by VIKING ADULT
I would gladly see him a last time.”
“What he said of a father’s love is true for us all,” observed Yoshitsune.
“He could hardly feel otherwise.”
So he ordered Kawagoe no Kotar Shigefusa, who had charge of the boy,
to take him to where Munemori was lodged.
Shigefusa borrowed a carriage and accompanied him with two gentlewomen.
The boy was very happy to see his father after so long.
“Come here!” Munemori took him on his lap and, in tears, stroked his hair.
Then he said to the guards,
“Listen to me, every one of you!
This little boy has no mother, you know.
His mother gave birth easily enough,
but she was very ill afterward,
and in the end, you see, she died.
And this is what she said to me:
‘Should you have in the future other children, by other women,
do not for that allow your feeling for this one to cool,
but bring him up in memory of me.
Do not just send him off for some nurse to look after.’
Her appeal so moved me that I replied,
‘When I appoint Kiyomune over there commander
in some campaign to quell an enemy of the court,
I will ensure that this little boy goes as fukush, his second-in-command.’
The way I called him ‘Fukush’ pleased her so much
that it became her pet name for him to the end.
She died only seven days later.
All of that comes back to me
every time I see this boy,”
he concluded, weeping tears
that he could not keep from flowing.
All the warriors guarding him
likewise wrung tears from their sleeves.
Kiyomune likewise wept
and Fukush’s nurse, too.
“Very well, Fukush, you may go now,” Munemori said after a moment.
“It has been so lovely to see you!”
But Fukush did not go.
Kiyomune, looking on, did his best not to shed further tears.
“Come, Fukush,” he said, “for today it’s time to go.
A visitor is due at any moment. Hurry back tomorrow morning.”
But Fukush clung to his father’s white sleeve.
“No, no! I don’t want to!” he protested, crying.
This went on for quite a long time, until at last the sun went down,
but it could not go on forever.
The little boy’s nurse picked him up and put him in the carriage.
She and the other gentlewoman,
pressing their sleeves to their weeping eyes,
said good-bye, boarded their carriage,
and started off. Munemori
watched them fade into the distance,
heart breaking as never before.
No, he had never sent the boy off
for some nurse somewhere to look after.
Touched by the mother’s deathbed plea,
he had brought his son up at home,
in his third year had him come of age,
and given him the name Yoshimune.
The boy grew up so bright and pretty
that his father, who loved him dearly,
never let him out of his sight,
not even aboard ship, under far skies,
sailing the waves of the western seas.
Then came defeat. The aftermath
had kept them apart until this day.
Kawagoe Shigefusa went before Yoshitsune. “Sir,” he said, “may I ask you what you intend for this boy?”
Yoshitsune answered, “I cannot possibly take him all the way to Kamakura. Deal with him here as you see fit.”
Shigefusa went to where the boy was staying. “Lord Munemori will go down to Kamakura,” he told the two women, “but his son is to remain in the city. I, too, am going to Kamakura, so my orders are to pass him to Ogata no Sabur Koreyoshi. Have him board this carriage immediately.”
The carriage was already drawn up, and the boy innocently got in. “Am I going to my father’s, like yesterday?” the poor little fellow asked happily.
The carriage followed Rokuj eastward.
“Oh, dear, I don’t like this at all!” the frightened women said to each other.
Fifty or sixty warriors rode up behind them as the carriage emerged onto the bank of the river.
They stopped the carriage and spread out a furry animal hide.
“Please alight,” they said. The young lord obeyed.
He did so with grave misgivings.
“Where are they taking me?” he asked,
but the women had no answer.
One among Shigefusa’s men,
keeping his drawn sword at his side,
circled around behind the young lord
and was just preparing to strike
when the boy saw him, dodged aside,
and fled into his nurse’s embrace.
Not even this warrior had the heart
to tear him from her by main force.
She collapsed with her arms around him,
rent the air with full-throated screams,
and writhed in such obvious terror
that one could only feel pity for her.
But all this was taking much too long.
Shigefusa said, fighting back tears,
“Listen, please. You cannot save him.
It is time.” He wrenched the child from her,
stretched him out at the point of his dagger,
and at last cut off his head.
Every man present wept, for the bravest warrior is neither stock nor stone.
Shigefusa went off with the head, to present it for inspection to Yoshitsune.
The boy’s nurse followed him, barefoot.
“May I not at least have his head,” she begged, “so that I can pray for him in the hereafter?”
Yoshitsune, deeply moved, shed many tears.
“I understand completely,” he said. “Of course you must have it. Here it is.”
She took it from him, put it into the fold of her robe,
and, as far as anyone knew, returned, weeping, to the city.
Five or six days later, two women threw themselves into the Katsura River.
The one who drowned with a boy’s head in her front fold was Fukush’s nurse;
the one who went down clasping a headless corpse was her companion.
That the nurse should have taken this drastic step was perhaps inevitable.
How admirable of her companion, though, to do so, too!
17. Koshigoe
Meanwhile Lord Munemori, accompanied by Kur Yoshitsune,
passed Awataguchi at dawn on the seventh of the month,
thus leaving the world of city and palace behind.
The clear spring at saka barrier drew this from him, with tears:
That was my last sight,
today, of the capital;
and the barrier spring—
will I ever come again,
to see it reflect my form?
He was so downcast on the way
that Yoshitsune, kind as he was,
did all he could to give him comfort.
Lord Munemori said to him,
“Please, I beg you, leave me my life.”
“I expect that he will banish you to some far province or some distant island,”
Yoshitsune answered. “He will hardly have you executed, and even if he means to,
I will plead for your life in exchange for the reward due me for my victories.
By all means set your mind at rest.”
This reassuring speech elicited the unfortunate reply,
“I will be grateful merely to keep this worthless life of mine,
even among the savages in the Chishima Islands.”278
The days went by, and on the twenty-fourth they r
eached Kamakura.
Kajiwara Kagetoki got there ahead of them.
“You now control every corner of Japan,” he said to Yoritomo.
“As far as I can see, your final enemy is your younger brother, Kur Yoshitsune.
Why do I say that? This is what he said:
‘Without my charge down from above Ichi-no-tani,
we would never have broken through the east and west gates.
You are to present the prisoners and the dead to me and to no one else. The very idea of presenting them to Noriyori, who never lifted a finger! If he refuses to give me Shigehira, I will go and get him myself!’ Yoshitsune and I almost came to blows, but I got Doi no Jir to take charge of Shigehira, and your brother calmed down.”
Yoritomo announced, “I hear that Yoshitsune is due to reach Kamakura today. Men, I want you all on guard!”
Warriors great and small raced to assemble. They soon numbered several thousand.
Yoritomo put up a barrier at Kanearai-zawa, took charge there of Munemori and his elder son, and sent Yoshitsune back to Koshigoe. From within a many-layered circle of mounted guards, he declared, “Yoshitsune is crafty enough to pop out at any moment from under this mat, but no, he will not get past me.”
These were Yoshitsune’s thoughts: “I crushed Yoshinaka in the first month of last year, then risked my life all the way from Ichi-no-tani to Dan-no-ura in the campaign to finish the Heike. I safely retrieved both the mirror and the chest containing the jewel, I took the Heike commander and his son prisoner, and now I have brought them here. Yoritomo cannot refuse at least to see me, whatever this strange business may be.
Not for a moment did I doubt
that he would offer me appointment
as commander over all Kyushu,
or perhaps over the provinces
south of the city, to east or west
along one seacoast or the other;
or over all of Shikoku and Kii,
there to provide a bulwark for him—
but no, he now informs me that I am to have only Iyo,
and he will not even let me enter Kamakura!
I can hardly believe it! What does this mean?
Were not Yoshinaka and I
the ones who brought peace to Japan?
Yoritomo’s father was mine, too.
Being born first makes him the elder,
second makes me the younger brother,
but that is all. Why, anyone
eager to rule the realm can do so.
And he will not even receive me,
but sends me back instead to the city?
I will never forgive him for this!
What apology does he want from me?”
So he muttered, but all in vain.
In solemnly sworn oath after written oath,
Yoshitsune assured his brother that he harbored no disloyal thoughts,
but Kagetoki’s denunciation convinced Yoritomo to ignore them.
At last the weeping Yoshitsune sent e no Hiromoto this letter:
Minamoto no Yoshitsune with all due respect wishes to communicate the following:
On behalf of Lord Yoritomo, at his express request and acting as an imperial envoy in accordance with the relevant decree, I overthrew the enemies of the court and cleansed the shame once incurred by our house. Precisely when reward was due me, however, foul slander suddenly intervened to erase the great merit that I had accrued and to heap blame on my blameless self.
Innocent and deserving, I nonetheless suffer Lord Yoritomo’s wrathful ban, and for this I weep vain tears of blood. I cannot defend myself until the truth of the accusations is subjected to scrutiny and I am allowed into Kamakura. Meanwhile I endure wasted days. It is so long since I beheld my noble brother’s countenance that my bond of flesh and blood with him seems almost to have lapsed and our fated tie to be null and void. Or could it be that evil karma from past lives is at work? Alas! Who but my august father, reborn, could now plead my unhappy case? Who will take pity on me?
At the risk of seeming to voice an unwelcome complaint, I cannot refrain from observing that my father passed away only a few days after my birth, leaving me an orphan. My mother then carried me in her arms to Uda county in Yamato, and since then I have never known peace. My unworthy life remained mine, but I could not frequent the capital; instead I hid far away, in remote provinces, under the care of local people and peasants. Then, however, my fortunes turned. I was called up to the city, to wage war against the Heike. I first crushed Kiso no Yoshinaka. Next, in pursuit of victory, I whipped my swift steed over precipitous crags, in utter disregard of my life, or braved wind and wave on the boundless sea, ever at risk of sinking to the depths and being devoured by great fish. I slept in the wilds, pillowed on helmet or armor, in steadfast pursuit of the calling of arms, solely to soothe the wrath of my ancestors and to attain the long-cherished goal of triumph. I also found myself appointed an officer of the police, with the fifth rank: a weighty post and, for our house, a signal honor. Nevertheless profound grief now burdens me. What can I do, failing the aid of the gods and buddhas, to convey my anguished plea?
Therefore I have sworn on the backs of protective talismans from countless temples and shrines that I have no ambition whatever, and I have presented prayers to that effect to divinities great and small throughout Japan. So far, however, he has not relaxed his suspicions. Now, this land of ours is the land of the gods, and the gods surely accept no offense against what is right.
I have no other recourse but you; to you alone I look for vast compassion. Should you successfully discern the moment to bring my appeal before Lord Yoritomo, should you devise a way to convince him so thoroughly of my innocence that he grants me his pardon, then the excellent karma accrued will win your house everlasting glory, even as smiles light up an anxious face now relieved of care and grateful for the prospect of a life lived in peace.
I might have said more, but I have kept my remarks purposely brief.
Your humble servant,
Yoshitsune
Genryaku 2, sixth month, fifth day
18. The Execution of Munemori
Meanwhile Yoritomo received Lord Munemori,
seating him in a room across an inner court from his own
and watching him through blinds.
Through Hiki no Tshir Yoshikazu, he addressed him as follows:
“I have no personal grievance against anyone of the Heike.
I would not have lived, despite Lady Ike’s pleas,
if the late Lord Kiyomori had not permitted me to do so.
I owe the commuting of my sentence of exile entirely to his kindness,
and in exile I remained, for twenty years and more.
But then the Heike became enemies of the court,
and a decree from the cloistered emperor charged me with suppressing them.
Having been born and nurtured on imperial soil,
I could not for a moment ignore so august a command. I had no choice.
It is a pleasure for me to meet you.”
When Yoshikazu came before Lord Munemori to convey these words,
Munemori straightened his posture and bowed, in a pitiful display of deference.
The local warrior chieftains, great and small,
gathered there from many provinces included men from the capital.
These snapped their fingers in dismay.
“Is sitting up respectfully straight going to save his life?” some muttered.
“He should have met his fate out there in the west.
No wonder he was taken alive and dragged all the way down here.”
Others shed tears, and one among them said,
“When the tiger haunts the mountains,
every beast trembles with fear,
but when caged he wags his tail,
begging for food. What commander,
however brave, reduced to this,
would not find his courage failing?
And so, too, Lord
Munemori.”
Kur Yoshitsune meanwhile went on pleading with his brother,
but Kagetoki’s slander persuaded Yoritomo to withhold any clear reply.
Then came this order: “You are to proceed without delay to the city.”
So on the ninth of the sixth month, Yoshitsune started back up to the capital
in the company of Munemori and his son Kiyomune.
Munemori by this time was grateful for every added day of life.
Along the way he kept wondering, “Is this the place? Or this?”
But province after province, post station after post station went by.
They came to Utsumi, in the province of Owari. Here Yoshitomo, the brothers’ father, had been executed, and Munemori knew that he would be, too. But no: As before, they passed on by, and he felt somewhat reassured. “Are they actually going to let us live?” he wondered pathetically to his son.
“Not a chance,” Kiyomune wanted to answer. “They’re just waiting till we get close to the capital, to make sure our heads don’t rot in this heat.” His father looked so miserable, though, that he kept his peace. He just went on calling the Name.
Day followed day. The capital came closer.
They reached the post station at Shinohara in the province of mi.
Yoshitsune, thoughtful as always, sent a man three days’ march ahead
to summon from hara the holy man known as Honjb Tang.
Father and son had been together until the previous day,
but that morning they were separated.
“This, then, must be the day we die,” they reflected in mounting distress.
Munemori shed bitter tears.
“Where is my son?” he cried. “Where is Kiyomune?
They will take our heads, I know,
but I thought that our bodies at least would lie together.
It is too hard, to be parted while we both still live!
He has never been away from me, not once in all these seventeen years.
It was for him that I did not drown myself in the western ocean
but lived on instead to spread abroad an invidious name!”
The holy man, moved to pity, shrank nonetheless from betraying similar weakness.
He dried his tears and said with affected detachment,
“You must not allow your thoughts to wander.
It would distress you both too much to witness each other’s death.
