Shinju

by Laura Joh Rowland

  As he mounted his horse, he realized that, despite his firm resolutions, he’d meant to do this all along. Today he’d carried out his administrative duties without deviation from procedure or custom. But the one thing he hadn’t done was complete the report that would close the investigation into Noriyoshi’s and Yukiko’s deaths.

  “One last interview can’t hurt,” he rationalized aloud, surprising the grooms. “After this, I’ll stop.”

  Still, he couldn’t quite shake his guilt or his premonition of impending disaster.

  Nighttime Yoshiwara more than lived up to Sano’s memories. Beneath a fading crimson sunset, Naka-no-cho glittered with life and excitement. Lanterns blazed from the eaves. Restaurants, their doors thrown wide open, emitted the delicious smells of all possible foods—fried noodles, grilled fish and shrimp, and sweet cakes among them—to tempt the strolling crowds. Raucous laughter erupted from the teahouses; each window framed a tableau of joking, posturing men tossing back cups of sake. Beautiful yūjo in gaudy kimonos filled the window cages of the pleasure houses like so many exotic butterflies, with groups of hungry-eyed men loitering before them. The women flirted with the men in shrill voices. From the lighted rooms behind the women, samisen music issued: a few lucky men had already chosen their companions, and the parties had begun.

  Sano found the Palace of the Heavenly Garden without difficulty: it was the largest house on the street. With its carved beams and pillars painted red and accented with yellow and green, it resembled a Chinese temple. Above the entrance, two resplendent dragons held between them a red banner that announced the house’s name in gold characters. Sano pushed through the crowd that stood three deep in front of the window and saw that the women inside were even more beautiful than the others.

  “Honorable lady, where can I find Wisteria?” he called to the nearest, a very young girl dressed in a red kimono printed with white, lucky characters. According to custom, yūjo were treated with the high respect usually accorded to noblewomen.

  Red Kimono pouted daintily. “The Lady Wisteria, master? What can she offer you that I cannot?” Her stilted, formal style of speech was the same one all Yoshiwara prostitutes used to their customers. “Surely a warrior as masculine and discerning as yourself would prefer a delicate maiden who has just reached the flowering of her womanhood?”

  She fluttered her fan, coyly shielding her face with it in a manner just as clichéd as her speech. The other women giggled, waiting for Sano’s response.

  Gathering his patience, Sano said, “I meant no insult to you, my lady.” No matter how meaningless the courtesans’ flattery or how brazen their invitations, one always replied with courtesy. To do otherwise ran counter to Yoshiwara tradition and invited the anger of their owners, who banned rude patrons from the pleasure houses. “But I need to talk to Wisteria.”

  “Talk? He comes here to talk?”

  More giggles.

  Sano decided that the best thing to do was identify himself and state his business. “I am Yoriki Sano Ichirō from the police department. I must speak to Wisteria about an official matter. Can you send word to her that I am here?”

  Red Kimono was unimpressed, and obviously piqued at having wasted her effort on a noncustomer. Dropping her flirtatious manner, she said, “In your own sphere, others must do your bidding, yoriki. But I am not your servant.” The other women giggled again. “Unless …”

  Her disdainful gaze moved over him, taking in his simple cloak and hat. A haughty smile turned up the corners of her mouth.

  Unless you have the money to pay, it implied, and I can see that you don’t.

  “Please,” Sano said. “It’s very important. I have to talk to her about Noriyoshi.”

  At the mention of Noriyoshi’s name, Red Kimono’s smile vanished. She nodded curtly. Turning to the room behind her, she beckoned. She whispered to a maid that appeared beside her. A moment later, the maid opened the door, bowing to Sano.

  “Go with her,” Red Kimono said.

  Sano stepped into the entryway of the Palace of the Heavenly Garden, where he removed his shoes. As he placed his swords on the rack, he remembered that safety, as well as etiquette, dictated that they must not enter the house. An unhappy yūjo might try to escape her enforced servitude by committing suicide with an unattended weapon.

  In the large salon, women and their customers reclined on bright silk cushions scattered over the floor, chatting and laughing. A samisen player performed a popular love song. Maids circulated with plates of delicacies and poured sake. Coins clinked as lavish tips passed from the customers—rich merchants, by the look of their opulent clothing—to the maids. Sano followed his escort through this room and out a sliding door onto the roofed veranda.

  The veranda faced a garden that must have been the site of many parties in spring, when its cherry trees dropped blossoms over the lawn, upon the stone lanterns, and into the ornamental pond with a small temple on an island in the middle. Now, with winter not yet gone, it was deserted. But lanterns burned from the verandas of the buildings that surrounded it—one above every door. Lights glowed through the windows. Laughter issued faintly from a few of the rooms, where some yūjo had already begun entertaining their customers in private.

  The maid pointed to a door at the back left corner. “There, sir.”

  Sano walked along the veranda to the door and knocked. He waited. No laughter emanated from this room, only a listening silence. Then:

  “Come in.” It was a woman’s voice, forced cheerfulness evident even in the short phrase.

  Sano entered, bowing to the woman who knelt before a lacquer dressing table. “Good evening, Lady Wisteria.”

  She had turned a welcoming smile toward him; now it faded. “I was expecting someone else,” she said. “Who are you?” Unlike Red Kimono’s, her speech was plain, uninflected Edo—perhaps because he’d surprised her.

  Sano bowed again and introduced himself, while covertly studying Wisteria. She didn’t fit his preconceived picture of Noriyoshi’s lady friend. He’d imagined a woman long past her prime, who played the role of mother to her clients. But Wisteria was no more than twenty, and clearly a yūjo of the first rank. She wore a lavish black-and-white-checked silk brocade kimono with a bold pattern of lavender wisteria blossoms and pale green leaves spilling diagonally from her left shoulder to the hem. It was obviously expensive. Her eyes, unusually round, made her piquant face exotic, provocative. The large, airy room reflected her status and set off her beauty. It was filled with luxurious furnishings: silk quilt and futon, carved lacquer chests and cabinets, painted lanterns. The alcove held a branch of dried winter berries in a creamy celadon vase that was surely the work of a master potter, and a scroll bearing classic Chinese verse in the unmistakable hand of a famous Kyoto calligrapher.

  “I’m here about your friend, Noriyoshi,” Sano said, turning from his examination of the room and back to her face.

  Her eyes, liquid and luminous, seemed to darken. Turning abruptly to the round mirror on her dressing table, she picked up a comb and began to arrange her hair, drawing the long, shining black mass up at the sides into a complicated loop at the back. Her movements had a languid, sensuous quality that Sano found extremely erotic and arousing, despite his preoccupation with the murder case.

  “I refuse to discuss Noriyoshi. And I’m expecting a guest.” Her voice trembled. “So get out. Now.”

  The sadness and absence of animosity in her voice told Sano that grief, not anger, had provoked her rude dismissal. He hesitated, unwilling to cause her pain. But he didn’t want to leave without learning what she knew.

  Wisteria flung her comb to the floor and faced him. “Well? What are you waiting for?” Tears glistened in her eyes. “If you’ve come to tell me that Noriyoshi committed suicide for love of some silly little upper-class goose, and that his body will be put out on the riverbank for people to gawk at … well, I already know. The story is all over the quarter. So go. Leave me in peace.”

  Sano
decided to tell her as much of the truth as possible. “Noriyoshi didn’t commit suicide. He was murdered.”

  She stared at him. Sounds from the next room filled the silence: samisen music, with a male and a female voice singing softly. Her face registered first disbelief, then dawning hope.

  “Murdered?” Her voice dropped to a whisper. “Can this be true? How do you know?”

  “I can’t tell you that,” Sano said. He didn’t know if he could trust her, and he didn’t want the story of the dissection spread around Yoshiwara. “But it’s true.” He knelt beside her. “I want to find out why he was killed, and by whom. Will you help me?”

  “How?”

  “Tell me everything you know about Noriyoshi: his family background, what kind of man he was. Who his enemies were, and why one of them might have wanted to kill him.”

  Wisteria’s eyes took on a faraway look. She began to run her fingers through her hair. Maybe the action was a nervous habit, but everything about her suggested sex—her luxurious room with the bed ready, her faint, flowery scent, her rosy mouth. Sano, watching her slender, soft hands, couldn’t help imagining them caressing his body. He shifted nervously. The room seemed very warm.

  “Everyone thinks Noriyoshi was a hustler who cared only for himself and his deals,” she said. “Mention his name, and they do this.”

  Looking over her shoulder as if to make sure no one was watching, she smiled slyly and pretended to count money from an imaginary hand into her own. The vulgar pose looked incongruous on someone so elegant, but it gave Sano a vivid picture of what Noriyoshi must have looked like alive.

  “But he was different with me.” She paused, then went on in a lower voice. “I came to Edo from Dewa Province when I was ten. My father sold me to a brothel’s procurer because his crops had failed that year and he couldn’t afford to feed me as well as my mother and my four brothers. I started out as a maid here at the Heavenly Garden. Do you know what that was like?”

  Sano nodded. Young girls, unless they showed extraordinary promise, were virtual slaves in the pleasure houses. They worked long, hard hours cleaning the rooms, helping in the kitchens, and running errands. All for inadequate food and shelter. Many died before they reached maturity; most of the others could hope to rise no higher than maid or second-class prostitute. Few became celebrated first-rank yūjo, and even fewer ever gained independence from the men who owned them.

  “I met Noriyoshi a year later, when he came to the house to deliver some shunga for the ladies to show their customers. He stopped in the kitchen for some tea, and I was there peeling vegetables.” A smile of reminiscence touched Wisteria’s lips. “He asked me my name, where I was from. He must have known I was hungry; I was so thin my bones showed.” She touched the smooth rich flesh at her collarbone. “And my hair had started to fall out.

  “After that, he brought me food every day when no one was watching. I was afraid that he would stop, but he didn’t. I got healthy again. My hair grew back. And Noriyoshi started to walk with me when I left the house on errands. He made me laugh at his jokes. And he started teaching me how to move, how to smile, how to talk to men. I must have learned my lessons well, because one day my owner said I didn’t have to work in the kitchen anymore. He had the maids dress me up in fine clothes. And from then on …”

  Her hand gestured toward her room and herself. “You know the rest of the story.”

  “Yes.” Sano could guess how Noriyoshi, with his artist’s eye, had spotted Wisteria’s potential. He’d saved her from a harsh fate. But not unselfishly: he’d no doubt put her in his debt in order to avail himself of her favors. Sano’s eyes went to the neckline of her kimono, where the swell of her breasts began. The blood surged to his loins. For a moment, he almost envied the dead man.

  Wisteria’s sharp glance rebuked him. “I know what you’re thinking,” she snapped. “But it wasn’t like that. Noriyoshi was never my lover. He preferred men, you see.”

  That could explain the drawing on the artist’s desk, Sano thought.

  “When I heard how he died, I was angry,” Wisteria said sadly. “Not because he’d fallen in love with that girl, or because she had managed to make him want her the way he never wanted me. But because he never told me. Never confided in me, the way he did about everything else. And now that you tell me he was murdered”—she swallowed—“I feel so ashamed of my anger.”

  Sano looked away tactfully as she struggled to control her tears. He was about to ask her again who Noriyoshi’s enemies were, when someone rapped on the door.

  Wisteria jumped to her feet. “Quick, quick!” She opened the cabinet door and gestured for Sano to get inside. “It’s my client. He mustn’t find you here.”

  From inside the dark cabinet, Sano heard her slide open the door. He heard a low male voice, and Wisteria making excuses. “… indisposed … sorry. Perhaps tomorrow night … many thanks.” The rustle of silk as they embraced. What would it feel like to hold her himself? He was glad when the door slid shut again, interrupting his fantasy. He stepped out of the cabinet to see Wisteria unceremoniously toss her client’s gift—a silk fan—on the dressing table.

  “Noriyoshi’s enemies?” she said in response to Sano’s question after they were settled again. “Which ones do you want to know about? All of them, or just the worst?”

  “Start with the worst.”

  Wisteria frowned, as if trying to decide who should head the list. “Kikunojo,” she said finally.

  “Kikunojo?” Sano repeated in surprise. “Not the Kabuki actor? Why would he have killed Noriyoshi?”

  She nodded, then shrugged. “Noriyoshi sometimes … accepted money from people in exchange for keeping their secrets.”

  Blackmail. The ugly, unspoken word hung between them. Sano saw Wisteria flush and pitied her for having to expose her friend’s flaws. But the flush reminded him of the way a woman looked when sensually excited, as did the way her breath quickened. His own excitement mounted. To add to his discomfort, the couple next door had abandoned their duet. A rhythmic thumping shook the thin walls. Sano looked away when Wisteria smiled briefly at him. She probably meant the smile as an apology for the noise, but to Sano, it said, “Wouldn’t you like to do what they’re doing?”

  To cover his embarrassment, Sano asked quickly, “So Noriyoshi was paid for his silence. By who else besides Kikunojo?”

  “One other that I know of. A sumo wrestler, but I don’t know his name.”

  Maybe one of Noriyoshi’s other friends would know. “Did Noriyoshi collect a large payment shortly before his death?” Sano asked, thinking of the gold he’d found in the artist’s room.

  Wisteria’s eyes misted. “Maybe. He said he was about to come into enough money to pay off my debt to the Heavenly Garden, and to start his own gallery. We were going to run it together. He even had a building picked out. One with rooms behind it where we could live. But I don’t know if he ever got the money.”

  Sano decided not to tell her about the gold that Cherry Eater had taken. It would only hurt her. Besides, the sum he’d seen, while considerable, wasn’t enough for such an enterprise. Noriyoshi must have been expecting much more. Maybe Kikunojo had killed him to avoid having to pay.

  “Kikunojo might very well have murdered Noriyoshi,” Wisteria said bitterly, echoing Sano’s thoughts. “He threatened to do it. And Noriyoshi’s other enemies—” She reeled off a long list of people, both samurai and commoners, that Noriyoshi had owed money to, offended, or cheated. “I don’t think they cared enough to kill him.”

  Here at last was some information he could take to Magistrate Ogyu. Bowing, Sano said, “My thanks, Lady Wisteria. I’ll do everything in my power to bring Noriyoshi’s murderer to justice.”

  He rose to leave … and found himself unable to move away from Wisteria. Her eyes drew him into their dark depths; her body reached for him without moving. He gazed at her helplessly, longingly.

  “Wait.” Wisteria caught his sleeve. “Don’t leave me alone.�
� She tried to pull him back down to the floor. “Stay with me tonight.”

  Sano pulled away. His manhood, already erect, now sprang to full, demanding life at the thought of lying with her. He saw now that for the whole time he’d spent with her, she’d been subtly, deliberately seducing him. His whole body ached for her. But there was no way he could afford her price.

  “I’m sorry, my lady,” he managed to say, removing his sleeve from her grasp. “Please.” Please don’t make me humiliate myself by admitting that I’m too poor to have you.

  She stood, playing the fingers of one hand down the length of his arm. “No, you don’t understand. I ask nothing of you.” Her other hand stroked his chest. “Nothing except … you.”

  “Why?” Sano couldn’t believe that a yūjo who kept company with the wealthiest, most powerful men in Edo would want him. Who cares why, his body asked as his skin tingled under her touch.

  “Because with you, I don’t have to hide my sorrow.”

  She stepped away from him. With a graceful gesture, she slipped the knot of her sash. Her kimono opened, then fell away from her body. Naked, she stood before him. Her breasts were small and round. Her arms and legs were slender, her skin a flawless golden ivory. At her shaven pubis, trademark of all yūjo, the delicate cleft of her womanhood showed. Beneath her perfume, Sano could smell her natural scent, pungent and intoxicating. She took his hands and lifted them to her breasts.

  A moan escaped Sano when his fingers touched her nipples. Then he recoiled as she closed her mouth over his. Like other samurai, he’d experienced the pleasures of sex often enough—with his neighbors’ maids, or with girls he met in the entertainment districts of Nihonbashi. But he’d never tried seppun, the exotic practice of touching mouths that had been introduced to Japan by the banished foreign barbarians.