Gai-Jin (72 page)

On the other side of the screen, Father Leo was more attentive than usual. Normally he listened with half an ear, sadly, sure that his penitents were lying, their sins unconfessed, their level of transgression great—but no greater than in other Settlements in Asia—and the penances he ordered were merely paid lip service, or totally disregarded.

“So, my child, you have sinned,” he said in his most pleasant voice, his French heavily accented. He was fifty-five, corpulent and bearded, a Portuguese Jesuit and Believer, ordained for twenty-seven of those years and largely content with the crumbs of life he judged God permitted him. “What sins have you committed this week?”

“I forgot to ask the Madonna for forgiveness in my prayers one night,” she said with perfect calm, continuing her pact, “and had many bad thoughts and dreams, and was afraid, and forgot I was in God’s hands …”

At Kanagawa, the day after
that night—
once she had reasoned a way out of her catastrophe—she had knelt weeping before the small crucifix she always carried with her. “Mother of God, there’s no need to explain what has happened and how I’ve been sinned against grievously,” she had sobbed, praying with all the fervor she could gather, “or that I’ve no one to turn to, or that I need your help desperately, or that obviously I can’t tell anyone, even at Confession, I daren’t openly confess what has happened. I daren’t, it would destroy the only chance …

“So please, on my knees I beg you, may we have a pact: when I say at Confession:
I forgot to ask the Blessed Mother for forgiveness in my prayers
, it really means that I’m confessing and telling everything that I’ve told you and you’ve seen happen to me, together with the added little white lies I may—I will have to tell to protect myself. I beg forgiveness for asking, and beg your help, there’s no one else I can turn to. I know you’ll forgive me and know you’ll understand because you are the Mother of God and a woman—you will understand and know you will absolve me …”

She could see Father Leo’s profile behind the screen and smell the wine and garlic on his breath. She sighed, thanked the Madonna with all her heart for helping her. “Forgive me, Father, for I have sinned.”

“Those sins don’t appear to be so bad, my child.”

“Thank you, Father.” She stifled a yawn, preparing to accept her usual, modest penance, then to cross herself and be absolved and to thank him and to leave. Tiffin at the Club with Malcolm and Seratard, siesta in my beautiful suite next to Malcolm’s, dinner at the Russian Leg—

“What kind of bad thoughts did you have?”

“Oh, just being impatient,” she said without thinking, “and not content to rest in God’s hands.”

“Impatient about what?”

“Oh, with, impatient with my maid,” she said flustered, caught unawares, “and that—that my fiancé is not as fit, is not as well as I’d like him to be.”

“Ah yes, the tai-pan, a fine young man but grandson of a great enemy of the True Church. Has he told you about him? His grandfather, Dirk Struan?”

“Some stories, Father,” she said, even more unsettled. “About my maid I was impa—”

“Malcolm Struan’s a fine young man, not like his grandfather. You have asked him to become Catholic?”

The color went out of her face. “We have discussed it, yes. Such a … such a discussion is very delicate and—and of course may not be hurried.”

“Yes, yes indeed.” Father Leo had heard the intake of breath and sensed her anxiety. “And I agree it is terribly important, for him and for you.” He frowned, his experience telling him the girl was hiding much from him—not that that would be unusual, he thought.

He was going to leave the matter there, then suddenly realized here was a God-given opportunity both to save a soul and have a worthwhile enterprise—life in Yokohama, unlike in his beloved and happy Portugal, was drab with little to do except fish and drink and eat and pray. His church was small and dingy, his flock sparse and ungodly, the Settlement a veritable prison. “Such discussion may be delicate but it must be pressed forward. His immortal soul is in absolute jeopardy. I will pray for your success. Your children will be brought up in Mother Church—of course he has already agreed?”

“Oh, we have discussed it too, Father,” she said, forcing lightness. “Of course our children will be Catholic.”

“If they are not, you cast them into the Eternal Pit. Your immortal soul will be at risk as well.” He was glad to notice her shudder. Good, he thought, one blow for the Lord against the Antichrist. “This must be formally agreed to before marriage.”

Her heart was racing now, her head aching with apprehension that she fought to keep out of her voice, believing absolutely in God and the Devil, Life Everlasting and Eternal Damnation. “Thank you for your advice, Father.”

“I will talk to Mr. Struan.”

“Oh no, Father, please, no,” she said in sudden panic, “that would be … I suggest that would be very unwise.”

“Unwise?” Again he pursed his lips, scratching absently at the lice that inhabited his beard and hair and ancient cassock, quickly concluding the
possible coup of Struan’s conversion was a prize worth waiting for and needed careful planning. “I will pray for God’s guidance and that he will guide you too. But don’t forget you are a minor, as he is. I suppose, in the absence of your father, Monsieur Seratard would legally be considered your guardian. Before any marriage could be performed or consummated permission must be granted, and these and other matters settled for the protection of your soul.” He beamed, more than a little satisfied. “Now, for penance, say ten Hail Marys and read the letters of Saint John twice by next Sunday—and continue to pray for God’s guidance.”

“Thank you, Father.” Thankfully she crossed herself, her palms sweaty, and bowed her head for his benediction.

“In nomine Patris, et Filii, et Spiritus Sancti, absolvo tuum.”
He made the sign of the cross over her. “Pray for me, my child,” he said with finality, ending the ritual, in his mind already beginning his dialogue with Malcolm Struan.

At dusk Phillip Tyrer was sitting cross-legged opposite Hiraga in a tiny private room in the equally tiny restaurant that was half hidden beside the house of the shoya, the village elder. They were the only customers, and this was the first real Japanese meal with a Japanese host Tyrer had experienced. He was hungry and ready to taste everything.
“Thank you invite me, Nakama-san.”

“It is my pleasure, Taira-san. May I say that your Japanese accent is improving. Please eat.”

On the low table between them the maid had set many small dishes with different foods, some hot some cold, on decorative lacquered trays. Shoji screens, tatami mats, small sliding windows open to the descending darkness, oil lamps giving a pleasing light, flower arrangement in the nook. Adjoining was another private room and, outside these, the rest of the restaurant, not much more than a corridor with stools that opened to an alley that led to the street—charcoal cooking brazier, saké and beer barrels, a cook and three maids.

Hiraga and Tyrer wore loose-belted sleeping-lounging kimonos—Tyrer enjoying its unaccustomed comfort and Hiraga relieved to get out of the European clothes that he had worn all day. Both had been bathed and massaged in the nearby bathhouse.
“Please eat.”

Awkwardly Tyrer used chopsticks. In Peking, the Embassy had advised against eating any Chinese foods: “… not unless you want to get poisoned, old boy. These buggers really eat dog, drink snake’s bile, spoon up insects, anything, and have an astounding but universal belief, If its back faces heaven you can eat it! Ugh!”

Hiraga corrected the way to hold the sticks.
“There.”

“Thank you, Nakama-san, very difficult.”
Tyrer laughed.
“Will fat not get eating theses.”

“‘I will not get fat eating with these,’”
Hiraga said, not yet weary of correcting Tyrer’s Japanese, for he had found he enjoyed teaching him. Tyrer was an apt pupil with a remarkable memory and happy disposition—and very important for himself, a continual fountain of information.

“Ah, sorry, I won’t get fat eating with these. What is, sorry, what are these foods?”

“This is what we call tempura, fish fried in batter.”

“So sorry, what is ‘batter’?”
Tyrer listened attentively, missing many of the words but understanding the gist, just as he knew the other man would miss English words. We speak more English than Japanese, he thought wryly, but never mind. Nakama’s a great teacher and we seem to have made an accommodation which is fine—without him I wouldn’t be here, probably not alive, either, and would certainly never have all the face I gained with Marlowe, Pallidar and Wee Willie Winkie, let alone the invaluable intelligence he is supplying. Tyrer smiled. It pleased him to be able to think of Sir William now by his nickname when only a few days ago he had been petrified of him.
“Oh, now I understand
. Batter!
We also use batter.”

“This food to your liking, Taira-san?” Hiraga asked, switching to English.

“Yes, thank you.”
Whenever he could Tyrer would answer in Japanese.
“Thank for everything, massage, bath, now caml, sorry, now calm and happy.”

Some of the food he found exciting, tempura and yakitori, bite-sized pieces of chicken that were grilled with a sweet and salty sauce.
Unagi
turned out to be grilled eel with a warm sweet-sour sauce he particularly liked.
Sushi
, slivers of various raw fish of different colors and textures on a ball of rice he found difficult to swallow at first, but when dipped in a mysterious salty sauce called
soy
or
soya
they became palatable. After all, he thought, Father did advise me to try everything: “My son, since you insist on this dramatic idea of becoming a Japanese interpreter, then I advise you to hurl yourself into their way of life and foods and so on—without forgetting you’re an English gentleman with obligations, a duty to the Crown, the Empire and to God …”

Wonder what the Old Man would say about Fujiko. She’s certainly part of their way of life. Tyrer beamed suddenly and pointed with a chopstick.
“What’s this?”

“Oh, sorry, Taira-san, it’s bad manners to point with the thin end of a chopstick. Please use the other end. This is
wasabi.” Before Hiraga could stop him, Tyrer had picked up the nodule of green paste and eaten it. At once his sinuses caught fire and he gasped, eyes watering, almost blinded. In time the
conflagration passed, leaving him panting. “My Go’d,” Hiraga said, copying Tyrer and trying not to laugh. “Wasabi do not eat, just put ’ritt’er—sorry, word very hard for me—just put some in the soy to make spicy.”

“My mistake.”
Tyrer gasped, momentarily strangled. “My God, that’s lethal, worse than chili!
Next time I careful.”

“You very good for man who begin, Taira-san. And you ’rearn Japanese o’rr so quick, very good.”

“Domo, Nakama-san, domo.” Same with you in English
. Pleased to be complimented, Tyrer concentrated on being more deft. The next morsel he tried was
tako
, sliced octopus tentacle. It tasted like slimy rubber even with a touch of soy and wasabi.
“This is very tasty, I like this very much.”

I’m starving, he was thinking. I’d like triples of the chicken, another bowl of rice, twenty more of the tempura prawns, and Hiraga eats like a baby. Never mind, I’m being entertained by a samurai, it’s not a week since he helped get us out of the Yedo Legation without an international incident, not six weeks since I first met André, yet I can already talk a little Japanese, already know more about their customs than most traders who have been here since the beginning. If I can keep this up I’ll be gazetted as an official interpreter in a few months and in line for the official salary: Four hundred pounds a year! Hooray,
or Banzai
, as a Japanese would say. At the present rate of exchange I can easily afford another pony but before that …

His heart quickened.

Before that I’ll buy Fujiko’s contract. Nakama’s promised to help so I’ll have no trouble. He promised. Perhaps we’ll begin tonight—thank God, Fujiko’s back from visiting her grandmother. I suppose I really shouldn’t on a Sunday, but never mind. Karma.

He sighed. Between André and Nakama he had discovered that word and the marvelous way it became a panacea for all happenings, good or bad, over which you had no control.
“Karma!”

“What, Taira-san?”

“Nothing. Food’s good.”

“Food’s good,” Hiraga mimicked him. “Good, thank you, I p’reased.” He called for more beer and saké. The shoji slid back and the drinks appeared on a tray carried by a merry-faced maid who beamed at Hiraga, smiled shyly at Tyrer. With hardly a thought, Hiraga caressed her rump.
“How would you like it Over the Mountain?”

“Eeee, you naughty man! Over Mountain? Oh, no, not me, nor Under, but I might Play the Flute for a gold oban!”

They both laughed at the sally—one gold oban being outrageously expensive, the fee a courtesan of the first class might charge for such a service. The maid poured the saké, filled Tyrer’s mug and left.

“What she say, Nakama-san?”

He smiled. “So sorry, difficu’t exp’rain, not words enough yet. Just joke, man-woman joke, you understand?”

“Wakarimasu. Church today, you like?”
With Sir William’s approval and the avid consent of the Reverend Michaelmas Tweet he had sneaked Hiraga up to the minstrels’ gallery. Dressed in his new Western clothes, made to order by the Chinese tailor with his usual unbelievable speed, and beaver top hat, Hiraga had passed as Eurasian and was hardly noticed. Except by Jamie McFay who had winked discreetly.

“Church good, and your exp’rain too,” Hiraga said, but inside he was still trying to sift Tyrer’s information into perspective, along with the astonishing sight of all these grown men, and two revolting-looking women, singing in unison, getting up, sitting down, solemnly droning out prayers, bowing their heads to their very strange God who, after the service, Tyrer had explained was actually three people, the Father, his Son who was crucified like a common criminal, and a kami.
“So ka?”
Hiraga had said, perplexed. “So, Taira-san, woman name Madonna who not God has son God—but she not God—and she pi’rrow with kami who not God but like
hatomoto
of God with wing who not husband, husband who o’rso not God, but father is, so father of her son is grandfather,
neh?”