-in-law is out. I thought we had had some snacks somewhere, but."

"Please don't fuss. ---You must be depressed as well, Boss. Have your feelings settled?"

Masaji gave a forced smile. "It hasn't connected with me yet. He really was a healthy fella, after all. I went out to work like always, then there was talk that he collapsed at the office. When I rushed to the hospital, he'd already lost consciousness. And then he never opened his eyes since."

"I had heard that there were heart problems, but?"

Masaji shook his head, saying not at all. "During his spring check up, he was fit as a fiddle. The heart failure was so sudden. ---No, he did have signs he wasn't well, come to think of it. It's just, it only seemed he was out of it at the time. I wondered if he'd stayed up late or was hung over and it came to this. Honestly...." Masaji trailed off. "It's only something I remember because it came to this. It's something I only remember now that you mention it, looking back. I didn't think anything of it the day I saw it, just going out like always into the fields, not even taking a good look at his face."

"Then, he wasn't especially bedridden or anything of that nature?"

"He wasn't really bedridden. ....No, this whole year, my son's health hasn't been something I could really sum up. He might have been sick but it wasn't enough for even my daughter-in-law to notice, so I didn't think anything in particular about it at all." 

Is that so, Seishin murmured. Whether Shimizu Ryuuji had it or not wasn't clear. Dying within a few days of his family noticing was customary but Ryuuji was a few days faster than that. It might have been that his case progressed exceptionally fast, or it might have been completely unrelated to the relevant matter. Seishin couldn't ascertain which it was.

"But... As this was truly something sudden, it must have been difficult."

"More than on me, it's  his wife. I shouldn't say this, but these things do happen. It's just, I feel for my daughter-in-law and grandson. All said, I've lost my spouse, so without my daughter-in-law and grandson, I'd be alone. That grandson come next spring will graduate from high school and go on to college and to get a job, so once he's out of the house, it'll just be two old people with no blood relatives left. I told her she could go back to her own family, but. Shuuji isn't here anymore but still having her there to water me on my death bed makes me feel sorry for her." As Masaji spoke, an unaffected but forced smile floated up onto his face. "In the past, I would've said 'well she married into this family now so' but the times have changed, so."

Is that so, Seishin thought. In the village, parents and children lived in mutli-generational households as a matter of course. But, the concept of family was indeed changing. A yet incomplete transformation. It was... jarring. 

"...Still, she said she couldn't by any means abandon me on my own but I'm sure it's weighing on her. Even though having her spouse go on ahead of her is calamity enough, having head-ache inducing problems that she does makes you feel for her. He's being paid his retirement sum, she'll at least get that, but."

Seishin tilted his head. Masaji's smile became all the more wry. "The day my son collapsed, you know? On that day, that Ryuuji, I don't know what he was thinking but it seems he suddenly put in his retirement notice. Me and my daughter in law didn't know about it, don't know what was in his heart at the time. His office didn't process it but that Ryuuji said he had to stop that day, shouting caustically that he didn't need severance pay or his pay check. He was fighting with the accountant, then suddenly collapsed, it seems. When we heard that as the hospital, his wife went ghostly pale. We still need that money to raise our grandson, and all."

"That's..."

"Still, the accountant was compassionate, he made like it never happened for her. He died in the office but it's being handled as if he retired, which is a big help. Really---That son of mine, what was he thinking?"

The old man looked up at the photo of the deceased. 

"When they get to that age, we're as good as strangers. Even if we live together, that's because this is the country; if it were the city, he'dmove out and have his own home at his age. It's a matter of appearances. He can't go on asking his father for advice about everything. So, even while it's obvious...."

That's true, Seishin murmured. "Then, was Ryuuji-san no longer offering his assistance to you as the Boss? In the past, I had seen you working together very many times, hadn't I?"

"Nah, not lately, I guess. In the past he didn't unless we were really needing the help. We do landscape gardening, but that isn't what we focus on, so we don't have many hands on deck for that kind of work."

"Then, he did not have any intent to inherit the business to become the next Boss, I suppose."

"I don't think he did. I don't think he was of a mind for it. I didn't intend for him to either, after all."

And so it seemed that Masaji didn't come and go to many places throughout the village. While he thought of it, he asked about Masaji's working arrangements. He asked about whether he'd come and gone from any homes, whether he'd gone to Yamairi, or how about the Maruyasu sawmill, whether Ryuuji had ever gone to such places with him. He had intended to ask indirectly but Masaji himself apparently hadn't gone to Yamairi or to Maruyasu, so it seemed Ryuuji had no connections with them either. Nor did he go into the mountains. Masaji's household didn't own any mountain lands. Masaji and Ryuuji both lived in Sotoba but they made their livings almost entirely in Mizobe, so as far as interacting with their neighbors it seemed they had no such ties at all. 

"We do have relatives in Monzen, though," said Masaji with a strained smile. "In the past, any time anything happened, we'd be coming and going from each other's places often but since my cousin died, our ties had been cut. This isn't an age where you go to visit your dead father's cousin as a relative anymore, is it?" 

That's true, was all Seishin answered. 

Leaving Masaji's house, Seishin went towards Naka-Sotoba. He visited the elder Koike, the funeral manager. Hirosawa Takatoshi who died on August 11th had been a resident of Naka-Sotoba. As Seishin had no connections with that Hirosawa household, for the time being he would try visiting Koike, who could be called an influential man in Naka-Sotoba but it seemed Koike didn't know them very well either. 

Human relations were interwoven like a complicated net, Seishin had felt. He had the impression that the people of the village had a regional bond that expanded throughout the village. But, that regional bond had at some point had been severed at certain points. Without the people themselves being conscious of it, the village followed the trensd of the era, being dismantled bit by bit. 

So this is how it is, Seishin thought. Seishin himself was at the center of the parish families. Being the focal point of so many complicated interpersonal relationships, he hadn't sensed the changes that had taken place. But, bit by bit the village was changing. ----Seishin wasn't the only one who thought that. The elder Koike too shook his head with a sigh.

"In the past, if you asked me about someone from somewhere, I'd know what kind of person they were and how they made a living as if they were my own relative or family, but."

"Is that so?"

"I intended to at least get to know his parents. His father was grieving about it. It seems he suddenly collapsed in Mizboe. And they say he collapsed in a Pachinko parlor, like. He was sure he was going to work but he'd quit his job."

Eh? Seishin asked at that. "His job, he quit?"

"Seems like it. Without a word to his parents. For two or three days he'd been sick, right, unsteady on his feet, but he still went out in his business suit, so they thought he must be going to the company as usually but the company said he quit three days ago. But he was wasting his time at the Pachinko parlor. And that's where he collapsed."

Seishin blinked. What on earth was this? It was similar to Shimizu Ryuuji----.

Perhaps not noticing Seishin's bewilderment, the elder Koike forced a smile. "It's a lonely way to go but there's no helping it, is there? It's sad that we're not long for this world." With that said, Koike tilted his head. "But, what is with these continuing deaths, I wonder, huh?"