はるか昔、武蔵の国のとある山里に、茂作と巳之吉という二人の木こりが住んでいた。茂作はもう髪が真っ白に近い老人であったが、弟子の巳之吉はまだ十八の血気盛んな若者であった。
Long, long ago, in a mountain village in the old province of Musashi, there lived two woodcutters named Mosaku and Minokichi. Mosaku was an old man whose hair was already nearly white, but his apprentice Minokichi was a hot-blooded youth of just eighteen.
ある冬の日のことであった。二人がいつものように奥山で木を切っていると、午後遅くから空模様が急に怪しくなり、たちまち吹き荒れる猛烈な吹雪に見舞われてしまった。
It happened on a winter's day. The two of them were at work up in the depths of the mountains as usual when, late in the afternoon, the sky abruptly turned strange, and in no time at all they were caught in a fierce, raging blizzard.
帰ろうにも、視界はわずか数歩先までしか効かず、道はすっかり雪に埋もれていた。仕方なく、二人は山道の途中にあった渡し守の粗末な小屋に転がり込み、嵐をやり過ごすことにしたのである。
They tried to start home, but visibility extended only a few paces ahead, and the path was wholly buried in snow. There was nothing for it but to tumble into a ferryman's rough hut beside the trail and wait out the storm there.
小屋には火の気もなく、外と変わらぬほど冷たかったが、もはやそれ以上のぜいたくは言えなかった。二人は身を寄せ合うようにして横になり、長い一日の疲れに身を任せて深い眠りに落ちていった。
There was no fire in the hut, and within it was as bitterly cold as outside, but they could no longer afford any more luxury than this. Drawing close to one another, the two of them lay down, surrendered to the weariness of the long day, and dropped into deep sleep.
夜中、ふと巳之吉は、自分の頬に氷のように冷たい息が吹きかかるのを感じて目を覚ました。半分眠ったままぼんやり目を開けると、すぐそばに、見たこともない白い装束をまとった一人の女の姿があった。
In the middle of the night, Minokichi awoke at the sensation of a breath cold as ice playing over his cheek. Half asleep, opening his eyes to a dim half-vision, he saw, right beside him, a woman in a white robe such as he had never seen before.
髪は深い黒、肌は雪のように白く、何より目を奪われたのは、その口から漏れる息が音もなく白く凍りついていくさまであった。女は茂作の上にすうっとかがみ込み、長い長い白い息を、まるで霜のように吹きかけていた。
Her hair was a deep, cold black, her skin white as snow, and what most of all riveted his gaze was the way the breath escaping from her mouth froze silently into white vapor in the air. She had leaned down softly over Mosaku and was breathing upon him, a long, long white stream of breath like frost.
巳之吉が声を上げる間もなく、茂作は身じろぎひとつしないまま、すでにこと切れていた。
Before Minokichi could so much as cry out, Mosaku, without a single twitch, was already dead.
ようやく気づいた女が振り返り、巳之吉と目が合った瞬間、彼の血は全身から引いていくようであった。「お前にも同じようにしてやろうかと思ったものの、見れば、まだ若い体つきをしておる」と、女は静かな声で言った。
At last the woman noticed him; she turned, and the moment their eyes met, the blood seemed to drain from every part of his body. "I had thought to do the same to you," she said in a quiet voice, "but seeing you, I find your body still very young."