The Samurai and the Long-Nosed Devils

by Lensey Namioka

  Chiyo and the two men whirled around to find Lady Yuki looking at them with an air of amusement. She was dressed in a thin silk kimono of pale green, a color which suited her creamy skin and blue-black hair. In spite of the heat she looked cool and comfortable. Matsuzo was somewhat repelled by her cold, too-perfect beauty. He much preferred Chiyo’s warmth and liveliness.

  There was malice as well as amusement in Lady Yuki’s voice. “When I heard that Chiyo was seeing some friends of her fiancé, Hambei, I became curious. I know that Hambei works for Nobunaga, who is my father’s enemy in spite of all his protestations of friendship. Little did I know that Hambei’s friends are also bodyguards of the Portuguese, enemies even closer to home. Have I been so inconsiderate as to interrupt your plotting?”

  “Lady Yuki, you do us an injustice,” said Zenta firmly. “We are not enemies of your father, and if he thinks so, the feeling is onesided. As for yesterday’s fight, it was started by your men. They should have shown more self-control.”

  Matsuzo held his breath, expecting Lady Yuki to turn livid with rage. She did not look like a person who received a reprimand with good grace.

  To his surprise, Lady Yuki’s mouth dropped open, and after a second she burst out laughing. “Why, you’re right! My men really did show a shameful lack of self-control!” Her eyes were bright as she looked at Zenta. “But you dealt very severely with Kotaro. Do you know what it’s like to keep your head covered all day long in this weather? It might have been kinder if you had simply killed him.”

  Matsuzo looked suspiciously at Lady Yuki. “The little fox is trying to fascinate Zenta,” he said to himself. “And the horrible thing is that she seems to be succeeding.”

  Before Zenta could reply to Lady Yuki, the other serving girl came hurrying to them. “Lady Yuki, you father is very impatient at the delay. He wishes to return home immediately.” “Oh, very well, tell him I’m coming,” said Lady Yuki, pouting. She had one more shaft for Chiyo, however. “I’m relieved to hear that you’re not plotting against us, Chiyo. But I sometimes wonder what you are really doing in our household. A girl of your talents is wasted as a serving lady.”

  Watching Lady Yuki’s retreating back, Matsuzo felt the need to wipe his brow. “I don’t think your mistress likes you, Chiyo. What if she reports our meeting to her father? It could look even worse than gossiping with Maria.”

  In Chiyo’s glance at her mistress there was contempt and, surprisingly, a touch of pity. “I don’t think she will report this talk. If I know her character, she is more likely to keep it a secret in order to have a hold over me. It would amuse her to tease me with it.”

  Matsuzo was shocked. “It must be very hard to work for a cruel mistress like this! Can’t you ask Hambei to find a pleasanter position for you?”

  “I don’t mind,” said Chiyo, and it was true that she didn’t look downtrodden in the least. “Lord Fujikawa treats me well enough, and Lady Yuki’s only trouble is boredom. That’s why she toys with Kotaro until that poor wretch has lost his head over her completely.” “Perhaps marriage will put an end to her boredom,” said Zenta. His eyes were on Lady Yuki’s graceful figure, and to Matsuzo’s alarm,

  his expression was wistful.

  “On the contrary, the boredom will be much worse after her marriage,” said Chiyo. “Lord Fujikawa is arranging a match with a nobleman whose only interest in life is tea.”

  “Tea?” exclaimed Matsuzo.

  “He spends hours every day studying tea ceremony. It is whispered everywhere that he feels no woman has the fascination of a clay tea bowl or bamboo scooper.”

  “Decadent Miyako nobleman,” muttered Matsuzo.

  “Lady Yuki hates the thought of this marriage,” continued Chiyo. Before she could say more, they heard commands given for departure. “I must go,” she said hurriedly. “I’ll try to get word to you if I hear any news about the gun.”

  She left not a moment too soon. The samurai were all standing at attention as Lord Fujikawa made ready to enter his sedan chair. He was a tall, stooped man with lines of ill-humor deeply scored on his face. Even from a little distance away, Matsuzo could tell that he was hot and angry.

  Lord Fujikawa’s ill-humor needed a victim, and he rounded on his daughter. “Where have you been?” he demanded, without bothering to lower his voice. “I’ve been waiting since the end of the meal!”

  Receiving no answer, he became angrier still. “You’ve been allowed to run completely wild after your mother’s death! I see that I’ve been delaying the completion of your marriage negotiations too long. It’s time to get you married off and out of my house!”

  Matsuzo had no particular liking for Lady Yuki, but at her public humiliation, even he felt a deep embarrassment. He could sense Zenta growing tense with anger.

  Lady Yuki, however, exhibited a superb self-control, so lacking in her father and her household samurai. Her only response was a cold stare. She climbed into her sedan chair and lowered the blinds with a sharp snap.

  One person, however, showed a more violent reaction to Lord Fujikawa’s words. The samurai at the head of the file clenched his fist and his hand went halfway to his sword before it fell back. Since the man wore a hat, Matsuzo could not see the upper part of his face, but he recognized the flaring nostrils and the grinding teeth. This was Kotaro, the involuntary recipient of a haircut and Lady Yuki’s devoted slave.

  After Lord Fujikawa’s party had left, the two ronin also prepared to descend. Zenta looked up for a moment at the gathering clouds. “We can expect a stormy night ahead of us.”

  Chapter 7

  “Hambei,” said Nobunaga, “are you sure that Zenta will be able to protect the Portuguese with only the help of his young assistant? The safety of these foreigners is important to me.” “Zenta is a superb swordsman, my lord.

  He is more than a match for Lord Fujikawa’s bullies.”

  “Your story about the shorn topknot is all very well, but we need more than a trick swordsman. Shouldn’t we send some of our own men also?”

  “We can’t afford to have our men come into open conflict with Lord Fujikawa, my lord. It’s better to use these two ronin, since they have no known allegiance. Zenta is experienced as a commander, and he will be able to organize the defense of the Portuguese.”

  “Hm . . . I think I should like to have this ronin as a staff officer eventually,” said Nobunaga thoughtfully. “But Hambei, if any harm comes to the Portuguese, I will have your head.”

  Waiting for the storm to break seemed to take an eternity. What Pedro needed this evening was company, but Father Luis was probably praying in his study, and most of the other staff had already retired for the night. Pedro found sleep to be impossible in the sultry heat. As he squirmed in his tight-fitting doublet and hose, he envied the Japanese in their loose cotton kimonos. Once he had even asked Maria to get him a kimono. But when he tried it on, his long legs had extended so far beyond the bottom of the hem that the sight had sent her into a fit of giggling.

  Pedro still remembered the first time he had ever seen Maria. She stood weeping outside their gate. When he had appeared, she ran to him and asked him to take her in, declaring herself willing to become a Christian convert. Pedro learned that her family were poor relations of Lord Fujikawa’s wife. After the girl had been left orphaned, she entered Lord Fujikawa’s household as an attendant. She soon found her master pursuing her with unwelcome attention, and she escaped to the Portuguese for refuge. To Pedro’s surprise, Maria showed a quiet courage totally unexpected in someone of her meek appearance. She held stubbornly to her Christian faith in spite of the fact that all of Lord Fujikawa’s people, except Chiyo, jeered at her whenever they had a chance.

  Lately Pedro found his thoughts turning more and more often to Maria. When he had jokingly spoken to Father Luis about marrying a Japanese wife, Maria had been in the back of his mind. But he knew that Father Luis would not approve. He would say that Pedro was taking advantage of Maria’s helpless and dependent sit
uation.

  Pedro sighed and looked wistfully at his guitar. He had an absurd desire to play sentimental songs on it. He had bought the instrument from a Portuguese merchant and he used to play his favorite songs, much to the fascination of the Japanese. Unfortunately the damp weather had ruined the strings and he had not been able to replace them. Once he had seen a blind Japanese musician using a plucked instrument called a biwa to accompany some ballads. It bore a vague resemblance to a guitar. Pedro had eagerly tried it out, but to his disappointment it had only four strings and was totally unsuited to European music. Father Luis, he knew, had ordered some viols and even a virginal to be sent, but it would be months before they arrived. Pedro was not optimistic about the effect of Japanese weather on the instruments.

  Finally he rose from his clammy bed and went to the room of the two bodyguards, hoping to find them still awake. Through the thin rice paper paneling, he could see that the lamp in their room was still lit, and he ventured to slide open the door an inch and look in.

  He found the two men hunched over a low square table made of a very thick slab of wood mounted on four stubby legs. The two ronin were concentrating upon the top of the table, which contained a configuration made up of a large number of little black and white stones.

  Without looking up Zenta said, “Come in and join us.” Then he took another white stone from a small bowl and added it to the design on the table.

  Pedro entered and looked curiously down at the table. He had seen it before in the room of one of his staff, but had thought that it was just another piece of furniture. Now he saw that the little stones were arranged on a grid of fine lines drawn upon the top of the table. Evidently a board game of some sort was in progress. “What are you playing?” he asked.

  “It’s a game called go,” replied Zenta. Turning to Matsuzo he said, “You agree that we are finished?”

  “There is no point in playing any longer,” said Matsuzo, looking resigned. He separated the black stones from the white and put them back into their containers.

  Zenta invited Pedro to sit down and, taking out a few of the stones, began to explain the game. “The object is to occupy territory, and you invade your opponent’s territory by capturing his men. A man, represented by a stone, is captured when he is completely surrounded.”

  To Pedro, the rules sounded elementary and even childish when compared to those of chess. He didn’t understand how two intelligent adults could enjoy such a game. His thoughts must have shown, for Zenta smiled and said, “The game is more interesting than you think. It’s supposed to develop strategic thinking, and that’s why it’s so popular among members of the warrior class. Why don’t you try it? You take the black stones and I’ll take the white. Let me show you how it goes.”

  In a very short while Pedro discovered to his amazement that no matter how hard he tried, he could not save a single one of his black men from capture. His opponent’s men, on the other hand, remained completely invulnerable. Then Zenta proceeded to demonstrate some tactics, how to strengthen one’s position against attack and how to launch an invasion. Pedro became so engrossed that he didn’t even notice when the first welcome breezes began to blow into the room.

  Finally a loud rattling of bamboo leaves outside the door attracted their attention. “Ah, at last,” sighed Matsuzo, taking a deep breath of the fresh and cool air. Suddenly a great gust of wind blew out the lamp in their room.

  Pedro stood up and pushed open the sliding door that led to the garden. He stepped out on the wooden veranda and stretched himself, enjoying the cool wind. There was a bright flash in the sky, followed a moment later by thunder. After a minute there was another bright flash which lit up the whole garden so that for an instant he could even see the roof of Lord Fujikawa’s house. The thunder that followed was ear-splitting.

  Soon, however, Pedro’s sweat-dampened clothes began to feel uncomfortable in the wind. He shivered. Once more a flash of lightning gave the scene an instant of strange blue radiance. The crack of thunder this time was not only loud, but it seemed to him that the sound had a slightly different timbre.

  Zenta, too, sat up straight at the last clap of thunder. “That one was close to home,” he remarked. “But it sounded quite different. I hope it didn’t strike a building. We really should keep our eyes open for the possibility of fire.”

  Pedro had lived long enough in Japan to understand the universal dread of fire, for the houses were largely built of paper and wood. He noticed a faint sulfurous smell in the air, rather like gunpowder, and he knew that Zenta’s fear of lightning striking a building was justified. They stood up and peered anxiously in the direction of Lord Fujikawa’s house, from which the sound had come. In the next moment the sky broke open and the rain thudded down on them like physical blows. There was no longer any danger of a general fire.

  “Speaking of fire, I don’t see how you expect to defend your castles against fire arrows when the main structures are all built of wood,” Pedro said as they hurried back into the room out of the rain. “In Europe we build our castles of stone, and only heavy artillery has a chance of making a breach.”

  Heavy artillery had not yet made its appearance in Japan, and Zenta was very eager to learn all that Pedro could tell him about cannons. While the rain poured in great sheets outside, they rekindled the lamp and Pedro described European warfare as he had experienced it. At Zenta’s suggestion, Pedro used the go board as a battlefield and the stones as soldiers to demonstrate how forces were massed by European commanders. The ronin was extremely quick at grasping the explanations. Pedro had met only one other person whose understanding was so quick, and that was Nobunaga.

  In the middle of Pedro’s descriptions, Zenta suddenly interrupted. “What was that? I thought I heard a splash.”

  Pedro had heard it also. The sound had seemed close at hand, but in the noise of the rain, he couldn’t be sure. Once more they went out on the veranda, and this time they even stepped down into the garden. Suddenly, a torrent of water, which had been collecting on the roof, broke its dam of pine needles and came down like a waterfall right into the back of Pedro’s collar. The shock of cold went down his back, into his pants, and even entered his hose.

  Pedro sputtered furiously, and the two ronin laughed out loud. “There is plenty of room in your puffed pants for more water,” said Matsuzo rather unkindly.

  At least that explained the splashing sound, thought Pedro sourly. Opening his mouth for a retort, he was overcome by a gigantic sneeze. If he didn’t take care, the drenching could cause a bad chill. It was time to retire for the night.

  Back in his room Pedro changed into dry clothes and lay down wearily on his thin mattress. He had long ago grown accustomed to the Japanese way of sleeping on the floor, and he fell immediately into a deep sleep.

  It seemed to him that only five minutes later someone was shaking him awake. He opened his eyes and found to his surprise that it was already morning. The person urgently shaking him was Matsuzo.

  The young ronin looked very grave. “I think you should get dressed immediately and come outside. Something very serious has happened.” As Pedro pulled on his doublet and fastened his sword belt, he became aware of angry voices shouting outside. “What are they shouting about? It sounds as if someone has been killed.”

  “Someone has,” replied Matsuzo grimly. “This morning Lord Fujikawa was found murdered.”

  Even as Pedro tried to absorb the meaning of these words, he heard some loud booming thuds. “Lord Fujikawa’s men are trying to break open our front gate,” explained Matsuzo.

  Pedro could now make out cries of “Death to the Portuguese murderers!”

  “But why are they so positive that we are the murderers?” he asked. Passing the door of the storeroom he stopped. “Wait, let me bring one of my guns.”

  Matsuzo caught him by the arm. “This is the one thing you must not do! You see, Lord Fujikawa was shot by a gun. That’s why his men are blaming you.”

  As Pedro s
tood stunned, Matsuzo added, “Of course you can guess which gun fired the shot.” “Yes,” said Pedro slowly. “The murderer must be the person who stole my gun.”

  They reached the front of the house where they were joined by Father Luis just as the gate broke open with a splintering crash. By their momentum, a dozen of Lord Fujikawa’s men were carried halfway across the front courtyard before they were brought up short by the sight of Zenta waiting with drawn sword.

  “Are you rioters?” demanded the ronin. “How dare you break into our house like this?”

  Under his stern eyes, the men dropped the big round beam which they had used as a battering ram. Finally one man spoke up defiantly. “We are not rioters, but loyal samurai. We have come to avenge the death of our master.”

  “To avenge your master, you must first find his slayer.”

  “We have found him!” shouted the man. “Our master was killed by the foreigner’s infernal weapon. That proves that the murderer was one of the Portuguese.”

  Pedro could contain himself no longer. “The fact that Lord Fujikawa was killed by a gun doesn’t prove that one of us shot him. Many of your countrymen have learned to use guns. Furthermore, I can show you that neither of my guns was used. Because of the humid weather, there will be rust on the trigger, and that shows that my guns have not been fired within the last two days.”

  “You will show us two guns that have not been fired,” retorted another man, “but you may have hidden away the one that was used.” “If I go to the trouble of doing that, why bother to use a gun at all, knowing that it would point to me as the murderer?” asked Pedro.

  But this logic was too complicated for the heated men. “Why do we waste time listening to this murderer?” shouted one man. “Let’s kill him!”

  He whipped out his sword and rushed at Pedro. Zenta’s sword flashed up, and the attacker fell back, clutching his ribs.