"Golden, Arthur - Memoirs of A Geisha" - читать интересную книгу автора (Golden Arthur)

Here the maid appeared with tea. While it was served I took the opportunity to steal a glance at Granny. Whereas Mother was a bit on the plump side, with stubby fingers and a fat neck, Granny was old and shriveled. She was at least as old as my father, but she looked as if she'd spent her years stewing herself into a state of concentrated meanness. Her gray hair made me think of a tangle of silk threads, for I could see right through them to her scalp. And even her scalp looked mean, because of patches where the skin was colored red or brown from old age. She wasn't frowning exactly, but her mouth made the shape of a frown in its natural state anyway.

She took in a great big breath in preparation to speak; and then as she let it out again she mumbled, "Didn't I say I don't want any tea?" After this, she sighed and shook her head, and then said to me, "How old are you, little girl?"

"She's the year of the monkey," Auntie answered for me.

"That fool cook is a monkey," Granny said.

"Nine years old," said Mother. "What do you think of her, Auntie?"

Auntie stepped around in front of me and tipped my head back to look at my face. "She has a good deal of water."

"Lovely eyes," said Mother. "Did you see them, Granny?"

"She looks like a fool to me," Granny said. "We don't need another monkey anyway."

"Oh, I'm sure you're right," Auntie said. "Probably she's just as you say. But she looks to me like a very clever girl, and adaptable; you can see that from the shape of her ears."

"With so much water in her personality," Mother said, "probably she'll be able to smell a fire before it has even begun. Won't that be nice, Granny? You won't have to worry any longer about our storehouse burning with all our kimono in it."

Granny, as I went on to learn, was more terrified of fire than beer is of a thirsty old man.

"Anyway, she's rather pretty, don't you think?" Mother added.

"There are too many pretty girls in Gion," said Granny. "What we need is a smart girl, not a pretty girl. That Hatsumomo is as pretty as they come, and look at what a fool she is!"

After this Granny stood, with Auntie's help, and made her way back up the walkway. Though I must say that to watch Auntie's clumsy gait-because of her one hip jutting out farther than the other-it wasn't at all obvious which of the two women had the easier time walking. Soon I heard the sound of a door in the front entrance hall sliding open and then shut again, and Auntie came back.

"Do you have lice, little girl?" Mother asked me.

"No," I said.

"You're going to have to learn to speak more politely than that. Auntie, be kind enough to trim her hair, just to be sure."

Auntie called a servant over and asked for shears.

"Well, little girl," Mother told me, "you're in Kyoto now. You'll learn to behave or get a beating. And it's Granny gives the beatings around here, so you'll be sorry. My advice to you is: work very hard, and never leave the okiya without permission. Do as you're told; don't be too much trouble; and you might begin learning the arts of a geisha two or three months from now. I didn't bring you here to be a maid. I'll throw you out, if it comes to that."

Mother puffed on her pipe and kept her eyes fixed on me. I didn't dare move until she told me to. I found myself wondering if my sister was standing before some other cruel woman, in another house somewhere in this horrible city. And I had a sudden image in my mind of my poor, sick mother propping herself on one elbow upon her futon and looking around to see where we had gone. I didn't want Mother to see me crying, but the tears pooled in my eyes before I could think of how to stop them. With my vision glazed, Mother's yellow kimono turned softer and softer, until it seemed to sparkle. Then she blew out a puff of her smoke, and it disappeared completely.

Chapter four

During those first few days in that strange place, I don't think I could 11 have felt worse if I'd lost my arms and legs, rather than my family V and my home. I had no doubt life would never again be the same. All I could think of was my confusion and misery; and I wondered day after day when I might see Satsu again. I was without my father, without my mother-without even the clothing I'd always worn. Yet somehow the thing that startled me most, after a week or two had passed, was that I had in fact survived. I remember one moment drying rice bowls in the kitchen, when all at once I felt so disoriented I had to stop what I was doing to stare for a long while at my hands; for I could scarcely understand that this person drying the bowls was actually me. Mother had told me I could begin my training within a few months if I worked hard and behaved myself. As I learned from Pumpkin, beginning my training meant going to a school in another section of Gion to take lessons in things like music, dance, and tea ceremony. All the girls studying to be geisha took classes at this same school. I felt sure I'd find Satsu there when I was finally permitted to go; so by the end of my first week, I'd made up my mind to be as obedient as a cow following along on a rope, in the hopes that Mother would send me to the school right away.

Most of my chores were straightforward. I stowed away the futons in the morning, cleaned the rooms, swept the dirt corridor, and so forth. Sometimes I was sent to the pharmacist to fetch ointment for the cook's scabies, or to a shop on Shijo Avenue to fetch the rice crackers Auntie was so fond of. Happily the worst jobs, such as cleaning the toilets, were the responsibility of one of the elderly maids. But even though I worked as hard as I knew how, I never seemed to make the good impression I hoped to, because my chores every day were more than I could possibly finish; and the problem was made a good deal worse by Granny.

Looking after Granny wasn't really one of my duties-not as Auntie described them to me. But when Granny summoned me I couldn't very well ignore her, for she had more seniority in the okiya than anyone else. One day, for example, I was about to carry tea upstairs to Mother when I heard Granny call out:

"Where's that girl! Send her in here!"