Gai-Jin (80 page)

“School? What school?” Zukumura mumbled. No one paid any attention.

“I disagree.” Toyama’s dewlaps shook. “The closer our sons get to gai-jin, the more infected they’ll be.”

“No,” Anjo said, “we’ll personally select the students—we must have trusted barbarian speakers. We will vote: the Bakufu will be ordered to form a language school at once. Agreed? Good, next, the gai-jin letter: we will continue Yoshi-sama’s tactic, the day before it’s due we tell them it will arrive ‘as soon as possible.’ Agreed?”

“Sorry, no,” he had said, “we must do the exact opposite. We must deliver the letter on time, exactly, and give them the second blackmail payment on time too.”

They stared at him and Zukumura mumbled, “Letter?”

Yoshi said patiently, “The gai-jin must be kept off balance. They will be expecting us to delay, so we don’t, and that will make them believe the one hundred and fifty-six days is also firm, which of course it isn’t.
That
we certainly delay and delay and hope to send them all mad.” They had laughed with him, even Zukumura who did not understand why they were laughing had laughed anyway—and even more when Yoshi told them how many times he had almost guffawed during the meeting, seeing how their impatience was ruining their already illusory bargaining position. “‘Without the killer dog the master’s as weak as a puppy against a man with a stick.’”

“What? Man with a stick?” Zukumura asked, his dead codfish eyes peering stupidly. “What dog?”

Much of Yoshi’s good humor had left him, reminded that now he had to endure this feebleminded man forever. Nonetheless, he explained that without muscle to back up their complaints, and the will to use it, the enemy were helpless.

“Muscle? Don’t understand, Yoshi-sama. What muscle?”

“Force,” Anjo said impatiently. “Force! Their cannons and their fleets, Zukumura. Oh, never mind!”

Toyama, the old man, said fiercely, “While they’re without their fleet we should burn them out—they are unspeakably arrogant, with foul manners, and as for their spokesman … I’m glad I didn’t have to be present, Yoshi-sama, I think I would have burst. Let’s burn them out, now.”

“Who? Burn who?”

“Keep quiet, Zukumura,” Anjo said wearily, “and just vote when I tell
you, Yoshi-sama, I agree with your reasoning. We’ll send the letter on time and the second part of their blackmail money when agreed. Everyone in favor? Good. Next: now that we’ve dealt with the gai-jin, and the Shōgun and Princess are safely on the North Road there’s not much to do for the next week or so.”

“Allowing them to go was a misguided decision and will come back to haunt us,” Yoshi had said.

“In this you are wrong. Please prepare a plan, your ideas how to bring that dog Sanjiro and Satsuma to heel. I vote we meet in two weeks, unless there is an emergency …”

Later, going back to his own quarters, Yoshi had not been able to think of any potential emergency that would require his presence in Yedo—even the second covert, whispered invitation to visit the French warship that he neither accepted nor refused but left open for the weeks ahead was not urgent. So he had resolved to put into effect at once the plan he and his wife, Hosaki, had devised. Now Anjo and his bowmen were barring his path.

What to do?

“Good night, Anjo-sama,” he said, making the decision. “As always, I will keep you advised.” Covering his disquiet and feeling naked, he spurred his pony forward, heading for the far archway. None of the archers moved, waiting for orders. His men and the two palanquins followed him, feeling equally defenseless.

Anjo watched them go, enraged. But for those rifles I would have had him arrested as planned. On what charge? Treason, plotting against the Shogun! But Yoshi would never have been brought to trial, oh no, so sorry, fools would have killed him as he tried to escape justice.

A sudden shaft of pain in his bowels made him grope for a seat.
Baka
doctors! There must be a cure, he told himself, then heaped more curses on Yoshi and the men who had disappeared under the far archway.

Yoshi was breathing better now, the fear sweat no longer chilling him. He trotted deeper into fortifications, along poorly lit corridors, passed more stables and harness rooms until he came to the end wall. The wall was sheathed in wood. Men dismounted and lit torches from those in wall brackets.

With his riding whip he pointed at a knob to one side. His aide dismounted and pulled it sharply. A whole section of the wall swung outwards to reveal a tunnel, tall enough and wide enough for two men to ride along, side by side. At once he heeled his pony into motion. When the palanquins and the last man were through and the door once more closed, he sighed with relief. Only then did he holster the rifle.

But for you, Rifle-san, he thought affectionately, I might be a dead man, at the very least a prisoner. Sometimes I can see a rifle really is better than a sword. You deserve a name—it was ancient Shinto custom to give names to
special swords or weapons or even rocks or trees. I shall call you “Nori,” which also can mean “seaweed” and is a pun on Nori Anjo, to remind me that you saved me from him and that one of your bullets belongs to him, in his heart or head.

“Eeee, Lord,” his Captain said, riding alongside. “Your shooting was a marvelous thing to behold.”

“Thank you, but you and all the men were ordered to be silent until I gave you leave to speak. You are demoted. Go to the rear.” The crestfallen man hurried away. “You,” Yoshi said to his second in command, “you are now Captain.” He turned in his saddle and went forward again, leading.

The air was stale in the tunnel. This was one of the many secret escape routes honeycombing the castle. The castle with its three moats and soaring donjon had taken just four years to build—five hundred thousand men had, at Shōgun Toranaga’s suggestion and at no cost to him, proudly worked on it night and day until it was finished.

The floor of the tunnel sloped downwards and curled this way and that, the sides hewn out of rock in places and roughly bricked in others, the ceiling propped here and there but in good repair. Always downwards but without danger. Now water dripped from the sides and the air became cooler and Yoshi knew that they were under the moat. He pulled his cloak closer around him, hating the tunnel and almost sick with claustrophobia—a legacy from the time when he and his wife and sons had been close confined for almost half a year in dungeon-like rooms by tairō Ii not so very long ago. Never again will I be confined, he had sworn, never again.

In time the floor sloped upwards and they came to the far end that opened into a house. This was a safe place that belonged to a loyal Toranaga clan vassal, who, forewarned, greeted him. Relieved that there was no further trouble, Yoshi motioned the advance guard to lead.

The night was pleasing and they trotted through the city by little known paths until they were on the outskirts and at the first barrier of the Tokaidō. There hostile guards immediately became docile seeing the Toranaga standard. Hastily they opened the barricade and bowed and closed it, all of them curious but none stupid enough to ask questions.

Not far beyond the barrier the road forked. A side road meandered northwards, inland, towards the mountains that, in a normal three or four days’ ride, would bring him to his castle, Dragon’s Tooth. Gladly the advance guard swung that way, heading for home—to their homes as well as his, most of them not having seen their families, fiancées or friends for the best part of a year. Half a league down the road, approaching a village where there was a fine watering place and a hot spring, he called out, “Guards!” beckoning them back.

The new Captain of the escort reined in alongside and almost said, Sire? but caught himself in time. He waited.

Yoshi pointed at an Inn as though a sudden decision. “We stop there.” It was called Seven Seasons of Happiness. “No need for silence now.”

The courtyard was neat and tidy and cobbled. At once the proprietor and maids and menservants hurried out with lanterns, bowing and anxious to please, honored with the majesty of their expected guest. Maids surrounded the palanquin to take care of Koiko, while the proprietor, a neat, balding, slim old man who walked with a limp, conducted Yoshi to the best and most isolated bungalow. He was a retired samurai called Inejin who had decided to shave his knot and become an innkeeper. Secretly he was still hatomoto—a privileged samurai—one of Yoshi’s many spies that dotted the surrounds of Yedo and all approaches to Dragon’s Tooth. The new Captain, conscious of his responsibility, and four samurai accompanied them, Misamoto and his two guards last.

Quickly the Captain made sure the dwelling was secure. Then Yoshi settled himself on the veranda, on a cushion facing the steps, the Captain and the other samurai kneeling on guard behind him. He noticed the maid offering tea was fresh-faced and well chosen, the tea tasting better for it. When he was quite ready he waved the maids and servants away. “Please bring them here, Inejin,” he ordered.

In moments Inejin returned. With him were the two gai-jin prospectors. One tall, the other stocky, both gaunt, tough-looking, bearded men wearing grimy, rough clothes and battered caps. Yoshi studied them curiously, distastefully, seeing them more as creatures than men. Both were uneasy. They stopped near the steps, gaping at him.

At once the Captain said, “Bow!” and when they did nothing, just stared at him without understanding, he snarled at two samurai, “Teach them manners.”

In seconds they were on their knees, faces in the dirt, cursing their stupidity at accepting such a perilous job: “Wot the fuck, Charlie,” the stocky man, a Cornish miner, had said in Drunk Town a few days ago after their meeting with Norbert Greyforth, “wot we’s got to lose? Nuffink! We’s starving and we’s broke, we’s no work, we’s can put nuffink more on the slate, man—even with my cobber Bonzer, for Gawd’s sake—there ain’t a bar in Yokopoko that’ll give us a beer, a bed or a bite of bread let alone some crumpet. Not a ship’ll give us a berth. We’s stuck and soon the Aussie Peelers’ll land here, or yors from ’Frisco, then we’s both be in chains, me hanging for bushwhacking a few poxy, claim-jumping miners and you for rustling and shooting some bloody bankers.”

“You trust that bastard Greyforth?”

“Where’s yor honner, me old cock sparrer! We give him our markers, right? He done like he promise, a proper toff, right? He give we’s twenty-two quid to pay wot we’s owe to stay out of the brig, another twenty in the bank for when we’s back, all shovels, powder and goods we’s need and a
sworn contract in front of the preacher that we’s to gets two parts of every five we ships to Yoko, right? All like he promise, right? He’s a toff but all toffs is slimy.”

The two men had guffawed, the other saying, “You’re goddam right.”

“Now we’s the prospectors, right? It’s we’s who finds the pay dirt, right? In Jappo land, where’s we’s alone, right? We’s kin hide a poke or two, eh? And sneak it out, right? All the grub, booze and dinkie-die for a year, our own bleeding Yoshiwara for not a penny piece, an’ a first shot at Jappo gold? Me, I’m in if you isn’t…. ”

“Let them sit up, do not hurt them. Misamoto!”

Misamoto was on his knees at once. The moment the two men saw him, some of their concern left them.

“These are the men you met at the dock yesterday?”

“Yes, Sire.”

“They know you as Watanabe?”

“Yes, Lord.”

“Good. They know nothing about your past?”

“No, Lord, I did it all as you ordered, everything an—”

“You said sailors in Nagasaki taught you English?”

“Yes, Lord.”

“Good. Now, first tell them they will be well treated and not to be afraid. What are their names?”

“Listen, you two, this’s the Boss, this’s Lord Ota,” Misamoto said as he had been told to name Yoshi, his coarse slang American easily understood by them. “I tol’ you bastards to bow and scrape or you’d hav’ it done for you. He says you’re to be well treated and wants to know yor names.”

“I’m Johnny Cornishman and he’s Charlie Yank an’ so far we’s nothing to eat or drink, for Christ’s sweet sake!”

As best he could, Misamoto translated the names.

“You will tell them nothing about me or what you have done since I took you out of prison—remember I have ears everywhere and I will know.”

“I will not fail, Lord.” Misamoto bowed deeply, hiding his hatred, desperate to please and frightened for his future.

“Yes.” For a moment Yoshi considered him. In the two-odd months since he had taken Misamoto into his service the man had changed radically, outside. Now he was clean-shaven, his pate also shaved and his hair groomed in samurai fashion. Enforced cleanliness had improved his appearance greatly, and even though he was deliberately kept in the vestments of the lowest class of samurai, he looked samurai and wore the two swords now as though they belonged. The swords were still false, just hilts with no blades within the scabbards.

Thus far Yoshi was pleased with his performance and when he had seen him robed and hatted as an Elder, he had been astonished, not recognizing
him. A good lesson to remember, he had thought at the time: how easy it is to appear to be what you are not!

“It would be better for you not to fail,” he said, then turned his attention to Misamoto’s two guards. “You two are responsible for the safety of these two men. The Lady Hosaki will supply further guards and guides but you two are responsible for the success of the venture.”

“Yes, Lord.”

“As to this fake Watanabe,” he said, his voice soft but no man mistook the finality therein, “he is to be treated as samurai though of the lowest rank, but if he disobeys correct orders, or tries to escape, you will tie his hands and feet and drag him to wherever I am. You are both responsible.”

“Yes, Lord.”

“I won’t fail you, Lord,” Misamoto muttered, grey-faced, some of his terror passing on to the two miners.

“Tell these men they are quite safe. And also that you will be their helper and teacher, there is no need for any of you to be frightened if you obey. Tell them I hope for a quick success to their search.”

“The Boss says there’s no need to be scared.”