Four Grays banded together and hurled themselves at Blackthorne, who was still rooted near his litter. Helplessly he saw them coming. Yabu and a Brown leaped to intercept, fighting demonically. Blackthorne jumped away, grabbed a flare, and using it as a whirling mace, threw the attackers momentarily off balance. Yabu killed one, maimed another, then four Browns rushed back to dispose of the last two Grays. Without hesitation Yabu and the wounded Brown hurled them selves into the attack once more, protecting Toranaga. Blackthorne ran forward and picked up a long half-sword, half-spear and raced nearer to Toranaga. Toranaga alone stood motionless, his sword sheathed, in the screaming fracas.
The Grays fought courageously. Four joined in a suicidal charge at Toranaga. The Browns broke it and pressed their advantage. The Grays regrouped and charged again. Then a senior officer ordered three to retreat for help and the rest to guard the retreat. The three Grays tore off, and though they were pursued and Buntaro shot one, two escaped.
The rest died.
CHAPTER 24
They were hurrying through deserted back streets, circling for the wharf and the galley. There were ten of them—Toranaga leading, Yabu, Mariko, Blackthorne, and six samurai. The rest, under Buntaro, had been sent with the litters and baggage train by the planned route, with instructions to head leisurely for the galley. The body of Asa the maid was in one of the litters. During a lull in the fighting, Blackthorne had pulled the barbed shaft out of her. Toranaga had seen the dark blood that gushed in its wake and had watched, puzzled, as the pilot had cradled her instead of allowing her to die quietly in private dignity, and then, when the fighting had ceased entirely, how gently the pilot had put her into the litter. The girl was brave and had whimpered not at all, just looked up at him until death had come. Toranaga had left her in the curtained litter as a decoy and one of the wounded had been put in the second litter, also as a decoy.
Of the fifty Browns that had formed the escort, fifteen had been killed and eleven mortally wounded. The eleven had been quickly and honorably committed to the Great Void, three by their own hands, eight assisted by Buntaro at their request. Then Buntaro had assembled the remainder around the closed litters and had left. Forty-eight Grays lay in the dust.
Toranaga knew that he was dangerously unprotected but he was content. Everything has gone well, he thought, considering the vicissitudes of chance. How interesting life is! At first I was sure it was a bad omen that the pilot had seen me change places with Kiri. Then the pilot saved me and acted the madman perfectly, and because of him we escaped Ishido. I hadn’t planned for Ishido to be at the main gate, only at the forecourt. That was careless. Why was Ishido there? It isn’t like Ishido to be so careful. Who advised him? Kiyama? Onoshi? Or Yodoko? A woman, ever practical would—could suspect such a subterfuge.
It had been a good plan—the secret escape dash—and established for weeks, for it was obvious that Ishido would try to keep him in the castle, would turn the other Regents against him by promising them anything, would willingly sacrifice his hostage at Yedo, the Lady Ochiba, and would use any means to keep him under guard until the final meeting of the Regents, where he would be cornered, impeached, and dispatched.
“But they’ll still impeach you!” Hiro-matsu had said when Toranaga had sent for him just after dusk last night to explain what was to be attempted and why he, Toranaga, had been vacillating. “Even if you escape, the Regents will impeach you behind your back as easily as they’ll do it to your face. So you’re bound to commit seppuku when they order it, as they will order it.”
“Yes,” Toranaga had said. “As President of the Regents I am bound to do that if the four vote against me. But here”—he had taken a rolled parchment out of his sleeve—“here is my formal resignation from the Council of Regents. You will give it to Ishido when my escape is known.”
“What?”
“If I resign I’m no longer bound by my Regent’s oath. Neh? The Taikō never forbade me to resign, neh? Give Ishido this, too.” He had handed Hiro-matsu the chop, the official seal of his office as President.
“But now you’re totally isolated. You’re doomed!”
“You’re wrong. Listen, the Taikō’s testament implanted a council of five Regents on the realm. Now there are four. To be legal, before they can exercise the Emperor’s mandate, the four have to elect or appoint a new member, a fifth, neh? Ishido, Kiyama, Onoshi, and Sugiyama have to agree, neh? Doesn’t the new Regent have to be acceptable to all of them? Of course! Now, old comrade, who in all the world will those enemies agree to share ultimate power with? Eh? And while they’re arguing, no decisions and—”
“We’re preparing for war and you’re no longer bound and you can drop a little honey here and bile there and those pile-infested dung-makers will eat themselves up!” Hiro-matsu had said with a rush. “Ah, Yoshi Toranaga-noh-Minowara, you’re a man among men. I’ll eat my arse if you’re not the wisest man in the land!”
Yes, it was a good plan, Toranaga thought, and they all played their parts well: Hiro-matsu, Kiri, and my lovely Sazuko. And now they’re locked up tight and they will stay that way or they will be allowed to leave. I think they will never be allowed to leave.
I will be sorry to lose them.
He was leading the party unerringly, his pace fast but measured, the pace he hunted at, the pace he could keep up continuously for two days and one night if need be. He still wore the traveling cloak and Kiri’s kimono, but the skirts were hitched up out of the way, his military leggings incongruous.
They crossed another deserted street and headed down an alleyway. He knew the alarm would soon reach Ishido and then the hunt would be on in earnest. There’s time enough, he told himself.
Yes, it was a good plan. But I didn’t anticipate the ambush. That’s cost me three days of safety. Kiri was sure she could keep the deception a secret for at least three days. But the secret’s out now and I won’t be able to slip aboard and out to sea. Who was the ambush for? Me or the pilot? Of course the pilot. But didn’t the arrows bracket both litters? Yes, but the archers were quite far away and it would be hard to see, and it would be wiser and safer to kill both, just in case.
Who ordered the attack, Kiyama or Onoshi? or the Portuguese? or the Christian Fathers?
Toranaga turned around to check the pilot. He saw that he was not flagging, nor was the woman who walked beside him, though both were tired. On the skyline he could see the vast squat bulk of the castle and the phallus of the donjon. Tonight was the second time I’ve almost died there, he thought. Is that castle really going to be my nemesis? The Taikō told me often enough: ‘While Osaka Castle lives my line will never die and you, Toranaga Minowara, your epitaph will be written on its walls. Osaka will cause your death, my faithful vassal!’ And always the hissing, baiting laugh that set his soul on edge.
Does the Taikō live within Yaemon? Whether he does or not, Yaemon is his legal heir.
With an effort Toranaga tore his eyes away from the castle and turned another corner and fled into a maze of alleys. At length he stopped outside a battered gate. A fish was etched into its timbers. He knocked in code. The door opened at once. Instantly the ill-kempt samurai bowed. “Sire?”
“Bring your men and follow me,” Toranaga said and set off again.
“Gladly.” This samurai did not wear the Brown uniform kimono, only motley rags of a ronin, but he was one of the special elite secret troops that Toranaga had smuggled into Osaka against such an emergency. Fifteen men, similarly clothed, and equally well armed, followed him and quickly fell into place as advance and rear guard, while another ran off to spread the alarm to other secret cadres. Soon Toranaga had fifty troops with him. Another hundred covered his flanks. Another thousand would be ready at dawn should he need them. He relaxed and slackened his pace, sensing that the pilot and the woman were tiring too fast. He needed them strong.
Toranaga stood in the shadows of the warehouse and studied the galley and the wharf and the foreshore. Yabu and a samurai were bes
ide him. The others had been left in a tight knot a hundred paces back down the alley.
A detachment of a hundred Grays waited near the gangway of the galley a few hundred paces away, across a wide expanse of beaten earth that precluded any surprise attack. The galley itself was alongside, moored to stanchions fixed into the stone wharf that extended a hundred yards out into the sea. The oars were shipped neatly, and he could see indistinctly many seamen and warriors on deck.
“Are they ours or theirs?” he asked quietly.
“It’s too far to be sure,” Yabu replied.
The tide was high. Beyond the galley, night fishing boats were coming in and going out, lanterns serving as their riding and fishing lights. North, along the shore, were rows of beached fishing craft of many sizes, tended by a few fishermen. Five hundred paces south, alongside another stone wharf, was the Portuguese frigate, the Santa Theresa. Under the light of flares, clusters of porters were busily loading barrels and bales. Another large group of Grays lolled nearby. This was usual because all Portuguese and all foreign ships in port were, by law, under perpetual surveillance. It was only at Nagasaki that Portuguese shipping moved in and out freely.
If security could be tightened there, the safer we’d all sleep at night, Toranaga told himself. Yes, but could we lock them up and still have trade with China in ever increasing amounts? That’s one trap the Southern Barbarians have us in from which there’s no escape, not while the Christian daimyos dominate Kyushu and the priests are needed. The best we can do is what the Taikō did. Give the barbarians a little, pretend to take it away, try to bluff, knowing that without the China trade, life would be impossible.
“With your permission, Lord, I will attack at once,” the samurai whispered.
“I advise against it,” Yabu said. “We don’t know if our men are aboard. And there could be a thousand men hidden all around here. Those men”—he pointed at the Grays near the Portuguese ship—“those’ll raise the alarm. We could never take the ship and get it out to sea before they’d bottled us up. We need ten times the men we’ve got now.”
“General Lord Ishido will know soon,” the samurai said. “Then all Osaka’ll be swarming with more hostiles than there are flies on a new battlefield. I’ve a hundred and fifty men with those on our flanks. That’ll be enough.”
“Not for safety. Not if our sailors aren’t ready on the oars. Better to create a diversion, one that’d draw off the Grays—and any that are in hiding. Those, too.” Yabu pointed again at the men near the frigate.
“What kind of diversion?” Toranaga said.
“Fire the street.”
“That’s impossible!” the samurai protested, aghast. Arson was a crime punishable by the public burning of all the family of the guilty person, of every generation of the family. The penalty was the most severe by law because fire was the greatest hazard to any village or town or city in the Empire. Wood and paper were their only building materials, except for tiles on some roofs. Every home, every warehouse, every hovel, and every palace was a tinderbox. “We can’t fire the street!”
“What’s more important,” Yabu asked him, “the destruction of a few streets, or the death of our Master?”
“The fire’d spread, Yabu-san. We can’t burn Osaka. There are a million people here—more.”
“Is that your answer to my question?”
Ashen, the samurai turned to Toranaga. “Sire, I’ll do anything you ask. Is that what you want me to do?”
Toranaga merely looked at Yabu.
The daimyo jerked his thumb contemptuously at the city. “Two years ago half of it burned down and look at it now. Five years ago was the Great Fire. How many hundred thousand were lost then? What does it matter? They’re only shopkeepers, merchants, craftsmen, and eta. It’s not as though Osaka’s a village filled with peasants.”
Toranaga had long since gauged the wind. It was slight and would not fan the blaze. Perhaps. But a blaze could easily become a holocaust that would eat up all the city. Except the castle. Ah, if it would only consume the castle I wouldn’t hesitate for a moment.
He turned on his heel and went back to the others. “Mariko-san, take the pilot and our six samurai and go to the galley. Pretend to be almost in panic. Tell the Grays that there’s been an ambush—by bandits or ronin, you’re not sure which. Tell them where it happened, that you were sent ahead urgently by the captain of our escorting Grays to get the Grays here to help, that the battle’s still raging, that you think Kiritsubo’s been killed or wounded—to please hurry. If you’re convincing, this will draw most of them off.”
“I understand perfectly, Sire.”
“Then, no matter what the Grays do, go on board with the pilot. If our sailors are there and the ship’s safe and secure, come back to the gangway and pretend to faint. That’s our signal. Do it exactly at the head of the gangway.” Toranaga let his eyes rest on Blackthorne. “Tell him what you’re going to do, but not that you’re going to faint.” He turned away to give orders to the rest of his men and special private instructions to the six samurai.
When Toranaga had finished, Yabu drew him aside. “Why send the barbarian? Wouldn’t it be safer to leave him here? Safer for you?”
“Safer for him, Yabu-san, but not for me. He’s a useful decoy.”
“Firing the street would be even safer.”
“Yes.” Toranaga thought that it was better to have Yabu on his side than on Ishido’s. I’m glad I did not make him jump off the tower yesterday.
“Sire?”
“Yes, Mariko-san?”
“I’m sorry, but the Anjin-san asks what happens if the ship’s held by the enemy?”
“Tell him there’s no need to go with you if he’s not strong enough.”
Blackthorne kept his temper when she told him what Toranaga had said. “Tell Lord Toranaga that his plan is no good for you, that you should stay here. If all’s well I can signal.”
“I can’t do that, Anjin-san, that’s not what our Master has ordered,” Mariko told him firmly. “Any plan he makes is bound to be very wise.”
Blackthorne realized there was no point in arguing. God curse their bloody-minded, muleheaded arrogance, he thought. But, by the Lord God, what courage they’ve got! The men and this woman.
He had watched her, standing at the ambush, in her hands the long killing sword that was almost as tall as herself, ready to fight to the death for Toranaga. He had seen her use the sword once, expertly, and though Buntaro had killed the attacker, she had made it easier by forcing the man to back off. There was still blood on her kimono now and it was torn in places and her face was dirty.
“Where did you learn to use a sword?” he had asked while they rushed for the docks.
“You should know that all samurai ladies are taught very early to use a knife to defend their honor and that of their lords,” she had said matter-of-factly, and showed him how the stiletto was kept safe in the obi, ready for instant use. “But some of us, a few, are also taught about sword and spear, Anjin-san. Some fathers feel daughters as well as sons must be prepared to do battle for their lords. Of course, some women are more warlike than others and enjoy going into battle with their husbands or fathers. My mother was one of these. My father and mother decided I should know the sword and the spear.”
“If it hadn’t been for the captain of the Grays being in the way, the first arrow would have gone right through you,” he had said.
“Through you, Anjin-san,” she corrected him, very sure. “But you did save my life by pulling me to safety.”
Now, looking at her, he knew that he would not like anything to happen to her. “Let me go with the samurai, Mariko-san. You stay here. Please.”
“That’s not possible, Anjin-san.”
“Then I want a knife. Better, give me two.”
She passed this request to Toranaga, who agreed. Blackthorne slid one under the sash, inside his kimono. The other he tied, haft downwards, to the inside of his forearm with a strip of silk he tor
e off the hem of his kimono.
“My Master asks do all Englishmen carry knives secretly in their sleeves like that?”
“No. But most seamen do.”
“That’s not usual here—or with the Portuguese,” she said.
“The best place for a spare knife’s in your boot. Then you can do wicked damage, very fast. If need be.”
She translated this and Blackthorne noticed the attentive eyes of Toranaga and Yabu, and he sensed that they did not like him armed. Good, he thought. Perhaps I can stay armed.
He wondered again about Toranaga. After the ambush had been beaten off and the Grays killed, Toranaga had, through Mariko, thanked him before all the Browns for his “loyalty.” Nothing more, no promises, no agreements, no rewards. But Blackthorne knew that those would come later. The old monk had told him that loyalty was the only thing they rewarded. ‘Loyalty and duty, señor,’ he had said. ‘It is their cult, this bushido. Where we give our lives to God and His Blessed Son Jesus, and Mary the Mother of God, these animals give themselves to their masters and die like dogs. Remember, señor, for thy soul’s sake, they’re animals.’
They’re not animals, Blackthorne thought. And much of what you said, Father, is wrong and a fanatic’s exaggeration.
He said to Mariko, “We need a signal—if the ship’s safe or if it isn’t.”
Again she translated, innocently this time. “Lord Toranaga says that one of our soldiers will do that.”
“I don’t consider it brave to send a woman to do a man’s job.”
“Please be patient with us, Anjin-san. There’s no difference between men and women. Women are equal as samurai. In this plan a woman would be so much better than a man.”
Toranaga spoke to her shortly.
“Are you ready, Anjin-san? We’re to go now.”
“The plan’s rotten and dangerous and I’m tired of being a goddamned sacrificial plucked duck, but I’m ready.”
She laughed, bowed once to Toranaga, and ran off. Blackthorne and the six samurai raced after her.