Musashi - Eiji Yoshikawa [80]
This, however, was not the whole story. In the final analysis, Matahachi did not have the courage to let Okō and Akemi see him working as a day laborer. He had grown lazy and soft; the young man who dressed in silk and could distinguish Nada sake from the local brew by its taste was a far cry from the simple, rugged Matahachi who had been at Sekigahara. The worst aspect was that living this strange life with an older woman had robbed him of his youthfulness. In years he was still young, but in spirit he was dissolute and spiteful, lazy and resentful.
“But I’ll do it!” he vowed. “I’ll get out now!” Giving himself a final angry blow on the head, he jumped to his feet, shouting, “I’ll get out of here this very day!”
As he listened to his own voice, it suddenly sank in that there was no one around to hold him back, nothing that actually bound him to this house. The only thing he really owned and could not leave behind was his sword, and this he quickly slipped into his obi. Biting his lips, he said determinedly, “After all, I am a man.”
He could have marched out the front door waving his sword like a victorious general, but by force of habit he jumped into his dirty sandals and left by the kitchen door.
So far, so good. He was out of doors! But now what? His feet came to a halt. He stood motionless in the refreshing breeze of early spring. It was not the light dazzling his eyes that kept him from moving. The question was, where was he headed?
At that moment it seemed to Matahachi that the world was a vast, turbulent sea on which there was nothing to cling to. Aside from Kyoto, his experience encompassed only his village life and one battle. As he puzzled over his situation, a sudden thought sent him scurrying like a puppy back through the kitchen door.
“I need money,” he said to himself. “I’ll certainly have to have some money.”
Going straight to Okō’s room, he rummaged through her toilet boxes, her mirror stand, her chest of drawers, and everywhere else he could think of. He ransacked the place but found no money at all. Of course, he should have realized Okō wasn’t the type of woman who would fail to take precautions against something like this.
Frustrated, Matahachi flopped down on the clothes that still lay on the floor. The scent of Okō lingered like a thick mist about her red silk underrobe, her Nishijin obi and her Momoyama-dyed kimono. By now, he reflected, she would be at the open-air theater by the river, watching the Kabuki dances with Tōji at her side. He formed an image of her white skin and that provoking, coquettish face.
“The evil slut!” he cried. Bitter and murderous thoughts arose from his very bowels.
Then, unexpectedly, he had a painful recollection of Otsū. As the days and months of their separation added up, he had grown at last to understand the purity and devotion of this girl who had promised to wait for him. He would gladly have bowed down and lifted his hands in supplication to her, if he’d thought she would ever forgive him. But he had broken with Otsū, abandoned her in such a way that it would be impossible to face her again.
“All for the sake of that woman,” he thought ruefully. Now that it was too late, everything was clear to him; he should never have let Okō know that Otsū existed. When Okō had first heard of the girl, she had smiled a little smile and pretended not to mind in the slightest, but in fact, she was consumed with jealousy. Afterward, whenever they quarreled, she would raise the subject and insist that he write a letter breaking his engagement. And when he finally gave in and did so, she had brazenly enclosed a note in her own obviously feminine hand, and callously had the missive delivered by an impersonal runner.
“What must Otsū think of me?” groaned Matahachi sorrowfully. The image of her innocent girlish face came to his mind—a face full of reproach. Once again he saw the mountains and the river in Mimasaka. He wanted to call out to his mother, to his relatives. They had been so good.