Rashomon Gate (28 page)

"I have no intention of employing that fellow," Ono said sharply. "He may know his Chinese, but his manners are unacceptable and he is completely unreliable. Would you believe it, he has taken off without so much as a note explaining where he went or when he planned to return?"

"I dare say Kobe will dig him up," said Akitada, and regretted his choice of words immediately. "You and Ishikawa were the last to see Oe alive that night, weren't you?"

Ono's eyes shifted nervously. "We only took him as far as Mibu Road. He insisted he had private business to take care of and ordered us to return to the competition to keep an eye on things."

"I see." Akitada decided to probe further. "I don't recall seeing either of you return."

Ono stiffened and glared at him. "I cannot speak for Ishikawa," he said coldly, "and I certainly don't feel I need to explain my actions to you, but I was quite unwell and had no desire to disgrace myself before the company, so I remained around the corner near the side stairs." Narrowing his eyes, he added, "For that matter, I saw you leave early, before the last competition started."

"My apologies." Akitada bowed. "I spoke thoughtlessly."

Ono acknowledged this with a curt nod. Akitada walked away, reflecting that the erstwhile worm was putting on the scales of the dragon already. Or had Ono always been a poisonous snake masquerading as a harmless creature?

He looked around and joined Nishioka, who was talking to Fujiwara. The latter seemed to have lost his booming good humor and merely looked tired and irritated.

But Nishioka's eyes sparkled. He was more cheerful than anyone else here. Tucking some loose strands of hair back into his topknot and scratching his lantern chin, he said to Akitada, "I was just telling our friend here that he need not worry about being arrested for Oe's death. I have thought about it and decided that his particular personality disqualifies him from all but the most brutal of murders, and then only if he were provoked upon the instant and carried out the deed without regard to his own safety."

"Thank you for that testimonial," said Fujiwara dryly. His cheek showed the ugly marks left by Oe's nails, and he had not bothered to change. Akitada noticed the blood stains on the sleeve of his robe and wondered if he only owned the one garment. "But," continued Fujiwara, "how will you convince the police captain that I did not have another quarrel with the man in the Temple of Confucius and lost my temper?"

Nishioka shook his head. "Impossible! You would not have bothered to tie him to the statue. You would have smashed a few things and run off to get drunk."

Fujiwara choked back a laugh. "I see my reputation is well established. Well, who, in your opinion, has the correct personality?"

"Oh, at least two people." Nishioka smiled slyly. "Though in one case I have not yet worked out how it was done unless he had an—" He broke off as a sudden hush fell in the hall.

A side door had opened and His Reverence entered. The noble monk was hardly a prepossessing figure. Very fat, he was dressed in a black silk clerical robe; a green and gold embroidered stole was slung across one shoulder and his paunch. He padded with a waddling gait to the raised dais and plopped down on the cushion with a grunt.

They all bowed deeply. Akitada risked a surreptitious look and saw a moon face with small deep-set eyes under heavy lids and a small, soft mouth. Sesshin surveyed the bowed backs impassively. To Akitada there was a sort of naked grossness about the man which was not entirely due to his shaven head. His smooth, round face had hardly any eyebrows and rested on a triple chin. The ears were enormous, with pendulous lobes which rested on fleshy shoulders.

Perhaps it was due to his natural and learned dislike for Buddhist clergy, but it seemed to Akitada that appointing a man such as this as president of the university, a spoiled member of the imperial family who had renounced his worldly career in order to devote himself to leisure and luxurious living, was another example of the weakness of the current government.

The fat monk cleared his throat and said in a soft, dry voice, "Thank you all for coming. Please be seated. "With a general shuffling of feet and rustling of robes they obeyed.

Sesshin looked over their heads and spoke in the same low, soft voice. "Recent events require my presence here and I take this opportunity to make a few announcements." The silence in the hall was profound as they all strained to hear. Akitada thought irritatedly that the man was even too lazy to raise his voice. "Because of the unfortunate death of our colleague, certain disruptions of my routine and yours are unavoidable, but we must attempt to carry on. You will, of course, meet your students as usual and cooperate fully with the police. Ono will temporarily see to the lectures on Chinese literature. I will send him a suitable assistant. As usual, when I am in residence, I will conduct a series of lectures on the scriptures. This time I will give a commentary on the Great Wisdom sutra. It will take place every afternoon immediately after the noon rice. You may announce this to your students. That is all." He nodded to them, rose with another grunt, and padded out.

That was all? For a moment Akitada sat stunned, while his colleagues got up and began to chatter. Then cold and irrational fury seized him. How dare the man? Before he was fully conscious of what he was doing, he was up and striding after the figure of the priest.

He passed through the door into a long dark corridor where the distant faint daylight gleamed on polished black boards. Ahead of him moved the large figure of the monk. Sesshin stopped at a door, disappeared into the room behind, and closed the door after him. Akitada opened it again and walked in.

"I want to speak to you," he snapped, adding lamely, "Your Reverence."

Sesshin had his back to him and was removing his stole. Turning slowly, he looked at Akitada. After a long moment he said, "You must be Sugawara. If I remember, abruptness was always a failing of the Sugawaras. Please be seated."

Akitada was still fuming. This man had deserted two helpless children. "What I have to say will not take long. I have just been told that you are the brother of the late Prince Yoakira."

Sesshin calmly folded the embroidered stole and draped it over a stand. The room contained little more than that, a pair of cushions and a small low table upon which were set a wooden rosary, a beautifully decorated sutra box and a brazier with a teapot. The monk lowered himself to the cushion next to it. "Forgive me for sitting down myself. I am an old man. I would offer you a cup of tea, but it is not customarily consumed while standing. You young fellows do not allow yourself enough leisure. All is haste and intensity for you."

"I am afraid that most of us do not have the privilege," Akitada said tartly. "I apologize for the abrupt intrusion, but I won't keep you from your leisure long. Your great-nephew, Lord Minamoto Sadamu, is presently a student here, and I had occasion to speak to him at some length this morning about a situation which is disturbing, to say the least."

Sesshin remarked placidly, "I hope the young scamp has not given you cause to complain of him?"

Akitada steadied his breath. "Not at all. Quite the opposite. He is extremely bright and has a sense of responsibility beyond his years. That is why I have acceded to his wish to investigate his grandfather's death."

Sesshin sighed and reached for his beads. He neither responded nor changed his calm demeanor. If anything, he seemed more indifferent than before. The heavy lids drooped over his deep-set eyes until he looked almost asleep.

"Have you nothing to say?" cried Akitada. "I had hoped that you would take an interest in your brother's grandchildren. They are quite alone in the world and, if I am not mistaken, in danger of their very lives."

There was no reaction from the monk, and Akitada turned to leave. "I am sorry," he said. "I was mistaken."

"A moment," said the soft dry voice. Akitada paused with his hand on the door latch and looked back over his shoulder. The smoldering black eyes were fully on him now. "You intrude most painfully into my hard-won peace," he said. "When I lost my brother, I nearly lost myself. My faith wavered and my very soul was drowning in tears. I returned to the world to conduct the memorial service, and was told on that occasion that the children were in good hands, that they had chosen their future paths freely. After the service I returned to the mountains to ask the Buddha's help in emptying my heart and mind of the memories. I do not tell you this because I owe you an explanation, but because I am grateful that my great-nephew has found a friend in his teacher. Now you may go in peace."

Akitada wished to argue but knew it would be both futile and dangerous to do so. He bit his lip, bowed, and left.

Since Lady Sugawara decided it was time for the annual cleaning of the family storehouse, Tora could not leave for the city until late in the day. When he was finally free to look for the old beggar, he headed first to the office of the eastern capital near the university.

Tora stated his business at the gate, and the guard became excited. "Hey, fellows!" he shouted. "Here's someone asking about old Umakai."

Guards, constables, and clerks gathered around them. All expressed concern about the old beggar. Umakai was their special pet, and they had missed him. He was expected regularly for his noon rice. This the guards and clerks provided by passing his bowl around for everyone to contribute a small share of his own meal until the old man's bowl was filled to overflowing. The trouble was he had not been seen, except for a brief visit right after his release from jail, and they were all worried.

Tora asked if Umakai might be eating elsewhere, for instance with their colleagues in the western office, but they assured him that those people had hearts of stone and arrested beggars as vagrants and loiterers. In short, nobody knew where Umakai might have disappeared to.

Tora thanked them, promising to keep them informed. He began walking through increasingly busy streets, stopping from time to time to ask peddlers and street musicians about the old man. Some knew Umakai, but none had seen him around lately. It was not until he neared the market that Tora picked up a clue, and when he did, the news was not good.

He saw a middle-aged prostitute who was plying her trade on the street. No longer attractive enough to work in the Willow Quarter, she was reduced to accosting passing laborers and apprentices. Her eyes had assessed Tora, but his neat blue robe and black cap had convinced her that he was beyond her reach. Tora approached her. A woman like this would be familiar with the other street people who competed with her for a few coppers.

She was disappointed when he asked his question, but told him she did not know Umakai. When Tora turned away, she cried after him, "They fished an old man out of a canal this morning."

Tora's heart sank. "How do you know?"

"I was there, wasn't I? Bunch of people were looking, so I went to see what was up. He was dead all right. Small, skinny old guy. Looked down on his luck. Some old drunk, maybe. Stumbled into the water and drowned. Guess the warden thought so too. He just looked at him and then let his friends take him away. Could be it's your guy."

Tora nodded. "It could be. These friends? Do you know where I might find them?"

She laughed. "They're poor folk, like me. We don't have a regular place to go home to like you." She gave Tora's neat outfit an envious glance. "People like us live and sleep in the streets, or maybe in the western city in some shed or old ruin. But mostly we keep moving." She eyed Tora speculatively. "I don't suppose you'd be interested in a bit of pleasure?"

"Another time. I'm on duty."

She nodded in resignation and turned away.

"Wait! If you can describe the men who took the body away, there's ten coppers in it for you."

"Ten coppers?" She flushed with pleasure. "I can do better than that! It was Spike and Nail got the dead guy. Spike's a big brute. He lost a hand and put a metal spike in its place. His buddy's a thin little feller. Get it? Spike and Nail! Heh, heh. Anyway, I guess they knew what they'd find, 'cause they'd brought along a monk to say a few prayers."

Tora stared at her. The story sounded weird, but there might be something in it. "Thanks," he said and counted the promised coppers into her dirty hand.

She looked at the money, then closed her fingers tightly around it. Nodding towards a dirty alley behind her, she offered, "If you like, I could twirl your stem for you." She grinned and passed an agile tongue across her lips. "It won't cost you nothing."

Tora blushed. "No, thank you. I'm in a hurry to find out what happened to the old man." He turned to walk away.

"Bet they took him to Rashomon," she called after him.

Rashomon!

Tora shuddered. Of course. Everyone knew that the poor who could not afford a funeral left their corpses there for the authorities to gather and cremate on a common pyre. That was why nobody but cutthroats went to Rashomon after dark— and the light was fading rapidly.

Actually Rashomon was the great southern gateway of the capital. An impressive two-storied structure with immense red columns, blue tile roofs, and whitewashed plaster walls, it had been built as a fitting welcome for visitors to the imperial capital. As soon as they passed through its massive structure, they saw before them Suzaku Avenue, immensely wide and long, bisected by water and lined with willows, leading straight as an arrow to Suzakumon in the far distance, the entrance to the imperial city itself. And if you were leaving the capital, you walked through Rashomon and found yourself on the great southern highway which led to Kyushu and exotic foreign ports.

But Rashomon had fallen on hard times as, indeed, had the capital itself. The gate was rarely guarded nowadays and had become a hangout for vagrants, crooks and undesirables from the surrounding provinces. After dark, ordinary people avoided the place, making it a safe haven for criminals. The police turned a blind eye, except that twice a week, in the pre-dawn hours, the city authorities sent crews to gather the corpses.