O’Hara leaped in the air and pulled his legs up, felt the cold scythe as it swished under his feet. Chameleon spun in midair like a twirler, brought the blade full around and made a second swipe. O’Hara caught it on his sword but the fierce power of the three-hundred-and-sixty-degree swing rang up the steel blade. Pain streaked into O’Hara’s fingers, then his wrists, his arms, his biceps. The sword wrenched out of one hand but he held onto it with the other and rolled away, seeking a far corner of the room to regain his strength and composure.
But Chameleon gave no quarter. He charged again, a hopping move, bounding across the room, the sword held high over head.
As O’Hara straightened out of the roll and moved his feet under him, he sensed movement near the shattered panel of the room, and then heard the harsh order: ‘Tomare! Stop!’
They froze like statues, Chameleon poised with his sword overhead, O’Hara crouched, his sword in front of him.
Kimura entered the room. Sammi stood silent near the door.
Kimura stood like a referee between them, his right arm held straight out from the shoulder, the palm of his hand pointed toward the ground.
To draw blood against each other is to dishonour the higaru-dashi,’ he said quietly. ‘Whoever made this challenge must kill me before going on.’
Okari stared at Kimura, the sword wavering in his two hands. ‘I do not understand,’ he said.
‘Before you kill each other, you must kill me first,’ the old man repeated.
‘Why do you stand between us?’ Okari demanded. ‘This has nothing to do with the higaru.’
‘Oh? You question the authority of the Tokenrui?’
‘No!’ cried Chameleon. ‘But this man is a beikoku-jin, he.—’
‘So he is an American. What difference? Would you attack an unarmed man?’
Do not insult me, Tokenrui-san, I offered him his choice of weapons.’
‘And if he is not trained in the use of them, he might as well be unarmed.’
‘I know about O’Hara-san. He is the one they call Kazuo. He knows the way of the sword.’
‘I named him Kazuo. I have taken him as my son. And he, too, is higaru-dashi.’
Chameleon was shocked.
Kimura looked at both men. The muscles in his face were ridged, his eyes stern. ‘I thought both of you had gone beyond brawling. Do either of you think there is any honour to this duel? I fear if there is to be wisdom here, it must come from me. And if there is to be a challenge, it must be made properly and it must be approved by me.’
‘I made the proper challenge,’ O’Hara said.
Kimura looked at the thin scratch down O’Hara’s chest, at the buttons on the floor. Turning to Chameleon, he said, ‘And you, Okari, provoked him.’
‘Hai.’
‘You both insult me.’
‘Why?’ demanded O’Hara.
‘Because it is the way of higaru-dashi. Because we are all brothers, and an honourable man does not take up the sword against his brother. Because both of you are men of honour who have taken the oath of the Secret Warrior.’
Okari and O’Hara stared hard at each other from opposite sides of the small room while the significance of Kimura’s revelation sank in. Kimura stood between them, his arm still outstretched. Neither of them would challenge that gesture. To do so would mean to challenge Tokenrui.
Okari very precisely slid his sword into its sheath.
‘Arigato,’ Kimura said quietly.
‘So, Marui-me has learned the Way of the Secret Warrior,’ Okari said.
‘This man is your brother and yet you use your term “Round-Eyes’ as if it were an insult,’ Kimura said. ‘You, Okari, have you forgotten the fifth lesson of the Tendai? Your arrogance shocks me. For many years you have studied the discipline of humility and now you are about to throw it away in one foolish moment.’
‘He came to kill me!’
‘You say that without fear of being wrong?’ He walked to the far side of the room and turned, standing with his hands clasped before him. ‘I will remind you both, the purpose of our discipline is to make each man a competitor only with himself, for only when you have mastered that demon are you ready to challenge others.’
O’Hara and Okari stood with heads lowered as Kimura chastised them, reminding them of their vows.
Okari said, ‘I never thought—’
‘You never thought! For years you have been trained to look beyond what appears to be reality, to anticipate the unknown. Now you tell me you did not think. You are right — you did not think. Have you still to learn that one never trusts what seems obvious? Does the peacock joyously embrace the trap?’
He walked back to their side of the room and stood in front of them. ‘You have deceived yourselves by your failure to look beyond what seems to be. Both of you have achieved the mystery of the seventh level and yet neither of you has practised it in this affair.’
He stopped for a moment, watching the two men shuffling before him. ‘Could I be wrong? Perhaps neither of you is worthy to be a candidate for Tokenrui.’
They both looked up with shock.
‘Yes, one day I must select between you to take my place as Tokenrui, Now do you understand? I have watched and trained both of you since long before either of you achieved manhood. And at this moment, I could not choose between you.’
‘It never occurred to me that I might be considered,’ O’Hara said.
‘Nor I,’ said Okari.
‘Good. That is encouraging. Perhaps you are still in touch with humility.’
‘What about Sammi,’ O’Hara said, ‘isn’t he a candidate?’
‘Unfortunately, he will be number three. And whichever of you is not chosen as Tokenrui will be second to the one that is. I say “unfortunately” only because Sammi is my grandson and he has trained as hard as either of you. But he has achieved only the state of the fifth level. Whatever the outcome, you three are brothers, and that can never change and if that bond is broken by either of you, you will be banished in dishonour from higaru-dashi forever.’
‘I am to call this gaikoku no karicho my brother?’ Okari said.
‘Does one tiger condemn the stripes of another?’ said Kimura sternly to Okari.
The younger man flashed a look at O’ Hara and then back at Kimura. ‘The beikoku-jin would have killed me,’ he said.
‘Do you know for sure the American would kill you, or does the fear in your heart speak for you?’
Okari hesitated, staring hard at the green-eyed American.
‘He is not a spy and he does not kill,’ said the old man. ‘And he is not one of them. He came back to expose them’
‘He does not deny he is Chameleon,’ said O’Hara.
‘Yes and no,’ said Kimura. ‘He is Chameleon and he is not.’
‘Yeah, the Chameleon is never what it appears,’ O’Hara said.
‘This time it is quite true. The Chameleon is certainly not what you believe him to be. You both have much to learn. When you both have taken the Walk of a Thousand Days, and the special powers of Zen have been revealed to you, perhaps then your wisdom will be less cloudy. For now, we must decide on our next step. May I suggest we have some tea — all this talk has made me thirsty.’
10
‘This is Chameleon, but not the Chameleon you seek,’ Kimura said, putting his hand on Okari’s shoulder,
O’Hara had called the hotel. As planned, Eliza and the Magician had taken the late-afternoon train to Kyoto and they were in the bar waiting for him to return from Tanabe. He did not explain where he was and what had happened, he merely gave them the address. Now they were all seated in a square. O’Hara and Gunn faced Kimura and Okari, The Magician was seated at one end of the square and Sammi faced him. Tension still crackled between O’Hara and Okari, but they listened intently as Kimura spoke.