Laura Rowland - Black Lotus

Reiko was the only person who had any way of knowing she’d come to the temple and figuring out that she’d been caught. Surely Reiko would come looking for her. Yet even as Midori sought comfort in the idea, doubts plagued her mind. What if Reiko didn’t find the note? Even if she did, and even if she sent a rescue party, how would it find Midori?

She thought of Hirata, and her heart ached. If only she’d been satisfied with the crumbs of attention he’d tossed her! Now she would probably never see him again.

Footsteps approached her cell. Hope and terror collided within Midori. She yearned for human contact, yet she feared the punishment that High Priest Anraku had promised. Light shone through the square hole in the door, brightening as the footsteps neared. Sitting up, Midori fought an urge to leap toward the welcome illumination. She wrapped her arms around her knees, helplessly waiting for whatever would happen.

In the opening appeared the side of a round paper lantern, like the curve of the moon. It shone into Midori’s cell, momentarily blinding her. Then her vision returned, and she saw beside the lantern a portion of a face, containing a single eye focused on her with dark, gleaming concentration. It belonged to Anraku.,

A whimper issued from Midori; her heart thudded in terror. She wanted to look away, but Anraku’s gaze held hers captive. Pleas for mercy rose to her lips, but she couldn’t speak.

Then a woman said, “Why must we keep her?” Midori recognized the sharp, irritated voice of Abbess Junketsu-in.

“She is special,” Anraku said quietly.

Midori realized that they were talking about her.

“What makes her different from anyone else?” Junketsu-in said. “And haven’t you enough women already?” Midori heard jealousy in her tone. “I think you should have gotten rid of her as soon as we found out she was a spy.”

The high priest didn’t answer. Alarm flared in Midori.

“She’s no problem as long as she’s down here,” said a man’s rough voice. It was Priest Kumashiro. “But if she somehow escapes, she could cause trouble. Keeping her alive is too risky. Please allow me to eliminate her at once.”

Midori’s alarm turned to horror. But Anraku spoke again. “Remember what my vision has foretold. Three signs shall herald our day of destiny. We have already witnessed human sacrifice and persecution against our kind, but we still await the third sign. And I have had a new vision.”

Anraku exuded mystical energy like a fire radiating heat through the door. Midori cringed from it.

“The Buddha said that the capture of Niu Midori presages the third sign,” Anraku continued, “and we shall not achieve glory unless she remains alive to perform a critical role.”

“What role? Why her?” demanded Junketsu-in.

“How long must we tolerate an enemy in our midst?” Kumashiro said, clearly displeased.

Anraku’s tactile stare probed Midori. “Question me no more. You shall know soon enough.”

His face and the lantern vanished from the peephole. Darkness immersed the cell as footsteps receded down the corridor. Anraku’s spell over Midori relaxed like kite strings when the wind ceases, and she hurled herself against the door.

“Please don’t leave me! Come back!” she cried.

The darkness and solitude seemed even worse now. Her terror was more acute because although she now knew she would live awhile, she didn’t know how much longer, or for what terrible purpose.

“Help, help!” Midori screamed. Bursting into wild sobs, she pounded on the door. “Let me out!”

There was no response except the echo of her own desperate voice resounding through the tunnels.

The trial of Haru shall commence,” announced Magistrate Ueda.

He was seated upon the dais in the Court of Justice, a cavernous hall with barred windows set in paneled walls, illuminated by lanterns. Sano sat at his right; secretaries flanked them. All wore black ceremonial robes.

The magistrate continued, “Haru is accused of four crimes: arson, and the murders of Police Commander Oyama, a peasant woman named Chie, and a small boy of unknown identity.”

The secretaries wrote, recording his words. Sano hid anxiety behind a cool façade. He’d spent the day preparing for the trial. Now, as twilight dimmed the windows, he hoped to secure a conviction and elicit facts that would convince the shogun to authorize a rescue expedition to the Black Lotus Temple, but the outcome of the trial was by no means certain.

A large audience sat in rows on the floor, in a haze of smoke from tobacco pipes. Sano eyed Hirata, who knelt among other Tokugawa officials, apart from a delegation of civilian town leaders. Hirata’s features were strained with worry about Midori.

Magistrate Ueda addressed the guards stationed at the door at the far end of the court: “Bring in the defendant.”

The guards opened the heavy, carved door. Through it walked two soldiers, with Haru between them. Her hands were bound by ropes, and her ankles shackled in iron cuffs joined by a thick chain. She wore a gray muslin kimono and straw sandals, and her hair was braided. The bruises around her eyes had darkened to violet; her puffy nose and raw, split lips rendered her face almost unrecognizable to Sano. As the guards led her toward the dais, she moved stiffly, as if in pain.

Uneasy murmurs swept the audience. Magistrate Ueda’s calm didn’t waver, yet Sano doubted that this father of a beloved daughter could remain unmoved by the injured girl. She might induce sympathy in the man designated to judge her.

The guards positioned Haru on her knees on a straw mat on the shirasu, an area of floor directly before the dais, covered by white sand, the symbol of truth. Haru bowed low. Looking down at her bent back, Sano could pity her himself.

“Look up,” Magistrate Ueda ordered her.

Haru lifted a woeful face.

“Do you understand that the purpose of this trial is to determine whether you are guilty of the arson and murders for which you were arrested?” Magistrate Ueda said.

“Yes, master.” Haru’s voice was a barely audible whisper that the audience strained forward to hear.

“First we shall hear the facts of the crimes and evidence against you, presented by His Excellency the Shogun’s sōsakan-sama,” said Magistrate Ueda. “Then you may speak in your own defense. Afterward, I shall render my decision. “ He nodded to Sano. “Proceed.”

“Thank you, Honorable Magistrate.” Sano described the fire at the Black Lotus Temple, how the victims found in the cottage had died, then how the fire brigade had discovered lamp oil, a torch, and Haru at the scene. “Haru claimed to have lost her memory of the time preceding the fire. She insisted that she didn’t set the fire or kill anyone. But my investigation has proved that she is a liar, arsonist, and murderess.”

Haru sat with eyes humbly downcast, like a martyr resigned to persecution. Sano was glad that Reiko wasn’t here. He hadn’t seen her since morning, when she’d told him Midori was missing; he hadn’t told her about the trial because he didn’t want her around to interfere. Next he related Haru’s probable involvement in her husband’s death, and what Abbess Junketsu-in and Dr. Miwa had said about her misbehavior at the temple. He mentioned that the two girls from the orphanage had seen Haru go to the cottage.

“Therefore, Haru had both the bad character and the opportunity necessary to commit the crimes,” Sano said.