Chapter 16
There were few people on the Mitsui Busankaisha Company’s wharf on the morning when the Nachisanmaru brought me in to Bangkok from Japan.
This was because there were no more than seven or eight passengers on the vessel, of whom I was the only Thai.
Thus, when the boat docked, I was able to see quite clearly the group of people waiting for me.
The first person I saw was my father. He was standing at the front of a group of more than ten close relatives.
There were four or five close friends of about the same age as me there, too.
Among the group of relatives was a woman I did not recognize, but from the way she looked at me, she seemed no less interested in me than anyone else.
I saw no sign of Mom Ratchawong Kirati among the group.
Only when I cast my eyes around the whole area did I see a beautiful figure in navy blue, leaning back against the door of a large saloon car.
Then I saw the tiny hand waving slowly to me.
I waved back happily, because even though she was standing some distance away, I recognized the figure as Mom Ratchawong Kirati.
Once the crew had fixed the gangway, all the friends and relatives who had come to meet me boarded the boat.
I stood by the gangway, ready to greet them.
My father was the first to welcome me. He came straight up to me and hugged his eldest son with all the love and emotion that he had kept bottled up for eight years.
I hugged him with the same emotion. Then other relatives and friends crowded round and expressed their affection in a similar fashion.
I cannot describe how I felt that first morning I reached Bangkok.
It was the most wonderful day of my life, and never since have I experienced such joy and happiness.
As I was greeting one lady a little uncertainly, my father came over, placed his hands on my shoulder, and told me that she was my fiancée.
Then I recognized her. She had a plain, ordinary-looking face, neither ugly nor beautiful.
Standing there before me, her manner was one of shyness and embarrassment.
I am not good at small talk and since we were only slightly acquainted, I said only a few words before she drew aside to let others come and greet me.
Mom Ratchawong Kirati was the last to come and see me.
She was wearing a navy-blue outfit with a white floral design, the same outfit as she had worn when I first met her in Tokyo, five or six years earlier.
However, even though it was the same outfit I remembered from a long time ago when we first met, strangely, that morning, it did not strike me.
It was strange, too, that Mom Ratchawong Kirati, for whatever reason, should have come to meet me on my first day in Bangkok, wearing the same clothes she had worn six years ago.
Her manner still seemed quiet and charming, as it had been in the past. The difference was that the dignity of her age, which was now past forty, made her even more charming.
Although some of her radiance had diminished, her attractiveness and great beauty had not abandoned her. She was still striking in appearance.
Mom Ratchawong Kirati touched my hand, and I squeezed hers, with all the joy and excitement I would have felt at meeting a sister who had been away for a long time. I was the first to speak.
‘I’ve missed you a lot.’
‘I’ve thought of you constantly. Constantly, since we parted,’ she said, slowly and calmly, although I could see the deep happiness in her eyes.
I felt embarrassed by her words when I recalled that, no matter how intensely I had missed her on occasions, my feelings had not remained constant, as hers had for me.
‘I’m so pleased to see you again,’ I continued.
‘And I’ve been waiting for you. Waiting all the time.’
‘You’re so kind to me.’
‘If what you say is true, then so I should be, shouldn’t I?’
‘I fear I’m not worthy. You’re too kind to me,’ I said, laughing. I paid no attention to the effect my response might have upon Mom Ratchawong Kirati. Nevertheless, she was silent for a while.
‘You’re hurting my hand,’ Mom Ratchawong Kirati chided me gently. ‘Today isn’t like when we parted at the docks in Kobe.’
‘Oh, I’m sorry,’ I cried, releasing her hand immediately. ‘I’m in Bangkok now and we don’t have to part again. We don’t have to go through that misery.’
‘Who knows, Nopporn?’ she countered softly, which puzzled me a little.
‘Well, I’m not planning to leave again for the rest of my life.’
‘But that’s not the only cause of parting, nor the only source of sorrow,’ she said, touching my arm. ‘But let’s not argue about it now. All your relatives are wanting you.’
‘You’re as much a relative as them, as far as I’m concerned.’
‘That may be so. But I still shouldn’t keep you to myself today. Off you go, my dear, go and see your father.’
So together we went straight to the ship’s saloon, where most of my friends and relatives were waiting.
Some of them dragged me off to the cabin I had occupied at sea, to see what my living conditions were like and to help carry my things off the boat.
After that, I was constantly surrounded by people, and scarcely got another opportunity to speak to Mom Ratchawong Kirati.
As we disembarked, I invited her to continue our conversation at home.
‘I must excuse myself, Nopporn. You should spend all of your first day with your close relatives.’
‘No relative is going to want me for the whole day.’
‘Well, there’s your father, at least. He’s going to want several hours to chat with a son who’s been away for seven or eight years. And there are others, too.’
‘My father’s not going to be so desperate to say everything in one single day,’ I replied with a laugh, but my manner remained composed.
‘Let’s meet another day, Nopporn.’
‘In that case, I’ll visit you as soon as I can,’ I said, deferring to her wishes.
The curtain fell all too quickly and unremarkably on that first day’s meeting in Bangkok between Mom Ratchawong Kirati and me.
Most of the day was taken up with meeting people, with a short rest in the afternoon.
In the evening, after dinner, I talked with my father in the sitting room.
At one point in our long conversation, the subject of Mom Ratchawong Kirati came up.
‘So, you’re very well acquainted with Khunying Atthikan, are you?’ he asked, as we chatted casually about various things.
‘You mean Khunying Kirati? Yes,’ I continued when he had confirmed this. ‘I became close friends with her when she visited Japan. I was assisting her and Chao Khun most of the time.’
‘It’s a shame Chao Khun died so soon. When he was alive,’ my father continued, ‘I heard him speak very highly indeed of his wife, and from what I’ve seen since he died, I think she’s a lovely woman, well worthy of high regard.’
‘I have great admiration for her,’ I responded.
‘Even though it wasn’t for very long, I got to know her very well.
She’s a very intelligent woman and a good person.
I’ve never met anyone sharper. I think she ought to marry again.
She surely won’t be able to escape the attentions of someone or other. ’
‘I’m not so sure, because since the death of Chao Khun Atthikan, I’ve heard that she takes little pleasure in society.
She leads a quiet life and is held in high esteem by all of Chao Khun Atthikan’s close friends everywhere.
Recently I heard that there was someone paying her a lot of attention, even, it seems, to the point of sounding her out on marriage.
But she turned him down. People say that she seems like someone with some sort of secret hidden away. ’
I listened calmly in silence and, after that, my father changed the subject.