The Rattrap PDF

Once upon a time there was a man who went around selling small rattraps of wire. He made them himself at odd moments, from the material he got by begging in the stores or at the big farms. But even so, the business was not especially profitable, so he had to resort to both begging and petty thievery...

Once upon a time there was a man who went around selling small rattraps of wire. He made them himself at odd moments, from the material he got by begging in the stores or at the big farms. But even so, the business was not especially profitable, so he had to resort to both begging and petty thievery to keep body and soul together. Even so, his clothes were in rags, his cheeks were sunken, and hunger gleamed in his eyes. No one can imagine how sad and monotonous life can appear to such a vagabond, who plods along the road, left to his own meditations. But one day this man had fallen into a line of thought, which really seemed to him entertaining. He had naturally been thinking of his rattraps when suddenly he was struck by the idea that the whole 32/Flamingo © NCERT not to be republishedworld about him --- the whole world with its lands and seas, its cities and villages --- was nothing but a big rattrap. It had never existed for any other purpose than to set baits for people. It offered riches and joys, shelter and food, heat and clothing, exactly as the rattrap offered cheese and pork, and as soon as anyone let himself be tempted to touch the bait, it closed in on him, and then everything came to an end. The world had, of course, never been very kind to him, so it gave him unwonted joy to think ill of it in this way. It became a cherished pastime of his, during many dreary ploddings, to think of people he knew who had let themselves be caught in the dangerous snare, and of others who were still circling around the bait. One dark evening as he was trudging along the road he caught sight of a little gray cottage by the roadside, and he knocked on the door to ask shelter for the night. Nor was he refused. Instead of the sour faces which ordinarily met him, the owner, who was an old man without wife or child, was happy to get someone to talk to in his loneliness. Immediately he put the porridge pot on the fire and gave him supper; then he carved off such a big slice from his tobacco roll that it was enough both for the stranger's pipe and his own. Finally he got out an old pack of cards and played 'mjolis' with his guest until bedtime..... The old man was just as generous with his confidences as with his porridge and tobacco. The guest was informed at once that in his days of prosperity his host had been a crofter at Ramsjo Ironworks and had worked on the land. Now that he was no longer able to do day labour, it was his cow which supported him. Yes, that bossy was extraordinary. She could give milk for the creamery every day, and last month he had received all of thirty kronor in payment. The stranger must have seemed incredulous, for the old man got up and went to the window, took down a leather pouch which hung on a nail in the very window frame, and picked out three wrinkled ten-kronor bills. These he held up before the eyes of his guest, nodding knowingly, and The Rattrap/33 © NCERT not to be republishedthen stuffed them back into the pouch. 1 1. From where did the peddler get the idea of the world being a rattrap? 2 The next day both men got up in good season. The crofter was in a hurry to milk his cow, and the other man probably thought he should not stay in bed when the head of the house had gotten up. They left the cottage at the same time. The crofter locked the door and put the key in his pocket. The man with the rattraps said good bye and thank you, and thereupon each went his own way. But half an hour later the rattrap peddler stood again before the door. He did not try to get in, however. He only went up to the window, smashed a pane, stuck in his hand, and got hold of the pouch with the thirty kronor. He took the money and thrust it into his own pocket. Then he hung the leather pouch very carefully back in its place and went away. 2. Why was he amused by this idea? 3 3. Did the peddler expect the kind of hospitality that he received from the crofter? 4 4. Why was the crofter so talkative and friendly with the peddler? 5 5. Why did he show the thirty kroner to the peddler? 6 6. Did the peddler respect the confidence reposed in him by the crofter? As he walked along with the money in his pocket he felt quite pleased with his smartness. He realised, of course, that at first he dared not continue on the public highway, but must turn off the road, into the woods. During the first hours this caused him no difficulty. Later in the day it became worse, for it was a big and confusing forest which he had gotten into. He tried, to be sure, to walk in a definite direction, but the paths twisted back and forth so strangely! He walked and walked without coming to the end of the wood, and finally he realised that he had only been walking around in the same part of the forest. All at once he recalled his thoughts about the world and the rattrap. Now his own turn had come. He had let himself be fooled by a bait and had been caught. The whole forest, with its trunks and branches, its thickets and fallen logs, closed in upon him like an impenetrable prison from which he could never escape. 34/Flamingo © NCERT not to be republishedIt was late in December. Darkness was already descending over the forest. This increased the danger, and increased also his gloom and despair. Finally he saw no way out, and he sank down on the ground, tired to death, thinking that his last moment had come. But just as he laid his head on the ground, he heard a sound---a hard regular thumping. There was no doubt as to what that was. He raised himself. ''Those are the hammer strokes from an iron mill'', he thought. ''There must be people near by''. He summoned all his strength, got up, and staggered.. in the direction of the sound. The Ramsjo Ironworks, which are now closed down, were, not so long ago, a large plant, with smelter, rolling mill, and forge. In the summertime long lines of heavily loaded barges and scows slid down the canal, which led to a large inland lake, and in the wintertime the roads near the mill were black from all the coal dust which sifted down from the big charcoal crates. During one of the long dark evenings just before Christmas, the master smith and his helper sat in the dark forge near the furnace waiting for the pig iron, which had been put in the fire, to be ready to put on the anvil. Every now and then one of them got up to stir the glowing mass with a long iron bar, returning in a few moments, dripping with perspiration, though, as was the custom, he wore nothing but a long shirt and a pair of wooden shoes. All the time there were many sounds to be heard in the forge. The big bellows groaned and the burning coal cracked. The fire boy shovelled charcoal into the maw of the furnace with a great deal of clatter. Outside roared the waterfall, and a sharp north wind whipped the rain against the brick-tiled roof. It was probably on account of all this noise that the blacksmith did not notice that a man had opened the gate and entered the forge, until he stood close up to the furnace. Surely it was nothing unusual for poor vagabonds without any better shelter for the night to be attracted to the forge by the glow of light which escaped through the sooty panes, and to come in to warm themselves in front of The Rattrap/35 © NCERT not to be republishedthe fire. The blacksmiths glanced only casually and indifferently at the intruder. He looked the way people of his type usually did, with a long beard, dirty, ragged, and with a bunch of rattraps dangling on his chest. He asked permission to stay, and the master blacksmith nodded a haughty consent without honouring him with a single word... The tramp did not say anything, either. He had not come there to talk but only to warm himself and sleep. In those days the Ramsjo iron mill was owned by a very prominent ironmaster, whose greatest ambition was to ship out good iron to the market. He watched both night and day to see that the work was done as well as possible, and at this very moment he came into the forge on one of his nightly rounds of inspection. Naturally the first thing he saw was the tall ragamuffin who had eased his way so close to the furnace that steam rose from his wet rags. The ironmaster did not follow the example of the blacksmiths, who had hardly deigned to look at the stranger. He walked close up to him, looked him over very carefully, then tore off his slouch hat to get a better view of his face. ''But of course it is you, Nils Olof!'' he said. "How you do look!".. The man with the rattraps had never before seen the ironmaster at Ramsjo and did not even know what his name was. But it occurred to him that if the fine gentleman thought he was an old acquaintance, he might perhaps throw him a couple of kronor. Therefore he did not want to undeceive him all at once. ''Yes, God knows things have gone downhill with me'', he said. ''You should not have resigned from the regiment'', said the ironmaster. ''That was the mistake. If only I had still been in the service at the time, it never would have happened. Well, now of course you will come home with me.'' To go along up to the manor house and be received by the owner like an old regimental comrade --- that, however, did not please the tramp. 36/Flamingo © NCERT not to be republished''No, I couldn't think of it!'' he said, looking quite alarmed. He thought of the thirty kronor. To go up to the manor house would be like throwing himself voluntarily into the lion's den. He only wanted a chance to sleep here in the forge and then sneak away as inconspicuously as possible. The ironmaster assumed that he felt embarrassed because of his miserable clothing. ''Please don't think that I have such a fine home that you cannot show yourself there'', He said\... ''Elizabeth is dead, as you may already have heard. My boys are abroad, and there is no one at home except my oldest daughter and myself. We were just saying that it was too bad we didn't have any company for Christmas. Now come along with me and help us make the Christmas food disappear a little faster." But the stranger said no, and no, and again no, and the ironmaster saw that he must give in. ''It looks as though Captain von Stahle preferred to stay with you tonight, Stjernstrom'', he said to the master blacksmith, and turned on his heel... 1 1. What made the peddler think that he had indeed fallen into a rattrap? 2 2. Why did the ironmaster speak kindly to the peddler and invite him home? 3 3. Why did the peddler decline the invitation? But he laughed to himself as he went away, and the blacksmith, who knew him, understood very well that he had not said his last word. It was not more than half an hour before they heard the sound of carriage wheels outside the forge, and a new guest came in, but this time it was not the ironmaster. He had sent his daughter, apparently hoping that she would have better powers of persuasion than he himself. She entered, followed by a valet, carrying on his arm a big fur coat. She was not at all pretty, but seemed modest and quite shy. In the forge everything was just as it had been earlier in the evening. The master blacksmith and his apprentice still sat on their bench, and iron and charcoal still glowed in the furnace. The stranger had The Rattrap/37 © NCERT not to be republishedstretched himself out on the floor and lay with a piece of pig iron under his head and his hat pulled down over his eyes. As soon as the young girl caught sight of him, she went up and lifted his hat. The man was evidently used to sleeping with one eye open. He jumped up abruptly and seemed to be quite frightened. ''My name is Edla Willmansson,'' said the young girl. ''My father came home and said that you wanted to sleep here in the forge tonight, and then I asked permission to come and bring you home to us. I am so sorry, Captain, that you are having such a hard time.'' She looked at him compassionately, with her heavy eyes, and then she noticed that the man was afraid. ''Either he has stolen something or else he has escaped from, jail'', she thought, and added quickly, "You may be sure, Captain, that you will be allowed to leave us just as freely as you came. Only please stay with us over Christmas Eve.'' She said this in such a friendly manner that the rattrap peddler must have felt confidence in her. ''It would never have occurred to me that you would bother with me yourself, miss,'' he said. ''I will come at once.'' He accepted the fur coat, which the valet handed him with a deep bow, threw it over his rags, and followed the young lady out to the carriage, without granting the astonished blacksmiths so much as a glance. But while he was riding up to the manor house he had evil forebodings. ''Why the devil did I take that fellow's money?'' he thought. ''Now I am sitting in the trap and will never get out of it.'' The next day was Christmas Eve, and when the ironmaster came into the dining room for breakfast he probably thought with satisfaction of his old regimental comrade whom he had run across so unexpectedly. "First of all we must see to it that he gets a little flesh on his bones," he said to his daughter, who was busy at the table. "And then we must see that he gets something else to do than to run around the country selling rattraps." 38/Flamingo © NCERT not to be republished"It is queer that things have gone downhill with him as badly as that," said the daughter. "Last night I did not think there was anything about him to show that he had once been an educated man." "You must have patience, my little girl," said the father. "As soon as he gets clean and dressed up, you will see something different. Last night he was naturally embarrassed. The tramp manners will fall away from him with the tramp clothes." Just as he said this the door opened and the stranger entered. Yes, now he was truly clean and well dressed. The valet had bathed him, cut his hair, and shaved him. Moreover he was dressed in a good-looking suit of clothes which belonged to the ironmaster. He wore a white shirt and a starched collar and whole shoes. But although his guest was now so well groomed, the ironmaster did not seem pleased. He looked at him with puckered brow, and it was easy to understand that when he had seen the strange fellow in the uncertain reflection from the furnace he might have made a mistake, but that now, when he stood there in broad daylight, it was impossible to mistake him for an old acquaintance. "What does this mean?" he thundered. The stranger made no attempt to dissimulate. He saw at once that the splendour had come to an end. "It is not my fault, sir," he said. "I never pretended to be anything but a poor trader, and I pleaded and begged to be allowed to stay in the forge. But no harm has been done. At worst I can put on my rags again and go away". "Well," said the ironmaster, hesitating a little, "it was not quite honest, either. You must admit that, and I should not be surprised if the sheriff would like to have something to say in the matter." The tramp took a step forward and struck the table with his fist. "Now I am going to tell you, Mr Ironmaster, how things are," he said. "This whole world is nothing but a big rattrap. All the good things that are offered to you are nothing but cheese rinds and bits of pork, set out to drag a poor fellow The Rattrap/39 © NCERT not to be republishedinto trouble. And if the sheriff comes now and locks me up for this, then you, Mr Ironmaster, must remember that a day may come when you yourself may want to get a big piece of pork, and then you will get caught in the trap." The ironmaster began to laugh. "That was not so badly said, my good fellow. Perhaps we should let the sheriff alone on Christmas Eve. But now get out of here as fast as you can." But just as the man was opening the door, the daughter said, "I think he ought to stay with us today. I don't want him to go." And with that she went and closed the door. "What in the world are you doing?" said the father. The daughter stood there quite embarrassed and hardly knew what to answer. That morning she had felt so happy when she thought how homelike and Christmassy she was going to make things for the poor hungry wretch. She could not get away from the idea all at once, and that was why she had interceded for the vagabond. "I am thinking of this stranger here," said the young girl. "He walks and walks the whole year long, and there is probably not a single place in the whole country where he is welcome and can feel at home. Wherever he turns he is chased away. Always he is afraid of being arrested and cross-examined. I should like to have him enjoy a day of peace with us here --- just one in the whole year." The ironmaster mumbled something in his beard. He could not bring himself to oppose her. "It was all a mistake, of course," she continued. "But anyway I don't think we ought to chase away a human being whom we have asked to come here, and to whom we have promised Christmas cheer." "You do preach worse than a parson," said the ironmaster. "I only hope you won't have to regret this." The young girl took the stranger by the hand and led him up to the table. "Now sit down and eat," she said, for she could see that her father had given in. The man with the rattraps said not a word; he only sat down and helped himself to the food. Time after time 40/Flamingo © NCERT not to be republishedhe looked at the young girl who had interceded for him. Why had she done it? What could the crazy idea be? After that, Christmas Eve at Ramsjo passed just as it always had. The stranger did not cause any trouble because he did nothing but sleep. The whole forenoon he lay on the.. sofa in one of the guest rooms and slept at one stretch. At noon they woke him up so that he could have his share of the good Christmas fare, but after that he slept again. It seemed as though for many years he had not been able to sleep as quietly and safely as here at Ramsjo... In the evening, when the Christmas tree was lighted, they woke him up again, and he stood for a while in the drawing room, blinking as though the candlelight hurt him, but after that he disappeared again. Two hours later he was aroused once more. He then had to go down into the dining room and eat the Christmas fish and porridge. As soon as they got up from the table he went around to each one present and said thank you and good night, but when he came to the young girl she gave him to understand that it was her father's intention that the suit which he wore was to be a Christmas present --- he did not have to return it; and if he wanted to spend next Christmas Eve in a place where he could rest in peace, and be sure that no evil would befall him, he would be welcomed back again. The man with the rattraps did not answer anything to this. He only stared at the young girl in boundless amazement. The next morning the ironmaster and his daughter got 1 1. What made the peddler accept Edla Willmansson's invitation? 2 2. What doubts did Edla have about the peddler? 3 3. When did the ironmaster realise his mistake? 4 4. What did the peddler say in his defence when it was clear that he was not the person the ironmaster had thought he was? 5 5. Why did Edla still entertain the peddler even after she knew the truth about him? up in good season to go to the early Christmas service. Their guest was still asleep, and they did not disturb him. When, at about ten o'clock, they drove back from the church, the young girl sat and hung her head even more The Rattrap/41 © NCERT not to be republisheddejectedly than usual. At church she had learned that one of the old crofters of the ironworks had been robbed by a man who went around selling rattraps. "Yes, that was a fine fellow you let into the house," said her father. "I only wonder how many silver spoons are left in the cupboard by this time." The wagon had hardly stopped at the front steps when the ironmaster asked the valet whether the stranger was still there. He added that he had heard at church that the man was a thief. The valet answered that the fellow had gone and that he had not taken anything with him at all. On the contrary, he had left behind a little package which Miss Willmansson was to be kind enough to accept as a Christmas present. The young girl opened the package, which was so badly done up that the contents came into view at once. She gave a little cry of joy. She found a small rattrap, and in it lay three wrinkled ten kronor notes. But that was not all. In the rattrap lay also a letter written in large, jagged characters --- "Honoured and noble Miss, "Since you have been so nice to me all day long, as if I was a captain, I want to be nice to you, in return, as if I was a real 1 1. Why was Edla happy to see the gift left by the peddler? 2 captain --- for I do not want you to be embarrassed at this Christmas season by a thief; but you can give back the money to the old man on the roadside, who has the money pouch 2. Why did the peddler sign himself as Captain von Stahle? hanging on the window frame as a bait for poor wanderers. "The rattrap is a Christmas present from a rat who would have been caught in this world's rattrap if he had not been raised to captain, because in that way he got power to clear himself. "Written with friendship and high regard, "Captain von Stahle." 7 The Interview From the Introduction to The Penguin Book of Interviews edited by Christopher Silvester. About the Author Christopher Silvester (1959) was a student of history at Peterhouse, Cambridge. He was a reporter for Private Eye for ten years and has written features for Vanity Fair. Following is an excerpt taken from his introduction to the Penguin Book of Interviews, An Anthology from 1859 to the Present Day. Part I Since its invention a little over 130 years ago, the interview has become a commonplace of journalism. Today, almost everybody who is literate will have read an interview at some point in their lives, while from the other point of view, several thousand celebrities have been interviewed over the years, some of them repeatedly. So it is hardly surprising that opinions of the interview --- of its functions, methods and merits --- vary considerably. Some might make quite extravagant claims for it as being, in its highest form, a source of truth, and, in its practice, an art. Others, usually celebrities who see themselves as its victims, might despise the interview as an unwarranted intrusion into their lives, or feel that it somehow diminishes them, just as in some primitive cultures it is believed that if one takes a photographic portrait of somebody then one is stealing that person's soul. V. S. Naipaul1 'feels that some people are wounded by interviews and lose a part of themselves,' Lewis Carroll, the creator of Alice in Wonderland, was said to have had 'a just horror of the interviewer' and he never consented to be interviewed --- It 1. Known as a cosmopolitan writer. In his travel books and in his documentary works he presents his impressions of the country of his ancestors that is India. He received the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2001. 68/Flamingo © NCERT not to be republishedwas his horror of being lionized which made him thus repel would be acquaintances, interviewers, and the persistent petitioners for his autograph and he would afterwards relate the stories of his success in silencing all such people with much satisfaction and amusement. Rudyard Kipling2 expressed an even more condemnatory attitude towards the interviewer. His wife, Caroline, writes in her diary for 14 October 1892 that their day was 'wrecked by two reporters from Boston'. She reports her husband as saying to the reporters, "Why do I refuse to be interviewed? Because it is immoral! It is a crime, just as much of a crime as an offence against my person, as an assault, and just as much merits punishment. It is cowardly and vile. No respectable man would ask it, much less give it," Yet Kipling had himself perpetrated such an 'assault' on Mark Twain only a few years before. H. G. Wells3 in an interview in 1894 referred to 'the interviewing ordeal', but was a fairly frequent interviewee and forty years later found himself interviewing Joseph Stalin4. Saul Bellow5, who has consented to be interviewed on several occasions, nevertheless once described interviews as being like thumbprints on his windpipe. Yet despite the drawbacks of the interview, it is a supremely serviceable medium of communication. "These days, more than at any other time, our most vivid impressions of our contemporaries are through 1 1. What are some of the positive views on interviews? 2 2. Why do most celebrity writers despise being interviewed? 3 3. What is the belief in some primitive cultures about being photographed? 6 6. What do you understand by the expression "thumbprints on his windpipe"? 5 5. Who, in today's world, is our chief source of information about personalities? 2. A prolific writer who was known as the poet of the common soldier. Kipling's Jungle Book which is a story of Kimball O' Hara and his adventures in the Himalayas is considered as a children's classic all over the world. 3. An English novelist, journalist, sociologist and historian he is known for his works of science fiction. Wells best known books are The Time Machine, The Invisible Man and The War of the Worlds. 4. A great Russian revolutionary and an active political organiser. 5. A playwright as well as a novelist, Bellow's works were influenced widely by World War II. Among his most famous characters are Augie March and Moses. He published short stories translated from Yiddish. He won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1976. The Interview/69 © NCERT not to be republishedinterviews," Denis Brian has written. "Almost everything of moment reaches us through one man asking questions of another. Because of this, the interviewer holds a position of unprecedented power and influence." Part II "I am a professor who writes novels on Sundays" -- Umberto Eco The following is an extract from an interview of Umberto Eco. The interviewer is Mukund Padmanabhan from The Hindu. Umberto Eco, a professor at the University of Bologna in Italy had already acquired a formidable reputation as a scholar for his ideas on semiotics (the study of signs), literary interpretation, and medieval aesthetics before he turned to writing fiction. Literary fiction, academic texts, essays, children's books, newspaper articles---his written output is staggeringly large and wide-ranging, In 1980, he acquired the equivalent of intellectual superstardom with the publication of The Name of the Rose, which sold more than 10 million copies. Mukund: The English novelist and academic David Lodge once remarked, "I can't understand how one man can do all the things he \[Eco\] does." Umberto Eco: Maybe I give the impression of doing many things. But in the end, I am convinced I am always doing the same thing. Mukund: Which is? Umberto Eco: Aah, now that is more difficult to explain. I have some philosophical interests and I pursue them through my academic work and my novels. Even my books for children are about non-violence and peace\...you see, the same bunch of ethical, philosophical interests. And then I have a secret. Did you know what will happen if you eliminate the empty spaces from the universe, eliminate the empty spaces in all the atoms? The universe will become as big as my fist. 70/Flamingo © NCERT not to be republishedSimilarly, we have a lot of empty spaces in our lives. I call them interstices. Say you are coming over to my place. You are in an elevator and while you are coming up, I am waiting for you. This is an interstice, an empty space. I work in empty spaces. While waiting for your elevator to come up from the first to the third floor, I have already written an article! (Laughs). Mukund: Not everyone can do that of course. Your non-fictional writing, your scholarly work has a certain playful and personal quality about it. It is a marked departure from a regular academic style --- which is invariably depersonalised and often dry and boring. Have you consciously adopted an informal approach or is it something that just came naturally to you? Umberto Eco: When I presented my first Doctoral dissertation in Italy, one of the Professors said, "Scholars learn a lot of a certain subject, then they make a lot of false hypotheses, then they correct them and at the end, they put the conclusions. You, on the contrary, told the story of your research. Even including your trials and errors." At the same time, he recognised I was right and went on to publish my dissertation as a book, which meant he appreciated it. At that point, at the age of 22, I understood scholarly books should be written the way I had done --- by telling the story of the research. This is why my essays always have a narrative aspect. And this is why probably I started writing narratives \[novels\] so late --- at the age of 50, more or less. I remember that my dear friend Roland Barthes was always frustrated that he was an essayist and not a novelist. He wanted to do creative writing one day or another but he died before he could do so. I never felt this kind of frustration. I started writing novels by accident. I had nothing to do one The Interview/71 © NCERT not to be republishedday and so I started. Novels probably satisfied my taste for narration. Mukund: Talking about novels, from being a famous academic you went on to becoming spectacularly famous after the publication of The Name of the Rose. You've written five novels against many more scholarly works of non-fiction, at least more than 20 of them\... Umberto Eco: Over 40. Mukund: Over 40! Among them a seminal piece of work on semiotics. But ask most people about Umberto Eco and they will say, "Oh, he's the novelist." Does that bother you? Umberto Eco: Yes. Because I consider myself a university professor who writes novels on Sundays. It's not a joke. I participate in academic conferences and not meetings of Pen Clubs and writers. I identify myself with the academic community. But okay, if they \[most people\] have read only the novels\... (laughs and shrugs). I know that by writing novels, I reach a larger audience. I cannot expect to have one million readers with stuff on semiotics. Mukund: Which brings me to my next question. The Name of the Rose is a very serious novel. It's a detective yarn at one level but it also delves into metaphysics, theology, and medieval history. Yet it enjoyed a huge mass audience. Were you puzzled at all by this? Umberto Eco: No. Journalists are puzzled. And sometimes publishers. And this is because journalists and publishers believe that people like trash and don't like difficult reading experiences. Consider there are six billion people on this planet. The Name of the Rose sold between 10 and 15 million copies. So in a way I reached only a small 72/Flamingo © NCERT not to be republishedpercentage of readers. But it is exactly these kinds of readers who don't want easy experiences. Or at least don't always want this. I myself, at 9 pm after dinner, watch television and want to see either 'Miami Vice' or 'Emergency Room'. I enjoy it and I need it. But not all day. Mukund: Could the huge success of the novel have anything to do with the fact that it dealt with a period of medieval history that\... Umberto Eco: That's possible. But let me tell you another story, because I often tell stories like a Chinese wise man. My American publisher said while she loved my book, she didn't expect to sell more than 3,000 copies in a country where nobody has seen a cathedral or studies Latin. So I was given an advance for 3,000 copies, but in the end it sold two or three million in the U.S. A lot of books have been written about the medieval past far before mine. I think the success of the book is a mystery. Nobody can predict it. I think if I had written The Name of the Rose ten years earlier or ten years later, it wouldn't have been the same. Why it worked at that time is a mystery. It is the time of the World War. An American prisoner of war is washed ashore in a dying state and is found at the doorstep of a Japanese doctor. Should he save him as a doctor or hand him over to the Army as a patriot? Who was Dr Sadao? Where was his house? Dr Sadao Hoki's house was built on a spot of the Japanese coast where as a little boy he had often played. The low, square stone house was set upon rocks well above a narrow beach that was outlined with bent pines. As a boy Sadao had climbed the pines, supporting himself on his bare feet, as he had seen men do in the South Seas when they climbed for coconuts. His father had taken him often to the islands of those seas, and never had he failed to say to the little brave boy at his side, ''Those islands yonder, they are the stepping stones to the future for Japan.'' ''Where shall we step from them?'' Sadao had asked seriously. ''Who knows?'' his father had answered. ''Who can limit our future? It depends on what we make it.'' 24 Vistas © NCERT not to be republishedSadao had taken this into his mind as he did everything his father said, his father who never joked or played with him but who spent infinite pains upon him who was his only son. Sadao knew that his education was his father's chief concern. For this reason he had been sent at twenty-two to America to learn all that could be learned of surgery and medicine. He had come back at thirty, and before his father died he had seen Sadao become famous not only as a surgeon but as a scientist. Because he was perfecting a discovery which would render wounds entirely clean, he had not been sent abroad with the troops. Also, he knew, there was some slight danger that the old General might need an operation for a condition for which he was now being treated medically, and for this possibility Sadao was being kept in Japan. Clouds were rising from the ocean now. The unexpected warmth of the past few days had at night drawn heavy fog from the cold waves. Sadao watched mists hide outlines of a little island near the shore and then come creeping up the beach below the house, wreathing around the pines. In a few minutes fog would be wrapped about the house too. Then he would go into the room where Hana, his wife, would be waiting for him with the two children. But at this moment the door opened and she looked out, a dark-blue woollen haori1 over her kimono. She came to him affectionately and put her arm through his as he stood, smiled and said nothing. He had met Hana in America, but he had waited to fall in love with her until he was sure she was Japanese. His father would never have received her unless she had been pure in her race. He wondered often whom he would have married if he had not met Hana, and by what luck he had found her in the most casual way, by chance literally, at an American professor's house. The professor and his wife had been kind people anxious to do something for their few foreign students, and the students, though bored, had accepted this kindness. Sadao had often told Hana how nearly he had not gone to Professor Harley's house that night --- the rooms 1 haori: a loose outer garment worn over the kimono. The Enemy 25 © NCERT not to be republished26 Vistas were so small, the food so bad, the professor's wife so voluble. But he had gone and there he had found Hana, a new student, and had felt he would love her if it were at all possible. Now he felt her hand on his arm and was aware of the pleasure it gave him, even though they had been married years enough to have the two children. For they had not married heedlessly in America. They had finished their work at school and had come home to Japan, and when his father had seen her the marriage had been arranged in the old Japanese way, although Sadao and Hana had talked everything over beforehand. They were perfectly happy. She laid her cheek against his arm. It was at this moment that both of them saw something black come out of the mists. It was a man. He was flung up out of the ocean --- flung, it seemed, to his feet by a breaker. He staggered a few steps, his body outlined against the mist, his arms above his head. Then the curled mists hid him again. ''Who is that?'' Hana cried. She dropped Sadao's arm and they both leaned over the railing of the veranda. Now they saw him again. The man was on his hands and knees crawling. Then they saw him fall on his face and lie there. ''A fisherman perhaps,'' Sadao said, ''washed from his boat.'' He ran quickly down the steps and behind him © NCERT not to be republishedHana came, her wide sleeves flying. A mile or two away on either side there were fishing villages, but here was only the bare and lonely coast, dangerous with rocks. The surf beyond the beach was spiked with rocks. Somehow the man had managed to come through them --- he must be badly torn. They saw when they came toward him that indeed it was so. The sand on one side of him had already a stain of red soaking through. ''He is wounded,'' Sadao exclaimed. He made haste to the man, who lay motionless, his face in the sand. An old cap stuck to his head soaked with sea water. He was in wet rags of garments. Sadao stopped, Hana at his side, and turned the man's head. They saw the face. "A white man!" Hana whispered. Yes, it was a white man. The wet cap fell away and there was his wet yellow hair, long, as though for many weeks it had not been cut, and upon his young and tortured face was a rough yellow beard. He was unconscious and knew nothing that they did for him. Now Sadao remembered the wound, and with his expert fingers he began to search for it. Blood flowed freshly at his touch. On the right side of his lower back Sadao saw that a gun wound had been reopened. The flesh was blackened with powder. Sometime, not many days ago, the man had been shot and had not been tended. It was bad chance that the rock had struck the wound. Will Dr Sadao be arrested on the charge of harbouring an enemy? ''Oh, how he is bleeding!'' Hana whispered again in a solemn voice. The mists screened them now completely, and at this time of day no one came by. The fishermen had gone home and even the chance beachcombers would have considered the day at an end. ''What shall we do with this man?'' Sadao muttered. But his trained hands seemed of their own will to be doing what they could to stanch the fearful bleeding. He packed The Enemy 27 © NCERT not to be republishedthe wound with the sea moss that strewed the beach. The man moaned with pain in his stupor but he did not awaken. ''The best thing that we could do would be to put him back in the sea,'' Sadao said, answering himself. Now that the bleeding was stopped for the moment he stood up and dusted the sand from his hands. ''Yes, undoubtedly that would be best,'' Hana said steadily. But she continued to stare down at the motionless man. ''If we sheltered a white man in our house we should be arrested and if we turned him over as a prisoner, he would certainly die,'' Sadao said. ''The kindest thing would be to put him back into the sea,'' Hana said. But neither of them moved. They were staring with a curious repulsion upon the inert figure. ''What is he?'' Hana whispered. ''There is something about him that looks American,'' Sadao said. He took up the battered cap. Yes, there, almost gone, was the faint lettering. ''A sailor,'' he said, ''from an American warship.'' He spelled it out: ''U.S. Navy.'' The man was a prisoner of war! ''He has escaped.'' Hana cried softly, ''and that is why he is wounded.'' ''In the back,'' Sadao agreed. They hesitated, looking at each other. Then Hana said with resolution: "Come, are we able to put him back into the sea?" "If I am able, are you?" Sadao asked. "No," Hana said, "But if you can do it alone\..." Sadao hesitated again. "The strange thing is," he said, "that if the man were whole I could turn him over to the police without difficulty. I care nothing for him. He is my enemy. All Americans are my enemy. And he is only a common fellow. You see how foolish his face is. But since he is wounded..." "You also cannot throw him back to the sea," Hana said. "Then there is only one thing to do. We must carry him into the house." "But the servants?" Sadao inquired. 28 Vistas © NCERT not to be republished"We must simply tell them that we intend to give him to the police --- as indeed we must, Sadao. We must think of the children and your position. It would endanger all of us if we did not give this man over as a prisoner of war." "Certainly," Sadao agreed. "I would not think of doing anything else." Thus agreed, together they lifted the man. He was very light, like a fowl that had been half-starved for a long time until it is only feathers and skeleton. So, his arms hanging, they carried him up the steps and into the side door of the house. This door opened into a passage, and down the passage they carried the man towards an empty bedroom. It had been the bedroom of Sadao's father, and since his death it had not been used. They laid the man on the deeply matted floor. Everything here had been Japanese to please the old man, who would never in his own home sit on a chair or sleep in a foreign bed. Hana went to the wall cupboards and slid back a door and took out a soft quilt. She hesitated. The quilt was covered with flowered silk and the lining was pure white silk. "He is so dirty," she murmured in distress. "Yes, he had better be washed," Sadao agreed. "If you will fetch hot water I will wash him." "I cannot bear for you to touch him," she said. "We shall have to tell the servants he is here. I will tell Yumi now. She can leave the children for a few minutes and she can wash him." Sadao considered a moment. "Let it be so," he agreed. "You tell Yumi and I will tell the others." But the utter pallor of the man's unconscious face moved him first to stoop and feel his pulse. It was faint but it was there. He put his hand against the man's cold breast. The heart too was yet alive. "He will die unless he is operated on," Sadao said, considering. "The question is whether he will not die anyway." Hana cried out in fear. "Don't try to save him! What if he should live?" "What if he should die?" Sadao replied. He stood gazing The Enemy 29 © NCERT not to be republisheddown on the motionless man. This man must have extraordinary vitality or he would have been dead by now. But then he was very young --- perhaps not yet twentyfive. "You mean die from the operation?" Hana asked. "Yes," Sadao said. Hana considered this doubtfully, and when she did not answer Sadao turned away. "At any rate something must be done with him," he said, "and first he must be washed." He went quickly out of the room and Hana came behind him. She did not wish to be left alone with the white man. He was the first she had seen since she left America and now he seemed to have nothing to do with those whom she had known there. Here he was her enemy, a menace, living or dead. She turned to the nursery and called, "Yumi!" But the children heard her voice and she had to go in for a moment and smile at them and play with the baby boy, now nearly three months old. Over the baby's soft black hair she motioned with her mouth, "Yumi --- come with me!" "I will put the baby to bed," Yumi replied. "He is ready." She went with Yumi into the bedroom next to the nursery and stood with the boy in her arms while Yumi spread the sleeping quilts on the floor and laid the baby between them. Then Hana led the way quickly and softly to the kitchen. The two servants were frightened at what their master had just told them. The old gardener, who was also a house servant, pulled the few hairs on his upper lip. "The master ought not to heal the wound of this white man," he said bluntly to Hana. "The white man ought to die. First he was shot. Then the sea caught him and wounded him with her rocks. If the master heals what the gun did and what the sea did they will take revenge on us." "I will tell him what you say," Hana replied courteously. But she herself was also frightened, although she was not superstitious as the old man was. Could it ever be well to 30 Vistas © NCERT not to be republishedhelp an enemy? Nevertheless she told Yumi to fetch the hot water and bring it to the room where the white man was. She went ahead and slid back the partitions. Sadao was not yet there. Yumi, following, put down her wooden bucket. Then she went over to the white man. When she saw him her thick lips folded themselves into stubbornness. "I have never washed a white man," she said, "and I will not wash so dirty a one now." Hana cried at her severely. "You will do what your master commands you!" There was so fierce a look of resistance upon Yumi's round dull face that Hana felt unreasonably afraid. After all, if the servants should report something that was not as it happened? "Very well," she said with dignity. "You understand we only want to bring him to his senses so that we can turn him over as a prisoner?" "I will have nothing to do with it," Yumi said, "I am a poor person and it is not my business." "Then please," Hana said gently, "return to your own work." At once Yumi left the room. But this left Hana with the white man alone. She might have been too afraid to stay had not her anger at Yumi's stubbornness now sustained her. Will Hana help the wounded man and wash him herself? "Stupid Yumi," she muttered fiercely. "Is this anything but a man? And a wounded helpless man!" In the conviction of her own superiority she bent impulsively and untied the knotted rugs that kept the white man covered. When she had his breast bare she dipped the small clean towel that Yumi had brought into the steaming hot water and washed his face carefully. The man's skin, though rough with exposure, was of a fine texture and must have been very blond when he was a child. The Enemy 31 © NCERT not to be republishedWhile she was thinking these thoughts, though not really liking the man better now that he was no longer a child, she kept on washing him until his upper body was quite clean. But she dared not turn him over. Where was Sadao? Now her anger was ebbing, and she was anxious again and she rose, wiping her hands on the wrong towel. Then lest the man be chilled, she put the quilt over him. "Sadao!" she called softly. He had been about to come in when she called. His hand had been on the door and now he opened it. She saw that he had brought his surgeon's emergency bag and that he wore his surgeon's coat. "You have decided to operate!" she cried. "Yes," he said shortly. He turned his back to her and unfolded a sterilized towel upon the floor of the tokonoma2 alcove, and put his instruments out upon it. "Fetch towels," he said. She went obediently, but how anxious now, to the linen shelves and took out the towels. There ought a0lso to be old pieces of matting so that the blood would not ruin the fine floor covering. She went out to the back veranda where the gardener kept strips of matting with which to protect delicate shrubs on cold nights and took an armful of them. But when she went back into the room, she saw this was useless. The blood had already soaked through the packing in the man's wound and had ruined the mat under him. "Oh, the mat!" she cried. "Yes, it is ruined," Sadao replied, as though he did not care. "Help me to turn him," he commanded her. She obeyed him without a word, and he began to wash the man's back carefully. "Yumi would not wash him," she said. "Did you wash him then?" Sadao asked, not stopping for a moment his swift concise movements. "Yes," she said. He did not seem to hear her. But she was used to his absorption when he was at work. She wondered for a 2 tokonoma: a niche or an alcove in a Japanese home for displaying a flower arrangement, kakemono, or other piece of art. 32 Vistas © NCERT not to be republishedmoment if it mattered to him what was the body upon which he worked so long as it was for the work he did so excellently. "You will have to give the anesthetic if he needs it," he said. "I?" she repeated blankly. "But never have I!" "It is easy enough," he said impatiently. He was taking out the packing now, and the blood began to flow more quickly. He peered into the wound with the bright surgeon's light fastened on his forehead. "The bullet is still there," he said with cool interest. "Now I wonder how deep this rock wound is. If it is not too deep it may be that I can get the bullet. But the bleeding is not superficial. He has lost much blood." At this moment Hana choked. He looked up and saw her face the colour of sulphur. "Don't faint," he said sharply. He did not put down his exploring instrument. "If I stop now the man will surely die." She clapped her hands to her mouth and leaped up and ran out of the room. Outside in the garden he heard her retching. But he went on with his work. "It will be better for her to empty her stomach," he thought. He had forgotten that of course she had never seen an operation. But her distress and his inability to go to her at once made him impatient and irritable with this man who lay like dead under his knife. The Enemy 33 © NCERT not to be republished"This man." he thought, "there is no reason under heaven why he should live." Unconsciously this thought made him ruthless and he proceeded swiftly. In his dream the man moaned but Sadao paid no heed except to mutter at him. "Groan," he muttered, "groan if you like. I am not doing this for my own pleasure. In fact, I do not know why I am doing it." The door opened and there was Hana again. "Where is the anesthetic?" she asked in a clear voice. Sadao motioned with his chin. "It is as well that you came back," he said. "This fellow is beginning to stir." She had the bottle and some cotton in her hand. "But how shall I do it?" she asked. "Simply saturate the cotton and hold it near his nostrils," Sadao replied without delaying for one moment the intricate detail of his work. "When he breathes badly move it away a little." She crouched close to the sleeping face of the young American. It was a piteously thin face, she thought, and the lips were twisted. The man was suffering whether he knew it or not. Watching him, she wondered if the stories they heard sometimes of the sufferings of prisoners were true. They came like flickers of rumour, told by word of mouth and always contradicted. In the newspapers the reports were always that wherever the Japanese armies went the people received them gladly, with cries of joy at their liberation. But sometimes she remembered such men as General Takima, who at home beat his wife cruelly, though no one mentioned it now that he had fought so victorious a battle in Manchuria. If a man like that could be so cruel to a woman in his power, would he not be cruel to one like this for instance? She hoped anxiously that this young man had not been tortured. It was at this moment that she observed deep red scars on his neck, just under the ear. "Those scars," she murmured, lifting her eyes to Sadao. But he did not answer. At this moment he felt the tip of his instrument strike against something hard, dangerously 34 Vistas © NCERT not to be republishednear the kidney. All thought left him. He felt only the purest pleasure. He probed with his fingers, delicately, familiar with every atom of this human body. His old American professor of anatomy had seen to that knowledge. "Ignorance of the human body is the surgeon's cardinal sin, sirs!" he had thundered at his classes year after year. "To operate without as complete knowledge of the body as if you had made it --- anything less than that is murder." "It is not quite at the kidney, my friend," Sadao murmured. It was his habit to murmur to the patient when he forgot himself in an operation. "My friend," he always called his patients and so now he did, forgetting that this was his enemy. Then quickly, with the cleanest and most precise of incisions, the bullet was out. The man quivered but he was still unconscious. Nevertheless he muttered a few English words. "Guts," he muttered, choking. "They got\...my guts\..." "Sadao!" Hana cried sharply. "Hush," Sadao said. The man sank again into silence so profound that Sadao took up his wrist, hating the touch of it. Yes, there was still a pulse so faint, so feeble, but enough, if he wanted the man to live, to give hope. "But certainly I do not want this man to live," he thought. "No more anesthetic," he told Hana. He turned as swiftly as though he had never paused and from his medicines he chose a small vial and from it filled a hypodermic and thrust it into What will Dr Sadao and his wife do with the man? the patient's left arm. Then putting down the needle, he took the man's wrist again. The pulse under his fingers fluttered once or twice and then grew stronger. "This man will live in spite of all," he said to Hana and sighed. The young man woke, so weak, his blue eyes so terrified when he perceived The Enemy 35 © NCERT not to be republishedwhere he was, that Hana felt compelled to apologise. She herself served him, for none of the servants would enter the room. When she came in the first time, she saw him summon his small strength to be prepared for some fearful thing. "Don't be afraid," she begged him softly. "How come\... you speak English..." he gasped. "I was a long time in America," she replied. She saw that he wanted to reply to that but he could not, and so she knelt and fed him gently from the porcelain spoon. He ate unwillingly, but still he ate. "Now you will soon be strong," she said, not liking him and yet moved to comfort him. He did not answer. When Sadao came in the third day after the operation, he found the young man sitting up, his face bloodless with the effort. "Lie down," Sadao cried. "Do you want to die?" He forced the man down gently and strongly and examined the wound. "You may kill yourself if you do this sort of thing," he scolded. "What are you going to do with me?" the boy muttered. He looked just now barely seventeen. "Are you going to hand me over?" For a moment Sadao did not answer. He finished his examination and then pulled the silk quilt over the man. "I do not know myself what I shall do with you," he said. "I ought of course to give you to the police. You are a prisoner of war --- no, do not tell me anything." He put up his hand as he saw the young man was about to speak. "Do not even tell me your name unless I ask it." They looked at each other for a moment, and then the young man closed his eyes and turned his face to the wall. "Okay," he whispered, his mouth a bitter line. Outside the door Hana was waiting for Sadao. He saw at once that she was in trouble. "Sadao, Yumi tells me the servants feel they cannot stay if we hide this man here any more," she said. "She tells me that they are saying that you and I were so long in 36 Vistas © NCERT not to be republishedAmerica that we have forgotten to think of our own country first. They think we like Americans." "It is not true," Sadao said harshly "Americans are our enemies. But I have been trained not to let a man die if I can help it." "The servants cannot understand that," she said anxiously. "No," he agreed. Neither seemed able to say more, and somehow the household dragged on. The servants grew more watchful. Their courtesy was as careful as ever, but their eyes were cold upon the pair to whom they were hired. "It is clear what our master ought to do," the old gardener said one morning. He had worked with flowers all his life, and had been a specialist too in moss. For Sadao's father he had made one of the finest moss gardens in Japan, sweeping the bright green carpet constantly so that not a leaf or a pine needle marred the velvet of its surface. "My old master's son knows very well what he ought to do," he now said, pinching a bud from a bush as he spoke. "When the man was so near death why did he not let him bleed?" "That young master is so proud of his skill to save life that he saves any life," the cook said contemptuously. She split a fowl's neck skillfully and held the fluttering bird and let its blood flow into the roots of a wistaria vine. Blood is the best of fertilisers, and the old gardener would not let her waste a drop of it. "It is the children of whom we must think," Yumi said sadly. "What will be their fate if their father is condemned as a traitor?" They did not try to hide what they said from the ears of Hana as she stood arranging the day's flowers in the veranda near by, and she knew they spoke on purpose that she might hear. That they were right she knew too in most of her being. But there was another part of her which she herself could not understand. It was not sentimental liking of the prisoner. She had come to think of him as a prisoner. She had not liked him even yesterday when he The Enemy 37 © NCERT not to be republishedhad said in his impulsive way, "Anyway, let me tell you that my name is Tom." She had only bowed her little distant bow. She saw hurt in his eyes but she did not wish to assuage it. Indeed, he was a great trouble in this house. As for Sadao, every day he examined the wound carefully. The last stitches had been pulled out this morning, and the young man would, in a fortnight be nearly as well as ever. Sadao went back to his office and carefully typed a letter to the Chief of police reporting the whole matter. "On the twenty-first day of February an escaped prisoner was washed up on the shore in front of my house." So far he typed and then he opened a secret drawer of his desk and put the unfinished report into it. On the seventh day after that, two things happened. In the morning the servants left together, their belongings tied in large square cotton kerchiefs. When Hana got up in the morning nothing was done, the house not cleaned and the food not prepared, and she knew what it meant. She was dismayed and even terrified, but her pride as a mistress would not allow her to show it. Instead, she inclined her head gracefully when they appeared before her in the kitchen, and she paid them off and thanked them for all that they had done for her. They were crying, but she did not cry. The cook and the gardener had served Sadao since he was a little boy in his father's house, and Yumi cried because of the children. She was so grieving that after she had gone she ran back to Hana. "If the baby misses me too much tonight, send for me. I am going to my own house and you know where it is." "Thank you," Hana said smiling. But she told herself she would not send for Yumi however the baby cried. She made the breakfast and Sadao helped with the children. Neither of them spoke of the servants beyond the fact that they were gone. But after Hana had taken morning food to the prisoner, she came back to Sadao. "Why is it we cannot see clearly what we ought to do?" she asked him. "Even the servants see more clearly than we do. Why are we different from other Japanese?" Sadao did not answer. But a little later he went into the room where the prisoner was and said brusquely, "Today 38 Vistas © NCERT not to be republishedyou may get up on your feet. I want you to stay up only five minutes at a time. Tomorrow you may try it twice as long. It would be well that you get back your strength as quickly as possible." He saw the flicker of terror on the young face that was still very pale. "Okay," the boy murmured. Evidently he was determined to say more. "I feel I ought to thank you, Doctor, for having saved my life." "Don't thank me too early," Sadao said coldly. He saw the flicker of terror again in the boy's eyes --- terror as unmistakable as an animal's. The scars on his neck were crimson for a moment. Those scars! What were they? Sadao did not ask. In the afternoon the second thing happened. Hana, working hard on unaccustomed labour, saw a messenger come to the door in official uniform. Her hands went weak and she could not draw her breath. The servants must have told already. She ran to Sadao, gasping, unable to utter a word. But by then the messenger had simply followed her through the garden and there he stood. She pointed at him helplessly. Sadao looked up from his book. He was in his office, the other partition of which was thrown open to the garden for the southern sunshine. Will Dr Sadao be arrested on the charge of harbouring an enemy? "What is it?" he asked the messenger and then he rose, seeing the man's uniform. "You are to come to the palace," the man said. "The old General is in pain again." "Oh," Hana breathed, "is that all?" "All?" the messenger exclaimed. "Is it not enough?" "Indeed it is," she replied. "I am very sorry." When Sadao came to say goodbye, she was in the kitchen, but doing nothing. The children were asleep and she sat merely resting for a moment, more exhausted from her fright than from work. The Enemy 39 © NCERT not to be republished"I thought they had come to arrest you", she said. He gazed down into her anxious eyes. "I must get rid of this man for your sake," he said in distress. "Somehow I must get rid of him." (Sadao goes to see the General) "Of course," the General said weakly, "I understand fully. But that is because, I once took a degree in Princeton. So few Japanese have." "I care nothing for the man, Excellency," Sadao said, "but having operated on him with such success..." "Yes, yes" the General said. "It only makes me feel you more indispensable to me. Evidently you can save anyone --- you are so skilled. You say you think I can stand one more such attack as I have had today?" "Not more than one," Sadao said. "Then certainly I can allow nothing to happen to you," the General said with anxiety. His long pale Japanese face became expressionless, which meant that he was in deep thought. "You cannot be arrested," the General said, closing his eyes. "Suppose you were condemned to death and the next day I had to have my operation?" "There are other surgeons, Excellency," Sadao suggested. "None I trust," the General replied. "The best ones have been trained by Germans and would consider the operation successful even if I died. I do not care for their point of view." He sighed. "It seems a pity that we cannot better combine the German ruthlessness with the American sentimentality. Then you could turn your prisoner over to execution and yet I could be sure you would not murder me while I was unconscious." The General laughed. He had an unusual sense of humour. "As a Japanese, could you not combine these two foreign elements?" he asked. Sadao smiled. "I am not quite sure," he said, "but for your sake I would be willing to try, Excellency." The General shook his head. "I had rather not be the test case," he said. He felt suddenly weak and overwhelmed with the cares of his life as an official in times such as these when repeated victory brought great responsibilities all over 40 Vistas © NCERT not to be republishedthe south Pacific. "It is very unfortunate that this man should have washed up on your doorstep," he said irritably. "I feel it so myself," Sadao said gently. "It would be best if he could be quietly killed," the General said. "Not by you, but by someone who does not know him. I have my own private assassins. Suppose I send two of them to your house tonight or better, any night. You need know nothing about it. It is now warm --- what would be more natural than that you should leave the outer partition of the white man's room open to the garden while he sleeps?" "Certainly it would be very natural," Sadao agreed. "In fact, it is so left open every night." "Good," the General said, yawning. "They are very capable assassins --- they make no noise and they know the trick of inward bleeding. If you like I can even have them remove the body." Sadao considered. "That perhaps would be best, Excellency," he agreed, thinking of Hana. He left the General's presence then and went home, thinking over the plan. In this way the whole thing would be taken out of his hands. He would tell Hana nothing, since she would be timid at the idea of assassins in the house, and yet certainly such persons were essential in an absolute state such as Japan was. How else could rulers deal with those who opposed them? He refused to allow anything but reason to be the atmosphere of his mind as he went into the room where the American was in bed. But as he opened the door, to his surprise he found the young man out of bed, and preparing to go into the garden. "What is this!" he exclaimed. "Who gave you permission to leave your room?" "I'm not used to waiting for permission," Tom said gaily. "Gosh, I feel pretty good again! But will the muscles on this side always feel stiff?" "Is it so?" Sadao inquired, surprised. He forgot all else. "Now I thought I had provided against that," he murmured. He lifted the edge of the man's shirt and gazed at the healing The Enemy 41 © NCERT not to be republishedscar. "Massage may do it," he said, "if exercise does not." "It won't bother me much," the young man said. His young face was gaunt under the stubbly blond beard. "Say, Doctor, I've got something I want to say to you. If I hadn't met a Jap like you --- well, I wouldn't be alive today. I know that." Sadao bowed but he could not speak. "Sure, I know that," Tom went on warmly. His big thin hands gripping a chair were white at the knuckles. "I guess if all the Japs were like you there wouldn't have been a war." "Perhaps," Sadao said with difficulty. "And now I think you had better go back to bed." He helped the boy back into bed and then bowed. "Good night," he said. Sadao slept badly that night. Time and time again he woke, thinking he heard the rustling of footsteps, the sound of a twig broken or a stone displaced in the garden --- a noise such as men might make who carried a burden. The next morning he made the excuse to go first into the guest room. If the American were gone he then could simply tell Hana that so the General had directed. But when he opened the door he saw at once that there on the pillow was the shaggy blond head. He could hear the peaceful breathing of sleep and he closed the door again quietly. "He is asleep," he told Hana. "He is almost well to sleep like that." "What shall we do with him?" Hana whispered her old refrain. Sadao shook his head. "I must decide in a day or two," he promised. But certainly, he thought, the second night must be the night. There rose a wind that night, and he listened to the sounds of bending boughs and whistling partitions. Hana woke too. "Ought we not to go and close the sick man's partition?" she asked. "No," Sadao said. "He is able now to do it for himself." But the next morning the American was still there. Then the third night of course must be the night. The wind changed to quiet rain and the garden was full of the 42 Vistas © NCERT not to be republishedsound of dripping eaves and running springs. Sadao slept a little better, but he woke at the sound of a crash and leaped to his feet. "What was that?" Hana cried. The baby woke at her voice and began to wail. "I must go and see," But he held her and would not let her move. "Sadao," she cried, "what is the matter with you?" "Don't go," he muttered, "don't go!" His terror infected her and she stood breathless, waiting. There was only silence. Together they crept back into the bed, the baby between them. Yet when he opened the door of the guest room in the morning there was the young man. He was very gay and had already washed and was now on his feet. He had asked for a razor yesterday and had shaved himself and today there was a faint colour in his cheeks. "I am well," he said joyously. Sadao drew his kimono round his weary body. He could not, he decided suddenly, go through another night. It was not that he cared for this young man's life. No, simply it was not worth the strain. What will Dr Sadao do to get rid of the man? "You are well," Sadao agreed. He lowered his voice. "You are so well that I think if I put my boat on the shore tonight, with food and extra clothing in it, you might be able to row to that little island not far from the coast. It is so near the coast that it has not been worth fortifying. Nobody lives on it because in storm it is submerged. But this is not the season of storm. You could live there until you saw a Korean fishing boat pass by. They pass quite near the island because the water is many fathoms deep there." The young man stared at him, slowly comprehending. "Do I have to?" he asked. "I think so," Sadao said gently. "You understand --- it is not hidden that you are here." The Enemy 43 © NCERT not to be republishedThe young man nodded in perfect comprehension. "Okay," he said simply. Sadao did not see him again until evening. As soon as it was dark he had dragged the stout boat down to the shore and in it he put food and bottled water that he had bought secretly during the day, as well as two quilts he had bought at a pawnshop. The boat he tied to a post in the water, for the tide was high. There was no moon and he worked without a flashlight. When he came to the house he entered as though he were just back from his work, and so Hana knew nothing. "Yumi was here today," she said as she served his supper. Though she was so modern, still she did not eat with him. "Yumi cried over the baby," she went on with a sigh. "She misses him so." "The servants will come back as soon as the foreigner is gone," Sadao said. He went into the guest room that night before he went to bed himself and checked carefully the American's temperature, the state of the wound, and his heart and pulse. The pulse was irregular but that was perhaps because of excitement. The young man's pale lips were pressed together and his eyes burned. Only the scars on his neck were red. "I realise you are saving my life again," he told Sadao. "Not at all," Sadao said. "It is only inconvenient to have you here any longer." He had hesitated a good deal about giving the man a flashlight. But he had decided to give it to him after all. It was a small one, his own, which he used at night when he was called. "If your food runs out before you catch a boat," he said, "signal me two flashes at the same instant the sun drops over the horizon. Do not signal in darkness, for it will be seen. If you are all right but still there, signal me once. You will find fresh fish easy to catch but you must eat them raw. A fire would be seen." "Okay," the young man breathed. 44 Vistas © NCERT not to be republishedHe was dressed now in the Japanese clothes which Sadao had given him, and at the last moment Sadao wrapped a black cloth about his blond head. "Now," Sadao said. The young American, without a word, shook Sadao's hand warmly, and then walked quite well across the floor and down the step into the darkness of the garden. Once --- twice\... Sadao saw his light flash to find his way. But that would not be suspected. He waited until from the shore there was one more flash. Then he closed the partition. That night he slept. "You say the man escaped?" the General asked faintly. He had been operated upon a week before, an emergency operation to which Sadao had been called in the night. For twelve hours Sadao had not been sure the General would live. The gall bladder was much involved. Then the old man had begun to breathe deeply again and to demand food. Sadao had not been able to ask about the assassins. So far as he knew they had never come. The servants had returned and Yumi had cleaned the guest room thoroughly and had burned sulphur in it to get the white man's smell out of it. Nobody said anything. Only the gardener was cross because he had got behind with his chrysanthemums. But after a week Sadao felt the General was well enough to be spoken to about the prisoner. "Yes, Excellency, he escaped," Sadao now said. He coughed, signifying that he had not said all he might have said, but was unwilling to disturb the General further. But the old man opened his eyes suddenly. "That prisoner," he said with some energy, "did I not promise you I would kill him for you?" The Enemy 45 © NCERT not to be republished"You did, Excellency," Sadao said. "Well, well!" the old man said in a tone of amazement, "so I did! But you see, I was suffering a good deal. The truth is, I thought of nothing but myself. In short, I forgot my promise to you." "I wondered, Your Excellency," Sadao murmured. "It was certainly very careless of me," the General said. "But you understand it was not lack of patriotism or dereliction of duty." He looked anxiously at his doctor. "If the matter should come out you would understand that, wouldn't you?" "Certainly, Your Excellency," Sadao said. He suddenly comprehended that the General was in the palm of his hand and that as a consequence he himself was perfectly safe. "I can swear to your loyalty, Excellency," he said to the old General, "and to your zeal against the enemy." "You are a good man," the General murmured and closed his eyes." "You will be rewarded." But Sadao, searching the spot of black in the twilighted sea that night, had his reward. There was no prick of light in the dusk. No one was on the island. His prisoner was gone --- safe, doubtless, for he had warned him to wait only for a Korean fishing boat. He stood for a moment on the veranda, gazing out to the sea from whence the young man had come that other night. And into his mind, although without reason, there came other white faces he had known --- the professor at whose house he had met Hana, a dull man, and his wife had been a silly talkative woman, in spite of her wish to be kind. He remembered his old teacher of anatomy, who had been so insistent on mercy with the knife, and then he remembered the face of his fat and slatternly landlady. He had had great difficulty in finding a place to live in America because he was a Japanese. The Americans were full of prejudice and it had been bitter to live in it, knowing himself their superior. How he had despised the ignorant and dirty old woman who had at last consented to house him in her miserable home! He had once tried to be grateful to her because she had in his last year nursed him through 46 Vistas © NCERT not to be republishedinfluenza, but it was difficult, for she was no less repulsive to him in her kindness. Now he remembered the youthful, haggard face of his prisoner --- white and repulsive. "Strange," he thought. "I wonder why I could not kill him?" t to be republishedTHE YAKIMA RIVER The Yakima River is a tributary of the Columbia River in eastern Washington, U.S.A. The state is named after the indigenous Yakama people. Sketch map not to scale 24/Flamingo © NCERT not to be republishednaked into it and show my skinny legs. But I subdued my pride and did it. From the beginning, however, I had an aversion to the water when I was in it. This started when I was three or four years old and father took me to the beach in California. He and I stood together in the surf. I hung on to him, yet the waves knocked me down and swept over me. I was buried in water. My breath was gone. I was frightened. Father laughed, but there was terror in my heart at the overpowering force of the waves. My introduction to the Y.M.CA. swimming pool revived unpleasant memories and stirred childish fears. But in a little while I gathered confidence. I paddled with my new water wings, watching the other boys and trying to learn by aping them. I did this two or three times on different days and was just beginning to feel at ease in the water when the misadventure happened. I went to the pool when no one else was there. The place was quiet. The water was still, and the tiled bottom was as white and clean as a bathtub. I was timid about going in alone, so I sat on the side of the pool to wait for others. I had not been there long when in came a big bruiser of a boy, probably eighteen years old. He had thick hair on his chest. He was a beautiful physical specimen, with legs and arms that showed rippling muscles. He yelled, "Hi, Skinny! How'd you like to be ducked?" With that he picked me up and tossed me into the deep end. I landed in a sitting position, swallowed water, and went at once to the bottom. I was frightened, but not yet frightened out of my wits. On the way down I planned: When my feet hit the bottom, I would make a big jump, come to the surface, lie flat on it, and paddle to the edge of the pool. It seemed a long way down. Those nine feet were more like ninety, and before I touched bottom my lungs were ready to burst. But when my feet hit bottom I summoned all my strength and made what I thought was a great spring upwards. I imagined I would bob to the surface like a cork. Instead, I came up slowly. I opened my eyes and saw nothing Deep Water/25 © NCERT not to be republishedbut water --- water that had a dirty yellow tinge to it. I grew panicky. I reached up as if to grab a rope and my hands clutched only at water. I was suffocating. I tried to yell but no sound came out. Then my eyes and nose came out of the water --- but not my mouth. I flailed at the surface of the water, swallowed and choked. I tried to bring my legs up, but they hung as dead weights, paralysed and rigid. A great force was pulling me under. I screamed, but only the water heard me. I had started on the long journey back to the bottom of the pool. I struck at the water as I went down, expending my strength as one in a nightmare fights an irresistible force. I had lost all my breath. My lungs ached, my head throbbed. I was getting dizzy. But I remembered the strategy --- I would spring from the bottom of the pool and come like a cork to the surface. I would lie flat on the water, strike out with my arms, and thrash with my legs. Then I would get to the edge of the pool and be safe. I went down, down, endlessly. I opened my eyes. Nothing but water with a yellow glow --- dark water that one could not see through. And then sheer, stark terror seized me, terror that knows no understanding, terror that knows no control, terror that no one can understand who has not experienced it. I was shrieking under water. I was paralysed under water --- stiff, rigid with fear. Even the screams in my throat were frozen. Only my heart, and the pounding in my head, said that I was still alive. And then in the midst of the terror came a touch of reason. I must remember to jump when I hit the bottom. At last I felt the tiles under me. My toes reached out as if to grab them. I jumped with everything I had. But the jump made no difference. The water was still around me. I looked for ropes, ladders, water wings. Nothing but water. A mass of yellow water held me. Stark terror took an even deeper hold on me, like a great charge of electricity. I shook and trembled with fright. My arms wouldn't move. My legs wouldn't move. I tried to call for help, to call for mother. Nothing happened. 26/Flamingo © NCERT not to be republishedAnd then, strangely, there was light. I was coming out of the awful yellow water. At least my eyes were. My nose was almost out too. Then I started down a third time. I sucked for air and got water. The yellowish light was going out. Then all effort ceased. I relaxed. Even my legs felt limp; and a blackness swept over my brain. It wiped out fear; it wiped out terror. There was no more panic. It was quiet and peaceful. Nothing to be afraid of. This is nice\... to be drowsy\... to go to sleep\... no need to jump\... too tired to jump\... it's nice to be carried gently\... to float along in space\... tender arms around me\... tender arms like Mother's\... now I must go to sleep\... I crossed to oblivion, and the curtain of life fell. The next I remember I was lying on my stomach beside the pool, vomiting. The chap that threw me in was saying, "But I was only fooling." Someone said, "The kid nearly died. Be all right now. Let's carry him to the locker room." Several hours later, I walked home. I was weak and trembling. I shook and cried when I lay on 1 1. What is the "misadventure" that William Douglas speaks about? 2 2. What were the series of emotions and fears that Douglas experienced when he was thrown into the pool? What plans did he make to come to the surface? 3 3. How did this experience affect him? my bed. I couldn't eat that night. For days a haunting fear was in my heart. The slightest exertion upset me, making me wobbly in the knees and sick to my stomach. I never went back to the pool. I feared water. I avoided it whenever I could. A few years later when I came to know the waters of the Cascades, I wanted to get into them. And whenever I did --- whether I was wading the Tieton or Bumping River or bathing in Warm Lake of the Goat Rocks --- the terror that had seized me in the pool would come back. It would take possession of me completely. My legs would become paralysed. Icy horror would grab my heart. This handicap stayed with me as the years rolled by. In canoes on Maine lakes fishing for landlocked salmon, Deep Water/27 © NCERT not to be republishedbass fishing in New Hampshire, trout fishing on the Deschutes and Metolius in Oregon, fishing for salmon on the Columbia, at Bumping Lake in the Cascades --- wherever I went, the haunting fear of the water followed me. It ruined my fishing trips; deprived me of the joy of canoeing, boating, and swimming. I used every way I knew to overcome this fear, but it held me firmly in its grip. Finally, one October, I decided to get an instructor and learn to swim. I went to a pool and practiced five days a week, an hour each day. The instructor put a belt around me. A rope attached to the belt went through a pulley that ran on an overhead cable. He held on to the end of the rope, and we went back and forth, back and forth across the pool, hour after hour, day after day, week after week. On each trip across the pool a bit of the panic seized me. Each time the instructor relaxed his hold on the rope and I went under, some of the old terror returned and my legs froze. It was three months before the tension began to slack. Then he taught me to put my face under water and exhale, and to raise my nose and inhale. I repeated the exercise hundreds of times. Bit by bit I shed part of the panic that seized me when my head went under water. Next he held me at the side of the pool and had me kick with my legs. For weeks I did just that. At first my legs refused to work. But they gradually relaxed; and finally I could command them. Thus, piece by piece, he built a swimmer. And when he had perfected each piece, he put them together into an integrated whole. In April he said, "Now you can swim. Dive off and swim the length of the pool, crawl stroke." I did. The instructor was finished. But I was not finished. I still wondered if I would be terror-stricken when I was alone in the pool. I tried it. I swam the length up and down. Tiny vestiges of the old terror would return. But now I could frown and say to that terror, "Trying to scare me, eh? Well, here's to you! Look!" And off I'd go for another length of the pool. This went on until July. But I was still not satisfied. I was not sure that all the terror had left. So I went to Lake 28/Flamingo © NCERT not to be republishedWentworth in New Hampshire, dived off a dock at Triggs Island, and swam two miles across the lake to Stamp Act Island. I swam the crawl, breast stroke, side stroke, and back stroke. Only once did the terror return. When I was in the middle of the lake, I put my face under and saw nothing but bottomless water. The old sensation returned in miniature. I laughed and said, "Well, Mr Terror, what do you think you can do to me?" It fled and I swam on. Yet I had residual doubts. At my first opportunity I hurried west, went up the Tieton to Conrad Meadows, up the Conrad Creek Trail to Meade Glacier, and camped in the high meadow by the side of Warm Lake. The next morning I stripped, dived into the lake, and swam across to the other shore and back --- just as Doug Corpron used to do. I shouted with joy, and Gilbert Peak returned the echo. I had conquered my fear of water. The experience had a deep meaning for me, as only those who have known stark terror and conquered it can appreciate. In death there is peace. There is terror only in the fear of death, as Roosevelt knew when he said, "All we have to fear is fear itself." Because I had experienced both the sensation of dying and the terror that fear of it can produce, the will to live somehow grew in intensity. At last I felt released --- free to walk the trails and climb the peaks and to brush aside fear.