IN JULY, MAJOR GENERAL YAMADA came home on leave from the campaign in China. His wife, Mineko, greeted him coldly. Though she’d begun their marriage in innocence and good faith, she’d become disappointed, then tired, then enraged by his complete lack of presence. She was barely moved to see him considerably aged. There were now deep grooves on his once-elegant forehead. He’d lost two fingers on his right hand, which he kept encased in a glove even in the sweltering heat. She might have felt pity for a stranger wounded in battle, but not for her husband, who had dedicated his entire life to war and conquest.
The morning after his arrival, Mineko sat down to tea with her husband and asked for a divorce. She was three months pregnant, she explained. If he would be decent enough to set her free, she would marry her lover and move back to Japan.
Yamada didn’t say anything, not because he was angry or indignant but because he’d lost the desire to speak. He stared at Mineko, who was in a pink dress similar to the one she’d worn at their first meeting. It occurred to him then that they had been married sixteen years and were still strangers at heart. They had had nothing to say to each other, until this moment.
“I will have to speak to your brother about this,” Yamada replied, putting an end to their discussion.
An hour later, he was sitting in Ito Atsuo’s reception room. It was not the same one where he had looked at the porcelains and the tiger skin, so many years ago. Ito had built himself a fine Beaux Arts mansion at the foot of South Mountain, said to be one of the most beautiful houses in all of Korea. The room was decorated in French style with Louis Seize chairs and gilded drapes, and though there were a few celadons above a mantelpiece, the tiger skin was nowhere to be found.
“Genzo, how many years has it been? When did you arrive and how long will you be staying?” Ito strode into the room, looking barely aged since they last saw each other.
“Almost eight years. You look exactly the same,” Yamada said, shaking Ito’s hand.
“Do I? Even so, it hasn’t been easy for me. Sit, sit . . . Let’s talk about you first though. I heard about your hand, you war hero!”
Yamada sat down on the deep-seated chair and smoothed down his thighs, smiling awkwardly. “Hardly. There were many others who lost their lives. Farm boys, butcher’s boys, and heirs to old and respectable families. Some were truly fearless, others were only worried about surviving. But in the end, they all died screaming. Death is a great equalizer.”
“But surely you were in the thick of action. Not playing cards or drinking back at the camp!”
“It’s not because I’m brave that I lost two fingers . . . It was only a matter of chance.”
“Perhaps you’re right. Still, you’ve made a sacrifice, as all men ought to. Even I’ve had to donate all of the iron and gold mined from my ores in the past six months. As you can imagine, that has been a staggering loss. But as an obedient subject of His Majesty the Emperor, I am glad to play my part. And, of course, I’ll receive the rewards for my loyalty once this war is over. Indochina has far more ores than Korea, and Burma is rife with rubies. And within a year, we’ll wrest India from Britain’s grip. I will be richer than a rajah!”
Ito smiled triumphantly, but his brother-in-law remained silent. The quick-witted servant took advantage of the lull to step between them and lay out the coffee and biscuits.
“Coffee is rarer than gold these days. Drink up, my friend,” Ito said.
“It’s not going to happen,” Yamada muttered, ignoring the steaming cup on the saucer. “The war. We can’t win.”
“What are you talking about? You were in China. We’ve conquered that giant beast—the great, decaying, toothless dragon. We’ve taken Indochina from France, and—”
“You speak that way because you know only what the newspapers are allowed to print. You haven’t seen what I’ve seen on the front lines. We don’t have enough oil, iron, rubber, or food to keep this war going. It’s us up against Britain and France, and if America gets involved . . . They have hundreds of planes and ships for each one of ours, and thousands of soldiers for each one of ours, do you understand that?”
“Germany and Italy will fight with us if America gets involved.”
“Germany is busy fighting Russia, and Italy is nothing without Germany . . . It’s fine if you don’t believe me.”
“If you were not my brother-in-law, I would think that you have sacrilegious ideas in your head, Genzo. This is unbecoming of a general of His Majesty’s Imperial Army,” Ito warned.
“So be it. I am no longer your brother-in-law, so have me arrested if you desire.” Yamada shook his head in ambiguity, more disdainful than melancholy. “Mineko asked me for a divorce. She is with child and wants to marry its father and move back to Japan.”
It was Ito’s turn to shake his head. He put down his cup and leaned back in his chair like a doctor about to announce some unfortunate but essential fact. “You can’t divorce her. I’m sorry, it’s not ideal, but you have to think about our families. We could arrange to have a distant relative adopt the child, if you wish.”
“I’m afraid it’s no longer up to you, Atsuo. I’ve already made up my mind to divorce her even if it’s the last thing I do before I go back to war,” Yamada countered. He felt so strangely uplifted by saying this out loud, he nearly wanted to say it again. “You know, Atsuo, I’ve never really felt free. But in my youth, I thought that constriction was good, beneficial. I saw the world as a system laid out by intelligent and important people, and I was going to be one of them. But now I realize what a fool I’ve been. That system is nothing but that which brings destruction.”
Ito had never heard Yamada speak this way, and was almost worried that he would start acting violently. But Yamada got up calmly in the next moment, pulled down the hem of his uniform jacket, and extended a hand.
“We probably won’t see each other again, so this is farewell.”
“Genzo, of course we will. Just because of Mineko . . .” Ito started to feel quite sad in spite of himself. “With anyone else I wouldn’t care, but I don’t want us to part this way.”
Yamada smiled, and it was a carefree and genuine smile that Ito had never seen before in his friend. “Fine, Atsuo. I’m being redeployed to China. No idea when I’ll come back . . . But be well until we meet again.”
22
Zoo Animals