(invariably five yen).
"You must stop your fooling around with women. You've gone far
enough. Society won't stand for more."
What, I wondered, did he mean by "society"? The plural of human
beings? Where was the substance of this thing called "society"? I had
spent my whole life thinking that society must certainly be something
powerful, harsh and severe, but to hear Horiki talk made the words
"Don't you mean yourself?" come to the tip of my tongue. But I held
the words back, reluctant to anger him.
Society won't stand for it.
It's not society, You're the one who won't stand
for it—right?
If
you
do such
a
thing society will make you suffer for
it.
It's not society. It's you, isn't it?
Before you know it, you'll be ostracized by society.
It's
not
society. You're going to do the ostracizing,
aren't you?
Words, words of
every
kind went flitting through my head. "Know
thy particular fearsomeness, thy knavery, cunning and witchcraft!"
What I said,
however, as I wiped the perspiration from
my face
with a
handkerchief was merely, "You've put me in a cold sweat!" I smiled.
From then on, however, I came to hold, almost as a philosophical
conviction, the belief: What is society hut an individual?
From the moment I suspected that society might be an individual I
was able to act more in accordance with my own inclinations. Shizuko
found that I had become rather self-willed and not so timid as before.
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