Five

Ordinarily Suezō thought of little else than money matters, but before he had even ascertained Otama's where-abouts or whether she would agree to his proposal, he had begun looking around for a house to rent some-where in his neighborhood. After considering a number of possibilities, he found two that were to his liking. One was situated on the edge of the pond, half-way between the home of the writer Fukuchi Gen’ichirō, which was next to his own home, and the Rengyo-kuan, a restaurant famous for its buckwheat noodles. It was situated just beyond the southwest corner of the pond, in