Japanese Ghost Stories by Hiroko Yoda

Author:Hiroko Yoda
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: classic horror; supernatural horror; short stories; ghost storiesl folktales
Publisher: Flame Tree Publishing
Published: 2023-11-01T13:55:49+00:00

Ghost Story of the Flute’s Tomb

Collected by Richard Gordon Smith

Long ago, at a small and out-of-the-way village called Kumedamura, about eight miles to the south-east of Sakai city, in Idsumo Province, there was made a tomb, the Fuezuka or Flute’s Tomb, and to this day many people go thither to offer up prayer and to worship, bringing with them flowers and incense-sticks, which are deposited as offerings to the spirit of the man who was buried there. All the year round people flock to it. There is no season at which they pray more particularly than at another.

The Fuezuka tomb is situated on a large pond called Kumeda, some five miles in circumference, and all the places around this pond are known as of Kumeda Pond, from which the village of Kumeda took its name.

Whose tomb can it be that attracts such sympathy? The tomb itself is a simple stone pillar, with nothing artistic to recommend it. Neither is the surrounding scenery interesting; it is flat and ugly until the mountains of Kiushu are reached. I must tell, as well as I can, the story of whose tomb it is.

Between seventy and eighty years ago there lived near the pond in the village of Kumedamura a blind amma called Yoichi. Yoichi was extremely popular in the neighbourhood, being very honest and kind, besides being quite a professor in the art of massage – a treatment necessary to almost every Japanese. It would be difficult indeed to find a village that had not its amma.

Yoichi was blind, and, like all men of his calling, carried an iron wand or stick, also a flute or ‘fuezuka’ – the stick to feel his way about with, and the flute to let people know he was ready for employment. So good an amma was Yoichi, he was nearly always employed, and, consequently, fairly well off, having a little house of his own and one servant, who cooked his food.

A little way from Yoichi’s house was a small teahouse, placed upon the banks of the pond. One evening (April 5th; cherry-blossom season), just at dusk, Yoichi was on his way home, having been at work all day. His road led him by the pond. There he heard a girl crying piteously. He stopped and listened for a few moments, and gathered from what he heard that the girl was about to drown herself. Just as she entered the lake Yoichi caught her by the dress and dragged her out.

“Who are you, and why in such trouble as to wish to die?” he asked.

“I am Asayo, the teahouse girl,” she answered. “You know me quite well. You must know, also, that it is not possible for me to support myself out of the small pittance which is paid by my master. I have eaten nothing for two days now, and am tired of my life.”

“Come, come!” said the blind man. “Dry your tears. I will take you to my house, and do what I can to help you.

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