The Samurai and the Long-Nosed Devils (8 page)

Pedro translated. “Father Luis says that we are greatly relieved by your arrival. Since the shogun must want the real murderer of Lord Fujikawa to be found, we know that we can expect you to listen impartially to logic and accept only true evidence.”

In spite of their bizarre appearance, the two Portuguese bore themselves with dignity. Zenta felt a touch of pride in being their bodyguard.

Kagemasa mounted to the front veranda of the house and seated himself on a cushion brought out by a maid. His manner became more brisk and less like that of a luxury-loving court dandy. “Gentlemen, you will surrender your weapons to my men,” he commanded. “Now let us hear the evidence.”

Except for the two Portuguese, who were not expected to understand proper behavior, the rest of the men went down on their knees in the courtyard and waited with lowered heads for their turn to speak. At a gesture from Kagemasa, one of Lord Fujikawa's samurai began.

“This morning, one of the maid servants noticed that our master's door on the garden side was open. She considered this strange because it had been raining hard last night. She looked into the room, and to her horror, she saw our master lying dead in a pool of blood. We rushed into the room when we heard her screams and found our master with a ghastly wound in the middle of his chest. It was a huge, ragged hole that could not have been made by a normal weapon. We knew then that he had been killed by the foreigners' devilish weapon.”

“I have seen a demonstration of this weapon,” said Kagemasa. “A gun, I believe it is called. It makes a very loud sound when fired. Why did no one hear the shooting?”

Zenta looked at Kagemasa with interest. For all his foppish airs and affected speech, the shogun's deputy was no fool.

“We wondered about this also,” replied the samurai. “We presume that the shooting took place during the thunderstorm last night, and we must have mistaken the sound of the shot for a clap of thunder.”

Zenta had come to the same conclusion. He realized that the shot must have coincided with the clap that had sounded a little strange at the time.

Kagemasa digested the information in silence for a few minutes. He finally turned to Pedro and said, “You may speak.”

The Portuguese had himself well under control. When he spoke, his intonation of Japanese was a little worse than usual, but he remembered to avoid using feminine forms of speech. “I had three guns in my possession, but one of them was stolen yesterday. I believe that the murderer stole my gun and used it to kill Lord Fujikawa in order to have the suspicion fall on me.”

“I have only your statement that the gun was stolen,” said Kagemasa. “Since the murder took place last night and was not discovered until this morning, you would have had plenty of time to get rid of the murder weapon.”

There was a stir among Lord Fujikawa's men and several of them raised their heads to exchange triumphant looks. They evidently thought that the investigation was going very well.

Zenta looked anxiously at Pedro. In spite of having to use an unfamiliar tongue to address a largely hostile audience, the Portuguese looked calm and collected. Zenta felt a flash of admiration for him.

Before Pedro could speak again, the silence of the courtyard was broken by the sound of excited voices coming from the back of the house. “I thought all the staff was assembled here,” said Kagemasa, looking annoyed. He turned to one of his men. “Go and see who is making the disturbance.”

The man soon returned and made his report. “Some of Lord Fujikawa's serving women have discovered that a portion of the fence in their garden was unfastened. They found footprints in the gap leading to the foreigners' garden.”

“That's the proof you need, my lord!” shouted one of the Fujikawa samurai. “The Portuguese made these prints when he returned after committing the murder!”

Zenta cursed himself for not having checked the fence. He should have thought of it as soon as the murder was discovered. But the mention of footprints gave him an idea of how to prove Pedro's innocence. He raised his head and caught Kagemasa's eye. “May I have permission to speak?” he asked. At Kagemasa's nod, he said, “I should like to inspect the footprints near the fence. On past occasions I have found that footprints can reveal a great deal about the person who made them.”

“What can we possibly learn from footprints?” said one of the Fujikawa samurai. “This man is simply trying to delay justice!”

Kagemasa looked thoughtfully at Zenta. “I should like to examine those footprints. I am curious myself to see what you can learn from them.”

He pointed out two of the Fujikawa men who had been the loudest in denouncing the Portuguese. “You shall come with us. Then you can have no cause to say that the evidence has been tampered with.”

Leaving his men to keep order in the courtyard, Kagemasa and the two Fujikawa samurai followed Pedro and Zenta to the garden at the back of the house. The section of the fence used by Chiyo and Maria for passing back and forth was unfastened and propped against a bush.

The rain had washed away most of the footprints made on the wet, muddy ground, but near the fence, the camellia bushes grew thickly enough to provide a good cover. There were several distinct prints made by bare feet, and all of them pointed towards the house of the Portuguese.

Zenta stooped down and inspected the clearest of the prints. What he saw gave him satisfaction. “There is no doubt about it. The Portuguese did not make these prints,” he said, rising.

Kagemasa languidly waved an exquisitely painted fan, but his eyes were shrewd and alert. “Explain,” he ordered.

Turning to Pedro, Zenta said, “Take off your shoes and walk a few steps. No, over here, on the soft ground.”

Looking a little self-conscious, Pedro sat down on a rock and pulled off his heavy leather boots. Then with the eyes of everyone on him, he gingerly took a few steps. The soft earth oozing through his toes made him grimace. (He later explained that only the poorest peasants in his country walked barefoot.)

Pointing to the fresh prints made by Pedro, Zenta said, “The foreigners wear a different kind of shoe from ours. Their footgear does not have a strap that comes between the big toe and the other toes. Look at the prints just made: the big toe and the second one are close together. But in the prints made earlier, the big toe is widely separated from the rest. These earlier prints were made by one of our countrymen.”

In silence everyone stared at the two sets of prints. Finally Kagemasa turned to the two Fujikawa samurai and said, “I find this man's argument quite convincing.”

It was clear that the two samurai had become less certain of Pedro's guilt. One of them, however, set his jaw stubbornly and glared at Zenta. “All right, I admit that the Portuguese was not the one who did the actual killing, but he might have ordered
you
to do it. He could have taught you to fire a gun.”

“If my employer wanted me to murder Lord Fujikawa, he would have ordered me to use a sword,” said Zenta. “The gun would immediately place the suspicion on him.”

For a moment the two Fujikawa men were silent. Then the more stubborn one said, “Who did kill our master, then? The broken fence and the footprints still show that the murderer came from your side.”

“Not necessarily,” said Zenta. “They merely show that the murderer
escaped
this way. He could have been someone from your side.”

“What!” shouted the samurai. “Are you accusing one of us?”

“This is a very serious charge,” said Kagemasa. “It seems to me that there is another possibility—that the murderer was someone from the outside.”

“He was barefoot,” Zenta pointed out. “An outsider would most likely have worn sandals. He certainly wouldn't have taken the trouble to remove his sandals when he stepped into Lord Fujikawa's room to commit murder. From the bare feet, it would seem that the murderer had been hiding inside the house, or was some member of the household.”

After giving the two Fujikawa samurai time to think over the idea, Zenta asked, “Did anyone in your household have reason to hate Lord Fujikawa?”

When he asked the question, Zenta had, of course, already guessed the answer. The two men raised their heads and looked at each other in dismay. Finally one of them said to the other, “Where is Kotaro? Have you seen him this morning?”

“Who is Kotaro?” demanded Kagemasa. “He is in charge of the samurai in our master's household,” replied Fujikawa's men. “I would have expected him to lead this assault on the Portuguese, then,” said Kagemasa. The two Fujikawa samurai looked very uncomfortable. “He didn't appear when we prepared for the assault, and we had to leave without him,” said one of them.

“Perhaps he didn't want to be seen in public until his hair . . .” began the other man, and then broke off in some confusion. He stole a look at Zenta.

“He could have worn a scarf over his head in that case,” said the first man. “Maybe he is at home arranging the protection of the womenfolk. After all, with a murderer loose, they must be terrified.”

“Then we shall go immediately to Lord Fujikawa's residence,” said Kagemasa. He seemed anxious to get out of the hot sun before it ruined his complexion. “Lady Yuki must be overcome with grief, and it is my duty to offer her my condolences. We can inquire about this Kotaro while we are there.”

 

If Lady Yuki felt any grief for her father, she managed to hide every trace of it. This morning she wore no facial makeup except powder. Her skin had almost the purity of snow, which was the meaning of her name. With perfect composure, she received her visitors and gave orders for refreshments to be brought.

As Kagemasa delivered an elegantly phrased speech of condolence, Lady Yuki bowed her head and pressed her sleeves briefly over her eyes. Zenta noticed that her eyes were quite dry, and he caught her glance at him as she lowered her sleeve. She was probably wondering why he wasn't under arrest together with the Portuguese. His inclusion as one of the investigating party must have seemed odd to her.

The ronin looked around the room and noticed Chiyo among the serving women. The girl's movements as she served tea were stiff and jerky, and Zenta realized that she was in a state of shock. Lord Fujikawa's death seemed to have affected her more than it did Lady Yuki. Knowing Chiyo's spirit, he found this puzzling.

Kagemasa had come to the end of his polite speech and his voice took on a more businesslike tone. “Lady Yuki, forgive me for intruding on your grief like this, but there are certain questions I must put to you so that we may apprehend your father's murderer without delay.”

For the first time Lady Yuki's composure was slightly shaken. “Apprehend my father's murderer? Did the Portuguese escape?”

Kagemasa gave a delicate cough. “At the moment, I do not believe that the foreigners next door are guilty. Unpleasant as it seems, there is a possibility that someone in this household may have committed the deed.”

Zenta, who was watching Lady Yuki closely, saw the blood recede from her powdered face and then come rushing back in angry, uneven patches. When she spoke, however, her voice was steady. “May I ask the reason for your extraordinary suspicion, my lord?”

Kagemasa's embarrassment made him brusque. “We found some footprints which seemed to point the suspicion this way.”

His eyes turned to Zenta as he spoke, and Lady Yuki followed his glance. The ronin had the uncomfortable feeling that she knew he was the person responsible for the direction of Kagemasa's suspicion.

“And now I'm afraid that I must question your people,” said Kagemasa. “Can you have someone prepare a list of all the men in your father's employ?”

“All of the men have rushed next door to avenge my father's death,” said Lady Yuki. “If you want a list, you will have to send Kotaro back. He is in charge of the samurai, and he would know all the names.”

“But Lady Yuki,” said Kagemasa, “Kotaro was not among the men who made the attack next door. We came to see if we could find him here.”

Lady Yuki stared speechlessly at the shogun's deputy. Her face was absolutely without expression, but her hands clenched tightly, and Zenta realized that she was furiously angry.

“I see,” she said at last, her voice betraying a very faint tremble. “You must be impatient to start a search for Kotaro. Please don't let me get in your way.”

After a few more perfunctory words of condolence, Kagemasa turned to his men and gave his orders. No one was to leave the residence, and a thorough search was to be made of the house and grounds.

When Zenta rose to join the searchers, Kagemasa ordered him to remain. He wanted to question the ronin about the household of the Portuguese. The shogun had once given a state audience to the foreigners, but Kagemasa had never seen them at close range and he was curious about their customs and habits.

Zenta confessed that he had entered the foreigners' service only two days earlier and knew little about their way of life. Whereupon Kagemasa became curious to know why he had chosen to serve the Portuguese rather than Nobunaga or one of the other powerful warlords. Zenta didn't wish to reveal that it was on Nobunaga's orders that he had been appointed bodyguard for the foreigners. He said that he took the job because it was a new experience, and in a way that was true.

The answer amused Kagemasa, who laughed and became quite affable. All the time, however, Zenta was aware of Lady Yuki's baleful glance on him. She had seen him talking to Chiyo, and if she chose she could reveal his connection with Hambei, one of Nobunaga's men.

Instead, she smiled sweetly and murmured, “The ways of the world are strange. A man can be a beggarly ronin one day and one of the investigators of my father's murder on the next.”

Meeting Kagemasa's look of annoyance, she bowed and rose. “You must excuse me if I speak distractedly, my lord. Permit me to leave and make arrangements for the funeral.”