The students who had just begun school the previous year were reciting their multiplication tables. Beside them the third-year pupils were leafing through their practice ledgers and entering figures on abacuses. During the morning’s lesson they practiced writing Chinese characters and numerals, copying out dates and shop names, like so:

October 1 – Edoya
October 2 – Shinagawaya
October 3 – Kawasakiya

Below each they had entered the value of goods sold on credit. Once they had finished their calculations, they wrote the total at the bottom and exchanged ledgers with the student sitting next to them. They had been instructed to make believe that they were a rice wholesaler, or in the case of the girls, his wife. They all seemed to enjoy the game — even the girls.

When the bell sounded at two o’clock, Hagino — who was teaching addition to the new children that entered her school that spring — looked around the classroom. Classes commenced at eight in the morning and ended at two in the afternoon. The children sat watching her with their hands resting on their knees.

“That will be all for today.”

“Thank you!” they replied in unison, bowing politely before standing up and moving the desks to the side of the room.

The pupil in charge of calling roll that day went to a corner of the room and opened the attendance book. One by one, the students’ names were called out and checked off, and the children were dismissed. After each child’s name was called, he or she approached Hagino and said goodbye before leaving.

There were only eight boys and girls in the third-year class, but nineteen in the second year and twenty-four in the newest batch. In addition, two parents had recently come to see Hagino, requesting that their children be admitted to her school in the fall. One family had just moved to Hagino’s Horiechô neighborhood, but the other lived clear on the other side of the Isechô moat in Honfunechô. The child’s parents had heard of Hagino’s reputation and preferred their son commute to her school rather than attend the one nearest them.

As she saw the children off, Hagino was feeling rather proud of herself. Six years before, when she had taken over the school following the death of her father, Yamanaka Tatewai, students had left in droves. Enrollment had dropped from nearly seventy to just twenty-seven or twenty-eight. Parents began sending their children to other schools in Honfunechô or Horidomechô, believing that a female schoolteacher would be too lenient on her students. The spacious twenty-mat classroom had felt practically empty, with just a small group of children huddled in the middle.

It wasn’t that female schoolteachers didn’t exist in Edo – they did. But general opinion held them to be inferior to men. Even other teachers frowned upon them, citing the example of one teacher in Odenmacho who was prone to get emotional and scream at her students. But Hagino wasn’t about to close her school just because female schoolteachers had a bad reputation. Even if she were left with only one pupil, it was her duty to make sure that the child learned to read, write, and use an abacus in order to smooth his path through life and spare him from social ridicule.

So, as her pupils dwindled in number year by year, she bit her lip and soldiered on, teaching the ones that remained how to enter sums in their practice ledgers. She taught them how to add and subtract so they could calculate what their profit would be if they bought a barrel of sweet saké for six mon and a sack of candy for three, then sold them for eight mon and four mon, respectively.

Then, the previous year, enrollment had begun to increase. Children in Edo generally left school after three years and went on to begin apprenticeships. Word had been getting out that Hagino’s former students were all performing superbly in their new positions, without any need for additional training . . . Suddenly Hagino realized that the pupil who had called roll was saying goodbye to her. Once he had left the room and Hagino had heard the lattice door sliding shut after him, she went out into the front hall.

There was an area of dirt floor inside the front door where the children removed their sandals, and shelves on either side for storing them away that were now all empty. She checked that none of the children had forgotten anything. As she turned away from the door, she heard the voices of several children who were loitering in the street outside before heading home. Then came the sound of the front door being slid open with trepidation.

A smile on her face, Hagino turned around expecting to see one of the children returning to collect something. Instead there was a man standing just beyond the threshold – a well-built man whose appearance was nevertheless unprepossessing due to his small stature. He bowed to Hagino. She was just about to ask who he was but stopped herself, knelt on the wooden floor, and returned his bow. She had recognized his round childlike face.

Between the third and fourth blocks of Horiecho there was a street lined with shops selling wooden clogs, leather-soled sandals, umbrellas, and all manner of objects related in one way or another to the weather. For that reason, the street was known as Terifurichô, or “Rain or Shine Street.” The man’s name was Eijirô and he was an employee of Tokiwaya, an umbrella shop.

“Can I help you?”

“Well, um …” Eijirô hesitated, looking away at Hagino, hands still on the floor, raised her face and made eye contact.

The poor man was sweating profusely, probably from walking around in the heat of the day. Hagino watched as large beads of sweat rolled down his forehead. She looked away. Realizing he was sweating, Eijirô hurriedly took out a handkerchief and wiped his face, then around his neck, and then his face again. Growing impatient, Hagino repeated her inquiry just as Eijirô was timidly opening his mouth to speak.

“Well, um—”

“Did you come to see me?”

“Actually, I would . . . um . . . ” Eijirô looked at Hagino, his face betraying some inner turmoil. “I would . . . like to become a student here.”