But, oddly, try as he might, Kent could not draw even from the all-surrounding evidences of abject poverty an impression of suffering, of heart-rending misery. It was revolting that here several hundreds of humans were forced to find shelter in these miserable hovels, collections of rotten wood worth probably less than a thousand yen as kindling and fit for nothing else. But while presence of Americans or Europeans in such quarters would have caused him indignation, intense sympathy, here these people, inured to hardship by generation after generation of Spartan frugality, possessed a happy faculty of making the best of these wretched circumstances, of accepting them stoically. Mingled with the complaints, the stories of distress, had been laughter of children, the glimpse of the family at table, triumphantly wringing content from even such mean material. He was annoyed that he should feel like this, essentially unsympathetic, unable to register the distress which the plight of these people should produce; but the fact was that there seemed to be no anguish, no grinding, torturing grief.
He mentioned it to his companion. "It seems strange to me; here is poverty, and squalor and even want, and yet most of these people do not seem to be altogether unhappy; some even seem fairly well satisfied."
"Yes, that's true, but, as a matter of fact, you've come at the wrong time. Yesterday was the first of the month, and those of them who had jobs got their pay, and even those without jobs benefit from that. Those who have money share with the rest. But you ought to have been here last month, during the rains. I was down here trying to help, and the water came up to my armpits, tide and rain water mixed. The whole district was flooded, and the houses. In the single-story ones like the Tunnels the water stood several feet over the floors and the people had to construct makeshift shelves for themselves and their belongings. There they sat for several days, wet, hungry, cold. I've heard the cry of little children for food and their mothers trying to hush them, explaining that the father could not work during the flood. And that sort of thing is not unusual; it happens several times a year, as often as half a dozen times, whenever there is a heavy rain. This entire quarter is not fit for human habitation, but the factories have been built here because the location is convenient and the land comparatively cheap; and the workers must live near the factories. The whole district should be filled, but these people have no voice in the government. Only the rich can vote for city councilmen, and the government funds are spent for the benefit of the rich, in wide avenues in the fine residence districts, by hundreds of thousands for celebrations—but there is no money for rescuing the poor from the floods.
"And do you know that the odd thing is that it's these very same poor people who are carrying the burden of maintaining the city. Tokyo collects less than four million yen a year from land and house taxes, and yet she is the sixth largest city in the world. The revenue is collected by indirect taxation, by the huge profits of the car system, by the imposts and stamp duties and licenses for every conceivable thing. The proportion of business tax paid by the magnates is infinitesimally small when compared with that wrung from the peddlers and small shopkeepers. So you see, the poor wretches who must cling to their walls like bats while the flood waters sweep over their floors, are at the same time paying for the boulevards and improving the property whose owners contribute almost nothing. Until a few years ago they did not think of that; they didn't know that things could be different. But now they're being taught, and they're beginning to figure things out. This is the kind of a place that breeds 'dangerous thoughts,' and, I tell you, when I am down here during flood time, I come pretty close to having 'dangerous thoughts' myself."
A few days later Kent was telling of this experience to a group of friends, Japanese and foreign, chance-met at the Imperial Hotel bar. "It's damnable. Of course, in every country we have rich rolling in luxury and poor ones groaning in misery, but in no place is the gulf between the classes so great, and nowhere else are the plutocrats so utterly unfeeling, so heartless; in no place are the poor ground so hard to make such absurdly high profits, your sixty and seventy per cent. dividends, your constant subsidies to giant companies and industries, your tariffs for protection of profiteers. I tell you, when I was mucking about down there in Fukagawa and heard of what it was like during the rains, and what it will continue to be like, I felt that I should like to meet these people, the Watanabes, the Inouyes, the Yamanakas, the Oharas, the lady with the blood-dyed silken shift of the song, you know, and I should like to kick the whole damned outfit, yes, the lady, too, by the gods."
"Look out, Kent, you're getting 'dangerous thoughts.'" They laughed and dismissed the subject, but one of them, Hata, leaned across the table to Kent.
"You know, Kent-san, I don't think you'd want to kick them at all, if you met them. In fact, you'd like them. I'll bet you a tiffin on it."
"All right, you're on," he replied thoughtlessly. The others had taken up the question of the Chinese demand for the return of the Liaotung peninsula, and he was interested.
A few days later Hata appeared at his office. "I have an invitation for you, you and your friend, Mr. Karsten, to have luncheon with Baron and Baroness Ohara, almost any day that would suit you. Would next Friday do? You know," he had noted the surprise on Kent's face, "you said you'd like to meet them."
Could ever such an absurd situation occur outside of Japan? How the devil could he accept the hospitality of people whom he had said he would like to kick, the Baroness at that? And still he was greatly tempted to grasp this opportunity to see at first hand, in their intimate home surroundings, these people, these heartless plutocrats who ground down the poor that they might amass wealth in a measure far greater than they could possibly use by even the most extravagant luxury. He hesitated.