12. Days in green.
藤の花の香りが運ぶ、うたかたの夢。地獄の使者が去った後、目覚めればまたそれも夢。
第十二章「みどりの日々の事」
Just after sunset. Wisteria scented the wooden sunshade by the veranda. The boy was lying on the wooden floor there, watching his uncle drawing. Ten days ago, the boy’s greyhound[1] gave birth to her puppies, and he asked his uncle to draw them.
His brush was a magical tool. Cartoon puppies appeared on the white paper.
“Come in. Soon, the darkness is going to come,” Grandmother[2] called to them from the room. “My prince, put a warmer gown on after bathing, or you’ll catch a cold.”
In the room, Tamako was practicing the biwa. Father taught her to play more delicately. Finally, she pouted, and he smiled helplessly. He showed her his good playing, but she shook her head and lay there.
“Come on, Kazuhito. Your sister gave up practicing. Are you playing this together?” Father told him, and the boy jumped and nodded. “Of course! Father, just a moment.”
He bowed to the uncle and picked the paper up. He brought it to Grandmother. “Look! My favorite is the white curly pup here. I’ll let him remain with me, and the others I’ll give my friends.”
“All of them are so cute.” She smiled.
He knew all of them in this room had already gone. It’s just a dream. He didn’t want to wake, never.
However, he had to return because someone abruptly removed his blanket.
...
“Good morning. You’re too nice to each other!” Okihito laughed, raising the blanket high.
Kazuhito opened his eyes and noticed that he was holding Akiko’s hand. She also woke up and showed embarrassment on her face. “Oh, I had too much sleep and am barefaced!” She stood up and ran to the kitchen, hiding her red face.
“At midnight, Hisanari noticed you two were sleeping well outside, and I brought the blanket and the screen to you so you would not catch cold. Although the sun has risen, you still slept. So, my turn has come to take it off from you this morning, Father!”
Okihito spoke quickly and smiled all over his face.
The ladies had already taken the books away, and he heard footsteps approaching behind him. He looked back.
Hisanari stopped under the eaves with a basket. The basket was filled with several long clusters of purple wisteria flowers, slightly soaked by morning dew.
“Doc, where did you bring that from?” Kazuhito sat on the sheet and smelled their sweet perfume.
“Listen, Your Majesty. After I was sure you and Okata-sama were sleeping well here, I had an amazing dream in my straw bed. In the dream, a lot of celestial beings stayed in the courtyard. They were playing a spirited music, and the five-colored clouds floated around. I was bewitched by the wonder of it for a while. Before long, a piece of the clouds took the form of a beautiful woman dancing in a shiny dress, flying away to the moon in the western sky.”
Kazuhito narrowed his eyes but ambiguously smiled. The doctor might want to relieve him from the fear of the nightmare, although the ex-emperor knew that the beings who had stayed there the night before weren’t heavenly existences.
“I’m sure that the princess’s mother was released from her sin of the earth. She will never visit you again. After the rooster had woken me up, I walked around the courtyard to pick up vegetables. Because I heard some noises near the house, I found the basket by the front door,” he said.
“I see. Someone climbed trees in the early morning to pick them,” Okihito said, putting one of the clusters on his headwear like an ancient headdress. “The girl must have slept well last night.”
Kazuhito put his hand in his futokoro and the urn bag. All the cords that bound the urn’s lid had been broken, and a few fine bone particles were spilled out in the bag. Then he asked Sadako to bring a piece of paper and collected the tiny bones on the paper on the desk to put them carefully back into the urn.
“…I’ve been a high-maintenance boy for him yet,” he whispered to himself.
“Father?”
Naohito came from the direction of the gate.
“The guests have come,” he said. They looked over there. Two people approached the courtyard with some hesitation. They were Lady Iga and the watching boy.
Sadako came from the kitchen, and they talked in the courtyard. Kazuhito stood up and walked toward them.
Iga apologized that they had come too early and begged him to lend The Tale of Genji. The boy brought a bale of rice grains.
“We always welcome rations and lend the books with pleasure, after our ladies clean and finish to read them,” he smiled and said to her.
“I thank you for your high kindness, Your Majesty!” When the samurai boy screamed delightfully, he dropped the bale on his foot. “Ouch!” he shouted.
“Be careful, kid!” Iga scolded him.
“Are you going to read the novel, too?” Kazuhito asked him.
“I, ...I importuned madam to ask you to lend the books for me yesterday. I’ve been dreaming of reading the story for a long time,” the boy said. “The princess hates the novel, so I haven’t been able to ask her about that...”
“You’re welcome. To avoid someone suspecting you’re a spy for us, I’ll lend a part of the series to Madam Kusunoki first. After you have read an issue, you should visit her and borrow the next issue there. Is that OK?”
“Absolutely!” He jumped, and his ponytail also bounced up and down.
“Valiants have loved beauties since ancient times. The strong warriors I knew also liked the novel. Boy, it’s not too early for you to learn women’s thoughts and hearts,” Kazuhito said.
Iga looked at Kazuhito with surprised eyes. A moment of silence passed.
“Your Majesty. Her name is Koben, and she is a girl!”
“What?”
The ex-emperor stared at the girl, his jaw dropping. She had thick eyebrows, and her face was tanned well. Her fingers were sinewy and longer than those of other same-age girls. “Oh, I’m very sorry to...”
Then his face changed to serious. The deep sadness came into his heart. He grabbed softly at the urn bag. When even girls and children were forced to fight wars, people would be forced to kill each other to the last one.
Besides the ex-emperor’s sadness, Koben said clearly, “It always happens, and please don’t apologize to me, Your Majesty. We live in an emergency, and even women must work as well as men. Anyway, I like martial arts lessons as well as reading.”
“Let me see...” Kazuhito searched his words for a while. Then, “The story was created three hundred years ago…” he said.
“I know. It would be difficult to read as directly as I would like, but madam will teach and explain it,” she said.
“Ah?” Iga pulled the ponytail of the girl. “My householding occupies me! You should ask such things of others,” she whispered to her.
“Great.” Kazuhito moved his arm outward. “By the way, I’d like to tell you that even the legendary works have a few imperfections. You would have different opinions about samurai from the author, Madam Murasaki, because she might not like her armed relatives in the countryside so much. If she had been born after the raid of Mongolia, I think she could have changed her opinion. One of my favorite characters is a samurai head, the provincial vice-governor of Hitachi...”
“Your Majesty! Please don’t be a story spoiler to a newcomer.” Sadako interrupted his talking.
“You’re right.” He stopped leaking.
At the same time, Koben stopped breathing suddenly. She looked beyond Kazuhito. He noticed her eyes began to wet, and he looked back.
“Princess...” the girl murmured.
His sons were dancing in the courtyard with the wisteria clusters on their heads and shoulders, like ancient dancers or a young spring god wearing wisteria vines and flowers to get a beautiful maiden in an ancient myth.
“It’s wonderful. I love the season of wisteria.” Iga admired the dancing.
“Me too,” Kazuhito said.
He realized that he had to take his small responsibility before he would go to hell, which promised absolute peace and equality. He must seek a new negotiation route toward General Kusunoki, who was Iga’s husband, because he was the head of the moderates in the Southern Court, step by step, and not with haste.
“Koben, whose stationery set do you usually use to write?” Kazuhito asked her.
“I borrow my father’s,” she said.
“If you like,” he said, “could you try my old one for your writing? I had made it small enough to be portable for writing poems everywhere, and it would be convenient for your active style.”
Iga and Sadako exchanged glances without words for a moment.
“It’s too much for me! I’m not worth such high kindness…”
“Listen, your madam is busy dealing with the difficult problems in her domestic life and the court. When you have questions about the story, you can note them and slip them in the book with the bookmark. Our ladies and I will answer with pleasure. The books also would be pleased by that, and I think that would be the best memorial service for Lady Otogi rather than chanting any sutras.”
“I’ll do that exactly!” Koben said in a vibrating voice and dropped the bale again.
Her shout sounded toward the blue sky and the shiny green mountains.
“It’s like a dream! I’d like never to wake up!”
The end.
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1. The western variety of dogs had been imported then via China or other eastern and southern Asia islands.
2. Eifuku-mon-in (1271–1342), empress of Emperor Fushimi, poet, aunt of Saionji Kin-mune. After his death, she supported his wife in bringing up his son.
最後までお読みいただいた皆様、ありがとうございました。
よろしければご感想なりいただけましたら、たいへん嬉しく存じます。
Thank you to everyone who read to the very end!
If you would be so kind as to share your thoughts and feedback, I would be very grateful.
