Chapter 2
Childhood 1894-1895

I.

In the evening of the day after we were burned out of our house we moved in with an army family named Otachime, close friends of my parents. Their house was behind the elementary school next to the parade grounds. There were six or seven children in the family. The oldest, named Akira, was two years older and two grades ahead of me in school. He was rather stupid and I had always treated him with contempt because of it. As soon as I moved in, we started to quarrel. The next day I knocked him into the ditch in front of his house. Covered with mud and crying, he ran into the house. Before making him change his clothes, his mother slapped him a few times, saying, "What kind of a kid are you, to bawl when you're beaten by someone younger than you?"

Surprisingly, my mother hardly scolded me at all. Instead she put on her coat and went out somewhere. Early the next morning we moved in with a woman teacher from the elementary school. Her house had only three rooms, including the entrance hall; we borrowed the use of the small six-mat^[1] living room while the teacher lived alone in the next room.

[1] A standard single tatami mat is roughly three feet by six feet, so the room was about nine feet by twelve.

"This is because you're always picking fights," Mother said, scowling at me a little. Still frowning, she turned to the maid, who was carrying in some luggage on her back: "It'd really do him good to lose sometimes." Then she laughed. "And next time he picks a fight it'll be with the teacher!"

After we had lived there a couple of weeks, a little house four or five doors down the street became vacant and we moved in. There was a large compound with three buildings in it; one had been divided into a two-family dwelling. A family named Yokoi, who must have been in the army, lived in one half and we lived in the other. The largest building was the home of a Major Ishikawa. Ours fronted on Hachiken-cho with its back to the other two and was set apart by a fence. In the house next door was a family named Yamagata, whose father was either a captain or a major in the army. My own father had just been promoted to captain on the battlefield.

There were four or five Yamagata boys; the eldest, Taro, was two or three years older than I. He attended the Aizu Middle School and was away at school most of the time. The next eldest, Jiro, was a very good friend of mine. Major Ishikawa had two sons, the older about the same age as Taro. In the Yokoi family there was one boy, who was my age. Except for this boy, Yellow Jaundice as we called him, I had no enemies. And except for my teasing him, he wasn't really an enemy. All of us, including the son of a Captain Okubo who lived diagonally across the street from the Ishikawas, immediately became friends. Yet there wasn't much close friendship among us. We never fought among ourselves but we held one another in mutual contempt. Ishikawa and Okubo had lived across the street from one another for a long time and were on good terms. I couldn't stomach either of these two refined "young gentlemen" and they made fun of me for being rustic. The Yamagatas' Jiro was also a young gentleman. But he had lived in town for a long time and attended the town elementary school, so his "refinement" was of a different sort from that of Ishikawa or Okubo. Consequently he couldn't really be intimate with the other two. Jiro's townsman refinement disgusted me, and I detected a latent brutality hidden in him. He often amused himself by tormenting his younger brother while

I passed the time teasing Yellow Jaundice. We called Yokoi that because of the yellow cast to his face. He did look undernourished. He and his younger sister, who had the same thin yellow face, played forlornly together.

Although our mothers were all the wives of officers, they had almost nothing to do with one another.

Another night, when Mrs. Yamagata was returning from a trip to the toilet, she opened the outside door intending to wash her hands. A large full moon hung suspended between the pine trees in the garden and it was as bright as day outside. Reaching for the pot of water, she could see the moon reflected on the surface of the water. Then, as she started to scoop up some water, big drops of rain suddenly began to fall. Thinking it strange, she raised her head and looked—the full moon was shining brightly among the pines without a sign of rain. Again she bent over the pot of water. Again, as she did so, rain started to fall. Frightened, she fled back to her bedroom.

Late the following night Mrs. Yamagata woke up again. She started toward the toilet but, opening the sliding door, heard something heavy fall with a bang at her feet and then roll away. Peering into the darkness after the sound of the rolling object, she had a queer feeling of uneasiness. Then the huge head of a man appeared in sharp outline against the pitch black. Mrs. Yamagata uttered a little cry and collapsed.

The next time, two or three nights later, she saw a huge figure standing on the veranda. After that, the Yamagata household fell into chaos. Four or five young men from town and around the neighborhood came to stay in the house. They kept oak clubs at their sides and stayed up all night drinking. Although the ghost did not show up for the next few nights, as soon as the youths left it appeared again. This same thing

happened over and over again until Mrs. Yamagata called in a priest, one in whom she had great faith, to say prayers. He stayed for some days. I don't quite remember now whether the ghost did disappear under the influence of the prayers but the priest seems to have been of questionable character.

The Ishikawas and the Okubos took no part in the talk about the ghost. Yet it was rumored that they had some sort of plan in case it became necessary to have the priest stay with them. As for Mrs. Yamagata, she was a rather saucy sort.

At about that time the Women's League held a meeting to pray for victory in the war and the safety of all their husbands. The same priest who was involved in the other matter showed up at the ceremony; there was some story about somebody's wife clinging to his side. Moreover, this priest's temple was in Sutani Valley in the mountains about eight miles from Shibata, and there was also talk about some wives who went clear out there on pilgrimages.

The ghost appeared at our house just once. Mother was sick and had gone to a hot springs somewhere. During her absence my younger sister and the maid awoke suddenly in the middle of the night. While they were lying there trying to get back to sleep, the same clatter started in the kitchen. Trembling, they listened in silence. Just then the Yokois' small house dog began to bark. A few minutes later the ghost fled. The younger children and I, who were lying in the next room, all slept through the whole thing.

The next day when I was told about this, I said it was stupid and laughed at them. Nevertheless the maid, worried and frightened, sent Mother a telegram calling her home immediately. Mother comforted us all: "As long as your mother and elder brother are here, you're safe." She didn't really look the least bit worried.

Yamagata Taro entered the military cadet school in Nagoya two years ahead of me. Four or five years later when I met him there, he said that he had heard the noises with his own ears and believed in the ghost.

It appeared once more, this time at the home of a soldier who was killed in the war. In the middle of the night his young wife had the feeling that her name was being called and opened her eyes. Standing at the

head of her bed was her husband, covered with blood. The next morning she received the telegram informing her that her husband had died honorably in battle.

II.

After we had lived in the Hachiken-cho house for two or three months, we moved to a place on the next block, Niken-cho, directly across from the upper elementary school. It was there, toward the end of my tenth year, that I first awakened to the pleasures of sex.

An army family named Kawamura had also been burned out in the fires and the wife rented a place in the neighborhood. My mother and Mrs. Kawamura were as close as two sisters. I also liked Mrs. Kawamura very much and her daughter, Ohana, even more. Ohana was the same age as I or a little younger. She came to our house almost every day and usually played just with me rather than with my sisters. When all of us were together, we often played cards in the kotatsu with a blanket spread over the low table to keep our legs and feet warm.^[2] At those times Ohana always sat next to me. Then our hands would meet under the blanket and clasp tightly or just our fingertips would suddenly touch. We both enjoyed the contact, which led to real [sex play]^[3] before we knew it.

Neither Ohana nor I was satisfied with just this. So frequently we would go up to my room on the second floor and spend several hours together. There we could play at being adults without anyone else interfering.

Another girl who was my friend was the daughter of an army family named Senda who lived in the same neighborhood. I've forgotten what it was I had done wrong but one day my mother insisted I apologize. The more insistent she became the more I felt I couldn't apologize. After

[2] A kotatsu is a space several feet square created below the level of the mat floor to accommodate the legs and usually, as here, furnished with quilts and perhaps with a heat source for use in cold weather.

[3] In this first example of a number of passages to do with sexuality or politics that were censored in the prewar edition, the only deletion here was sei (sex)—two-thirds of the word asobi (to play or amuse); readers would have needed little sophistication to fill in the blanks.

dinner Mother said, "I can't put up with such a stubborn child any more. We're going to Aunt Yamada's in Tokyo." She had the maid and the children change their clothes, and then she took them all and left carrying a small wicker suitcase. I thought she didn't mean it when she said they were going to Tokyo, but she made such elaborate preparations that I wondered if they weren't really going somewhere. I thought to myself that maybe I should have apologized.

Two or three hours later I heard a lot of noise at the front door. They were all returning. With them were Mrs. Senda and her daughter, Reichan. Mrs. Senda came to my bedroom and begged me, "Auntie will apologize for you. Say you won't ever do it again, all right?" But I thought that she and my mother had talked it all over beforehand, so I no longer wanted to apologize.

"Look for yourself. They've all come back, haven't they?" I did agree with her but pulled the covers over my head and said nothing. I heard my mother state, "I told you how stubborn he was, didn't I?" The two of them seemed to be discussing ways of dealing with me. Mrs. Senda reproached my mother, saying "You mustn't go too far," and urged her to drop the matter and go to bed.

Meanwhile Reichan came to my bedside and, stealing her hand under the covers, grasped my hand: "Sakae, I'll apologize for you, so it'll be all right. You won't do it again so you'll be forgiven, okay? I'll say you're sorry for you, okay? I'll apologize for you." She pulled the covers back and looked at my face, repeating over and over, "Okay? okay?" The tight feeling in my chest gradually faded and I finally nodded in silence.

Ohana attended the elementary school in town, so I never saw her in school. But Reichan went to my school in the grade below mine, while Mitsuko was in my class. Reichan had a reputation as the prettiest girl in her class and was the best student too. Mitsuko was the best student in our class, but when it came to looks she had a strong rival named Kinukawa Tamako.

Tamako was the daughter of a retired army man. She was quite cute with her round face, plump cheeks, and large eyes. But I couldn't stom-

ach the air of self-conceit about her. She always wore pretty clothes and would strut with self-assurance as she passed by on her frequent social calls. Even now when I think of her I think of a little princess.

Mitsuko was the daughter of a low-ranking pharmacist or some such person at the garrison hospital. Her clothes were always dirty. Her eyes were narrow and the complexion of her thin, hollow-cheeked face was very poor with a reddish coarseness to it—not at all like the rosy color of Tamako's.

One day I lay in wait for Tamako and blocked her path. Puffing out her cheeks, she merely stared at me. I hated this kind of attitude. Mitsuko would have shouted, "Stop it!" or something similar, pushed me aside, and gone on her way. Since that is what I expected, I often blocked Mitsuko's path.

Ishikawa and Okubo, who were both quite handsome, were admirers of Tamako. This made me dislike her even more, so I became an admirer of Mitsuko.

Mrs. Yoshida had cut her hair short after a shower of sparks fell on it during the fire. Above one eyebrow she had a large mole that looked like a wart. She was not a very attractive woman. She often tutored her son and me in English and arithmetic. When she praised me for learning well, she had the habit of hugging me tightly, her cheek pressed against mine, as a reward. These rewards made me very happy. Once when her son was out of the room and the mother was rewarding me in this way, she said, "I didn't come to this house as a bride. I was tricked into it. And soon I'm going to leave here." Afterward I heard that she actually did leave.

Behind that house was a large rice field. One night there was a drizzling rain and far off on the other side of the field I saw what is called a "fox's marriage." Three or four lights—like paper lanterns—appeared

and then disappeared, only to reappear somewhere else. As I was thinking I had never seen anything like that, suddenly a line hundreds of meters long lit up all at once. Then it too disappeared. Wondering if I could be imagining it, I watched as it appeared again. This time it spread until the distant field became a solid sheet of twinkling lights.

Mrs. Yoshida said, "It's only caused by the sulphur," and one night she brought out some wax matches of a type I had never seen before. She used one to draw a man's face on a rain-soaked fence. The outline of a pale ghostlike face appeared, glowing dimly. Half afraid and half fascinated, I did what she told me and slowly touched it with my finger. My fingertip gave off a pale glow. I rubbed my finger around the ghost's face; the places I touched all began to glow. "You're not the least bit afraid, are you?" she said, hugging me and pressing her cheek to mine until she made my face glow too.

Later I heard a legend about the fox's marriage. Once upon a time two lords fought at this place. One was the attacker and the other the defender. The defending lord knew that he was no match for the other, so he devised a strategy. The area was covered with swampy land that appeared at first glance to be merely pools of water but were actually seas of mud so deep that anyone who fell in immediately sank from sight. The lord ordered his troops to entice the unwary enemy into these bogs. They put on footwear ordinarily used for walking on snow and ran across the swamps pretending to be in full retreat. The enemy pursued them, plunged into the mud, and sank out of sight. The will-o'-the-wisps I saw were their departed spirits coming back to haunt. As a matter of fact, when I lived there one still found human bones, spears, swords, armor, and the like in the vicinity.

III.

Shortly before my father returned from the war we moved into yet another house in Katata-machi, four or five doors away from our former place. While living there I attended two years of upper elementary school. I had always done well in school, never lower than third in my class from the first grade of primary through the second year of upper

elementary school.^[4] In the upper elementary school, however, I could never stay ahead of a boy named Osawa, who had gone through the primary grades in the town school. He stayed at the head of the class both years, while Okubo or I came in second. Okubo was one year older than I and Osawa was two years older.

While in upper elementary school I also studied English, mathematics, and classical Chinese with private tutors. My English tutor was named Hayami and lived next door to our former house in Katata-ma-chi. I don't know what sort of education he had but he was very stylish and gave the appearance of being very much the rake. His students came from morning to night and there were almost always thirty or forty in attendance.

I think I started classical Chinese and mathematics after the English tutor left, but I've completely forgotten the name of the first of these teachers or even what he looked like. I recall only that his house was in Soto-ga-wa behind the army barracks. My second Chinese tutor was a warder at the local prison. He was short with a pale face and quite shabby appearance. His house was shabby as well. Since he left for work early, it was always still dark when I went to his house for my morning lesson. Along with me he had two or three other pupils.

In the winter the snow was three or four feet deep and I would almost freeze as I made my way to the tutor's house through the drifts that were not yet packed down. As soon as I arrived, his mother, looking extremely cold, would come and put a little charcoal dust in the small brazier. By blowing very hard she would finally get a fire started. I felt very sorry for her and told my mother about it. She immediately had my father's groom take two bushels of charcoal to the woman, who cried as she thanked him and from that day on always made me a roaring fire with large chunks.

[4] In the 1890s public elementary schooling was divided into the first four primary grades (jinjo shogakko ), which were compulsory, and the next two years (koto shogakko), which--because of funding difficulties—were not made mandatory until 1907. The more important break came at the next level, the lower secondary or middle school (chugakko ), which was for the more ambitious who could afford the costs. The beginning of middle school also marked the end of coeducational schooling. Most higher secondary schools (kotogakko ) for males were strictly college preparatory.

I finished reading the Four Books—The Confucian Analects, The Book of Mencius, The Doctrine of the Mean , and The Great Learning —under this teacher. He was about twenty-five—or at the oldest, twenty-seven or twenty-eight—and didn't cut a very impressive figure. His mother's clothes were always dirty but her face had a refined quality. It was not in the least unusual for me to see samurai families who had come down in the world in such fashion. Since that time I have been a prisoner in jail several times and each time I have thought of that teacher. He was very quiet and rather shy, even when he scolded his pupils. He must have had a desk job in the jail that didn't require him to deal directly with the prisoners. He wasn't the type of teacher who could speak roughly or scold a prisoner.

About that time, four or five friends began to gather at my house and we started a small club in which we read essays, gave lectures, and wrote compositions. The other regular members were Nishimura Torako, who lived one house away; Sugiura, from town; and Tani, whose mother I've already talked about.^[5] Torako and Sugiura were in the grade ahead of me. Both were tutored by Professor Shibayama in the neighborhood and so Torako brought Sugiura along to our club. Tani was a year younger than I.

I read a great deal and always took the lead in the group. Among all my friends I was almost the first to read the magazine World of Young People .^[6] Then I discovered a wonderful bookstore and purchased all kinds of books to read. Furthermore, I owned a collection of moral anecdotes in translation as well as four or five large volumes of essays that none of the others knew about. The lectures and essays that I secretly took from these or from the magazines never failed to win their praises.

The bookstore named Nakamura's Banshodo was in the town of Suibara, seven or eight miles southwest of Shibata. One of the clerks or

[5] There is some confusion in the 1930 Kaizo edition; it gives the name as Otani, in apparent reference to Mrs. Tani, the friend of Osugi's mother mentioned in chapter 1 part 3.

[6] Shonen sekai was published twice a month by the Hakubunkan in Tokyo. In addition to articles and other features, it printed essays by its readers. For analysis of the motifs in youth magazines of the day, see Earl H. Kinmonth, The Self-Made Man in Meiji Japanese Thought .

shop boys had come to Shibata and was living in a tenement off a back alley. I found out about him somehow and became probably his first customer when I went to buy some book or other. He had no store or anything like one—just a few dozen books lined up in one corner of his living room. But in a town like Shibata where only one variety store served both as a stationery and textbook shop, his volumes were enough to seem like a tremendous selection. Whenever I had free time, I used to visit the place and read lying down. Although I received no allowance, when I needed books or stationery I could charge them without even asking my mother first. If I ran up too large a bill, she might warn me to ask beforehand but never scolded me for it.

Soon afterward, the man moved into a store in Kamimachi and named it the Banshodo. Until I left Shibata three or four years later I was that store's best customer. Last summer, when I made the trip back to Shibata, the first thing I did—partly because my inn was close by—was to visit that bookstore. The same man still ran it.

"Do you recognize me?" I asked him as he stared at me in silence. "

I certainly recall the face all right, but I can't recall where."

"Well, it has been all of twenty years. I don't blame you for not remembering."

"No, wait. Now I recall the voice. It certainly has been a long time, hasn't it." He had the shop boy bring us some tea and then I listened to him tell all about the whereabouts of my old friends. The shopkeeper had graduated from Shibata Middle School, so he knew practically all of them.

In telling the story of the bookstore I've digressed from the subject of my friends and our club. Let me return to it for a bit. The club's greatest topic was the return of the Liaotung Peninsula. I found a contribution in the readers' section in World of Young People entitled "On Vengeance" and delivered it as a lecture.^[7] Almost in tears, everyone there

[7] Defeated in the Sino-Japanese War, China signed the April 1895 Treaty of Shimonoseki, ceding part of the Liaotung Peninsula to Japan. Within the week, however, Russia, Germany, and France intervened to block Japan from taking possession. This "retrocession" of the peninsula forced upon the Japanese caused a public outcry against the "triple intervention" and is mentioned several times in the following chapters.

The essay's actual title, "Gashin shotan ron," referred to the slogan used by the Japanese government to counter public criticism of its handling of the affair and alluded to a prince in ancient China who was said to keep a container of gall by his side the better to nurse his vengeance against victorious enemies.

swore revenge. I urged them to memorize the Imperial Rescript on the Retrocession of the Liaotung Peninsula and I recited the whole thing in a loud voice every morning as soon as I arose.

Torako moved to Hokkaido as a clerk right after he graduated from upper elementary school. There hasn't been any news of him in fifteen or twenty years. Tani entered military cadet school one year after I did and is probably a major by now. I don't know what Sugiura's father did for a living but, judging from his terrible stinginess despite the nice house he lived in, I suppose that he must have been a moneylender. When I was back in Shibata I asked about Sugiura and heard that the family became the town's biggest landowner and Sugiura now just lounges about as head of the family.

When I visited him he explained at length about his relations with the farmers. "I don't know about other places, but at least one can say about Shibata that there aren't any farmer movements going to start up around here. And you know, that's because rather than a relation of lord and vassal, it's one of parent and children—and the landlords here take good care of their tenants." As he talked, he moved about the room using his fan with grace to carefully extinguish the candles in the household altars.

IV.

Thus, in those days I studied hard but also played hard. My playground had changed since I lived in Katata-machi. I no longer went to the parade grounds. Now I hunted grasshoppers at the target range in Taihoji, searched for mushrooms in the hills behind it, and caught crabs in the marshes around Ijiminoyama, the amusement grounds of ancient lords. I also wandered around the clear streams at Kajiyama and climbed above the ruins of the castle where three hundred years earlier some lord, his castle besieged and his water supply cut off by the enemy, had

taken rice from his storehouse and poured it over the backs of his horses in order to fool his opponent. If you dug a bit in the red clay of the small plain at the top of the mountain, you could still find the rice charred black by fire.

All these places were within two or three miles of my house and perfect for our hikes. One summer day when Torako and I went to play at Kajiyama, we found the mountain lilies in full bloom. Torako began to dig for bulbs. Because his house had a large garden in back and he often helped his elderly grandmother with her plants, he knew a great deal about such things. I too started to dig. We had a good harvest; thinking, Torako's family is poor, I decided to give all the bulbs to him. Torako also liked fishing. On the many occasions that we set out together at three o'clock in the morning, I always let him keep everything we caught. But as we were on the way home this day I suddenly remembered my mother, who wasn't feeling well and had stayed in bed. I got the idea of taking some flowers home for her. I ran all over gathering the biggest lilies with the most blooms I could find. The two of us returned home elated. As soon as I got to the house I went to where Mother was sleeping.

Barely glancing at the flowers, which were already wilting, Mother said, "You should have brought the bulbs home. You are really stupid!" She criticized me for giving away the lily bulbs: "And you're always so concerned about Torako."

I've never been so sad. I didn't cry but felt as if I were all tied up inside. Dejected, I went to my own room without being able to say anything in my own defense—or rather without even feeling like trying to explain. I know that if I had just told her why, she would have apologized and praised me; yet this is the saddest memory I have of my mother.

Nonetheless I loved my mother. One evening that same summer our family was enjoying the coolness of the living room when suddenly my sister, gazing out into the garden, gave a shriek. Startled, we turned to look out at the garden. There in one corner was something with one huge, glittering eye. Frightened, all that we children could say was

"Oh!" But Mother stood up, slipped on a pair of clogs, and went out into the garden. We watched without speaking.

"Come here, all of you! There's nothing to be afraid of," she called. "Here is your real ghost," she said, showing us what we had thought so frightening. It was a tin can lying on its side.

Nevertheless, probably because I became harder to deal with as I grew older, Mother's punishments came to be increasingly harsh. I remember an occasion when she and the maid tied me up with a rope and both of them beat me severely because I hadn't minded the maid while Mother was out. My mother often left the children for half the day or more while she visited neighborhood friends, mostly other army wives. The maid had complete authority at such times.

I also got into a lot of fights. My mother would often grumble about all the complaints my fighting caused, saying, "I've never had to apologize for anything I have done; yet all I do is apologize for something this kid has done." Again and again I would do something bad that my parents would have to apologize for.

One day during my second year in upper elementary school I had a quarrel with a fellow named Nishikawa. He was in the same grade but in a different class. I was the toughest boy in my class and he was the toughest in his. Thinking that my usual route home would be dangerous that day, I selected a thin piece of metal—a rod used as a paperweight on our writing pad—and slipped it into my shirt front. Then I set out from school trying to look nonchalant. Nishikawa followed me just as I expected. Seven or eight of his friends trailed along behind him. I took the usual way home and entered the parade grounds next to the garrison hospital. As soon as I was inside the grounds I stuck my right hand in my shirt and got ready. Up until then the others had stayed their distance. Now they drew closer, making a lot of noise. They cursed me and dared me to fight. Suddenly someone ran up behind me and a voice yelled, "Come on! Fight!" Grasping the metal rod, I wheeled around. Nishikawa had his fist raised to hit me. Without warning I struck out with the rod. Nishikawa half turned and blood gushed from his head. Everyone was shocked and gathered around him. I withdrew feeling tri-

umphant as well as a little worried. From that day on Nishikawa had a two-inch spot on his head where no hair would grow.

One day, a long time after that incident, my father returned home from the regiment and immediately called me into his room. He and my mother faced me, both with very worried expressions. "Is it true you hit or kicked someone in the head at school the other day?" Father asked sternly, looking quite upset. I could see the veins in his forehead swelling. This was the first time that my father had ever put me on trial this way and I could sense that something important was involved. Yet I couldn't recall hitting anyone recently. Then my mother spoke, asking me if I knew a certain boy.

I did know him since we were in the same class. He wasn't a close friend, but I knew him from school. Increasingly puzzled as to what this was all about, I answered only that I did know him.

Mother, who had been waiting for my answer, then asked, "Didn't you kick or hit him in the back of the neck?"

Now even more mystified since I could not recall anything of the sort, I answered, "No."

Finally Mother relaxed and told me the whole story. Major Okada, the regimental commander, lived in Hachiken-cho. My father was his adjutant. According to Major Okada, his groom or orderly was cleaning up in front of the house when a schoolboy passed. The boy was staggering from one side of the street to the other and several times fell down in the gutter in front of the house. Puzzled, the man took the boy by the arm and questioned him.

"They say he told them you had done it," my mother said. "Anyway, they took him to his home. The doctor said that he had been struck at a spot on the base of the skull so vulnerable that you can kill a man by just sticking him there with a needle. Even if he recovers, he will probably be an idiot the rest of his life."

Then I remembered. Every rainy day at school we used to play a game called Capture-the-Corner. Each side stationed itself in part of the gym we used for exercise. Then one side would try to force the other defenders out of the way and occupy their camp. Sometimes, however, the game couldn't be decided just by pushing and shoving according to

the rules. So when the first assault had done its damage and the enemy lines were beginning to crumble, one or two volunteers would leap into the gap. They would climb on someone's shoulders and jump over the others deep into the enemy's territory, thus occupying their camp at one fell swoop. This volunteer mission was my specialty. I wondered if I might not have kicked someone in the neck when I was leaping over his head.

I told my parents about the game and the three of us decided that events must have happened that way. My father immediately went to pay a sick call on the boy. The family deeply appreciated the call and nothing more came of the matter. I don't remember exactly what became of the boy, but I think he had a slight squint afterward and never spoke much.