Musashi - Eiji Yoshikawa [46]
Takuan rolled a rock up near the fire and patted Takezō on the back. “You sit here,” he said.
Abruptly, Takezō sat down. Otsū, for her part, couldn’t even look her ex-fiancé’s friend in the face. She felt as though she were in the presence of an unchained beast.
Takuan, lifting the lid of the pot, said, “It seems to be ready.” He stuck the tips of his chopsticks into a potato, drew it out, and popped it into his mouth. Chewing heartily, he proclaimed, “Very nice and tender. Won’t you have some, Takezō?”
Takezō nodded and for the first time grinned, showing a set of perfect white teeth. Otsū filled a bowl and gave it to him, whereupon he began alternately to blow on the hot stew and slurp it up in big mouthfuls. His hands trembled and his teeth clattered against the edge of the bowl. Pitifully hungry as he was, the trembling was uncontrollable. Frighteningly so.
“Good, isn’t it?” asked the monk, putting down his chopsticks. “How about some sake?”
“I don’t want any sake.”
“Don’t you like it?”
“I don’t want any now.” After all that time in the mountains, he was afraid it might make him sick.
Presently he said, politely enough, “Thank you for the food. I’m warmed up now.”
“Have you had enough?”
“Plenty, thank you.” As he handed his bowl back to Otsū, he asked, “Why did you come up here? I saw your fire last night too.”
The question startled Otsū and she had no answer ready, but Takuan came to the rescue by saying forthrightly, “To tell the truth, we came here to capture you.”
Takezō showed no particular surprise, though he seemed hesitant to take what Takuan had said at face value. He hung his head in silence, then looked from one to the other of them.
Takuan saw that the time had come to act. Turning to face Takezō directly, he said, “How about it? If you’re going to be captured anyway, wouldn’t it be better to be tied up with the bonds of the Buddha’s Law? The daimyō’s regulations are law, and the Buddha’s Law is law, but of the two, the bonds of the Buddha are the more gentle and humane.”
“No, no!” said Takezō, shaking his head angrily.
Takuan continued mildly. “Just listen for a minute. I understand that you are determined to hold out to the death, but in the long run, can you really win?”
“What do you mean, can I win?”
“I mean, can you successfully hold out against the people who hate you, against the laws of the-province and against your own worst enemy, yourself?”
“Oh, I know I’ve already lost,” groaned Takezō. His face was sadly contorted and his eyes brimmed with tears. “I’ll be cut down in the end, but before I am I’ll kill the old Hon’iden woman and the soldiers from Himeji and all the other people I hate! I’ll kill as many as I can!”
“What will you do about your sister?”
“Huh?”
“Ogin. What are you going to do about her? She’s locked up in the stockade at Hinagura, you know!”
Despite his earlier resolve to rescue her, Takezō could not answer.
“Don’t you think you should start considering the wellbeing of that good woman? She’s done so much for you. And what about your duty to carry on the name of your father, Shimmen Munisai? Have you forgotten that it goes back through the Hirata family to the famous Akamatsu clan of Harima?”
Takezō covered his face with his blackened, now nearly clawed hands, his sharp shoulders piercing upward as they shook in his haggard, trembling body. He broke into bitter sobs. “I … I … don’t know. What … what difference does it make now?”
At that, Takuan suddenly clenched his fist and let go with a solid punch to Takezō’s jaw.
“Fool!” the monk’s voice thundered.
Taken by surprise, Takezō reeled from the blow and before he could recover took another punch on the other side.
“You irresponsible oaf! You stupid ingrate! Since your father and mother and ancestors are not here to punish you, I’ll do it for them. Take that!” The monk struck