Shinju

In Shinagawa, the roadside inns, teahouses, and restaurants were doing a brisk business. Cooking odors drifted from behind curtains into the street. Tsunehiko greeted the sights and smells with a cry of rapture.

“Please, can we get something to eat, Yoriki Sano-san?” he begged.

“Later.” Sano, having watched the secretary eat almost nonstop since the onset of their journey, knew he was in no danger of starving. They could have a meal at the next station, while the horses rested and fed. He wanted to cover as much ground as possible before dark. He led the way to the checkpoint, where the low plaster post house stood well back from the road.

In front of the post house, a line snaked toward the window where station officials registered the travelers, checked their documents, and either granted or denied further passage. A nearby stable offered packhorses for hire. As Sano dismounted and took his place in line beside Tsunehiko, he heard drunken laughter coming from beyond the stable. There the local kago bearers sat around a fire in their encampment of flimsy shacks, drinking sake while they waited for customers.

After a few moments, Tsunehiko said impatiently, “What’s taking so long?”

Sano stepped out of line to look. A gray-haired woman and her two male escorts stood at the window. The official was sorting through a pile of papers, pausing now and then to question the woman.

“I don’t see why they have to bother about some old lady,” Tsunehiko complained when told. “They shouldn’t make us wait. We’re in a hurry!”

Sano resisted the impulse to tell him that they would have made better time if he hadn’t stopped so often. Tsunehiko’s obvious pleasure in the trip and his pride at traveling with his superior were rather endearing.

“The government can’t afford to let the daimyo smuggle their women out of Edo,” Sano said, taking the opportunity to teach his ignorant secretary. “With the hostages safe in the provinces, they would be free to express their anger toward the shogun’s taxes and restrictions on their freedom by launching a rebellion.”

Finally the woman followed a female official into the post house to be examined for the identifying scars and marks specified on her travel pass. Sano wondered how the Nius had arranged a pass for Midori so quickly. Those prized documents required many signatures and could take months to get. The Nius must have paid a fortune in bribes. Although they could well afford the expense, surely this meant they had strong reason to want Midori away from Edo.

When he reached the head of the line, Sano presented their passes and paid their tolls. He and Tsunehiko helped the searchers turn out their saddlebags to check for smuggled gold, foreign goods, and firearms. As government officials, they passed the inspection without difficulty. But as he prepared to depart, Sano experienced an uneasy, prickling sensation.

Someone was watching him. He could feel eyes trained on him, boring into his back with malicious intent.

He pretended to recheck the fastenings of his bags. Then he turned quickly. Several more travelers, including some mounted samurai, a few peasants, and a religious pilgrimage, had arrived since he’d last noticed. The few faces that looked back at him showed no more than ordinary interest. He saw no one he recognized.

“What are we waiting for, Yoriki Sano-san?” Tsunehiko sat astride his horse. “Is something wrong?”

“No, nothing.” Sano didn’t want to alarm Tsunehiko. He mounted his own horse, taking one last glance around as he led the way back to the road. The metsuke-government spies-kept a watch on all comings and goings along the Tokaido. Probably one of them, disguised to blend with the crowd, had chosen that moment to observe him. That was all.

But Sano’s uneasiness persisted. As they continued toward the next station at Kawasaki, he caught himself looking backward with increasing frequency. Were those three samurai or that peddler following them? The highway curved through a patch of woodland, and for a moment he and Tsunehiko had it to themselves. Tsunehiko stopped to urinate again. While he waited, Sano gazed into the pine trees that met overhead to form a canopy through which patches of blue sky showed. An excellent spot for soldiers to take cover from enemy arrows and bullets during war, he thought. And an equally excellent place for evildoers to hide. Every year, countless travelers were robbed and murdered on the Tokaido.

Horses’ hooves clopped on the road behind Sano. He peered back toward the curve, waiting for the rider to pass. Then the hoofbeats stopped. The morning was still, except for the twitter of birds and the rustle of the boughs overhead. Its silence, made ominous by that watching presence, unnerved Sano. His hand went to his sword. Did he dare shout, “Who goes there?” or ride around the curve to look? He had no desire to face an unknown assailant in this deserted place.

“Hurry up, Tsunehiko,” he called instead.

He was relieved when they emerged from the woods into open space. Then, to his frustration, he saw a serious obstacle to a quick escape: the Tama River. Several swimmers were fording horses across the smooth, sparkling water; others waited on the rocky bank. Ferrymen were helping passengers into flat wooden boats. The Tokugawas and their efficient peacekeeping tactics! To restrict troop movement along the Tokaido, they’d destroyed most of the bridges.

In his haste to be gone, Sano didn’t bother to negotiate fares with the river men. He paid the high prices they asked and helped Tsunehiko unload the horses. He hurried his secretary into one of the boats, threw their bags in, and jumped inside after them. The ferryman began to row them across the river with infuriating slowness, while two pairs of swimmers guided the horses carefully between hidden underwater rocks and logs.

Tsunehiko stuck his hand in the water and immediately pulled it out again. “Oh, it’s cold!” he exclaimed. To the swimmers, he called, “How can you bear it?”

The swimmers laughed, their tanned, grinning faces bobbing in the water beside the horses. “We’re tough!” one of them answered.

Sano listened with half his attention. He squinted across the water to the receding shore. Although he could see no one lurking among the trees, his sense of impending danger did not diminish.

From his hiding place behind a clump of firs, the watcher stood and gazed toward the river as the ferryboat carried Sano Ichiro to the opposite bank. The yoriki kept turning around to peer at the woods. He obviously knew he was being followed. Maybe he’d guessed as far back as the post house, but certainly when the watcher had almost come upon him on that deserted stretch of road.

But the watcher kept his position, unworried. He could tell by the way Sano’s puzzled gaze had darted from one person to another on the road-and the way it now swept the woods-that Sano didn’t know who was watching him, or from where. The watcher knew that he was a superb spy. He’d had plenty of experience with disguises and hiding. His drab hat and cloak had allowed him to blend first with the other travelers, and now with the landscape. And he knew how to conceal his thoughts and intentions so that no one noticed, let alone suspected him. People-Sano included-looked straight through him as if he wasn’t there. He hadn’t had to take to the fields yet, as he might when they got farther from Edo and the traffic thinned. And he didn’t much care that the yoriki was on guard. Anxiety would eat away at him. It would reduce him to helplessness by the time the watcher was ready to make his move.

Still, one thing disturbed the watcher. Not the smells of woods and water or his need for secrecy, which all vividly reminded him of the night he’d dumped the bodies in the river. The brilliant sunlight did much to banish any similarity between then and now. And the passage of time had allowed him to recover from the worst of his fear. His nightmares had stopped. He no longer awoke, sweating, heart pounding, from dreams of his own arrest, torture, and execution.

No-it was the young samurai traveling with Sano that bothered him. He’d expected Sano to be alone, and he didn’t like surprises. Then he told himself that the boy’s presence had its advantages. Sano made slower progress than he would have otherwise. Two men were easier to track than one. The watcher could lag far behind and still keep them in view, still catch up with them at every station. And the boy would distract Sano, making him less observant, less cautious.

The ferryboat reached the opposite bank. Sano and his companion stepped out and began unloading their bags. Their horses splashed ashore. Anxiously the watcher waited as his quarries dried, loaded, and mounted their horses and disappeared over the wooded bluff beyond the river. His eagerness nearly sent him rushing after them, but he fought it. Patience, he told himself. They couldn’t escape.

He made himself wait a few more heartbeats. Then he whistled softly to his horse. She’d been waiting