Shipwrecks by Akira Yoshimura

took his leave. Isaku’s mother sat down on the straw matting.
    Isaku was sitting beside the fireplace, and when he happened to look at his mother’s face, glowing for an instant in the firelight, he was frightened by the strange look in her eyes. They were glazed and misty with tears. He assumed she was thinking about his father and his dead baby sister.
    When parties of villagers went to the neighbouring town to sell dried fish or salt, they would always call on the labour contractor’s. This was the only way they could hear news of their indentured kin. Sometimes they would hear reports of deaths, or that the person was ailing. Without exception, those who were sick would eventually die, but even knowing this, the family would pray for their loved one’s recovery. There was no news of Isaku’s father, which meant that he was almost certainly free from illness and working safely somewhere.
    Isaku moved away from the fireplace and curled up under his straw matting, his eyes barely open as he peered at his mother’s face.
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    The mountains turned a deep shade of green. Light winds, seldom stronger than a breeze, started coming in, mostly from the east. Flies began to exhibit their prolific powers of breeding and swarmed over the squid hanging out to dry. When evening came, buzzing mosquitoes flitted by one’s ear.
    Occasionally cargo vessels would pass by, but the villagersbarely looked up from the job at hand as the ships retreated steadily into the distance across the calm sea.
    The number of squid caught began to dwindle, and fewer were seen hanging out to dry. Those already dried were tied up with twine and packed away.
    On early mornings in mid-May people carrying bundles of dried squid on their backs would appear on the path, to be joined by others as they climbed up the mountain path.
    His mother, too, twice carried such bundles of squid to the next village. The amount of grain she brought back in return was nothing to speak of, but she seemed cheerful all the same. She had stopped in at the labour contractor’s to ask about his father, and there was no news. No news was good news; he must still be fit and well. Isaku felt relieved at this, but then he heard his mother say that Tami’s elder sister had fallen sick after working only two months.
    â€˜And the broker’s got the gall to complain that he’s been had – after he’s been paid a big fat commission,’ his mother said, spitting out the words in outrage.
    If a bond servant died, the broker would have to pay a certain amount of compensation to the employer on the grounds that he had provided an unfit worker. For this reason the broker would choose only physically sound people. To cover a possible financial loss from a worker’s death, he would pay the bond servant’s family a great deal less than what he got from the employer. Isaku’s village provided a good supply of workers.
    No doubt Tami’s family would have heard by now, but Isaku wondered how they might take the news. Of course they would be distraught; but he thought they might harbour other thoughts as well. They had already received the bond payment, and Tami’s sister’s departure meant they had one less mouth to feed. On top of that, even if she were able to return to the village after finishing her bond service, in terms of age she would be unable to command a favourable match. In this respect, the news that Tami’s sister had fallen sick with what could only be a fatal illness might not necessarily be viewed as misfortune for the family.

    Putting the grain she had brought back into an urn in the larder, his mother muttered, ‘There’s no way your father’s dead. He’s too strong,’ almost as though she were trying to admonish herself for a moment’s doubt.
    In the evening of the day after his mother returned from her second trip taking dried squid to the next village, Isaku was