The operation

The servants are frightened and angry. The old gardener says the white man should be allowed to die: his own government would kill him anyway. When Hana asks the maid Yumi to wash the man, Yumi refuses: she will not wash a white man.

Hana is angry with Yumi, but she does not give up. She takes the basin and washes the man herself, though she has never touched a white man before, because he is a wounded, helpless human being.

Sadao decides to operate. There is no one else to help, so Hana gives the anaesthetic, though she has never done it. The sight of the wound makes her feel sick, and once she has to run out of the room to vomit; then she comes back and goes on.

Sadao works with complete concentration. He finds the bullet lodged very near the kidney, and removes it. While he works, he is lost in the problem of saving a life; at one moment he even speaks to the patient as 'my friend'.

After the operation, the man is in danger, but Sadao gives him an injection, and he lives. Hana notices scars on his neck: perhaps he was tortured as a prisoner.