Autumn Bridge (58 page)

“You would murder your own child?”

“I would follow my lord’s command.”

“I can’t believe he would give such an order,” Stark said again. “I don’t see any reason for it.”

“I am not saying he would do so,” Heiko said. “Perhaps he would be happy. But he is a Great Lord. Great Lords have reasons ordinary men do not. It is better to avoid unnecessary risks, is it not?”

Stark’s eyes were unfocused and he looked unwell.

Heiko felt much sympathy for him. She would explain it better to him if she could, but she herself was filled with uncertainty.

While professing to love her, Genji had sent her into distant exile. He didn’t call it that, of course. He had given over into her charge a huge fortune in gold, and directed her to establish solid footing for the clan here in America. He had asked Matthew Stark, his trusted American friend, to protect her and guide her in his homeland. But the simple fact remained, and it was undeniable: An ocean’s width now separated them from each other, and it did so only because Genji had commanded it.

She believed he did love her. The way he looked at her, the way he touched her, the tone of his voice, the expression on his face — even the rhythm of his breath when he was asleep beside her — all these things told her his love for her was as strong as hers was for him, and for her, there was nothing stronger in this life.

Yet she was here in this alien place and he was on the other side of the world. Why had he sent her away? Would she ever know? And when he learned that a child had been born, what would he do? Command her return? Order the child’s death, and her own as well?

Heiko put her hand on the still-mild swelling of her abdomen. If the child survived — if it was male — But there was no use speculating. For now, the only thing to do was wait. Wait and take good care of herself. Time would resolve every question. Time and Genji.

She closed her eyes and, smiling, soon fell gently into sleep.

Stark didn’t dare move. Heiko leaned against him as she slept. She was so small and delicate, and the voyage had been a hard one.

She was with child.

He could hardly believe it. She seemed still a child herself, far too young to face the mortal dangers posed by childbirth. Newborns died almost as often as they lived, and far too frequently they took their mothers with them. Added to the natural perils was the completely unexpected threat that Heiko said came from Genji.

Stark felt a blush of shame. He had asked her why, but he knew why. At least, one of the possibilities. He had not thought of falling in love with Heiko, and so had not been on guard against it. His concern in that direction was with Emily Gibson, his fellow missionary in Japan. She was an astonishing golden beauty of eighteen, just blossoming into womanhood. Her charms were so obvious, it was easy for Stark to keep his heart cold with her. His purpose in Japan was deadly. There was no room for the distractions of love. He had not guarded himself against Heiko, because the possibility had not even occurred to him. She was Japanese. She was a geisha. She was Lord Genji’s lover. Ironically, his feelings for her arose, not because of her beauty, but because of her courage. Despite her diminutive stature and her apparent fragility, she had on two separate occasions cut down a total of two dozen heavily armed samurai with her own delicate little hands — and not with a gun but hand to hand, with a knife, a sword, and throwing blades called
shuriken
. By the time he realized his admiration had changed into something far more potent, it was too late to deny.

He loved her.

Did Heiko fear Genji’s wrath because he knew how Stark felt about her? Did he wrongly suspect that those feelings had been translated into action? If he did, would he have sent her with Stark and asked him to watch over her?

There was no use wondering. Stark didn’t understand the Japanese in general, and Genji in particular was even more confusing than most. Heiko was certainly right about one thing: The motives of a Great Lord were always complex and convoluted, and impossible to guess. He would have to wait and see.

Was it possible Genji would order the child’s death once it was born? Stark knew him as a kind and gentle man, in manner and deed quite the opposite of the fierce warriors he commanded. If he didn’t know better, he would never think him capable of any cruelties. But he had seen the most horrendous butchery carried out at Genji’s command, and heard horrifying rumors of worse. Not many months earlier, Genji had led his men in the slaughter of an entire village of peasants. More than a hundred people — including women, children, and even suckling infants — had been brutally hacked to death, and the village burned to the ground. So the rumors went, and no one denied them. Why was it done? No one knew. It was ordered, and the order was obeyed. For samurai, that was enough.

Stark knew that if Genji gave the command, Jiro and Shoji would not hesitate. Nor would Heiko.

No, that would not happen. He would not let it happen. He had fought alongside the two samurai, but he would shoot them down like rabid vermin before he let them harm Heiko’s child. And Heiko, what of her? If he simply took the child from her to prevent her from obeying Genji, she would kill herself for failing to carry out his command. He would have to find a way to save the child and Heiko both, if it came to that. How? He didn’t know.

He felt Heiko resting warmly against his chest. His own breathing began to slow and match hers as she slept.

Half a year would pass before the child arrived. It was too early to worry, and maybe he was worrying about nothing anyway. Everything could work out right in the end.

It was easier to hope than believe, and it wasn’t that easy to hope.

In the first hour of labor, Heiko began to bleed.

The doctor said, “A certain amount of blood is quite natural. There is no cause for concern.”

In the fifth hour, the flow became profuse, and the child had not yet crowned.

The doctor said to Stark, “I can do nothing to stanch the blood until the child leaves her womb.”

In the fifteenth hour, Heiko had to struggle to stay awake. The sheets and towels under her turned dark crimson as soon as they were replaced.

The doctor said, “If she sleeps, we will lose them both.”

In the twentieth hour, Heiko made the last push that sent her child into the world, and lost consciousness. The baby, healthy and strong, wailed with powerful new lungs.

The doctor said, “I will try to save her, Mr. Stark, but you must understand, she is a small woman and has lost much blood.”

“She has the courage of ten men,” Stark said.

“Yes, sir, no doubt,” the doctor said. “But that tenfold courage is still contained within one tiny human being.”

“I will call him Makoto,” Heiko said. She lay in bed with the boy wrapped in swaddling cloth and cradled in her arms. She had given Lord Genji a son and an heir. His order recalling them to Japan would come as soon as he knew. “
Makoto
means ‘truth.’ ”

Heiko imagined the foliage in Japan now, turning orange to signal the approach of winter. She had always been fond of autumn, had never felt the melancholy of falling leaves and the withering away of summer flowers. After every winter was the rebirth of spring.

“Makoto is a good name,” Stark said. For her sake, he fought back his tears.

I have stopped the bleeding, the doctor had said, but only because she has so little left to lose. It will begin again. I am sorry, Mr. Stark.

“He looks very much like Lord Genji, does he not?” Heiko asked.

“He is beautiful,” Stark said, “like his mother.”

Heiko smiled. Despite her weakness and her bloodless pallor, her smile was as radiant as dawn.

“Flatterer,” she said. Then, worry creasing her brow, she moved the cloth away from Makoto’s face. “It isn’t true, is it? He doesn’t look more like me, does he?”

“Why are you frowning?” Stark said. “He would be lucky to look like you. That would make him more handsome than those Kabuki heroes you women all love so much.”

“He isn’t going to be a Kabuki hero,” Heiko said. “He is the next Great Lord of Akaoka. It will be much better for him to resemble his father. His official mother will be more likely to be loving to him.”

“The boy’s mother is the boy’s mother,” Stark said. “What does ‘official’ have to do with it?”

“I am not of noble birth,” Heiko said. She nuzzled her son’s soft, fat little cheek. He slept blissfully on. “Lord Genji must have a noblewoman as his wife. She will be Makoto’s mother.” She saw the expression on Stark’s face and said, “Don’t look so sad. I will see him often enough. Lord Genji will establish a separate residence for me. He may elevate me to concubine. And if not, it doesn’t really matter. My son is his heir.”

An hour later, the blood began to flow once again.

Heiko said, “I am dying.”

“No,” Stark said. “No.”

“Bring Makoto.”

Sachiko carried the sleeping baby to Heiko’s bedside and offered him to her. Heiko shook her head.

She said, “You hold him, Sachiko. Don’t let him feel the taint of death. Hold him and care for him until Lord Genji orders his return to his homeland.”

Sachiko tried to answer, but she could not. Clutching the baby to her breast, she slowly collapsed to her knees, weeping uncontrollably.

Heiko said to Stark, “We are not afraid of death. You and I have been its messenger too many times to fear it.”

“No,” Stark said.

Heiko reached her hand out to him.

“Help me up,” she said. “I want to see Japan.”

Heiko leaned against Stark in the seat of the carriage. They were stopped on the crest of a rise overlooking the bay, facing west across the Pacific.

Though it was a clear morning, Heiko said, “Mist. I have always loved mist. When I look into it, I can almost believe the most impossible dreams will come true.”

“Heiko,” Stark said.

But she was already gone.

When Stark walked back into his house, he felt dead.

Then he went into Heiko’s room and saw Sachiko, still sitting on the floor, sobbing, with the baby held close against her.