he found no clue to who had killed the girl.
“What now?” Marume asked..
His face reflected the disappointment that Sano felt. As Sano tried to think where to turn next, he paced Lilac’s corner, and something caught his attention. Salt crystals had collected in a crack between two floorboards, a crack slightly wider than elsewhere. Halting, Sano noticed that one board was shorter than the rest, about as long as his hand. He stepped gently on the short board, and it gave under his weight.
“A secret compartment?” Marume said, intrigued.
“I hope.” Sano knelt. He tried to lift the board, but couldn’t get his fingers inside the crack. He spoke to the maids who’d gathered around to watch: “Fetch me a hairpin.”
One was handed to him. He inserted it in the crack and pried up the short board. Underneath he found a narrow space between the floor joists and a wad of brown cloth. When he picked it out, it was heavier than it looked, due to small, hard objects wrapped inside. He shook into his palm four irregular, gleaming yellow lumps.
“Is that gold?” Marume put a lump in his mouth, bit it, and said, “In my amateur opinion, yes.”
The maids murmured with awe at the sight of more money than they could earn in years. The older woman said, “Lilac always had good things. She was like a squirrel, hiding them away.”
“Where could she have gotten this gold?” Marume asked.
“I think I can guess.” Sano asked the woman, “Did Lilac know Daigoro the gold merchant?”
The woman shook her head, but the half-blood girl tugged her arm and whispered to her. “She says she once saw Lilac talking to him in town.”
Sano’s investigation rebounded to the suspect that Hirata had interviewed, that they’d not pursued because they hadn’t had time and other suspects had seemed likelier culprits. Now Sano had made a connection between Daigoro and Lilac. He weighed in his hand the gold nuggets she must have extorted from the merchant. Daigoro was back in the picture, a new chance for Sano to solve the murder case just when he’d thought he’d exhausted his options.
“It’s time for a talk with Daigoro,” Sano said.
“My thoughts exactly,” Marume said, “but how do we get out of the castle?”
28
Dagger in hand, Reiko pressed her back against the wall of a building inside Fukuyama Castle. Soldiers carrying armloads of guns hurried near her through the courtyard. When they were gone, she sped along passages. She glanced sideways and backward, alert for threats, but kept her mind focused straight ahead. The world outside the castle had vanished from her consciousness. Normal, human life had ended for her. She didn’t feel the cold. She had no past nor future; she existed solely in the present moment. All her physical and spiritual energy pulsed through her with concentrated intensity. She was a human arrow, burning flames at both ends, fired toward a single purpose.
She didn’t bother spying on Lord Matsumae. He could wait. If Sano and Hirata failed to assassinate him, she would succeed. She would slash his throat and gladly watch him die for what he’d done to Masahiro. Her sense of purpose blazed away self-doubt as well as fear. But she had other matters to take care of first.
Slaying Lord Matsumae wasn’t enough to satisfy her. Although he’d have made the decision to kill her son, a samurai lord didn’t dirty his own hands. He wouldn’t have tended to Masahiro in that cage, treating him like an animal. Other men had done that. Reiko wanted their blood, too. They must pay for Masahiro’s suffering. She didn’t know who among all the troops they were, but she knew where to start looking.
Reiko headed for the keep. She easily evaded the troops busy preparing for war and the servants trudging on their daily routine. She felt invincible.
The tower was a black monolith against the orange sunrise. It appeared on fire, the cloud wisps like smoke. Reiko hurried up the hill, retracing the path she’d taken yesterday, an eternity ago. As she ran in the open door, her heart pumped with wild, erratic rhythm. She could taste blood from her own innards lacerated by grief, from those about to die by her hand.
All her senses and instincts were preternaturally alert. They tested the atmosphere in the tower and found only dead, empty air. Nobody was inside. Disoriented, she stumbled outside, down the hill. She paused at the gate to rethink her plans and catch her breath. The violent energy charging through her made her dizzy. Black waves licked her vision. She couldn’t remember how long it had been since she’d eaten or slept. Her body might give out on her before she was finished with it. She was aware that she’d gone as mad as Lord Matsumae. There must be something in the air in Ezogashima that drove people to extreme actions. The madness was destroying her as it had done him. Reiko clutched the gate for support and willed her strength to endure.
As she breathed deeply, her forehead pressed against the cold stone wall, the blackness retreated. She could see the wall’s rough, grayish plaster surface. Tiny black markings flecked it. They resembled crudely written characters. Reiko blinked, and they popped into focus. They actually were characters. She could read them.
A cry burst from Reiko. She dropped to her knees in the snow beside the wall. She yanked off her glove and touched the characters, afraid that she was hallucinating this message from her son. But she felt the rough edges where they‘ d been scratched into the plaster with some sharp object. The black color was charcoal ground into them. It rubbed off on her fingers. The message was real.
Reiko pictured Masahiro carving the words on the wall with a rock. Somehow he’d gotten himself out of his cage, out of the keep. He’d known that she and Sano would come for him, but decided to make his break for freedom in case they arrived too late to save him. He’d wanted to tell them he was making his own way home. He’d written the message where they might possibly find it, where his captors wouldn’t. Reiko saw Masahiro rub a piece of charcoal against the characters so that they would be visible, then run out this very gate. She clasped her hands and sobbed. Her brave, resourceful boy! The full implications of her discovery struck her.
Maybe Masahiro wasn’t dead after all.
Maybe he’d managed to get out of Fukuyama Castle, the Matsumae troops had never executed him, and the blood on the blanket wasn’t his.
Maybe he was still alive.
The hope she’d forsaken surged anew in Reiko. Her body trembled violently from its force that exploded the plans she’d made, shattered her unnatural state of calm, disciplined insanity. Her mind shifted focus, away from vengeance, to the new possibility of reuniting with Masahiro. She laughed for joy as mad as her grief had been. She noticed that the sun had risen, dazzling and gold. But her laughter quickly faded.
How long ago had Masahiro escaped?
What had happened to him since then?
Merciful gods, where was he now?
Reiko staggered to her feet and looked around for some clue about what had become of Masahiro. But she saw nothing except the empty compound, the deserted keep. As she tried to think what to do, she heard footsteps from the other side of the wall. A male voice said, “Old Gizaemon is working us so hard, I’ll be exhausted before the war even starts.”
Another, similar voice said, “Me, too. Let’s take a rest in here. Maybe he won’t notice we’re gone.”
The gate opened. Two young soldiers were beside Reiko before she had a chance to hide. “Hey, who are you?” one said. His friend asked, “What are you doing here?”
Reiko took in their almost identical pudgy faces and stocky builds, their belligerent expressions. She recognized them as the two guards she’d seen on her first trip to the keep, the men she’d come hunting. She wasn’t so far past her obsession with revenge that she’d forgotten it; she hadn’t forgotten her anger toward her son’s jailers. She still wanted to kill them.
She lashed her dagger at the soldiers. They leaped away, too surprised to fight back.
“Hey!” one of them exclaimed. “Why are you attacking us?”
