1132
PARTISAN REVIEW
been sketched with delicate quickness. There were pink clouds, con–
taining some graceful calligraphy, and a sea, that was a pale blue
except at the edges, containing four sampans with indications of
people in them. Pines edged the water and on the far-off beach there
was a cluster of thatched huts towered over by pine-dotted mountains
of grey and blue. The frame was scalloped and gilt.
After Rosie's mother pronounced it without peer and somewhat
prodded her father into nodding agreement, she said Mr. Kuroda
must at least have a cup of tea, after coming all this way, and al–
though Mr. Kuroda did not want to impose, he soon agreed that a
cup of tea would be refreshing and went along with her to the house,
carrying the picture for her.
"Ra, your mother's crazy!" Rosie's father said, and Rosie laughed
uneasily as she resumed judgment on the tomatoes. She had emptied
six lugs when he broke into an imaginary conversation with Jesus
to tell her to go and remind her mother of the tomatoes, and she
went slowly.
Mr. Kuroda was in his shirtsleeves expounding some
haiku
theory
as he munched a rice cake, and her mother was rapt. Abashed in the
great man's presence, Rosie stood next to her mother's chair until
her mother looked up inquiringly, and then she started to whisper the
message, but her mother pushed her gently away and reproached,
"You are not being very polite to our guest."
"Father says the tomatoes ... " Rosie said aloud, smiling fool–
ishly.
"Tell him I shall only be a minute," her mother said, speaking
the language of Mr. Kuroda.
When Rosie carried the reply to her father, he did not seem
to hear and she said again, "Mother says she'll be back in a minute."
"All right, all right," he nodded, and they worked again in
silence. But suddenly, her father uttered an incredible noise, exactly
like the cork of a bottle popping, and the next Rosie knew, he was
stalking angrily toward the house, almost running, in fact, and she
chased after him crying, "Father! Father! What are you going
to do?"
He stopped long enough to order her back to the shed. "Never
mind!" he shouted. "Get on with the sorting!"
And from the place in the fields where she stood, frightened and
