Page:Tayama Katai and His Novel Entitled Futon (Reece).pdf/149

 Anna and thought that if there were such a girl as Anna, it would be a natural consequence to fall into such a tragedy. He heaved a sigh at the thought that from now on he could no longer play the part of Johannes.

Though he did not teach to her, he once taught her Turgenev's short story,. In the well-lit four-and-a-half-mat study her expressive eyes glistened with ever deeper meaning, while her youthful heart filled with admiration when she listened to the colorful love story. The lamp threw its light upon her upper body, her fashionable low pompadour with its comb and ribbon, and when her face came closer to the book on the table, he smelled the indescribable scent of her perfume, the scent of flesh, her womanly scent--his voice trembled when he lectured on the passage in which the hero of the story read to his sweetheart.

"But, everything is finished!" Again he said this tearing his hair.

His name was Tokio Takenaka.

Three years ago his wife gave birth to their third child and they were at the stage when the pleasures of their honeymoon had a long time ago subsided. He found no significance in daily happenings in the world, nor did he have the courage to throw himself into his lifework, he had gotten tired of a monotonous daily life--getting up in the morning, reporting to the office, and returning home about four in the afternoon and seeing his wife's face day