The Shogun's Daughter

13

A gentle spring twilight descended on the city as Sano and Marume rode up to Edo Castle. The sky was radiant in shades of pink, gold, and lavender. The noise from hammers and saws ceased. Dust settled out of the cooling air.

“Peace at last,” Marume said with relief.

Sano thought Edo was holding its breath, waiting for tomorrow’s onslaught of rebuilding. Nearing the gate, he looked for the family he’d seen that morning. He saw human shapes huddled along the avenue, but he couldn’t tell which were theirs. Inside the castle he heard the ordinary sounds of evening-footsteps and horses’ hooves on stone pavement, talk and laughter from sentries in the covered corridors and watchtowers along the walls. Patrol guards carrying lanterns passed. Everything had a semblance of normalcy. At Sano’s estate, shadows softened the irregular lines of walls and buildings still under reconstruction. Sentries by the recently finished guardhouse let Sano and Marume in the new gate. Sano and Marume left their horses with a stable boy. As Sano walked through the inner precinct, birds trilled. After the earthquake, birds had been scarce, as if most of them had sensed the earthquake coming and flown away. Any that had stayed had been devoured by starving citizens, in spite of the Buddhist prohibition against eating meat and the Tokugawa law against hunting. But the canals and highways were now clear of earthquake debris, and transport of food into the city had resumed. The birds had returned to nest in Edo Castle. It was a good omen, Sano hoped.

Flames in stone lanterns lit his path to his mansion. Repairs to its front section, where he conducted business, had been completed. Reiko, Masahiro, and Akiko appeared on the veranda. They called excitedly to Sano. He smiled, thankful for them. That his family had survived the earthquake was a miracle. He could savor their togetherness despite the tribulations of politics.

“Masahiro and I have a lot to tell you,” Reiko said as Sano climbed the steps.

“I have a lot to tell you,” Sano said.

Akiko said, “Papa!” and held up her arms to him.

She always brightened his spirits. He picked her up, hugged her, and set her down. “You’re getting so big. Pretty soon I won’t be able to lift you anymore.”

They went into the house. As Sano removed his shoes and hung his swords on the rack in the entryway, Reiko asked, “Where have you been all day?”

“Working at my new job, mostly.” Sano told her about the accident. “The engineer is under a lot of pressure to finish the bridge. The supports weren’t installed properly. He’s to blame for six deaths. I had to arrest him for negligence.” Sano didn’t mention his disturbing encounter with Hirata. “Let’s have dinner while we talk about our investigation.”

They went to the private chambers, which weren’t quite refinished; some rooms still needed floors varnished and tatami mats laid. The parlor still contained displaced furniture and trunks of clothes. Sano and his family ate rice, grilled seafood, and soup made with tofu and spring greens.

“I’m glad it’s not dried fish and seaweed and pickles anymore,” Akiko said, referring to the preserved edibles they’d relied on for months. “I’m sick of earthquake food.”

Sano smiled at her innocent pleasure in the return of good meals to their table.

“Did you find evidence that Yanagisawa murdered the shogun’s daughter?” Reiko asked.

“Not exactly.” Sano described his visit to Lord Tsunanori’s estate. “If I didn’t want to believe Yanagisawa killed her, Lord Tsunanori would be my favorite suspect.” He swallowed a mouthful of tea. “Did you talk to that nurse I sent you?”

“I did. What a nasty woman! She deliberately coughed in my face, and she taunted me about giving me smallpox!” Reiko scrubbed her face with a napkin. “She hated Tsuruhime. And she’s had smallpox. She could have gone to the tent camps, found someone with smallpox, then brought back their soiled bedsheet and put it in with Tsuruhime’s things without any harm to herself. If I didn’t want to believe Yanagisawa is guilty, she would be my favorite suspect.” Reiko thought a moment. “Tsuruhime is starting to sound not very nice. If everybody hated her, it will be hard to figure out who killed her. But someone inside her house would have had an easier time killing her than someone from outside.”

“Not everybody hated her.” Masahiro told Sano, “I got inside Lord Tsunanori’s estate today.” He described the young samurai whom the others had teased. “It sounded as if he liked her too much.”

“If there was an affair between him and Tsuruhime, that adds new complications,” Sano said, interested. “What else did you find out?”

“Nothing.” Masahiro’s eyes clouded, as if with a troubling memory. “When he ran out of the estate, I lost him. I can go back tomorrow and talk to him.”

“All right.” Sano would give Masahiro a chance to pursue the lead he’d found.

“The nurse did tell me something that implicates Yanagisawa,” Reiko said. “Yoshisato came to call on Tsuruhime shortly before she took ill.”

Sano felt a stir of excitement followed by trepidation.

“That means Yoshisato had a chance to put the infected sheet in her room,” Masahiro said. “Yanagisawa could have told him to. Aren’t you glad?”

“Yes, because this could be construed as evidence against Yanagisawa. No, because it’s also evidence against the shogun’s heir. We have to be careful with it.” Sano turned to Reiko. “Do you believe the nurse’s story?”

“She said Tsuruhime’s servants and ladies-in-waiting can confirm it.”

Although it connected Yanagisawa with Tsuruhime’s death, Sano had mixed feelings. Was Yoshisato a willing participant in Yanagisawa’s plan to seize power? Or had Yanagisawa forced him to pose as the shogun’s long-lost son? Sano thought of Yanagisawa’s elder son, Yoritomo, and recalled what Hirata had told him today. Even if the secret society were to blame for Yoritomo’s death, Sano still felt responsible for creating the circumstances for it to occur. Sano hated to destroy another young life. But he’d undertaken this investigation with full knowledge of where it might lead. If he brought down Yanagisawa, then Yoshisato would probably go down, too. And Yoshisato might be far from an innocent pawn. He might be guilty of murdering Tsuruhime as well as becoming her father’s heir by fraud.

“Well. Since we haven’t been able to incriminate Yanagisawa, we’ll go after Yoshisato.” That said, Sano couldn’t entirely quell his misgivings.

A maid came to the door. “Excuse me, but Lady Nobuko is here to see you.”

Reiko and Masahiro started to rise, but Sano said, “I’ll see her by myself.” He had a bone to pick with Lady Nobuko.

Lady Nobuko and her lady-in-waiting were in the reception room. Her face had relaxed a little, as if the prospect of revenge against her enemy had eased her headache. Korika smiled eagerly. Lady Nobuko barely greeted Sano before she demanded, “What did you discover?”

Short-tempered from too many acrimonious confrontations, Sano said, “I discovered that you lied to me this morning.”

Lady Nobuko blinked at his tactless manner. “What are you talking about?”

“I asked you who else besides Yanagisawa might have wanted to kill Tsuruhime. You said no one. Then I went to see Lord Tsunanori. He made it patently clear that he hated her and wanted to be rid of her. He said you knew.”

“Yes, I knew.” Lady Nobuko sounded annoyed, as if Sano was frivolously wasting her time. “So what?”

“So why didn’t you tell me the truth?”

“Lord Tsunanori didn’t kill Tsuruhime.”

“How do you know?”

“He hasn’t the intelligence or the imagination to think of infecting her with smallpox.”

“Oh, well, I’m glad to hear such definitive proof that he’s innocent,” Sano retorted. “Did you know that Tsuruhime’s nurse had had smallpox?”

“Yes. Why does it matter?”

Sano didn’t bother answering; he could tell that Lady Nobuko knew exactly why it mattered. “Why didn’t you tell me about the nurse or about Lord Tsunanori?”

Korika cringed from Sano’s anger. Lady Nobuko sighed in exasperation. “Because if I had told you that they could have murdered Tsuruhime, you might not have believed it was Yanagisawa. You might not have agreed to investigate her death.”

“If you’d told me she was murdered, it would have been my duty to investigate regardless of who you think killed her.”

“Your duty? Yes. Your top priority?” She gave a dry chuckle. “Not unless there was something special in it for you, such as a chance to destroy Yanagisawa.”

She was right, but that didn’t make Sano feel any friendlier toward her. “Because you lied to me, I spent today finding out things you already knew.”

The muscles on the right side of Lady Nobuko’s face contracted tighter. She regarded Sano with disappointment. “Didn’t you find any evidence that Yanagisawa is guilty?”

She was so focused on her single objective that she didn’t care about anything or anyone else, Sano thought. “Actually, I did.”

“What kind of evidence?” She leaned toward him, avid as a raptor.

“Before I tell you, I want two things from you,” Sano said. “First, answer this question, and answer honestly: Is there anything else you’re not telling me?”

“No,” she said, irate.

“Second, promise that from now on you’ll never withhold information from me again.”

Lady Nobuko looked as offended and disgusted as if he’d asked her to give him her underwear. “All right. Now stop wasting my time. What have you learned?”

It was dangerous information to give a person he still didn’t trust, but Sano owed it to Lady Nobuko. Her lady-in-waiting’s story about the bedsheet had presented his best opportunity for bringing Yanagisawa down. “There’s a witness at Lord Tsunanori’s estate who claims that Yoshisato visited Tsuruhime there shortly before she got smallpox.”

Lady Nobuko said triumphantly, “I told you so!” Korika smiled with relief because her mistress’s humor had been restored. “Yanagisawa murdered Tsuruhime, and he sent Yoshisato to do the dirty work.”

“I haven’t had a chance to substantiate the story,” Sano said. “Don’t jump to conclusions.”

“Don’t be so quick to discount it,” Lady Nobuko said. “It’s our first big step toward destroying Yanagisawa and preventing Yoshisato from becoming the next shogun.” She and Korika rose to leave. “You’ll see that I’m right.”

* * *

LATER THAT NIGHT Reiko sat in her bedchamber, brushing her hair. Sano came into the room, fresh from his bath. He removed his robe and hung it on the clothes stand. The light from the lantern made his body gleam. Reiko admired his firm muscles. His skin was marked with scars from battles he’d fought, like badges of honor. She smiled. After more than fourteen years of marriage, while six months pregnant, she desired her husband as much as when she’d been a new bride. She was glad their quarters had been rebuilt and they didn’t have to sleep with the children. Now they could make love in private.

In bed together, she and Sano embraced. Moonlight filtered in through the open window. A light quilt shielded them from the cool spring breeze. But Reiko sensed absent-mindedness in Sano’s caresses. His thoughts were far away.

“What’s the matter?” she asked.

He rolled away from her and lay on his back. Studying him in the moonlight, Reiko saw the tense, unhappy set of his profile. “Are you still upset because of Lady Nobuko?” He’d told her about the woman’s lie.

“It’s not that.” Sano said reluctantly, “I ran into Hirata today.”

“Oh! He’s back?” Glad and excited, Reiko said, “I should go tell Midori.”

“No.” Sano caught her hand.

“Why not?” Reiko said, puzzled now. “Why didn’t Hirata come home with you? Has something bad happened to him?”

“Something has happened. ‘Bad’ doesn’t begin to describe it.” Sano reluctantly told Hirata’s story. Reiko listened in disbelief. When he’d finished, they gazed at the ceiling while she absorbed what she’d heard.

“Magic rituals and a ghost! A plot to destroy the Tokugawa regime! I never imagined Hirata becoming involved in anything of the sort.” Reiko thought about Hirata and recalled things Midori had said. “But I understand how he could have fallen in with the secret society. He’s not a good judge of people, and he doesn’t think enough before he acts.”

Sano chuckled wryly. “You know him better than I did.” He thumped his fist on the bed. “The fool! Dishonoring himself! Putting me in this position!”

“You’re not really going to arrest him and charge him with treason?” Reiko was horrified by the very idea. Even if Hirata deserved it, his family didn’t.

“I gave him five days to put an end to the society and the conspiracy,” Sano said. “In the meantime, don’t tell Midori. There’s nothing she can do. She’ll only worry.”

A frantic knocking shook the door. “Sano-san? Reiko-san? Are you awake?” It was Midori, breathless and panicky. “I need your help. Taeko is missing!”

“What? Oh, no.” Alarmed, Reiko crawled out of bed, threw on her robe.

Sano was already up and dressed. Reiko opened the door. Midori fell into her arms and began to cry. “I thought she was painting somewhere. But it started getting dark, and when she didn’t come in for dinner, I went looking for her. I can’t find her anywhere! No one’s seen her since this morning!”

Reiko remembered her horror when Masahiro had been kidnapped. She tried to soothe Midori. “I’m sure Taeko is just fine.”

“I’ll send out search parties.” Sano headed for the barracks.

Midori thanked him and sobbed. Reiko hugged her friend. “Hush, or you’ll wake the other children.” She silently prayed that Hirata would get himself out of trouble and Midori would never have to know what he’d done.