The Heike Story (37 page)

"Vile priest! How dare you insult the throne?"

Shinzei's retainers struck out at Mongaku's legs with their spears. Mongaku, taken unawares, reeled. When his attackers saw this, they threw themselves on Mongaku, pinning down his arms and clasping his legs, and by sheer numbers overwhelmed him. Mongaku uttered no sound, but lay breathing heavily under the bodies piled on him. When he saw that they were trying to bind him with ropes, he roared:

"Here, I'll get up," and struggled to his feet, brushing off his opponents as if they were pygmies.

"Don't let him go," shouted some soldiers who blocked Mongaku's path. At the uproar more servants and even the grooms came running to the scene. Instead of making for the gateway, Mongaku leaped to the porch and stood there defiant.

A cry went up: "An assassin—don't let him get in!"

Mongaku reached out and, clutching a man in either hand, slung each over the balustrade. Another he caught by the scruff of his neck and knocked his head against the nearest pillar until the fellow cried out for mercy. A screening-wall gave way and a shutter fell; while the mansion echoed and re-echoed with the commotion, the screams of women increased the bedlam that ensued. Mongaku suddenly appeared again at the entrance porch, his pack on his back, staff in hand, looking about wildly for an avenue of escape.

As he darted toward the inner gate, there was a shout: "You, there!" Mongaku leaped aside nimbly as a javelin was thrust at him. He glared at the mass of unsheathed swords and the flashing halberds between him and the outer gate; some waterlilies growing in a large bronze cistern beside the inner gate caught his eye. Throwing aside his staff, he lifted the unwieldy vessel to him. The water splashed and poured down its side. Amazed by this feat of strength, Mongaku's opponents stood back and watched him. He tottered forward toward the men who blocked the outer gate, and with a great heave sent the vessel crashing to earth with a hollow metallic roar. Mongaku burst into peals of laughter at the sight of the servants and soldiers covered with tangles of waterlilies, and dripping with slime. Then he quickly slipped out by the gate, still laughing heartily, and was soon out of sight.

Tsunemunй and Nobunori, who crouched by the hedge in astonishment, watched Mongaku vanish.

More than a hundred noblemen and warriors were decapitated, but there was no sign that the executions had come to an end. Yorinaga's body was exhumed and identified.

"Were I still Morito of the Guards, I might have been one of those ordered to disinter that corpse, or else I doubtless would have been decapitated on the riverbank. . . . Ah, Kesa-Gozen, beloved one, you were indeed my protecting angel incarnate. . . . Kesa-Gozen!"

Mongaku's love for Kesa-Gozen was undimmed. He had renounced all fleshly love and enshrined her in his heart as a saint. For more than ten years he had tried to atone for his crime by mortifications that few men could endure. He now sat on the bank of the Kamo beside a small fire he had kindled under the August stars. Alone—but not quite alone, for Kesa-Gozen's spirit was beside him. Taking a brush and inkstone from his pack, he began to inscribe prayers on the stones about him, prayers for those who had fallen in battle. He hoped that the casual passer-by who saw these stones—ten thousand, he vowed, would carry his prayers— would stop and piously add other prayers to his own for the dead.

For three days he had gone into hiding when he heard that Councilor Shinzei had ordered his capture. As he rapidly took up stone after stone, he sometimes inscribed the name of a long-dead friend beside a prayer. . . . Ah, life, karma—all things visible must undergo change. How escape karma?

". . . Still more. The rest must wait until tomorrow night," Mongaku muttered, replacing his writing-materials in his pack. He bathed his face in the river and stood up to go, when he saw a dim figure coming toward him. Mongaku climbed the embankment in the whitening dawn. The silent figure continued to follow. He turned to look at the wraithlike shape. It was a small dirty-looking fellow. A secret agent? Mongaku went on and the shape trailed after him.

"I thank you from my heart. . . . Many a soul that died unwept by this river and elsewhere must now be floating to paradise. ... I thank you for your pains." Repeating his thanks, the odd little fellow drew near with a friendly air and tripped after Mongaku.

"Are you one of the people who live hereabouts?"

"No. . . ."

"Why do you thank me?"

"You also share my feelings. Nothing makes me happier than to find another being who shares them."

"Oh? Are you, then, one of the condemned?"

"Perhaps. Or someone like that."

"I have something to ask you. Do you have some alms for me?"

"I'm sorry I have nothing with me now. You are welcome to all I have, except my life."

Mongaku began to laugh. "You will give me everything—" and stopped to scrutinize the barefooted fellow in the early light. A beggar, he thought, by his ragged tunic and trousers. He was bareheaded, and his hair matted with filth. "I hesitate to ask you, yet—"

"No, I beg you to tell me. If there is anything I can do for you, I shall consider the day spent worthily."

"It isn't so very much—just one meal. To tell you the truth, I haven't eaten since yesterday morning."

"Ah, food is it?" The little fellow looked puzzled, then with an apologetic air said: "I must admit that I haven't had a roof over my head since the war, and have no idea of where I shall find anything to eat this morning. I keep body and soul together by begging . . . but I shall surely find you something later on.

Will you not wait for me by the well among the ruins of the Willow-Spring Palace until I return?"

Mongaku regretted what he had said and began hastily remonstrating with the little fellow, who, however, cheerfully darted away down an avenue and round a corner.

Mongaku made his way to the site of the Willow-Spring Palace. It seemed a good refuge, for he had not been able to return to his hermitage in the hills and only with difficulty found places to sleep during the day. Arrived at the Willow Spring, he found no trace of its former splendor—broken tiles and scorched trees lay strewn about. Charred boards and dead birds floated on the pond, once famous for its beauty. He found, however, that the ground around the Willow Spring had been swept and cleaned, and boards laid over the well to keep leaves from blowing into it. Fearing to litter the spot, Mongaku withdrew to a clump of trees among which he spied a flimsy shelter of blackened planks. He took off his pack and stretched himself on a rush mat to sleep. He had apparently fallen into a sound slumber, for suddenly he felt someone shaking him.

"Please, sir. Please, sir."

He opened his eyes. It was high noon by the sun. The little fellow was back and had set out some boards for a table and arranged a meal of cooked rice, salted fish, pickles, and some bean paste on oak and paulownia leaves.

"Good, sir. It is ready. Will you not come and eat?" said the fellow, saluting Mongaku with a deep bow.

Mongaku stared at the courteously bowing figure, then at the food laid out on the leaves, and tears sprang to his eyes. "Is this— is this what you got by begging?"

"I will not deceive you. That is exactly what I did—but every bit of this food is clean. The poorest, who have scarcely enough for themselves, have shared their little with this beggar who can hardly recite a sutra. All I did was to beg at each door with folded hands. It is sufficient reward for me that you, a holy man, should eat this, and I am certain that those who gave me this food would feel as I do, did they know. I beg you to eat."

Mongaku sat up silently with his lips tightly closed; finally he took up a pair of chopsticks and said: "I thank you, then. You have not had anything to eat yet. No, I am sure you have not had anything at all today. You must share this with me."

The little man shook his head, but finally consented, and the two slowly tasted the food together.

"Asatori—Asatori, the caretaker!"

A young servant-girl carrying a wooden pail appeared.

"Is it you, Yomogi? Did you want water?"

"Yes, I've come again for some water from your well. People refuse to give water to anyone who is friendly with my mistress, Tokiwa. Some of them even throw stones at our house in passing."

"Wait, now, I'll get you some water myself," Asatori cried, and ran off.

There were tales that soldiers had been throwing all manner of filth into wells, or even the bodies of the dead. The well at the servant-girl's house was one of those which could no longer be used and she was obliged to go elsewhere to draw water. Mongaku heard that Tokiwa was Yoshitomo's mistress, and that the common people were bitterly hostile to him.

From that day on, Mongaku stayed with Asatori in his small shelter, sharing his strange life of beggary. The two often sat on moonlight nights among the desolate Palace ruins contemplating the ebb and flow of life around them in a silence unbroken by the sound of music and gaiety. Asatori went out begging during the day, and Mongaku when darkness fell.

One night Mongaku returned early with a jar of wine and announced that he had decided to leave for the hills in the region of the Nachi Falls, and the wine, which he had got from a temple where they knew him, was to drink to their parting. He thanked Asatori for his great kindness, telling him that this night it was his turn to do the honors of the table.

Asatori became downcast at this news. He protested: "But this is too good for one such as I," but he drained cup after cup of wine, until he was quite intoxicated.

"Ah—I am completely overcome. Good Mongaku, when we next meet, let us hope it will not be in the midst of such ruins, and I shall then listen to one of your religious discourses."

"Ah, Asatori, you have no need for my sermons. The devotion with which you guard the Willow Spring fills me with joy. You have won my admiration by your fidelity in fulfilling your duty to your absent lord. It gladdens my heart to know that there is even one such as you in this world."

"Oh, no, it is all that a dull-witted fellow like me is fit for. In these troubled times I haven't the slightest desire to take up the music my father taught me."

"When all this trouble is over, the aristocrats in their mansions and the noblemen at the Court will resume their nightly banqueting and music, and if you once more become court musician, what a life of elegance and ease you might lead!"

"I have had enough of being kept by the aristocrats. If my playing on the flute and flageolet truly gave them pleasure, then would I enjoy performing for them, and the calling of a musician would not be entirely distasteful to me; but that rarely happens, for in the midst of all that feasting and gaiety I have all too often seen the pitiful rivalries, the jealousies, and the intrigues."

"Yes, I can quite see how the musician remains the outsider who watches the revelers drink themselves to insensibility."

"My father often used to lament being born to the profession of music and having to make a living by dancing attendance on the Court in its orgies and rites."

"You mean that you would rather spend your life among the humble, guarding this spring? I agree with you in that. You should put your skill to better use among the common folk."

"I doubt that the music which is suited to the Court would please them. Yet there must be some way in which I can make those harmonies delightful to them."

"Come, Asatori, will you not play me something on that flute of yours?"

Mongaku's request reminded Asatori of the ex-Emperor's unfulfilled promise and he replied: "Forgive me for refusing you.

There are too many sad memories that my flute would awaken, and I could not play without weeping. The happy mood in which this wine leaves me would vanish and all I shall have left would be my lonely thoughts."

Mongaku did not press him further. There were other sweet sounds to soothe the mind and ear, for far and near in the grass among the ruins myriads of crickets chirred, strummed, and tinkled. A small moon hung high in the night above them.

"Will this, then, be the end of the fighting?"

"I fear not."

"You believe there will be more?" Asatori shuddered.

"Not until men learn to cast out greed and suspicion from their hearts," Mongaku replied. "While sons distrust their fathers, and fathers their children, there is no telling when brothers and kin will become bitter enemies. When master and retainer and friends dare not trust each other, then without even the shedding of blood, life on earth becomes a hell. In this last war the flames of hell itself reached out at us."