Laura Rowland: Shinjū

Sano cleared his throat. “ Otōsan ,” he said, bowing, “I’ve returned home for the holiday only. The shogun has appointed me his special investigator. When I leave here, I shall take up residence in the castle and begin my work-at ten times my former salary.” There: he’d said it aloud. Telling someone gave the reward a reality it had lacked when the shogun had bestowed it and he’d accepted. The acknowledgment filled him with a formless dread that left no room for pleasure.”If you let me inside, I’ll explain.”

His father frowned in disbelief. Then his eyes, which hadn’t left Sano’s face, moved to the horse, the clothes, the swords. He paled, and the arm that supported him began to shake. He started to fall.

“ Otōsan !”

Dropping the reins, Sano hurried forward and caught him. At the same time, his mother appeared in the doorway. Her joyful greeting turned to an exclamation of dismay when she saw her husband’s ashen face. With her help, Sano got the old man into the house and settled under warm quilts beside the charcoal brazier. Then he went back outside to stable the horse.

“Ichirō- chan , we were so worried, what happened to you?” his mother cried when he returned. “Where have you been?” She gazed in awe at Sano’s clothes and swords, and at the treasure -laden saddlebags that he held. “What can be the meaning of this?”

Sano knelt before his parents. Tokugawa Tsunayoshi had given him permission to tell them the truth. After swearing them to secrecy, he did. “If anyone asks, you must say only that the shogun promoted me because of a service I did him while I was a yoriki ,” he added when he’d finished. That was the story that Yanagisawa and the elders had concocted. How neatly they’d secured his complicity in the deception.

His mother reacted to the news with delight. “Oh, Ichirō- chan , you are a hero! And what a wonderful reward for your courage!” Eyes teary, she beamed at him.”Everything has turned out for the best.”

Sano wished he could share her belief. He feared, without being able to say exactly why, that his new appointment would prove to be as much a punishment as a reward. Trying to push these disturbing thoughts away, he managed a smile for his mother. Then he turned to his father.

The old man only nodded and said, “You have brought honor to our family name, my son.” But he sat straighter, visibly gaining color, strength, and vitality.

Laughing, Sano’s mother rose. “With all this excitement, I’ve forgotten all about our meal!” She hurried out to the kitchen.

During their New Year’s Day feast, Sano made himself eat to please his mother. Pain and fatigue robbed him of desire for the red beans and cold soup, the sweet spiced wine and other holiday treats, although he took great satisfaction from seeing his father eat with an unusually good appetite that presaged an eventual return to health. All he wanted was to be alone, so that he could begin to make sense of all that had happened to him since he’d first heard of the shinjū . He wanted to ponder the meaning of his alarming change of fortune, to understand the emotions now starting to surface through his initial shock and numbness.

Finally the long meal ended. Sano rose, bowing to his parents. “I must go to Wada- san ’s house and give him his new horse,” he explained. Taking along parcels of mochi and tangerines to distribute among his neighbors, he escaped into the quiet streets.

He delivered the horse to Wada- san , who accepted it with awe and made him stay and celebrate his promotion with a drink. He called on his neighbors, but did no more than wish them a pleasant New Year. News traveled fast; they would know of his dubious luck soon enough. Afterward, he wandered through the streets on foot, carrying his one remaining gift parcel, his thoughts in a turmoil. Mulling over the events that had brought him to this moment, he wondered what he could have done differently. Could he have prevented a great tragedy without causing the lesser ones? Did his ultimate victory outweigh his many defeats? And why did he dread beginning his new servitude?

He wasn’t surprised when he found himself outside Edo Jail once again. What he wanted was not solitude after all, but the right sort of company.

This time Dr. Ito did look surprised when he welcomed Sano at the door of his cell. After accepting Sano’s gift and exchanging New Year’s greetings, he said, “I must admit that I wondered whether I would ever see you again, my friend. Strange rumors have been circulating. What brings you here, obviously safe and-”‘ His eyebrows lifted as he saw the Tokugawa crests on Sano’s garments. “And if not well, then at least with every appearance of being well off?”

Sano said nothing. He felt full to bursting with the need to bare his soul. But now that Dr. Ito stood waiting for him to explain the real purpose of his visit, he didn’t know how to begin. How could he voice the complex fears, regrets, and doubts that tormented him?

Dr. Ito broke the silence. “I am glad you have come, Sano- san ,” he said. “You are just in time to participate in my special New Year’s Day ritual. Come with me.”

He led the way through a series of guarded doors and passages and into a courtyard where the guards’ barracks stood at the base of the jail’s outer wall. In one corner, a flight of stone steps led to the top of the wall and the western guard tower.

As they climbed the steps, Dr. Ito said, “This is the day on which I look outside these walls and enjoy the view of Edo and its environs.”

Concern for his friend made Sano forget his own problems for the moment. “You mean you’re allowed to see outside the prison only once a year?” he asked in dismay. In comparison with lifelong incarceration, his own ordeal seemed trivial and the shogun’s reward an unmitigated blessing.

“Oh, no,” Dr. Ito said with a wry laugh. “The guards would let me come up whenever I asked. I treat their ailments, and in return they grant me privileges that our illustrious government would not. No, I myself choose to ration my pleasures. It gives me something to look forward to. And permits me less chance to reflect upon how much I have lost.

They reached the top of the stairway and walked along the broad, flat summit of the wall. The wind fluttered their robes as they looked out at the city.

“It is beautiful, is it not?” Dr. Ito said softly. “The beginning of the New Year is a time for hope, and my hope is that I will someday regain my freedom.” He turned and fixed his penetrating gaze on Sano.”But you did not come to hear about my troubles.”

Encouraged by his friend’s attentive and bracing presence, Sano told Dr. Ito how he’d spent Setsubun . Dr. Ito listened in silence. When Sano finished and turned to see his reaction, he nodded.

“And so you are a hero,” he said. “But not, it would appear, in your own estimation.”

The astute remark unleashed the torrent of emotion that Sano had been holding back. “Oh, yes, I’m a hero,” he said bitterly. “I saved the shogun’s life; I killed a traitor. Maybe I even prevented the collapse of the Tokugawa regime and five more centuries of civil war. I found the murderer and brought about her death. But three innocent people died because of me. Tsunehiko. Raiden. O-hisa. All sacrifices to what I considered a necessary search for the truth. To my vanity.

“If I’d known this would happen, I might have acted differently. I could have let the shinjū remain a shinjū . I’ve been a fool-a proud, clumsy fool-and rewarded for it!” Driven by unhappiness and self-disgust, he began to pace the wall.

Dr. Ito laid a gentle, restraining hand on his arm. “I can see why you feel as you do,” he said. “But such self-reproach is useless. You have fulfilled your duty to the lord who commands your highest allegiance. Perhaps the others were fated to die, just as you were fated to save the shogun. You cannot know otherwise.”