The Heike Story (53 page)

"No."

"You don't?"

"No."

"Why is that?"

"When I am writing like this, nothing troubles me."

"Then you only look forward to dying so you can meet your father again? We are told, you know, that we will meet our loved ones in that other world."

"I do not want to die. It frightens me to think of it."

"But did you not take part in the fighting?"

"I was with my father and brothers then, and so excited that I never thought of death."

"Do you sometimes have dreams?"

"No — what kind of dreams?"

"I mean, do you never dream of your father and brothers?"

Yoritomo shook his head. "No — never." A tear glistened and rolled down his cheek, and he looked down quickly.

Shigemori was deeply moved in spite of himself, and when he came to plead with his father, he did so with passionate intensity and an array of carefully marshaled arguments, begging Kiyomori to grant Ariko her wish. But this only caused Kiyomori to turn on his son in fury.

"What, you're nothing but a boy! How dare you argue with me — with the airs of a sage! You're too young yet to be toying with these outrageous religious fantasies! Enough of your grandmother's contentions about 'Buddhahood' and 'karma' and such profundities — none of which settle the troubles of the world today! See for yourself the rottenness of the priesthood at Nara! Are those ravening wolves on Mount Hiei any holier than the vagrants and beggars in our streets? We are all creatures of flesh and blood, and this world we live in is a den where we devour or are devoured! We give no quarter to our fellow beings; all that matters is whether one wins or loses. ... If you must meddle with such nonsense—this babbling of 'mercy' and 'good works,' shedding a few easy tears—then take yourself off to some temple or to your grandmother's! I will not have you bring such matters to me when affairs of far greater importance demand my attention."

And though Shigemori reasoned with his father with cool deliberation, Kiyomori raged back at his son in a wild torrent of words. Under the stress of emotion the habits of his reckless younger years asserted themselves, and he stormed at his son in the coarse speech once learned from the ruffians of the marketplace. Yet at times like this when he ranted so scornfully of "easy tears," Kiyomori had great difficulty in concealing his own.

The question of whether Yoritomo should be executed or not was no longer a political issue, but a family dispute in which Kiyomori found his stepmother, his half-brother, and even his own son ranged against him. Though not so intended, he saw himself accused of being a monster of cruelty and heartlessness.

A CHAPEL ON THE HILL

It was the 3rd of January and savagely cold. Not a single light was to be seen anywhere. Darkness washed round the bleak, resounding temple buildings and flowed along the maze of open galleries, whose floors had turned to ice. The raw night air found its way through the shutters and even the walls of the Kannon Chapel in the grounds of Kiyomizu Temple.

"Oh, hush, hush, my love. . . . You are safe in Mother's arms. Is it the cold that makes you cry so? What is it, my little one?"

At the base of a wooden pillar near the altar, where some straw matting had been spread, slept two children, huddled under a thin coverlet.

Tokiwa nuzzled the wailing seven-month-old infant in the folds of her robes and whispered through her tears: "My breasts are dry, and it must be hunger that makes you cry so. ... What could be keeping Yomogi? . . . She should be back soon. Hush, hush or you'll break my heart, little one."

The young mother paced the chapel floor in anguish, fearing the wails might wake her sleeping sons. It was like this last night, and tonight toward sundown Ushiwaka had again begun to cry piteously. Tokiwa was beside herself, for her breasts scarcely yielded a trickle sufficient to moisten the baby's lips.

Tokiwa, who worshipped here every month on the Kannon's holy days and was known to the priests, fled to Kiyomizu Temple with her children and servants when fighting broke out in the capital. But rumors soon followed that Kiyomori had sent his soldiers to capture her, and at this her frightened servants left her, all except the nursemaid Yomogi. And the priests, though they pitied her exceedingly, feared Kiyomori and refused to have anything to do with Tokiwa. A young novice, Kogan by name, however, was touched by the sight of her distress and offered to conceal her in the Kannon Chapel, where few worshippers ever came. There she had stayed hidden now these three days. It was Kogan who surreptitiously brought her a pallet and some bedding, and who supplied her with morsels of food, though barely enough to keep her and her children alive.

For the first time in her life Tokiwa tasted the bitterness of man's indifference to man. In the sheltered life of the Court, where she had been a favorite of the former Empress-elect, Lady Shimeko, Tokiwa, whose beauty made her the talk and the envy of the capital's women, had only known happiness. For her Yoshitomo embodied all that was finest in manhood, and his love had encompassed all her needs. Of men Tokiwa knew nothing other than him; of life, only her duties to her mistress and the care of the children she had had by Yoshitomo. Then was she suddenly thrown upon the mercies of a world reeking with vengeance and blood and hunted down as one of the vanquished.

Ushiwaka had been a high-strung infant since birth, and distressed his young mother by his fits of crying. In those terror-haunted days when Tokiwa had had to make her way out of the capital with her children, her breasts had gone dry. She had then fed him with food that disagreed with him, and Ushiwaka showed signs of rapidly sickening. Frantically, she poured out her prayers to Kannon that the child might be spared; and the Tokiwa who prayed was no longer the same mother of happier days. Half-demented by danger and hardships and the fear of capture, all her being had become an anguished will that her three children should live. All consciousness, every desire was now merged into and become one with their being. Distraught, her hair in disorder, Tokiwa paced the chapel by the frail light of a single candle, rocking and soothing her infant. At the cautious creaking of a door, Tokiwa started in alarm, and then asked: "... Is that you, Yomogi?"

"Yes, it's Yomogi. I begged the good monk Kogan to cook me a little of the powdered arrowroot, and here it is."

"Oh? Good! Give it to me here. He can scarcely cry any more, he's so starved."

"See how greedily he laps at it!"

". . . He wants to live, you see. He knows it's good for him. See, he won't even wait to take breath as he drinks it down! Just look at him!"

Tokiwa's tears began to flow again as she looked down at the baby in her arms. Why, why, she mused, could not her milk flow as abundantly as her tears? Why could not her flesh and blood and all be changed to milk?

"Lady Tokiwa—he has stopped crying at last, hasn't he?"

Yomogi had forgotten to tell her mistress that the young monk had come with her.

"Oh, good sir, I have put you to much trouble at this late hour."

"I have not done anything at all, really, but something very disturbing has happened."

"What—again?"

"I'm sure you know what it is. There has been so much gossip in the temple, and it is no longer safe for you here."

"Oh, what am I to do if I am forced to leave this place?"

Then Kogan told her that the priests had heard the baby's cries and now knew that Tokiwa was hiding in the chapel. There was talk that Kiyomori's soldiers were arriving next day to make a search of the temple buildings, and that Kogan would be blamed for sheltering fugitives.

"Let me carry one of the children," Kogan urged, "Yomogi can take Imawaka by the hand, and you, my lady, Ushiwaka, and before dawn . . ."

Once the necessity had been impressed upon her, Tokiwa ceased to tremble, and before dawn they were on their way down through the hills around Kiyomizu Temple.

Kogan went with them as far as the river, where a small craft was preparing to sail for Eguchi, at the mouth of the Yodo River; and when Tokiwa and her children and the nursemaid were safely aboard, he left them.

Two dancing-girls, who were on their way back to Eguchi, gave the two older children some cakes, exclaiming: "What pretty children! . . . And where are you going at this early hour?"

"Thank you kindly. We have an acquaintance at Mimaki, a short way down the river," Tokiwa replied.

"Then you will be leaving us quite soon. Are you visiting there?"

"No____"

"Then you must be like our parents, whose homes were burned down during the fighting last month. We came up from Eguchi to pay them a visit and are on our way back. Isn't it true that the innocent ones always get the worst of it? ... What a dreadful time these dear little things must have had!"

"Mmm . . ." Imawaka said, shaking his head with annoyance at the strange woman who stroked his hair. "Look, Mother! Otowaka is already eating his cake! I want to eat mine, too— Mother!"

"Say 'Thank you' before you do."

The dancing-girls appeared to be fond of children and brought out more cakes from a bamboo hamper; one even removed a pad of silk floss from her shoulders to wrap around the baby.

"Good-by, children!" the women waved as Tokiwa disembarked at Mimata.

Tokiwa's uncle was a dealer in yoke-oxen, which he bred on his farm.

"Well, well, is it you, Tokiwa?" her aunt exclaimed in astonishment, but made no move to invite her in. "I must appear heartless, but you surely know that the soldiers are after you. There's a lot of money coming to whoever hands you over to Kiyomori at Rokuhara—a reward, you know. . . . Come now, you'd better be off while your uncle's asleep; he's not one to let you give him the slip if he finds out you've been here. Now, don't turn down my advice," she said, driving Tokiwa from her door.

Tokiwa could only recall one distant relative to whom she might turn, and he lived in the country of Yamato. Wearily she made her way there, begging where she could for food for her children, sleeping under temple porches, moving on day after day and night after night like a vagrant. Strangers eyed her suspiciously, but they were kind to her and her brood. Those who recognized her for the fugitive that she was, took pity on her and made no attempt to notify the authorities.

This relative whom Tokiwa sought was a priest, and he kept her hidden in the small temple of which he had charge. Along toward early February, when Ushiwaka was well again, Tokiwa's uncle appeared unexpectedly at the priest's house with an old creaking ox-cart. He talked with the priest until late into the night and on the following morning said to Tokiwa:

"You can't hide here much longer, you know. You'd better get back to the capital and think things over, or they may hang or crucify your mother, who's still there."

". . . But why should they?"

"Why? Only natural, isn't it? You clear out with Yoshitomo's children, so they catch your mother instead and throw her into the jail at Rokuhara."

"What—my mother?"

"Who else? Everyone knows about that. And there's some ugly gossip about you too—forgetting your own mother for love of the children you had by Yoshitomo!"

Tomizo's unblinking eyes, the eyes of an uncouth animal, bulged as Tokiwa burst into tears. For long her only thought had been for her children, but now she wept as a child does for her mother.

Tomizo laughed derisively. "Here, enough of that"—when another thought seemed to occur to him, and he continued: "While you're about it, you might as well bawl for that man of yours—Yoshitomo. You think he's gone east and will come back for you soon, but he's dead. Died on the 3rd of January, do you hear?"

“…”

Tokiwa stared at her uncle in disbelief; her lips turned waxen and seemed paralyzed.

"That's the truth. You can find out for yourself by going to the capital. His head hung from that tree by the East Jail for seven days. There's not a man in Kyoto who hasn't seen it."

An agonized sigh escaped from Tokiwa's lips: "Then—"

"Tokiwa!"

"But Yoshitomo—"

"Here, Tokiwa, what's come over you? Pull yourself together! Don't stare at me as though you'd gone mad. I had nothing to do with it, do you hear me? It's war that's done this to you and yours, and didn't Yoshitomo have a hand in all this madness? Come now, forget what's past."