No Longer Human ( PDFDrive )

139
I answered nonchalantly, "It doesn't matter. You
can say anything before her."
As a matter of fact, Yoshiko was what I should
like to call a genius at trusting people. She suspected
nothing of my relations with the madam of the bar in
Kyobashi, and even after I told her all about the incident
which occurred at Kamakura, she was equally
unsuspicious of my relations with Tsuneko. It was
not because I was an accomplished liar—at times I
spoke quite bluntly, but Yoshiko seemed to take everything
I said as a joke.
"You seem to be just as cocksure of yourself as
ever. Anyway, it's nothing important. She asked me
to tell you to visit her once in a while."
Just when I was beginning to forget, that bird
of ill-omen came flapping my way, to rip open with
its beak the wounds of memory. All at once shame
over the past and the recollection of Bin unfolded
themselves before my eyes and, seized by a terror so
great it made me want to shriek, I could not sit still
a moment longer. "How about a drink?" I asked.
"Suits me," said Horiki.
Horiki and myself. Though outwardly he appeared
to be a human being like the rest, I sometimes
felt he was exactly like myself. Of course that was
only after we had been making the round of the bars,
drinking cheap liquor here and there. When the two