ad, full of numbers and business terms. When I finished, I looked up at Mother, kneeling on 
the other side of the table. 

"Iwamura Electric's fortunes have turned around completely," she said. "Why didn't you tell 
me about this?" 

"Mother, I hardly even understand what I've just read." 

"It's no wonder we've heard so much from Nobu Toshikazu these past few days. You must 
know he's proposed himself as your danna. I was thinking of turning him down. Who wants a 
man with an uncertain future"? Now I can see why you've seemed so distracted these past 
few weeks! Well, you can relax now. It's finally happening. We all know how fond you've 
been of Nobu these many years." 


I went on gazing down at the table just like a proper daughter. But I'm sure I wore a pained 
expression on my face; because in a moment Mother went on: 

"You mustn't be listless this way when Nobu wants you in his bed. Perhaps your health isn't 
what it should be. I'll send you to a doctor the moment you return from Amami." 

The only Amami I'd ever heard of was a little island not far from Okinawa; I couldn't imagine 
this was the place she meant. But in fact, as Mother went on to tell me, the mistress of the 
Ichiriki had received a telephone call that very morning from Iwamura Electric concerning a 
trip to the island of Amami the following weekend. I'd been asked to go, along with Mameha 
and Pumpkin, and also another geisha whose name Mother couldn't remember. We would 
leave the following Friday afternoon. 

"But Mother ... it makes no sense at all," I said. "A weekend trip as far as Amami? The boat 
ride alone will take all day." 

"Nothing of the sort. Iwamura Electric has arranged for all of you to travel there in an 
airplane." 

In an instant I forgot my worries about Nobu, and sat upright as quickly as if someone had 
poked me with a pin. "Mother!" I said. "I can't possibly fly on an airplane." 

"If you're sitting in one and the thing takes off, you won't be able to help it!" she replied. She 
must have thought her little joke was very funny, because she gave one of her huffing 
laughs. 

With gasoline so scarce, there couldn't possibly be an airplane, I decided, so I made up my 
mind not to worry-and this worked well for me until the following day, when I spoke with the 
mistress of the Ichiriki. It seemed that several American officers on the island of Okinawa 
traveled by air to Osaka several weekends a month. Normally the airplane flew home empty 
and returned a few days later to pick them up. Iwamura Electric had arranged for our group 
to ride on the return trips. We were going to Amami only because the empty airplane was 
available; otherwise we'd probably have been on our way to a hot-springs resort, and not 
fearing for our lives at all. The last thing the mistress said to me was, "I'm just grateful it's you 
and not me flying in the thing." 

When Friday morning came, we set out for Osaka by train. In addition to Mr. Bekku, who 
came to help us with our trunks as far as the airport, the little group consisted of Mameha, 
Pumpkin, and me, as well as an elderly geisha named Shizue. Shizue was from the 
Pontocho district rather than Gion, and had unattractive glasses and silver hair that made her 
look even older than she really was. What was worse, her chin had a big cleft in the middle, 
like two breasts. Shizue seemed to view the rest of us as a cedar views the weeds growing 
beneath it. Mostly she stared out the window of the train; but every so often she opened the 
clasp of her orange and red handbag to take out a piece of candy, and looked at us as if she 
couldn't see why we had to trouble her with our presence. 

From Osaka Station we traveled to the airport in a little bus not much larger than a car, which 
ran on coal and was very dirty. At last after an hour or so, we climbed down beside a silver 
airplane with two great big propellers on the wings. I wasn't at all reassured to see the tiny 
wheel on which the tail rested; and when we went inside, the aisle sloped downward so 
dramatically I felt sure the airplane was broken. 

The men were onboard already, sitting in seats at the rear and talking business. In addition 
to the Chairman and Nobu, the Minister was there, as well as an elderly man who, as I later 
learned, was regional director of the Mitsubishi Bank. Seated beside him was a man in his 


thirties with a chin just like Shizue's, and glasses as thick as hers too. As it turned out, 
Shizue was the longtime mistress of the bank director, and this man was their son. 

We sat toward the front of the airplane and left the men to their dull conversation. Soon I 
heard a coughing noise and the airplane trembled . . . and when I looked out the window, the 
giant propeller outside had begun to turn. In a matter of moments it was whirling its swordlike 
blades inches from my face, making the most desperate humming noise. I felt sure it would 
come tearing through the side of the airplane and slice me in half. Mameha had put me in a 
window seat thinking the view might calm me once we were airborne, but now that she saw 
what the propeller was doing, she refused to switch seats with me. The noise of the engines 
grew worse and the airplane began to bump along, turning here and there. Finally the noise 
reached its most terrifying volume yet, and the aisle tipped level. After another few moments 
we heard a thump and began to rise up into the air. Only when the ground was far below us 
did someone finally tell me the trip was seven hundred kilometers and would take nearly four 
hours. When I heard this, I'm afraid my eyes glazed over with tears, and everyone began to 
laugh at me. 

I pulled the curtains over the window and tried to calm myself by reading a magazine. Quite 
some time later, after Mameha had fallen asleep in the seat beside me, I looked up to find 
Nobu standing in the aisle. 

"Sayuri, are you well?" he said, speaking quietly so as not to wake 

Mameha. 

"I don't think Nobu-san has ever asked me such a thing before," I said. "He must be in a very 
cheerful mood." 

"The future has never looked more promising!" 

Mameha stirred at the sound of our talking, so Nobu said nothing further, and instead 
continued up the aisle to the toilet. Just before opening the door, he glanced back toward 
where the other men were seated. For an instant I saw him from an angle I'd rarely seen, 
which gave him a look of fierce concentration. When his glance flicked in my direction, I 
thought he might pick up some hint that I felt as worried about my future as he felt reassured 
about his. How strange it seemed, when I thought about it, that Nobu understood me so little. 
Of course, a geisha who expects understanding from her danna is like a mouse expecting 
sympathy from the snake. And in any case, how could Nobu possibly understand anything 
about me, when he'd seen me solely as a geisha keeping my true self carefully concealed? 
The Chairman was the only man I'd ever entertained as Sayuri the geisha who had also 
known me as Chiyo-though it was strange to think of it this way, for I'd never realized it 
before. What would Nobu have done if he had been the one to find me that day at the 
Shirakawa Stream? Surely he would have walked right past . . . and how much easier it 
might have been for me if he had. I wouldn't spend my nights yearning for the Chairman. I 
wouldn't stop in cosmetics shops from time to time, to smell the scent of talc in the air and 
remind myself of his skin. I wouldn't strain to picture his presence beside me in some 
imaginary place. If you'd asked me why I wanted these things, I would have answered, Why 
does a ripe persimmon taste delicious? Why does wood smell smoky when it burns? 

But here I was again, like a girl trying to catch mice with her hands. Why couldn't I stop 
thinking about the Chairman? 

I'm sure my anguish must have shown clearly on my face when the door to the toilet opened 
a moment later, and the light snapped off. I couldn't bear for Nobu to see me this way, so I 
laid my head against the window, pretending to be asleep. After he passed by, I opened my 


eyes again. I found that the position of my head had caused the curtains to pull open, so that 
I was looking outside the airplane for the first time since shortly after we'd lifted off the 
runway. Spread out below was a broad vista of aqua blue ocean, mottled with the same jade 
green as a certain hair ornament Mameha sometimes wore. I'd never imagined the ocean 
with patches of green. From the sea cliffs in Yoroido, it had always looked the color of slate. 
Here the sea stretched all the way out to a single line pulled across like a wool thread where 
the sky began. This view wasn't frightening at all, but inexpressibly lovely. Even the hazy disk 
of the propeller was beautiful in its own way, and the silver wing had a kind of magnificence, 
and was decorated with those symbols that American warplanes have on them. How peculiar 
it was to see them there, considering the world only five years earlier. We had fought a brutal 
war as enemies; and now what? We had given up our past; this was something I understood 
fully, for I had done it myself once. If only I could find a way of giving up my future . . . 

And then a frightening image came to mind: I saw myself cutting the bond of fate that held 
me to Nobu, and watching him fall all the long way into the ocean below. 

I don't mean this was just an idea or some sort of daydream. I mean that all at once I 
understood exactly how to do it. Of course I wasn't really going to throw Nobu into the ocean, 
but I did have an understanding, just as clearly as if a window had been thrown open in my 
mind, of the one thing I could do to end my relationship with him forever. I didn't want to lose 
his friendship; b