The Last Concubine (54 page)

Taki turned away abruptly. Sachi knew that she was trying her hardest to conceal her feelings, as was proper for a samurai, but her thin shoulders were quivering with distaste.

‘You ladies,’ said Fuyu. ‘Y’all end up down ’ere.’

‘You mean . . . there are other women here?’ Taki demanded. ‘Other women from the palace?’

Sachi thought of her ladies-in-waiting, her maids and attendants, all those women who had disappeared. All this time she had assumed they were safely back with their families. Surely none of them could have ended up here?

‘Sure. Some are on the streets. Some are in the brothels in the Yoshiwara. They’re not so high and mighty now, that’s for sure.’

‘And you?’ asked Haru softly.

‘Don’t give me any of your pity,’ snapped Fuyu. Her voice was hard and brittle. ‘My master’s a pawnbroker. He takes care of me. I made a mistake. I was young. But then . . .’ Her voice softened. ‘Anyway, it’s all fallen apart, hasn’t it? Whether you become the shogun’s concubine or whether you don’t – makes no difference now. It’s all come to nothing.’

A pawnbroker’s mistress! No doubt Fuyu had brought her destiny on herself, but no matter what had happened between them, it was terrible to see her fallen so low. Much though Sachi disliked and distrusted Fuyu, she couldn’t help pitying her. To have come to this – Fuyu, the star of the women’s palace, the Retired One’s preferred candidate to be the concubine of the shogun. Sachi too had fallen a long way since then, she knew that. But not as far as Fuyu.

‘What you doin’ here anyway?’ Fuyu demanded. ‘Somewhere to stay, is that it? Work? You want some work? Come. My master’ll help you out, whatever it is you want.’

Sachi glanced at Taki and Haru and nodded slightly. They were totally lost and had little choice but to follow her. Fuyu led them deep into the warren of streets and they walked behind, all their senses on the alert.

‘Perhaps she’s planning to sell us,’ Taki muttered to Sachi, glancing around her with big eyes. ‘Anything’s possible these days. Fuyu knows better than anyone who you are and how much you’d be worth if she handed you over to the southerners.’

‘Don’t say that,’ murmured Sachi, shaking her head.

‘No Edo-ite would collaborate with the occupiers,’ whispered Haru sternly. ‘Not even poor Fuyu. We’re all in this together.’

They turned a corner on to a broader stretch of road. There was a barber’s shop, a public bath, a vegetable merchant’s and next to that a large shop with a pawnbroker’s sign displayed outside. Fuyu ducked under the curtains.

‘Oi, Fuyu, is that you?’ croaked a voice. ‘What you doin’ runnin’ off when there’s work to be done?’

‘Oi!’ snapped another voice.

A fug of smoke swirled inside. A shrivelled old woman bundled up in a shapeless brown garment, with her hair in a knot, was sitting, skinny legs folded under her, smoking a long-stemmed pipe. She turned a withered face towards the newcomers. A man was sprawled behind a railing. Beside him a notice warned sternly that pledges would be accepted for a maximum of eight months. Eight months, thought Sachi. Who could possibly know what the world would have come to by then or where they would all be?

A hunted look like that of a cornered animal flashed across Fuyu’s face. Then she drew back her painted lips in a coquettish smile.

‘It’s me,’ she said in a girlish falsetto. ‘Brought some friends. From the old days.’

The man sat up slowly when he saw the three women and tapped out his pipe. His merchant’s gown was crumpled, the top of his head unshaved. He narrowed his eyes and peered at them suspiciously, then smiled slowly, all affability, flashing a few rotten stumps of teeth.

‘Palace ladies, is it? Come in. Our shop is very small. Something to pawn, have you?’

‘No. We’re looking for a rice merchant,’ said Haru.

‘Run out of food, unh?’ he scowled, fingering his abacus. ‘Yup, times are hard. It’s had it, this place. Those folk what used to make their living off the daimyos, all gone. Left town. We got our stuff packed up ready to go too. Isn’t that right, Fu-
chan
?’

Fuyu put her mouth to his ear. His jaw dropped nearly to the floor. He gave an audible gasp, threw aside his abacus and scrambled to his knees, grinding his face into the straw matting.

‘So sorry! So sorry!’ he squawked in muffled tones, his mouth rubbing against the matting. ‘Forgive me, your honourship. Your honourable concubinage. Thank you for honouring my miserable shop. Whatever I can do to help. We’ll never forget . . . His young Majesty.’

A big tear, then another plopped on to the grimy matting. He brushed his hand across his eyes. The old woman too had scrambled to her knees.

‘We’re all loyal subjects down ’ere, your eminenceship,’ she croaked. ‘We ’ate those southerners much as anyone. Whatever we can do. Whatever we can do.’

Sachi wasn’t sure how sincere they were, but it didn’t matter as long as they could get food. Haru dipped into her obi and pulled out a single gold coin.

‘We’d like to arrange to have rice delivered. We have a deposit,’ she said.

The man picked up some glasses, brought the coin close to his face and peered at it. He handed it to the old woman who bit at it thoughtfully.

‘Heard it was all gone,’ he said in tones of wonder. A cunning smile crossed his face. ‘Beggin’ your pardon, your honourship. Not sure this will do down ’ere. See, it’s marked with the Tokugawa stamp.’

Sachi took the coin and turned it over, bewildered. Sure enough, there was the hollyhock crest of the Tokugawas.

‘Y’see, they’ll think we nicked it. There’s been soldiers down ’ere, southern soldiers, ransackin’ people’s ’ouses. Say they’re lookin’ for the shogun’s gold. Say it’s gone missin’.’

‘Don’t be stupid, Older Brother,’ snapped Fuyu. ‘It’s big ingots they’re lookin’ for. Don’t forget I used to live in the palace too. Anyway, no one really thinks it’s down ’ere. Wherever it is it’s been smuggled out of the city long since. Do them ladies a favour. You can ’ave it remelted.’

‘Ain’t you ladies got any copper?’ said the man with an obsequious smile. ‘Just a few
mon
. That’ll do for a deposit. After all, it’s for her honourable concubinage. The lads will see you all right.’

Haru dug around in her obi and produced a string of copper coins.

‘I’ll see ya fair, m’ladies,’ said the man. ‘Gotta do my bit for the memory of His young Majesty.’

III

The pawnbroker was as good as his word. The next day Haru reported that enough rice, salt, miso, lamp oil, vegetables and firewood had arrived to keep the women supplied for many months.

A few days later Sachi was writing when she heard the whisper of silk. Taki appeared at the door, her fingertips pressed to the tatami, her immaculately coiffed head bowed.

‘A visitor,’ she announced in her most official voice.

Something was wrong. Taki’s mouse-like squeak was a fraction shriller than usual. There was a note of hysteria in her voice.

‘Edwards-
sama
?’

‘No,’ said Taki sharply. ‘Your honourable father. Daisuké-
sama
.’ Sachi put down her brush in amazement.

‘My father! But . . . But why? I know he’s been taking care of us . . . but I’m not sure I want to see him.’

The words came out before she could stop them.

‘I know he’s your father,’ Taki said. Her thin face was stern. She pinched her eyebrows together into a frown and drew her breath through her teeth in a hiss. ‘But it frightens me to think you might let him get too close to you. He’s not . . . the same sort of person as us. He’s not of the samurai class. Remember what happened to your mother.’

‘All the same I have to see him,’ Sachi murmured almost to herself. ‘I have to find out more about my mother.’

It wasn’t that she had forgotten her mother; but she had tucked her, and the mystery of what had become of her, somewhere deep inside her mind. Like a fire that has been damped down and left to smoulder, now that yearning burst into flame again, blazing more fiercely than ever.

Taki held up a mirror. Sachi’s face glimmered palely back at her from the polished bronze surface. These days she no longer wore her hair cut short like a widow but coiled into a loose twist. She remembered the days when she had had a new hairstyle every time she rose in rank and a different set of kimonos to mark the passing of each month. She smiled sadly as she thought of that innocent time, when such things had seemed so thrilling and allimportant. That world was gone for ever.

She brushed her finger across her cheek. There was sadness on her face. It looked thinner, the cheekbones cut a little more sharply, and there was a faint shadow around the slant of her eyes. She had yet to reach her nineteenth year yet it was hard to imagine what future there could possibly be for her. But it was not only herself that she saw. She was getting closer and closer to the age her mother had been when she met her father. It was strange – disconcerting – to be inhabited by her own mother, a mother she didn’t even know. The more life touched her, the more her face was shaped by suffering, the more she must look like her mother. Daisuké would see it immediately.

While Taki scurried before her, making sure the doors were open, she glided from one shadowy room to the next. The quilted hem of her kimono swished behind her. Part of her wanted never to reach the great hall, never to see this untrustworthy charmer, this father of hers. Yet another part of her could hardly wait. She slowed her steps till she was barely moving, sliding one foot then the other across the tatami the way she had been taught to walk at the palace, the way great ladies walked. But her spirit seemed to race in front of her.

Long before she reached the great hall she smelled the woody fragrance of tobacco smoke and the distinctive foreign aroma that always clung to Daisuké’s clothes. There was another scent too.
She paused. Hints of musk, aloe, wormwood, frankincense – the kind of perfume a court lady would use to scent her robes. Despite herself her feet moved faster.

She caught the sound of familiar voices. Haru was there already.

‘Haru.’ It was Daisuké’s low rumble. In the stillness Sachi could hear every word. She stopped and gestured to Taki to be silent.

‘Haru, did I do wrong? Should I have waited at the temple? All these years it’s preyed on me. I thought it would be best for her if I disappeared.’

For her. So he was talking about Lady Okoto, Sachi’s mother. His voice was an agonized growl.

‘I have to know why she never came back. Was she locked up? Sent into exile? Was she forced to kill herself? If I knew she was dead at least I could mourn. I can’t bear it, not knowing. All these years I’ve had to carry it inside myself.’ He gave a deep sigh.

‘Haru, you must have some idea what became of her. Please tell me. I’ve paid for my misdeeds. I’ve suffered enough.’

Sachi hardly dared breathe. She had always told herself that her mother might still be alive somewhere, that it was just a matter of finding her.

‘Not now, Older Brother.’ Haru was speaking in the softest of murmurs. ‘My lady is on her way. She will be here at any moment.’

He groaned. ‘If she’s alive, just tell me. Just one word, that’s enough.’

Unable to bear it any longer, Sachi stepped forward into the great hall.

Threads of smoke coiled in the shafts of sunlight that slid through the cracks between the paper doors. Smoke drifted like mist around the huge black rafters. Daisuké and Haru sat leaning towards each other on each side of the tobacco box. Between them, glowing like a piece of the sky, was the brocade. Sachi’s mother’s overkimono, neatly folded. Daisuké’s large hand rested on it as lightly as a caress.

When they saw her, they started and leaped back as if they had been caught plotting some terrible crime. Daisuké snatched his hand from the brocade. His eyes opened wide and a look of shock
flickered across his face. Sachi knew it was not her he saw but her mother. Then he put down his long-stemmed pipe, scrambled to his knees and bowed.

The broad shoulders and massive back, the bull-like neck and large head covered in black stubble speckled with grey, the powerful hands on the tatami – everything about him was strong, capable, honest, open. Despite the months that had gone by it was as if no time had passed at all. Sachi knew she should be wary: he had caused her mother’s downfall and had fought on the side of the southerners. But she also knew that he had taken good care of her, Haru and Taki. She couldn’t help feeling a surge of relief and joy that this man was her father. Quickly she knelt.

He raised his head and gazed at her with a long steady gaze, as if he was afraid that if he once stopped looking she would disappear again. He looked a little careworn, his jaw was more jowly, the crease between his eyebrows deeper, but he was still as warm and handsome as ever.

‘Daughter,’ he said solemnly. Then his face relaxed. He broke into a smile.

Sachi bowed. It was hard not to smile back.

‘Welcome,’ she replied stiffly. She knew he wanted her to address him as ‘Father’ but she couldn’t. Not yet.

‘I’m sorry,’ she said. She couldn’t be bothered with the usual exchange of platitudes and compliments. ‘It’s very rude but . . . I couldn’t help overhearing what you said.’

Haru was on her knees with her face pressed to her hands. The gleaming loops and coils of her coiffure quivered slightly.

‘Haru,’ Sachi said softly. ‘Please tell us. I beg you. My mother . . .’

There was a long silence. Haru looked up. Her plump face was drained of colour and her lips were trembling.

‘If she is dead,’ Sachi pleaded, ‘I need to know. I am her child. I need to make offerings and pray. With no one to pray for her she will be a hungry ghost. I need to be sure she is safely in the next world.’

Haru’s face crumpled in anguish. She closed her eyes. When she opened them she seemed to be staring into a past she had tried her best to forget.

‘My lady, I told you,’ she whispered. But which ‘my lady’ was she speaking to? And what was it she had told her?

‘You told me that after I was born my mother went back to the palace,’ said Sachi. ‘Then she received a summons to go home . . .’