“You carry on our conversations so well by yourself, why do you need me to say anything?” Hirata snapped.
“I knew they were trouble the first time I laid eyes on them. Where did you go last night? What happened?”
“I can’t tell you,” Hirata said between clenched teeth. “You know that.”
“I know that you’ve changed since you met those three. You’re secretive and cross all the time. I don’t like it. And neither does Sano- san, obviously.” Fear quenched her anger. Her hand went to her throat, and she said in a hushed voice, “What happens next? Sano- san throws you out and you become a r o nin?”
“No. He wouldn’t,” Hirata lied.
Midori bent and clutched his arm. “Whatever you’re up to with those men, you have to stop it! Before you ruin us!”
Their hold over him shackled Hirata like iron chains. “I can’t.”
“Why not? Are you so infatuated with them that you’ll let them make you lose everything?” Midori’s anger resurged. “Maybe you don’t care about yourself, but what about me and our children? How are we supposed to live when we’re thrown out in the streets? Don’t you care about us anymore?”
“That’s not it,” Hirata protested.
“Then what is it? Why must you continue going along with those men?”
The secrets he’d been keeping filled Hirata like pus in a boil. Their volume had swelled to the bursting point. Hirata had to let something out. “Unless I do, they’ll kill Sano- san.”
Midori crumpled as if he’d struck her behind the knees. “Oh.” She understood that his master’s murder was a calamity that a samurai must do everything in his power to avert. “Well, can’t you protect Sano- san?”
“No.” Hirata heard the flatness of defeat in his voice. “They’re stronger than I am.”
Midori frowned in disbelief. “You’re the best fighter in Edo.”
“I’m only the one who’s won the tournaments and duels. Tahara, Kitano, and Deguchi have kept their powers to themselves-so far.”
“Tell Sano- san. Surround him with guards,” Midori suggested. “Those men won’t be able to get close enough to touch him.”
“Yes, they will.” As Hirata told her about the prayer tag that Tahara had planted on Sano, he watched horror erase her disbelief. “I can’t keep him safe. Except by doing what they want me to do.”
“What do they want you to do?”
“I can’t tell you. I’ve already said too much.” Hirata knew the men would kill whoever learned more about their business than they liked, including women and children. “It’s too dangerous for you to know.”
Midori wrung her hands. “What’s going to happen to us?”
“Nothing, I promise,” Hirata said with too hearty confidence. “Everything will be fine.” But first he must do the ghost’s bidding.
After Midori left him to look after the children, who were playing outside, Hirata glumly contemplated the message branded on his arm. He couldn’t just walk up to Lord Ienobu and say, “Come to the shogun’s garden with me.” Ienobu would want to know why, or refuse outright. Hirata supposed he could use his mystical powers to make Ienobu follow him as mindlessly as a sleepwalker. But they might run into someone who would notice that something was odd about Ienobu and accuse Hirata of casting an evil spell over him. Hirata especially didn’t want Sano to see him and wonder what he was doing. He decided against sneaking up behind Ienobu, hitting him on the head, knocking him unconscious, putting his body in a sack, and dumping him in the garden at the designated hour. In addition to the risk of being caught, he might hurt Ienobu. Think! he exhorted himself. You haven’t much time left!
Hirata mulled over his store of information about Lord Ienobu, whom he didn’t personally know. He’d heard the man was ambitious, sneaky, selfish, and had his eye on the dictatorship. That was all. It was enough.
Rummaging in the household clutter, Hirata found writing supplies and a blank sheet of paper. He prepared ink, dipped a brush, and wrote in square, blocky characters that disguised his calligraphy: Go to the shogun’s garden at the hour of the cock tomorrow, and you will learn something to your advantage. Hirata rolled the letter without signing it and put it in a bamboo scroll container. Surely Ienobu wouldn’t be able to ignore an anonymous tip. All Hirata had to do was get the letter into Ienobu’s hands.
Then he would continue his investigation into Tahara, Kitano, and Deguchi.
“You’re back already?” Reiko’s grandmother said, standing outside her tent. “Did you have a nice visit with Lady Ogyu?”
Reiko climbed out of her palanquin. “Not especially.”
“I want to hear all about it.” Grandmother’s eyes sparkled with eagerness. “Come inside.”
They sat in the tent, where the old woman served murky soup that reeked of onions, fermented fish, and vinegar. Reiko said, “None for me, thank you,” and described her attempt to pump Lady Ogyu about her husband and the murders.
“Well, you really flubbed your chance,” her grandmother said. “You should have been more subtle.”
“Like you?” Reiko couldn’t resist saying.
Her grandmother waggled a finger at Reiko. “Now, now, don’t be sarcastic, my girl. Was my letter of reference completely wasted?”
“Not completely.” Reiko described how she’d eavesdropped on Minister Ogyu and his wife.
“That’s exactly what I’d have done. Maybe you did inherit a few of my wits. So what did you hear?”
Reiko related the Ogyus’ conversation. “I think the old woman named Kasane may be able to supply the proof that Minister Ogyu is the murderer.”
“And you want my help finding out who she is and where she is.” Grandmother shook her head. “Can’t you do anything without me?”
“I would be very grateful for your assistance,” Reiko said humbly.
Grandmother pondered. “Kasane, Kasane. Give me a moment.” Reiko imagined the old woman sorting through pages of history stored in her capacious memory, the paper yellowed but the writing still black and clear. “The Ogyu family had a nursemaid named Kasane.”
Reiko wasn’t surprised that her grandmother knew the servants employed by high-society families. She poached them whenever she fired her own unsatisfactory servants.
“There was something odd,” Grandmother went on. “Kasane was given a yearly income and went to live near relatives in Mitake. It must have been more than fifteen years ago.”
“That is odd,” Reiko said. Usually, longtime servants either were allowed to stay on with the family, which supported them in their old age, or were cast off to fend for themselves. It was a rare, benevolent employer who let a servant go her own way on his payroll.
“So.” Grandmother gave Reiko a smug look that proclaimed her own superiority and Reiko’s indebtedness to her. “Hadn’t you better go home and prepare for the trip?”
After he finished exchanging respects with the officials who’d welcomed him back to court, whether they were glad to see him or not, Yanagisawa entered the guesthouse and headed toward the shogun’s chambers. He’d been away too long. How superfluous he’d made himself, how vulnerable! But he’d needed to let his grief have its way with him so that he could rise again, stronger than ever, when the time came. That time was now. He must fight to reclaim the place that was rightfully his, and here was the first obstacle to surmount.
Ienobu stood in the corridor. His small, hunched figure blocked Yanagisawa’s path. His ugly face was twisted with displeasure.
“Greetings, Lord Ienobu.” Yanagisawa stopped and bowed.
Ienobu demanded, “What do you think you’re doing?”
“I’m going to call on His Excellency.” Yanagisawa thought it was too bad he hadn’t arranged a fatal “accident” for Ienobu a long time ago. He’d wrongly assumed Ienobu would never crawl out from under his rock.
“But you haven’t left your house in almost a year.” Ienobu had apparently thought that grief had done Yanagisawa in and he needn’t worry about competition from the shogun’s old friend. “You’ve taken no interest in my uncle. ” He emphasized his relationship to the shogun. “Or in government business.”