The Cloud Pavilion

by Laura Joh Rowland

  Sano cut to the more serious issue. “Why on earth were you spying on Yanagisawa?”

  Masahiro cringed from Sano’s anger. “You wanted to know what he’s doing. I wanted to help.”

  Sano could only shake his head, his mouth open but empty of words. Although he was furious at Masahiro for breaking a rule intended to keep him safe, and for taking such a risk, Sano couldn’t bear to scold Masahiro. His son’s wish to do him a good deed moved Sano almost to tears.

  Reiko grabbed Masahiro by the front of his kimono and shook him so hard that his head bobbled. “How could you be so foolish? You know how dangerous Yanagisawa is!”

  “He didn’t even see me,” Masahiro defended himself.

  “Indeed he didn’t,” Toda said, amused. “Your son’s disguise was pretty good.”

  “But what if he had?” Reiko demanded.

  “Yanagisawa is the kind of man who assumes that anyone following him is an assassin,” Sano told Masahiro. “If he’d seen you, he’d have killed you first and asked questions later. And that would have made your mother very, very unhappy.”

  “It certainly would have,” Reiko said, “although right now I’m ready to kill you myself.”

  Masahiro sagged in capitulation and shame. “I’m sorry.” Then he brightened and said, “I followed Yanagisawa and Yoritomo all the way to the river. I saw them meet three ladies.”

  “Oh?” Sano said, his interest caught even though he knew Masahiro was trying to barter information for forgiveness. “What did they do?”

  “Don’t encourage him,” Reiko protested.

  “Yanagisawa talked to the two old ladies,” Masahiro answered eagerly. “Yoritomo went for a walk with the younger one. But I couldn’t hear what they said.”

  “That’s enough,” Sano said. “Masahiro, you are never to spy on Yanagisawa or anybody else ever again. Do you understand?”

  Masahiro sighed. “Yes, Father.”

  “Go to your room,” Sano said. “You’ll stay there until you realize what a reckless thing you did and I decide you can be trusted again.”

  As Masahiro rose to obey, Fukida and Marume appeared at the door. Sano said, “Organize a watch on my son. Make sure he doesn’t leave his room.”

  “Why?” Marume asked. “Masahiro, have you been a bad boy?”

  “I’m sure he’ll tell you all about it,” Reiko said as the detectives followed the glum, defeated Masahiro out of the reception chamber.

  “I hope that will teach him a lesson,” Toda said. “If it does, it might add a few years to his life.”

  Sano didn’t want to discuss Masahiro’s future with Toda. “Thank you for bringing him home,” he said, then changed the subject. “Did you see the three ladies?”

  “I did.”

  “Who were they?” Sano asked.

  “I don’t know,” Toda said. “I’ve never seen them before.”

  “What were they doing with Yanagisawa and Yoritomo?”

  “Sorry, I can’t answer that question, either. They chose a place that had few people and lots of open space. I couldn’t get close enough to eavesdrop. But it looked like a miai.”

  “It’s reasonable that Yanagisawa would decide his son should marry,” Reiko said to Sano. “Yoritomo is more than of age. Maybe the meeting had nothing to do with political schemes.” She sounded more hopeful than convinced.

  “Maybe not, but then why should Yanagisawa keep Yoritomo’s marriage prospects under wraps? I’d have expected him to put out the word that he was looking for a wife for his son and send a go-between to solicit offers from important families. No—there’s something fishy about that miai.”

  Sano turned to Toda. “Continue your surveillance on Yanagisawa. Find out who those ladies are and what Yanagisawa is trying to accomplish.”

  “I’ll do my best,” Toda said, then bowed and departed.

  Alone with his wife, in the quiet of their home, Sano suddenly realized how exhausted he was from the day’s endeavors and disappointments. Masahiro’s escapade on top of everything else was entirely too much. Sano was also ravenous with hunger.

  “Let’s eat,” he said, “then go to bed.”

  “That sounds wonderful,” Reiko said. “Tomorrow should be a better day,” Sano said. “We’ll get another chance to catch the kidnapper. And what else could possibly go wrong?”

  Morning thunder awakened Edo. Storm clouds obliterated the sunrise. Rain swept the city, drenched people hurrying along streets whose ends vanished into streaming mist. Edo Castle wore a veil of showers that poured down from the sky, rendering the turrets and rooftops invisible from below.

  Inside her chamber, Reiko opened the door that led to the garden. She frowned at the rain. Today’s journey would be wet and uncomfortable, even more so for her palanquin bearers and guards than for herself. As she closed the door, Akiko toddled into the room and said, “Mama, no go.”

  Reiko sighed. Akiko often ignored her for days, and Reiko had to work to get her attention. But sometimes—invariably when Reiko had important business to take care of—Akiko couldn’t live without her. Akiko had sharp instincts that warned her when Reiko was about to leave the house. Maybe she feared being abandoned again, and her bad timing was perfect.

  “I’ll be back before you know it,” Reiko said as she knelt, hugged Akiko, and tried to soothe her.

  Akiko clung and began to cry. Reiko finally had to call the nurse to peel Akiko off her. She left Akiko with a promise to bring her candy. The sound of Akiko’s sobs followed her down the corridor. Motherhood and detective work were not always compatible. Reiko swallowed her guilt and went to look in on Masahiro.

  He was in his room, practicing calligraphy, supervised by his tutor, guarded by one of Sano’s soldiers. When Reiko put her head into the room, he barely glanced up from his work.

  “I have an errand, then I’m going to visit your father’s cousin,” Reiko said. “Be good while I’m gone.”

  “Yes, Mother.” Masahiro looked so unhappy about being confined to his quarters that Reiko felt sorry for him. But she had to uphold the law that Sano had laid down.

  “Do you promise to stay home?” she asked.

  Masahiro sighed with all the exasperation and impatience that nine-year-old boys could convey so well. “Yes, Mother.”

  Before Sano could resume his investigation, he had an important meeting with the shogun, Yanagisawa, and the Council of Elders.

  In the main reception room in the palace, the shogun knelt on the dais. The mural at his back depicted lily pads and blossoms floating on a blue pond under a gilded sky. Charcoal braziers warmed away the dampness in the air. Sano and Yanagisawa shared the place of honor to the shogun’s right. They scrupulously took turns sitting closest to him. Today the privilege was Sano’s.

  The elders—four old men who comprised Japan’s highest governing body—knelt on the floor one level below the dais. A few lesser officials occupied the next, lower level. Secretaries sat at desks off to the side; guards stood along the walls. Everyone was flushed from the heat except the shogun. Although he was bundled up in a thick, bronze satin robe, his complexion had its usual waxen pallor. As Sano, Yanagisawa, and the elders discussed government affairs, he grew bored and restless. Sano could almost see the words going in one of his ears and out the other. When asked to approve decisions, he did so automatically, and the secretaries applied his signature seal to documents.

  The assembly reached the final item on the agenda. “His Excellency’s pilgrimage to Nikko Toshogu,” announced the senior elder.

  The Toshogu was a shrine in the city of Nikko, a two-day journey north of Edo, where the first Tokugawa shogun had been laid to rest. Now the shogun perked up.

  “Ahh, I’ve been so looking forward to my trip.” He normally preferred not to brave the discomforts of travel, but he was enjoying a rare spell of good health, and it had whetted his taste for adventure. “When would be an auspicious time for me to go?”

  The elders didn’t answer. Hands fo
lded, expressions grave, they waited for someone else to deliver the bad news.

  “Your Excellency, I regret to say that I must advise you against making the trip,” Sano said.

  “Oh?” Miffed, the shogun turned to Yanagisawa in hope of advice he liked better. “What do you say?”

  At one time Yanagisawa would have contradicted Sano to gain points in their lord’s favor. But now Yanagisawa said, “I must agree with Chamberlain Sano.” The elders looked simultaneously relieved and disappointed. Sano suspected that they missed the excitement of political strife even though they appreciated the peace and quiet. “The trip isn’t feasible.”

  The shogun regarded Sano and Yanagisawa with the hurt expression of a child bullied by his two best friends. “Why not, pray tell?”

  Once, Yanagisawa would have let Sano say what the shogun didn’t want to hear and suffer the consequences. Instead he explained, “A trip would involve a huge procession, with new ceremonial robes for you and everyone else, plus lodging and formal banquets. That’s too expensive.”

  “How can it be?” the shogun said, puzzled. “I’m rich, I can afford anything I want.” Uncertainty crept into his eyes. “Can’t I?”

  It was Sano’s turn to acquaint his lord with reality. “There’s not enough money in the treasury to pay for the trip and cover the regime’s other expenses.”

  The shogun wavered between annoyance and dismay. “We’ve never had this, ahh, problem in the past.”

  The regime had been chronically short on funds during his rule, and his officials had often tried to tell him, but it never sank in. Ordinarily, Yanagisawa would have jumped at the chance to blame Sano for the shortfall. He’d have accused Sano of squandering and embezzling the money during Yanagisawa’s absence. Sano could have accused Yanagisawa of both crimes, which Yanagisawa certainly had committed in the past. But Yanagisawa wasn’t doing it now. Sano knew because he kept a close watch on the treasury. Why Yanagisawa now adhered strictly to the rules was a mystery to Sano. So was the reason Yanagisawa didn’t seize the opportunity to make Sano look bad.

  Sano studied his onetime foe, seeking clues, as Yanagisawa said, “The Tokugawa treasury has become depleted over the years. The cost of rebuilding Edo after the Great Fire—”

  The shogun waved away the Great Fire as if it had been a minor inconve nience instead of a disaster that had killed over a hundred thousand people and laid the city to waste. “That was more than forty years ago!”

  “There have been other heavy expenditures,” Sano said. “You have many temples and shrines to maintain, as well as roads, bridges, and canals.”

  “Remember that you’re supporting thousands of retainers, including the Tokugawa army,” Yanagisawa said.

  “Ahh.” The shogun hunched his back, momentarily weighed down by the thought of his financial responsibilities. “Well, if I need more money, can’t you make me some more?”

  “It’s not that easy,” Sano said. “The yield from the gold and silver mines has been decreasing. We can’t just mint more coins.”

  “Much of Japan’s wealth has left the country with foreign traders who sell us goods from abroad,” Yanagisawa added.

  The shogun pouted. “Then why not just, ahh, debase the coinage again?”

  That drastic measure had been undertaken six years ago, when coins had been collected, melted down, and alloyed with base metal to reduce their gold and silver content, thereby increasing the supply of currency.

  “We can’t do that too often,” Sano said.

  “It has the unfortunate side effect of raising the price of goods,” Yanagisawa explained.

  “Why should I care?” the shogun said, confused and vexed.

  “Many citizens won’t be able to afford food,” Yanagisawa said. “There will be famine. You don’t want that, do you?”

  “No, but I still want to go to Nikko.” The shogun’s face took on the peevish expression that presaged a tantrum that would end with him threatening to execute Sano and Yanagisawa.

  “The people need you to take care of them,” Sano said. “That’s your duty according to Confucius.” The shogun was an enthusiast of the Chinese sage whose philosophy had strongly influenced Japa nese government. “Therefore, you must be frugal. As shogun, you’re not just a dictator; you’re virtually a god, with the power to be generous and merciful.”

  “I guess I am,” the shogun said, preening at this glorified image of himself. In a tone lofty with self-sacrifice he said, “I shall postpone my trip for the sake of doing what’s right.”

  Yanagisawa raised an eyebrow at Sano, suggesting that Sano had laid it on a bit thick, but he didn’t complain. No one else in the room would look at them or anyone else. “That’s admirable of you, Your Excellency. We must all bow to your superior judgment.”

  The shogun beamed. Everybody else relaxed. But his mood suddenly darkened. “What is this world coming to?” he lamented. “I’m running out of money. I’m so anxious about the future. When I die, what will become of my regime?”

  “Don’t worry, you’re still young,” Sano said. But the shogun’s demise was something that everyone in the regime feared. When the reins of a dictatorship changed hands, so could the fate of everyone inside it change for the worse.

  “The court astrologer says that the stars predict a long life for you,” Yanagisawa said. Had the astrologer predicted anything else, he’d have been executed. And Yanagisawa knew as well as Sano did that they must calm the shogun down or anxiety could bring about another serious, perhaps fatal, illness.

  “Everyone dies someday,” the shogun said, refusing to be soothed. “And I seem, ahh, destined to go without an heir to carry on my bloodline!” This was a constant source of grief for him. “Ahh, how fate has worked against me.”

  No one dared point out that his own sexual preference for men had worked against his chances of fathering a son. “There’s still time,” Sano said, hiding his own doubt.

  “Perhaps you could make a special prayer to the gods,” Yanagisawa said.

  The shogun flapped his hands at the idea. “Nothing I do seems to work. I established laws to protect animals, I build temples.” Nobody dared suggest the direct, obvious solution to the problem. “And what good has it all done? My wife is an invalid.” She was confined to the women’s quarters and rarely seen. “My only son died.” Rumor said that the boy, born by one of the palace concubines, wasn’t the shogun’s. “And my daughter doesn’t seem likely to bear a child.” The identity of her father was also a matter of speculation, although not in the shogun’s hearing. “What have I done to deserve such misfortune?” the shogun wailed.

  Before Sano or Yanagisawa could reply, his mood took another turn. “Perhaps it’s not my fault. Perhaps I’ve done wrong because of bad advice from other people.”

  His glare accused everyone in the room, then focused on Sano and Yanagisawa.

  “Chamberlain Yanagisawa has given you the wisest, soundest advice that anyone could,” Sano hurried to say.

  “So has Chamberlain Sano,” said Yanagisawa. “He’s devoted his life to your service.”

  “Oh?” The shogun narrowed his eyes at Sano. “Then what’s this I hear about you investigating a crime that I never authorized you to investigate? The abduction of your uncle’s daughter, I understand?”

  Sano felt the bad wind of the shogun’s pique blow harder in his direction. “It’s a family matter. I assure you that it has not interfered with my duty to you.” But the case had taken time away from his official duties, and the shogun was a jealous man. “May I ask how you heard about the investigation?”

  “Yoritomo told me,” the shogun said.

  Sano glanced at Yanagisawa, who frowned as though genuinely dismayed by his son’s actions. “My duty to you is my top priority,” Sano assured the shogun. “Should you need anything, I’ll drop whatever I’m doing and rush to your aid.”

  “So will I,” Yanagisawa said. “Trust us, Your Excellency, and everything will be fine.”
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br />   “Well . . .” The shogun vacillated, torn between the pleasure of indulging in hysterics and his liking for peace, passivity, and indolence. “All right. But if I decide that either of you has served me ill . . .”

  He didn’t need to complete the sentence. Everyone knew that the penalty for displeasing him was death by ritual suicide.

  “Enough of all this business, I’m tired,” he said. “This meeting is adjourned.”

  When Reiko climbed out of her palanquin in the Zj Temple district, Lieutenant Tanuma held an umbrella over her head to shield her from the rain. He opened the gate of Keiaiji Convent for her, and she lifted the hem of her robe as she walked through the wet garden in her high-soled sandals. The pine trees filled the air with their fresh, resinous scent; their heavy green boughs dripped. The abbess came out on the veranda to greet Reiko.

  “May I see Tengu-in again?” Reiko said. “I’m hoping she’ll be able to tell me more than she did yesterday.”

  Now that Chiyo and Fumiko had failed to identify either of the two suspects as their kidnapper, Sano had run out of leads. Questioning the nun one more time was the only way that Reiko could think of to help him.

  The abbess’s pleasant expression shifted into a frown of concern. “Tengu-in is weaker than when you saw her. Today she hasn’t left her bed. I doubt she’ll talk to you.”

  Reiko feared that her previous visit had caused Tengu-in’s turn for the worse, but she said, “Please, I must try.”

  “Very well.” The abbess sounded resigned; she knew she couldn’t deny a request backed by Sano’s authority.

  Inside, the convent was quiet; the nuns and novices had left to pray in the temples or do charity work among the poor. The corridor down which Reiko walked was a dim tunnel that echoed with her footsteps and the patter of rain on the roof. Flies buzzed somewhere in the building. Reiko experienced a sudden stab of premonition.

  She hastened toward the bedchamber. She ran through the door, breathless with sudden fright, and stopped.