en the okiya was silent. Occasionally I thought I heard a soft whimper or a groan, but 
the sounds were so quiet, I couldn't be sure. I won't say I knew just what they were doing in 
there, but I did think of my sister holding up her bathing dress for the Sugi boy. And I felt 
such a combination of disgust and curiosity that even if I'd been free to leave my spot, I don't 
think I could have. 

Once a week or so, Hatsumomo and her boyfriend-who turned out to be a chef in a nearby 
noodle restaurant-came to the okiya and shut themselves in the maids'room. They met other 
times in other places as well. I know because Yoko was often asked to deliver messages, 
and I sometimes overheard. All the maids knew what Hatsumomo was doing; and it's a 
measure of how much power she had over us that no one spoke a word to Mother or Auntie 
or Granny. Hatsumomo would certainly have been in trouble for having a boyfriend, much 
less for bringing him back to the okiya. The time she spent with him earned no revenue, and 
even took her away from parties at teahouses where she would otherwise have been making 
money. And besides, any wealthy man who might have been interested in an expensive, 
long-term relationship would certainly think less of her and even change his mind if he knew 
she was carrying on with the chef of a noodle restaurant. 

One night just as I was coming back from taking a drink of water at the well in the courtyard, I 
heard the outside door roll open and slam against the door frame with a bang. 

"Really, Hatsumomo-san," said a deep voice, "you'll wake everyone 


I'd never really understood why Hatsumomo took the risk of bringing her boyfriend back to 
the okiya-though probably it was the risk itself that excited her. But she'd never before been 
so careless as to make a lot of noise. I hurried into my position on my knees, and in a 
moment Hatsumomo was in the formal entrance hall, holding two packages wrapped in linen 
paper. Soon another geisha stepped in behind her, so tall that she had to stoop to pass 
through the low doorway. When she stood erect and looked down on me, her lips looked 
unnaturally big and heavy at the bottom of her long face. No one would have called her 
pretty. 

"This is our foolish lower maid," said Hatsumomo. "She has a name, I think, but why don't 
you just call her 'Little Miss Stupid.'" 

"Well, Little Miss Stupid," said the other geisha. "Go and get your big sister and me 
something to drink, why don't you?" The deep voice I'd heard was hers, and not the voice of 
Hatsumomo's boyfriend after all. 

Usually Hatsumomo liked to drink a special kind of sake called amakuchi-which was very 
light and sweet. But amakuchi was brewed only in the winter, and we seemed to have run 
out. I poured two glasses of beer instead and brought them out. Hatsumomo and her friend 
had already made their way down to the courtyard, and were standing in wooden shoes in 
the dirt corridor. I could see they were very drunk, and Hatsumomo's friend had feet much 
too big for our little wooden shoes, so that she could hardly walk a step without the two of 
them breaking out in laughter. You may recall that a wooden walkway ran along the outside 
of the house. Hatsumomo had just set her packages down onto that walkway and was about 
to open one of them when I delivered the beer. 

"I'm not in the mood for beer," she said, and bent down to empty both glasses underneath 
the foundation of the house. 

"I'm in the mood for it," said her friend, but it was already too late. "Why did you pour mine 
out?" 

"Oh, be quiet, Korin!" Hatsumomo said. "You don't need more to drink anyway. Just look at 
this, because you're going to die from happiness when you see it!" And here, Hatsumomo 
untied the strings holding shut the linen paper of one package, and spread out upon the 
walkway an exquisite kimono in different powdery shades of green, with a vine motif bearing 
red leaves. Really, it was a glorious silk gauze-though of summer weight, and certainly not 
appropriate for the fall weather. Hatsumomo's friend, Korin, admired it so much that she drew 
in a sharp breath and choked on her own saliva-which caused them both to burst out 
laughing again. I decided the time had come to excuse myself. But Hatsumomo said: 

"Don't go away, Little Miss Stupid." And then she turned to her friend again and told her, "It's 
time for some fun, Korin-san. Guess whose kimono this is!" 

Korin was still coughing a good deal, but when she wras able to speak, she said, "I wish it 
belonged to me!" 

"Well, it doesn't. It belongs to none other than the geisha we both hate worse than anyone 
else on earth." 

"Oh, Hatsumomo . . . you're a genius. But how did you get Satoka's kimono?" 

"I'm not talking about Satoka! I'm talking about. . . Miss Perfect!" 


"Who?" 

"Miss Tm-So-Much-Better-Than-You-Are' . . . that's who!" 

There was a long pause, and then Korin said, "Mameha! Oh, my goodness, it is Mameha's 
kimono. I can't believe I didn't recognize it! How did you manage to get your hands on it?" 

"A few days ago I left something at the Kaburenjo Theater during a rehearsal," Hatsumomo 
said. "And when I went back to look for it, I heard what I thought was moaning coming up 
from the basement stairs. So I thought, 'It can't be! This is too much fun!' And when I crept 
down and turned on the light, guess who I found lying there like two pieces of rice stuck 
together on the floor?" 

"I can't believe it! Mameha?" 

"Don't be a fool. She's much too prissy to do such a thing. It was her maid, with the custodian 
of the theater. I knew she'd do anything to keep me from telling, so I went to her later and 
told her I wanted this kimono of Mameha's. She started crying when she figured out which 
one I was describing." 

"And what's this other one?" Korin asked, pointing to the second package that lay on the 
walkway, its strings still tied. 

"This one I made the girl buy with her own money, and now it belongs to me." 

"Her own money?" said Korin. "What maid has enough money to buy a kimono?" 

"Well, if she didn't buy it as she said, I don't want to know where it came from. Anyway, Little 
Miss Stupid is going to put it away in the storehouse for me." 

"Hatsumomo-san, I'm not allowed in the storehouse," I said at once. 

"If you want to know where your older sister is, don't make me say anything twice tonight. I 
have plans for you. Afterward you may ask me a single question, and I'll answer it." 

I won't say that I believed her; but of course, Hatsumomo had the power to make my life 
miserable in any way she wanted. I had no choice but to obey. 

She put the kimono-wrapped in its linen paper-into my arms and walked me down to the 
storehouse in the courtyard. There she opened the door and flipped a light switch with a loud 
snap. I could see shelves stacked with sheets and pillows, as well as several locked chests 
and a few folded futons. Hatsumomo grabbed me by the arm and pointed up a ladder along 
the outside wall. 

"The kimono are up there," she said. 

I made my way up and opened a sliding wooden door at the top. The storage loft didn't have 
shelves like the ground-floor level. Instead the walls were lined with red lacquered cases 
stacked one on top of the next, nearly as high as the ceiling. A narrow corridor passed 
between these two walls of cases, with slatted windows at the ends, covered over with 
screens for ventilation. The space was lit harshly just as below, but much more brightly; so 
that when I had stepped inside, I could read the black characters carved into the fronts of the 
cases. They said things like Kata-Komon, ~Ro-"Stenciled Designs, Open-Weave Silk 
Gauze"; and Kuromontsuki, Awase-"Black-Crested Formal Robes with Inner Lining." To tell 
the truth, I couldn't understand all the characters at the time, but I did manage to find the 


case with Ha-tsumomo's name on it, on a top shelf. I had trouble taking it down, but finally I 
added the new kimono to the few others, also wrapped in linen paper, and replaced the case 
where I'd found it. Out of curiosity, I opened another of the cases very quickly and found it 
stacked to the top with perhaps fifteen kimono, and the others whose lids I lifted were all the 
same. To see that storehouse crowded with cases, I understood at once why Granny was so 
terrified of fire. The collection of kimono was probably twice as valuable as the entire villages 
of Yoroido and Senzuru put together. And as I learned much later, the most expensive ones 
were in storage somewhere else. They were worn only by apprentice geisha; and since 
Hatsumomo could no longer wear them, they were kept in a rented vault for safekeeping until 
they were needed again. 

By the time I returned to the courtyard, Hatsumomo had been up to her room to fetch an 
inkstone and a stick of ink, as well as a brush for calligraphy. I thought perhaps she wanted 
to write a note and slip it inside the kimono when she refolded it. She had dribbled some 
water from the well onto her inkstone and was now sitting on the walkway grinding ink. When 
it was good and black, she dipped a brush in it and smoothed its tip against the stone-so that 
all the ink was absorbed in the brush and none of it would drip. Then she put it into my hand, 
and held my hand over the lovely kimono, and said to me: "Practice your calligraphy, little 
Chiyo." 

This kimono belonging to the geisha named Mameha-whom I'd never heard of at the time-
was a work of art. Weaving its way from the hem up to the waist was a beautiful vine made of 
heavily lacquered threads bunched together like a tiny cable and sewn into place. It was a 
part of the fabric, yet it seemed so much like an actual vine growing there, I had the feeling I 
could take it in my fingers, if I wished, and tear it 