The Thousand Autumns of Jacob De Zoet: A Novel (57 page)

Shuzai empties dead ash from his pipe. 'The Shrine sits in this triangular hollow between Bare Peak above, and those two lesser ridges. My guess is that a castle from the Age of Warring States once sat on the site claimed by Enomoto's ancestor in the amulet pedlar's tale - note these defensive walls and the dry moat. You'd need twenty men and a battering ram to force those gates, too. But don't be disheartened: any wall is only as strong as the men defending it, and a child with a grappling hook would be over in a minute. Nor is there any chance of getting lost once we're inside. Now
this
' - Shuzai points his bowstring-calloused forefinger - 'is the House of Sisters.'

Unguardedly, Uzaemon asks, 'Did you see her?'

Shuzai shakes his head. 'I was too far away. The remaining daylight I spent searching for ways down from Bare Peak other than the Mekura Gorge, but there are none: this north-east ridge hides a drop of several hundred feet; and to the north-west, the forest is so dense you'd need four hands and a tail to make any headway. At dusk, I headed back down the gorge and reached the Halfway Gate just as the moon rose. I climbed over a bluff to the lower path, reached the mouth of Mekura Gorge, crossed the rice terraces behind Kurozane, and found a fishing-boat to sleep under on the road to Isahaya. It was damp and cold, but I didn't want witnesses coming to share a fire. I returned to Nagasaki by the following evening, but let three days pass before contacting you to hide the link between my absence and your visit. It is safest to assume that your servant is in Enomoto's pay.'

'Yohei has been my servant since the Ogawa family adopted me.'

'What better spy,' Shuzai shrugs, 'than one above suspicion?'

Uzaemon's cold feels worse by the minute. 'Do you have solid reason to doubt Yohei?'

'None at all, but all
daimyo
retain informers in neighbouring domains; and these informers acquire understandings with major families' servants. Your father is one of only four Interpreters of the First Rank on Dejima: the Ogawas are not people of no importance. To spirit away a
daimyo
's favourite is to enter a dangerous world, Uzaemon. To survive, you must doubt Yohei, doubt your friends and doubt strangers. Knowing all this, the question is: are you still intent on liberating her?'

'More than ever, but' - Uzaemon looks at the map - 'can it be done?'

'Given careful planning, given money to hire the right men, yes.'

'How much money and how many men?'

'Less than you'd suppose, is the good news: the fifty
koku
the seaweed gatherers talked about sounds daunting, but a fair portion of that fifty is eaten by Enomoto's entourage. What's more,
that
building' - Shuzai points to the lower right corner - 'is the refectory, and when it emptied after dinner, I counted just thirty-three heads. The women I discount. The masters will be past their prime, which leaves at most two dozen able-bodied acolytes. In Chinese legends, monks may shatter rocks with their bare hands, but the goslings of Shiranui are hatched from much frailer eggs. There was no archery range in the shrine, no barracks for lay-guards, and no evidence of martial training. Five excellent swordsmen, in my opinion, could rescue Miss Aibagawa. My policy of double-insurance calls for ten swords, in addition to yours and mine.'

'What if Lord Enomoto and his men appear before we attack?'

'We postpone our venture, disperse and hide in Saga until he leaves.'

Smoke from the struggling fire tastes of salt and bitterness.

'You'll have considered,' Shuzai raises a delicate point, 'that to return to Nagasaki with Miss Aibagawa would be . . . would be . . .'

'Tantamount to suicide. Yes, I have considered little else this last week. I shall -' Uzaemon sneezes and coughs '- I shall abandon my life here, accompany her to wherever she wishes to go and help her until she orders me to leave. A day, or my lifetime, whichever she chooses.'

The swordsman frowns, nods, and watches his friend and student.

Out in the street, dogs run past, barking murderously.

'I worry,' admits Uzaemon, 'about you being linked to this raid.'

'Oh, I assume the worst. I, too, shall move on.'

'You are sacrificing your life in Nagasaki in order to help me?'

'I prefer to blame Nagasaki's particularly menacing creditors.'

'Won't our hired men also be making fugitives of themselves?'

'Masterless samurai are used to looking after themselves. Make no mistake: the man with most to lose is Ogawa Uzaemon. You are exchanging a career, a stipend, a bright future . . .' the older man casts around for a tactful phrase.

'. . . for a woman - in all likelihood a broken, pregnant woman.'

Shuzai's expression replies,
yes
.

'Or thanking my adoptive father by disappearing without a word?'

My suffering wife, at least
, Uzaemon foresees,
can go back to her family
.

'Confucianists would scream "heresy!" ' Shuzai's gaze settles on the urn housing his master's thumb-bone, 'but there are times when the less loyal son is the better man.'

'My "commission",' Uzaemon struggles to articulate himself, 'feels less a matter of righting a wrong and more a matter of - of role, of "This is what I am for." '

'Now it is you who sounds like the believer in Fate.'

'Please make the arrangements for the raid. Whatever the costs, I will pay.'

Shuzai says 'Yes,' as if there is no other conclusion.

'Raise your elbow
that
high,' a sharp-voiced senior disciple in the
dojo
hall tells a junior, 'and one well-aimed
uekiri
stroke will pound it to rice powder . . .'

'Where,' Shuzai changes the subject, 'is Jiritsu's scroll now?'

Uzaemon resists an urge to touch the scroll-tube in an inner pocket. 'It is hidden . . .'
if we are captured
, he thinks,
better not to know the truth
'. . . under the floor of my father's library.'

'Good. Keep it there for now,' Shuzai rolls up his own drawing of the Shiranui Shrine, 'but bring it when we leave for Kyoga. If all goes well, you and Miss Aibagawa will vanish like two drops of rain, but if Enomoto ever tracks you down, that manuscript could be your sole means of defence. I said earlier that the monks pose little danger; I cannot say the same for the Lord Abbot's vengeance.'

'Thank you,' Uzaemon rises, 'for your clear-headed advice.'

* * *

Jacob de Zoet empties the hot water into a cup and stirs in a spoonful of honey. 'I had the same cold last week. Sore throat, headache, and I'm still croaking like a frog. During July and August, my body forgot what cold weather felt like - quite a feat for a Zeelander. But now it's that blistering summer heat I can't remember.'

Uzaemon missed some words. 'Memory is tricks and strangeness.'

'That's the truth,' de Zoet adds a dash of pale juice, 'and this is lime.'

'Your room,' observes the visitor, 'is change.' Additions include the low table and cushions, a New Year's
kadomatsu
pine wreath, a competent picture of a monkey drawn in pen and ink, and a folding screen to hide de Zoet's bed.
Which Orito might have shared
, Uzaemon suffers a complicated ache,
and better that she had
. The head clerk has no slave or servant, but the apartment is tidy and swept. 'Room is comfort and pleasant . . .'

'Dejima,' de Zoet stirs the drink, 'is to be my home for some years.'

'You do not wish to take a wife for more comfort life?'

'I don't view such transactions as lightly as do my compatriots.'

Uzaemon is encouraged. 'Picture of monkey is very beauty.'

'That? Thank you, but I'm an incurable beginner.'

Uzaemon's surprise is genuine. '
You
draw monkey, Mr de Zoet?'

De Zoet replies with an embarrassed smile and serves the lime and honey drink. He then flouts the laws of small-talk. 'How may I be of service, Ogawa-
san
?'

Uzaemon looks at the steam rising from the bowl. 'I am disturb your office at important period, I fear.'

'Deputy Fischer exaggerates. There isn't much to be done.'

'Then . . .' the interpreter touches the hot porcelain with his fingertips '. . . I wish Mr de Zoet keep - to hide - a . . . a very important thing, safe.'

'If you wish to use one of our warehouses, perhaps Chief van Cleef should--'

'No no. This is small thing.' Uzaemon produces the dogwood scroll-tube.

De Zoet frowns at the item. 'I shall oblige, of course, and gladly.'

'I know Mr de Zoet is able to hide items with greatest care.'

'I shall hide it with my Book of Psalms, until you want it back.'

'Thank you. I - I hoped you say these words.' Uzaemon addresses de Zoet's unasked questions with a foreigner's directness. 'First, to answer, "What is the words in this scroll?" You remember Enomoto, I think' - the name causes de Zoet's face to cloud over - 'is Lord Abbot of Shrine in Kyoga Domain, where . . . where Miss Aibagawa must live.' The Dutchman nods. 'This scroll is - how to say? - rules believings laws of Order, of Shrine. These laws are -'
this would be hard in Japanese
, the interpreter thinks, sighing,
but in Dutch it is like breaking rocks
'- these rules are . . . are bad, worse, worst than worst wrong, for woman. It is great suffering . . . it is not endurable.'

'What rules? What must she endure, Ogawa, for God's sake?'

Uzaemon shuts his eyes. He keeps them shut and shakes his head.

'At least,' de Zoet's voice is cracked, 'tell me if the scroll could be a weapon to attack Enomoto, or shame him into releasing her? Or, via the Magistracy, could the scroll win Miss Aibagawa justice?'

'I am Interpreter of Third Rank. Enomoto is Lord Abbot. He has more power than Magistrate Shirayama. Justice in Japan is justice of power.'

'So Miss Aibagawa must suffer - suffer the "unendurable" for the rest of her life?'

Uzaemon hesitates. 'A friend, in Nagasaki, wish to help . . . with directness.'

De Zoet is no fool. 'You plan a rescue? Can you hope to succeed?'

Uzaemon hesitates again. 'Not he and I alone. I . . . purchase assistance.'

'Mercenaries are risky allies, as we Dutch know well.' De Zoet's mind works an abacus of implications. 'But how could you return to Dejima, afterwards? And she would just be recaptured. You'd have to go into hiding - permanently - and - so why - why sacrifice so much - everything? Unless . . .
oh
.'

Momentarily, the two men are unable to look each other in the eye.

So now you know
, the interpreter thinks,
I love her too
.

'I am a fool.' The Dutchman rubs his green eyes. 'A myopic, holy fool . . .'

Two of the Malay slaves hurry down Long Street speaking their language.

'. . . but why did you help my - my advances towards her, if you, too . . .'

'Better she lives here with you than become locked forever in bad marriage, or be sent away from Nagasaki.'

'Yet still you entrust me with this' - he touches the tube - 'unusable evidence?'