Shogun (The Asian Saga Chronology) (47 page)

"You're her confessor."

"Yes.  But she won't say anything."

"Why?"

"Clearly she's been forewarned and forbidden to discuss what happened and what was said.  I know them too well.  In this, Toranaga's influence would be greater than ours."

"Is her faith so small?  Has our training of her been so inept?  Surely not.  She's as devout and as good a Christian as any woman I've ever met.  One day she'll become a nun—perhaps even the first Japanese abbess."

"Yes.  But she will say nothing now."

"The Church is in jeopardy.  This is important, perhaps too important," dell'Aqua said.  "She would understand that.  She's far too intelligent not to realize it."

"I beg you, do not put her faith to the test in this.  We must lose.  She warned me.  That's what she was saying as clearly as if it were written down."

"Perhaps it would be good to put her to the test.  For her own salvation."

"That's up to you to order or not to order.  But I'm afraid that she must obey Toranaga, Eminence, and not us."

"I will think about Maria.  Yes," dell'Aqua said.  He let his eyes drift to the fire, the weight of his office crushing him.  Poor Maria.  That cursed heretic!  How do we avoid the trap?  How do we conceal the truth about the guns?  How could a Father Superior and Vice-Provincial like da Cunha, who was so well trained, so experienced, with seven years' practical knowledge in Macao and Japan—how could he make such a hideous mistake?

"How?" he asked the flames.

I can answer, he told himself. It's too easy.  You panic or you forget the glory of God or become pride-filled or arrogant or petrified.  Who wouldn't have, perhaps, under the same circumstances?  To be received by the Taikō at sunset with favor, a triumphal meeting with pomp and ceremony—almost like an act of contrition by the Taikō, who was seemingly on the point of converting.  And then to be awakened in the middle of the same night with the Taikō's Expulsion Edicts decreeing that all religious orders were to be out of Japan within twenty days on pain of death, never to return, and worse, that all Japanese converts throughout the land were ordered to recant at once or they would immediately be exiled or put to death.

Driven to despair, the Superior had wildly advised the Kyushu Christian
daimyos
—Onoshi, Misaki, Kiyama and Harima of Nagasaki among them—to rebel to save the Church and had written frantically for conquistadores to stiffen the revolt.

The fire spluttered and danced in the iron grate.  Yes, all true, dell'Aqua thought.  If only I'd known, if only da Cunha had consulted me first.  But how could he?  It takes six months to send a letter to Goa and perhaps another six months for one to return and da Cunha did write immediately but he was the Superior and on his own and had to cope at once with the disaster.

Though dell'Aqua had sailed immediately on receiving the letter, with hastily arranged credentials as Ambassador from the Viceroy of Goa, it had taken months to arrive at Macao, only to learn that da Cunha was dead, and that he and all Fathers were forbidden to enter Japan on pain of death.

But the guns had already gone.

Then, after ten weeks, came the news that the Church was not obliterated in Japan, that the Taikō was not enforcing his new laws.  Only half a hundred churches had been burned.  Only Takayama had been smashed.  And word seeped back that though the Edicts would remain officially in force, the Taikō was now prepared to allow things to be as they were, provided that the Fathers were much more discreet in their conversions, their converts more discreet and well behaved, and that there were no more blatant public worship or demonstrations and no burning of Buddhist churches by zealots.

Then, when the ordeal seemed at an end, dell'Aqua had remembered that the guns had gone weeks before, under Father Superior da Cunha's seal, that they still lay in the Jesuit Nagasaki warehouses.

More weeks of agony ensued until the guns were secretly smuggled back to Macao—yes, under my seal this time, dell'Aqua reminded himself, hopefully the secret buried forever.  But those secrets never leave you in peace, however much you wish or pray.

How much does the heretic know?

For more than an hour his Eminence sat motionless in his highbacked leather chair, staring sightlessly at the fire.  Alvito waited patiently near the bookcase, his hands in his lap.  Shafted sunlight danced off the silver crucifix on the wall behind the Father-Visitor.  On one side wall was a small oil by the Venetian painter Titian that dell'Aqua had bought in his youth in Padua, where he had been sent by his father to study law.  The other wall was lined with his Bibles and his books, in Latin, Portuguese, Italian, and Spanish.  And, from the Society's own movable-type press at Nagasaki that he had ordered and brought at so much cost from Goa ten years ago, two shelves of Japanese books and pamphlets: devotional books and catechisms of all sorts, translated with painstaking labor into Japanese by Jesuits; works adapted from Japanese into Latin to try to help Japanese acolytes learn that language; and last, two small books that were beyond price, the first Portuguese-Japanese grammar, Father Sancho Alvarez's life's work, printed six years ago, and its companion, the incredible Portuguese-Latin-Japanese dictionary printed last year in Roman letters as well as
hiragana
script.  It had been begun at his order twenty years ago, the first dictionary of Japanese words ever compiled.

Father Alvito picked up the book and caressed it lovingly.  He knew that it was a unique work of art.  For eighteen years he himself had been compiling such a work and it was still nowhere near finished.  But his was to be a dictionary with explanatory supplements and far more detailed—almost an introduction to Japan and the Japanese, and he knew without vanity that if he managed to finish it, it would be a masterpiece compared to Father Alvarez's work, that if his name was ever to be remembered, it would be because of his book and the Father-Visitor, who was the only father he had ever known.

"You want to leave Portugal, my son, and join the service of God?" the giant Jesuit had said the first day he had met him.

"Oh, yes, please, Father," he had replied, craning up at him with desperate longing.

"How old are you, my son?"

"I don't know, Father, perhaps ten, perhaps eleven, but I can read and write, the priest taught me, and I'm alone, I've no one of my own, I belong to no one. . . ."

Dell'Aqua had taken him to Goa and thence to Nagasaki, where he had joined the seminary of the Society of Jesus, the youngest European in Asia, at long last belonging.  Then came the miracle of the gift of tongues and the positions of trust as interpreter and trade adviser, first to Harima Tadao,
daimyo
of the fief of Hizen in Kyushu where Nagasaki lay, and then in time to the Taikō himself.  He was ordained, and later even attained the privilege of the fourth vow.  This was the special vow over and above the normal vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience, given only to the elite of Jesuits, the vow of obedience to the Pope personally—to be his personal tool for the work of God, to go where the Pope personally ordered and do what he personally wanted; to become, as the founder of the Society, the Basque soldier Loyola, designed, one of the Regimini Militantis Ecclesiae, one of the professed, the special private soldiers of God for His elected general on earth, the Vicar of Christ.

I've been so very lucky, Alvito thought.  Oh, God, help me to help.

At last dell'Aqua got up and stretched and went to the window.  Sun sparkled off the gilded tiles of the soaring central castle donjon, the sheer elegance of the structure belying its massive strength.  Tower of evil, he thought.  How long will it stand there to remind each one of us?  Is it only fifteen—no, it was seventeen years ago that the Taikō put four hundred thousand men to building and excavating, and bled the country to pay for this, his monument, and then, in two short years, Osaka Castle was finished.  Incredible man!  Incredible people!  Yes.  And there it stands, indestructible.  Except to the Finger of God.  He can humble it in an instant, if He wishes.  Oh, God, help me to do Thy will.

"Well, Martin, it seems we have work to do."  Dell'Aqua began to walk up and down, his voice now as firm as his step.  "About the English pilot: If we don't protect him he'll be killed and we risk Toranaga's disfavor.  If we manage to protect him he'll soon hang himself.  But dare we wait?  His presence is a threat to us and there is no telling how much further damage he can do before that happy date.  Or we can help Toranaga to remove him.  Or, last, we can convert him."

Alvito blinked.  "What?"

"He's intelligent, very knowledgeable about Catholicism.  Aren't most Englishmen really Catholic at heart?  The answer is yes if their king or queen is Catholic, and no if he or she is Protestant.  The English are careless about religion.  They're fanatic against us at the moment, but isn't that because of the Armada?  Perhaps Blackthorne can be converted.  That would be the perfect solution—to the Glory of God, and save his heretic soul from a damnation he's certainly going to.

"Next, Toranaga: We'll give him the maps he wants.  Explain about 'spheres of influence.'  Isn't that really what the lines of demarcation were for, to separate the influence of the Portuguese and our Spanish friends? 
Si, e vero!
  Tell him that on the other important matters I will personally be honored to prepare them for him and will give them to him as soon as possible.  Because I'll have to check the facts in Macao, could he please grant a reasonable delay?  And in the same breath say that you are delighted to inform him that the Black Ship will sail three weeks early, with the biggest cargo of silks and gold ever, that all our assignments of goods and our portion of the cargo and . . ." he thought a moment—and at least thirty percent of the whole cargo will be sold through Toranaga's personally appointed broker."

"Eminence, the Captain-General won't like sailing early and won't like—"

"It will be your responsibility to get Toranaga's immediate sailing clearance for Ferriera.  Go and see him at once with my reply.  Let him be impressed with our efficiency, isn't that one of the things he admires?  With immediate clearances, Ferriera will concede the minor point of arriving early in the season, and as to the broker, what's the difference to the Captain-General between one native or another?  He will still get his percentage."

"But Lords Onoshi and Kiyama and Harima usually split the brokerage of the cargo between them.  I don't know if they'd agree."

"Then solve the problem.  Toranaga will agree to the delay for a concession.  The only concessions he needs are power, influence, and money.  What can we give him?  We cannot deliver the Christian
daimyos
to him.  We—"

"Yet," Alvito said.

"Even if we could, I don't know yet if we should or if we will.  Onoshi and Kiyama are bitter enemies, but they've joined against Toranaga because they're sure he'd obliterate the Church—and them—if he ever got control of the Council."

"Toranaga will support the Church.  Ishido's our real enemy."

"I don't share your confidence, Martin.  We mustn't forget that because Onoshi and Kiyama are Christians, all their followers are Christians in their tens of thousands.  We cannot offend them.  The only concession we can give to Toranaga is something to do with trade.  He's fanatic about trade but has never managed to participate personally.  So the concession I suggest might tempt him to grant a delay which perhaps we can extend into a permanent one.  You know how the Japanese like this form of solution—the big stick poised, which both sides pretend does not exist, eh?"

"In my opinion it's politically unwise for Lord Onoshi and Lord Kiyama to turn against Toranaga at this time.  They should follow the old proverb about keeping a line of retreat open, no?  I could suggest to them that an offer to Toranaga of twenty-five percent—so each has an equal share, Onoshi, Kiyama, Harima, and Toranaga—would be a small consideration to soften the impact of their 'temporary' siding with Ishido against him."

"Then Ishido will distrust them and hate us even more when he finds out."

"Ishido hates us immeasurably now.  Ishido doesn't trust them any more than they trust him and we don't know yet why they've taken his side.  With Onoshi and Kiyama's agreement, we would formally put the proposal as though it was merely
our
idea to maintain impartiality between Ishido and Toranaga.  Privately we can inform Toranaga of their generosity."

Dell'Aqua considered the virtues and defects of the plan.  "Excellent," he said at length.  "Put it into effect.  Now, about the heretic.  Give his rutters to Toranaga today.  Go back to Toranaga at once.  Tell him that the rutters were sent to us secretly."

"How do I explain the delay in giving them to him?"

"You don't.  Just tell the truth: they were brought by Rodrigues but that neither of us realized the sealed package contained the missing rutters.  Indeed, we did not open them for two days.  They were in truth forgotten in the excitement about the heretic.  The rutters prove Blackthorne to be pirate, thief, and traitor.  His own words will dispose of him once and for all, which is surely divine justice.  Tell Toranaga the truth—that Mura gave them to Father Sebastio, as indeed happened, who sent them to us knowing we would know what to do with them.  That clears Mura, Father Sebastio, everyone.  We should tell Mura by carrier pigeon what has been done.  I'm sure Toranaga will realize that we have had his interests at heart over Yabu's.  Does he know that Yabu's made an arrangement with Ishido?"

"I would say certainly, Eminence.  But rumor has it that Toranaga and Yabu are friends now."

"I wouldn't trust that satan's whelp."

"I'm sure Toranaga doesn't.  Any more than Yabu has really made any commitment to him."

Suddenly they were distracted by an altercation outside.  The door opened and a cowled monk came barefooted into the room, shaking off Father Soldi.  "The blessings of Jesus Christ upon you," he said, his voice rasping with hostility.  "May He forgive you your sins."