Chapter 6 Chapter Six

No matter what we feel about Hatsumomo, she's the queen of our art houses because we all live off her earnings.And the most junior apprentice in the art gallery had to wait for her to come back in the middle of the night. One night, when I was walking back after drinking water by the well in the courtyard, I heard the outside door being opened and then closed heavily, hitting the door frame with a loud bang.I hurriedly knelt back to my original standby position, and soon Hatsumomo walked into the front hall, holding a package wrapped in linen paper.After a while, another geisha came in after her. Her name was Korin and she was very tall.Hatsumomo put her bundle on the aisle, untied the string, and spread out in the hallway an exquisite kimono of various shades of pink and green, decorated with red leaf patterns.

Hatsumomo said, "Miss Korin, whose kimono do you think belongs to?" "I wish it was mine!" "Well, it's not yours. Its owner is none other than the person we both hate the most in this world—Miss Perfect." "Mameha! Oh my god, this is Mameha's kimono. How did you get it?" "I left something in the theater during a rehearsal the other day," Hatsumomo said. "When I went back to look for it, I heard something that sounded like a groan coming from the basement stairs. So I thought, ' Impossible! This is too much fun!' I tiptoed down below, turned on the light, and lying there were Mameha's maid and theater caretaker. I knew she would do anything for me to keep my mouth shut. thing, so I found her later and said I wanted this kimono from Mameha."

Hatsumomo brought pen and ink from her room.Then she put the writing brush into my hand, took my hand and held it on top of the beautiful kimono, and said to me: "Practice your calligraphy, Chiyo." This kimono belonged to a geisha named Mameha - I hadn't heard of her at the time - but her kimono was an absolute work of art, with a lacquered thread twisted from the hem to the waist The embroidered beautiful vine, it is part of the fabric, but it looks lifelike, as if a real vine is growing there, I feel that if I want to, I can touch it with my fingers and pull it off, It's like pulling a grass out of the ground.The leaves on the vines are curled up, as if they are dying in autumn, and the leaves are even slightly yellow.

"I can't do it, Miss Hatsumomo!" I yelled. "If you don't want to find your sister!" I hesitated a few strokes on the pink-green silk. Korin was not satisfied with this, so Hatsumomo pointed out where and how to paint.Afterwards, she refolded the kimono, wrapped it in linen paper, and tied it with string.As they opened the gate to the street, Hatsumomo ordered me to follow.We walked about a block in the moonlight and crossed a wooden arched bridge to another part of Gion.Hatsumomo and Korin stopped in front of a wooden door. "You take this kimono upstairs and give it to the maid there." Hatsumomo said to me, "If Miss Perfect comes to open the door by herself, you give it to her. Don't say anything, just hand it over." .We'll be here watching you."

Saying that, she stuffed the wrapped kimono into my arms, and Korin immediately opened the door.A flight of polished wooden steps led into darkness.Shaking with fear, I climbed to the top of the stairs, knelt down in the darkness, and shouted, "Sorry to bother you!" Soon, the door opened.The girl kneeling in the door was no older than Satsu, with a thin body and a nervous expression like a bird.I handed her the kimono wrapped in linen paper.Surprised, she took it from me almost in desperation. "Who's there, Mami?" came a voice from inside the apartment.I saw a lighted paper lantern hanging on an antique lampstand, next to a newly made futon with a scratchy sheet and elegant silk coverlet, and a "high pillow"— — Just like the one Hatsumomo used.The high pillow isn't really a pillow at all, just a padded wooden bracket around the neck; it's the only way to keep a geisha from messing up her delicate hairstyle while she sleeps.

The maid didn't answer the man's question, but just opened the wrapping paper of the kimono as lightly as possible. When she found the ink graffiti on it, she gasped and covered her mouth with her hand.Tears rolled down her cheeks almost instantly, and then a voice asked: "Mami! Who's there?" "Oh, no one, miss!" cried the maid.She hastened to wipe her tears away with one sleeve, and I felt myself sympathizing with her very much.I caught a glimpse of her mistress as she went to close the door.I immediately understood why Hatsumomo called her "Miss Perfect".Her face was perfectly oval-shaped, and even without makeup, her skin was as smooth and delicate as porcelain.

The next day, as soon as Hatsumomo stepped into the art hall, a maid ran to inform her mother, and her mother came out to stop Hatsumomo who was about to go upstairs. "Mameha and her maid came to visit us this morning," she said. "Oh Mom, I knew exactly what you were going to say. I was so sorry for that kimono. I tried to stop Chiyo from spilling ink on it, but it was too late. She must have thought it was my kimono! I don't know Why did she hate me so much when she came here... just think about it, she ruined such a beautiful kimono just to hurt me!" "Enough!" Mom said, "Now listen to me, Hatsumomo. You don't really think that anyone is so stupid as to believe your little story. I don't allow this kind of behavior in the art museum, even you Don't go out of line either. I respect Mameha very much. I don't want to hear anything like this happen again. As for the kimono, someone has to pay for it. Let the little girl pay for it." Mom said and put the pipe back in her mouth.

At this time grandma came out of the reception room and asked a maid to fetch the bamboo pole. "Chiyo has already had enough debts," the aunt said, "I don't understand why she should bear Hatsumomo's fault." "We've talked enough about this," Grandma said. "The little girl should be beaten and compensated for the kimono. That's it. Where's the bamboo pole?" "I'll hit her myself," said the auntie. "I don't want your joints to hurt again. Come here, Chiyo." My aunt waited for the maid to bring the bamboo poles and took me to the yard.But my aunt didn't hit me. She leaned the bamboo pole against the wall of the storage room, limped over and said to me calmly:

"What did you do to Hatsumomo? She's hell-bent on destroying you. There must be a reason for it, and I want to know what it is." "I swear to you, Aunty, she's been doing this to me since I got here. I don't know how I offended her." "Grandma may say that Hatsumomo is an idiot, but trust me, Hatsumomo is not an idiot. If she wants to ruin your career completely, she can. No matter what you did to make her angry, now you It has to stop doing that." "I did nothing, Auntie, I swear to you." "You must not trust her, even when she says she wants to help you. She has saddled you with such a debt that you may never be able to pay it off."

"I don't understand..." I said, "What debt?" "Hatsumomo's trick with that kimono will cost you money you never thought possible in your entire life. That's what I mean by debt." "But...how can I pay back the money?" "When you become a geisha, you have to pay back the money to the geisha, including all the money you will owe - the money for your meals and lessons; if you are sick, you will owe medical bills. You must Paying for everything yourself. Why do you think mother spends time in her room writing numbers in those little books? You even owe a fee to the art gallery to get you."

"If you want to ruin your life in Gion, there are many ways," said the auntie. "You can run away. Once you do that, Mom will see you as a bad investment, and she won't invest more The money is on someone who can disappear at any moment. That means your lessons are terminated, and you can't become a geisha without training. Or you can make the teachers dislike you, so they won't give it You help. Or you can grow up to be an ugly girl like me. I wasn't an ugly girl when grandma took me from my parents, but then I didn't grow up, in this matter Grandma always hated me. Once because of something I did, she beat me so hard that she broke half of my femur. Since then I can no longer be a geisha. That's why I want to Come and beat you without letting grandma do it." She led me to the passage and made me lie on my back.I don't really care if she hits me; nothing seems to me to make my situation any worse.Every time the bamboo pole fell, my body would shake up and down, and I let go of my courage and cried loudly.After beating me, my aunt left me there to cry.After a while, I felt the aisle tremble with someone's footsteps, and I sat up to find Hatsumomo standing in front of me. "Chiyo, I would be very grateful if you would stay out of my way." "You promised to tell me where to find my sister, Hatsumomo," I told her. "I said so!" She bent down and brought her face closer to mine, "Your older sister is in the house of a girl named Tatsuyoshi." She told me, "in the Miyagawa-cho district just south of Gion. " After she finished speaking, she kicked me lightly with her foot, and I got up and stepped aside to make room for her to pass.