The Gate of Rain - V (and Epilogue)

The Woodcutter, Again

“That is quite a story.” Exclaimed the laborer. “Now I will say I do not exactly believe it. But it is a good story. Though it does not fit in with the other two.”

“What is wrong with it, from your point of view?” The monk asked this while sitting down and setting one of the few meditation candles he had left. He set to work lighting a fire. Eventually, he lit the candle.

“Well, the first thing is was the warrior killed with the knife or the sword? The brigand and the warrior both said it was with the sword, but the lady said it was with the knife. If one could get to the glade, this would be a simple matter to find out. Do not you think?”

“Yes, we all questioned that, among other things.”

“And I was thinking - was he killed by a run-in with the bandit, or not? Again - this should be easy to find out.”

“The judge did not seem to want to hunt up the forest valley. It was not a particular concern of his. Though I do not know why. It may be outside of his jurisdiction.”

The woodcutter nodded. “He stays away, and called the medium.” There were nods all the way around.

“Also the lady is a mystery. Was she in love with the bandit? I do not think so.”

“According to the warrior, she detested him.”

“That is what I keep saying, people do things for themselves and they make up stories to fit the deeds.”

Then woodcutter again complained: “I tell you it is all lies.”

At this point, the labor looked at the woodcutter's face and said: “What is your story? I think you have something to say, the judge is not around.”

“I do not want to get involved.”

“Do not you think it is too late for that?”

“I think you would not believe me anyway.” Intoned the woodcutter.

“Do not you think you should try us? I think the monk would like to know, I feel he has questions too. Questions that you have not answered.”

“I tell you it is all lies.”

“So why not tell us the truth?”

The monk then added: “Do not you think you have been holding out on me for a little while? Do not you think that you deserve to tell me the story?”

At this point, the woodcutter realized he would have to come out and tell the tale. The woodcutter sat next to the others in the large gate. They were covered by a small entrance, which had not been pillaged for kindling. The rain was noticeably slowing, but it was not over. The woodcutter straightened his pants, and his shirt – both were dirty and umber. Then something odd – he cleaned his hair. Which was on because he had not done so in the past.

“Do not believe anything that you have heard so far. Because there is a figure, and it is not among the living. But I must reach back to the moment that I saw the glade.”

“It seems like your story is the most interesting.” Interrupted the laborer. “I think you saw everything, didn't you?”

“First I found the lady's hat as I walk on a path through the woods. Then as the forest got darker, I saw a glove. Then a while later, I saw all three of them in a circle.”

“And what you see that? Who killed the warrior? Was it the brigand, the lady, or the warrior himself?”

“None of the above.”

“Did you kill the warrior?” The monk with a very serious expression on his face pleaded with him.

“No. I can never do that. I saw the thing that did; it was not living. But you will have to wait while I tell you what happened.” Thus, the two other men waited, waited with bated breath.

He gave them a new tale:

The brigand was importuning the lady.

 “I will give you everything that you ever dreamed of. I have a lot of money and many fine things over the years. Being a thief is a good living. I fancy you; it will be better than a warrior who has slipped from grace.” But the lady continued with her face on the ground and her body recumbent. She was bawling her eyes out.

“If you do not want my money, I will work. I will sell whatever I can. Just please be with me.” but again the lady would not speak.

 “If I cannot get an answer from you, I will have to kill you. Is that what you want?” Finally, the lady looked up into his face but began weeping again. Until she rose up and found the dagger, neatly slicing the fibers which held her husband. But then she was weeping again and threw herself onto the ground with her fingers touching his sandals.

  At this point, the warrior stood up, and looking at the brigand, finally said something:

 “You can keep this shameless whore; I do not want her even for an instant. She is dirt to me; you can have her if you want.” And with that, he sniffed, almost as if he would say nothing more.

 With an extreme look upon her face, the lady realized that this was not going the way she wanted to – and with a crooked grin briefly going across her face, though neither of the two men saw it as I did, she molded her look into one of terror. Then moving on all four legs towards the brigand, she gripped her face onto his ear and in a loud whisper that everyone could hear: “You see what he is doing?” And it was at this point that I knew she was wicked. Or something in her was, because at that moment something like came out of her veil, something ethereal. Something that inhabited her and was rising up like a form that was human, but only in shadow. The two men saw it, and all were petrified – but in different ways. The bandit did not know what it was and was mystified as well as terrified. Unlike the bandit, with an eye for such things – the warrior knew what it was. Call it one of the undead, taking form before our very eyes.

 It did not speak a word, but instead pointed his hand at the dagger – and perhaps it was the closeness – made it jerk until it was in its hand. Everyone saw this and tried to crawl away from this ghastly figure.

 Then there was a dread over the glade, with each one of the three wondering if it was their turn to die. How it got into the lady, I think I shall never know. But it was inhabited in this place, waiting for a chance to come out. Perhaps it was when she dropped things, but I do not know. It also may have transferred from one to the other as it suited its purposes. For example, taking the bandit so as to enjoy the lady, and then taking the lady to try and get the two men to fight. Only when this failed due it comes out and do the deed itself.

But some choice was made, and it was for the warrior that is spaced for. The terror of the warrior's face was open for us to see. I do not want to think about what was going on in his mind. I knew it must have been terrible. That is when it finally made its choice. The lady was screeching, almost at the top of her lungs. Even the bandit was crying. But it was over the prone warrior that it moved to, and it drew the dagger off over its head. But the dagger was also changed – as if it were lengthening in its reach. It towered over the warrior. Then from the peak of its reach, it stabbed the once upon a time. O the dagger – though it was near sword length now, was terrible watch having its blade plunge into the warrior. The drizzle began, spattering like blood on the hilt, like tears to the gate.

It walked away into the night as if it were done. Leaving behind the noise of the brook, the breath of wind through the rocks, the leaves quivering, the foliage quaking, and the birds began chirping as it passed into the distance.

The lady knew it was her chance to escape since the warrior was dead and the brigand was stunned. Off into the wood she went. Finally, the bandit roused himself, picked up the two swords, and made his escape.

Then I was alone, with only the dead warrior for company. But I was still when something happened: the warrior seemed to dissolve into the mist. I think that was the moment when he finally died. I must have been crying, for I saw the tears soaked into my shirt, but I do not recall it happening.

At last, with great effort, I began moving from my hiding place. It was an extreme trial as if my will been drained too. Finally, I stood up and looked around. Then it went into the underbrush and disappeared.

"And that is what happened. I have not anything more to say, I am sorry I lied to you. But you see I was in a position – how could I tell this story, when it would not believe believed?"

Quiet around the fire, with both the monk and the laborer immersed in a sense of deep hush. One could almost hear the mind thinking to itself from each of the three. But then the laborer said: “So now we know why you did not tell your tale. Either the judge would not believe you, or he was in the with the Dark God.” Then he rattled some Oumon coins in his hand.

“The judge was of the living, not the dead. That means that he must have an understanding with the God of the Dead.”

With this, the laborer sensed that this was true. “I do not want to think about what would happen if the Dark God want someone who was living.”

“I think we just did. The warrior had some debt to the Dark God,” The woodcutter said: “though I do not think we will ever know what it was.”

A pointed brow leaped upon the labor’s face. “So it took only him, and left the lady and the bandit.”

“Who is to say? Perhaps he knew that he was getting the bandit soon enough.” The monk replied, with a reproach on his voice. “Time is different for spirits.”

“It was the lady who carried the dagger and it became a sword.”

Reminded the monk: “The undead wanted the warrior. who had done something remiss in his time,” They then brush off the drops on his arm. All three of them lapse back into an embittered soundlessness. But they could hear that the rain was stopping. But then a crying was heard. Not a man or a woman, but a child's. It almost had to feel of the bandits weeping, though that was surely impossible. Evening air went the laborer, with not a care in the world. But the monk went around the boards and saw a baby wrapped up and left there. Then the monk wrapped up the baby and slung it on his shoulder. “I cannot leave this baby here, there is too much wrong with the world.”

The monk and the woodcutter entered into the gate. Then the woodcutter turned to the monk: “There is not much food, but I can manage for all of us. You are different from most, you do worry about what you are a fellow man have to live on. That in this world is truly good. It begins anew with every moon that rises again.” Then to and through the gate, as all the precipitation dried up, and even the late afternoon sun was coming out. The two stretches in the rays. They each turn to the other, and the monk spake: “You are very kind to offer. But there is an orphanage, which will put me up for the night. And they have a nurse to wean the baby because I do not think that he is yet of age.”

The woodcutter looked at the monk even while the sun broke through the ramparts in a colon. The monk put out the candle and stood up.

The woodcutter spoke: "The tale has made you its storyteller though none may have cause to believe it. There is no truth."

The monk replied back: "That seems to be its sentence. The tale keeps its secrets in its claws."

The woodcutter raised his eyes like a question mark.

The monk offered his hand.

The woodcutter shook it and then departed in a comma.

Fin.

Epilogue

The original story a great deal of the emphasis is on the formality of pronouns, particularly the various levels of form of the word “I,” this is because Japanese has many forms which denote the status of the person and to a great extent the sex of the person. It is now much looser but still present in the language. In the original short story by Ryūnosuke Akutagawa, we have displayed a master class in the use of pronouns to highlight and accentuate the problem that there is no resolution to the quandary - each person looks different in the other person's perspective, and there is no way to know which person is guilty. When Akira Kurosawa and Kazuo Miyagawa wrote a script they had when another level from the short story, also by Akutagawa, called Rashomon. The southern at even the time of the story is ruined and that means that it is symbolic of the state of decay and ruin of Japan at the time. The audience might well know that the gate was inhabited by a demon.

Kurosawa’s main thrust was not only the upper level of the gate but a circularity to the story, where the characters are pondering the irreconcilability that each of the tales is the memory from a particular stance. The Lady is by turns heroic, submissive, or conniving depending on who is telling the story.

When one takes a story one has to add an another level for the time one lives in. In my case, it is that the story is written and knows this, and the readers are brought in explicitly into the tale. The tale picks a teller, even if that choice is a further complication. Thus, if the Rashomon problem is one cannot decide from the evidence brought to light then the Rashomon squared problem is that the echoes of the problem only get larger when the tale is retold in writing. And this is why I could not put this in a prologue: because putting it in a prologue would be to cube the square. And thus I put my keyboard down and give you this lesson. Of course, the story by Akutagawa and the film by Kurosawa are pinnacles in their respective genres, and each one of them should be read and watched multiple times.