Shiki Volume 1 Chapter 4 part2

2

"Oh, it's the Junior Doctor!"

Toshio turned towards the voice calling out from the side of the parking lot to see three women standing and talking. Standing under the bowers beside the gate to avoid the sun's rays, they fanned themselves with their handkerchiefs while seeming to make lively gossip. Thinking it'd be a pain, Toshio picked up his pace towards the car. Either way their topic was obvious.

The bells chimed from the mountains. The sounds of funeral bells. He managed to escape to the inside of his car, avoiding the women standing and chatting but the seat was scorching hot, leaving Toshio thoroughly demoralized and worn down to the bone all the same.

The tragedy in Yamairi had the people of the village all wound and worked up. They gathered here and there, seemingly to solidify their theories. They must have heard from somewhere or another that Toshio stood in on the autopsy, and thanks to that despite it being his no-consultation day, he had plenty of patients. Making a face like it was entirely natural they requested examinations, and on top of that he had plenty of requests for house calls. And when asked what they wanted to ask about there, it wasn't about the one calling him in, it was commentary on the Yamairi incident. Even though he cut into the words of and shut up the patients who wanted to make idle chatter, there was no end to the patients to see. To put it bluntly he was fed up with them.

With that in mind, being beaten down by the smoldering heat in the car, Toshio headed towards Mizuguchi. Down the village road to the south, the long and narrow village community stretched out on the opposite bank. Just across that bridge was Mizuguchi.

In the lowest reaches of Mizuguchi, in a narrow farm field and amongst the forests that were so thick it couldn't even be called part of the village anymore was a miserable little hovel, Itou Ikumi's house. Calling it a miserable little hovel was by no means an invalid statement. The old building was so worn by the years that at a glance anyone would think anything so laid to waste was abandoned. The warped and slanted roof's tiles were broken and the sheet iron planks that handled the rain runoff were rusted and spotted with holes. It was questionable whether it could even open, the window with the wooden frame's glass so filthy that it couldn't even fulfill its function as glass. The glass door to the entryway was lurched open, an old fashioned electric light with a broken shade hanging down from above, the light bulb ever unlit.

"Good day."

Toshio stepped inside past the glass door, calling out. Inside was a dim dirt floor, the air heavy with heat, enough to choke someone easily with the strong odor of incense floating about. The dirt floor of the entryway continued to the other side, straight ahead, the depths of which from the daughter of the Ikumis Tamae poked her face out. She was about three years Toshio's senior but with a face seeming to be worn out, she'd aged to the point where one could think she'd lapped him.

Tamae's eyes seemed somehow hollow as she spoke her gratitude for the house visit, thank you for coming all this way. Chunky and rotund, Tamae being the very picture of lethargy was how Toshio had always remembered her being, as far back as his memory could go. Just as Tamae was raising her face from her bow, a voice resonated from within the house.

"Is it the doctor? Come in."

Toshio nodded in acknowledgement to Tamae, heading in past the dirt floor. Beyond the open glass door, in the six mat corner of a room like a cellar, before the kitchen entrance, there was a thin futon spread out. On that sat a woman. This was Tamae's mother, Ikumi.

"By all means, do come in."

A smile rose up over Ikumi's whole face, thin in contrast to that of her daughter's. Toshio withheld the sigh he felt inside as he came up into the six mat room. He narrowly managed to squeeze himself into an opening on the tatami to sit. The reason for such minimal space was because of the tools of the family trade. There was enough to cram up half of the room, counting neither the family altar nor the family shrine, before which was a stand with an incense burner large enough to be mistaken for a brazier, in it incense sticks burning, smoking the room in dark soot, and there were two shelves with a strange luster to them, lined with ambiguous, cryptic little objects coated in dust.

Toshio drew his eyes from that and professionally took out his medical bag. "What's wrong?"

"Since yesterday, I've been so hot."

So Ikumi said but her face was brimming. At the very least she seemed healthier than anyone else he'd met today.

"Your temperature?" Toshio asked, taking out a thermometer. He knew full well from experience this household didn't have medical thermometer. Ikumi frequently requested house calls but she'd never even put out a cushion to sit on, nor served a single cup of tea. He was pretty sure there weren't any cushions for guests to sit on in the house anyway. He had his doubts about whether there were even teacups for guests' use.

Ikumi cheerfully took the thermometer in hand and put it in her armpit. As Toshio took her pulse and blood pressure readings, talk of Yamairi began. How she was surprised by the patrol cars rushing by Takemura, how surprised she was when she heard a just dreadful case occurred in Yamairi, personal criticisms on the Murasako couple and old man Gigorou, she went sounding off on all such things. Ikumi had a tendency to be a tight lipped and gloomy woman but at the very least towards Toshio, she burst out a flood of words as always. He mechanically put the stethoscope to her.

Ikumi was a famous miser. Even in this day and age she used firewood from the mountains in a wood burning stove, and she used the neighbor's baths for hot water. Though she was loath to spend a single yen, she frequently called Toshio out for house calls. He had a theory that her reasoning may have been colored by her hang-ups about doctors--or maybe about the household known as 'Ozaki'---that if you went to the hospital for an examination, they'd examine things that didn't need to be examined charging unnecessary medical fees, so she probably believed. In any case, having come, there wasn't really a thing wrong with Ikumi. Every time something happened in the village, she'd call Toshio out and on the rare occasion there was something wrong, she'd refuse medicine and treatment. Of course, she had no insurance. The mother and child farmed a narrow field and garden, and the rest that they ate was at the generosity of others.

Toshio performed a perfunctory examination, and merely answered that there was nothing particularly abnormal.

"Is that so? How strange, I do feel ever so sluggish," Ikumi said, suddenly turning with a 'by the way!' "Seems Gotoudsan's Shuuji-san has passed away, yes? I wonder if that hasn't got some connection to Yamairi?"

"Connection?"

"I mean, isn't it strange, so many dead people in succession like that. And moreover, Shuuji-san was Murasako's Hidemasa's nephew, wasn't he? Makes you wonder if there's something to it, doesn't it? And the Murasako family, it was down to just Hidemasa wasn't it? Hidemassan and Fuki-san were the only two left but there were originally five siblings you know, from that house. And yet, three of them died young. On top of that, Mieko-san's last child was a stillbirth, too...."

Toshio packed away his stethoscope, breathing a sigh. "You're not trying to say it's a curse again, now are you?"

"Oh dear," said Ikumi as if shocked. "I just mean, isn't it curious? That three people of the same stock died in succession."

"Gigorou-san died too, you know."

"Gigorou-san was like a part of the family to the Murasako household. I wonder if he might not have been a victim of circumstance, you know?."

"What circumstances are we talking about? Try not to make it sound too stupid."

"I thought that the Junior Doctor would say as much but the truth is, I saw it."

"Saw what?"

"The truth is, what was it, ten days ago now? I saw a strange dream. A pitch black cloud over Yamairi. That was all there was to the dream but it struck a chord in me. That something no good is going to come to Yamairi."

"It's just a dream. ---Well, see ya."

Toshio said as he said that while rising to a stand when Ikumi gripped at him. She clung to him with her full body weight hanging off of him, not about to let go easily.

"Ikumi-san."

"I knew. I was certain that unhappiness would befall Yamairi. Then, after Shuuji-san, there was that uproar. Be sure, something happened at the Murasako house. Back when I was young, there's something I told Mieko-san. I told her that family is no good, you, in entering into the family like that, will not meet an easy end, I told her. But still, Mieko-san is a person who won't open her ears when people speak. And then there was that dream, wasn't there? It struck a chord with me but, I didn't want to have weird faces made at me again. So I stayed quiet then but, knowing and doing nothing doesn't feel very good now does it? So you see, I did a special prayer, a prayer that nothing bad would befall the Murasako household. As I did, in the very middle of prayer, a gecko appeared, twice no less!"

"Okay," Toshio said curtly, trying to pry her grip off but once he got the right hand off, her left took hold.

"This is no good, I thought! That isn't all, either. Look, I've been saying it all along haven't I? This year something's strange! When I read New Year's fortunes, I had a bad premonition, did I not? Then we had this heat and this drought! On top of that, as soon as the year began, I had a bad feeling from that Kanemasa house. I've felt like it's stagnant with evil. For a while now I thought that stagnation's been flowing towards Yamairi. And then there's that precognitive dream, yes? I thought it wasn't good that the Kanemasa estate was sold. That solidified the feel of the village for the worst. To begin with, Kanemasa is what you would call a fated lot, after all. "

"Ikumi-san, you do know I don't have the time to be listening to your pretentious rants?"

"Oh, just listen, I'm not saying anything bad. That house at Kanemasa, it's not good. That house's direction is no good. The position of the gate is strange, isn't it, it wasn't a good idea to build over the old Kanemasa house. At least they should have set it like it was before. I thought about going to tell them that, I went to visit, but there's nobody there to visit now is there? Be sure of it, it's bad luck. I'd even bet on it. They had plans to come but some misfortune befell them, so they weren't able to move in. It's not impossible, that house, they build it to move in."

"Ikumi-san."

"I'm not finished yet. You go ahead and just see if anybody really moves into that house. Worse things'll come to pass if they do. Junior Doctor, did you know? Near here are statues of the three wise monkeys, aren't there? They were broken, the other day. Right around the time the three died in Yamairi, that it was. When I thought about it and went to look, the O-jizo-san and the Koubou-sama statue in front of the Shrine were broken too. Its head was knocked off and it was torn to pieces. If you listen, you'll hear them talking about how Gigorou-san's body was torn to pieces too, yes? There's a connection there, don't you think as much?"

"Personally I can't help but think there's no connection at all, but," Toshio said coldly tearing Ikumi's hand off. "Anyway, there's nothing especially wrong with you, so. If possible, before calling me in you could try thinking a little more rationally about how bad you're really feeling?"

Oh my, Ikumi scowles at Toshio. "I am quite rational, I will have you know. It seems you don't believe what I'm saying. However, ever since I'd seen that strange, precognitive dream, I've been feeling dreadful. I think it's clear I've been in contact by something ominous. I've been like that ever since then, really."

"Sure," Toshio said dismissively as he stepped down onto the dirt floor. He desperately wished never to have to pay Ikumi another house call examination again but he was certain he'd be called in again. If Ikumi called in directly there were times when he could try to turn her down, passing it off by asking how she was doing over the phone. But, without fail if the phone call came from her daughter Tamae, if he refused the house call, she'd break out into crying hysterics. After being rejected, she'd whine cloyingly until eventually, she'd be winded and collapse; it'd come to the point before where Tamae herself would have to be brought in by ambulance. Toshio's father had a certain antipathy towards the mother-daughter pair, a vein popped out in anger but, even still his patience would be worn down and, in the end, even while hot with rage, he'd head out. It was unfortunately likely that Toshio, likewise, was going to be pulled into the same pattern.

Leaving behind Ikumi who appeared to still have something to say, he briskly went to the dirt floor entryway. Coming from the room beside the entryway, Tamae bowed her head. What she held out towards him was a used direct mail envelope, so he knew that inside was the fixed fee, from years of knowing them.

"Thank you...." Tamae said with a shrinking voice. Toshio took the envelope with a sigh.

"It's not that I don't get how hard it is on you, Tamae-san, but can I ask you not to call me over things like this? While I'm doing things like this, there are patients who really do need an examination who might come rushing into the hospital at their last minute."

"I'm sorry," Tamae said, fully cowering into herself. "Mother just insisted...."

"I understand that. But, for me, being called out for gossip is a problem. If you could at least convince your mother to come into the hospital herself, if you can't try to hold back the flood just a little..."

"...Yes, sir." Tamae absently lowered her head. Toshio gave another sigh and exited the entryway. There was a shimmer of hot air over the road, the baking asphalt letting off a heat haze. There was no escaping the frustration that came with the languid stagnation in the air.

With a mother like that, living all alone with her was a hardship he knew but when he was busy like this, and furthermore for dragging him out in this heat, he couldn't help being frustrated with Tamae. If she at least had other relatives or someone to exchange viewpoints with it'd be one thing but Ikumi had married into the village from outside and was estranged from her own family, and due to her bizarre talks and habits, her in-laws in the village cleanly and precisely cut ties with her. Her neighbors kept a respectful distance, or so they called it, so about the only ones who would interact with her were those who had too much time on their hands, the old folks at Takemura. If it was demanded they would help her and in their own way they offered assistance but, they weren't by any means welcome to become too involved. The mother and daughter were isolated, just the two of them, on the outskirts of the village.

"Good grief..."

The lingering scent of incense still making him nauseous, he had the feeling it had stained its way into his white coat. Being friends with Seishin, he was used to the smell of incense but he'd never thought of the incense at the temple as being unpleasant. Rather, he even thought that in its own way it had an air of refinement but, that might have been a matter of personal preference. Or maybe it was a matter of the incense itself.

Just as he was thinking he'd change his white coat once he got back to the hospital, resident Takami made an appearance there beside the hospital. Still in uniform, he wiped at the nape of his neck with the towel draped around it. As he stopped the car, Takami gave a friendly smile.

"Ah, Junior Doctor!"

Toshio had the feeling he was being saved in some way, by Takami's simplistic smile.

"Working hard. Doing the rounds?"

"And you are working hard as well. A house call?"

"To the Itou's Ikumi-san, yeah."

As Toshio said that, Takami gave an exaggerated sigh. "That's, yeah, hard work all right, isn't it?"

"Tell me about it. Takami-san, you're looking boiled alive there. You wanna come in, drink something cold and cool off?"

"That's, yeah, I'd be grateful."

Takami gave a broad smile. Toshio motioned to the passenger's seat, but he waved his hand and motioned to the hospital. It was about ten meters to the hospital parking lot. Catching his meaning, he drove on into a space in the parking lot, Takami following after him.

"Well, you know, I thought I should at least try to pretend to do some basic information gathering, and all."

Toshio stepped out of the car, looking back at Takami's embarrassed face. "Information gathering? On what?"

"Of course, I accept that that thing over at Yamairi was a natural death, but. For the record, confirming that there were no suspicious people sighted wouldn't be a bad idea, I thought."

"Ah ha."

"It's just, if I don't do that much, it feels like I'm not doing my part so to speak, so if you want to say I'm just going through the motions, that might be true." Takami laughed and wiped his face. Toshio headed towards the side entrance also laughing,

"That might be human nature."

"With that in mind, going here and there asking around was well and good but, in the end, in asking, the most I got any talk out of was Katou-san's boy. Sounds like a few days ago, a scary man was seen walking up along the village road or something."

"Scary?" Toshio asked while heading up into the side entrance.

"He is a kid and all; what scared you and how, I asked, but couldn't get any essentials. In summary, he spotted a man at twilight, carrying a bat or a hammer or something like that, and all I got out of it was that it was scary. According to Kyousuke-kun, the Kanemasa house is an Oni's nest, it seems."

Toshio laughed. "That's what they mean by 'childish.' I might've been the same when I was a kid."

"You don't remember?"

"I forgot. Going off the stories people around tell me, I was a far throw from anything as cute as that, but."

Takami's voice rose in a laugh, causing Kiyomi's face to pop out from the break room. Kiyomi was of course also off today but, due to the flood of patients that the doctor had been unable to make any progress through, he had her come in. Of course it was a pain for Kiyomi when it was at last her day off but, having to pay her wages for it made it a pain for Toshio too.

Takami took off his cap and greeted Kiyomi. Toshio brought Takami back towards the waiting room, stripping off his white coat, tossing it aside and standing in front the ventilator opening for the air conditioner. That was when he at last had a stunning revelation.

"I feel that air conditioning may be the greatest invention of mankind."

"Don't you mean air conditioning and refrigerators?"

"May be."

"I walked around in the middle of this heat and when I finally had someone talk to me, all I got was the scary man story and the car story. You know, at the end of July there was the boy from Kami-Sotoba who was hit by a car, wasn't there?"

Yeah, Toshio nodded.

"Since that's the extent of it and nobody's particularly seen anyone unfamiliar, the village is peaceful."

"That's more because it's a closed universe."

Takami laughed as he fanned himself with his cap. "For the record, it was on my mind so I did try going to Kanemasa, too, though."

"And you walked all the way to a place like that. Still, what was on your mind?"

"Well, that car---it was a black, big foreign car, they said, right? There was a rumor that it might have been the Kanemasa car."

"I see. Easy to see how they'd make the association."

"Therefore, just in case, I went to Kanemasa to see what it was like. Confirming whether it was really unmanned or not wouldn't be bad, I thought."

"Hnnn?"

"The gate appears to be sealed by a bar from the inside, so whether I pushed or pulled it wouldn't open. Side entrance was the same. So, I tried to take a peek inside, you see?"

Toshio opened his mouth. "See what, that you jumped the fence?"

"Yeah, well," Takami said all the more embarrassed. "It was bothering me you see. Inside was a pitiable sight."

"Don't tell me, it was ransacked or something?"

"No, nothing like that. The front yard alllllllways had grass planted. It did but, with nobody living there to water it, then there's this drought on top of it... So, their prized lawn was completely withered. It's, if seed's not planted fresh again, it won't become a lawn again."

"I see," Toshio laughed.

"But, if a car came in or if people were coming and going, you'd be able to tell by the dirt, wouldn't you? For example, there were no marks like footprints, so after all there probably really is no one there, yes? At the least, it doesn't seem like anybody's coming or going. I tried to peek in through the windows too but, it doesn't seem there's anyone there. Incidentally, when I went around to the back, I did see the meter, though."

"Heh?"

"The water and the gas's stopcock was closed. The power meter didn't move an inch either. It didn't seem they were using any gas either. That'd mean unmanned right? If it's all shut off like that, and without the gift of air conditioning or refrigerators, you couldn't live."

"Probably not. Even if you turn the AC off from time to time, if the refrigerator's running, the meter should move, too."

"That is correct. Wow, it sure was a waste of effort."

Takami's visibly tanned face was red as he laughed. Toshio returned a forced smile. Everyone was starved for a story. ---No, they were starved for change. In a rut for years on end, they lived without any change. The incident in Yamairi was a stone thrown into that. Maybe they wanted to preserve those ripples just as long as they could. Maybe they didn't want it to be wrapped up as a simple tragedy. It wasn't a feeling Toshio didn't understand himself.

Chapter end