Uzaemon missed some words. ‘Memory is tricks and strangeness.’

‘That’s the truth,’ de Zoet adds a dash of pale juice, ‘and this is lime.’

‘Your room,’ observes the visitor, ‘is change.’ Additions include the low table and cushions, a New Year’s kadomatsu pine wreath, a competent picture of a monkey drawn in pen and ink, and a folding screen to hide de Zoet’s bed. Which Orito might have shared, Uzaemon suffers a complicated ache, and better that she had. The head clerk has no slave or servant, but the apartment is tidy and swept. ‘Room is comfort and pleasant…’

‘Dejima,’ de Zoet stirs the drink, ‘is to be my home for some years.’

‘You do not wish to take a wife for more comfort life?’

‘I don’t view such transactions as lightly as do my compatriots.’

Uzaemon is encouraged. ‘Picture of monkey is very beauty.’

‘That? Thank you, but I’m an incurable beginner.’

Uzaemon’s surprise is genuine. ‘You draw monkey, Mr de Zoet?’

De Zoet replies with an embarrassed smile and serves the lime and honey drink. He then flouts the laws of small-talk. ‘How may I be of service, Ogawa-san?’

Uzaemon looks at the steam rising from the bowl. ‘I am disturb your office at important period, I fear.’

‘Deputy Fischer exaggerates. There isn’t much to be done.’

‘Then…’ the interpreter touches the hot porcelain with his fingertips ‘… I wish Mr de Zoet keep – to hide – a… a very important thing, safe.’

‘If you wish to use one of our warehouses, perhaps Chief van Cleef should-’

‘No no. This is small thing.’ Uzaemon produces the dogwood scroll-tube.

De Zoet frowns at the item. ‘I shall oblige, of course, and gladly.’

‘I know Mr de Zoet is able to hide items with greatest care.’

‘I shall hide it with my Book of Psalms, until you want it back.’

‘Thank you. I – I hoped you say these words.’ Uzaemon addresses de Zoet’s unasked questions with a foreigner’s directness. ‘First, to answer, “What is the words in this scroll?” You remember Enomoto, I think’ – the name causes de Zoet’s face to cloud over – ‘is Lord Abbot of Shrine in Kyôga Domain, where… where Miss Aibagawa must live.’ The Dutchman nods. ‘This scroll is – how to say? – rules believings laws of Order, of Shrine. These laws are -’ this would be hard in Japanese, the interpreter thinks, sighing, but in Dutch it is like breaking rocks ‘- these rules are… are bad, worse, worst than worst wrong, for woman. It is great suffering… it is not endurable.’

‘What rules? What must she endure, Ogawa, for God’s sake?’

Uzaemon shuts his eyes. He keeps them shut and shakes his head.

‘At least,’ de Zoet’s voice is cracked, ‘tell me if the scroll could be a weapon to attack Enomoto, or shame him into releasing her? Or, via the Magistracy, could the scroll win Miss Aibagawa justice?’

‘I am Interpreter of Third Rank. Enomoto is Lord Abbot. He has more power than Magistrate Shirayama. Justice in Japan is justice of power.’

‘So Miss Aibagawa must suffer – suffer the “unendurable” for the rest of her life?’

Uzaemon hesitates. ‘A friend, in Nagasaki, wish to help… with directness.’

De Zoet is no fool. ‘You plan a rescue? Can you hope to succeed?’

Uzaemon hesitates again. ‘Not he and I alone. I… purchase assistance.’

‘Mercenaries are risky allies, as we Dutch know well.’ De Zoet’s mind works an abacus of implications. ‘But how could you return to Dejima, afterwards? And she would just be recaptured. You’d have to go into hiding – permanently – and – so why – why sacrifice so much – everything? Unless… oh.’

Momentarily, the two men are unable to look each other in the eye.

So now you know, the interpreter thinks, I love her too.

‘I am a fool.’ The Dutchman rubs his green eyes. ‘A myopic, holy fool…’

Two of the Malay slaves hurry down Long Street speaking their language.

‘… but why did you help my – my advances towards her, if you, too…’

‘Better she lives here with you than become locked forever in bad marriage, or be sent away from Nagasaki.’

‘Yet still you entrust me with this’ – he touches the tube – ‘unusable evidence?’

‘You wish her freedom, too. You will not sell me to Enomoto.’

‘Never. But what am I to do with the scroll? I am a prisoner here.’

‘Do nothing. If rescue succeed, I not need it. If rescue…’ the conspirator drinks his honey and lime ‘… if rescue does not succeed, if Enomoto learns of scroll’s existence, he will hunt in my father’s house, in friends’ houses. Rules of Order is very, very secret. Enomoto kill to possess it. But on Dejima, Enomoto has no power. Here he will not search, I believe.’

‘How will I know whether your mission succeeds or not?’

‘If succeeds, I send message when I can, when is safe.’

De Zoet is shaken by this interview, but his voice is steady. ‘You shall be in my prayers, always. When you meet Miss Aibagawa, tell her… tell her… just tell her that. You shall both be in my prayers.’

XXIII Yayoi’s Room at the House of Sisters, Mount Shiranui Shrine

Minutes before sunrise on the Eighteenth Day of the First Month

Housekeeper Satsuki receives Yayoi’s milky-lipped baby daughter. By firelight and dawnlight, Satsuki’s tears are visible. No fresh snow fell during the night, so the track down Mekura Gorge is passable, and Yayoi’s twins are to be taken to the World Below this morning. ‘For shame, Housekeeper.’ Abbess Izu issues a gentle rebuke. ‘You’ve helped with dozens of Bestowals. If Sister Yayoi accepts that she isn’t losing little Shinobu and Binyô, but sending them on ahead into the World Below, surely you can control your feebler feelings. Today is a parting, not a bereavement.’

What you call ‘feebler feelings’, thinks Orito, I call ‘compassion’.

‘Yes, Abbess.’ Housekeeper Satsuki swallows. ‘It’s just… they’re so…’

‘Without the Bestowal of our Gifts,’ Yayoi half recites, ‘Kyôga Domain’s rivers would dry, its seedlings would wither, and all its mothers would be barren.’

Before the night of her escape and voluntary return, Orito would have considered such words to be despicably passive: now she understands that only this belief, that Life requires their sacrifice, makes the separation tolerable. The midwife rocks Yayoi’s hungry son, Binyô: ‘Your sister’s finished, now. Give your mother a little rest…’

Abbess Izu reminds her, ‘We say “Bearer”, Sister Aibagawa.’

‘You do, Abbess,’ Orito responds, as expected, ‘but I am not “we”…’

Sadaie empties crumbs of charcoal on to the fire: they snap and spit.

… We made, Orito holds the Abbess’s gaze, firm understandings: remember?

Our Lord Abbot, Abbess Izu holds Orito’s gaze, shall have the final word.

Until that day, Orito holds the Abbess’s gaze and repeats, ‘I am not “we”.’

Binyô’s face is damp, pink, velvet: it folds into a prolonged squawk.

‘Sister?’ Yayoi receives her son for his last feed from her breast.

The midwife scrutinises Yayoi’s inflamed nipple.

‘It’s much better,’ Yayoi tells her friend. ‘The motherwort works.’

Orito thinks of Otane of Kurozane, who no doubt supplied the herb, and wonders if she can insist on a yearly meeting as part of her terms. The Newest Sister remains the Shrine’s lowest-ranking captive, but her decision on the Todoroki Bridge to forfeit her escape, and her successful delivery of Yayoi’s twins, have elevated her status in many, subtle ways. Her right to refuse Suzaku’s drugs is recognised; she is trusted to walk around the Shrine’s ramparts three times each day; and Master Genmu agreed that the Goddess wouldn’t choose Orito for Engiftment, in return for Orito’s silence about the counterfeit letters. The moral price of the agreement is high; mild friction with the Abbess occurs daily; and Lord Abbot Enomoto may undo these advances… but that is a fight, Orito thinks, for a future day.