She shook her head.
The bosun’s grizzled face split into a grin and he helpfully dipped the chicken leg into the heavy gravy and held it under her nose. “Gravy makes it even better. Hey, it’s good to be able to talk proper, eh? Never did that before. Go on, it’ll give you strength—where it counts! It’s Macao capon I tell you.”
“No—no, thank you. To eat meat—to eat meat is forbidden. It’s against the law, and against Buddhism and Shintoism.”
“Not in Nagasaki it isn’t!” The bosun laughed. “Lots of Jappos eat meat all the time. They all do when they can get it, and swill our grog as well. You’re Christian, eh? Go on, try, little Donna. How d’you know till you try?”
“No, no, thank you.”
“A man can’t live without meat. That’s real food. Makes you strong so you can jiggle like a stoat. Here—” He offered the chicken leg to Kana. “You want?”
Kana shook his head, equally nauseated. “Iyé!”
The bosun shrugged and threw it carelessly back onto the table. “Iyé it is. What’ve you done to your arm? You hurt in the fight?”
“Yes. But not badly.” Mariko moved it a little to show him and swallowed the pain.
“Poor little thing! What d’you want here, Donna Senhorita, eh?”
“To see the An—to see the pilot. Lord Toranaga sent me. The pilot’s drunk?”
“Yes, that and the food. Poor bastard ate too fast ’n drank too fast. Took half the bottle in a gulp. Ingeles’re all the same. Can’t hold their grog and they’ve no cojones.” His eyes went all over her. “I’ve never seen a flower as small as you before. And never talked to a Jappo who could talk civilized before.”
“Do you call all Japanese ladies and samurai Jappos and monkeys?”
The seaman laughed shortly. “Hey, senhorita, that was a slip of the tongue. That’s for usuals, you know, the pimps and whores in Nagasaki. No offense meant. I never did talk to a civilized senhorita before, never knowed there was any, by God.”
“Neither have I, senhor. I’ve never talked to a civilized Portuguese before, other than a Holy Father. We’re Japanese, not Jappos, neh? And monkeys are animals, aren’t they?”
“Sure.” The bosun showed the broken teeth. “You speak like a Donna. Yes. No offense, Donna Senhorita.”
Blackthorne began mumbling. She went to the bunk and shook him gently. “Anjin-san! Anjin-san!”
“Yes—yes?” Blackthorne opened his eyes. “Oh—hello—I’m sor—I . . .” But the weight of his pain and the spinning of the room forced him to lie back.
“Please send for a servant, senhor. He should be washed.”
“There’s slaves—but not for that, Donna Senhorita. Leave the Ingeles—what’s a little vomit to a heretic?”
“No servants?” she asked, flabbergasted.
“We have slaves—black bastards, but they’re lazy—wouldn’t trust one to wash him myself,” he added with a twisted grin.
Mariko knew she had no alternative. Lord Toranaga might have need of the Anjin-san at once and it was her duty. “Then I need some water,” she said. “To wash him with.”
“There’s a barrel in the stairwell. In the deck below.”
“Please fetch some for me, senhor.”
“Send him.” The bosun jerked a finger at Kana.
“No. You will please fetch it. Now.”
The bosun looked back at Blackthorne. “You his doxie?”
“What?”
“The Ingeles’s doxie?”
“What’s a doxie, senhor?”
“His woman. His mate, you know, senhorita, this pilot’s sweetheart, his jigajig. Doxie.”
“No. No, senhor, I’m not his doxie.”
“His, then? This mon—this samurai’s? Or the king’s maybe, him that’s just come aboard? Tora-something? You one of his?”
“No.”
“Nor any aboard’s?”
She shook her head. “Please, would you get some water?”
The bosun nodded and went out.
“That’s the ugliest, foulest-smelling man I’ve ever been near,” the samurai said. “What was he saying?”
“He—the man asked if—if I was one of the pilot’s consorts.”
The samurai went for the door.
“Kana-san!”
“I demand the right on your husband’s behalf to avenge that insult. At once! As though you’d cohabit with any barbarian!”
“Kana-san! Please close the door.”
“You’re Toda Mariko-san! How dare he insult you? The insult must be avenged!”
“It will be, Kana-san, and I thank you. Yes. I give you the right. But we are here at Lord Toranaga’s order. Until he gives his approval it would not be correct for you to do this.”
Kana closed the door reluctantly. “I agree. But I formally ask that you petition Lord Toranaga before we leave.”
“Yes. Thank you for your concern over my honor.” What would Kana do if he knew all that had been said, she asked herself, appalled. What would Lord Toranaga do? Or Hiro-matsu? Or my husband? Monkeys? Oh, Madonna, give me thy help to hold myself still and keep my mind working. To ease Kana’s wrath, she quickly changed the subject. “The Anjin-san looks so helpless. Just like a baby. It seems barbarians can’t stomach wine. Just like some of our men.”
“Yes. But it’s not the wine. Can’t be. It’s what he’s eaten.”
Blackthorne moved uneasily, groping for consciousness.
“They’ve no servants on the ship, Kana-san, so I’ll have to substitute for one of the Anjin-san’s ladies.” She began to undress Blackthorne, awkwardly because of her arm.
“Here, let me help you.” Kana was very deft. “I used to do this for my father when the saké took him.”
“It’s good for a man to get drunk once in a while. It releases all the evil spirits.”
“Yes. But my father used to suffer badly the next day.”
“My husband suffers very badly. For days.”
After a moment, Kana said, “May Buddha grant that Lord Buntaro escapes.”
“Yes.” Mariko looked around the cabin. “I don’t understand how they can live in such squalor. It’s worse than the poorest of our people. I was almost fainting in the other cabin from the stench.”
“It’s revolting. I’ve never been aboard a barbarian ship before.”
“I’ve never been on the sea before.”
The door opened and the bosun set down the pail. He was shocked at Blackthorne’s nudity and jerked out a blanket from under the bunk and covered him. “He’ll catch his death. Apart from that—shameful to do that to a man, even him.”
“What?”
“Nothing. What’s your name, Donna Senhorita?” His eyes glittered.
She did not answer. She pushed the blanket aside and washed Blackthorne clean, glad for something to do, hating the cabin and the foul presence of the bosun, wondering what they were talking about in the other cabin. Is our Master safe?
When she had finished she bundled the kimono and soiled loincloth. “Can this be laundered, senhor?”
“Eh?”
“These should be cleaned at once. Could you send for a slave, please?”
“They’re a lazy bunch of black bastards, I told you. That’d take a week or more. Throw ’em away, Donna Senhorita, they’re not worth breath. Our Pilot-Captain Rodrigues said to give him proper clothes. Here.” He opened a sea locker. “He said to give him any from here.”
“I don’t know how to dress a man in those.”
“He needs a shirt ’n trousers ’n codpiece ’n socks and boots ’n sea jacket.” The bosun took them out and showed her. Then, together, she and the samurai began to dress Blackthorne, still in his half-conscious stupor.
“How does he wear this?” She held up the triangular, baglike codpiece with its attached strings.