Cloud of Sparrows (5 page)

“God is everywhere,” Cromwell said, “and in everything. He watches over all without exception.”

McCain grunted. The wordless syllable made his thoughts on the matter clear. He stepped out onto the pier with the longboat’s mooring rope in hand and passed it to one of the waiting Japanese dockworkers. This man bowed deeply as he accepted it. No words passed between them, since McCain spoke no Japanese, and none of the Japanese wharf men spoke English.

“The
Star
sails for Hong Kong in a fortnight,” McCain said. “If you’re not back aboard by then, it will be six weeks before we return on our way back to Hawaii.”

“We will see you in six weeks, then,” Cromwell said, “to bid you a good journey. This is where we will remain, doing God’s work, for the rest of our lives.”

McCain grunted again and stalked off toward the dockside warehouses.

“Prior arrangements have been made,” Cromwell said to Emily and Stark. “Permissions have been granted. We face only formalities here. Brother Matthew, if you will keep Sister Emily company and watch over our luggage, I will deal with the Shogun’s officials.”

“I will do so, Brother Zephaniah,” Stark said.

Cromwell hustled off to the table where the three officials sat. Stark offered his hand to Emily. She took it and stepped from the boat onto the pier.

The obvious fact that all the workers were Japanese didn’t cause Stark to relax. Men could do a task because they were driven to it. They could do it because they were afraid not to do it. And they could do it because they were paid to do it. Anyone among them could be such a man. He had no intention of dying as soon as he stepped ashore, stopped before he could even begin.

“You seem taken by the appearance of the Japanese, Brother Matthew,” Emily said. “Do you find them so unusual?”

“Not at all,” Stark said. “I was only admiring their efficiency. They have removed our belongings from the longboat in a quarter of the time it took our own seamen to place them there.”

They followed their luggage to the table where the three officials sat. Cromwell had become engaged in a rather heated discussion with them.

“No, no, no,” Cromwell said. “Do you understand? No, no, no.”

The official in the center was apparently chief among them. His face remained bland, but his voice, too, rose as he said, “Must yes. Yes, yes. Understand you?”

“They’re insisting on searching our luggage for contraband,” Cromwell said. “That is expressly forbidden by treaty.”

“No yes,” the official said. “No Japan come.”

“What harm is there in allowing a search?” Emily said. “We carry no contraband.”

“That’s not the point,” Cromwell said. “If we yield to arbitrary interference now, there will be no end to it. Our mission will be destroyed before it can begin.”

A samurai came running up to the table. He bowed to the chief official and said something in Japanese. His tone was urgent. All three officials jumped to their feet. Following a quick exchange among them, the two junior officials went running off with the samurai who had brought the message.

The stubborn look was gone from the remaining official’s face. Now he appeared agitated and extremely worried. “Please to wait,” he said with a bow, suddenly polite.

In the meantime, samurai who had apparently been in readiness poured from the dockside armory onto the pier. A good number of them carried firearms as well as swords. Stark recognized them as muskets of an earlier era. Antique, but still capable of killing at a good distance in the hands of marksmen. Distance, in this case, would not be an issue. Even as they ordered themselves in ranks, another group of samurai arrived, about two dozen of them, wearing uniform clothing of a different color and pattern. Four bearers in the center of the group carried a palanquin on their shoulders. The new arrivals came onto the pier and stopped less than five paces away from the front rank of the Shogun’s men. Their attitude was not friendly.

“Make way!” Saiki declared. “How dare you obstruct the passage of the Great Lord of Akaoka.”

“We were not informed that any Great Lord would grace us with his presence.” Saiki recognized the speaker as Ishi, the fat and pompous commander of the Shogun’s harbor police. If it came to violence, his would be the first head Saiki would take. “We are therefore not authorized to allow such a presence.”

“Mannerless creature!” Saiki took a step toward Ishi, his right hand on the hilt of his sword. “Lower yourself to your proper level!”

Without any order being given, half of the Akaoka samurai arrayed themselves in battle line alongside their commander, their hands like his on the hilts of their swords. Though there were four times as many men wearing the Shogun’s colors, they were not nearly as well organized. The musketeers were at the back, where their weapons could not be employed without potentially decimating their own ranks. That is, if they had been prepared to fire, which they were not. The swordsmen in the front rank were equally unprepared for conflict. When Saiki stepped forward, they staggered backward as if they had already been struck.

“Our lord needs to inform wharf rats of nothing!” Saiki was ablaze. Another insolent remark from Ishi and he would cut the oaf down where he stood. “Remove yourselves from our path or we will assist you in your departure.”

Inside the palanquin, Genji listened with grim amusement. He had come to the harbor to greet visitors. It would not seem to be a difficult undertaking. Yet here he was, on the verge of becoming involved in a life-and-death struggle over simple access to the pier. Enough. He slid open the door of the palanquin with a sharp clack of wood on wood.

“What is the problem?”

“Lord, please don’t expose yourself.” One of his bodyguards knelt beside the palanquin. “There are musketeers nearby.”

“Nonsense,” Genji said. “Who would want to shoot me?” He stepped out. As his feet went toward the ground, his sandals were quickly placed beneath them.

In the back rank of the Shogun’s men, Kuma, in the guise of a musketeer, saw Genji step into the open. He saw also that there was no identifying crest on Genji’s clothing. This was the opportunity he had been warned to expect. Because Genji wore no crest, it could be claimed that he was suspected of being an impostor involved in some plot against the recently landed missionaries. No one would believe this, nor was it meant to be believed. It was an excellent excuse, however. Kuma stepped back where he would not be seen by his fellow musketeers, raised his musket, and sighted in at the center of Genji’s right shoulder joint. As he had been instructed, he would administer a crippling wound, not a mortal one.

Saiki rushed to stop Genji from proceeding any farther. “Lord, please go back. There are thirty musketeers not ten paces away.”

“This is too ridiculous.” Genji brushed past Saiki and stepped out beyond the front rank of his own men. “Who is in charge here?”

Kuma pulled the trigger.

The musket did not fire. Kuma looked at it. He should have been more careful when he had rushed out of the armory. He had grabbed someone else’s empty weapon instead of his own loaded one.

“You there, what do you think you’re doing?” The gunnery captain strode up to him. “No one ordered you to raise your musket.” He looked sharply at Kuma. “I don’t know you. What is your name and when were you assigned to this unit?”

Before Kuma could answer, Ishi said, “Lord Genji,” and fell to his knees. His men, including Kuma and the angry gunnery captain, were forced to follow suit.

“So you recognize me?” Genji said.

“Yes, Lord Genji. If I had known you were coming, I would have properly prepared for your arrival.”

“Thank you,” Genji said. “May I greet my guests, or must I go elsewhere first to secure permission to do so?”

“Get out of Lord Genji’s way,” Ishi said to his men. They moved swiftly to the side without standing completely and dropped right back down to their knees. “Forgive me, Lord Genji. I could not let your men proceed without knowing you were really among them. There are so many plots these days, and the Shogun is especially concerned about plots against outsiders.”

“Idiot!” Saiki was still on the verge of exploding. “Are you suggesting I would undermine the best interests of my own lord?”

“I am sure he is not,” Genji said. “Are you?”

“Not at all, Lord Genji,” Ishi said, “I was merely . . .”

“There,” Genji said to Saiki, “all settled. Now may we proceed?” He walked down the pier toward the missionaries.

Saiki watched him go, his heart filled with admiration. With a hundred potential assassins at his back, he walked away as casually as if he were strolling in the innermost garden of his own castle. Genji was young and inexperienced, and perhaps lacked sound political judgment. But there was no doubting the strength of the Okumichi blood in his veins. Saiki’s hand left his sword. With a final glare at Ishi, he followed his lord’s lead.

Emily didn’t realize she had stopped breathing until she exhaled with a gasp.

Moments earlier, a bloody fight had seemed inevitable. Then someone had stepped out of the palanquin, spoken a few quiet words, and the tension had immediately dissipated. Emily watched with a high degree of curiosity as that someone now walked toward them.

He was a young man of striking appearance, with dramatically dark features that stood out vividly against his pale skin. His eyes were long, rather than wide. They would have attracted more notice than admiration in a Western face. In the oval of his Eastern one, they were perfect complements to the high arches of his brows, his delicate nose, the mild rise of his cheekbones, the suggestion of a smile that held his lips in a small curve. Like the other samurai, he wore a jacket with stiff winglike extensions at the shoulders, had the same elaborately styled hair with partially shaved sections, and like all of them, wore two swords in his sash. Despite the weapons, his manner seemed distinctly unwarlike.

As he neared, the official who had been giving Zephaniah so much trouble fell to his knees and pressed his head to the wooden planks of the pier. The young man said a few words in Japanese. At this, the official came quickly to his feet.

“Genji Lord, come, he,” the official said, nervousness causing his English skills to deteriorate even as he spoke. “You, he, go, please.”

“Lord Genji?” Cromwell said. When the youth bowed in affirmation, Cromwell introduced himself and his party. “Zephaniah Cromwell. Emily Gibson. Matthew Stark.” God help us, he thought. This effeminate child is the Great Lord of Akaoka, our protector in this savage land.

Now a second samurai approached. This one was more mature, and much more ferocious in appearance. Genji said a few soft words. The ferocious one bowed, turned, and made a small circular gesture with an upraised hand.

Genji said something to the official. The official bowed to the three missionaries and said, “Genji Lord say, welcome Japan.”

“Thank you, Lord Genji,” Cromwell said. “We are most honored to be here.”

Clattering noises came from the land end of the pier. Three small two-wheeled carriages came their way, pulled, not by horses, but each by a single man.

“They have slavery here,” Stark said.

“I had thought not,” Cromwell said, “but it appears I was mistaken.”

“How terrible,” Emily said. “Human beings used as beasts of burden.”

“It’s the same in the slave states,” Stark said, “and worse.”

“Not for long, Brother Matthew,” Cromwell said. “Stephen Douglas awaits inauguration as President of the United States, and he is pledged to abolition.”

“It might not be Douglas, Brother Zephaniah. It might be Breckinridge or Bell or even Lincoln. This past election was full of uncertainty.”

“The next ship will bring the news. But it matters little. Whoever is President, slavery is finished in our country.”

Genji listened to their conversation. Here and there he thought he recognized a word. Human. United States. Pledged. He couldn’t be sure. He had practiced conversational English with tutors since he was a child. But the flow of the language from the mouths of native speakers was another matter altogether.

The rickshaws stopped in front of the missionaries. Genji gestured for them to step aboard. To his surprise, all three adamantly refused. The ugliest of the three, their leader, Cromwell, gave a long explanation to the harbormaster.

“He says their religion does not permit them to ride in rickshaws.” The harbormaster nervously wiped the sweat from his brow with a handkerchief.

Genji turned to Saiki. “Did you know this?”

“Of course not, lord. Who would ever think rickshaws had anything to do with religion?”

Genji asked the harbormaster, “In what way do rickshaws offend them?”

“He’s using many words I don’t understand,” the harbormaster said. “Forgive me, Lord Genji, but my usual task is dealing with freight. My vocabulary is limited mostly to trade items, landing permits, fees, prices, and the like. Religious doctrine is far beyond my ken.”

Genji nodded. “Very well. They will have to walk. Load the luggage into the rickshaws. We’ve paid for them. We might as well put them to some use.” He gestured for the missionaries to proceed on foot.

“Good,” Cromwell said, “we have won our first victory. We have made our host understand how firmly we stand for Christian morality. We are the people of His pasture and the sheep of His hand.”