Ienobu frowned in disappointment but said, “It’s just as well. No use throwing around accusations until you can make them stick.”
Disconcerted, Sano said, “How do you know I haven’t found any proof that Yanagisawa or Yoshisato is guilty? Do you have ‘friends’ in my house, too?”
Ienobu repeated his wheezy laugh. “Don’t worry. I simply figured that if you had, they would have been charged with murder already.”
Sano wasn’t reassured; Ienobu hadn’t denied spying on him. “Why did you want to see me? Just to find out what the shogun said?”
“Let’s start with that.”
“He ordered me to take time off from my other duties and catch the killer. What’s the ‘important matter’ that you mentioned in your message?”
Ienobu brought his fingertips together, as if collecting his thoughts between them. Sano was struck by the difference between Ienobu and Yanagisawa. Since that day when Ienobu had been thrown out of the court, Yanagisawa had grown reckless, taken over by his emotions; Ienobu had cooled down. Once Sano had thought Ienobu didn’t stand a chance against Yanagisawa. Now he wasn’t so sure.
“Suppose you manage to incriminate Yanagisawa and Yoshisato,” Ienobu said. “Maybe that will take them out of the picture; maybe not. Yanagisawa is good at getting around the shogun. He’s also good at covering his tracks. It’s probable that you’ll fail to pin the murder on Yanagisawa, and he and Yoshisato will go on their merry way toward ruling Japan. In that case, what would you do?”
Downcast by the bleak scenario Ienobu described, Sano was silent. He thought it better not to disclose his intention-destroying Yanagisawa-to a man he distrusted more and more as time went on.
Ienobu smiled with satisfaction, as if he’d divined Sano’s thoughts and Sano had played into his hands. “Here’s what I wanted to discuss: I’m going to make you a proposition.”
I’m attracting propositions like spilled honey attracts flies, Sano thought. “What is it?”
“Join forces with me.” The mocking humor fell away from Ienobu. His voice turned rough, urgent. “I help you destroy Yanagisawa and his bastard. Then you support my bid for the succession.”
Sano was still conflicted about destroying Yoshisato, but the prospect of help with Yanagisawa was alluring. Sano hadn’t realized until this moment how isolated and vulnerable he felt, how exhausted from fourteen years of battling Yanagisawa and never gaining any permanent ground. All of a sudden Ienobu didn’t seem so repulsive. Nor did the idea of Ienobu as the next shogun.
“Destroy them, how?” Sano asked.
“I have friends, remember. They’ll supply evidence that Yanagisawa murdered the shogun’s daughter. All you have to do is pretend to find it. They’ll pressure Yanagisawa’s allies to change sides. We’ll try him for murder and convict him. The shogun will have to put him to death or lose face. And once Yanagisawa is gone, Yoshisato will be a lamb among wolves.” His teeth glistened with saliva in his grin.
Sano knew he should be revolted by this scheme. “That’s fighting dirty.” But somehow he wasn’t, and protecting Yoshisato suddenly seemed less important than a chance at a permanent victory over Yanagisawa.
Ienobu’s hunched shoulders rose in a shrug. “No dirtier than Yanagisawa fights. If you want to win this war, you have to be willing to roll in the mud. Are you?”
* * *
“What did you say to Ienobu?” Reiko asked Sano at dinner that night, after he’d told her and Masahiro about the proposition.
“The same thing I said to Yoshisato. That I would think it over.”
Reiko was so surprised she almost dropped her rice bowl. “You’re not serious?”
“I am.” Sano’s face was drawn with fatigue and unhappiness. “You’ll have noticed that I’m not exactly in a position to turn away potential allies. By the way, I had a confrontation with Yanagisawa and Yoshisato. They may not see eye to eye on how to run the government, but it’s in their mutual interest to destroy me before I can prove that one or both of them murdered the shogun’s daughter.”
“But Ienobu is essentially offering to help you frame Yanagisawa.”
“If Yanagisawa is guilty, which I believe he is, what does it matter how I go about delivering him to justice?” Sano said with a bitter twist of his mouth. “Genuine evidence hasn’t been as plentiful as ruined houses after the earthquake. Fake evidence may have to suffice.”
Reiko was frightened by his cynicism, which was so unlike him. Had his constant struggle to survive in the cutthroat world of politics finally changed the husband she loved into a stranger willing to compromise his principles?
“Father, how can you say that?” Masahiro asked. “I hate Yanagisawa, too, but it would be dishonorable to frame him.” Reiko saw that he, too, was afraid Sano had changed. “And you’ve always taught me that honor is more important than anything else.”
Sano responded with a wry smile, ashamed of his own blasphemous words yet proud of Masahiro for setting him straight. “Of course it is. I would never want to do what Ienobu suggested. I just had to argue in favor of it and hear how bad it sounded.”
Masahiro sighed with relief, but Reiko’s fear lingered. When put under enough pressure, anyone could be corrupted, even Sano. She hated seeing him pushed toward decisions he wouldn’t ordinarily make.
“It’s odd,” Sano said thoughtfully. “When Ienobu was telling me his proposition, it sounded perfectly reasonable, somehow. It was as if he understood what I wanted, and when he offered to help me get it, I was blind to the reasons why it was bad. I could almost taste the reasons why it was good. Does that make any sense?”
“No,” Reiko said, puzzled. “Of course Ienobu knows you’d like to defeat Yanagisawa. Everybody does. You’ve had other chances to compromise your honor for the sake of political gain and refused them. Why jump at this one?”
“Maybe because I realized that honor probably won’t win my battle against Yanagisawa. I can’t explain it. Ienobu had a strange effect on me.”
“Ienobu has an effect, all right. Being around him feels like touching a slug.” Masahiro made a disgusted face.
Reiko laughed, protesting, “You shouldn’t say that about the shogun’s nephew.”
“I feel like that about him, too,” Sano confessed. “And that’s another reason I didn’t accept Ienobu’s proposition, aside from the fact that it’s dishonorable. Because a samurai shouldn’t make deals with people he instinctively dislikes and distrusts.” He bent a stern, affectionate look on Masahiro. “If I ever forget that, be sure to remind me.”
But Sano hadn’t exactly said he was going to turn down Ienobu’s proposition. Mixed feelings troubled Reiko. On the one hand, she didn’t want Sano entering a dishonorable alliance. On the other, her family needed any port in a storm. “What will Ienobu do if you refuse?”
“He won’t say ‘no hard feelings’ and let me go about my business. He said that if I’m not with him, I’m against him. Meaning, he and his allies will run me out of the regime. Unless Yanagisawa does it first.”
These consequences were as bad as Reiko had thought. “Exactly who are his allies?”
“Several major daimyo clans,” Sano said. “They’re Tokugawa hereditary allies, who are enemies of Yanagisawa. Their combined armies have hundreds of thousands of troops.”
“Who are our allies?” Masahiro asked.
Sano was silent. Reiko and Masahiro already knew the disheartening answer: There was no one powerful whom they could rely on to fight for them. Sano said ruefully, “Remember, Ienobu’s proposition isn’t the only one in front of me. There’s Yoshisato’s.”
“You’re still considering it?” Reiko asked in surprise.
“Being around him isn’t like touching a slug,” Sano said. He and Masahiro smiled at each other.
Reiko frowned. Yoshisato was coming between her and Sano again. “I don’t understand your attachment to Yoshisato.”
“You would if you met him.”