The Incense Game by Laura Joh Rowland Read Free Book Online

Sano, their faces anxious, their hands wringing. “Honorable Chamberlain, have you news of my daughters?”
    “I’m afraid so,” Sano said somberly. “We’ve found the bodies of two young women.”
    “Why do you think they’re my daughters?” Lord Hosokawa looked torn between the hope that the missing had been located and the wish that the dead weren’t his kin.
    “They were wearing these.” Sano displayed the sashes he’d brought.
    Lady Hosokawa snatched the magenta sash with the crests worked in gold thread. “That’s Myobu’s! I embroidered it for her myself!” She pressed the sash to her face and wept.
    The concubine grabbed the green, plainer sash. Cradling it, she fell to her knees, sobbed, and rocked back and forth. “Kumoi! No! No!”
    Pained by their grief, Sano averted his eyes. He’d witnessed similar scenes too many times since the earthquake. No family was untouched by loss.
    The lines on Lord Hosokawa’s face knitted his features into a mask of agony. He sagged to his knees. “Myobu. Kumoi.” He sounded as if he’d aged ten years. “My only two girls, my treasures. I prayed that they were alive, but I knew that after all this time, they couldn’t be.”
    Sano crouched opposite Lord Hosokawa. “I’m sorry to bring you such bad news.”
    “There’s no need to apologize. Thank you for coming. I know how busy you must be.” Lord Hosokawa swallowed tears. “It’s better to know that my children are dead than to spend the rest of my life wondering what had become of them.”
    Tama the concubine crawled up to Sano. “I want to see Kumoi!” The sash was twisted in the clasped hands that she raised to him. “Where is she?”
    “And Myobu?” Lady Hosokawa lifted her face. “May I see her?”
    Sano hesitated. He couldn’t tell the parents that the bodies were on the way to the morgue for an illegal examination.
    “You mustn’t,” Lord Hosokawa told the women. “Not after this long.” He obviously thought the bodies were too decomposed for the mothers to bear viewing.
    The women wept harder but accepted his pronouncement. Sano felt guilty about letting them keep a false impression.
    “After our daughters are cremated, may we have the ashes to bury in our family tomb?” Lord Hosokawa asked.
    “Certainly.” Sano couldn’t help feeling relieved that the family wouldn’t see the signs of the examination.
    Lord Hosokawa seemed to draw on the strength of will that had made him one of the most capable provincial rulers in Japan. “Where were they found?”
    “In a house in Nihonbashi that sank underground during the earthquake,” Sano said.
    Surprise momentarily distracted Lady Hosokawa from her grief. “Whose house?”
    “What were they doing there?” Tama asked between sobs.
    “The house belonged to an incense teacher named Usugumo,” Sano said. “She and your daughters were playing an incense game when the earthquake struck. They all died.”
    Lord Hosokawa shook his head, puzzled. “We didn’t know Myobu and Kumoi had left the estate that night. We didn’t realize they were missing until after the earthquake.” He turned to the women. “Did you know they were taking incense lessons in town?”
    “No,” Lady Hosokawa said.
    “Kumoi never told me,” Tama said.
    “I taught Myobu not to mix with commoners unless they’re people we know well, who work for our family or do business with us,” Lady Hosokawa said. “She never would have gone there on her own.” She angrily turned on Tama. “It must have been your daughter’s idea. She liked new fads. She liked slumming with the lower classes.”
    “That’s not true!” The fury in her eyes and the makeup running down her face made Tama look like a demon in a Kabuki play. “Your daughter was the big sister. Kumoi would follow her wherever she went. It’s Myobu’s fault that my daughter died in that house!”
    “Don’t you speak to me like that!” Lady Hosokawa slapped Tama’s face.
    Tama threw herself on