The Machine

In a small Japanese nameplate workshop, one worker does the dangerous jobs everyone else avoids. His employer is generous, childlike, and incapable of holding on to money. The employer’s wife manages the household, while a loyal workman guards its secrets with suspicion and violence.

When another craftsman arrives to help complete an urgent order, the narrator sees a possible industrial spy—and an intelligence that attracts and unsettles him. Chemical experiments, secret formulas, imagined conversations, and shifting alliances draw the three men into a struggle whose motives become harder to distinguish. After a night of drinking, a death leaves the narrator unable to judge even his own actions.

First published in 1930, Yokomitsu Riichi’s psychological story explores the mechanisms of trust, self-deception, and responsibility. This new English translation presents the complete supplied text, preserving its eight long paragraphs and unresolved ending. Ten notes clarify cultural references, traditional measures, and uncertain workshop terms.