Because Kazuko said she’d met him, despite his not remembering that, he thought (and was surprised) that he must have been sleepwalking or something.
The bit I don’t get is the run of hiragana after 夢遊病 (にでもかかったのかと), although the final と is self-explanatory. Is かかる here from 罹る, meaning ‘to suffer from’? And I’m assuming のか is something like nominalising and questioning the preceding statement - “I was suffering from sleepwalking or something like that”. Don’t know the role of にでも here though.
Page 34
ちょっとおどろいたというふうに、目をしばたたいている小松先生に一礼して、和子は自分の席にもどった。
So… just wondering - is Komatsu-sensei blinking their eyes with a slight air of surprise, or is Kazuko bowing at Komatsu-sensei with a slight air of surprise? I’m assuming the former because it would be weird to mention the blinking otherwise, but is there a way to tell unambiguously from the sentence or is it just context / the choice of word ordering?
You’re right about it all, but かかる simply goes with に, and the でも in the middle means sleep walking or something
After,
小松 is the one being modified, so it’s him. Also, the おどろいたというふうに is how he’s blinking, so.
Edit:
Paying more attention to your question, I wouldn’t say there’s a way to distinguish - gramatically - who is doing something in a surprised way. I think you have to just assume.
@seanblue さん made the same guess earlier, and I agree with it:
The rest of the hiragana you seem to have interpreted correctly, because your translation looks fine. でも here means “or something” or something like that (wink) and に is there because that’s the particle かかる is asking for, I assume. のか is also what you think it is, I would say.
found this example sentence in my dictionary to help understand the expression いのりを込める:
平和への祈りをこめて歌った：our singing embodied our (fervent) prayers for peace.
いのりをこめる would be best described in english as fervently then perhaps?
that explains it quite well… but the word ‘embody’ makes it even more visual and easy to remember for me.
Just finished ch 4… and now I’m wondering if I’ll spoil myself if I read on. Do you guys remember if you discussed these chapters more or less chronologically… or probably not. Guess I don’t really need to ask. xD I remember from previous threads that the spoilers weren’t always completely hidden. Guess I’ll come back after ch 5.
Depends how averse to spoilers you are. The discussion is definitely not chronological, so I’d stay away if you’re worried, but in general I think people are reasonably good at hiding things which give away genuine spoilers.
Pretty averse. I’ve been known to stop reading because what’s the point. Probably wouldn’t happen with this one as my main reason for reading is the Japanese and not the story, but better not risk it. Thanks!
Done! Thanks as always, it’s very helpful for me to go through these threads along side the book after reading.
In checking back if there was anything left unclear I’d like to ask, I found one thing I’d marked as grammar trouble. Solved that one by myself when I read over it again. Was making that sentence way more complicated than it turned out to be. xD
If you're curious what that sentence was
(This part on p28 in the つばさ文庫, 「みつけだそうとして」, for some reason in my head it went like, 見つけ・だそう・として… So stem + was said + she tried to. I was really hung up on the だそう, like, it didn’t even make any sense even while I was thinking it, but I couldn’t see past it. Somehow combining those first two parts to form one meaning did not occur to me until now. )
Good to know! But seriously, feels good to know that I’m not alone in making these mistakes. Might just be part of learning how to actually read Japanese.
I honestly kept coming up against this issue when writing out the question 
Thanks as always, it’s very helpful for me to go through these threads along side the book after reading.
But seriously, feels good to know that I’m not alone in making these mistakes. Might just be part of learning how to actually read Japanese.