I. Parker: The Crane Pavillion

Akitada stopped. He should not make his children cry. No matter how he felt himself, they were innocent of wrong doing. “Please get up, Oyuki,” he said more calmly. “Nobody told me. Who suggested that you and the children live here?”

Yoshi cried, “I don’t live here, Father. I have my own room.”

“Good,” said his father. “You must show me later.”

Oyuki, who was also weeping by now, got to her feet. “Lady Akiko thought it was best if Lady Yasuko took her mother’s room. Lady Akiko said I was to be Lady Yasuko’s maid now.”

Lady Akiko! His sister. Meddlesome as always. “Well,” he said, “I’m sorry if I spoke harshly to you. I didn’t know. I suppose this is a practical arrangement. Only my daughter seems rather young to take possession of my wife’s things.”

“We asked permission of Lady Akiko because Hanae said you weren’t to be bothered. Lady Akiko and I looked through Lady Tamako’s things and chose two gowns that could be shortened for Lady Yasuko. Lady Yasuko was trying on the gown, sir.”

And so he had been put in the wrong. He always seemed to become the ogre in his children’s eyes. A flash of another memory crossed his mind: Yori looking up at him with frightened eyes after a reprimand. Yori, who had died shortly afterward of smallpox. And his father had spent the years that had passed wishing he could take back his harshness, wishing he had instead held his son and told him that he loved him.

He raised his hands to his face and groaned. Then he lowered them, turned to his son and held out his hand, and said, “Come, Yoshi. Let us go up to your mother’s pavilion and see your sister’s room.”

Yoshi came reluctantly. “You will come and see mine also? I have a picture of a very fierce tiger.”

“I will come and see it.”

They climbed the steps together. Oyuki stepped aside, and Akitada looked down at his daughter’s tear-stained face. “I’m very sorry, Yasuko,” he said. “It’s been a very hard time for me. I miss your mother very much, you see.”

She burst into new tears and flung herself into his arms. He ended up kneeling on the veranda and holding his weeping children.

And weeping with them.

Oyuki sniffled and withdrew.

Later that day another visitor arrived. This time, Akitada made an effort to be hospitable.

The gentleman announced by Tora was Nakatoshi, formerly his clerk in the Ministry of Justice, but now senior secretary at the Ministry of Ceremonial. Nakatoshi had called before to express his condolences, but he had seen how deeply wounded Akitada was and left again quickly.

Nakatoshi was one of the few friends who had never asked Akitada for anything, while Akitada had gone to him on numerous occasions for assistance that always been freely given. He had obligations to Nakatoshi.

Nakatoshi came into Akitada’s study almost timidly. “Forgive me,” he said, just as if he were still his clerk. “I hate to intrude. You must tell me to go if it’s an imposition.”

It was an imposition, but Akitada would never say so. He rose to his feet, fixed a smile on his face, and went to greet Nakatoshi with an embrace. “Welcome, my friend,” he said, “and I hope I never hear you call me ‘sir’ again. I think by now you outrank me.” He grimaced. “If we give it another month, I’ll be lucky if they’ll let me serve as a junior clerk in your office.”

It was a feeble joke. Akitada expected a very serious reprimand for deserting his post.

Nakatoshi looked anxious. “Have you heard anything from the Central Affairs Office?”

Akitada shook his head. “Come, let us sit. You’ll take some wine?”

With their cups filled and tasted, they fell into an awkward silence. Akitada did not know what to say. He thought that Nakatoshi probably wondered how he was handling his loss but could not ask such a question. Clearly word was out that he was handling it poorly. But to his surprise, Nakatoshi had something very different on his mind.

“I’ve come to beg a favor, Akitada,” he said, looking embarrassed. “I know I shouldn’t burden you with this, but I cannot talk about it to anyone else.”

Oh yes, there were obligations! Obligations had a way of stepping in your path and forcing you to go in another direction whether you wanted to or not.

Akitada nodded and said, “As you know, my friend, I’m very much in your debt. Please tell me what I can do.”

Nakatoshi flushed deeply. “No, no,” he said quickly, “you mustn’t feel like that, Akitada. I’ve done nothing. I’m the one who always benefitted from your assistance.”

Akitada shook his head and smiled a little. “Please speak freely.”

Nakatoshi took a gulp of wine. “I think you may remember the Abbot Genshin of the Daiun-ji near Mount Hiei?”

“I don’t think so.”

“He used to be Takashina Tasuku. You were at the university together, I heard.”

“Tasuku? Yes. I know Tasuku. And I did know that he took the tonsure many years ago. He’s an abbot now?”

Nakatoshi nodded.

Tasuku, the handsome heir of a powerful and wealthy family, had been blessed with extraordinary looks and the attention of the most beautiful women at court. But he had engaged in secret trysts with an imperial concubine who was murdered on her way back to the palace. In remorse or to escape punishment, Tasuku had become the monk Genshin. Tasuku an abbot of a monastery?

“Not surprising, given his family’s influence. What about him?” Akitada said, curious in spite of himself.

“Someone living in his mansion, a woman, was found hanged a week ago. It’s being called a suicide, but Abbot Genshin is uneasy about the matter. He came to me and asked if I would speak to you.”

Akitada frowned. He did not like the fact that a man who had once been his friend had taken such a roundabout way to approach him. True, Tasuku knew that Akitada had strongly disapproved of him in the past and held him responsible for the concubine’s death. And now he was apparently again involved in some scandal with a woman, and this woman had also died. But perhaps Nakatoshi owed him a favor much as Akitada owed many to Nakatoshi. It was the way of the world. Never mind that he had meant to escape it.

“What was this woman to the abbot?” he asked, his voice cold.

Nakatoshi looked startled. “Nothing. Or rather, she found refuge on his estate. A matter of charity.”

Akitada snorted.

“Have I touched on a sore subject? You must forgive me. I know very little about Abbot Genshin and nothing whatsoever about the lady.”

Akitada saw no reason to beat about the bush. “The reverend abbot was a great philanderer before he took the tonsure. I believe he did so only because he was involved in a scandal. The other woman also died.”

“Dear heaven. Can it be so? He has the reputation of being a truly holy man. There’s talk he will be made a bishop soon. Do you believe he is responsible for this lady’s suicide?”

Akitada did not answer this. “Did the police investigate?”

“Yes. Apparently there was no doubt. She was alone in her pavilion, pushed one of her trunks under a rafter, climbed up, and tied a length of silk around the rafter and her neck, then jumped off the trunk. Two children who lived in the neighborhood and sometimes visited her found her the next morning.” Nakatoshi paused, then added, “Abbot Genshin was on Mount Hiei with his monks. He hadn’t been in the capital for many months.”

Akitada sat in silence, thinking about it. “I don’t like it,” he said finally. “What is it that he expects me to do?”

Nakatoshi flushed again. “I hardly dare propose it, but could you take a look at the place, and maybe talk to the people who live there?”