Tales of Old Japan - Maybe You Like It

The following evening, as Jiuyémon was sitting in his shop casting up
his accounts, with his counting-board 57 in his hand, Takaségawa passed
by, and Jiuyémon called out to him, saying:—
"Well met, Takaségawa! I was just thinking of drinking a cup of wine
to-night; but I have no one to keep me company, and it is dull work
drinking alone. Pray come in, and drink a bout with me."
"Thank you, sir, I shall have much pleasure," replied the wrestler, who
little expected what the other was aiming at; and so he went in, and they
began to drink and feast.
"It's very cold to-night," said Jiuyémon, after a while; "suppose we
warm up a little macaroni, and eat it nice and hot. Perhaps, however,
you do not like it?"
"Indeed, I am very fond of it, on the contrary."
"That is well. O Hiyaku, please go and buy a little for us."
"Directly," replied his wife, who hurried off to buy the paste, delighted
at the opportunity for carrying out her murderous design upon her husband.
As soon she had prepared it, she poured it into bowls and set it before
the two men; but into her husband's bowl only she put poison. Jiuyémon,
who well knew what she had done, did not eat the mess at
once, but remained talking about this, that, and the other; and the wrestler,
out of politeness, was obliged to wait also. All of a sudden, Jiuyémon
cried out—
"Dear me! whilst we have been gossiping, the macaroni has been getting
cold. Let us put it all together and warm it up again. As no one has
put his lips to his bowl yet, it will all be clean; so none need be wasted."
And with these words he took the macaroni that was in the three bowls,
and, pouring it altogether into an iron pot, boiled it up again. This time
Jiuyémon served out the food himself, and, setting it before his wife and
the wrestler, said—
"There! make haste and eat it up before it gets cold."
Jiuyémon, of course, did not eat any of the mess; and the would-be
murderers, knowing that sufficient poison had been originally put into
Jiuyémon's bowl to kill them all three, and that now the macaroni, having
been well mixed up, would all be poisoned, were quite taken aback,
and did not know what to do.
"Come! make haste, or it will be quite cold. You said you liked it, so I
sent to buy it on purpose. O Hiyaku! come and make a hearty meal. I
will eat some presently."
57.The abacus, or counting-board, is the means of calculation in use throughout the
Continent from St. Petersburg to Peking, in Corea, Japan, and the Liukiu Islands.
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