“I judged her work, not her sex. No man I know wrote about life six hundred years ago with such passion and interest.”
Manase nodded his head. “In that I suppose you’re right. I’ve tried to read all I can about the courtly life of that period, and I keep coming back to The Tale of Genji over and over again. If a woman can be a genius, she was one, but it’s strange to hear you call her that.”
Kaze said nothing.
Manase folded up the scroll and said, “You’re also a devotee of Noh.”
“I used to be, in times past. It’s been many years since I’ve seen a Noh play. That’s why it was a real pleasure to see you that day.”
“And how did you know it was me?”
“A Noh dancer learns balance and grace. His walk can be quite distinctive. When you were practicing Dojoji I was able to observe your walk for a long time. When I saw you enter the courtyard I saw the same walk.”
Manase laughed again. “That’s a useful trick, identifying a man by his walk.”
“It can be useful on a battlefield. You can see someone from far away and still tell who he is.”
“Surely the crest on his helmet will tell you that.”
“No, not always. A man can wear any helmet. Sometimes the crest on the helmet doesn’t identify the man. It’s a popular ruse in war to have someone else wear a leader’s helmet to confuse the enemy.”
“But I was able to identify General Iwaki Sadataka by his helmet. I would have been a complete fool to kill the wrong man and take his head to Tokugawa-sama.”
Kaze had a hard time picturing this dandy killing anyone, much less a famous general like Iwaki, but the manor they were sitting in showed that the Lord had been rewarded for something.
“If that happened, who do you think would be more surprised?” Kaze asked. “Lord Tokugawa or the man who lost his head because it was found under the wrong helmet?”
Manase gave his high-pitched, tittering laugh again. “You’re a droll fellow. I like you! It’s so deadly dull in this little backwater. Like your name, a fresh wind is always welcome.”
Kaze nodded. “How did you come to kill General Iwaki, if I may ask?”
“It was during the battle of Sekigahara,” Manase said in the tone of a man reciting something he’s said many times before. “Sekigahara was a confusing battle with two hundred thousand warriors present. In the morning the forces against Tokugawa-sama outnumbered his troops, but he had made secret agreements to get support from many of the lords who were supposed to be fighting against him. At the proper time, these troops would turn on their own army and help the Tokugawas. In addition, Tokugawa-sama had made arrangements for several other lords to remain neutral and not enter the battle at all. Despite that, it was a desperate battle, and it wasn’t decided until the forces who had agreed to turn against their own army did so.
“Toward the end of the battle General Iwaki became separated from his guards. I managed to come across him when he was alone and kill him.” Manase gave a flip of his hand. “The General was an old man but still skillful with the sword. I was lucky to kill him.”
“He was separated from his guards?”
“Oh yes. The guards were quite mortified by their carelessness. I understand they all committed seppuku on the battlefield to atone for their lack of fidelity.”
“This is the first time I’ve heard of a general getting separated from his guards.”
“I said Sekigahara was a very confusing battle. Armies were first on one side, then the other. It was hard to know who was fighting whom, and enemies in the morning were allies by that afternoon.”
“Yes, I know.”
“Were you at Sekigahara?”
Kaze laughed. “Oh, I’ve never been in such a famous battle. Sekigahara changed Japan, because the forces that supported the late Taiko’s widow and heir were defeated. Now the widow and the Taiko’s young son are entrenched in Osaka Castle, and Tokugawa-sama is the real ruler of Japan. Rumor says he will soon declare himself Shogun, so you received this district from the hands of a future Shogun. I’m just a ronin, and one who is frankly a little envious that you had a chance to distinguish yourself in battle and receive this district as your reward.”
Manase looked petulant. “It’s a miserable little 150-koku district and far removed from all the things I love.” In theory, Manase could provide many fighting men if he was called to do so by the new Tokugawa government, although usually he would be asked to take to the field with only a fraction of the theoretical total. It was a small district compared to some of the fifty-thousand- and hundred-thousand-koku districts ruled by major lords, but Tokugawa Ieyasu was notoriously tightfisted.
“If I may be impolite and ask, where is your original home?” Kaze asked.
“I come from Ise,” Manase said, naming an ancient district at the edge of the Inland Sea. “I long for the shimmering waters of Ise Bay and the taste of fresh sea bream. I felt closer to the Gods there. His Majesty, the Emperor, comes to Ise to consult with the gods Amaterasu-o-mikami and Toyouke-no-o-mikami at their home in the Grand Shrines.”
“Those shrines are made of unpainted hinoki wood, Japanese cypress?”
“Of course.”
“Were you ever there for a sengu-shiki ceremony?”
“When I was a young man. They do it only every twenty years, and thousands of pilgrims come to see it.”
“During the ceremony they actually dismantle the shrine buildings and construct entirely new ones?”
“Yes. The pilgrims and the populace get bits of the shrines as talismans. Oh, the happiness to get a bit of the sacred shrine is something to behold.”
“You must miss it terribly.”
Kaze was surprised to see a tear well up in Manase’s eye. “Oh yes,” he said. “This rural life has very few compensations.”
Kaze sat in silence while Manase recovered himself.
“This conversation has taken a melancholy turn,” Manase said. “I had intended to take advantage of the rare sight of a cultured man in this backwater.” He pointed to a large block of wood in the corner of the room, as thick as the span of a man’s hand. “Would you like to play a game of go? Only the imbecile Magistrate plays here, and he hardly gives one a game.”
Kaze nodded and slid across the mat to the go board. He moved it between the two of them and took one of the brown, covered, monkeywood bowls from the top. Kaze took the lid off his bowl as Manase took a second bowl from the top of the board. Inside were white go stones made of shelclass="underline" pearlescent, thick, and expensive. Manase’s bowl held black stones, equally thick. The top of the board was crisscrossed with nineteen lines, forming a grid.
Since Manase had black, he moved first. He took a stone between the tips of two of his fingers and set it down on an intersection of the grid with a decided snap, a move that made a pleasing “click” sound on the thick go board. The board had a sound hole and small legs on the bottom to magnify and enhance this sound.
The opening moves, which followed standard patterns called joseki, went quickly as the two men snapped down stones. Go is a game of position and territory. Once a stone is placed it can’t be moved except to remove it from the board if it is completely encircled by the enemy’s stones. The winner secures the largest territory, either through strategy or “killing” the opponent’s stones.
Early in the game Manase made a move that invited Kaze to start a fight along one side of the board. Without comment, Kaze declined the gambit and played a stone at a bigger point; a place that secured more territory for him. “I would have thought you were a fierce fighter,” Manase commented after Kaze made his move.
“Fighting without purpose is the activity of fools,” Kaze said.