by Spence, Alan
‘More.’
She came back with the jug, full to the brim. This time he took it from her, waved away the cup, drank straight from the jug, slopping water over himself, drained it, gave back the empty, said, ‘Fine. Enough. Arigato.’
She smiled, glided out, little stockinged feet sliding on the wooden floor. He lay back in the chair, wishing he could disappear, be nothing.
He woke with a jolt, and the girl was indicating he should come to the bathroom. The tub was full; he peeled off his stinking clothes, sank into the water that was almost too hot to bear, felt the heat of it ease his bones, the steam make him lightheaded.
After it, he dried off, threw a yukata round him. The girl had turned his mattress, replaced the stained bedding with clean sheets, a fresh pillow. He fell into it, slept again, woke once more unsure of who he was, and where.
A change of clothes had been laid out for him, the filthy clothes he’d been wearing spirited away. Dressing, he still felt fragile. The girl was in the kitchen, cooking something, a broth flavoured with ginger. The smell made him gag again, retch. She took the pot from the stove, covered it with a lid, bowed and backed out.
‘Thank you,’ he said, struggling to remember her name. ‘Tsuru-san?’
‘Hai,’ she said, ‘so desu.’
‘Fine. You go now.’
She looked confused.
‘Sagare,’ he said, remembering the word.
She understood, went immediately, closing the door quietly, leaving him to himself.
*
He needed a drink, went to the Foreigners’ Club, sat in the furthest darkest corner, away from the bar.
Mackenzie sought him out, asked how he was faring.
‘Oh, fine and dandy,’ he said. ‘I watched our navy flatten a whole town, kill women and children and innocent old folk, kill my wife, for God’s sake! And for what? To avenge the life of one stupid Englishman! It’s madness on a grand scale!’
Mackenzie looked morose, stared into his drink. ‘I know, Tom. I know. It’s gunboat diplomacy at its worst.’
‘And I just had a letter from that idiot Satow, talking as if the whole thing was a prank, a jape, as if it only hit home when that arsehole of a captain was blown to bits by cannon-fire. Then he has the fucking gall to say, Oh well, toodlepip, old boy, let’s put it all behind us, get back to trading as usual!’
‘Aye, well.’
‘I mean, Jesus Christ, Ken, what the hell are we doing here?’
‘Just making a living, Tom. That’s all.’
‘We don’t belong here. We should get the hell out!’
Mackenzie stared into his glass, swirled his drink. ‘It’ll come good, Tom, in time.’
‘But at what cost? How many more towns do we flatten? How many folk do we kill? Just so their leaders get the fucking point?’
He was shouting, caused conversations at the bar to stop, heads turn in his direction.
He stood up to go. ‘Now, if you’ll excuse me …’
Walsh had just arrived, made to speak to him. ‘Tom …’
Glover was venomous, spat the words at him. ‘And what the hell do you want? Got another idea for a fast buck? Faster the better. One law. Supply and demand. One criterion. Can they pay?’ He pushed Walsh aside, shoved past him, headed out into the night.
Back home, at Ipponmatsu, he drank again, slumped into numbness and stupor, another uneasy sleep.
The next day passed in another dwalm, a vague haze. At the end of the afternoon he went to his warehouse, didn’t look through the paperwork accumulating on his desk; made a desultory pass by the docks, didn’t oversee the unloading of a cargo. Then something caught his eye, a workman supervising the operation. He couldn’t place it, but there was something awkward, furtive, in the way the man looked about him. He clearly hadn’t seen Glover, who was half hidden from view behind a stack of crates. The workman quickly, surreptitiously, bundled a box onto a handcart wheeled by another workman, who covered it with a cloth, wheeled it away.
Glover saw what was happening; his business was bedevilled by this kind of pilfering. It was on the increase, was eating into his profits. The anger rose in him, and he roared at the two men.
‘You thieving bastards!’
He picked up a length of bamboo, rushed at the men and laid into them, beat them. The barrowboy managed to break clear, jumped into the harbour to escape. The other stumbled and fell and Glover continued to batter him with the stick, lashed down on him with all the pent-up unreasoning rage that had suddenly welled up.
Then as he raised the stick once more, a hand was catching it, holding him back, restraining him. He wrested back the stick, saw that it was Matsuo who had blocked him.
‘So you’re part of it too?’
‘You kill him, not good,’ said Matsuo. ‘I stop you.’ And he bowed.
Glover glared at him, enraged, but knowing he was right.
‘Ach!’ he said. ‘Bugger off! Leave me alone!’
Matsuo stepped back but didn’t move away.
‘Go!’ shouted Glover. ‘Ike!’
He threw down the stick, turned away.
The thief had dragged himself to his feet. Matsuo yelled at him, then followed Glover, keeping his distance.
*
He couldn’t face going home, didn’t want to talk to Walsh or Mackenzie at the club, couldn’t go back to the teahouse after the damage he’d caused. He sat at his desk, aware of the evening darkening. With one movement of his arm he swept the pile of papers onto the floor, sat staring at the little collection of objects he’d gathered, kept for good luck: the paper butterfly, bamboo token, silver coin. A sake cup sat, inverted; he lifted it, looked at the gold coin underneath.
A sudden noise at the door made him turn. A figure stepped out of the shadows, moved into the room. He braced himself, ready for trouble, but it was Ito. The apprehension turned to irritation.
‘What do you want?’
‘This no good,’ said Ito. It was a challenge. This was Glover’s mood, his demeanour.
‘Oh, really?’ said Glover, aggressive.
‘You must get over this,’ said Ito.
This.
‘Is that right?’
‘Existence is suffering,’ said Ito. ‘Have to continue. Important thing is what you do next.’
Glover snorted. ‘What I do next is get out of this damn country. I’ve had a bellyful of it.’
Now it was Ito’s turn to be angry. ‘You have belly full all right! You get fat on our country then you go. You just like all the rest.’
‘Now wait a minute!’ Glover was scraping back his chair, standing up.
Ito was in full flow. ‘You sell your opium, you sell your guns, you take our gold. You don’t care who suffer, as long as you make money!’
Glover shouted at him, outraged. ‘Enough!’
‘I thought you were a man. I thought you were a warrior, like samurai. But you are a coward.’
This was too much to take, an insult too far. He swung a punch, caught Ito on the side of the head, sent him staggering. But Ito was tough, steadied himself, hit back with a blow to the stomach, knocked the wind out of him. They squared up to each other, slugged it out, punch for punch. Glover was tiring, grabbed at Ito and held him in a bearhug. Ito managed to break the grip, shove him clear, connect with a perfect left to the jaw that felled him, knocked him to the floor.
Glover sat up, dazed, tasted blood. Ito helped him to his feet, bowed.
‘Jesus!’ said Glover, holding his jaw. ‘If I’ve taught you nothing else, I’ve taught you how to throw a left hook!’
Ito’s expression remained serious. ‘You owe this country something.’
Glover spat blood. ‘Aye.’
9
BURNING BRIGHT
Nagasaki, 1864
Kagoshima had changed Glover for good. Or for ill. Only time would tell which. He felt something of Ito’s firm resolution, that readiness for death at the heart of the samurai code. In Kagos
hima he had seen so much death at first-hand, knew himself and everyone else already dead. He knew the imminence of his own death, not just as an idea, but in his very bones. Very well. He was already dead, so let him live.
His actions had consequences and he was answerable for them. This also he knew, irrevocably.
He aligned himself completely with Ito and the other rebels. To hell with the Shogun! To hell with the British Government! Damn them all!
He threw himself into his work with a fury, an unremitting energy, cranked everything up.
He beefed up his regular trade, in tea, silk, opium, Walsh’s ‘blessed trinity’. He bought and sold property, mortgaged from Jardine’s. He dealt in anything that would turn a quick profit, exported vegetable wax and camphor oil, imported cotton goods and woollens from home. He heard of a quantity of sapanwood some merchant had bought in Malaya and been unable to sell. The knock-down price was a dollar a picul; he bought 8,000 piculs, had it shipped in, sold it in Yokohama for 35 dollars a picul. He invested the profits in shipping, bought a second-hand steamer, the SS Sarah, sold it to the Satsuma for 70,000 dollars. He argued that, in the long term, Japan had to build its own ships, in its own dry docks, mine its own coal, forge its own iron and steel. He was drunk on the dream of it.
He re-entered the floating world, spent time again in the teahouse – he had paid for repairs, made good the damage he’d done in his dark night; he’d recompensed the madame, handsomely, and was once more an honoured guest.
Tsuru came every day to Ipponmatsu; she cleaned and cooked for him, flirted a little with that fluttering lightness. But she didn’t move in; he wasn’t ready for that; and at the teahouse he enjoyed the favours of Maki Kaga, the young girl he’d met that same night. Her image had stayed with him, through his drunkenness and boorishness, and on his return he’d sought her out. There was something about her, a naturalness and ease, a lack of formality, a character he found engaging; she laughed easily; behind the mask of the courtesan she was alive, uninhibited, and that suited his mood. When she served him tea, turning the bowl, just so, or arranged a single spray of flowers, or played some haunting melody on the samisen, it was balm to his soul.
Ito had a favourite song he would sing when he was drunk. At first Glover couldn’t make out the words – it was sung in some rough throaty argot – and when they were in their cups, Glover’s Japanese deserted him and Ito’s English became imaginative and improvised. But eventually they’d worked out a rough translation.
Drunk I lie, my head pillowed on some beauty’s lap.
Sober and awake, I’ll grab power and lead the nation.
Lying one night in Maki’s arms, he heard Ito bawling out the song from another room. He tried to join in, mangled the words, heard Ito laugh out loud, pretend to howl like a dog. Maki laughed till the tears ran down her face, and he pulled her to him again.
*
Both Ito and Maki, in their own distinct ways, taught Glover something of Zen, through stories and poems, parables and riddles. Some of it was baffling, enigmatic, some of it outrageous, ferociously illogical. It was often funny, and much of it, to Glover, seemed grounded in a kind of enlightened common sense.
‘Aye,’ he’d say, in response to some direct, clear-eyed observation. ‘That’s very like the thing.’
Maki had learned from one of her first clients, a young monk who would escape from time to time the rigours of monastic life, make his way to the Sakura. He would tell her the stories, make her smile, whether she understood them or not. She took them as a kind of part-payment for her services, treasured them, told them now to Glover.
There was one about two monks approaching a river where a beautiful young woman was waiting to cross. One monk ignored her, obeying the injunction of his master not even to look at a woman. The other, however, carried the woman on his shoulders, waded across the river, set her down on the other side, bowed and walked on. The first monk walked alongside him, clearly upset. A mile down the road he stopped, complained bitterly to the second monk about his behaviour. The second monk looked baffled, said, ‘The woman? I left her back at the river. Why are you still carrying her?’
That made Glover laugh.
As well as the stories, Maki had memorised poems she had read and loved, mainly haiku and tanka, little meditations, heartbreaking insights into the beauty and transience of the moment.
The fallen leaf,
returning to the branch?
It was a butterfly.
‘Very like the thing,’ said Glover.
Ito’s Zen was altogether tougher, was rooted in Bushido, the way of the warrior. He would draw strength from Hagakure, the samurai code.
Meet a difficult situation with courage and joy. The more the water, the higher the boat.
At other times Ito would ask Glover unanswerable questions, riddles he couldn’t fathom. Ito would call them out between drunken songs at the Sakura.
What is the sound of one hand clapping? Does a dog have Buddha nature? What was your face before you were born?
Glover asked what were the answers. Ito said he didn’t know.
‘Have to find answers, inside,’ said Ito.
‘By thinking?’ said Glover.
‘By not thinking!’ said Ito.
‘Aye,’ said Glover. ‘Fine.’
*
During Ito’s absence, Takashi had grown more powerful, influenced the Choshu leadership to align more firmly against the West. In spite of Kagoshima, he still thought they could drive the invaders from their shores, or, perhaps even more glorious, they would die trying.
The Choshu had gun emplacements overlooking the straits of Shimonoseki, north of Nagasaki. The straits were strategically vital, a channel between the two islands of Kyushu and Honshu, leading to the Inland Sea, the main route to Osaka and beyond, to Yokohama and Edo. It was the principal passage for western ships; it was crucial that the lanes be kept open. The Choshu mounted a blockade, declared that no foreign ships would be allowed through, and began opening fire on any who made the attempt.
Ominously, a combined fleet of British, American, French and Dutch ships assembled in Yokohama harbour, a score of warships carrying two thousand troops.
As in the case of Richardson, an ultimatum was delivered to the Shogun, insisting that he take action against the Choshu or risk reprisals. The Shogun, playing on age-old enmities, ordered the Satsuma to send troops, attack the Choshu with a land-based force, diverting their attention from the Straits.
Still resistant to the Shogun and the West, the Satsuma were nevertheless circumspect about bringing another bombardment on their heads. But they could not resist the legitimate opportunity of doing harm to their rivals. They sent a contingent of infantry which docked at Nagasaki, marched north and took up position inland, cutting off the Choshu’s retreat.
Ito came thundering in to Glover’s office, raging. ‘I told you, Satsuma useless! Before, they very stupid but very brave, stand up to Shogun and fight West. Now they do what Shogun tell them, help West, attack Choshu!’
Glover said he was sorry to hear it, but it was the pot calling the kettle black.
‘Why you talk like this?’ said Ito, even angrier. ‘This English nonsense!’
‘It seems to me it’s the Choshu who are being headstrong and foolish.’
‘Takashi is a madman,’ said Ito. ‘His head too strong!’
‘It’s not so long since you agreed with him,’ said Glover.
‘Not any more.’ Ito looked offended. ‘I change.’
‘I know,’ said Glover. ‘Now your whole clan has to change.’
‘Satsuma also,’ said Ito.
‘Aye,’ said Glover. ‘Satsuma also!’
*
Parkes was attempting diplomacy again, had written, care of Glover, to The Honourable Prince Ito Hirobumi of the Choshu Clan. The letter briskly outlined the current situation, the aggressive actions of the Choshu leadership, the threat to peaceful trade. It then appeal
ed to Ito as an honoured friend of the West, one who had so recently visited Britain under the good offices of Mister Glover and with the support and goodwill of Her Majesty’s Government, one whose continued friendship would be valued, he hoped, in the years to come. It exhorted Ito to use his influence as a Prince of the Choshu Clan to dissuade the Daimyo and his advisers from their present aggressive course of action, and to persuade them to cease hostilities forthwith, or face the consequences.
Ito read the letter, looked at Glover. ‘He want me to make them stop?’
‘That’s the sum and substance of it.’
‘Sorry?’
‘Yes,’ said Glover. ‘He wants you to make them stop.’
‘I don’t think is possible,’ said Ito, quietly. ‘Daimyo listen to Takashi.’
Glover remembered his own efforts in Kagoshima, the rock-hard intransigence of the Satsuma Daimyo. For a moment he smelled gunpowder and burning, saw Sono’s face.
‘I know,’ he said. ‘It’ll be difficult.’
‘But have to try,’ said Ito.
‘Aye.’ Glover knew Ito was about to risk his life, knew also he had no choice.
*
Ito was set to leave the next day, with Matsuo and with Inoue Kaoru, another of the Choshu Five recently returned. Inoue was a serious-minded young man, less of a firebrand than Ito, but no less committed to change. He had come back from the West shaken and chastened by what he had seen. The three men were to sail to Yokohama, be given safe passage from there on a British warship, dropped off at Kasato island off Shimonoseki. There they would meet leaders of their own clan, present them with a document containing the demands of the British Government and their allies.
At the last moment, Glover decided to travel with them. On a Jardine’s clipper, they sailed at night, under cover of dark, eased through the Straits without incident. At Yokohama they were met by a British delegation, including Ernest Satow, who handed Ito a scroll.
