All the World's a Stage

Suddenly the Inaudible One stops and turns towards her.

IZUMI (putting down the bundle) Have you chosen this spot to make a halt? You’re right, it is so lovely here, with this cliff and the river down below… (She walks to the edge of the hanamichi and looks down.) That is the genuine karyukai, the world of flowers and willow trees, where Beauty lies concealed, faithful to yugen…

Meanwhile the Inaudible One takes the kimono out of the bundle and spreads it out on the ground. Then he takes a scroll of paper out of the sleeve and hands it to his companion.

IZUMI (laughing quietly) Yes, you wrote something before we left, I remember. Only you wouldn’t let me read what you had written. But I have realised now: is it love poems? Have you chosen this place to show them to me?

Taking the piece of paper in one hand and the lantern in the other, she reads. After a little while the lantern starts to tremble.

STORYTELLER

Oh, poor Izumi! This is not poetry at all.
The Sinobi confesses his accursed trade.
He writes that she is doomed to die,
And her only salvation is to disappear without a trace.
She must leave the capital, nevermore to return,
And start a new life in some distant place.
He is releasing her, rather than destroy his own honour.
Without honour a man’s life in this world is pointless,
He is bound to atone for his offence with death.
But first he wishes to throw the assassins off the trail.
Here on the clifftop they will find Izumi’s kimono,
Splattered with blood, but no body inside it.
They will think that he threw the body in the river
And the current carried the dead woman off.
It matters not if the Sinobi’s own body is found,
Everything will be clear to the Jyonin in any case.
He will think his emissary carried out the sentence,
But clearly was unable to locate the dragon
And, faithful to his vow, took his own life.
This is the action of a Ninja who values his honour.
And in the final lines of this appalling missive,
The Inaudible One gives her his final behest:
‘Run! Live! Save your own life and forget me.
Let me remain for you a shadow with no face.’

The Inaudible One puts on his mask.

Numbed to her soul, Izumi knows not what to say.
She cannot stir, she thinks this is a dream,
An absurd, senseless dream. She must awaken from it!
Her parting from the dumb man takes place without words…

He strikes the drum.

The Inaudible One pulls the snake-blade dagger out from behind his back. pierces his own throat with it, leans down so that the blood pours out onto the outspread kimono, turns round and falls over the cliff (into the dark corner between the hanamichi and the hall). We hear water splashing.

Izumi gives a piercing scream. She drops the lantern and everything is plunged into darkness.

We hear the singing of the funeral sutra to the steady beating of the drum. At this point the actress must creep behind the curtain, taking the lantern and kimono with her.

Scene five

Izumi’s room.

She is standing motionless on the threshold of the room, to which she has only just returned.

STORYTELLER

Knowing not her path and seeing nothing,
Izumi wandered blindly through the night,
But, coming to herself, she saw that her haphazard steps
Had led her back to this very same house.
Just so a theatre puppet, when the show is ended,
Is set away again, lying lifeless in its customary chest…

He strikes the drum.

Izumi slowly gazes round the room, as if seeing it for the first time, and sits down in front of the casket, in profile to the audience. She looks at the casket and raises the lid with the mirror.

STORYTELLER

Half her life she has spent before the mirror,
Admiring the reflection of a lovely face.
And now she looks into that gleaming surface
As if seeking a vision of the truth there.
‘He was an assassin, a Ninja. But who are you?
Who are you, in real truth? Why were you born?’
She interrogates the mirror avidly,
As if the reflection in it can answer her…

IZUMI (ecstatically) ‘Without honour a man’s life in this world is pointless,’ he said, and abandoned me there in the desolate night. Frozen in horror, I had no chance to ask: ‘And can a woman live in this world without honour?’ Who, then, am I? I am a geisha, my Way is to bring forth feminine beauty, in its imperishable image. And to become imperishable there is one excellent recipe: to make the story of Izumi legend. Let them write poems, let them compose plays about the geisha and the Ninja who gave up their all for love. Both of them were faithful to their art. But when suddenly love blocked off the Way and the barrier was impassable, then they soared into the sky, high above the earth, to where honour and love abide in harmony…

She takes the stiletto out of the casket and looks at it. Then she continues quietly, with no affectation.

All this is foolishness, my beloved. I wish to be with you. And all the rest is no more than a geisha’s empty chatter. Throughout the blackness of eternity you and I are destined to fly, like two comets in a starless sky…

She plunges the stiletto into her throat. The lights go out and immediately two bright beams blaze up above the auditorium, like two comets.

Curtain

The Erast Fandorin Mysteries

By the Same Author

The Winter Queen

Turkish Gambit

Murder on the Leviathan

The Death of Achilles

Special Assignments

The State Counsellor

The Coronation