Musashi - Eiji Yoshikawa [579]
“Yes, sir. I’m sorry. I didn’t know.”
Despite his robes, the man was no priest. He was Toriumi Benzō, one of Yukimura’s leading retainers.
The Port
“Gonnosuke! … Gonnosuke! … Gonnosuke!”
Iori couldn’t seem to stop himself. He called the name over and over and over. Having found some of Gonnosuke’s belongings lying on the ground, he was convinced the man was dead.
A day and a night had passed. He’d been in a walking daze, oblivious of his weariness. His legs, hands and head were spattered with blood, his kimono badly torn.
Seized by a spasm, he would look up at the sky and cry, “I’m ready.” Or stare at the ground and curse.
“Have I gone crazy?” he thought, suddenly feeling cold. Looking into a puddle of water, he recognized his own face and felt relieved. But he was alone, with no one to turn to, only half believing he was still alive. When he’d awoken at the bottom of the ravine, he couldn’t remember where he’d been the past several days. It didn’t occur to him to try to go back to the Kongōji or Koyagyū.
An object glinting with the colors of the rainbow caught his eye—a pheasant. He became aware of the fragrance of wild wisteria in the air and sat down. As he tried to make sense of his situation, thoughts of the sun captured his mind. He imagined it as being everywhere—beyond the clouds, among the peaks, in the valleys. He shifted to a kneeling position, clasped his hands, shut his eyes and began praying. When he opened his eyes a few minutes later, the first thing he saw was a glimpse of ocean, blue and misty, between two mountains.
“Little boy,” said a motherly voice. “Are you all right?”
“Hunh?” With a start, Iori turned his hollow eyes toward the two women who were staring at him curiously.
“What do you suppose is wrong with him, Mother?” asked the younger woman, regarding Iori with distaste.
Looking puzzled, the older woman walked over to Iori, and seeing the blood on his clothes, she frowned. “Don’t those cuts hurt?” she asked. Iori shook his head. She turned to her daughter and said, “He seems to understand what I say.”
They asked his name, where he had come from, where he had been born, what he was doing here, and whom he had been praying to. Little by little, as he searched around for the answers, his memory came back.
More sympathetic now, the daughter, whose name was Otsuru, said, “Let’s take him back to Sakai with us. Maybe he’d be useful in the shop. He’s just the right age.”
“That might be a good idea,” said her mother, Osei. “Will he come?” “He’ll come…. Won’t you?”
Iori nodded and said, “Uh-huh.”
“Come along then, but you’ll have to carry our luggage.”
“Uh.”
Iori acknowledged their remarks with a grunt but otherwise said nothing on the journey down the mountain, along a country road and into Kishiwada. But among people again, he became talkative.
“Where do you live?” he asked.
“In Sakai.”
“Is that near here?”
“No, it’s near Osaka.”
“Where’s Osaka?”
“We’ll take a ship from here and go to Sakai. Then you’ll know.”
“Really! A ship?” Excited by the prospect, he rattled on for several minutes, telling them how he’d ridden any number of ferryboats on the way from Edo to Yamato, but though the ocean wasn’t far from his birthplace in Shimōsa, he’d never been out to sea in a ship.
“That’ll make you happy, then, won’t it?” said Otsuru. “But you mustn’t call my mother ‘Auntie.’ Say ‘Madam’ when you speak to her.”
“Uh.”
“And you mustn’t answer ‘Uh.’ Say ‘Yes, ma’am.”’
“Yes, ma’am.”
“That’s better. Now, if you stay with us and work hard, I’ll see you’re made a shop assistant.”
“What does your family do?”
“My father’s a shipping broker.”
“What’s that?”
“He’s a merchant. He owns a lot of ships, and they sail all over western Japan.”
“Oh, just a merchant?” sniffed Iori.
“‘Just a merchant’! Why—!” exclaimed the girl. The mother was inclined to overlook Iori’s bluntness, but the daughter was indignant. Then she hesitated, saying,