"But you're the best."
Humor crinkled Toda's eyes. "Flattery is nice, but what I would really like-"
His gaze suddenly moved past Sano and sharpened. He called, "Kimura-san! Ono-san! Hitomi-san!"
Three people walking across the bridge stopped abruptly. One was a stout woman with a shawl that covered her hair and a basket over her arm. One was a water-seller carrying wooden buckets that hung from a pole across his shoulders. The other was a filthy beggar dressed in rags.
Toda beckoned, and the three lined up before him. "How did you know it was us?" said the woman. She pulled down her shawl, revealing a shaved crown and hair tied in a samurai topknot.
"That's not a bad costume, Kimura-san, but you walk like a sumo wrestler," Toda said. "Nobody on the lookout for a spy would mistake you for a woman." He turned to his other students. "Hitomi-san, your buckets are too light; I could tell they're empty. Don't be so lazy when you're on a real job. It'll get you killed. And you, Ono-san," he said to the beggar. "I saw a merchant throw a coin on the ground, and you didn't pick it up. A samurai like you wouldn't because it's beneath you, but a real beggar would have."
The students hung their heads. Toda said, "You all fail this lesson. Go back to the castle."
They slunk off. Sano said, "Ah, a class on secret surveillance."
"Weren't you a little harsh on your boys?" Marume called from astride his horse. "I didn't see through their disguises."
"You weren't paying attention," Toda said. "But you should be. You might miss someone who's stalking your master."
Marume looked chastened. A chill passed through Sano. Did Yanagisawa plan to assassinate him? Was he acting friendly because he knew Sano wouldn't be around much longer?
"What I would really like," Toda said, resuming their conversation, "is for you to ensure that if there's a political upheaval and you come out on top, I'll survive and prosper."
That was a fair deal as far as Sano was concerned. "Find out what Yanagisawa is up to, and I will."
9
The rain turned into a downpour while Reiko and her escorts traveled to Asakusa. By the time they reached Major Kumazawa's estate, the roof of her palanquin was leaking and her cloak was damp. She alighted in the courtyard, under a roof that was supported on pillars and covered a path leading up the steps of the mansion. She'd been curious to see Sano's clan's ancestral home, but the streaming rain obscured the buildings.
An old woman met her on the veranda, bowed, and said, "Welcome, Honorable Lady Reiko. We've been expecting you." She was in her sixties, gray-haired, modestly dressed. Her plain, somber face was shadowed under the eyes, as if from a sleepless night. "My name is Yasuko. I am Chiyo's mother." She ushered Reiko into the mansion's entryway, where Reiko removed her shoes and cloak. "I'm sorry you had to make such a long journey in this weather." She seemed genuinely regretful. "It would have been easier for you to see Chiyo at her home in town, but she is unable to return there. Her husband has cast her off."
Reiko was shocked, although she realized she shouldn't be. Society viewed a woman who'd been violated as disgraced and contaminated. Rape was considered akin to adultery, even though the victim wasn't to blame.
"When he came last night to fetch Chiyo, he found out what had happened to her," Yasuko explained. "He no longer wants her as his wife. He means to get a divorce."
"How terrible," Reiko said as the woman escorted her through the mansion's dim, dank corridors.
Her husband could divorce Chiyo by simply picking up a brush and inking three and a half straight lines on a piece of paper. And that was a mild punishment. He could have sent her to work in a brothel if he so chose.
"What is worse, her husband has kept their children, and he won't even let her see them," Yasuko said. "She is very upset."
She slid open a door, called inside, "Lady Reiko is here," and stood aside for Reiko to enter.
Chiyo was sitting up in bed, propped by pillows. A quilt covered her from bosom to toes, even though the room was warm and stuffy. Her lank hair spilled from the bandage that swathed her head. Her features were so swollen from crying that Reiko couldn't tell what she looked like under normal circumstances. Chiyo's mouth quivered and her chest heaved with sobs.
Reiko knew that state of profound grief that possesses mind and body like an uncontrollable force. She'd experienced it once in Miyako, when she'd thought Sano had been killed, and again when she'd gone north to rescue Masahiro and found evidence that he was dead. Now Reiko faced a woman who'd lost her husband and children even though they were still alive. She forgot that she'd once been ready to dislike Sano's relatives because they cared more for social customs than for their blood kin. Her heart went out to Chiyo.
She knelt beside Chiyo, bowed, and said, "I am so sorry about what happened." She felt inadequate, unable to think of anything else to say but, "Please accept my sympathy."
"Many thanks." Chiyo's voice broke on a sob. "You're very kind."
Her mother offered Reiko refreshments. Reiko politely refused, was pressed, then accepted. The social routine gave Chiyo time to compose herself. Yasuko went off to see about the food. Reiko sensed that she didn't want to listen while Reiko questioned Chiyo and hear disturbing answers.
"Honorable Lady Reiko, I appreciate your coming to talk to me," Chiyo said humbly.
"There's no need to call me by my title," Reiko said. "My name will do."
"Very well, Reiko-san. A thousand apologies for causing you so much trouble."
Reiko liked Chiyo for caring about other people's feelings even after her terrible ordeal. "I'm sorry we had to meet under such circumstances."
Chiyo's face crumpled.
Reiko had to force herself to say, "My husband wants me to ask you about what happened. Can you bear it?"
Chiyo nodded meekly. A tremulous sigh issued from her. "But what good will it do?"
"It will help my husband catch the man who hurt you."
Tears trickled down Chiyo's drenched face. Her eyes were so red that she looked as if she were weeping blood. "Suppose he does. Nothing will change. My husband won't take me back. Last night he told me I was dead to him, dead to our children. Once he loved me, but he doesn't anymore. He looked so stern, so hateful." She wailed, "I'll never see my babies again!"
Reiko could hardly bear to imagine her own children ripped away from her. Alarmed at Chiyo's suffering, she urged, "Wait a while. Your husband may feel differently."
"No, he won't," Chiyo insisted. Reiko's sympathy and family connection made Chiyo speak more frankly than she might have with another stranger. "He's a good man, but once he makes up his mind, he never changes it."
How Reiko deplored male obstinacy and pride!
"He thinks I've dishonored our family." Chiyo sobbed. "I think maybe he's right."
"Why?"
"Because I brought it on myself."
"No, you didn't," Reiko said firmly. "My husband told me what you said happened at the shrine. You left your group because your baby was upset. You got kidnapped. That wasn't your fault."
"That isn't all that happened. I remember more than I told your husband. It's coming back to me in bits and pieces."
Controlling her eagerness for information, Reiko spoke gently: "What else do you remember?"
"I took my baby into the garden, and I nursed him." Chiyo's arms crept out from under the quilt and cradled around the infant who should have been there but wasn't. "I heard someone moaning behind a grove of bamboo. He called for help. I went to see what was wrong."
Women were taught from an early age to put themselves at the service of others, and Chiyo had an obliging nature. Reiko understood what must have happened, and she burned with anger at the rapist. "He lured you to him by playing on your kindness."
"But I was stupid!" Chiyo cried. "I fell for the trick. I deserve for my husband to divorce me and take our children."