The Thousand Autumns of Jacob De Zoet: A Novel by David Mitchell Read Free Book Online Page B

two-bearer palanquin. Peter Fischer squints in the merciless afternoon sunlight. 'Dejima is yours for an hour or two, Mr Fischer,' Vorstenbosch tells him from the Chief's palanquin. 'Return her to me in her current condition.'
    'Of course.' The Prussian achieves a flatulent grimace. 'Of course.'
    Fischer's grimace turns to a glower as Jacob's palanquin passes.
    The retinue leaves the Land-Gate and passes over Holland Bridge.
    The tide is out: Jacob sees a dead dog in the silt . . .
    . . . and now he is hovering three feet over the forbidden ground of Japan.
    There is a wide square of sand and grit, deserted but for a few soldiers. This plaza is named, van Cleef told him, Edo Square to remind the independent-minded Nagasaki populace where the true power lies. On one side is the Shogunal Keep: ramped stones, high walls and steps. Through another set of gates, the retinue is submersed in a shaded thoroughfare. Hawkers cry, beggars implore, tinkers clang pans, ten thousand wooden clogs knock against flagstones. Their own guards yell, ordering the townspeople aside. Jacob tries to capture every fleeting impression for letters to Anna, and to his sister, Geertje, and his uncle. Through the palanquin's grille, he smells steamed rice, sewage, incense, lemons, sawdust, yeast and rotting seaweed. He glimpses gnarled old women, pocked monks, unmarried girls with blackened teeth. Would that I had a sketchbook , the foreigner thinks, and three days ashore to fill it . Children on a mud wall make owl-eyes with their forefingers and thumbs, chanting ' Oranda-me, Oranda-me, Oranda-me ': Jacob realises they are impersonating 'round' European eyes and remembers a string of urchins following a Chinaman in London. The urchins pulled their eyes into narrow slants and sang, 'Chinese, Siamese, if you please, Japanese.'
    People pray cheek by jowl before a cramped shrine whose gate is shaped like a p .
    There is a row of stone idols; twists of paper tied to a plum tree.
    Nearby, street acrobats perform a snonky song to drum up business.
    The palanquins pass over an embanked river; the water stinks.
    Jacob's armpits, groin and knees are itchy with sweat; he fans himself with his clerk's portfolio.
    There is a girl in an upper window; there are red lanterns hanging from the eaves, and she is idly tickling the hollow of her throat with a goose feather. Her body cannot be ten years old, but her eyes belong to a much older woman's.
    Wistaria in bloom foams over a crumbling wall.
    A hairy beggar kneeling over a puddle of vomit turns out to be a dog.
    A minute later, the retinue stops by a gate of iron and oak.
    The doors open and guards salute the palanquins passing into a courtyard.
    Twenty pikemen are being drilled in the ferocious sun.
    In the shade of a deep overhang, Jacob's palanquin is lowered on to its stand.
    Ogawa Uzaemon opens its door. 'Welcome to Magistracy, Mr de Zoet.'
    * * *

    The long gallery ends at a shady vestibule. 'Here, we wait,' Interpreter Kobayashi tells them, and motions for them to sit on floor cushions brought by servants. The right branch of the vestibule ends in a row of sliding doors emblazoned with striped bulldogs boasting luxuriant long eyelashes. 'Tigers, supposedly,' says van Cleef. 'Behind it is our destination: the Hall of Sixty Mats.' The left branch leads to a more modest door decorated with a chrysanthemum. Jacob hears a baby crying a few rooms away. Ahead is a view over the Magistracy walls and hot roofs, down to the bay where the Shenandoah is anchored in the bleached haze. The smell of summer mingles with beeswax and fresh paper. The Dutchmen's party removed their shoes at the entrance, and Jacob is thankful for van Cleef's earlier warning about holes in stockings. If Anna's father could see me now , he thinks, paying court to the Shogun's highest official in Nagasaki . The officials and interpreters maintain a stern silence. 'The floorboards,' van Cleef comments, 'are sprung to squeak, to foil assassins.'
    'Are