I easily located the station and purchased my ticket. The train I boarded was like a match box on wheels. After rattling along for what seemed but a handful of minutes, it was already time to get off. No wonder the ticket only cost me three sen. I hired a rickshaw and rode to the school, but it was after hours and no one was there. The janitor informed me that the fellow on night duty had gone out on errands. Seems they had a rather loose interpretation of "duty." I thought of calling on the principal, but I was exhausted by that point, so I asked my driver to take me to an inn. He quickly pulled me to a place called Yamashiroya. Interestingly, this was the same name as the next door pawn shop in my old neighborhood where Kantarō lived.
I was shown to a dark room beneath the staircase. This room was unbearably hot. I asked for a better room but was told that, unfortunately, all of the other rooms were occupied. Then they tossed my bags down and left. There was nothing to do but stay and sweat it out. When they finally called me to the bath, I jumped in with a splash and finished quickly. On the way back to my room I looked in on a number of empty rooms that were cooler than mine. These folks were disrespectful and dishonest. After a while the maid brought my dinner tray. The room was stifling, but the food was much better than at my former lodgings. While serving, the maid asked where I was from, so I told her I was from Tōkyō. When she replied that Tōkyō must be a nice place, I told her of course it was. After she took the finished tray away and returned to the kitchen, I heard loud laughter. I'd had enough of their nonsense by now and turned in early, but I couldn't sleep. It wasn't just the heat, but the noise too. This place was five times louder than my former lodgings. When I did drift off, I dreamt of Kiyo. She was munching on her leaf-wrapped sweets from Echigo, bamboo leaf and all. I told her she should stop because bamboo leaves are poisonous, but she replied that these leaves were medicine and continued eating. I was greatly amazed at this and laughed out loud. My laugh woke me, and I saw that the maid was opening the shutters. The weather was unchanged, just an endlessly clear sky.