"By now the morning light had begun to trickle into the city, as if to suggest that God had finally noticed the sufferings of man. Shops opened their doors, and flocks of cows and sheep, the bells around their necks tinkling, crossed the streets. Unlike Japan, here no one gave Otsu a strange look as he passed by with the old woman on his back.
How many people, how much agony had he taken on his shoulders and brought to the River Ganges? Otsu wiped away the seat with a soiled cloth and tried to steady his breathing. Having only a fleeting connection with these people, Otsu could have no idea what their past lives had been like. All he knew about them was that each was an outcast in this land, a member of an abounded cast of humanity.
He could tell how high the sun had climbed from the intensity of the light that struck his neck and back.
O Lord, Otsu offered up a prayer. You carried the cross upon your back and climbed the hill to Golgotha. I now imitate that act. A single thread of smoke already was rising from the funeral pyres at the Manikarnika Ghat. You carried the sorrows of all men on your back and climbed the hill to Golgotha. I now imitate that act."
-Shusaku Endo, Deep River
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