Feeling hungry, Isaku started eating some of the roasted beans he had in his bag.

'There's quite a bit of cargo there. That's some haul,' said Gonsuke, his voice trembling as he looked down on the bay.

'Is this more than O-fune-sama in the past?' asked Isaku.

'There have been bigger ships, but this amount of cargo's unusual. There's a lot on the beach, and there's still more to come off the ship.' Gonsuke's eyes glistened with excitement.

Gonsuke undoubtedly knew what he was talking about, since he had been on lookout each time O-fune-sama had come. Isaku felt excitement welling up inside him at the very thought of the exceptional amount of cargo. 'What do you think could be on board?' he asked.

'Well, first of all, there could be rice, then maybe things like beans, cloth, pottery, tobacco, writing-paper, oil and sugar. Once there was even a ship carrying twenty casks of wine,' he said, baring his chipped teeth in a grin.

The ship must have been eventually emptied of cargo around the time the sun began to set. The boats became less active, and the villagers started to carry everything off the beach up to the chief's house.

The snow on the mountains looming behind the village took on a purple tinge before giving way to the night. Down on the beach the light of the fire suddenly glimmered, and the village sank into darkness.

Isaku helped Gonsuke dig a hole in the deep snow that had built up behind a large rock, lining the inside with dry leaves and gra.s.s. After they had criss-crossed sticks over the top of the hole and placed bark on top, they climbed in and lay down back to back.

There was a wicked chill in the air, but inside the hole it gradually became warmer. Gonsuke started to snore.

Isaku lay in the dark, his eyes wide open. By all accounts the village chief would order the bounty from O-fune-sama to be distributed fairly to each household, according to the number of people in each family. With the bulk of the cargo undoubtedly being bales of rice, Isaku was beside himself with joy at the thought of partaking of such a delicacy. His younger brother and sister had never tasted rice, and he imagined the luxury of serving them rice gruel. He could just picture how the delectably sweet taste of the white gruel would astonish them.

Gonsuke was certainly right about the large haul, and naturally this meant that each family could look forward to receiving a generous amount of food and other items. With the saury not selling and a poor catch of autumn octopus allowing them to buy only a pitiful amount of grain, the coming of O-fune-sama was nothing less than deliverance from the fear of starvation. If managed properly, the bounty would last them two or even three years. There would be no need for them to sell themselves into bondage, and no doubt they would be able to lead quiet, peaceful lives for some time to come. Tami would stay with her family, and Takichi would continue to spend his days as a fisherman and a father to his child.

Isaku put his hand over his heart. The coming of O-fune-sama was due to divine intercession, and Isaku wanted to offer a prayer of grat.i.tude from the bottom of his heart.

The sound of the waves breaking at the foot of the promontory seemed to reverberate from the earth's very core. Before he knew it he was asleep.

He woke up to find a hand shaking his shoulder.

Gonsuke reached up and pushed aside the branches and bark covering the hole. Isaku felt a sudden rush of cold air. There were still stars in the night sky, but they were losing their brightness.

Isaku crawled out of the hole. Gonsuke was blowing life into the dying embers of the fire, and in no time he had the dry branches crackling.

Isaku warmed himself by the fire and looked out to sea. As daybreak drew near, the sea was calm. Down in the bay, work had already started; he could see what must have been flaming torches set up in the boats moving on the water, as well as on the stranded ship.

Gonsuke cooked two salted saury in the fire, handing one to Isaku. Fat oozed out of the hot fish, and as he ate it with the roasted beans the saltiness of the saury was neutralised, producing an incredibly delicious taste.

Daybreak came, and the sea was bathed in morning sunlight. Splashes of spray shot up again and again round the stranded ship as pieces of timber and planks were thrown overboard.

'Looks like they're taking O-fune-sama apart,' said Isaku, straining his eyes to see what was happening.

'That's because she's made of good-quality timber. Can be used for anything. There are nails and hinges to be had there, too. And all the pots and pans down in the galley, not to mention the knives, buckets and rice tubs. Sometimes there are even cabinets or chests,' said Gonsuke enthusiastically.

Now Isaku understood why the elder in charge had got them to prepare saws, axes and mallets. The ship was being taken apart and the timber dropped into the water.

The boats were towing it to the sh.o.r.e, where it was pulled up on the beach. From there it was carried into the woods behind the village.

Isaku and Gonsuke cast their eyes across the sea: no sign of any pa.s.sing vessels. Off to the east, they could now see scores of seabirds dancing in the air like snowflakes, with the reflections off a school of fish breaking the surface of the sea below them. No smoke was to be seen over the other side of the bay, either, on Tide Point.

Two small boats started to move away from the ship in the direction of the promontory where Isaku and Gonsuke were standing.

'They're taking the bodies away,' said Gonsuke.

Isaku looked over. He could clearly see something covered with straw matting in the bottom of the boats. Eventually, the boats started to disappear from sight, one after another, down at the foot of the cape.

The tumult around the ship showed no signs of stopping, and the vessel soon lost all semblance of its original shape. Work was progressing at a brisk pace, and already the part of the stern that held the smashed rudder had disappeared. He could see a boat carrying away the sailcloth.

Just after the Hour of the Horse, the only part left on the rocks was the bottom of the hull. There were also people actually standing on the reef as they worked on the boat with astonishing speed.

When the timber from what seemed to be bunks had been towed away, all that was left floating on the water was pieces of the keel. When these were pulled up onto the sh.o.r.e, the last trace of the ship disappeared from the rocky bay, leaving nothing but the placid sea.

'Have you ever seen a ship heading this way when you've been on lookout?' asked Isaku, seeming to lose interest in the task at hand.

'Yeah, I have. Two in one day,' said Gonsuke, scanning the sea.

A plume of smoke rose into the air.

'That's the signal that they've finished. That's it for us, too,' said Gonsuke, throwing snow on the fire. 'Let's go and have a look at what they've got. Looks like a fair-sized haul all right,' he added, swinging his axe up onto his shoulder.

Isaku followed Gonsuke into the woods, weaving his way between the trees as he scampered to keep up with Gonsuke's fast clip. Exhilarated, he felt as if he were walking on air. No doubt his mother and Isokichi had worked through the day with the other villagers.

He wanted to join the frenzied excitement in the village as quickly as he could. When they reached the mountain path, Gonsuke, axe on his back, broke into a trot, with Isaku close behind, impatient to see the bounty O-fune-sama had brought.

Coming out of the trees they could see the sh.o.r.e down to the right. They expected to see the villagers dancing madly, but instead they all stood stock-still by the water's edge. Taken aback, Isaku broke stride for a second, but Gonsuke ran on unperturbed down the slope so he followed him.

Gonsuke left the path and stepped onto the beach. Breathing hard, Isaku walked over to the gathering.

The villagers were standing around their chief, palms pressed together as they faced out to sea. Isaku understood that they were offering prayers of grat.i.tude for the bounty bestowed on them by the sea. When the village chief finished praying, the elder standing beside him turned to the people and in a spirited voice said, 'Well done. Your hard work has made your chief happy. Now go home and spend the rest of the day praying to your ancestors. The bounty from O-fune-sama will be apportioned tomorrow morning.'

The chief left the water's edge, followed by the villagers, no one saying a word, the glint in their eyes and their beaming smiles telling all. Prodded by Gonsuke, Isaku took a step in front of the elder. The old man was satisfied when Gonsuke reported that there had been no signs of ships approaching. Isaku bowed deeply and walked to his house.

When Isaku pushed his way past the straw matting hanging at the doorway, his mother turned to look at him as she prayed in front of the ihai, their ancestral tablet. She looked completely different, her face flushed with happiness, the corners of her mouth turned up in a way that Isaku had never seen before.

He stepped onto the floor, pressed his palms together in front of the ancestral tablet, and sat down by the fireside. Feeling another wave of joy, he wanted to jump up and dance around the room.

The sun had begun to go down and the temperature was falling. His mother started heating a pot of water with buckwheat seeds, then brought some salted saury over to the fireside. Obviously the makings of a meal much more generous than usual.

'What was on O-fune-sama?' Isaku asked his mother.

'Rice, and lots of it,' his mother said, enunciating each word for effect.

'What else?'

'There was cotton and rapeseed oil, too. Wax, tea, wine and soy sauce, vinegar and matting. But the rice ... This O-fune-sama was a rice ship,' said his mother excitedly.

What a great day it is, Isaku thought. It was a joy to see his mother so talkative, and he felt her happiness affecting not only him but his brother and sister as well; they sat, smiling, beside him. When the buckwheat seeds started to dance in the hot water, his mother added some vegetables and seaweed. The room grew dark, and their faces gleamed red in the light from the flames. Smoke started to float up from the skewered saury around the fire. His mother filled their bowls from the pot one by one, Isaku first, next his brother, and then his sister, before serving herself.

Isaku nibbled a saury and sipped away at the vegetable porridge. The next day the rice would be distributed, and he was elated at the thought of his brother and sister's first taste of rice gruel.

'Just another year and a bit more now,' whispered his mother as she picked up her bowl. Isaku looked at her, wondering what she meant, but soon realised from the gleam in her eyes that she was thinking of his father. He had gone into bondage for a three-year term, which would be up around the time the snow melted the year after next. Some of the bounty from O-fune-sama would undoubtedly still be left, which would take a load off his father's mind. If they had been starving, his father might even have considered selling himself into bondage once again; but now such fears were gone.

His mother dished out another serving of vegetable porridge for his brother and sister, a relaxed expression on her face as she manipulated her chopsticks. Shortly after finishing the meal, his little sister started to nod off, so his mother picked her up and carried her to the straw bedding. His brother lay down in the corner of the room.

'How many dead bodies were there?' asked Isaku, remembering the two little boats he had seen from his observation post on the cape.

His mother looked up as she sipped her cup of hot water.

'Three fell overboard and drowned. There were four people left on the ship, counting the injured men, but they were all killed,' she said quietly.

'Did they resist at all?' asked Isaku as he watched his mother's face by the light of the fire.

'I heard they didn't do a thing, just pleaded for their lives,' said his mother in a toneless voice.

Most likely the crew had cut off their topknots as they sought divine protection. Isaku could imagine them kneeling on the deck, dishevelled hair hanging down as they pleaded with the villagers to spare their lives.

'There's no room for pity. It'd be a disaster if any of 'em were allowed to live. They had to be killed; your ancestors decided that, and that's how it's been ever since. Village rules have to be obeyed,' said his mother, a stony look in her eyes. Isaku nodded solemnly.

The next day the sea was rough. The waves broke on the sh.o.r.e with a thunderous roar, and the straw matting at the entrances to the houses fluttered as the wind lashed against the coast.

Isaku and his mother headed along the path to the village chief's house, spray raining down on them each time a wave crashed in. The faces of the people they met along the way beamed with joy.

The earthen floor of the entrance to the village chief's house thronged with people talking in restrained voices, but there was no doubting the gleam in their eyes and the gaiety in their voices. At the back of the room the village elders were busy laying out hemp stalks on the floor to use for their calculations. It had been decided that the rice would be distributed first.

The men bent over the sticks on the floor looked up as one of them got down on all fours and spoke to the village chief. The chief nodded again and again. When the trusted elder sitting beside the chief stood up, the noise of talk died away.

'There were three hundred and twenty-three bales of rice on board O-fune-sama,' he said. The crowd seemed to sway as one in reaction to his words. Isaku's heart almost missed a beat at the news of such incredible riches.

'Each adult man and woman will receive three bales and each child one bale. The remaining forty-nine bales will be stored as the village chief's share.'

On hearing this, the villagers struggled to hold back their excitement, and a hubbub of voices broke from the floor again as people bowed deeply toward the village chief.

Smiles appeared on the faces of the village chief and the elder, and Isaku saw his mother and others around him weeping. Those ten years old and above were judged to be adults, so both Isaku and his mother qualified for the adult quota. Isaku counted up their allotment on his fingers, working out that their family was ent.i.tled to eight bales of rice.

'We'll get eight bales!' he blurted excitedly to his mother.

'Eight bales!' she cried, looking down at her son. Tears continued to well up in her eyes and flow down her cheeks. From the look on her face, she seemed to be fighting to stop herself from breaking down and sobbing.

When people returned to the village from indentured service, the chief would supply them with their share of rice from what was stored away. When Isaku's father returned in the spring the year after next, he would receive an allotment, too, and the family would benefit even more.

The village chief got to his feet, as did the elder. The villagers followed them to the area behind the house. There were too many bales to fit in the storeroom, so they had been stacked up outside on straw matting. Isaku peered over people's shoulders at the bales of rice as though he were looking at an incredible treasure.

On the elder's instructions the men started sharing out the bales of rice. Using hemp stalks, they counted the number of bales. When the elder called Isaku's name, eight bales of rice were laid on the ground with two long sticks, and two short ones signifying his brother and sister's allocation. He thought that if his sister Teru had not died, another short stick would have been placed there.

When the allocation was finished, the villagers prostrated themselves in front of the chief and uttered words of grat.i.tude. Many pressed their hands together in prayer.

The elder raised his voice to be heard.

'Eat the rice a little at a time. We don't know when O-fune-sama will be back again. It might not be for years. People who get too used to the taste of rice will reap the consequences. You men must keep yourselves busy fishing, and the women must still scour the sh.o.r.e for sh.e.l.lfish.'

The villagers bowed deeply once more.

They all got to their feet and stood in front of their respective allotments of rice, sixteen portions in all. Household heads took to the village path with their share.

'You'll never be able to carry that,' said his mother. Isaku grabbed the rope on the bale and tried to lift it onto his shoulder, but could get it no further than his waist. It was much heavier than he had expected.

'Sissy!' barked his mother, but the smile on her face betrayed her happiness. She took hold of the bale and worked it onto her shoulder, her hips wobbling a little as she set off along the path.

Isaku blushed with embarra.s.sment, miserable to think that he, the supposed provider of the family, was unable to lift a bale of rice onto his shoulder; what was more, his newfound fishing skills obviously counted for nothing when judging manhood, a humbling fact.

His mother made several trips between the village chief's house and their home, where they stacked up the bales on top of some planking on the earthen floor area. After carrying back the last bale, she took a drink of water, wiped the sweat from her brow, and sat down to have a rest before scooping a little bowlful of rice from one of the bales and placing it as an offering in front of the ihai, the ancestral tablet. The children copied their mother as she knelt in prayer.

In the evening his mother put the rice from the offering into a pot and started to boil it. The smell drifted up and brought to mind his last memories of rice; he stared at the seething white ma.s.s in the pot where the swollen grains jumped up and down. His mother served him some of the rice gruel. He was overwhelmed as soon as he put it to his lips: a rich and elegant taste. He felt as though he were being filled with strength. His little brother and sister ate speechlessly, but there was no mistaking the astonished look in their eyes.

Kura's father came to meet Isaku's mother and accompanied her to Takichi's house. Because Kura had played her role so successfully in the O-fune-sama ritual, she was now lauded in the village. A celebration was held in her honour at Takichi's house.

A while later Isaku's mother returned home in high spirits.

'She did well. The village chief sent three bales of rice and some wine. He said that her kicking over that table so well was what brought O-fune-sama in.' His mother had obviously been drinking, for she took a deep breath after gulping down some water from the jug.

The roar from crashing waves was oppressive to the ear, but it could not dampen the gaiety that prevailed throughout the village.

Isaku lay down to sleep beside Isokichi.

The distribution of goods continued the next day. Rapeseed oil, soy sauce, vinegar and wine were apportioned according to the size of each family, and the people carried away their shares in jars and tubs. The wax and half the tea were to be kept at the village chief's house, which also functioned as the village meeting-house. The tatami matting, too, was stored away.

That night the fires under the salt cauldrons were lit again, because the village chief wanted to encourage his people to return to their daily routine, lest their windfall make them succ.u.mb to indolence. Even so, they hoped they might be blessed with yet another O-fune-sama.

The men started to go out fishing again on calm days, exchanging cheery glances across the water. Some even waved or smiled at Isaku without any special reason.

Isaku took Isokichi out on the water, but the thought of the bales of rice and the other luxuries piled up at home made him slacken. There were times when he pulled the line only to find that the bait had been taken. With enough food to last them a long time, Isaku lost the hunger needed to fish for small fry.

Even the women foraging for sh.e.l.lfish and seaweed on the sh.o.r.e seemed to spend more time chatting than working. Their cackling laughter could occasionally be heard out on the water.

Isaku's turn came to tend the fires on the beach. He had thought that O-fune-sama had always been little more than a pipe dream for the villagers, but now that he had experienced it at first hand, he felt the importance of the work on the cauldron fires and wanted nothing more than to see O-fune-sama out there when he was on duty.

The year ended, and New Year's Day came. Isaku turned eleven years of age.

As was the custom, during the New Year holiday villagers stayed at home. Isaku spent his time in silence with his family. The sea was rough, and each day saw another snow squall. Their return to work on the sixth day of the New Year was marked by clear skies with little wind, but the sea was still running high. His mother put a generous amount of rice into the pot to boil. Pieces of dried squid grilled slowly on the fire. There was also a plateful of pickled octopus.

Isaku sipped his gruel with its ample measure of rice and nibbled away at the dried squid. This was the first time he had partaken of a breakfast befitting New Year.

After the meal, they all went to pay their respects at the graves of their ancestors. So much snow had fallen that it came up to his hips. His mother had his little sister strapped to her back as she made her way with the other villagers to the cemetery. They brushed the snow off the graves, placed several grains of rice on each stone, and prayed.

They trudged back through the snow along the path to the village chief's house. The sky was blue and the glare off the snow was dazzling.

On stepping into the village chief's house they saw three of the more prominent members of the community sitting around, drinking wine. Isaku and his family bowed as they uttered New Year's greetings to the chief, who smiled back and nodded in recognition.