The Ronin’s Mistress

Pines.”

This was a passage some two hundred paces long and twenty wide, named for the paintings of pine trees on the sliding doors along it. Sano and Kajikawa stood in the middle of the polished cypress floor while officials and servants strolled past them. Shiny wooden pillars supported the high, coffered ceiling. Footsteps and voices echoed. Sano had walked the Corridor of Pines many times, but now he viewed it through fresh eyes, as a crime scene.

“There’s a lot of traffic here every day,” he said. “And yet, when Lord Asano attacked Kira, you were the only witness? How is that?”

“There are moments when the corridor is pretty deserted,” Kajikawa said. “Lord Asano attacked Kira during one of them.”

“Could you tell me what happened?” Sano asked.

Kajikawa’s delicate eyebrows drew together; his small mouth pursed. “I’ve already told the officials who investigated the incident.”

Sano sensed that his meekness hid a stronger spine than most people would attribute to him. “Why don’t you want to tell me? Are you tired of talking about it, or is something else wrong?”

“No.” Kajikawa gave way with the air of a man often defeated. “I’d be glad to tell you.”

1701 April

An army of officials and servants toiled to entertain the imperial envoys who’d arrived from Miyako. Kajikawa rushed back and forth, busy with a million details. He was on his hands and knees on the floor in the reception chamber, picking up lint, when a messenger told him, “The master of ceremonies says that there’s been a change in the schedule. The presentation of the gifts will take place an hour earlier than originally planned.”

Kajikawa was in charge of conveying the gifts to the envoys. “Are you sure that’s what Kira said?”

“Yes, but you can ask him yourself.”

Kajikawa hurried through the palace in search of Kira. He paused in the Corridor of Pines to catch his breath. The corridor was vacant, eerily silent. Then a man appeared at the far end, as if he’d materialized out of thin air. It was Lord Asano. He moved toward Kajikawa.

“Greetings,” Kajikawa called. “Have you seen the master of ceremonies?”

Lord Asano didn’t answer. As he came nearer, Kajikawa could see that the young daimyo was pale and trembling, his face a mass of twitches. His hollow eyes looked straight through Kajikawa. A door opened along the corridor between them. Out stepped Kira, elegant in black formal robes, wearing his usual expression of sour disapproval.

“Kira-san, could you please confirm the time of the gift ceremony?” Kajikawa called.

The old man turned toward Kajikawa; he started to answer. Suddenly Lord Asano rushed up behind Kira. Rage distorted his features. He seized the hilt of the long sword at his waist and yanked the blade from the scabbard. Kajikawa gasped, too shocked to move or speak, as Lord Asano gripped the sword in both hands and swung at Kira.

Kira saw the emotion on Kajikawa’s face and turned around to see what had caused it. Lord Asano’s blade came slashing toward him. Kira yelled and dodged. Lord Asano’s sword struck a pillar, cutting into the wood.

“What are you doing?” Kira demanded.

“What do you think?” Lord Asano shouted as he jerked his blade free. “Have you forgotten my grievance?”

“My dear friend, I have no idea what you’re talking about.” Kira pedaled backward down the corridor, his arms raised in self-defense.

“Oh, yes, you do!” Lord Asano charged after Kira.

As Kajikawa watched with his hands over his mouth, Lord Asano sliced at Kira again. The blade struck Kira on the head. Kira howled, was knocked down, and landed on his back. Kajikawa found his voice and screamed. Kira raised himself on his elbows. His face dripping with blood, he crawled away from Lord Asano, who hacked repeatedly at him and repeatedly missed. Lord Asano shouted, “I know this isn’t the appropriate time or place to kill you, but kill you I must, you evil, corrupt old snake!”

“Help! Help!” Kira called.

Kajikawa grabbed Lord Asano and restrained him until the castle guards arrived moments later. As they dragged him away, Lord Asano broke down and sobbed.

* * *

Now, almost two years after the attack, Sano stood in the Corridor of Pines and touched the cut on the pillar that Lord Asano had struck, the only evidence left. Sano raised his eyes to Kajikawa, who had put a new, surprising slant on the forty-seven ronin case.

“Did Lord Asano really accuse Kira of corruption?” Sano asked.

“Yes.” Kajikawa sounded a bit peeved that Sano would question his veracity. Sano suspected he often felt underrated. “I heard him with my own ears.”

“You never reported it during the investigation into the attack,” Sano said.

“… No.”

“Why not?”

Kajikawa’s head bobbled nervously. “At the time, I didn’t know if there was any truth to Lord Asano’s accusation. I didn’t want to mention it and get myself in trouble with Kira.”

“So you withheld the information.” Sano eyed the little man with reproach because it was information that related to Lord Asano’s grievance against Kira, that pertained to the motive for the attack and the underlying truth about the vendetta.

“I should have spoken up,” Kajikawa admitted. “I’m sorry I didn’t. But neither did Lord Asano. I thought he would try to justify his attack by casting aspersion on Kira. I was surprised that when he was asked what his quarrel with Kira was, he refused to say.”

Sano had been surprised, too. He’d wondered what grievance had driven the man into such drastic action. So had everyone else.

“I decided that if Lord Asano didn’t say anything, then it was better that I didn’t,” Kajikawa said primly.

Sano disliked Kajikawa for his cowardice, which he was passing off as discretion. But the man had given Sano a new direction for his inquiries. “You said you didn’t know if there was any truth to Lord Asano’s charge of corruption against Kira ‘at the time.’ Does that mean you’ve changed your mind since then?”

Kajikawa cleared his throat. “I don’t like to speak ill of the dead.”

“I give you permission,” Sano said.

“It’s just a rumor I heard about Kira a long time ago. I remembered it months after the attack. I don’t know whether it’s true.”

“I’ll determine that. Talk.”

Kajikawa sighed, perhaps tired of being coerced, perhaps relieved that he could unburden himself of a weighty secret. “When Kira was young, he had a brother-in-law who was a wealthy daimyo, Lord Uesugi of Yonezawa Province. Lord Uesugi didn’t have any sons. He named Kira’s son as his heir. Soon afterward, Lord Uesugi died. Kira’s son inherited his title and estate. The rumor said that Kira poisoned Lord Uesugi.”

This was the first evidence a witness not personally involved in the case had given that Kira was other than a blameless man. But even as Sano welcomed the evidence, he remarked on an important point: “Nothing seems to have come of the rumor.”

“It was never proven. If the government had thought there was any truth to it, Kira would never have risen so high. So you can understand why I haven’t brought it up until now.”

Sano unwillingly spotted more weaknesses in the evidence. “Even if it was true that Kira poisoned his brother-in-law, I can’t see that Lord Asano would have cared enough to attack Kira.” And he was hard-pressed to demonstrate that Lord Asano’s motive for attacking Kira had any bearing on the forty-seven ronin’s vendetta.

“Maybe there was a connection between Kira’s brother-in-law and Lord Asano. People of their rank are so inbred.” Now Kajikawa seemed eager to promote the theory that the supposed murder was the motive behind the attack.