by I. J. Parker
There was a pregnant silence, then Akitada said, "Please don't blame Tora. No man could ask for a more loyal friend than you have in him. As for myself, I cannot help my birth any more than you can yours. In fact, I've had little cause to consider myself more fortunate than other men. I wished to learn your skills because I might need them someday and because I believe a man should have many skills."
Hidesato glowered silently.
"I am sorry you will not accept me," Akitada said heavily after a moment. "Tora wanted to leave my service when he found out how you felt, but I would not let him go without talking to you first. He was honor-bound to an agreement we made when we met. I mention this so you will know that he deserves your friendship. But he is free now. I won't stand between you." He fished a string of coppers from his sash and rose. "It's been a long day, and I am weary. Use the coppers to pay the bill, Tora."
"I'm tired also," Tora said, dropping the money on the mat and getting to his feet. "Let's be on our way. Good luck, Hidesato."
Akitada stopped, dismayed. He had not intended to force a choice on Tora. Before he could speak, Hidesato said, "Sit down, little brother. You, too, sir, if you wouldn't mind. It's hard to believe you find Tora at all satisfactory, but I'll take your word for it." He reached for the pitcher and filled their cups. "Now that I'm to be employed again, I look forward to returning your hospitality, sir."
Akitada and Tora sat down dazedly. Hidesato smiled and nodded. "I'm not much for making speeches," he said to Akitada, "but Tora's judgment is good enough for me. I don't hold with the nobility as a rule, but I'll make an exception in your case if you don't mind the company of a rough soldier." He raised his cup to Akitada and drank.
It was not much, but Akitada was grateful. Raising his own cup, he said, "I'm glad and honored to know you."
With the ice finally broken, they told Hidesato about their exploits, and after some questions about the monks and Higekuro and his daughters, he offered his help whenever his military duties permitted it. This pleasant state of affairs was interrupted when a waitress whispered something to Hidesato. He rose and looked toward the entrance.
"Sorry," he muttered, "the friend I mentioned waits outside."
Akitada felt companionable. "Invite your friend to join us," he suggested.
Hidesato flushed crimson. "She'll refuse," he said.
"A lady? But I insist," said Akitada, fascinated. Looking around the room, he added, "I see other women eating here."
Hidesato said stiffly, "As you wish, sir."
He returned with a young woman who was wrapped in a quilted jacket that partially covered a soiled and garish gown. Her face wore the heavy makeup of brothel women.
"This is Jasmin," Hidesato said awkwardly.
The young woman nodded timidly.
"Come," said Hidesato. "Sit down. You must be cold and hungry." He helped her remove her jacket while Tora called for more food and wine.
Without the thick quilted jacket Jasmin looked pitifully thin. Akitada thought she was probably young and coarsely pretty under the layers of pasty white powder, but at the moment she looked merely unhealthy and pathetic. The wind had tangled her hair, and her hands were grimy and had bitten fingernails. Yet Hidesato fussed over her with a devotion only a son or lover could show such a woman. Akitada exchanged a glance with Tora.
"My," the girl said in a throaty voice, looking about her, "a woman's life's a thousand times harder than a man's. Here you sit with your friends, keeping warm and filling your stomach, while I'm earning a living freezing my toes on the dark streets. In this weather there's hardly any custom. Only the poor are out--and they like it for free." Unconcerned about their reaction, she went on, "They wouldn't let me in till you came to get me. Oh, food!" She reached hungrily for the shrimp the waitress set before her and began to eat so greedily that the shrimp disappeared half-shelled between her small teeth. Hidesato watched her with a besotted smile and pushed the wine cup toward her. She nodded her thanks, and chattered between bites and gulps, and picked shells from her teeth. "Mmm, that's good...It's been a bad night... only one trick, an old tightwad ... carpenter from the slums. Pour me another, will you, Hito dear? The bastard gave me ten coppers ... can you believe it? And not even a room! Just an alley, standing up! Ten coppers! Roku had the rest out of my hide earlier."
She looked tired and drawn all of a sudden. Absently she rubbed her left cheekbone with sticky fingers and dislodged enough caked powder to reveal an ugly bruise.
"That bastard beat you again," Hidesato said hoarsely. "I told you to let me teach him a lesson. Listen, Jasmin, I got the job. At the garrison. I'll be a sergeant again. The money's good. You can give up this life and get away from that brute. Move in with me. I'll look after you."
Jasmin shook her head. "I can't, Hito. You know why. And you mustn't touch him. Promise? If you're truly my friend?" She looked at him piteously.
Hidesato opened and shut his big hands in helpless misery. Then he pushed the wine cup toward her again. "Well, eat and drink. You still look half frozen. I've got some money and there'll be more. So don't worry, eh?" He fished in his sleeve and brought out a handful of coppers that he pressed into her hand.
Tora was beginning to look very angry, and Akitada decided it was time to leave. Hidesato gave them a brief, distracted smile before turning his attention to the woman again.
Akitada left enough money with the waitress to cover the bill for all of them, then joined Tora in the street. "You know the girl?" he asked.
Tora cursed fluently. "I thought he was rid of her. Jasmin is from his hometown, daughter of a cousin or something. He's looked after her for years. Fool woman wants nothing to do with decent men like Hidesato. Look where it's gotten her. I bet he lost his lodging because he gave her all his money so she won't get beaten up by her latest boyfriend. It's tearing him apart."
The perversity of human relationships struck Akitada painfully. Women played havoc with the men whose hearts they touched. The burly sergeant loved a common harlot who discussed her customers and her abusive lover with him. Yukinari had succumbed twice to women and was a broken man because he had had the bad luck to fall in love with Motosuke's daughter. Lady Tachibana, like her mother before her, had manipulated men, leaving them ruined or dead. Bright butterflies were fatal. Why did men become so enmeshed in their desire for certain women that they lost all sense of proportion and propriety?
They walked home in silence.
* * * *
FOURTEEN
GREEN SHARD,
BLUE FLOWER
Seimei and Akitada arrived at the back gate of the Tachibana mansion at midmorning the next day. Akitada's visits to the bathhouse took time not only from his practice bouts with Tora but now also from his work. Feeling both tired and guilty, he was short-tempered and hardly spoke to the boy Junjiro who admitted them.
Junjiro trotted beside Akitada toward the studio, looking up at him expectantly. When they reached the steps, Akitada glanced down and said brusquely, "We won't need you, but don't mention our presence to your mistress." He glanced nervously across to the main house lying peacefully in a deserted garden. The snow had disappeared everywhere except under shrubs and against the north side of the hall. He had no wish to see the winter butterfly.
"The monks are gone," offered Junjiro.
"Good," snapped Akitada, setting his foot on the bottom step.
"Shall I bring you some tea and a brazier?"
"No, thank you. We shall not be long."
The boy turned to go, and Akitada sat down on the veranda to remove his shoes. Seimei joined him. Below them Junjiro turned and asked, "Have you arrested the captain?"
"The captain?" Then Akitada remembered what the boy's mother had claimed to have seen. "No," he said. "Captain Yukinari was not in town during the night your master was murdered."
Junjiro's eyes grew round. "But who else could it have been?"
"Your mother made a mistake."
The boy flared up. "
My mother doesn't make mistakes. I'll be back." And he ran off.
Akitada sighed and got up. "Come on, Seimei. Let's get this over with."
They were bent over the documents, sorting and reading, when Junjiro reappeared. He had a stubborn look in his eyes and announced, "My mother says it was the captain's helmet she saw. He used to wear it sometimes when he came to visit. It has red cords and big silver stripes all around it. She's sure because she remembers how the red showed up against the blue robe."
Astonished, Akitada put down an account of provincial silk production and said, "A blue robe? Why would the captain have worn his helmet with a blue robe? Surely he would have been in uniform, that is, armor." He reached up to massage his neck, which ached abominably, and tried to focus bleary eyes on the boy.
Junjiro's jaw dropped. "That's right," he said. Then he grinned. "I'm glad it wasn't him." He turned and skipped away.
Akitada shook his head, winced at the pain, and returned to work. They finished in time to return to the tribunal for their noon rice, a meal that Akitada merely picked at. Tora came, and when they had eaten, Akitada said, "We found nothing among Tachibana's papers. Either the man was too careful to write his suspicions down, or the killer took the incriminating documents."
Tora nodded and turned to Seimei to discuss the brushstrokes he had been practicing under the old man's direction.
"Pay attention, both of you," Akitada snapped irritably, aware that this was meant as much for himself as for his companions. His head felt incredibly fuzzy, and the little he had eaten had left him mildly nauseated, perhaps due to the previous night's overindulgence in shrimp and wine. "Let's think about the murder," he said. "The sequence of events starts with Lord Tachibana's whispered invitation to me. We must assume that he had a secret to communicate, which was dangerous, and that he did not trust someone who was present. We have eliminated Motosuke and Yukinari as suspects, so that leaves only Joto or Ikeda."
"I think they're in it together," pronounced Tora. He belched and stretched out on his back, arms folded under his head. "The baldpate sleeps with boys and buries old monks alive, and Ikeda is a crooked official. That's good enough for me."
Seimei said, "You don't make sense. How could they both be guilty of the same crime?" He poured Akitada a cup of tea.
"Is there any more wine?" Tora asked him, rolling onto his elbow.
"You drink too much. Wine makes you say stupid things. And sit up properly in the master's presence."
Tora rearranged himself somewhat. "What is so stupid about the prefect and the abbot being in it together?"
Akitada was massaging his temples. A headache had joined his upset stomach. He was aware of a general soreness but was not sure whether to blame it on the nighttime exertions at the monastery or his lovemaking with Ayako. Putting such thoughts away, he said, "Tora makes sense in a way. They would make excellent allies. Joto provides the manpower and Ikeda the information about the convoy."
"You see, old man?" Tora said.
"Even a blind turtle finds a piece of driftwood sometimes." Seimei looked at him sourly.
"But," said Akitada, "it does not help us with the Tachibana murder or provide us with the proof we need to arrest the two."
"Maybe somebody used the captain's helmet as a disguise. It would be perfect to hide the shaven head of a monk," offered Seimei.
Akitada thought of Otomi's scroll and nodded. "Perhaps," he said, "the lady was carrying on with a lover and her husband surprised them. But Joto does not fit the picture of the secret lover." He rummaged in his writing box for the green shard from Tachibana's topknot. His fingers encountered another small hard object. It was the tiny blue flower ornament from the peddler's tray.
How long ago that seemed now. He wondered what had caused him to save the useless fragment. But he felt it again, that oddly unpleasant sense that the flower was significant. He picked up the fragment. Beyond the fact that it resembled a morning glory, fashioned from pure gold and blue enamel by a mysterious and probably foreign process, he had no clue what it might be. He had assumed that it must belong to a religious statue. If so, was it somehow related to Joto and the shipments of religious objects?
"Seimei?" he asked. "Do you recall this little scrap?"
Seimei peered at it. "You paid that rascal too much money for his trumpery goods."
Akitada replaced the flower in his writing box. "I want you to go to the market with Tora. The waitress at the inn was quite taken with you, especially after I gave her the peddler's wares with your compliments. Ask her if she knows where he lives. He is probably a regular. Then find him and ask him where he got the flower."
"Sir," protested Seimei, his face lengthening with horror, "I'd rather not. Can't Tora go?"
"Sorry, old friend. You are the only one who can identify him. Tora was chasing Otomi and the two monks." Seeing Seimei's dismay, Akitada relented. "I would not ask it if it were not important."
Then he picked up the little green shard. Tucking it into his sash, he rose. "It's getting late. I'm going to call on the widow and this time I'm determined to find the murder weapon. Tachibana was bludgeoned to death somewhere in that house. It is likely that it happened in his wife's rooms and that she knows. It always seems to come back to her." He did not say that he suspected her or how much he dreaded the visit.
Akitada was crossing the tribunal compound when he remembered Ikeda and stopped. He must be unusually distracted to forget that Ikeda, who was a potential suspect in the tax robberies, must not know of Akitada's activities in the Tachibana case until after the temple ceremony. Akitada could not call on the prefectural constables if the need arose. He was tempted to postpone his plans but decided against further delay. Instead, he turned his steps to the governor's residence, where he discussed his problem with Akinobu.
The Tachibana residence looked peaceful in the pale wintry sun. The sightseers were gone, and Junjiro opened the gate instantly. Beside him on the gravel of the courtyard stood a box and a bulging basket. The boy's mother and another woman, bent under large bundles of clothing strapped to their backs, came from the hall and passed Akitada with a bow.
"What is happening?" he asked the boy, looking after them.
"We're leaving. Sato's already gone. His niece came for him. The mistress sent for her. The old dragon gives all the orders now and she told us to get out."
"I'm sorry," said Akitada, and meant it. There was nothing he could do to help them. "Don't worry. Any master will be glad to get as good a pair of servants as you and your mother."
Junjiro drew himself up proudly. "We'll manage, sir. I'm clever. Perhaps we could serve you?"
Suddenly utterly fatigued, Akitada wanted to get his distressing visit over with as quickly as possible. "I'm afraid not," he said. "But you can take me to your mistress now."
There was some delay at the door to Lady Tachibana's apartments. When he was finally admitted, Akitada saw that the room was empty except for himself and the big nurse. The woman, more deferential today, took Akitada to the same low screen, placing a silk cushion for him. "We did not expect your honored visit," she said, bowing for the third or fourth time. "The mistress will come in a moment." She left by another door, presumably to help Lady Tachibana with her toilet.
The moment she was gone, Akitada searched the room. It looked unchanged from the last time he had seen it. The thick, patterned carpet was underfoot. The scroll of cranes hung between its two stands, one displaying the tall Chinese vase, the other an artificial tree with jade leaves and gold blossoms. Though, come to think of it, the tree had not been there before. Akitada went to look at it. It was a pretty bauble, but this stand had been empty on the day of the funeral. He recalled noticing the lack of symmetry and being bothered by it. Two matching stands required two matching vases.
And then it clicked. The vase was green.
He went to the remaining vase and took the shard from his sash. Yes, the same color and glaze. One of the pair had been used to kill Lord T
achibana. He hefted the vase by its slender neck. It was heavy and made an excellent club. Had not Junjiro complained that the servants were being blamed for breakage when they had been innocent? It should be easy enough to find out if someone had been accused of breaking a green vase the morning of the murder. Replacing the survivor of the pair, he got on his hands and knees to inspect the Chinese carpet. He found the spot almost immediately. Near the outside border was a rough and matted area. It felt faintly moist. He parted the thick threads. Yes, there was a brownish residue farther down. He touched his finger to it and then smelled it. Blood. Head wounds bleed copiously, and there had been only a small stain in the studio. Lord Tachibana had died here. He had his proof.
Hearing a sound from the next room, Akitada managed to reach his cushion and sit down barely in time to watch the widow enter.