Chapter 117 - Name and Reality 40 {68 Solo} (156–157: Isaka Masamitsu's Monologue 5)
Nishida and Yoshimura watched Masamitsu in silence for a while as he fell quiet. Finally, Masamitsu began to resume his story.
"Earlier, my old man, who had heard the story from Oshima... from Kuwano's cousin Onodera, learned of Kuwano's tragic death. For my old man, he was more than just a comrade; to put it grandly, he was someone he respected. So, even though he had gone through his own miserable experiences, he felt it was a great shame. But immediately after that, he was apparently confessed to by the guy: 'To be honest, I was surprised when you made yourself Kin-chan's double.' Until then, he hadn't been told, but when he listened closely, it turned out Onodera had been impersonating Kuwano, who had died in an explosion, even on the family register. Moreover, the purpose was to inherit Kuwano's status—since Kuwano had been exempt from conscription due to a finger injury—and the story goes that he somehow managed to get through the war without ever being called up. And because my old man thought of a similar method, in a sense, when he visited the Sada house, he was told it was surprising... At that point, my old man said he had to fight to suppress the rage boiling up inside him. Oh, right. Do you know the story about how Kuwano wasn't conscripted because of a finger injury, or rather, a missing finger?"
To Masamitsu, who was confirming this once more,
"Yeah, I know. I've been investigating this for a long time, but I only noticed it recently,"
Nishida nodded.
"Then it's fine to keep talking like this... So, here's the thing. It's true that my old man knew well that Kuwano wouldn't be called up as a soldier due to his missing finger. But when he learned that the cousin had exploited Kuwano's disability to successfully escape the hellish days that my old man himself had experienced, he felt a surge of resentment at the unfairness. That wasn't all. Because he had heard about Kuwano's past struggles with that missing finger, he apparently couldn't forgive the fact that the guy had exploited that misfortune... It seems something snapped in my old man at that moment."
Listening this far, Nishida recalled the story of how Daikichi and Hojo had beaten Takamura to death in retaliation for killing Mende. Certainly, while that murder could by no means be called self-defense, Nishida glimpsed a trace of a certain "passionate feeling for his comrades," however twisted, in the type of person Daikichi originally was. Nishida surmised that, as Masamitsu said, it wasn't an emotion born solely from anger at the unfairness of Oshima escaping conscription.
"And so, your old man, driven to desperation, decided to split the gold dust only with Oshima? But from his anger toward Oshima, that conclusion doesn't quite sit right..."
Yoshimura threw a major doubt at Masamitsu. Indeed, regarding that part, it was a development difficult to connect to his anger toward Oshima (Onodera).
"Actually... after hearing that story and becoming quite reckless, my old man apparently intended to dig up the gold dust, kill Oshima, and keep all the gold for himself. He had a justification: Hojo himself was dead in the war anyway, and he didn't think Mende's child would ever be found."
"Hey, now! That's some dangerous talk."
At this point, Nishida couldn't help but recognize once again the cruel side of Daikichi's personality, which contradicted his strange sense of duty.
"However, he gave up on that for two reasons. One was that Oshima was a relative of Kuwano, who had looked after him. The other was... when he thought about his many comrades who had died in Okinawa, he felt he had to consider, just for that moment, whether there was any meaning in causing even more useless deaths. I know it's quite ironic that the same old man would later go on to kill people, but... And so... he decided that if he was going to commit the sin of stealing the other guys' shares, he would make the unpleasant guy in front of him bear that burden as well, thereby lightening his own sense of guilt. He did it in the heat of the moment while he was reckless... At that time, regardless of what Oshima thought, my old man felt he was usurping Hojo's share for Oshima and Mende's child's share for himself. Especially regarding Mende's child, considering the situation, the possibility of finding them was lower than Hojo's younger brother. He arbitrarily found a convenient meaning in it, thinking that if that was the case, he wouldn't be cursed for taking it, and applied his own share to that... Even as his son, I don't think such sophistry justifies it, including his killing people later to maintain his social status."
Saying that much, Masamitsu's expression became bitter. If he truly had a strong sense of justice, then even if it concerned a blood relative, there were parts he simply could not forgive.
"In that case, returning to the story of the gold dust and the bundles of cash, your old man did eventually convert only his own share into money, didn't he?"
When Nishida asked that,
"That's right. Once my old man got the gold dust, he parted ways with Oshima and began living in Kitami. He disposed of his own share of the gold, but even though he did it out of desperation, he seems to have soon regretted usurping the shares that were originally meant for his comrades... He left the other share of gold dust—the one he had arbitrarily designated for Mende's child—untouched until the very end. Then, later, after his business got on track and he had some leeway, he prepared the equivalent value of the gold dust he had assumed Oshima had used up—Hojo's share—in cash as his own responsibility. That's what happened. That was his way of taking responsibility for the betrayal of his comrades..."
I see. It seems Isaka Daikichi had, at the very least, regretted his betrayal of his comrades (and their heirs) from an early stage after his reckless period. It could be said that this was supported in reality by the storage of the gold dust and the bundles of new ten-thousand-yen bills featuring Shotoku Taishi, an older issue format. While Daikichi was extremely selfish and possessed a cruelty toward those inconvenient to him, it was evident that his original strong sense of camaraderie remained until the end of his life, as seen from the fact that he entrusted it to Masamitsu.
"Thanks to that, the mystery regarding the gold dust and money Daikichi left behind has been solved... However, the problem lies in what happened after that. Please continue."
Prompted by Nishida, Masamitsu began to speak again.
"After that, he married my mother in Showa 22 (1947), I was born in Showa 24, and the following year, Showa 25, he established the Isaka Group. My name is Masamitsu, and apparently, my old man gave it to me wishing for 'politics with light' (Masamitsu) to be conducted. He said he named me that because he had a terrible time in Okinawa and realized painfully the importance of politics, which an individual can do nothing about... To think I would hear that after turning forty... And that same old man ended up manipulating politics privately to secure construction work; it's nothing but irony. You guys think so too, right? It's only natural to think so."
When asked, the two didn't quite know how to react, but as a matter of fact, it could only be described as a great irony. It often happens that when the core of a matter is struck too accurately, it becomes difficult to answer. Even so, Nishida thought that everything Daikichi did contradicted his original ideas far too much. He had a sense of justice, but depending on his emotions at any given moment, his correct thinking was inconsistent, and he committed misdeeds. Needless to say, one cannot deny that even ordinary humans have such aspects to some extent, but Daikichi's range of fluctuation was simply too large.
"And I, who was given that name, also distorted politics just like my old man... Contrary to the thoughts embedded in the name, the reality turned out to be the complete opposite... Unfortunately, maybe that's just how humans are. If I may be allowed an excuse, that is..."
Masamitsu spoke self-deprecatingly.
However, it was honestly a surprise to Nishida and Yoshimura that Isaka Daikichi had embedded such thoughts from his war experiences into the name "Masamitsu," which was completely unrelated to his former name "Tasuke" or his post-change name "Daikichi."
"By the way, your old man's name was 'Tasuke' before the war, but he changed it to 'Daikichi.' Was there any meaning to that?"
When Nishida asked in passing,
"You noticed a good point. My old man confessed that to me at the time as well... Part of it was that he tried to change his fortune by renaming himself when he started the company, but that wasn't all. Out of a sense of apology to the deceased Mende, whose child's share of gold he had taken, he took the 'Kichi' character from Shigeyoshi and the 'Tai' (thick/big) character from his own Tasuke. Then, he apparently took the dot from the bottom of 'Tai' (太) to make it 'Dai' (大). He said he changed it like that to include the meanings of both 'taking the dots'—in other words, taking the numbers to improve business performance—and 'taking the world' (Tenka wo toru). Also, he said using the character 'Kichi' (luck/joy) was a prayer for good fortune in his life ahead... As for Hojo Masato's share of the gold, as I said earlier, my old man felt he had let Oshima usurp it, and since he knew he wasn't a 'righteous' (Masato) person himself, the idea of taking a character from Masato to use in his name never entered his head from the start."
Masamitsu answered.
Nishida had complex feelings, as he hadn't expected the character for "Kichi" in the post-change name Daikichi to be intertwined with a sense of atonement toward Mende Shigeyoshi. Once again, while Isaka Daikichi was sometimes extremely cold-blooded toward those inconvenient to him, behind that, a strangely dutiful and comrade-oriented nature—albeit a selfish one—was visible, making it impossible to speak of him from a one-sided perspective of simple good and evil.
"Now then, have you heard what the situation was like after he established the Isaka Group? We surmise that it was probably in the late Showa 30s, likely during Oshima Kaiji's first run for the House of Representatives, that he reunited with Oshima, or rather Onodera Michitoshi... or should I say Tadokoro Yasuo?"
Yoshimura questioned him about what followed, taking over for Nishida, who had fallen silent while reflecting on the matter of the names.
"That's right... The Isaka Group was a company my old man started with the funds from the gold dust, but for a while, it continued in a state of scraping by as a subcontractor for things like JNR track maintenance. After that, things progressed into the flow I mentioned earlier..."
With this story, Nishida and Yoshimura recalled once again that Daikichi had attended the 1947 memorial service for the victims of Tako-beya labor in Ikutahara, organized by JNR employees, as the representative of the Isaka Group, which had previously undertaken track maintenance work. And the time Oshima first ran for and won a seat in the House of Representatives was the 1963 general election. Since Masamitsu was born in 1949, he would have been around 14 at the time. Even if Oshima was a green, first-term legislator, there was no doubt he possessed a certain amount of Kaito's influence, given that he was Kaito's successor.
If that were the case, even if Kaito himself practiced clean politics, it's likely that by utilizing that influence, some "unreasonable" favors could be managed. And if that were possible, it's safe to assume it was possible to funnel a certain amount of vested interests to the Isaka Group from the start.
Just like Masamitsu, who was looking back on things he didn't want to say, including his own life, Nishida and the others on the questioning side couldn't think of the next words for a while. However, they couldn't remain silent forever out of consideration for Masamitsu's feelings. They couldn't afford to waste time. Since Masamitsu had not yet specifically spoken about the story of when Oshima and Isaka met again, they needed to hear it.
"We believe that the Isaka Group getting on track and developing by becoming intertwined with Oshima's political power began with your old man's reunion with Oshima... or more accurately, the manner of that reunion."
"That was the story..."
Saying so, Masamitsu slightly opened his tightly set mouth and let out a soft breath.
"I heard that my old man and Oshima did indeed reunite when Oshima returned to Kitami for his first election campaign. He was apparently shocked to see the man he had traveled with from the location of the gold dust in Ikutahara to Kitami—and whom he hadn't known the whereabouts of since they parted there—giving a speech in an election. And my old man blackmailed Oshima. 'You're actually Onodera Michitoshi, who's impersonating Kuwano Kinya, aren't you?'... In the end, Oshima began funneling work to the Isaka Group just as my old man demanded. As I've already said, the more power Oshima gained as a politician, the more the Isaka Group's work increased and the company grew. It was that kind of cycle. A virtuous cycle for us, and what you'd call a vicious cycle for the world."
At the end of this statement, Masamitsu wore a faint smile, but it was surely self-deprecation in the sense of "it couldn't be helped."
"As we thought. We heard from someone who knew Oshima well (the elderly Koshiba) that Oshima initially felt a sense of resistance to running from Hokkaido, and it seems that fear was well-founded,"
Yoshimura said, and Masamitsu revealed:
"However, what left an impression on me was my old man telling me that initially, rather than a desire to increase his company's work, his anger toward Oshima was stronger. He apparently couldn't forgive the fact that a man who had gone so far as to exploit his cousin's death to escape the war was now trying to become a Diet member. He said the feeling of wanting to pull the rug out from under him was stronger... The company wasn't exactly doing well yet, but work was gradually increasing, so it wasn't a desperate situation... I think some self-interest and jealousy were involved, but I'm certain that a feeling like anger definitely surged up immediately after he spotted Oshima. When he revealed his own shame directly to his son, there shouldn't have been a need to lie that much... Well, it's unavoidable to be suspected of 'making excuses,' but it wouldn't be strange for those feelings to have been there."
When he heard this statement, Nishida was instead curious about how Oshima had received this blackmail. He surmised that Oshima probably thought Isaka Daikichi was blackmailing him purely for the growth of his own company. He likely didn't imagine that his escaping conscription... escaping the war, was significantly influencing the blackmail. This included Daikichi's state of mind when he was approached with the proposal to usurp the gold dust.