Another stone hit Sato on the leg. He was limping now. He stared around, as pale and hollow-eyed as a ghost, then he and Sakurai turned and stumbled off.
Nobu’s heart was pounding hard still and his ears were ringing. Everything had happened so fast, there’d been no time to think. He’d protected Taka, he hadn’t done anything he need be ashamed of; nobody had even been hurt. But he knew this was just a first taste of war. Soon he’d be swept up in the real thing and there’d be no quarter for him or anyone.
‘If they’d come any closer I would have hacked them down with my halberd,’ Taka said quietly, brushing twigs from his hair. He nodded. Women had no need to know about war. It made his heart ache to see her, her face flushed with excitement, her eyes shining. Her hair had come loose and was hanging round her face in glossy strands. All too soon their time together would be over and he’d be back in the harsh world of the army.
People crowded out, filling the narrow lane, lobbing rocks after the fleeing figures. ‘Call yourselves soldiers? Go tell your generals to leave the Satsuma alone.’ An old man holding a rifle took a pot shot, making the retreating soldiers skip and jump.
Nobu unhitched his robe and pulled it down to hide his spats and he and Taka shook the dirt and leaves from their clothes and pushed open the gate.
The people outside were small and thin with nut-brown faces, dressed in traditional style, as if modern Tokyo didn’t exist. There were thin-cheeked women in baggy trousers and indigo work jackets, snotty-nosed barefoot children, gnarled war veterans with missing arms or legs and an old man with a couple of holes in his face instead of a nose. They had all been unable to go with the army or even flee. But although they were farmers and country dwellers, they were not afraid. They were a clan of warriors, ready to take on the enemy if need be.
They were all brothers-in-arms now, no one was suspicious of him and Taka. Nevertheless Nobu kept his mouth shut. It was best to play dumb. He didn’t want anyone to pick up on his Aizu accent. Taka was obviously well spoken and well bred and Nobu, as he knew, was dirty and dishevelled with his sleeves stinking of river water and his uniform bulging through Eijiro’s crumpled cotton gown. These people would probably think that she was the samurai mistress and he her servant.
Taka stepped forward, bowing and smiling. She stood a head above most of these country dwellers. ‘Thank you, thank you,’ she said. ‘You saved us.’
A child with the front of his hair tied in an old-fashioned forelock twisted his mouth into a ferocious scowl. ‘We showed them what the Satsuma are made of,’ he piped in the local brogue.
‘Too bad we didn’t hit one, we could have kept him as a hostage,’ said the old man, leaning on his rifle.
‘That’ll show them,’ mumbled the man with no nose. ‘Think they can march into our city and just take over, go anywhere they like.’
‘That’s right, Granddad,’ answered a chorus of voices.
Men, women and children gathered eagerly around Taka, bombarding her with questions. ‘Have you come from the city? What’s the news? So it wasn’t just a rumour, the army really has come. Headed for the mountains, are you?’
‘We’re on our way to the Kitaoka house.’ The people looked at each other and beamed, bowing low at the name.
A woman hobbled forward, her back so bent her face was nearly on the ground. She reached out an arthritic hand and stroked Taka’s sleeve, rubbing the fabric between twisted old fingers, and gave an appreciative rumble from deep in her throat. ‘Family, are you?’ she croaked.
Taka nodded shyly.
‘There was a lady passed this way just yesterday, isn’t that right?’ Other women with crumpled, faded faces pushed forward, nodding solemnly. The birds had settled back in the trees and were twittering again, more loudly than ever.
‘A lady?’ Nobu heard the hesitation in Taka’s voice. ‘Just one?’
‘No, three. Grand ladies, Tokyo types. Geishas, if you ask me. Don’t see ladies like that down this way very often, not ever, in fact.’
Taka looked for Nobu and their eyes met. Her mother. So they were on the right path. He could feel her reluctance now they were so close. She hadn’t wanted to go to Madame Kitaoka’s in the first place, she didn’t know what she would find there or even whether she would be welcome, and she didn’t want to say goodbye to him.
But he had a war to fight. There could never be any other woman, that went without saying. She was everything he’d ever wanted. But there was also work to be done. He needed to deliver her to safety and be on his way.
‘We’ll take you, if you like,’ the women volunteered.
‘We can’t ask you to do that. Just tell us where to go.’
‘Masa of Bamboo Village, we call him. He’s a farmer, our Masa, he likes ploughing, digging, carrying nightsoil. Go back to the main road and look for the second lane on your right. Masa’s house is towards the hills. There’s no one there now, mind. Well, there might be a watchman still, you can ask him where they’ve gone.’
35
‘KITAOKA. BAMBOO HOUSE’. The nameplate was so small they almost walked straight past it.
Taka had stopped to admire a black pine that stretched gnarled branches above the road, so perfectly shaped it could have been in an ink painting. Pale knobbly pine blossoms were scattered across the ground. She stood on tiptoe, pulled down a branch and rubbed the spiky needles between her fingers. Whenever she smelt that sharp fresh scent she would remember this day, she thought.
They were nearly in the hills. Houses hidden behind hedgerows looked out over a patchwork of rice, vegetable and millet plantations, smelling of rising sap and fresh leaves and newly turned earth, with the volcano misty in the distance. Rice shoots poked like brilliant green spears from the dazzling water that flooded the fields, but there were no people working there. Bullfrogs croaked and a heron flapped its white wings and settled on a bank between the fields.
They walked hand in hand, stopping at each gate to check the nameplate.
Taka’s heart was still pounding. She’d never imagined that if she was attacked she’d fight, not flee. She’d never felt so alive. But now it was all over she was shaking. She heard explosions in her ears, felt bullets screaming past her face, saw smoke, smelt gunpowder. Now it was over, now she felt afraid – not for herself but for Nobu and her father, who must somehow survive day after day of dreadful battles far worse than this.
She clenched her fists, her hands clammy with fear. She wished there was more she could do than just hope and pray they would come back alive.
‘This is it,’ said Nobu. She read the tiny characters on the nameplate and her eyes filled with tears.
She’d almost forgotten where they were going. Now she was horribly aware of how uncertain it all was. She had no idea whether Madame Kitaoka or her mother would be there, or how Madame Kitaoka would receive her. Once inside this gate, she’d be in another world, which Nobu was not – could not be – a part of. It was more than she could bear.
‘Maybe there’s no one here …’ Maybe they’d run away together after all. They could disappear into the hills and no one would ever find them. The thought was like a ray of sunshine. Their eyes met and she wondered if Nobu was thinking the same. But it could never be. Like birds that flocked, like bees that swarmed, they were part of their clans. They couldn’t exist without them.
Nobu drew himself up. ‘I’m a soldier of the Imperial Army and this is General Kitaoka’s house. I’ll wait at the gate till you’re settled.’ She could see him stiffening, growing more reserved, now that the time to part was near.
‘Please come with me. If there’s a watchman, he’ll just think you’re my servant.’
He’d pulled his obi tighter but the uniform underneath still made Eijiro’s once-smart kimono look crumpled and baggy; and he’d taken off his straw hat, revealing his military crop.
The gate of her father’s house was faded and rickety with a sun-bleached straw roof. It creaked in its grooves but slid straight
open. Inside was a hedge-lined path with bamboo groves and vegetable gardens behind. But there was no one ploughing or digging the vegetables. A hoe and some bamboo baskets lay discarded to one side, along with a hod still reeking of nightsoil – human excrement used as fertilizer.
They made their way along the path past thickets of swaying bamboo to a cluster of steep-roofed houses with earthen walls and irises growing from the thatch. So this was where her father lived. Like him, the buildings were solid, unpretentious, down-to-earth. There were strings of bright orange persimmons and fat white radishes hanging from the eaves and trays of mulberry leaves drying on the ground.
There was no grand front entrance, just verandas running around the buildings. It was a modest place, a retreat, very different from the Tokyo mansion where Taka had lived.
They passed a well with a tiled roof, a whitewashed rice storehouse and a building that looked like a kitchen. There was a man squatting on his haunches there, skinny brown arms resting on his knees.
Taka approached him timidly. ‘Excuse me …’
He took a long draw of his pipe, puffed out a cloud of smoke and looked up.
‘First people I’ve seen all day.’ He had a broad leathery face and more gaps than teeth in his mouth. ‘Heard a lot of noise a while ago. Can’t be fireworks, thinks I, not at this time of year. Must be the army in town. Madame’s gone, they’ve all gone. Left as soon as we heard the soldiers were coming. Not that anyone would do Madame any harm but it’s better to be safe. What have you got there?’
Taka took off her hat, laid her bundle on the veranda and untied it. The pile of oranges and sweet potatoes glowed like gold in the afternoon sun. The watchman helped himself to an orange.
‘You must be the master’s daughter,’ he said, peeling it neatly so the skin opened out into petals. ‘You’ve got something of him in your face. Lucky you didn’t inherit his girth, or your mother’s either.’
Taka laughed. ‘So my mother came?’
The watchman eased the segments apart, lifted one out and put it in his mouth. ‘She went with Madame. She said you’d turn up in the end. Told me to take you up there. It’s not that far, one ri or so, through the valley beside the river, then up a mountain track. There’s a bit of a climb. We can take horses most of the way.’ He narrowed his eyes and glanced at Nobu, squatting silently beside the veranda.
‘That’s my servant. He’s going back. What’s the best way for him to get a message to me?’
‘Deaf mute, huh? Always safest if you’ve secrets to keep. He can come find me here. Even if soldiers overrun the place, I’ll stay. If he can’t find me, he can look for Madame in her cottage in the hills. Write the name down for him: West Beppu. Though if things get really bad there won’t be anyone here at all. We’ll all be dead.’
Taka walked Nobu back along the path beside the hedge to the gate, thankful that the watchman couldn’t see them there. They didn’t hold hands, it was too late for that. She scuffed her feet in a haze of sadness. There was nothing to say, no plans or promises to make. She daren’t even beg him to come back to her or promise to be here when he did.
‘I hope you find your way,’ she said helplessly. The bamboo stirred and rustled and tiny birds flittered about. Insects swarmed and buzzed.
‘I’ll head for the volcano.’ She saw it rising over the fields in front of them.
He gestured at Eijiro’s robe, tangling up around his legs as he walked. ‘Do you mind if I keep this till I’m back in army-controlled territory? I’ll try and get it back to you.’
She laughed sadly. ‘Just throw it away.’ Their city was to be burnt, Eijiro was gone, everything would be destroyed. Who cared about the garment? It had done its job.
They stood together at the gate. She bowed and said very formally, ‘Thank you for taking care of me.’
She looked up at his intense brown eyes, his prominent nose, his sculpted face and full mouth and remembered the feel of his lips on hers. She wanted to run her fingers across his cheek for the last time but she felt shy. Something had changed in his face. In his mind he was already back in the army, preparing for battle. He was a samurai through and through, she saw that now. That was why he’d always seemed mysterious, why he’d made such an unlikely servant.
And she too, she remembered, was a samurai, the daughter of the greatest samurai of them all.
He took her hands and pressed them to his lips. ‘I shall never forget you. If the gods spare me, if I am alive when the war is over, I’ll come and find you. I promise you that.’
She swallowed and stared at the black ash-strewn ground, blinking hard. She wanted to leave him with the memory of a smiling face.
‘I beg you, please take care of yourself and come back safely,’ she whispered.
‘It’s in the hands of the gods.’
‘So this is goodbye …’ If they’d been on the same side she could have wished him good luck and success; but success for him would mean disaster for her father, and she couldn’t wish him that. She looked at him, hoping he would understand.
But there was something that could still be said. Suddenly she had the conviction that if she voiced the wish strongly enough, the words would take on magic power, like a spell, and weave a protective armour to keep him safe. They’d been parted before and each time they’d found each other and each time it had been different. They could find each other again.
‘Come back to me,’ she said, as firmly and as strongly as she could. ‘I’ll wait for you.’
He nodded and smiled. Then he took her in his arms and she squeezed her eyes shut and pressed against him, feeling their bodies mould together, the warmth of him, his firm chest, the beating of his heart, trying to fix it all in her memory. She prayed that time would stop and they could stay there forever while the earth revolved around them and the sun moved.
He released her and she felt his cheek brush hers and his fingers touch her hair. ‘My weaver princess,’ he whispered.
Then the gate opened and he was gone.
PART VI
The Last Samurai
36
Eighth month, year of the ox, the tenth year of the Meiji era (September 1877)
A TWIG CRACKED and a chill ran down Nobu’s spine. The hairs on the back of his neck tingled. Thorns and brambles scratched his skin, bees buzzed around his face and ants swarmed up his arms but he moved not a muscle, praying to the gods he’d not been spotted.
He was crouching in a thicket halfway up the hillside, his grey cotton uniform torn and sodden with sweat. He’d been climbing since dawn, fighting his way through pines, cedars, camellia trees swathed in vines and groves of creaking bamboo. Buzzards soared overhead, looking for carrion, and volcanic ash drifted on the breeze.
The faint noise might have been a deer or a boar or a fox or a rabbit but most likely it was Satsuma, moving as soft as creatures of the forest. He cursed silently. He hadn’t even heard them approach. They were familiar with the terrain and he wasn’t, and they were used to the sweltering heat while he, from the cooler north, was exhausted and panting, even though he’d been down here for months. His only relief was that he was allowed to wear straw sandals now instead of the hard leather boots that tore his feet to shreds.
An ominous sound confirmed his suspicions – the scrape of a sword sliding from its scabbard. The Satsuma didn’t bother with sparring; they brought the blade down in a single lunge that killed the enemy before he’d had a chance to take a breath. ‘If you need a second strike you’re already dead,’ was their motto.
Once a sword was out it could not be returned without tasting blood.
A field lark trilled in the silence, a breeze rustled the long grasses, crickets chirruped. The air was heavy with moisture.
If he was to die, he would face it stoically, like a samurai. His life was of no consequence. He’d always known sooner or later it would end.
In the last five months he’d seen people shot or cut to pieces right next to him, heard the screams as
limbs were blown off and guts spewed out and jaws shattered. He’d fought ferocious Satsuma warriors who’d ambushed him and his fellow soldiers, sent limbs flying himself until the ground was slippery with blood and he was trampling over corpses. In the Kagoshima hospitals there was an epidemic of illness. Men lay wasted and hollow-eyed, dying of typhoid and dysentery without even having seen the enemy. The mortuaries were overflowing.
Yet somehow he’d not been killed, not even wounded. He’d always thought the gods were indifferent to men’s fates, but for some reason they’d given him a reprieve. Until now, that was. Today it seemed his time had come.
A poem Yasutaro, his brother, liked to recite revolved in his mind:
tsui ni yuku Though I had heard before
michi to wa kanete there is a road
kikishikado which some day all must travel –
kino kyo to wa I never thought for me
omowazarishi o that day would be today.
Yasu had told him it was the death poem of a famous warrior, lover and poet of ancient times. Nobu remembered how, when he was a child in Aizu, samurai had composed poems before they went into battle. In this era of rifles and cannons, death sneaked up on you and took you by surprise. There was no leisure for poems.
He could almost hear the swish as the sword swept down. He shuddered, imagining it biting between his shoulder blades, tasting the oblivion that would surely follow. Taka’s face swam before him, as she’d been at the moment of parting. ‘Come back to me,’ she’d said, in her soft, sweet voice. ‘I’ll wait for you.’ He thought of her slender body and silken hair and the days and months they’d spent together in Tokyo. At least he’d found her again, they’d found each other. There was nothing left undone. That was some consolation. Like a warrior he would go calmly to join his mother and sisters and grandmother, and perhaps his brothers too; perhaps they too had already crossed to that other place.
But to fail in his mission now, when he was so close. That was truly bitter.
He could feel the letter inside his jacket, pressing next to his heart. He didn’t know what was in it but he knew it was of vital importance. It was his duty, his responsibility to place it in the hands of General Kitaoka, no one else. Along with Sakurai and Sato he’d been honoured with this task, entrusted by General Yamagata himself, the commander-in-chief of all the government forces.
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