Shōgun полностью

Fujiko took them reverently, offered them to Blackthorne with a bow, speaking softly.

Mariko said, “Your consort rightly points out that a hatamoto is, of course, obliged to wear the two swords of the samurai. More than that, it’s his duty to do so. She believes it would not be correct for you to go to Lord Yabu without swords—that it would be impolite. By our law it’s duty to carry swords. She asks if you would consider using these, unworthy though they are, until you buy your own.”

Blackthorne stared at her, then at Fujiko and back to her again. “Does that mean I’m samurai? That Lord Toranaga made me samurai?”

“I don’t know, Anjin-san. But there’s never been a hatamoto who wasn’t samurai. Never.” Mariko turned and questioned Omi. Impatiently he shook his head and answered. “Omi-san doesn’t know either. Certainly it’s the special privilege of a hatamoto to wear swords at all times, even in the presence of Lord Toranaga. It is his duty because he’s a completely trustworthy bodyguard. Also only a hatamoto has the right of immediate audience with a lord.”

Blackthorne took the short sword and stuck it in his belt, then the other, the long one, the killing one, exactly as Omi was wearing his. Armed, he did feel better. “Arigato gozaimashita, Fujiko-san,” he said quietly.

She lowered her eyes and replied softly. Mariko translated.

“Fujiko-san says, with permission, Lord, because you must learn our language correctly and quickly, she humbly wishes to point out that ‘domo’ is more than sufficient for a man to say. ‘Arigato,’ with or without ‘gozaimashita,’ is an unnecessary politeness, an expression that only women use.”

“Hai. Domo. Wakarimasu, Fujiko-san.” Blackthorne looked at her clearly for the first time with his newfound knowledge. He saw the sweat on her forehead and the sheen on her hands. The narrow eyes and square face and ferret teeth. “Please tell my consort, in this one case I do not consider ‘arigato gozaimashita’ an unnecessary politeness to her.”

Yabu glanced at the swords again. Blackthorne was sitting cross-legged on a cushion in front of him in the place of honor, Mariko to one side, Igurashi beside him. They were in the main room of the fortress.

Omi finished talking.

Yabu shrugged. “You handled it badly, nephew. Of course it’s the consort’s duty to protect the Anjin-san and his property. Of course he has the right to wear swords now. Yes, you handled it badly. I made it clear the Anjin-san’s my honored guest here. Apologize to him.”

Immediately Omi got up and knelt in front of Blackthorne and bowed. “I apologize for my error, Anjin-san.” He heard Mariko say that the barbarian accepted the apology. He bowed again and calmly went back to his place and sat down again. But he was not calm inside. He was now totally consumed by one idea: the killing of Yabu.

He had decided to do the unthinkable: kill his liege lord and the head of his clan.

But not because he had been made to apologize publicly to the barbarian. In this Yabu had been right. Omi knew he had been unnecessarily inept, for although Yabu had stupidly ordered him to take the pistols away at once tonight, he knew they should have been manipulated away and left in the house, to be stolen later or broken later.

And the Anjin-san had been perfectly correct to give the pistols to his consort, he told himself, just as she was equally correct to do what she did. And she would certainly have pulled the trigger, her aim true. It was no secret that Usagi Fujiko sought death, or why. Omi knew, too, that if it hadn’t been for his earlier decision this morning to kill Yabu, he would have stepped forward into death and then his men would have taken the pistols away from her. He would have died nobly as she would be ordered into death nobly and men and women would have told the tragic tale for generations. Songs and poems and even a Nōh play, all so inspiring and tragic and brave, about the three of them: the faithful consort and faithful samurai who both died dutifully because of the incredible barbarian who came from the eastern sea.

No, Omi’s decision had nothing to do with this public apology, although the unfairness added to the hatred that now obsessed him. The main reason was that today Yabu had publicly insulted Omi’s mother and wife in front of peasants by keeping them waiting for hours in the sun like peasants, and had then dismissed them without acknowledgment like peasants.

“It doesn’t matter, my son,” his mother had said. “It’s his privilege.”

“He’s our liege Lord,” Midori, his wife, had said, the tears of shame running down her cheeks. “Please excuse him.”

“And he didn’t invite either of you to greet him and his officers at the fortress,” Omi had continued. “At the meal you arranged! The food and saké alone cost one koku!”

“It’s our duty, my son. It’s our duty to do whatever Lord Yabu wants.”

“And the order about Father?”

“It’s not an order yet. It’s a rumor.”