Sowing Ghosts 10.2

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[continuing chapter 10]

“I wanted to thank you face-to-face for speaking with the arms master on my behalf.”

Kanegawa Akihiro looked embarrassed as he spoke the words, and Hiroki understood the young man’s discomfort. If he had got it into his head that Hiroki had been acting on a generous impulse, doing him a favour, then Kanegawa would quickly come to believe himself in Hiroki’s debt.

And it was a debt that could never be discharged: how did you repay the saving of your life? Hiroki had heard of samurai in similar situations who felt compelled to take their own lives because they could not live with the knowledge of being so irredeemably in debt to another person.


“It was nothing, I assure you,” Hiroki told him. “I merely expressed my opinion of your situation, after having considered all that I had learned of the circumstances surrounding Lady Tomiko’s death.” The expression on Kanegawa’s face did not change; if anything the young man looked even more conflicted. “I am speaking the truth when I tell you I did not act as a favour to you, or as a gift of some sort. It was entirely the arms master’s decision to free you, and if you owe anyone, you owe him.”

“Even if what you say is true, I still owe you my thanks. I wish it could be more.” Kanegawa gestured at the small room in which they sat. “You see how I live here. I can give you nothing except for thanks.”

The room was one of the most comfortable and tastefully appointed places Hiroki had seen in years. A small shoin alcove built into one corner served as desk and store for the writing supplies Kanegawa used in his daily work. Adjacent to it, a toko displayed a hanging scroll on which were beautifully drawn the two characters of the word “duty.” The calligraphy, stylized though it was, clearly announced that Kanegawa himself was the artist.

That there was no ostentation in this room was not, to Hiroki’s way of thinking, a disadvantage; if anything he was inclined to a more positive view of the young man’s character. “You may have little,” he said, smiling, “but you display it to splendid advantage. I believe you have nothing to apologize for, Kanegawa-sama, and your thanks are more than I deserve for doing” — he nodded in the direction of the hanging scroll — “what I was required to do.”

Kanegawa dropped his head, as if acknowledging he had no answer to Hiroki’s words.

“There is one other thing you could do for me, though,” Hiroki said, prompting Kanegawa’s head to lift again. “Can you tell me why you did not think it worth telling me that you had attempted to intercede with the arms master on behalf of his sister and Akamatsu Noritoyo?”

Kanegawa’s head jerked back, and a look of distress came over him. “I don’t know how to answer that,” he said. For a moment he stared past Hiroki into some middle distance; the effect was to make him appear to have lost his senses entirely. Eventually he said, “I failed utterly in my attempt to help them. It was something I tried to put from my mind, Yoshino-dono. I could claim no credit that resulted from my actions, and at the time I think I had convinced myself I had made things worse by intruding.

“Why would I want to tell anyone else about an effort that was so terribly unsuccessful? Rather than help Lady Tomiko I made her more unhappy than she already was. All I brought her — brought both of them, really — was unhappiness. That was a marriage that should have been, a marriage that would have helped bring two clans closer together in their mutual responsibilities and obligations. And now it can never be.

“Can you wonder, then, that I should be so reluctant to talk about it?”

Hiroki had to admit that he could not. Even if it does seem to me Kanegawa is more upset about his failure than he ought to be. With that said, there was nothing more for him to talk about with Kanegawa, who anyway begged his pardon, pleading a task he had to attend to. Hiroki bowed himself out of the room, only just managing to avoid a maid — young Aki, as it turned out — who was approaching with a kettle in one tiny hand, teapot and cup in the other.

Tea, he thought. An excellent idea. I need a break from this confusing work.

Next    Characters    Chapter 1    Chapter 2    Chapter 3    Chapter 4    Chapter 5    Chapter 6
Chapter 7    Chapter 8    Chapter 9    Chapter 10