A Tale of False Fortunes (17 page)

From the time His Majesty crossed the bridge to the Fujitsubo Pavilion, the building was filled with the fragrance of an unusual sort of incense. It was impossible to identify it, but somehow it permeated him and was quite unlike fragrances anywhere else.

Even such things as boxes of combs and inkstone cases left casually lying about . . . not one was of the ordinary sort, and His Majesty looked carefully at each of them. He had come to visit Shòshi early in the morning, and he was delighted by everything in her quarters. Though tender in age, the ladies-in-waiting were also beautiful in appearance and trim in deportment, and he thought he would like to raise the little princess (Princess Shû-

shi) in such a manner. All the ladies who had been with him until then were now grown up, but these were still very young. He lavished attention on them with the familiarity one would show a beloved younger sister.

It does not explicitly say so in this description from
A Tale of
Flowering Fortunes,
but the implication is that Teishi was no match for the charms of Shòshi, who attracted the emperor like the freshness of spring’s first blossoms.

On the surface, at least, this was no doubt the atmosphere that prevailed in the imperial women’s quarters. The emperor could not afford to make an enemy of Michinaga, and it is hardly likely he would have shown displeasure with the innocent actress placed in the middle of the sumptuous stage the regent had furnished. When he was in the Fujitsubo Pavilion, the emperor was no doubt obligated to play the role of a male doll worthy of Shòshi.

At about the same time as the new lady’s splendid presenta-Chapter Five c
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tion at court, Teishi gave birth to Atsuyasu, the first imperial prince. This occurred after she had taken temporary residence at Imperial Steward Taira no Narimasa’s rather shabby mansion, which lacked even the four-pillared roofed gates then stan-dard at houses of the aristocracy. Several years previously the household of the former regent was at the height of its glory, but now the extent of the change defied imagination.

Had his heart been fickle and easily seduced by anything new and showy, the emperor might have switched his affection to Shòshi at first sight and never given further thought to Teishi.

And yet, no matter how clever Shòshi might have been at that time, she was a mere girl of twelve years. It is not likely that her body had matured to the point that true conjugal relations would have been safely possible. His affection for Teishi—with whom the now twenty-year-old emperor had been deeply intimate for nearly ten years and who had gently directed him in the manner of an elder sister and raised him to manhood—

could not have been so easily moved by the appearance of Shò-

shi on the scene. Such a scenario was rendered all the less probable by Teishi’s being the mother of his children: his darling prince and princess. Even if he was moved to love Shòshi as a pretty little girl, it is unthinkable that his long-standing affection for Teishi faded in the least. The author of
A Tale of False Fortunes
was probably of a mind similar to mine and, though perhaps tending somewhat to exaggeration, wished to portray the emperor’s constant and loving attachment to his first empress:
The Emperor felt uneasy when it was determined that the
Lady of the Fujitsubo Pavilion be elevated to Empress and
that she who had occupied that position be called

“Empress Consort.” It was unprecedented in any previous
reign for there to be two empresses at the same time. The
First Prince (Prince Atsuyasu) now lacked backing. The
Emperor had hoped that the Prince’s mother might enjoy
a secure position and that the Prince would thereby find
great favor with society. But such hopes had been dashed.

It occurred to him at times that if this had been during the
age of the former Regent, the glory and renown of the
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Prince would be praised by every tongue. At such times
the Emperor regretted it as an unpardonable sin against
his son not to have kept the Lord Governor-General

[Korechika] in the regency after the death of Lord Awata

[Michikane]. Combined with his tendency to self-censure
was his sore longing for Teishi, who was living separately
but whose form and features were always before him like
an apparition. He even yearned to go wandering after her,
but since his position prevented such aimless ambulations,
the most he could do was secretly pour his thoughts into
letters. These he concealed from the view of others and
usually had delivered to Teishi’s ladies-in-waiting through
Ukon no Naishi.

The more the empress consort studied the dignified beauty of the new prince’s face, the more he seemed the very image of the emperor when he had been a child. She often dampened her sleeve with tears, thinking, “Alas, if only the former times had continued.” Korechika prayed to the gods and buddhas with single-minded devotion, thinking that if only this prince could grow up healthy, their clan’s former glory would again shine.

The younger brother, Takaie, though reared in the same family, possessed a certain political discernment and was able to see the whole situation objectively from a broad perspective. In this respect he was more like Michinaga than like his father or elder brother. Even if Prince Atsuyasu should safely reach maturity and be endowed with intelligence and courage, it was clear to Takaie that as long as his uncle, Michinaga, enjoyed a long life and remained in power, the clouds gathering over their clan would only grow thicker, never to be penetrated by a ray of sunlight. The depth of the emperor’s feelings would not matter

—or rather might even prove to be a liability to the former regent’s household. Takaie had learned a lesson from the setback of exile and had shed the presumptuousness of a willful, indulged child. He had turned into a self-possessed, dignified young man with both a far stronger sense of pride in himself and a keen discernment. In that respect he stood in remarkable contrast to his elder brother, Korechika, whose exuberant wit
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and charm had so shone when all was going favorably, but who, since his fall from power, had turned into a weak-willed, mediocre sort of person confined to effeminate querulousness, relying for future prospects only on hopeful observations and placing blind faith in the power of incantations and prayers.

Rather than sympathizing with his own elder brother, Takaie was often seized by a desire to spurn him.

Empress Consort Teishi, on the other hand, was quite different from Korechika. In Takaie’s eyes, she seemed to radiate a far more finely honed wisdom than she had had even during the zenith of her salon in the imperial women’s quarters, where she had enjoyed status as the only empress. The cares that come with age—combined with having borne two children—had left her thin and fragile in appearance, as if her body were but a cast-off shell with only thick black hair appearing above mounds of clothing. Even so, an inviolable noble purity resided in the almost translucent white of her bosom, like moonlight on snow in the depth of winter.

“No matter how they try to smother the emperor’s feelings, he’ll still fly to the empress consort. That’s something that Michinaga can’t change no matter how he decks out the child empress.” When there were no letters from the emperor for two or three days, Takaie would make such a remark as if to deride his elder brother’s fretting. Korechika somehow felt relieved to hear his younger brother speak so confidently.

Empress Consort Teishi had come to love the emperor with a deep love held mutually and equally. It was a love distinct from the natural maternal affection she had for the young prince and princess. In a roundabout manner, the emperor evaded Michinaga’s zealous efforts to focus his affections on the new empress and remained passionately attached to Teishi. The empress consort basked in the warmth of his devotion. For her, it was a far more secure feeling than she had experienced during their early years together, when they were innocently amusing themselves with music and games in what seemed like a never-ending, hal-cyon spring day. It was after falling into adverse circumstances that she was truly able to appreciate the gravity and intensity of the emperor’s love. Though in actual life she had been reduced
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to circumstances unworthy of her status, her heart was yet nourished by these newly realized feelings, and she was unable to think of herself as having been abandoned.

In
The Pillow Book,
Sei Shònagon never seems to portray her noble mistress in a state of dejection; rather, the Empress Consort Teishi depicted there is a woman always surrounded by a bright aura. To dismiss Sei Shònagon’s description as mere idealization, however, would also be a biased view. Even after she had fallen into unfavorable circumstances, the empress consort’s beauty and nobility of character increased in radiance.

According to
A Tale of False Fortunes,
a refined atmosphere permeated her quarters in spite of the fact that materially her life stood in pathetic contrast to what she had formerly enjoyed in the court.

One time when Takaie visited Narimasa’s residence, Teishi was sitting at a desk within the curtained dais writing something.

When she suddenly looked up, he could guess from the gleam in her eyes and the maidenly rosiness of her cheeks that she must be writing a reply to one of the emperor’s letters.

“Am I bothering you?”

She shook her head and had Kureha bring a cushion. Then she emerged from within the curtains and took her seat in the main hall.

Takaie watched Kureha withdraw to do as she had been bidden. “That lady-in-waiting has been with you for a long time, hasn’t she? If I’m not mistaken, I believe she was in your service even before I went to Tajima.”

Teishi nodded. “That’s right. I suppose it has been six or seven years now. Even in the fire at the Nijò mansion when you two were away, she risked her very life to protect me. We were about to be burned alive.”

The dreadful scene of the Nijò mansion engulfed in flames appeared vividly before her eyes, like a painting of hell. She had been at the time only half-conscious, but she was vaguely aware that someone tried somehow to lure her into the flames, and that someone else headed the villain off and saved her by tak-Chapter Five c
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ing her outside. She was informed later that the one who had saved her was Secretary of the Imperial Police Yukikuni, but apparently the sole witness to the life-and-death struggle was Kureha, who had never said a word about the incident. Moreover, Teishi never asked.

When she thought about it, Teishi realized how very fortunate she was to have been able to give birth to a healthy princess after experiencing such danger during pregnancy. And again, it seemed that it was after she had passed through those dangerous flames that something heavy—something she did not quite understand herself—sank into her soul, making it resistant to all caprices that would move it.

After Kureha had gone from sight, Takaie continued to stare in that direction and said, “So, then, she’s loyal to you I suppose, that lady-in-waiting. . . .What is her background? Somehow I don’t like the look in her eyes.”

“Ho, ho.” The empress consort laughed merrily behind her fan. “I’m no match for you. His majesty also says that Kureha’s eyes are like those of an
Asura
child. But as for myself, I would rather have someone whose eyes show character than a woman whose eyes conceal their expression behind narrow slits. . . .” Takaie said, as if to himself, “They have a sinister light about them . . . those eyes. . . . It seems that someone like you ought to have noticed that.”

The empress consort smiled lightly and said, “Sinister, you say? When a woman is in love, she becomes very suspicious, you know.”

“She has a lover? . . .Who is it?”

“I don’t know for certain, but I hear that it is Yukikuni, of the imperial police.”

“He’s the officer who saved you from the fire, isn’t he?”

“That’s right. Some of the servants have said that she is feeling dejected because he won’t take her as his wife, even though they’ve been lovers for rather a long time.”

“Hmmm.” Takaie folded his arms as if lost in thought.

“Why are you concerned about a fledgling lady-in-waiting like her? It’s unbecoming for you to . . .”

“No, I don’t really have any ground for thinking so, but
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. . . if she’s so in love with this Yukikuni, wouldn’t it be better to have them marry and let her leave your service? You’ll be returning to the palace again soon anyway, and . . . I just don’t want that woman to be at your side.”

“If it seemed that she would become Yukikuni’s wife, I would be only too happy to give her leave, but . . .” Teishi seemed to be absorbed in thought for a moment, and then added, “Just what are you thinking that my return to court will be like, anyway? The lady of the Fujitsubo Pavilion will be away, and his majesty is anxious to have me return during her absence, but I’m sure that a lot of troublesome things would come up again. . . .”

“Was there something to that effect in his majesty’s letters? I have heard a few things from other sources. . . .”

“What kind of things have you heard?” The empress consort asked as she leaned one elbow against an armrest.

“I heard that his majesty has told the regent he wishes to abdicate soon. They say the regent dissuaded him, saying such a thing was preposterous, and that the empress dowager then proposed you come to the palace.”

“Actually, it was in response to that very thing that I was just now writing a letter. I told his majesty that he must not do anything childish and make trouble for the lord regent.” Takaie laughed with delight. “Well, now, you’ve become rather good at tormenting the emperor, too. You’re quite grown up now, aren’t you? As for strategies now to keep the regent in check, even I think the best thing is for his majesty to say that he wishes to abdicate. After the regent has gone to the trouble of presenting the lady of the Fujitsubo Pavilion at court and even making her empress, a thirteen-year-old consort of course won’t be able to produce a prince for a while yet. The crown prince is older than his cousin, the emperor, and already has princes by the lady of the Sen’yòden Palace. If his majesty were to abdicate now, our uncle would not be able to assert his authority as a maternal relative, and if he is not able to keep his majesty on the throne for at least ten more years, everything he has so carefully arranged will come to nothing.”