Kwaidan: Stories and Studies of Strange Things

RIKI-BAKA

His name was Riki, signifying Strength; but the people called him
Riki-the-Simple, or Riki-the-Fool,—“Riki-Baka,”—because he had been
born into perpetual childhood. For the same reason they were kind to
him,—even when he set a house on fire by putting a lighted match to a
mosquito-curtain, and clapped his hands for joy to see the blaze. At
sixteen years he was a tall, strong lad; but in mind he remained always
at the happy age of two, and therefore continued to play with very
small children. The bigger children of the neighborhood, from four to
seven years old, did not care to play with him, because he could not
learn their songs and games. His favorite toy was a broomstick, which
he used as a hobby-horse; and for hours at a time he would ride on that
broomstick, up and down the slope in front of my house, with amazing
peals of laughter. But at last he became troublesome by reason of his
noise; and I had to tell him that he must find another playground. He
bowed submissively, and then went off,—sorrowfully trailing his
broomstick behind him. Gentle at all times, and perfectly harmless if
allowed no chance to play with fire, he seldom gave anybody cause for
complaint. His relation to the life of our street was scarcely more
than that of a dog or a chicken; and when he finally disappeared, I did
not miss him. Months and months passed by before anything happened to
remind me of Riki.

“What has become of Riki?” I then asked the old woodcutter who supplies
our neighborhood with fuel. I remembered that Riki had often helped him
to carry his bundles.

“Riki-Baka?” answered the old man. “Ah, Riki is dead—poor fellow!...
Yes, he died nearly a year ago, very suddenly; the doctors said that he
had some disease of the brain. And there is a strange story now about
that poor Riki.

“When Riki died, his mother wrote his name, ‘Riki-Baka,’ in the palm of
his left hand,—putting ‘Riki’ in the Chinese character, and ‘Baka’ in
_kana_ (1). And she repeated many prayers for him,—prayers that he
might be reborn into some more happy condition.

“Now, about three months ago, in the honorable residence of
Nanigashi-Sama (2), in Kojimachi (3), a boy was born with characters on
the palm of his left hand; and the characters were quite plain to
read,—‘_RIKI-BAKA_’!

“So the people of that house knew that the birth must have happened in
answer to somebody’s prayer; and they caused inquiry to be made
everywhere. At last a vegetable-seller brought word to them that there
used to be a simple lad, called Riki-Baka, living in the Ushigomé
quarter, and that he had died during the last autumn; and they sent two
men-servants to look for the mother of Riki.

“Those servants found the mother of Riki, and told her what had
happened; and she was glad exceedingly—for that Nanigashi house is a
very rich and famous house. But the servants said that the family of
Nanigashi-Sama were very angry about the word ‘Baka’ on the child’s
hand. ‘And where is your Riki buried?’ the servants asked. ‘He is
buried in the cemetery of Zendōji,’ she told them. ‘Please to give us
some of the clay of his grave,’ they requested.

“So she went with them to the temple Zendōji, and showed them Riki’s
grave; and they took some of the grave-clay away with them, wrapped up
in a _furoshiki_[1]].... They gave Riki’s mother some money,—ten
yen.”... (4)

“But what did they want with that clay?” I inquired.

“Well,” the old man answered, “you know that it would not do to let the
child grow up with that name on his hand. And there is no other means
of removing characters that come in that way upon the body of a child:
_you must rub the skin with clay taken from the grave of the body of
the former birth_.”...