The Daimio having been pleased to announce that, yielding to the intercession of his charming guest, Masago might be permitted to remove the corpses, he crossed the inner moat, followed by his brilliant train, while the grim samurai laughed behind their vizards, wondering how the ladies would agree.
CHAPTER X.
[FOREBODINGS.]
It was with feelings strangely mingled that the concourse prepared to depart. For their good, the farmer had suffered martyrdom; himself and his family were swept like insects from the earth, but not from the grateful memories of the people. No sooner was the inner drawbridge raised behind the departing despot, than with one accord all meekly knelt while the Abbess issued orders. Her brow was more sombre than its wont, her jaw more firmly set, as the troubled elders related what had happened. She had prayed for light, but Buddha had vouchsafed no answer. What was this coil that was winding slowly but surely round the son of him who had been her husband? Ay, round her own son as well, the noble Sampei. It was under misapprehension that Koshiu had included him in his anathema, supposing him the seducer of his child; yet here was the child, clad now in the crape of a nun, as pure as she had ever been. The farmer was in error, and surely idle curses recoil on those who launch them. Sampei, the brave and generous, was without reproach. Even sleepy Buddha must know that. Perchance he was at this moment rating Koshiu, on the further bank of the mystic Sandzu, for his precipitate injustice. Masago strove to persuade herself that it must be so, whilst striving to console the terror-stricken Miné, and yet at the bottom of her heart there was apprehension, a dull weight of cold foreboding.
The ways of Heaven are so strange, so unaccountable sometimes, and to our purblind vision so unjust, that the most robust of faith is sometimes sorely shaken. Miné wrung her hands, refusing comfort. As with trembling fingers she untied the bonds which supported her dead father, she prayed to him with cries and lamentations. It was through her own wrongheaded madness that the mistake had occurred. Sure her parent knew it now. If the curse must fall on one of the two, let it be on her, for she was in fault, not the glorious young General. Could he hear her now, her father? Oh, for some sign that he could hear and would grant her humble petition! Wretched, wretched child! Her punishment was already greater than she could bear, for was not she doomed to drag on a sad existence, stripped of all her kin. Had she but behaved as a dutiful daughter should, instead of grieving now, heart-broken, she would be standing on the further bank of the river of death along with Gennosuké, and little Sohei, and sweet Kihachi. Alack! alack! While the bereaved daughter raved, distracted, the elders of Tsu and the outlying villages were taking counsel. A notice had been handed to them, on the part of their lord, which ran thus:--"The property of the deceased, his rice fields and corn fields, and forest and mountain land, shall be sold without delay, and divided into two parts; one shall be paid over to the lord of the estate; the other, by his extreme condescension, shall be the portion of the culprit's daughter, who has been permitted to live. This is to show how godlike and noble is your master; and it is hereby strictly forbidden to make comments on the sentence, or find fault with this his decision."
One-half for Miné, who was in some sort an heiress, then. Poor heart! She little recked of her good fortune. The temple yonder would be the richer for her portion, for she was Buddha's servant now,--his handmaid till her spirit was released. With regard to the dead, the elders consulted awhile, and then with calm decision Zembei, supported by Rokubei, rose from his knees and spoke.
"Dear friends," he said, "Koshiu, who suffered this day, bruised his bones and crushed his soul for your sakes. In appealing direct to the Most Holy Mikado he sinned greatly, but 'twas from excess of zeal; and in being compelled to see those he loved massacred before his eyes, his punishment was in excess of his misdemeanour. We have decided that honour shall be paid to him, for indeed before his death he was the mouthpiece of the Eternal, who deigned to speak through his lips. It is meet therefore that we, his old friends, who loved him and his as ourselves--though perhaps on one occasion we were unduly selfish--should undertake this matter. We will leave our homes and lands in possession of our heirs, and, shaving our heads, will retire for a while to the top of the holy mountain; and after a period of probation, will descend from Mount Kôya in Kishiu, and, becoming priests, will wander from town to town, praying at every shrine for the souls of the departed, collecting as we go from the charity of all good people. And then, having collected enough, we will erect a temple over their bones, with six Buddhas in bronze to do them honour, and there shall prayers be offered up for ever for them, and also for us."
The people listened to the oration, and bowed their heads without a word, for the decision of the elders was good and natural. All therefore lighting paper lanterns, for it was dark now, turned to follow across the outer moat, away along the straggling interminable street, the procession of the dead.
Masago had accepted a temporary trust, and it was well. Within the darkling groves of her sacred pines should the victims lie at peace, until such time as, by divine grace, the elders should return to fulfil their holy task; and it behoved those here assembled, who had witnessed the sacrifice, to offer a prayer together, and commence among themselves a collection for the building of a shrine.
Solemn and slow, like an army of glow-worms, the procession wended along to the sad chant of nuns and bonzes; and, unknown to them, as the simple people marched, there followed a fervent benison from the lips of one despairing. The dreary chatelaine was sitting at an upper casement of the castle, wistfully gazing into the night.