The next day. Clear skies dotted with wispy white clouds—perfect weather for mountain climbing. I ate a generous breakfast at the hotel buffet to fuel up. I checked out early, asking for the receipt to be made out to “Godo Shobo.” I’ll bill it all to Yuriko later.
I met Yuriko at Higashiyama Subway Station. At Nijō, we transferred to the JR Sagano Line and got off at Hozukyo Station. This station is a mind-boggling piece of engineering, built right on top of a railway bridge. Situated in the dead center of the steep Hozukyo Gorge with zero flat land anywhere, they had no choice but to construct it in a place like this.
“Should we take a taxi for the uphill part?” Yuriko asked.
“A leisurely walk is fine by me,” I replied.
There was no sign of a taxi at the station roundabout anyway. Naturally—who in their right mind would wait around for passengers in a place like this? Calling one by phone sounded like too much hassle, so we set off on foot. After walking for a while, we crossed the Katsura River over a red steel truss bridge. The prefectural road beyond was engulfed in deep groves of cedar trees on both the right and left.
After trudging up a gentle slope for well over an hour, we passed the mausoleum of Emperor Seiwa. Ah, so this is Saga-Mizunoo. Emperor Seiwa’s alternate name, “Emperor Mizunoo,” originates from this very land. It is said that he suddenly abdicated at the ripe young age of twenty-seven, took a liking to this village of Mizunoo, declared it his final abode, and devoted himself to Buddhist asceticism including fasting—but coming here makes it glaringly obvious that that story is a total fabrication. He passed away a mere five years after abdicating. His wicked wife, Fujiwara no Takaiko, drove her husband out to a remote backwater like this to let him die in lonely isolation. He might have been a terrible husband who shirked his duties and spent his days chasing women, but I couldn’t help but feel a pang of sympathy for him—what a cruel thing to do to a man. Emperor Seiwa’s elder brother, Prince Koretaka, was similarly confined deep in the mountains of Hiei in the village of Ono. And Emperor Yōzei, Seiwa’s son, was stripped of his throne under false pretenses, left to spend a long and meaningless rest of his life. It was simply a matter of them not being exiled to distant lands like Emperor Sutoku, Emperor Go-Toba, or Emperor Go-Daigo later were.
They say the settlement here in Mizunoo consists of descendants of the Matsunoo Shrine priests who moved here to tend to the Retired Emperor Seiwa. Could there be a connection to the Nishikyogoku family as well?
Still, it certainly felt like the kind of place where an Okutsuki—an ancient burial site or tomb—of Heian-period imperial family members or court nobles wouldn’t be out of place.
We veered further and further off the prefectural road, pushing into pathless terrain. There wasn’t a soul in sight. If anyone were to run into us, would they think we were a married couple taking a stroll along a mountain path? Or would they suspect we were an adulterous couple looking for a spot to commit double suicide?
“I used to bring my husband here often,” Yuriko said. “It’s unsafe for a woman alone.”
“How often?”
“Four times a year, without fail, once every season—to clear away cobwebs and let fresh air in.”
“That sounds like quite an ordeal. How did you and Asakura meet, by the way?”
“He was an alumnus of the drama club. Since my mother was a geiko, I had been trained in Japanese classical dance since I was a child. So that’s how…”
“Huh. Come to think of it, Asakura also aimed to become a Kabuki actor for a while, didn’t he? I’m pretty sure he even performed on stage in some minor walk-on role. He even gave me a free ticket to one of his performances once, though I never actually went to see it. He’s quite the handsome devil, after all, that guy.”
Yuriko seemed to blush slightly.
For a while, we walked on in silence, our footsteps crunching over the dry cedar twigs scattered across the ground, until Yuriko abruptly brought up a topic I had no particular desire to discuss.
“Enomoto-san, I heard you run a bookstore in Jinbocho.”
“Yeah.”
Just because we were running out of things to say and feeling awkward didn’t mean she had to go poking into my personal life. Until my early thirties, I had bounced around doing all sorts of things—cram school instructor, adjunct lecturer, special research fellow at JSPS, freelance writer, and translator. I had managed to earn my doctorate, but I was never blessed with a tenured post. Okita and Asakura were the same; pretty much everyone I knew was in a similar boat. Taking pity on my situation, an acquaintance in the publishing industry introduced me to the owner’s spot at a store in Jinbocho.
“Jinbocho is supposed to be the best bookstore district in the whole country, isn’t it? I’ve always admired it.”
“Oh my. Were you a literary girl, then?”
“I was.”
I work in Jinbocho now because I used to be a literary boy myself back in the day. I could understand how she felt.
“Though these days, Jinbocho has quieted down quite a bit, too.”
“Why is that?”
“Because the universities have been relocating and disappearing one after another. The students are gone. Compared to the past, the number of bookstores itself hasn’t decreased all that much, but maybe it’s just my imagination—the selection feels much thinner. These days, rare and obscure books sell for high prices online. Pre-war second-hand books used to be piled high like mountains in the old days—magazines like King or Heifun. You hardly ever see those anymore.”
Even if you say “pre-war,” that was already seventy years ago. Naturally, the books themselves were bound to diminish.
“A lot of the casual diners folded, too. In the past, there were plenty of independently owned joints serving lunch to students and office workers, but now it’s all just soulless chain stand-and-eat soba shops.”
“I see. But it must be fun keeping shop at a bookstore, right?”
“What makes you think that?”
“I used to work part-time at a second-hand bookstore on Teramachi Street back when I was a student. It was a wonderful memory.”
“I ask students from my university classes to work part-time for me, too. What with running around for adjunct gigs and sourcing stock, I can’t be at the shop all the time. Besides, staying cooped up in a place like that would make me suffocate.”
“Cute female college students, perhaps?”
“Huh?”
“The ones you hire for part-time work.”
“Who knows. Female workers are obviously better than male ones. Customers respond better to them, and they’re observant. Men only do what they’re told, but women find tasks to do and take initiative before I even say anything. Sometimes they’re housewives who have already graduated. Setting aside whether they’re cute or not, they all love books. Naturally—anyone who goes out of their way to work at a bookstore would. When business is slow, they just read books the whole time. Once the shop closes, I sometimes take them out for drinks around Ochanomizu or near Kanda’s west exit.”
“My, my, Enomoto-san. What do you intend to do, getting female college students and housewives tipsy?”
“Nothing whatsoever. I don’t intend a single thing.” Good grief, women always suspect the worst. I shifted the topic to prevent the conversation from heading down a weird path. “By the way, do we still have a long way to walk?”
“Just a bit more.” Yuriko took the lead, swinging a tree branch around to clear away spiderwebs. “This way. It’s an inconvenient spot, isn’t it? Cars can’t even get in here. As you well know: ‘Deep in the Sagano hills, at her final resting place, if only I could catch a glimpse of the hidden Buddha.’“
“I do know it. Yuriko-san, where did you hear that poem?”
“Yes. I heard it directly from my father. What about you, Professor Enomoto?”
“It was written in an ancient book that Nishikyogoku Kiyomasa showed me. That poem is likely recorded nowhere else but in that book. It’s a poem known to no one.”
“Is that so…”
“Deep” indeed. On the slopes of Mount Atago, another hour’s trek down a narrow animal trail led to a dense, isolated thicket of forest that was conspicuously untouched by human hands. Unlike the surrounding area, it hadn’t been cleared for timber, its vegetation distinctly different, consisting of wild, unplanted trees. Nestled within it was a stone chamber. The entrance was concealed by propped-up brushwood; once the brush was cleared, a heavy chain was wrapped tightly around an iron gate, secured with a sturdy latch. Yuriko unlocked the padlock with a key.
The state-of-the-art LED headlamp I had bought on Amazon had finally found its moment to shine. It was intensely bright, capable of narrowing or widening its beam—almost like the Specium Ray.
Hunched over, we shuffled through a narrow tunnel, at the end of which lay a dark, chilly stone chamber. In the center sat a stone sarcophagus. Is Minamoto no Katako really sleeping inside this thing? Well, I’d leave the archaeology to some other specialist. It’d be trouble if the sarcophagus was rigged with a curse or a trap, anyway.
A alcove was carved into the far wall, where an ebony zushi—a miniature shrine—was placed.
That shrine was also fitted with a padlock. Yuriko unlocked it once more using another key from her ring.
Feeling it would be a pity to blast it with raw LED light, we lit a candle on a candlestick, offered up incense, and gazed upon it.
It was unmistakably a statue of Kannon modeled after a woman—a bewitchingly beautiful one.
From the crown adorning its head, openwork water-flames blazed like fire, and a gorgeous necklace studded with jewels wrapped around its neck. The pupils were black, and the hair was painted a deep indigo blue. Rather than that of a conventional Kannon, its eyes held an enigmatic gaze akin to a Maitreya, and traces of red pigment still lingered on the lips, bearing a faint, fleeting smile.
Its waist was slender and tapered, its fingers long and delicate, adorned with bracelets on both wrists. Its hands were formed into the Raigō-in mudra, softly pinching a single stem of a double-layered, five-petaled Hōsōge flower in its right hand. Rather than traditional Buddhist art, it was infinitely closer to a Hindu idol.
” Terrifying…”
“Isn’t it?” Yuriko whispered. “I, too, fell under this statue’s spell. It’s the urge to meet this statue again that keeps bringing me back to this mountain.”
Was Minamoto no Katako truly a woman of such nature?
I envisioned Emperor Shirakawa, having lost his beloved consort Katako, holding this Kannon statue in this very stone chamber, pressing his lips against hers.
I photographed the statue from as many angles as possible with my camera. First, I had to appraise its authenticity. It might be necessary to transport it out of here for X-ray imaging, or to shave off a tiny portion for pigment analysis and radiocarbon dating. Or perhaps, long before going to such lengths, evidence of it being a forgery would easily present itself. In any case, I had to examine it meticulously by comparing it with Buddhist statues from the same era.
Minamoto no Katako was the daughter of Minamoto no Akifusa of the Murakami Genji clan. After being adopted by the Regent Fujiwara no Morozane, she entered Emperor Shirakawa’s court as a consort (nyogo). Akifusa was a great-grandson of Emperor Murakami. Entering court as an imperial consort cost an astronomical sum of money. It wasn’t merely about wedding ceremony expenses. The father of a consort had to build a palace for the Emperor to reside in, feed him, and foot the bill for Imperial Shinto rituals. To secure that kind of wealth, Akifusa handed his daughter over to a regent family for adoption. That was likely the long and short of it. That the Murakami Genji clan flourished later, producing prominent figures like Koga Michichika, Dōgen, and Kitabatake Akifusa among their descendants, was entirely because Emperor Shirakawa loved Katako so dearly and favored her biological father, Akifusa.
Katako entered the court at the traditional age of fifteen and bore the Emperor five children within a single decade.
The Emperor sent all princes born to women other than Katako into the Buddhist priesthood (hōshinnō), barring them from ascending the throne. He then appointed Prince Yoshihito, born to Katako, as Crown Prince, who later became Emperor Horikawa. When Katako was on her deathbed, the Emperor refused to let her leave the palace for her childhood home. To avoid ritual pollution associated with death, even blood relatives and spouses were forbidden from being present at the moment of passing. When she died, the Emperor was so stricken with grief that he wailed without eating for days. Katako was twenty-eight years old. The Emperor was thirty-one.
When his retainers admonished him, saying, “There is no precedent for an Emperor to attend a funeral procession,” the Emperor declared, “Then let precedent begin with this,” and refused to leave Katako’s corpse.
Afterward, the Emperor took no official empress or consort, instead abandoning himself to debauchery with the courtesans of Gion.
The Emperor had loved Katako far too much. There was no one who could fill the gaping void left in his heart after losing her. The Emperor built Katako’s memorial temple in this secluded, remote location, commissioned a Kannon statue made in her likeness, and entrusted its protection to the descendants of Katako’s adoptive father, Fujiwara no Morozane.
Yet, I felt certain this statue had to be a forgery.
The craftsmanship was simply too flawless, the story far too convenient. There was no way a statue like this could have been created in the eleventh century, during the late Heian period, by the vow of Emperor Shirakawa, and remain entirely unknown to anyone until today.
Even this stone chamber, though clearly aged and not something constructed recently, might have just been an ordinary icehouse used up until the Edo or Meiji period. Snow would stack deep up here in the winter; they might have simply stored it here and cut ice to use during the summer.
After locking the shrine back up, we stepped outside. Just as before, we propped the brushwood against the entrance as camouflage.
“You’ve set up quite a grand lie, haven’t you?” I said. “This isn’t something you could have pulled off alone. Whose scheme is this, exactly?”
“How could you say that? That’s terrible!”
I studied her expression closely. In the end, I couldn’t spot a single suspicious thing about her.
“I imagine the investigation will take time,” I told her. “Well, there’s no rush, is there? Just wait patiently.”
On the slope heading down the mountain, she turned back to look at me as I followed behind.
“I’ve come to think that… maybe it’s best not to tell anyone about this after all, and just leave it to our children. After all, that’s what all my ancestors have done.”
“I see. That’s a shame. I thought I’d finally get my moment in the spotlight, but do as you wish.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Actually, doing nothing isn’t half bad a thought. National Treasures and Important Cultural Properties come with that nuisance called the Law for the Protection of Cultural Properties. Inheriting a National Treasure involves cumbersome paperwork, and while there are tax relief measures for inheritance, you’re still taxed according to its asset value. Plus, the burden of management responsibility alone is huge for a National Treasure—fire, theft, earthquake countermeasures. Even if you can make a living off it, one misstep could ruin you financially. Pushing off all those hassles to the next generation and taking your time to think it over is one way to go.”
“You’re right. Honestly, I didn’t have the slightest clue what to do.”
“On the flip side, letting go of it to ease your mind is another option—donating it to the state or something. Well, if you ever feel like going public with it, let me know right away. I’ll help as much as I can.”
“Thank you. I’ll rely on you when the time comes.”
“By the way… when you say ‘our children,’ do you mean yours and Asakura’s?”
“No, we haven’t had a single child yet.”
“Then you can’t leave it to descendants in the first place, can you?”
“I believe my husband will return to me someday.”
“And what if he doesn’t return?”
Standing atop a drift of fallen cedar leaves, she spoke with firm resolve. “I’ll wait. I’ll make sure to wait. But… if word comes that he has died…” For some reason, she smiled faintly, her cheeks blushing a subtle pink. “If that happens, fate will have changed. When that time comes… would you take me as your wife?”
“Huh?”
“I’m exhausted from being pushed around by that man. I just want to live quietly and happily, like a normal woman. I want to live in a home with a husband and children. If you’d have someone like me—a divorcee whose husband passed away before her…”
I stared at her face in utter dumbfoundment. Just the two of us, deep in these mountains. It didn’t sound like she was joking.
I hadn’t said a word about whether I was single or married. Did she just assume I was single?
Now that she mentioned it, looking closely at her again, she couldn’t be more than thirty or so. She had a pleasant, lovely face. Fair-skinned and fragile, with neat, compact features—eyes, nose, and mouth—she was, if anything, a plain and quite ordinary woman. One might even say her features didn’t leave much of an impression. If asked whether I could love her as a wife, I thought maybe I could. But it was so out of the blue, I couldn’t say for sure right now.
If I followed the logic of this conversation, marrying her would mean closing up shop in Jinbocho, moving out here, climbing the mountain four times a year, and spending my life guarding a tomb—alongside a divorced wife. How on earth would that turn out?
“About what you just said… please let me put my answer on hold.”
“Yes. You’re quite free to forget it. It was just a momentary lapse of reason. Because my husband hasn’t returned at all and hasn’t even sent word, I just blurted out something crazy. I’m so sorry.”