Page:The Cannery Boat.pdf/158

148 All were silent.

All heads were bowed.

Miesima, who was against the majority, looked around and said quietly: “Good. I am bound to admit that what you say is just. We have been struggling for three years. But I mean to go on. You are right in saying my life is different from yours. There are only three of us—myself, my wife, and my mother. The argument is over. All those who have accepted the company’s offer will go to Shimaji. Those who agree with me will remain.”

“We will stay,” answered Kurose and Ozawa, both together. Others also in the same group raised their heads and said in once voice, “We will stay.”

Miesima turned to Todoroki: “Hand over the banner of our union.”

The banner brought by Todoroki was handed over to Miesima, to the eleven. A sob was heard.

So it was that eleven families were left in Yotani.

Very often they had to ward off surprise attacks from the company. When they were abused in insulting language the fathers of families joined together and attacked the company, but they were always defeated.

The Suihei district committee in Shiga mobilized three hundred of its members in the provinces of Yazu, Koga, Gamau and Aichi, and sent them to the village of Osawa. They seized the offices