The Diamond Chariot

SPILLED SAKE




Tamba said:

‘You must fall as a pine needle falls to the ground – smoothly and silently. But you topple like a felled tree. Mo ikkai.’1

Erast Petrovich pictured a pine tree, its branches covered with needles, then one of them broke away and went swirling downwards, settling gently on the grass. He jumped up, flipped over in the air and thudded flat out into the ground.

‘Mo ikkai.’

The pine needles fluttered down one at a time, the imaginary branch was entirely bare now and he had to start on the next one, but after every fall he heard the same thing:

‘Mo ikkai.’

Erast Petrovich obediently pounded himself black and blue, but what he wanted most of all was to learn how to fight – if not like Tamba, then at least like the unforgettable Neko-chan. But the jonin was in no hurry to get to that stage; so far he had limited himself to the theory. He had said that first it was necessary to study each of the three principles of combat separately: nagare – fluidity, henkan – mutability, and the most complex of all, rinki-ohen – the ability to improvise according to the opponent’s manner.

In the titular counsellor’s opinion, the most useful part was the information about blows to vitally important points. In this area, it was quite possible to make do with the skills of English boxing and French savate while one was still struggling to grasp the unpronounceable and inexplicable principles of ninjutsu.

The pages of his cherished notebook were filled with sketches of parts of the human body with arrows of various thicknesses, according to the strength of the blow, and mysterious comments such as: ‘Soda (sxth. vert.) – temp. parls.; not hard! – or inst. Death’. Or: ‘Wanshun (tric.) – temp. parls arm; not hard! – or fracture’.

Surprisingly, the hardest thing proved to be the breathing exercises. Tamba bound his pupil’s waist tightly with a belt and Fandorin had to inhale two thousand times in a row, deeply enough to inflate the lower section of his abdomen. This apparently simple exercise made his muscles ache so badly that on the first evening Fandorin crawled back to his room hunched over and very much afraid that he couldn’t make love to Midori.

But he could.

She rubbed his bruises and grazes with a healing ointment and then showed him how to banish the pain and fatigue with ketsuin – the magical coupling of the fingers. Under guidance Erast Petrovich spent a quarter of an hour twisting his fingers out of joint to form them into incredibly complicated shapes, after which the absolute exhaustion disappeared as if by magic and his body felt strong and filled with energy.

The lovers did not see each other during the day – Fandorin strove to comprehend the mysteries of falling and correct breathing and Midori was occupied with some business of her own, but the nights belonged entirely to them.

The titular counsellor learned to manage with two hours of rest. It turned out that if one mastered the art of correct sleeping, that was quite sufficient to restore one’s strength.

In accordance with the wise science of jojutsu, each new night was unlike the one before and had its own name: ‘The cry of the heron’, ‘The little gold chain’, ‘The fox and the badger’ – Midori said that sameness was fatal for passion.

Erast Petrovich’s previous life had been coloured primarily in white, the colour of the day. But now that his sleeping time had been reduced so drastically, his existence was dichromatic – white and black. Night was transformed from a mere backdrop to the stage of life into an integral part of it, and the universe as a whole benefited greatly as a result.

The space extending from sunset to dawn included a great many things: rest, passion, quiet conversation and even rowdy horseplay – after all, they were both so young.

For instance, once they argued over who was faster: Midori running or Fandorin on his tricycle.

They didn’t think twice about crossing to the other side of the crevice, where the Royal Crescent was waiting for its master, then going down to the foot of the mountain and holding a cross-country race along the path.

At first Erast Petrovich shot out in front, but after half an hour, tired from turning the pedals, he starting moving more slowly, and Midori started gaining on him. She ran lightly and steadily, without increasing her rate of breathing at all. After almost ten versts she overtook the tricyclist and her lead gradually increased.

That was when Fandorin realised how Midori had managed to deliver the healing maso herb from the southern slope of Mount Tanzawa in a single night. She had simply run fifteen ri in one direction and then the same distance back again! So that was why she laughed when he pitied the overworked horse …

Once he tried to strike up a conversation about the future, but the answer he received was:

‘In the Japanese language there is no future tense, only the past and the present.’

‘But something will happen to us, to you and me,’ Erast Petrovich insisted stubbornly.

‘Yes,’ she replied seriously, ‘but I haven’t decided exactly what yet: “The autumn leaf” or “The sweet tear”. Both endings have their advantages.’

He went numb. They didn’t talk about the future any more.

On the evening of the fourth day Midori said:

‘We won’t touch each other today. We’re going to drink wine and talk about the Beautiful.’

‘How do you mean, not touch each other?’ Erast Petrovich asked in alarm. ‘You promised me “The silver cobweb”!’

‘“The silver cobweb” is a night spent in exquisite, sensitive conversation that binds two souls together with invisible threads. The stronger this cobweb is, the longer it will hold the moth of love.’

Fandorin tried to rebel.

‘I don’t want this “cobweb”, the moth isn’t going anywhere in any case! Let’s do “The fox and the badger” again, like yesterday!’

‘Passion does not tolerate repetition and it requires a breathing space,’ Midori said in a didactic tone.

‘Mine doesn’t require one!’

She stamped her foot.

‘Which of us is the teacher of jojutsu – you or me?’

‘Nothing but teachers everywhere. No life of my own at all,’ muttered Erast Patrovich, capitulating. ‘Well, all right, then, exactly what is “the Beautiful” that we are going to talk about all night long?’

‘Poetry, for instance. What work of poetry is your favourite?’

While the vice-consul pondered, Midori set a little jug of sake on the table and sat down cross-legged.

‘Well, I don’t know …’ he said slowly. ‘I like “Eugene Onegin”. A work by the Russian poet P-Pushkin.’

‘Recite it to me! And translate it.’

She rested her elbows on her knees and prepared to listen.

‘But I don’t remember it off by heart. It’s thousands of lines long.’

‘How can you love a poem that has thousands of lines? And why so many? When a poet writes a lot, it means he has nothing to say.’

Offended for the great genius of Russian poetry, Fandorin asked ironically:

‘And how many lines are there in your favourite poem?’

‘Three,’ she replied seriously. ‘I like haiku, three-line poems, best of all. They say so little and at the same time so much. Every word in its place, and not a single superfluous one. I’m sure bodhisattvas talk to each other only in haiku.’

‘Recite it,’ said Erast Petrovich, intrigued. ‘Please, recite it.’

Half-closing her eyes, she half-declaimed, half-chanted:

‘Dragonfly-catcher,

Oh, how far ahead of me

Your feet ran today …’

‘It’s beautiful,’ Fandorin admitted. ‘Only I didn’t understand anything. What dragonfly-catcher? Where has he run off to? And what for?’

Midori opened her eyes and she repeated wistfully in Japanese:

‘Doko madeh itta yara … How lovely! To understand a haiku completely, you must have a special sensitivity or secret knowledge. If you knew that the great poetess Chiyo wrote this verse on the death of her little son, you would not look at me so condescendingly, would you?’

He said nothing, astounded by the profundity and power of feeling suddenly revealed in those three simple, mundane lines.

‘A haiku is like the casing of flesh in which the invisible, elusive soul is confined. The secret is concealed in the narrow space between the five syllables of the first line (it is called kami-no-ku) and the seven syllables of the second line (it is called naka-no-ku), and then between the seven syllables of the naka-no-ku and the five syllables of the third and final line (it is called shimo-no-ku). How can I explain so that you will understand?’ Midori’s face lit up in a crafty smile. ‘Let me try this. A good haiku is like the silhouette of a beautiful woman or an artfully exposed part of her body. The outline and the single detail are far more exciting than the whole thing.’

‘But I prefer the whole thing,’ Fandorin declared, putting his hand on her knee.

‘That’s because you are a little urchin and a barbarian.’ Her fan smacked him painfully across the fingers. ‘It is enough for a sophisticated individual merely to glimpse the edge of Beauty, and in an instant his imagination will fill in all the rest, and even improve it many times over.’

‘That, by the way, is from Pushkin,’ the titular counsellor growled, blowing on his bruised fingers. ‘And your favourite poem may be beautiful, but it is very sad.’

‘Genuine beauty is always sad.’

Erast Petrovich was astonished.

‘Surely not!’

‘There are two kinds of beauty: the beauty of joy and the beauty of sadness. You people of the West prefer the former, we prefer the latter. Because the beauty of joy is as short-lived as the flight of a butterfly. But the beauty of sadness is stronger than stone. Who recalls the millions of happy people in love who have quietly lived their lives, grown old and died? But plays are written about tragic love, and they live for centuries. Let’s drink, and then we shall talk about the Beautiful.’

But they were not fated to discuss the Beautiful.

Erast Petrovich raised his little cup and said: ‘I drink to the beauty of joy.’

‘And I drink to the beauty of sadness,’ Midori replied, and drank, but before he could do likewise, the night was split asunder by a frenzied bellow: ‘TSUME-E-E!’2 The response was a roar that issued from an entire multitude of throats.

Fandorin’s hand shook and the sake spilled out on to the tatami.

As his hand trembled,

Wine spilled on to the table.

An evil omen

1 ‘Again’ (Japanese)

2 ‘Attack!’ (Japanese)





A BIG FIRE




Not that it happened often, but sometimes he did come across a woman who was stronger than him. And then the thing to do was not thrust his chest out and put on airs, but quite the opposite – pretend to be weak and defenceless. That made the strong women melt. And then they handled everything themselves; all he had to do was not get under their feet.

In the village of the accursed shinobis there was only one object of any interest to a connoisseur of female charm – seventeen-year-old Etsuko. She was no beauty, of course, but, as the saying went, in a swamp even a toad is a princess. Apart from her, the female population of the village of Kakusimura1 (Masa had invented the name himself, because the shinobi didn’t call the village anything) consisted of the old witch Neko-chan (what a lovely little p-ssy-cat!),2 pock-faced Gohei’s pregnant wife, one-eyed Sae, and fifteen-year-old Nampopo. And two snot-nosed little girls of nine and eleven who didn’t even count.

Masa didn’t try to approach his chosen prey on the first day – he watched her from a distance, drawing up a plan of action. She was a fine girl, with qualities that made her interesting. Hard working, nimble, a singer. And it was interesting to wonder how the kunoichi – ninja women – were made down there. If she could do a jump with a triple somersault or run up a wall on to the roof (he’d seen that for himself), then what sort of tricks did she get up to in moments of passion? That would be something to remember and tell people about.

At first, of course, he had to find out whether she belonged to any of the men. The last thing he needed was to draw down the wrath of one of these devils.

Masa sat in Little Cat’s kitchen for an hour, praised her rice balls and found out everything he needed to know. There was a fiancé, his name was Ryuzo, a very nice boy, but he had been studying abroad for a year already.

So let him carry on studying.

Now Masa could get down to work.

He spent a couple of days getting friendly with the object. No languorous glances, no hints – Buddha forbid! She was pining without her fiancé, and he was far from home, among strangers, they were about the same age, so surely they had things to talk about?

He told her a lot of things about the wonders of Yokohama (fortunately, Etsuko had never been to the gaijin city). He lied a bit, of course, but only to make it more interesting. Gradually he worked his way round to the exotic bedroom habits of the gaijins. The girl’s eyes glinted and her little mouth opened halfway. Aha! She might be a shinobi, but she had real blood in her veins!

That finally convinced him that he would be successful and he moved on to the last stage but one – he started asking whether it was true that kunoichi women really had the right to do as they wished with their own bodies and the idea of being unfaithful to a husband or a fiancé did not even exist for them.

‘How can some little hole in your body be unfaithful? Only the soul can be unfaithful, and our souls are true,’ Etsuko answered proudly – the clever girl.

Masa had no interest at all in her soul. The little hole was quite enough for him. He whined a bit about never having hugged a girl – he was so very shy and unsure of himself.

‘All right, then, come to the crevice at midnight,’ Etsuko whispered. ‘And I’ll give you a hug.’

‘That would be very charitable of you,’ he said meekly, and start blinking very, very fast – he was so touched.

The place chosen for the rendezvous was absolutely perfect, all credit to the girl for that. At night there wasn’t a soul here, and it was a good hundred paces to the nearest house. They didn’t post sentries in Kakusimura – what for? On the other side of the crevices there were ‘singing boards’ under the earth: if anyone stepped on one, it started hooting like an eagle owl and it could be heard from very far away. That time when he and the master had climbed across the rope they’d had no idea that the village was ready to receive visitors.

With Etsuko everything happened quickly, even too quickly. There was no need to act like an inexperienced boy in order to inflame her passions more strongly – she came dashing out of the bushes so fast she knocked him off his feet, and a minute later she was already gasping, panting and screeching as she bounced up and down on Masa, like a cat scraping at a dog with its claws.

There wasn’t anything special about the kunoichi, she was just a girl like any other. Except that her thighs were as hard as stone – she squeezed him so hard, he would probably have bruises left on his hips. But she wasn’t inventive at all. Even Natsuko was more interesting.

Etsuko babbled something in a happy voice, stroked Masa’s stiff, short-trimmed hair and made sweet talk, but he couldn’t hide his disappointment.

‘Didn’t you like it?’ she asked in a crestfallen voice. ‘I know I never studied it … The jonin told me: “You don’t need to”. Ah, but do you know how good I am at climbing trees? Like a real monkey. Shall I show you?’

‘Go on, then,’ Masa agreed feebly.

Etsuko jumped up, ran across to the dead pine tree and clambered up the charred trunk, moving her hands and feet with incredible speed.

Masa was struck by a poetic idea: living white on dead black. He even wondered whether he ought to compose a haiku about a naked girl on a charred pine. He had the first two lines all ready – five syllables and seven:

The old black pine tree,

Trembling like a butterfly …

What next? ‘With a girl on it?’ Too blunt and direct. ‘See love soaring upwards’? That was six syllables, but it should be five.

In search of inspiration he rolled closer to the pine tree – he couldn’t be bothered to get up.

Suddenly Masa heard a strange champing sound above him. Etsuko dropped out of the tree with a groan and fell on to the ground two steps away from him. He froze in horror at the sight of a thick, feathered arrow-shaft sticking out of her white back below her left shoulder-blade.

He wanted to go dashing to her, to see whether she was alive.

Etsuko was alive. Without turning over or moving her head, she kicked Masa, so that he went rolling away.

‘Run …’ he heard her say in a muffled whisper.

But Masa didn’t run – his legs were trembling so badly, they probably wouldn’t have held up the weight of his body.

The night was suddenly full of rustling sounds. Dark spots appeared at the edge of the crevice – one, two, three. Black men climbed up on to the edge of the cliff at the point where the shinobi had their secret hoist. There were many of them, very many. Masa lay in the tall grass, looking at them, horror-struck, and he couldn’t move.

One of the black men walked over to where Etsuko was lying face down and turned her over on to her back with his foot. He leaned down, and a blade glinted in his hand.

Suddenly the girl sat up, there was a wheeze, and he was lying, but Etsuko was standing with a sword in her hand, surrounded on all sides by the mysterious newcomers. White among the black, Masa thought fleetingly.

The clash of metal, howls, and then the white figure disappeared, and the men in black were furiously hacking at something lying on the ground that crunched as they hit it.

Masa clearly heard a girl’s voice shout out:

‘Kongojyo!’

One of the killers came very close. He tore up a bunch of grass and started cleaning off his sword. Masa heard loud, sporadic breathing.

The pale light of the moon seeped through a thin cloud for a moment and Masa saw a hood with holes instead of eyes, a cartridge belt over a shoulder, a black jacket.

Don Tsurumaki’s men, that was who they were! They’d followed the shinobi’s example and covered their faces so that they wouldn’t show white in the darkness!

How had they managed to get past the ‘singing boards’? Surely they couldn’t have come through the underground passage? Who could have showed it to them?

Masa crawled on all fours into the undergrowth, jumped to his feet and ran.

The Black Jackets didn’t waste any time. He heard a muffled command behind him, and fallen pine needles started crunching under rapid footsteps.

He had to get to the houses quickly, to raise the alarm! The Don’s men wouldn’t bother to find out who was a shinobi and who wasn’t, they’d finish off everybody regardless.

When he had only twenty paces left to go to the first hut, Masa was unlucky – in the darkness he ran into a branch, tore his cheek and – worst of all – he couldn’t stop himself crying out.

The men behind him heard and realised they had been discovered.

‘TSUME-E-E!’ roared a commanding bass voice.

The response was a roar from many voices.

‘An attack! An attack!’ Masa roared as well, but shut his mouth almost immediately, realising that he was only exposing himself to unnecessary danger.

The attackers were roaring and tramping so loudly that the inhabitants of Kakusimura couldn’t help but hear them.

Now, if he wanted to live, he had to think very quickly. So Masa didn’t run towards the houses, he hid behind a tree.

Less than half a minute later a crowd of Black Jackets went rushing past, spreading out and forming into a half-moon in order to take in the whole width of the island.

Torches blazed into life, thrust into the ground along a line at intervals of five paces. The chain of fire cut across the entire forest, from one edge to the other.

‘Fire!’

Rapid, crackling salvoes of carbine fire. Masa could hear the bullets thudding into the wooden walls and the squeal of splinters flying out.

Ah, what a disaster! How could he save his master from this hell? The Black Jackets would riddle the first three houses with bullets now, and then they would set about Tamba’s home.

Masa dashed about between the pines in despair and saw that he couldn’t possibly slip through the brightly lit zone and the cordon.

A crunch of branches. A man running with a limp from the direction of the crevice. Black jacket, black hood – he must have fallen behind the others. Masa attacked him from the side, knocked him down with a single blow and then, to make sure, squeezed the fallen man’s neck with his knee and waited for it to crunch. He didn’t have to worry about the noise – all the shooting that was going on was deafening.

He pulled the trousers and jacket off the corpse and put them on. He covered his face with the hood – it was very helpful that the Don’s men had decided to wear such a useful item.

While he was still fiddling about, the shooting stopped. The wooden walls that had been riddled with bullets were covered in black dots, like the poppy-seed bun that Masa had given Netsuko as a treat. It was almost as bright as day, there were so many torches all around.

One by one the gunmen entered the houses, holding their carbines at the ready. Then they came back out – in twos, dragging dead bodies that they laid out on the ground. The commander leaned down, looking into the dead faces.

Masa counted nine big bodies and four little ones. There were two adults missing.

‘Tamba’s not here,’ the commander said loudly. ‘And the gaijin’s not here either. They’re in the house on the edge of the precipice.’

And he walked away, but not far, only a few steps.

Suddenly one of the bodies came to life. The man (Masa recognised affable, talkative Rakuda) arched up like a cat and jumped on to the commander’s back. A knife blade glinted, but the leader of the Black Jackets proved to be very adroit – he jerked his head to dodge the blow, threw himself backwards and started rolling about on the grass. Men dashed to help him from all sides, and a shapeless black octopus with arms and legs sticking out in all directions started writhing on the ground.

Taking advantage of the commotion, another body started moving, this time a little one. It was eight-year-old Yaichi. He rose halfway to his feet, staggered and then shook himself. Two Black Jackets tried to grab the boy, but he wriggled between their outstretched arms and scrambled up a tree in an instant.

‘Catch him! Catch him!’ his pursuers shouted. There was a rumble of shots.

Yaichi flew across to the next tree, and then the one after that. The branch he was holding broke off, smashed by a bullet, but he grabbed another one.

Meanwhile they had finished off Rakuda. Two Black Jackets were left lying on the ground. The others dragged the dead shinobi away and helped their commander to get up. He pushed their willing hands away angrily and pulled the hood off his head. A revolver glinted as he aimed the barrel at the boy skipping though the trees. The barrel described a short arc, spat out a gobbet of flame – and Yaichi came tumbling down like a stone.

Masa froze open-mouthed, astonished by the gunman’s accuracy and the gleam of his smoothly shaved head. He had seen this man before, only a few days earlier! The itinerant monk who had spent the night at the village hotel with Kamata’s ‘construction brigade’, that was who it was!

And everything was finally clear.

Don Tsurumaki was a prudent man. He hadn’t relied on the faithful but dull-witted Kamata. He had attached a spy to the brigade, a man who had watched everything and sniffed everything out without making himself known. He had seen the massacre on the mountain, noted where the entrance to the underground passage was, and the hoist … Neat work, no two ways about it!

The Monk (that was what Masa called the Black Jackets’ commander now) was obviously afraid that another dead ninja would come back to life. He pulled a short sword out of its scabbard and set to work. The blade rose thirteen times and fell thirteen times and a pyramid of severed heads rose up by the wall of the house. The Monk handled the sword deftly, he clearly had a lot of experience.

Before moving on to the concluding stage of the storm, the commander ordered his unit to form up in a line.

‘Our losses are small,’ said the Monk, walking along the line with a springy step. ‘The naked girl killed two, the dead man who came to life killed two more, one was hurt when he fell off the hoist. But the greatest danger lies ahead. We shall proceed strictly according to the plan drawn up by Mr Shirota. It’s a good plan, you’ve seen it. Mr Shirota assumes that the house of the werewolves’ leader is full of traps. And therefore – extreme caution. Not a single step without orders, is that clear?’ Suddenly he stopped, peering into the darkness. ‘Who’s that there? You, Ryuhei?’

Realising he had been spotted, Masa slowly stepped forward. What should he do? Walk over or take to his heels?

‘So you got up after all? Didn’t break any bones? Good man. Get back in line.’

Most of the Black Jackets had followed their commander’s example and taken off the hoods, but a few, Buddha be praised, had left their faces covered, and so no one suspected Masa; only the man next to him in the line squinted at him and nudged him in the side with his elbow – but he thought that must be a kind of greeting.

‘Twenty men cordon off the clearing,’ the Monk ordered. ‘Hold your carbines at the ready, stay awake. If one of the shinobi tries to break through, drop him on the spot. The others come with me, into the house. No crowding, in line, two by two.’

Masa didn’t want to join the cordon. He attached himself to the men who would go into the house, but he couldn’t get into the first row, only the third.

The plan of the storm had clearly been worked out in detail.

The long double column trotted to the clearing with the jonin’s wooden plank house standing on its edge. The twenty-man cordon took up position round the edge of the clearing and stuck torches into the ground.

The others stretched out into a long dark snake and moved forward.

‘Carbines on the ground!’ the commander ordered, keeping his eyes fixed on the house, which was maintaining a sinister silence. ‘Draw your daggers!’

He dropped back a little bit from the men in front and stopped, as if feeling uncertain.

He doesn’t want to stick his own neck out, Masa realised. And he’s right too. Rakuda (whose heroic death had probably raised him to the next level in the cycle of rebirth) had said that when there was danger, Tamba’s house became like a prickly hedgehog – there were some secret levers that had to be pressed for that. The inhabitants of the house had had plenty of time, so there would be lots of surprises in store for the Black Jackets. Masa remembered with a shudder how the floor had tilted under him that night and he had gone tumbling down into darkness.

The Monk was a cautious man, and there was no point in pushing forward too fast.

And then immediately, as if to confirm this idea, it started.

When one of the two men at the front was just a step away from the porch, he disappeared, as if the ground had opened and swallowed him up.

Or rather, there was no ‘as if’ about it – it did swallow him up. Masa had walked across that spot a hundred times, and he had no idea that there was a pit hidden under it.

There was a spine-chilling howl. The Black Jackets first shied away from the gaping hole, then swarmed round it. Masa stood on tiptoe and looked over someone’s shoulder. He saw a body pierced through by sharp stakes, still jerking about.

‘I only just stopped myself, right on the very edge!’ the survivor from the first row said in a trembling voice. ‘The amulet saved me. The goddess Kannon’s amulet!’

The others remained morosely silent.

‘Line up!’ the commander barked.

Skirting round the terrible pit, from which groans were still emerging, they started walking up on to the porch. The owner of the miraculous amulet held one hand out ahead of him, clutching a dagger, and pulled his head down into his shoulders. He passed the first step, the second, the third. Then he stepped timidly on to the terrace, and at that very instant a heavy section fell out of the thick beam framing the canopy. It smacked the man standing below across the the top of his head with a dull thud and he collapsed face down without even crying out. His hand opened and the amulet in its tiny brocade bag fell out.

The goddess Kannon is good for women and for peaceful occupations, thought Masa. For the affairs of men the god Fudo’s amulet is more appropriate.

‘Well, why have you stopped?’ shouted the Monk. ‘Forward!’

He ran fearlessly up on to the terrace, but stopped there and beckoned with his hand.

‘Come on, come on, don’t be such cowards.’

‘Who’s a coward?’ boomed a great husky fellow, pushing his way forward. Masa stepped aside to let the brave man past. ‘Right, now, let me through!’

He jerked the door open. Masa winced painfully, but nothing terrible happened.

‘Good man, Saburo,’ the commander said to the daredevil. ‘No need to take your shoes off, this isn’t a social call.’

The familiar corridor opened up in front of Masa: three doors on the right, three doors on the left, and one more at the end – with the little bridge into emptiness beyond it.

The hulking brute Saburo stamped his foot on the floor – again nothing happened. He stepped across the threshold, stopped and scratched the back of his head.

‘Where to first?’

‘Try the one on the right,’ ordered the Monk, also entering the corridor. The others followed, crowding together.

Before going in, Masa looked round. A long queue of Black Jackets was lined up on the porch, with their naked swords glittering in the crimson light of the torches. A snake with its head stuck into a tiger’s jaws, Fandorin’s servant thought with a shudder. Of course, he was for the tiger, heart and soul, but he himself was a scale on the body of the snake …

‘Go on!’ said the commander, nudging the valiant (or perhaps simply stupid) Saburo.

The hulk opened the first door on the right and stepped inside. Turning his head this way and that, he took one step, then another. When his foot touched the second tatami, something twanged in the wall. From the corridor Masa couldn’t see what had happened, but Saburo grunted in surprise, clutched at his chest and doubled over.

‘An arrow,’ he gasped in a hoarse voice, turning round.

And there it was, a rod of metal protruding from the centre of his chest.

The Monk aimed his revolver at the wall, but didn’t fire.

‘Mechanical,’ he murmured. ‘A spring under the floor …’

Saburo nodded, as if he was completely satisfied by this explanation, sobbed like a child and tumbled over on to his side.

Stepping over the dying man, the commander rapidly sounded out the walls with the handle of his gun, but didn’t find anything.

‘Move on!’ he shouted. ‘Hey, you! Yes, yes, you! Go!’

The soldier in a hood at whom the Monk was pointing hesitated only for a second before walking up to the next door. Muffled muttering could be heard from under the mask.

‘I entrust myself to the Buddha Amida, I entrust myself to the Buddha Amida …’ Masa heard – it was the invocation used by those who believed in the Way of the Pure Land.

It was a good prayer, just right for a sinful soul thirsting for forgiveness and salvation. But it was really astonishing that in the room which the follower of the Buddha Amida would have to enter there was a scroll hanging on the wall, with a maxim by the great Shinran:3 ‘Even a good man can be resurrected in the Pure Land, even more so a bad man’. What a remarkable coincidence! Perhaps the scroll would recognise one of its own and save him?

It didn’t.

The praying man crossed the room without incident. He read the maxim and bowed respectfully. But then the Monk told him:

‘Take down the scroll! Look to see if there’s some kind of lever hidden behind it!’

There was no lever behind the scroll, but as he fumbled at the wall with his hand, the unfortunate man scratched himself on an invisible nail. He cried out, licked his bleeding palm and a minute later he was writhing on the floor – the nail had been smeared with poison.

Behind the third door was the prayer room. Right, now – what treat would it have in store for visitors? Not staying too close to the Monk (so that he wouldn’t call on him), but not too far away either (otherwise he wouldn’t see anything), Masa craned his neck.

‘Well, who’s next?’ the commander called and, without waiting for volunteers, he grabbed by the scruff of the neck the first man he could reach and pushed him forward. ‘Boldly now!’

Trembling all over, the soldier opened the door. Seeing an altar with a lighted candle, he bowed. He didn’t dare go in wearing his shoes – that would have been blasphemy. He kicked off his straw jori, stepped forward – and started hopping about on one leg, clutching his other foot in both hands.

‘Spikes!’ the Monk gasped.

He burst into the room (he was wearing stout gaijin boots) and dragged the wounded man out into the corridor, but the man was already wheezing and rolling his eyes up into their lids. The commander sounded out the walls in the prayer room himself. He didn’t find any levers or secret springs.

Back out in the corridor he shouted:

‘There are only four more doors! One of them will lead us to Tamba! Perhaps it’s that one!’ He pointed to the door that closed off the end of the corridor. ‘Tsurumaki-dono promised a reward to the first man to enter the old wolf’s den! Who wants to earn the rank of sergeant and a thousand yen into the bargain?’

There was no one who wanted to. An invisible boundary seemed to run across the corridor: in the section farther on there was plenty of space – the commander was standing there all on his lonesome; but in the first section there was a whole crowd of about fifteen men crammed close together, and more were piling in from the porch.

‘Ah, you chicken-hearts! I’ll manage without you!’

The Monk pushed the door aside and held out his hand with the pistol in it. Seeing the blackness, he started back, but immediately took a grip on himself.

He laughed.

‘Look at what you were afraid of! Emptiness! Well, there are only three doors left! Does anyone want to try his luck? No? All right …’

He opened the farthest door on the left. But he didn’t hurry inside; first he squatted down and waved his hand for them to bring him a lamp. He examined the floor. He struck the tatami with his fist and only then stepped on to it. Then he took another step in the same way.

‘A stick!’

Someone handed him a bamboo pole.

The Monk prodded at the ceiling and the wall. When a board in the corner gave out a hollow sound, he immediately opened fire – one, two, three shots roared out.

Three holes appeared in the light yellow surface. At first it seemed to Masa that the commander was being too cautious, but suddenly there was a creak, the wall swayed open and a man in the black costume of a ninja fell out face first.

There was a dark hollow in the wall – a secret cupboard.

Without wasting a second, the Monk switched the revolver to his left hand, pulled out his sword and hacked at the fallen man’s neck. He pulled off the mask and picked up the head by its pigtail.

Gohei’s pockmarked face glared at his killer with furious bulging eyes. Tossing the trophy into the corridor, right at Masa’s feet, the commander wiped a trickle of blood off his elbow and glanced cautiously into the cavity.

‘Aha, there’s something here!’ he announced eagerly.

He gestured impatiently to call over one of the soldiers who had just removed his hood.

‘Shinjo, come here! Take a look at what’s in there. Climb up!’

He folded his hands into a stirrup. Shinjo stepped on them with one foot and the upper half of his torso disappeared from view.

They heard a muffled howl: ‘A-a-a-a!’

The Monk quickly jumped aside and Shinjo came tumbling down like a sack. A steel star with sharpened edges was lodged in the bridge of his nose.

‘Excellent!’ said the commander. ‘They’re in the attic! You, you and you, come here! Guard the entrance. Don’t stick your noses in the hole any more, or else they’ll throw another shuriken. The important thing is not to let any shinobi get out this way. The rest of you, follow me! There has to be a way into the basement somewhere here as well.’

Masa knew how to get into the basement. The next room, the second on the right, had a cunning floor – you ended up in the basement before you could even sneeze. Now the man with the shaved head would finally get what he deserved.

But the Monk didn’t blunder here either. He didn’t barge straight in, like Masa, but squatted down again and examined the wooden boards for a long time. He prodded them with his pole, suddenly realised something and gave a grunt of satisfaction. Then he pressed down hard with his fist – and the floor swayed.

‘And there’s the basement!’ The commander chuckled. ‘Three of you stand at the door, and keep your eyes on this!’

The Black Jackets swarmed thickly round the last door. They slid it open and gazed expectantly at their cunning commander.

‘Ri-ight,’ he drawled, running a keen gaze across the bare walls. ‘What do we have here? Aha. I don’t like the look of that projection over there in the corner. What’s it needed for? It’s suspicious. Come on, then.’ Without looking, the Monk reached his hand backwards and grabbed Masa by the sleeve. ‘Go and sound it out.’

Oh, he really didn’t want to go and sound out that suspicious projection! But how could he disobey? And the Monk was egging him on too!

‘What are you hanging about for? Get a move on! Who are you? Ryuhei? Take that hood off, you don’t need it here, it just stops you looking at things properly.’

I’m done for anyway, thought Masa, and pulled off the hood – he was standing with his back to the Black Jackets and their commander.

He prayed silently: Tamba-sensei, if you’re looking through some cunning little crack right now, don’t think I’m a traitor. I came to save my master. Just in case, he winked at the suspicious wall, as if to say: It’s me, I’m one of you.

‘That’s not Ryuhei,’ he heard someone say behind him. ‘Ryuhei doesn’t have a haircut like that, does he?’

‘Hey, who are you? Right, turn round!’ the Monk ordered.

Masa took two rapid steps forward. He couldn’t take a third – the tatami closest to the suspicious projection was false: just straw, with nothing underneath it. With a howl of despair, Masa tumbled through the floor.

A strip of metal glinted right in front of him, but no blow followed.

‘Masa!’ a familiar voice whispered. Then some Russian words: ‘Ya chut ne ubil tebya!’

The master! Alive! Pale, with his forehead contracted into a frown. A dagger in one hand and a little revolver in the other.

Midori-san was beside him – in black battle costume, only without a mask.

‘We can’t stay here any longer. Let’s leave!’ the mistress said, then adding something in the gaijin language, and all three of them dashed away from the rectangular hole with gentle yellow light pouring down through it.

In the very corner of the basement there was a black shape that looked like some kind of chute, and Masa made out two jute ropes in it – that must have been the projection that had seemed suspicious to the Monk.

The master took hold of one of the ropes and went flying upwards as if by magic.

‘Now you!’ Midori-san told him.

Masa grabbed the rough jute and it pulled him up towards the ceiling. It was absolutely dark and a little cramped, but the ascent was over in just half a minute.

First Masa saw a wooden floor, then the rope pulled him through a hatch up to his waist and after that he scrambled out by himself.

He looked round and realised he had ended up in the attic. He saw the sloping pitches of the roof on both sides of him, with pale light seeping in through the wooden grilles of the windows.

After blinking so that he could see better in the semi-darkness, Masa made out three figures: one tall (that was the master), one short (Tamba) and one middle-sized (the red-faced ninja Tanshin, who was like the sensei’s senior deputy). Midori soared up out of the hatch and the wooden lid slammed shut.

Apparently all the surviving inhabitants of the village of Kakusimura were gathered here.

The first thing to do was look to see what was happening outside. Masa moved over to the window with glimmers of scarlet light dancing in it and pressed his face to it.

A fiery border of torches ran round the house in a half-circle, from cliff-edge to cliff-edge. Loitering between the tongues of flame were dark silhouettes with guns held at the ready. There was no point in sticking their noses out that way, that was clear.

Masa ran across to the other window, but that way was really bad – there was just the black yawning abyss.

So where did that leave them? A precipice on one side and guns on the other. The sky up above and down below … In the far corner of the attic there was a yellow square of light in the floor – the hatch discovered by the Monk in the third room on the left. There were Black Jackets in there with naked daggers. So they couldn’t go down there either.

But what about all the way down, into the basement?

Masa ran over to the lifting device and opened the hatch slightly – the one he had clambered out of only a couple of minutes earlier.

Down below he could hear the tramping of feet and a buzz of voices – the enemy was already getting up to his tricks in the basement.

That meant they would soon reach the attic too.

It was all over. It was impossible to save the master.

Well then, it was a vassal’s duty to die with him. But first to render his master a final service: help him leave this life with dignity. In a hopeless situation, when a man was surrounded on all sides by enemies, the only thing left was to deprive the enemies of the pleasure of seeing your death agony. Let them have nothing but the indifferent corpse, and your dead face gazing at them with superior contempt.

What method could he suggest to his master? If he was Japanese, it would be quite clear. He had a dagger, and there was more than enough time for a decent seppuku. Tanshin had a short, straight sword hanging at his side, so the master would not be left writhing in agony. As soon as he touched his stomach with the dagger, faithful Masa would cut his head off.

But gaijins didn’t commit seppuku. They liked to die from gunpowder.

So that would be it.

Wasting no time, Masa went over to the jonin, who was whispering about something with his daughter, while at the same time doing something quite incomprehensible: inserting sticks of bamboo one into the other.

After apologising politely for interrupting the family conversation, Masa said:

‘Sensei, it is time for my master to leave this life. I wish to help him. I have been told that for some reason the Christian religion forbids suicide. Please translate for my master that I would consider it an honour to shoot him in the heart or the side of the head, whichever he desires.’

Then the master himself came across to him. He waved his revolver and said something. The master’s face was sombre and resolute. He must have had the same idea.

‘Explain to him that he shouldn’t open fire,’ Tamba told his daughter, speaking rapidly in Japanese. ‘He has only seven cartridges. Even if he doesn’t miss once and shoots seven Black Jackets, it won’t change anything. They’ll take fright, stop the search and fire the house. They haven’t done that so far because they want to present the Don with my body and they’re hoping to find some secret caches. But if they’re badly scared, they’ll set the house on fire. Tell him I asked you to translate because my English is too slow. Take him to one side, distract him. I need another minute. Then act according to our agreement.’

What agreement was that? What did Tamba need a minute for?

While Midori-san was translating what Tamba had said to the master, Masa kept his eyes fixed on the jonin, who finished fiddling with the bamboo sticks and starting shoving them into a narrow kind of case with a large piece of black cloth attached to it.

What weird sort of device was this?

A flag, it’s a flag, Masa guessed, and suddenly everything was clear.

The leader of the shinobi wanted to leave this life in beautiful style, with the flag of his clan unfurled. That was why he was spinning things out.

‘Is that the Momochi banner?’ Masa whispered to Tanshin, who was standing close by.

Tanshin shook his head.

‘Then what is it?’

The rude shinobi left the question unanswered.

Tamba picked up the cloth with the bamboo sticks inserted in it, threw it across his shoulders and belted it on, and it became clear that it wasn’t a flag at all, but something like a wide cloak.

Then the jonin held out his hand without speaking and Tanshin put the naked sword in it.

‘Farewell,’ said the jonin.

The shinobi answered with a word that Masa had heard once before that night.

‘Kongojyo.’ And he bowed solemnly.

Then Tamba walked out into the middle of the attic, pulled a string on his neckband, and the strange cloak folded up, fitting close around his body.

‘What does the sensei intend to do?’ Masa asked Tanshin.

‘Look down there,’ Tanshin muttered gruffly, then went down on all fours and pressed his face to the floor.

So Masa had to do the same.

The floor turned out to have observation slits in it, through which it was possible to observe the corridor and all the rooms.

There were Black Jackets scurrying about everywhere, and the Monk’s head was gleaming in the centre of the corridor.

‘Haven’t you found anything?’ he roared, leaning down towards a hole in the floor. ‘Sound out every siaku!4 There must be hiding places!’

Lifting his head up from the slit, Masa glanced at Tamba – and just in time.

The jonin pressed some kind of lever with his foot and yet another hatch opened, located above the corridor. The old man jumped down, as straight as a spear.

Masa stuck his nose against the floor again, in order not to miss anything.

Ah, what a sight it was!

The jonin landed between the Monk and two Black Jackets. They just gaped open-mouthed, but the tricky man with the shaved head jerked to one side and pulled his revolver out of his belt. Ah, but what could he do against Tamba! A short, easy stroke of the sword and the glittering head went tumbling across the floor, and blood spurted out of the severed neck. Without turning round, the old shinobi flung his left hand out backwards and gently touched the nose of one of the soldiers: the soldier fell woodenly, without bending, and crashed to the floor. The second man squatted down and covered his head with his hands, and Tamba didn’t touch him.

He leaned forward slightly and then ran, slowly at first, but picking up speed all the time, towards the wide-open door with the precipice beyond it. A whole crowd of pursuers dashed after him, shouting and yelling.

Masa was in ecstasy. What a fine idea! To take a final stand on the little bridge above that abyss. First, no one would attack from behind and, secondly, it was so beautiful! And then these Black Jackets didn’t have any guns, they had been left outside. Oh, old Tamba would really pulverise them right at the end!

He heard a rustling sound beside him. It was Tanshin jumping to his feet and dashing to the window. He wants to see his master’s final battle, Masa realised, and dashed after him as fast as he could.

The little bridge was clearly visible through the wooden grille. The moon peeped out, and the wooden planking turned silver against the black precipice.

There was the jonin, running out on to the little bridge at a furious pace, the sides of his cloak jutting out like the wings of a bat. Still running, Tamba pushed off hard with his foot and jumped into the precipice.

But what about the final battle? Masa almost cried out.

He could have killed a dozen or two enemies and then dropped over the edge of the abyss like a stone.

But Tamba didn’t fall like a stone!

The Black Jackets crowding on the little bridge howled in horror, and fine drops of cold sweat stood out on Masa’s forehead too. And for good reason …

The leader of the Momochi clan had turned into a bird!

The huge black hawk soared above the valley, cutting through the moonlight and slowly descending.

Masa was brought round by a slap on his shoulder.

‘Now we have to act quickly,’ said Tanshin. ‘Before they can recover their wits.’

Midori-san and the master were already clambering through a hatch on to the roof. He had to catch up with them.

Tiles grated under his feet and a fresh wind blew into his face. Masa turned towards the precipice for another glimpse of the magical bird, but it wasn’t there any more – it had flown away.

They crawled the last few steps on their stomachs so that the Black Jackets in the cordon wouldn’t see them.

They needn’t have been so cautious – the torches were burning in the clearing, but the sentries had disappeared.

‘Where are they?’ Masa asked in a whisper.

He guessed the answer himself: they had all gone dashing into the house. But of course! The commander had been killed, the head ninja had turned into a hawk. If he hadn’t seen it with his own eyes, he would never have believed it.

There was no cordon, but what good was that to them? If they jumped down, they’d break their legs, it was four ken5 here. But Midori-san waved her hand just before the ridge of the roof and a gentle ringing sound filled the emptiness. A thin, transparent cable was stretched from the house out into the darkness. Midori-san took off her belt and threw it over the cable, tied a knot and showed the master how to put his elbows through it. But she herself managed without a strap – she just took hold with her hands, pushed off and soared over the clearing in a single sweep. The master didn’t waste any time either: he took a firm hold of the belt and flew off, setting the air rustling.

It was Masa’s turn. Tanshin prepared the strap for him in a second and pushed him in the back.

Rushing through space above the brightly lit clearing and the blazing flames was scary but enjoyable. Masa barely managed to stop himself whooping in delight.

The flight could have ended better, though. The trunk of a pine tree came flying towards him out of the darkness and if the master hadn’t grabbed his servant by the arms, Masa would have been flattened. As it was, he hit his forehead hard enough to set sparks flying.

There was a small wooden platform attached to the tree, and he had to climb down from it by feeling for branches with his foot.

As soon as he jumped down on to the ground, Masa saw that Tanshin had stayed on the roof – from here, on the other side of the clearing, his black silhouette was clearly visible.

There was a glint of steel, and something rustled in the air. Midori-san picked up the transparent rope and pulled it towards herself.

‘Why did he cut the cable?’ Masa exclaimed.

‘They’ll climb up on the roof, see the cable and guess everything,’ the mistress replied briefly. ‘And Tanshin will jump down.’

As soon as she said it, men climbed out on to the roof from below, a lot of men. They saw the shinobi poised on the very edge, started clamouring and ran towards him.

But Tanshin huddled down, jumped up, turned over in the air, and a moment later he was down below. He rolled across the ground like a ball and jumped to his feet.

But they were already running towards him out of the house.

‘Quickly! Quickly!’ Masa whispered, squeezing his fists tight.

The ninja reached the middle of the clearing in a few bounds, but he didn’t run into the forest – he stopped.

He doesn’t want to lead his pursuers to us, Masa guessed.

Tanshin pulled a torch out of the ground, then another, and rushed at his enemies. The Black Jackets first recoiled from the two furiously swirling tongues of flame, but then immediately closed back round the shinobi.

Someone’s clothing burst into flames and someone else ran off howling, trying to beat the flames off their burning hair. The fire swirled about above the crowd, stinging, scattering sparks.

They had to get away from there as quickly as possible, but Masa was still watching the beautiful way Tanshin was dying. A fiery death framed in glittering sword blades – could anything possibly be more beautiful?

The master pulled Midori-san into the thicket and pointed in the direction of the crevice – he must be pointing towards the hoist.

Masa had to explain to the bird-man’s daughter that they couldn’t get away through the underground passage. The Monk must have left sentries at the bottom of the crevice: they wouldn’t let anyone get down – they’d shoot them.

‘Better to sit it out here, in the forest,’ Masa concluded.

But Midori-san didn’t agree with him.

‘No. The Black Jackets have let my father get away, and now they have to find your master at any cost. They won’t dare report to the Don without his head. When they finish searching the house, they’ll start combing the forest again.’

‘What can we do?’

The mistress was going to answer, but then the master butted into this important conversation at just the wrong moment.

He pulled Masa aside and said in his broken Japanese:

‘Lead away, Midori-san. You. Trust. I here.’

Oh no! Masa didn’t even listen. He objected gruffly:

‘How can I lead her away? I’m not Tamba, I can’t fly through the sky.’

He flapped his arms like wings to demonstrate but the master, of course, didn’t understand. How could Masa possibly explain anything to him when he had no language?

The Black Jackets flocked round Tanshin’s body, arguing about something in loud voices. Many of them had been killed, including the commander, but there were even more left. Thirty men? Forty?

Masa had always been good at mental arithmetic, and he started counting.

The master had seven bullets in his little revolver. Masa could kill three. Or four – if he was lucky. Midori-san was a ninja – she’d probably polish off ten.

How many did that make?

Midori-san prevented him from finishing his calculation.

‘Wait here,’ she said. ‘My father will come back for you.’

‘Are you really going away, mistress?’

She didn’t answer and turned to the master.

He also asked something in a tense, halting voice.

She didn’t answer him either. At least, not in words.

She stroked his cheek, then his neck. A fine time she’d chosen for lovey-doving! A woman was always a woman after all, even if she was a ninja.

Midori-san’s hand slipped round to the back of the master’s head, the white fingers suddenly closed firmly together – and his round gaijin eyes turned even rounder in amazement. The master sat down on the ground, slumping back against a tree trunk.

She had killed him. The accursed witch had killed him.

With a fierce growl, Masa aimed the fatal kubiori blow at the traitor: it should have ripped her scurvy throat out, but a strong hand seized his wrist.

‘He’s alive,’ the shinobi woman said quickly. ‘He simply can’t move.’

‘But why?’ hissed Masa, wincing in pain. What a grip!

‘He wouldn’t have let me do what must be done.’

‘And what is that?’

She let go of him, realising that he would hear her out.

‘Go into the house. Go down into the basement. There’s a barrel of gunpowder there in a secret place. The charge is calculated to make the house collapse inwards, crushing everyone in it.’

Masa thought for a moment.

‘But how will you get into the house?’

‘His strength will return in an hour,’ Midori-san said instead of answering. ‘Stay with him.’

Then she leaned down to the master and whispered something in his ear in gaijin language.

And that was all – she went out into the clearing and walked towards the house with a light stride.

They didn’t notice her straight away, but when they spotted the figure in the black, close-fitting ninja costume, they were startled.

Midori-san raised her empty hands and shouted.

‘Mr Tsurumaki knows me! I am Tamba’s daughter! I will show you his secret hiding place!’

The Black Jackets swarmed round her and started searching her. Then the entire crowd moved towards the porch and went into the house. Not a single soul was left outside.

The distance was only about thirty paces, Masa suddenly realised. If there was an explosion, wreckage would come showering down. He had to drag the master farther away.

He put his arms round the motionless body and dragged it across the ground.

But he hadn’t carried him very far, only a few steps, when the earth shook and his ears were deafened.

Masa turned round.

Momochi Tamba’s house collapsed neatly, as if it had gone down on its knees. First the walls caved in, then the roof swayed and came crashing down and broke in half, sending dust flying in all directions. It was suddenly completely light all around and a blast of hot air hit him in the face.

The servant leaned over to protect the body of his master and saw tears flowing out of the wide-open eyes.

The woman had deceived him. The master did not come round in an hour, or even in two.

Masa went to look at the heap of rubble several times. He dug up an arm in a black sleeve, a leg in a black trouser leg, and also a close-cropped head without a lower jaw. He didn’t find a single person alive.

He came back several times and shook the master to make him wake up. The master wasn’t actually unconscious, but he just lay there without moving, looking at the sky. At first the tears kept running down his face, then they stopped.

And not long before dawn Tamba appeared – he simply came through the forest from the direction of the crevice, as if everything was perfectly normal.

He said he had been on the other side and killed the sentries. There were only six of them.

‘But why didn’t you fly here through the sky, sensei?’ Masa asked.

‘I’m not a bird, to go flying through the sky. I flew down off the cliff on wings made of cloth, a man can learn to do that,’ the cunning old man explained, but, of course, Masa didn’t believe him.

‘What happened here?’ asked the sensei, looking at the master lying on the ground and the ruins of the house. ‘Where’s my daughter?’

Masa told him what had happened and where his daughter was.

The jonin knitted his grey eyebrows together but, of course, he didn’t cry – he was a ninja.

He said nothing for a long time, then he said:

‘I’ll get her out myself.’

Masa also said nothing for a while – for as long as was required by consideration for a father’s feelings – and then he expressed concern about his master’s strange condition. He enquired cautiously whether Midori-san could possibly have tried too hard and whether the master would now be paralysed for ever.

‘He can move,’ Tamba replied after taking another look at the man on the ground. ‘He just doesn’t want to. Let him stay like that for a while. Don’t touch him. I’ll go and rake through the rubble. And you cut some firewood and build a funeral pyre. A big one.’

I could sit watching,

Watch it till the break of dawn –

The flame of the fire

1 Hidden village (Japanese)

2 In Japanese neko-chan means ‘little cat’

3 Shinran (1173–1263), the founder of the Jodo sect of the school of the Way of the Pure Land

4 A unit of area (0.033 m3)

5 A unit of length (1.81m)