Black Wind

by F. Paul Wilson

  "But why did Tokyo burn? I thought Namazu caused tsunamis."

  Matsuo remembered the news in September of 1923 that his family's summer home had narrowly missed destruction by a tidal wave.

  "Sometimes, yes," Nagata said. "But this time, Namazu did not merely twitch his tail as he usually does. This time he must have been terribly angry, for he caused the ground to heave and roll like the deck of a ship in a storm. The convulsions of the land caused Tokyo to burn for days. It was three-quarters destroyed before the fire was brought under control. Over one hundred thousand people died. Those who lived escaped only with the clothes on their back and whatever valuables they could carry. Most wear Western clothes now because they lost everything and have no money left to replace their silk kimonos. Western styles are cheaper."

  "I see."

  Knowing the reason for this drabness gave Matsuo some peace of mind. For a while it had almost seemed that he was back in the Nihonmachi section of San Francisco.

  It struck him then that he had grown up in a city recently rebuilt from a great earthquake and fire, and now he was in another one halfway across the world that was in the process of doing the same. Was he destined to dog the trail of disaster?

  They passed into the Marunouchi district that seemed little damaged. They then came to the moat-encircled Imperial Palace at the center of the Chiyoda-ku district. Matsuo recognized it immediately.

  "The Palace! It was not damaged?"

  "You don't think Namazu would dare to harm the Son of Heaven?" Nagata said. "If you look now you will see how the great walls just beyond the Imperial moat are composed of huge stones laid one atop the other with no form of cement or grout between them. This makes them better able to withstand the tremors of the earth."

  Matsuo wished he could see over those high walls. He knew that behind them lay hundreds of serene acres filled with woods and pools and gardens and pavilions. This was where the Emperor lived and worked and played.

  Matsuo had noticed the occupants of a packed streetcar bow as one as the vehicle passed the gates of the Imperial Palace, so he was ready to bow along with Nagata and Kimura as their own car passed. Nagata gave him a small, approving smile.

  They went uphill then and turned off the main thoroughfare into a narrow, willow-lined street. Before he knew it, they were parked before a large two-story house with high walls of weathered teak and a black-tiled roof. To the left of the entry gate stood a four-foot-high kodomatsu of pine, bamboo, and a sprig of plum blossom, the New Year's decoration that was supposed to bring vigor, strength, and long life to all family members. Matsuo hoped he had been included in that wish.

  My family. My home.

  He drew a tremulous breath and felt the sharp jab of pain by which his ribs reminded him that they were not yet fully healed. And with the pain came the memory of how Frankie had run off and left him to face his white attackers alone. The memory of Frankie would be forever linked to pain—in his ribs and in his heart.

  But now was the time to push Frankie into the past where he belonged and where he would always stay. Matsuo was home now. Inside, his family awaited him. Here was where he belonged, where he would spend the rest of his life.

  As the driver pulled open the gate, the front door to the house opened and a middle-aged man in a dark green kimono embroidered with maple leaves stepped out, followed by a young man all in black. Matsuo recognized them instantly from the many photographs he had received over the years.

  "Father!" he cried and broke into a run across the courtyard.

  Deep in the recesses of his mind a voice sounding very much like Nagata's told him that proper filial piety demanded that he stop and bow before his father but he ignored it. He ran straight ahead, and actually increased his speed in the surge of incredible joy that splashed over him when he saw his father open his arms to him.

  And then he was in those arms and they were folding around him. Despite his very best efforts, he burst into tears.

  Home at last.

  * * *

  Hiroki returned his brother's bow. After that disgraceful display with Father, Matsuo at least had the good manners not to hug him, too.

  So, this was the long-lost Matsuo, the little brother from America. He was quite a sight with his bruised face and stiff, splinted spine; he tried to hide it but it was obvious to Hiroki that his younger brother walked with a limp. Even worse, he acted like a country bumpkin, bowing either too low or not bowing low enough. After burning an incense stick before the picture of Mother at the household shrine, he acted like a poorly trained puppy, running from one corner of the room to the next, touching and inspecting everything. Yet the joy in his face and his open adoration of Father was touching in a crude sort of way. Despite his reservations, Hiroki found himself responding to his younger brother's awe and almost serflike deference to him.

  And all the while, the notorious Takijiro Nagata stood by the door, watching his protégé like an approving parent.

  Eventually, Father went off to a corner of the room with Nagata, leaving Hiroki and Matsuo alone together. Hiroki turned to his brother.

  "Do you miss America?"

  Matsuo shook his head. Pain flickered across his features. "No. I have no friends there. My life is here."

  "But you are going back."

  Matsuo bristled visibly. "I am never going back."

  His vehemence startled Hiroki. "I think you'd better speak to Father about that."

  Matsuo shook his head. "I am never going back."

  "Why not? Is that where you got those bruises?"

  "He came by those wounds honorably," said Father from behind him. "Nagata-san has just explained the circumstances to me." He leaned forward and placed his hands on Matsuo's shoulders. "He subjected himself to a beating at the hands of hooligans rather than risk exposing his father to public ridicule. I am proud of you, my son. And of Nagata-san, who has done his work well."

  As Hiroki watched the old samurai beam and bow, he struggled to hide the resentment that flared within him. He maintained a calm, pleased expression. He could not remember Father ever honoring him so.

  "We have an important meeting tomorrow," Father said as he removed his hands from Matsuo's shoulders. He glanced at Nagata and then at Hiroki. "I believe Matsuo has proven himself worthy of attendance.”

  "I am honored, Father," Matsuo said, bowing.

  Hiroki took a deep breath and let it out slowly. It wasn't going to be easy, but he was going to stay calm. Matsuo was a novelty now. Father would be concentrating on him, making a special effort to help the boy feel at home. This was natural and Hiroki would not allow himself to be offended, as long as his younger brother caused him no loss of face. The novelty of Matsuo's presence would wear thin very shortly and Hiroki's natural superiority would manifest itself to all. Until then, he would pay no heed to the extra attentions and privileges lavished on his younger brother. After all, Hiroki was a lay acolyte of the Kakureta Kao and privy to secrets beyond the dreams of everyone else.

  He looked over and saw Father and Matsuo deep in animated conversation and felt all his muscles tighten.

  No, it was not going to be easy.

  * * *

  It will come. I will belong here.

  But how long until he no longer felt like a visitor? Perhaps it was unreasonable to expect his father and brother to take him into their hearts without getting to know him first. After all, he arrived here a stranger. He was of their own flesh and blood, yet still felt himself an outsider.

  It will come in time.

  He rolled up his futon now and stowed it in the closet. He spied his oak bokken standing in the corner of the closet and took it out. He had not practiced since leaving America. He thrust it through the belt of his kimono, then drew it out in a slashing motion. When he moved now, the pain in his side was bearable, but the ribs did not seem to be healing properly. They remained bent inward on his right flank, forming a fist-sized concavity in the otherwise smooth curve of his chest wall.
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  The pain reminded him, as it always did, of Frankie, but instead of the gut-aching hurt the memory usually brought, today he missed Frankie.

  No!

  He slashed the wooden sword through the air. He could not miss that betrayer. Only a little loneliness. And that would pass.

  It was Nagata he missed, not Frankie. The man who had risen with him every morning and had structured the minutes and hours of each day for as long as Matsuo could remember had returned to quarters at the rear of this house, tending to Father's affairs, leaving an immense void in Matsuo's life. The world seemed empty without him, as empty as...

  ... Japan.

  Where was the Japan he had been told about, had spent his days dreaming about? He hadn't found it here in Tokyo. And he hadn't found it on the day trips with his father and brother. He had felt a hint of it in Hayama when he had gazed upon the snow-capped majesty of Mount Fuji, but that was natural beauty. Where was the beauty of the Japanese people, the Japanese culture Nagata had never stopped telling him about? And where was the sense of honor which flowed from Nagata? Matsuo certainly found no evidence of it in the Tokyo papers, filled as they were with stories of trade wars between the industrial zaibatsu, and political plots and conspiracies and assassinations.

  Did the Japan of his dreams exist at all, or was it all some fairy tale concocted by Nagata?

  One bright spot though had been yesterday's pilgrimage. At Matsuo's request, Father had taken him to the Shinagawa district to visit the Sengaku-ji Temple. As Matsuo walked through the Sanmon—the massive main gate of dark wood—he had felt the weight of the ages upon him. On a snowy December night more than two centuries ago, the Forty-seven Ronin had retreated here after decapitating Lord Kira. They had satisfied their giri to their dead master. Here was where they chose to satisfy chu. Here within the grounds of the Sengaku-ji, they all committed seppuku.

  Matsuo walked reverently among headstones in the temple graveyard and lit a joss stick to their memory, feeling that here he was at least touching the hem of the Japan Nagata had told him about, the Japan he had expected. Giri lived in the ancient temple.

  He left the Sengaku-ji reluctantly, but was delighted on the way out to discover that the shoes he had left pointing inward on the steps when he had entered had been turned around to ease his exit.

  In the room his father had given him, Matsuo now stood barefoot on the tatami and began a slow kata, swinging the oak sword through the air in a ritualized set of movements, testing his flexibility. Yes, pain remained, but it felt good to have the bokken in his hands, to move again in the familiar patterns. As he loosened up, he accelerated into a string of the more complex iai-jutsu kata, many of which involved leaping up from a crouching position and attacking an imaginary opponent. These were the most demanding, calling for brief slashing barrages interspersed with moments of statuelike stillness.

  As Matsuo whirled and slashed at his make-believe enemy, he caught sight of his brother standing in the doorway, watching him. Hiroki's face was set in its usual stern expression, but Matsuo detected a light in his eyes he had not seen before. Without a word, he disappeared from the doorway and returned in half a minute with a bokken of his own. He stepped into the room and removed his shirt. Matsuo noticed a dark mark above his right wrist. He looked closer and saw that it was a tattoo of some sort: a black hexagon with a meshwork center.

  Oblivious to his brother's stare, Hiroki flexed his muscular arms and shoulders, then bowed to Matsuo and took the ready stance with his bokken. Matsuo returned the bow and held his own wooden sword in the ready position. Then they circled each other.

  It took only a few cuts and slashes—all expertly pulled within a fraction of an inch so that only a puff of air touched him—for Matsuo to realize that his brother was an excellent swordsman. Hiroki's movements were quick, graceful, fluid, his style unique, at least to Matsuo. But then, the only style he had ever known was Nagata's.

  They wove patterns across the tatamis, Hiroki always on the offensive, Matsuo constantly parrying, dodging, and retreating, hampered by the stiffness in his rib cage and the burning pain there. After a while, he began to get a feel for the rhythm of Hiroki's thrusts, and when he sensed a pause coming, Matsuo stepped forward with a burst of strokes toward his brother's neck and chest, all whispering within a hair's breadth of the skin. Hiroki's eyes hardened as he responded with a blinding flurry of cuts that had Matsuo backpedaling across the room. As Matsuo twisted to avoid a particularly well-aimed thrust, he felt a searing pain lance through his chest wall from his broken ribs. The pain threw him off balance and he fell to the side, ripping through the paper wall of his room and landing in the hall outside.

  The pain blinded him for a moment, but when he opened his eyes, he saw Hiroki standing over him, panting, smiling, and holding out his hand to him. Matsuo took it and allowed his brother to help him to his feet. He would have preferred to kneel on the floor and clutch at his ribs, but this was the first time since his arrival that his brother had smiled at him, and he did not wish to demean Hiroki's victory by calling attention to the prior injury. So he clenched his teeth and bowed.

  "Nagata-san has taught you well, little brother," Hiroki said, returning the bow.

  "I learned well and practiced hard."

  Matsuo saw his brother blink with surprise at his words. He cursed his mouth for allowing the American within him to speak.

  "Yes. Well, I suppose that is true," Hiroki said, sounding just the slightest bit unsure of himself.

  Matsuo tried to cover his error. "But it is obvious that I was not taught as well as you were by your own sensei." He did not fully believe this. Although his brother was four years older and had that many extra years of training, he felt he might have beaten Hiroki, or at least fought him to a draw, if he had been able to move more freely. "I fear I am a poor samurai."

  " ‘Samurai'? Never call yourself that. You are of noble blood—samurai serve you."

  "Yes, my brother."

  Will I ever learn?

  "But as for my training, I have had the advantage of many teachers. Every guard at the temple is adept in the art."

  "Temple?"

  Hiroki smiled again. "You will learn of that soon enough. But for now, let's go to the kotatsu and warm our feet. I wish to speak to you."

  Matsuo's spirits lifted at the invitation. Their rooms sat side by side on the second floor overlooking the garden, separated only by a flimsy wall of translucent paper on a walnut frame, but it might as well have been granite block for the effectiveness of the way it divided them. This was the first time his brother had shown a desire to be with him.

  They slipped into woolen kimonos as Hiroki led the way to the ground floor and the kotatsu. They seated themselves around the small sunken heater in the floor of a room that overlooked the rear garden. Hiroki took the cushion nearest the window. Matsuo reveled in the warmth that flowed into his feet as he slipped them beneath the coverlet. It was said that warming the feet warmed the whole body, and he believed it.

  Hiroki withdrew a packet of cigarettes from a sleeve and offered one to Matsuo who accepted. He knew Father was somewhere in the house and wondered if he would disapprove of his smoking, but for now he wanted to share something with his brother. Hiroki held the match for him, and Matsuo struggled to suppress a cough as he inhaled. The tobacco was strong. They smoked in silence, the two brothers watching each other. Matsuo was fascinated at the way Hiroki held his cigarette between his thumb and forefinger with his palm up.

  Eventually Hiroki began questioning him about America. At first he asked about how he had been treated there, but then his questions moved into the area of troop strength and numbers of battleships and destroyers.

  "Why do you wish to know, brother?"

  "Because someday we will be at war with them," Hiroki said in a low voice.

  The certainty in his brother's tone startled Matsuo. "I'm sorry," he said, feeling as if he were letting Hiroki down. "I have no answers for you."


  "Then why did Father send you there? You've learned nothing." Before Matsuo could frame a reply, he heard his father's voice behind him.

  "I did not send your brother to America to be a spy, Hiroki. I sent him there so he would be familiar with the American mind." He turned to Matsuo. "The United States looms large in Japan's future. I plan for you, with your day-to-day knowledge of how Americans think and act, to play an important part in that future."

  "But Father," Matsuo said, feeling the room constrict around him, "I know nothing."

  "You know more than you think you do," the baron said with a smile. "And you shall know much more."

  That had an ominous ring to it but Matsuo pushed all questions aside as his brother spoke.

  "If it comes to war, Father, surely the Chinese and the British will pose more of a threat."

  "We must learn not to think of war solely in terms of guns and soldiers and ships, but in terms of industry and trade and production. There are many kinds of war, and the hardest fought and most valuable victories will take place in the marketplace between countries." His eyes roamed the room and came to rest on a small five-needle pine bonsai on a shelf in the corner. He motioned Hiroki toward the tree. "Bring that over here."

  When Hiroki had placed it on the table between them, the baron spoke again.

  "Consider this tree as Japan. You will note that it is overdue for repotting and thus quite suitable for what I wish to show you. You will note how its root mass has increased to the point where it is actually lifting the entire tree, mossy base and all, out of its pot. There are three possible futures for this honorable tree: It may have its roots trimmed back and be repotted to reduce its capacity for any sort of substantial growth; or it may be left untended as it is and eventually die, strangled by its own roots; or..."

  Matsuo leaned forward into the pause. "Yes?"

  "Or it may be liberated from the restrictions of its pot to let its pent-up roots find new feeding grounds. Britain has its roots in India and Africa and even in Hong Kong. The United States has the Philippines and Hawaii—and the United States doesn't even need roots, having only thirty-one people per square mile as compared to Japan's four hundred. All of our eighty million live on a group of islands the size of California. The roots of most of the European countries feed off Asia and the Pacific in one way or the other. Why not Japan? Of all countries, Why not Japan?"