Gai-Jin (96 page)

“Much more likely. So why not choose power to us and not them. First, together we crush Tosa.”

Again the short, hard laugh. “Not easily, not with Sanjiro and his Satsuma legions ready to go to Tosa’s aid at once—he could never allow us to smash Tosa, because then he is isolated and we would turn on him. He would never allow me to smash Tosa which I could do in time, let alone allow an alliance between us. Not possible to split them although they hate each other. At length we would beat them but neither of us can easily sustain a lengthy war—and certainly never while the gai-jin are on our shores and ready to exploit us.”

“Leave the gai-jin for the moment, except to say that I oppose the Treaties, want all gai-jin expelled, want—with all my strength—to fulfill the Emperor’s request, want the Elders replaced and most of the Bakufu dismissed.”

Again Ogama stared at him, hardly able to believe his ears. “Such private thoughts, lethal thoughts, so openly spoken will not remain secret for long. If true.”

“They are true. They are spoken privately, between us. I gamble with you, yes. But there is purpose: Nippon. I propose a secret alliance: together we could control all power. You are a good leader, you possess the Shimonoseki Straits, your cannon cannot stop the gai-jin ships until we can buy or build an equal fleet and modernize our armies—gai-jin ships, cannon and firearms are all we need. And you are strong enough and clever enough to understand the problems confronting us.”

“They are?”

“Five main ones: a weak, stupid and out-of-date Shōgunate supported by an even more stupid Bakufu; second, the nation is divided; third, the gai-jin and the need for us to modernize before their ships, cannons and rifles
enslave us like they enslaved China; fourth, how to obliterate all shishi whose influence grows in spite of the smallness of their numbers. And then fifth: the Princess Yazu.”

“Four, I agree. But why is she a problem?”

“Nobusada is a child, querulous and simple, yes, and I think he will remain one. On the other hand, she is strong, educated, and cunning, cunning beyond her years.”

“But a woman,” Ogama cut in irritably, “with no army, no purse, and once she becomes a mother all her energies will be expended on her sons. You see fire in a bowl of water.”

“But say her husband is impotent.”

“What?”

“That is what his doctors whisper to me. Say also he is totally within her spell—believe me this girl has all the wits and devilment of a wolf kami! This visit is her idea, the beginning of her plan: to put him and through him the Shōgunate into the clutches of Court sycophants who have no temporal experience, who will misguide the Deity and wreck us all.”

“She could never do it,” Ogama said sourly, “however clever; no daimyo would accept such madness.”

“Step one: the visit, step two: the Shōgun takes up permanent residence in the palace. From then on, supported by the Emperor’s requests, her brother’s requests, decisions come down through her cronies, one of whom is your Prince Fujitaka.”

“I do not believe that!”

“Certainly he will not admit it. I can give you proof in a little while that he is not really working for you but against you.” Yoshi kept his voice down and filled with sincerity. “Once Nobusada is permanently inside the walls, she rules. That is why she is a problem.”

Ogama sighed and sat back, again weighing what his adversary had been saying, much of which was true, wondering how far he could trust him. Certainly a secret alliance had possibilities, if the price extracted was high enough.

“The answer to her is to break the marriage,” he said thinly. “The Emperor was asked to approve it, eh? Perhaps the Emperor would be happy to request the annulment. At once you neutralize her, gain back support from the many who detest the Toranaga connection as a gross impertinence … not my opinion,” he added hastily, seeing a momentary flush, not wanting an open clash yet, so much yet to hear and to decide.

After a moment, Yoshi nodded. “A good idea, Ogama-dono. It had not occurred to me.” Indeed it had not. The more he thought about it, the more titillating the offshoots became. “That should have priority. Excellent.”

Across the square a horse neighed restlessly and skittered. Both men watched while the soldier holding the bridle gentled her, Ogama wondering
in his most secret heart if, when he had eliminated Yoshi—and then, without a hiccup, Nobusada, the rest of the Toranagas and their allies—and became Shōgun, if he should then inherit this Imperial Princess. No woman would ever give me a problem, she would be spawning sons so quickly even gods would smile.

“So what is your proposal?” he asked, his head reeling with the wonderful avenues a temporary alliance might open.

“We make a secret agreement from today to join forces and influence and formulate plans: first to smash the shishi; second to neutralize Anjo and Sanjiro of Satsuma; third, a surprise attack on Tosa being a priority. The moment Anjo is dead or resigns, I will propose you as Elder in his place and guarantee your appointment. Simultaneously Zukumura will resign and a replacement, agreed in advance by both of us, put in his place. Three to two. Toyama I keep, Adachi is replaced by your appointee. I vote for you to be the Council Leader.”

“With the rank of tairō.
”

“To be Chief Minister of the Council, that is enough.”

“Perhaps not. In return for what?”

“From today Tosa and Satsuma are considered enemy. You will commit all necessary force for a joint, surprise attack on Tosa the moment it is feasible. We divide his fief.”

“As he is an Outside Lord, his lands should go to an Outside Lord.”

“Perhaps, perhaps not,” Yoshi said easily. “You agree never to ally yourself with Tosa and Satsuma against me, or the Shōgunate. If, I should say when, Satsuma and Tosa separately or together attack you, I bind myself to support you at once with massive force.”

“Next?” Ogama asked impassively.

“You agree not to take sides against me, as I agree not to take sides against you.”

“Next?”

“From today, quietly, each in our own way, we work to annul the marriage.”

“Next?”

“Last: the Gates. You agree that legal, legitimate Shōgunate forces take back control from dawn tomorrow.”

Ogama’s face closed. “I already showed you I am the legal and legitimate representative of the Deity.”

“I already pointed out, though the document is certainly signed correctly, the signature was, regretfully, obtained by misrepresentation.”

“So sorry, no.”

“The Gates must come back into Shōgunate control.”

“Then we have little left to talk about.”

Yoshi sighed. His eyes slitted. “Then, sadly, there will be a new request from the Emperor—for you to leave the Gates and leave Kyōto with all your men.”

Just as coldly Ogama stared back at him. “I doubt it.”

“I, Toranaga Yoshi, guarantee it. In six or seven days Shōgun Nobusada and his wife are within the palace. As Guardian I have immediate access to him—and to her. Both will see the correctness of my argument—about the Gates and much else.”

“What much else?”

“The Gates should not be a problem for you, Ogama-dono. I would give guarantees not to flaunt this in your face, would ‘gratefully accept your kind invitation to assume control,’ would not fortify them against you. What is so difficult? The Gates are mostly a symbol. I advise you formally, to continue the peace and ensure order in the Land until Anjo is onwards, the Shōgunate should have their place there.”

Ogama hesitated, in a quandary. Yoshi could easily have such another “request” sent to him, that he would have to accept. “I will give you an answer, in a month.”

“So sorry, noon on the sixth day from now is the limit.”

“Why?”

“In five days Nobusada reaches Otsu. By the dusk on the sixth day Nobusada will go through the Gates. I require possession, temporary possession, before that.” It was said so gently and so politely.

Their eyes locked. Noncommittally, but equally politely, Ogama said, “I will think about all of this, Yoshi-dono.” Then he bowed, Yoshi bowed, both men walked to their palanquins and everyone in the square sighed with relief that their ordeal was over and the expected bloodbath had not happened.

FRIDAY, 21ST NOVEMBER
:

The way station of otsu had been bustling all day in a crescendo of excitement, anticipation paired with fear over final preparations for tonight’s stop of the impossibly august visitors, Shōgun Nobusada and the Princess Yazu. For weeks the citizens had been brooming streets, cleaning all dwellings, hovels, outhouses—roofs, walls, wells, gardens manicured—new tiles, shojis; tatamis, verandas, with the Inn of Many Flowers, the best and biggest in the whole of Otsu, still in a state of near panic.

It had begun the moment it was known the Hallowed Travellers had
declined to stay in the nearby Shōgunate castle of Sakamoto that had graced the area since before Sekigahara, selecting the Inn instead: “Everything must be perfect!” the Patron wailed, awed and at the same time petrified. “Anything not perfect will merit beheading or at the very least a whipping, man, woman or child! Tales of the honor done to us this one night will be remembered through the ages—our successes or failures! The Lord High Shōgun himself? In all his glory? His wife, a sister of the Deity?
Oh ko
…. ”

Late in the afternoon, veiled, surrounded by guards and counselors and well screened from being observed, Shōgun Nobusada hurried from his palanquin through the gates into the isolated section of the Inn reserved for him, with the Princess and their entourage of personal bodyguards, servants, her ladies-in-waiting and maids. There were forty traditional raised bungalows of four rooms each, surrounding the inner sanctum of the Shōgun’s sleeping quarters and bathhouse, many of the covered verandas interlocking in a maze of pleasing walks and bridges over delicate pools and streams that came down from tiny mountains and all self-contained within a high, thick hedge of manicured hemlocks.

The room was warm and spotless, with new tatamis and polished charcoal braziers. Nobusada threw his veiled hat and outer clothes aside, tired and querulous. As always the palanquin had been uncomfortable and the ride bumpy. “I hate this place already,” he said to their Chamberlain, whose head was touching the floor beside those of an echelon of maids. “It’s so small and stinks and I ache all over! Is the bath ready?”

“Ah, yes. Sire, everything is as you require.”

“Otsu at long last, Sire,” Princess Yazu said gaily, sweeping in with several ladies-in-waiting. “Tomorrow we arrive home and everything will be marvelous.” She dropped her huge, also veiled, hat and outer clothes. Maids scrambled to gather them up. “Tomorrow we will be home! Home, Sire! Bypassing a few way stations will be well worth it,
neh?”

“Oh, yes, Yazu-chan, if you say so,” he said, smiling at her, quickly caught up in her exuberance.

“You will meet all my friends, cousins, aunts, uncles, elder sister and baby sister, my dear stepbrother Sachi, he’s nine this year”—she twirled with happiness—“and hundreds of less close relatives and in a few days you’ll meet the Emperor and he will greet you as his brother too and solve all our problems and we will live in tranquility ever after. It’s cold in here. Why isn’t everything ready? Where is the bath?”

Their Chamberlain—a portly, greying man of fifty with few teeth and heavy jowls—had already been here a day with an advance party of special maids and cooks to prepare their quarters, and particular foods and fruits, with an abundance of polished rice, which the Shōgun’s delicate stomach required and the Princess demanded. Superb flower arrangements by a
Master of
ikebana
abounded. Again he bowed, inwardly cursing her. “Extra charcoal heaters are ready, Imperial Highness. The bath is ready, your light meal just as you and Shōgun Nobusada ordered, dinner the same. It will be the most sumptuous—”

“Emiko! Our bath!”

At once her chief lady-in-waiting led her out and down the corridor, cocooned by other ladies and maids like the queen bee she was. Nobusada glared up at the Chamberlain and stamped his tiny foot. “Am I to be kept waiting? Show me the bath and send for the masseuse, I want my back rubbed now. And make sure there is no noise—I forbid noise!”

“Yes, Sire, the Captain issues the order daily and I will send the masseuse to the bathhouse, Sire. Sako will b—”

“Sako? She’s not as good as Meiko—where’s Meiko?”

“So sorry, she’s sick, Sire.”

“Tell her to get better! Tell her to be better by sunset. No wonder she’s sick. I feel sick! This foul journey!
Baka!
How many days on the road? It should be at least fifty-three and it’s less than…why all the haste … ?”

The Captain of the Escort waited for the Chamberlain in the garden. He was in his thirties, bearded, highly trained, a renowned Master of Swords. His adjutant hurried up.

“Everything is secure, sir.”

“Good. It should all be routine by now,” the Captain said, his voice weary and edged. Both wore light travelling armor and hats and two swords over Shōgunate tunics and pantaloons. “Only one more day—then our problems get worse. I still cannot believe the Council and Guardian would allow such a dangerous venture.”

His adjutant had heard the same thing said every day. “Yes, Captain. At least we will be in our own barracks, with hundreds more men.”

“Not enough, never enough, we should never have left. But we did and karma is karma. Check the rest of the men and make sure the evening roster of guards is correct. And then tell the horse master to look at my mare, to take a look at her left foot, she may have split her hoof …” Shoeing horses was unknown in Japan at this time. “She almost shied passing the barrier, then come back and report.” The man hurried away.

The Captain was more satisfied than usual. His tour of the Inn and its grounds within the high, giant perimeter bamboo fences, and particularly this sector, the hedged area with a single gateway, had reassured him that the Shōgun’s cluster of bungalows was easy to defend, that all other travellers had been forbidden the Inn for this night, that the watch knew the password and were clear on their prime duty: no one was allowed within five metres of the Shōgun or his wife uninvited, and no one, ever, with any weapons—except the Guardian, the Council of Elders and himself, and any guards accompanying him. The law was well known, the punishment for
an armed approach death, for both the armed man and the unalert guards—unless pardoned by the Shōgun personally.