Sano Ichiro 9 The Perfumed Sleeve (2004)

by Laura Joh Rowland

  “I don’t remember.”

  Okitsu ducked her head. Sano bent down to peer into her face. Her eyes were so wide with terror that rings of white showed around the pupils. Her story now suggested that she and the actor had been apart long enough for him, as well as her, to kill Makino—if Daiemon hadn’t.

  “There’s something else you neglected to tell my chief retainer,” said Sano. “Yesterday he visited Rakuami, your former master. Rakuami said you hated Senior Elder Makino so much that you tried to commit suicide rather than be his concubine. Is it true?”

  A gulp that ended in a retch convulsed Okitsu; her arms wrapped tight around her stomach. “No.”

  “Then Rakuami was lying?”

  “No!”

  “Either he lied about you, or you hated Makino. Which is it?” Sano said.

  “I didn’t hate him. I mean, I did at first, but…” Okitsu babbled, “After I’d lived with him awhile, and he was so kind to me, I was grateful to him, and I didn’t hate him anymore, I loved him very much…”

  She’d told Sano what he needed to know about her feelings toward Makino. “You said you knew Daiemon from parties. Were they parties at Rakuami’s club?”

  “I don’t remember,” Okitsu said. She moaned while clutching her stomach.

  “Was he a client that you entertained for Rakuami?”

  “I don’t remember.”

  Her favorite answer didn’t convince Sano, for he observed the blush that reddened the back of her neck above her kimono: Even Okitsu, who must have served many men at the club, hadn’t forgotten that she’d served Daiemon. “When was the last time you saw him?”

  Okitsu moved her head from side to side, then up, then down, as if trying to catch thoughts that sped and jumbled in her mind. “It was—it was the night Senior Elder Makino died.”

  “Think again,” Sano said. “Was it yesterday evening instead?” No.

  “Where were you last night?”

  “I was… with Koheiji.”

  Her favorite alibi didn’t convince Sano either. “He went out alone. You left here after he did.”

  “I was with him. I was!” Okitsu began sobbing.

  “Did you meet Daiemon at the Sign of Bedazzlement?” Sano said. “Were you his mistress?”

  “No!”

  “Did you go to him there last night? Did you stab him to death?”

  “I didn’t meet him! I didn’t kill anyone!”

  A terrible stench of diarrhea arose: Okitsu’s bowels had moved. Ibe grimaced in disgust. “Let’s get out of here,” he said. He and Otani and their troops herded Sano and his men outside, where they gathered on the veranda. Hemmed in by his watchdogs, Sano stood at the railing. In the garden, the sand was pocked by raindrops, the boulders dark and slick with moisture. Distant war drums throbbed; distant gunshots cracked die cold air.

  “The girl lied about seeing Daiemon the night of Makino’s death,” Ibe said. “Her alibis for both murders stink like fish ten days old.”

  Sano agreed, but he said, “That doesn’t mean she’s guilty.” And he didn’t think she was. She seemed incapable of stabbing or beating a man to death—at least without help. Yet she could be the common factor in both murders, if indeed they were connected.

  “Why else would she lie?” Otani said with disdain.

  “To protect someone else,” Sano suggested. “To hide secrets that have nothing to do with the murders.”

  “Well, as far as I’m concerned, she’s as good as guilty,” said Ibe, “and so is the widow.”

  “Arrest one or the other,” said Otani.

  “Choose now. Waste no more time,” Ibe said.

  Sano didn’t budge, although he could feel the pressure of their wills against his and he envisioned Masahiro, tiny and helpless, surrounded by their thugs. “Not yet,” he said. “Not based on such flimsy evidence.”

  Ibe expelled a curse. “You’ve got two women who hated Makino, had the opportunity to kill him, and gave unsatisfactory accounts of their actions on the nights of his murder and Daiemon’s. What more do you want?”

  Sano wanted to assure himself that he wasn’t persecuting an innocent person, subverting justice, and compromising his honor, but he didn’t expect his watchdogs to have any sympathy for that. “At the very least, I must prove what the women were up to during the time when Daiemon was killed. That means tracing their whereabouts last night. Until I’ve done that, I’ll not arrest anyone.”

  Ibe and Otani leaned over the railing and looked at each other across Sano. He discerned their reluctance to use the threat they held over him. Cowards both, they were as afraid of hurting Masahiro and provoking Sano’s wrath as Sano was of having his son harmed. A deadlock paralyzed everyone. In a lull of battle noises, Sano heard rain trickling down a drain spout.

  Finally, the watchdogs exchanged nods, their expressions churlish. “All right,” Ibe told Sano. “You can trace the women’s whereabouts. But no dragging your feet.”

  Sano felt little relief. Could he keep stalling his watchdogs until he solved the crimes—and before impatience forced them to make good on their threat?

  In the meantime, war might destroy them all.

  On a fallow rice field outside Edo, the two armies clashed. Matsudaira horsemen charged at mounted troops from the Yanagisawa faction. Banners marked with their leaders’ crests fluttered on poles worn on their backs. Hooves pounded the earth; lances skewered riders on both sides. Foot soldiers whirled and darted, their swords lashing their enemies. Gunners at the sidelines fired volleys of bullets. Arrows sizzled through clouds of gunpowder smoke. Men fell, amid howls of agony, in mud already strewn with corpses and darkened by bloodshed.

  From the combatants rose savage cries of exultation as they shattered the peace that had stifled the warrior spirit during almost a century of Tokugawa rule. Atop high terrain at either end of the field, generals on horseback surveyed the action. They called to the commanders, who conveyed their orders to the troops via braying conch trumpets and thundering war drums. Soldiers charged, attacked, retreated, regrouped, and counterattacked. Scouts scanned the battlefield through spyglasses, counting casualties.

  The victor would be the man who had a large enough army left after the battle to maintain himself in power over the regime.

  At the Matsudaira estate, black mourning drapery festooned the portals. A notice of the clan’s bereavement hung on the gate. Inside a wooden tub in a chamber in the private quarters, the naked corpse of Daiemon reposed. Matsudaira womenfolk dressed in white poured water out of dippers filled from ceramic urns into the tub. They wept as they bathed Daiemon, washing away blood from the wound in his chest, tenderly wiping his handsome, lifeless face.

  Lord Matsudaira squatted nearby, his head propped on his clenched fists. He wore battle armor, but his golden-horned helmet lay on the floor beside him. As the women prepared his nephew for the journey to the netherworld, grief tortured his spirit.

  Someone knelt beside him, and he looked around to see Uemori Yoichi, his crony on the Council of Elders. Uemori was a short, squat man in his fifties, with sagging jowls. He said, “Please pardon my intrusion, but I thought you would want to hear the latest news from the battlefield.”

  “Yes? What is it?” Lord Matsudaira said, momentarily distracted from his torment.

  “Casualties are estimated at two hundred men,” Uemori said, “with more than half of them on Chamberlain Yanagisawa’s side.”

  Grim satisfaction filled Lord Matsudaira. He rose and walked to the corpse of his nephew. The women had lifted Daiemon from the tub and laid him on a wooden pallet. As they dried his body with cloths and sobbed bitterly, Lord Matsudaira gazed down at Daiemon.

  “I’ll win this war in your name,” Lord Matsudaira promised. “You won’t have lived or died for nothing. And when I rule Japan, I will expose Chamberlain Yanagisawa as the scoundrel and murderer that he is.”

  Chamberlain Yanagisawa and his son Yoritomo stood in a watchtower on the wall of his compoun
d. They gazed through the barred windows, across Edo. Mist and smoke obscured the field where the battle raged. Distance muffled the blaring of conch trumpets. Yanagisawa inhaled deeply, his keen nose detecting the faint, sulfurous odor of gunpowder. He imagined he tasted blood in the air. Exultation pulsed alongside dread inside him.

  “I’ve heard that some of our allies have defected to Lord Matsudaira,” said Yoritomo. “That he has three troops for every two of ours, and more guns. Things are bad for us, aren’t they, Honorable Father?”

  Yanagisawa nodded, for he couldn’t deny the truth. “But don’t despair. We’ve other weapons against Lord Matsudaira besides troops and guns.”

  He looked out the open door, which led to an enclosed corridor that ran along the top of the wall. Some twenty paces down the corridor, in the dim light from its tiny windows, stood his wife. She watched Yanagisawa with such intensity that he could feel her gaze like flames licking his body. He smiled slyly to himself as he turned back to Yoritomo.

  “There are other ways to destroy our enemy than fighting on a battlefield.” Yanagisawa laid a reassuring hand on his son’s shoulder. “When we’re finished, we’ll control the regime.”

  And he would be above the law, immune to evil consequences from the murder investigation.

  * * *

  27

  A party that evening in the reception hall of Senior Elder Makino’s estate mocked the threat posed by the war.

  While Koheiji played the samisen and sang, male servants beat drums. Okitsu and two maids danced in a circle, singing along, tipsy and giggling. Other maids poured sake for samurai guards who lounged around the room, laughing, calling out encouragement to the dancers, and toasting one another. The widow and her ladies-in-waiting sat in a corner, drinking. Agemaki’s eyes were glazed; she swayed back and forth. Lanterns glowed brightly. A desperate, uneasy gaiety infused the air.

  Reiko, who’d sneaked away from the kitchen, peered in through a gap between the lattice-and-paper partitions. A door across the room from her scraped open. Into the party strode Tamura. His face wore an angry scowl.

  “Stop this racket!” he shouted.

  Koheiji plinked a few last, discordant notes on the samisen. As his singing trailed off, the drummers fell silent; Okitsu and the dancers stumbled to a halt, their giggles ending in nervous twitters. The guards put down their cups and sat upright; their cheer gave way to apprehension. All the revelers stared in surprise at Tamura.

  “What do you think you’re doing?” Tamura demanded, surveying the revelers with contempt.

  Reiko was glad to witness something more than drunken merriment and glad to see Tamura, whom she’d not had a chance to observe since yesterday in Makino’s chamber.

  After a brief, uncomfortable silence, Koheiji said, “We’re just having a little fun.”

  “Fun? With the honorable Senior Elder Makino dead only four days?” Tamura said, incredulous. His hard, shiny complexion turned purplish-red with rage. “You ought to be ashamed of yourselves. Such disrespect toward your master! Such disregard for propriety!”

  He pointed at the guards. “Get back to your posts.” The men leaped to their feet and collided with one another in their haste to leave the room. Tamura dismissed the maids and ladies-in-waiting, then addressed Agemaki, Koheiji, and Okitsu: “As for you, there will be no more such entertainment.”

  His back was toward Reiko, so she couldn’t see his expression, but she had a clear view of the other three people. She saw guilt on Okitsu’s face, blankness on Agemaki’s, and offense on Koheiji’s.

  “Hey, you can’t order us around,” Koheiji said. “You’re not our master. We’ll do as we please.”

  “I’m in charge here for the time being,” Tamura said. “My master is gone, and I needn’t put up with nonsense from you three for his sake anymore. You’ll behave properly from now on. Now go to your rooms at once.”

  Reiko saw anger focus Agemaki’s blank gaze. Okitsu gasped in offense. “Can he make us?” she asked Koheiji.

  “Of course he can’t.” Koheiji’s chest swelled with outrage as he glared at Tamura. “I’m not going anywhere.”

  “Nor am I,” Agemaki said, her voice slurred by drink.

  “We’ll see about that,” Tamura said. He stalked over to Agemaki, seized her arm, and hauled her to her feet.

  “Let me go!” she cried. “How dare you treat your master’s widow like this!”

  “You’re nothing but a whore who took advantage of an old man,” Tamura said. “I’ve seen you fawn over Senior Elder Makino, then gag behind his back. I warned him that you were a selfish, greedy witch and up to no good, but did he listen? No—the fool married you anyway. Well, you’ve wrung your last bit of gold from him. Your days here are numbered.”

  Agemaki shouted protests, clawing at his arm, but he dragged her toward the door. On the way, he grabbed Okitsu.

  “No!” shrieked Okitsu. “Help me, Koheiji-san!”

  She flung out her hand toward the actor. As he and Tamura tugged her in opposite directions, she reeled between them.

  “Let go of her,” Koheiji shouted.

  “You two are the scum of the earth,” Tamura said, struggling with Agemaki. “I’ve seen you playing your filthy sex games with my master, distracting him from duty, sinking him into degradation. None of you respected or cared for him. You’re all nothing but parasites who fed on his wealth!”

  “Hey! What about you? Do you think you’re so much better than us?” Koheiji said. He and Tamura yanked on Okitsu, who squealed. “You lived off Makino, too. You’d be nothing if not for him. And everybody knows you hated him because he wasn’t the virtuous samurai you wanted him to be.”

  “You’ll regret that you dared speak to me with such disrespect,” Tamura said, his eyes black with fury. “Especially if I find out that one of you killed my master.” Tamura moved toward the door, dragging Agemaki. With brutal strength, he hauled Koheiji as well as Okitsu along after him. “I’ll carry out my vendetta and make you pay with your own life for his death.”

  “Oh, I’m sure you’d love to have the murder pinned on one of us,” Koheiji said, bracing his feet on the floor and clinging to the squealing, sobbing Okitsu. “That would get you off the hook, wouldn’t it? But do you know what I say? I say you murdered old Makino.” Brazen with anger and fear, he jabbed his index finger at Tamura. “You wanted to get rid of him, and us, as well. You killed four birds with one arrow.”

  Reiko wondered if Tamura had indeed killed Makino, for those very reasons. She recalled watching Tamura’s suspicious behavior in the hidden chamber. Perhaps he’d sought to purge the house, the clan, and himself of evil influences by killing Makino and banishing his hangers-on.

  But Reiko also recalled her suspicions regarding the other three.

  A sudden, fierce grip on her shoulder halted Reiko’s thoughts. She snapped her head around to find herself looking into the ugly, triumphant face of Yasue.

  “Hah! Caught you!” Yasue said.

  Her voice was so loud that the people in the room turned at the sound. Dismay filled Reiko as they ceased their tussling and peered in her direction.

  “What’s going on out there?” Tamura demanded.

  Reiko tore free of Yasue. She bolted, but the old woman caught her sleeve. They wrestled together, crashed against the partition. As the flimsy lattice and paper ripped and splintered, Reiko and Yasue stumbled, through the jagged hole they’d made, into the room. Tamura, Koheiji, Agemaki, and Okitsu stared in amazement.

  “Hey, hey,” the actor said.

  He let go of Okitsu and walked toward Reiko and Yasue. A mischievous grin lit up his face. Reiko understood that he was happy for a distraction that prevented Tamura from further mistreating him. Her heart sank as she also understood that his good luck was to be her downfall.

  “You’re the new maid, aren’t you?” Koheiji said to her. “What have you been up to?”

  “She’s been snooping,” Yasue said, her hand locked around Rei
ko’s wrist. “This is the second time I’ve caught her.”

  “Get her out of here,” Tamura ordered Yasue. “Don’t bother me with domestic problems.”

  Then he leaned toward Reiko for a closer look. As she shrank away from him, he frowned. “That’s odd,” he said. “Your eyebrows are shaved. And your teeth—”

  Reiko clamped her lips shut, but he pried them apart with his strong fingers.

  “They’ve been dyed,” Tamura said. “You’re no peasant—you’re a lady.”

  The actor blinked at Reiko. “And not an old one, either,” he said, rubbing Reiko’s hair between his fingers. “That isn’t gray hair, it’s soot. I should have known—I’ve used that trick myself in the theater.”

  “Who are you? What are you doing here?” Tamura said, hostile and suspicious.

  “I’m a poor woman who has fallen on hard times,” Reiko said, feigning a humble commoner’s speech, desperate to conceal her true identity and purpose. “I’m here to earn my living.”

  Disbelief showed on the faces around her. Yasue said, “I knew there was something not right about her. It was strange that the estate manager should hire her, because I can tell she’s never worked a day in her life.”

  Koheiji said, “I remember you waited on Okitsu and me yesterday. You seemed a little too interested in us.”

  “In me, too,” Agemaki said. “When she brought my meal, she tried to hang around me, even though it was obvious that I didn’t want her.”

  “She must be a spy,” Tamura said.

  Quiet descended. Reiko felt as if Tamura’s words had depleted all the air from the room. But at least she’d managed to learn a few things about the members of the household. Now she sensed them wondering how much she’d observed, to their detriment.

  “Whose spy are you?” Tamura demanded. He seized Reiko’s chin in a painful grip, wrenching her face upward and glaring into her eyes. “Are you working for Lord Matsudaira? Did he send you to report on Senior Elder Makino’s household?”

  Startled by his erroneous assumption, Reiko kept silent. His hands quickly felt along her body. He found the dagger strapped to her thigh under her skirts, tore it off, and threw it aside. A dreadful moment passed while Tamura contemplated her.