The Convict's Sword (5 page)

Tora chuckled. “Tomoe? Not really. She’s just the best street singer in the city.” He shot his master a sidelong glance.

“Very well,” said Akitada. “We’ll have a cup of good wine somewhere, listen to your street singer, and come home.” By that time, he reasoned, nobody would wonder what had happened at the ministry. He would postpone unpleasant explanations until tomorrow.

They headed southward along busy Suzaku Avenue, where porters trotted with their loads slung on their backs, and a few messengers, at a full run, dodged horsemen and the occasional ox-drawn carriage. These tall two-wheeled vehicles were reserved for the good people and moved along sedately as their drivers walked beside the oxen and a retinue of servants followed behind. Their noble occupants sat inside, hidden behind bamboo blinds, protected from the dirty and ramshackle world of the common people. But most people were pedestrians like themselves, on their way to the business center of the city.

It was still early in the year, but the weather was getting warm already. There had been no rain for days, and a thin cloud of dust, stirred up by wheels, hooves, and feet, covered everything. The willow trees lining the avenue drooped motionless in the still air.

“Tora,” said Akitada, “do you remember Sadoshima? Did Haseo speak to you at all before he died?”

“What made you think of that again?”

“Guilt. That day I promised to clear his name. It’s been on my conscience, and today I decided to do something about it. The trouble is, I know next to nothing about his background.”

Tora clapped his hands. “Good! A new case. Just what we need. But I can’t help you much. He wasn’t up to talking, remember? Muttered a bit, though. His mind was wandering. I thought maybe he was praying.”

Praying? That did not sound like Haseo. “Try to remember his words.”

“I don’t know that I can, sir. It’s been five years.” Tora scrunched up his face in thought. “Well, he said something about a sword. But he’d been talking about swords before the battle. A good swordsman would, you know.”

“Yes.” Akitada thought about it and had an idea. If Haseo had been an expert sword fighter, perhaps his name would be known to other swordsmen. “Yes,” he said again with a nod. “That’s very helpful. We can make inquiries here in the capital. The training schools for young noblemen may know something or point us to someone who does.” Akitada’s mood lifted. “What did he say about this sword?”

“It’s been so long, sir. All I remember is some muttering about ‘my sword’ or ‘where’s my sword,’ or ‘my fine sword.’ Sorry, sir.”

“Never mind. I should have asked him before he got fatally wounded, but my mind was on other matters then. Do you remember anything else? About this praying, for example?”

Tora, though visibly concentrating, shook his head.

They were passing the walled and gated compound of the administration of the Left Capital. Akitada stopped. “I wonder if Haseo spent any time studying swordsmanship. Perhaps the city administration has a record of him.”

“Ah,” said Tora. “Very good! Wish I’d thought of that. But what about Tomoe?”

“Later. Where does this street singer of yours perform?”

“On the tower platform of the Left Market.”

Akitada suppressed a shudder. What had he been thinking of to agree to go to such a public place and listen to a common trollop? “You have low-bred girlfriends,” he said.

“She’s not low-bred and she’s not my girlfriend,” Tora said, a little stiffly. “Can’t a fellow have women friends without sleeping with them?”

“In your case it’s doubtful.” Akitada chuckled as he turned into the offices of the Left Capital. Tora’s romantic pursuits were legion. He felt a great deal better. Tora always had that effect on him because he approached all obstacles with energetic zeal, unlike Akitada, who was invariably torn by conflicting duties and agonized over every decision. Even now, he was guiltily aware that he should be in his office.

The city administration, like other official buildings in the capital, existed in two separate halves, one on each side of Suzaku Avenue, each responsible for its half of the capital. The Right Capital had, soon after its inception, fallen into ruin and ill repute and was now mainly occupied by the poor, the gangs, and a few holdouts. Akitada assumed that Haseo, as a member of the provincial gentry, would have resided in the Left Capital.

Since he was still wearing his official silk robe and stiff gauze hat and was accompanied by a servant, Akitada was greeted by the head clerk, who listened to his question and shook his head. “Utsunomiya? A single gentleman taking lodgings? And this was more than five years ago? Maybe as many as ten? Impossible, my dear sir. There is considerable coming and going in the city. Unless his family maintains property here, we won’t find anything.”

The man was not trying very hard, but he had a point. Akitada sighed and glanced around at the shelves of ledgers and registers of city wards. “Perhaps he resided in the area where the training schools in martial arts are located.”

The clerk was beginning to fidget. Only Akitada’s rank kept him from throwing up his hands and sending this bothersome person away. “Such schools exist in three different wards.”

“Ah,” said Akitada encouragingly. “That should help. Can we look through the residential registers of those wards for the years I mentioned?”

“But,” protested the clerk, “we don’t keep records of the students attending every training academy in the capital. Besides, there is no certainty that he even registered. He may simply have been someone’s houseguest. How long was he here?”

Akitada did not know and decided that he had to use different tactics. He raised his brows. “What possible difference does it make? Don’t you have your wardens report the names of everyone in their ward for every month of each year? Surely that is what the law requires.”

The clerk capitulated. “Of course,” he muttered. “Just a moment.” He went to consult with an assistant, who went to consult with several more, who dispersed and returned carrying enormous stacks of documents. “There you are,” said the clerk with a smirk. “The registers for the twelfth, thirteenth, and fifteenth wards for the past fifteen years. They are the wards which have or had training schools for martial arts.”

The stacks were enormous. Akitada saw no point in sifting through tens of thousands of entries. Instead, he informed himself about the location of the wards, the names of the schools, and the identity of the local wardens, and they left.

The first training school belonged to a master called Takizawa. They found him and his disciples already hard at work. The students, two agile youngsters in their mid-teens, were facing each other barefoot on the gleaming wood floor, while their teacher moved around them, calling out instructions. They were using wooden swords, but even a wooden sword could do considerable damage. As Akitada and Tora watched, one of the youngsters did not parry properly and had his wrist injured by his opponent. He bore the pain manfully, only asking the master’s assistant, who was putting on a splint and a bandage, if he would ever fight again.

The accident created an opportunity for Akitada to speak to Master Takizawa. But the name Utsunomiya meant nothing to the man.

“I never had a student by that name,” he said. “A colleague of mine once had quite a good pupil called Haseo. But his family name was different.”

They walked to the next school, where they met with nearly the same answer, although the master in this instance—they had to wait through two instruction sessions before he was at liberty to speak to them—suggested that a serious student of swordsmanship was likely to invest in a good sword made by a master swordsmith. Such an order was expensive and not many really fine swords were sold. The swordsmith would remember his customer. He provided them with the name of the best smith.

As they approached the Left Market, Tora said, “We could stop for a bowl of noodles or a cup of wine now, sir.”

“Later. We have hours until the evening rice.”

Tora drew in his breath. “I was hoping to introduce you to Tomoe, sir. She leaves early.”

Akitada glowered at him. “Surely even you can see that this is more important than your affairs. And please spare me the particulars.”

Tora, who had opened his mouth in protest, snapped it shut and looked offended instead.

They walked in silence through a quarter where all sorts of artisans lived and worked. Signs at gates or on door curtains advertised lacquer work, wood carving, paper making, weaving, and dyeing. Each craft had its own street, and each crafts-man belonged to his own guild. The swordsmiths shared their section with the attendant trades of the polishers, as well as of makers of scabbards, pommels, sword guards, and sword stands. Most of the houses here backed on the Arizu River, a small branch of the Kamo. Good, pure water was essential to their craft. Iron sand and carbon could be brought in from Bizen Province, but not water, and all three were ingredients in the forging of steel blades that were both hard and flexible.

The name they sought was inscribed beside the gate of a small villa: Sukenari Munechika. The size of the property and the fact that the owner had two names meant that he was descended from a family that had once been noble, and that he was held in high esteem, well above the rest of the craftsmen and merchants.

A servant received them with a bow and took their shoes. The house was quiet, but from a distance they could hear the steady rhythm of hammers striking steel. They stepped up into a large beautiful room, softly lit through paper screens. It was nearly empty, except for a few silk cushions on thick grass mats and an alcove with a calligraphy scroll and a single sword displayed on a stand.

“The master is at work, but I shall announce the gentlemen,” said the servant with another bow and disappeared on silent feet.

They sat down and looked at the sword in its scabbard covered with intricate silver overlay. The calligraphy on the scroll was also quite beautiful.

Tora asked, “What does it say, sir?”

Akitada read, “Using the sword when there is no other choice is also Heaven’s Way.”

Tora nodded. “Very good. We soldiers know that sometimes you have to kill to save lives. Right?”

“Yes. The master is also a philosopher, it seems.”

“I’ve watched a swordsmith. Before he starts, he prays to the gods to favor his work. It’s very inspiring.”

“Yes.” Akitada’s mind went back to Haseo, who had wanted a sword in his hand more than anything else in the world. Akitada, not knowing this, had kept the only sword for himself. In the subsequent battle against overwhelming odds, Haseo had fought first with a pole, and then, after unseating and killing a horseman, with his victim’s sword. It was from that moment on, when his hand had at last gripped a sword, that Haseo’s face had been filled with pure happiness. He had fought and killed, and by doing so he had saved their lives, though he had lost his own.

The hammering in the distance had stopped, and now they heard the soft footfall of the master swordsmith Sukenari. He was a middle-aged man, not tall, but with the broad shoulders and muscular upper arms of his trade. Dressed in a dark silk robe, his graying hair tied smoothly on top of his head, he looked more like a nobleman than someone who had just hammered red-hot steel into a deadly blade.

Sukenari’s manners and speech were as impeccable as his appearance. Introductions out of the way, he presented his visitors with wine and made polite small talk about the season, the recent Kamo festival, and the deep honor of their presence in his humble house. Akitada responded with compliments on the wine, comments on the unseasonably hot weather, and an anecdote about an incident during another Kamo celebration. Tora was silent, shifting in his seat. His eyes kept moving to the sword on its stand until he could not restrain himself any longer. “Did you make that?” he asked.

Sukenari smiled and shook his head. “You flatter me, young man. That sword was made by my namesake, Sanjo Munechika. I strive to learn from its perfection.”

“Could I see it?”

The smith rose immediately and took the sword from its stand. He presented it to Tora with both hands and a small bow. “Your interest honors me.”

Tora grunted and slid the blade from the scabbard. “Moves as easily as floating on air,” he commented. The blade gleamed blue in the soft light coming through the shoji screens. Its slender shape was incredibly graceful, thirty inches of narrow, curved steel so finely honed that it could split a man in half as smoothly as if he were a melon. “Sharp,” muttered Tora, touching the edge, “and straight,” extending it and looking down its length. Then, before Akitada could stop him, he had jumped up, taking the swordfighter’s stance. The air hissed as he performed a series of slashes with the weapon. When he sat back down, his eyes shone. “A man would be unbeatable with such a sword.”

“Tora!”

“Oh. Sorry, sir. Here you are.” Tora passed the sword to Akitada. “Just look at that blade! I believe it’s lighter than yours.”

Akitada received the sword and turned to Sukenari. “Please forgive my friend. He’s very enthusiastic and forgets his manners when his heart is moved.”

“I understand. Mine is moved in the same way. The gods dwell in that blade.”

Akitada noted the beauty of the temper lines that ran along the sharp edge like waves. Tora asked, “Do you think Haseo’s sword would have been as fine as that?”

To their surprise, Sukenari leaned forward, his face intent. “Haseo?”

Akitada reinserted the blade in its scabbard and, holding the sword in both hands, returned it with a bow of thanks. “I had a friend who loved swords and was a fine fighter. His family name was Utsunomiya. We came to ask if you had heard of him, thinking that perhaps he had once, years ago, had a sword made for him.”

Sukenari’s face fell. “No,” he said regretfully. “No, that is not the same man. I did make a sword once for a young man named Haseo, a very common name to be sure, but his family name was Tomonari. I don’t suppose you can describe this sword?”