Gai-Jin (193 page)

“Follow, but be careful!” Tyrer ran back to the village shadows and stopped beside the other man in the lee of the half-finished dwelling. Jamie McFay. When it was safe, Hiraga and Akimoto joined them, moving much more lithely, silently.

Jamie McFay said, “Here, quick.” He opened the sack and handed them rough seaman’s clothes and woolen balaclavas and shoes. They stripped and dressed and put their own clothes into the sack which Akimoto slung on his back. Tyrer saw Hiraga slip a derringer into a side pocket.

It had taken barely a minute or two. Jamie led the way along where the village main street had once been—and would soon be again. They could feel eyes everywhere. Above them the moon came out of the cloud briefly. Automatically Hiraga and Akimoto froze into shadows, both men ready to go for their weapons, mentally cursing the inept carelessness of the other two. The moon vanished, and they went on.

The shoya’s dwelling was three-quarters rebuilt, the shop front empty but the living quarters behind were temporarily finished and livable. Jamie eased through a pile of beams and shojis and knocked on a makeshift door. It opened and he went in. The others followed into darkness. The door closed.

In a moment a match struck and the wick of the candle caught. The shoya was alone, grey with fatigue and a fear he tried hard to hide. On the
low table were flasks of saké, and a little food. Hiraga and Akimoto wolfed the food and emptied two of the flasks in seconds. “Thank you, shoya,” Hiraga said. “I will not forget you.”

“Here, Otami-sama.” The shoya gave him a small bag containing coins. “Here are a hundred gold oban and twenty Mex.”

A brush was on the table, the ink tablet prepared beside the paper. Hiraga signed the receipt. “What about my cousin?”

“So sorry, this was all I could get so quickly,” the shoya said, with a sidelong glance at Jamie the others missed.

“Never mind.” Hiraga did not believe him but then Akimoto had no credit, nor anyone to repay the loan as he did. “Thank you. And please see my guarantor gets this safely.” He gave him a small scroll. It was a painstakingly coded farewell note to his mother and father, telling them his plan, and giving them news about Sumomo. For safety it contained no real names. In English he said, “Taira-sama, ready. Here finish.”

“Ready, Jamie?” Tyrer asked, feeling peculiar, nauseous, not knowing if it was caused by excitement or fright, tiredness or despair. Since the fire, every few minutes Fujiko’s face would well up from his subconscious, screaming and in flames. “Best hurry, Otami-sama,” he said to Hiraga. Both had agreed never to use Hiraga or Nakama again. “Pull your cap more over your face.
Domo, shoya, mataneh.”
Thank you, shoya, good night.

He went out on to the street again. When it was safe he signalled the others. “You lead, Jamie,” he whispered. In sudden panic they slid into the shadows as a Grenadier patrol approached and passed by. Breathing once more, Tyrer muttered, “They’re on the watch for looters, thieves,
wakari-masuka
?”

“Wakarimasu.”

Once more Jamie hurried ahead, turned and twisted through the rubble towards the jetty on the other side of the promenade, near the site where the
Guardian
building had stood. Many men were wandering about, gawking at the damage to the village and Yoshiwara and Drunk Town, or just numb, too early to sleep yet. Recognizing some of them, he slowed his pace, not wanting to attract attention. Dmitri was amongst them, heading homewards, and he smiled wryly. This morning Dmitri, beaming, had sought him out to say he had found Nemi in the early hours and that she was all right, just a few bruises and hardly touched.

“Thank God for that, Dmitri.”

“The first thing she said was, Jami-san okay? I said yes and she gave me a hug for you. Then I gave her your message, that you’d find her as soon as possible.”

“Thanks, that’s a load off my mind. I was afraid she was a goner. Eventually I found her Inn but it was a heap of ash, our house included. Never did find anyone…Thank God.”

“You remember what I—”

“I remember, but first I’ve got to talk to her. She’s not a piece of furniture, for God’s sake.”

“Hey, easy, old buddy, perish the thought, didn’t mean to imply anything …”

Jamie sighed, picking his way through the wreckage of a saké still, now not far from the promenade. Dmitri’s a good enough fellow, he thought, but Nemi was special and …

“Oh, my God, look!” He pointed. A group of weary samurai fire fighters were squatting around a bonfire beside the jetty, brewing tea. Quickly he weighed the alternatives. There were none. “Can’t help it, come on.”

As they reached the promenade Lunkchurch reeled out of the darkness. “Jamie,” he said dully, “wot you going to do? You’re wiped out like me …” He glanced at Phillip, hardly noticing the other two. They looked like ordinary Asian seamen of a type abundant in the merchant fleet. “It’s a bastard …”

“Maybe it won’t be so bad, Barnaby, I’ve a few ideas, I’ll find you to morrow.”

Jamie brushed past and walked for the jetty, raised his hat politely to the fire fighters and their officer who absently acknowledged them. The rickety jetty pilings and its wooden walkway went fifty metres into the sea. His heart sank. No waiting cutter, and none approaching from the Struan jetty, to the north. Out in the bay
Atlanta Belle
was alight, swarming with rowboats arriving and leaving.

Earlier this afternoon Jamie had asked MacStruan if he could borrow the cutter for a quick trip this evening to see the captain of the
Belle
, Johnny Twomast, an old friend. Phillip, after leaving Sir William who had confirmed Hiraga’s supposed death, had rushed over to see him. Stumbling over his words with excitement, Phillip told him, to his delight, that Hiraga was alive, hidden in a Drunk Town well, how the man had saved his life last night, laying out his scheme to save him. “We just sneak him aboard the
Belle
and no one’s the wiser.”

“He’s alive? I’d heard about him dying in the fire—he’s alive?”

“Yes. All we have to do is sneak him aboard.”

“I’ll ask Johnny Twomast to hide them but only if you get Willie’s approval. Hiraga is still a mur—”

“Hiraga’s dead—Nakama, Hiraga, it’s all the same, officially. Willie said it, the Sergeant confirmed his death in the fire. Nakama’s dead and gone forever, so’s Hiraga. Getting him out on a ship is the perfect solution and he’s worth saving! We’re only helping two samurai students to see the world, our world, for a year or so, one of them called Otami.”

“If we get caught, Willie will spit blood, our blood.”

“There’s no reason we should. Otami is Otami, it’s his real name and
he’s told me about you and the shoya cooking up all sorts of business deals, you’ll be the winner when he comes back, we all will. We’ve got to help him!”

Finally Jamie had agreed and had seen the shoya to arrange the loan that he had also guaranteed. By then it was sunset. At sunset Tyrer had gone to the well to prepare Hiraga and Akimoto and now they waited on the jetty.

“Where’s the cutter, Jamie?” Tyrer said nervously.

“It’ll arrive.” Feeling highly exposed, the four men waited at the end of the jetty near the wobbly, seaweed-slicked steps, all too aware of the nearby samurai, their captain idly swaggering up and down.

Hiraga whispered, “Taira-sama, that captain, remember? He Enforcer. Remember him, captain at gate?”

“What gate?”

“In Yedo. At your Big House in Yedo. When first meet.”

“Oh, my God!” Now it poured back—the tough samurai who had insisted on searching the Legation when they had been surrounded and locked in before the evacuation, Hiraga escaping on a stretcher disguised as a smallpox sufferer.

“What’s up now?” Jamie said. Tyrer told him. Over Tyrer’s shoulder he could see the officer glance at them. His anxiety increased. “He’s too bloody curious.”

“I recognize him now,” Tyrer was saying. “We’d better … Look, there she is!” The cutter was chugging out of the dark, her riding lights on but dim. The Bosun waved, they waved back. Waves against the pilings threw shards of spray at them.

“Get aboard, quick as you can,” Jamie said, his excitement increasing. Phillip had convinced him Hiraga was not an assassin but a fighter for freedom, and, for himself, he already had seen how useful Hiraga had been. Now he was even more sure how valuable an English-speaking shishi and friend would be in the future, particularly one who had been guided and helped by him—he had prepared a dossier of people to meet in England and Scotland, where to go, what to see that he was going to explain before the ship sailed.

Phillip’s a genius, he chortled, glanced back at him and drew in breath sharply. Behind Tyrer he saw the Japanese officer strolling towards their jetty. “My God, the bugger’s coming for us!” They gaped at the man, took a quick look at the cutter. No way could she arrive before he did. “We’re done for.”

Hiraga had already decided the same. He tore at the kimonos covering their swords. “Akimoto, we kill him.”

“Wait! Here!” Urgently Tyrer handed Hiraga a large envelope that contained letters of introduction to his father and uncle, also a solicitor, and
to the dean of his university. “I was going to explain them on the cutter,” he said hurriedly. “No time now—Jamie, you do it for me.” He looked at Hiraga deeply a last time and stuck out his hand. “Thanks, I’ll always be your friend, come back safely.” He felt the strong grip, saw for an instant a smile, then turned and in a cold sweat went to meet the enemy.

The captain had already covered half the jetty when Tyrer planted himself in the middle of the planks and bowed with great formality. A grunt, the man hesitated, his hand on his long sword, then bowed back. When he tried to pass, Tyrer bowed again and said in his best Japanese, deliberately ponderous, “Ah, Sir Officer, I want say you how samurai men good fight fire. Remembering from Yedo, yes? Please excuse me, on behalf my Master, Head Gai-jin in Nippon, accept great thank for help save all houses ours.”

“Yes, thank you, now I want to see th—”

“See? Look there, Sir Officer!” Tyrer pointed at the town and all around, his Japanese dissolving more and more into gibberish as each time the man tried to walk around him he moved into his path. “See what fire h—”

“Out of the way!” the samurai said angrily, his breath heavy with the stench of
daikon
, horseradish. “Move!”

But Tyrer pretended not to understand and flailed his arms to block him, trying to make it appear unintentional and careful not to touch him, saying how awful the devastation was and how well the samurai had performed—Jamie and the others were behind him so he had no way of judging how much time he had, then the officer snarled,
“Baka!”
he saw his face twist with rage and readied for the blow but at that second he heard Jamie call out, “Cast off, for Christ’s sake!” and he was roughly shoved aside as the man ran for the boat.

Panting, Tyrer picked himself up and, wet with relief, saw the cutter swerving off at full throttle, the other three ducking into the cabin, Bosun in the wheelhouse, seaman at the prow, the cabin lights doused the instant the samurai reached the jetty’s head, his bellowing shout, calling them back, drowned by the engine. The moment before the lights went out and Hiraga and Akimoto turned their backs, Tyrer thought he saw their faces clearly—if he did the officer must have done.

“Imagination,” Phillip gasped, already hurrying away in the fastest walk possible. He raised his hat to the samurai around the fire who acknowledged him perfunctorily, and by the time he heard the Japanese shout of “You, come here,” he was swallowed in the crowd. When it was safe he broke into a trot, and did not begin to breathe until he was safe in the Legation.

“Good gracious, Phillip,” Bertram said, popeyed, “you poor dear, what on earth’s the matter?”

“Oh, fuck off,” Tyrer said, not over the close call.

“Why should he do that?” Sir William asked from his office doorway, his face taut and voice harsh.

“Oh … oh, sorry, sir, it was…just a pleasantry.”

An irritable grunt greeted that. “Phillip, your brains are addled! Where the devil have you been? There’s a note from the Bakufu marked urgent on your desk to translate, a dispatch for Sir Percy to copy that must go with
Atlanta Belle
tonight, four insurance claims to stamp—I’ve already signed and approved them. When you’ve done that come and find me. I’ll either be here or at the jetty seeing the passengers off—well, don’t just stand there! Hurry up!”

Sir William went back into his office and closed his door and leaned against it. Inexorably his eyes went to André’s file neatly centered on his desk. Sadness welled up again.

When Angelique had left he had hardly moved for an hour or more, trying to decide, desperate to be correct, for truly this was a life and death issue. His mind had wandered into the byways of his own experience: to his boyhood in England, to the Paris Desk, to St. Petersburg, his house there and the garden and laughing with Vertinskya in spring and summer and autumn and winter, loving her; then back to England again, to missions in the battlefields of the Crimea, and into swirling, smoky dark passages that frightened him.

He was glad that Phillip’s voice had drawn him back to normality. Again his eyes wandered over the room and the fire and to the file, past that to the lovely young face in the miniature smiling at him. His heart broke as it always did and then repaired itself. A little less each time.

He went over and picked the miniature up and studied it, every brushstroke already etched on his mind. If I didn’t have her portrait, would I have forgotten her face as Angelique did her Malcolm? “No answer to that one, Vertinskya, my darling,” he said sadly, near tears, setting it down again. “Maybe I would—your face—but never you, never never never you.”

And much as he tried to go back to live again the time he had been most alive, André’s file was an iron door between them.

God damn him!

Never mind that, make the decision. No more shillyshallying, he ordered himself. Back to work, deal with this problem so you can go on to more important matters like Yoshi and the coming war against Satsuma—you are Her Britannic Majesty’s Minister. Act like one!