Musashi - Eiji Yoshikawa [514]
Though Omitsu was officially regarded as Tadaaki’s niece, it had been whispered about that she was really the daughter of Itō Ittōsai by a mistress. Rumor had it that since Ittōsai was Tadaaki’s teacher, Tadaaki must have agreed to rear the girl.
The look of fear in her eyes was most unusual. “I heard Uncle and the guest talking—their voices got louder and louder—and the next thing I knew … I don’t suppose Uncle’s in danger, but—”
The four generals emitted a collective yelp and lit out for the garden, which was set off from the outer compound by a shrub fence. The others caught up with them at the woven-bamboo gate.
“The gate’s locked.”
“Can’t you force it?”
This proved unnecessary. The gate gave way under the weight of the samurai pressing against it. As it fell, a spacious area backed by a hill came into view. Tadaaki, his faithful Yukihira sword held at eye level, stood in the middle. Beyond him, at a fair distance, was Kojirō, the great Drying Pole rising above his head, fire shooting from his eyes.
The charged atmosphere seemed to create an invisible barrier. For men raised in the strict tradition of the samurai class, the awe-inspiring solemnity surrounding the combatants, the dignity of the deadly unsheathed swords, was inviolable. Despite their agitation, the spectacle momentarily deprived the students both of their mobility and of their emotions.
But then two or three of them started toward Kojirō’s rear.
“Stay back!” cried Tadaaki angrily. His voice, harsh and chilling, not at all the fatherly voice they were accustomed to, arrested all movement on the part of his students.
People were apt to guess Tadaaki’s age to be as much as ten years less than his fifty-four or -five years and take his height for average, whereas actually it was somewhat less than that. His hair was still black, his body small but solidly built. There was nothing stiff or awkward in the movements of his long limbs.
Kojirō had not yet made one strike—had not, in fact, been able to.
Yet Tadaaki had had to face one fact instantly: he was up against a terrific swordsman. “He’s another Zenki!” he thought with an imperceptible shudder.
Zenki was the last fighter he had encountered to have such scope and driving ambition. And that had been long ago, in his youth, when he traveled with Ittōsai, living the life of a shugyōsha. Zenki, the son of a boatman in Kuwana Province, had been Ittōsai’s senior disciple. As Ittōsai aged, Zenki began to look down on him, even proclaiming that the Ittō Style was his own invention.
Zenki had caused Ittōsai much grief, for the more adept he became with the sword, the more harm he caused other people. “Zenki,” Ittōsai had lamented, “is the greatest mistake in my life. When I look at him, I see a monster embodying all the bad qualities I ever had. It makes me hate myself to watch him.”
Ironically, Zenki served the youthful Tadaaki well—as a bad example—spurring him to higher achievements than might otherwise have been possible. Eventually, Tadaaki clashed with the evil prodigy at Koganegahara in Shimōsa and killed him, whereupon Ittōsai awarded him his certificate in the Ittō Style and gave him the book of secret instructions.
Zenki’s one flaw had been that his technical capability was marred by a lack of breeding. Not so Kojirō. His intelligence and education were evident in his swordsmanship.
“I can’t win this fight,” thought Tadaaki, who felt himself in no way inferior to Munenori. In fact, his assessment of Munenori’s skill was not very high.
While he stared at his awesome opponent, another truth came home to rest. “Time appears to have passed me by,” he thought ruefully.
They stood motionless; not the slightest change was evident. But both Tadaaki and Kojirō were expending vital energy at a fearful rate. The physiological toll took the form of sweat pouring copiously from their foreheads, air rushing through flaring nostrils, skin turning white, then bluish. Though a move seemed imminent, the swords