ked 
at you that evening . . . well, I knew in a moment that I couldn't possibly take away from him 
the thing he so clearly wanted. It never diminished my concern for your welfare. In fact, as 
the years have gone by, it has become increasingly difficult for me to listen dispassionately 
while Nobu talks about you." 

Here the Chairman paused and said, "Sayuri, are you listening to me?" 

"Yes, Chairman, of course." 

"There's no reason you would know this, but I owe Nobu a great debt. It's true I'm the founder 
of the company, and his boss. But when Iwamura Electric was still quite young, we had a 
terrible problem with cash flow and very nearly went out of business. I wasn't willing to give 


up control of the company, and I wouldn't listen to Nobu when he insisted on bringing in 
investors. He won in the end, even though it caused a rift between us for a time; he offered to 
resign, and I almost let him. But of course, he was completely right, and I was wrong. I'd 
have lost the company without him. How do you repay a man for something like that? Do you 
know why I'm called 'Chairman' and not 'President'? It's because I resigned the title so Nobu 
would take it-though he tried to refuse. This is why I made up my mind, the moment I 
became aware of his affection for you, that I would keep my interest in you hidden so that 
Nobu could have you. Life has been cruel to him, Sayuri. He's had too little kindness." 

In all my years as a geisha, I'd never been able to convince myself even for a moment that 
the Chairman felt any special regard for me. And now to know that he'd intended me for 
Nobu . . . 

"I never meant to pay you so little attention," he went on. "But surely you realize that if he'd 
ever picked up the slightest hint of my feelings, he would have given you up in an instant." 

Since my girlhood, I'd dreamed that one day the Chairman would tell me he cared for me; 
and yet I'd never quite believed it would really happen. I certainly hadn't imagined he might 
tell me what I hoped to hear, and also that Nobu was my destiny. Perhaps the goal I'd sought 
in life would elude me; but at least during this one moment, it was within my power to sit in 
the room with the Chairman and tell him how deeply I felt. 

"Please forgive me for what I am about to say," I finally managed to begin. 

I tried to continue, but somehow my throat made up its mind to swallow-though I can't think 
what I was swallowing, unless it was a little knot of emotion I pushed back down because 
there was no room in my face for any more. 

"I have great affection for Nobu, but what I did on Amami . . ." Here I had to hold a burning in 
my throat a long moment before I could speak again. "What I did on Amami, I did because of 
my feelings for you, Chairman. Every step I have taken in my life since I was a child in Gion, I 
have taken in the hope of bringing myself closer to you." 

When I said these words, all the heat in my body seemed to rise to my face. I felt I might float 
up into the air, just like a piece of ash from a fire, unless I could focus on something in the 
room. I tried to find a smudge on the tabletop, but already the table itself was glazing over 
and disappearing in my vision. 

"Look at me, Sayuri." 

I wanted to do as the Chairman asked, but I couldn't. 

"How strange," he went on quietly, almost to himself, "that the same woman who looked me 
so frankly in the eye as a girl, many years ago, can't bring herself to do it now." 

Perhaps it ought to have been a simple task to raise my eyes and look at the Chairman; and 
yet somehow I couldn't have felt more nervous if I'd stood alone on a stage with all of Kyoto 
watching. We were sitting at a corner of the table, so close that when at length I wiped my 
eyes and raised them to meet his, I could see the dark rings around his irises. I wondered if 
perhaps I should look away and make a little bow, and then offer to pour him a cup of sake . 
.". but no gesture would have been enough to break the tension. As I was thinking these 
thoughts, the Chairman moved the vial of sake and the cup aside, and then reached out his 
hand and took the collar of my robe to draw me toward him. In a moment our faces were so 
close, I could feel the warmth of his skin. I was still struggling to understand what was 


happening to me-and what I ought to do or say. And then the Chairman pulled me closer, 
and he kissed me. 

It may surprise you to hear that this was the first time in my life anyone had ever really kissed 
me. General Tottori had sometimes pressed his lips against mine when he was my danna; 
but it had been utterly passionless. I'd wondered at the time if he simply needed somewhere 
to rest his face. Even Yasuda Akira-the man who'd bought me a kimono, and whom I'd 
seduced one night at the Tatematsu Teahouse-must have kissed me dozens of times on my 
neck and face, but he never really touched my lips with his. And so you can imagine that this 
kiss, the first real one of my life, seemed to me more intimate than anything I'd ever 
experienced. I had the feeling I was taking something from the Chairman, and that he was 
giving something to me, something more private than anyone had ever given me before. 
There was a certain very startling taste, as distinctive as any fruit or sweet, and when I tasted 
it, my shoulders sagged and my stomach swelled up; because for some reason it called to 
mind a dozen different scenes I couldn't think why I should remember. I thought of the head 
of steam when the cook lifted the lid from the rice cooker in the kitchen of our okiya. I saw a 
picture in my mind of the little alleyway that was the main thoroughfare of Pontocho, as I'd 
seen it one evening crowded with well-wishers after Kichisaburo's last performance, the day 
he'd retired from the Kabuki theater. I'm sure I might have thought of a hundred other things, 
for it was as if all the boundaries in my mind had broken down and my memories were 
running free. But then the Chairman leaned back away from me again, with one of his hands 
upon my neck. He was so close, I could see the moisture glistening on his lip, and still smell 
the kiss we'd just ended. 

"Chairman," I said, "why?" 

"Why what?" 

"Why . . . everything? Why have you kissed me? You've just been speaking of me as a gift to 
Nobu-san." 

"Nobu gave you up, Sayuri. I've taken nothing away from him." 

In my confusion of feelings, I couldn't quite understand what he meant. 

"When I saw you there with the Minister, you had a look in your eyes just like the one I saw 
so many years ago at the Shirakawa Stream," he told me. "You seemed so desperate, like 
you might drown if someone didn't save you. After Pumpkin told me you'd intended that 
encounter for Nobu's eyes, I made up my mind to tell him what I'd seen. And when he 
reacted so angrily . . . well, if he couldn't forgive you for what you'd done, it was clear to me 
he was never truly your destiny." 

One afternoon back when I was a child in Yoroido, a little boy named Gisuke climbed a tree 
to jump into the pond. He climbed much higher than he should have; the water wasn't deep 
enough. But when we told him not to jump, he was afraid to climb back down because of 
rocks under the tree. I ran to the village to find his father, Mr. Yamashita, who came walking 
so calmly up the hill, I wondered if he realized what danger his son was in. He stepped 
underneath the tree just as the boy-unaware of his father's presence-lost his grip and fell. Mr. 
Yamashita caught him as easily as if someone had dropped a sack into his arms, and set 
him upright. We all of us cried out in delight, and skipped around at the edge of the pond 
while Gisuke stood blinking his eyes very quickly, little tears of astonishment gathering on his 
lashes. 

Now I knew exactly what Gisuke must have felt. I had been plummeting toward the rocks, 
and the Chairman had stepped out to catch me. I was so overcome with relief, I couldn't even 


wipe away the tears that spilled from the corners of my eyes. His shape was a blur before 
me, but I could see him moving closer, and in a moment he'd gathered me up in his arms just 
as if I were a blanket. His lips went straight for the little triangle of flesh where the edges of 
my kimono came together at my throat. And when I felt his breath on my neck, and the sense 
of urgency with which he almost consumed me, I couldn't help thinking of a moment years 
earlier, when I'd stepped into the kitchen of the okiya and found one of the maids leaning 
over the sink, trying to cover up the ripe pear she held to her mouth, its juices running down 
onto her neck. She'd had such a craving for it, she'd said, and begged me not to tell Mother. 

Chapter thirty-five 

Now, nearly forty years later, I sit here looking back on that evening with the Chairman as the 
moment when all the grieving voices within me fell silent. Since the day I'd left Yoroido, I'd 
done nothing but worry that every turn of life's wheel would bring yet another obstacle into 
my path; and of course, it was the worrying and the struggle that had always made life so 
vividly real to me. When we fight upstream against a rocky undercurrent, every foothold 
takes on a kind of urgency. 

But life softened into something much more pleasant after the Chairman became my danna. I 
began to feel like a tree whose roots had at last broken into the rich, wet soil deep beneath 
the surface. I'd never before had occasion to think of myself as more fortunate than others, 
and yet now I was. Though I must say, I lived in that contented state a long while before I 
was finally able to look back and admit how desolate my life had once been. I'm sure I could 
never have told my story otherwise; I don't think any of us can speak frankly about pain until 
we are no lo