Dreaming Spies (21 page)

“Mistah Holmès, I am happy for having this talk. I am pleased to find you are not a … fictional character,” he added with that shy smile. “And I give you, with your honourable wife, my thanks, both for the task you have agreed to do me, and for this talking. It is rare to meet one who speak to me as man and not as god. This also why I treasure the onsen of Mojiro-joku. Its keeper is a … person I value.” Although he stopped short of using the word “friend,” Haruki-san still went bright pink, dropping into the aquatic form of prostration, her face brushing the water. We made haste to follow her example, and the three of us bent staring at the water while the next Emperor of Japan, the Son of Heaven and sovereign of the Land Where the Sun Was Born, His Imperial Highness the Regent of Japan, Honourary Knight Grand Cross of the Royal Victorian Order and the Order of the Bath, Honourary General of the British Army, Prince Hirohito lifted his imperial self to his feet and stepped out of the bath.

Sounds followed, as he was rinsed, dried, and dressed, like any lesser mortal. The three of us stayed motionless. My head swam with the heat. An external door slid open, then shut; the air pressure seemed abruptly to drop.

Haruki-san let out a long-held breath and slumped back against the side of the big tub. I instantly wallowed up onto the highest shelf, to sit with my legs in the water and the room swaying around me, my skin working furiously to rid itself of my body’s dizzying heat.

Holmes cleared his throat again. “I begin to see the purpose of our baptism by fire.”

In the book’s pages

The key to a great Empire

Lies, unsuspected
.

Would we have been so much as permitted a glimpse of this Son of Heaven, had we not submitted first to Haruki-san’s tutoring, then to her rigorous examinations?

“Without the past week,” I said, “you could not be certain we wouldn’t give some deadly insult.”

She opened her eyes. “I was told that you were both remarkably clever and adaptive, but time was too short to coddle your lessons. Although I am sorry about the bear,” she added.

“Have Russell tell you about stopping a charging boar with a spear,” Holmes suggested mildly. “What is the thing your young Emperor-to-be wants us to find?”

“More important,” I said, “who told you about us? I’m assuming you knew, long before you got on the ship.”

She sat upright, summoning the familiar schoolmistress attitude—if one could imagine a nude schoolmistress in a public bath. “I am not permitted to identify our informant. And I cannot say that I knew about you much before I was sent to board the
Thomas Carlyle
. But yes, our
meeting was arranged. His Highness has requested that I tell you how this came about. And he told me to answer your questions. Most of them.”

She was, clearly, prepared to launch into her long explanation then and there. I interrupted. “Must we do this here? If I spend another five minutes in this water, I’ll pass out.”

We adjourned, first to the outer section of the baths to be dried and dressed in the ryokan’s indigo yukatas, then to one of the freestanding pavilions, where tea and trays of snacks awaited us—and where, I noted, no one could approach without our seeing.

The air was cold, following the lengthy parboiling, but I pulled a padded
haori
coat over the thin cotton garments and edged closer to the glowing coals of the fire-pit. I cupped my tea in both hands, thinking that a long nap would have been nice. Instead, I attacked the tray’s contents.

“There was much,” Haruki-san began, “that His Highness did not say to you. It was necessary that you meet him, just as it was necessary that you be … trained to the proper behaviour in meeting him. His Highness wishes me to tell you about the object he requires you—that he would appreciate your retrieving for him. However, in order to do so, I told him that I would need also to tell you the background of the object, that you may understand its significance.”

We made ourselves as comfortable as we could. Holmes took out his pipe.

“You know something of the Samurai, the warrior class of Japan. Samurai are trained from birth, men and women alike, to serve. Under the Shoguns, they became an aristocracy of warriors, and although we are no longer a feudal society, Samurai influence remains powerful.

“As the Shogunate grew in power, the Samurai became more aristocrats than warriors. There became jobs they would not do. Shinobi—ninja, if you will—came into being to fill those holes. A warrior proud of his adherence to bushido—our code of conduct, with Samurai values of loyalty, courage, humility, self-control—will die willingly in battle, or commit
seppuku
—suicide—to assert his honour. But he will hesitate to
lie, steal, or sneak, even when such things are necessary to serve his master. A proud warrior is worthless, if one requires a spy.

“ ‘Ninja’ means hidden. We are invisible, because we look like something else. We may be Samurai, but we appear to be peasants, or priests, or one of the
eta
—outcasts, who perform the filthiest of jobs—in order to bring our master the information he requires. Or, I admit, sometimes to gain access to a man our master requires killed.

“And then you have our Emperor, who is above all this, and yet a part of it all. For much of our history, he has wielded supreme authority, yet had little actual power.

“Of course, over two and a half thousand years, matters change. Some Emperors have commanded armies, others were mere puppets. In theory, the Shogun was the Emperor’s battle commander. In practise, the Shogun’s rise marked the Emperor’s retreat from power. I do not say, as the radicals of my country would, that the Emperor is an empty symbol of the past. The Emperor retains enormous power in the hearts of his countrymen. He is the country’s connection to the gods. The people love their Emperor. Most would die for him. A huge power, and an equally huge responsibility: the Emperor exists because the people would never permit him to be removed. At the same time, he would never act in a way that would harm the people, and his ministers know that, and use that knowledge to keep him in control.

“In the West, our Emperor is a puzzle. To us, he is the essence of who we are. The man who walked out of here is a Japanese citizen by the name of Hirohito. He will also be the manifestation of the Divine in all of Japan. Even the Japanese constitution leaves the rôle of the Emperor … ambiguous. He has every freedom—so long as his wishes do not stray from expectations. This is why he was trained from birth to control his ambitions and desires. When he was seventy days old, he was given to be raised by a man who would teach him proper behaviour and self-control. When he returned from your country with new ideas about democracy and freedom, he gave a party for his friends, permitting them too much familiarity with his person. He has not made that mistake again.

“The danger is, when a person becomes too high to dirty his hands with matters of daily rule, he is laid open to … manipulation. The more luxury a man is given, the fewer personal rights he may claim. You and I earn money, keep it in bank accounts, spend it as we need. The man who just walked out of here has no such needs. But as you heard, he also has no such money. What need for personal finances when all luxuries are given?

“His Highness the Prince Regent’s grandfather, the Meiji Emperor, was probably the last Emperor of Japan to wield actual power, and that came about because the Americans decided to sail a battleship into our harbour. His Majesty’s advisors were in a panic, with no idea what to do. So for the first time in centuries, they turned to the heart of the people: our Emperor. It is ironic that the Enlightened Age, when democratic rule began to replace that of the Shogun, was overseen by an Emperor.

“But now the new system of government has again locked the Emperor away. And as His Highness revealed to you, he is kept on tight reins indeed, even financially.

“And that is the very root of our current dilemma.

“Three years ago, as I am sure you know, His Highness became the first Crown Prince to leave the country. He was twenty-one years old. He was to spend six months on the journey, visiting England especially. He would meet your Prime Minister, Mr David Lloyd George, but more than that, he would spend some days in the Palace home of your King. His Highness regarded this, rightly, as both a state honour and a personal one. As he prepared for this momentous journey—and remember, he was barely twenty-one—he decided that the many gifts provided by the Government and the Imperial Court might be fine for the state honours, but as recognition of the personal favour King George was doing him—having Japan’s Crown Prince to stay in the family home—such formal thanks were most inadequate. He wished to give your King something personal in return.

“His choice was … unfortunate. Had he been Prince Regent then, or had his father been well enough to tell him, His Highness would have known its importance. However, as Crown Prince, he thought it was
merely a beautiful possession that, belonging as it did to his family, he had the right to give where he wished.”

She frowned at the embers. “I cannot emphasise too much, just how dangerous a position His Highness stands in. Our entire world rests upon unspoken agreements: that His Majesty represents the will of Japan; that the opinions he voices are those of his government. For him to go against the decisions of his ministers would be … I will not say unthinkable, but His Highness would need to override his awareness of how catastrophic overt disagreement could be for the nation.

“All of which means that, were evidence to come to light that not just one Emperor, but generations of the Sons of Heaven, had been quietly acting on their own—that they possessed their own network of spies and advisors, even a sort of private army of shinobi … Were that to be known, the delicate balance that holds this country together would be destroyed. The government would shatter. Revolution would be at hand. And, as a side matter important only to me, one probable result would be the arrest and execution of my entire family.”

“You are saying that there is evidence of an Imperial shadow government.” Holmes, growing weary of Haruki-san’s attempts at explanation, was moving to the point.

“ ‘Shadow government.’ A good description, as it would not exist without the one that stands in the light. Yes, this government of the shadows is very much a part of Japan. And yes, it leads us to what His Highness requires—
requests
that you help us find and take back.” She drew a breath, then with the attitude of a swimmer facing a very cold plunge, dove in.

“What His Highness gave to your King is a book. A folding book of illustrated poems, some eight inches tall and three and a half wide, with a slip-case to hold it. When stretched out, it forms a panorama of the very road you travelled along to get here: the Kisokaido. The poems are by Bashō. The illustrations are by Hokusai, under his name of Gakyo Rojin Manji. That means, Old Man Crazy About Art.

“The book was commissioned by a wealthy Samurai as a gift to the Ninko Emperor during the Tempo era, what would be your 1838 or
1839. Shortly after this, the artist’s studio burned and his sketches were lost, although some earlier prints survive, with waterfalls that he later painted into the Emperor’s book.

“The images in the book are paintings, not prints: this book is the only one of its kind. I am told it is extraordinarily beautiful. The poems and illustrations are innocent. The key, I am told, lies within the binding.”

“That ‘key’ being what, exactly?”

But she shook her head. “That, I do not know. I doubt it is an actual key. Although the binding was done in the artist’s lifetime—he died in 1849—the hidden object belonged originally to Matsuo Bashō himself. It is difficult to imagine any serious locks of his era tiny enough for its key to be concealed within the binding.”

“So it’s probably a paper,” I said. “A letter or treaty, a signed agreement of some kind. Bashō was the late seventeenth century, wasn’t he?”

The poet had been born in 1644, a few years after the edicts that shuttered Japan into two hundred years of seclusion. He had died in 1694, no doubt worn out by his constant wandering. What did an itinerant haikumaster have to do with an Emperor’s authority? I decided to ask.

She smiled at my question. “The Master was born a few miles from here. He was, in fact, a distant relative of mine. And yes, Matsuo Bashō was ninja.”