The Pure Land (10 page)

‘
Kore wa!
’ she said.

This one.

He lifted the cup.

No coin.

She shrieked and held her hands up. Glover chuckled, straightened his cuffs, did the trick again. Now she pointed at the right-hand cup.

‘
Kore wa!
’ This time she was definite.

Again he lifted the cup; again there was no coin.

She let out a little gasp. He lifted the left-hand cup and there it was, shining.

‘
Voilà!
’

She gave a startled
Oh!
that made him laugh out loud.

‘Magic!’ he said.

Mackenzie was raging, dumped a moneybag full of coins onto his desk, the silver itzibu spilling out.

‘Bloody Shogun! Bloody Bakufu! Bloody country! Why can’t they stick to gold like everybody else?’

‘Ah!’ said Glover. ‘There you have it. They’re not like everybody else. They’re not like
anybody
else.’

‘It’s wilful,’ said Mackenzie. ‘It’s obstructive.’

‘It’s Japanese!’

Glover sifted the coins, let them shimmer through his fingers, the gesture enormously satisfying, theatrical, the miser with his hoard. Silver and gold.

He stopped, suddenly jolted by a thought so preposterous he didn’t dare trust it.

‘Jesus Christ!’ he said.

‘What is it?’ asked Mackenzie, still tetchy.

‘A daft idea,’ said Glover.

‘Another one?’

Glover checked the
Advertiser
, commodity prices, the going rate for gold bullion.

‘God Almighty!’

He threw down the paper, rushed out, left Mackenzie shaking his head.

He shouldered his way into the Customs House, Shibata and Nakajimo following in his wake. The place was jampacked with traders – Americans, Europeans, Chinese, all haggling and angry, the noise a raucous babble. He saw Montblanc looking petulant, piqued, as only a Frenchman could. Behind the counter sat a customs official, face bland, expressionless, weighing out coins on a set of scales, his movements practised and unhurried as if he were performing some ancient religious ritual, refusing to be ruffled or flustered by the racket and hubbub around him.

Shibata bowed low to the official. Glover had primed him on what to ask. The official grunted out a reply. Shibata gave Glover a nod, and he turned and shoved his way back out, the two clerks hurrying to keep up.

He was back in half an hour. With the help of the two clerks he had emptied his own safe of the silver coins, filled six bags, loaded them on a handcart. He had also taken the precaution of bringing his pistol, tucked into his belt. They carried the bags straight up to the counter, thudded them down. Then they waited, patient, while the high priest of commerce, in his own time, set their offerings on the scales, wrote a set of figures on a paper scroll with a brisk flourish of a bamboo brush. Glover checked with Nakajimo that the figure was what he expected.

A second time he led the way out and down the street, stopped at the heavily guarded Hong Kong and Shanghai Bank. Inside he handed over the document from the Customs House, received a quantity of gold bars from the strongroom. Nakajimo and Shibata loaded them onto the handcart, covered them with a length of rough cloth, trundled the precious load back to Glover’s
office. Glover walked ahead, alert, one hand on the pistol at his belt.

When the gold was securely locked away, he hurried out again in search of Mackenzie and Walsh, found them at the Club.

‘You’re not going to believe this!’ he said, trying not to speak too loudly, but unable to keep the eagerness from his voice. He held up an itzibu coin. ‘These are worth their weight in gold. In fact they’re worth three times their weight!’

‘You have my full undivided attention,’ said Walsh.

‘Explain,’ said Mackenzie.

‘It’s simple!’ said Glover. ‘Four of these – that’s about six shillings at the present rate – buys a cobang of gold. But ship that gold out and a cobang sells for eighteen shillings. Two hundred percent profit!’

‘Good God!’ said Mackenzie.

Walsh was already on his feet, heading towards the door.

‘We’ll have to move fast,’ he said, ‘before every freebooter in Nagasaki has the same idea.’

‘Every
other
freebooter!’ said Mackenzie.

For weeks it was chaos, a goldrush, as word spread and traders cashed in. Ship after ship left for China, laden with Japanese gold. Fortunes were made before the customs officials imposed restrictions on the number of itzibu issued to any one trader. But they simply bought under assumed names. Glover, Mackenzie and Walsh became Messrs Hook, Line and Sinker respectively. Finally the Shogun’s government intervened, reluctantly returned to the gold standard, closed the door on further profiteering.

The three of them were back in the Foreigners’ Club, drinking a toast to their success.

‘To alchemy!’ said Mackenzie.

‘Magic!’ said Glover.

‘The fast buck!’ said Walsh.

‘Mister Hook!’

‘Mister Line!’

‘Mister Sinker!’

They drained their glasses.

‘Of course, the Shogun’s none too pleased about the whole business,’ said Mackenzie. ‘It could have destabilised their entire economy.’

‘They’ve nobody to blame but themselves,’ said Walsh. ‘They were the ones trying to cheat, undervaluing the dollar. It just backfired on them, that’s all.’

‘Hell mend them,’ said Glover. ‘And if it undermines the Shogun, well and good.’

He was seated again at the table, facing Sono, the little sake cups once more between them. Again he placed a silver coin beneath one of the cups, performed his
legerdemain
, worked the magic. She chose the middle cup. He lifted it, revealed a gleaming gold coin. Then he lifted the left-hand cup, and there was a second gold coin; he lifted the right and there was a third. She scooped up all three coins, jingled them together, laughed in sheer delight.

Sono was expecting a child. She had been hesitant about telling him, tentative, unsure how he would react.

He was overwhelmed – thrilled, excited, intoxicated, terrified. A child! Himself a father! He laughed, thumped the desk, said they’d get married straight away.

‘You don’t strictly have to,’ said Walsh when he told him the news. ‘I mean, there are ways and means. The girl can be farmed out, paid off. The child can be adopted.’

Glover was stung. ‘Christ!’ he said, ‘I knew you were callous, but this is bloody coldhearted. It’s beyond belief!’

‘Sorry,’ said Walsh, realising he’d misjudged. ‘I’d forgotten you were a man in love!’

The word discomfited Glover. ‘Aye, well.’

But when he stood with Sono at the temple on the hill behind Ipponmatsu, he was moved by a huge tenderness towards her.

His wife.

His wife. And she was carrying his child, a son perhaps, to continue the line, bear the family name; and if a daughter, then that was good too, it was all good, and a son would come later.

The ceremony was simple. The Buddhist monk from the temple chanted a mantra, bestowed a blessing. A Christian minister read the vows, and as Glover repeated each one, Sono nodded in agreement.

Till death us do part.

‘
Hai, so desu
.’

Mackenzie and Walsh were there as witnesses, the madame from the teahouse smiling her own benediction.

Back at Ipponmatsu Glover and Sono stood on the lawn, watching the evening light on the far hills, the ships at anchor out in the bay. They had talked about going to Kagoshima, to visit Sono’s father. Now it seemed essential.

‘He’s going to be a grandfather,’ said Glover. ‘
Oji-
san
.’

She laughed, clapped her hands. ‘
Oji-
san!
’

‘You think he’ll be happy about that?’

‘I hope so,’ she said. ‘He very strong man. Like you.’

She had already spoken of her father, a samurai from Satsuma clan. Kagoshima, in the far south, was their stronghold. Now she said her father, and the clan, might want to do business with him.

‘Well,’ he said. ‘Now that he’s family …’

She smiled.

‘Isn’t that right, Mrs Glover?
Guraba-
fujin
.’

She laughed and covered her mouth. He hugged her, made her shriek, lifted her and carried her, so light, into the house.

Sono had gone on ahead, travelled to Kagoshima a few days earlier, prepared her father, Shimada-san, for the meeting. She was waiting at the quay to greet Glover as his ship docked. She clapped her hands with a childlike eagerness when she saw him, then consciously regained her composure, her poise, bowed formally. Glover laughed, bowed ridiculously low, then took her hand and kissed it.

Kagoshima was not one of the treaty ports. The Satsuma were hostile to change, resented the western invasion and the Shogun who had allowed it. As he walked with Sono along the narrow street to the ryokan, the inn where they would be staying, Glover sensed it in the air. People stared at him, not with curiosity but with open hostility, with hatred and fear; the women turned away, the men spat out curses, the children ran and hid.

He had read accounts of the American Wild West, by traders who had ventured into Indian settlements, and he imagined it must feel like this, the atmosphere predatory, himself as prey. Some of the men were armed, swords tucked in their waistbands. More than once he saw a hand rest on a hilt, in readiness, and was glad he had brought his pistol. He was grateful too that he was with Sono. Then the unease he felt, the nervousness in his gut, even made him suspicious of her. She might be under her father’s sway, be leading him into a trap. They had only been together a few months, and if he knew anything about the Japanese, it was that he knew nothing. The sense of apprehension grew, the unease deepened. This woman, his wife, was a stranger to him. Then she stopped at the entrance to the inn, turned and looked at him with such openness that he felt ashamed.

The meeting with Shimada-san was set for later in the day. Glover gave himself over to Sono, to show him her town.

‘Kagoshima beautiful,’ she said.

‘So I see.’

She laughed, mimicked what he’d said, singsong. ‘So I see!’

In the distance, on an island offshore, was a volcano, its sheer sides blue-green, a plume of smoke above its peak.

Sono saw him looking. ‘
Sakurajima
,’ she said, naming it.

She showed him gardens and temples, a pottery with exquisite bowls and vases, some black some white, tastefully displayed. Past it ran a small stream, and placed in the flow was a length of bamboo. It was open at one end and fastened, mid-length, to a cross-piece, a fulcrum. It faced upstream, so it gradually filled with water, and the weight tipped it so it hit a rock with a satisfying thunk. Then the bamboo emptied and the whole process started again. He stood watching it, fascinated, as it filled and emptied, filled and emptied.

Thunk.

‘
Shishi-odoshi
,’ said Sono.

‘That’s what it’s called?’

‘
Hai
.’

‘But what’s it
for
?’

She shrugged, didn’t understand the question.

Shishi-odoshi
.

At a shrine she stopped and bowed to a little stone statue, one of their gods, its face benign and compassionate, one hand raised in benediction. Round its shoulders was a tiny piece of silk, wrapped like a shawl, and in front of it someone had placed offerings, a single chrysanthemum flower, a ricecake, a sake flask.

‘Jizo,’ she said, and patted her belly. ‘We pray to him for baby.’

She faced the statue again, seemed to be uttering a prayer.
She folded her hands and bowed once more. He smiled and did the same.

Shimada sat, cross-legged, at a low table. Glover had removed his shoes, kneeled on the tatami mat, facing the old man; Sono was between them, even more deferential and self-effacing than usual, the dutiful daughter, meekness incarnate. She introduced Glover, formally, and the old man grunted.

‘Shimada-san,’ said Glover, bowing low enough to show respect, but still maintain his own dignity. ‘
Hajimemashite. Yoroshiku
onegai shimasu
.’

Shimada seemed pleased at being greeted in his own language by the gaijin. This time his grunt was a little more expressive, more accepting. He gave a barely perceptible incline of the head, indicated Sono should pour them drinks, sake in small black ceramic cups.

‘
Kanpai!
’ said Glover, and they drank.

Sono refilled the cups and Glover raised his again. It was time to try his party-piece, a toast he had prepared, rehearsed with Sono’s help.

He looked straight at the old man. ‘
Shogun!
’ he said, and the old man paused, cup raised halfway to his lips, before Glover continued, ‘
Nanka kuso kurae!
’

The old man looked startled, weighed up what Glover had said, let it sink in. The Shogun! To hell with him!

Shimada’s face seemed to crumple, fold in on itself. A choking sound gurgled in his throat. Then he spluttered and roared with laughter, thumped the table.

‘
Nanka kuso kurae!
’

This was good! It was a story to tell: the gaijin, his son-in-law, cursing the Shogun!

Now they could talk business.

It was slow and laboured, the language a problem, but with Sono’s help and the sake flowing, they found common ground. At one point Shimada saw the pistol in Glover’s belt, under his coat, and he pointed at it. Glover thought he was angry at him for bringing a weapon into the house, and he started to apologise, but the old man simply wanted to see the gun, take a closer look.

Glover made sure the safety catch was in place, locked, and he handed over the gun, handle-first. Shimada made a great play of weighing it in his hand, observing it was heavy.

Then time stopped.

The old man levelled the pistol straight at him, drew a bead on him, cocked the hammer. Glover was instantly hard stone-cold sober, looking down the barrel. The old man’s eyes were ice, gave nothing away. Then he laughed, handed the pistol back, indicated his approval. This was what he wanted to buy, and more. He mimed firing a rifle. Glover mimed clutching his heart, as if he’d been shot. Again the old man roared.