The Ghost in the Tokaido Inn (13 page)

He gritted his teeth and forced
such thoughts out of his mind. Follow the path, he told himself
again. But was this really the right path?

Late in the day, they trudged down
the steep mountain road that led to the town of Hakone on the shore
of Lake Ashi. The sunset over the lake, seen from here, was famous
for its beauty, but Seikei could see nothing but slate gray clouds
that grew steadily darker. The scene matched his mood.

In Hakone they found a theater
whose owner willingly invited the troupe to put on a play. Tomomi
led the others inside. “We have little time to prepare,” said
Tomomi. “So we will present a simple drama, one that always proves
popular. Get out the costumes for the love-suicide
play.”

While the actors dressed, Seikei
and Kazuo were sent to spread word of the performance and draw
people to the theater. Kazuo told Seikei to visit the inns along
one side of the street while he took the other. “What am I supposed
to do?” Seikei asked.

“Tell everyone you see that there will be a performance
of
The Double Suicide at
Sonezaki
at the theater. It’s a famous
play. Even the farmers come to see it. Sneak inside the door of the
inn and shout it in the hallway.”

“Won’t that disturb the
guests?”

Kazuo shook his head impatiently.
“Who cares? They won’t do anything but throw you out. Just make
sure everybody hears you.”

Seikei approached the first inn
shyly. Two pretty young women stood outside, trying to entice
travelers inside. Seikei realized his task was similar to theirs,
and remembered that his father always said inns that used such
methods were inferior.

The women paid no attention as he
slipped by them. But at the top of the steps he found his path
blocked by a burly innkeeper. “Do you wish to stay here?” the man
asked.

‘There is a play,” Seikei replied. He tried to raise his
voice so that it would carry inside. “The ... the
Double Love
of
Sonezaki
.
I
mean
Suicide
.
At the theater. Down the street.”
He could not make himself shout, and he realized that no one but
the innkeeper could possibly hear him.

The man pushed Seikei down the
steps, nearly causing him to fall. “Go away,” he said.

“
The Double Suicide!”
Seikei cried, a litde louder this time because he was angry.
“Come see!”

The innkeeper threw a stone at
him. As Seikei fled past the two women, he realized that their
voices were louder than his.

Glumly, he walked to the next inn.
This one had no women in front. It looked a bit more elegant than
the first one. Seikei was certain he would be thrown out as soon as
he entered the door.

He hunched his shoulders and
walked up the steps. Before he reached the door, it opened. A
komuso stood there, like the other one, wearing a basket over his
head. Seikei wondered again if this was the same komuso he had seen
earlier.

The komuso raised his hand and
gestured for Seikei to come inside. Seikei took a step backward,
suspicious. He decided it would be just as well to go on to the
next inn. As he turned, however, the man swept forward like a
demon. He picked Seikei off the ground and tossed him over his
shoulder as easily as if he had been a sack of rice.

Seikei struggled, but it was
useless against the man’s strength. As they moved through the
doorway, Seikei caught sight of Kazuo entering a teahouse across
the street. Seikei started to cry for help, but the komuso clapped
a hand over his mouth.

The main hall of the inn was
deserted. No one noticed as the komuso carried Seikei down a
hallway. He slid open a door and plopped Seikei down on the floor.
At once, Seikei jumped to his feet and reached for his sword,
determined to give the komuso a fight.

“Hold!” came a loud voice. Seikei
recognized it, and froze. He turned to face Judge Ooka, who was
sitting calmly on a mat, a steaming pot of tea by his side. Seikei
could not keep himself from staring.

“I thought you knew that a samurai
only draws his sword in order to use it,” the judge said
sternly.

“I intended to use it,” Seikei
replied. He turned and pointed to the komuso. “This man meant to
rob me.”

“Nonsense,” said the judge. “You
have nothing for him to steal. Why not be patient and see where he
was taking you? You owe him an apology. Kneel now and beg his
forgiveness.”

Seikei hesitated only for a
second. He knew he had to obey his lord without question. He knelt
on the floor before the komuso. “I beg your forgiveness,” he said,
bowing his head.

The judge clapped once. “You are
acquiring discipline,” he said. “Now look at the man I sent to
protect you.”

When Seikei looked up, he saw that
the komuso had removed the basket from his head. It was Bunzo, the
samurai who had showed him how to ride a horse.

Seikei’s astonishment showed on
his face, and Bunzo grinned. “I told the judge how you continued on
the road even though your feet were bleeding.”

“And much else,” the judge added.
“Now I must hear what you have seen. Be quick, for I think we must
soon part again.”

Seikei began to pour out the story
of everything he had seen since he left the judge at the theater.
He bowed his head in shame when he revealed that the actor had
taken his sword, but the judge stopped him. “Tell me again the name
he gave when you fought.”

“Genji, the son of the daimyo
Takezaki Kita.”

“Takezaki Kita,” the judge
repeated slowly. “A Kirishitan daimyo, who was executed when he
refused to give up his faith.”

“Tomomi—or Genji—himself wears the
cross of the Kirishitans around his neck,” Seikei said. “But I must
tell you the rest. I know he stole the jewel, for I saw him with it
the next morning at the shrine of Ise. He left it there as an
offering to Amaterasu!”

“Of course,” the judge said. “What
else would he do with it? It would be impossible to sell
it.”

Seikei was disappointed that his
report caused so little surprise. “He told me to tell you what I
had seen,” Seikei said.

The judge nodded. He took a sip of
his tea. “The fact that he wishes it known is significant. I think
I see where his path will lead him.” He wagged a finger at Seikei.
“But he must not know you have told me already,” he said. “Then he
might change his plans. Go back to him now and do what he
says.”

“Go back?” said Seikei. “But you
know he is the thief. You know where the jewel is. Shouldn’t you—”
he caught himself in time. It would be wrong to tell the judge his
duty.

“The jewel is perfectly safe,” the
judge said. “We must let Genji follow his own path. He has another
performance in his mind.”

“That’s true,” said Seikei. “They
say he is working on a new play.”

“Is that so?” said the judge.
“Then I must be there to see it. There may be another criminal in
the case. Genji will show me who it is.” The judge folded his hands
across his stomach. “I am pleased that he trusts me so
much.”

Seikei had a thousand questions,
but the judge urged him to hurry. “There will be time later to
examine the case in detail. Do whatever Genji tells you. Find out
whatever you can about him. Bunzo will follow you as before, and
keep me informed of your progress.” Judge Ooka smiled. “You have
proved resourceful, a desirable quality in a samurai.”

Seikei silently glowed with
pleasure as he bowed to the judge and left the room. As he hurried
down the hall, he reached down and touched his wooden sword. For
the first time, he felt worthy of wearing it. It did not matter
that he had lost it once. He had pleased the judge.

I
must
continue to be resourceful
, Seikei told
himself.
Do what Genji says.
The trouble was, he didn’t have the slightest
idea what Genji wanted him to do. He shrugged. The judge seemed to
understand. All Seikei had to do was continue to follow the path,
wherever it led.

16: The Magic of Kabuki

As Seikei stepped outside the inn,
he found Kazuo waiting for him in the street. “What were you doing
so long in there?” Kazuo asked.

“Telling the guests about the
play.” Seikei responded quickly.

Kazuo looked at him suspiciously.
“I guess they didn’t throw you out because you’re wearing a sword,”
he said.

‘The innkeeper wasn’t around,”
Seikei explained.

“Dumb luck,” muttered Kazuo. “At
one of the teahouses, they threw boiling water at me.” He shrugged.
“Let’s get back to the theater. There’s work to do.”

When they arrived, Seikei saw a
scene of bewildering confusion. People were rushing about—some
partly dressed in costumes, some setting up lights for the stage,
some carrying tea utensils, paper screens, and other props. A group
of musicians sat off to one side, playing their instruments and
shouting at each other at the same time. Three of the actors,
spotting Kazuo, yelled at him at once. “Where’s the scarlet
makeup?” “What happened to the sandals for my costume?” “Find me a
mirror!”

As Kazuo rushed off on three
errands at once, Seikei wandered through the backstage area, trying
not to bump into anyone. He felt a hand grab his sleeve. Seikei
turned and nearly jumped at the sight of a fierce chalk-white face,
with crimson and black lines around the eyes. “Get me a sword!”
When Seikei hesitated, the actor pointed to a chest on the other
side of the room. “The green chest. Get the sword with the plain
black scabbard.”

Hurrying through the crowd, Seikei
opened the green chest. It was filled with swords, daggers, spears,
bows and arrows, bottles of poison—a treasure trove of deadly
objects. As he examined them, however, he saw that they were only
props. He slipped one of the swords from its scabbard and
cautiously rubbed his thumb along the edge. It was as dull as the
edge of a plate. A good thing, for as he knew, a real samurai sword
was razor sharp and strong enough to cut a man’s body in two with a
single blow.

He selected the proper sword and
took it back to the actor. The man slipped it through the sash of
his kimono and stood with his arms stretched out. The kimono was
made from a deep purple cloth covered with silver and gold
embroidered animals. The wide sleeves fluttered gracefully as the
actor turned. “What do you think?” he asked Seikei.

“It’s . . . amazing,” said Seikei.
Suddenly, the actor whipped the sword from its scabbard and raised
it high. Seikei ducked instinctively, and the man laughed. “You’ll
see that move again when I strike off Tomomi’s head,” he
said.

Seikei looked around. “Where is
Tomomi?” he asked.

“Oh, he thinks he’s too good to
dress with the rest of us,” the actor said. “He’s hiding behind a
screen somewhere, changing himself into a woman.”

“A woman?” said
Seikei. “How can he do that?”

“The magic of kabuki,” the actor
replied. “Don’t you know that the shogun forbids women from
appearing on the stage?”

“Oh ... I think I did hear that,”
said Seikei.

“A pity, for it was a woman, the
immortal Okuni, who invented kabuki.” He gave Seikei a wink. “But
it is all in the same spirit, for Okuni took men’s roles. In
kabuki, you see, you can never tell what’s real.”

That was true
enough
, thought Seikei. He looked around,
seeing the ordinary-looking men transforming themselves into
strange and spectacular figures. One actor’s kimono was so immense
that it made him look as broad as he was tall. In fact, two
assistants crouched behind him, holding thin sticks that supported
the sides of the kimono. The three of them practiced now, stepping
in unison so that the audience would not see the
assistants.

The backstage confusion seemed to
increase as the time of the play grew near. Seikei looked for a
place where he could watch everything and not be in the way. Shyly,
he followed the musicians. They took their places behind a platform
where they could see the action on stage. Still arguing among
themselves, they paid no attention to Seikei.

All at once, the argument stopped.
The musicians looked toward the back of the theater. There, Seikei
saw the actor wearing the purple kimono raise his hand. As he
jumped onto the runway, one of the musicians picked up two thick
wooden blocks. He clapped them twice, so loudly that Seikei put his
hands over his ears. The actor began to run toward the stage. Drums
rolled, bells tinkled, and the samisens played a lively tune. The
play was on!

The story was not hard to follow.
The actor in the purple kimono was Toshio, the son of a rich
merchant. Seikei suddenly grew more interested. Toshio complained
to the audience that his parents had chosen a bride for him, but he
loved another.

In the first
scene, Toshio’s father—the actor with the very wide kimono—waddled
on stage. People in the audience jeered. He did look ridiculous,
like an immensely fat man who had made a fortune off others.
A typical
merchant
, thought Seikei
ruefully.