Priest Anraku-these all validated Reiko’s sudden notion that Haru had admitted while asleep a guilt her conscious mind refused to recall.
But Reiko didn’t want to believe that she’d mistakenly interfered with Sano’s attempts to serve justice. Perhaps she’d misinterpreted what Haru had said. The blows Haru had received to her head and the medicine Dr. Ito had given her might have confused her. One thing was certain. Much as Reiko hated to breach the code of honesty in her marriage with Sano, she couldn’t tell him about Haru’s unconscious ramblings, for that would escalate his campaign against Haru, and the Black Lotus would never be exposed.
29
If there be those who trouble and disrupt the proponents of the true Law,
Their blood will spill like rivers.
– FROM THE BLACK LOTUS SUTRA
Midori awakened to groggy consciousness. A heavy fog of sleep weighed upon her. Through it she heard distant chanting. Her head ached; her mouth was dry and her stomach queasy. Rolling onto her side, she opened her eyes.
She was lying on a futon on a wooden pallet, in a large room illuminated by shafts of sunlight from barred windows. Around her, other women lay asleep on beds arranged in rows. Midori frowned in confusion. Who were they? Where was she? Then she realized that she must be in the Black Lotus convent, and the women were her fellow novices. The fog in her mind lifted, and she recalled the initiation ceremony with lucidity and horror.
She’d enjoyed that man touching her, thinking he was Hirata! She couldn’t believe she’d behaved so disgracefully! There must have been poison in the incense that had driven her mad. Anraku’s blood must have contained a sleeping potion, because she couldn’t recall anything that had happened after drinking it.
Now Midori noticed that the sleeping women were dressed in gray robes instead of the white ones they’d worn last night. Some of them were bald: Their heads had been shaved. Midori’s heart lurched as she recalled that now they were all nuns. Her hand flew to her own head. She felt long, silky hair and sighed in relief, though she wondered why she’d been spared. Examining herself, she saw that she, too, wore gray. Someone had changed her clothes while she slept. Misery and shame swelled inside Midori. She’d thought herself such a clever spy, yet she’d succumbed to the Black Lotus.
A nun walked up the aisle, banging a gong. “Get up!” she ordered. “It’s time to begin your new life!”
Amid murmurs and yawns, the new nuns stirred. Midori sat up, wincing as vertigo engulfed her. Servant girls passed out steaming bowls of tea and rice gruel.
“No talking,” the nun announced.
Midori received her portion and realized she was hungry, but feared that the food contained poison. If she wanted to keep her wits, she must not consume anything the sect gave her.
“If you’re not going to eat yours, can I have it?” someone whispered.
Looking up, Midori saw Toshiko kneeling on the bed beside hers. Toshiko looked sleepy; she still had her hair, too. Midori noticed that all the prettier girls did. Concerned for her friend’s safety, Midori whispered urgently, “No, you can’t! It might be bad!”
“Bad?” Toshiko frowned. “What do you mean?”
The nun patrolled the aisles. Midori didn’t want to find out what the punishment was for breaking rules. She realized that she couldn’t leave Toshiko at the mercy of the Black Lotus. When she left the temple, she must take her friend with her. “I’ll explain as soon as I can.” Then curiosity overrode caution. “What did Anraku promise you?”
Toshiko never got a chance to answer, because the nun herded everyone outside to use the privies and fetch water from the well to wash themselves. Then she took them to the main hall. The precinct was full of nuns and priests bringing in rice bales, loads of charcoal and wood, urns of oil, barrels of pickled vegetables and dried fish. Midori wondered why they needed so many provisions. She saw no pilgrims around, and felt a stab of fear.
The Black Lotus had indeed expelled everyone except its members. She must be the only outsider here. The weather was clear and bright, but Midori sensed an undercurrent in the atmosphere, as if from an invisible storm brewing. She longed to run away before anything worse happened to her, but she couldn’t go home with nothing to tell except the details of the initiation ceremony, and she’d rather die than have anyone know that. If she returned empty-handed, everything she’d gone through would be for naught. Besides, she’d come to believe that the Black Lotus really was evil, and she wanted to help defeat it. She must be brave and stay long enough to gather the information she’d promised Reiko.
Inside the main hall, her group joined a crowd of monks and nuns who were kneeling on the floor. An elderly priest led them in chanting. Midori secured a place next to Toshiko and chanted the monotonous prayer. The hall looked different today. Curtains covered the mirrors, and only a few candles burned on the altar, yet the emotional intensity she’d felt last night still charged the air. Senior nuns and priests guarded the doors or patrolled narrow aisles between the ranks of kneeling figures. Head bowed, Midori nudged Toshiko.
“The Black Lotus is dangerous,” she whispered. “It kills people. Something bad is going to happen.”
“How do you know?” Toshiko whispered back.
The thought of revealing her true identity and purpose scared Midori, but she didn’t think Toshiko would believe her unless she did. “I’m Niu Midori, a spy for the wife of the shogun’s sosakan-sama. She told me,” Midori said. “I’m here to find out what’s happening. As soon as I do, I’m leaving. You have to come with me because if you stay, you could get hurt.”
They kept chanting as Toshiko flashed Midori a frightened glance. Then Toshiko whispered, “All right. What are we going to do?”
“I’ll sneak away later and look around,” Midori answered. “Then I’ll come back for you.”
At intervals during the prayers, groups of nuns and priests filed out of the hall and others filed in, worshipping in shifts. Eventually, the nun led Midori’s group to a building that housed a workshop for printing prayers. Inside, nuns cut sheets of paper and mixed pots of acrid black ink. Others worked at long tables, spreading ink on wooden blocks incised with characters and pressing the blocks against paper. Midori and Toshiko were assigned to cut the printed prayers into strips that bore the message, “Hail the new era of the Black Lotus.” Two priests roved the room, overseeing the work. Midori waited until the priests were busy at the other end of the room, then edged toward the door.
“Where are you going?” demanded a loud, female voice.
Startled, Midori looked around and saw a nun glaring at her from the printing table. The priests moved toward her. “To the privy,” Midori lied, belatedly aware that everyone here watched one another.
“Go with her,” one of the priests told the nun.
On the way to the privy and back, the nun never let Midori out of sight. Working beside Toshiko, Midori whispered, “You have to help me get away.”
Toshiko sliced her knife between rows of printed characters. “I’ll do something to distract everybody.”
“When?” Midori asked anxiously.
“We’ll have to wait for the right time. Just be patient and watch me. When I wink at you, run.”
Now Midori was glad she’d taken Toshiko into her confidence. Toshiko was exactly the clever accomplice she needed.
“We should not have left Haru in jail,” Reiko said to Sano.
It was late afternoon, and they were traveling through Nihonbashi toward Edo Castle. Reiko rode in her palanquin, while Sano walked beside its open window, leading his horse; Hirata and the detectives preceded them. A short time ago, Sano had finished his inquiries at Edo Jail, told Reiko the results, and said it was time to go home. Reiko hadn’t wanted to leave Haru, and she didn’t agree with his version of events, but she couldn’t disgrace her
