     I was looking around the room uncertainly, trying to persuade myslef that this place wasn't'so bad, when suddenly I heard the sound of someone crying. I turned my head and saw that it was a fourteen or fifteen year old boy sniffling loudly behind me. There was someone next to the boy, talking in a low voice - - it seemed as thoguh he was trying to comfort him. Although I couldn't hear what they were saying, I knew what it felt like to be miserable like that. I was new and didn't have the courage to deal with this sort of a situation, but my heart began to feel heavy. Why was it that just when I was so happy to have found a job, this young boy was so unhappy that he was crying bitterly? Finally I decided that the boy was just too young. He must have been crying because he was homesick. With this thought, I stopped worrying so much.

     In the middle of my dreamy state, eight o'clock came and an electric bell rang. "Time to sleep, it'll be morning soon?the newspapers arrive between two and three in the morning and everyone has to get up then," Tanaka told me.

III.
     Starting at the foot of the wall, more and more people began to lie down in rows. The room was already packed full of people. I didn't know if I could squeeze in - - there didn't seem to be enough room even to lie down on my side. Tanaka took the quilt, and the two of us, along with another boy named Sato squeezed in. We were squeezed together very tightly. I couldn't even move, much less turn my body. I'd seen people pack porcelain ware into bamboo containers before - - when you do that, the tighter you pack it, the better - - you shouldn't leave any empty spaces. I think we were packed in as tightly as that. No, it was more like tinned sardines. We all had to be pressed together tightly like that or else we couldn't fit.

     At home, out in the country, I slept in a wide open space. The room was always swept because I can't stand lice. But the Osaki Newspaper Dispatch was covered with nests of jumping lice. They would attack your entire body, at your feet, thighs, waist, belly, and chest. It itched so much I couldn't stand it. Although the rooms in the cheap hotels I used to stay in also had lice, they weren't as crowded as this place. There at least you could get out from under the covers and scratch. In this "half floor" place you couldn't even move - - we were packed together like canned sardines. The only way to endure it was to set your teeth and resign yourself to be patient. When I thought of how hard it had been to find this job, this job that represented the first step leading to success, then I thought that this bit of discomfort didn't matter at all.

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