頓野の在に親戚の女の人を訪れに行く母は勘六橋を渡りきると、それまでさしていた絵日傘をすぼめて、傘の先でこちら側の川岸の橋の下を指し示す。

「ほら、勘六橋のお玉さんばい」

母の右手か伸ばした絵日傘の、その先には橋の下の、橋桁と橋桁に横木を渡し、炭俵を掛け渡しただけの俄造りの小屋か、そして、小屋の前には小犬の顔のようなそらまめの花がいっぱい咲いていた。

「唐豆(とうまめ)の花のあるばい？」

「お玉さんの、お汁(つい)の実に植えなったとやろたい」

晩い春のゆったりと瀬(ものう)い遠賀川の水照(みで)りを浴びて、微風(そよかぜ)に揺れ動いているそらまめの花はいかにもそこに人が生きているという、人間くさい生活(たつき)の匂いをさせていたが、その匂いの本体であるお玉さんの姿は、どこにもなかった。

「お玉さんな？」

「物乞(ほいと)にでん、行(い)とんなるとやろたい」

母に間くお玉さんは、もともと直方の裕福な町方の娘だった。年頃になって、頓野の大百姓の御寮人(ごりおん)さんになり、玉のような男の子も生んだ。夫は優しく、身代は豊かに、男衆(おとこし)、女衆(おなごし)にかしずかれ、お玉さんは何不自由ない、しあわせな身の上のはずだった。それか急に、ほんとうに急に、「狐のついた如(ごと)」気がふれて出奔し、勘六橋の下に住むようになったと言うのだ。

夫や身寄りの者は勘六橋まで出向いて、この狂女をつれ戻す。さして抵抗するでもなく、狂女は婚家の夫と息子のもとへ連れ戻される。しかし、二、三日すると、この大人しい狂女はもう勘六橋の下の、日だまりにいて、着ている長総社を細く裂いて、こよりにしているのだった。

どんな頑乗な座敷牢に入れても、どんなに厳重な監視付きでも、お玉さんは「幽霊のように」いなくなった。そして、いなくなると同時に勘六橋にいた。頓野から勘六橋に向う道筋で逃げて行くお玉さんを見たという人は一人もないと、母は怖ろしそうに言う。

お玉さんの息子は当然、「気狂いの子」「物乞(ほいと)の子」とはやされ、いじめられた。いまは大きくなり、死んだ父親に替って、家をとりしきっている。どこぞの在から新嫁(にいよめ)ももらい、村の信望も篤い。息子もまた、母親思いで、勘六橋まで出向いては、何度か狂える母親を連れ戻そうとした。しかし、いまではあきらめて、月に三度、十日ごとに早朝出かけては勘六橋のほとりに笊(しようけ)に入れた精米(しらげ)を置き、盆暮れには腰巻や着物を置いておく。

朝な朝な、炊(かし)ぎの煙が橋の下から昇り、腰巻や着物か橋桁から橋桁に渡した綱にかかっているのを見ると、息子の心づくしはたしかに母親の手に渡っているのだろうか、さて、それがいとしい息子からの贈りものだとわかっているかの段になると……。

I sometimes went with Mother as she went to visit a female relative in Tonno. When we would cross Kanroku Bridge, she would close her decorative parasol then point with the tip at the riverbank below.

“Down there, below Kanroku Bridge is where Otama-san lives.”

The decorated parasol in her right hand pointed below the bridge where the horizontal beams of the bridge passed from pillar to pillar. There were straw bags, the kind that originally held coal, hanging between the pillars to form a makeshift shelter. In front of that was a bunch of fava bean flowers, which always looked to me like the faces of little puppy dogs.

“Down there with the flowers?”

“Yeah, Otama-san must have planted them so she can make them into soup later.”

Stirred by the wind and bathed in the shallows of the Onga River which flowed so listlessly in late spring, the fava bean flowers did make it appear someone was indeed living there. Still, Otama, the woman whose existence was suggested by these plants, was nowhere to be seen.

No matter how hard they would try to keep her at home, no matter how strictly they kept watch over her, Otama-san would always find a way to escape — sometimes simply disappearing ‘like a ghost.’

“Where is she?”

“She’s probably gone out to beg.”

According to Mother, Otama was originally the daughter of a well-to-do family in Naokata. When she got to be of marriageable age, she became the wife of a wealthy farmer in Tonno and gave birth to a lovely, little boy. Her husband was kind; she had plenty of money, and she had male and female servants to wait on her. She lived a life free of want, and should have been entirely happy. All of the sudden, however, she lost her senses and began living under Kanroku Bridge. It was so sudden that it was as if she had been possessed by some malevolent spirit.

Her husband and other relatives set out to Kanroku Bridge to bring the madwoman back. She did not resist as they took her back home to where her husband and son lived, but only a few days would go by before the madwoman was back at her sunny spot below Kanroku Bridge, ripping the undergarments of her kimono into long strips and twisting them to form strings.

No matter how hard they would try to keep her at home, no matter how strictly they kept watch over her, Otama-san would always find a way to escape — sometimes simply disappearing “like a ghost.” No sooner had she disappeared than she would reappear at the Kanroku Bridge. Mother told me that not a single person had ever seen Otama-san escape along the road from Tonno to the Kanroku Bridge. As she said this, she made a scary voice.

Naturally, people teased Otama-san’s son. They bullied him, calling him “the crazy lady’s son” and “the beggar’s boy.” By the time I went to the bridge, however, he had grown up. His father had passed away, and he had taken charge of his father’s household. He had taken a bride and had a great reputation in town. Still, he thought of his mother. I was told he had gone over and over to the bridge to try to bring back his mother, but eventually he gave up completely. Three times a month — every ten days — he went early in the morning and put a basket full of uncooked, polished rice next to the bridge. At the end of the Obon season, he also left her a kimono and a sash. It was clear his gifts had reached her when he saw the smoke rising from the fire at the base of the bridge where she cooked the rice every morning or when he saw the kimono and sash hanging on her clothesline between the pillars. Still, was she aware that these gifts were from her beloved son…?