Brent
On a rainy afternoon a wandering samurai walks to report for work in a small village. His path takes him across a low bridge, on which a beautiful woman is standing, looking into the waters below. She carries a beautifully painted red umbrella that stands out against the gray afternoon sky. She seems sad and as he passes he warns her that the waters below are not very deep, it would not be a good place to jump, if that's what she was thinking.
Surprised she asks if she looked that sad and that she would do such a thing. Her manners and dress revealed that she belonged to a higher class of Japanese society. Respectfully, he differs and continues on his path.
His work for the evening is at a small food stand, serving fresh eel to passers by. This work is below a trained samurai warrior. He knows nothing of cooking but is prepared to face this challenge as he would an enemy. The stand owner leaves with a shrug. His first customer is the pretty young woman that he passed on the bridge. She steps in out of the rain and greets him. Slightly embarrassed she orders a fresh grilled eel. The eels are kept in a bowl and swim very fast. It takes a certain practiced skill to grab just the one you want from the bowl. A skill that the samurai certainly lacks. After a few clumsy tries the young woman intervenes. She says
no, you cannot use brute force to grab them. Women are like eels you must predict where they will be. If you use brute force they will just slip away, here
and she reaches into the bowl and pulls out the first eel.
She shows him how to lay it on the cutting board and clean it, then puts it on a skewer and dips it in the sauce, then onto the hot coals to cook. Soon the smell of the treat attracts a surprising amount of business on that rainy night. The two of them work side by side fulfilling orders.
As the last of the rush of people leaves, the samurai insists on grilling another eel for her. His grilling is particularly bad. She makes a show of good manners by eating what he has made. She says
good night
and that she enjoyed the evening with him and she leaves, without her painted umbrella.
When he notices that she left her umbrella, he runs out after her into the rain. Down the street and into the bad parts of town he searches for her. Finally, he finds her and offers her the umbrella. She laughs sadly with tears streaming down her face, mingling with the rain. She then explains that her husband has a lot of debits and that they have nothing left to pay off the debit with except her body. Tomorrow she is starting life as a prostitute to pay off the debits. She will be a kept-woman who has no need of a decorative umbrella.
It was a bad time for her and he was right; she was going to try to jump from the bridge. But she supposes that this sort of thing happens all the time. Not knowing what to say, he allows her to walk away. The next day he finds the brothel building in which she now lives but without the money to pay for her services, the men who work there chase him away.
Though the wandering samurai does not have money himself, he does have friends who owe him favors and he borrows the money to see the young woman for a short time. The brothel owners are pleased to have him back as a paying customer and the young woman is pleased to see a friendly face again. She has already been used by strange and unappealing men and she was once beaten by one of her dates.
They sit awkwardly, drinking tea and talking. They feel a connection and she is pleased to spend the time with him but her time is money and it comes to an end quickly. This goes on for several nights. The samurai swears to break her free and carry her away from this life. There is a nunnery across the river that will take her in if she asks for sanctuary, he tells her. Or they could run away and start a new life together, on the run from the brothel owner's henchmen.
He tells her to pack up that night and they will make a run for it. They weave the bed sheets into a rope to climb to the ground. Half way over the edge of the balcony one of the men who works there grabs her and the samurai tells her to jump, she looks down at the long drop and trustingly jumps into the void. He catches her out of the air and together they make a run for the riverbank.
Pursued by the angry brothel workers who shout and run after them. The couple find a skiff that could take them across the river and into sanctuary. Before they can safely jump aboard, the men catch them and try to drag her away. During the fight, she manages to climb on board the skiff and then the samurai pushes it out into the river, away from the dock while he defends her getaway.
She stands at the rear of the skiff; silently she thanks him, not just for rescuing her but also for letting her go.
Author note: This story is a retelling of an ancient Japanese folk tale.