Musashi - Eiji Yoshikawa [245]
Search as he might, he could not find Otsū. While he fretted, Musashi and Akemi moved to the end of the bridge, presumably to avoid being so conspicuous. Musashi folded his arms and leaned on the railing. Akemi, at his side, looked down at the river. They did not notice Jōtarō when he slipped by on the opposite side of the bridge.
“Why is she taking so much time? How long can you pray to Kannon?” Grumbling to himself, Jōtarō stood on tiptoe and strained his eyes toward the hill at the end of Gojō Avenue.
About ten paces from where he was standing, there were four or five leafless willow trees. Often a flock of white herons gathered here along the river to catch fish, but today none were to be seen. A young man with a long forelock leaned against a willow branch, which stretched out toward the ground like a sleeping dragon.
On the bridge, Musashi nodded as Akemi whispered fervently to him. She had thrown pride to the winds and was telling him everything in the hope that she could persuade him to be hers alone. It was difficult to discern whether her words penetrated beyond his ears. Nod though he might, his look was not that of a lover saying sweet nothings to his beloved. On the contrary, his pupils shone with a colorless, heatless radiance and focused steadily on some particular object.
Akemi did not notice this. Completely absorbed, she seemed to choke slightly as she tried to analyze her feelings.
“Oh,” she sighed, “I’ve told you everything there is to tell. I haven’t hidden anything.” Edging closer to him, she said wistfully, “It’s been more than four years since Sekigahara. I’ve changed both in body and in spirit.” Then, with a burst of tears: “No! I haven’t really changed. My feeling toward you hasn’t changed a bit. I’m absolutely sure of that! Do you understand, Musashi? Do you understand how I feel?”
“Mm.”
“Please try to understand! I’ve told you everything. I’m not the innocent wild flower I was when we met at the foot of Mount Ibuki. I’m just an ordinary woman who’s been violated…. But is chastity a thing of the body, or of the mind? Is a virgin who has lewd thoughts really chaste? … I lost my virginity to—I can’t say his name, but to a certain man—and yet my heart is pure.”
“Mm. Mm.”
“Don’t you feel anything for me at all? I can’t keep secrets from the person I love. I wondered what to say when I saw you: should I say anything or not? But then it became clear. I couldn’t deceive you even if I wanted to. Please understand! Say something! Say you forgive me. Or do you consider me despicable?”
“Mm. Ah …”
“When I think of it again, it makes me so furious!” She put her face down on the railing. “You see, I’m ashamed to ask you to love me. I haven’t the right to do that. But … but … I’m still a virgin at heart. I still treasure my first love like a pearl. I haven’t lost that treasure, and I won’t, no matter what kind of life I lead, or what men I’m thrown together with!”
Each hair of her head trembled with her sobbing. Under the bridge where her tears fell, the river, glistening in the New Year’s sun, flowed on like Akemi’s dreams toward an eternity of hope.
“Mm.” While the poignance of her story elicited frequent nods and grunts, Musashi’s eyes remained fixed on that point in the distance. His father had once remarked, “You’re not like me. My eyes are black, but yours are dark brown. They say your granduncle, Hirata Shōgen, had terrifying brown eyes, so maybe you take after him.” At this moment, in the slanting rays of the sun, Musashi’s eyes were a pure and flawless coral.
“That has to be him,” thought Sasaki Kojirō, the man leaning against the willow. He had heard of Musashi many times, but this was the first time he had set eyes on him.
Musashi was wondering: “Who could he be?”
From the instant their eyes met, they had silently been