Musashi - Eiji Yoshikawa [259]
Hurriedly dropping to his knees, Musashi stopped Kōetsu from bowing. “Then you’re her son?” he asked in confusion.
“Yes.”
“It is I who must apologize. I don’t really know what made your mother afraid, but as soon as she saw me, she dropped her basket and ran off. Seeing she’d spilled her greens made me feel guilty. I’ve brought the things she dropped. That’s all. There’s no need for you to bow.”
Laughing pleasantly, Kōetsu turned to the nun and said, “Did you hear that, Mother? You had the wrong impression entirely.”
Immensely relieved, she ventured out from her place of refuge behind the servant. “Do you mean the rōnin didn’t intend to harm me?”
“Harm? No, not at all. See, he’s even brought back your basket. Wasn’t that considerate of him?”
“Oh, I’m sorry,” said the nun, bowing deeply, her forehead touching the prayer beads on her wrist. Quite cheerful now, she laughed as she turned to her son. “I’m ashamed to admit it,” she said, “but when I first saw the young man, I thought I detected the smell of blood. Oh, it was frightening! I broke out in goose pimples. Now I see how foolish I was.”
The old woman’s insight amazed Musashi. She had seen right through him and without really knowing, had put it very candidly. To this woman’s delicate senses, he must indeed have seemed a terrifying, gory apparition.
Kōetsu, too, must have taken in his intense, penetrating look, his menacing mane of hair, that prickly, dangerous element that said he was ready to strike at the slightest provocation. Still, Kōetsu seemed inclined to search out the good in him.
“If you’re in no hurry,” he said, “stay and rest awhile. It’s so quiet and peaceful here. Just sitting silently in these surroundings, I feel clean and fresh.”
“If I pick a few more greens, I can make some nice gruel for you,” said the nun. “And some tea. Or don’t you like tea?”
In the company of mother and son, Musashi felt at peace with the world. He sheathed his bellicose spirit, like a cat retracting its claws. In this pleasant atmosphere, it was hard to believe he was among perfect strangers. Before he realized it, he had removed his straw sandals and taken a seat on the rug.
Taking the liberty of asking some questions, he learned that the mother, whose religious name was Myōshū, had been a good and faithful wife before becoming a nun, and that her son was indeed the celebrated aesthete and craftsman. Among swordsmen, there was not one worth his salt who did not know the name Hon’ami—such was the family’s reputation for sound judgment with regard to swords.
Musashi found it difficult to associate Kōetsu and his mother with the picture he had of how such famous people should look. To him they were simply ordinary people he had met by accident in a deserted field. This was the way he wanted it to be, for otherwise he himself might grow tense and spoil their picnic.
Bringing the kettle for the tea, Myōshū asked her son, “How old do you suppose this lad is?”
With a glance at Musashi, he replied, “Twenty-five or -six, I imagine.” Musashi shook his head. “No, I’m only twenty-three.”
“Only twenty-three,” exclaimed Myōshū. She then proceeded to ask the usual questions: where his home was, whether his parents were still alive, who had taught him swordsmanship, and so on.
She addressed him gently, as though he were her grandson, and this brought out the boy in Musashi. His manner of speech slipped into the youthful and informal. Accustomed as he was to discipline and rigorous training, to spending all his time forging himself into a fine steel blade, he knew nothing of the more civilized side of life. As the old nun talked, warmth spread through his weather-beaten body.
Myōshū, Kōetsu, the things