Ushiwaka said nothing for a time; then he finally looked up. "Yes, Asatori, I know what my mother wants of me."
"You do?" Asatori replied eagerly.
"But—" Ushiwaka went on, "my mother is a woman and cannot understand. From her letter I can tell how truly womanly she is. If only I could meet her! Is she at all like the mother of whom I dream all the time?"
"Do you really want so much to see her?"
"What stupid things you keep saying!"
"There's no reason why you shouldn't see her after you've taken the vows. When people recognize you as a great sage and a holy man, I am sure that you will be allowed to return to the capital to see her. Even the Heike may some day welcome you among them."
"I can't wait so long. I must see her now. . . ."
"If you make the wrong choice, you may never see her."
"Is it unnatural for me to want to see my mother?"
"You must remember the Heike."
"Who are they, and what are they to me? Are they gods? Are they supernatural beings?"
"It is war that brought all this unhappiness on you, and you must turn away from those things which bring about war."
"Is this to go on forever? Am I to stay as I am, a prisoner here from the time I was born?"
Asatori went on: "It is for us to find a way of life which will not bring conflict or create a hell on earth. Only by following the path which leads to peace will you show how much you love your mother. The world cannot be changed overnight, nor can we escape karma."
"Was that all you came to tell me, Asatori?" Ushiwaka asked, wrapping the letter round the image and thrusting them into the folds of his tunic. Suddenly he stamped his foot at Asatori, who knelt before him.
"Now I know who you are," he said. "You're the one who spied on us that night in the valley. Off with you! I'll see that my answer reaches my-mother. Don't stay here any longer—go at once —now!"
As he spoke, Ushiwaka ran from the shrine and disappeared into the surrounding woods. Asatori tried to follow him, but Ushiwaka had already vanished.
CHAPTER XLIX
USHIWAKA ESCAPES
The morning haze rose like steam from the mountain. It was the last day of the three-day festival. Thousands of lamps glimmered in the early dawn and the chanting of sutras and the sound of music were everywhere. It promised to be another sweltering day.
"Ushiwaka's looking quite elegant, isn't he?"
"Not a bit like him, when he's all dressed up!"
"You must be Ushiwaka. Come, let's see if you really are."
The novices were gathered in a room behind the dance stage and teasing Ushiwaka, who wore a poppy-colored tunic and trousers of a deep purple. His hair was arranged in an elaborate knot on his head. While the other novices laughed and shouted and leaped about in their excitement, Ushiwaka alone sat apart, quietly waiting.
"You're worried, aren't you," one of his companions asked.
Ushiwaka shook his head. "No, I couldn't sleep at all last night."
"You're lying! What kept you awake, then?"
"I was too excited."
"Excited? About what?"
"Today, of course."
"Queer, aren't you?" Another novice snorted and then ran off to join his companions who were leaning over the balustrades of a gallery.
A great shout went up: "Just look at the crowds today!"
"There are still more coming up! Like ants in a procession!"
"Where, where? Let me take a look!"
The novices climbed onto the balustrades and swarmed up pillars in their excitement. While their backs were turned, Ushiwaka sprang to his feet and disappeared down a hall into his room. From behind the books on his small writing-table he snatched a small case, took out the silver image, threw the case away, and carefully placed the image in the inner folds of his tunic; he patted it to see that it was safe, then tightened the sash around his waist.
"Ushiwaka! Ushiwaka, where are you?"
The sound of voices startled Ushiwaka, who ran back, replying as he ran.
A score of novices were already lined up, and a monk who saw Ushiwaka shouted at him angrily:
"Where were you anyway?"
"I went to the privy."
"You're lying! I saw you coming from your room."
"I was tightening the sash of my trousers."
A monk led the procession, cutting a path through the crowds. Musicians followed him, sounding bells and gongs; after them marched high priests and the many novices who were taking part in the sacred dramas.
Hotter and hotter it grew, and not a cloud was to be seen as the procession made its way round the mountain, from shrine to shrine, from temple to temple. The novices panted and perspired, straggled, broke rank as their high spirits got the better of them, and dodged and darted about. Ushiwaka, the smallest of them, marched at the end, orderly and sedate. His eyes, however, were busy, darting to left and right among the watching pilgrims, and sometimes a gleam of recognition came into his eyes as he tramped on after the rest.
When the four-hour march round the mountain ended, the novices scattered for their noonday meal and then prepared themselves for the dances in which they were to take part. All afternoon and into the night the dancing and music went on. Bonfires were lighted all over the mountain. Multitudes of pilgrims pushed and jostled one another, moving from one performance to the next. Novices wriggled their way through the crowds, anxious not to miss anything. Ushiwaka alone wandered about aimlessly on the fringes of sightseers, until without warning a man approached him from behind, threw a thin, summer cloak about him, and whispered:
"Now, sir!"
"Is that you, Masachika?"
"I will go with you as far as the road leading down to the valley."
"That road has been fenced in."
"No matter—hurry!"
Ushiwaka started running. No sooner was he out of sight than Masachika put his fingers to his lips and gave two shrill whistles. Several men quietly slipped through the crowd, absorbed in watching the bamboo-splitting rites, and disappeared into the night. Not long after, priest after priest, taking part in the rites, quickly left the scene.
Someone was heard to say: "A monk was killed at the barriers to one of the valleys."
People were soon talking among themselves excitedly. A novice had broken through a barrier and escaped. He had killed two guards as he got away. No, a Tengu had done it, people claimed.
The rumor soon reached the musicians, who were resting and drinking in their quarters. Asatori, who had been drinking with the rest, sat up.
"A novice escaped? Who was it? What was his name? Is this true?" he asked his companions, and then stealthily left his seat to slip away outside.
The Tengu were now gathered in the hut where Asatori had first seen them.
"The first step has now been safely taken and we congratulate you," said one, turning to Ushiwaka, who huddled among the dark bodies that surrounded him, still dazed by his narrow escape.
One of the men, who seemed to be older and more experienced than the rest, interposed: "It's a little too early to congratulate ourselves. Remember, we still have to reckon with the Chieftain Hidehira, and, furthermore, we've done this without Kichiji's consent. It's easy enough to get away from Kurama Mountain, but how are we going to manage the rest? If luck is with us, Kichiji will be told of this; otherwise it will be practically impossible for us to elude Kiyomori's soldiers and escape east."
Another broke in: "But this was our last chance. In any case, Ushiwaka took matters into his own hands."
"We won't depend on Kichiji. If he refuses help, then we'll manage the rest ourselves. Remember, we expected this to happen when Ushiwaka said that he would escape on his own. There was nothing else we could do, and it would have been cowardly to do otherwise."
"Hardly cowardly. It's only proper to take every precaution in a matter as serious as this."
"There's not much use in arguing about this, I carefully warned Konno-maru
of what would happen tonight. It worries me that he hasn't appeared yet."
The futility of trying to escape east was apparent, for the Heike would give the alarm and block every road leading east. Kichiji alone could assist them. They waited then for Konno-maru, who finally appeared a little before dawn.
"Yes, it took me by surprise. I hadn't expected this to happen until midnight, and I had great difficulty following you."
"We're sorry about that. It couldn't be helped. We said midnight, but our plans changed suddenly because a better chance came. . . . We're lucky to be here, though. What of Kichiji? What did he have to say?"
"He laughed at our impatience and seemed to think that there was nothing he could do but fall in with our plans."
"So he agrees with us?"
"Did Kichiji then offer some ideas, or did he insist that it was still too soon to tell you what they were? What did he say, Konno-maru?"
Dawn was beginning to fill the sky, and a faint radiance filtered in through a small window of the hut.
The Tengu hung on Konno-maru's words.
"Kichiji is more than ever with us, but he has some conditions. He says he will not answer for Ushiwaka's life if we don't accept his terms."
"What are they?"
"He will answer only for Ushiwaka's safety. The rest of you, he says, must look after yourselves."
"What! He's going to leave us out of this entirely?"
"Yes, he says that Ushiwaka's safety depends on that."
"How is that possible?"
"No one in this region knows who you are. People take you for Tengu demons, but if you come with Ushiwaka, Kichiji believes that that will be enough to put his life in danger."
"Konno-maru, do you believe he's right?"
"I do. We have played our part. Now that Ushiwaka has left Kurama Mountain, there is nothing more for us to do but leave him and disappear."
"And what will Ushiwaka do without us?"
"Kichiji will take care of the rest."
"Do we dare trust him?"
"If he was not to be trusted, he would never in the first place have trusted us—so he says."
"What if you're mistaken?"
"If anything goes wrong, then Kichiji will be the first to pay for it—and with his life. There's not much use in saying more. All we can do is trust him," Konno-maru said.
The rest now turned to Ushiwaka expectantly, and Masachika asked:
"You have just heard how matters are. What is your will?"
Faced now with the fulfillment of his greatest hope, Ushiwaka replied without hesitation: "I do not wish to go east at once. If I go, there's no telling whether I shall ever see my mother again. I must go to the capital—alone, or with all of you. I must see my mother. . . . Take me this once to see her."
News of Ushiwaka's escape reached Rokuhara toward dawn. Soldiers and agents set out immediately for Kurama Mountain, where the monks most familiar with the mountain terrain had already begun the hunt for Ushiwaka. By noon, when several hundred warriors from Rokuhara arrived on Kurama Mountain, Ushiwaka and his followers were on their way to Sajiki Peak. When they reached it, Konno-maru said: "From here the roads lead to the provinces of Shiga, Tamba, and Sanjo, and we shall leave you now. I alone will stay with our young master until he reaches the capital." Then he turned to Ushiwaka. "I will stay with you until you are ready to leave for the northeast with Kichiji. After that you will be entirely alone. You're quite sure you want to go, aren't you, Ushiwaka?"
Ushiwaka hesitated; then he again asked: "Konno-maru, will you really take me to see my mother? When will you do this?"
"I must first talk to Kichiji," Konno-maru replied. "Kichiji will think of a way to do it."
"Can't you manage alone, Konno-maru? Why must you first speak to Kichiji?"
"I promised that nothing would be done without his consent."
"Now—for the future!"
"Which way are you going, Goro?"
"First to Tamba, where I'll stay in hiding for a time."
"And you, Adachi?"
"I'm thinking of going to North Shiga. And you, Kamata?"
"I'll cross to Omi and then to Owari, where my father was assassinated together with Lord Yoshitomo."
One by one the men took leave of Ushiwaka, with promises to rally to him in the east. At sunset Ushiwaka and Konno-maru were alone on Sajiki Peak, towering above Kurama Mountain; the sun was setting and the mist eddied about them.
"Ushiwaka, will you be able to walk much farther?"
"Of course!"
"We shall see the lights of the capital tomorrow at this time. A carriage will be waiting for us at a certain spot."
"A carriage? . . . And where shall we be going?"
"That I don't know, but you need not worry about it. Kichiji will see to everything. You need only trust him. If I have reason to doubt him, he'll not get off alive."
The two started down the peak. They saw no one until dusk, when they met a stranger of whom they asked the way. They went on for several leagues, until they passed a small settlement, then far below them they saw some lights dotting the darkness.
"Konno-maru, are those the lights of the capital?"
"No, that is Mount Atago over there—the lights of the Atago Shrine and the monastery."
"We've come a good way, but are we any nearer the capital?"
"Not yet. We've been doubling on our tracks to escape pursuit, but we're getting closer and closer to the capital."
"Ushiwaka—" Konno-maru said suddenly, "when we reach the capital you must never call me Konno-maru, but Kowaka."
"Call you Kowaka?"
"That's what people there call me."
"Oh? . . . I'm hungry, Konno-maru," he said.
"That's natural. I'll see if I can find you something to eat. Wait in that shrine over there."
After what seemed a long time, Konno-maru returned and found that Ushiwaka had flung himself down to sleep on the shrine porch. He could hear his even breathing as he lay there under the stars. Konno-maru shook him awake, and together they devoured the food that Konno-maru had brought from a farmhouse; then they lay down to sleep until the short summer's night whitened into dawn.
They walked on for half the day. From time to time they met strangers from whose appearance they could tell that they were nearing Kyoto.
"We're not far from Saga now," Konno-maru told Ushiwaka as they came in sight of a hill against whose side nestled a thatched cottage, enclosed by a brushwood hedge. "Look, he's come as he promised! There's the ox-carriage on the road below the cottage," Konno-maru exclaimed.
Ushiwaka was unmoved by what he saw, but the look of relief on Konno-maru's face caused him to look up expectantly. Konno-maru cautiously approached a gate in the hedge and peered over it into the cottage.
The Heike Story Page 66