“Theater?” Krysty said. “Could be interesting. Will we go, Ryan?”
“Why not?”
He turned to Issie. “When is it?”
She performed a little mime of a clock hand revolving through three hundred and sixty degrees. “One hour.”
She glanced at Jak. “You come now. Others can come later.”
“Go with her,” Ryan urged. “Get what you can while you can, Jak.”
“At your heels you’ll soon hear time’s winged chariot drawing near,” Doc intoned. “And yonder all before you lie deserts of vast eternity. In other words gather those damn rosebuds while you can, laddie.”
Jak patted the old man on the arm. “Time’s don’t know what fuck talking about, Doc.”
Ryan gestured to him to leave. “Be down soon, Jak,” he said. “Real soon.”
Issie snatched at Jak’s arm and shepherded him out, sliding the paneled door shut behind them.
“Think she heard?” J.B. asked.
“Doubt it.” Ryan looked at the others. “Not sure she’s got more than two brain cells to rub together.”
“Pretty little girl,” Doc said.
“Oh, yeah. Pretty enough. All right, let’s go see this play. And keep eyes and ears extra open.”
A STAGE HAD BEEN SET at one end of the larger rooms in the heart of the ville. It was like a raised dais, with a double row of cushions set on the floor in front of it.
Doc groaned when he saw the cushions. “Oh, my aching knees and back.” He sighed. “The good Lord did not intend me to sit cross-legged like some contemplative ape. He would have supplied me with more supple and mobile joints if that had been his declared intention.”
At that moment Mashashige came in, accompanied by Yashimoto and Hideyoshi, with a few of the senior warriors. Jak and Issie were part of his company.
The shogun bowed to Ryan and the rest of the outlanders. “You are welcome to the play,” he said.
“I’ve never seen a what’s it called?”
“Kabuki,” the shogun said. “It is a very old and formal kind of theater. This is a time to relax. We have many men come to join us from the places around. They will soon be trained as sec men. Then we can think of marching to remove the threat of my brother Ryuku, and his ronin forever. But we must make the new men welcome. There will be a basho tomorrow morning.” He saw incomprehension on the faces of the foreigners. “Sumo wrestling,” he explained.
“And there will be flying of kites,” Hideyoshi said, beaming. “These are not toys, but big enough to lift a man. Their cords have small knives attached to cut strings of enemy kites. It is battle, just like life.”
“Battling kites!” Mildred laughed. “I’ve heard of dueling banjos, but not fighting kites.”
“This play last long?” the Armorer asked. “Not all that keen on long plays.”
“Is sumo wrestling with men about four hundred pounds, wearing diapers?” Jak asked. “Saw old mag with pix. Looked kind of hot pipe to see.”
“It will be excellent entertainment,” the samurai promised. “A visiting troupe of sumo. That will be tomorrow. But now” he turned to the noise of gongs, flutes and drums, “it will be the Kabuki play.”
RYAN FOUND IT incredibly difficult to follow.
It was all in Japanese, which didn’t help matters at all, though Hideyoshi did his best to give them a running whispered commentary on the dialogue and the action. Not that there seemed to be very much action.
The actors were all men, even those who were playing the parts of princesses, courtesans, geisha and wandering female spirits.
They wore heavy makeup that transformed their faces into masks of startling beauty or boggling horror. Eyes and mouths were emphasized, and the actions were all very melodramatic and stylized, relying a great deal on mime.
Their long dresses were magnificently embroidered with floral patterns, and the ornate material hissed as the actors moved slowly about the stage.
The men gesticulated furiously, their voices raised for much of the talking, while those who played the women simpered and drooped submissively, their voices thin and fluting.
The story was complicated.
It seemed that a lord had gone away to war and had left his favorite wife behind in the care of his most trusted nobleman. But the couple had fallen hopelessly in love, and the wife had chosen to throw herself from the castle’s battlements rather than betray her husband. The stricken samurai lover wandered the world, seeking his own death. But he was so brave and uncaring that he always won his fights.