So he decided to try a different approach.
He dismissed the guards and got up and leaned on the windowsill, looking at the city. "Tell me, quickly, in your own words what happened to you."
"I was a fisherman in the village of Anjiro in Izu, Lord, where I was born thirty-three years ago, Lord." Misamoto began at once--obviously the tale told a hundred times before. "Nine years ago I was fishing with six others in my boat, a few ri offshore, but we were caught in a sudden storm that quickly became a great one and we were blown before it for thirty days or more, eastwards, out into the great sea, hundreds of ri, perhaps a thousand, Sire.
During this time, three of my companions were washed overboard. Then the sea became calm but our sails had been ripped to pieces and there was no food and no water. The three of us fished but caught nothing, there was no water to drink... One of us went mad and jumped into the sea and began to swim to an island he thought he saw and drowned quickly. We saw no land or ship, just water.
Many days later the other man, my friend Ishii, died and I was alone. Then one day I thought I had died because I saw this strange ship that went along without sails and seemed to be on fire, but it was just a paddle steamer, American, going from Hong Kong to San Francisco. They rescued me, gave me food and treated me as one of them --I was petrified, Lord, but they shared their food and drink and clothed me..."
"This American ship took you to this San place? What happened then?"' Misamoto told how he had been put with a brother of the Captain of this ship, a ship's chandler, to learn the language and do odd jobs until the authorities decided what to do with him.
He lived with this family for about three years, working in their shop and in the port. One day, he was taken before an important official called Natow who questioned him closely, then told him he was to be sent with the warship Missouri to Shimoda to be an interpreter for Consul Townsend Harris who was already in Japan negotiating a Treaty.
By this time he wore Western clothes and had learn some Western ways.
"I accepted happily, Sire, certain I could be helpful here, specially helpful to the Bakufu. On the ninth day of the eighth month of the year 1857 by their counting, five years ago, sire, we hove to off Shimoda in Izu, my home village not far north, Sire. The moment I was ashore I obtained permission to leave for a day and set off at once, Lord, to report to the nearest guard house to find the nearest Bakufu official believing I would be welcome because of the knowledge I had got... But the barrier guards would not ..." Misamoto's face twisted with anguish.
"But they wouldn't listen to me, Sire, or understand ... they bound me and dragged me to Yedo... that was about five years ago, Lord, and ever since I've been treated like a criminal, confined like one though not in prison and I keep explaining and explaining I'm not a spy but a loyal man of Izu and what had happened to me..."
To Yoshi's disgust, tears began streaming down the man's face. He cut the whimpering short.
"Stop it! Do you or do you not know it is forbidden, by Law, to leave Nippon without permission?"' "Yes, Lord but I th--"' "And do you know under the same law, if broken, whatever the reason, whoever he or she is, the lawbreaker is forbidden to return on pain of death?"' "Oh yes, Sire, yes yes I did but, but I did not think it would include me, Sire, I thought I'd be welcomed and valuable and I'd been blown out to sea. It was the storm th--"' "A law is a law. This law is a good law. It prevents contamination. You consider you have been treated unfairly?"' "Oh no, Lord," Misamoto said hastily, wiping his tears away, with even greater fear, bowing his head to the tatami, "Please excuse me, I beg your forgiveness, please ex--"' "Just answer the questions. How fluent is your English?"' "I... I understand and speak some American English, Sire."
"Is that the same as the gai-jin here speak?"' "Yes Sire, yes more or les--"' "When you came to see the American Harris were you shaven or unshaven?"' "Unshaven, Sire, I had a trimmed beard like most sailors, Sire, and let my hair grow like theirs and tied into a pigtail and knotted with tar."
"Who did you meet with this gai-jin Harris?"' "Just him, Sire, just for an hour or so, and one of his staff, I don't remember his name."
Once more Yoshi weighed the dangers of his plan: to go to the meeting disguised, without Council approval, and to use this man as a spy, to overhear the enemy secretly. Perhaps Misamoto is a spy already, for gai-jin, he thought grimly, as all his interrogators believe. Certainly he's a liar, his story far too smooth, his eyes too cunning, and he's like a fox when off guard.
"Very well. Later I want to know everything you have learned, everything and... do you read and write?"' "Yes, Lord, but only a little in the English."
"Good. I have a use for you. If you obey exactly and please me, I will review your case. If you fail me, however slightly, you-will-wish-you-had-not."
He explained what he wanted, assigned him teachers, and when his guards had returned Misamoto yesterday clean-shaven, his hair dressed like a samurai's, and wearing the clothes of an official with two swords though these were false and without blades, he had not recognized him.
"Good. Walk up and down."
Misamoto obeyed and Yoshi was impressed how quickly the man had learned an erect posture as the teacher had shown him, not the correct, normal servile attitude of a fisherman.
Too quickly, he thought, convinced now that Misamoto was more, or less, than he wanted others to see.
"You understand clearly what you are to do?"' "Yes, Sire, I swear I won't fail you, Sire."
"I know, my guards have orders to kill you the instant you leave my side, or become clumsy, or... indiscreet."
"We'll stop for ten minutes," Sir William said wearily. "Tell them, Johann."
"They ask why?" Johann Favrod, the Swiss interpreter yawned.
"Pardon. Seems they think they've discussed all the points etc. etc., that they'll carry back your message etc. etc. and meet again at Kanagawa with the reply from on high etc. etc. in about sixty days as suggested earlier etc. etc."
The Russian muttered, "Let me have the fleet for a day, and I'll solve these matyeryebitz and this whole problem."
"Quite," Sir William agreed, adding in fluent Russian, "sorry, my dear Count, but we're here for a diplomatic solution, preferably." Then in English, "Show them where to wait, Johann. Shall we, gentlemen?" He got up, bowed stiffly, and led the way into a waiting room. As he passed Phillip Tyrer he said, "Stay with them, keep your eyes and ears open."
All the Ministers headed for the tall chamber pot that was in the corner of their anteroom. "My God," Sir William said thankfully.
"Thought my bloody bladder would pop."
Lun came in leading other servants with trays. "Heya, Mass'er. Tea-ah, sam'wich-ah!" He jerked a disdainful thumb towards the other room. "All same give monkees, heya?"
"You'd better not let them hear you say that, by God. Perhaps some of them speak pidgin."
Lun stared at him. "Wat say, Mass'er?"
"Oh never mind."
Lun went out laughing to himself.
"Well, gentlemen, as expected, progress zero."
Seratard was lighting his pipe, Andr`e Poncin beside him, carelessly pleased with Sir William's discomfiture. "What do you propose to do, Sir William?"
"What's your advice?"
"It is a British problem, only partially French. If it was entirely mine I would have already settled it with French elan--on the day it happened."
"But of course, mein Herr, you would need an equally fine fleet," von Heimrich said curtly.
"Of course. In Europe we have many, as you know. And if it was Imperial French policy to be here in strength as our British allies, we would have had one or two fleets here."
"Yes, well..." Sir William was tired. "It's clear that your collective advice is to be tough with them?"
"Rough and tough," Count Zergeyev said.
"Ja."
"Of course," Seratard agreed. "I thought that's what you had already in mind, Sir William."
The Minister munched on a sandwich and finished his tea. "All right. I'll close the meeting now, reconvene for ten tomorrow, with an ultimatum: a meeting with the Shogun within a week, the murderers, the indemnity or else--with, er, of course your joint approval."
Seratard said, "I suggest, Sir William, given it might be difficult for them to deliver a meeting with the Shogun, why not keep that for later until we have reinforcements--and real cause for a meeting with him. After all, this exercise is a show of force to correct an evil, not to implement Imperial policy, yours or ours."
"Wise," the Prussian said reluctantly.
Sir William pondered the reasons behind the suggestion but could find no fault or hidden hazard. "Very well. We'll demand an "early meeting" with the Shogun. Agreed?"