Shogun

The old man groped his way over, mumbling to himself. The other inmates let him pass or step on them or over them without saying a word. He stared down at Blackthorne through rheumy eyes, his face warted. "Oh, Blessed Virgin, the senor is real. Who art thou? I'm . . . I'm Friar . . . Friar Domingo . . . Domingo . . . Domingo of the Sacred . . . the Sacred Order of St. Francis . . . the Order . . ." and then for a while his words became a jumble of Japanese and Latin and Spanish. His head twitched and he wiped away the ever present spittle that dribbled to his chin. "The senor is real?"

"Yes, I'm real." Blackthorne eased himself up.

The priest muttered another Hail Mary, the tears coursing his cheeks. He kissed the cross repeatedly and would have got down on his knees if there had been space. Bulldog shook his neighbor awake. Both squatted and made just enough room for the priest to sit.

"By the Blessed St. Francis, my prayers have been answered. Thou, thou, thou, I thought that I was seeing another apparition, senor, a ghost. Yes, an evil spirit. I've seen so many - so many - how long is the senor here? It's hard for a body to see in the gloom and my eyes, they're not good . . . . How long?"

"Yesterday. And you?"

"I don't know, senor. A long time. I'm put here in September - it was in the year of our Lord fifteen hundred ninety-eight."

"It's May now. Sixteen hundred."

"Sixteen hundred?"

A moaning cry distracted the monk. He got up and picked his way over the bodies like a spider, encouraging a man here, touching another there, his Japanese fluent. He could not find the dying man so he droned the last rites to that part of the cell and blessed everyone and no one minded.

"Come with me, my son."

Without waiting, the monk hobbled down the cage, through the mass of men, into the gloom. Blackthorne hesitated, not wanting to leave his place. Then he got up and followed. After ten paces he looked back. His place had vanished. It seemed impossible that he had ever been there at all.

He continued down the length of the hut. In the far corner was, incredibly, an open space. Just enough room for a small man to lie down in. It contained a few pots and bowls and an ancient straw mat.

Father Domingo stepped through the men into the space and beckoned him. The surrounding Japanese watched silently, letting Blackthorne pass.

"They are my flock, senor. They are all my sons in the Blessed Lord Jesus. I've converted so many here - this one's John, and here's Mark and Methuselah...." The priest stopped for breath. "I'm so tired. Tired. I... must, I must..." His words trailed off and he slept.

At dusk more food arrived. When Blackthorne began to get up, one of the nearby Japanese motioned him to stay and brought him a well - filled bowl. Another man gently patted the priest awake, offering the food.

"Iye," the old man said, shaking his head, a smile on his face, and pushed the bowl back into the man's hands.

"Iye Farddah-sama."

The priest allowed himself to be persuaded and ate a little, then got up, his joints creaking, and handed his bowl to one of those in the middle row. This man touched the priest's hand to his forehead and he was blessed.

"I'm so pleased to see another of my own kind," the priest said, sitting beside Blackthorne again, his peasant voice thick and sibilant. He pointed weakly to the other end of the cell block. "One of my flock said the senor used the word 'pilot', 'anjin'? The senor is a pilot?"

"Yes."

"There are others of the senor's crew here?"

"No, I'm alone. Why are you here?"

"If the senor is alone - the senor came from Manila?"

"No. I've never been to Asia before," Blackthorne said carefully, his Spanish excellent. "This was my first voyage as pilot. I was... I was outward bound. Why are you here?"

"Jesuits put me here, my son. Jesuits and their filthy lies. The senor was outward bound? Thou art not Spanish, nonor Portuguese..." The monk peered at him suspiciously and Blackthorne was surrounded by his reeking breath. "Was the ship Portuguese? Tell the truth, before God!"

"No, Father. It was not Portuguese. Before God!"

"Oh, Blessed Virgin, thank you! Please forgive me, senor. I was afraid - I'm old and stupid and diseased. Thy ship was Spanish out of where? I'm so glad - where is the senor from originally? Spanish Flanders? Or the Duchy of Brandenburg perhaps? Some part of our dominions in Germania? Oh, it's so good to talk my blessed mother tongue again! Was the senor shipwrecked like us? Then foully thrown into this jail, falsely accused by those devil Jesuits? May God curse them and show them the error of their treachery!" His eyes glittered fiercely. "The senor said he has never been to Asia before?"

"No."