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a year, so of course his teeth grew loose and his muscles atrophied. Dad came home utterly debilitated, but Mom looked happy as she tried to cheer him up.
    It was always there in a corner of my mind, the thought that I wanted to learn what Dad’s jail life had been like. Years later, I had a visit from a woman in the same theater group as Dad. The instant she saw me, she said, “Without a doubt! You’re the spitting image of him!” This woman, S., was shocked that I resembled Dad so exactly.
    According to S., her most vivid memory of jail life was on January 1. They were all let out of their isolation cells, lined up in the corridor, and the whole theater group sang favorite antiwar songs. The guard was considerate: while they sang antiwar songs, he abandoned his post and took no notice. He must have sympathized with Dad’s theater group and thought well of them. After her release, S., too, had had bitter experiences. When talk of marriage arose and the day of the marriage interview approached, the other side always called things off. Like serpents coiling about S., the detectives of the thought police kept up their surveillance; to teach her a lesson, they broke up all her marriage negotiations. They continued to spread rumors about her, that she was a wicked woman; they even treated her family harshly, leaving bad memories.
    S. spoke of Dad as if she were leafing through the pages of a fond past. Dad was great in the spotlight reading his lines; when he’d got married, she had thanked Dad for all he’d done for her. The leader of Dad’s theater group had been held in Yoshijima Prison, awaiting trial, until Japan’s defeat in 1945.
    For the fourteen months Dad was detained, Mom had faced great worries about money. With us young ones to feed, she earned money working for all she was worth at the painting of clogs that was the family business. I spoke to the young boss of the guild that handled clogs then; he said it pained him to see Mom at that time—she was so haggard. Her technique wasn’t great, so he couldn’t give her much work, but he couldn’t simply stand by silent. So he’d sent work her way behind his boss’s back. But she hadn’t produced good stuff, and one time his boss caught on and thundered at him not to send orders Mom’s way. Throwing herself on the mercy of her parents, Mom got money to live on. Frantic, she raised us.
    Don’t Die a Dog’s Death!
    There is another vivid memory from November 1941 burned onto my heart. Mom’s younger brother, Uncle Y., resplendent in the uniform of a naval officer and grasping his military sword by its white handle, appeared at our home looking stern. I liked Uncle Y. He was very attractive. I’d told Mom that I wanted to be like him when I grew up. Uncle Y. often came to visit us. When I had a cold or at other times, he’d take off his short sword and let me play with it. I can’t forget the heft of the short sword and the feel of its polished blade.
    That day Uncle Y. climbed with nervous step up to Dad’s workroom on the second floor and, a serious expression on his face, listened to Dad. That tense atmosphere came across to me, young as I was. I’d gone up with him. Dad unsheathed Uncle Y.’s sword, stood the blade upright, and stared at it. Oppressed by the extraordinary tension, I sat beside Dad and stroked the remarkable white sword. And I compared Dad’s grave expression with Uncle Y.’s. I always wondered, “What was that all about?”
    After the war ended, I learned from Uncle Y., who’d been repatriated, and understood the reason for the tension. Uncle Y. was set to leave from Kure harbor on a submarine to be in the front lines of the Pearl Harbor attack on December 7, 1941, as Japan plunged into the Pacific War. That day he’d come to pay a final farewell to Dad and Mom. The image that lingered, of tension, was because life and death were