The Iris Fan

by Laura Joh Rowland

  Manabe was worried to see Ienobu so passive now. His long history with Ienobu allowed him to speak bluntly. “Yanagisawa and Yoshisato are set to take over the regime. Why are you just standing there with one foot in the grave?”

  “This is just a temporary setback. They won’t win.”

  “Yoshisato is the heir and Acting Shogun. He’ll be the real shogun, and probably soon.”

  “He won’t,” Ienobu declared. “I am destined to be the next shogun.”

  Manabe remembered an eight-year-old Ienobu crawling out of a mud puddle where a gang of samurai had pushed him. Manabe had drawn his sword and been ready to do battle, but Ienobu had stopped him, saying, It doesn’t matter. I’ll be shogun someday. He’d always had a peculiar way of making the most outlandish things sound perfectly reasonable. From then on Manabe felt a commitment to Ienobu that went beyond a samurai’s usual duty to his master. Manabe was no longer just a caretaker of a deformed, unwanted child; he was the guardian of a future shogun. And soon there came a sign that it was true. Lord Tsunashige’s noble wife died; there was no more reason to keep secret the existence of his deformed only child; and Ienobu was recognized as Lord Tsunashige’s legitimate son and a true member of the Tokugawa ruling clan. He was eligible for the succession.

  Thirty-nine years later, he still had that peculiar quality. But now, for the first time, Manabe wondered if Ienobu’s longtime sense of destiny was self-delusion.

  “We kidnapped and imprisoned Yoshisato.” Manabe had denied it to Sano, but it was true. “Yoshisato knows. He has the shogun half convinced. You saw.”

  “Are you afraid?” Ienobu sounded disappointed by Manabe’s lack of faith in him.

  “Yes.” Manabe wasn’t afraid for himself; his fear was all for Ienobu. If the shogun came to believe that Ienobu had kidnapped and imprisoned Yoshisato and faked his death, it would be the beginning of the end of Ienobu. Manabe would gladly die alongside Ienobu if it came to that, but he desperately hoped it wouldn’t. “Yoshisato isn’t the only problem. Yanagisawa has the shogun half convinced that you tried to have him assassinated.”

  Manabe gave the words an inflection that asked, Did you? He’d been Ienobu’s confidant for a lifetime, but he didn’t know whether Ienobu had engineered the attack on the shogun. He was Ienobu’s right hand, but Ienobu had many hands. Ienobu wasn’t the outcast, helpless child anymore. He’d used his wits, his position in the Tokugawa clan, and his peculiar quality to gain friends and control them. Two of those friends were Madam Chizuru and Lady Nobuko, both suspects in the stabbing.

  “What do you think?” Ienobu challenged. “Are you half convinced that I’m guilty?”

  More than half, Manabe thought. He was afraid to know for sure. He would willingly carry most burdens Ienobu placed on him, but he didn’t want the attempted murder of the shogun on his conscience. That was too extreme a violation of Bushido. “It doesn’t matter what I think. It matters what the shogun believes. You should do something to counteract Yanagisawa and Yoshisato.”

  Screams interrupted the conversation. Ienobu’s two-year-old son toddled into the room, stamping his little feet as he cried. Ienobu’s wife hurried after the child and picked him up.

  “Can’t he ever be quiet?” Ienobu demanded.

  “He’s just a baby,” his wife said apologetically.

  Ienobu jabbed his crooked finger in the child’s face. “You’d better learn to discipline yourself.” The child shrank from him and cried harder. “You’re going to be shogun after me.”

  His wife carried the screaming child out of the room. Ienobu smiled and said, “I have a bet with myself that Yanagisawa and Yoshisato will be taken care of for me.” He tilted his gaze toward the ceiling. “The gods want me to be shogun.”

  Manabe experienced a familiar discomfort in his gut. “Not that again.”

  “Don’t act like it’s nonsense. What else can explain the money that regularly appears on my doorstep?”

  “The gods leave you gold coins in dirty sacks?”

  “You couldn’t prove otherwise.”

  Manabe had kept watch outside the house for many nights. On some mornings he’d found a sack of gold beside him with no idea how it had gotten there. “But I still think the money was left by a human.” It wasn’t that he didn’t believe in mysterious cosmic forces; he just didn’t like the idea of them meddling with Ienobu. Cosmic forces were dangerous.

  “What about the other things that have happened?” Ienobu demanded.

  The thought of those other things worsened the discomfort in Manabe’s gut. They were much more serious than gold magically appearing. “Coincidences.”

  “They’re too good to be coincidences. They’re signs that the gods are on my side and my plans will be successful.”

  Manabe’s gut churned. Acid burned up to his heart. He was as leery of those plans as he was of cosmic forces, but there was no winning this argument with Ienobu. He tried a different tactic. “You wouldn’t want the gods to think you’ve grown lazy and dependent on them. They may decide to fulfill someone else’s destiny instead. Do something about Yanagisawa and Yoshisato. And Sano. He’s probably halfway toward proving you tried to assassinate the shogun.” Manabe stated his firm belief: “The cosmic forces help those who help themselves.”

  Ienobu said with a sly smile, “Would you like to make a bet with me?”

  “What kind of bet?” Manabe didn’t like gambling.

  “By tomorrow the tide will turn in my favor without my having to do anything.”

  Manabe could only nod. He realized that he’d made the riskiest bet of all forty-seven years ago, when he’d cast his lot with Ienobu.

  20

  AT THE PALACE, the search for evidence and witnesses in the Large Interior continued. Masahiro ransacked chambers while Sano and Detective Marume questioned the women. So far none had seen or heard, or admitted to seeing or hearing, anything unusual during or immediately before or after the attack on the shogun. Sano had just finished another fruitless interview when a squadron of soldiers marched into the Large Interior.

  “Chamberlain Yanagisawa sent us to help you with your investigation,” said the leader, a stiff-necked lieutenant named Haneda.

  Sano saw that Yanagisawa’s help was a mixed blessing. “Come with me.” He herded the soldiers out of the Large Interior, to the wide corridor in the public part of the palace. “Now undress.”

  “What?”

  “You heard me.”

  The men reluctantly stripped while clerks, officials, and servants passing along the corridor gawked. All except one man unwound their loincloths. Sano gave him a stern look. As he peeled away the long white strip of fabric, out fell a small ceramic jar.

  Sano picked up the jar and uncorked it. Inside was fresh red blood, probably from a horse. He asked the naked soldiers, “Where were you planning to sprinkle this?” They were silent, nervous. Sano didn’t waste his anger on them; they were only following orders from Yanagisawa. After they’d dressed, he took them back to the Large Interior and told Marume and Masahiro, “These are Yanagisawa’s men. They’ll help you move things around. Keep an eye on them, and search them before they leave. I’m going to talk to Lord Ienobu’s people.”

  Leaving the Large Interior, he passed Madam Chizuru’s chamber. The old woman peeked out past the guard stationed by her door and beckoned Sano. When he entered the cramped, cluttered room, she stood with her hands clasped inside the sleeves of her gray kimono and said in a low, unsteady voice, “I want to confess.”

  It was so unexpected that Sano tilted his head and frowned.

  “Lord Ienobu told me to stab the shogun,” Madam Chizuru said.

  Sano’s heart gave a huge, thumping leap. This was the answer to his prayers—a confession that not only solved the crime but incriminated Lord Ienobu.

  It seemed too good to be true.

  His instincts sent out a warning that sliced through his elation like a knife through a sail. He looked closely at Madam Chizuru.
“Why are you confessing?”

  Head bowed, she gazed at the floor. She gulped several breaths, then spoke in a rush. “Because I’m guilty.”

  Suspicion bred in Sano. “That’s not what you said yesterday.”

  “Yesterday … I lied.”

  Sano thought she’d sounded more convincing then than she did now. “What changed your mind?”

  Madam Chizuru lifted her head. Her eyes were rimmed with red. “I—I don’t want it on my conscience any longer.” Oddly, she also seemed more afraid that he wouldn’t believe her.

  “Very well,” Sano said, still dubious. “Tell me what happened that night.”

  “I waited in my room until everybody was asleep.” Now Madam Chizuru spoke too fast, too fluently, as if her speech were rehearsed. “Then I tucked the iron fan under my sash.” She pantomimed. “Then I—”

  “Wait,” Sano said. “Where was the fan?” She responded with a worried, uncomprehending frown. “I mean, where did you keep it?”

  Madam Chizuru glanced uncertainly around the room. “There.” She pointed at a shelf. “Behind those ledgers.”

  “So you took the fan from behind the ledgers. What next?”

  “I tiptoed through the palace.”

  “Did you see anyone?” Sano wanted to know whether a witness he hadn’t located yet had seen Madam Chizuru and could corroborate her story.

  “No.”

  “It must have been dark. How did you find your way?”

  Her breath made a little hitching sound. “I took a lamp with me. I forgot to say.” She hurried on. “I went in the shogun’s chamber.” Her jowls trembled, the loose flesh like empty, shaken sacks. “I—I shone the lamp on the bed. The shogun was asleep. I—I drew back the quilt. And then I took the fan and I stabbed him.” She sounded relieved to finish rather than upset because she was guilty of attempted murder.

  “How many times?” Sano asked.

  Panic glazed Madam Chizuru’s eyes. “Why, I—I don’t remember. I just did it. Then he started screaming, and I ran away.”

  Sano wondered whether the number of stab wounds was a detail missing from the news that had spread through the castle. He urgently wanted a reason to believe her confession. “Let’s back up for a moment. When did Lord Ienobu ask you to stab the shogun?”

  “A few days ago?” She spoke as if she hoped it was a good answer.

  “How did he ask you?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Did he come here to speak with you? Did you go to see him?” Those were events that might have been witnessed by someone.

  The fear in Madam Chizuru’s expression deepened. “Lord Ienobu sent me a letter?”

  “How was the letter delivered? By messenger?”

  “I—I don’t know. I found it in my room. He—he must have had someone put it there.”

  “Where is this letter?” Sano asked skeptically.

  “It said to burn it after I read it. So I did.”

  Disappointed, and more skeptical than ever, Sano asked, “Where did you get the fan?”

  “In a shop in Nihonbashi.” She sounded as if she were on firmer ground.

  Sano had seen similar fans for sale in the merchant district. She probably had, too, even if she’d never bought this one. “Which shop?”

  “I don’t remember.”

  “What is the design on the fan?”

  Her hands twisted together like a small, frightened animal under her sleeves. Sano thought she didn’t know because she’d never seen the fan and hadn’t heard about the painted irises. She blurted, “Why must you ask me all these questions?”

  “I’m trying to make sure you’re telling the truth.” And the truth was in the details.

  “I am!”

  Never had Sano met a criminal so determined to convince him of her guilt or so inept at it. “Did somebody put you up to confessing?”

  “No.” Madam Chizuru met Sano’s gaze for a moment before averting her eyes. “It was my own idea.”

  Sano leaned out the door to ask the guard if anybody had visited Madam Chizuru since yesterday. He saw the crowd of people eavesdropping in the passage—Masahiro, Detective Marume, and Yanagisawa’s troops.

  “I’m not answering any more questions!” Madam Chizuru cried. “I stabbed the shogun. I confessed. That should be enough.”

  “It’s enough for me,” Lieutenant Haneda told Sano. “Arrest her. Tell the shogun.”

  “Not until I’ve checked out her story,” Sano said. “It’s as full of holes as your head.”

  Glowering at the insult, Haneda advanced. “If you won’t, I will.”

  Madam Chizuru moaned and covered her mouth with her hands. She seemed to realize for the first time what trouble she was in. Sano blocked the door and said, “You’re not in charge of the investigation. Get out.”

  “Sano-san, listen.” Marume inserted himself between Sano and Haneda. “She confessed. The shogun deserves to be told.”

  “This is our chance to get Lord Ienobu!” Masahiro called over Marume’s shoulder.

  Now Sano found himself set against his son and his retainer. “I won’t let her or Lord Ienobu be condemned until I’m sure they’re guilty.” According to his code of honor, even Ienobu, damn him, deserved fair play.

  “It’s not up to you,” Haneda said.

  Yanagisawa’s other men invaded the room and dragged Madam Chizuru out. She began howling. Her legs collapsed. The troops carried her down the corridor. Women emerged from their chambers, gasping and murmuring as they watched.

  “Lock her in the tower,” Haneda told the troops. “Tell Yanagisawa-san what happened. I’m going to the shogun.” He said to Sano, “You and your people can come if you like.”

  * * *

  THE PHYSICIAN MET Sano, Marume, Masahiro, and Lieutenant Haneda at the door of the shogun’s bedchamber. “His Excellency is asleep. He shouldn’t be disturbed.”

  “He’ll want to wake up for this.” It was Yanagisawa, arriving with Yoshisato, both short of breath from running and jubilation.

  “Did you force Madam Chizuru to confess?” Sano asked. When he saw Yoshisato, he did a double take. Yoshisato was groomed as a samurai—shaved crown, oiled topknot, and silk robes. Except for the tattoos, it was as if he’d never left the court.

  “You give me too much credit,” Yanagisawa said. “Not even I could make that tough old bag put her neck on the chopping block.”

  He swept past the physician into the chamber where two bodyguards sat by the shogun’s bed. Yoshisato followed; he seemed occupied with his own thoughts. Sano eyed him curiously as he entered with Marume and Masahiro.

  Yanagisawa knelt beside the shogun. “Your Excellency?”

  The shogun opened sunken, crusted eyes in a gray face. He’d declined since morning. A different smell tainted the air—the smell of decay.

  “Good news,” Yanagisawa said. “The person who stabbed you has been arrested.”

  Interest animated the shogun’s groggy expression. “Who is it?” His voice was a croak.

  “It’s Madam Chizuru, the otoshiyori. She confessed.”

  Sano stepped forward. “It’s not certain she’s guilty. Her confession—”

  The shogun spoke over him. “Why did she do it?”

  “Excuse me, Your Excellency,” Sano said, “but her confession is extremely dubious.”

  “Because Lord Ienobu told her to,” Yanagisawa said. “He wanted you dead so that he could be shogun. He sent Madam Chizuru to assassinate you.”

  “Merciful gods, it’s true.” The shogun’s face turned grayer. “My nephew is responsible.”

  “She couldn’t tell me how many times you were stabbed,” Sano said. “She couldn’t describe the fan.”

  Detective Marume whispered, “Sano-san, for the love of all of us, be quiet.” Masahiro whispered, “Father, please.” Yoshisato observed the spectacle with dawning distrust.

  Sano was well aware that he was arguing against his own interests, but his hunger for just
ice had become so entrenched. He was too stubborn to change, or too old. “I think it’s because she doesn’t know. She may be innocent, and so may Lord Ienobu.”

  “Yesterday you were ready enough to believe that Ienobu was responsible for the attack.” Yanagisawa gave Sano a look that reminded him of their pact, threatening him with mayhem if he didn’t cooperate.

  The opium spread blankness across the shogun’s expression. Yanagisawa hurried to press his case. “It’s for Your Excellency to decide. Madam Chizuru confessed. Either she’s guilty and she’ll be punished, or she’s not and you may never get revenge on the person who stabbed you.”

  “Those aren’t the only outcomes,” Sano said, sick and tired of Yanagisawa’s fast talk. “If Your Excellency accepts her confession without letting me verify it, you could be condemning innocent people while letting the real assassin go free.”

  The shogun’s gaze moved back and forth between Sano and Yanagisawa, his eyes skittering like pebbles in their hollow sockets. “Nobody in her right mind would confess if she were innocent. She must be guilty.” He moaned at a spasm of pain.

  He was impatient to know his attacker’s identity; delay was a luxury that a man gravely injured couldn’t afford. It was Sano’s duty now, more than ever, to give the shogun what he wanted. Vengeance might be the shogun’s last wish—a solemn demand that Sano couldn’t refuse to fulfill. It came down to a choice between his lord versus Madam Chizuru and Lord Ienobu.

  That was no choice.

  But although Sano still disbelieved the confession, he must give it the benefit of the doubt. “Let’s hear what Lord Ienobu has to say for himself.”

  “Find him. Bring him here,” Yanagisawa told Lieutenant Haneda. “Don’t tell him why.”

  Soon Haneda and his troops brought in Lord Ienobu, accompanied by Manabe. Excitement flushed Ienobu’s usually sallow complexion. His lips stretched over his big teeth in a grin. “You sent for me just in time, Uncle.” He obviously thought the shogun meant to take him back into his favor. “I was ready to vacate the heir’s residence. Now I won’t have to—”