“Kohana’s note!” I exclaimed. “Does it tell all that?”
“Between the lines, as you say,” he answered; and he read the writing, “‘Gengo has taken pay of Keiki.’”
CHAPTER XXII—Tea with the Tycoon
There followed four days of anxious waiting. Though the Prince went daily to the palace, my presence was not commanded, and in the continued state of public stress and turmoil, it was thought best that Yoritomo and I should keep close within the yashiki. The Mito faction had given wide publication to a garbled account of our trial, which libelled us with the stigma of confessed spies. Had we appeared in the streets of the official quarter before excess of fury had exhausted the rancor and excitement of the samurais, we should have been hacked to pieces by our enemies and their dupes.
Throughout the vast extent of the lower city the panic continued without cessation. Day and night the bay-front populace streamed inland by thousands, bearing upon back and shoulder their household goods, young children, and aged mothers. Skirting along the outer moat of the official quarter, the bulk of the refugees from the southern half of Yedo poured past Owari Yashiki in an endless mob, all alike possessed by the one frantic desire to place themselves beyond reach of the magic tojin cannon.
Yet vast as was the multitude of townsfolk that poured out of Yedo, fully a third were replaced by the hatamotos and samurais that rushed in to the defence of the Shogun’s capitol, while reports were received that the daimios down the bay had assembled ten thousand armor-clad men within the first two days. The clans were responding to the call of the Shogunate by lining up to present a solid front to the barbarians.
Had there been confirmation of the first wild rumor that the black ships numbered sixty and their guns six hundred, or had Commodore Perry attempted a forceful landing, the heat of patriotic loyalty would have fused even the icy venom of the hatred between Owari and Mito. But the Commodore, though firm to arrogance, took utmost care to avoid all acts of violence, and his squadron was not large enough to awe the Mito faction into forgetfulness of their desire to overthrow the Shogunate.
At last, after much debate and intrigue, the Prince and Satsuma, backed by Ii Kamon-no-kami, won a denial of the demand of Keiki and Midzuano for immediate hostilities. The American envoy having resolutely refused to go to Nagasaki and having again threatened to ascend the bay, Iyeyoshi reluctantly appointed two of the lesser daimios as commissioners to receive the letter of the President of the United States.