Pathway to Japanese Literature

Frost Within the Castle Walls

I

On the morning of October 7th, Ansei 6 (1859), Ii Naosuke, Lord Kamon no Kami, had proceeded to Edo Castle earlier than customary and was already present in the official chamber by eight o'clock.
It was the first cold morning since the beginning of the year.
The Great Elder’s seat occupied the upper position within the Elder Council chamber, enclosed by taut paper screens. Though equipped with a large ceremonial fireplace called an omaaburi and a brazier drawn close at hand, the piercing morning cold permeated every corner of the room, making fingers, toes, and extremities ache with numbing chill.

Yet what pierced so keenly was not merely the cold. The Junior Council’s normally bustling chamber lay hushed, while the Elder Council chamber—where Wakizaka Yasutake, Ōta Sukemoto, Manabe Akikatsu, and others sat in solemn rows—was enveloped in a silence as sharp and crystalline as the jagged edge of shattered glass. It was a time when the great purge—later to be called the Ansei Purge—was just entering its final stage. The Head Attendants and Chamber Attendants hurrying in and out all had pale faces, and the Elder Council and Junior Council members coming and going shone with restless eyes. Before Manabe Akikatsu and Wakizaka Yasutake lay official document boxes overflowing with papers, while fans—used to clip completed documents and pass them onward—flitted ceaselessly from one station to the next… These frenetic motions were being performed with utmost stealth beneath a silence so heavy it seemed to crush the air itself. Yet despite it all, the atmosphere within the Elder Council chamber quivered like a colossal tree confronting an invisible whirlwind.

Within the partitioned screens, Ii Naosuke kept bringing his hand to the right side of his neck and furrowing his brows. The obese, corpulent man had developed a boil on the nape of his neck two or three days prior, and each time the kimono collar brushed against it, an unpleasant sensation would arise. He kept reaching up to try pressing it out, but the skin encasing the adzuki bean-sized lump of fat only sent sharp pains shooting through him whenever he applied pressure, stubbornly refusing to rupture....The 9 o'clock timekeeper's bell rang. And before long, the Head Attendant announced the arrival of Magistrate Ishiga Atsukiyo... Naosuke nodded and pushed away the fire bucket he had drawn close. Magistrate Ishiga Atsukiyo wore a pale, twisted expression. As he took his seat before the Great Elder, both the Junior Council chamber and Elder Council chamber fell utterly silent—even the farthest corners of the corridors hushed—until one could feel a new silence settling over them, different from before: a bone-chilling silence that seeped into the marrow.

“The execution of the convicted criminals has been completed.”

“...Your efforts are noted.”

“Iizumi Kinai, Yanagawa Sanjūrō.”

At that point, Atsukiyo fell silent.
Naosuke remained silent, his large eyes beneath thick brows fixedly gazing down at Atsukiyo’s face… But that breathless silence was soon shattered by Naosuke’s sonorous voice.

“Is that all? There should have been one more.”

“........”

Ishiga lowered his eyes.
“What of Hashimoto Sanai of Echizen?”
Atsukiyo raised his face, lips trembling.

“This morning, there was an official decree for the death penalty, but as Hashimoto Sanai had already been sentenced to exile, I wondered if there might have been some administrative error…”

“Death penalty. Hashimoto Sanai is sentenced to death.”
Naosuke pressed.

With an expression of despair, Atsukiyo withdrew.
……The hurried shuffling footsteps faded away, drawing the attention of all present—the Elder Council, Junior Council, and Chamber Attendants.
Naosuke pulled the fire bucket closer once more while—

“Attendant... Bring tea,” he barked.

The Chamber Attendant who brought the tea—a man ordinarily favored by Naosuke—now behaved like a different person this morning, trembling so visibly that his hands shook as he presented the tenmoku bowl.

Naosuke sipped his tea while raising his broad shoulders and staring wide-eyed into space—as though bracing his entire body to withstand the colossal, terrifyingly vast invisible enemy looming over him.

A little past ten o’clock, Magistrate Ishiga Atsukiyo entered once more… This time he appeared composed, though it was a composure drained of vigor, as if he were spent.

“The execution of Sanai has been completed.”

“...Your efforts are noted.”

“It was truly an admirable end—he composed his death poem with unshaken composure and even showed a tranquil smile, as though simply returning home.”

“That one too… And that one… Composed to the end…”
Naosuke interrupted the other’s words and muttered lowly, as if unable to contain his loathing: “With a serene smile… Recited a death poem? That man too—such… Such—”
“It was truly a magnificent death.”

With those words, Atsukiyo withdrew.
The expression of contempt that had appeared on Naosuke’s face did not fade easily.
He muttered repeatedly under his breath... “a serene smile,” “composure,” “as though departing for home.”
Muttering such things, he twisted his large lips with an extremely displeased look.
Then he raised his hand again and attempted to press out the boil on his neck.
Clenching his fingers with force and gritting his teeth... his thick eyebrows twisted tightly.

II

When Magistrate Ishiga Atsukiyo withdrew back to his office, Prison Magistrate Ishide Naotane was waiting.

“……How did it go?”

“I couldn’t state the facts,” Atsukiyo burst out. “…I reported that Hashimoto Sanai composed his death poem with composure and died with a quiet smile. Please ensure everyone maintains that account as originally instructed.”

“I too believed that to be the case and took the liberty of temporarily silencing everyone, but…”

“I didn’t want a man of his caliber remembered as one who clung to life. But what truly perplexes me is the Great Elder’s demeanor—there are elements I simply cannot comprehend.”

“Was there something…?”

“When I reported that he had died with a quiet smile, [the Great Elder] made an extremely displeased expression and muttered twice under his breath—‘That one too died composed?’ ‘That one too…’—as though talking to himself. The fact that [Sanai] had died reciting a death poem as though departing for home seemed to have offended him beyond measure.”

“Surely the truth hasn’t reached his ears…?”

“Perhaps that is so—but… how should I put it? In any case, that displeasure was of a different nature altogether. I simply cannot fathom it.”

Naotane broached the matter he had long awaited to address.

“In truth… there are individuals who have come to retrieve Lord Sanai’s remains.”

“You may release them. Who claims them?”

“One named Ishihara Jinjuro and three others asserting ties to the Echizen house.”

Naotane withdrew in haste.

As it was his day to return to his private residence, Ishiga Atsukiyo left the government office by palanquin once three o'clock in the afternoon had passed.
He could not shake the feeling that his failure to save Hashimoto Sanai was entirely his own responsibility... Yoshida Shōin, Kobayashi Minbu, Rai San'yō, Umeda Unpin—these and many other loyalist samurai had been those who took direct stands against the shogunate's governance.
But Hashimoto Sanai was different from them.
He was a royalist yet simultaneously advocated both pro-shogunate policies and national opening.
His theory was the most moderate while also innovative and outstanding.
To perfect Japan's national defense, one must focus attention from Manchuria through Mongolia.
For that purpose, an alliance with Russia was essential.
Sanai's theories of this kind were serving as major tentative proposals within the shogunate's foreign policy.
Rather than joining hands with distant nations like Britain, America, and France, how much more critical and rational it was to directly ally with Russia—which loomed over Japan's northern borders—and bring the Manchurian-Mongolian region into our sphere of attention was something any person of discernment at that time could readily grasp.
Atsukiyo had long been an ardent adherent of Sanai's "Russo-Japanese Alliance Theory" and firmly believed the day would come when it would be adopted as the shogunate's foreign policy.
Therefore today they had suddenly reversed Sanai's sentence from exile to death.
When the edict was issued, he had been left utterly bewildered, at a complete loss for what to do.

However, having sensed that even among the Elder and Junior Councils there was a covert atmosphere deeming the judgment too harsh, when he went to report the completion of Iizumi Kinai and Rai San'yō’s executions, he deliberately refrained from mentioning Sanai’s name.
For he had thought that if he could manage it without being reprimanded, he would immediately have him exiled… There were not merely one or two cases where those sentenced to death had been saved by such minor legal oversights.
Atsukiyo had anticipated this outcome, but ultimately even that desperate stratagem proved futile.
Not only had his efforts been in vain, but he had also been forced to witness something far more unbearable at the execution grounds.
As a samurai, it was a scene more bitter and tragic than any he had experienced to date… And it was not only Atsukiyo who found it tragic and bitter.
Among those present at the execution ground, some were astonished, while others clearly clicked their tongues in scorn.
The sight still appears vivid to this day.
The bleak expanse of the execution ground, Sanai’s figure beneath the decapitation blade, and the unsettled expressions of the officials.
―Pathetic clinging!
Because Atsukiyo could discern Sanai’s innermost thoughts, he felt anger with the same emotion that found it tragic.

There, from the prison magistrate down to the lowly jailers, they were all watching.
The executioner’s assistant had been specially requested from a samurai of a certain domain rather than being a regular executioner.
No matter how bitter or regretful the death might be, if Sanai was a samurai, he should have been prepared for such an outcome.
Even if it were a lie, this was the time when he should have died quietly and with the composure of a samurai.
……Though his name might be regrettable, a samurai’s worth cannot be known without witnessing their moment of death.
Ishiga Atsukiyo was repeatedly thinking about that inside the palanquin.
It was already dusk when he arrived at his private residence.
As it was his once-every-ten-days return home, his wife and children had all gathered to greet him, but before he could even relax, a retainer came to inform him of a visitor.
“They state they are someone related to Hashimoto Sanai.”

III

Upon hearing it was someone related to Sanai, Atsukiyo immediately had them shown to the parlor and, after adjusting his attire, went out to meet them.
The guest was a girl of about twenty.
Her hairstyle immediately revealed her as a samurai-class woman—slightly dusky cheeks drawn taut with dignity, small lips red as if painted with rouge yet betraying a modestly spirited air, her countenance tinged with loneliness…… She introduced herself as Kanae, second daughter of Kita Kanzō, a Fukui samurai.

“And so, what is the purpose of your visit?”

“This is truly an impertinent request, but regarding how Sanai’s sentence was changed from exile to death penalty this time—what circumstances led to this… and I wish to inquire about his final moments.”

“Why have you come to ask me that?”

“A certain person informed me that you would be kind enough to disclose it.”

Ishiga Atsukiyo mentally sketched two or three possible individuals but concluded it was likely Ishide Naotane.

“And what relation does Omoto bear to Lord Sanai?”

“We are also cousins.”

As she said this and suddenly lowered her eyes, Atsukiyo saw something like heat haze flicker across them.
It was an exceedingly faint thing—less something seen with the eyes than something that brushed against his intuition—but Atsukiyo suddenly felt his chest constrict.

“Regarding the alteration to capital punishment—as it pertains to matters of governance, I have no liberty to comment. However, I shall convey his final moments.”
“…Yes.”
“In prison, Lord Hashimoto led a daily life truly worthy of emulation. Though the time for his execution would come later, he annotated the *Zizhi Tongjian*, discussed educational methods to compose a book, and wrote treatises on prison systems—all were writings deserving praise as the insights of a lifetime… Perhaps due to his masterly demeanor despite his youth, the jailers uniformly revered him, and through special consideration, he was treated with utmost courtesy during his imprisonment.”

The girl sat with her hands neatly arranged on her knees, eyes steadfastly closed and head bowed, listening as though determined not to miss a single word.

“This morning, when the death penalty edict was issued.”
Atsukiyo continued quietly, “When the jailer came to summon him, Lord Sanai calmly rose from his seat and exited through the cell door. The cell door measured only four shaku by three shaku—even the bravest man, once condemned to death, would inevitably stiffen and strike his body against one side when passing through. Yet Lord Sanai slipped through with such composure that he scarcely brushed his garments… The watching officials could not help but exclaim, ‘Magnificent.’”

That story was one he had heard directly from Ishide Naotane…… The girl, however, did not display the emotional reaction he had anticipated.

“When he exited the cell, there he changed into new clothes—a formal kamishimo attire dispatched by Lord Shungaku…… This needless to say was an unprecedented act, from which you may well understand how deeply Lord Sanai was esteemed.”

“…I am deeply honored.”

“After being taken to the execution ground—”
Atsukiyo began to say this but furrowed his brow slightly, then promptly continued in a hurried tone: “He appeared fully resolved—pulling over the prepared brush and inkstone to compose his death poem, then met his end with utmost calmness, even a hint of a smile. The executioner was not a jailer but a samurai specially selected from a certain domain. Even this man could not help but acknowledge him as a remarkable figure of his time.”

“Wait—please wait a moment.”
The girl suddenly raised her eyes and said, “Then did he compose a death poem, smile quietly, and die?”

“This is his death poem.”

Atsukiyo did not answer the counterquestion; he took out a folded piece of paper from his breast pocket and handed it to the girl. She stepped back slightly and quietly unfolded it, but her hands—enveloped in smooth skin—trembled visibly.

Bitter anguish defies cleansing; resentment resists restraint;

Last night, frost first fell within the castle walls; Who could know the heart of pines and cypresses that wither last?

She gazed at the characters for some time, her round shoulders rippling.

Kanae soon left the Inaba residence.

……The short winter day had already darkened, and the town was fully lit. Tonight would likely freeze again; though no wind blew, the air had turned utterly cold, and the chill creeping up from one’s feet seemed to penetrate straight to the bone. Kanae walked while pressing her chest firmly with both sleeves. As though trying to shield Sanai’s heart—encased within the death poem she had tucked into her breast—from the cold……when she reached the crossroads, it became a street of brightly lit merchant houses. People on the street shrank from the cold as they hurried past each other—What was this feeling? A feeling that refused to settle continued to leave a thorn in Kanae’s heart.

—Even after hearing everything so thoroughly, she couldn't sense any reality in Lord Sanai's final moments—she who should have known Lord Sanai best of all, what kind of person he truly was...
She repeated these words to herself again and again, her heart refusing to find peace.

IV

Kanae was three years younger than Sanai.
Both were born in Fukui's home province; being cousins with residences near one another, they had interacted frequently since early childhood and become well acquainted.
Sanai was a fair-skinned, petite youth of handsome features—well-defined eyebrows framing a face that spoke little, exceptionally mild-mannered, possessing a gentle disposition more akin to a girl's.
As his father Nagatsuna served as the domain doctor, he had entered literary studies early, but soon displayed such exceptional talent that by fifteen or sixteen, it was said there remained none in Fukui Domain unaware of his name.

Kanae still vividly recalls those days.
At that time, Sanai had already entered the school of Yoshida Tōkō, the domain Confucian scholar, and commuted daily from his home in Tokiwa-chō.
He would always walk over quietly alone, one eyebrow sharply raised as he cradled a bundle of books in his left arm…… His somewhat delicate-looking, melancholic pale face, with two or three strands of disheveled hair falling across it, left an impression so strikingly beautiful it was almost alluring.
It was early summer when Kanae was twelve—fourteen by the traditional count.
On her way back from shopping accompanied by a maid, just as she was about to turn onto Saiwaibashi Street, she spotted Sanai heading toward the Toshima Riding Grounds.
When she suddenly stopped to look, five boys of similar age were following along, keeping some distance as they surrounded him front and back as if escorting him. Realizing these youths were the notorious ruffians now called the “Seiryū-gumi” who were terrorizing the castle town, Kanae sent the maid ahead and pursued them.
Upon entering the grove of mixed trees outside the riding grounds, the boys formed a circle around Sanai.
Sanai calmly looked around and said something.
From where Kanae was hiding, she could not hear his words, but she clearly heard the boy named Makita Kingo immediately shouting over him.
Kingo berated Sanai as a weakling.
He called him a pale-faced bastard akin to a rotten woman; after hurling every manner of abuse, he finally declared that Sanai was in an indecent relationship with Kanae Kita.
Kanae had heard those words distinctly; though she didn’t truly grasp their meaning, she found herself trembling with an oppressive shame and fury—as though someone had abruptly torn open forbidden curtains to expose their innermost depths, revealing something profoundly sinful she couldn’t name.

In a quiet yet sharp voice, Sanai said: “That’s a lie.”
He continued: “You must not spread baseless rumors. As a man, I can endure it—but for a woman, it becomes irreparable. At least retract that.”
“There’s no need to retract,” Kingo countered.
Before Kingo could finish speaking, Sanai drew his sword.
The boys, caught off guard, scattered in all directions, but Sanai pressed the tip of his blade against Kingo and held him motionless.
“Kingo, retract your words now.”
His voice remained calm, but his eyes burned into his opponent’s face like raging flames.

Kanae still could not forget the intensity of that moment.
Sanai—who was usually as delicate as a woman and had never once shown anger—had drawn his sword and stood his ground for Kanae.
Overwhelmed by that desperate resolve, Kingo retracted his slanderous words, but to Kanae, such a thing held no significance.
His resolute attitude—confronting with a sword for her honor—alone made her feel as though any disgrace could be washed away.

At sixteen years old, Sanai left for Osaka to study Western medicine and Dutch studies under Ogata Kōan.
At their parting, when Kanae found a moment they were alone together—“I must apologize for having once put you in danger because of me.”
Since she had never mentioned it before, Sanai at first seemed not to understand her meaning, but when Kanae told him she had witnessed that quarrel, he abruptly averted his eyes, his cheeks flushing.
That expression conversely flustered Kanae; feeling herself blushing to the tips of her ears, she ended up fleeing.

In the third year after that, Sanai returned home to see his father off in death, and in the spring of his twenty-first year, departed for Edo.
During these two years, Sanai frequently visited the Kita residence and often held discussions with her brother Kanichiro.
By that time, he had already succeeded his father as a domain doctor, yet was esteemed for new medical techniques such as surgery, vaccination, and dissection. He lectured on various Western medical texts to fellow physicians, earning a flourishing reputation.
However, he had no opportunity to speak intimately with Kanae and departed once more for Edo to pursue his studies.

The third time he returned was when he was twenty-three.
During these two years in Edo, he had completely changed course.
He formed connections with Fujita Tōko and Yasui Sokken, then established a friendship with Saigō Kichinosuke—taking his first steps as a loyalist—while simultaneously being recognized by domain lord Matsudaira Shungaku to serve at his lord’s side, becoming a figure who engaged in critical state affairs alongside veteran retainers like Suzuki Chikara and Nakane Sekkō.
……It was some time after he had returned home and begun overseeing the domain school Meidōkan that Kanae met Sanai.
Kanae had often heard rumors about Sanai from her brother and had imagined how much he might have changed, but when she actually met him, she was surprised to find him not altered in the slightest.

V

His manner of speech remained gentle, as ever kind in a womanly way, and his movements were exceedingly quiet.—“Congratulations on your remarkable success.”

When Kanae said this, he responded with his usual somewhat sorrowful smile, saying “Thank you,” but added that he felt lonely without time to read books.

Those tones of his voice, that sorrowful smile—they did nothing to erode the impressions of the past engraved in Kanae’s heart.

The boy who had carried bundles of books to school, the youth who had flushed crimson when confronted about his quarrel with Kingo—no, even earlier than that—the child who had played innocently with her in their younger days: all these versions of him had not changed in the slightest. It was that same boy who stood before her now as a grown man.

His thin-skinned face, though slightly haggard from unrelenting duties, remained pale as though blood might show through, and his small, soft physique—paired with quiet movements—retained an intensely feminine quality even now.

And at the same time, hidden beneath that surface was a geothermal-like willpower—tenacious and robust.

The intense, resolute passion from when he alone had drawn his sword and confronted five ruffians of the Seiryū-gumi was harbored there.

Sanai left for Edo the following year at the age of twenty-four.
At their parting, he left Kanae with these words: “When I return this time—”
That was the last time she saw him, the last time she heard his words... “When I return this time—” What had Sanai meant to say?
The manner in which he had spoken carried a radiance that made further words unnecessary.

“I humbly await your safe return.”
Kanae was satisfied with having answered thus.

Sanai did not return.
The times grew increasingly perilous, and he too plunged himself into the turbulent waves of a chaotic world.
Kanae knew nothing; embracing the memory of Sanai alive within her heart, she quietly waited for the day of his return.
Even when she heard Sanai had undergone interrogation by shogunate officials, and when she learned he had finally been arrested—That Lord Sanai—it all felt like matters too distant to grasp. And even as she traveled to Edo with her brother Kanichiro upon hearing his sentence had at last been fixed as exile, she instead felt it might become an opportunity to reclaim Sanai for herself.

Kanae arrived in Edo three days prior with her brother.
They had intended to see him off as he departed for exile.
However, Sanai was suddenly charged additionally and sentenced to beheading.
Kanae trembled for the first time and could not suppress the fierce desire to know why that Sanai had been charged with such a grave crime and what manner of death he had met.
And the account she had managed to gather still painted a Sanai who felt impossibly remote.
It was said he had composedly recited his death poem at the execution ground, smiled quietly, and died as though returning home.
In the memory living within Kanae’s breast, nowhere could she find such a heroic version of him… It was entirely different—utterly incongruous.

“Is that... Kanae?”
Suddenly called out to, she stopped in surprise—and there was her brother Kanichiro approaching. “Have you just returned?”

“……Yes.”
Kanae instinctively clutched her chest.

“You mustn’t walk so absentmindedly—you’ve passed the gate.”

When told this and noticing, Kanae realized she had already walked twenty or thirty paces past the clan residence.
Kanichiro seemed to immediately sense his sister’s feelings. “I’ve only just returned myself—let’s go home,” he said, then started walking ahead.

He had gone to retrieve Sanai’s corpse alongside Ishihara Jinjuro and others.
And after temporarily interring the remains at Ekōin Temple in Senju Kozukahara, he alone had returned ahead of the others.

At the Kita residence within the clan compound, over a dozen young men had already arrived and were waiting.
Among them was Makita Kingo.

“……What’s wrong? Did it go well?”

“Did they hand over the corpse?”

When they saw Kanichiro’s face, the waiting people all leaned forward at once.

“The remains were duly received.”
Kanichiro placed his frozen hands on his knees. “The officials extended us every courtesy. In particular, Prison Magistrate Ishide Tatewaki invited us in and gave a detailed account of Sanai’s daily life in prison and the circumstances of his final moments.”

“Then Sanai’s treatment wasn’t poor after all.”

“He was executed in new clothes dispatched by the authorities—an unprecedented occurrence since the prison system’s establishment. Sanai composed a death poem and accepted his sentence with a smile—they were deeply moved by this.”

“That may be so, but—” Entsuba Tounoshin interjected, “But once exile had been decided, why was it abruptly revised to the death penalty—and carried out by beheading without even half a day’s delay? What is the reason for that?”

VI

“That much is perfectly clear.”
Kingo snapped, “They’re trying to eliminate everyone implicated in the Succession Dispute—no doubt under Ii Kamon-no-kami’s orders! Even the Three Branch Houses weren’t spared: Lord Yoshikatsu of Owari and Lord Nariaki of Mito were ordered into confinement and retirement! Beheading Sanai was intimidation against Fukui Domain.”

“That’s right—it was Ii Kamon-no-kami’s hand that dealt the blow.”

“As a loyalist samurai, he executed Umeda, executed Shōin, executed Mikisaburō—Komura Minbu and countless others. In the Succession Dispute, he crushed the Three Branch Houses’ authority, punished feudal lords, then proceeded to execute Ashima Tatewaki and Sanai… He himself drives a hoe into the anthill of this collapsing levee! He swings an axe to dismantle the shogunate! He is none other than the chief architect of imperial restoration!”

At that time, the succession dispute surrounding the thirteenth shogun Iesada—centered on Hitotsubashi Yoshinobu and Kii Yoshitomi—sent shockwaves through the political landscape.
This matter held such gravity that it drew a secret imperial directive alongside the commercial treaty’s ratification, yet the shogunate resolutely designated Yoshitomi as heir and unleashed severe repression upon those who had advocated for Hitotsubashi Yoshinobu.
Thus did Mito Nariaki face censure and enforced retirement; his son Yoshinaga endured confinement; Owari Yoshikatsu suffered house arrest; Matsudaira Shungaku likewise met with restriction; Ashima Tatewaki, chief retainer of the Mito house, received orders for ritual suicide—with multitudes more falling victim.
And Sanai too became ensnared in this same affair’s web.
“Precisely! Great Elder Ii himself stands as the arch-instigator of the shogunate’s overthrow.”

This Spring-and-Autumn-style expression stirred the gathering to fervor.

“Kita,” Entsuba Tounoshin interjected as if suddenly recalling something important—his voice carrying through the charged atmosphere—“when Sanai formed ties with Saigo Kichinosuke of Satsuma... there’s quite a tale there.”

“No—if it’s that story, let me tell it.”

“Let me tell it—you’re too long-winded and get us nowhere. It’s like this: When Sanai first went to visit him, Kichinosuke was in the garden having young men wrestle while he sat there like this, legs spread wide.”

“Kichinosuke stripped to the waist—”

“I told you to be quiet.”

Kanae brought tea and remained there, sitting quietly in a corner listening.
“After exchanging initial greetings, Sanai earnestly pressed him for his views on the current state of affairs. However, Yoshinosuke—in a tone of utter feigned ignorance—declared, ‘As you can see, I’m just a man who wrestles with youngsters here and there—no talent for such difficult matters,’ refusing to engage with a single word of discussion.”

“However, the very next day—”

“I told you to be quiet! But after Sanai left, Yoshinosuke finally realized what a remarkable man he was—and astonished, came here to visit Sanai the very next day.”

“Hey… Ishihara’s back!”
Interrupting the story, one of them shouted.

Ishihara Jinjuro and the other two who had remained at Ekōin Temple to handle the aftermath returned; to accommodate the three men, everyone spread out their seats.

“You have had a hard time. Is everything settled?”

“We have mostly taken care of things, but… we heard an unpleasant story.”

Jinjuro did not touch the tea Kanae offered. Carved deep wrinkles into his dark, angular face as he spoke in a sullen tone.

“What’s this unpleasant business?”
Kingo lifted his face.

“Did they slight you at the temple?”

“Not that.”
Jinjuro’s eyes flashed upward. “They say Sanai wept.”

“Wept… you mean—”

“When he was dragged to the execution ground and the executioner’s blade was raised, he covered his face with both hands and wept—or so they say.”

The words were unexpected.

Everyone gulped audibly and fell silent for a time, unable to gauge the truth of the matter…… Then Kanichiro swung around sharply and demanded—

“Ishihara, where did you hear that? Who started this story? You’re not suggesting it’s some baseless rumor…”

“That would have been a hundred times better! If it were a baseless rumor, we wouldn’t have to endure this shame—but sadly, it was the truth.”

“Let me hear in full detail. Speak.”

“It happened not long after you returned ahead of us.”
Jinjuro spoke haltingly, “...We gave sake to the low-ranking official who attended to the remains. You’d know about that, wouldn’t you?”
“That old underling was drunk, weeping and rambling—‘I’d heard Hashimoto Sanai was a loyalist samurai of renown,’ he said. ‘Even the jailers respected his character during imprisonment. I myself had long admired him… But a man’s worth isn’t known till the coffin’s sealed. Never thought Sanai’d prove a craven clinging to life—sniveling for survival.’”
“So he claimed… Hearing this, we dragged the wretch in for questioning. He tried blaming drunkenness—said it was a slip of the tongue—but pressed hard enough, he confessed the truth.”

“...And this fact—”
They all held their breath.

Seven

“Sanai went out to the execution ground and took his designated seat.”
Jinjuro continued gravely, “The executioner was a samurai from a certain domain. When he moved behind Sanai, raised his great sword, and called out ‘Are you ready?’—Sanai turned around—”

“Wait—wait a moment.”

he said.
And when the executioner held back the sword, Sanai shifted his position slightly, bowed toward the clan residence, then covered his face with both hands and wept in stifled silence—for a short while, a short while—before sitting upright again,

“That’s enough—cut.”

“...he said ‘That’s enough—cut.’ That’s the truth of it.”

“How can you be certain it’s true?”

“I confirmed it with the executioner—a samurai from a certain domain. I can’t name his clan or him due to our pact, but he attested to every detail without variance.”

No one spoke. Jinjuro’s eyebrows twitched as he continued: “What Ishide Tatewaki told us was warrior’s mercy. According to that underling’s account, all witnesses were ordered to keep silent about Sanai’s tears—they pitied him deeply. They say even the magistrate did. Yet Sanai himself—”

“Just as I thought—a bookish weakling after all,” said Makita Kingo sharply, crossing his arms. He had remained silent until now. “He had talent, sure—but he was a doctor’s son. Until recently, he’d been running around with a medicine spoon for surgeries and vaccinations. No wonder he didn’t know how to die like a samurai.”

“That may be so—but if Sanai was indeed any sort of loyalist samurai, he must have understood what significance his death carried.”

“Exactly—Hashimoto Sanai isn’t being executed as some private citizen. The dignity of Fukui samurai hangs upon him—the honor of loyalists across the nation hangs upon him!”

“But... but I can’t credit this as truth.”

“No—he’s precisely the bookish weakling I named him. Likely never possessed a shred of samurai pride. Yet even so—to weep at death’s approach? That reeks of base attachment. However you slice it, such blubbering...”

“Wait—please wait a moment.”

From the corner, Kanae quietly called out.
The clamorous gathering fell utterly silent at her voice and turned as one toward Kanae… Her forehead was deathly pale, her lips quivering as though giving direct voice to the fury in her heart… The people, seeing that expression, all straightened their knees as if struck through their very cores.

“I have heard Mr. Ishihara’s account.”
Kanae began, her voice restrained, “And I have heard all of your criticisms as well. But could Lord Sanai’s weeping truly be such a disgraceful act of cowardly clinging? … Though he was indeed raised as a physician’s son as you say, he was not one to cling to life when the moment came—a fact I believe Mr. Makita Kingo knows well.”

Kingo looked at Kanae with a start, but seeming to immediately grasp her meaning, he abruptly averted his eyes and bowed his head.

“All of you condemn his weeping—but if those who laugh at death are brave warriors, then consider this: they say many of those lawless men executed for robbery and murder laugh and recite death poems with ease as they meet their end… Are *they* the true brave warriors?”
Kanae, while desperately holding back her welling fury, caught her breath and spoke.

“Kindly listen closely to what I now say: Lord Sanai halted the executioner, bowed quietly toward our honorable clan residence, and wept in stifled silence. Once dragged to the execution ground, even a three-year-old child knows there’s no escaping whether one weeps or screams. Do you truly believe that a man who served our domain with even modest dedication would weep out of fear for his life in that moment? … That he wept from clinging attachment? … Even the lowliest lawless men can laugh as they die! But the courage to halt the decapitating blade, cover one’s face in silence, *then* weep—that belonged to Lord Sanai alone! … I do not claim he wept for our domain’s sake. Nor do I say he wept for our clan’s honor. Yet I *know*—it was neither cowardice nor attachment. No—it was a far nobler tear: a warrior’s lament for a life truly cherished!”

Kanae burst into tears the moment she finished speaking.
The assembled people had all lowered their faces by then, and among them were even those wiping their eyes with their fingers; Kanae rose from her seat while choking back sobs.

When she fled the hall as if escaping, she rushed straight to her room, leaned against the small desk, and wept for a time, her back quivering with sobs.
Kanae felt that now, at last, she had touched upon the true Sanai.
When Magistrate Ishiga had said he died laughing, the Sanai alive in her heart had not aligned with that description at all—it had felt like hearing about a stranger. But now, Sanai had returned in his former form.
Now, she truly reclaimed him.

Lord Sanai—you lived without a shred of falsehood, true to yourself until the end. You died true to yourself until the end. Never again will I let you depart from my heart.

Kanae murmured as if calling out to him alive and took out the death poem from the fold of her kimono. And when she reached the third verse, choking back sobs, she quietly recited thus.

"...Last night, frost first fell within the castle walls.
...Last night, frost first fell within the castle walls..."