TAIKO: AN EPIC NOVEL OF WAR AND GLORY IN FEUDAL JAPAN

by Eiji Yoshikawa

  "Yojiro, come back! Yojiro! Yojiro!"

  But regardless of the number of times he called, Yojiro did not come back again. Murakoshi had also received a number of wounds. When he was somehow able to crawl out through the bamboo stand, he saw the silhouette of a man passing right by him.

  "Ah! Lord Shigetomo."

  "Sanjuro?"

  "How is His Lordship?"

  "He has breathed his last."

  "No!" Sanjuro was surprised. "Where?"

  "He is right here, Sanjuro." Shigetomo indicated Mitsuhide's head, which he had wrapped in a cloth and attached to his saddle. He looked away sadly.

  Sanjuro leaped with a violent force toward the horse. As he seized Mitsuhide's head he raised a long, wailing cry. At length he asked, "What were his last words?"

  "He recited a verse that began 'There are not two gates: loyalty and treason.'"

  "He said that?"

  "Even though he attacked Nobunaga, his action could not be questioned as a matter of loyalty or treason. Both he and Nobunaga were samurai, and they served the same Emperor. When he finally woke from fifty-five years of a dream, he found that even he was not someone who could escape from the world's blame and praise. After saying these words, he killed himself."

  "I understand." Murakoshi was sobbing convulsively, wiping the tears from his face with his fist. "He neither listened to Lord Toshimitsu's admonishments nor refused to fight a decisive battle at Yamazaki on disadvantageous ground with a small army, because he depended on that Great Way. In that light, retreating from Yamazaki would have amounted to abandoning Kyoto. When I realize what was in his heart, I can't stop crying."

  "No, even though he was defeated, he never abandoned the Way, and doubtless died with that long-cherished ambition. He showed his last verse to heaven. But you know, if we waste time here, those brigands will probably come back and attack again."

  "Right."

  "I was unable to take care of everything here by myself. I have left our lord's corpse without the head. Would you bury it so no one will find it?"

  "What about the others?"

  "They all gathered around his body and died bravely."

  "After I've carried out your orders, I'll find some place to die too."

  "I'm taking his head to give to Lord Mitsutada at the Chionin Temple. I'll think about disposing of myself after that. Well, good-bye then."

  "Good-bye."

  The two men went separate ways on the narrow path through the bamboo grove. The speckles of light scattered by the moon were lovely to behold.

  * * *

  Shoryuji Castle fell that night. It happened just as Mitsuhide was dying in Ogurusu. The generals Nakagawa Sebei, Takayama Ukon, Ikeda Shonyu, and Hori Kyutaro all moved their command posts there. Lighting a huge bonfire, they lined their camp stools outside the castle gate and waited for Nobutaka and Hideyoshi to arrive. Nobutaka soon stood before them.

  To have taken the castle was a resplendent victory. Both soldiers and officers straightened their banners and looked up at Nobutaka with great reverence. As Nobutaka dis­mounted and passed through the ranks of the army, he nodded to the men with a friendly expression. He was almost overly polite to the generals, greeting them respectfully and showing his gratitude.

  Taking Sebei's hand, he said with special affection, "It is due to your loyalty and courage that the Akechi were crushed in a single day's battle. My father's soul has been appeased, and I will not forget this."

  He gave the same praise to Takayama Ukon and Ikeda Shonyu. Arriving a little later, however, Hideyoshi said nothing at all to those men. As he rode by them in his palan­quin, he even appeared to be looking down on them.

  Sebei was a man of unequaled ferocity, even in the midst of rough warriors, and it is likely that he felt offended by Hideyoshi's behavior. He cleared his throat loud enough to be heard. Hideyoshi glanced out from inside the palanquin and passed on with a parting remark.

  "Good work, Sebei."

  Sebei stamped his feet in anger. "Even Lord Nobutaka was civil enough to dismount for us, but this man is so arrogant that he goes right by in his palanquin. Maybe Monkey thinks he's already running the country," he said, loudly enough so that everyone around him could hear, but beyond that he could do nothing.

  Ikeda Shonyu, Takayama Ukon, and the others held the same rank as Hideyoshi, but at some point Hideyoshi had started treating them as though they were his subordinates They, too, had steadily come to feel that they were somehow under Hideyoshi's command. To be sure, that was not a pleasant feeling for any of them, but no one had protested.

  Even on entering the castle, Hideyoshi simply gave a quick glance to the burned-out ruins of the building and gave no thought to resting. Ordering that a curtained enclosure be set up in the garden, he placed his camp stool next to Nobutaka's, quickly summoned the generals, and began giving out orders.

  "Kyutaro, lead an army to the village of Yamashina and push on toward Awadaguchi.

  Your objective is to come out at Otsu and cut off the road passage between Azuchi and Sakamoto." Then he turned to Sebei and Ukon. "You should hurry down the Tamba Road as quickly as possible. It appears that many of the enemy have fled toward Tamba and we don't want to give them time to get to Kameyama Castle and make preparations. If we're slow here, we're likely to lose even more time. If you can reach Kameyama by midday tomorrow, it should fall without much trouble."

  Some, then, were sent hurrying to Toba and the area of Shichijo, while others were to advance to the vicinities of Yoshida and Shirakawa. The instructions were highly explicit and Nobutaka only sat to the side as they were being given. In the eyes of all the generals, Hideyoshi's attitude was nothing less than presumptuous.

  Nevertheless, even Sebei, who had at first opened his mouth in anger, meekly accepted his orders like the others. Finally they distributed provisions to the soldiers for the first time since morning, ladled out some sake, filled their stomachs, and once again started off for the next battlefield.

  Hideyoshi understood that there was a time and place for making people yield to his control, and his ploy this time had been to wait for the time when each of the generals had just won a victory. But Hideyoshi knew that his colleagues were men of matchless valor and unmanageable courage, and he was not so imprudent as to risk addressing them as subordinates by use of this ploy alone.

  An army must have a leader. While Nobutaka should have been the commander-in-chief in terms of rank, he had only recently joined the campaign, and all of the generals recognized the fact that he was lacking in both authority and resolve. That being so, there was absolutely no one left to assume leadership other than Hideyoshi.

  Although not one of the generals felt disposed to submit to Hideyoshi, each one knew that no one else was acceptable to the whole group. Hideyoshi had planned this battle to be the requiem for Nobunaga, and he had rallied them together. So if they now complained about his handling of them as subordinates, they would only have exposed themselves to the accusation of self-interest.

  The generals had no time for rest but were to set off at once for the new battlefields to which they had been ordered. As they stood up together to depart, Hideyoshi remained in the commander's seat and gestured to each man with his chin.

  Hideyoshi stayed at the Mii Temple, and on the night of the fourteenth there was another huge thunderstorm. The smoldering embers of Sakamoto Castle were extinguished, and all night long, pale white lightning flashed over the ink-colored lake and Shimeigatake.

  With the dawn, however, the heavens were wiped clean and the hot summer sky appeared once again. From the main camp at the Mii Temple, a thick yellow smoke could be seen rising from the eastern bank of the lake in the direction of Azuchi.

  "Azuchi is burning!"

  At the report of the guards, the generals went out onto the veranda. Hideyoshi and the rest of them shaded their eyes with their hands.

  A messenger reported, "Lord Nobuo, who was camped at Tsuchiyama in Omi, and Lord Gamo joined
forces and have been attacking Azuchi since morning. They set fire toboth the town and the castle, and the wind from the lake has engulfed all of Azuchi in flames. But theie were no enemy soldiers left in Azuchi, so there was no battle."

  Hideyoshi could imagine what was occurring far away.

  "There was no reason to set that fire," he muttered sullenly. "No matter who he is, Lord Nobuo and even Gamo acted hastily."

  But he soon calmed down. The culture that Nobunaga had spent the blood and resources of half a lifetime constructing was to be mourned in every way, but Hideyoshi had faith that very soon—and with his own strength—he would build an even greater castle and culture.

  Just at that moment, another patrol of soldiers came from the main temple gate. They were gathered around a single man and were bringing him to Hideyoshi. "A farmer from Ogurusu by the name of Chobei says that he found Lord Mitsuhide's head."

  It was the custom to inspect the head of an enemy general with grave decorum and etiquette, and Hideyoshi gave orders for his camp stool to be set up in front of the main temple. Soon thereafter, he sat down with the other generals and looked at Mitsuhide's head in silence.

  Afterward, the head was exposed at the ruins of the Honno Temple. Only half a month had passed since the morning the standard of the bellflower had been set up amid the Akechi army's war cries.

  Mitsuhide's head had been displayed for the benefit of the citizens of the capital, and they swarmed together at the site from morning till night. Even those who had denounced Mitsuhide's treason now said a prayer, while others threw flowers beneath the rotting skull.

  Hideyoshi's military commands were simple and clear. He had only three laws: Be diligent in your work. Commit no wrongs. Troublemakers will be executed.

  Hideyoshi had not yet conducted a formal funeral service for Nobunaga; the grand ceremony he had in mind could not be accomplished with military power alone, and it would not be right for it to be under only his patronage. The fire in the capital had finally died down, but the sparks had spread to all the provinces.

  Nobunaga was dead, Mitsuhide was dead, and there was the possibility that the country would once again be divided into three spheres of influence, as it had been before Nobunaga. Worse, family feuds and rival warlords defending their own local interests might plunge the country into the chaos of the last years of the shogunate.

  From the Mii Temple, Hideyoshi moved his entire army onto a fleet of warships, boarding everything from horses to gilded screens. That was on the eighteenth of the month, and the objective was to move to Azuchi. Another military force also snaked its way east along the land route. The line of ships moving over the lake was driven by the breeze that filled the banners, and it reflected the marching land army advancing along the coast.

  But Azuchi was already nothing more than scorched earth, and as soon as the troops arrived, they found themselves disheartened. The gold-and-blue walls of Azuchi no longer existed. All the gates of the outer wall and the towering eaves of the Soken Temple had been burned to the ground. The castle town was even worse. There was nothing for which even the stray dogs could hunt, and the priests from the Christian church walked around with empty eyes.

  Nobuo should have been there, but he was fighting rebels in Ise and Iga. It became clear that the burning of Azuchi had not been ordered by Nobuo. Certainly the fires had been started by his men, but it seemed plausible that that had been the result of a misunderstanding or perhaps of false rumors spread by the enemy.

  Hideyoshi and Nobutaka had traveled to Azuchi together and lamented the destruction with deep feeling. Nevertheless, after they realized that the fires had not been set at Nobuo's command, their indignation seemed to abate somewhat. They stayed in Azuchi for only two days. The convoy of ships once again set sail, this time for the north. Hideyoshi was advancing his main army to his home castle at Nagahama.

  The castle was safe. There was no sign of the enemy, and allied troops were already entering the castle grounds. When the commander's standard with the golden gourds was raised, the people of the castle town were overjoyed. They filled the streets through which Hideyoshi passed en route from his boat to the castle. Women, children, and the elderly prostrated themselves in the dirt to greet him. Some people cried, and some could not even lift their faces. There were some who cheered and waved their hands, while others even forgot themselves as they danced with joy. He purposefully passed by on horseback to respond to the enthusiastic welcome of his people.

  For Hideyoshi, however, there remained a very serious anxiety, and it grew even more intense after he entered Nagahama Castle. He burned with such impatience and longing that he could not stand idle even for a moment. Were his mother and wife safe?

  After sitting down in the inner citadel, he asked the question over and over to each one of the generals who came and went. He was suddenly very worried about the condition of his family.

  "We've looked everywhere for them, but no clear report has come in yet," the generals said.

  "Wasn't there anyone who knew anything about their whereabouts?" Hideyoshi asked.

  "Well, we thought so," one general answered. "But none of the people seem to have seen them. When they fled the castle, their destination was kept an absolute secret."

  "I see. It must be true. If their whereabouts had leaked out to the common people the enemy would have given chase, and they would have been in danger."

  Hideyoshi met another general and discussed an entirely different subject. That day the enemy troops at Sawayama Castle had abandoned the fortress and fled in the direction of Wakasa. The general reported that the castle had been returned to the control of its former commander, Niwa Nagahide.

  Ishida Sakichi and four or five other members of the pages' group suddenly returned hurriedly from an unknown destination. Before they got to Hideyoshi's room, happy voices could be heard bubbling up in the corridor and the pages' room, and Hideyoshi asked those around him, "Has Sakichi come back? Why is he so slow in coming here?" He sent a man to rebuke him.

  Ishida Sakichi had been born in Nagahama, and he knew the geography of the area better than anyone. He had thought, therefore, that now was the time to use his knowledge. He had been out on his own since noon, looking for the place where his lord’s mother and his wife might be hiding.

  Sakichi knelt respectfully in front of Hideyoshi. According to his report, Hideyoshi's mother, his wife, and the rest of the household were hiding in the mountains a little more than ten leagues from Nagahama. It seemed that they were barely keeping body and soul together.

  "Well, let's get ready to leave right away. If we go now, we should be able to get there tomorrow night," Hideyoshi said, standing. He was nearly unable to restrain himself, so great was his impatience.

  "Take care of things while I'm gone," he ordered Kyutaro. "Hikoemon is stationed at Otsu, and Lord Nobutaka is still at Azuchi."

  As Hideyoshi left the castle gate, he saw six or seven hundred men lined up and waiting for him. They had fought successive battles at Yamazaki and Sakamoto, and had had no time to rest even at Azuchi. The warriors had arrived only that morning, and their faces were still tired and muddy. Hideyoshi said, "It will be enough if fifty horsemen come with me.

  Hideyoshi only said this after the mounted men carrying torches had started to lead the procession. Almost all of the soldiers, then, were to stay behind.

  "That's dangerous," Kyutaro said. "Fifty horsemen are too few. The road you'll take tonight passes close by Mount Ibuki, and enemy forces may still be hiding there."

  Both Kyutaro and Shonyu were especially vociferous in cautioning him, but Hideyoshi seemed convinced that there was no need for such concern. Answering that it was not worth worrying about, he ordered the men with the torches to lead the way. Leaving the castle gate, they went along the tree-lined road toward the northeast. Riding through the night until about the fourth watch, Hideyoshi progressed five leagues down the road without too much haste.

  The group arrived at Sanjui
n Temple at midnight. Hideyoshi had thought the monks would be taken completely by surprise, but to his amazement, when they opened the main gate, he saw that the inside of the temple was brilliantly lit with lanterns, water had been splashed over the grounds, and the entire area had been swept clean.

  "Somebody must have come ahead and announced that I was coming."

  "It was me," Sakichi announced.

  "You?"

  "Yes. I thought that you would probably be stopping here to rest, my lord, so I had a young man who is a fast runner come ahead and order meals prepared for fifty men."

  Sakichi had been an acolyte at Sanjuin Temple, but at twelve years of age he had been accepted by Hideyoshi as a page at Nagahama Castle. That had been eight years ago, and he had since become a twenty-year-old samurai. Sakichi had excellent good sense and was more quick-witted than most people.

  At dawn, the outline of Mount Ibuki could be seen against the rose and pale blue hues of the sky, while nothing could be heard but the chirping of tiny birds. The dew was deep on the road, and darkness hung beneath the trees.

  Hideyoshi looked happy. He knew that with every step he was getting closer to his mother and wife, and he seemed to mind neither the steep slope of the road nor his own fatigue. Now, the closer he approached Nishitani as the light increased on Mount Ibuki, the more he had the feeling of being held to his mother's breast.

  No matter how long they climbed upstream along the Azusa River, they never seemed to come to its source. On the contrary, it opened up and they came out into a valley so wide that they might have forgotten they were in the middle of the mountains.

  "That's Mount Kanakuso," announced the monk who was acting as guide, and he pointed to a steep peak directly in front of them. He wiped the sweat from his forehead. The sun had climbed to the center of the sky, and the heat of midsummer was rising.

  The monk walked on ahead again on the narrow path. After a while the path became so narrow that Hideyoshi and his attendants had to dismount. Just at that moment the men around Hideyoshi stopped.