Dream of a Spring Night

by I. J. Parker

  Hardly one of the girls slept that night. They chatted and giggled while frowning older ladies paced the hall, reminding them that they would need their sleep for the next day’s performances.

  Toshiko discovered the reason for their excitement. Each girl hoped that she would make an impression the next day. On this one day’s public appearance in their young lives, they all hoped to have their futures decided by finding a noble husband or by becoming a lady-in-waiting for one of the imperial households. Toshiko had already gained this latter status, but her position at the retired emperor’s palace — she did not mention what it entailed — was judged to be duller than those at the imperial court or in the households of the crown prince or any of the dowager empresses or imperial princesses. The retired emperor was said to be on the point of taking the tonsure.

  Both performances passed uneventfully for Toshiko. Indeed, she barely paid attention to the festive atmosphere and the formal rows of senior nobles who watched them in both palaces. When it was all over, she climbed back into her carriage and returned, accompanied by more chatter from the maid, who was fascinated with the romantic possibilities of having forty beautiful young women exposed to the curious eyes of men who normally only saw an edge of a sleeve or a hem of a gown.

  “You have many admirers, Lady Toshiko,” she said with great satisfaction as soon as they had left the palace. “Very great gentlemen and so handsome. I have brought all their letters.” She held up a fat bundle wrapped in silk.

  “Throw them away,” snapped Toshiko.

  The maid’s eyes widened. “What? Now? Throw them out into the street?”

  Toshiko clicked her tongue in frustration. “No. Of course not.” What would Lady Sanjo do to her if she heard about this? “You should never have accepted them. Hide them and burn them later. No, better give them to me.”

  The maid smiled knowingly and passed the bundle across.

  From Lady Sanjo’s Pillow Book

  Ah, spring!

  How very appropriate are the last words I wrote into in my journal. We have been so busy. The beginning of the year is always the most exciting time. There are visitors and outings and banquets every single day. “Oh, cherry blossoms, fall and hide me in a cloud, so old age will never find me!”

  Indeed, I have been looking my best lately. What with all the rich meals I have been eating, I am getting positively fat. A round face and softly dimpled limbs are what seduce men. Instead of stuffing my cheeks with plums, I now line my gowns with soft rolls of silk floss, cunningly doubled in all those places that men like to touch and squeeze. To my utter delight, His .Majesty took notice during one of the banquets and sent me a serving of delicacies from His own table with a note that said, “Even hungry ghosts must be fed on the New Year.” It was more than I could reasonably eat, but the dear, generous man smiled so lovingly at me that I forced myself.

  The change in me has been noted by others. The chancellor himself paid me a compliment the other day. I flirted shamelessly with him before His Majesty and do believe the dearest man was quite put out. I mean His Majesty, of course. The chancellor became frightened and ran off. I suppose he thought he had been caught poaching on a heavenly reserve.

  Thus my chances have improved remarkably, while my rival has fallen into disfavor. He rarely sends for her any more. He even dispatched her to court to perform with the circle dancers. When I heard of this, I quickly sent for the court silk merchant and selected a particularly precious figured brocade from his samples. I chose the most striking pattern — brilliant red safflowers against green — and set about making a new robe for His Majesty. Sitting up all night, I used my daintiest stitches and imagined to myself his delight when I presented it to Him. As I sewed the sleeves, I thought of being held in His embrace, and when I stitched the collar, I pressed my face into the fabric in anticipation. The hem . . . oh, dear, the hem! The robe is casual, the sort He would wear in the evening in the privacy of his rooms. It ends above the knees to show off His full silk trousers. I made certain that it opened easily by trying it on when it was finished.

  And then I composed a little verse: “Ever since I first glimpsed the realm above the clouds, my love has been as fresh and bright as the safflower.”

  The great moment of my presentation came after the Oba girl had left for her dancing. She looked quite crushed when any other girl would have been delighted with a visit to the imperial palace. No doubt it was due to having lost His Majesty’s favor. As it is, I had no hand in it, though once I almost caught her out. Never mind.

  Naturally, His Majesty was surprised when I approached him. Always gracious, he accepted my gift and read the note with the kindest smile.

  “Dear Lady Sanjo,” He said, “you are a treasure to me. Whenever I am sad, I only have to think of you and I laugh right away. This is a most unusual pattern. How ever did you find it?”

  I nearly swooned, but managed, “When it is a matter of giving Your Majesty pleasure, nothing is impossible. I am yours to command, sire. You have but to send for me.”

  As it turned out, He was too busy that night and the next. I lay awake, my hair and body perfumed, and pictured to myself the moment when we would be together at last. “Eagerly I await his call, but alas, no one appears but the morning star.” When He had not sent for me by the time the Oba girl returned, my tears soaked my sleeves. The disappointment might have crushed me “like the waves that pound Nagahama beach,” but He did not send for her either.

  Besides, by then my plan to discredit her in His Majesty’s eyes was beginning to take shape after all. Her dancing for the New Year’s guests at the imperial palace had done what I had failed to do: her maid informed me that all the brash young men wanted to get a taste of the emperor’s morsel. They soon came, left letters and poems, and waited for replies. Regrettably, she rejected all the notes without glancing at them, but I kept my eye on her suitors and managed to see quite a few of their silly effusions in verse — comparing her to cherry blossoms and themselves to the breeze, talking about how they burned for her like Mount Fuji at night, and endlessly wringing out their wet sleeves.

  To my surprise, I recognized the youngest son of the regent among them. I wondered what his father would say if he knew and then realized that the young man was perfect for my plan because he would not dare mention any part of it to anyone.

  My heart became “as light as a cloud passing across a mountain peak.”

  When I took the young man aside, I played the concerned friend. Did he not realize, I asked, what a difficult position the young lady was in.

  He admitted it, looking as sorrowful as a wilted cabbage.

  Was it kind to turn her poor young head, I asked.

  He perked up at this. “Oh? Does she care a little for me?” he asked eagerly.

  Poor fool.

  “You must not continue this,” I said, looking severe. “No matter how much she may pine for you.”

  He brightened even more at that, then frowned. “But she has not answered my notes,” he said.

  “I should hope not.” I shook my finger at him. “My dear young man, you must stop this nonsense. If you were caught together, it would be the end of her.”

  “Oh, but Lady Sanjo . . .” he muttered, looking half disconsolate, half hopeful.

  I patted his arm in a motherly fashion — he is by no means unattractive — and said consolingly, “Be brave. Put her from your mind. I said the same to her only last night as she lay sleepless in the northern eave chamber.”

  He stared at me. For a moment, I thought I would have to lead him to the place and show him how to open the shutters. Then he nodded and bowed. “You are right to censure me, Lady Sanjo,” he said. “I have been very foolish. Thank you for reminding me of my duty.” And off he trod with a little bounce in his step. He is really quite attractive. I’m doing the girl a favor.

  Ah, spring!

  The Eave Chamber

  Eventually, Toshiko returned to the eave chamber. Lady Sanjo was not
likely to show her face again after her defeat over the note with the one-eyed cat, and Toshiko felt safe to take it out again. She would sit near a place where the sun slanted through a crack between the curtain and the door frame and carefully unfold the small scrap. Once it was dry, the writing had become more legible. It was very faint, but she recognized the word “come” and guessed that the rest gave directions to his house or a place where they could meet.

  Her heart began to beat faster at the thought that he had wanted her to come to him. Oh, if only she had been here when he left the note. Or if at least she had found it right away. She would have run to him then. Now everything had changed, and besides he surely no longer expected her.

  She spent much time staring at the smudged words, trying to guess their meaning. One was surely Sumei-mon, a gate in the city. Perhaps he lived near this gate, or in a quarter with that name or near a street called Sumei.

  But always she would know that it was too late and, holding back her tears, she would refold the precious scrap and tuck it inside her mother’s letter.

  *

  In the eave chamber, she felt close to him and had some privacy from prying eyes and from the constant chatter. The emperor only rarely sent for her now that He was preparing for the move to the new palace. She busied herself with writing down the last of the imayo for His collection. Soon He would no longer need her for this work, and she was afraid that He had tired already of her body. There were times when she wondered if her parents would consider Takehira’s appointment and a few gowns worth their efforts. Of course, if she were to conceive, that would change everything. Takehira had been quite right about that.

  Because of her loneliness and isolation, she wished for a child with all her heart. She would have someone of her own then, someone to care about, and who would care about her. Even if the child were taken from her to be raised elsewhere, she would watch it grow from a distance. She knew that giving birth to the emperor’s child would not elevate her to the grandiose heights imagined by her family. Everyone still treated her like the lowliest of His Majesty’s ladies, without the slightest recognition of the fact that she was also His occasional bed partner.

  *

  But her status seemed to have changed a little the day Lady Sanjo approached her with an invitation to make the eave chamber her own private domain and to sleep there in the future.

  Perhaps Lady Sanjo wanted to make amends for her rudeness, but Toshiko was pleased for different reasons. Lately, a few of the ladies had received nighttime visits from men. Toshiko suspected that Shojo-ben was one of them, because her friend was strangely distracted and had a dreamy look on her pretty face. Toshiko was happy for her, but also uncomfortable. When you shared quarters with others, separated only by flimsy screens, and spent much time lying awake in the dark, you could hear every sound, and such sounds as these were all too familiar to Toshiko now. Her closeness to the secret lives of others embarrassed her and reminded her of her own duties in the emperor’s curtained bed.

  So she welcomed the change and had her maid move her trunks and bedding and a few screens to the eave chamber. Lady Sanjo was there, all smiles and bustling energy, ordering grass mats to be brought in and lamps and braziers to be placed just so.

  “You will be quite comfortable now,” she said, fluttering her fan. “This room is small but private, and you have your own small garden.” She raised a shade and peered out. “Delightful. Nobody ever comes here. You can sit on the veranda if you like. I am sure His Majesty prefers that you keep away from the noisy visitors who seem to plague us lately.”

  It was, of course, more isolation, but Toshiko was glad of that. There was even a possibility that the emperor had become considerate of her feelings and suggested the change.

  That night, she spread her bedding and set her headrest so that she faced the veranda. The weather was still cold, and the shutters were closed at night, but she propped one open a little — finding the catch already unlocked — so that she could watch the pale moon rise above the roofs of the palace buildings. Then she undressed to her under robe, something she had not done for a long time, and lay down beneath a double layer of quilts.

  The moon was very beautiful this spring night, a silver disk that floated along the roof ridge in the starry blackness. She remembered how she had sat with her mother and sister, composing poems about the moon. They had not been very good poems, but she had felt cherished and happy then. She let her tears blur both moon and stars. It was a rare luxury, this open grieving. For too long a time she had had to stifle her sadness, always afraid it would be noted, or that the call for her would come while her eyes were swollen from weeping. Tonight it was too late for a summons from the emperor.

  After a while, she stopped weeping and dabbed away the tears. Somewhere to the east of her, the doctor would also have gone to bed. Perhaps he, too, was looking at the same moon. Perhaps he thought of her as she thought of him. She imagined their thoughts meeting among the stars like winged fairies or like the herdsman and the weaver maid who met to make love only once a year. Oh, she would give everything for one such meeting.

  The emperor had called her His Moon Princess that first time, plying her with pretty stories and pictures like the child she had been until He had taken her in His arms. Sometimes she thought she hated Him.

  Her moist cheeks began to itch and she rubbed them dry with her sleeve. Children may cry, but not grown women. She closed her eyes with a sigh.

  It was much quieter here than in the great room beyond the door. She was farther from her companions, whose dim shapes, covered with piles of bedding or robes, used to breathe and rustle until the darkness seemed like a huge beehive.

  As she dozed off, a faint sound, barely noted, niggled at the remnants of her consciousness. A door closing somewhere? Someone on her way to the privy?

  Walking on gravel? There was no gravel on the way to the privy, just the smooth boards of the corridor. Old buildings creaked. Wondering if the new palace would have fewer creaks than this one, she fell asleep.

  And dreamed. Some creature hissed and scrabbled in her dream. It tugged at her quilts. The cat, she thought with a drowsy smile. Mikan, the one-eyed cat. The doctor’s one-eyed cat. What gentle hands he had. His hand on hers, soothing the hurt from Mikan’s scratch —

  She came fully awake when the hand — a cold hand — parted her gown and touched her bare skin. A dark shape hovered above her, murmuring, searching with that impatient hand, breathing hotly in her face. For a moment she thought it was the emperor and moved sleepily to accommodate Him, but then the strange scent told her that this was not the emperor and she cried out.

  It was only a soft cry and stifled instantly by the man’s hand on her lips and his hissed “Ssh!”

  She resisted, scrambling away, frightened now, her eyes wide, yet unseeing in the darkness. He snatched at her arm and whispered, “Don’t be afraid, Lady Toshiko. I did not mean to startle you.”

  In her confusion, she tried to account for his presence. Had the doctor sent a message by this stranger? “Who are you?” she managed, pulling her cover closer. “What do you want?”

  “I’m Fujiwara Munetada. Don’t you remember me?”

  She shook her head. “No. What do you want? You’re not supposed to be here.”

  Their furtive whispering made the encounter strangely intimate. Then Toshiko remembered the questing hand on her breasts and was afraid again. But perhaps this Fujiwara nobleman had made a mistake and come to the wrong bed. She said so, and he chuckled softly.

  “No mistake, my lovely. Come a little closer so I can see your beautiful face in the moonlight. I have dreamed of this moment ever since I saw you dancing.”

  Toshiko silently cursed the circle-dancing excursion. “You must leave instantly,” she hissed. “If you don’t, I shall cry for help. Surely you don’t wish His Majesty’s anger to fall on you.”

  “B-but,” he stammered, “d-didn’t you get my letters? Didn’t you w-wish me to co
me?”

  “I have not accepted letters from anyone, and I certainly did not wish this. Go! Now! Before it is too late.”

  There was a moment’s silence. Then, to her astonishment, he said, “No, I won’t be tricked.” Crawling closer on his knees, he said in a low voice, “You are beautiful, but your manners leave something to be desired. Come, making noise will do you no good. These things are much better carried on in silence. Especially in your case.”

  There was a touch of menace in his tone. She suppressed her panic. He was right. She could not afford the scandal of being found with a man in her bed.

  It struck her that her sudden move to this room had been Lady Sanjo’s idea, and that this visit was planned. While she arrived at this knowledge, he was coolly divesting himself of his robe and untying is trousers.