moment in a No drama when the actor playing a nice, ordinary woman reveals her true character by changing masks and becoming a ferocious demon.
“No, that’s not true.” Reiko tried to pull away, but Lady Miyagi’s fingernails dug into her flesh. “Let me go!”
“Cousin, what are you talking about?” mewled Lord Miyagi. “Why are you treating our guest this way?”
“Don’t you see she’s trying to prove you poisoned Harume and stabbed the old drug peddler from Daikon Quay? And you won’t let me protect us. You fell right into her trap!”
The daimyo shook his head in befuddlement. “What drug peddler? How can you attribute such vile intentions to this sweet young lady? Release her at once.” Leaning over, he tried to pry his wife’s fingers loose. “Why should we need protection? I didn’t do those terrible things. I’ve never killed anyone in my life.”
“No,” Lady Miyagi said in a voice full of quiet menace, “you haven’t.”
Suddenly the truth hit Reiko like a blow to the stomach. The broken alibis didn’t incriminate Lord Miyagi alone. His wife’s lies had been intended to protect herself as well. “You’re the murderer!” Reiko exclaimed.
Lady Miyagi chuckled, a low growl deep in her throat. “If it took you this long to figure it out, then you’re not as smart as you think.”
“Cousin!” As realization dawned on Lord Miyagi, he fell back on his knees. His face seemed to cave in, the soft flesh sinking around the holes of his gaping mouth, his horror-stricken eyes. “You killed Harume? But why?”
“Never mind,” rasped Lady Miyagi. “Harume isn’t important anymore. This one is the problem now. She knows too much.” Her lips curved in a malicious grin directed at Reiko. “Do you know, I’m actually quite glad you turned out to be a spy. Now I feel even more justified in doing what I’ve been planning all along.”
“What-what’s that?” Still stunned by her discovery, Reiko shrank from the hostility that dripped from Lady Miyagi’s voice.
“I didn’t let you come here so you could steal my husband’s affection. No, I brought you because I saw the perfect chance to get you out of our life for good. Just the way I did with his two concubines.”
Lord Miyagi gasped. “Snowflake? Wren? What have you done to them?”
“They’re both dead.” Lady Miyagi nodded in smug satisfaction. “I tied them up and cut their throats.”
Horror flooded Reiko in a sickening gush. Seeing the maniacal fury in her hostess’s eyes, she regretted wasting her fear on the wrong person. The daimyo was innocent and harmless. The real danger lay in this woman whom Reiko had dismissed as his insignificant shadow. Now she yearned for the knife strapped to her left upper arm, but Lady Miyagi kept her right hand immobilized. She couldn’t reach the hidden weapon.
“But why, Cousin, why?” Lord Miyagi said. White with shock, he stared at his wife. “How could you kill my girls? They never did anything to hurt you. Surely… surely you’re not jealous?” Amazement lifted his voice. “They were just harmless diversions, like all my other women.”
“I know better,” Lady Miyagi snapped. “They could have taken you away from me and ruined everything. But I got rid of them. And now I’m going to make sure this one never comes between us, either.”
The urgency of demented purpose must have been building rapidly inside Lady Miyagi since Harume’s death, driving her to murder again and again. Sudden panic infused Reiko’s body with strength. Now the woman meant to kill her, too! Wrenching out of Lady Miyagi’s grip, she sprang to her feet and lunged toward the open front of the pavilion. But Lady Miyagi caught the end of her sash and yanked, whipping her around. She grabbed Reiko’s ankle. Losing her balance, Reiko fell backward across the table. Food and crockery went flying. As the crash shot pain through Reiko’s spine, Lady Miyagi jumped on top of her.
“Snowflake, Wren,” the daimyo moaned, huddling in the corner. “No, no… Cousin, you’ve lost your senses. Stop, please. Stop!”
Reiko tried to throw off the daimyo’s wife, but her arms were ensnared by the voluminous folds of her kimono, her legs twisted between Lady Miyagi’s. She couldn’t reach the dagger. She thrashed helplessly as the older woman grappled for her throat. Butting her forehead hard against Lady Miyagi’s face, she felt the painful crack of bone against bone. Her vision went black for an instant. Lady Miyagi cried out and reared back. Reiko heaved herself upright, but Lady Miyagi recovered before she could grab the knife. Blood streaming from her mouth, front teeth broken at the gums, she flew at Reiko, eyes crazed. Together they crashed against the lattice wall, splintering it. Cold air rushed into the pavilion.
“Cousin, stop,” keened Lord Miyagi.
With great chagrin, Reiko realized that she, a believer in the power of women, had underestimated the daimyo’s wife. Lady Miyagi’s urge to protect her husband equalled Reiko’s determination to share Sano’s work. Sano had considered Lady Miyagi a mere slave of her husband and not a serious suspect; like a thoughtless fool, Reiko had followed his example. She’d dismissed Lady Miyagi as old and weak, hardly capable of violence or killing. Now Reiko deplored her own stupidity. She’d correctly placed the blame for the murders within the Miyagi household, but failed to identify the actual culprit. She’d mistaken Lady Miyagi’s murderous mania for sexual arousal, overlooking every clue provided by her behavior. Even the poem, an oblique, chilling confession, had slipped past Reiko. Social mores had blinded her as much as Sano.
“Help!” Reiko shouted. At this moment, she would welcome the protection of a man. “Detective Fujisawa. Detective Ota. Help!”
Lady Miyagi laughed breathlessly as she clawed and kicked and pummeled. She tore at Reiko’s hair, scattering pins and combs. “Scream all you want. They won’t come.”
She clamped a hand over Reiko’s chin, forcing it back. Reiko fought to free herself, but Lady Miyagi possessed the unnatural strength of madness. Her knees pinned Reiko down. She whipped a dagger from beneath her robe and held the blade to Reiko’s face, touching her lips.
At once Reiko ceased struggling and went rigid. Eyes riveted on the length of sharp steel, she couldn’t breathe. She pictured the two concubines, slaughtered like animals, and felt her whole spirit recoil from the blade that could spill her own blood. The only other time she’d faced such danger was during that long-ago sword battle in Nihonbashi. She’d felt invincible then-she’d been so young, so foolish. Now the terrible fact of her own mortality struck Reiko. Yearning for Sano, she bitterly rued the error of confronting a murderer alone. But Sano was back in Edo; regrets wouldn’t save her.
Reiko forced herself to look past the dagger at Lady Miyagi, who knelt atop her, face hovering so close that Reiko could see the jagged edges of her broken teeth, the red veins in the whites of her hate-filled eyes. “Please don’t hurt me.” Despite her effort to sound brave, Reiko’s voice came out a tearful whisper. “I won’t tell anyone what you did, I promise.”
Lord Miyagi cried, “See, she wants to cooperate. Set her free. We can all go home and forget about this.”
“You mustn’t believe her lies, dearest Cousin.” Tenderness momentarily softened Lady Miyagi’s voice as she addressed her husband. “You must trust me to take care of everything, the way I always do.” She angled the knife downward, until it lay across Reiko’s throat.
“Please, let her go,” the daimyo moaned. “I’m scared.” His fascination with death had either been just a pose, or hadn’t withstood the spectacle of real violence. “I don’t want any trouble.”
“I told my husband where I was going,” Reiko said, longing for her own, inaccessible weapon. “You may get away with killing Harume and Choyei, but not me.”
Lady Miyagi laughed. “Oh, but I’m not going to kill you, Lady Sano.” Keeping the knife positioned, she eased sideways off Reiko. “You’re going to do it for me.”
She wound a thick skein of Reiko’s hair around her free hand, then stood. Yanked upright, Reiko cried out as pain shot through her scalp. She stumbled to her feet. Lady Miyagi held her tight; the knife grazed her neck.
“You were so enchanted by the moon,” the daimyo’s wife said, “that you decided to take a walk along the precipice.” Breathing hard, she forced Reiko to walk over scattered food and poems, past the cowering Lord Miyagi. “You tripped and fell to your death.”
“No!” Fresh horror weakened Reiko. “My husband will never believe it.”
“Oh, yes, he will.” Ruthless determination filled Lady Miyagi’s voice. She propelled Reiko down the steps of the pavilion and into the vast, windswept night. “So tragic, but accidents do happen. Move!”
39
