Lady Hiroko’s head sank a little lower. “Oh, this is so painful. In the dream, Masako spoke to me. She begged my help to find peace. She kept saying, ‘Make him confess what he’s done.’” She raised her face and looked at them. “She was white as snow and shivered with cold. It was terrible.”
Akitada cleared his throat. “I understand your difficulties, but you may trust us. We, too, revere His Majesty. What happened must not reflect on Him.”
She nodded and looked at him gratefully. “That is indeed what troubles me. We are forbidden to speak of life in the inner apartments. But in this case… well, Masako was so very unhappy. I was assigned as her companion when she first came. It was thought then that His Majesty would make her a favorite. She was very beautiful, you see, and her family is influential. But it did not come to pass, though both Masako and her father did everything they could to promote her interests. His Majesty’s heart had been given elsewhere. These things happen.”
Akitada and his sister nodded. Akiko said, “It must have been a terrible disappointment.”
“For Masako yes. She passed all of last year in grief and misery. She attended events in her most beautiful gowns and with her face and hair perfect, but we were always placed as far away from His Majesty as possible. There was unpleasant gossip among the ladies about it. It seems someone overheard His Majesty saying that he disliked her. Masako wept when she heard. My own family is understanding and no one expected me to make much of an impression on anyone, but it was different for her.”
Akiko said, “I think you must have looked quite elegant, Lady Hiroko. You have a certain grace.”
Hiroko blinked, then shook her head. “You are kind, but I’m not beautiful. Masako was magnificent, even if she was taller than the other ladies. She comes… came from a family of tall people. Both her father and her brother are giants.”
A shadow passed over her face as she said this and Akitada asked, “Did you meet Lord Masaie and his son?”
“Yes. They visited quite often, especially late last year.” She shuddered. “Their visits were painful for Masako. You see, they were angry with her that she had not been noticed by His Majesty. As if she could have helped it, poor dear.”
“I suspected as much,” said Akitada. “Lord Masaie had his heart set on seeing her become empress.”
Hiroko nodded again and twisted her hands. “It grieved her so much that her father was angry. They were very close.”
Akiko asked, “Were you aware of her affair with Prince Atsuhira?”
Hiroko blushed and lowered her eyes. “Yes,” she said almost inaudibly. “I tried to warn her, but she… she said he loved her and she wanted to be loved by someone.”
Silence fell. Akitada thought that Masako had acted out of loneliness and desperation. The young emperor had cruelly rejected her, her father and her brother blamed and threatened her, and the ladies of the court mocked her. What did she have to look forward to? When that inveterate womanizer Prince Atsuhira had seen the beautiful young woman and courted her, she must have been overcome with gratitude. “How old was Lady Masako?” he asked.
“Eighteen. Older than His Majesty but not as old as His consort.” Lady Hiroko blushed and covered her lips. “Oh, I should not have mentioned the consort.”
“Never mind,” Akiko said warmly. “You must have liked Lady Masako very much. I’m sure her treatment by everyone was very unfair.”
Lady Hiroko gave her a grateful look. “I did love her. She was kind to me and I thought her very brave. In my heart, I wanted her to find happiness.”
Akiko nodded. “It’s surely a most romantic tale: the handsome prince who might have been emperor but for his karma, and the rejected beauty. Who can blame them for falling in love with each other? I take it they met in the palace?”
Akitada shot his sister a warning glance, and Lady Hiroko blushed rosy red again. “It was very proper. I was there, and so were others. It was only later that Masako left the palace to meet him.” She twisted her hands again and looked down.
Akiko smiled. “You helped her, I take it?”
Akitada said quickly, “It doesn’t matter now. What matters is to find out who knew about their assignations. You said the other ladies were less than kind to Lady Masako. Did she have enemies among them?”
Lady Hiroko looked shocked. “Oh, nothing like that. Not murder.” She paused. “Could it have been a madman?”
It was an interesting thought. The killer had been furiously angry, but he had also been coldly calculating.
Akiko gave Akitada a questioning look, and he shook his head slightly. “The possibility of an accidental meeting with a dangerous stranger is remote,” he said. “Given her story, someone must have considered her an obstacle to his plans or desires. It must have been a person who knew of these secret meetings. Can you think of anyone like that? It need merely be a matter of gossip being passed around.”
The novice looked at Akitada directly for the first time. “Late last year there was some gossip. I don’t know how it started and who may have heard. By then, Masako had already planned to leave the palace for good. You see, there was no chance of hiding the relationship any longer.”
Akiko said bluntly, “Because Lady Masako was with child.”
The young woman nodded.
“Could she have been desperate enough to consider killing herself?” Akitada asked, thinking of the letter the prince had mentioned to Kobe.
“Oh, no. She was very happy when she found out. It was her future, she said. Their future together, for the prince also wanted it. For her, the child was her whole life. Her life was only just beginning.”
Akitada was moved by this. “I see.” He did not add that she had fallen in love with a man who had not deserved such a sacrifice.
“You will find out who did this?” Hiroko asked anxiously.
“Yes.”
“Oh, yes,” echoed Akiko.
Hiroko nodded and reached into her sleeve to pull out a slender booklet. “I brought this. I wasn’t sure if I had the right to let anyone see it. Now I think perhaps you should read what she wrote. You may find something that tells you who did this. It’s Masako’s journal.”
Akiko gasped. “Her journal? Oh, that is excellent, isn’t it Akitada?”
Akitada looked at the thin volume of fine paper in its brocade cover. He was also flabbergasted by the good luck. “It may indeed hold some answer,” he said. “Thank you for your trust, Lady Hiroko. You will not regret it.”
“You will return it? It is all I have left of her.”
Akiko cried, “Of course.”
The homeward journey was filled with Akiko’s loud chatter and frequent demands to stop and have a peek at the journal. When a rather silent Akitada refused, she spent the time on various theories about what it might contain. They were almost home before Akitada had the heart to spoil her pleasure.
“It may not contain anything useful. If it did, Lady Hiroko would have told us. I doubt Lady Masako knew her danger. She would not have made the lonely journey to the villa, knowing that someone wished her dead.”
Akiko was silent for a moment. Then she raised her chin. “Well, in that case we must read between the lines. I have a knack for that sort of thing. I always knew ahead of time what the characters in Lady Murasaki’s novel were going to do next.”
Spies
Tora waited for Saburo in front of Mrs. Komiya’s little house. He passed the time charming Saburo’s landlady, who had noticed him and come out.
“I knew right away he was good man,” she said to Tora after he had introduced himself. “I got a feeling for that sort of thing. And I have a big heart. The poor man looks terrible, and people are unkind or fearful. They believe they see goblins and oni everywhere. Me, I’ve never seen one of those, so I’m not afraid.”
Tora regarded her with surprise. He had never really seen any apparitions either, but he believed in their existence with every fiber of his being. He said cautiously, “Well, Saburo’s had some bad luck. And you’re right. He’s a good man. I can testify to that.”