Black Lotus

by Laura Joh Rowland

  “I want a basin of hot water and cloths so I can clean her,” Reiko said to him.

  The warden looked surprised that she’d spoken, then affronted. He turned to Sano.

  “You found her like this?” Sano asked him.

  “Yes.”

  “And you’ve not treated her injuries?” Disapproval cooled Sano’s voice.

  “It’s not our practice to pamper criminals,” the warden said defensively.

  “Get the bath supplies,” Sano ordered, “and fetch Dr. Ito.”

  The warden left to obey. Reiko’s anger extended to Sano. He didn’t really care about Haru; he just wanted to keep her alive for her trial. Having arrested her, he was partly responsible for her suffering. Reiko averted her eyes from him and soothed Haru until the girl quieted.

  “What happened, Haru-san?” Reiko said gently.

  Haru pressed her damp, feverish face against Reiko’s shoulder. She mumbled, “There were three men. They hurt me.”

  She began weeping again. Reiko patted her back. “It’s all right, you’re safe now.” She would have liked to give Haru more time to tell the story at her own pace, but Sano and Hirata were waiting for information, and Reiko feared they would intercede if she delayed too long. “Who were the men?”

  “I don’t know. They wore masks.” Huge sobs convulsed Haru. “I tried to fight back, but they—they—”

  Her hand moved down over her pubis. Now Reiko noticed how much blood there was on the lower portion of Haru’s robe, and understood what else the gang had done. She whispered, “Oh, no.” Glancing up, she saw her own comprehension and pity reflected on Sano’s face, but his reaction didn’t ease her ire toward him.

  “We need to question all the jail personnel,” Sano said to Hirata. “Assemble them outside.”

  Hirata departed. Two prison guards brought in clean rags and a basin of steaming water. An elderly man with a stern face and white hair accompanied them. He wore the dark blue coat of a physician and carried a wooden chest.

  “Good morning, Sano-san,” he said.

  “Thank you for coming, Ito-san,” said Sano. “Please allow me to introduce my wife.”

  Reiko and Dr. Ito exchanged bows, regarding each other with mutual interest. “It’s an honor to meet you,” Reiko said.

  “The honor is mine,” Ito replied sincerely. He saw Haru, and concern deepened the creases in his forehead. “This is my patient? Perhaps you would be kind enough to assist while I treat her?”

  Haru shrank away from him, whimpered, and clung to Reiko.

  “Don’t be afraid,” Reiko said. “We’re going to make you feel better.”

  She leveled a cool gaze at Sano, hinting that Haru needed privacy and he should remove himself. He gave her a warning look, bade farewell to Dr. Ito, then left the room, closing the door firmly behind him.

  In the prison’s main courtyard, Sano found Hirata with the hundred men who staffed Edo Jail. The few samurai officials stood together. Forty guards had lined up in rows nearby. These were petty criminals—thieves, gangsters, brawlers, confidence men—sentenced to work in the jail. They sported cropped haircuts, cotton kimonos and leggings, and various clubs, daggers, and spears. Apart from the rest knelt the eta. Everyone bowed to Sano.

  “Who was on duty in the women’s wing last night?” Sano asked them.

  Three men stepped forward from the ranks of the guards.

  “You found Haru after she was attacked?” Sano said.

  “Yes, master,” chorused the guards.

  “Do you know who attacked her?”

  They shook their heads, but Sano saw their feet shift uneasily. He didn’t think they had beaten Haru, but he guessed whom they would want to protect. He walked along the rows of guards, scrutinizing them, until one caught his attention. This guard was in his twenties, with slitty eyes under a low brow. While the other men wore old, faded, patched kimonos, the indigo fabric of his garment was dark and new.

  “Where were you last night?” Sano asked him.

  “Asleep in the barracks.” The guard stood with his hands clasped behind him.

  Sano grabbed the guard’s hands, yanked them around, and inspected them. Raw, red scratches marked the wrists. “How did you get these?”

  “I was playing with a cat,” the guard muttered, pulling out of Sano’s grasp.

  “A cat named Haru?”

  On a hunch, Sano lifted the guard’s kimono. He saw a dingy loincloth covered with brownish bloodstains: The man had changed his outer clothes after assaulting Haru, but not his underwear. Disgust filled Sano. His belief that Haru was a killer limited his sympathy for her, but he abhorred people who preyed on the helpless.

  “Who were your accomplices?” he demanded.

  Down the row, another guard started running toward the gate. Hirata and two other detectives chased and caught him. They forced him to the ground. Sano walked over to the captive, who lay facedown while the detectives held him.

  “He’s one of the attackers,” Hirata said, pointing to the scratches on the guard’s arms.

  The warden joined them. “These two men are known for sporting with female prisoners,” he said.

  Then the attack on Haru was an ordinary incident of violence at Edo Jail and unrelated to the murder case, Sano thought. Still, he needed to be certain. He addressed the guard: “Why did you torture Haru?”

  “We just wanted a little fun,” the man whined.

  “Who was the third accomplice?”

  “We didn’t do anything that doesn’t happen here all the time,” the man said.

  “Never mind the excuses,” Sano said. “Answer me.”

  “There wasn’t anyone else. Just the two of us.”

  While her guards stood watch outside the cell, Reiko had helped Dr. Ito undress Haru and bathe her. Dr. Ito had applied healing salve to her wounds, bandaged them, and fed her a potion containing herbs to strengthen her system and opium to relieve pain. He’d promised to check on Haru later, then left. Now Haru lay on fresh straw, wearing a clean robe, covered by a blanket. Reiko sat beside her.

  “Have you any idea why those men attacked you?” Reiko asked.

  Haru’s bruised face relaxed as the sedative began to take effect. She said in a soft, drowsy voice, “He wanted me to confess to killing those people and setting the fire. He said that if I didn’t, he would hurt me even worse, then kill me.”

  An ominous chill passed through Reiko. Apparently, Haru was talking about the gang’s leader, who’d had a purpose more sinister than blood sport. “Why did he want you to confess?”

  “I don’t know.” Haru yawned. “He didn’t say.”

  “Who was he?”

  “ … I don’t know.”

  However, Reiko could think of a good explanation. The Black Lotus must have decided that forcing Haru to confess would stop the investigation into the sect. The thugs must be followers of High Priest Anraku, sent by him to threaten Haru. This scenario strengthened Reiko’s belief that Haru knew too much about the sect’s clandestine business, and Anraku wanted her to take her secrets to the grave. Reiko became determined to remove Haru from Edo Jail. Therefore, she must convince Sano that Haru needed special protection and had knowledge that would further his investigation.

  “Haru-san, you must tell me what you saw and heard while you were living at the Black Lotus Temple,” Reiko said.

  The girl stirred. She murmured, “What kinds of things?”

  “Secret underground rooms and tunnels,” Reiko said. “Novices being starved, imprisoned, tortured, or killed.”

  Haru tossed her head from side to side. Sleepy anxiety puckered her face.

  Reiko thought she knew the reason for the girl’s agitation. “High Priest Anraku took you in and you feel indebted to him, but if you want to save yourself, you must tell the truth.”

  “Anraku …” Haru’s voice trailed off on a sad, lonely note. “Why has he forsaken me?”

  “What is the sect planning?” Reiko asked urgently. “Did
Anraku order the attacks in Shinagawa? Is he going to do something worse?”

  “No,” Haru protested weakly. “He’s good. He’s wonderful. I love him. I thought he loved me.”

  She closed her eyes as if the conversation had exhausted her, and Reiko saw the veil of sleep descending upon her. Reiko believed that Haru knew more than a misguided sense of loyalty allowed her to tell. Might Anraku have enchanted Haru as he had other followers? Could Haru have been involved in his schemes? The cold touch of suspicion disturbed Reiko, yet as she looked down at Haru’s small, battered figure, her instincts insisted that Haru could still be basically good, despite the mistakes she’d made. Besides, it seemed improbable that the sect would have entrusted important facts to her. Still, Reiko wondered how strong was Anraku’s hold on Haru, and what Haru might have done for the high priest.

  “Haru-san,” she said, “if you tell me what the Black Lotus is up to, I may be able to get you out of jail.”

  The girl lay asleep, her breathing slow and even. Her eyelids fluttered, and a moan issued from her parted lips. She said, “I didn’t know he was there.”

  “Who?” Reiko said, startled.

  “Radiant Spirit,” Haru murmured. Her eyes remained closed; she was apparently talking in her sleep. “Chie’s little boy.”

  “Chie had a child named Radiant Spirit?” Reiko wondered if this was fact, or a fabrication of Haru’s dreams.

  Under the blanket, Haru twitched. “I didn’t want to him to get hurt,” she cried. “He wasn’t supposed to be there. It was an accident!”

  “Where?” Premonition solidified into a cold, sinking weight inside Reiko.

  “In the cottage,” Haru said.

  Then she sighed, and her restless movements ceased. She slept peacefully while Reiko beheld her in horror. It sounded as though Haru meant she’d set the cottage on fire and accidentally burned the child because she hadn’t known he was inside. Had she started the fire to destroy the bodies of Commander Oyama and Chie—the people she really had intended to hurt, and had indeed killed?

  The terrible possibility held Reiko in a stunned thrall. Over the pounding of her heart, she heard women shouting down the corridor, and a guard ordering them to be quiet. All her doubts about Haru rose up in her. The lies, the fire that had killed her husband, her repeated attempts to incriminate other people, her bond with High Priest Anraku—these all validated Reiko’s sudden notion that Haru had admitted while asleep a guilt her conscious mind refused to recall.

  But Reiko didn’t want to believe that she’d mistakenly interfered with Sano’s attempts to serve justice. Perhaps she’d misinterpreted what Haru had said. The blows Haru had received to her head and the medicine Dr. Ito had given her might have confused her. One thing was certain. Much as Reiko hated to breach the code of honesty in her marriage with Sano, she couldn’t tell him about Haru’s unconscious ramblings, for that would escalate his campaign against Haru, and the Black Lotus would never be exposed.

  29

  If there be those who trouble and disrupt the proponents of the

  true Law,

  Their blood will spill like rivers.

  —FROM THE BLACK LOTUS SUTRA

  Midori awakened to groggy consciousness. A heavy fog of sleep weighed upon her. Through it she heard distant chanting. Her head ached; her mouth was dry and her stomach queasy. Rolling onto her side, she opened her eyes.

  She was lying on a futon on a wooden pallet, in a large room illuminated by shafts of sunlight from barred windows. Around her, other women lay asleep on beds arranged in rows. Midori frowned in confusion. Who were they? Where was she? Then she realized that she must be in the Black Lotus convent, and the women were her fellow novices. The fog in her mind lifted, and she recalled the initiation ceremony with lucidity and horror.

  She’d enjoyed that man touching her, thinking he was Hirata! She couldn’t believe she’d behaved so disgracefully! There must have been poison in the incense that had driven her mad. Anraku’s blood must have contained a sleeping potion, because she couldn’t recall anything that had happened after drinking it.

  Now Midori noticed that the sleeping women were dressed in gray robes instead of the white ones they’d worn last night. Some of them were bald: Their heads had been shaved. Midori’s heart lurched as she recalled that now they were all nuns. Her hand flew to her own head. She felt long, silky hair and sighed in relief, though she wondered why she’d been spared. Examining herself, she saw that she, too, wore gray. Someone had changed her clothes while she slept. Misery and shame swelled inside Midori. She’d thought herself such a clever spy, yet she’d succumbed to the Black Lotus.

  A nun walked up the aisle, banging a gong. “Get up!” she ordered. “It’s time to begin your new life!”

  Amid murmurs and yawns, the new nuns stirred. Midori sat up, wincing as vertigo engulfed her. Servant girls passed out steaming bowls of tea and rice gruel.

  “No talking,” the nun announced.

  Midori received her portion and realized she was hungry, but feared that the food contained poison. If she wanted to keep her wits, she must not consume anything the sect gave her.

  “If you’re not going to eat yours, can I have it?” someone whispered.

  Looking up, Midori saw Toshiko kneeling on the bed beside hers. Toshiko looked sleepy; she still had her hair, too. Midori noticed that all the prettier girls did. Concerned for her friend’s safety, Midori whispered urgently, “No, you can’t! It might be bad!”

  “Bad?” Toshiko frowned. “What do you mean?”

  The nun patrolled the aisles. Midori didn’t want to find out what the punishment was for breaking rules. She realized that she couldn’t leave Toshiko at the mercy of the Black Lotus. When she left the temple, she must take her friend with her. “I’ll explain as soon as I can.” Then curiosity overrode caution. “What did Anraku promise you?”

  Toshiko never got a chance to answer, because the nun herded everyone outside to use the privies and fetch water from the well to wash themselves. Then she took them to the main hall. The precinct was full of nuns and priests bringing in rice bales, loads of charcoal and wood, urns of oil, barrels of pickled vegetables and dried fish. Midori wondered why they needed so many provisions. She saw no pilgrims around, and felt a stab of fear.

  The Black Lotus had indeed expelled everyone except its members. She must be the only outsider here. The weather was clear and bright, but Midori sensed an undercurrent in the atmosphere, as if from an invisible storm brewing. She longed to run away before anything worse happened to her, but she couldn’t go home with nothing to tell except the details of the initiation ceremony, and she’d rather die than have anyone know that. If she returned empty-handed, everything she’d gone through would be for naught. Besides, she’d come to believe that the Black Lotus really was evil, and she wanted to help defeat it. She must be brave and stay long enough to gather the information she’d promised Reiko.

  Inside the main hall, her group joined a crowd of monks and nuns who were kneeling on the floor. An elderly priest led them in chanting. Midori secured a place next to Toshiko and chanted the monotonous prayer. The hall looked different today. Curtains covered the mirrors, and only a few candles burned on the altar, yet the emotional intensity she’d felt last night still charged the air. Senior nuns and priests guarded the doors or patrolled narrow aisles between the ranks of kneeling figures. Head bowed, Midori nudged Toshiko.

  “The Black Lotus is dangerous,” she whispered. “It kills people. Something bad is going to happen.”

  “How do you know?” Toshiko whispered back.

  The thought of revealing her true identity and purpose scared Midori, but she didn’t think Toshiko would believe her unless she did. “I’m Niu Midori, a spy for the wife of the shogun’s ssakan-sama. She told me,” Midori said. “I’m here to find out what’s happening. As soon as I do, I’m leaving. You have to come with me because if you stay, you could get hurt.”

  They kept chanting as
Toshiko flashed Midori a frightened glance. Then Toshiko whispered, “All right. What are we going to do?”

  “I’ll sneak away later and look around,” Midori answered. “Then I’ll come back for you.”

  At intervals during the prayers, groups of nuns and priests filed out of the hall and others filed in, worshipping in shifts. Eventually, the nun led Midori’s group to a building that housed a workshop for printing prayers. Inside, nuns cut sheets of paper and mixed pots of acrid black ink. Others worked at long tables, spreading ink on wooden blocks incised with characters and pressing the blocks against paper. Midori and Toshiko were assigned to cut the printed prayers into strips that bore the message, “Hail the new era of the Black Lotus.” Two priests roved the room, overseeing the work. Midori waited until the priests were busy at the other end of the room, then edged toward the door.

  “Where are you going?” demanded a loud, female voice.

  Startled, Midori looked around and saw a nun glaring at her from the printing table. The priests moved toward her. “To the privy,” Midori lied, belatedly aware that everyone here watched one another.

  “Go with her,” one of the priests told the nun.

  On the way to the privy and back, the nun never let Midori out of sight. Working beside Toshiko, Midori whispered, “You have to help me get away.”

  Toshiko sliced her knife between rows of printed characters. “I’ll do something to distract everybody.”

  “When?” Midori asked anxiously.

  “We’ll have to wait for the right time. Just be patient and watch me. When I wink at you, run.”

  Now Midori was glad she’d taken Toshiko into her confidence. Toshiko was exactly the clever accomplice she needed.

  “We should not have left Haru in jail,” Reiko said to Sano.

  It was late afternoon, and they were traveling through Nihonbashi toward Edo Castle. Reiko rode in her palanquin, while Sano walked beside its open window, leading his horse; Hirata and the detectives preceded them. A short time ago, Sano had finished his inquiries at Edo Jail, told Reiko the results, and said it was time to go home. Reiko hadn’t wanted to leave Haru, and she didn’t agree with his version of events, but she couldn’t disgrace her husband by challenging his authority at the jail, so she’d reluctantly kept silent until now.