“I don’t think so, Sire,” Omi said, unafraid. “Iwari, Mikawa, Totomi, and Sugura are all hostile to him, neh? And to anyone who’s allied to him. They’d never warn him, so perhaps he doesn’t know yet. Inform him and suggest—”
“Didn’t you hear?” Yabu shouted. “All four Regents agree to Ito’s appointment, so the Council’s legal again and the Council meets in twenty days!”
“The answer to that is simple, Sire. Suggest to Toranaga that he have Ito Teruzumi or one of the other Regents assassinated at once.”
Yabu’s mouth dropped open. “What?”
“If you don’t wish to do that, send me, let me try. Or Igurashi-san. With Lord Ito dead, Ishido’s helpless again.”
“I don’t know whether you’ve gone mad, or what,” Yabu said helplessly. “Do you understand what you’ve just said?”
“Sire, I beg you, please, to be patient with me. The Anjin-san’s given you priceless knowledge, neh? More than we ever dreamed possible. Now Toranaga knows this also, through your reports, and probably from Naga-san’s private reports. If we can win enough time, our five hundred guns and the other three hundred will give you absolute battle power, but only once. When the enemy, whoever he is, sees the way you use men and firepower they’ll learn quickly. But they’ll have lost that first battle. One battle—if it’s the right battle-will give Toranaga total victory.”
“Ishido doesn’t need any battle. In twenty days he has the Emperor’s mandate.”
“Ishido’s a peasant. He’s the son of a peasant, a liar, and he runs away from his comrades in battle.”
Yabu stared at Omi, his face mottled. “You—do you know what you’re saying?”
“That’s what he did in Korea. I was there. I saw it, my father saw it. Ishido did leave Buntaro-san and us to fight our own way out. He’s just a treacherous peasant—the Taikō’s dog, certainly. You can’t trust peasants. But Toranaga’s Minowara. You can trust him. I advise you to consider only Toranaga’s interests.”
Yabu shook his head in disbelief. “Are you deaf? Didn’t you hear Nebara Jozen? Ishido’s won. The Council is in power in twenty days.”
“May be in power.”
“Even if Ito…. How could you? It’s not possible.”
“Certainly I could try but I could never do it in time. None of us could, not in twenty days. But Toranaga could.” Omi knew he had put himself into the jaws of the dragon. “I beg you to consider it.”
Yabu wiped his face with his hands, his body wet. “After this summons, if the Council is convened and I’m not present, I and all my clan are dead, you included. I need two months, at least, to train the regiment. Even if we had them trained now, Toranaga and I could never win against all the others. No, you’re wrong, I have to support Ishido.”
Omi said, “You don’t have to leave for Osaka for ten days—fourteen, if you go by forced march. Tell Toranaga about Nebara Jozen at once. You’ll save Izu and the Kasigi house. I beg you. Ishido will betray you and eat you up. Ikawa Jikkyu is his kinsman, neh?”
“But what about Jozen?” Igurashi exclaimed. “Eh? And the guns? The grand strategy? He wants to know about everything tonight.”
“Tell him. In detail. What is he but a lackey,” Omi said, beginning to maneuver them. He knew he was risking everything, but he had to try to protect Yabu from siding with Ishido and ruining any chance they had. “Open your plans to him.”
Igurashi disagreed heatedly. “The moment Jozen learns what we’re doing, he’ll send a message back to Lord Ishido. It’s too important not to. Ishido’ll steal the plans, then we’re finished.”
“We trail the messenger and kill him at our convenience.”
Yabu flushed. “That scroll was signed by the highest authority in the land! They all travel under the Regents’ protection! You must be mad to suggest such a thing! That would make me an outlaw!”
Omi shook his head, keeping confidence on his face. “I believe Yodoko-sama and the others have been duped, as His Imperial Highness has been duped, by the traitor Ishido. We must protect the guns, Sire. We must stop any messenger—”
“Silence! Your advice is madness!”
Omi bowed under the tongue-lash. But he looked up and said calmly, “Then please allow me to commit seppuku, Sire. But first, please allow me to finish. I would fail in my duty if I didn’t try to protect you. I beg this last favor as a faithful vassal.”
“Finish!”
“There’s no Council of Regents now, so there is no legal protection now for that insulting, foul-mannered Jozen and his men, unless you honor an illegal document through—” Omi was going to say “weakness” but he changed the word and kept his voice quietly authoritative—“through being duped like the others, Sire. There is no Council. They cannot ‘order’ you to do anything, or anyone. Once it’s convened, yes, they can, and then you will have to obey. But now, how many daimyos will obey before legal orders can be issued? Only Ishido’s allies, neh? Aren’t Iwari, Mikawa, Totomi, and Sugura all ruled by his kinsmen and allied to him openly? That document absolutely means war, yes, but I beg you to wage it on your terms and not Ishido’s. Treat this threat with the contempt it deserves! Toranaga’s never been beaten in battle. Ishido has. Toranaga avoided being part of the Taikō’s ruinous attack on Korea. Ishido didn’t. Toranaga’s in favor of ships and trade. Ishido isn’t. Toranaga will want the barbarian’s navy—didn’t you advocate it to him? Ishido won’t. Ishido will close the Empire. Toranaga will keep it open. Ishido will give Ikawa Jikkyu your hereditary fief of Izu if he wins. Toranaga will give you all Jikkyu’s province. You’re Toranaga’s chief ally. Didn’t he give you his sword? Hasn’t he given you control of the guns? Don’t the guns guarantee one victory, with surprise? What does the peasant Ishido give in return? He sends a ronin-samurai with no manners, with deliberate orders to shame you in your own province! I say Toranaga Minowara is your only choice. You must go with him.” He bowed and waited in silence.
Yabu glanced at Igurashi. “Well?”
“I agree with Omi-san, Sire.” Igurashi’s face mirrored his worry. “As to killing a messenger—that would be dangerous, no turning back then, Sire. Jozen will certainly send one or two tomorrow. Perhaps they could vanish, killed by bandits—” He stopped in mid-sentence. “Carrier pigeons! There were two panniers of them on Jozen’s pack horses!”
“We’ll have to poison them tonight,” Omi said.
“How? They’ll be guarded.”
“I don’t know. But they’ve got to be removed or maimed before dawn.”
Yabu said, “Igurashi, send men to watch Jozen at once. See if he sends one of his pigeons now—today.”
“I suggest you send all our falcons and falconers to the east, also at once,” Omi added quickly.
Igurashi said, “He’ll suspect treachery if he sees his bird downed, or his birds tampered with.”
Omi shrugged. “It must be stopped.”
Igurashi looked at Yabu.
Yabu nodded resignedly. “Do it.”
When Igurashi came back he said, “Omi-san, one thing occurred to me. A lot of what you said was right, about Jikkyu and Lord Ishido. But if you advise making the messengers ‘vanish,’ why toy with Jozen at all? Why tell him anything? Why not just kill them all at once?”
“Why not indeed? Unless it might amuse Yabu-sama. I agree your plan’s better, Igurashi-san,” Omi said.
Both men were looking at Yabu now. “How can I keep the guns secret?” he asked them.
“Kill Jozen and his men,” Omi replied.
“No other way?”
Omi shook his head. Igurashi shook his head.
“Maybe I could barter with Ishido,” Yabu said, shaken, trying to think of a way out of the trap. “You’re correct about the time. I’ve ten days, fourteen at the most. How to deal with Jozen and still leave time to maneuver?”
“It would be wise to pretend that you’re going to Osaka,” Omi said. “But there’s no harm in informing Toranaga at once, neh? One of
our pigeons could get to Yedo before dusk. Perhaps. No harm in that.”
Igurashi said, “You could tell Lord Toranaga about Jozen arriving, and about the Council meeting in twenty days, yes. But the other, about assassinating Lord Ito, that’s too dangerous to put in writing even if … Much too dangerous, neh?”
“I agree. Nothing about Ito. Toranaga should think of that himself. It’s obvious, neh?”
“Yes, Sire. Unthinkable but obvious.”
Omi waited in the silence, his mind frantically seeking a solution. Yabu’s eyes were on him but he was not afraid. His advice had been sound and offered only for the protection of the clan and the family and Yabu, the present leader of the clan. That Omi had decided to remove Yabu and change the leadership had not prevented him from counseling Yabu sagaciously. And he was prepared to die now. If Yabu was so stupid as not to accept the obvious truth of his ideas, then there soon would be no clan to lead anyway. Karma.
Yabu leaned forward, still undecided. “Is there any way to remove Jozen and his men without danger to me, and stay uncommitted for ten days?”
“Naga. Somehow bait a trap with Naga,” Omi said simply.
At dusk, Blackthorne and Mariko rode up to the gate of his house, outriders following. Both were tired. She rode as a man would ride, wearing loose trousers and over them a belted mantle. She had on a wide-brimmed hat and gloves to protect her from the sun. Even peasant women tried to protect their faces and their hands from the rays of the sun. From time immemorial, the darker the skin the more common the person; the whiter, the more prized.
Male servants took the halters and led the horses away. Blackthorne dismissed his outriders in tolerable Japanese and greeted Fujiko, who waited proudly on the veranda as usual.
“May I serve you cha, Anjin-san,” she said ceremoniously, as usual, and “No,” he said as usual. “First I will bathe. Then saké and some food.” And, as usual, he returned her bow and went through the corridor to the back of the house, out into the garden, along the circling path to the mud-wattled bath house. A servant took his clothes and he went in and sat down naked. Another servant scrubbed him and soaped him and shampooed him and poured water over him to wash away the lather and the dirt. Then, completely clean, gradually—because the water was so hot—he stepped into the huge iron-sided bath and lay down.
“Christ Jesus, that’s grand,” he exulted, and let the heat seep into his muscles, his eyes closed, the sweat running down his forehead.
He heard the door open and Suwo’s voice and “Good evening, Master,” followed by many words of Japanese which he did not understand. But tonight he was too tired to try to converse with Suwo. And the bath, as Mariko had explained many times, ‘is not merely for cleaning the skin. The bath is a gift to us from God or the gods, a god-bequeathed pleasure to be enjoyed and treated as such.’
“No talk, Suwo,” he said. “Tonight wish think.”
“Yes, Master. Your pardon, but you should say, ‘Tonight I wish to think.’”
“Tonight I wish to think.” Blackthorne repeated the correct Japanese, trying to get the almost incomprehensible sounds into his head, glad to be corrected but very weary of it.
“Where’s the dictionary-grammar book?” he had asked Mariko first thing this morning. “Has Yabu-sama sent another request for it?”
“Yes. Please be patient, Anjin-san. It will arrive soon.”
“It was promised with the galley and the troops. It didn’t arrive. Troops and guns but no books. I’m lucky you’re here. It’d be impossible without you.”
“Difficult, but not impossible, Anjin-san.”
“How do I say, ‘No, you’re doing it wrong! You must all run as a team, stop as a team, aim and fire as a team’?”
“To whom are you talking, Anjin-san?” she had asked.
And then again he had felt his frustration rising. “It’s all very difficult, Mariko-san.”
“Oh, no, Anjin-san. Japanese is very simple to speak compared with other languages. There are no articles, no ‘the,’ ‘a,’ or ‘an.’ No verb conjugations or infinitives. All verbs are regular, ending in masu, and you can say almost everything by using the present tense only, if you want. For a question just add ka after the verb. For a negative just change masu to masen. What could be easier? Yukimasu means I go, but equally you, he, she, it, we, they go, or will go, or even could have gone. Even plural and singular nouns are the same. Tsuma means wife, or wives. Very simple.”
“Well, how do you tell the difference between I go, yukimasu, and they went, yukimasu?”
“By inflection, Anjin-san, and tone. Listen: yukimasu—yukimasu.”
“But these both sounded exactly the same.”
“Ah, Anjin-san, that’s because you’re thinking in your own language. To understand Japanese you have to think Japanese. Don’t forget our language is the language of the infinite. It’s all so simple, Anjin-san. Just change your concept of the world. Japanese is just learning a new art, detached from the world…. It’s all so simple.”
“It’s all shit,” he had muttered in English, and felt better.
“What? What did you say?”
“Nothing. But what you say doesn’t make sense.”
“Learn the written characters,” Mariko had said.
“I can’t. It’ll take too long. They’re meaningless.”
“Look, they’re really simple pictures, Anjin-san. The Chinese are very clever. We borrowed their writing a thousand years ago. Look, take this character, or symbol, for a pig.”
“It doesn’t look like a pig.”
“Once it did, Anjin-san. Let me show you. Here. Add a ‘roof’ symbol over a ‘pig’ symbol and what do you have?”
“A pig and a roof.”
“But what does that mean? The new character?”
“I don’t know.”
“‘Home.’ In the olden days the Chinese thought a pig under a roof was home. They’re not Buddhists, they’re meat eaters, so a pig to them, to peasants, represented wealth, hence a good home. Hence the character.”
“But how do you say it?”
“That depends if you’re Chinese or Japanese.”
“Oh ko!”
“Oh ko, indeed,” she had laughed. “Here’s another character. A ‘roof’ symbol and a ‘pig’ symbol and a ‘woman’ symbol. A ‘roof’ with two ‘pigs’ under it means ‘contentment.’ A ‘roof’ with two ‘women’ under it equals ‘discord.’ Neh?”
“Absolutely!”
“Of course, the Chinese are very stupid in many things and their women are not trained as women are here. There’s no discord in your home, is there?”
Blackthorne thought about that now, on the twelfth day of his rebirth. No. There was no discord. But neither was it a home. Fujiko was only like a trustworthy housekeeper and tonight when he went to his bed to sleep, the futons would be turned back and she would be kneeling beside them patiently, expressionlessly. She would be dressed in her sleeping kimono, which was similar to a day kimono but softer and with only a loose sash instead of a stiff obi at the waist.
“Thank you, Lady,” he would say. “Good night.”
She would bow and go silently to the room across the corridor, next to the one Mariko slept in. Then he would get under the fine silk mosquito net. He had never known such nets before. Then he would lie back happily, and in the night, hearing the few insects buzzing outside, he would dwell on the Black Ship, how important the Black Ship was to Japan.
Without the Portuguese, no trade with China. And no silks for clothes or for nets. Even now, with the humidity only just beginning, he knew their value.
If he stirred in the night a maid would open the door almost instantly to ask if there was anything he wanted. Once he had not understood. He motioned the maid away and went to the garden and sat on the steps, looking at the moon. Within a few minutes Fujiko, tousled and bleary, came and sat silently behind him.
“Can I get you anything, Lord?”
“No, thank you. Pleas
e go to bed.”
She had said something he did not understand. Again he had motioned her away so she spoke sharply to the maid, who attended her like a shadow. Soon Mariko came.
“Are you all right, Anjin-san?”
“Yes. I don’t know why you were disturbed. Christ Jesus—I’m just looking at the moon. I couldn’t sleep. I just wanted some air.”
Fujiko spoke to her haltingly, ill at ease, hurt by the irritation in his voice. “She says you told her to go back to sleep. She just wanted you to know that it’s not our custom for a wife or consort to sleep while her master’s awake, that’s all, Anjin-san.”
“Then she’ll have to change her custom. I’m often up at night. By myself. It’s a habit from being at sea—I sleep very lightly ashore.”
“Yes, Anjin-san.”
Mariko had explained and the two women had gone away. But Blackthorne knew that Fujiko had not gone back to sleep and would not, until he slept. She was always up and waiting whatever time he came back to the house. Some nights he walked the shore alone. Even though he insisted on being alone, he knew that he was followed and watched. Not because they were afraid he was trying to escape. Only because it was their custom for important people always to be attended. In Anjiro he was important.
In time he accepted her presence. It was as Mariko had first said, ‘Think of her as a rock or a shoji or a wall. It is her duty to serve you.’
It was different with Mariko.
He was glad that she had stayed. Without her presence he could never have begun the training, let alone explained the intricacies of strategy. He blessed her and Father Domingo and Alban Caradoc and his other teachers.
I never thought the battles would ever be put to good use, he thought again. Once when his ship was carrying a cargo of English wools to Antwerp, a Spanish army had swooped down upon the city and every man had gone to the barricades and to the dikes. The sneak attack had been beaten off and the Spanish infantry outgunned and out-maneuvered. That was the first time he had seen William, Duke of Orange, using regiments like chess pieces. Advancing, retreating in pretended panic to regroup again, charging back again, guns blazing in packed, gut-hurting, ear-pounding salvos, breaking through the Invincibles to leave them dying and screaming, the stench of blood and powder and urine and horses and dung filling you, and a wild frantic joy of killing possessing you and the strength of twenty in your arms.