At the sound of the door opening and footsteps on the veranda, Lady Miyagi said, “Tea is served.”
“Tea! Oh, yes!” Reiko exclaimed, giddy with relief.
They sat in the pavilion. The concubines brought hot, damp cloths for washing their hands and laid before them an extravagant repast: tea, fresh figs, bean-jam cakes, pickled melon, boiled chestnuts in honey, sliced lobster arranged in the shape of a peony. As Reiko politely sampled the refreshments, she thought of the poisoned ink. Her throat closed; a surge of nausea roiled her stomach. She felt a growing conviction that Lord Miyagi was the killer. The crimes against Lady Harume, which had involved no physical contact, suited the daimyo’s habits. He’d sent her the ink bottle. The tea tasted bitter in Reiko’s mouth, and the sweets saturated with the taint of dead flesh.
Lounging beside her, Lord Miyagi chewed slowly, amid much lip-smacking. As he ate petals of the lobster peony, his gaze moved over Reiko as if peeling off her clothes with his eyes. She blushed under her makeup, forcing down a gulp of tea. Her stomach lurched, and for one awful moment she feared the liquid would come back up.
The daimyo intoned:
'High on the bough hangs the ripe fruit,
Safe beyond the reach of man; untouched
A wasp pierces her downy flesh
And drinks of the sweetness within-
From below, I celebrate the wedding
With my own ecstasy.”
He bit into the rosy pulp of a fig, never taking his gaze from Reiko. With a sinuous movement, he lifted a hand to her head. Reiko gasped. The concubines tittered; Lord Miyagi chuckled. “Don’t be afraid, my dear. A leaf has become tangled in your pretty hair-let me remove it.”
His fingers trailed over Reiko’s temple and down her cheek before falling away. There was no leaf in them. The daimyo’s touch left a damp sensation, like a snail’s track. Hot with angry embarrassment, Reiko looked away. As a sheltered upper-class girl, she’d had little contact with men outside her immediate household, and none had dared treat a magistrate’s daughter with such disrespect. Thus, she had no idea how to handle Lord Miyagi’s vulgar attentions. The only thing she could think to do was pretend she didn’t know what he was doing.
“You have an admirable turn of phrase,” she said weakly, then looked to Lady Miyagi for assistance. If the woman had any pride or sense, she would stop the daimyo’s outrageous flirtation now! How could any wife bear seeing her husband make advances toward another woman? Reiko herself would kill Sano if he ever behaved this way.
Yet Lady Miyagi merely watched and nodded; her stiff smile never wavered. If she felt any jealousy, she kept it well hidden. “Do you enjoy poetry, Lady Sano?” Sunlight slanted through the pavilion’s lattice walls, revealing the mustache hairs on her upper lip. At Reiko’s helpless nod, she said, “So do I.”
They discussed famous poets and quoted classic poems. Lady Miyagi recited some of her own verse and invited Reiko to do the same. Licking his fingers, Lord Miyagi watched. Reiko hardly knew what she was saying. As the food soured in her churning stomach, her mind whirled with questions. What had happened between the couple and Lady Harume? Was this how it had started? Had it led to the concubine’s death?
However, Reiko had lost whatever control she’d had over the interview. None of Sano’s explanations or advice had prepared her for the actuality of this situation. She couldn’t figure out how to direct the conversation back to the murder case without arousing suspicion. Despair worsened the sickness that washed over her in hot and cold waves. The morning took on the dimensions of a nightmare. Lady Miyagi’s eyes shone as she recited haiku. Reiko squirmed beneath Lord Miyagi’s tactile gaze. At last she could bear her distress no longer.
“I’ve imposed upon your hospitality for too long,” she choked out. “Now I must be going.”
The daimyo sighed regretfully. “So soon, my dear? Ah, well… partings are inevitable, the joys of life ephemeral. The frost claims even the freshest, loveliest blooms.”
Again the dark excitement swelled in his voice. Reiko felt the spirit of Lady Harume hovering over the garden. Her gorge rose.
Then Lord Miyagi’s eyes brightened, like sunlight reflecting off polluted water. “Tonight we are making a trip to our villa in the hills, to view the autumn moon. Would you be so good as to accompany us?”
No! I never want to see you again! Let me out of here! The vehement refusal would have burst from Reiko’s lips, had she not been pressing them together in an attempt to contain her sickness. She knew the danger she courted during every moment spent with a man who found pleasure in the death of a young woman.
“Please do come,” Lady Miyagi urged. “Your poetic talent will find much inspiration in the beauty of nature.”
Sano had told her to be careful, and the thought of going anywhere with the Miyagi terrified and repulsed Reiko.
“The occasion will provide us a chance to become better acquainted, my dear.” The daimyo’s lazy smile suggested a night of bizarre, forbidden thrills. “So far from the city, nothing shall disturb us.”
Yet Reiko had no proof that Lord Miyagi had poisoned Harume. Her own certainty wouldn’t convict him. She needed evidence, or a confession. To obtain either, she must take advantage of the chance to see Lord Miyagi again.
“Thank you for the kind invitation.” Reiko forced the words past the sour bile in her throat. “I gladly accept.”
Fighting nausea, her skin cold and clammy, she nodded as her hosts discussed and settled upon travel arrangements. “Now I must be on my way to finish my calls and prepare for the journey. Good-bye!”
The walk through the daimyo’s estate to the street lasted an eternity. Dizzy and faint, Reiko jumped into her waiting palanquin, not at all sure she could control herself until she got home. As the vehicle bounced with the bearers’ steps, her stomach heaved.
“Stop!” Reiko cried.
Leaping out, she ran into an alley, crouched, and vomited, raising her sleeve to shield herself from public view. Relief was instantaneous, but dread followed immediately. How could she bear to spend an entire night with the Miyagi? Stumbling back to the palanquin, Reiko consoled herself with the knowledge that she had the rest of the day to prepare for the ordeal. She couldn’t let Sano down, when failure to solve the case would ruin them. Somehow she must deliver Lord Miyagi to justice.
If only her courage-and stomach-didn’t fail her.
34
The Tsubame Inn, where Lady Harume and Lord Miyagi had trysted, was located in a quiet lane on the outskirts of Asakusa, away from the busy Kannon Temple precinct. Its low, thatch-roofed buildings clustered behind a high bamboo fence. Across the street, an earthen wall surrounded a minor temple. The blank facades of warehouses comprised the immediate neighborhood.
Dismounting outside the inn’s gate, Sano surveyed the empty street.
A short distance away, birds soared above rice fields. Harume and the daimyo could not have chosen a more private, out-of-the-way place for a rendezvous. However, Sano hadn’t come here to investigate their affair. He was playing a hunch.
He stepped through the gate. Inside, an artfully landscaped garden of evergreens, cherry trees, and red-leafed maples signaled a high class of clientele, none of whom was visible. The buildings’ doors were closed, their windows shuttered. But Sano heard the murmur of voices through thin walls; he could smell food cooking. Steam issued from the bathhouse. Sano suspected that a raid on the inn would expose the illicit liaisons of some of Edo ’s most prominent citizens. He hoped that the solution to the mystery of Lady Harume’s murder also hid here.
The entranceway of the front building sheltered an alcove tastefully decorated with branches of red berries in a black ceramic vase instead of the usual list of prices for room and board. When Sano rang the bell, the proprietor emerged from his living quarters.
“Welcome to the Tsubame Inn, master,” he said. “You wish lodgings?” His grave mien and somber black kimono conveyed the utmost discretion.
