Laura Rowland: The Incense Game

“I know who their family is.” Sano pointed to the symbol. “That’s the Hosokawa clan crest.”

Dismay mixed with his satisfaction at finding a clue to the women’s identities. Lord Hosokawa was one of Sano’s top political allies, who headed an ancient family that controlled the fief of Higo Province. Higo was a top rice-producing domain and the Hosokawa clan one of Japan’s largest, wealthiest landholders.

“I’ll have to inform Lord Hosokawa,” Sano said, even though he had a million other urgent things to do. This was too sensitive a matter to delegate to a subordinate. “I’d better take some of their personal effects to show him.” Sano gingerly untied the women’s sashes and tucked them in his horse’s saddlebag.

A loud groan came from the bristly haired young townsman. He staggered as if he were drunk; he held his head in both hands. “Ow, my head aches!” Wheezing, he cried, “I can’t breathe!” and then he fell to the ground.

His friends hurried to his aid. He vomited violently.

“What’s the matter, Okura?” the headman asked.

A stench arose as Okura’s bowels moved and diarrhea gushed down his legs. “I don’t know,” he said between retches and gasps. “My stomach hurts. I hurt all over.” Dazed, he looked around at the ruins as if seeing them for the first time. “What happened? Where am I?”

Sano started to say, “Fetch a doctor,” then remembered that since the earthquake doctors were too few and too far between.

Detective Marume said, “Vomiting, diarrhea-the women had those symptoms, too.”

“You’re right,” Sano said. “I think they were poisoned.”

“Okura must have breathed the poison when he went down in the hole,” Hirata said.

Okura went into shuddering convulsions while the other townsmen tried to soothe him. The headman said, “But we all went down. Why is he the only one who’s sick?”

“The rest of us didn’t go down until the hole was opened up and the fresh air got in,” Sano recalled. “And he didn’t wear his mask.”

“Is he going to die?” the headman asked anxiously.

“I don’t know.” But if Sano was right about the poison, it had already killed three people. “He’s young and strong. Maybe he got only a small dose of the poison and he’ll recover.”

Sano did know that the likelihood of poison complicated the matter of the dead Hosokawa women. He said to Hirata and Marume, “This looks like murder to me.”

Laura Joh Rowland

The Incense Game: A Novel of Feudal Japan

“I’m hungry,” the shogun announced to the boys crowded into his chamber. Lounging on cushions on the dais, wrapped in quilts, he stroked the heads of his two favorite boy concubines. They were twins, thirteen years old, with rosy, pretty faces and sweetly bland smiles. “Where’s lunch? It must be, ahh, at least an hour overdue.”

Chamberlain Sano’s son Masahiro opened the door to let in three elderly servants. They staggered up to the dais, carrying trays laden with covered dishes. All the younger servants were out helping to fix the castle. Only two of Masahiro’s fellow pages and a lone, middle-aged bodyguard were on duty. The old servants set the trays before the shogun and bowed.

“Ahh, at last.” The shogun took the lids off dishes, revealing rice, pickled vegetables, and a soup made with dried shrimp, tofu, and seaweed. The boys leaned forward hungrily. Masahiro’s stomach growled. The shogun frowned. “This is the same lunch I had yesterday! I want something else.”

One of the servants said, “A thousand apologies, Your Excellency, but-but I’m afraid… there isn’t anything else.”

Food had been scarce and limited in variety since the earthquake, even in the castle, Masahiro knew. But the shogun either didn’t know or didn’t care.

“There has to be something else for me to eat! I’m the shogun!” He picked up a bowl and hurled it. The servant ducked. Soup sprayed from the bowl as it flew. It hit the wall, then broke on the floor. The boys gasped. Masahiro couldn’t help thinking that if he’d acted like that when he was little, his nurse would have spanked him.

The shogun flapped his hand at the servants. “Take this slop away and bring something new, or I’ll, ahh, have you and the cooks put to death!”

Lugging the trays, the servants hurried off. Masahiro and the other boys gazed longingly after the food. The shogun said to them, “Clean up the mess!”

The two other pages jumped to obey. They, like Masahiro, were sons of government officials. They were in competition to show who could best serve the shogun. If they impressed him favorably, they would get high positions when they grew up. They raced each other to pick up the broken bowl.

“Pour me some tea-I’m thirsty,” the shogun said. One of the twins lifted the teapot from a table. He poured tea into a cup held by his brother, who handed it to the shogun. The shogun drank, and grunted. “This is cold!”

The twins set the pot on a brazier, then discovered that the fire inside had gone out. The pages stepped on the spilled soup and tracked it across the tatami.

“You’re making things worse!” the shogun cried. Other concubines removed the grate from the brazier and fanned the coals. Ash billowed into the air. “Stop, stop!” He waved his hand and coughed. The pages rushed to open the window. “No! I’ll freeze to death!”

Masahiro had witnessed many scenes like this since the earthquake, since the shogun’s concubines and youngest retainers had been given charge of the private chambers. Incompetence and chaos reigned. Masahiro slipped quietly from the chamber and fetched a broom and dustpan. Unlike other samurai boys, he’d learned from his family’s servants how to make fires, clean house, and even cook simple foods when he was little; he’d thought it was fun. Every day he resisted the urge to put his skills to use lest he attract too much attention from the shogun. His parents had warned him against that, when he’d first become a page last year.

“This is a great opportunity,” Sano had said. “Do well, and you’ll bring honor to the family as well as secure yourself a good place in the regime. But it’s also dangerous, because the shogun likes boys.”

As his father awkwardly explained what the shogun did with them, Masahiro wasn’t surprised. He’d happened upon similar goings-on among the retainers in his own household. Manly love was considered normal, acceptable. And Masahiro had heard the gossip about the shogun and the boys at the palace.

“Your mother and I don’t want that for you,” Sano said. “We’d rather you get a lesser post than become the shogun’s plaything.”

Masahiro had learned that their attitude was unusual. Most parents in their position would willingly, if not happily, sacrifice their children to advance the family.

“We can’t keep you away from the shogun, and even if we could, we wouldn’t deny you the opportunity to make good for yourself.” Regret showed on Sano’s face. “All we can do is tell you to be careful.”

“How?” Masahiro asked. Even though he felt no disapproval toward people who practiced manly love, he didn’t have any urge to do it himself-especially not with the shogun, who was a cranky old man.

“Be obedient, but don’t volunteer for anything,” Sano said. “Do the best work you can, but quietly. Only speak if you’re spoken to.” His conflicted expression said he knew his advice ran counter to what a courtier should do if he wanted to succeed. “Don’t stand out.”

“Yes, Father,” Masahiro said.

At the time he couldn’t have foreseen the earthquake or how hard it would be to sit by and watch other people do badly what he could do well. Now he handed the broom and dustpan to the other pages. He surreptitiously wiped the floor mats with a cloth while they made a show of sweeping up the china fragments. He stood in a corner instead of taking over for the two boys who were poking at the coals in the brazier, trying to restart the fire.