The Hell Screen - [Sugawara Akitada 02]

by I. J. Parker

  Akitada pushed the boy forward without loosening his grip. “You claim to care about your children. Open your eyes!” he challenged the big man. “Look at him! Today he tried to grab a few coppers from my sash, but in another year or two he’ll be pulling knives on helpless old men and women. Do you want him to turn to murder or be killed himself ? How many of your boys are running wild now? How many of your sons end up dead or in chains?”

  The other men’s muttering turned angry, but the big man stared at the youngster, and Akitada could see his conviction waver. “Kinjiro’s a good kid, one of eight,” the man said defensively. “I know his folks. They’re poor like the rest of us. His father’s been sick and his mother’s just had another kid. Maybe he just bumped into you. Hey, Kinjiro? Did you try to take the gentleman’s money?”

  The boy burst into tears and sobbed explanations in a dialect which Akitada could not make out. But as the big man listened, his face lengthened. When the boy stopped with a sniffle and a swipe at his running nose, he put a big paw on the thin shoulder for a moment. “All right,” he said. “Don’t worry! I’ll take care of it. You go home now.” He looked at Akitada. “You can let him go. I’m Hayata, the warden of this quarter, and I’ll go talk to them. The new babe died this morning and they have no money for a funeral.”

  “Oh.” Akitada released the boy instantly. “I am sorry,” he said, helpless in the face of such sadness and so extreme a want. His hand went to his sash for money, but he changed his mind. He had no proof if what he had been told was true or merely a trick to get his money.

  The bearded giant nodded to the youngster. “Off you go! And don’t ever let me catch you and Yoshi again.” Then he waved away the other men, who dispersed quickly. When they were alone, he gestured to Akitada’s clothes and remarked, “It is easy to see that this is not your kind of place, sir. Best go home now.” Having said this, he turned and walked quickly after the boy.

  The message was clear: he was not welcome. Angered by this reception into stubborn persistence, Akitada brushed off his robe and crossed the street to the temple.

  He entered through the sagging gateway and wandered about the vast courtyard filled with people gathered around open fires or haggling with vendors. Children tumbled about among the adults, shouting and chasing each other. Near one of the fires, ragged men sat on the ground gambling with dice. On the temple steps, a storyteller held a group of gaping adults and children spellbound. And everywhere men and women were selling things: cheap wine, soup, amulets, vegetables, old clothes, chipped utensils, and medicinal drafts, potions, and balms for every imaginable ailment. And ailments there appeared to be many. One man was missing an eye, another hobbled on a crutch, one foot hanging mangled and deformed, while near the storyteller an old crone sat coughing weakly into a bloodstained rag.

  In spite of these surroundings, Akitada became aware of a ravenous hunger. Following an appetizing smell, he made his way through a group of poor people, who fell back from him in silent awe, and found a young woman, cleaner than the rest, stirring a large pot of soup over a small fire. He held out some coppers, and she ladled a generous helping into an earthenware bowl.

  Warming his cold hands on the bowl, Akitada wished he could do the same for his ears. The soup appeared to consist mostly of assorted vegetables and beans. He took a cautious swallow. It was as good as it smelled. He thought he could make out turnip and cabbage, but there was another leafy vegetable, deep green, which had a slightly bitter but pleasant flavor. He emptied the bowl quickly and asked for another. The woman smiled at him this time and watched him eat. He asked her what the green vegetable was. Dock, she said. It was plentiful hereabouts, especially in the old monks’ burial grounds behind the temple.

  Akitada choked down the last bite and looked where she pointed. In a nearby open area some six or seven small boys were gathered near leaning wooden tablets where one of them was spinning a top. Akitada had played with tops himself as a youngster, and smiled. The boy with the top looked to be about five or six and was most adept. His top spun and danced, flew through the air, and returned. He made it dart in and out between his friends and kept it moving precisely where he wanted it.

  Akitada chuckled. “He’s good, that little one,” he said.

  The woman said proudly, “He’s my son. He loves his top. There’s not much else he can be good at, poor boy.”

  Akitada handed back his empty bowl and said, “What do you mean? He looks like a fine boy.”

  She cast a glance toward the children, and he saw that tears welled up in her eyes. “A fine cripple,” she said bitterly.

  Stunned by her words, Akitada looked again and saw now that the small boy was not merely holding his right arm close to his body but seemed to lack his forearm altogether. The right arm ended just below the elbow. Among his people, who relied on the skill and strength of their hands to make a living, he would be unable to support himself by any useful trade and become dependent on alms tossed him by the more fortunate. This part of the city was full of crippled beggars sitting at street corners and on the steps of temples with their begging bowls. Any number of accidents could cut short a productive life and reduce a man to this sort of misery. But this was only a child.

  Suddenly an unpleasant thought arose in his mind. Saburo had warned him that this temple had an unsavory reputation based on some gruesome local superstitions. It was said to be inhabited by flesh-eating demons who roamed its grounds after dark to attack unwary sinners on their way home from a debauch. The occasional discovery of a dismembered body testified to the truth of such stones, which were additionally embroidered by the warning that the unhappy souls of the dead had turned into hungry ghosts, forced to live near the temple, feeding on excrement and garbage while wailing for food. Akitada glanced around him with a shudder. Some of these poor living creatures looked hungry enough to be ghosts themselves.

  To still such imaginary horrors, he asked the mother what had happened to the child.

  “An accident, foolish boy. He won’t tell. A kind man brought him home. He said he found him by the road, bleeding, his severed arm gone, and a gold coin clutched in his other hand. Lucky this man found him and stopped the bleeding. He thinks my son saw the piece of gold in the road and was snatching it up just when a cartwheel caught his arm. Foolish child!” She sniffled and wiped her eyes.

  “A terrible accident,” Akitada said sympathetically. “What will you do about his future?”

  She cheered up a little. “Oh, he’ll be a monk. This same good person who found him got him a place at one of the big temples outside the city. May the Buddha bless him forever! It was a great relief to me.”

  Akitada looked at the boy again, the young face rosy-cheeked in the cold air, teeth glistening as he burst into triumphant laughter at performing a skillful trick. So kindness was not dead in this slum. Perhaps it was even more alive here than among the wealthy—an irony when the need here was so much greater and the resources so pitifully slender. And Akitada admitted grudgingly to himself that for once the monks were performing a useful and generous act in taking in this poor child.

  “I am glad,” he said. “He will do well. Look at how many friends he has made already.”

  She smiled. “At first the boys wouldn’t come near him. They thought the demons had caught him and eaten his arm and were going to come back and eat the rest of him. But in time they took to him because he’s so clever with his top. He’s a good boy.”

  The incident depressed Akitada further and he left the temple compound, glancing up with a shudder at the great hall which loomed dark and forbidding above the scrambling humanity. The temple of the flesh-eating demons!

  At the gate, Akitada asked directions to the Bamboo Hermitage from an old man selling incense sticks. He pointed down a narrow side street across from the temple.

  “Is it far?” Akitada asked, eyeing the unpainted row houses with small shuttered windows dubiously. He got no answer. The old man was making rasping noises in h
is throat and pointed to his mouth. He was dumb, another cripple. Akitada put some coins in his bowl and walked away.

  The narrow street resembled more an alley than an ordinary thoroughfare. It looked empty except for some debris and garbage, but Akitada kept his eyes open and soon noticed some furtive movement up ahead where a tangle of trees and the corner of a shed obscured the view. He felt sure that someone was hiding there and slowed his steps, cursing himself for setting out alone after having been warned. Suddenly there were quick steps behind him. They were accompanied by a familiar flapping sound, and Akitada whirled around. The bearded giant with the pockmarked face was blocking the lane behind him. Trapped! So much for the local warden, thought Akitada, and backed against a house wall.

  “Looking for someone?” the giant asked, smirking a little.

  Akitada looked him over. He appeared even bulkier than before, and infinitely more threatening in these surroundings. Looking to the right and left, Akitada searched for a weapon. There was nothing but a loose piece of lath a few steps away. It was shorter than a man, part of a broken fence, a puny weapon, but Akitada had some skill at stick fighting. He inched toward it, asking, “What do you want?”

  The giant followed his eyes and made a strange rumbling deep in his chest. It sounded exactly like a dog’s growl, and Akitada moved a little faster toward the thin length of wood. The pockmarked face split into a broad, gap-toothed grin and the growl became a chuckle. “I mean you no harm,” the giant said, raising both hands to show he carried no weapon. “Just making sure you’re all right. This place is a bit rough and we don’t get rich gentlemen very often. If you’ll tell me where you’re going, I’ll walk with you.”

  It was an impasse. The man could, of course, be lying. But there was something about him worth taking a chance on, and after a moment, Akitada detached himself from the wall. “Thank you. I thought I saw someone hiding up ahead. I am on my way to a place called Bamboo Hermitage.”

  The warden raised bushy brows. “So! Old Noami’s got another customer. Well, come along, then. We think a lot of Noami around here. He’s got an open hand when it comes to the poor.”

  Akitada felt himself flush. He reached into his sash and produced a string of coppers. “I have been thinking about that youngster’s family,” he said. “Perhaps you might give them this to help bury the little one.” -

  The big man looked astonished, but he took the money, saying, “Thank you, sir. May the gods reward you for your kindness. It was the only time that boy’s ever been in trouble and he’ll never do it again. Well, let’s be on our way, then.”

  He strode off, his torn boot soles slapping the frozen ground. Akitada followed.

  When they got to the shed, two rough characters jumped out into the street, barring their way. The moment they saw his companion, their ferocious scowls turned to horror and they bolted.

  “Hah!” shouted the warden after them. “Come back here! I’ve seen you bastards! Don’t think that you’ll get your ration this week, you dirty scoundrels!” They paid no heed, and he muttered angrily, shaking his fist.

  “Do you know them?” Akitada asked, astonished.

  “Do I!” he grumbled. “They’ll be sorry! Well, there you are! That’s Noami’s place over there! Excuse me, but I’ve got to go catch those two. Don’t hang about till dark, and take the other way out. There’s a busy street that way.” He gestured ahead, the way the two would-be robbers had gone, and strode off after them, boots flip-flapping in a purposeful manner.

  The Bamboo Hermitage had been named for the dense growth of bamboo around the thatched buildings. A tall fence woven from bamboo canes surrounded the property. Next to the gate a small sign, beautifully lettered in Chinese, proclaimed its name and identified it as an “artist’s studio.” Both gate and fence were in excellent repair and reinforced with beams and sharpened bamboo spikes along the top. No wonder Noami took precautions against thieves in this neighborhood, thought Akitada. Considering the fortifications, he was mildly surprised when the gate swung open at his touch.

  He entered, calling out, but got no answer. It was very silent here. Only the dry bamboo leaves rustled in the cold air. Bamboo grew so thickly and so tall that the tops screened out the sky, and Akitada walked in their shade between the dense, thick canes to the front door. When he reached it, a raucous cry overhead made him jump. A chain rattled above him, and then another cry sounded. Akitada peered up cautiously and saw a huge black crow on a projecting roof beam, eyeing him with its beady eyes and fluffing up its feathers. The chain around one claw was fastened to the beam and clinked again.

  Apparently the bird was a primitive yet effective system for announcing visitors. Akitada waited for the artist to appear, but nothing happened. He could see through the open door into a large dim hall. Scrolls hung suspended from rafters, and long tables held pots of paints and stacks of papers. A half-painted screen stood near a set of sliding doors at the back.

  Akitada called out again, the crow joining in his effort. When this noise produced no better results, he took off his boots and stepped onto the wooden floor of the hall to look around. Almost instantly an irrational feeling of danger seized him, and the hairs on the back of his head rose.

  Too much talk of demons, he thought, and forced himself to look around. The wooden floor of the hall was dull with dirt and splotches of paint and ink. New rolls of paper and silk lay stacked in a big pile in one corner. From the low, smoke-darkened beam in the center of the room hung a heavy bronze lantern, suspended by a chain from a massive hook. The studio had the appearance of belonging to someone who cared nothing for comfort or cleanliness, and everything for his work.

  Akitada strolled over to the half-finished screen and saw an autumn scene in the forest. In the foreground some large rocks had been sketched in with elegant strokes of black ink, and the background was a misty wash of blue and gray, subtly hinting at wooded mountainsides. But a leaning maple tree in the center was already outlined and painted in all its crimson glory, every leaf daintily detailed, so real that one could almost see it trembling in the breeze. A similarly realistic large black crow, a double of the one outside, perched on one of the rocks, and a few sparrows were pecking at seeds in the foreground.

  Small dishes of paint and containers of water stood about in front of the screen, along with bowls containing remnants of dried food and half -eaten pickles. Brushes of all sizes lay everywhere. Akitada bent to touch one dish filled with crimson paint. It was still moist. So the painter had been at work here not too long ago. Where could he be?

  Akitada slid open one of the back doors. They led to a garden behind the house. A vast wilderness of vegetation had closed in on the building here also. He thought he could hear faint sounds from the far corner of the property. “Hoh! Is anyone home?” bellowed Akitada. “Master Noami?” He thought he heard a shout, but nobody came and Akitada turned back to his exploration of the studio.

  Idly, he wandered around, picking up loose sketches of flowers and birds, marveling at the painstaking skill of execution. Toshikage had not exaggerated. This man was a consummate, even obsessive artist.

  He was just bending over the large stack of sketches which had been piled higgledy-piggledy into a dark corner when there was the sudden sound at the back door. Almost simultaneously he heard a string of curses and rapid slapping footsteps across the floor.

  Akitada turned quickly. A short, wiry individual in a dirty, paint-smeared monk’s robe glared at him from a head shaped like a kickball, his skull shaven but covered with a thin stubble, the eyes like dark berries on either side of a flat nose, and the mouth a mere slash above the thin strands of a chin beard. He was neither young nor old, indisputably ugly, and indefinably menacing.

  “Get away from there, you whoreson piece of excrement!” the odd creature screeched at Akitada, waving his arms in the air as if he were shooing away dogs. “Away, I say! Don’t touch anything!”

  The unexpected crudity, exceeding as it did even the most
extreme example of disrespect, shocked Akitada. Looking at this astonishing being, he had the disconcerting feeling of having walked into some demonic tale, so unreal seemed the encounter and so grotesque the person’s appearance and manner. Perhaps the man was mad.

  He stepped quickly away from the sketches and raised his hands into the air. “I beg your pardon,” he said. “No one answered my calls when I arrived.”

  The wiry man said nothing, just stood scowling and studied him with his beadlike eyes as if he were memorizing every line of his face, every hair or fold of his robe. He was barefoot, his feet liberally caked with mud, his hands covered with earth. Akitada decided that this must be the painter’s assistant, evidently a half-wit. “Where is your master?” he demanded.

  The man said in his strange high voice, “I’m Noami. Who wants to know?”

  Akitada suppressed his surprise and introduced himself, explaining his errand.

  “A screen?” asked the painter, relaxing visibly. “Like that one?” He jerked a thumb toward the autumn scene.