Chapter 40

The porter who stood night guard at the gate of the house Lord Eitaro occupied in the city saw the master's daughter, Lady Anko, in the garden. The message he held had come urgently, late in the night.

It was addressed to Lady Satsuki, but surely Lady Anko would see her mother even before Kiyo, Lady Satsuki's maid, appeared in the garden.

Anko herself sat on a rustic half-log bench, listening to the birds waking up with the sun. She couldn't sleep any more. She'd see Benjamin soon. He was the young American sailor she'd met while he was surveying the area by her new home in the northeast mountains of Kyushu. He'd tickled her fancy with his talk of foreign shores. His people wanted something from her father's fief, but she wasn't sure what. She hadn't worked out how she'd manage to see him yet, but she would.

"Lady Anko, Lady Anko, good morning," the porter called.

"Good morning." She turned on the bench to see the man bowing obsequiously. "What do you want?"