Shogun - Clavell James (бесплатные полные книги .TXT) 📗

He could see the length of the sun's shadows and the color of the light. It's a little after dawn, he thought, and blessed God again that his sight was undamaged.

He saw the doctor's lips move but no sound came through the ringing turbulence. Carefully he felt his face and mouth and jaws. No pain there and no wounds. Next his throat and arms and chest. No wounds yet. Now he willed his hands lower, over his loins, to his manhood. But he was not mutilated there as Alban Caradoc had been, and he blessed God that he had not been harmed there and left alive to know, as poor Alban Caradoc had known.

He rested a moment, his head aching abominably. Then he felt his legs and feet. Everything seemed all right. Cautiously he put his hands over his ears and pressed, then half opened his mouth and swallowed and half yawned to try to clear his ears. But this only increased the pain.

You will wait a day and half a day, he ordered himself, and ten times that time if need be and, until then, you will not be afraid.

The doctor touched him, his lips moving.

"Can't hear, so sorry," Blackthorne said calmly, hearing his words only in his head.

The doctor nodded and spoke again. Now Blackthorne read on the man's lips, I understand. Please sleep now.

But Blackthorne knew that he would not sleep. He had to plan. He had to get up and leave Osaka and go to Nagasaki - to get gunners and seamen to take the Black Ship. There was nothing more to think about, nothing more to remember. There was no more reason to play at being samurai or Japanese. Now he was released, all debts and friendships were canceled. Because she was gone.

Again he lifted his head and again the blinding pain. He dominated it and sat up. The room spun and he vaguely remembered that in his dreams he had been back at Anjiro in the earthquake when the earth had twisted and he leaped into it to save Toranaga and her from being swallowed by the earth. He could still feel the cold, clammy wetness and smell the death stench coming from the fissure, Toranaga huge and monstrous and laughing in his dream.

He forced his eyes to see. The room stopped spinning and the nausea passed. "Cha, dozo," he said, the taste of gunpowder back again. Hands helped him to drink and then he held out his arms and they helped him to stand. Without them he would have fallen. His body was one great hurt, but now he was sure that nothing was broken inside or out, except his ears, and that rest and massage and time would cure him. He thanked God again that he was not blinded or mutilated and left alive. The Grays helped him to sit again and he lay back a moment. He did not notice that the sun moved a quadrant from the time he lay back to the time he opened his eyes.

Curious, he thought, measuring the sun's shadow, not realizing he had slept. I could have sworn it was near dawn. My eyes are playing me tricks. It's nearer the end of the forenoon watch now. That reminded him of Alban Caradoc and his hands moved over himself once more to make sure he had not dreamed that he was unhurt.

Someone touched him and he looked up. Yabu was peering down at him and speaking.

"So sorry," Blackthorne said slowly. "Can't hear yet, Yabu-san. Soon all right. Ears hurt, do you understand?"

He saw Yabu nod and frown. Yabu and the doctor talked together and then, with signs, Yabu made Blackthorne understand that he would return soon and to rest until he did. He left.

"Bath, please, and massage," Blackthorne said.

Hands lifted him and took him there. He slept under the soothing fingers, his body wallowing in the ecstasy of warmth and tenderness and the sweet-smelling oils that were rubbed into his flesh. And all the while his mind planned.

While he slept Grays came and lifted the litter bed and carried it to the inner quarters of the donjon, but he did not awaken, drugged with fatigue and by the healing, sleep-filled potion.

"He'll be safe now, Lady," Ishido said.

"From Kiyama?" Ochiba asked.

"From all Christians." Ishido motioned to the guards to be very alert and led the way out of the room to the hallway, thence to a garden basking in the sun.

"Is that why the Lady Achiko was killed? Because she was Christian?"

Ishido had ordered it in case she was an assassin planted by her grandfather Kiyama to kill Blackthorne. "I've no idea," he said.

"They hang together like bees in a swarm. How can anyone believe their religious nonsense?"

"I don't know. But they'll all be stamped out soon enough."

"How, Lord General? How do you do that when so much depends on their goodwill?"

"Promises - until Toranaga's dead. Then they'll fall on each other. We divide and rule. Isn't that what Toranaga does, what the Lord Taiko did? Kiyama wants the Kwanto, neh? For the Kwanto he'll obey. So he's promised it, in a future time. Onoshi? Who knows what that madman wants . . . except to spit on Toranaga's head and Kiyama's before he dies."

"And what if Kiyama finds out about your promise to Onoshi - that all Kiyama lands are his - or that you mean to keep your promise to Zataki and not to him?"

"Lies, Lady, spread by enemies." Ishido looked at her. "Onoshi wants Kiyama's head. Kiyama wants the Kwanto. So does Zataki."

"And you, Lord General? What is it you want?"

"First the Heir safely fifteen, then safely ruler of the realm. And you and him safe and protected until that time. Nothing more."

"Nothing?"

"No, Lady."

Liar, Ochiba thought. She broke off a fragrant flower and smelled the perfume, and, pleased by it, offered it to him. "Lovely, neh?"

"Yes, lovely," Ishido said, taking it. "Thank you."

"Yodoko-sama's funeral was beautiful. You're to be congratulated, Lord General."

"I'm sorry she's dead," Ishido said politely. "Her counsel was always valuable."

They strolled a while. "Have they left yet? Kiritsubo-san and the Lady Sazuko and her son?" Ochiba asked.

"No. They'll leave tomorrow. After Lady Toda's funeral. Many will leave tomorrow, which is bad."

"So sorry, but does it matter? Now that we all agree Toranaga-sama's not coming here?"

"I think so. But it's not important, not while we hold Osaka Castle. No, Lady, we have to be patient as Kiyama suggested. We wait until the day. Then we march."

"Why wait? Can't you march now?"

"It will take time to gather our hosts."

"How many will oppose Toranaga?"

"Three hundred thousand men. At least three times Toranaga's number."

"And my garrison?"

"I'll leave eighty thousand elite within the walls, another fifty at the passes."

"And Zataki?"

"He'll betray Toranaga. In the end he'll betray him."

"You don't find it curious that Lord Sudara, my sister, and all her children are visiting Takato?"

"No. Of course Zataki's pretended to make some secret arrangement with his half brother. But it's only a trick, nothing more. He will betray him."

"He should - he has the same rotten bloodline," she said with distaste. "But I would be most upset if anything happened to my sister and her children."

"Nothing will, Lady. I'm sure."

"If Zataki was prepared to assassinate his own mother . . . neh? You're certain he won't betray you?"

"No. Not in the end. Because he hates Toranaga more than he does me, Lady, and he honors you and desires the Kwanto above all else." Ishido smiled at the floors soaring above them. "As long as the castle's ours and the Kwanto exists to give away, there's nothing to fear."

"This morning I was afraid," she said, holding a flower to her nose, enjoying the perfume, wanting it to erase the aftertaste of fear that still lingered. "I wanted to rush away but then I remembered the soothsayer."

"Eh? Oh, him. I'd forgotten about him," Ishido said with grim amusement. This was the soothsayer, the Chinese envoy, who had foretold that the Taiko would die in his bed leaving a healthy son after him, that Toranaga would die by the sword in middle age, that Ishido would die in old age, the most famous general in the realm, his feet firm in the earth. And that the Lady Ochiba would end her days at Osaka Castle, surrounded by the greatest nobles in the Empire.