by Hearn, Lian
10
The sun had slipped behind the mountain peaks and a blue dusk was descending when they came to a hut at a fork in the path. It was small, its roof thatched; a lean-to along one side sheltered a pile of neatly stacked logs. It had one door, a heavy wooden one, and no screens. They paused to wash their hands and drink from the nearby spring. An animal scampered under the veranda at their approach. Matsuda heaved at the door, slid it open, and peered inside. He chuckled. “It’s withstood winter well. No one’s been here since last summer.”
“No one but rats,” Shigeru said, looking at the droppings on the floor.
Shigeru had placed the bundles on the wooden step—hardly a veranda, though it served the same purpose. Matsuda knelt to untie one and took out a handful of wood shavings. He put the embers from the iron pot in a small brazier, added the shavings and blew gently on them. When they began to smoke, he stood again and took up a broom.
“I’ll do that,” Shigeru said.
“We’ll share these simple chores. You go and find kindling.”
Mosquitoes whined around his head as he searched for dry wood in the gathering darkness. The forest here was beech and oak, with one alder by the pool where the spring overflowed. Here and there were white mountain lilies and arum, and near the stream kingcups gleamed. The first stars were appearing through the heavy foliage above.
He breathed out deeply.
The fallen branches on the ground were still sodden after the rain, but there was enough dead wood on the lower limbs and trunks of the trees to gather an armful of kindling. He could smell the pine shavings from the hut, a friendly human smell in the lonely forest. When he returned, a frog was calling from the pool. Another answered it.
He broke the kindling into small pieces and carried them inside. The floor was clean and Matsuda had lit a small lamp and spread out the thin hemp bedding and quilts in order to air them. The tiny room was filled with smoke.
An iron hook suspended from the ceiling held a small pot, which was starting to steam. With the extra wood, it was soon boiling. Matsuda took dried mushrooms and bean paste from a container in the bamboo basket and added them to the water. After a few minutes he took the pot from the hook and poured the soup into two wooden bowls. He performed all these movements with dexterity and great skill, as though he had done them many times before, and Shigeru guessed the master had been to this hut on many occasions, alone or with other pupils, during the years he had served the Enlightened One at Terayama.
They drank the soup and followed it with the last two rice cakes from the container. Shigeru wondered what they would eat the next day; maybe they were to fast. Matsuda told him to take the pot to the spring, rinse it, and refill it; he would make tea.
It was completely dark by now, the stars visible through the swaying branches, the moon a faint glow in the east behind the peaks. A vixen screamed in the distance, an inhuman sound that made him think of goblins—and suddenly of Takeshi, who had wanted to be taught the art of the sword by the goblins of the mountain, like Matsuda himself. Maybe it had been in this very place; maybe Shigeru would see the same goblins, be taught by them, become the best swordsman in the Three Countries, far better than Iida Sadamu. . . . He resolved not to waste a moment of this time with Matsuda. Whether it involved fasting, fetching wood, sweeping the floor, he would carry out all the tasks of the disciple in order to learn from his master.
BEHIND THE HUT was a small clearing, level and smooth-grassed. Rabbits, hares, deer, and other forest creatures came to graze here before sunrise. It made a perfect natural training ground, and Shigeru was eager to begin. Yet Matsuda seemed in no hurry. He roused Shigeru while it was still dark, the silent darkness that precedes dawn when the sounds of night, even the frogs, are muffled. The moon had already set, and the stars were dimmed by mist rising from the damp earth. The embers of the fire still glowed, a tiny light against the darkness of mountain and forest that lay around them.
After they had relieved themselves, washed their faces and hands in the spring, and drunk from the water, Matsuda said, “We will sit for a while. If you are to learn, it must be with an empty mind. Watch your breath; that is all you need to do.”
The old man sat down, legs crossed on the small wooden step. Shigeru could not see his face, though he was barely a pace away. He also sat, on the ground, legs crossed, hands on his knees, the first finger lightly touching the thumb.
He breathed in and out, feeling the breath as it filled his chest and flowed out through his nostrils. The inbreath was strong, the outbreath weak—the inbreath full of life, the other somehow suggestive of death. Always the strong breath followed it, the body possessed of its own desire to live, but one day that outbreath would be the last. The air would no longer go in and out of him. This body, which was so familiar to him, indeed so loved by him, would decay and rot: eventually even the bones would crumble. But his spirit? What happened to that? Would it be reborn into the endless cycle of life and death? Or into the hell reserved for the wicked, as some sects taught? Or would it reside in some remote shrine like this one, as the country people believed, or at Terayama, where his descendants would revere him and honor him?
His descendants: He would be married; he would have children. He brought his thoughts back from that direction. He would not start dwelling on women. He opened his eyes and glanced guiltily at Matsuda. The old man’s eyes were closed, but he said quietly, “Watch the breath.”
The breath went in and out. Thoughts circled around it like goblins or demons, clamoring for his attention.
As the fletcher whittles arrows, as the horseman tames horses, so you must direct and control your straying thoughts.
But the horses made him think of Kiyoshige and of the black colt he had left behind. He thought he could see through the horse’s eyes, taste the summer grass in the water meadows; he longed to feel the animal beneath him, the springy, controlled tension, the excitement in the curve of neck and back, the pleasure in controlling a creature so much larger and more powerful than himself. And the arrows: He felt his hands change out of their meditative pose into a longing to shape themselves around the bow, the rein, the sword.
He breathed in and out.
If you cannot quieten yourself, what will you ever learn?
The words fell into his hearing. He knew it was Matsuda who had spoken them, yet they seemed to come from some other source, some place of truth within himself. He repeated them under his breath. If you cannot quieten yourself. They became the breath. For a few brief moments his mind emptied. However, almost immediately the clamorous thoughts returned. So that’s what my teacher meant! I did it. Now maybe I can start using the sword.
Impatience set its ant bite on him. As if in response, his body began to complain about its discomfort. His legs were cramped, his belly empty, his throat dry. Yet Matsuda, over three times his age, did not move at all, merely breathed calmly, in and out.
I will be like him, Shigeru thought. I will. He tried to discern the master’s breathing and follow it. He watched himself breathe. In. Out.
Birds were starting to call from the trees. A thrush burst into song. He opened his eyes briefly and realized it was lighter. He could make out the shape of the hut, the trees beyond Matsuda’s figure sitting above him. He could not help thinking of the morning meal: his mouth filled suddenly with water. In Hagi, at this moment, the kitchens would be coming to life, the fires stoked, the soup boiling, the cooks slicing vegetables, the maids preparing tea: the whole army of servants that maintained the life he led would be awake, working deftly, silently. All his life he had been able to command them: even in times of famine, after natural disasters such as typhoons, droughts, or earthquakes when many in the Middle Country had starved, he had not gone hungry. Now he had given all that away: he had become like one of them, dependent entirely on the will of another. He trusted Matsuda: he believed the old man could teach him many things he needed to know. He submitted his reluctant will to the master’s, let th
e thoughts of food float into his mind and float out again, breathed in, breathed out. His mind stilled, like a green horse that finally accepts that all its bucking and rearing will not unseat the rider. He saw how all desires, all longings, can be either indulged or allowed to dissipate. He grasped what the master meant about choice. In the stillness came a sense of his spirit, a wave on the surface of the ocean; calm flooded over him, together with compassion for all beings, compassion for himself, reverence and love for Matsuda.
A sudden warmth struck him as the sun cleared the high peaks around them. Shigeru opened his eyes involuntarily and saw that Matsuda was looking at him.
“Fine,” the old man said. “Now we will eat.”
Shigeru stood, ignoring his cramped legs, and went into the hut. He took the pot to the spring and filled it with water, fetched wood and built up the fire; when the smoke had dissipated—like desire, he thought—and the flame glowed strong and clear, he set the water above it to boil. He took the bedding and spread it in the sun to air, trying to copy Matsuda’s way of doing such things, his deftness and economy of movement. Something of the hours of meditation colored his actions, giving him single-mindedness and concentration.
Matsuda stepped into his sandals and beckoned to Shigeru. “We’ll see what the forest has for us this morning!”
He took a small basket and a digging tool, a sharp blade set into a curved wooden handle, and they walked up the path toward the west, the sun warm on their backs. The track curved between huge rocks for a while, and the climb was steep, but eventually the ground leveled again, and a clearing opened up in front of them. Here grew cedars, cypress, and spruce, but on the edges of the clearing, ferns were starting to push through the forest floor, their heads curved in snaillike spirals. Matsuda showed Shigeru how to cut the tenderest ones; then they walked through the forest until they came to a small upland pool. It was full of birds, heron, duck, and teal that took off at their approach with harsh cries. Round the edge grew wild lotus and burdock. Matsuda pulled the lotus from the water for its succulent roots and dug the burdock from the soft ground. Its roots were long and thin, the flesh white beneath the dark, fibrous skin.
It was too early in the year for mushrooms or yams, but on their way back they found fresh sorrel leaves and the new green foliage of hawthorn bushes. Matsuda ate this as they walked, and Shigeru copied him; the taste vividly recalled his childhood.
The burdock they peeled and left to soak, but the rest of the harvest formed the morning meal, boiled in soup. Matsuda poured dry rice grains into the remains of the soup and put it aside to swell. Then he told Shigeru to practice the warm-up exercises he had been studying at the temple. “With an empty mind,” he added.
The food and the sun’s warmth had brought the sleep-demon closer. Shigeru strove to drive it away as he went through the routine, thinking of the other boys at the temple, wondering if they were doing the same exercises at that moment with minds far emptier than his. But there was something about the exercises, he realized, that worked with the meditation, that enhanced it. In the same way that exercising the muscles of his mind had shown him how to control his thoughts, so using the body’s muscles brought control of mind and body together. Tiredness disappeared; in its place came anticipation and an alert calmness.
He had been moving at the measured pace he had been taught at the temple, each exercise recalled almost unconsciously as one movement followed another. He found that here in the lonely forest the impatience he had felt at the temple disappeared. He thought he had practiced diligently before, but he could see now how far he had fallen short, how divided and weak his attention had been, how his own self-pride had slowed and blinded him. He watched his breath flow in and out as each exercise was executed, and felt how the sun, the air, the ground beneath his feet seemed to follow the breath and flow through him. The world around him was ready to share its power with him—its energy, lightness, steadiness. He simply had to accept the gifts and draw on them.
“Good,” Matsuda said. “The teachers at the temple were worried that you lacked concentration—your father’s greatest weakness, I’m afraid—but I think we will prove them wrong. Tie up your robe—we are going to move a little faster now.”
“Shall I bring the poles,” Shigeru started to ask, but Matsuda held up one hand.
“When you’re ready for the poles, I’ll tell you to bring them.”
His own robe hitched up, the old man stood in front of Shigeru, his feet planted firmly on the sandy ground.
“Watch carefully.”
The movement was so swift Shigeru could barely follow it. He saw the form of the old man, but through the lean frame, the sinewy limbs, flashed something ageless, a force that transformed his teacher. He was open-mouthed.
Matsuda saw the expression on his face and laughed. “It’s nothing magical, no sorcery or anything like that about it. Anyone can do it. You just have to work hard and empty your mind. You prepare your body for the life force to enter it, and then you use it with an undivided heart. All it takes is training—training and practice. You are not patient now, but you will be.”
Shigeru set himself to copy his teacher’s movements, amazed that a man over three times his age could move so much faster. But by the end of the session, when the sun was at its highest point in the sky, he’d come to realize that the exercises he had learned gave his body the pattern in which to move. His muscles had been readied for this.
“It’s a question of stages,” he said to Matsuda as they wiped the sweat from their faces. “You build one thing on another.”
“Yes, like most things worth doing,” the old man said. “Hard work, infinite patience, learning from those who have gone ahead.”
He seemed in a very good mood; Shigeru dared to say, “People say that you learned from goblins!”
Matsuda laughed. “I was taught by a holy man who lived in the mountains. Some thought he was a spirit—a goblin or even an ogre—but he was a human being, though a rare kind. I sought him out and served him as a disciple, just as you now serve me. But he was a harsher taskmaster than I am. I spent a year fetching his firewood and cleaning his dishes before he even acknowledged my existence. I was after all only a humble warrior—my time was my own. Your case has a greater urgency. We do not have forever.”
When they returned to the hut, someone had come silently and left offerings of millet cakes and dried mushrooms, two tiny salted plums and fresh bamboo shoots. Matsuda bowed in thanks.
“Who was it?” Shigeru said, looking around. “Who knows we are here?”
“There is a small hamlet no more than two hours’ walk away. They often come to leave offerings for the god who provides the water for their fields. They are sharing what they have with him and us.”
Shigeru also bowed in thanks, grateful to the unknown farmers who gave so generously.
“My brother, Takeshi, wants to be taught by goblins,” he said, when the food was finished.
“How old is he now? About ten?”
“He’s four years younger than me; he turned eleven last year.”
“Ah, time goes by fast,” Matsuda said. “I hope he will also come to Terayama.”
“He will be a better fighter than I am. He has no fear. He killed a boy older than himself when he was eight.” After a pause, Shigeru admitted, “I have never killed anyone.”
“In times of peace there is no need,” Matsuda said quietly. “All your training may seem to be a preparation for war, but we hope it will also be its prevention. There are many ways to prevent war—alliances, marriages—but the best way is to be strong enough to make your enemy think twice about attacking you, yet not so aggressive that he feels threatened. Keep your sword sheathed as long as you can, but once it is unsheathed, use it without hesitation.”
“Are the Otori strong enough to prevent war with the Tohan?” Shigeru said, remembering the Kitano boys in Inuyama.
“The Iida family are very ambitious. Once a man has set his foot upon
that path to power, little will stop him save his own death. He will always strive to be the greatest, and he lives in constant fear that somewhere another is greater than he and will topple him. And of course this will happen, because everything that has a beginning has an ending.”
Just beyond the shade from the eaves, an army of ants were milling over a dead dragonfly, tugging at the body with their tiny jaws.