Shogun - Clavell James - Страница 73

• Предыдущая
• 73/313
• Следующая

In the silence Naga picked the head up and ripped off the mask. The face was ordinary, the eyes still fluttering. He held the head, hair dressed like a samurai, by its topknot.

"Does anyone know him?"

No one answered. Naga spat in the face, threw the head angrily to one of his men, tore open the black clothes and lifted the man's right arm, and found what he was looking for. The small tattoo - the Chinese character for Amida, the special Buddha - was etched in the armpit.

"Who is officer of the watch?"

"I am, Lord." The man was white with shock.

Naga leaped at him and the others scattered. The officer made no attempt to avoid the ferocious sword blow which took off his head and part of his shoulder and one arm.

"Hayabusa-san, order all samurai from this watch into the courtyard," Naga said to an officer. "Double guards for the new watch. Get the body out of here. The rest of you are-" He stopped as Kiri came to the doorway, the dagger still in her hand. She looked at the corpse, then at Blackthorne.

"The Anjin-san's not hurt?" she asked.

Naga glanced at the man who towered over him, breathing with difficulty. He could see no wounds or blood. Just a sleep - tousled man who had almost been killed. White-faced but no outward fear. "Are you hurt, Pilot?"

"I don't understand."

Naga went over and pulled the sleeping kimono away to see if the pilot had been wounded.

"Ah, understand now. No. No hurt," he heard the giant say and he saw him shake his head.

"Good," he said. "He seems unhurt, Kiritsubo-san."

He saw the Anjin-san point at the body and say something. "I don't understand you," Naga replied. "Anjin-san, you stay here," and to one of the men he said, "Bring him some food and drink if he wants it."

"The assassin, he was Amida-tattooed, neh?" Kiri asked.

"Yes, Lady Kiritsubo."

"Devils - devils."

" Yes."

Naga bowed to her then looked at one of the appalled samurai. "You follow me. Bring the head!" He strode off, wondering how he was going to tell his father. Oh, Buddha, thank you for guarding my father.

"He was a ronin," Toranaga said curtly. "You'll never trace him, Hiro-matsu-san. "

"Yes. But Ishido's responsible. He had no honor to do this, neh? None. To use these dung-offal assassins. Please, I beg you, let me call up our legions now. I'll stop this once and for all time."

"No." Toranaga looked back at Naga. "You're sure the Anjin-san's not hurt?"

"No, Sire."

"Hiro-matsu-san. You will demote all guards of this watch for failing in their duty. They are forbidden to commit seppuku. They're ordered to live with their shame in front of all my men as soldiers of the lowest class. Have the dead guards dragged by their feet through the castle and city to the execution ground. The dogs can feed off them. " Now he looked at his son, Naga. Earlier that evening, urgent word had arrived from Johji Monastery in Nagoya about Ishido's threat against Naga. Toranaga had at once ordered his son confined to close quarters and surrounded by guards, and the other members of the family in Osaka - Kiri and the Lady Sazuko - equally guarded. The message from the abbot had added that he had considered it wise to release Ishido's mother at once and send her back to the city with her maids. "I dare not risk the life of one of your illustrious sons foolishly. Worse, her health is not good. She has a chill. It's best she should die in her own house and not here."

"Nags-san, you are equally responsible the assassin got in," Toranaga said, his voice cold and bitter. "Every samurai is responsible, whether on watch or off watch, asleep or awake. You are fined half your yearly revenue."

"Yes, Lord," the youth said, surprised that he was allowed to keep anything, including his head. "Please demote me also," he said. "I cannot live with the shame. I deserve nothing but contempt for my own failure, Lord."

"If I wanted to demote you I would have done so. You are ordered to Yedo at once. You will leave with twenty men tonight and report to your brother. You will get there in record time! Go!" Naga bowed and went away, white-faced. To Hiro-matsu he said equally roughly, "Quadruple my guards. Cancel my hunting today, and tomorrow. The day after the meeting of Regents I leave Osaka. You'll make all the preparations, and until that time, I will stay here. I will see no one uninvited. No one."

He waved his hand in angry dismissal. "All of you can go. Hiro-matsu, you stay."

The room emptied. Hiro-matsu was glad that his humiliation was to be private, for, of all of them, as Commander of the Bodyguard, he was the most responsible. "I have no excuse, Lord. None."

Toranaga was lost in thought. No anger was visible now. "If you wanted to hire the services of the secret Amida Tong, how would you find them? How would you approach them?"

"I don't know, Lord."

"Who would know?"

"Kasigi Yabu."

Toranaga looked out of the embrasure. Threads of dawn were mixed with the eastern dark. "Bring him here at dawn."

"You think he's responsible?"

Toranaga did not answer, but returned to his musings.

At length the old soldier could not bear the silence. "Please Lord, let me get out of your sight. I'm so ashamed with our failure-"

"It's almost impossible to prevent such an attempt," Toranaga said.

"Yes. But we should have caught him outside, nowhere near you."

"I agree. But I don't hold you responsible."

"I hold myself responsible. There's something I must say, Lord, for I am responsible for your safety until you're back in Yedo. There will be more attempts on you, and all our spies report increased troop movement. Ishido is mobilizing."

"Yes," Toranaga said casually. "After Yabu, I want to see Tsukku-san, then Mariko-san. Double the guards on the Anjin-san."

"Despatches came tonight that Lord Onoshi has a hundred thousand men improving his fortifications in Kyushu," Hiro-matsu said, beset by his anxiety for Toranaga's safety.

"I will ask him about it, when we meet."

Hiro-matsu's temper broke. "I don't understand you at all. I must tell you that you risk everything stupidly. Yes, stupidly. I don't care if you take my head for telling you, but it's the truth. If Kiyama and Onoshi vote with Ishido you will be impeached! You're a dead man - you've risked everything by coming here and you've lost! Escape while you can. At least you'll have your head on your shoulders!"

"I'm in no danger yet."

"Doesn't this attack tonight mean anything to you? If you hadn't changed your room again you'd be dead now."

"Yes, I might, but probably not," Toranaga said. "There were multiple guards outside my doors tonight and also last night. And you were on guard tonight as well. No assassin could get near me. Even this one who was so well prepared. He knew the way, even the password, neh? Kiri-san said she heard him use it. So I think he knew which room I was in. I wasn't his prey. It was the Anjin-san."

"The barbarian?"

"Yes."

Toranaga had anticipated that there would be further danger to the barbarian after the extraordinary revelations of this morning. Clearly the Anjin-san was too dangerous to some to leave alive. But Toranaga had never presumed that an attack would be mounted within his private quarters or so fast. Who's betraying me? He discounted a leakage of information from Kiri, or Mariko. But castles and gardens always have secret places to eavesdrop, he thought. I'm in the center of the enemy stronghold, and where I have one spy, Ishido - and others - will have twenty. Perhaps it was just a spy.

"Double the guards on the Anjin-san. He's worth ten thousand men to me."

After Lady Yodoko had left this morning, he had returned to the garden Tea House and had noticed at once the Anjin-san's inner frailty, the over-bright eyes and grinding fatigue. So he had controlled his own excitement and almost overpowering need to probe deeper, and had dismissed him, saying that they would continue tomorrow. The Anjin-san had been given into Kiri's care with instructions to get him a doctor, to harbor his strength, to give him barbarian food if he wished it, and even to let him have the sleeping room that Toranaga himself used most nights. "Give him anything you feel necessary, Kiri-san," he had told her privately. "I need him very fit, very quickly, in mind and body."

• Предыдущая
• 73/313
• Следующая