The Red Eye

Okiku was a maid at the mansion of the Japanese samurai Tessan Aoyama. The samurai wanted to seduce the cute girl but she rejected his advances. Aoyama used a trick. He hid one of ten valuable Dutch plates and threatened to Okiku to make public that she had stolen the plate unless she agreed to become his mistress. In her desperation Okiku threw herself into the well and drowned.

Every night afterwards, Okiku's ghost rose from the well, counts slowly to nine and then broke into heartrending sobs, over and over and over again, tormenting the samurai. Finally, vengeance is wrought when Aoyama goes insane.

There are different versions of the ghost story of Okiku. What they all have in common is the description of her ghost coming out of the well and counting from one to nine and then breaking out into a heart-rendering sobbing.

In an alternate version, Aoyama wishes Okiku to become his mistress, and falsely accuses her of breaking a plate so that he can offer forgiveness in exchange for her love. When she refuses, he kills her and throws her into the well.

In another version, Okiku really breaks a plate and is killed by her master and her corpse is thrown into the well.

In yet another version, it is the wife of Aoyama, who breaks the plate. To hide her guilt, she throws the broken plate into the well and accuses Okiku of having it stolen. In this version she is also killed by her master for punishment and thrown into the well.

There is also an alternate version for the end of the story. To stop the nightly sobbing, a friend of the family of Aoyama is hired. He is hiding at the well during the night and after Okiku had counted from one to nine, he is stepping forward shouting loudly "ten". From then on the ghost of Okiku was never seen again.

Some Japanese fear planting chrysanthemums in their garden as they think that that will be able to invoke the spirit of Okiku and she would then start haunting them!