Musashi - Eiji Yoshikawa [369]
“He’s coming!” cried Jōtarō, dashing out of the tea shop onto the shorter section of the bridge, where he stood beckoning to Musashi with one hand and pointing to the tea shop with the other. “There he is, Otsū! See? Riding a cow.” He broke into a little dance. Soon Otsū was standing beside him, she waving her hand, he waving his basket hat. A broad grin lit Musashi’s face as he drew near.
He tied the cow to a willow tree, and the three of them entered the tea shop. Though Otsū had called wildly to Musashi while he was still on the far side of the bridge, now that he was beside her, words failed her. Beaming happily, she left the talking to Jōtarō.
“Your wound’s healed,” said the boy, almost rhapsodically. “When I saw you on the cow, I thought maybe it was because you couldn’t walk. But we still managed to get here first, didn’t we? As soon as Otsū got your letter, she was ready to leave.”
Musashi smiled, nodded, murmured “oh”s and “ah”s, but Jōtarō’s talk about Otsū and her love in front of strangers made him uncomfortable. At his insistence, they moved to a little porch in back, which was shaded by a wisteria trellis. Otsū remained too diffident to speak, and Musashi grew taciturn. But Jōtarō paid no heed; his rapid chatter mingled with the buzzing of bees and the whir of gadflies.
He was interrupted by the proprietor’s voice, saying, “You’d better come inside. A storm’s brewing. Look how dark the sky’s getting above Ishiyamadera.” He bustled about, putting away straw blinds and placing wooden rain shutters around the sides of the porch. The river had turned gray; gusts of wind set the lavender wisteria blossoms into wild motion. All at once, a flash of light streaked through the sky, and the rain came pouring down in great torrents.
“Lightning!” cried Jōtarō. “The first this year. Hurry up, get inside, Otsū. You’ll get soaked. Hurry, Sensei. Oh, the rain came at just the right time. It’s perfect.”
But if the shower was “perfect” for Jōtarō, it meant embarrassment for Musashi and Otsū, for going back inside together would make them feel like starry-eyed lovers. Musashi held back, and Otsū, blushing, stood at the edge of the porch, no better protected from the elements than the wisteria blossoms.
The man holding a piece of straw matting over his head as he ran through the blinding rain looked like a large self-propelled umbrella. Dashing under the eaves of a shrine gate, he smoothed his wet, rumpled hair and looked up questioningly at the swiftly moving clouds. “It’s just like midsummer,” he grumbled. No sound was audible above the pounding of the rain, but an abrupt flash of light sent his hands to his ears. Matahachi squatted fearfully near a statue of the god of thunder, which stood beside the gate.
As suddenly as it had begun, the rain ceased. The black clouds parted, the sunshine streamed through, and before long the street had returned to normal. Somewhere in the distance Matahachi could hear the plinking of shamisen. As he started to move on, a woman dressed like a geisha crossed the street and walked directly up to him.
“Your name’s Matahachi, isn’t it?” she said.
“It is,” he answered suspiciously. “How did you know?”
“A friend of yours is at our shop now. He saw you from the window and told me to come get you.”
Glancing around, he saw that there were several brothels in the neighborhood. Though he hesitated, the woman hurried him along toward her own. “If you have other business,” she said, “you don’t have to stay long.”
When they entered, the girls virtually fell all over him, wiping off his feet, removing his wet kimono and insisting that he go to the parlor upstairs. When he asked who this friend was, they laughed and told him he would find out soon enough.
“Well,” said Matahachi, “I’ve been out in the rain, so I’ll stay until my clothes dry, but don’t try to keep me here any longer than that. There’s a man waiting for me at the bridge in Seta.”
With much tittering, the women promised him he could leave in good time, meanwhile almost pushing