His fingers probed deeper and ever deeper. "They put me with a blind monk who taught me how to massage and to see again with my fingers. Now my fingers tell me more than my eyes used to, I think.
"The last thing I can remember seeing with my eyes was the bandit's widespread mouth and rotting teeth, the sword a glittering arc and beyond, after the blow, the scent of flowers. I saw perfume in all its colors, Yabu-sama. That was all long ago, long before the barbarians came to our land-fifty, sixty years ago - but I saw the perfume's colors. I saw nirvana, I think, and for the merest moment, the face of Buddha. Blindness is a small price to pay for such a gift, neh?"
There was no answer. Suwo had expected none. Yabu was sleeping, as was planned. Did you like my story, Yabusama? Suwo asked silently, amused as an old man would be. It was all true but for one thing. The monastery was not near Osaka but across your western border. The name of the monk? Su, uncle of your enemy, Ikawa Jikkyu.
I could snap your neck so easily, he thought. It would be a favor to Omi-san. It would be a blessing to the village. And it would repay, in tiny measure, my patron's gift. Should I do it now? Or later?
Spillbergen held up the bundled stalks of rice straw, his face stretched. "Who wants to pick first?"
No one answered. Blackthorne seemed to be dozing, leaning against the corner from which he had not moved. It was near sunset.
"Someone's got to pick first," Spillbergen rasped. "Come on, there's not much time."
They had been given food and a barrel of water and another barrel as a latrine. But nothing with which to wash away the stinking offal or to clean themselves. And the flies had come. The air was fetid, the earth mud-mucous. Most of the men were stripped to the waist, sweating from the heat. And from fear.
Spillbergen looked from face to face. He came back to Blackthorne. "Why-why are you eliminated? Eh? Why?"
The eyes opened and they were icy. "For the last time: I don't know."
"It's not fair. Not fair."
Blackthorne returned to his reverie. There must be a way to break out of here. There must be a way to get the ship. That bastard will kill us all eventually, as certain as there's a north star. There's not much time, and I was eliminated because they've some particular rotten plan for me.
When the trapdoor had closed they had all looked at him, and someone had said, "What're we going to do?"
"I don't know," he had answered.
"Why aren't you to be picked?"
"I don't know."
"Lord Jesus help us," someone whimpered.
"Get the mess cleared up," he ordered. "Pile the filth over there!"
"We've no mops or-" "Use your hands!"
They did as he ordered and he helped them and cleaned off the Captain-General as best he could. "You'll be all right now."
"How-how are we to choose someone?" Spillbergen asked.
"We don't. We fight them."
"With what?"
"You'll go like a sheep to the butcher? You will?"
"Don't be ridiculous - they don't want me - it wouldn't be right for me to be the one."
"Why?" Vinck asked.
"I'm the Captain-General."
"With respect, sir," Vinck said ironically, "maybe you should volunteer. It's your place to volunteer."
"A very good suggestion," Pieterzoon said. "I'll second the motion, by God."
There was general assent and everyone thought, Lord Jesus, anyone but me.
Spillbergen had begun to bluster and order but he saw the pitiless eyes. So he stopped and stared at the ground, filled with nausea. Then he said, "No. It it wouldn't be right for someone to volunteer. It - we'll - we'll draw lots. Straws, one shorter than the rest. We'll put our hands - we'll put ourselves into the hands of God. Pilot, you'll hold the straws."
"I won't. I'll have nothing to do with it. I say we fight."
"They'll kill us all. You heard what the samurai said: Our lives are spared - except one." Spillbergen wiped the sweat off his face and a cloud of flies rose and then settled again. "Give me some water. It's better for one to die than all of us."
Van Nekk dunked the gourd in the barrel and gave it to Spillbergen. "We're ten. Including you, Paulus, " he said. "The odds are good."
"Very good-unless you're the one." Vinck glanced at Blackthorne. "Can we fight those swords?"
"Can you go meekly to the torturer if you're the one picked?"
"I don't know."
Van Nekk said, "We'll draw lots. We'll let God decide."
"Poor God," Blackthorne said. "The stupidities He gets blamed for!"
"How else do we choose?" someone shouted.
"We don't!"
"We'll do as Paulus says. He's Captain-General," said van Nekk. "We'll draw straws. It's best for the majority. Let's vote. Are we all in favor?"
They had all said yes. Except Vinck. "I'm with the Pilot. To hell with sewer-sitting pissmaking witch-festering straws!"
Eventually Vinck had been persuaded. Jan Roper, the Calvinist, had led the prayers. Spillbergen broke the ten pieces of straw with exactitude. Then he halved one of them.
Van Nekk, Pieterzoon, Sonk, Maetsukker, Ginsel, Jan Roper, Salamon, Maximilian Croocq, and Vinck.
Again he said, "Who wants to pick first?"
"How do we know that - that the one who picks the wrong, the short straw'll go? How do we know that?" Maetsukker's voice was raw with terror.
"We don't. Not for certain. We should know for certain," Croocq, the boy, said.
"That's easy," Jan Roper said. "Let's swear we will do it in the name of God. In His name. To-to die for the others in His name. Then there's no worry. The anointed Lamb of God will go straight to Everlasting Glory."
They all agreed.
"Go on, Vinck. Do as Roper says."
"All right." Vinck's lips were parched. "If-if it's me-I swear by the Lord God that I'll go with them if-if I pick the wrong straw. In God's name."
They all followed. Maetsukker was so frightened he had to be prompted before he sank back into the quagmire of his living nightmare.
Sonk chose first. Pieterzoon was next. Then Jan Roper, and after him Salamon and Croocq. Spillbergen felt himself dying fast because they had agreed he would not choose but his would be the last straw and now the odds were becoming terrible.
Ginsel was safe. Four left.
Maetsukker was weeping openly, but he pushed Vinck aside and took a straw and could not believe that it was not the one.
Spillbergen's fist was shaking and Croocq helped him steady his arm. Feces ran unnoticed down his legs.
Which one do I take? van Nekk was asking himself desperately. Oh, God help me! He could barely see the straws through the fog of his myopia. If only I could see, perhaps I'd have a clue which to pick. Which one?
He picked and brought the straw close to his eyes to see his sentence clearly. But the straw was not short.
Vinck watched his fingers select the next to last straw and it fell to the ground but everyone saw that it was the shortest thus far. Spillbergen unclenched his knotted hand and everyone saw that the last straw was long. Spillbergen fainted.
They were all staring at Vinck. Helplessly he looked at them, not seeing them. He half shrugged and half smiled and waved absently at the flies. Then he slumped down. They made room for him, kept away, from him as though he were a leper.
Blackthorne knelt in the ooze beside Spillbergen.
"Is he dead?" van Nekk asked, his voice almost inaudible.
Vinck shrieked with laughter, which unnerved them all, and ceased as violently as he had begun. "I'm the-the one that's dead," he said. "I'm dead!"
"Don't be afraid. You're the anointed of God. You're in God's hands," Jan Roper said, his voice confident.
"Yes," van Nekk said. "Don't be afraid."
"That's easy now, isn't it?" Vinck's eyes went from face to face but none could hold his gaze. Only Blackthorne did not look away.
"Get me some water, Vinck," he said quietly. "Go over to the barrel and get some water. Go on."
Vinck stared at him. Then he got the gourd and filled it with water and gave it to him. "Lord Jesus God, Pilot," he muttered, "what am I going to do?"
"First help me with Paulus. Vinck! Do what I say! Is he going to be all right?"
Vinck pushed his agony away, helped by Blackthorne's calm. Spill bergen's pulse was weak. Vinck listened to his heart, pulled the eyelids away, and watched for a moment. "I don't know, Pilot. Lord JesusI can't think properly. His heart's all right, I think. He needs bleeding but-but I've no way-I-I can't concentrate . . . . Give me . . ." He stopped exhaustedly, sat back against the wall. Shudders began to rack him.
The trapdoor opened.
Omi stood etched against the sky, his kimono blooded by the dying sun.
CHAPTER 4
Vinck tried to make his legs move but he could not. He had faced death many times in his life but never like this, meekly. It had been decreed by the straws. Why me? his brain screamed. I'm no worse than the others and better than most. Dear God in Heaven, why me?
A ladder had been lowered. Omi motioned for the one man to come up, and quickly. "Isogi!" Hurry up!
Van Nekk and Jan Roper were praying silently, their eyes closed. Pieterzoon could not watch. Blackthorne was staring up at Omi and his men.
"Isogi!" Omi barked out again.
Once more Vinck tried to stand. "Help me, someone. Help me to get up!"
Pieterzoon, who was nearest, bent down and put his hand under Vinck's arm and helped him to his feet, then Blackthorne was at the foot of the ladder, both feet planted firmly in the slime.
"Kinjiru!" he shouted, using the word from the ship. A gasp rushed through the cellar. Omi's hand tightened on his sword and he moved to the ladder. Immediately Blackthorne twisted it, daring Omi to put a foot there.
"Kinjiru!" he said again.
Omi stopped.
"What's going on?" Spillbergen asked, frightened, as were all of them.
"I told him it's forbidden! None of my crew is walking to death without a fight."
"But but we agreed!"
"I didn't."
"Have you gone mad!"
"It's all right, Pilot," Vinck whispered. "I-we did agree and it was fair. It's God's will. I'm going-it's . . ." He groped to the foot of the ladder but Blackthorne stood implacably in the way, facing Omi.
"You're not going without a fight. No one is."
"Get away from the ladder, Pilot! You're ordered away!" Spillbergen shakily kept to his corner, as far from the opening as possible. His voice shrilled, "Pilot!"
But Blackthorne was not listening. "Get ready!"
Omi stepped back a pace and snarled orders to his men. At once a samurai, closely followed by two others, started down the steps, swords unsheathed. Blackthorne twisted the ladder and grappled with the lead man, swerving from his violent sword blow, trying to choke the man to death.
"Help me! Come on! For your lives!"
Blackthorne changed his grip to pull the man off the rungs, braced sickeningly as the second man stabbed downward. Vinck came out of his cataleptic state and threw himself at the samurai, berserk. He intercepted the blow that would have sliced Blackthorne's wrist off, held the shuddering sword arm at bay, and smashed his other fist into the man's groin. The samurai gasped and kicked viciously. Vinck hardly seemed to notice the blow. He climbed the rungs and tore at the man for possession of the sword, his nails ripping at the man's eyes. The other two samurai were hampered by the confined space and Blackthorne, but a kick from one of them caught Vinck in the face and he reeled away. The samurai on the ladder hacked at Blackthorne, missed, then the entire crew hurled themselves at the ladder.
Croocq hammered his fist onto the samurai's instep and felt a small bone give. The man managed to throw his sword out of the pit not wishing the enemy armed-and tumbled heavily to the mud. Vinck and Pieterzoon fell on him. He fought back ferociously as others rushed for the encroaching samurai. Blackthorne picked up the cornered Japanese's dagger and started up the ladder, Croocq, Jan Roper, and Salamon following. Both samurai retreated and stood at the entrance, their killing swords viciously ready. Blackthorne knew his dagger was useless against the swords. Even so he charged, the others in close support. The moment his head was above ground one of the swords swung at him, missing him by a fraction of an inch. A violent kick from an unseen samurai drove him underground again.
He turned and jumped back, avoiding the writhing mass of fighting men who tried to subdue the samurai in the stinking ooze. Vinck kicked the man in the back of the neck and he went limp. Vinck pounded him again and again until Blackthorne pulled him off.
"Don't kill him-we can use him as a hostage!" he shouted and wrenched desperately at the ladder, trying to pull it down into the cellar. But it was too long. Above, Omi's other samurai waited impassively at the trapdoor's entrance.
"For God's sake, Pilot, stop it!" Spillbergen wheezed. "They'll kill us all-you'll kill us all! Stop him, someone!"
Omi was shouting more orders and strong hands aloft prevented Blackthorne from jamming the entrance with the ladder.
"Look out!" he shouted.
Three more samurai, carrying knives and wearing only loincloths, leapt nimbly into the cellar. The first two crashed deliberately onto Blackthorne, carrying him helpless to the floor, oblivious of their own danger, then attacked ferociously.
Blackthorne was crushed beneath the strength of the men. He could not use the knife and felt his will to fight subsiding and he wished he had Mura the headman's skill at unarmed combat. He knew, helplessly, that he could not survive much longer but he made a final effort and jerked one arm free. A cruel blow from a rock-hard hand rattled his head and another exploded colors in his brain but still he fought back.
Vinck was gouging at one of the samurai when the third dropped on him from the sky door, and Mactsukker screamed as a dagger slashed his arm. Van Nekk was blindly striking out and Pieterzoon was saying, "For Christ's sake, hit them not me," but the merchant did not hear for he was consumed with terror.
Blackthorne caught one of the samurai by the throat, his grip slipping from the sweat and slime, and he was almost on his feet like a mad bull, trying to shake them off when there was a last blow and he fell into blankness. The three samurai hacked their way up and the crew, now leaderless, retreated from the circling slash of their three daggers, the samurai dominating the cellar now with their whirling daggers, not trying to kill or to maim, but only to force the panting, frightened men to the walls, away from the ladder where Blackthorne and the first samurai lay inert.
Omi came down arrogantly into the pit and grabbed the nearest man, who was Pieterzoon. He jerked him toward the ladder.
Pieterzoon screamed and tried to struggle out of Omi's grasp, but a knife sliced his wrist and another opened his arm. Relentlessly the shrieking seaman was backed against the ladder.
"Christ help me, it's not me that's to go, it's not me it's not me-" Pieterzoon had both feet on the rung and he was retreating up and away from the agony of the knives and then, "Help me, for God's sake," he screamed a last time, turned and fled raving into the air.
Omi followed without hurrying.
A samurai retreated. Then another. The third picked up the knife that Blackthorne had used. He turned his back contemptuously, stepped over the prostrate body of his unconscious comrade, and climbed away.
The ladder was jerked aloft. Air and sky and light vanished. Bolts crashed into place. Now there was only gloom, and in it heaving chests and rending heartbeats and running sweat and the stench. The flies returned.