The Ghost in the Tokaido Inn

by Tom Hoobler

  “Oh,” said the woman. “You mean Tomomi.”

  “That’s right. Is he here?”

  “Not tonight. I didn’t know he’d returned.” She

  pointed down the street. “Try that place, with the green lantern in front. That’s the sort of house where Tomomi would go.”

  This time, a younger woman opened the door. Her kimono was not as fine as the older woman’s, and the hair piled up on her head was slightly out of place. She put her hand over her mouth and giggled when she saw the boys.

  “We’re looking for Tomomi,” Kazuo said at once. “Is he here?”

  She said nothing, but stood aside and pointed to the back of the house. Leaving their sandals at the entrance, Kazuo and Seikei padded across the wooden floor.

  They passed several closed doors, hearing the sounds of music and laughter behind them. Seikei smelled sweet incense drifting throughout the house. Kazuo listened briefly at each door, then shook his head and moved on. Finally, they reached the last room, where a man was talking loudly. Even Seikei recognized the sound of the actor’s voice. Boldly, Kazuo slid open the door and Seikei followed him inside.

  Lying on a bed of many pillows was the actor Seikei now knew as Tomomi. He still wore the costume of the samurai Oishi, though his knot of hair had fallen around his head. He had loosened his obi and removed his two swords, but they lay carefully next to him, just as a samurai would have placed them.

  Three young women were kneeling around him. They were geishas, women who trained for years to please men with the arts of music and conversation. One strummed a samisen, and another was holding a tray with small cups on it. The third was rubbing Tomomi’s feet.

  Tomomi had been reading aloud from a book, but when the door opened, Seikei saw the man’s mouth freeze and his eyes darken. Instantly he was on guard, and his hand moved a fraction toward the swords before he recognized Kazuo.

  “Aha, you’ve found me,” Tomomi said. His eyes moved to Seikei. “And who’s this?” Tomomi’s smile was genial, but Seikei had the feeling the man was carefully inspecting him.

  “Just somebody who wants to bring you a message,” said Kazuo.

  Tomomi’s eyes, dark and faintly menacing, went up and down Seikei. “I see he wears a sword,” Tomomi said. “Come closer.”

  Seikei felt himself drawn forward by Tomomi’s voice. Earlier, in the theater, he had felt the actor’s power from a distance. Now, face-to-face, Tomomi seemed like a demon who could cast a spell over him.

  “That’s a beautiful piece of wood,” Tomomi said, looking at Seikei’s wooden sword. “Where did you get it?”

  “From my lord,” said Seikei, without thinking.

  “And he sends you to me with a message? What is it?”

  Seikei struggled to think what his answer should be. “He . . . admired your performance,” he stammered.

  Tomomi grinned and cocked his head. “Is that so? He sent you merely to say that? What is your master’s name?”

  Seikei hesitated. Should he tell the truth? The judge had not told him what to do if he found Tomomi. But Tomomi’s eyes compelled him to speak.

  “The samurai Judge Ooka,” he said.

  Tomomi threw back his head and laughed. The sound rattled through the house, shaking the paper screens that divided the rooms.

  “That fat old fool,” Tomomi said, wiping his eyes. “He sends a boy to find me?”

  Seikei was angry and embarrassed. He let his hand drop to the hilt of his sword.

  “Aha!” Tomomi said, seeing the gesture. “You will fight, then? A trained samurai, are you? Raised from birth to follow the way of the warrior?” He sat up, lazily, like a cat, and reached for one of his own swords, the long one. “Let us test each other, then.”

  “His sword isn’t real,” Kazuo murmured softly to Seikei. “Just a prop for the stage.”

  “Not real?” Tomomi said. “Real enough, for in a samurai’s hand it can deliver a blow and draw blood.” He stood up now, sword in hand, bracing his feet for combat. The three women around him gasped and drew away, looking at each other. One moved forward and put her hand on Tomomi’s arm, but he shook her off.

  Tomomi’s eyes were taunting Seikei. “Are you willing to defend your honor?”

  Seikei nodded grimly, though his hands were shaking with fear. It would be a disgrace to decline such a challenge. He drew his sword from his obi, knowing that when a samurai unsheathed his sword he must use it.

  Seikei bowed, remembering the proper way of accepting a challenge to combat. “I am Seikei, the son of Konoike Toda, and a retainer of the samurai Ooka. Come take my head if you can.”

  Tomomi’s eyes shone. “So honorable! So beautifully innocent! I feel compelled to imitate you.” Then he too bowed. “I am Genji, the son of the daimyo Takezaki Kita. Descendant of a noble house, I am reduced to a homeless actor who calls himself Tomomi.”

  Tomomi looked around the room and his voice rose almost as if he felt himself on stage. “Yes, that is my true origin,” he declared to the three women, who were cowering in a comer. Tears began to fall from Tomomi’s eyes. “See me now! Disgraced, but pledged to avenge my honor.” He touched his face and rubbed off the white makeup he had worn on stage.

  Seikei saw the scar. Tomomi was indeed the man he had seen on the Tokaido Road, taunting Lord Hakuseki.

  Tomomi traced the scar’s outline on his cheek. “To avenge this, I have pledged my life. And see—they send a boy to fight me!” Suddenly, with a loud cry, he raised his sword above his head and lunged forward.

  The actor’s sword whistled through the air, aimed at Seikei’s head. Without thinking, Seikei raised his wooden sword to ward off the blow. The metal sword struck his—and shattered. Pieces of it flew around the room. The women shrieked and ran for the doorway.

  Seikei still stood with his sword raised, not quite realizing what had happened. Tomomi looked at the shattered stump in his hand. He threw it aside and grabbed Seikei’s sword with both hands. Seikei was thrown backward, but he held onto the sword with all his strength.

  Yet Tomomi was much stronger. As Seikei struggled with him, he felt the man’s power. He was like a demon! Tomomi wrenched the sword out of Seikei’s hand, and Seikei leaped forward to take it back. As Tomomi turned aside, Seikei grabbed at the actor’s robe, tearing it open.

  Next to Tomomi’s chest, on a silver chain around his neck, were two crossed sticks with the body of a man nailed to them, arms outspread. Seikei blinked. He knew what this magic charm meant. “You are a Kirishitan!” he exclaimed.

  Tomomi hastily pulled his robe together. Just then, two burly men came through the door. “No fighting!” they shouted. One of them pointed at Seikei. ‘You! Out!” He picked Seikei up and slung him over his shoulder. Seikei saw Tomomi strike the other man with the wooden sword, but the blow only enraged him. He grabbed Tomomi by the scruff of his neck and shoved him out of the room.

  In a few moments, the men had tossed them onto the street outside. Kazuo followed, hustling out the door on his own feet. “You’re an idiot!” he shouted at Tomomi. “You broke your sword, and now I’ll get blamed.”

  Tomomi brushed himself off. He swayed slightly, and Seikei saw that he must be drunk from the wine. “But I have another sword now. This one.” He held up the wooden sword.

  “That’s mine,” cried Seikei. “Give it back.” Tomomi grinned. “I took it from you in combat. Now it’s mine. And must I remind you of the proper action for a samurai who loses his sword?”

  Seikei felt his knees weaken. He knew what a disgraced samurai must do—kill himself in the ceremony known as seppuku.

  He swallowed hard. “I have no sword with which to kill myself,” he said. “Will you give me one?”

  Tomomi laughed again, sending echoes down the dark street. He clapped Seikei on the back. “Hai! You do indeed have honor in your bones. A lesser man, not to mention a boy, would shrivel and whine that he was not a samurai at all. And you are not, are you?”

  Seikei
shook his head. Everyone could tell he was merely a merchant’s son. “All the same, I must return my sword to my master. He entrusted it to me.”

  “He did well,” said Tomomi. He shot a sly look at Seikei. “But before I give it to you, you must serve me. Are you willing?”

  Seikei hesitated. What would the judge think when he did not return to the inn? “I will not do anything dishonorable,” he said.

  Tomomi nodded. “I can see you won’t.”

  “What is it you want me to do?” asked Seikei.

  “I’ll let you know in the morning. Come with me now, and let us get some rest,” said Tomomi. Seikei followed him and Kazuo down the street. Somewhere in the darkness behind them, he could hear the eerie sound of a flute playing.

  12: An Offering to Amaterasu

  Seikei opened his eyes and saw a man juggling swords. As they flashed through the air, he counted... three, four, five of them! The juggler’s hands hardly seemed to move, yet he kept the swords whirling around his head in an endless circle. He glanced down at Seikei. “Awake at last, sleepyhead? I hear you were out all night with Tomomi.”

  Tomomi! Seikei remembered everything that had happened the night before. Tomomi had brought him back to the common hall, where pilgrims were allowed to sleep for free.

  Seikei wondered what the judge must have thought when he did not return. And worse...Seikei felt the empty place at his side, remembering the lost sword.

  He got up and looked around the large room, which consisted of little more than a roof and a floor covered by thin straw mats. A monk was distributing bowls of rice, and a few dozen men and boys were eating the simple breakfast. Seikei recognized some of them as actors who had been in the play.

  The scent of the steaming rice reminded Seikei that he was hungry. But that could wait. Where was Tomomi? Where was his sword? Tomomi had promised to return it, but if he did not, Seikei could never face the judge. He was starting to compose a poem to express his misery, when someone tapped him on the shoulder.

  It was Kazuo, holding out a bowl of rice and a pair of chopsticks. “I saved this for you. These greedy pigs would let their mothers go hungry if it means a full belly for them.”

  Seikei bowed. “I am grateful,” he said. “But I must find Tomomi.”

  “Eat first,” said Kazuo. ‘Tomomi went to the shrine to make an offering. But you’ll never find him in the crowd. What’s the rush anyway? He’ll come back. We have to get on the road again. In two days, we’ll be in Edo.”

  Seikei wanted to pursue Tomomi, but his growling stomach got the better of him. He took the bowl of rice and began to eat. Then he thought of something. “Why would Tomomi make an offering at the shrine?”

  Kazuo shrugged. “The same reason as anybody, I guess. He wants Amaterasu’s blessing.”

  “But he is a Kirishitan. You saw—”

  “I know,” said Kazuo. “He wears those crossed sticks with the man nailed onto them. That’s supposed to be the Kirishitan god. I ask you, why would anyone worship a god who let himself be nailed to a cross? You know what I think?”

  “What?” Seikei said between mouthfuls of rice.

  “Tomomi probably wears that just because he wants to be different. The other actors are uneasy with him, even though they know he’s the best actor and he writes most of our plays. He’s very strange, always putting on airs. He goes off by himself to meet people in the middle of the night. But before he fought you, I never heard him say he was the son of a daimyo.”

  “Why would the son of a daimyo—” Seikei started to say, but then caught himself.

  Kazuo nodded. “Don’t worry. I know what you’re thinking. What’s he doing with a bunch of kabuki actors? Everybody looks down on actors, don’t they?”

  Seikei shook his head. “I am the son of a merchant, and everybody regards us with contempt.”

  “A merchant?” Kazuo looked at Seikei with interest. “In that case, why were you carrying a sword like a samurai?”

  Seikei took a deep breath. He was afraid of seeming foolish, but Kazuo was so frank and open that Seikei felt he would not laugh. “My greatest dream is to be a samurai,” Seikei said.

  Kazuo opened his eyes wide. “Ah! That can never be. You must know that. Everyone is born into his proper place. Think of what might happen if people tried to become something they were not meant to be. There would be fighting and disorder, and everyone would suffer.”

  “That is what my father says,” Seikei said glumly.

  “If I had a father who was a merchant,” said Kazuo, “I would try to please him by becoming the best merchant I could be.”

  Seikei remembered the judge pointing out the twisted tree on the road. The tree that grew where it could not become a proper tree. Was it meant to be a lesson for Seikei?

  Seikei put down his empty bowl. “I must try to find Tomomi,” he said.

  “He’ll return soon enough,” said Kazuo. “Why go looking for trouble, when trouble will come to you?”

  “Because I must recover my sword,” replied Seikei.

  No one stopped him as he left the hall. Outside, he found himself in the midst of a great throng of people. He saw pilgrims of every age and station in life. Some were clearly afflicted by illness, coming here to seek a cure. Mothers carried babies on their backs to present before the goddess. Old men and women were helped along by their children and grandchildren. Wealthy or poor, noble or common—it seemed as if everyone in Japan had come to beg the goddess Amaterasu for her blessing.

  Kazuo was right. Seikei could not hope to find Tomomi in this mass of people. Yet he let himself be carried along as the crowed surged toward the wooden building where the spirit of Amaterasu dwelled. He could hear the sound of hundreds of hands clapping together. As the pilgrims passed through the torii, the great gate at the entrance to the temple area, they clapped to attract the goddess’s attention.

  Under the torii, Seikei clapped his hands like everyone else. Amaterasu, he prayed, help me to save my honor. Let me recover my sword.

  He strained to see above the crowd. On the wooden porch of the shrine stood a group of white-robed Shinto priests. No one but them could actually go inside the shrine.

  As the people passed by, the priests waved smoking sticks of incense at them. The pilgrims reached out to catch the perfumed smoke in their hands and wave it over their bodies, for it was said to cure illness. Seikei saw a mother carrying a child with no legs, trying to get close to the smoke. He could hear people in the crowd crying out with joy or weeping softly as the smoke wafted over them.

  Finally his part of the crowd reached the steps of the shrine. Seikei saw large bowls there, overflowing with coins and countless other offerings that people had left. Many families had brought food that they had grown. A little girl left an onion; an aged farmer set down a gourd that grew in such an unusual shape he was convinced a kami lived within. Craftsmen offered examples of their finest work—statues of the goddess, beautifully woven mats and cloth, paper fans and umbrellas. Among the offerings was a little doll that a child must have given.

  Seikei thought of Michiko, and was glad she could not see him now. Disgraced by the loss of his sword! If he could not recover it, the only honorable thing to do was kill himself. That was what a samurai would do.

  Suddenly, he felt someone grasp his elbow. As he turned, he saw Tomomi’s face glaring down at him. “I thought you would be here sooner,” Tomomi said. “Laziness is a bad habit in one who would pretend to be a samurai.”

  “So is deceit,” Seikei replied hotly. He pointed to his sword, hanging from Tomomi’s belt. “And theft.”

  “No theft,” said Tomomi, “I won it from you in combat.”

  “What about the jewel that belongs to Lord Hakuseki?” Seikei replied.

  Tomomi raised his eyebrows and opened his eyes wide. “How do you know about that?” he asked in a low voice.

  Seikei knew he should not have spoken of the jewel. “I...I was in the inn on the night it was stolen,” Seik
ei said. “But it was found,” he added hastily. “In the room of a paper-maker.”

  Tomomi cocked his head and looked strangely at Seikei. “I have the feeling I have seen you somewhere else, before last night. Tell me, if the jewel was found, why did you mention it now, to me? Do you mean to accuse me of a crime I didn’t commit?”

  Seikei felt caught by the man’s piercing eyes. He tried to think of an answer.

  “No matter,” Tomomi said with a shrug. “It seems that fate has brought you to see this.” He reached into his robe, and drew something out of it. He held his clenched fist under Seikei’s nose, and slowly unfolded his fingers.

  The shining red jewel rested on his palm. Seikei gasped. Light shone from deep within it, like blood pouring out onto Tomomi’s hand. It was not like glass at all. Seikei realized why people prized jewels so highly. This one must be almost as beautiful as the ancient jewel that was supposed to be kept here in the temple of Ise. That jewel was the very one Amaterasu herself had given to the first emperor long, long ago, as a sign of her blessing.

  “A worthy offering for Amaterasu, don’t you think?” said Tomomi.

  Seikei tore his eyes away from the jewel and looked at Tomomi. What could he mean? It must be one of his cruel jests. Yet as Seikei watched, Tomomi turned and dropped the ruby into one of the offering-bowls at the foot of the temple steps. It rolled off the pile of coins and lay on the edge of the bowl.

  It took a great effort for Seikei to control himself. He wanted to reach down and take the jewel back. That, of course, was unthinkable.

  He turned back to Tomomi, who smiled as if he were basking in the applause of an audience. Slowly, he drew the wooden sword from his belt. “Here,” he said. “You have served me, and I fulfill my part of the bargain.” He turned and began to walk away.

  Seikei caught him by the sleeve. “Wait. I don’t understand. What did I do for you?”

  “Go back and tell your master what you saw. That is enough.” He shook off Seikei’s hand and quickly disappeared into the crowd.

  Seikei’s head spun as he tucked the sword through his belt. He had discovered who the thief was, but...he had left the stolen jewel here. And he wanted the judge to know about it. Why? Was he trying to atone for his theft? But then why not return the jewel to its owner? Why steal it in the first place?