"Van Lustbader, Eric - Linnear 02 - The Miko" - читать интересную книгу автора (Van Lustbader Eric)

FOR VICTORIA
with love... in all lands of weather
FOR MY FATHER
with love to the human encyclopedia

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
No character in The Miko bears the slightest resemblance to any actual person, living or dead, save those mentioned as obvious historical figures. Though MITI is real, and though its power and role in the development of the postwar Japanese economy have been accurately portrayed here, certain specific events at the time of its formation as well as the ministers depicted are purely a product of the author's imagination.
Thanks are due to the following people: Roni Neuer and Herb Libertson, the Ronin Gallery; Richard Bush, the Asia Society, Washington, D.C., for unlocking the riddle of the Wu-Shing;
Charlotte Brenneis, assistant to the president, Asia Society, New York City;
Nancy Lerner;
All at the Grill & Bar, Kapalua, for helping to make work so pleasurable;
HM, for editorial assistance; VSL, for editorial assistance and spiritual sustenance; and, especially, Tomomi Seki, the Ronin Gallery, for translations, assistance in all things Japanese time and again, not only for the The Miko but for The Ninja as well.
Domo arigato, Seki-san.


Tsugi-no ma-no tomoshi mo kiete yo-samu kana
The next room's light
that too goes out, and nowЧ the chill of night
Shiki (1867-1902)
MRS. DARLING: George, we must keep Nona.
I will tell you why. My dear, when I came into this room to-night I saw a face at the window.
]. M. Barrie, Peter Pan
NARA PREFECTURE, JAPAN SPRING, PRESENT
Masashigi Kusunoki, the sensei of this dojo, was making tea. He knelt on the reed tatami; his kimono, light gray on dark gray, swirled around him as if he were the eye of a great dark whirlpool.
He poured steaming hot water into an earthen cup and, as he took up the reed whisk to make the pale green froth, the form of Tsutsumu shadowed the open doorway. Beyond his bent body, the polished wooden floor on the dojo stretched away, gleaming and perfect.
Kusunoki had his back to the doorway. He faced the edge of the shoji screen and the large window through which could be seen the cherry trees in full blossom, clouds come to walk the earth, marching up the densely wooded slopes of Yoshino, their oblique branches as green as the hills beyond, covered with ancient moss. The scent of cedar was very strong now, as it almost always was in this section of Nara prefecture, save during those few weeks of winter when the snow lay heavy through the ridges and rises of the terrain.
Kusunoki never tired of that view. It was steeped in the history of Japan. It was here that Minamoto no Yoshitsune sought the shelter of these fortresslike mountains in order to defeat the treachery of the Shogun, his brother; it was here that the great doomed Emperor Go-Daigo assembled his troops and ended his exile, beginning his attempt to return to the throne; here, too, where Shugendo developed, the way of mountain ascetics, a peculiar fusion of Buddhism and Shinto. Mount Omine was out there and on its slopes congregated the yamabushi, the wandering, self-mortifying adherents of this syncretic religion.
He looked now at the tea, its color lightening as the spume rose, and he saw all there was to see beyond that thin pane of glass.
Behind him, Tsutsumu was about to announce himself softly but, seeing the sensei kneeling, unaware, froze his tongue. For a long time he contemplated the figure on the tatami, and as he did so his muscles began to lose their relaxedness. He had been alert; now he was ready. His mind sought the many pathways toward victory while his eyes drank in the utter stillness in the other. The hands must be moving, Tsutsumu told himself, because I know he is preparing the tea... yet he might as well be a statue for all I can see of it.
He knew the time to be right and, unbidden, he rose, unfurling himself like a sail before the wind. Taking two swift, silent strides, he crossed the threshold and was within striking distance. His body torqued with the first onset of intrinsic energy.
At that instant, Kusunoki turned and, extending the hot cup of tea, said, "It is always an honor to invite a pupil so quick to learn into my study."
His eyes locked onto Tsutsumu, and the student felt as if he had hit against an invisible, impenetrable wall. All the fire of the energy he had banked for so long, now at last turned loose, was stifled, held momentarily in thrall, then dissipated.
Tsutsumu shivered involuntarily. He blinked as an owl might in daylight. He felt intensely vulnerable without that which had always been his.
The sensei was smiling pleasantly. "Come," he said, and Tsutsumu saw that another cup of tea had somehow materialized. "Let us drink together... to show respect and our mutual good intentions."
The student smiled awkwardly and, shakily, sat on the tatami facing Kusunoki. Between them was a break in the reed mats that was far more than an architectural or an esthetic delineation. It was the space between host and guest, always observed.
Tsutsumu took the cup and, holding it carefully and correctly in both hands, prepared to drink. The warmth of the tea rushed into his palms. He bowed to his sensei, touched the curved rim of the cup to his lips, and drank the intensely bitter beverage. It was very good, and he closed his eyes for an instant, forgetting where he was and, even, who he was, to the extent that that was possible. He tasted the earth of Japan and with it all things Japanese. History and legend, honor and courage, the weight of kami, hovering. And, above all, duty. Giri.
Then his eyes opened and all was as it had been before. He felt again the uncomfortableness of being so far from home. He was from the north and Nara was an alien place to him; he had never liked it here. Yet he had come and had stayed for two long years. Giri.
"Tell me," Kusunoki said, "what is the first thing we assess in combat?"
"Our opponent," Tsutsumu said immediately. "The exchange of attitude and intention tells us where we are and how we are to proceed."
"Indeed," Kusunoki said, as if this were a new concept to him and he was mulling it over in his mind. "So we think of victory."
"No," the student said. "We concern ourselves with not being defeated."
The sensei looked at him with his hard black eyes that seemed ripped from a hawk's fierce face. "Good," he said at last. "Very good, indeed."
Tsutsumu, sipping his tea slowly, wondered what this was all about. Words and more words. The sensei was asking him questions to which any good pupil must know the answers. Be careful, he cautioned himself, remembering the instantaneous dissolution of his attacking force. Be on guard.
"So here we equate defeat with the end of life."
The student nodded. "In hand-to-hand we are on the death ground, as Sun Tzu has written. We must fight, always."
Now Kusunoki allowed a full smile. "But Sun Tzu has also written, 'To subdue the enemy without fighting shows the highest level of skill. Thus, what is supreme is to attack the enemy's strategy.'"
"Pardon me, sensei, but it seems to me Sun Tzu was speaking solely about war in that instance."
"Well," Kusunoki said evenly, "isn't that what we are also talking about?"
Tsutsumu felt his heart skip a beat and it was with a great personal effort that he kept himself calm. "War? Forgive me, sensei, but I do not understand."
Kusunoki's face was benign as he thought, And Sun Tzu also wrote that those skilled in war can make themselves invincible but cannot cause an enemy to be vulnerable. "There are many faces war may take on, many guises. Is this not so?"