Shogun (47 page)

“Eminence, the Captain-General won’t like sailing eariy and won’t like—”

“It will be your responsibility to get Toranaga’s immediate sailing clearance for Ferriera. Go and see him at once with my reply. Let him be impressed with our efficiency, isn’t that one of the things he admires? With immediate clearances, Ferriera will concede the minor point of arriving early in the season, and as to the broker, what’s the difference to the Captain-General between one native or another? He will still get his percentage.”

“But Lords Onoshi and Kiyama and Harima usually split the brokerage of the cargo between them. I don’t know if they’d agree.”

“Then solve the problem. Toranaga will agree to the delay for a concession. The only concessions he needs are power, influence, and money. What can we give him? We cannot deliver the Christian
daimyos
to him. We—”

“Yet,” Alvito said.

“Even if we could, I don’t know yet if we should or if we will. Onoshi and Kiyama are bitter enemies, but they’ve joined against Toranaga because they’re sure he’d obliterate the Church—and them—if he ever got control of the Council.”

“Toranaga will support the Church. Ishido’s our real enemy.”

“I don’t share your confidence, Martin. We mustn’t forget that because Onoshi and Kiyama are Christians, all their followers are Christians in their tens of thousands. We cannot offend them. The only concession we can give to Toranaga is something to do with trade. He’s fanatic about trade but has never managed to participate personally. So the concession I suggest might tempt him to grant a delay which perhaps we can extend into a permanent one. You know how the Japanese like this form of solution—the big stick poised, which both sides pretend does not exist, eh?”

“In my opinion it’s politically unwise for Lord Onoshi and Lord Kiyama to turn against Toranaga at this time. They should follow the old proverb about keeping a line of retreat open, no? I could suggest to them that an offer to Toranaga of twenty-five percent—so each has an equal share, Onoshi, Kiyama, Harima, and Toranaga—would be a small consideration to soften the impact of their ‘temporary’ siding with Ishido against him.”

“Then Ishido will distrust them and hate us even more when he finds out.”

“Ishido hates us immeasurably now. Ishido doesn’t trust them any more than they trust him and we don’t know yet why they’ve taken his side. With Onoshi and Kiyama’s agreement, we would formally put the proposal as though it was merely
our
idea to maintain impartiality between Ishido and Toranaga. Privately we can inform Toranaga of their generosity.”

Dell’Aqua considered the virtues and defects of the plan. “Excellent,” he said at length. “Put it into effect. Now, about the heretic. Give his rutters to Toranaga today. Go back to Toranaga at once. Tell him that the rutters were sent to us secretly.”

“How do I explain the delay in giving them to him?”

“You don’t. Just tell the truth: they were brought by Rodrigues
but that neither of us realized the sealed package contained the missing rutters. Indeed, we did not open them for two days. They were in truth forgotten in the excitement about the heretic. The rutters prove Blackthorne to be pirate, thief, and traitor. His own words will dispose of him once and for all, which is surely divine justice. Tell Toranaga the truth—that Mura gave them to Father Sebastio, as indeed happened, who sent them to us knowing we would know what to do with them. That clears Mura, Father Sebastio, everyone. We should tell Mura by carrier pigeon what has been done. I’m sure Toranaga will realize that we have had his interests at heart over Yabu’s. Does he know that Yabu’s made an arrangement with Ishido?”

“I would say certainly, Eminence. But rumor has it that Toranaga and Yabu are friends now.”

“I wouldn’t trust that Satan’s whelp.”

“I’m sure Toranaga doesn’t. Any more than Yabu has really made any commitment to him.”

Suddenly they were distracted by an altercation outside. The door opened and a cowled monk came barefooted into the room, shaking off Father Soldi. “The blessings of Jesus Christ upon you,” he said, his voice rasping with hostility. “May He forgive you your sins.”

“Friar Perez—what are you doing here?” dell’Aqua burst out.

“I’ve come back to this cesspit of a land to proclaim the word of God to the heathen again.”

“But you’re under Edict never to return on pain of immediate death for inciting to riot. You escaped the Nagasaki martyrdom by a miracle and you were ordered—”

“That was God’s will, and a filthy heathen Edict of a dead maniac has nothing to do with me,” the monk said. He was a short, lean Spaniard with a long unkempt beard. “I’m here to continue God’s work.” He glanced at Father Alvito. “How’s trade, Father?”

“Fortunately for Spain, very good,” Alvito replied icily.

“I don’t spend time in the counting house, Father. I spend it with my flock.”

“That’s commendable,” dell’Aqua said sharply. “But spend it where the Pope ordered—outside of Japan. This is
our
exclusive province. And it’s also Portuguese territory, not Spanish. Do I have to remind you that three Popes have ordered all denominations out of Japan except us? King Philip also ordered the same.”

“Save your breath, Eminence. The work of God surpasses earthly
orders. I’m back and I’ll throw open the doors of the churches and beseech the multitudes to rise up against the ungodly.”

“How many times must you be warned? You can’t treat Japan like an Inca protectorate peopled with jungle savages who have neither history nor culture. I forbid you to preach and insist you obey Holy orders.”

“We will convert the heathen. Listen, Eminence, there’s another hundred of my brothers in Manila waiting for ships here, good Spaniards all, and lots of our glorious conquistadores to protect us if need be. We’ll preach openly and we’ll wear our robes openly, not skulk about in idolatrous silken shirts like Jesuits!”

“You must not agitate the authorities or you’ll reduce Mother Church to ashes!”

“I tell you to your face we’re coming back to Japan and we’ll stay in Japan. We’ll preach the Word in spite of you—in spite of any prelate, bishop, king, or even any pope, for the glory of God!” The monk slammed the door behind him.

Flushed with rage, dell’Aqua poured a glass of Madeira. A little of the wine slopped onto the polished surface of his desk. “Those Spaniards will destroy us all.” Dell’Aqua drank slowly, trying to calm himself. At length he said, “Martin, send some of our people to watch him. And you’d better warn Kiyama and Onoshi at once. There’s no telling what’ll happen if that fool flaunts himself in public.”

“Yes, Eminence.” At the door Alvito hesitated. “First Blackthorne and now Perez. It’s almost too much of a coincidence. Perhaps the Spaniards in Manila knew about Blackthorne and let him come here just to bedevil us.”

“Perhaps, but probably not.” Dell’Aqua finished his glass and set it down carefully. “In any event, with the help of God and due diligence, neither of them will be permitted to harm the Holy Mother Church—whatever the cost.”

“I’ll be a God-cursed Spaniard if this isn’t the life!”

Blackthorne lay seraphically on his stomach on thick futons, wrapped partially in a cotton kimono, his head propped on his arms. The girl was running her hands over his back, probing his muscles occasionally,
soothing his skin and his spirit, making him almost want to purr with pleasure. Another girl was pouring saké into a tiny porcelain cup. A third waited in reserve, holding a lacquer tray with a heaping bamboo basket of deep-fried fish in Portuguese style, another flask of saké and some chopsticks.

“
Nan desu ka
, Anjin-san?” What is it, Honorable Pilot—what did you say?

“I can’t say that in
Nihon-go
, Rako-san.” He smiled at the girl who offered the saké. Instead he pointed at the cup. “What’s this called?
Namae ka?”

“
Sabazuki
.” She said it three times and he repeated it and then the other girl, Asa, offered the fish and he shook his head. “
Iyé, domo
.” He did not know how to say “I’m full now” so he tried instead “not hungry now.”

“
Ah! Ima hara hette wa oranu,”
Asa explained, correcting him. He said the phrase several times and they all laughed at his pronunciation, but eventually he made it sound right.

I’ll never learn this language, he thought. There’s nothing to relate the sounds to in English, or even Latin or Portuguese.

“Anjin-san?” Asa offered the tray again.

He shook his head and put his hand on his stomach gravely. But he accepted the saké and drank it down. Sono, the girl who was massaging his back, had stopped, so he took her hand and put it on his neck and pretended to groan with pleasure. She understood at once and continued to massage him.

Each time he finished the little cup it was immediately refilled. Better go easy, he thought, this is the third flask and I can feel the warmth into my toes.

The three girls, Asa, Sono, and Rako, had arrived with the dawn, bringing cha, which Friar Domingo had told him the Chinese sometimes called
t’ee
, and which was the national drink of China and Japan. His sleep had been fitful after the encounter with the assassin but the hot piquant drink had begun to restore him. They had brought small rolled hot towels, slightly scented. When he did not know what they were used for, Rako, the chief of the girls, showed him how to use them on his face and hands.

Then they had escorted him with his four samurai guards to the steaming baths at the far side of this section of the castle and handed him over to the bath attendants. The four guards sweated stoically
while he was bathed, his beard trimmed, his hair shampooed and massaged.

Afterwards, he felt miraculously renewed. They gave him another fresh, knee-length cotton kimono and more fresh tabi and the girls were waiting for him again. They led him to another room where Kiri and Mariko were. Mariko said that Lord Toranaga had decided to send the Anjin-san to one of his provinces in the next few days to recuperate and that Lord Toranaga was very pleased with him and there was no need for him to worry about anything for he was in Lord Toranaga’s personal care now. Would Anjin-san please also begin to prepare the maps with material that she would provide. There would be other meetings with the Master soon, and the Master had promised that she would be made available soon to answer any questions the Anjin-san might have. Lord Toranaga was very anxious that Blackthorne should learn about the Japanese as he himself was anxious to learn about the outside world, and about navigation and ways of the sea. Then Blackthorne had been led to the doctor. Unlike samurai, doctors wore their hair close-cropped without a queue.

Blackthorne hated doctors and feared them. But this doctor was different. This doctor was gentle and unbelievably clean. European doctors were barbers mostly and uncouth, and as louse-ridden and filthy as everyone else. This doctor touched carefully and peered politely and held Blackthorne’s wrist to feel his pulse, looked into his eyes and mouth and ears, and softly tapped his back and his knees and the soles of his feet, his touch and manner soothing. All a European doctor wanted was to look at your tongue and say “Where is the pain?” and bleed you to release the foulnesses from your blood and give you a violent emetic to clean away the foulnesses from your entrails.

Blackthorne hated being bled and purged and every time was worse than before. But this doctor had no scalpels or bleeding bowl nor the foul chemic smell that normally surrounded them, so his heart had begun to slow and he relaxed a little.

The doctor’s fingers touched the scars on his thigh interrogatively. Blackthorne made the sound of a gun because a musket ball had passed through his flesh there many years ago. The doctor said “
Ah so desu”
and nodded. More probes, deep but not painful, over his loins and stomach. At length, the doctor spoke to Rako, and she nodded and bowed and thanked him.

“
Ichi ban?”
Blackthorne had asked, wanting to know if he was all right.

“
Hai
, Anjin-san.”

“
Honto ka?”

“
Honto
.”

What a useful word,
honto
—‘Is it the truth?’ ‘Yes, the truth,’ Blackthorne thought. “
Domo
, Doctor-san.”

“
Do itashimashité,”
the doctor said, bowing. You’re welcome—think nothing of it.

Blackthorne bowed back. The girls had led him away and it was not until he was lying on the futons, his cotton kimono loosed, the girl Sono gentling his back, that he remembered he had been naked at the doctor’s, in front of the girls and the samurai, and that he had not noticed or felt shame.

“
Nan desu ka
, Anjin-san?” Rako asked. What is it, Honorable Pilot? Why do you laugh? Her white teeth sparkled and her eyebrows were plucked and painted in a crescent. She wore her dark hair piled high and a pink flowered kimono with a gray-green obi.

“Because I’m happy, Rako-san. But how to tell you? How do I tell you I laughed because I’m happy and the weight’s off my head for the first time since I left home. Because my back feels marvelous—all of me feels marvelous. Because I’ve Toranaga-sama’s ear and I’ve put three fat broadsides into the God-cursed Jesuits and another six into the poxy Portuguese!” Then he jumped up, tied his kimono tight, and began dancing a careless hornpipe, singing a sea shanty to keep time.

Rako and the others were agog. The shoji had slid open instantly and now the samurai guards were equally popeyed. Blackthorne danced and sang mightily until he could contain himself no longer, then he burst out laughing and collapsed. The girls clapped and Rako tried to imitate him, failing miserably, her trailing kimono inhibiting her. The others got up and persuaded him to show them how to do it, and he tried, the three girls standing in a line watching his feet, holding up their kimonos. But they could not, and soon they were all chattering and giggling and fanning themselves.

Abruptly the guards were solemn and bowing low. Toranaga stood in the doorway flanked by Mariko and Kiri and his ever present samurai guards. The girls all knelt, put their hands flat on the floor and bowed, but the laughter did not leave their faces, nor was there
any fear in them. Blackthorne bowed politely also, not as low as the women.