I. Parker - Death on an Autumn River

The ugly man had returned.

Akitada was outraged at the intrusion. “Why? And how did you get in?”

The ugly man smiled a crooked smile and gestured up. Akitada raised his eyes but saw nothing beyond the bare rafters and the darkness of the roof above. He frowned. “I don’t understand. How did you know I was here, and where are your clothes?” His initial panic subsided, but he was still very uneasy about this visitor.

The ugly man chuckled. “I came through the roof. It seemed best not to announce my presence to the fat bastard at the front door. And I took off my clothes to dry them. There was a terrible storm earlier. As for how I knew you were here, I followed you.”

Akitada peered around the room and now saw that a gray shirt and a pair of short pants lay spread on the floor boards. The ugly man wore only a loincloth. Akitada sat down and said, “I see,” though he did not really see anything at all. “What do you want, er . . .”

“Saburo,” said the ugly man helpfully.

“Why are you following me, Saburo?”

“I have information that may be useful to you and an offer that may benefit both of us. I thought this way we could meet unobserved.”

Akitada looked at the man in silence. He really wished he had brought his sword. While this strange creature had indubitably saved his life, his behavior had been and remained suspicious. But there was nothing to be gained from throwing him out. At the present state of his affairs, he might as well listen to what Saburo had to say.

“What information?”

“Everyone knows you’re looking for the young man who traveled with you.” He gave Akitada his crooked smile and recited, “‘The sailing clouds understand the traveller’s dreams, but the setting sun must go away like parting friends.’ Young men are full of enthusiasm and care little about the worry they cause their friends. Though perhaps this parting is more of an inconvenience than a grief?”

The man was astounding. The poem he quoted sounded familiar. Akitada had taken him for a common man, and a vagrant at that. “An inconvenience is putting it mildly. He may already be dead. Go on.”

“Oh, but he may also be alive. I came to offer you my help in finding him.”

Akitada waved that away as a mere ploy to get money. “Thank you, but the matter is in good hands. He was seen going on board of one of the ships. He’ll be brought back . . . if he is alive. And even if he’s dead, I shall know what happened to him.”

Saburo cocked his head. The damaged eye leered horribly at Akitada. “What if I told you he’s not on the Black Dragon?”

Akitada sat up. “How do you know that?”

The ugly man chuckled. “I had no other work to occupy me and decided to do some work for you . . . on account, so to speak. In other words, I kept my eyes and ears open.”

Akitada said quickly, “I cannot pay for information that isn’t verified.”

The other man nodded. “I only mentioned it to prove I can be useful. You need not pay me a copper coin if you’re not satisfied with the information.”

Narrowing his eyes suspiciously, Akitada asked, “Who are you exactly? What is your profession?”

Saburo hesitated a moment. “I’m nobody now, but once I was a monk, a warrior, and an informer.”

“A full life,” commented Akitada, raising his brows. “Those two men who attacked me. Did you kill them?”

The ugly man shook his head. “The first one bled badly, but that was an accident. Call it age and lack of practice. The angle wasn’t right and I had no time to move. His friend must’ve helped him away. Anyway, their tracks showed they walked.”

“I’m relieved,” Akitada said dryly. “The police could have blamed me. So you went back after you left me?”

Saburo nodded.

“You didn’t by any chance find the silver I threw to the robbers?”

“No. Just footsteps and blood, and I got rid of those.”

It might be a lie, but considering that the man had saved his life, Akitada did not persist. Still, the amulet was another matter. “The money can be replaced, but I accidentally dropped a small amulet, a family heirloom. It’s important to me.”

“Sorry. They must’ve found it.” Saburo paused, giving him a sideways glance something like an evil leer. “I could try to get it back for you.”

Aha, thought Akitada, so he does have it. He said, “Surely that would be difficult, even impossible.”

The other man grinned crookedly. “Perhaps not. I shall try.”

“Good. It’s worth two pieces of silver to me.”

The ugly man waved the offer away grandly. “Don’t mention it. It’s all part of the job.”

“How did you manage to overcome two armed men so quickly? They were younger and stronger than you and armed. It almost looked like a magic trick.”

Saburo smirked and shoved a hand into the jacket that was drying on the floor near him. He brought out a curious metal disk with prongs around its circumference. It was about the size of an orange. This he handed to Akitada. The disk was quite heavy and the prongs were sharp.

“What is it?”

“A shuriken. It is thrown like a knife. It isn’t as efficient as a knife, but then no one takes it for a weapon. That’s useful when a man is caught and searched.”

Akitada gave back the disk and glanced up at the beams. Saburo reminded him of the clever thief Tora had rescued from a vicious gang of youths a few years back. “You mean you’re a thief?”

Saburo smiled. “Never a common thief. I was a shinobi-mono . These days, I’m getting too old for such work.”

“What brought down the second man?”

Saburo reached again into his wet jacket and drew out two slender black sticks about a foot long. “This,” he said, taking them apart to show that they were connected at one end by a thin chain.

“How?”

Saburo chuckled. “It’s a nunchaku. ” He held one of the sticks and whirled the other through the air. It made a strange humming noise, and the cricket outside answered. Catching the flying stick deftly, he passed both to Akitada. They were surprisingly heavy.

“Steel,” said Saburo. “Small enough to hide inside my sleeve, but deadly when they strike a man’s head. Also useful for strangling.”

Akitada dropped the sticks. “So you’re a killer,” he said flatly. “Why did you save my life?”

Saburo sighed and tucked the nunchaku away. “I’m not a killer. Those two who attacked you were the killers. I did not kill them.”

Akitada grunted in disbelief, but the sound reminded him of the governor’s insulting huffing, and he cleared his throat. “Perhaps you’d better explain yourself.”

“I told you I was a monk once. It was the time when the great monasteries were jealous of each other. I was very young then and an acolyte.”

Since he did not regard the Buddhist faith with the same reverence as the court did, Akitada was not favorably impressed by this, but he said nothing.

“My monastery trained its own warriors. I wasn’t big and strong enough for battle, but I was quick and agile, so they sent me to Mount Koya.”

This did not help either. Akitada thought that the arming of monks in order to kill other monks was disgusting behavior for someone who professed to live by the Buddha’s teachings. The existence of heavily armed monks furthermore was dangerous to maintaining peace and harmony among the people and posed a threat to the government.

Saburo must have read his face, because he said apologetically, “I was very young and found the excitement of this training very much more to my taste than the constant round of praying, instruction, and meditation.”

Akitada nodded. “To become a shinobu-mono , a shadow warrior?”