Laura Rowland: The Concubine’s Tattoo

A massive oak door, banded in iron and decorated with carved flowers, sealed the entrance to the women’s quarters, home to the shogun’s mother, wife, and concubines, their attendants, and the palace’s cooks, maids, and other female servants. Two sentries guarded the door.

“We’re here on His Excellency’s orders to investigate the death of Lady Harume,” Sano said, identifying himself and Hirata.

The sentries bowed, opened the door, and admitted Sano and Hirata into a narrow, lantern-lit corridor. The door closed behind them with a soft, reverberant thud.

“I’ve never been in here before,” Hirata said, his voice hushed with awe.”Have you?”

“Never,” Sano said. Mingled interest and trepidation stirred inside him.

“Do you know anyone in the Large Interior?”

In his capacity as the shogun’s sōsakan, Sano had free access to most of the castle. He was familiar with its walled passages and gardens, keep, ancestral shrine, martial arts training ground, and forest preserve, the Official Quarter where he lived, the outer section of the palace, and even the shogun’s private chambers. But the women’s quarters were closed to all men except a few carefully chosen guards, doctors, and officials. These did not include Sano.

“I know some of the servants and minor officials by sight,” he said, “and I once headed a military escort to convey the shogun’s mother and concubines on a pilgrimage to Zōjō Temple. But my duties have never involved direct contact with anyone from the Large Interior.”

Now Sano had the disconcerting sense of entering alien territory.”Well, let’s get started,” he said, driving confidence into his voice as he regretted his postponed nuptial festivities. How much longer before he and Reiko could be together? Sano started down the corridor, resisting the urge to tiptoe.

The polished cypress floor gleamed, dimly reflecting Sano’s and Hirata’s distorted images. Painted flowers adorned the coffered ceiling. Unoccupied rooms were crammed full of lacquer chests, cabinets, and screens, charcoal braziers, mirrors, scattered clothing, dressing tables littered with combs, hairpins, and vials. Gilt murals covered the inner walls, in abandoned bathchambers, round wooden tubs steamed. The corridor was deserted, but behind the latticed wood and paper walls, countless shadowy figures moved. As Sano and Hirata passed, doors cracked open; frightened eyes peeked out. Somewhere a samisen played a melancholy tune. The high murmur of feminine voices filled the air, which felt warmer and smelled different than in the rest of the palace, sweet with the scent of perfume and aromatic unguents. Sano thought he could also detect the subtler smells of women’s bodies: sweat, sexual secretions, blood?

In this crowded hive, the very walls seemed to expand and contract with female breath. Sano had heard rumors of extravagant entertainments held here, of secret intrigues and escapades. But what practical expertise could he bring to a mysterious case of fatal disease in this private sanctum? Sano glanced at Hirata.

The young retainer’s wide, boyish face wore a look of nervous determination. He walked self-consciously, shoulders hunched, putting one foot in front of the other with exaggerated care, as if afraid to make noise or occupy space. Despite his own discomfort, Sano smiled in rueful sympathy. Both of them were beyond their depth here.

Sano, the son of a rōnin-masterless samurai-had once earned his living as an instructor in his father’s martial arts academy and as a tutor to young boys, studying history in his spare time. Family connections had secured him a position as a senior police commander. He’d solved his first murder case and saved the shogun’s life, an act that had led to his current post.

Twenty-one-year-old Hirata’s father had been a doshin, one of Edo ’s low-ranking police patrol officers. He’d inherited the position at age fifteen, maintaining order in the city streets until becoming Sano’s chief retainer a year and a half ago, when they’d investigated the notorious Bundori Murder case. Their humble origins, personal inclinations, and past experience ill suited them for this assignment. Yet, as Sano reminded himself, they’d emerged victorious from other difficult situations.

“What should we do first?” Hirata asked, his cautious tone echoing Sano’s misgivings.

“Find someone who can show us the scene of Lady Harume’s death.”

This, however, proved unnecessary. A great commotion drew Sano and Hirata deeper into the shadowy maze of rooms inhabited by countless unseen women who whispered and sobbed behind closed doors. Blue-robed physicians rushed about, carrying medical chests; servants followed with trays of tea and herbal remedies. Voices chanted and called; bells tinkled; drums throbbed; paper rustled. The sweet, tarry odor of strong incense wafted through the corridors. Sano and Hirata easily located the focus of activity, a small chamber at the end of a hallway. They entered.

Inside, five saffron-robed Buddhist priests rang bells, chanted prayers, beat drums, and shook paper-tasseled wands to drive away the spirits of disease. Maids sprinkled salt on the windowsill and around the perimeter of the room, laying down a purifying boundary, across which death’s contamination could not pass. Two middle-aged female palace officials, dressed in the somber gray robes of their station, waved incense burners. Through the asphyxiating haze Sano could barely see the shrouded body on the floor.

“Please wait outside for a moment,” Sano told the priests, maids, and officials. They complied, and Sano said to Hirata, “Get the chief physician.”

Then he opened the window to admit sunlight and clear away the smoke. He took a folded cloth from beneath his sash and covered his nose and mouth. After wrapping his hand with the end of his sash to protect himself from physical disease and spiritual pollution, he squatted by the corpse and pulled back the white shroud.

There lay a young woman, full and robust of body, skirts parted to expose naked hips and legs. She had an oval face whose smooth skin and softly curved features must have once been beautiful, but were now smeared with the blood and vomit that also stained her red silk kimono and the tatami around her. Sano swallowed hard. Earlier this morning he’d been too nervous about the wedding to eat; now, the sensation of nausea on an empty stomach was almost overpowering. He shook his head in pity. Lady Harume had died in the bloom of her youth. Then Sano frowned, noticing the corpse’s odd condition.

Her whole body looked as rigid as if she’d been dead for many hours, instead of just moments: spine arched, fists tight, arms and legs stiffly straight, jaws clenched. With his covered hand, Sano palpated her arm. It felt hard and unyielding, the muscles frozen in a permanent spasm. And Harume’s wide-open eyes seemed too dark. Leaning over for a closer look, Sano saw that the pupils were dilated to maximum size. And her shaved pubis bore what appeared to be a freshly tattooed symbol, still red and puffy around the inked black cuts-the character ai:

At the sound of footsteps in the corridor, Sano looked up to see Hirata and the castle physician enter the room. They crouched beside him, cloths held over their noses and mouths, studying Lady Harume’s corpse.

“What disease was this, Dr. Kitano?” Sano spoke through his own cloth, which was now wet with saliva.

The doctor shook his head. He had a lined face, and thin gray hair knotted at his nape.”I don’t know. I’ve been a physician for thirty years, but I’ve never seen or heard of anything like this before. The sudden onset, the violent delirium and convulsions, the dilated pupils, the rapid demise… It’s a mystery to me; I know of no cure. The gods help us if this disease should spread.”