The next morning, another day of clear skies and birdsong, he was sipping his tea after the usual bowl of rice gruel, when Tora came in.
Akitada offered tea, but Tora shook his head. He poured himself some wine instead. Akitada said, “I don’t know how you can drink wine early in the morning. It just makes my head fuzzy.”
Tora drank deeply, smacked his lips, and poured another. “It makes my blood move faster,” he said with a grin. “That guard captain is a bastard. Teaching him his manners has worn me out.” He sat down. “I thought you might want to hear how the murder investigation is going.”
“Please.”
With considerable satisfaction, Tora described the sights and sounds of Hakata and outlined the case and the statements of the son and daughter. He was voluble about the shrine priest’s wife.
“Hmm,” said Akitada. “In my experience such behavior by children, though reprehensible, is often the result of something the parent has done. What about the son?”
“Oh, he’s a loser. He gambles and was fired for drunkenness. He claims he hasn’t been home for a long time, but he sees his father regularly when the old man delivers goods in Hakozaki. Apparently, they don’t get along. He made no effort to defend him and implied the father might have left early.”
“Hmm. What’s this about Hakozaki? What was the father delivering?”
“His dolls. There’s a shipping harbor there.”
“Yes, it’s privately owned. Can you find out what sorts of things are being traded there?”
“Maybe, though Maeda may not want to go back there. Hiroshi made him angry. He’s got a nasty mouth.”
“This investigation and your acquaintance with Sergeant Maeda are useful. You may as well continue.”
Tora looked quite happy about this. He quickly quaffed another cup of wine and departed with an airy wave of his hand, wishing his master “a fine day.”
Akitada pushed his tea cup aside and reached for the document box he had worked on the night before. Carrying this to the tribunal office, he felt sorry for himself. Tora was off to Hakata on the trail of a killer, and Saburo had plans to explore the city after dark tonight. He was the only one tied to dusty documents and government files, exactly the sort of thing he had hoped to escape in the capital.
Mori rose and bowed when he entered. Two strangers also rose from behind desks, bowing deeply.
“The scribes sent from Dazaifu,” Mori explained and introduced them. Akitada saw two nondescript middle-aged men he hoped were up to the work. They needed more staff, but there was hardly any money or rice to pay them. He nodded to the newcomers.
Mori seemed to have taken pains with his costume today. His robe looked new, and a formal small, stiff hat had replaced the soft one he had worn before. Akitada guessed Mori had dressed for his new position and to impress the scribes. He suppressed a smile as he sat down with his document box.
“Perhaps you can answer a question, Mori,” he said. “I see we unload all sorts of goods in Hakata harbor. What happens to these?”
“Oh, they are transferred to other ships, or taken overland by porters or ox carriage, or they are warehoused.”
“Hmm. In other words, they already have buyers? How are the Chinese merchants compensated?”
“Why, payment is in other goods, or rice, or gold, sir.”
“The documents only list taxes collected and names of ships. Who are the buyers?”
“Oh, it could be anybody, sir.”
“You mean you don’t know?”
“Well, sometimes we know. There was a Nara temple, for example, that bought a whole cargo of religious objects and books. And, of course, the local merchants buy some of the things.”
“Does the court in the capital purchase directly from the Chinese merchants?”
Mori looked blank. “I don’t think so, sir. The Chinese goods go mostly to local merchants or landowners. They pass them on to Japanese merchants.”
“I see.”
Actually, he did not see. It seemed to him there must be huge profits collected by local people. The trouble was one could deal with paperwork just so long, and then the facts and figures, those black characters on a white ground, started doing a mad dance, and one was completely lost. He thought again with envy of Tora, who was even now riding happily toward Hakozaki where real people were engaged in the activities he was trying to comprehend on paper.
He got up and walked onto the veranda. Outside, the clear blue sky stretched into the distance. Somewhere to the north was the Inland Sea and Hakata harbor and Chinese merchants. What was to prevent him from going there now? Only his position. Governors did not mingle with the common people. Normally, they travelled with a procession of soldiers and servants. And that, of course, would not get him close enough to the people to learn about their lives.
He remembered the times when he had mingled with the crowds like an ordinary man. In Kazusa province, he had been young and very foolish, and yet it had been wonderful.
Surely nobody would know him here, if he wore ordinary clothes. He had not been in Kyushu long enough to be recognized. Of course, if he were to meet someone who would remember him later, it could be embarrassing. He would almost certainly get a reprimand for not observing proper decorum.
The sun was warm, and overhead sea gulls circled, their wings catching the sun and flashing brightly against the immense blue sky.
He went back inside and interrupted Mori, who was instructing one of the scribes. “I’m going for a ride, Mori. If there are any problems, speak to Saburo.”
In his room, Saburo informed him that the boy had brought him a present. “He had a hard time with it, so I helped him. Go outside and take a look.”
Akitada stepped on his narrow veranda and saw a small cherry tree in a large tub where there had been nothing but bare gravel before. The little tree was heavily in bud. He did not know what to say. This act of kindness and welcome, delivered belatedly, left him speechless.
“It seems this was one of the things carried away and not returned,” Saburo explained. “Koji knew where it was and got it back for you.”
“He’s a good boy. We must see what we can do for him.” Akitada smiled at Saburo. “Maybe things won’t be too bad here after all.”
In a happy mood, he returned to his room and changed quickly into a plain brown robe and boots. A soft hat replaced the small official cap. Saburo watched in astonishment. Akitada said, “I’m going to have a look at Hakata.”
“Shall I come, sir?”
“No.”
Saburo’s face fell. “You’d better take your sword. You never know what might happen.”
“I’m going alone and without a sword. Anything else would attract attention. I’ll be an ordinary man, strolling about and looking into shops. I may not be back until dark. Meanwhile, you’ll be in charge.” With a light step, he hurried to the stables, selected a decent but unremarkable horse, thanked the startled stable boy Koji for his present, and rode out of the gate with a lighter heart than he had had in many weeks.
The distance to Hakata was modest and over the same road he had come by before. But this time, Akitada enjoyed the ride and looked about him with less foreboding. The road was still crowded with traffic moving in both directions, but he now noted comforting details. Trees were about to bloom and rice fields newly planted. The farmers with their carts piled with early vegetables were going to the market in Hakata. On the Mikasa River, fishermen worked in their boats. Soon the low roofs of Hakata appeared, stretching out across the plain between the Mikasa and Naka Rivers all the way to the blue sea beyond. The larger islands beyond the distant horizon were the provinces Iki and Tsushima, two of the nine which had given the large island Kyushu its name “Nine Provinces.”
He left his horse at the Hakata post station, and started walking. It was good to get some exercise. He had become stiff and lazy on the long boat journey. The people he saw differed little from those at home. They looked like decent, hard-working people. He took courage from this, but those he must discover were no ordinary men. They were almost certainly already on their guard about the new governor.