Feedback and comments are very welcome. Email Sue at wood_bee@yahoo.co.uk.  Please note that due to work commitments, replies may be delayed or not possible. Apologies in advance.

The Eightfold Fence

by Sue

FOUR

Rodrigues had begun to hate his horse before they were an hour from the city, and by the end of the journey he would cheerfully have hacked it to pieces and thrown them to the four winds if it had not been for the necessity of returning almost immediately. If he had wanted to spend his time riding on horseback like some God-cursed pox-ridden landsman he would have chosen another trade years ago; he was a seaman, and he knew he cut a poor figure on a horse.

He was painfully aware too that Naga and the other members of his escort were stifling their amusement behind their hands. No doubt they thought they were being polite, but he could see and hear only too clearly their opinion of his riding skills. The situation was made worse for him by the fact that he'd been unable to convey fully the dreadful urgency of his mission. He and Naga-san had sat face-to-face for more than an hour trying to communicate in the simplest of Japanese sentences, no interpreter being available. He would have given his right arm, then, for the services even of Father Sebastio - except that he could hardly have conveyed through the priest that he needed help to rescue Father Alvito. But Sebastio was still at Anjiro, spreading the gospel among the peasants in the Anjin's own feif. Rodrigues' road took him in exactly the opposite direction.

"Naga-sama, Toranaga-sama ni iku ... Taihen desu!" he'd blurted out, almost breathlessly, feeling the critical eyes of Naga's samurai on him as he spoke. "Isogimasu!"

Haste and urgency and fear were unwelcome visitors to Osaka Castle; in company with a large, sweating and apparently distressed foreigner they were positively anathema, and yet Naga had listened courteously when the names of Anjin-san and Tsukku-san were mentioned. Although Toranaga's son and chosen heir and his representative in Osaka while the Shogun was away from home, Naga knew nothing of his father's interest in the two barbarians except that he had chosen to befriend them. Now this barbarian sea-captain seemed to be suggesting that there was danger to one or other of them - Naga could not discern his meaning entirely, but his obvious anxiety indicated as much - and it was his duty to his father to make sure Toranaga knew about it immediately. This was the reason he had decided to escort Rodrigues personally; this, and the suspicion that had strayed into his mind that this was some barbarian ruse to bring harm to Toranaga himself. He'd left Osaka Castle heavily garrisoned and commanded by Hiromatsu, Buntaro's uncle, and had ridden out with Rodrigues as soon as it was light.

It was late afternoon before they encountered the first Toranaga samurai at the camp's perimeter. Buntaro had ridden back with more men two days previously, and now the guard on the camp had been doubled. However since the only marauding bandits in the area had been effectively dispatched the night they attacked the hunting-camp, there had been no further disturbance.

Naga spoke rapidly to the guard, who bowed and pointed to a trail leading away up the hillside, his gestures making it apparent that he was giving directions. When he had finished, Naga nodded and led the small convoy off on the route given.

It took another eternity to reach the hunting-camp, Rodrigues swinging down from his horse gratefully at Naga's signal and looking about him in some concern.

"Hey, Ingeles, are you here?" he bellowed at full volume, ignoring Naga's scandalised stare. "I've urgent word from Osaka, from the Jesuit mission. Ingeles, where are you?"

Moments passed when all life in the camp seemed to have ceased, and when from Naga's fierce glare Rodrigues expected to be knocked senseless at any moment, but he was saved from this ignominious fate by the arrival of Blackthorne. The English samurai was dressed in a dark green kimono with a small gold pattern, and although his face seemed lined and tired he looked strong and in full command of any situation.

"Jesus God, Rodrigues!" he exclaimed in Portuguese. "Three years since you sailed from Osaka and you turn up here! You're fatter than ever, you greedy Portuguese bastard!"

"Ah, Ingeles, thy father was a dog. But this is serious, man; I've news of Father Alvito." Disdaining the ritual exchange of insults that had characterised their seldom easy friendship Rodrigues grabbed Blackthorne by the arm and steered him away from Naga, but the Englishman noticed a quick defensive movement on Naga's behalf and hurried to reassure the samurai that he was not under threat.

"Ië, Naga-san, domo," he said, quickly. "What news?" he asked, switching languages without thought.

"He's sentenced to death, Ingeles. I'm to tell you that I spoke with Brother Michael yesterday, and that ... God curse you, Ingeles, the message is that if you care for Martin at all you must help him. He's to burn for sodomy and heresy and half a dozen other things."

Unable to grasp all that Rodrigues was saying, Blackthorne seized on a detail. "To burn? When?"

"Five days. It's that jealous pox-brained Spanish Bishop brought him to this, Ingeles. Unless it was you, of course."

"Me?"

"Sodomy's not done alone, Ingeles."

"But we didn't ... " Blackthorne stopped abruptly. Whether or not Alvito was guilty of the charge was irrelevant; he had been condemned to die for it. "We didn't," he repeated, seeking to meet Rodrigues' eyes.

The Portuguese pilot regarded him with something between disbelief and loathing. "You and Father Alvito?" he asked, an eyebrow lifting in appalled enquiry.

"It's not what you're thinking. He's changed, these last few years."

"Aye, so I hear. 'More than half samurai', I've been told. He's still a priest, though, Ingeles, and if you've led him astray you've damned him and yourself."

"On my honour, Rodrigues, I never touched him. I don't deny I wanted to, but he refused me. Toranaga'll tell you that; Alvito asked him to keep us apart so that we couldn't be tempted again."

"Toranaga! What the devil does he have to do with this?" Rodrigues was mopping his forehead, staring at Blackthorne with bulging eyes. A dozen answers ran through Blackthorne's mind. He's trying to force us together, he thought. He wants us to be lovers. It suits some plan of his.

He said; "Tsukku-san's his friend. He'll need to be told."

Memories of his interview with Naga uppermost in his mind, Rodrigues nodded his assent wearily. "Very well, Ingeles. But you interpret for me, damn you! My Japanese is rusty from three years away."

"Come with me, then," Blackthorne told him briskly. "And watch your damned manners when you speak to Toranaga-sama, you heathen murdering pirate." Turning, he spoke a few words to Naga, who bowed and moved to follow them towards Toranaga's pavilion.

The interview with Toranaga was a singularly painful one for all concerned. Forewarned by his samurai of Rodrigues' arrival, he had assembled Buntaro, Omi and half a dozen guards in his pavilion before Naga and the two Europeans entered. Rodrigues, still sweating and uncomfortable from the ride, made a good deep bow and was acknowledged with politeness, then squatted awkwardly on a cushion beside Blackthorne.

"Anjin, I understand that this barbarian brings word from the Christian house in Osaka. Does it concern Tsukku-san?"

Blackthorne felt the Shogun's measuring gaze on him, but could scarcely meet Toranaga's eyes.

"Sire, he says that the new Christian daimyo has imprisoned Tsukku-san and intends to have him executed five days from now for ... for keikan; sodomy."

A puzzled expression came into Toranaga's eyes. "Keikan? Yes, I understand you - but why?"

"Because, Sire, their church believes that sodomy and heresy are the same. That's when a man denies God, or worships Him in a different way."

"This barbarian Captain is a Christian, isn't he?" Toranaga asked.

"Does he also believe that? Will he help Tsukku-san?"

"I think so, Sire. He brought the message, after all."

"There could be other reasons for that. Ask him, Anjin-san, and tell me his words exactly."

Turning to Rodrigues, Blackthorne couched the question in careful Portuguese. "Lord Toranaga wishes to know whether you agree that sodomy is the same as heresy, and that a man who commits it should be put to death."

Rodrigues's stare was appalled. "Ingeles ... " he faltered, gathering his thoughts with difficulty, "that's no question for you to ask me!"

"It's not my question, Captain, it's Lord Toranaga's. I'm only the interpreter."

Rodrigues swallowed nervously. "Well, then, Toranaga-sama," he said in Portuguese, turning to face the daimyo again, "a man can't help his nature, whether he's a peasant or a priest. Displeasing the church isn't the same thing as displeasing God. I've been around the world enough to know that there are Bishops and Cardinals and even Popes who bed with men, and no-one ever thought of burning them. If you ask me, Toranaga-sama, this Spanish Bishop hates all Portuguese; maybe if Father Alvito had been a Spaniard he'd have ignored the whole business. The Father's an honest man, for a priest. If he burns, it'll be a barbaric waste of a life."

Blackthorne did his best to shape Rodrigues' chaotic words into coherent Japanese, and was rewarded by a grim smile from Toranaga. "Yoshi. He'll help us, then?"

Blackthorne put the question, and was somehow not surprised when Rodrigues' answer was made direct to Toranaga.

"Hai, Toranaga-sama. You can rely on me, Ingeles. Whatever else may be true, Alvito's Portuguese and so am I. I'd not stand by and let a countryman of mine be burned by any damned Spaniard if I could help him."

"Good," Blackthorne told him, translating swiftly.

"Then it's simple," Toranaga said. "You'll take a dozen armed men and release Tsukku-san from his prison, Anjin."

Blackthorne glanced up and met Omi's interested gaze. "Gomen kudasai, Toranaga-sama, it isn't that simple at all," he explained, with a deep sigh. "To start with, I would need to know that Tsukku-san wanted to be rescued."

"Wanted to be rescued?" Naga put in, excitedly. "Anjin-san, are you out of your mind? Why would any man want to be burned to death?" Toranaga's glare told his son exactly what the Shogun thought of the interruption, but it was a valid question nonetheless.

"Yes, Anjin, why?" he said.

"I believe, Sire, he may have chosen to die rather than live with the knowledge of ... of what could not be. He said once that although he wanted to pillow with me he would die before he allowed it to happen - and suicide is a sin among Christians."

"Then you think he would deliberately provoke the Christian daimyo to order him killed?"

"I don't know, Sire, but if he dies ... I will formally ask your permission to commit seppuku."

"If he dies," Toranaga said, firmly, "you may ask me again and I will be sympathetic - but I have decided that he will not die. If Tsukku-san truly wishes to die I will not interfere, but if he chooses to live he will be saved - if you have to kill every Christian in Osaka to do it. These are my orders, Anjin-san. Do you understand?"

"Hai. Wakarimasu."

"Good. Then explain it to the barbarian Captain."

Blackthorne summed up in a few words for Rodrigues. "He orders me to discover whether Alvito wants to die," he said, briskly. "If not, then I'm to free him."

"Aha! What's your plan, Ingeles? Storm the mission with swords and cannon and tear the place apart around the Bishop's ears? Madonna, much as I love my God and my faith, I'd be happy enough to see that damned Spanish miser brought down."

"I have no plan," Blackthorne confided. "And what's more, if anyone goes to the mission to free him it can't be me. I gave my word not to see him unless he sent for me."

Rodrigues rocked back on his heels. "Good God, man, you talk as if you're in love!" he exclaimed, half-amused by the concept. The lack of response to his accusation brought him back to reality more swiftly than any words. "Oh, Ingeles, you fool!" he said, sadly. "Don't you know better than to fall in love with a Jesuit father?"

"It seems not. And when you take Alvito from the mission, you should be wiser than to ask him the same question."

"When I take him ... Ingeles, you're mad."

"I can't do it, Pilot, for the reason I've given you. I made a vow; made it to Alvito himself. It's as sacred to me as any vow he makes to his God. Save his life, get him away from Japan on your ship; it doesn't matter where - China, or somewhere the Jesuits don't own. Keep him alive and keep him safe; you'll have all the men and arms and gold you need, but I won't be with you. I promised."

Glancing up at Toranaga, Blackthorne repeated in Japanese the gist of what had been said, while Rodrigues digested the words.

"Is your vow so important, Anjin-san?" Toranaga asked, gently.

"Yes, Sire, and you know why. I didn't seek to love Tsukku-san any more than I sought to love Mariko-san; it just happened, and I had no control over it. But I won't force love where he can't give it; that would put him in a prison worse than any the Bishop might choose."

"And if I offered to grant you a lifetime wish now, today?"

Blackthorne was startled. A lifetime wish was exactly that; one supreme gift from a lord to his vassal that could never be repeated. By tradition such a wish was always granted, and it was a privilege that was exercised with great care.

"I would beg you to ensure that Tsukku-san was brought safely out of prison and out of Japan, Sire, assuming that is also his wish. If it is not, then I repeat my request to be allowed to die."

"But then I would lose you both," Toranaga mused. "Very well, I will consider your lifetime wish. Instruct the Captain to have his vessel ready for sail at a moment's notice. You had better question him about the tides and plan the rescue accordingly. Buntaro will go in your place to the mission with the foreigner. You will make the plan and ensure that everything is accounted for, but you need not be present during the rescue."

"Domo, Toranaga-sama."

"Nani mo. Now, take this sweating barbarian away and have him bathed. It will take time to plan the rescue properly, and he'll think better when he's clean and fed. I'll order the whole camp to return to Osaka tomorrow morning. Whatever you need, you may ask Naga to provide. Now, leave me; we'll speak again in the morning."

"How did it happen, Ingeles?" Rodrigues, bathed and scrubbed but returned to his own brocade doublet and velvet breeches, loomed massively in the midst of Blackthorne's pavilion finishing a huge meal while the Englishman, disenchanted both with the thought of food and with his visitor, stood with his arms folded and his back turned, brooding.

"How did what happen?"

"You know what I mean, my friend; you and the Father. How does a thing like that happen?"

There was sympathetic enquiry in Rodrigues' tone, but Blackthorne chose to ignore it. "Nothing has happened," he said, dismissively.

"Ah, now, Ingeles, that's not strictly true," Rodrigues chided, mildly. "After three years away I had scarcely set foot on Japanese soil when what should I see but our friend Father Alvito dressed up like a samurai prince in what I later discovered was one of Toranaga's own robes? After that it was only a few hours before I learned he was to die for some unholy act committed with you, of all people. When I left Japan, Ingeles, you and he were enemies; tell me how it happened, that's all I ask."

"Or else what?" Scowling, Blackthorne rounded on him.

"Or else I'll die in ignorance," was the easy reply. "Oh, you've got my loyalty already, Ingeles, and you know it, whatever you and Alvito may or may not have done between you. Just satisfy my curiosity, that's all. Tell me what it's like to know you desire someone completely impossible and then to discover they desire you."

Blackthorne grunted non-committally. "Half of me still believes it was Mariko's doing," he said, not meeting Rodrigues' intrigued gaze. "She always wanted us to be better friends. She told Alvito our destinies were interlocked; confessed it to him the last time she saw him. She knew she was going to die.

"After Kasigi Yabu committed suicide I didn't see Alvito again for more than a year. In that time Toranaga fought the War and became Shogun - and I built my ship, The Lady. Then Alvito passed through Anjiro on his way to Osaka, and I noticed that he was a different man. From that time onward, I gradually came to admire him more and more. I don't know how it happened, or why, only that it did.

"I watched it happen to two of my crew on the voyage out here; the man Yabu had killed was one of them. You'll have heard of 'The Night of the Screams', when Yabu boiled a man to death? That man was named Pieterzoon, and he loved a boy named Crooq. All that night, all that long time it took for Pieterzoon to die, I held Crooq in my arms while he cried. I learned something from him, Pilot. Something about love."

"Madonna, Ingeles, it's a serious business," Rodrigues breathed, softly. "Stealing a priest out of God's own house, away from God's own justice. Oh, I'll do it, never fear - but am I damning my own soul, too?"

Blackthorne rounded on him. "Who was the holiest man you ever met in your life, Rodrigues? The closest to God?"

The massive Portuguese grinned uneasily. "Why, Father dell'Aqua, of course," he said, readily enough.

"Amen. And do you think that good and holy man would have let this happen? He only ordered Alvito to face up to his desires and subdue them; he would never have had him or any other man burned for not having the strength to obey that order."

"I know, I know. Oh, Pilot-major Blackthorne, if only I'd known how much trouble you'd be! This'll finish me for Japan and the Black Ship, if my part in it's found out - as no doubt it will be. It's a good thing I've salted away my little fortune where not even the Jesuits can find it! And what I've got, such as it is," he added, hating himself for every word, "is at Father Alvito's disposal as long as he needs it."

"Oh, you'll be paid, you Portuguese whore-monger," Blackthorne told him, bitterly. "Put a price on Alvito's freedom and I'll pay it, even if I have to ransom my service to Toranaga for the rest of eternity."

"That won't be possible if he lets you commit seppuku," Rodrigues told him. "I may not have much Japanese, Anjin, but I have that much. By the Holy Name, Pilot, did you think I would put a price on it? You're in love with the man - and he with you, unless I'm mistaken. It doesn't matter to me who or what you are; I've a soft heart, and I'd just as soon see lovers together. Besides which, I'd do anything to rob that Spanish buzzard of his prey."

"All you need to do is go to confession tomorrow evening," Blackthorne told him, coldly. "Confess yourself to Brother Michael, any sin you like. Tell him to find out whether or not Alvito wishes to be rescued, and arrange for him to get the answer to you somehow. Then prepare your ship to sail as soon as he's aboard. Arm your men. We'll still have nearly four days; this Bishop won't execute him without making him suffer first, as a warning to the others."

"Tell me I won't have to kill a priest, Pilot. Much as I'd like to see Bishop Mendoza suffer, I don't want to kill him." Rodrigues looked alarmed, as though the possibility had only just occurred to him that this might be a rather more serious matter than some buccaneering adventure.

Blackthorne shook his head. "There won't be any killing," he said, firmly. "You just make sure you get Alvito away from Japan alive," he added, menacingly. "The rest is in the hands of God."

The stake and piled brushwood stood in the courtyard outside the Jesuit mission. The brothers, in their orange cassocks, lined the square, all facing inwards, and behind them were half a hundred Japanese from the nearby streets with terror in their faces. Could the gaijin priests really intend to burn one of their number here in front of them all? Surely Toranaga-sama would launch a rescue? Surely the barbarian priest had friends who would come to his aid? His crime was a mystery to them. Keikan, it was said. What was so criminal about keikan? Young men had been falling in and out of love with one another since the gods walked the land; pages and soldiers would walk together, hand in hand, without a thought of anyone's opinion. And what of the Buddhist monasteries in the hills where the young monks all had lovers? If Buddha did not frown on it, why should the Christian God?

And this Christian priest who was to suffer was the best of them, it was said. Yes, he was arrogant and cold towards the lower orders - but that was perfectly proper in a superior. He did not look arrogant and cold now, walking calmly towards the stake. He looked as if his soul had already crossed over - as if it had done so some considerable time ago, and he was now in a hurry to be rid of the body whose desires had betrayed him. It was a horrible death the Christians contemplated, and there was no honour in it, but a man who met any death bravely would be rewarded in Heaven - surely even the Christian God approved of courage?

Struggling for a closer look they noticed his eyes. They were dark and deep, all fear banished, and saw nothing of the square or the stake or the people. If he had to be guided into place on the piled brushwood it was not because he was unwilling, simply that he was already in another place and he knew nothing of what was happening to him. His hands were bound together in front of him in an attitude of prayer, his head lifted as he seemed to regard the sky with a noble detachment. There were white clouds high above, and white sea-birds moving easily through the brilliant blue. How fine it would be to be a part of that sky; to be smoke, rising to meet those clouds! In a barbarian such appreciation was almost supernatural. Could it be, they wondered, that he had come here to turn them all towards the Christian God and instead the ancient gods of Japan had caught him and turned him towards themselves? Could it be that while his body was European, his soul was Japanese? Could that be why he had thought the Japanese way of a man with a man was no sin? Sometimes the gods made miracles like that.

A brother in orange robes had brought a flaming torch from the mission building. Behind him was a cruel-looking old man in black robes with a purple obi; the new Christian daimyo, the one who had come to replace the good and gentle man who had died. Pity the Christian brothers if their new lord was as harsh as he looked. Would he light the fire himself? For a moment it seemed that he would; then he ordered the brother to do it. The brother could not look into the face of the bound man, and when he turned away he was weeping and covering his eyes. The Japanese people waited, open-mouthed and silent, to see how this barbarian priest with a Japanese soul would meet his death.

"Martin!" Blackthorne was awake suddenly and shockingly, his heart thudding in his chest and a sick feeling rising from his stomach. The image had been so clear, so horrible - and yet, in its own way, quite beautiful. He'd seen burnings at the stake; they were never beautiful. He'd seen ordinary criminals burned who'd been strangled before the flames were lit, and witches who had been burned alive to drive the devils out of them. He'd seen a pregnant woman burned alive at Tyburn when he was only seventeen. He hadn't stopped vomiting for three days afterwards, and her screams had been in his nightmares for years. He didn't even know whether Alvito would be strangled first, or whether he'd have to face a slow death in the fire; probably the decision would be made by the Spanish Bishop, and if the man was as vindictive as Rodrigues had led him to believe it didn't seem likely that he'd be merciful at the end.

But still there was that beauty; the beauty of courage. What he had seen was exactly what he knew would happen. Alvito would go to his death with a light step, his soul being already safe in God's hands. An innocent death, without protest or fear. God would welcome him, that much was certain, no matter what imagined crime had been the pretext for his death. And shortly after that ...

Blackthorne contemplated the icy swiftness of steel, saw in his imagination the way his stabbing sword would catch the light just before he plunged it into his own belly. He would ask Omi to be his witness, and Omi would kneel beside him the way Blackthorne and Omi and Martin Alvito had knelt beside Kasigi Yabu during his last moments. Whatever his life had been, if he could make a death as good as Yabu's he would be well content. Yabu's death poem came back to him exactly as he had heard it - declaimed fiercely in Yabu's gutteral voice, and then translated into Portuguese for him in Alvito's more measured, more cultured tones.

"The blue sky above the Earth

White clouds rise towards Heaven

Life is only a butterfly's dream

Death, the way to Eternal Life."

It had been a very elegant last poem. Blackthorne wished he were a poet. He could compensate for that lack by making his entire seppuku a poem, by being more Japanese and more correct than any samurai ever born. Toranaga will be proud of me, he thought. And so will Martin. The name had come to him unbidden, a way of thinking of Alvito now that belonged to him alone.

I have never said his name. I have called him 'priest' and 'Samaritan' and 'enemy' and 'Tsukku-san', but I have never said 'Martin'. He said it aloud now, to taste the shape of the word in his mouth. "Martin."

It was a small word, but it described within it everything he needed and wanted, everything he believed. With sudden determination he knew that it would be his death poem, and he knew that the Japanese would understand.

"By Heaven, Ingeles, do you intend to sit there all night repeating the man's name to yourself?" Rodrigues' bad-tempered sleepy tones demanded from far away across the pavilion. "There's nothing you or I can do before daylight, anyway. But still," he added, relenting a little, "if you can't sleep - and I'll be damned if I understand how any man sleeps on a bed like this - we'll talk. Oh, not about Father Alvito if you don't want to. Tell me about England, about the places you've sailed to and the things you've seen. Or I'll tell you, if you prefer."

Blackthorne sat up straight, the futon sliding down his bared chest. It was a cold night but he was feverish with worry, drops of sweat cooling on his skin.

"Aye, Pilot," he said, raggedly. "We'll talk. Tell me what dragons and sea-monsters you've seen. Have you been through the Sargasso, where the water's choked with weeds and there's no current to drive a ship south?" Rodrigues laughed, shrugged off his futon, and sat himself comfortably with his legs crossed.

"More than once, Ingeles," he said, cheerfully. Any subject, any story would do as long as it didn't recall Blackthorne to a knowledge of the fate that awaited Martin Alvito. Not yet. Not before morning, when they could do something about it. "The Sargasso, eh? Did you ever see the eels that live beneath the weed, eh, Pilot? Longer than a ship's keel and thicker than a man's waist ... "

He rattled on, hopping from one subject to another like a mayfly, spilling out a chain of irrelevancies until Blackthorne's mind eased and the fear began to leave him. As Toranaga had said, Alvito would not die. Between them, they would see to that. What would happen after he was rescued he could not begin to imagine, but he would see Martin Alvito free both in body and in spirit and that would be enough.

Twisting the brim of his hat nervously in his hands, Rodrigues waited in the entrance hall of the Jesuit mission. Father Soldi had admitted him, and stared at him with those disturbing eyes of his as though he could tell exactly what he was thinking, but at length had gone away to fetch Brother Michael. A brother he did not recognise was present in the hallway, ostensibly replenishing the candles in their sconces, but glancing across towards him at moments when he thought he was not observed. The brother was Japanese, much younger than Michael - a boy, not more than twenty years old. He seemed afraid, although whether that was natural caution towards a stranger or a reflection of his own fear Rodrigues did not know. It seemed a century before Brother Michael appeared from the depths of the building; a century during which Rodrigues tried to imagine the unseen geography of the mission and the possible places where they might keep a prisoner secured.

Where are you, Father Alvito? he wondered. This place is an inhospitable hovel without you and the Father Visitor to make a man welcome. He would never forget the night he had come here to deliver the maps and logs that had been stolen from Blackthorne's ship the Erasmus. He'd known even then what a valuable cargo he carried, and how bringing it to the Jesuits was placing the English pilot's life in the balance. But then Alvito and Blackthorne had been on opposite sides in an undeclared war. Now, the peace they had declared between them threatened even greater disruption to his own quiet world.

Michael crossed towards him, with a shy smile on his face. "Good evening, Captain Rodrigues," he said, politely.

"Good evening, Brother. If you please, I would like to be confessed." Michael nodded. "Please step into the chapel with me," he requested, opening the door. He lifted a candelabrum from a side-table almost from under the nose of the young brother. "Brother Ambrose, please go and replenish the candles in His Grace's private room."

Rodrigues couldn't decide whether the expression on the young man's face was disappointment or annoyance, but Ambrose bowed his head respectfully and moved in silence to obey Michael's instructions. Michael gestured for Rodrigues to precede him into the chapel; he followed him, and closed the door firmly.

The confessional was a curtained alcove on the far wall of the chapel; red velvet brought from Europe so long ago that its colour had faded to a dusky pink except in the folds hung across the mouth of the alcove, and within a shoji painted with a calm pastoral scene separated the alcove into two booths. Michael placed the candelabrum carefully on a low table before pulling aside the curtain and seating himself on a wooden bench inside one booth. Rodrigues, acutely aware of his huge bulk in relation to the size of the booth, settled gingerly in the other. It was a tiny enclave of musk and shadows, the candle-light entering above the level of the curtains to reflect from the curved white ceiling and filter through the upper part of the shoji.

A quiet cough from Michael encouraged him to speak.

"Brother," he said, softly. "I'm not here to confess, although Sweet Heaven knows I've enough on my conscience. Is it safe for me to speak of another matter?"

"Yes, Captain," Michael told him, in the same confidential whisper. "Only keep your voice low."

"Very well. I rode back from the hunting-camp today with Toranaga and the Anjin and Naga and Omi and Buntaro and every other sama that matters a damn in this city - excuse me, Brother, every other sama that matters in the least, I meant to say."

"I understand." There would have been amusement in Michael's tone in other circumstances, but this matter was far too serious for that.

"I gave your message yesterday to the Anjin. It seems strange to speak of it here, Brother, but he's in love."

"I never doubted it," Michael told him. "What does he intend to do?"

Rodrigues drew in a breath, and felt the shoji shudder between them. "I'm instructed," he said, "to discover whether Father Alvito wishes to die. If he does, then we're to do nothing; he's chosen his road, and he's a brave enough man to walk it to the end. However if he chooses to live, then I'm to rescue him; I and Buntaro-sama. Not the Anjin; he's bound by some promise he made the Father not to intervene unless he's sent for. I can have the Black Ship ready to sail on the evening tide the day after tomorrow; I could take him out of here after Vespers, and have him out of Japan before midnight. I sail directly for Canton," he added, briskly.

"Then ... he could have his life, without any obligation to the Anjin," Michael repeated, for clarification.

"Yes. Toranaga-sama only insists that he doesn't die unless he wants to. No-one's placed any other conditions on the rescue. He's free to be or do whatever he wants, from the moment he sets foot aboard my ship." He paused a moment, and then said; "There's enough money to set him up in any calling he chooses, where the Jesuits can't get their hands on him. I guarantee it, before God."

"And I am to find out what his wishes are?"

"Yes. And listen, Brother, if I come here again Father Soldi will know there's a plot to free Father Alvito. I make confession once or twice in a voyage, not three nights in the same week! Can you be about in the town tomorrow?"

Briefly, Michael considered. "I can be in the Street of Sandal-makers during the afternoon," he said. "I could take sandals for repair."

"Then look for one of the Japanese there," Rodrigues told him. "Omi or Buntaro. I'm too conspicious, and the whole of Osaka knows I'm Portuguese."

"Very well." Michael absorbed the instruction without comment.

"Where are they holding him?" Rodrigues asked, a graveyard tone creeping into his voice. "Anjin will be sure to ask me. Is he chained? Does he have light?"

There was a pause, and then Michael replied. "He is not chained," he said, "but there is no light. It's a store-room that can be locked; under the kitchen, cut into the hill. He's a penitent, Captain; there's no comfort for him. He's permitted to drink water at certain times, and he has a bucket for his body's needs. Apart from that he has nothing but his clothes and his rosary."

"And is he strong?" The phrasing of the question took Rodrigues by surprise, but he knew it was exactly what Blackthorne would want to know - whether Alvito was bearing his punishment with fortitude.

"Yes, Captain-san," was the quiet reply. "Strong as a mountain."

"Hmmm." He had expected nothing else. "God be thanked," he said, fervently, using the opportunity to offer up a prayer for Alvito's safety. Only feet away, in the semi-darkness, Michael also prayed for the same thing.

It was not the darkness that oppressed, Michael realised, moving slowly through the building some hours later, so much as the silence. Even in a house of faith there was always someone awake during the night, and even when that someone was engaged in prayer or devout contemplation there was always a sound of some sort. Silken robes carried their own subtle whisper; straw sandals against floors of wood or stone made small sounds; men muttered when they prayed, or fumbled with their beads, or sighed at the turn their thoughts took. Tonight, even these small familiar sounds were absent. There were the occasional noises of people moving past in the street - guard samurai, traders returning late or leaving early, stray animals, men with no good purpose in mind - but within the mission the silence had a tangible quality that wrapped itself like a heavy cloak over every movement Michael made, deadening even the sound of his breathing and the hammering of his heart.

It was not that what he was doing was wrong. Not exactly. The Bishop had not forbidden him to move about the mission in the middle of the night without a light, but he had not sanctioned it either. And he had, most specifically, forbidden anyone of any description to have association with Martin Alvito. The punishment for disobeying this command had not been specified, but he could imagine that it would be harsh. Nevertheless there was another charge laid on him now, and the Bishop's displeasure was the risk he took.

First Cook was asleep in the kitchen. Michael heard his snores as he passed through the room, the banked-down coals of the fire providing a sullen illumination. A European-style fireplace and chimney had been constructed, far safer than the usual Japanese cooking arrangement, and First Cook never allowed the fire to go out. That was why he slept beside it, whatever the season, whatever the weather.

Michael's explanation to Rodrigues had necessarily been brief. Part of the kitchen itself was cut into the side of the hill and below it, taking advantage of a natural cave discovered during construction of the building, was a complex of store-rooms some of which were more like low tunnels. Whatever valuables the Jesuits owned, whatever silver and silks and other treasures were not considered suitable for open display, were housed here below ground, protected from the damp and the rats and every other ill except the risk of earthquake - and even those they had survived, shored as they were with strong timber baulks. The underground area was not extensive, but it had been put to good use with the introduction of a number of stout wooden doors that could be locked. Not that any man would dare to steal from the Christian mission, of course, but Father Dell'Aqua had thought prudence the best policy. Besides, on occasion there were items in these strongrooms whose existence he did not want widely known - such as the pilot's rutter stolen from Blackthorne's cabin aboard the Erasmus and brought here by Vasco Rodrigues, before it had been delivered into the hands of Toranaga.

The way down to the cave had been hacked back into uneven stairs, polished smooth now with the passage of many sandalled feet. Michael made his way down cautiously, counting the steps and feeling ahead of him as he moved, knowing this rough stairway intimately from long use but still aware of the perils of overconfidence. Reaching the bottom he paused and listened to the silence, felt it fill up the empty spaces in the darkness, strained his ears to detect any sound other than those he made himself, but he could not.

"Martin?" Barely a whisper, yet his voice sounded to him like the roar of an enraged tiger.

There was no response so he shuffled cautiously across the narrow floor, aware that kitchen refuse was often dumped down here and afraid to put his foot on some slippery piece of rotting vegetation and fall uselessly.

"Martin?" A wooden door under his hands, but this first chamber was large and well-ventilated and contained casks of wine and a quantity of antique silver plate and elaborate vestments Father Dell'Aqua had abhorred. Deeper down, though, where the floor began to dip away, was a room about the size of a tiger's cage with a door not high enough to reach a man's waist. That was where he would be, kept dry and cold between the wine store and the casks of salted meat; in the little room reserved for valuable cargoes and recalcitrant priests. In Father Dell'Aqua's time it had been used so rarely that the community had almost forgotten its existence; but this was not Father Dell Aqua's time.

Reaching the small door, Michael dropped to the ground and pressed his face close to the wood. "Martin? Martin, do you hear me?"

The silence moved with the faintest rustle of silk. Michael almost heard bare feet on stone, the light pressure of Alvito's hand on the inner face of the door.

"Michael?" A whisper, very close to his ear, reverberating loudly through the utter blackness.

"Yes."

Within the small room Alvito leaned heavily against the door, feeling strength leach from his bones. Bent almost double by the low roof of the chamber, he slid down the door to sit with his cheek pressed against its cold surface.

"Why are you here? Is it time already?"

Confused by the remark, Michael realised only slowly that Alvito could have little idea of the passage of time in his dark prison. Night and day would be the same to him, although the sounds of activity in the kitchen above would reach him during the day. It would be easy to lose track of time if one slept - or prayed - a great deal.

"No. It's night." Aware of the urgency of his business here, yet unwilling to startle Alvito by a sudden or misplaced word, Michael examined his thoughts and brought them into order. "Martin, are you afraid?"

"Afraid to die?" Alvito contemplated the question as though he often had to debate it in whispers in the middle of the night. "No, I don't think so. God will forgive me, whatever I have done."

"But you have done nothing. You said as much."

In the dark a sour smile crossed Alvito's face. "His Grace would not sentence a man to death for 'nothing', Michael," he said, and it was impossible to tell from his tone whether or not he meant it.

"And would the manner of dying not mean anything to you?"

"The fire is to cleanse the sin," was the simple reply. "I should rejoice in it."

Outside, leaning so heavily against the door that but for its presence they would have been shoulder to shoulder, Michael suppressed a sigh of exasperation.

"Martin," he said, softly, "do you truly wish to die?"

The silence that followed the question was of such long duration and such a peculiar quality that Michael was flooded with fear.

"Martin?"

From behind the door, a soft cough. Then, in subdued tones; "My obedience is to God through His Holy Church, Michael. If I have disobeyed one of His commands it is my duty to accept whatever punishment His Bishop decrees."

"But the path you spoke of - the one God had chosen for you? Did that path take you to John Blackthorne?"

Reluctantly, the answer came at last. "Yes."

"Then will you allow it possible ... Martin, could it be that God does not want you to die? Could it be that he has work for you that His Grace cannot understand? That God's purpose requires you to live?"

"If I live ... " Uncharacteristically Alvito spoke quickly, anxiously.

"If I live, then I will do so in the deepest sin with the Englishman. If I die, my sins will be wiped away."

Gripping the rosary at his belt to give him strength, Michael said cautiously; "But if God's chosen punishment for you was to live and bear your sin, Martin ... ? If He was not ready yet to forgive you?"

"What are you saying?"

Michael detected in the shocked tones the sound of a man rearranging his ideas. There was a seed of doubt in Alvito's mind, a seed which Michael himself had planted there.

"Only that you should consider ... that God's purpose is never thwarted," he replied, his heart thudding alarmingly. "No man ever escapes His punishment. Escaping from the Bishop's punishment is not the same thing. Bishops are mere human men like you and me; the Lord is with them, but they are still fallible. Even our beloved Father Dell'Aqua made mistakes, and Bishop Mendoza is not above error. He relies entirely too much on the advice of Father Soldi, and Father Soldi has never concealed his envy of you. Would you throw away your whole life to another man's envy?" There was no reply. Michael paused, collecting his thoughts and regaining his breath.

"God can punish a man anywhere and at any time," he went on, at length. "His lightning falls where He chooses. If He wants you to die, Martin, He will choose the time and place. Even if you were away from here. Even if you were with the English pilot."

"Is it Blackthorne that sends you?" The question was bleaker than winter, and Michael shuddered.

"No. Lord Toranaga has sent a message to find out whether or not you die by your own choice. If not, his samurai will free you. Anjin-san will not be involved; he will keep his vow not to see you or speak to you unless you will it."

"And where am I to go?"

"To China, with the Black Ship. It sails on tomorrow's midnight tide."

"To China, with Rodrigues?" There was a note almost of humour in the repetition.

"Yes. Away from Japan and the Anjin for all time."

"Away from Japan." Again, the pensive echoing in Michael's words - and within Martin Alvito's heart the further echo; Away from the Anjin for all time.

Had he really just been using the Bishop's decree as a way of escaping John Blackthorne? If that was what he wanted, there were other ways of escaping. He had thought he was going into God's grace, to a reward for his constancy and humility however bitterly earned. If, instead, he was sacrificing his life to Geoffrey Soldi's vaunting ambition ... if he was dying only to punish John Blackthorne ... if he was choosing cowardice instead of courage ...

The thoughts scrambled for precedence, tumbling over one another in colourful confusion. In the utter darkness of his cell, the only lights and colours he saw were the ones he carried within him. They paraded through his mind like traders shouting their wares; this way lies madness; this way lies pain; this way lies death.

"A samurai," Michael said, gently, through his bewilderment, "may not die until his Master gives his permission. Whatever his disgrace, he must live with it until then."

"I ... " He had been about to deny that he was a samurai, but with sudden illumination he knew that the word was a better fit than 'priest'. "Am I a samurai?"

"Not by birth," Michael conceded, "but I think you will be one in death."

A samurai under God's direct command! The multi-hued vision burst on Alvito's weary mind. With all the rights and duties of a samurai. It made sense. And if he were a samurai, no-one but his own Master could order his death; anyone who did would be a murderer, and it was his duty to resist them.

It was also a samurai's duty to escape his prison.

Could that truly be the answer? Could Toranaga be just as much God's emissary as Bishop Mendoza? Blackthorne's joking words of weeks before came back to him with renewed force. Perhaps God is Japanese, after all. Despite his situation, he could not help laughing at the suggestion, frightening Brother Michael into an alarmed enquiry.

"Martin?"

Want of food had made him light-headed. He slumped against the door, listening to the sound of his own laughter in complete bewilderment. If an Englishman could become a samurai - hatamoto, a valued retainer of a samurai lord - could not a Portuguese? Blackthorne had not been required to renounce any faith he held - and certainly he retained a belief in God, distorted almost beyond recognition though it was. This being the case, it was possible to serve God and Toranaga at the same time. Such a conclusion, however, forced the consideration of a far more complicated question.

"No," he said, bringing himself under control at last long enough to choose the path he feared the most - the path of madness.

"No?"

"No, Michael, I do not want to die," he said, composure returning with certainty. "Please thank Lord Toranaga for his generous offer, and tell him ... tell him I am at his disposal."

On the other side of the door Michael, too, felt the tension melt from his body to be replaced by helpless, boneless relief. He sagged against the door-frame, his cheek on the rough timber of the jamb, a hand over his eyes, the cold of the floor seeping up through his body. He was quite limp from exhaustion, unable to move had his life depended on it. He remained there for some considerable time, his overtired brain endlessly re-running one circular thought whose bizarre illogic defied any attempt to exorcise it and whose relentless rhythm battered his consciousness into weary submission. I am taking a soul from God's care and handing him over to Toranaga. I am taking a soul from God's care ... and handing him over to Toranaga.

When the dawn rose short hours later Brother Michael had already returned to his duties, his mind scarcely calmer but his outward defences perfectly in place. If a certain tension was detectable beneath the serenity, it was only the same tension that pervaded every member of the community from the Bishop to the kitchen-boy. Although the name of Martin Alvito was not mentioned, the sentence that hung over him hung over them all; his punishment was as much their own, and they felt it keenly. Bishop Mendoza had passed an uncomfortable night. For some years now he had found sleep elusive, and had often passed the night in study or prayer or in some other productive activity. However what had once been mere sleeplessness was now accompanied more often than not by the pain that had become a frequent companion whose presence he was finding it more and more difficult to bear with fortitude. He had taken a measure of strong wine in the middle of the night which had eased the physical anguish considerably, but his mind had raced unstoppably through the ramifications of his actions until weariness overcame him.

With the morning came an unwelcome visitor. Father Soldi, immaculate and unsmiling, requested speech with him, and the Bishop graciously agreed to hear him. He listened without comment to a story of overheard conversations; of meetings between Rodrigues and Brother Michael, of a visit by the same Michael to the cells beneath the kitchen.

"I could not hear exactly what was said," Soldi admitted, and obviously it pained him to do so, "but Your Grace has forbidden any contact with Father Alvito. Brother Michael was in transgression of your decree."

"And you say you were ... where?"

"In the wine cellar, Your Grace. The storeroom in which the wine and valuables are held."

"You have a key to it?"

"Yes, Your Grace. I have charge over all the domestic arrangements for the mission; Father dell'Aqua entrusted me with the key."

The Bishop turned heavy eyes towards him. Taking up Carlo dell'Aqua's burden had so far proved a more onerous task than he had expected, and he wondered briefly how the Father Visitor had kept the peace between the two opposed factions under his charge; how had he kept Martin Alvito and Gregory Soldi from tearing out one another's throats and destroying themselves and all around them? He suspected the man had done nothing, simply leaving his underlings to behave as they chose. Or, more charitably, perhaps he had been too ill to understand what was happening. Too ill to notice that his most favoured protege had turned sodomite and was flaunting himself in the streets among heathens and heretics. Too ill to notice that his chamberlain was victim to the kind of ambition men take to Rome - or which takes them. He could wish his own illness had dulled his perceptions, instead of sharpening them.

"You suspect an attempt will be made to rescue Father Alvito?" he asked, cutting through the verbiage.

There was an unctuous smile hovering close to Soldi's lips as he acknowledged the Bishop's words.

"Yes, Your Grace, I do," he confirmed, with a light heart.

* * *

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