Musashi: Bushido Code (137 page)

"In three years, a newborn babe ceases to be a baby and becomes a three-year-old. You're an old tree; I'm a sapling. Sorry to say, you can't treat me like a sniveling brat anymore."

"Surely it can't be true. Are you really Jōtarō?"

"You ought to have to pay for all the grief you've caused my teacher over the years. He avoided you only because you're old and he didn't want to harm you. You took advantage of that, traveling around everywhere, even to Edo, spreading malicious rumors about him and acting as though you had a legitimate reason to take revenge on him. You even went so far as to prevent his appointment to a good post."

Osugi was silent.

"Your spite didn't end there, either. You bedeviled Otsū and tried to injure her. I thought at last you'd given up and retired to Miyamoto. But you're still at it, using that Mambei to carry out some scheme against Otsū."

Still Osugi did not speak.

"Don't you ever tire of hating? It'd be easy to slice you in two, but fortunately for you, I'm no longer the son of a wayward samurai. My father, Aoki Tanzaemon, has returned to Himeji and, since last spring, is serving the House of Ikeda. To avoid bringing dishonor on him, I shall refrain from killing you."

Jōtarō took a couple of steps toward her. Not knowing whether to believe him or not, Osugi moved back and cast about for a way to escape. Thinking she saw one, she bolted toward the path the men had taken. Jōtarō caught up with her in one leap and grabbed her by the neck.

She opened her mouth wide and cried, "What do you think you're doing?" She turned around and drew her sword in the same motion, struck at him and missed.

While dodging, Jōtarō pushed her violently forward. Her head struck hard against the ground.

"So you've learned a thing or two, have you?" she moaned, her face half buried in the grass. She seemed unable to dislodge from her mind the idea that Jōtarō was still a child.

With a growl, he placed his foot on her spine, which seemed very fragile, and pitilessly wrenched her arm around her back.

Dragging her in front of the shrine, he pinned her down with his foot, but couldn't decide what to do with her.

There was Otsū to think about. Where was she? He had come to know of her presence in Shikama largely by accident, though it may have been because their karmas were intertwined. Along with his father's reinstatement, Jōtarō had been given an appointment. It was while he was on one of his errands that he had caught a glimpse through a gap in the fence of a woman who looked like Otsū. Returning to the beach two days ago, he had verified his impression.

While he was grateful to the gods for leading him to Otsū, his long-dormant hatred of Osugi for the way she had persecuted Otsū had been rekindled. If the old woman was not disposed of, it would be impossible for Otsū to live in peace. The temptation was there. But killing her would embroil his father in a dispute with a family of country samurai. They were troublesome people at the best of times; if offended by a daimyō's direct vassal, they were certain to cause trouble.

Finally, he decided the best way was to punish Osugi quickly and then turn his attention to rescuing Otsū.

"I know the place for you," he said. "Come along."

Osugi clung fiercely to the ground, despite his attempts to yank her along. Seizing her by the waist, he carried her under his arm around to the back of the shrine. The hillside had been shaved off when the shrine was built, and there was a small cave there, the entrance to which was just big enough for a person to crawl through.

Otsū could see a single light in the distance. Otherwise, everything was pitch black—mountains, fields, streams, Mikazuki Pass, which they had just crossed by a rocky path. The two men in front were leading her by a rope, as they would a criminal.

When they neared the Sayo River, the man behind her said, "Stop a minute. What do you suppose happened to the old woman? She said she'd be right along."

"Yeah; she should have caught up by now."

"We could stop here a few minutes. Or go on to Sayo and wait at the teahouse. They're probably all in bed, but we could wake them up."

"Let's go there and wait. We can have a cup or two of sake."

They searched along the river for a shallow place and had started to cross when they heard a voice hailing them from a distance. It came again a minute or two later, from much nearer.

"The old woman?"

"No; it sounds like a man's voice."

"It can't have anything to do with us."

The water was as chillingly cold as a sword blade, especially for Otsū. By the time they heard the sound of running feet, their pursuer was almost upon them. With great splashes, he beat them to the other bank and confronted them.

"Otsū?" called Jōtarō.

Shivering from the spray of water that had fallen on them, the three men closed in around Otsū and stood where they were.

"Don't move," shouted Jōtarō, arms outstretched.

"Who are you?"

"Never mind. Release Otsū!"

"You crazy? Don't you know you can get killed meddling in other people's business?"

"Osugi said you're to hand Otsū over to me."

"You're lying through your teeth." All three men laughed.

"I'm not. Look at this." He held out a piece of tissue paper with Osugi's handwriting on it. The message was short: "Things went wrong. There's nothing you can do. Give Otsū to Jōtarō, then come back for me."

The men, brows wrinkled, looked up at Jōtarō and moved onto the bank. "Can't you read?" taunted Jōtarō.

"Shut up. I suppose you're Jōtarō."

"That's right. My name is Aoki Jōtarō."

Otsū had been staring fixedly at him, trembling slightly from fear and doubt. Now, scarcely knowing what she was doing, she screamed, gasped and stumbled forward.

The man closest to Jōtarō shouted, "Her gag's come loose. Tighten it!" Then menacingly to Jōtarō: "This is the old woman's handwriting, no doubt about it. But what happened to her? What does she mean, 'come back for me'?"

"She's my hostage," Jōtarō said loftily. "You give me Otsū, I tell you where she is."

The three men looked at each other. "Are you trying to be funny?" asked one man. "Do you know who we are? Any samurai in Himeji, if that's where you're from, should be familiar with the House of Hon'iden in Shimonoshō."

"Yes or no—answer! If you don't surrender Otsū, I'll leave the old woman where she is until she starves to death."

"You little bastard!"

One man grabbed Jōtarō and another unsheathed his sword and took a stance. The first growled, "You keep talking nonsense like that and I'll break your neck. Where's Osugi?"

"Will you give me Otsū?"

"
_No!
"

"Then you won't find out. Hand over Otsū, and we can put an end to this without anybody getting hurt."

The man who had grabbed Jōtarō's arm pulled him forward and tried to trip him.

Using his adversary's strength, Jōtarō threw him over his own shoulder. But the next second, he was sitting on his behind, clutching at his right thigh. The man had whipped out his sword and struck in a mowing motion. Fortunately, the wound was not deep. Jōtarō jumped to his feet at the same time as his attacker. The other two men moved in on him.

"Don't kill him. We have to take him alive if we're to get Osugi back."

Jōtarō quickly lost his reluctance to become involved in bloodshed. In the ensuing melee, the three men managed at one point to throw him to the ground. He uttered a roar and used the same tactic that moments before had been used against him. Ripping out his short sword, he jabbed straight through the belly of the man about to fall on him. Jōtarō's hand and arm, halfway up to the shoulder, came away as red as if he'd stuck them into a barrel of plum vinegar, but his head was cleared of everything save the instinct for self-preservation.

On his feet again, he shouted and struck downward at the man in front of him. The blade hit a shoulder bone, and glancing sideways, tore off a slice of meat the size of a fish fillet. Screaming, the man grabbed for his sword, but it was too late.

"Sons of bitches! Sons of bitches!" Shouting with each stroke of his sword, Jōtarō held off the other two, then managed to seriously wound one of them.

They had taken their superiority for granted, but now they lost self-control and started swinging their arms with utter abandon.

Beside herself, Otsū ran around in circles, wriggling her bound hands frantically. "Somebody come! Save him!" But her words were soon lost, drowned by the sound of the river and the voice of the wind.

Suddenly she realized that instead of calling for help, she should be relying on her own strength. With a little cry of desperation, she sank to the ground and began rubbing the rope against the sharp edge of a rock. It was only loosely woven straw rope picked up by the wayside and she was soon able to free herself.

She picked up some rocks and ran straight toward the action. "Jōtarō," she called, as she threw a rock at the face of one man. "I'm here too. It's going to be all right!" Another rock. "Keep it up!" Still another rock, but like the first two, it missed its target. She rushed back to get more.

"That bitch!" In two leaps, one man disengaged himself from Jōtarō and took after Otsū. He was about to bring the blunt edge of his sword down on her back when Jōtarō reached him. Jōtarō drove his sword so deep into the small of the man's back that the blade pointed straight out from the man's navel.

The other man, wounded and dazed, started to slink away, then broke into an unsteady run.

Jōtarō planted his feet firmly on either side of the corpse, withdrew the sword and screamed, "Stop!"

As he started to give chase, Otsū pounced forcefully on him and screamed, "Don't do it! You mustn't attack a badly wounded man when he's fleeing." The fervency of her plea astonished him. He could not imagine what psychological quirk would move her to sympathize with a man who had so recently been tormenting her.

Otsū said, "I want to hear what you've been doing all these years. I have things to tell you too. And we should get out of here as fast as we can."

Jōtarō agreed quickly, knowing that if word of the incident reached Shimonoshō, the Hon'idens would round up the whole village to come after them.

"Can you run, Otsū?"

"Yes. Don't worry about me."

And run they did, on and on through the darkness until their breath gave out. To both, it seemed like the old days when they had been a young girl and a mere boy, making their way together.

At Mikazuki, the only lights visible were at the inn. One shone in the main building, where only a little earlier a group of travelers—a metal merchant whose business took him to the local mines, a thread salesman from Tajima, an itinerant priest—had been sitting around, talking and laughing. They had all drifted off to bed.

Jōtarō and Otsū sat talking by the other light, in a small detached room where the innkeeper's mother lived with her spinning wheel and the pots in which she boiled silkworms. The innkeeper suspected the couple he was taking in were eloping, but he had the room straightened up for them anyway.

Otsū was saying, "So you didn't see Musashi in Edo either." She gave him an account of the last few years.

Saddened to hear that she had not seen Musashi since that day on the Kiso highroad, Jōtarō found it difficult to speak. Yet he thought he was able to offer a ray of hope.

"It's not much to go on," he said, "but I heard a rumor in Himeji that Musashi would be coming there soon."

"To Himeji? Could it be true?" she asked, eager to latch on to even the flimsiest straw.

"It's only what people say, but the men in our fief are talking as though it's already decided. They say he'll pass through on his way to Kokura, where he's promised to meet a challenge from Sasaki Kojirō. That's one of Lord Hosokawa's retainers."

"I heard something like that too, but I couldn't find anybody who had heard from Musashi or even knew where he was."

"Well, the word going around Himeji Castle is probably reliable. It seems the Hanazono Myōshinji in Kyoto, which has close connections with the House of Hosokawa, informed Lord Hosokawa of Musashi's whereabouts, and Nagaoka Sado—he's a senior retainer—delivered the letter of challenge to Musashi."

"Is it supposed to happen soon?"

"I don't know. Nobody seems to know exactly. But if it's to be in Kokura, and if Musashi's in Kyoto, he'll pass through Himeji on the way."

"He might go by boat "

Jōtarō shook his head. "I don't think so. The daimyō at Himeji and Okayama and other fiefs along the Inland Sea will ask him to stop over for a night or so. They want to see what kind of man he really is and sound him out about whether he's interested in a position. Lord Ikeda wrote to Takuan. Then he made inquiries at the Myōshinji and instructed the wholesalers in his area to report if they
see
anyone answering Musashi's description."

"That's all the more reason to suppose he won't go by land. There's nothing he hates worse than a lot of fuss. If he knows about it, he'll do his best to avoid it." Otsū seemed depressed, as if she'd suddenly lost all hope. "What do you think, Jōtarō?" she asked pleadingly. "If I went to the Myōshinji, do you think I'd be able to find out anything?"

"Well, maybe, but you have to remember it's only gossip."

"But there must be something to it, don't you think?"

"Do you feel like going to Kyoto?"

"Oh, yes. I'd like to leave right away.... Well, tomorrow."

"Don't be in such a hurry. That's why you're always missing Musashi. The minute you hear a rumor, you accept it as fact and go flying off. If you want to spot a nightingale, you have to look at a point in front of where its voice comes from. It seems to me you're always trailing along behind Musashi, rather than anticipating where he might be next."