Island of Exiles

CHAPTER SEVEN

Akitada welcomed the journey. Masako had slipped too deeply under his skin, and he was torn by feelings of shame and guilt.

And then there was the fact that he had put his assignment from his mind in order to satisfy his curiosity about the girl and her father. It was high time he did what he had come to do and went home to his family.

The day began inauspiciously in Yutaka’s office. The governor had sent the shijo on an errand so that he and Akitada would have a private moment to discuss the upcoming journey.

“I know that you want to meet Kumo for yourself. Osawa always calls at his manor to go over the tax rolls with him and discuss the upcoming harvest and the mine production. After that you will travel on to Minato. Osawa has a letter from me to Professor Sakamoto, just a pretext to get you into his house. The return journey is to take you through Tsukahara. The prince’s manor is there and Taira still lives in it. Okisada also had many friends among the Buddhist clergy at the Konponji Temple nearby. The temple happens to be the district tax collector. You will probably find the monk Shunsei there. If word has reached Kumo, he may approach you first, but if he does not, then you will no doubt find a way to talk to him.” That was perhaps overly optimistic, but Akitada thanked him and asked, “Can you provide me with some signed paper in case I have to overrule your good Inspector Osawa?” Mutobe’s face fell. “Oh, dear. Yes, of course. I should have thought of that. Better not tell him anything yet, right? Osawa is all right, really. A bit lazy, but he’s unmarried and can travel whenever I need him. Besides, he is my only inspector and known to Kumo and Sakamoto and the others.” He helped himself to Yutaka’s ink, brush, and paper and dashed off a short letter, then gave it to Akitada, who read it and nodded. Mutobe took his seal from his sleeve, inked it with red ink, and impressed it next to his signature. Then he handed the folded note to Akitada, who was trying to tuck it away with his other papers when he made a disturbing discovery.

He was wearing his own clothes again, having packed his blue cotton clerk’s robe in his saddlebag. When he touched his neck where the fabric was doubled over and stitched into the stiff collar, he felt the papers inside, but the seam he had opened to pass the imperial document to Mutobe the day they met had been resewn. Masako must have discovered the loose stitches when she had cleaned his robe. Surely she had found the papers.

He felt beads of perspiration on his brow.

“What is the matter?” asked the governor, seeing his face.

“Nothing. Just wondering where to put this,” Akitada said, holding up the governor’s note. He quickly tucked it in his sash as footsteps approached and Yutaka entered with Osawa and one of the scribes, the big fellow called Genzo.

They knelt and bowed, the scribe looking sullen and giving Akitada a hate-filled look. Of the two who had been punished by Yutaka for the vicious beating they had given him, he was the one who had continued to bear Akitada a powerful grudge.

“Ah, yes, Yutaka,” said Mutobe. “Is this the man who is to go along?”

“Yes, Your Excellency. His name is Genzo.” Akitada was dismayed but could hardly object.

The governor continued, “I realize you cannot easily spare both Taketsuna and him, but it will only be for a few days, four at the most. They will take horses to make better speed. I have sent instructions to the stables to have them ready in two hours.”

“Horses?” gasped Osawa, then bowed immediately. “I beg your pardon, Excellency, but I did not expect . . . a great honor, of course . . . but I usually travel on foot. Perhaps a sedan chair?

Surely good bearers can move as quickly as a horse. And the two young men can run alongside.”

The big scribe’s jaw dropped.

“No,” said the governor brusquely, getting to his feet. “You will make all the speed you can. Oh. I am dispensing with a guard. Taketsuna has given his word not to escape.” He departed, leaving consternation behind.

Osawa stared at Akitada as if he were measuring his potential for unexpected violence.

“I can’t ride,” the scribe announced. “You’ll have to take Minoru instead.”

Osawa looked down his nose at him. “If you are referring to the other scribe in the archives, I am told he is nearly illiterate and it takes him forever to copy a page.”

“Well, then just take the prisoner. Master Yutaka always brags about how fast and elegant his brushstrokes are.”

“I need you both,” snapped Osawa. “He is to act as my secretary and you’ll do the copying. You are both under my orders now and will do as you are told.” He looked hard at Akitada, who bowed.

The problems multiplied at the stables. The horses were lively and pranced about the stable yard, making it hard for the grooms to control them.

Osawa saw this with an expression of horror. “These horses are half wild,” he protested. “We want something tamer.” The head groom shook his head. “Governor’s orders.” Akitada took the bridle of the calmest horse and led it to Osawa. “Please take this one, Inspector,” he said with a bow. “He has a soft mouth and will be manageable.” He turned to the scribe. Although Genzo was big-boned and heavy, he cringed from the horses. “And you, of course, will want the black?” The black was so big that two grooms hung on to his bridle.

Genzo shot Akitada a venomous look. “You take him,” he said. “I have no desire to kill myself.”

“As you wish.” Akitada swung himself into the saddle, taking pleasure in being on horseback again, while Genzo had to be helped onto the third horse and instantly fell back down. “Are there any mules?” Akitada asked the grinning head groom.

A sturdy mule was substituted for the horse, and Genzo managed to get in its saddle. They rode out of the stable yard accompanied by half-suppressed laughter from the grooms, passing the prison and Yamada’s house without seeing either father or daughter.

And so they left Mano and headed inland. The narrow road wound northeast through a wide plain of rice paddies stretching into the distance. On both sides wooded mountains rose, and ahead lay Mount Kimpoku, a dark cone against the blue sky. It marked the other side of Sadoshima and overlooked Lake Kamo and Minato.

The two horses and the mule trotted along smoothly. Lush green rice paddies promised a good harvest, a soft wind rustled through the pines lining the way, and small birds twittered in the branches. The sky was clear except for a few cloudlets, and the sun had not yet brought the midday heat. Now and then a hawk circled above, looking for field mice or a careless dove.

It would have been altogether pleasant, except for Akitada’s assignment and his companions’ ill humor. The former he could do nothing about; the latter he tried to ignore. Osawa was becoming used to his horse and did not do too badly, but he clearly disliked riding and was in a foul humor, which he took out on Genzo. The scribe kept slipping off his mule, causing delays while Akitada dismounted to help him back in the saddle. Genzo maintained a sullen silence under the barrage of ridicule and reproof heaped upon him by Osawa, and Akitada’s assistance made his antagonism worse instead of better.

They reached the hamlet of Hatano by midday and stopped at a small temple. In the grove of cedars surrounding the temple hall, they ate a light repast of cold rice wrapped in oak leaves and drank water from a well bubbling among mossy rocks.

Osawa, still in a bad mood, maintained distance between himself and his helpers, choosing to sit on a large rock near the well while making Akitada and Genzo squat on the ground next to their mounts.

Akitada was glad not to have to engage in chitchat with either of his companions. As soon as feasible, he left to relieve himself and inspected the collar of his robe by unpicking some threads. Both the imperial documents that commanded him to investigate Prince Okisada’s death and Governor Mutobe’s safe conduct were still there and in good condition. But he cursed himself for his carelessness; he should have foreseen his robe might need cleaning, though he had not expected to bleed quite so copiously over it. Masako must have washed out the bloodstains. But had she removed the documents first and later reinserted them and sewn up the collar?

If so, had she recognized the imperial seal? Could she read?

Her rough manners and the fact that she was a girl suggested that Yamada probably had not bothered to teach her, concentrating his efforts on his son instead. He had certainly not called on her to help him with his bookkeeping. But wouldn’t she have taken the documents to her father, who would have recognized them immediately? She had not done so, or Yamada would have mentioned it. It was puzzling and worrisome.

They remounted and continued the journey for another mile when Akitada’s horse shied and unseated him. He landed hard on his hip and right shoulder and stared in surprise at his saddle, which lay beside him in the road. The big black had jumped off the roadway into a rice paddy, where the deep mud prevented him from galloping off. Akitada picked himself up to a snicker from Genzo. Osawa frowned but said nothing. When he looked at his saddle, Akitada saw that both saddle band and back strap had broken because someone had partially cut them.

Genzo’s work, he thought, but he said nothing. Instead he caught the black and, slinging the saddle and saddle packs over his shoulder, rode the rest of the way bareback.

They reached the manor of Kumo Sanetomo, high constable of Sadoshima, before sunset. They had passed through rich rice lands, dotted here and there by small farms and modest manors, but Kumo’s estate was very large even by mainland standards. The walled and gated manor house was surrounded by a cluster of service buildings and an extensive garden. The whole looked more like a small village than a single residence.

Deep, thatched roofs covered the main hall and attached pavilions. The garden stretched beyond. A separate enclosure contained stables, kitchens, storage buildings, and servants’

quarters.

Akitada was intrigued by these signs of wealth. “The high constable’s manor looks more like a nobleman’s seat than a farm,” he said to Osawa, who was saddle sore and glowered.

“All those stables must contain many horses, and he probably employs and houses a hundred servants. If the place were better fortified, it might be a military stronghold.” Osawa grunted. “Kumo, as his father before him, is very wealthy. Horses are his particular fancy. Being a descendant of an old noble family, he carries on its traditions of hunting, swordsmanship, and archery from the back of a horse. Wait till you see the residence. I doubt there are many better in the capital.”

The big double gate opened promptly at their approach.

Kumo’s servants were well-dressed and healthy-looking men who took the animals and directed the travelers to the main hall of the residence. There an elderly house servant in a black silk robe received them and led them into a small but elegant room.

Sliding doors were open to the garden, panels covering storage areas had landscape paintings pasted on them, the rice mats underfoot were thick and new, and on the large black desk rested lacquered and painted writing boxes, jade water containers, bamboo brush holders, and a small, delicate ivory carving of a fox.

Osawa took one of the cushions near the desk, leaving Akitada and Genzo standing. After a minute, a young woman in a pretty green silk robe entered and placed a tray with refreshments before Osawa. She bowed and informed him that her master would come immediately.

He did. They could hear his firm steps and deep voice in the corridor outside before he flung back the sliding door and ducked in. The doorway was not particularly low, but Kumo was one of the tallest men Akitada had seen. He guessed him to be about his own age and in excellent physical condition.

Dressed in a copper-colored brocade hunting jacket and brown silk trousers, Kumo wore his hair loose to just above his broad shoulders and had a full mustache and short, well-trimmed chin beard. Perhaps he meant to combine the costly costume of the court noble with the manly appearance of the military leader. His eyes, strangely light in the deeply tanned face, passed indifferently over Akitada and Genzo, who had knelt and bowed their heads at his entrance.

“Ah, it’s my good friend Osawa,” Kumo said, his voice filling the small room, much as his large figure dominated it.

Osawa bowed deeply. “It is my very great pleasure to call on Your Honor again.”

Kumo laughed, seating himself on the other cushion and pouring wine from a flask into the two cups on the tray. Both flask and matching cups were of Chinese porcelain. He passed one of the cups to Osawa. “Never mind all the respectful phrases, my friend. I’m just a simple farmer who is honored by the visit of our governor’s most trusted advisor. Please, eat and drink. You must be quite exhausted from your long journey.

How is His Excellency these days?”

Osawa blushed with pleasure at the attention. “Not so well, I’m afraid,” he confided. He drank, he nibbled, and he became expansive. “In fact, he’s quite distraught. His son is awaiting trial, you know. The governor paid him a visit just the other day. I expect he was trying to elicit some shred of evidence in his favor.”

“Ah.” Kumo shook his head. “A dreadful tragedy. Was he successful? The trial is set for the end of this month, is it not?”

“Yes. It’s only a week away. And he was not successful, I think. His spirits were quite low when he came back, and his servants say he does not sleep at night.” Akitada was surprised how well informed Osawa was about Mutobe’s private life, but he was even more intent on watching the high constable, hoping to get the measure of the man who might have played a part in the late prince’s life and death. Suddenly he found himself the object of Kumo’s interest and quickly lowered his eyes again. Too late.

“You have a new assistant, I see,” drawled Kumo. “Usually you bring only one scribe with you. This signifies some new honor, I assume?”

Osawa flushed and laughed a little. “You are too kind, sir.

No, no. The fellow is a prisoner who happens to write well. The governor is desperately short-handed and wished us to return quickly.” He added in an aggrieved tone, “He even insisted we ride horses on this occasion.”

“What? No bearers, and you not used to riding? My dear Osawa, you must have a hot bath immediately and rest before we talk business. Perhaps your assistants can start on the work with the help of my secretary. Come,” he said, getting to his feet,

“I have just returned from hunting myself. We shall enjoy a nice soaking together and you can fill me in on all the news from Mano.”

To do Osawa justice, he hesitated. But then he rose. “You are most kind, Your Honor,” he said. “I am a little fatigued. If your secretary will be good enough to give the documents in question to Taketsuna-the new fellow-he will show the scribe what should be copied for our files. This Taketsuna has a good education. I shall inspect their work in the morning.” Turning to his companions, he said, “You heard me?” Akitada nodded and bowed. Kumo and Osawa disappeared, and a servant took him and Genzo into a large office where several scribes were bent over writing desks or getting books and boxes from the shelves which covered three sides of the room.

Kumo’s secretary was a small, pleasant man in his mid-fifties. He took one look at Genzo’s broad face and dull eyes and addressed Akitada. “I started gathering the relevant tax documents the moment I heard of Inspector Osawa’s arrival,” he said, with a gesture to a desk covered with bulging document boxes. “My name is Shiba. Please feel free to ask for anything.

My staff will see to it immediately.”

Kumo’s scribes, all pretending to be busy while casting curious glances at the visitors, were a far cry from the pitiful staff of the governor’s archives, and Akitada, encouraged by Shiba’s courteous manner, said, “I am Taketsuna, an exile from the mainland and still a stranger here. Forgive my curiosity, but I was told that capable scribes and clerks are extremely rare. How is it that your master seems so well supplied with them?” Shiba chuckled. “We are part of his household. The master and his father before him saved likely boys from work in the mines by training them in different skills,” he said. “I, for example, was sixteen when my mother died in poverty. Like you, my father came here as a prisoner. My mother followed him when I was four. My father died soon after our arrival, and my poor mother worked in the fields to support us. She tried to teach me a little, but when she succumbed also, I-being a boy and small of stature-was sent to the mines. The master’s father found me there and took me into his household, where he had me taught by his son’s tutor. My master continues his father’s legacy.”

Shiba’s image of Kumo differed diametrically from Mutobe’s. The governor had called young Kumo “haughty and overbearing,” but Akitada had seen no sign of it in the man who had greeted a mere inspector like Osawa as a valued guest.

Turning with new interest to the documents, he saw quickly that Shiba and his scribes had indeed been well trained. The system of accounting was efficient and the brushwork of the scribes far superior to Genzo’s. He quickly identified the relevant reports and handed some of them to Genzo with instructions to begin copying.

Genzo folded his arms. “Do it yourself,” he growled. “I’m not your servant.”

The man needed a good beating, but Akitada said peaceably, “Very well. Then you will have to read through those and summarize them for the governor.” He pointed to a stack of documents he had set aside for himself.

Genzo went to look at the top document, frowned, then said, “Dull stuff, this. I prefer the copying.” Having got his way, he settled down and started to rub ink. Akitada smiled.

Shiba had watched with interest. He said in a low voice,

“Forgive me, Taketsuna, but I see that you are a man not only of superior education but also of wisdom. Perhaps, before your trouble, you had the good fortune to live in the capital?”

“That is so.”

Shiba pressed his hands together and said fervently, “Truly, how very blessed your life must have been. And by chance, have you ever visited the imperial palace?” Akitada smiled. “I used to work there and once I even saw His Majesty from a distance. He rode in a gilded palanquin and was accompanied by the empress and her ladies in their own palanquins, a very beautiful sight.”

“Oh!” breathed Shiba. “I imagine it must have been like a glimpse of the Western Paradise.” He was rapt with pleasure for a moment, then remembered his duty. “Forgive my chatter. You will want to get started. Perhaps tonight, after your work, you might join me for a cup of wine?”

Akitada said regretfully, “You are most kind, but I do not think Inspector Osawa will permit it.”

“Ah. Well, I think that may be managed. You are now in the Kumo mansion. All men are treated with respect here. I’ll send someone for you after your evening rice.” Akitada spent an hour checking the tax statements and writing brief summaries of the salient points, a chore he was abundantly familiar with. At sundown, a gong sounded somewhere nearby. Genzo dropped his brush noisily in the water container, yawned, and stretched. “About time they fed us,” he muttered.

Akitada rose and went to look over Genzo’s shoulders. The sheet of paper the man had been copying was splotched with ink, and the characters were barely legible. Worse, a few were missing so that whole phrases made no sense.

“You’ll have to do better,” he said. “We want clean copies, and you left out words and characters. Do that one over again more carefully.” He leaned forward to reach for the other sheets, pathetically few for an hour’s work. “Is that all you’ve-” he started to say, when Genzo suddenly lashed out, pushing Akitada back so hard that he sat down on the floor.

The scribe was up quickly for someone of his size and general lack of energy. “I’ll teach you to tell me what to do, filthy scum,” he ground out and threw himself on Akitada.

Irritated past reason, Akitada met the attack by leaning back and kicking him with both legs in the stomach. Genzo sucked in his breath sharply as he flew back against the table, scattering papers and ink. Akitada stood and pulled him up by the front of his robe. He said through gritted teeth, “I have had enough of you. Don’t think I don’t know you cut my saddle bands. One more outburst from you, and I’ll make sure you never walk again. Do you understand?”

Eyes bulging, Genzo nodded. He looked green and held his stomach.

“Clean up this mess,” Akitada snapped, dropping him back on the floor. “I don’t think you will feel much like food, so you may as well spend the time copying those papers over neatly. I’ll let the secretary know that you are finishing some work before retiring.” He strolled out of the room and left the building.

The evening was delightfully cool after the heat of the day.

If the high constable did, in fact, practice common courtesy toward even the lowliest prisoner on the island, then his staff might share his philosophy and allow him the privileges accorded a guest. He decided to test this theory by exploring and found that, wherever he strayed, servants smiled and bobbed their heads. One or two stopped to ask if he was lost, but when he told them he was just stretching his legs and admiring the residence, they left him alone. He did not, of course, enter the private quarters but wandered all around them by way of the gardens.

These were extensive and quite as well designed as any he had visited in the noble mansions and villas of the capital. Paths snaked through trees, shrubs, and rockeries, crossing miniature streams over curved bridges to lead to various garden pavilions.

Patches of tawny lilies bloomed everywhere and birds flitted from branch to branch.

One of the pavilions turned out to be a miniature temple.

Akitada was enchanted by its dainty size, which nevertheless duplicated the ornate carvings, blue-tiled roofs, and gilded ornamentation of large temples. Someone had taken great pains and spent a considerable amount of money on this little building. He climbed the steps to a tiny veranda surrounded by a red-lacquered balustrade and entered through the carved doors.

Inside, every surface seemed carved and painted in glorious reds, greens, blacks, oranges, and golds. Even the floor was painted, and in its center stood a gilded altar table on its own carved and lacquered dais. A wooden Buddha statue rested on the altar, and a number of gilded vessels with offerings stood before it. Behind the Buddha figure, a richly embroidered silk cloth was suspended, depicting swirling golden clouds, em-blems of Kumo’s family name, on a deep blue background. A faint haze of intensely fragrant incense curled and spiraled lazily from a golden censer, perfuming the air and veiling the gilded tablets inscribed with the names and titles of Kumo ancestors. This was the Kumo family’s ancestral altar.

Akitada read some of the tablets and saw the names of two emperors among the distant forebears of the present Kumo.

Only the most recent tablets lacked titles. Kumo’s great-grandfather had been stripped of his rank and sent here into exile.

Akitada reflected that few families survived such punishment in the style of this one. His own family, though they had retained their titles, barely subsisted since his famous ancestor had died in exile.

He made a perfunctory bow to the Buddha. No larger than a child of three or four, the figure was an unskilled carving from some dull wood. It seemed out of place among all the gold and lacquer work, yet somehow for that reason more numi-nous, as if it somehow symbolized what the Kumos had become. Perhaps a local artisan had carved it or, more likely, the first Kumo exile had done so in order to find solace in religious devotion.

Stepping closer, Akitada found that the surface was astonishingly smooth for an artless carving, but the Buddha’s face repelled him. It was quite ugly and the god’s expression was more like a demon’s snarl than the gentle, peaceful smile of ordinary representations. The figure had golden eyes, but they shone almost shockingly bright from that dark, distorted visage. Odd. The Buddha’s shining eyes reminded Akitada of Kumo’s pale eyes and he wondered about his ancestry.

A faint and unearthly music came from the garden. Akitada stepped out on the veranda to listen. Somewhere someone was playing a flute, and he felt a great longing for his own instrument. The melody was both entrancing and beautifully played.

Like a bee scenting nectar, Akitada followed the music on paths which wound and twisted, leading him away as soon as he seemed to get closer until he lost all sense of direction. Shrubbery and trees hid and revealed views. He heard the splash of running water and passed a miniature waterfall somewhere along the way; he heard the cries of birds and waterfowl, then caught a glimpse of a pond, or miniature lake with its own small island. The flute seemed to parody the sounds of the garden until he wondered which was real.

The artist was playing a very old tune with consummate skill. It was called “Land of the Rice Ears,” and Akitada stopped, following each sequence of notes, paying particular attention to the second part, for it contained a passage he had never mastered himself. There! So that was the way it was supposed to be.

He smiled, raising his hands to finger imaginary stops, wishing he could play as well.

Just after the last note faded, he reached the lake. The sky above was still faintly rosy, almost iridescent, like the inside of a shell. All was silent. A butterfly rose from one of the lilies that nodded at the water’s rim. Then a pair of ducks paddled around the island and lifted into the evening air with a soft flapping of wings and a shower of sparkling drops. Akitada wondered if he had strayed into a dream.

With a sigh, he followed the lakeshore. His stomach growled, reminding him that food was more useful than this longing for a flute he had been forced to leave behind. Then his eye caught a movement on the small island. He could see the curved roof of another small pavilion rising behind the trees.

Two spots of color shimmered through a gap between the trees, a patch of white and another of deep lilac.

A dainty bridge connected the island to the path he was on.

He crossed it and heard the sound of women’s voices. Two ladies in white and wisteria blue sat behind the brilliant red balustrade and under the gilded bells that hung from the eaves of the pavilion. Thinking them Kumo’s wives, Akitada stopped and prepared to retreat. But then he saw that both women were quite old. The one in purple silk had very long white hair which she wore loose, like young noblewomen, so that it draped over her shoulders and back and spread across the wide skirts of her gown. She was tiny, seemingly shrunken with age, but her skin was as white as her hair, and the rich purple silk of her outer robe was lined with many layers of other gowns in four or five different costly colors. Such a costume might have been worn by a young princess in times gone by. On this frail old woman it mocked the vanity of youth.

It was the other woman who had been playing the flute-

the other woman who, in sharp contrast to her companion, wore a plain white robe and veil, and whose face and hands were darkened from exposure to the sun. The nun Ribata.