The Peony Lantern (8 page)

We were about to go out into the garden to gather branches and flowers for that morning's lesson when Shimizu appeared at the doorway to the kitchen. He
had disappeared into the other part of the house after breakfast.

‘Misaki, would you come with me? There's some family business I wish to discuss.'

‘Yes, of course. Wait for me, Kasumi — I won't be long.'

I busied myself collecting the scissors and baskets and buckets we'd need, but Misaki didn't return. I could hear the murmur of voices from the public reception room where Shimizu conducted his business.

I went into the reception room on our side of the house and ran my hands lightly over the blue-and-white bowl, very old Nabeshima ware, displayed on top of the cabinet. Misaki had told me it was part of a set and I wondered what the other pieces might look like. I opened the doors of the cabinet and kneeled to peer into the gloomy interior. I found a set of green-glazed sake cups on the top shelf and a painted fan. On the bottom shelf there was a large octagonal box. Excited, I carefully pulled it out; I had heard of such boxes but never seen one. Made of
maki-e
, lacquer sprinkled with gold powder, it held shells for playing
kaiawase
, a shell-matching game. I opened the lid and sure enough it was filled with clam shells, each one painted with a scene. Beneath this layer was a second layer of shells; each shell from the top layer would have a perfect match from the second. This must have been part of Misaki's wedding set, I realised. The matching of the two shell halves symbolised the perfect union of marriage.

I was lifting shells from the box and examining them one by one when I noticed with a start that the voices
which had been a background murmur had stopped. Then I heard Misaki calling me.

‘Coming,' I said, putting the box back where I had found it. I would have to ask Misaki about it later; perhaps we could even play.

‘I thought you might have gone to the garden without me. I'm glad you waited; you know you can't be trusted to select our materials yourself.' She smiled to let me know she was teasing, though it was true; I would have unerringly selected the most crooked branches and the most headstrong flowers.

As we snipped branches of pink-flowering crepe myrtle, my thoughts returned again to the conversation I'd overheard the day before. It was strange, I reflected, how you could spend almost every hour of the day with someone and still know so little about them. And Lord Shimizu had praised my powers of observation! Well, whether she was a samurai or not, with her gentle modest nature Misaki was undoubtedly a lady.

‘Ouch!' I had been squeezing so ferociously on the secateurs as I tried to cut a particularly thick branch that I had given myself a blood blister.

‘Oh, Kasumi, what are you doing? That branch wouldn't even fit in a vase.'

Any efforts to turn me into a lady, however, were clearly doomed to failure.

Cracking of branches

Colours painting the heavens:

Flowers in the sky

I thought we had seen the last of the rain, yet I woke one morning to find the day had dawned grey and drizzly.

‘I hope it doesn't last too long,' Misaki fretted. ‘They might have to cancel the fireworks festival.'

I had never seen fireworks before. ‘Are they actually like fire in the sky?' I asked.

‘Not exactly. They're more delicate. They're like . . . they're like drawings in the sky with light and colour and movement — and they're so loud.'

‘If I stand in the garden, will I be able to hear them?'

‘Probably.'

‘Will I be able to see them?' Drawings in the sky . . . what a beautiful notion.

‘I'm sorry, Kasumi. I don't think so.' Her eyes were
soft with regret. I knew she felt bad that I wouldn't be going, but I didn't; I knew that the ladies-in-waiting from the domain mansion would be real ladies, not like me. ‘So what should we do this morning?' Her eyes wandered to the window. ‘I would've liked to spend time in the garden.'

I remembered the box I had found in the cabinet. ‘We could play a shell-matching game.'

‘Shell-matching? What are you talking about?'

‘The box in the cabinet. I found it the other day.' As I was talking, I had moved to the cabinet and removed the box. ‘Was it part of your wedding set?'

Misaki frowned slightly as she looked at the octagonal box, and it occurred to me that she probably hadn't had a wedding set, not on this scale. Shell-matching boxes were for the daughters of daimyo and their highest-ranking samurai retainers.

‘No, it's not mine.' She bit her lip. ‘It's from my husband's family, perhaps. I didn't know it was there. I haven't really looked through the cupboards.'

That seemed to me to show a remarkable lack of curiosity. Or politeness; I shouldn't have been looking through my master's possessions without permission, I realised with shame. Still, it was done now.

I opened the top of the box. ‘Look at the shells. They're exquisite.'

Moving closer, Misaki kneeled beside me and pulled a shell from the box. ‘So many of them! Oh, look at this one.' On the inside of the shell were painted cherry blossom branches on a gold background, with what looked like a line of verse written down the side.

‘What does it say?'

She peered at it, then shook her head. ‘I don't know.'

‘I think there are supposed to be three hundred and sixty pairs,' I offered. ‘Shall we play?'

We laid out the shells from the top tray so that their pictures were visible.

The morning passed very happily, though Misaki pretended to sulk when I had found two pairs for every one of hers.

Fortunately the rain didn't last long. By the afternoon the skies were clear and we were able to take tea by the pond. It was the same spot in which Taro had revealed Lord Shimizu's secret, the only difference being the appearance of blue and white bellflowers in the garden. Misaki had a fan painted with bellflowers, I recalled, thinking I must remember to give it to her to carry the next time we came outside. She was still carrying the iris fan, but their season was coming to an end. What would be suitable for the fireworks? I wondered. If there was a wrong note struck in her dress or accessories, would it be observed? I turned to her to ask, then decided not to trouble her with my anxieties. I was only worried because I knew her secret — she didn't know I knew, and I wanted to keep it that way.

As it turned out, I was not alone in my anxiety. In the week since Shimizu had first announced that they would be going to Shunsho's viewing party, Misaki had seemed excited by the prospect, enlivened, but on the morning of the fireworks festival itself she was pale. She ate no
breakfast, and my attempts to engage her in conversation about the event were met with short answers.

Finally I asked, ‘Are you unwell, my lady?'

The face she turned on me was drawn not with illness but apprehension. ‘To be honest, Kasumi, I'm a little scared. Tonight will be my first time meeting my husband's friends.'

The afternoon of the festival was spent in getting ready. We went through Misaki's kimonos trying to decide which best suited the occasion. ‘What do you think of this one?' She held up a kimono of bright red silk embroidered with threads of yellow, indigo and pale blue.

‘That must be what fireworks look like,' I said.

‘Oh good, I thought so too. You don't think it's too bright?'

‘But the fireworks will be bright,' I pointed out. ‘And besides, it's so beautiful.' I traced an embroidered flower with my finger.

I redid Misaki's hair, using the red comb from Yabuhara as an ornament. Then she reapplied her white face makeup, and I took the brush to paint around the nape of her neck. A light application of rouge to her cheeks and lips, and then it was time for the kimono.

‘What if they don't like me?' she said tremulously as I tied the obi.

I suspected what she meant was:
What if they see through me?
After all, the only person she'd had to fool so far was me, and while I could spy the new shoot of a fern among a carpet of leaves, my eye for people had proved not quite so discerning: I hadn't suspected her secret at all.

‘How could they not like you?' I responded, pushing her towards the reception room.

To our surprise Isamu was waiting there with Shimizu, so striking in his formal over-jacket and
hakama
that for a moment I couldn't drag my eyes away. Fortunately he didn't notice, as his eyes were fixed on Misaki.

‘You look lovely, Misaki-chan,' Shimizu told his wife.

Isamu said nothing, but his gaze spoke volumes and, while I had never really bothered about my looks, for a moment I regretted not being beautiful myself.

Misaki gazed shyly at the floor.

‘It's nearly sunset,' Shimizu said. ‘We should be leaving.'

Misaki clutched my wrist. ‘Will you be listening in the garden?'

Isamu looked at her. ‘Did you want Kasumi to come with us?'

His uncle glanced at me in apology. ‘I never thought . . .'

‘I know that some of the other wives will have their ladies-in-waiting with them,' Isamu said. ‘Even from my quarters I've been hearing them all shrieking over their robes since dawn.'

Their
silk
robes, I thought to myself. ‘No, no,' I said, indicating my plain cotton kimono. ‘I don't think . . .'

‘No one will be looking at you,' Isamu interrupted. ‘They'll be looking at Misaki.'

It was true, but the comment stung all the same.

‘I suppose . . .' Shimizu said doubtfully. Was he really considering it? Suddenly I didn't care about my kimono if it meant I could see fireworks. I could guess why he was
hesitating: I was as unconventional a choice for a lady-in-waiting as Misaki was for a wife. Would my unsuitability for my role highlight some unsuitability in Misaki?

‘I'll look after her, Uncle,' Isamu promised. ‘We'll stay in the background and no one will even know we're there, right, Kasumi?'

I nodded eagerly, mentally thanking Isamu for saying exactly the right thing.

‘Oh yes, do let's take Kasumi. She's never seen fireworks. And it would be so good to have her there in case . . .' I could see Misaki searching for a reason why my presence would be beneficial. ‘In case I lose a hairpin,' she said.

We all looked at Shimizu in appeal. I tried my best to look like an efficient finder of hairpins.

‘All right,' he agreed. ‘But you be careful not to lose her in the crowd, Isamu. And you, Kasumi . . .' He smiled. ‘You keep a close eye on my wife's hairpins.' He glanced at her hair. ‘I see you're wearing the comb from Yabuhara.'

She touched it. ‘It's my favourite.'

We moved out towards the gate, where two palanquins waited to transport Lord Shimizu and Misaki. The festival was to be held in Ryōgoku by the Sumida River, a walk of about three-quarters of an hour.

‘I know a walk like this is nothing to you, Lady Kasumi,' Isamu remarked.

I rolled my eyes at his teasing. ‘I'm glad of it,' I said. ‘I'm used to taking long walks every day.' After being confined to strolling in the garden, it felt good to be moving. I discreetly held up my kimono so I could take longer strides, and I easily kept pace with Isamu, looking
about me curiously; it was my first chance to have a proper look at where I now lived.

We were walking on a road lined with tall trees and long whitewashed walls on either side.

‘So this neighbourhood is called Kanda?' I asked.

‘That's right. We're on a plateau between the Shogun's castle and the downtown area. Do you see that river?' He pointed ahead of us. ‘This side of the river is called inner Kanda, because it's closest to the castle. A lot of government officials live here. In fact, that wall there is a daimyo's compound. Quite a few daimyo have their mansions in inner Kanda.'

‘Where's the Matsuyama mansion?'

‘Daimyo Alley is that way. A lot of it was destroyed in the earthquake and it's only just been rebuilt.'

I nodded, remembering the terrible earthquake that had struck Edo a few years before in Ansei 2. We had even felt the tremors in Tsumago.

We crossed the bridge over the river, one of many bridges I could see up and down the waterway. Shops and houses were packed close together here, and there seemed to be people everywhere — and the noise! I was reminded of a flock of geese, with the calling and honking, but there seemed to be no order to the movements of the shopgirls and hawkers, samurai and deliverymen, geishas and children and carpenters and flower-sellers and . . . I was feeling almost dizzy.

Ahead of us the palanquins bearing Shimizu and Misaki were stopping and starting, and at times I lost sight of them as shoals of people moved between us.
Instinctively I walked closer to Isamu, his confidence and the familiarity of him reassuring me.

‘It's so big.' I tried to make it sound like an observation, but my voice must have betrayed how startled I was by the scale.

‘Don't think of it as one huge city,' Isamu suggested. ‘They say that Edo is made up of eight hundred and eight neighbourhoods. When you think of it that way it doesn't seem so overwhelming. Look there.' In what I suspected was an attempt to distract me, he pointed to a street we were passing; all along it I saw huge swathes of material hung from wooden rails. ‘That's the street where the dyers live. It's their cloth you can see drying.'

Soon I forgot my nerves and was able to focus on other vignettes of city life. Lounging outside a toothpick shop was a beautiful woman puffing at a pipe, a chicken pecking at her feet. A young boy, his hair standing straight up like the bristles on a pig, ran ahead of his samurai father; in his hand was a ball made from strips of brilliantly coloured kimono silk.

A gust of breeze blew up and a shop curtain flapped sideways, the movement echoed by the hem of a kimono and a banner in the shape of a carp left over from the boys' festival several weeks earlier. Even the low line of cloud sitting just above the horizon, catching the last rose and gold of the setting sun, was aligned.

And then the sun retreated, leaving a clear dusky sky salted with the first stars. I felt such a wave of euphoria come over me to be part of the bustle of the crowd beneath that immense sky that I laughed aloud.

‘What's funny?' asked Isamu.

I shook my head. ‘Nothing. It's just — look at it all!' People were jostling us from all sides, the twanging of a
shamisen
rising above the murmur of voices, and above that a vendor calling, ‘
Okonomiyaki
straight from Osaka!
Okonimiyaki
straight from Osaka!'

‘It makes you laugh?' Isamu said.

‘Yes!' I exclaimed, turning towards him. ‘It's just so . . . alive. And I'm here, in the middle of it.' I flung my arms out wide to embrace it all, and as my eyes met his I had a sudden urge to fling my arms around him too, because wasn't he part of it? And wasn't it because of him that I was here now, instead of spending a long evening alone in the house?

His eyes widened as if he could read my thoughts and for a moment we just gazed at each other. He seemed to sway towards me, then abruptly took a step back. Embarrassed, I dropped my arms to my sides. I hadn't really been suggesting . . .

‘You're a strange girl,' he said, shaking his head, but he was smiling. I supposed he thought
I
was the one worthy of ridicule. He was used to sedate ladies in silk kimonos riding in palanquins, and here was I, striding along like a peasant in my old cotton kimono laughing to myself. He must be horrified.

We were approaching another river, spanned by the biggest bridge I had ever seen. Pleasure boats lit with lanterns bobbed along sedately, smaller boats skating between them like water striders on the surface of a pond. Voices and laughter and snatches of music echoed across the water. Wide flat ferry boats guided by boatmen with poles plied a course from one side of the river to the other.