The Bamboo Sword Read online

  People passed the boys, climbing the hills, moving away from the coast. Pattering along the trails, they made a sound as if the forest were whispering sutras. Temple bells tolled and tolled, endlessly tolling.

  “Where did you learn how to do that, anyway?” Jun panted. “Knocking Kitsune down and taking the sword, I mean.”

  “The kendo master just taught us that move today,” Yoshi said.

  “Us?”

  “Well,” Yoshi said, “you were napping.”

  “Yoshi,” Jun panted as they jogged along the path, “our lives are not worth a copper penny now. If word of Hideki’s cowardice were to get out . . .” He stopped. “He ran away, didn’t he?”

  Yoshi didn’t answer.

  “You traded clothes with him and he ran.”

  Again, Yoshi said nothing.

  “Well,” Jun said, “Kitsune will figure it out, and let’s just say, the family would not want that piece of information known. They will look all over in the village, in the forest, at the temple. Nowhere is safe! Kitsune will find us and kill us for sure! Where can we go?”

  And then, suddenly, Yoshi knew where they could go. “Where is the one place he won’t look for us?” Yoshi said. “Where is the one place he will assume we will never go?”

  Jun turned to Yoshi, his eyes gleaming in the fading light. “But it is forbidden to go there!” he whispered. “You can’t be serious!”

  “Yes,” Yoshi said, “I am.” The thought of it made him shiver a little with fright. Or was it excitement?

  6

  THE WATERFRONT, TOWN OF URAGA

  The waterfront had been deserted by the usual crowd of ferryboat men, travelers, and fishermen and was instead a chaotic scene of armed samurai police and soldiers who had been sent to protect the country. None of them noticed the two dusty and ragged boys who kept to the lengthening shadows of the pines.

  It was a warm, humid evening. The scent of the sea lay heavy in the air, and the smoke of sentry fires and gunpowder hung like mist over the water. There was something else, too, Yoshi thought. Maybe the smell of the ships, carrying the scent of far-off places, frightening places, places he couldn’t even imagine.

  In the gathering darkness, the Black Ships were almost invisible. Still, Yoshi could sense them there, lurking in the bay like malevolent dragons. The air of mystery surrounding them was almost unbearable. Both boys shivered a little, despite the warmth of the evening.

  “At least we’re safe,” Yoshi said, settling down in a spot among the trees.

  “Maybe from Kitsune,” Jun said. “I’m not so sure we’re safe from them! Do you think they can see us?”

  “No. How?” Yoshi said.

  “It is said the hairy ones can see in the dark,” Jun said. “Like cats.”

  “They are too far away. We can’t see them; they can’t see us.” Yoshi stared at the vague black shapes.

  Without taking his eyes off the ships, Jun sat down next to him.

  “Do you ever wish you could sail far away out into the ocean?” Yoshi asked.

  “No!” Jun said. “Why would I want to do that? There is nothing good there. Barbarians. Monsters. The sea priest who lures fishermen to their deaths. Would you want to go there?”

  Yoshi lay back. “I don’t know. I’m too tired to think,” he said, but his nerves buzzed.

  “How will we ever sleep?” Jun said. “I’m so hungry!”

  “Oh!” Yoshi sat up, remembering the rice ball tucked into the fold of his sleeve. Ah, but Hideki was now wearing that garment. Well, Hideki would probably have gotten hungry, too, he supposed.

  How, Yoshi wondered, had he managed to bungle things so badly? Now he was hungry, without a job; his life wasn’t worth a copper penny; and the barbarians were about to invade the country. There was no use feeling sorry for himself. He had wished for things to change, he reminded himself, and they had.

  Jun was already snoring when Yoshi lay back again and stared up into the darkness. The sky was like a deep, vast ocean, dotted with shimmering islands. What would it be like to be up there, steering a boat from one bright star to the next? The world where these ships had come from, Yoshi wondered—what was it like? Had they come from some island as bright as a star?

  Yoshi fell asleep imagining swimming from star to star, though he didn’t know how to swim very well. But in his dream he struck off with bold strokes across a black ocean, aiming for the brightest star he could see.

  7

  THE COMET

  Early morning hours of July 9, 1853

  An interesting meteorological phenomenon was observed in the course of the night . . . a remarkable meteor seen from midnight until four o’clock in the morning.

  —M. C. Perry, Narrative of the Expedition to the China Seas and Japan, 1852–1854

  Jack woke to a potent stench and an eerie bluish light pouring through the round glass deadlight in the decking directly above his hammock. The blue light was unfamiliar. The stink, however, he immediately identified: Toley’s reeking boots and filthy stockings, which had once again been tossed into Willis’s hammock, right next to his own. The items might as well have been put in Jack’s berth, so closely together were the hammocks slung.

  He considered picking up the boots and dropping them on Toley’s sleeping form, but he thought better of it. Willis would probably be blamed and earn a sneaky punch in the gut from Toley when nobody was looking. Jack knew that was how the older boy kept the younger one in line. Why else would Willis go along with him, except that Toley was just enough older, just enough bigger, and just enough wilier to win every time.

  Well, Jack thought as he climbed the companionway ladder, he didn’t suppose there was much he could do about it.

  When he emerged on the upper deck, he was greeted by an unearthly light that bathed everything in its strange glow: Every spar and sail and each one of the four ships’ hulls shimmered in the same blue light that cast a metallic sheen upon the water of the bay.

  Some of his shipmates stood at the bulwark, looking at two very different spectacles. Overhead, a strangely bright blue sphere moved slowly across the sky, trailing behind it a red tail, from which it seemed sparks flew, while below, all along the hillsides, glimmered hundreds of bonfires.

  “Beacon fires,” he heard a sailor say. “The smaller ones are sentry fires, I think.”

  Every hamlet and village up and down the hills and all along the coast was illuminated by hundreds of such fires, while the flickering of torches moving from place to place looked like swarms of fireflies against the dark hills.

  Jack stared at the sight, and only when he heard voices did he realize that Commodore Perry himself was standing nearby, surveying the scene, with the purser and the first lieutenant.

  “We should construe this as a favorable omen,” the commodore said, gazing up at the comet. “That our mission shall succeed without resort to bloodshed.” He held a small telescope to his eye, looked at the hills for a good while, and sniffed. “A few unfinished forts, and I warrant only a handful of them with cannon, and those of no great caliber. The Japanese probably have not calculated on the exactness of view afforded by a Dolland’s telescope or, for that matter, a French opera glass.” He collapsed the telescope, turned, and caught sight of Jack.

  Jack saluted and tried to back away before he was scolded, but the commodore fixed his gaze on him as if he were the bull’s-eye on a target.

  “What’s your name, son?” the commodore asked.

  “Jack Sullivan, sir. Cabin boy, and,” Jack quickly added, “powder monkey.”

  “We are hopeful that your services will not be needed in that role,” the commodore said.

  “Aye, sir,” Jack replied.

  “How old are you?”

  Jack cleared his throat and tried to get his voice to sound a little deeper. “Thirteen, sir,” he said.

  The commodore turned to the lieutenant and said, “This boy and one other of the same height should be in the procession when—and if—
we deliver the president’s letter to the mikado. We’ll have them carry the boxes with the letters.”

  Once the commodore had swept off, the lieutenant pursed his lips and glowered down at Jack, who knew what the officer was thinking: This troublemaker? Jack imagined the lieutenant tallying up his misdeeds: inattentiveness to the door of the chicken coop, tangled lines, overturned slush buckets, and—

  “What happened to your buttons?” the lieutenant asked.

  Jack glanced down at his jacket. Sure enough, two of his buttons were missing. Probably the earlier struggle with the chicken was responsible. He stammered but couldn’t quite get anything intelligible out.

  “See to it that you’ve replaced those and are looking shipshape before going ashore.”

  “Aye, aye, sir!” Jack said.

  “There will be a thorough briefing before the landing,” the lieutenant went on, “but one thing you should know is that I will not stand for any show of obsequiousness. Not on the deck of an American man-of-war, not under the flag of the United States. Do you understand?”

  “Aye, aye, sir,” Jack repeated.

  The lieutenant stalked off, and Jack turned to see Griggs leaning against the bulwark not far off. “What was he talking about?” Jack asked.

  “Ah,” Griggs said, pushing himself off the rail. “He wants none o’ that scrapin’ one’s forehead on the ground what these folk are ’customed to do. He wants none such obsqueakiness from his crew.”

  Jack made a mental note to avoid any show of that—what Griggs said—and then he kicked up his heels. He would be among the first to go ashore in the fabled land of Japan!

  8

  THE STEAMING TEAPOT

  BOOM!

  Yoshi woke to the roar of a cannon. He sat bolt upright. And again: BOOM! BOOM! He cowered at the sound of the explosions. Had the war started while he and Jun had been sleeping?

  BOOM!

  Jun sat up next to him, his mouth wide open, his eyes blinking rapidly. “What just happened?” he asked. “What’s going on?”

  “It was the barbarian cannon that woke us.” Yoshi pointed at the smoke hanging over the water.

  “Are we at war?” Jun asked.

  Yoshi glanced at the soldiers and workers near the waterfront, now unfolding themselves from their crouching positions or appearing from behind trees.

  “Just a morning salute!” an official called out. “Some kind of barbarian custom. Not an attack. Go back to your stations.”

  “Not an attack,” Yoshi whispered, taking a deep breath.

  Samurai gather to defend the homeland against the foreign invasion.

  (Toshu Shogetsu)

  “Look at all those warriors!” Jun said. “Pikemen, cavalrymen armed with muskets, mounted samurai . . . And what are those workers doing with those baskets?”

  “It looks like they’re building an earthen wall,” Yoshi answered. He looked beyond the activity to the big ships in the bay. Now, in the daylight, he could really see them lurking there, each one anchored broadside to the shore. That was so they could aim their cannons directly at the village, he’d overheard a soldier say. He seethed with anger at the affront. “How dare they defile the waters of Edo Bay and threaten the Sacred Land of the Rising Sun,” he said.

  “How dare they defy the laws of our country forbidding all barbarians to come near,” Jun agreed.

  “Don’t you wish we were samurai, so we could fight and repel the white devils?” Yoshi asked Jun.

  “I think we should get out of here,” Jun said.

  “Wait,” Yoshi said. “Look at those boats approaching the Black Ships. What are they doing?” Some were guard boats stuffed with Japanese soldiers who held up a big banner with strange lines and markings on it. “I think the sign says something in their language, maybe.”

  “It doesn’t look like language,” Jun said. “It looks more like ink spatters. Like someone trying to get ink off a brush.”

  “What are the men in those other boats doing?” Yoshi asked. He pointed to boats crowded with men whose heads bobbed up and down like birds drinking from a puddle.

  “It looks like they’re writing . . . or drawing,” Jun said.

  “Ah!” Yoshi exclaimed. “They are sketching! They are making drawings of the barbarians. Wouldn’t that be something to see?”

  “Yoshitaro,” Jun said, “we should get out of here before something terrible happens.”

  “Let’s just wait until the artists get back. Maybe we can see what the hairy ones look like.”

  “I’ll tell you what they look like,” Jun said. “They are hairy. Now, let’s go!”

  “Don’t you want to see?” Yoshi asked. “Do they have horns? And fangs? And tails?”

  “No, I don’t want to see,” Jun said. “I’m going to go to my aunt and uncle’s house in the country. You can come, too. I know you don’t have anywhere to go. I’m sure they’ll take you in. Come on!”

  Yoshi looked toward the shore where one of the artists’ boats was now landing.

  Jun tugged on Yoshi’s sleeve. “Please!”

  Yoshi knew it made sense to follow Jun. He glanced back at the forested hills. He looked at the water of the bay, sparkling in the summer sun. “Be fluid like water,” he remembered the kendo teacher saying. “Water can fill a vessel of any shape and is able to make itself into a single drop or a vast ocean.” He turned back to Jun. “You go,” he said. “I’m going to stay.”

  As soon as Jun was gone, Yoshi hurried to the waterfront.

  “Honorable sir,” he said, bowing to one of the artists standing on the shore, “may I see your pictures?” He couldn’t believe how bold he was being. It was as if basic etiquette had been thrown out the window because of all the things that had happened.

  “In due time, in due time,” said the artist. “You’ll have an opportunity to purchase a picture of the foreign devils.”

  “I have no money,” Yoshi said, hanging his head, but then he quickly added, “You must be quite brave, to row out so close to the barbarians.”

  “No, no!” the man said. “Not at all. I was too busy to be afraid. But you must be quite brave, since here you are, near the barbarian ships, while others have run away.”

  “Not brave,” Yoshi confessed. “Just stupid!”

  The old artist laughed, and for the first time since all this had happened, Yoshi laughed, too. “What did the hairy ones look like?” he asked. “Are they really as white as porcelain? Could you smell them? People say they stink because they eat flesh.”

  “I wasn’t close enough to smell them,” the artist said. “But their ships smell like gunpowder!”

  Yoshi took a furtive glance at the rolls of rice paper the man carried, but as they were all rolled up, he couldn’t make out any of the images.

  “You’re a curious boy, aren’t you, little samurai?” the artist asked, looking him up and down.

  “Oh!” Yoshi exclaimed. “I am not really bushi. That is . . . these are not my clothes.”

  The man raised an eyebrow. “Well, no need to explain. These are desperate times. So you are curious and you are not afraid. And you are honest, too!”

  Yoshi bowed, saying, “It seems I possess nothing at all except honesty.”

  “Then, my boy,” the artist said, “you possess the most important thing, for as we know, ‘The gods dwell in the heads of the honest.’ Now, are you hungry?”

  Yoshi nodded.

  “Here’s a chance for you to earn a few coins for yourself, and with them you can buy whatever you’d like to eat.”

  Again Yoshi bowed.

  “My name is Ozawa. There is a shop in Edo where they know my name and will make prints of these images right away. I want you to take these there.”

  “In . . . Edo?” Yoshi could barely bring himself to say the word. Edo was the biggest city in all of Japan. There dwelled the shogun, the great lords, and the Bakufu, the ruling body of all of Japan!

  “Here is a travel permit. And here is money for the
ferry, for the prints, and to get something to eat. Oh!” The artist pressed another coin into Yoshi’s palm. “Get me some of those buns filled with sweetened bean paste that they sell near the Nihon Bridge. You know your way around Edo, don’t you?”

  Yoshi shook his head.

  “I shall draw you a map, then,” Ozawa said.

  Yoshi recoiled. “I don’t know if I am allowed to have a map . . . ,” he murmured.

  “Yes,” Ozawa said. “So many things are forbidden now: calendars, most new books—the Bakufu believes we have enough books already—and pictures of barbarians, and . . .” He rattled off the list of pictures that were forbidden while he continued drawing.

  When he was finished, he handed Yoshi the paper and said, “See? This is just a picture of an ordinary samurai’s face. All you need to know is that his forehead is the shogun’s castle, his topknot is the Yoshiwara—no need for you to go there. The mouth is the mouth of the Sumida River, and the creases in the face are all the many canals. See these two eyes? Yes, here in the very center of the right eye is the engraver’s shop. You shouldn’t have any trouble finding it. It lies in the shadow of the samurai’s forehead, by which I mean the—”

  “Shogun’s castle,” Yoshi finished.

  “Tell them Ozawa sent you,” the artist went on. “And then come right back—after stopping for buns, of course—right here”—he pointed to the samurai’s nostril—“and there will be more money for you to earn, because once I get the prints”—Ozawa thumped the rolled-up papers against his hand—“I’ll need an enterprising assistant to sell them for me.”

  “Sell them?” Yoshi looked around at the waterfront, deserted except for the soldiers and workers building earthen fortifications. “To whom?”

  “Don’t you worry,” the artist said. “This place will soon be jammed with curiosity seekers.”