Hideyoshi and Rikyū

by Nogami Yaeko

  The wooden statue was fastened to a sturdy pillar with big nails. The pillar had a cross bar, and many layers of rope were tied around the statue from shoulder to torso to prevent the statue from falling. It looked like a captured criminal. The pillar was set much higher than the place where Rikyū’s head was hung, so that it looked as if the sandals were stepping on the head. During the hanging process, nails had cracked the left side of the statue’s head from temple to ear, exposing the orange color of the camphor wood beneath.

  The statue hadn’t been hanging long enough to wear down the finish, and it kept the mysterious illusion of life given to it by Ankei. The crack in the head looked like a bloody wound, making viewers shiver.

  Next to the statue was a placard listing Rikyū’s crimes. The first crime on the list was placing his statue in the gate at Daitokuji Temple. Other crimes listed were making profits from buying and selling tea utensils, and acting as a go-between in those sales. The charges proclaimed that it was unforgivable for a monk to engage in selling.

  In life, he had been a high-ranking tea master, unreachable for the common people. But now, just as the wooden statue seemed to be crushing Rikyū’s head, Rikyū was degraded under their feet. They had no pity for his miserable end; they were amused by it. It gave them a feeling of superiority.

  At the market, it was the only thing they talked about. For shrewd merchants, it was a good chance to bring in more customers. A young man with scurvy at the vegetable store called out as if he were singing: “Why don’t you buy? Fresh-farmed brake, fern greens, radish, arrowhead bulb, citron, ginger! We also have the head of Japan’s best tea master. Why don’t you buy?”

  Selling goods at market was prohibited at night. The spring sunlight was gradually absorbed by the far-off mountains in the west. Mount Higashi was directly across from the market, and the same range held the high, round summit of Nyoigatake and the nearby Mount Hie. One evening, as the mountains were painted silver by the dusk, the shopkeepers prepared to close for the night, loading goods into carts or carrying wares home on their backs. After the noise of their packing, the market fell silent, as if evening had suddenly become midnight. There was nobody to be seen.

  But Kisaburō was still squatting at the foot of an old pine tree on the bank near the execution spot as if he never intended to leave.

  Where am I going? he wondered. There’s no place for me to go, no place I want to go. I have nothing. Everything is gone. It’s dark and empty. His body felt like a piece of straw.

  He hadn’t heard about his father until he left Wakasa and arrived in Harima. The little bit of information he had managed to gather was enough to make him abandon his secret plan and come home.

  When he had left for Wakasa, he’d never intended to return. His sister Katsu’s speculation was almost right: he wanted to go somewhere; the destination itself didn’t matter to him, as long as it wasn’t Sakai. It could have been China, India, or Europe. It was a kind of yearning, a need to be somewhere in the world where he could be himself. Whenever his difficult relationship with his father began to distress him, he thought about leaving. But this time his determination to escape sprang from his tangled relationship with Ochika. His plan was to lose his clerk and servant and then take off for Hakata or Nagasaki, and from there see where the wind took him. Then he heard the news.

  He made his way to Ōsaka by boat to visit his great-uncles. They told him everything. He heard how his father had been banished to Sakai, and about the details of Rikyū’s suicide. He heard that Torigai Yahei had escaped to Ōmi, but had been ruined completely by having a stroke. Yahei cried like a child now whenever someone mentioned Rikyū’s name.

  After the suicide order had been issued, Dōan and Shōan were sheltered by two of Rikyū’s closest disciples. Kanamori Hoin in Hida province was taking care of Dōan, while Gamō Ujisato in Aizu province took in Shōan. They expected that since Kampaku-sama’s rage was so intense, it would calm quickly, and the family would be forgiven.

  Since Kisaburō was still living with his parents and not an independent man, he was exempt from official punishment. Even so, Kisaburō’s uncles advised him to hide with them and not leave the house by day or by night. Above all, he should not return to Sakai. These were the confidential instructions he received from the same people who had found refuges for his brothers.

  Kisaburō ignored them. He thought about going to see his mother, who was racked with grief, but he needed to see his father again. He didn’t care what might happen to him if he were caught; even the threat of death meant nothing to him now.

  He was in Ōsaka for less than a day before catching the night boat to Kyōto. He wrapped his face from head to chin in indigo-blue cloth, leaving only his eyes and nose exposed. It didn’t look strange, given the times. The nobles who had lost their status during the long wars and people from well-known families who could not find the skills to earn a living often wore masks like that, as did dandies who went out traveling incognito.

  In truth, Kisaburō didn’t really need the mask. The sun had turned his face brown during his travels and made him haggard and dirty. His big, black eyes were dry, and his nose looked sharper than usual. Even people who knew him well might not have recognized him.

  Kisaburō mixed with the crowds of curious people and looked at his father through the bamboo fence. The sun had just emerged from behind a mass of silver clouds, shining on the statue and Rikyū’s head. The mottled statue gleamed, and the eyes and mouth seemed to be open wide. Even the head, perched underneath the feet like a piece of rotten fruit, looked like it was flashing with the tenacious, blue-white flame of the living dead.

  But even if the statue captured the true essence of Rikyū, at the end of the day it was just a piece of wood. The small, round, purple, distorted object underneath it was his father, but not his father. Where had he gone? Dead.

  Kisaburō felt like he’d just learned that word for the first time.

  As he got up and approached the bamboo fence, he felt nothing—no sadness, no pain, just a tight feeling, as if his whole body was condensed into a tiny space. But then the tightness melted with warm tears, and Kisaburō ran back to the bushes by the river like a child running from something scary.

  He cried like a child underneath the old trees. He didn’t know when or where he had started looking at his father with cold eyes. These tears were something new to him.

  When he finally calmed down, he noticed a strange change within himself. Up until Rikyū’s death, Kisaburō’s greatest complaint had been that he was Rikyū’s son. He had tried so hard to push up the heavy lid of his father’s fame that had sealed his own life in place. Now his father had been reduced to a half-rotten head. Kisaburō had been released by his father’s suicide, which banished his fame from this world along with his body. At last Kisaburō had gained what he was looking for. But what were these tears?

  Kisaburō could not help but recognize that his father had lived with strength and courage right up until the end. Even though Rikyū had occasionally sighed about the demands of being Kampakusama’s tea master, he had also been very proud of his position. That pride led him to create beauty in the tea world.

  As Kisaburō had walked through the market, he had heard people saying abusive things about his father. Some of them were blunt, but the words were true. Kisaburō knew Rikyū had sometimes used his name and status to do impudent things. Everything that Rikyū had gained in his life had been peeled off, taken away, or kicked down; now he was painted with curses and mocking words that he never would have received while he was alive. And now Kisaburō felt closer to him than ever. The man who used to despise the fact that he was Rikyū’s son now wanted to stand up and shout madly to the crowd, “I am the son of that head.”

  But he and his father were different. Rikyū’s talents and his life had been his and only his. Despite his father’s prosperity and success, Kisaburō had no interest in living the same way as his father had. Those thoughts sprang up naturally o
ut of habit, like green moss grows on a riverbank without any conscious intent. As the reality of Rikyū’s death sank in, so did the realities of Kisaburō’s situation. How was he going to live? That question had always scared him, regardless of who was asking, even if he was questioning himself. Up until now, he had never known hunger or slept out in the cold. Now he had only five or six silver coins left in his pocket. Compared to Kyōto and Ōsaka, Sakai could be a merciless city; he couldn’t afford to be sentimental.

  Before the heavy iron door shut on his life, he had to turn his back on it and face the future. Before he was kicked out the door, he needed to kick the door. That was just what he had to do. Once his last silver was spent, it wasn’t only his wallet that would be empty. Only a sick person truly understands the meaning of pain and fear. Kisaburō, who had never been hungry, didn’t know what it would be like. But his ignorance made him more courageous; with no wife or children to care for, he told himself he would be able to survive. He could even go back to Wakasa and Harima and draw water from the sea to make salt. Then at least he wouldn’t starve.

  He thought about it. He tried to believe that he could do it. But all of a sudden he was thrown into doubt. Even if he didn’t die from hunger, would he truly be alive? What did it mean to be alive? The thoughts sucked him in, like deep mud that kept pulling on his legs and bringing him down. As he struggled against those dark, cold, mysterious, sad thoughts, he remembered his father again. Rikyū had had a strong desire to live—truly live—and that had taken him even beyond being Japan’s highest-ranking tea master. Despite his horrible death, even in his last moments he hadn’t compromised.

  Have I ever truly lived? Kisaburō asked himself. The question mired him in the mud of his subconscious, and he couldn’t extricate himself. He had never felt that he belonged at his father’s house. He’d never felt he belonged anywhere.

  His real place in the world, he sensed, was somewhere else, doing something different from anything he had done before. In his previous life, he’d moved around aimlessly. Even when he was on a drinking spree, he was still strangely conscious of his inner state—empty, lonely, and cold. That was why he hadn’t followed the way of tea as his father and his brothers had. That was why he had had no desire to marry into the Kawachi family, no matter how much it upset his sister.

  I never lived even one day with my whole soul and body.

  But even as he thought it, his young cheeks blushed behind the indigo mask. He remembered Ochika’s heat, the glow of her white, smooth, satin-like skin, and it brought to life every cell in his body.

  Maybe I did live a little bit.

  It would be strange if a jar full of water didn’t spill over. In the same way, Ochika had naturally become Kisaburō’s woman. He didn’t completely doubt his sister’s words, but on the other hand, he wanted desperately to believe in Ochika. The beautiful kimono had been paid for by Yanagiya, it was true. But Yanagiya had been buying Ochika gifts for a long time. When Yanagiya’s wife was still alive, Ochika had made a show of sending them gifts, as if they were her parents—otherwise she could not have worn that kimono openly, with pride.

  Ochika had grown up not knowing who her own father was. Kisaburō knew that even though she had wandered from China to India, she had still kept her pure sense of self. That was quite rare. So he had wanted to believe in her rather than doubt.

  He had slept with her because he wanted the proof of her love; he had wanted to grasp that unshakable form. Ochika had known that no matter how much a woman is desired, the only way to give love is to show it. He had learned from her that the things he had been given by other women were not real.

  Just as his legs knew where to go and his hands moved to grasp objects without conscious thought, he had earnestly, frantically held fast to his relationship with Ochika. That was one time, surely, when he had truly lived. But it had lasted for only a month.

  On the day they had separated for good, he was at Daikumachi until the bell at Shōrinji Temple struck six times to mark the twilight. He had some business in Ōsaka early the next morning, and he wasn’t sure if he would be back that evening. When he left Ochika, he had explained that to her. But he wasn’t sure if he could stand to be away from her for two nights in a row. He might even have to be in Ōsaka for two or three days. He didn’t have to leave so early in the morning; he could spend that one night with her.

  As he had thought about it, passion had engulfed him, like the one warm drop of rain that incites a sudden downpour. Though he had just arrived back at his home, he had turned around and headed back out into the cold night. The stars were bright and lively in the clear sky. The streets were as quiet as if it were midnight. The wind coming off the sea had dropped off, and although the sound of the waves had been loud through the afternoon, now they had calmed down. He hurried through the empty, frozen streets toward Ochika’s house.

  Ochika’s house was always locked from the early evening onward. It was Yahei’s custom; a coward at heart, he was afraid of thieves, especially after the war. He kept the door securely fastened at all times. Now, only one of his servants, an old woman, kept up the custom.

  Kisaburō had knocked at the door as if it were his own house. He always knocked that way. Usually Ochika recognized the knock and replied quickly, with a lively voice. If not, the old woman came quickly with her mincing short steps. But that night, something had been different: Ochika’s voice hadn’t responded to his knock, and it had taken a long time for the old woman to come and unfasten the door. Sullen at being kept waiting in the cold night, Kisaburō had stepped inside without a word of greeting for the old servant. By that time, he had no doubt.

  The entrance to the back of the house was open. Ochika, who was usually dressed late into the night, had scurried up to him with bare feet, dressed in a long nightgown. She told him that after he had left, she had felt slightly ill and decided to go to bed early.

  The unnatural excuse made him stop at the entrance as if petrified. Her eyes were so wide they almost looked like they touched her well-shaped nose. Her hair was loose and untidy, brushing her smooth cheeks like satin, and her kimono was loose at the neck. Her waist was wrapped twice around with a red sash that had a long tassel, suggesting the slender but still voluptuous, naked, thirty-year-old body beneath.

  A paper-covered lamp stand had been brought to the hall and placed behind her. In the shadow of that faint flame, he had smelled another man’s skin and saw the traces of the immoral intimacy. He had stepped up into the room, not taking off his sandals, and slapped her. His hand hitting her white, elastic cheek sounded like a leather drum.

  Ochika had cried and thrown herself on him. He had kicked her off and flung her away.

  Three days later, he had left for Wakasa. This had been about forty days ago, if he included the days when he had come back from Ōsaka. But it wasn’t time or the travel that helped to push that night into the past. Just as a moment of surprise can cure hiccups, Rikyū’s downfall and death made Kisaburō shake off all of his doubts and struggles.

  The shock of his father’s death had been severe. He tried to leave all thoughts of Ochika behind, like an abandoned sandal on the road, and he was able to do it. Up until today, he hadn’t even thought of her. His rage and jealousy had faded, replaced by a warm and nostalgic feeling about his time with her. It pierced through his heart. He knew that if he returned to Sakai now, no one would give him the slightest consideration—but Ochika would be waiting for him. She would tell him that what had happened did not matter, that she would stay in Daikumachi and Yanagiya would take care of everything.

  Even if Ochika became Yanagiya’s wife—just as Kisaburō thought of becoming a salt collector if worst came to worst—she would say that her relationship with Kisaburō would be the same, which was exactly the reason he could never see her again. He couldn’t even be bothered to let her know where he was.

  He ridiculed himself now for thinking about being with Ochika again. Ochika had grown up in the red-lig
ht district, and when she was wandering from China to India, she had relationships with all kinds of men. Kisaburō was only one of them. He had heard her laugh at herself for forgetting foreign words. He could imagine her laughing and saying that she didn’t remember Kisaburō at all. That would be more like her. She had been that way for as long as he’d known her, and she would still be that way years from now. So what about Kisaburō?

  The endlessly bright sky had shifted to the color of dusk. The glow of sunset was wiped from the surface of the slow-moving Horikawa River. A warm evening wind began to blow, and the willow branches swung in bundles. Kisaburō left the bushes and began to walk, mechanically. He didn’t have a plan, or any place to go. He couldn’t even attempt to make a decision.

  The sound of sandals approached from behind. “Excuse me.”

  It was an old man who sold tea. Kisaburō had seen him in the market that day. He carried a kettle and a box-shaped booth on a pole, and in another box were a tea bowl, tea caddy, tea whisk, and a ladle used to make tea a cup at a time, which he would sell for one mon each. Although half of the tea was mixed with mulberry leaves, the basic utensils were all supplied. All the other shops were closed already. This old man must have taken a long time to pack up. He was a small man, with a sturdy back and shoulders; a black scarf covered his ears, from which white hair stuck out in clusters.

  “Old man, how far are you going?” Kisaburō asked him as he passed, without intending to. Even if he was only a tea peddler, tea is tea. Kisaburō felt a kinship with this old man, who was about the same age as his father; besides, he was very lonely.

  Instead of answering the question directly, the man began to talk about his work. He had come to the market for three or four days because someone had recommended it to him. But he hadn’t sold as much tea as he had hoped. Because the market was so far from his home, he was staying with some relatives in Sanjyo. But it was inconvenient, so he had decided to go home today. He would sell tea to the people who came to the Kitano Shrine.