“I’m not willing to move against Lord Matsumae based on this alone,” Sano said, holding up the diary. “Not when there are still other suspects.” And not while he needed to stay alive to rescue his son.

“Where should we look for evidence against them?” Hirata asked.

“The funeral is a good place to start. Some if not all of the suspects should be there. Let’s watch how they behave.”

A tapping noise caught Sano’s attention. Puzzled, he got up, walked to the wall, and lifted the mat. Underneath was a window. He opened the panel of paper panes and the shutters.

Reiko stood on the veranda. “Let me in!” she said in a loud, urgent whisper.

Sano hauled her through the window and closed it. “I thought you were in bed. Where have you been?”

She was trembling violently, her eyes red-rimmed, face crusted with mucus, lips white. Sano brushed the snow off her, hung her coat and gloves over a drying frame, and helped her remove her boots. He seated her and himself by a brazier. Hirata offered her hot tea, but she pushed it away.

“I went to the keep.” Her voice quavered. “Wente took me. This time we got inside. But Masahiro wasn’t there. All we found was an empty cage and a blanket with blood on it. And this.” She gave Sano a leather pouch she’d been clutching in her hand.

Sano opened the pouch and saw the toy horse painted to resemble the real horse that Masahiro had been learning to ride. His worst fears solidified into reality. Hope withered like burnt-out ashes.

“Masahiro is dead!” Reiko began to cry with violent, wracking howls. “He probably has been since before we came here. We were too late from the beginning!”

Sano held her. Her sobs shook them both. He wanted to break down and weep with Reiko. All along he’d seen the signs that their son was dead and tried to ignore them. He couldn’t now.

“Maybe Masahiro escaped,” Hirata said.

“Yes, why not?” Marume said. “He takes after his mother. She’s pretty good at getting out of tight spots.”

Their efforts to cheer up Sano and Reiko failed. Sano had tried not to wonder why Lord Matsumae and Gizaemon wouldn’t just give him back his son; what harm could it do them? The reason was that they knew Masahiro was dead because they’d killed him. They didn’t want to admit it to Sano for fear of eventual consequences. But at this moment Sano was devastated beyond craving retribution. All sense of meaning and purpose drained from his existence. His son was dead. Nothing mattered anymore.

“Let me die,” Reiko moaned in Sano’s embrace. “Let my death reunite me with Masahiro. Masahiro! My baby, my firstborn, my dearest child!” Her frantic cries resonated through the hollowness inside Sano. “Just let me see him again!”

As the other men watched with stern pity, Sano ceased to care about the investigation, about whether he ever found out who’d killed Tekare. He no longer cared whether Lord Matsumae set him and his comrades free or put them to death. If he and Reiko died on Ezogashima, at least their earthly remains would be near their son’s.

Through all the past dark times, Sano had always believed a brighter day lay ahead of him, that he would not only survive but triumph.

Not this time.

Life as he knew and cherished it had ended tonight.

20

The morning of Tekare’s funeral was clear and bright. Reiko stood lost among the mourners and guests convened outside the palace’s main reception hall. It seemed impossible to her that the sun was shining, the sky brilliant turquoise, the snowdrifts pure, fresh, and beautiful. The light hurt her eyes, which were swollen from weeping. How incredible that the world should go on, indifferent to her sorrow; that she was still alive when her heart had been torn out of her; that she should attend a funeral for a stranger while she grieved for her son.

She hadn’t wanted to come, but Sano had said, “Lord Matsumae’s ordered everyone in the castle to go. You must.”

He’d acted calm and strong, although his eyes had an expression that she’d seen in them once before, while he convalesced after he’d been beaten almost to death by an assassin. Then he’d looked as if his body had been tortured to the very limit of survival. This time he looked as if his spirit had. They’d spent the night clinging to each other in bed, but although they’d conceived Masahiro together and should have taken comfort from sharing their loss, Reiko had felt utterly alone in hers. She now felt as distanced from Sano as if he were on the moon, even though he stood beside her.

The funeral party entered the hall, led by Lord Matsumae, his uncle Gizaemon, and their officials, clad in formal black ceremonial robes decorated with gold crests. The native men and concubines followed, wearing their usual animal-skin clothing and bead jewelry. Reiko saw Wente, but Wente was watching the native men. A small, thin, male commoner strode in after them, bundled in a luxurious fur coat. Reiko heard Hirata say to Sano, “That’s Daigoro, the gold merchant.”

Lady Matsumae and her three attendants, all in lavish silk robes, minced up the stairs. Reiko was surprised that her mind continued functioning despite her grief. She noted that Lilac was absent. She remembered that Lilac had promised her information about Masahiro, about the murder, today.

Troops resplendent in full armor ushered Sano, Reiko, Hirata, the detectives, and the Rat last through the door. Inside the hall, a fire burned in a native-style hearth. The corpse lay north of the hearth, on a woven mat, amid brass bowls from which rose yellow, acrid smoke.

“It’s the native custom to burn sulfur, to mask the odor of decay,” the Rat whispered.

Reiko smelled its vicious stench despite the sulfur. The natives hugged one another, hands positioned on shoulders or under armpits, in a gesture of mutual condolence. Lord Matsumae and his men knelt along the north wall. His face was hollow-eyed and drawn with misery, theirs stoic. The strong, handsome native that Reiko remembered from the beach squeezed in beside Lord Matsumae, who was nearest the corpse.

“You don’t belong here,” Lord Matsumae said, offended. “Sit somewhere else.”

The native blurted out angry speech. The Rat whispered, “Urahenka says that as Tekare’s husband, he’s the most important mourner, and he, not Lord Matsumae, should sit in the place of honor.”

The troops stood over Urahenka. He slunk off to join the other native men along the east wall. Wente’s solemn gaze clung to him. Sano and his comrades took places along the south wall, the women along the west. Kneeling in the gap that separated the Japanese ladies from the native concubines, Reiko got her first good look at the corpse.

Tekare wore leggings, fur mittens, and an ocher-colored robe with black-and-white designs on the collar band and sleeve hems. These covered her shrunken body, but her face showed in all its gruesome mortality. The blue tattoo around her mouth melded with the discolored adjacent skin that had sunken at the eye sockets. Outlines of her teeth showed through it. Silver earrings hung with black, turquoise, and red beads pierced lobes that looked like dried gristle. Disgust nauseated Reiko. She thought of Lilac, who’d somehow avoided the funeral, and a spark of new emotion kindled within her grief.

It was anger toward Lilac. Reiko was certain that Lilac knew Masahiro was dead. She’d strung Reiko along, teasing her with false hopes, wangling for a new life in Edo. Such despicable cruelty!

Servants brought trays containing a feast-dried salmon, deer stew with vegetables, fish roe, chestnuts, cakes made from millet, and water vessels. They placed one tray beside the head of the corpse, offerings to the gods. The other trays were laid before the assembly. The natives and the local Japanese began to eat, slowly and ceremonially, with their fingers. “You have to eat,” the Rat hissed at the Japanese from Edo. “You’ll be cursed if you don’t.”