Red Chrysanthemum

3

The Lady’s Tale

GENROKU YEAR 11, MONTH 3 (APRIL 1698)

Cherry trees in the garden bloomed with radiant pink splendor. Petals drifted to the ground like snowflakes, dappled the grass, floated on the pond, and crowned the stone lanterns. They fell on Masahiro as he shot arrows from a little wooden bow at a straw target. Reiko watched from the veranda, where she reclined on cushions, sleepy and lethargic because she was two months pregnant.

Hirata’s wife, Midori, came out of the mansion, carrying a steaming bowl of tea. Plump and pretty, she wore a kimono patterned with cherry blossoms. In one arm she cradled her baby boy. Her four-year-old daughter, Taeko, toddled after her. She knelt beside Reiko and handed her the tea. “Drink this. It will make you more lively.”

Reiko sipped the brew of ginseng and aromatic herbs. “When I was carrying Masahiro, I felt so energetic. But I guess every pregnancy is different.”

Taeko ran into the garden toward Masahiro. She adored him even though he was too grown-up to pay much attention to a little girl. Now he ignored her and took aim.

“Watch out, Masahiro. Don’t hit her,” Reiko called.

“I know. I won’t.” He had the masculine, adult air of an expert and scorn for feminine worries.

A maid appeared, carrying a tray laden with bamboo scroll containers. “Here are some letters for you, Honorable Lady Reiko.” She set the tray beside Reiko, bowed, and departed.

“You get so many letters,” Midori said. “Are these from more people who want your help?”

“Probably.”

During the past few years, Reiko had developed a reputation as a person capable of solving problems. This stemmed from the fact that when Sano had been sosakan-sama, she’d assisted him with his investigations. Her deeds had been reported in the gossip that circulated through high society and in the news broadsheets sold in town. Controversy surrounded Reiko. Most people thought her unfeminine, scandalous, and disgraceful, but others had come to regard her as a sort of Bodhisattva, a merciful deity who would bring them salvation.

“It’s so good what you’ve done,” Midori said. Reiko had been running a sort of private assistance bureau, particularly for women in trouble. She’d found jobs and homes for them, paid for doctors to cure their sick children. “Those people would have died if you hadn’t gone out of your way to help.”

“I’m glad to do it.” Her work made Reiko feel useful. Serving the public also served honor, and occupied the time when Sano was too busy to be with her. She reflected that she and Sano were so seldom together that it was a wonder they’d managed to conceive a second child.

“Other people might have been executed,” Midori said.

Reiko had intervened on behalf of people unjustly accused of crimes. She’d investigated their cases and found the real culprits. The daughter of Magistrate Ueda, she’d used her influence with him to get the innocents acquitted. This gave her an outlet for her detective skills, which would otherwise have gone unused because Sano didn’t investigate crimes anymore.

“So many have you to thank for protecting them from people who did them wrong,” Midori said.

Reiko had also rescued women from cruel husbands, lovers, and employers. “I’m afraid not everybody would thank me.”

She began opening the scroll containers, read a letter full of obscene curses, and winced. Evildoers had gotten their comeuppance due to her. She’d made enemies who didn’t appreciate her interfering in their affairs. She’d also felt the sting of social disapproval because she took actions unheard of for a woman. Ladies of her class were polite to her and curried her favor, but they talked about her behind her back. Samurai officials looked askance at her, even though they wouldn’t dare criticize the chamberlain’s wife.

“And I’m afraid I’ve become a target of everybody who wants something.” Reiko read aloud from another letter: “ ‘Dear Lady Reiko, I need money. Please send me 100 koban.”’

The next message was written on cheap paper in calligraphy that was very neat, the characters as square as though printed from a woodblock. As she skimmed the words, Reiko sat up straight. “Listen to this one.”

Dear Lady Reiko,

Please excuse me for imposing on you, but I need your help. My name is Lily. I am a poor widow. We met at the Hundred-Day Theater in Ryogoku a few years ago. I helped you then, and I think it’s time for you to return the favor. My little boy has been stolen. He’s only five years old. Will you please find him and bring him back to me? I’m a dancer at the Persimmon Teahouse in Nihonbashi. I beg you to come and see me there as soon as possible.

Complicated directions to the teahouse followed. Reiko said, “I remember this woman.” Lily had been a witness who’d aided Reiko’s search for an escaped murderess.

“Are you going to help her?” Midori asked.

“I do owe her a favor,” Reiko said. “And to lose a child is a terrible calamity.” She looked through the lush, pink cherry trees at Masahiro in the garden.

“Bring me the arrows, Taeko,” he called.

The little girl gathered up the arrows he’d shot, pranced up to him, and handed them over. Reiko smiled because he’d found a clever use for his admirer.

“But you’re expecting,” Midori said in concern. “You shouldn’t risk your health.”

“I’ll be healthier if I’m busy,” Reiko said. Furthermore, Lily’s plight had aroused her maternal instincts. “At least I’ll go and see Lily.” She felt the surge of energy that each new investigation, and each new chance to help someone in need, brought her. “A little trip into town shouldn’t hurt me.”

Reiko rode in her palanquin along the winding passages of Edo Castle. Her bearers carried her downhill, and mounted bodyguards accompanied her through the main gate.

A holiday atmosphere enlivened the daimyo district. Ladies in floral kimono spilled out of palanquins, returning from jaunts to temples to view the cherry blossoms. Tipsy from too much wine, they flirted with guards at the gates. In the Nihonbashi merchant district, cherry trees bloomed in pots on balconies. Shopkeepers hawked parasols printed with the pink flowers; confectioners sold cakes decorated for the season. But neither holiday cheer nor the sun-spangled day could beautify the district to which Lily’s directions led Reiko.

Blighted rows of buildings looked ready to tumble into canals that stank of raw sewage. Gulls, rats, and stray dogs foraged in trash piles. Cesspools overflowed into the narrow, twisting lanes. Smoke from too many stoves blackened the air. Haggard mothers nursed babies in doorways; children and crippled beggars swarmed around Reiko’s palanquin, begging for coins, and her escorts chased them away.

The Persimmon Teahouse occupied the ground floor of a ramshackle building. Tattered blue curtains were fastened back from posts that surrounded a raised floor on which tough-looking male customers lounged. Slatternly maids served drinks. A man beat a drum while three women danced. The dancers wore garish cotton robes; their faces were masks of white rice powder and red rouge. They postured and gesticulated in a lewd manner. The customers laughed and groped under the dancers’ skirts. Reiko climbed out of her palanquin and peered at the women. She couldn’t recognize Lily, whom she’d only met once.

The proprietor greeted Reiko’s escorts with a broad smile. “Welcome, gentlemen. Join the fun!”

“My mistress is here to see a dancer named Lily,” said Lieutenant Asukai, who was Reiko’s chief bodyguard.

Surprise showed on the proprietor’s face as he beheld Reiko: Ladies of her class didn’t frequent places such as this. “Who’s your mistress?”

“Lady Reiko, wife of the Honorable Chamberlain Sano.”

Now the proprietor looked dumbfounded by a visit from such an exalted personage. Before he could reply, one of the dancers rushed out of the teahouse.

“Merciful gods! You came!” She dropped to her knees before Reiko. “I’ve waited for nine days since I sent the letter to you. I’d given up hoping. I can’t believe you’re really here.” Lily gazed up at Reiko as if entranced by a celestial visitation. “A thousand thanks!”

“Yes, I’m here to help you,” Reiko said, moved by her gratitude. As Lily stood up, Reiko remembered her. She was perhaps forty years old, thin and gaunt under her bright robes. She had once been pretty, but the bones of her face were sharp, the skin sagging on them, her hair limp. “Can we go somewhere and talk?”

“Lily, get back to work,” the proprietor interrupted. “You know you’re not allowed to entertain personal company.” The customers called and motioned for Lily to rejoin them.

Lieutenant Asukai rattled coins in the pouch that hung from his sash. “Our business in exchange for a moment of her time.”

The man relented. “All right,” he told Lily, “but make it short.”

As her escorts entered the teahouse, Reiko noticed a food stall across the street. “Let’s go over there.” Lily looked as if she could use a meal.

The food stall was a narrow storefront equipped with a ceramic hearth on which the cook boiled two big pots. Reiko and Lily sat on the raised floor. When their meal was served, Reiko dubiously eyed the scummy tea and the soup that contained noodles, withered bean sprouts, and gray, rancid bits of fish. But Lily wolfed down hers.

“In your letter you said your son was stolen,” Reiko said. “When did this happen?”

Lily paused between bites; tears spilled into her bowl. “Two months ago. I haven’t seen him since.”

“What is his name?”

“Jiro.”

“I have a son a bit older,” Reiko said. She and Lily smiled at each other; their common experience as mothers transcended their class differences. “In order for me to get Jiro back, first I need to find out who stole him.”

“I already know,” said Lily. “It was Lord Mori.”

“How do you know?”

“I gave Jiro to him. He was supposed to give him back. That was the deal. But he didn’t.”

There was obviously more to this case than the kidnapping it had seemed when Reiko had read the letter. “What kind of deal are you talking about?”

Lily resumed eating. Between gulps of broth, she said, “I heard that Lord Mori likes little boys. So I took Jiro to his house. Lord Mori paid me to have him for the night.”

Reiko couldn’t believe what she’d heard. “Do you mean for sex?”

“Yes.” Lily eyed Reiko as if she were daft. “What else?”

Shocked, Reiko blurted out, “You rented Jiro as a prostitute to Lord Mori?” Although she knew that child prostitution was legal and common, she’d never come face to face with an example. Now she remembered hearing of the cruelty, moral degradation, and physical pain suffered by the children at the hands of the men. “How could you do that to your own son?” Her sympathy for Lily was rapidly turning to revulsion.

“Do you think I wanted to? Do you think I liked for some man to maul my little boy? I only did it because I had no choice.”

Lily glared at the teahouse. “The boss pays me two coppers a day. That, and whatever tips I can wring out of the customers, is all I have to keep myself and Jiro alive. This year the landlord raised my rent. I couldn’t afford to buy food.” Envy and contempt filled the stare she gave Reiko. “I bet you don’t know what it’s like to hear your boy cry because he’s hungry.”

Reiko felt doubt restraining her compassion toward Lily. “Couldn’t you get another job?”

“I’ve tried. But no one will hire me for any more money than I’m paid now. I’ve tried selling myself to men, but I’ve been sick, and just look at me.” She spread her arms and lifted her face to the sunlight, which showed her to brutal disadvantage. “Men won’t pay much for a scrawny whore like me. But some of them will pay a lot for a boy as beautiful as Jiro.”

Lily stiffened her posture as her gaze held Reiko’s. “Lord Mori paid enough that I could have fed Jiro for a month. Judge me if you will, but you really don’t know how things are for the likes of us.”

Reiko realized that she was in no position to criticize. “I’m sorry.” She’d never lacked for anything, and neither had Masahiro. The blessing of her rich father and husband had ensured their good fortune. “My life is so different that I have a hard time understanding yours.”

“Does this mean you won’t help me get Jiro back?” Sudden panic flared in Lily’s eyes.

“No, of course I will,” Reiko assured her. The boy was innocent and deserved aid no matter what. Lord Mori shouldn’t be allowed to get away with stealing him. And Reiko pitied Lily in spite of her disapproval.

Lily expelled a shaky sigh of relief. She gazed at the empty bowl she’d been clutching. “I know I’m a bad mother. I know I don’t deserve your help,” she said in a humble, shamed tone. “But I really appreciate it.” She cast a covetous glance at Reiko’s untouched meal. When Reiko passed the bowls to her, she seized on them. “A million thanks!”

“Tell me what happened,” Reiko said. “You left your son with Lord Mori. Then what?”

“The next morning, I went back to the estate,” Lily said, chewing noodles. “I asked the guards for Jiro. They acted as if they didn’t know anything about him. They said Lord Mori didn’t have him.” Indignation suffused Lily’s face. “They were lying. I demanded that they give me my son. But they said that if I didn’t go away, they would kill me.” She sobbed, choked on her food, and coughed. “So I had to leave without Jiro.”

Reiko’s pity melted her disapproval, as she imagined losing Masahiro. She couldn’t help wondering if the boy was dead. “Was that the end of it?”

“No. I went to the doshin who patrols this neighborhood. I told him what happened and asked him to go to the Mori estate with me and get Jiro back. But he wouldn’t. He said Lord Mori was an important man, and there was nothing he could do.”

Reiko knew that the police didn’t dare bother a daimyo who was an ally of Lord Matsudaira. They wouldn’t risk themselves for a peasant like Lily.

“I heard that you help people in trouble. I got the idea to write to you.” Lily finished off her meal and set down the empty bowl. “You’re my last hope.”

“I’ll do everything in my power to‘ save Jiro for you,” Reiko promised.

Lily’s face crumpled into tears of joy. “A million thanks! I’ll repay you someday, I swear!”

The proprietor shouted from the teahouse: “Lily! You’ve been gone long enough. Get back to work!”

Lily bowed to Reiko, gave her a final, trusting look, then scurried off. As Reiko climbed into her palanquin and her escorts bore her down the street, she began planning how to go about reclaiming the stolen child.

“I could take some of my husband’s troops over to the Mori estate and ask for the boy,” she said to Lieutenant Asukai, who rode beside her.

“Lord Mori won’t be able to refuse,” Asukai said.

“But on second thought, I’d rather not bring my husband into this.” Reiko tried to keep her work far removed from Sano because she didn’t want to cause trouble for him. Her actions had sometimes jeopardized him in the past, and to involve him in a clash with Lord Mori would be politically risky. “I had better try something less obvious.”

The next morning found Reiko seated in her palanquin in a street near the daimyo district. Her bearers lounged against the wall of a shop while her guards sat astride their horses, near the neighborhood gate. Reiko peered out her window through the flow of pedestrians, looking for Lieutenant Asukai.

The clever young samurai had become her chief assistant. Soon she saw him coming down the street, escorting a middle-aged woman, dressed in a plain indigo robe and white head cloth, who carried a large basket. Reiko had sent him to loiter outside the Mori estate, follow the first servant who came out, and nab him or her. Had Reiko herself tried it, she would have been too conspicuous, but one more samurai among the thousands in the daimyo district was barely noticeable. Now Asukai brought Reiko the woman, a maid headed for the market. Her face showed both curiosity and wariness as he marched her up to the palanquin.

“I’m looking for a little boy who was at the Mori estate two months ago,” Reiko said. “His name is Jiro. He’s five years old. Have you seen him?”

“No. I don’t know anything about any boy.” Shoulders hunched in fear, the maid backed away. “I have to go now.”

Lieutenant Asukai made a move to detain her, but Reiko said, “Go fetch another servant. Maybe we’ll have better luck.”

During the next hour, Lieutenant Asukai brought a valet and another maid, but their reaction was the same, fearful disclaimer of knowledge about Jiro. As Reiko watched the valet hurry off, Lieutenant Asukai said, “I think they’re lying.”

“So do I,” Reiko said. “They’re afraid they’ll be punished for talking about Lord Mori’s business. Let’s try someone from an estate near his.”

Lieutenant Asukai went off and soon brought back a groom from the stable of Lord Mori’s neighbor daimyo. When Reiko asked him about Jiro, he said, “I see lots of boys going into Lord Mori’s estate. Funny thing, though. Some of them never seem to come out.” Then he took on the expression of a man who’d suddenly stepped into a hole. “Forget I said anything.”

After he’d absconded, Lieutenant Asukai fetched more witnesses, from whom Reiko heard similar dark, vague rumors followed by abrupt silence. “Fear of Lord Mori extends outside his household,” Lieutenant Asukai remarked.

“Yes,” Reiko said, “and something sinister is going on inside.” Again she wondered if Jiro was still alive.

“Now that we can’t get anyone to talk, what are we going to do?”

“We should make discreet inquiries elsewhere.”

More than a month passed while Reiko and Lieutenant Asukai questioned their acquaintances among upper-class society. But they gleaned no information about Lord Mori, whose clan and retainers kept to themselves. Hence, Reiko formulated another plan.

A cool, early summer dusk descended upon Edo. The setting sun gilded the rooftops while temple bells rang in the clear air. The tall framework structures of fire-watch towers stood out against the pearlescent sky like ink lines painted on sheer silk. From the base of a tower in an alley in the daimyo district, Lieutenant Asukai called, “Hey, you up there!”

The peasant man seated on the platform, beneath the bell suspended from the roof, peered over the rail. “Come down,” Lieutenant Asukai ordered.

Reluctant, yet afraid to disobey a samurai, the man descended the ladder. Reiko climbed up. She wore a padded cloak to keep her warm and a wicker hat that hid her face. Kneeling on the high, windswept platform, she hoped that people who happened to glance at the tower wouldn’t notice that it was occupied by someone other than the usual watchman. She gazed around her.

The panorama of Edo spread in every direction. Lights glimmered in windows and reflected from boats on the river. A crescent moon adorned the sky. Roofs, trees, and shadows hid the activity within the Mori estate, but she had a good view of the main gate. Lanterns burned outside it. She could see the guards stationed in front and anyone who came or went.

At first she observed only Lord Mori’s retainers arriving home. Later she noticed men crouched on roofs of the estate next door. They must be metsuke agents, spying as part of the routine surveillance on prominent citizens. The moon ascended over the hills; stars appeared while night extinguished the city’s lights and traffic thinned. Temple bells signaled the passage of two hours when a woman trudged up the street, leading a small child by the hand. They stopped by Lord Mori’s gate. Reiko watched the woman speak with the guards, heard their distant, unintelligible words. The guards let the pair in the gate. Soon the woman came out alone. She trudged away.

After a long, cold, uneventful vigil, Reiko thought she’d never been so glad to see the sun rise. She stretched muscles cramped from sitting in the tower the whole night except for brief descents to relieve herself. Now the woman reappeared, a peasant dressed in faded robes. Again she spoke with the guards. They shrugged and shook their heads. She became agitated; she pleaded with them. They shouted at her, and she fled, weeping.

Reiko had just witnessed a scene identical to the one Lily had described: Another mother had rented her son to Lord Mori and failed to get him back.

Anger filled Reiko because this kind of thing was allowed to happen. She felt more determined than ever to rescue Jiro. But what had happened to him, and to this other child?

Lord Mori’s retainers and servants came and went. Two porters carried out an oblong wooden crate. Below the tower, Lieutenant Asukai gestured for Reiko to come down before the day-shift fire-watcher arrived. As she alit on the ground, her mind drew a disturbing connection between the crate and the boy she’d seen last night.

“Go look for two porters who just carried a big wooden crate out of the Mori estate,” she ordered Lieutenant Asukai. “Hurry! Stop and search the crate for a dead body!”

He rode off, but after a long time he came back to report that he’d been unable to find the men she’d seen. Edo was full of porters. He’d stopped and searched many, but none of them had come from the Mori estate, and none were carrying anything except groceries. The pair in question had vanished into the crowds.

“I feel certain that Lord Mori is up to no good,” Reiko told Lieutenant Asukai while she journeyed homeward in her palanquin and he rode his horse alongside her. “I must get inside that estate and find out what’s going on.”

That afternoon, Reiko rode in her palanquin up the street she’d watched the previous night. She wore silk robes and lacquered clogs instead of the cloak and wicker hat. Her makeup was perfect, her upswept hair studded with floral ornaments. Her bearers set her palanquin down outside Lord Mori’s gate.

“Lady Reiko, wife of the Honorable Chamberlain Sano, is here to call on Lady Mori,” Lieutenant Asukai told the sentries.

They summoned servants to notify Lady Mori that she had a visitor. Reiko was glad that her social position entitled her to call on any ladies in Japan, who must see her whether they wanted to or not. Soon Reiko found herself seated in a chamber with Lady Mori.

“I am so flattered that you have come to see me,” Lady Mori said. She was in her forties, dressed in an expensive but dull green kimono. Her hair, worn in a simple knot, was threaded with silver. She was slim, but heavy cheeks, full lips, sloping shoulders, and a broad bottom gave her an appearance of weightiness. She spoke with delicate, formal precision. “This is an unexpected honor indeed.”

“It is you who has done me the honor of receiving me,” Reiko said, equally polite and formal. “I thought I would like to make the acquaintance of the important ladies in society.” She couldn’t very well say that she’d come in search of a child that the woman’s husband had stolen and might have harmed.

“How very gracious of you. Many thanks for choosing my humble self as the object of your attention.” Lady Mori smiled; her eyes sparkled with pleasure. She seemed a nice woman, and Reiko felt a twinge of guilt for exploiting her. “May I offer you refreshments?”

Tea was served by her maid, an older, gray-haired woman who looked vaguely familiar to Reiko. But Reiko couldn’t think where she’d seen the woman, who showed no sign of recognizing her. Perhaps the maid had once worked for someone Reiko knew.

“The weather is quite lovely, don’t you think?” Lady Mori said while she and Reiko sipped their tea and nibbled cakes.

“Yes,” Reiko said. “It’s not too warm yet.”

This type of trivial conversation was the reason that Reiko usually avoided visits to women of her class. Custom prevented them from saying anything interesting until they’d known one another for a longer time than Reiko wanted to spend. Laboring to make small talk, she looked through the open door at the garden and noticed that the large screen of embroidered silk that stood behind Lady Mori depicted the same landscape of pond, bridge, and trees as outside.

“What a beautiful screen,” Reiko said.

“Do you like it?” Lady Mori said eagerly. “I made it myself.”

“Very much. How impressive,” Reiko said with honest admiration.

“Do you embroider?” Lady Mori asked.

“I’m afraid not.” As a child Reiko had taken lessons, but she hated sewing.

The talk progressed to clothes, food, and the shops that sold them. Lady Mori discussed these topics with enthusiasm until Reiko wrenched the conversation to the subject of Lord Mori. “How long will your husband be in Edo?”

“He leaves for Nagato Province in late summer.”

Reiko knew that the law of alternate attendance required each daimyo to spend four months of each year in the capital and the rest in his province. The feudal lords were divided into two groups, one of which was in Edo while the other was in the country. This restriction kept them from staging a rebellion together, as did the fact that their families remained in town as hostages. Reiko hoped she could find out what Lord Mori had done with Lily’s son before he got away.

“What has Lord Mori been doing?” Reiko said.

“Oh, the usual things,” Lady Mori said, vague and surprised that Reiko should ask. “He doesn’t speak of them to me, of course.”

Most men didn’t discuss their business with their wives. “He must find more entertainment here than in the country?”

“I suppose so.”

Reiko couldn’t very well blurt out, Do you know that jour husband beds little boys? What happens to them all? Perhaps Lady Mori didn’t know. Arranged marriages were the norm, and many couples maintained separate personal lives.

“How long have you and Lord Mori been married?” Reiko said.

“Sixteen years.”

Maybe that was enough time for Lady Mori to have noticed her husband’s sexual practices even if she didn’t share them. She wasn’t blind; she must have been aware of those boys who frequented her home. But Reiko realized that her visit had lasted so long that unless she departed now, she would abuse Lady Mori’s hospitality. She wished she could have a look around the estate, but couldn’t think how to ask without arousing suspicion. She must get Lady Mori to invite her back.

Her gaze lit on the embroidered screen. Inspired, she said, “How I wish I could embroider as well as you do!” She gave Lady Mori a hopeful, bright-eyed, encouraging look. “How I would love to learn!”

“I would be delighted to teach you.” Lady Mori seemed flattered, and as eager for a better acquaintance as Reiko was. “Why don’t you come again tomorrow?”

Every day thereafter, Reiko went to the Mori estate for embroidery lessons. Lady Mori taught her how to sketch a design on silk and fill it in with colored thread. Reiko’s chance to explore the estate was when she went to and from the Place of Relief, but the estate was so heavily populated with servants and guards that she could never sneak past them. After five days, all Reiko had to show for her efforts was a silk square with lilies embroidered on it in crooked stitches, dotted with blood from pricking her fingers with the needle.

When she visited Lily at the teahouse and apologized because she hadn’t found Jiro, the dancer tried to hide her disappointment. “That’s all right,” Lily said. “I guess I never really expected to see him again.” Her brave acceptance of her loss made Reiko more determined than ever to rescue Jiro, or at least find out what had happened to him.

The sixth month came, bringing the wettest rainy season that Reiko could remember. She and Lady Mori sat sewing. Lady Mori worked on a large landscape panel, assisted by her ladies-in-waiting. Reiko hid her frustration as her thread snarled. She decided that this was the last time, and she must ask Sano for help despite her reluctance.

“My, it’s getting late,” said Lady Mori. “I believe we’ve had enough for today.” She set down her embroidery. “Will you do me the honor of staying for dinner?”

“That would be wonderful,” Reiko said, thrilled because night would be better for her detective work than day.

Maids brought in a lavish meal of sashimi, grilled seafood, dumplings, steamed greens, and sweet cakes. Wine enlivened the chatter between Lady Mori and her attendants. They grew loud, boisterous, and laughed at the slightest joke.

“Have some more wine,” Lady Mori said, her eyes feverishly bright from the liquor.

“Thank you.” Reiko held out her cup for the gray-haired maid to refill. She drank to keep up the pretense of enjoying the party. By midnight, the other women were too drunk to pay much attention to her, and she slipped out the door.

The rain had momentarily stopped. Smoke from a fire somewhere billowed in the darkness, veiling the wet air. Hazy lights shone through it. Reiko hurried across the garden. Trees dripped water on her and the wet grass drenched her hem and socks. She heard men talking in the distance, but she couldn’t see them through the smoke. Although not in immediate danger of being caught, she soon found that searching for a lost boy was harder than she’d anticipated.

The estate was vast, the mansion a labyrinth of wings connected to countless more wings. Lanterns shone in windows here and there, like glowing eyes. As Reiko circled buildings, two guards loomed suddenly out of the murk. She hid in a doorway, holding her breath until they passed. The house would be full of people, relatives of Lord Mori. Reiko didn’t dare intrude, and she doubted that he would quarter a boy prostitute with his family anyway. She groped through courtyards immersed in smoke and humidity, hazy and unreal. The odor of wet earth and drains filled her lungs. She evaded patrolling guards near the immense stables, where horses stomped and neighed. Dogs barked, and she fled to the martial arts ground. Ghost-warriors seemed to duel on the combat field. After some two hours, she realized the impossibility of exploring the whole estate by herself. Yet there remained one place that she most needed to see, the place where Lord Mori would most likely keep a nighttime companion.

If this estate had the typical layout, then the daimyo’s private chambers must be located at the center. Reiko navigated there by instinct. Fear drummed inside her. The private chambers would be the most heavily guarded section of Lord Mori’s domain, where a trespasser would be killed on sight, no questions asked first. She wished she could bring Lieutenant Asukai with her, but he was with her other guards in the barracks, and she had no time to fetch him. This might be her only chance to find Jiro, if he was still alive.

Ahead of Reiko towered a stone wall. A guard carrying a torch walked past it. She waited while his footsteps receded. Then she slipped through the gate. Some hundred paces distant, a building floated in the smoke, as if upon a misty ocean. Windows formed rectangles of yellow light. The eaves curved upward like dragon wings above the dark, gaping entrance. Reiko crept toward the building, around boulders that rose like reefs in fog, past a pond whose waters gleamed black and bottomless. At the entrance, the shadowy figures of two guards came into view; they conversed and gestured. Reiko thought she sensed someone else nearby, watching her. Her skin prickled. She almost lost her courage, when she heard a sudden, loud cry.

Shrill, human, and filled with pain, it pierced the quiet, vibrated the smoke. It resounded inside Reiko, evoking memories of nights she’d been awakened by Masahiro’s cries. This cry belonged to a little boy; she knew with every maternal fiber of herself. A boy was inside that building, and in distress.

She forged onward, aiming for the side of the building, away from the guards. She was almost there when two more patrolling guards suddenly materialized a few paces from her. She ducked under the veranda. From above her came more cries from the child, and fast, rhythmic thumping noises. She cowered in the dank, dark space while the guards’ legs passed by. Then she bolted out and climbed onto the veranda. She crawled across the wet, slick floorboards. Praying that the guards wouldn’t spot her, she huddled beside the lit window.

The child’s cries rose to panicky, desperate squeals.

Reiko took out the dagger she wore strapped to her arm beneath her sleeve in case she needed to defend herself. She poked it through the wooden grille that covered the window and cut a small hole in the paper pane. The noise inside was so loud, no one there would hear the blade rasping. She glanced furtively around her, but saw only dense, drifting smoke. She peered through the hole.

The cries abruptly stopped.

She was looking into a room in which lanterns suspended from the ceiling lit white chrysanthemums that bloomed in a ceramic vase in the alcove. Giant, gilded chrysanthemums adorned a black lacquer screen. A mural depicted naked men and small boys coupling, in various lewd positions and colorful graphic detail, amid more chrysanthemums. Reiko recalled that the flower was a symbol of male love because its tightly gathered petals resembled a boy’s anus. Then her attention riveted on the tableau in the corner of the room.

Atop a quilt-covered futon hunched a man that she presumed was Lord Mori, propped on his forearms and spread knees. He was nude and thickset; black hairs stippled him like bristles on a boar. His body heaved with fast, loud breathing. His mouth was open, his eyes closed, his complexion sweaty and flushed. A wine jar and cup sat on a nearby table. A small, bare leg and foot protruded from beneath him.

Lord Mori pushed himself upright. His penis was erect and gleaming wet. Where he’d lain on the futon was a naked boy, perhaps nine years old. His short black hair stuck up in a cowlick. Reiko couldn’t see his face; it was buried in the quilt. Her eyes widened with alarm at the red bruises around his neck. He didn’t move; he didn’t utter a sound.

Lord Mori smiled to himself, an ugly grimace of sensual satisfaction. He picked up a dressing gown and put it on. “You can come in now,” he called.

For one disturbing moment Reiko thought he was talking to her. Then a door inside the room opened. Two samurai entered.

“Get rid of him,” Lord Mori ordered. He had a voice so lacking in expression that it seemed inhuman.

The samurai bundled the boy into the quilt. Handling him as carelessly as if he were a sack of garbage, they carried him out of the room. Reiko turned away from her spy-hole, stunned because Lord Mori had apparently killed the boy during sex and had his retainers cover up the death.

Had he done the same to Jiro?

If so, Reiko couldn’t save Lily’s son. She couldn’t help the child she’d just seen murdered. But wrath flamed inside her. She mustn’t let Lord Mori get away with this, no matter that it was legal for a samurai to kill a peasant boy. This was an atrocity that went beyond the limits of the law. Lord Mori mustn’t hurt any more children. Reiko must tell her husband what had happened. Sano would punish Lord Mori even though he was a powerful daimyo and ally of Lord Matsudaira.

But as Reiko rose to head for home, dizziness unsteadied her. She staggered, her knees wobbly, and dropped her dagger. It hit the veranda with a clatter that sent odd, ringing echoes through her ears. The world spun in another, worse dizzy spell. Blackness engulfed her. She felt herself falling, but she was unconscious before she hit the ground.

A chill woke her from a deep, dead sleep. Reiko stirred groggily. Eyes still closed, she turned onto her side and reached down to pull the quilt over her. But her fumbling hand couldn’t find it. Sano must have yanked it onto his side of the bed. She could feel the bulk of his body, sleeping behind her. A headache pounded in her skull. She felt sticky wetness on the bed, underneath her, between her knees, in the crooks of her arms. A rotten smell crept into her nostrils. Instinctive alarm fluttered her eyes open.

In the dim light of dawn she saw that she wasn’t in her own chamber. This room had plain, masculine teak furniture and cabinets that she didn’t recognize, and stark white walls instead of the landscape murals she had at home.

Where was she?

Confused, she spoke her husband’s name. Sano didn’t answer. She reached behind herself for him. Her hand touched bare, unfamiliar flesh, cold as stone. An inkling of fear crept through Reiko. Wide awake now, she turned over on the bed.

And found herself face-to-face with a stranger. He lay on his back, his head twisted in her direction. His eyes were half open beneath their bristly brows; they stared vacantly. His heavy features sagged with stupor. Dark drool that filled his mouth had run down his parted lips onto his cheek.

Reiko screamed and recoiled. She scrambled to her hands and knees. Dizziness whirled the room around her. Pain thudded in her head as she crawled away from the man. Now she recognized him as Lord Mori. Images of bright chrysanthemums, the dead boy, and the men carrying out the shrouded body flashed in her mind. She noticed deep stab wounds that punctured Lord Mori’s bulky torso. Blood from them stained his skin. Shock and horror paralyzed Reiko as her gaze moved to his groin, where his male organs were absent and only a grisly red mass of blood, mutilated tissue, and pubic hair remained.

What on earth had happened?

The blood had flowed onto the bed. It was the source of the odor she’d smelled and the wetness she’d felt.

How in heaven had she come to be here?

Distraught, Reiko looked down at herself. She was naked, smeared all over with Lord Mori’s blood. It clotted her hair; she could taste its salty, iron flavor in her mouth. Retches and sobs burst from her. She felt an urge to cleanse herself, to cover her nakedness. Where were her clothes? She looked around and saw them on the floor. Beside them were Lord Mori’s severed organs, and a bloodstained dagger.

Her dagger.

Terror assailed Reiko. Even while panic, bewilderment, revulsion, and sickness hindered rational thought, she knew that her investigation had somehow landed her in the worst predicament imaginable. Thunder boomed; rain pattered on the roof. Whimpers, sobs, and gasps came from Reiko that she couldn’t stop. In a blind, hysterical effort to make things not so bad, she knelt beside Lord Mori, patted his face, and shook him, desperately trying to revive him. But he didn’t respond: She’d known he was dead as soon as she’d touched his cold flesh.