SI1 Shinju (1994)

by Laura Joh Rowland

  “No reflection on your establishment, but I’d rather keep them with me,” Sano told him.

  Gorobei led them across a small but pretty garden to the guest quarters. Climbing the steps of a narrow veranda, he slid open a door. The room, just large enough to sleep two men, was bare and clean. Its only furnishings were the tatami mats, a charcoal brazier, and a wall cabinet to hold bedding and the guests’ personal items. Gorobei lit the brazier and the lamps that stood beside it. Then he smiled and bowed.

  “I hope these poor lodgings will serve, masters. The bathhouse and privy are that way.” He pointed.”Please let me know if there is anything you need. “ With another bow, he bustled off toward the entranceway, where voices indicated that another party had arrived.

  Once bathed, dressed in a comfortable robe, and enclosed in the warm, bright little room, Sano felt his tension melt away. Physical comfort made all threats seem distant and unreal.

  “I’m starving,” Tsunehiko announced, wheezing as he knelt beside the brazier. “When do we eat?”

  As if in answer to his question, the door slid open. A maid entered on her knees. She bowed, then gave them two trays that held generous portions of fish, rice, vegetables, and soup. Sano, weary of scrutinizing every face he saw, was glad that inns had no public dining rooms and guests ate in their own quarters. The maid poured the tea and sake, then withdrew.

  “Good stuff,” Tsunehiko mumbled, his mouth full.

  Sano nodded in agreement. The rice was fragrant, the vegetables and soup well seasoned and savory. Ryokan Gorobei offered good value for its prices. He must remember to leave a generous tip. The knot of worry in his stomach loosened, releasing a voracious hunger. He ate almost as much as Tsunehiko, leaving only a portion of untouched radish pickle for his disappointed secretary to finish.

  “My, it’s noisy,” Tsunehiko remarked as they finished their last cups of sake. “What are they doing over there?”

  He leaned over and started to slide back the window panel.

  “Don’t-” Sano flung out a hand to stop him.

  Tsunehiko looked around in surprise. “Why not?”

  Sano dropped his hand. “Never mind,” he said. He didn’t want to reveal their whereabouts, but he couldn’t resist looking outside. Maybe this time he would see the watcher. “Go ahead.”

  Tsunehiko opened the window. The laughter and music that had grown steadily louder during their meal rushed in on a cold gust of wind. Sano looked across the garden toward the other guest rooms. Through the open window of one, he saw a group of samurai. A woman in bright kimono, probably the inn’s “waitress,” knelt in their midst, playing the samisen. One of the samurai struck a clownish pose and began to sing in an off-key voice. The others roared with laughter. In another room, two priests chanted sutras. Sano turned his gaze to another wing that stood a little apart from the rest. Was the watcher one of those shadowy forms silhouetted in flickering lamplight against the translucent windows? Or was he staying at another inn, ready to pick up their trail in the morning? Maybe he lurked somewhere in the darkness beyond the village. Safe within his own cozy room, listening to the ordinary noises, Sano could almost believe that the watcher posed no danger to them.

  Almost.

  Tsunehiko yawned. “I’m so tired,” he said.

  Sano yawned, too. His body’s need for sleep was fast overcoming his mind’s desire to stay alert. When the maid returned to fetch the trays, he asked her to set out their bedding. Then he put on his cloak and swords.

  “I’m going out for some fresh air,” he told Tsunehiko. He didn’t want to frighten his secretary, but he wanted to take one last look for the watcher, and assure himself that they would be safe for the night.

  Outside, he made a circuit of the courtyard, which had grown quiet as the parties wound down and the guests prepared for bed. He looked out onto the deserted street. A few lanterns still burned outside the teahouses and inns. On the way back to his own door, Sano greeted the nightwatchman, a younger version of Gorobei who must be the innkeeper’s son. Otherwise he saw no one. He no longer felt the watcher’s presence. Was his own fatigue making him less sensitive to it?

  Back inside the room, he locked the windows and doors, frowning at the flimsy wooden catches designed more to ensure privacy than security. Tsunehiko already lay asleep on the floor, his fat body hidden under the quilt with only the top of his head showing. His daytime wheezes had turned into soft, phlegmy snores. Sano shed his cloak and swords and extinguished the lamps. He lay down on his futon, drawing the quilt over himself. As drowsiness descended upon him, he heard the rhythmic beat of the night-watchman’s wooden clappers signaling “All is well.” But his hand reached out from under the quilt, toward the weapons that lay beside him. With his last conscious effort, he grasped the hilt of his long sword and unsheathed it.

  Sano slept.

  In the garden of the Ryokan Gorobei, the watcher waited behind a spreading pine tree. As midnight drew near, lamps no longer burned in the guest quarters. The inn’s grounds lay in almost total darkness, illuminated only by a diffuse glow from the star-pricked sky. Shrubs and buildings loomed blackly over gravel paths that gave back a dim reflection of the starlight. Only the wind’s restless movement animated the night, rattling the darkened paper lanterns and the trees’ bare branches.

  Then footsteps crunched on the path. A yellow light rounded one wing of the guest quarters. The nightwatchman appeared, lantern slung over one arm, clappers in his hands, and a sturdy wooden club hanging from his sash. He was making his rounds, as he had done without pause since sundown. He strolled past the buildings, stopping beside each door.

  In the lantern’s light, the watcher could see the man’s round, cheerful face beneath his straw hat, see his breath clouding the cold air. He held his own breath, willing himself to become part of the tree that hid him. But he had no real fear of discovery yet. He knew from long observation that the man came into the garden every third round and only as far as its edge during the others. He exhaled when, just as he’d expected, the man turned and passed through the gate that led to the street. A moment later, the footsteps sounded again, the light came around the building, and the whole routine repeated itself.

  But now the sight of the man filled the watcher with impotent rage. How would he get inside Sano’s room-and out again- without the miserable fool seeing him? He could approach the door while the nightwatchman was out in the street, but what if he was unable to force it open quickly enough? The nightwatchman would return and sound the alarm on his clappers. The whole village would awaken and descend upon the grounds like a swarm of demons.

  The watcher tried to persuade himself to give up and wait for another chance, along the road tomorrow or at the next night’s rest stop. But a consuming urge to finish his deed now, tonight, kept him in his place. This time, when the man finished inspecting the garden and turned toward the gate, the watcher moved out from behind the tree.

  His hands grasped the man’s neck. He squeezed, crushing the soft, warm flesh and rigid sinew.

  The man let out a choked cry. He stiffened and dropped his lantern and clappers. His body thrashed; his legs flailed. He gasped and wheezed, fighting for air. His fingers clawed the watcher’s, trying frantically to break their grip.

  The watcher held fast, clenching his teeth with the effort. He barely felt the pain as those scratching nails tore at his knuckles. Soon the man’s struggles weakened. His gasps ceased; his hands dropped. He twitched for a moment more, then went limp. The watcher eased the lifeless body to the ground and dragged it into the shrubbery. He snuffed out the fallen lantern. Darkness enveloped him in its protective cloak. A sense of absolute power swelled inside him. No one stood in his way now.

  He moved across the garden toward Sano’s door.

  Screams and moans echoed in Sano’s ears as he walked again through the foul-smelling corridors of Edo Jail. This time his guide was not Mura the eta but Magistrate Ogyu, his black ceremonial robes sweeping the fi
lthy floor.

  Ogyu stopped at the end of the corridor and threw open a door. “Come, Yoriki Sano,” he called, his high, reedy voice nearly drowned out by the cries of the prisoners. “Come and experience the fate of those who disobey orders and leave their obligations unfulfilled!”

  Sano didn’t want to go. He didn’t want to know what lay beyond that door. But an unseen force propelled him down the corridor. Almost sobbing with terror, he fell to his knees, seizing the magistrate’s robes.

  “Please… no… ”

  Ogyu laughed. “Where is your samurai courage now, Yoriki Sano?” he mocked.

  With a mighty kick, he sent Sano flying through the door to land inside the room on hands and knees. Sano cried out, once in surprise, then again in shock at the sight that met his eyes.

  Inside the morgue, Mura and Dr. Ito stood on either side of a dissection table. Mura held a long razor and had a white cloth tied over the lower half of his face. As Dr. Ito raised a beckoning hand, Sano noticed something that turned him sick with fear.

  The table was empty. Waiting. For him.

  “No!” Sano screamed.

  The watcher stealthily mounted the stairs of the veranda outside Sano’s door. His straw sandals made no noise, but each footfall produced a soft creak as his weight bore down on the wooden planks. He tried the door.

  Locked. He unsheathed his dagger. Sliding it between door and frame, he pushed on the catch. It gave way with a crack that almost startled him into dropping the dagger. He froze, listening.

  Only muffled snores came from inside the room. The noise hadn’t awakened them. Slowly, carefully, the watcher slid back the door. Dagger in hand, he squinted into the darkness of the room. There he could barely make out the two sleeping forms.

  Now…

  A loud gurgling sound awoke Sano. Suddenly Ogyu, Mura, Dr. Ito, and the morgue vanished. Sano gave a hoarse yell of surprise as he sat bolt upright in the darkness. Through the clinging haze of sleep, he saw a shadowy figure moving toward him. He cried out again, this time in sheer terror, as he instinctively lashed out at it with the sword that he still gripped in his hand. The figure leaped backward, turned, disappeared. Sano’s blade sliced empty air. Running footsteps shook the floor, then faded into the distance.

  Sano struggled free of the tangled bedcovers and jumped to his feet, sword ready. Fully awake now, he strained to see his surroundings and remember where he was. His heart still pounded; the lurid dream images of Edo Jail and the menacing intruder were still vivid in his memory. In his confusion, it took him a moment to recognize the dim confines of his room at the inn. All was quiet and peaceful. His fear should have subsided, yet he experienced the frightening conviction that something was very wrong. Every fiber of his being vibrated in alarm.

  The room felt oddly cold. An icy draft stirred the air, but didn’t obliterate the strong metallic odor that made Sano’s nostrils flare. Another peculiar scent-fainter, and musty, like dried herbs- prickled his throat and forced a sneeze from him. And there was something else different about the room, something missing.

  Tsunehiko’s snores. Sano no longer heard them-or any sound at all from the inert form next to him.

  “Tsunehiko?” he called.

  Bending over, he touched his secretary. And gasped, jerking his hand away. Something warm, wet, and faintly sticky coated the quilt. Filled with dread, he dropped his sword and groped around on the floor for the lamp and matches. It took his shaking hands three tries to light the wick. The lamp guttered, then flared into brightness. Sano looked at Tsunehiko.

  Shock stopped his heart, froze the words on his tongue. His lungs sucked in breath with a long, sharp hiss.

  Tsunehiko lay face up on the futon, the quilt pulled back to expose his neck and shoulders. Blood from the cruel gash in his throat, red and lustrous in the lamplight, stained his bedding and nightclothes. His sightless eyes gazed at the ceiling. He did not move, or speak, or make a sound.

  Chapter 15

  No!” Sano cried.

  Moaning, he knelt beside Tsunehiko. He ripped off his robe and pressed it to the terrible wound, trying to stanch the flow of blood that had already ceased. He slapped the boy’s cheeks in a desperate effort to revive him. But he knew in his heart that Tsunehiko was dead. That first horrifying look had told him.

  Now he understood the significance of the intruder, the strange gurgle, and the departing footsteps. He hadn’t dreamed them after all. Half asleep, oblivious to the danger, he’d heard Tsunehiko cry out as his throat was cut, and let the murderer escape afterward.

  “No!”

  Grief and rage exploded in Sano’s chest as he thought of Tsunehiko’s youthful innocence and cheerfulness. Not bothering to dress, he seized his sword. He registered the open door and splintered catch in the moment it took to hurl himself outside. The murderer-was it the mysterious watcher?-had entered and killed without difficulty. But he wouldn’t get away! A monstrous craving for vengeance howled inside Sano, one for which he hadn’t known he possessed the capacity. He wanted blood for blood. He wanted to call down the wrath of the gods. Barefoot, clad only in his loincloth, he stumbled into the freezing darkness of the garden. He thrashed his way blindly around the guest quarters, sword raised.

  “Stop! Murderer!” he shouted.

  As if in reply, rapid hoofbeats pounded away from the village and into the night.

  “Stop! Murderer!”

  Lights began to appear in the inn’s windows as Sano charged past them. He heard the guests stirring inside their rooms, and heard excited voices asking, “What is it? Who’s shouting?” But where was the nightwatchman? Having failed to keep the intruder away, he should now be summoning the checkpoint guards and village police with his clappers.

  Sano found no one lurking outside the guest quarters. Then, as he ran through the garden, his foot struck something. He tripped and went sprawling facedown. He gasped as his body hit not cold, hard ground, but something warmer and more yielding. Someone rushed up with a lantern and began to scream. Righting himself, Sano saw an old woman standing over him, her face stricken.

  “Jihei!” she screamed. “My son!” She burst into sobs.

  Sano looked at the thing he’d tripped over, and understood why the nightwatchman hadn’t sounded the alarm. Gorobei’s son lay motionless on his back. His terror-filled but lifeless eyes bulged; his tongue, protruding from between clenched teeth, oozed blood. Dark bruises encircled his throat. He was dead; strangled-probably by the same man who had killed Tsunehiko. Sano closed his eyes as the dizzying horror washed over him again. The woman’s sobs echoed his own anguish. He heard running footsteps and men’s voices. He opened his eyes to see his fellow guests, the samurai and priests, gathered around him.

  “Stay with her,” he ordered the priests, pointing at the distraught woman. To the dazed, bleary-eyed samurai: “Come with me! We have to catch the killer!”

  Without waiting for a response, he ran for the stables. The samurai, pudgy from easy living and the worse for tonight’s drinking, nevertheless rose to the challenge. In various states of undress, they panted after Sano, clutching their swords, bellies jiggling.

  But although Sano and his helpers searched up and down the road and all through the sleeping village, they found no one. The killer had simply vanished into the night.

  The next few hours passed in a blur. Sano endured them with every bit of the self-control and stoicism he possessed. He informed the grieving innkeeper that in addition to his son, a guest had been murdered. He reported the murders to the guards, who summoned the village police, elders, and headman. Everyone trooped over to the Ryokan Gorobei to see the bodies.

  “Are you sure he’s dead?” the headman kept asking anxiously as he hovered over Tsunehiko’s corpse.

  Sano knew that the death of an upper-class traveler meant much trouble and expense for a post town. It meant sending reports to the central highway administration in Edo, holding an inquest, notifying the next of kin, arranging for cremation of
the body or its transportation home. But the headman’s idiotic question made Sano’s precarious self-control snap.

  “Yes, of course he’s dead, you fool!” he shouted, throwing on his cloak over his shivering body. “So just forget about putting him in a kago and sending him on to the next town so he can die on someone else’s hands!”

  The headman gaped at him. Then he frowned. “How do we know you didn’t kill him yourself?”

  “This wasn’t robbery-murder,” one of the elders chimed in helpfully as he opened the cabinet and pawed through its contents. “Look, the money’s still here.” He held up Sano’s and Tsunehiko’s cash pouches.

  It had occurred to Sano that the officials might suspect him of committing the murders. Now he said, “Look at my weapons- there’s no blood on them. Even if I’d wanted to kill my companion, I wouldn’t have done it in our room. But if I had, I would have sneaked away instead of raising the alarm. I wouldn’t have needed to kill the nightwatchman, or to force the door.

  “If we’re to catch the killer, we must send a search party up and down the highway and out into the countryside. Now. Before he gets away.”

  Fortunately no one else took up the headman’s argument-due, Sano guessed, more to his status as a yoriki than to his explanation. But they hesitated so long over the decision to send the search party that Sano despaired of ever catching the killer. Three of the elders wanted to wait until daybreak; it was so dark, they said, that a search would be useless. The others thought it best to begin immediately-but they didn’t want to risk disturbing important guests at the inns. The headman threw up his hands in confusion. A young man who had only recently inherited his job from his father, he’d obviously never dealt with murder before. At last he announced that they would postpone the decision itself until he’d had more time to think about it.

  “Then let me organize the search,” Sano pleaded.”I’ll take full responsibility for any disturbance.”