After that the attendants’ begging of pipes from Narihiro came to an abrupt end. This was because Sōshun and Ryōtetsu proved to them that the pipe he carried was made of brass.

Then Narihiro’s three faithful retainers, who had temporarily deceived him with a brass pipe made to look like gold, after conferring together again, commanded Sumiyoshiya Shichibei to make a pure gold pipe. It had the plum-blossom-and-spear-point crest scattered over it and did not differ in the least from the one Kōchiyama [Pg 122]had received in the beginning. In his heart looking forward to the importunities of the attendants, Narihiro went triumphantly to the castle with the pipe.

But not a single attendant came to ask him for it. Even Kōchiyama, who had already begged two of them out of him, took but a single glance at this one and, with a slight bow, went away. The other daimyō present maintained silence and, of course, never asked to see it. This seemed strange to Narihiro.

No, it was not just strange. In the end, it made him vaguely uneasy. So when he saw Kōchiyama coming again, he spoke first himself this time.

“Sōshun, don’t you want me to give you a pipe?”

“No, thank you, I’ve already had one.”

Sōshun probably thought to make sport of Narihiro. There was a sharpness in the way these polite words were spoken.

When Narihiro heard them, his face clouded with displeasure. The flavor of his Nagasaki tobacco was no longer sweet in his mouth. For suddenly he felt that the power of his million koku, of which he had been sensible up to this time, was vanishing away utterly like the smoke rising from the end of his pure gold pipe.

According to men now grown old, in the Maeda family, after Narihiro, both Nariyasu and Noriyasu used only brass pipes, and this may well have been the result of a death-bed warning left to his descendants by Narihiro, whose pure gold pipe had taught him a lesson.

Comments

Comments