Musashi - Eiji Yoshikawa [336]
“Are you attending the wake?”
“Not exactly. I’m a coffin-maker from Toribe Hill. I was asked to go to the Matsuo house, so I went to Yoshida Hill. They don’t live there anymore.” “The Matsuo family on Yoshida Hill?”
“Yes; I didn’t know they’d moved. I went a long way for nothing. Thank you.
“Wait,” said Musashi. “Would that be Matsuo Kaname, who’s in the service of Lord Konoe?”
“That’s right. He fell sick only about ten days before he died.”
Musashi turned and walked on; the coffin-maker hurried off in the opposite direction.
“So my uncle’s dead,” thought Musashi matter-of-factly. He recalled how his uncle had scraped and saved to accumulate a small sum of money. He thought of the rice cakes he had received from his aunt and devoured on the bank of the freezing river on New Year’s morning. He wondered vacantly how his aunt would get along now that she was all alone.
He stood on the bank of the Upper Kamo and regarded the looming dark panorama of the thirty-six hills of Higashiyama. Each peak seemed to stare back at him with enmity. Then he ran down to a pontoon bridge. From the northern part of the city, it was necessary to cross here to reach the road to Mount Hiei and the pass leading to Omi Province.
He was halfway across when he heard a voice, loud but indistinct. He stopped and listened. The rapidly flowing water gurgled cheerfully, while a cold wind swept through the valley. He couldn’t locate the source of the cry and after a few more steps paused again at the sound of the voice. Still unable to tell where it came from, he hurried on to the other bank. As he left the bridge, he spied a man with upraised arms running toward him from the north. The figure seemed familiar.
It was—Sasaki Kojirō, the ubiquitous fixer.
As he approached, he greeted Musashi in an all too friendly way. After a glance across the bridge, he asked, “Are you alone?”
“Yes, of course.”
“I hope you will pardon me for the other night,” said Kojirō. “Thank you for putting up with my interference.”
“I think it is I who should thank you,” replied Musashi with equal politeness.
“Are you on your way to the bout?”
“Yes.”
“All alone?” Kojirō asked again.
“Yes, of course.”
“Hmm. I wonder, Musashi, if you’ve misunderstood the sign we put up at Yanagimachi.”
“I don’t think so.”
“You’re fully aware of the conditions? This isn’t to be a simple man-to-man fight as it was in the case of Seijūrō and Denshichirō.”
“I know that.”
“Though the battle will be fought in the name of Genjirō, he’ll be aided by members of the Yoshioka School. Do you understand that ‘members of the Yoshioka School’ could be ten men, or a hundred, even a thousand?”
“Yes; why do you ask?”
“Some of the weaker men have run away from the school, but the stronger and more courageous have all gone up to the spreading pine. Right now they’re stationed all over the hillside, waiting for you.”
“Have you been to take a look?”
“Urn. I decided I’d better come back and warn you. Knowing you’d cross the pontoon bridge, I waited here. I consider this my duty, since I wrote the sign.” “That’s very thoughtful of you.”
“Well, that’s the situation. Are you really intending to go alone, or do you have supporters going by another route?”
“I will have one companion.”
“Is that so? Where is he now?”
“Right here!” Musashi, his laughing teeth shining in the moonlight, pointed to his shadow.
Kojirō bristled. “This is no laughing matter.”
“I didn’t mean it as a joke.”
“Oh? It sounded as though you were making fun of my advice.”
Musashi, assuming an attitude even graver than Kojirō’s, countered, “Do you think the great saint Shinran was joking when he said that any believer has the strength of two, because the Buddha Amida walks with him?” Kojirō did not answer.
“From all appearances, it seems the Yoshiokas have the upper hand. They’re out in force. I’m alone. Without a doubt, you’re assuming I’ll be beaten. But I beg you not to worry on my behalf. Supposing I knew they had