The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet question

The Thousand Flutterings of Butterfly Wings


Bewildered Jasper DeZoet watches the scenes of the mnemo-parallax flash through his mind and prepares for the risky psychosurgery proposed by Marinus and Esther. Perhaps words spoken by Marinus to Jasper’s great great great grandfather nearly two hundred years before would have helped him to comprehend. “The soul is a verb. Not a noun.”
1799. Above Nagasaki the unborn son of Shiroyama, motionless and pulseless is roughly pulled from the womb - a stillborn, lifeless, clammy. A moth the size of a bird enters and blunders into the midwife Orito Aibagawa; forceps loudly clatter down. Four verbs: enter, blunder, clatter and soul have arrived with the fluttering moth along with the rebirth of the mewling, shuddering now pink heir of the Magistrate.
As disrespectful men gossip about the unprecedented presence of Miss Aibagawa on Dijima, interpreter of the third rank Ogawa Uzaemon defends her and his secret aspirations. “I am sure Miss Aibagawa one day make joyful marriage.” Just then, a moth careers into a candle flame and drops to the table, flapping. One of the group crushes it with his tankard, “Poor Icarus. Won’t you ever learn?” The adoring and gallant Ogawa will not.
The imperious Doctor Marinus permits Jacob DeZoet a brief time with Miss Aibagawa. She shares her dream of saving mothers and babies by advancing medical knowledge. Realizing the barriers to this in the Japan of her time she lowers her eyes. “A noble aspiration!” Jacob enthuses. “Aspiration is a goal in life,” he explains. “AH! A goal in life.” she repeats at the very moment a white butterfly lands upon her hand. She puffs it away. It flies up to a bronze candle on a shelf. The white butterfly closes and opens and closes and opens its wings.
As Abbot Enomoto alludes to his affinity with the foreigner DeZoet, a slow white butterfly passes within inches of Jacob’s face. Moments later, as Enomoto reveals “Our affinity was Orito”, the white butterfly passes inches from Enomoto’s face. Emphasizing his power and control, the abbot circles his hand above the butterfly which drops lifeless into a dark pool. “Our affinity is ended.” Does the smug self assurance of the harvester of souls blind him to a new affinity? The scroll hidden under Jacob’s coat portends a death vastly more important to the Abbot than that of the poor little white butterfly.
The Hall of the Sixty Mats lies nearly empty as Magistrate Shiroyama prepares to settle accounts with Edo, paying with his honorable death. Enomoto has won their final game of Go. Awaiting his final moments, Shiroyama imagines hundreds of souls, wronged by Enomoto, watching from the shadows, thirsty for vengeance. A black swallowtail butterfly blunders across the table.
The poisoned sake has fulfilled its promise. Enomoto’s anger shines from his eyes. “I cannot die!” Shiroyama’s heart stops and the earth’s pulse beats against his ear. An inch away is a go clamshell stone. A black butterfly lands on the white stone and unfolds its wings. Perhaps the butterfly carries the Magistrate’s soul to the High Ridge and the Dusk. Perhaps the black butterfly carries the soul of Enomoto against the Sea Wind and across Nagasaki to the moment the bewildered Jasper sees in the mnemo-parallax. Jacob sits writing in a ledger as a small black hole between his brows dwindles to nothing. Marinus explains to the struggling guitarist, “That was the moment Knock-Knock entered your ancestor and began his journey all the way to you.”