Saru-waka-cho sparkled with familiar color and activity. Bright signs plastered over the walls of the four main theaters announced the current play schedules. An occasional burst of song or cheering from the open upper-story windows signaled a play in progress. In square towers perched high on the rooftops, drummers beat a steady bass rhythm to summon theatergoers from distant parts of the city. People of all classes and ages crowded the wide streets, lining up at the ticket booths, seeking refreshment at the many teahouses and restaurants that occupied the spaces between the theaters, or pausing to exchange greetings. Sano knew some of them had waited all night to get a good seat to see their favorite actors.
“Where is Kikunojo performing?” he asked the attendant at the public stable where he left his horse.
The attendant pointed in the direction of the largest theater. “The Nakamura-za,” he said.
Sano made his way through the jostling crowds. When he reached the Nakamura-za, he saw signs posted across the front of the building: “Narukami, starring the great Kikunojo!” To his disappointment, there was no line outside. The performance had already started.
“Can I still get in?” he asked the ticket seller without much hope. Narukami-the story of a princess who saves Japan from a mad monk who has used magic to keep the rains from falling-was a popular attraction. And Kikunojo would fill the theater no matter what the play.
But the ticket seller nodded. He took Sano’s money and handed over a ticket, saying, “There are seats left, sir. The play has been running for a month now; most everyone has seen it already.”
Entering the theater, Sano paused for a moment to get his bearings. The vast room, lit only by windows in the roof and along the upper gallery, was dim because fire laws prohibited the use of indoor lighting. When his eyes grew accustomed to the darkness, he could make out the unlit lanterns hanging from the rafters, each bearing the crest of an actor who had performed in the Nakamura-za. Women and commoners occupied the less desirable seats along the walls. Raised dividers separated the space before the stage into square compartments, where the shaved crowns and upright sword hilts of the samurai predominated. Refreshment sellers ran up and down the dividers carrying trays of food and drink. The incessant chatter and restless movement of the audience almost drowned out the sound of the musicians’ wooden clappers. Sano climbed the nearest divider and walked along it until he spotted a compartment near the front with an empty space. Kneeling on the mat with five other samurai, he turned his attention to the stage.
The play was nearing its end. Against a painted backdrop of mountains and clouds, the actor playing the mad monk Narukami sang about the havoc he would wreak upon the country by withholding the rains. Exaggerated black eyebrows and whiskers gave him a demonic appearance. The brilliant red and gold cleric’s mantle that he wore over his brown monk’s robe caught the dim light. He bellowed each word in a resounding voice designed to carry over the noise of the audience, stamping, pacing, and gesticulating to hold their attention. The musicians seated at the side of the stage played a cacophonous accompaniment on their clappers, flutes, and samisens.
The song ended, and the music with it. A hush fell over the theater. Heads turned toward the back of the room.
“He’s coming,” someone whispered.
The clappers sounded again, rapid, frantic. Sano felt a ripple of anticipation pass through the audience.
A woman was walking slowly and daintily down the gangway that extended from the back of the theater to the stage. Princess Taema, dressed in a magnificent purple satin kimono printed with white chrysanthemums, was coming to free the rains and save her people. Her face was strikingly beautiful with its stark white makeup and scarlet mouth. Long black hair, pulled back at the sides, hung down to her waist.
“Kikunojo.” The name, spoken on a collective sigh, echoed through the room. “Kikunojo.” Then the audience burst into wild cheers.
Princess Taema reached the stage. The audience quieted as she began to sing. Sano sat transfixed. Although he knew that Kikunojo was Edo ’s foremost onnagata-specialist in female roles-he couldn’t believe that the figure onstage was not a real woman. Voice, posture, expression, and movements were all completely feminine. Not even the kerchief of purple cloth that covered the actor’s shaved crown could detract from the illusion. Sano watched, fascinated, as Princess Taema began to seduce Narukami.
Any effeminate man could be dressed up to resemble a beautiful woman, but Kikunojo’s genius lay in his ability to project emotion. Sano could feel the sexual current flowing from Princess Taema to Narukami, and he knew the rest of the audience could, too. How could Narukami resist her ploy?
He couldn’t. With much song and gesture, he yielded. Princess Taema cut the magic rope that held back the rain. The musicians produced the sound of falling water. Japan was saved amid cheers, whistles, and clapping from the audience.
Sano remained in his seat until most of the crowd had left the theater. Then he headed down the divider and onto the stage, where Kikunojo held court before a group of female admirers.
The onnagata was bigger than he looked from a distance. He stood taller than Sano, head and shoulders above the women crowded around him. The actor who played Narukami must have worn high-platformed sandals to top him. As Sano moved closer, he spotted more signs of Kikunojo’s true sex. The long, graceful hands, white with the same powder that covered the onnagata’s face, had large knuckles and bony wrists. His features, though delicate, lacked the softness of a woman’s. The tricks he used to disguise his masculinity were obvious: the long, trailing ends of the special sash that made him seem shorter, the way he kept his chin lowered to hide his adam’s apple.
But none of this bothered Kikunojo’s admirers. In fact, the spectacle of male sexuality hidden beneath a woman’s hairstyle and clothing excited them to a fever pitch. They flushed and giggled as they shyly advanced one at a time to offer tributes to him: a prettily wrapped package, a stammered compliment. Each of these Kikunojo accepted with an ethereal smile and a graceful bow. He placed the gifts on a small table evidently intended for that purpose.
“Go on! I dare you!” The woman next to Sano nudged her companion, a grandmotherly matron.
Grandmother darted forward and stood on tiptoe to touch
Kikunojo’s purple kerchief. Her wrinkled face full of glee at her own audacity, she scurried back to her place. The other women howled with laughter.
Sano smiled. The government had tried to reduce the sexual appeal of onnagata by requiring them to shave their crowns, but many women found the kerchiefs just as erotic as a full head of hair.
He waited until the last admirer had departed, then introduced himself. “Kikunojo-san, may I have a word with you in private?”
Kikunojo produced a silk fan from the folds of his kimono. Hiding the lower half of his face with it, he murmured, “Honorable master… my duties… errands… another performance soon… many apologies, but I have no time now… perhaps another day…?” The gesture, the high, sweet voice, and the vague, trailing speech perfectly mimicked those of a noble lady.
“It’s about Noriyoshi,” Sano said. “We can either talk here, in public, or somewhere else. Your choice.” Impressive though the act was, he didn’t intend to let Kikunojo get away.
Awareness widened Kikunojo’s eyes before his lids slipped down again. He nodded demurely and said from behind the fan, “Come with me.”
Sano followed Kikunojo’s stately figure through a door near the stage and down a dim passage to the onnagata’s dressing room. They left their shoes outside the curtained doorway, and Sano noted with amusement that Kikunojo’s were bigger than his own. In the tiny cubicle, bright kimonos hung from standing racks. Five wigs on wooden heads occupied one shelf, while others held fans, hair ornaments, shoes, and folded undergarments. Brushes, powder puffs, and makeup jars littered the dressing table; silk scarves were draped over the large mirror. A table held packages similar to the ones Sano had just seen Kikunojo receive,
probably gifts from other admirers. Had Niu Yukiko been one of them? The suicide note suggested a connection between her and the Kabuki theater, even if she hadn’t written it. And Lady Niu had commented upon the theater’s bad influence on young girls.
Kikunojo knelt before the dressing table. Sano knelt, too, feeling awkward. True onnagata like Kikunojo never stepped out of their female personae, even offstage. They claimed that this allowed them to perform their roles more convincingly. Was he supposed to join in the charade by addressing Kikunojo as a woman? He couldn’t forget that Kikunojo was a man. The actor’s very male odor of sweat, easily discernible in such close quarters, served as a vivid reminder.
To his relief, Kikunojo dropped his act, either because he sensed Sano’s discomfort or because he saw no need to waste his efforts on a yoriki.
“Whatever you have to say, please make it quick,” he said. He tossed aside his fan, lifted his head, and straightened his drooping posture. But his voice remained high and girlish, as if playing women onstage had somehow feminized him. “I have another performance this afternoon, and some very important business to conduct before then.”
“Such as paying someone like Noriyoshi to keep your secrets?” Sano asked, hoping to catch the actor off guard.
Kikunojo just shrugged. “So you’ve heard he was blackmailing me,” he said. “I hope you won’t mind if I undress? I’m in a bit of a hurry.”
“Not at all.” Sano watched, intrigued, as Kikunojo removed his purple kerchief to reveal his bare crown. The actor undid a complicated system of pins and knots that anchored the long black wig to his own hair, which was slicked back and tied in a tight knot at the nape of his neck. Then he picked up a cloth, dipped it into a jar of oil, and scrubbed the makeup from his face. In a startling transformation, the beautiful young Princess Taema became a man of regular but unremarkable features, long past his thirtieth birthday.
“Noriyoshi won’t be troubling me or anyone else now,” Kikunojo went on. “He’s dead, and I must say I’m not sorry. The little weasel!”
You wouldn’t be so outspoken about your feelings if you knew you were a murder suspect, Sano thought. Kikunojo had just made his motive clear.
“What was he blackmailing you for?” he asked.
Kikunojo stood and untied his sash. He shed his outer- and under-kimonos. Beneath them he wore cotton pads over his chest, hips, and buttocks. These he removed to expose a slender but well-muscled body. Sano decided that Kikunojo would definitely have had the strength to kill Noriyoshi and Yukiko and throw their bodies into the river.
“There’s an odd story making the rounds,” Kikunojo said. “People are saying that Noriyoshi didn’t really commit suicide. That he was murdered. Have you heard?”
“I may have.” Even as Sano decided that Wisteria must have spread the story, he could appreciate Kikunojo’s trick. The actor had neatly avoided answering the question by throwing out an interesting fact. Such quick thinking bespoke a man intelligent enough to plan and execute an elaborate murder. “What was he blackmailing you for?” he repeated, refusing to fall for the trick.
Kikunojo took a man’s black silk kimono decorated with gold cartwheels and blue waves from the rack. This he put on over a blue under-kimono, tying it with a plain black sash. “I hardly think that’s any of your business,” he said.
He looked with feigned interest toward the door. Through a gap in the curtain, a portion of the stage was visible. The intermission entertainment had begun for those members of the audience who hadn’t left the theater. An actor dressed as a samurai performed the yariodori, a comic dance that poked fun at the retainers of daimyo. He waved and flicked his plumed war staff in the manner of a woman doing her spring housecleaning. The cheers presumably came from the commoners in the audience; the hisses and catcalls from the samurai.
“It is if Noriyoshi was murdered,” Sano said.
Kikunojo gave an exasperated sigh as he pulled a black cloak over his kimono. “I didn’t kill him, if that’s what you’ve come here to find out.” When Sano didn’t reply, he said, “Oh, all right. Noriyoshi found out that I was seeing a married lady. Her husband would kill us both if he found out. You know how it is.”
Sano did. Kabuki theater had been founded about a hundred years before by a Shinto priestess from Izumo Shrine. But Kabuki had soon lost its religious associations. Courtesans took up the theatrics, and their lewd performances overstepped the bounds of propriety. Male admirers vied for their favors, often creating public disturbances. The government responded by banning female performers from the theater. Since then, all female roles had been played by men. But the troubles hadn’t ended. Onnagata proved just as adept at creating scandal as the courtesans. They attracted both women who found their masquerade titillating and men who simply liked men. Kikunojo, with his clandestine affair, was part of a tradition.
“The shogun can do as he pleases-with the wives and daughters of his ministers, yet,” Kikunojo continued. “But we ordinary adulterers get punished, if not by irate spouses, then by the authorities. What do you think of that, yoriki?”
Sano thought that Kikunojo had once again tried to divert the conversation. “Rank commands privileges, Kikunojo-san. Now, about Noriyoshi?”
Kikunojo shot him a look of grudging respect. “Noriyoshi kept asking for more and more money,” he said. “He bled me dry. Finally, about a month ago, I got to thinking: if he talked, who would believe him? It would be his word against mine, and who was he? So I took the chance. I said I wasn’t going to pay anymore, and I told him why.” Kikunojo took a white bridal kimono and red under-kimono from the rack and laid them on a square cloth with fresh socks and purple kerchief, the wig he’d removed, and a selection of makeup. “I should have done it a long time ago. Because he never talked, and he never asked for any more money.”
If Kikunojo had really stopped paying, where had the money in Noriyoshi’s room come from, Sano wondered. He saw a way to take advantage of the opening Kikunojo had given him.
“Suppose Noriyoshi was murdered,” he said. “Could you prove you were somewhere else when it happened?”
Kikunojo laughed as he tied the ends of the cloth around his possessions. “My good man, even if I’d wanted to kill Noriyoshi, I wouldn’t have had the time. The night he died, I had a rehearsal until well after midnight. We’re starting a new play tomorrow. After that… ” His smile eerily evoked the lovely Princess Taema. “After that, I was with my lady.”
“Would she corroborate that?”
The onnagata bent a pitying look on Sano. “Of course not. Didn’t I say she’s married? And don’t bother asking me her name, because I won’t tell you.”
Sano clenched his teeth together in annoyance. Getting facts from people during an unofficial murder investigation was proving difficult indeed. He had no legal means of forcing them to tell him anything, and any illegal methods he used would undoubtedly attract Magistrate Ogyu’s attention.
“Any more questions?” Kikunojo asked.
“One. Are you acquainted with Lord Niu’s daughter, Yukiko?”
Although Sano watched Kikunojo’s face closely, he saw no hint of uneasiness, only mild surprise at an apparently irrelevant question.
“Yukiko,” the actor said, narrowing his eyes thoughtfully. “Yes, I think I’ve seen her. The whole Niu family attends the theater often.”
If Kikunojo had killed Noriyoshi and Yukiko, his admission could be a clever way of implying that he had nothing to hide. Besides, Sano could easily have learned that the Nius were Kabuki enthusiasts, and a lie would have aroused his suspicion. Sano tried to imagine how and why the murders might have taken place. Maybe Kikunojo had killed Yukiko because she’d somehow witnessed Noriyoshi’s murder.
“If you’ll excuse me, I have to go now,” Kikunojo said. “I’m late already.” Then, very casually, as if the thought had just occurred to him, he added, “If you think that Noriyoshi got killed by someone he was blackmailing, then perhaps you should talk to a ce
rtain sumo wrestler named Raiden.”
Again Sano admired Kikunojo’s quick intelligence. What better way to divert suspicion than to direct it toward someone else?
“What did Noriyoshi have on him?” he asked.
Kikunojo shrugged. “You’ll have to ask Raiden.” He slid open the dressing room’s outer door, letting in a gust of cool wind from the street.
The prospect of seeing an onnagata walk casually out the door in male attire drew Sano’s interest momentarily from the investigation. “I thought you always appeared in public dressed as a woman,” he said.
“Sometimes I have to sacrifice my art for the sake of privacy,” Kikunojo explained. “If I were to venture outside in those”-he waved toward his kimonos and wigs-“people would recognize me. Some of my more persistent and adoring admirers might follow me. And I can’t have that. Not today-I have a very personal matter to attend to. A pity, though. I’ll have to get dressed all over again when I get there.” He slung the bundle over his shoulder.
Kikunojo was going to see his lady, Sano realized belatedly. Although why the actor needed to take along a bridal kimono was more than he cared to think about.
Lowering his eyes demurely, the onnagata smiled. “Sayōnara, yoriki,” he murmured, bowing low. Without makeup or costume, he became a woman before Sano’s eyes. Then the great Kikunojo turned and dashed into the street, a nondescript man quickly lost in the crowd.
SI1 Shinju (1994) Page 12