Shogun

talking to a real pilot. Come aboard. How did you sneak past Malacca? How did you avoid our Indian Ocean patrols, eh? Whose rutter did you steal?”

“Where are you taking me?”

“Osaka. The Great Lord High Executioner himself wants to see you.”

Blackthorne felt his panic returning. “Who?”

“Toranaga! Lord of the Eight Provinces, wherever the hell they are! The chief daimyo of Japan—a daimyo’s like a king or feudal lord but better. They’re all despots.”

“What’s he want with me?”

“I don’t know but that’s why we’re here, and if Toranaga wants to see you, Pilot, he’ll see you. They say he’s got a million of these slant-eyed fanatics who’ll die for the honor of wiping his arse if that’s his pleasure! ‘Toranaga wants you to bring back the pilot, Vasco,’ his interpreter said. ‘Bring back the pilot and the ship’s cargo. Take old Toda Hiro-matsu there to examine the ship and—’ Oh yes, Pilot, it’s all confiscated, so I hear, your ship, and everything in it!”

“Confiscated?”

“It may be a rumor. Jappers sometimes confiscate things with one hand, give ’em back with the other—or pretend they’ve never given the order. It’s hard to understand the poxy little bastards!”

Blackthorne felt the cold eyes of the Japanese boring into him and he tried to hide his fear. Rodrigues followed his glance. “Yes, they’re getting restless. Time enough to talk. Come aboard.” He turned but Blackthorne stopped him.

“What about my friends, my crew?”

“Eh?”

Blackthorne told him briefly about the pit. Rodrigues questioned Omi in pidgin Japanese. “He says they’ll be all right. Listen, there’s nothing you or me can do now. You’ll have to wait—you can never tell with a Jappo. They’re six-faced and three-hearted.” Rodrigues bowed like a European courtier to Hiro-matsu. “This is the way we do it in Japan. Like we’re at the court of Fornicating Philip II, God take that Spaniard to an early grave.” He led the way on deck. To Blackthorne’s astonishment there were no chains and no slaves.

“What’s the matter? You sick?” Rodrigues asked.

“No. I thought this was a slaver.”

“They don’t have ’em in Japan. Not even in their mines. Lunatic, but there you are. You’ve never seen such lunatics and I’ve traveled the world three times. We’ve samurai rowers. They’re soldiers, the old bugger’s personal soldiers—and you’ve never seen slaves row better, or men fight better.” Rodrigues laughed. “They put their arses into the oars and I push ’em just to watch the buggers bleed. They never quit. We came all the way from Osaka— three-hundred-odd sea miles in forty hours. Come below. We’ll cast off shortly. You sure you’re all right?”

“Yes. Yes, I think so.” Blackthorne was looking at Erasmus. She was moored a hundred yards away. “Pilot, there’s no chance of going aboard, is there? They haven’t let me back aboard, I’ve no clothes and they sealed her up the moment we arrived. Please?”

Rodrigues scrutinized the ship.

“When did you lose the foremast?”

“Just before we made landfall here.”

“There a spare still aboard?”

“Yes.”

“Where’s her home port?”

“Rotterdam.”

“She was built there?”

“Yes.”

“I’ve been there. Bad shoals but a piss-cutter of a harbor. She’s got good lines, your ship. New—haven’t seen one of her class before. Madonna, she’d be fast, very fast. Very rough to deal with.” Rodrigues looked at him. “Can you get your gear quickly?” He turned over the half-hour glass sand timer that was beside the hourglass, both attached to the binnacle.

“Yes.” Blackthorne tried to keep his growing hope off his face.

“There’d be a condition, Pilot. No weapons, up your sleeve or anywhere. Your word as a pilot. I’ve told the monkeys I’d be responsible for you.”

“I agree.” Blackthorne watched the sand falling silently through the neck of the timer.

“I’ll blow your head off, pilot or no, if there’s the merest whiff of trickery, or cut your throat. If I agree.”

“I give you my word, pilot to pilot, by God. And the pox on the Spanish!”

Rodrigues smiled and banged him warmly on the back. “I’m beginning to like you, Ingeles.”

“How’d you know I’m English?” Blackthorne asked, knowing his Portuguese was perfect and that nothing he had said could have differentiated him from a Dutchman.

“I’m a soothsayer. Aren’t all pilots?” Rodrigues laughed.

“You talked to the priest? Father Sebastio told you?”

“I don’t talk to priests if I can help it. Once a week’s more than enough for any man.” Rodrigues spat deftly into the scuppers and went to the port gangway that overlooked the jetty. “Toady-sama! Ikimasho ka?”

“Ikimasho, Rodrigu-san. Ima!”

“Ima it is.” Rodrigues looked at Blackthorne thoughtfully. “?‘Ima’ means ‘now,’ ‘at once.’ We’re to leave at once, Ingeles.”

The sand had already made a small, neat mound in the bottom of the glass.

“Will you ask him, please? If I can go aboard my ship?”

“No, Ingeles. I won’t ask him a poxy thing.”

Blackthorne suddenly felt empty. And very old. He watched Rodrigues go to the railing of the quarterdeck and bellow to a small, distinguished seaman who stood on the raised fore-poop deck at the bow. “Hey, Captain-san. Ikimasho? Get samurai aboard-u, ima! Ima, wakarimasu ka? ”

“Hai, Anjin-san.”

Immediately Rodrigues rang the ship’s bell loudly six times and the Captain-san began shouting orders to the seamen and samurai ashore and aboard. Seamen hurried up on deck from below to prepare for departure and, in the disciplined, controlled confusion, Rodrigues quietly took Blackthorne’s arm and shoved him toward the starboard gangway, away from the shore.

“There’s a dinghy below, Ingeles. Don’t move fast, don’t look around, and don’t pay attention to anyone but me. If I tell you to come back, do it quickly.”

Blackthorne walked across the deck, down the gangway, toward the small Japanese skiff. He heard angry voices behind him and he felt the hairs on his neck rising for there were many samurai all over the ship, some armed with bows and arrows, a few with muskets.

“You don’t have to worry about him, Captain-san, I’m responsible. Me, Rodrigu-san, ichi ban Anjin-san, by the Virgin! Wakarimasu ka?” was dominating the other voices, but they were getting angrier every moment.

Blackthorne was almost in the dinghy now and he saw that there were no rowlocks. I can’t scull like they do, he told himself. I can’t use the boat! It’s too far to swim. Or is it?

He hesitated, checking the distance. If he had had his full strength he would not have waited a moment. But now?

Feet clattered down the gangway behind him and he fought the impulse to turn.

“Sit in the stern,” he heard Rodrigues say urgently. “Hurry up!”

He did as he was told and Rodrigues jumped in nimbly, grabbed the oars and, still standing, shoved off with great skill.

A samurai was at the head of the gangway, very perturbed, and two other samurai were beside him, bows ready. The captain samurai called out, unmistakably beckoning them to come back.

A few yards from the vessel Rodrigues turned. “Just go there,” he shouted up at him, pointing at