Musashi - Eiji Yoshikawa [235]
Ryōhei and the others came back with the message to Musashi written on a freshly cut board.
“Is this what you had in mind?” asked Ryōhei.
The characters, still glistening wet, said:
Answer—In response to your request for a bout, I name the following time and place. Place: Field of the Rendaiji. Time: Seven o’clock in the morning, ninth day of the first month. I swear on my sacred oath to be present.
If, by some chance, you do not fulfill your promise, I shall consider it my right to ridicule you in public.
If I break this agreement, may the punishment of the gods be visited upon me! Seijūrō, Yoshioka Kempō II, of Kyoto. Done on the last day of [1605].
To the Rōnin of Mimasaka, Miyamoto Musashi.
After reading it, Seijūrō said, “It’s all right.” The announcement made him feel more relaxed, perhaps because for the first time it came home to him that the die was cast.
At sunset, Ryōhei put the sign under his arm and strode proudly along the street with a couple of other men to post it on the Great Bridge at Gojō Avenue.
At the foot of Yoshida Hill, the man to whom the announcement was addressed was walking through a neighborhood of samurai of noble lineage and small means. Conservatively inclined, they led ordinary lives and were unlikely to be found doing anything that would excite comment.
Musashi was going from gate to gate examining the nameplates. Eventually he came to a stop in the middle of the street, seemingly unwilling or unable to look further. He was searching for his aunt, his mother’s sister and his only living relative besides Ogin.
His aunt’s husband was a samurai serving, for a small stipend, the House of Konoe. Musashi thought it would be easy to find the house near Yoshida Hill but soon discovered there was very little to distinguish one house from another. Most were small, surrounded by trees, and their gates were shut tight as clams. Quite a few of the gates had no nameplates.
His uncertainty about the place he was seeking made him reluctant to ask directions. “They must have moved,” he thought. “I may as well stop looking.”
He turned back toward the center of town, which lay under a mist reflecting the lights of the year-end marketplace. Although it was New Year’s Eve, the streets in the downtown area still hummed with activity.
Musashi turned to look at a woman who had just passed going the other way. He hadn’t seen his aunt for at least seven or eight years, but he was sure this was she, for the woman resembled the image he had formed of his mother. He followed her a short distance, then called out to her.
She stared at him suspiciously for a moment or two, intense surprise reflected in eyes wrinkled by years of humdrum living on a tiny budget. “You’re Musashi, Munisai’s son, aren’t you?” she finally asked.
He wondered why she called him Musashi rather than Takezō, but what actually disturbed him was the impression that he was not welcome. “Yes,” he replied, “I’m Takezō, from the House of Shimmen.”
She looked him over thoroughly, without the customary “oh”s and “ah”s as to how large he had grown or how different he looked from before. “Why have you come here?” she asked coolly in a rather censorious tone.
“I had no special purpose in coming. I just happened to be in Kyoto. I thought it would be nice to see you.” Looking at the eyes and hairline of his aunt, he thought of his mother. If she were still alive, surely she would be about as tall as this woman and speak with the same sort of voice.
“You came to see me?” she asked incredulously.
“Yes. I’m sorry it’s so sudden.”
His aunt waved her hand before her face in a gesture of dismissal. “Well, you’ve seen me, so there’s no reason to go any farther. Please