CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

A CUDGEL FROM A BAMBOO BUSH

Just before Hiratsuka, the Tkaid became a raised causeway through the brown rice paddies that covered a broad plain. On both sides the paddies came up to the huge pines that lined the road. The mountains of Hakone that hunched against the ashen sky to the southwest were the same dark gray as the clouds closing in overhead.

Raveled strands of lightning flicked at the mountain peaks. The branches of the pines stirred fitfully. A kago bearer trotted by with his empty conveyance strapped to his back. As a pack horse driver hurried his animals past Cat and Kasane, the bells on the harnesses had an urgency to them.

Cat stopped at a stand selling religious accessories to those going to the small temple in the grove of ancient pines nearby. She bought two bundles of slender incense sticks, two small bowls of rice and tiny cups, and a pair of deep orange Mino persimmons. She chose the persimmons with care, picking the largest, so ripe and swollen with sweet juice that they seemed about to burst.

Cat divided her purchases with Kasane. “For your brother,” she said gruffly.

Kasane tried to thank her, but she was too overcome to speak. She bowed low over the things in her outspread hands.

Together they rinsed their mouths and hands at the chapel’s big stone basin. They put the bowls of rice and cups of water in front of the altar. They lit the incense in the coals of the brazier kept there for that purpose. Then they each put their palms together and bowed their heads. Cat prayed for the repose of her father’s soul and Kasane for her brother’s.

They resumed their journey in silence and were just entering Hiratsuka when the first large drops splattered on the brim of Cat’s hat. A gust of wind tore umbrellas and blew people’s clothes about them. It set the pines to lashing, and Cat and Kasane had to lean into it to walk. The few remaining travelers ran for shelter.

“Stop!” The cry came from the stable next to the government transport office. It was loud and imperious, and Cat heard it, of course. She shifted her grip on her staff so she could use it as a weapon and kept moving.

“Halt, you!” Two men moved away from the stable.

As the rain began falling in torrents, Cat dodged into an alley. She tucked her chin down, pulled her elbows in, and ran, splashing mud all over herself. She darted at random down one narrow passageway, then another.

She was trying to lose the peasant woman while she was at it. Being caught with Cat would mean trouble for Kasane. But Kasane had been ill used by so many people, she had come to think of Cat as a champion of sorts. She was determined not to be left behind. Burdened as she was, however, Kira’s men soon passed her.

Cat could hear the men gaining on her. When she saw the back door of a bathhouse slightly open, she slipped inside and slid it shut behind her. She ran down the dark back hallway while the wind rattled the heavy wooden shutters across the front of the building and rain drummed loudly on the cedar shingles of the roof.

Cat almost collided with an off-duty attendant on her way to take a bath herself. She was wearing an unbelted cotton robe with a small towel draped over one shoulder. She screamed and threw up her hands, and the toiletries flew out of the basin she was carrying. She charged through a sliding screen to avoid being trampled by Kira’s men.

Cat found the maneuvering space she needed in the large, high-ceilinged room of the bath itself. A square cypress tub with sides as high as Cat’s waist stood in the center of it. It was big enough to accommodate eight or nine bathers. Round wooden buckets for washing were stacked in pyramids against the walls. Wooden grates covered the long drains that ran around the edges of the room. One wall near the entrance was covered with broad shelves for clothing.

Two more attendants were taking advantage of the off-hour leisure. Naked, they gossiped as they scrubbed themselves with small bags of rice bran. They had been anticipating a long soak in the bath. They had slid off the wooden lid so that one edge rested on the floor and the other against the rim. Steam rose from the water.

They stared, with mouths open and bran bags poised, as Cat rushed in. When they saw the expression on her face they screamed and fled, leaving their clothes behind on the shelves. Cat whirled to face the door. She raised her staff in a fighting stance and poised her weight on the balls of her feet. Kira’s men followed with their long-swords drawn.

Cat backed up until the side of the tub almost grazed the backs of her legs. The steam rising from it enveloped her, giving her a ghostly appearance. When outnumbered, take the offensive, was Musashi’s advice. With a cry she charged. She maneuvered toward the left, pressing their off sides and keeping them in front of her. She thrust and blocked without the interference of conscious thought, sensing the men’s moves before they made them.

She knew she couldn’t hold out long against the two of them. She wasn’t well trained in the use of the staff, and in any case it lacked the reach and menace of the naginata. Her only advantage was desperation and the fact that Kira’s men had been ordered to capture her if possible and kill her only as a last resort. Kira didn’t want to be linked to a murder he couldn’t claim was an accident.

Musashi taught that a warrior must strike slow and hard, like the flow of deep water. Cat must feel the strength welling up within her. She must strike from the muscles of the abdomen and swing into the blow with her entire body. Cat’s staff resounded each time it blocked a steel blade. The shock of the blows numbed her fingers. Cat knew she was barely holding them at bay, and she was beginning to flag. Soon they would close and disarm her.

From the corner of her eye she saw Kasane enter the room. Kasane had taken off her pack and the furoshiki. As she raised one of the heavy wooden washtubs high over her head, the sleeves of her pilgrim’s robe fell back, revealing the sinuous muscles of someone used to hard work. Kasane heaved the bucket at the man closest to her.

He saw it coming, but not soon enough. He hadn’t been expecting a cudgel from a bamboo bush, an attack from a peasant. The tub hit him squarely on the side of the head. He toppled facedown into the bath, with his legs sticking out over the side. Other than the waving of his sleeves in the turbulent water, he didn’t move.

Kasane stared at him with a dazed look, as though her hands and arms and shoulders had acted without the permission of their owner. As though their imprudence were likely to get her into a great deal of trouble. Cat took advantage of the diversion to strike.

With a crunching sound, the staff connected with her opponent’s skull. Cat felt the give of bone through her fingers and up into her arms. As the man’s sword clattered to the floor and he crumpled, Cat whacked him across the back of the shoulders for good measure.

“Help me put him in the water.” With numb fingers and throbbing arms, Cat grabbed him under the armpits. Kasane picked up his legs. Together they swung him into the tub. Water cascaded over the sides and rushed across the floor and into the drains along the walls.

“Go check the alley,” Cat said. “Hurry. The police are surely coming. I’ll be right behind you.”

As soon as Kasane left, Cat heaved the first man’s legs into the water, too. Then she pulled the heavy lid up over the tub. It was designed to fit snugly inside the pale cypress walls and to float on the water. It pressed the men under. Maybe they would be rescued before they drowned, but Cat didn’t care if they weren’t.

She looked longingly at the fallen swords but left them. Even one of them would be too hard to hide and too likely to be traced. Instead she scooped up a robe and sash left on the shelf. She grimaced to herself as she thought of the old saying, “A liar is the beginning of a thief.” In her case, a murderer was the beginning of a thief.

Only a short time had passed between Cat’s darting into the bathhouse and her reemergence into the empty alleyway. She put the stolen robe in Kasane’s pack. Then she took the furoshiki from her and settled it onto her own back. Relieving Kasane of half her burden was small thanks for saving Cat’s life.

Beyond the end of the covered alleyway, Cat could see the storm raging. Trees whipped to and fro. The rain fell so heavily that she couldn’t see the building across the street.

Cat knew she and Kasane couldn’t stay in Hiratsuka. The police would be searching for her and for Kasane too if anyone had seen her hit the samurai. They would surely set up roadblocks and post notices. Oiso was only three-quarters of a ri away.

Cat put a spare cord over her hat and tied it tightly under her chin. Kasane did likewise. They both put their raincapes on over their packs and belted them around the waist to keep them from shredding in the gale.

When Cat reached the end of the alleyway’s shelter, she bent over to shield her face from the sting of the wind-driven rain. Leaning into the storm, she set off for Oiso. Without a word of complaint or protest, Kasane pulled down her hat brim and followed.

 

 

Hanshiro decided to seek shelter in Hiratsuka until the storm abated. He was sure Lady Asano wouldn’t be traveling in weather like this. When he saw the people clustered under straw mats and raincoats in the downpour outside the bathhouse, he went to investigate.

The crowd parted to make way for him and his swords. He could hear the high, shrill babble of women’s voices inside. He found the room where the cedar tub was and stood quietly behind the police and Hiratsuka’s magistrate, the bath’s manager, attendants, and servants.

He was startled to see the two corpses laid out on the floor. They were still bright red, parboiled by the bathwater, which had heated up considerably under the wooden lid.

Hanshiro almost smiled. He had to admit the wench was a woman of arm. She had persistence, length of heart. But if they connected her with this murder, she was doomed.

“He was a ghost!” One of the women who had been washing when the fight started now clutched a loose bathing robe about her. Her hairdo was disheveled, and she hadn’t even bothered to put on makeup. “I saw right through him.”

The second attendant disagreed. “He was a demon. He had horns. He had the face of a fox and the ears of a badger.”

Hanshiro listened a while longer to make sure no one here would be able to describe Lady Asano to him. But she was close, probably hiding somewhere in Hiratsuka. Finding her would be like searching for a thing in a bag.

Lady Asano had turned her flight into musha-shugyo, training that took the form of a journey. A warrior went on a pilgrimage of sorts to challenge other sword players and sharpen his own skills.

Hanshiro was amused by the thought that he would have to exercise some care in capturing her. This would be more entertaining than he had anticipated.

The tiger’s loose in the market, he thought as he hitched up his raincape around his shoulders, pulled down his hat brim, and walked out into the storm.