"Did they cook locusts, too?" my grandson asks me curiously, just as I once asked my grandfather and as my grandfather had once asked his grandfather. Before I reply, I break off a blade of grass and scrape the yellowish mucus which is about to drip into his mouth away from his nose. "Of course they did!"

　　I look into my grandson's black eyes as a feeling of sorrow and chill slowly comes over me. Although the grassland at dusk is still blazing hot, the breeze off the marsh is already cool. The smell of sludge penetrates into the very marrow of our bones. Seventy years have passed by in the twinkling of an eye. The times to dream about the dead have increased. I'm glad that the day of my own death isn't far off.

　　 ......In the beginning, Little Halfbreed sat there poking at an ant hill with a stem of grass. The thin man, skinny as a coil of black smoke, chuckled coldly behind him. Little Halfbreed wasn't scared; for the chuckling was familiar to him. The old folks of his clan all chuckled like that. Little Halfbreed coaxed a pink ant onto the stem of grass and let it creep along until it reached the end. The ant, as if at the edge of an abyss, scratched its head in hesitation. It was badly frightened. A black foot, like a monster with a life of its own, passed over Little Halfbreed's shoulder and set down before him. He could smell the foot. It had the faint odour of a wild chrysanthemum. The ant jumped to the protruding toes and quickly mounted, climbing over the instep and the ankle. Little Halfbreed looked up when he couldn't see the ant anymore. The dark, thin man was staring at him with eyes of sharply contrasting black and white. On his lips was a spectral smile. In his mouth were two rows of steely teeth ......

　My grandfather told me that Little Halfbreed examined the dark man for a while before all of a sudden asking, "Who are you?" The man in black replied, "I am myself." That was how they got acquainted. They didn't say anything to each other on the first day; nor did they on the second day. On the third day, when it was getting dark, the man in black said, "Tomorrow, I'll tell you something."

　　"Was it the story about how the young horse crossed over the marsh?" asks my grandson with curiosity. "Why did the young horse want to cross the marsh? Was it because there wasn't any tasty grass for it to eat south of the mash? ..."

　　"Don't interrupt!" I say to my grandson just as my grandfather had scolded me. "Don't interrupt!".

　　On the grass .... locusts were hopping about. It was oddly painful when one hit my tender skin ... A locust of shiny, fiery red perches on my withered, aged skin. It has a lustre to it, as if carved from jade, a real treasure. The spines on its legs are tickling me; so I raise my hand and brush it off.

"Grandpa, the locust is hurting me," my grandson says tearfully.

　　"Let's go under the three willows. The grass isn't so dense, and there're fewer locusts."

　　I was drawn in by the story about the dark man told by my grandfather. I could almost see the dark man's face and his dishevelled hair. He bore a perfect resemblance to black smoke ... My grandfather killed a locust on his arm and then led me to the three willows.