Musashi: Bushido Code (36 page)

Otsū, unaware of his presence, walked a few paces out from the gate. Looking back, she saw Jōtarō stooping to pick something up.

"Jōtarō, what on earth are you doing? Hurry up!"

"Wait!" he cried excitedly. "Look at this!"

"It's nothing but a dirty old rag! What do you want that for?"

"It belongs to Musashi."

"To Musashi?" she exclaimed, running back to him.

"Yes, it's his," replied Jōtarō as he held the hand towel up by the corners for her to see. "I remember it. It came from the widow's house where we stayed in Nara. See, here: there's a maple leaf design dyed on it and a character reading 'Lin.' That's the name of the owner of the dumpling restaurant there."

"Do you think Musashi was right here?" Otsū cried, looking frantically around.

Jōtarō drew himself up almost to the girl's height and at the top of his voice yelled,
"Sensei!"

In the grove there was a rustling sound. With a gasp, Otsū spun around and darted toward the trees, the boy chasing after her.

"Where are you going?" he called.

"Musashi just ran away!"

"Which way?"

"That way."

"I don't see him."

"Over there in the trees!"

She had caught a glimpse of Musashi's figure, but the momentary joy she experienced was immediately replaced by apprehension, for he was rapidly increasing the distance between them. She ran after him with all the strength her legs possessed. Jōtarō ran along with her, not really believing she'd seen Musashi.

"You're wrong!" he shouted. "It must be somebody else. Why would Musashi run away?"

"Just look!"

"Where?"

"There!" She took a deep breath, and straining her voice to the utmost, screamed, "Mu—sa—shi!" But no more had the frantic cry come from her lips than she stumbled and fell. As Jōtarō helped her up, she cried, "Why don't you call him too? Call him! Call him!"

Instead of doing as she said, he froze in shock and stared at her face. He had seen that face before, with its bloodshot eyes, its needlelike eyebrows, its waxen nose and jaw. It was the face of the mask! The madwoman's mask the widow in Nara had given him. Otsū's face lacked the curiously curved mouth, but otherwise the likeness was the same. He quickly withdrew his hands and recoiled in fright.

Otsū continued her scolding. "We can't give up! He'll never come back if we let him get away now! Call him! Get him to come back!"

Something inside Jōtarō resisted, but the look on Otsū's face told him it was useless to try to reason with her. They started running again, and he, too, began to shout for all he was worth.

Beyond the woods was a low hill, along the bottom of which ran the back road from Tsukigase to Iga. "It is Musashi!" cried Jōtarō. Having reached the road, the boy could see his master clearly, but Musashi was too far ahead of them to hear their shouts.

Otsū and Jōtarō ran as far as their legs would carry them, shouting themselves hoarse. Their screams echoed through the fields. At the edge of the valley they lost sight of Musashi, who ran straight into the heavily wooded foothills.

They stopped and stood there, forlorn as deserted children. White clouds stretched out emptily above them, while the murmuring of a stream accented their loneliness.

"He's crazy! He's out of his mind! How could he leave me like this?" Jōtarō cried, stamping the ground.

Otsū leaned against a large chestnut tree and let the tears gush forth. Even her great love for Musashi—a love for which she would have sacrificed anything—was incapable of holding him. She was puzzled, bereft and angry. She knew what his purpose in life was, and why he was avoiding her. She had known since that day at Hanada Bridge. Still, she could not comprehend why he considered her a barrier between him and his goal. Why should his determination be weakened by her presence?

Or was that just an excuse? Was the real reason that he didn't like her enough? It would make more sense perhaps. And yet ... and yet ... Otsū had come to understand Musashi when she had seen him tied up in the tree at the Shippōji. She could not believe him to be the sort who would lie to a woman. If he didn't care about her, he would say so, but in fact he had told her at Hanada Bridge that he did like her very much. She recalled his words with sadness.

Being an orphan, she was prevented by a certain coldness from trusting many people, but once she trusted someone, she trusted him completely. At this moment, she felt there was no one but Musashi worth living for or relying on. Matahachi's betrayal had taught her, the hard way, how careful a girl must be in judging men. But Musashi was not Matahachi. She had not only decided that she would live for him, whatever happened, but had already made up her mind never to regret doing so.

But why couldn't he have said just one word? It was more than she could bear. The leaves of the chestnut tree were shaking, as though the tree itself understood and sympathized.

The angrier she became, the more she was possessed by her love for him. Whether it was fate or not, she couldn't say, but her grief-torn spirit told her there was no real life for her apart from Musashi.

Jōtarō glanced down the road and muttered, "Here comes a priest." Otsū paid no attention to him.

With the approach of noon, the sky above had turned a deep, transparent blue. The monk descending the slope in the distance had the look of having stepped down from the clouds, of having no connection whatever with this earth. As he neared the chestnut tree, he looked toward it and saw Otsū.

"What's all this?" he exclaimed, and at the sound of his voice, Otsū looked up.

Her swollen eyes wide with astonishment, she cried, "Takuan!" In her present condition, she saw Takuan Sōhō as a savior. She wondered if she was dreaming.

Although the sight of Takuan was a shock to Otsū, the discovery of Otsū was for Takuan no more than confirmation of something he had suspected. As it happened, his arrival was neither accident nor miracle.

Takuan had been on friendly terms with the Yagyū family for a long time, his acquaintance with them going back to the days when, as a young monk at the Sangen'in in the Daitokuji, his duties had included cleaning the kitchen and making bean paste.

In those days, the Sangen'in, then known as the "North Sector" of the Daitokuji, had been famous as a gathering place for "unusual" samurai, which is to say, samurai who were given to thinking philosophically about the meaning of life and death; men who felt the need to study affairs of the spirit, as well as the technical skills of the martial arts. Samurai flocked' there in greater numbers than did Zen monks, and one result of this was that the temple became known as a breeding ground for revolt.

Among the samurai who came frequently were Suzuki Ihaku, the brother of Lord Kōizumi of Ise; Yagyū Gorōzaemon, the heir of the House of Yagyū; and Gorōzaemon's brother Munenori. Munenori had quickly taken a liking to Takuan, and the two had remained friends ever since. In the course of a number of visits to Koyagyū Castle, Takuan had met Sekishūsai and had acquired great respect for the older man. Sekishūsai had also taken a liking to the young monk, who struck him as having a great deal of promise.

Recently Takuan had stopped for a time at the Nansōji in Izumi Province and from there had sent a letter to inquire after the health of Sekishūsai and Munenori. He had received a long reply from Sekishūsai, saying in part:

I have been very fortunate lately. Munenori has taken a post with the Tokugawas, in Edo, and my grandson, who left the service of Lord Katō of Higo and went out to study on his own, is making progress. I myself have in my service a beautiful young girl who not only plays the flute well but talks with me, and together we have tea, arrange flowers and compose poems. She is the delight of my old age, a flower blooming in what might otherwise be a cold, withered old hut. Since she says that she comes from Mimasaka, which is near your birthplace, and was brought up in a temple called the Shippōji, I imagine that you and she have much in common. It is unusually pleasant to drink one's evening sake to the accompaniment of a flute well played, and since you are so close to here, I hope you will come and enjoy this treat with me.

It would have been difficult for Takuan to refuse the invitation under any circumstances, but the certainty that the girl described in the letter was Otsū made him all the more eager to accept.

As the three of them walked toward Sekishūsai's house, Takuan asked Otsū many questions, which she answered without reservation. She told him what she'd been doing since last seeing him in Himeji, what had happened that morning, and how she felt about Musashi.

Nodding patiently, he heard out her tearful story. When she was finished, he said, "I guess women are able to choose ways of life that would not be possible for men. You want me, I take it, to advise you on the path that you should follow in the future."

"Oh, no."

"Well..."

"I've already decided what I'm going to do."

Takuan scrutinized her closely. She had stopped walking and was looking at the ground. She seemed to be in the depths of despair, yet there was a certain strength in the tone of her voice that forced Takuan to a reappraisal.

"If I'd had any doubts, if I'd thought I'd give up," she said, "I'd never have left the Shippōji. I'm still determined to meet Musashi. The only question in my mind is whether this will cause him trouble, whether my continuing to live will bring him unhappiness. If it does, I'll have to do something about it!"

"Just what does that mean?"

"I can't tell you."

"Be careful, Otsū!"

"Of what?"

"Under this bright, cheerful sun, the god of death is tugging at you." "I ... I don't know what you mean."

"I don't suppose you would, but that's because the god of death is lending you strength. You'd be a fool to die, Otsū, particularly over nothing more than a one-sided love affair." Takuan laughed.

Otsū was getting angry again. She might as well have been talking to thin air, she thought, for Takuan had never been in love. It was impossible for anyone who'd never been in love to understand how she felt. For her to try to explain her feelings to him was like him trying to explain Zen Buddhism to an imbecile. But just as there was truth in Zen, whether an imbecile could understand it or not, there were people who would die for love, whether Takuan could understand it or not. To a woman at least, love was a far more serious matter than the troublesome riddles of a Zen priest. When one was swayed by a love that meant life or death, what difference did it make what the clapping of one hand sounded like? Biting her lips, Otsū vowed to say no more.

Takuan became serious. "You should have been born a man, Otsū. A man with the kind of willpower you have would certainly accomplish something for the good of the country."

"Does that mean it's wrong for a woman like me to exist? Because it might bring harm to Musashi?"

"Don't twist what I said. I wasn't talking about that. But no matter how much you love Musashi, he still runs away, doesn't he? And I daresay you never will catch him!"

"I'm not doing this because I enjoy it. I can't help it. I love him!"

"I don't see you for a while, and the next thing I know, you're carrying on like all the other women!"

"But can't you see? Oh, never mind, let's not talk about it anymore. A brilliant priest like you would never understand a woman's feelings!"

"I don't know how to answer that. It's true, though; women do puzzle me." Otsū turned away from him and said, "Let's go, Jōtarō!"

As Takuan stood watching, the two of them started down a side road. With a sad flicker of his eyebrows, the monk came to the conclusion that there was nothing more for him to do. He called after her, "Aren't you going to say good-bye to Sekishūsai before setting out on your own?"

"I'll say good-bye to him in my heart. He knows I never meant to stay at his house this long anyway."

"Won't you reconsider?"

"Reconsider what?"

"Well, it was nice living in the mountains of Mimasaka, but it's nice here too. It's peaceful and quiet, and life is simple. Instead of seeing you go out in the ordinary world, with all its misery and hardships, I'd like to see you live your life out in peace, among these mountains and streams, like those nightingales we hear singing."

"Ha, ha! Thanks so much, Takuan!"

Takuan sighed, realizing he was helpless before this strong-willed young woman, so determined to go blindly on her chosen way. "You may laugh, Otsū, but the path you are embarking on is one of darkness."

"Darkness?"

"You were brought up in a temple. You should know that the path of darkness and desire leads only to frustration and misery—frustration and misery beyond salvation."

"There's never been a path of light for me, not since I was born."

"But there is, there is!" Putting his last drop of energy into this plea, Takuan came up to the girl and took her hand. He wanted desperately for her to trust him.

"I'll talk to Sekishūsai about it," he offered. "About how you can live and be happy. You can find yourself a good husband here in Koyagyū, have children, and do the things that women do. You'd make this a better village. That would make you happier too."

"I understand you're trying to be helpful, but—"

"Do it! I beg you!"

Pulling her by the hand, he looked at Jōtarō and said, "You come too, boy!" Jōtarō shook his head decisively. "Not me. I'm going to follow my master." "Well, do as you like, but at least go back to the castle and say good-bye to Sekishūsai."

"Oh, I forgot!" gasped Jōtarō. "I left my mask there. I'll go get it." He streaked off, untroubled by paths of darkness and paths of light.