The Sailor Who Fell from Grace with the Sea Read Online Free PDF

have everything together in the office.”
    “I’d love to but I just don’t have time. I’ll just barely be able to work in a bite of lunch as it is now. Can I leave everything up to you? The important things are the boxes and wrapping—they’re the reality of a gift, don’t you think?”
    “We’ll package everything beautifully.”
    The secretary from Yokohama Importers arrived just as Yoriko was leaving, and she was the last regular customer for the day. Fusako had the sandwich and cup of tea she ordered every day from a coffee shop across the street brought up to her office and sat down in front of the tray alone again. Arranging herself comfortably in the chair like a sleeper burrowing under the covers in an attempt to recapture an interrupted dream, she closed her eyes and returned effortlessly to the bridge of the Rakuyo . . . .
    Tsukazaki led them down flights of stairs to the boat deck, from where they could watch cargo being raised from the No. 4 hold. The hatch was a large, dark fissure in the steel plates of the deck at their feet. A man in a yellow steel helmet standing on a narrow ledge just below them was directing the crane with hand signals.
    The half-naked bodies of stevedores glistened dully in the dusk at the bottom of the hold. The cargo first took the sun when it was hoisted wobbling up from the bottom high into the mouth of the hatch. Slats of sunlight slipped nimbly over the crates as they wheeled through the air, but faster even than the shattered light the cargo sped, and was hovering above the waiting barge.
    The terrifyingly deliberate prelude and the sudden, reckless flight; the dangerous glitter of silver in a twist of fraying cable—standing under her open parasol, Fusako watched it all. She felt load after heavy load of freight being lifted from her and whisked away on the powerful arm of a crane—suddenly, but after long and careful preparation. She thrilled to the sight of cargo no man could move winging lightly into the sky, and she could have watched forever. This may have been a fitting destiny for cargo but the marvel was also an indignity. “It keeps getting emptier and emptier,” she thought. The advance was relentless, yet there was time for hesitation and languor, time so hot and long it made you faint, sluggish, congested time.
    She must have spoken then: “It’s been so kind of you to show us around when I know you must be very busy. I was wondering, if you’re free tomorrow evening, perhaps we could have dinner together?”
    It was a sociable invitation and no doubt Fusako spoke the words coolly; to Tsukazaki’s ear, it sounded like the babbling of a woman stricken with the heat. He looked at her with perfectly honest, puzzled eyes. . . .
    The night before, they had gone to the New Grand Hotel for dinner. I was still just trying to thank him then. He ate so properly, just like an officer. That long walk after dinner. He said he’d walk me home, but we got to the new park on the hill and didn’t feel like saying good night yet, so we sat down on a park bench. Then we had a long talk. Just rambled on about all kinds of things. I’ve never talked so much with a man before, not since my husband died. . . .

CHAPTER FOUR
    A FTER leaving Fusako on her way to work, Ryuji returned briefly to the Rakuyo and then taxied back through empty, simmering streets to the park where they had stopped the night before. He couldn’t think of anywhere else to go until late afternoon, when they had arranged to meet.
    It was noon and the park was empty. The drinking fountain was overflowing, dyeing the stone walk a watery black; locusts were shrilling in the cypress trees. The harbor, sprawling toward the sea from the foot of the hill, rumbled thickly. But Ryuji painted out the noontime scene with reminiscences of night.
    He relived the evening, paused to savor a moment, traced and traced again the night’s course. Not bothering to wipe the sweat from his face, he picked