Shogun - Clavell James. Страница 46

One of the samurai was on his hands and knees and he followed Blackthorne's outstretched finger but saw nothing.

"There! Isn't that a ledge?"

With his hands he formed the ledge and with two fingers made a man and stood the man on the ledge and, with another finger, made a long bundle over the shoulder of the man, so now a man stood on a ledge-that ledge-with another over his shoulder.

"Quick! Isogi! Make him understand-Kasigi Yabu-sama! Wakarimasu ka?"

The man scrambled up and talked rapidly to the others and they looked too. Now they all saw the ledge. And they began to shout. Still no movement from Yabu. He seemed like a stone. They went on and Blackthorne added his shouts but it was as if they made no sound at all.

One of them spoke to the others briefly and they all nodded and bowed. He bowed back. Then, with a sudden screaming shout of "Bansaiiiiiii!" he cast himself off the cliff and fell to his death. Yabu came violently out of his trance, whirled around and scrambled up.

The other samurai shouted and pointed but Blackthorne heard nothing and saw nothing but the broken corpse that lay below, already being taken by the sea. What kind of men are these? he thought helplessly. Was that courage or just insanity? That man deliberately committed suicide on the off-chance he'd attract the attention of another man who had given up. It doesn't make sense! They don't make sense.

He saw Yabu stagger up. He expected him to scramble for safety, leaving Rodrigues. That's what I would have done. Is it? I don't know. But Yabu half crawled, half slid, dragging the unconscious man with him through the surf-disturbed shallows to the bottom of the cliff. He found the ledge. It was barely a foot wide. Painfully he shoved Rodrigues onto it, almost losing him once, then hauled himself up.

The rope was twenty feet short. Quickly the samurai added their loincloths. Now, if Yabu stood, he could just reach the end.

They shouted encouragement and began to wait.

In spite of Blackthorne's hatred he had to admire Yabu's courage.

Half a dozen times waves almost engulfed him. Twice Rodrigues was lost but each time Yabu dragged him back, and held his head out of the grasping sea, long after Blackthorne knew that he himself would have given up. Where do you get the courage, Yabu? Are you just devil-born? All of you?

To climb down in the first place had taken courage. At first Blackthorne had thought that Yabu had acted out of bravado. But soon he had seen that the man was pitting his skill against the cliff and almost winning. Then he had broken his fall as deftly as any tumbler. And he had given up with dignity.

Christ Jesus, I admire that bastard, and detest him.

For almost an hour Yabu set himself against the sea and against his failing body, and then, in the dusk, Takatashi came back with the ropes. They made a cradle and shinned down the cliff with a skill that Blackthorne had never seen ashore.

Quickly Rodrigues was brought aloft. Blackthorne would have tried to succor him but a Japanese with close-cropped hair was already on his knees beside him. He watched as this man, obviously a doctor, examined the broken leg. Then a samurai held Rodrigues' shoulders as the doctor leaned his weight on the foot and the bone slid back under the flesh. His fingers probed and shoved and reset it and tied it to the splint. He began to wrap noxious-looking herbs around the angry wound and then Yabu was brought up.

The daimyo shook off any help, waved the doctor back to Rodrigues, sat down and began to wait.

Blackthorne looked at him. Yabu felt his eyes. The two men stared at each other.

"Thank you," Blackthorne said finally, pointing at Rodrigues. "Thank you for saving his life. Thank you, Yabu-san." Deliberately he bowed. That's for your courage, you black-eyed son of a shitfestered whore.

Yabu bowed back as stiffly. But inside, he smiled.

Their journey from the bay to Osaka was uneventful. Rodrigues' rutters were explicit and very accurate. During the first night Rodrigues regained consciousness. In the beginning he thought he was dead but the pain soon reminded him differently.

"They've set your leg and dressed it," Blackthorne said. "And your shoulder's strapped up. It was dislocated. They wouldn't bleed you, much as I tried to make them."

"When I get to Osaka the Jesuits can do that." Rodrigues' tormented eyes bored into him. "How did I get here, Ingeles? I remember going overboard but nothing else."

Blackthorne told him.

"So now I owe you a life. God curse you."

"From the quarterdeck it looked as though we could make the bay. From the bow, your angle of sight would be a few degrees different. The wave was bad luck."

"That doesn't worry me, Ingeles. You had the quarterdeck, you had the helm. We both knew it. No, I curse you to hell because I owe you a life now - Madonna, my leg!" Tears welled because of the pain and Blackthorne gave him a mug of grog and watched him during the night, the storm abating. The Japanese doctor came several times and forced Rodrigues to drink hot medicine and put hot towels on his forehead and opened the portholes. And every time the doctor went away Blackthorne closed the portholes, for everyone knew that disease was airborne, that the tighter closed the cabin the safer and more healthy, when a man was as bad as Rodrigues.

At length the doctor shouted at him and posted a samurai on the portholes so they remained open.

At dawn Blackthorne went on deck. Hiro-matsu and Yabu were both there. He bowed like a courtier. "Konnichi wa. Osaka?"

They bowed in return. "Osaka. Hai, Anjin-san," Hiro-matsu said.

"Hai! Isogi, Hiro-matsu-sama. Captain-san! Weigh anchor!"

"Hai, Anjin-san!"

He smiled involuntarily at Yabu. Yabu smiled back, then limped away and Blackthorne thought, that's one hell of a man, although he's a devil and a murderer. Aren't you a murderer, too? Yes - but not that way, he told himself.

Blackthorne conned the ship to Osaka with ease. The journey took that day and the night and just after dawn the next day they were near the Osaka roads. A Japanese pilot came aboard to take the ship to her wharf so, relieved of his responsibility, he gladly went below to sleep.

Later the captain shook him awake, bowed, and pantomimed that Blackthorne should be ready to go with Hiro-matsu as soon as they docked.

"Wakarimasu ka, Anjin-san?"

"Hai."

The seaman went away. Blackthorne stretched his back, aching, then saw Rodrigues watching him.

"How do you feel?"

"Good, Ingeles. Considering my leg's on fire, my head's bursting, I want to piss, and my tongue tastes like a barrel of pig shit looks."

Blackthorne gave him the chamber pot, then emptied it out the porthole. He refilled the tankard with grog.

"You make a foul nurse, Ingeles. It's your black heart. " Rodrigues laughed and it was good to hear him laugh again. His eyes went to the rutter that was open on the desk, and to his sea chest. He saw that it had been unlocked. "Did I give you the key?"

"No. I searched you. I had to have the true rutter. I told you when you woke the first night."

"That's fair. I don't remember, but that's fair. Listen, Ingeles, ask any Jesuit where Vasco Rodrigues is in Osaka and they'll guide you to me. Come to see me - then you can make a copy of my rutter, if you wish."

"Thanks. I've already taken one. At least, I copied what I could, and I've read the rest very carefully."

"Thy mother!" Rodrigues said in Spanish.

"And thine."

Rodrigues turned to Portuguese again. "Speaking Spanish makes me want to retch, even though you can swear better in it than any language. There's a package in my sea chest. Give it to me, please."

"The one with the Jesuit seals?"