Chapter 3

The new life which opened up for June was brimming over with interest. Seki San lived in a regular toy house, which was like a lot of little boxes fitted into one big one. One whole side was open to the garden and a tiny railed balcony ran around outside the rooms. The walls were made of white paper, and when the sun shone all sorts of pretty shadows danced on them, and when it rained everybody ran about to put up the wooden screens, and fasten the house up snug and tight until the shower was over. A flight of low steps cut in the rock led down to a bamboo wicker, and here green lizards sunned themselves all day and blinked in friendly fashion at the passer-by.

The night June arrived he had looked about blankly and said:

“But Seki, there isn’t any furniture in your house; haven’t you got any bed, or chairs or table?”

And Seki had laughed and told the others and everybody laughed until June thought he had been impolite.

“I like it,” he hastened to add, “it’s the nicest house I ever was in, ‘cause, don’t you see, there isn’t anything to break.”

It was quite wonderful to see how easily one can get along without furniture. After one has sat on his heels, and slept on the floor and eaten off a tiny table no bigger than a footstool, it seems the most sensible thing in the world. June did hang up one picture and that was a photograph of his mother. She had left him two, but one was taken with her hat on.