Little Yokozuna Read online

  "I don't know if it was this Little Harriet," said the father. "But last night Kiyoshi-chan thinks he saw a little ghost in the form of a girl. Here."

  "Where?!" said Annie. "Where?"

  "In the garden," said the father. "In the darkest part of the night. But I am sorry."

  "Why are you sorry?" cried Annie. "Tell us where she went."

  "Now I am sorry that I mentioned it," said the father, very distressed. He looked almost as if he would cry. "It was so stupid of me. Please forgive me."

  "Why?" insisted Annie, confused. "Why?"

  "Because," said the father, "it could not have been this Little Harriet of yours. It must have been a dream of Kiyoshi-chan's."

  "But why must it have been a dream?" asked Knuckleball. "I don't understand."

  "Because of what Kiyoshi-chan said he saw," said the father. "He said that she came out of the garden like a ghost and dived back into the earth like a fish and disappeared" He spread his hands out and rolled his eyes toward Kiyoshi-chan. "I'm so sorry for mentioning it. Kiyoshi-chan had a very difficult night of sleeping last night."

  "But of course she dove into the ground!" said KnucklebalL "How else would she get away if she was scared?"

  Kiyoshi-chan's father looked at the boy as if he had three heads.

  "In America," he said, "do children swim through the ground like water? Do you learn how to do this in school?"

  "Not in school; said KnucklebalL "Hardly."

  Kiyoshi-chan's father slapped his knees decisively. "Your words make no sense," he said. "I don't think I want to listen anymore."

  "The truth is stranger than you know," said Annie. "Give us time to tell you."

  "Pah!" said the father, but not in a bad temper. "I think I have no time for your kind of truth."

  "But look at the strange things you have seen already tonight," said Annie. "Look at this helmet."

  "I've seen nothing," said Kiyoshi-chan's father. "Someone in a samurai costume played a prank on you in the street, and Kiyoshi-chan had another one of his foolish dreams. Last week he dreamed that the yokozuna Taiho was playing left field for the Boston Red Sox, in a pink kimono. Please let's eat. Itadaki-masu."

  " Itadaki-masu," said Annie and Knuckleball, but they looked at each other before picking up their chopsticks to eat. "She's here!" their eyes said to each other. And in the growing light of the blue-gray morning rain, it seemed to them as if it would be easy now to find her and bring her home again.

  CHAPTER 5

  Breaking and Entering

  On the same rainy morning Annie and Knuckleball were eating breakfast with Kiyoshi-chan's family in Kashiwa, the yellow sun was rising on a stony mountain, a painted temple, and an old snow monkey in another part of Japan.

  The mountain was covered with ancient, windshaped trees and overlooked a long valley that reached away to the horizon. In its history it had been climbed by untold numbers of pilgrims.

  The temple was silent and philosophical, as temples should be, especially one famous for a seven-hundred-year-old garden.

  The monkey was sitting under an alder tree, trying his best to look ignorant. His name was Basho, and he was an old macaque who possibly should have known better. Presently he was scratching his armpits, somersaulting, and trying to compose a haiku about a frog, three activities that very few humans can do simultaneously.

  "White cherry blossoms," he said. "Falling dapple the old frog. The golden sun smiles."

  "That is so trite," came a whisper from the bushes behind him. "At least try to be more original. I've read better haiku on cereal boxes."

  "Bah," said Basho. "One flea on my rump has more originality than you do in your whole soul. What could you know about haiku, gaijin?"

  "And sit still," the voice whispered again. "Try not to make a scene. Do you have to flip like that every ten seconds?"

  "Yes," said the monkey, standing on his head and looking between his legs at the temple. "Don't you?"

  "No!" said the voice in the bushes. "Does the expression self-control mean anything at all to you?"

  "Yes," the monkey replied again, doing a double flip in the air and landing on all fours. "It is no fun. It is one of the things that makes humans so boring. How can you stand it?"

  "It comes in handy," said the voice. "When you have to do things like sneak into secret gardens for unnatural purposes. Do I have to tie you to the ground?"

  "Try it," said the monkey. "You might be surprised who ends up in knots."

  "Hmph," grumped the voice.

  "Besides," said the monkey, "what do you think would be more conspicuous, a monkey acting just like a monkey, as I am, or a monkey just sitting still on the ground like a big dumb mushroom?"

  The voice mumbled something reluctant, which Basho decided to interpret as an apology.

  "Don't mention it," he said. He stood on his head, making a tripod with his two legs, and began to wave his bottom in the air. He peeped into the bushes and recited, "Age-old lotus pond. Suddenly a frog leaps in. Surprised water speaks."

  "Oh, put a sock in it," said the voice, for the first time in English. "I'm sick of your haiku."

  "Domo arigato," Basho said. "Your words are too kind. I don't understand your foreign gibberish exactly, but I sense that its meaning is that you love my poetry and will soon die if you don't hear more."

  "Oh, go jump in an age-old pond yourself," said the voice.

  The monkey kept up its vigil, watching the temple with one eye while leaping back and forth from the branches of the alder tree to the ground.

  "Besides," said the monkey again, getting bored. Another haiku followed. "Roadside frog awaits. Eager to reach other side. Donkey steps on him."

  "Well," said the invisible speaker, in a weary voice. "Now he's doing haiku about roadkill. Very sensitive. Sign of a great soul."

  "I love poetry," said the monkey, spinning around like a top. "Helps my digestion."

  At that moment, there was the sound of a quiet latch.

  "Hark!" said Basho.

  "Quiet!" hissed the voice.

  The temple gate opened. A very, very old priest came out, closed the gate, and shuffled away up the mountain path, all bent over and tapping with his staff on the stones.

  "Wow!" said a new voice in the bushes. "Did you see him? He must be at least a thousand years old."

  "Is he the last one to leave?" asked the first voice.

  "Should be," said the monkey. He waited till the old man had disappeared from sight, then scampered off toward the gate.

  "C'mon, 'Siah," said the bodiless voice to someone, and out of the bushes came two more figures, running over the grass after the monkey. One of them was a teenaged boy, dressed in ragged, baggy clothes, who kept looking in all directions as he ran. The other was much smaller, a quick little boy of maybe five, whose feet hummed over the ground. In no time at all, the three of them had slipped inside the gate and shut it behind them.

  "This is so ridiculous," said the bigger boy, as they made their way along a flagstoned path, looking in every direction as they went. He was a gentle bear of a young man, squarely built and soft-spoken, with handsome eyes. His head was covered with a fine dark stubble, like a Buddhist monk's. He had been named Owen Greatheart by his parents, and at some point had decided he wanted to be called by both his names. He had long ago forgotten why. "Why can't they just let people see their old garden without making us sneak around like criminals?"

  "Yeah," said the little boy called 'Siah. "We're not gonna hurt it or anything." His face was the beautiful dark color of smooth chocolate, and his expressions were quick and bright. His name was properly Josiah, but no one called him that.

  "Because," said the monkey, "they got tired of picking people's candy wrappers out of the philosophical shrubs." He got a poetic look on his monkey face for no good reason. "Young eager tadpole," he said. "Loses tail in the bright stream. The summer moon weeps."

  "What is it with you and frogs!" said Owen Greatheart. "Your poetry is ir
relevant"

  "Ah," said Basho the monkey, with infinite sadness. "You have no subtlety."

  They came to a high fence made of tied bamboo stakes.

  "Is this it?" said the big boy. There was a gate in the fence. Above the fence they could see the tops of small trees, but little else. They heard sparrows chittering inside, and the whisper of what might have been moving water. The three of them stood still suddenly, looking and listening. Something subtle shifted in the air.

  "This is the place," said Owen Greatheart. "I can tell." He tried the latch of the gate. "There's no lock here."

  "They trust us," Basho said with scorn, "not to try to enter where we're not wanted."

  "Well," said Owen Greatheart, "we wouldn't if it weren't an emergency."

  "Then enter," said the monkey, gesturing with exaggerated courtesy.

  The big boy lifted the latch and they entered the ancient garden in cautious single file, with the monkey at the rear. Directly before them was a shaded corridor of trees, bending sharply to the right out of sight.

  "Wait," said the monkey, hanging back. "I don't like this at all. Not another step until you give me a good reason for being here."

  "Well," said Owen Greatheart, with patience. "Haven't we explained this before?"

  "Not very clearly," said Basho. "We've hardly taken a spare breath since you kidnapped me."

  "I'd hardly call it a kidnapping" said Owen Greatheart. "You told us about this garden and said you'd lead us to it."

  "Ha!" said the monkey. "Only after you told me it was a matter of life and death. What could I say? Even a monkey has honor, you know."

  "No, we don't," said 'Siah. "We didn't even know that monkeys do poetry till we met you."

  "We still don't," said Owen Greatheart.

  "Sorry," said the monkey. "Not another step without more information."

  "OK," said Owen Greatheart, shutting the gate behind him and turning back to Basho. "Here goes, but let's make it quick. It all started in Boston."

  "What is Boston?" asked the monkey.

  "A city," said Owen Greatheart.

  "In America," said 'Siah.

  "What is America?" asked the monkey.

  "Never mind" said Owen Greatheart, beginning to lose patience. "We'll give you the geography lesson next time. Anyway, there we were at the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, in the Japanese garden."

  "Ah!" said the monkey.

  "It's just a little garden," said Owen Greatheart, "not old like this one, and you're supposed to stay on the path."

  "Of course," said the monkey.

  "So there we were," said Owen Greatheart, "looking at the little islands, the silver gravel, the bridges and lanterns, when Little Harriet suddenly saw a... I don't know the word in Japanese. A chipmunk."

  "Does it have feathers?" asked Basho. "This cheepumon- ku?"

  "No," said Owen Greatheart. "It's little, with stripes."

  "It's fun," said 'Siah. "Which is why Little Harriet chased it."

  "And Little Harriet is?" asked Basho.

  "Our sister," said 'Siah. "She's only four, and real little. She didn't know any better."

  "Well," said Owen Greatheart, "Little Harriet took off after that chipmunk and disappeared behind the stone lantern, into a thick clump of shrubs. We yelled at her first to come back, because we knew the museum would be mad at us if we all took off after her across the gravel, but she didn't seem to hear us."

  "A child," said the monkey, "with a will of her own. And a great love of cheepu-mon-ku." He chuckled to himself, enchanted with his own pronunciation of the foreign word, and repeated it several times under his breath.

  "That's what we thought," said Owen Greatheart, "but it's not really like Little Harriet. And that's when we felt the breeze."

  "Are breezes unusual in Boston?" asked the monkey.

  "No," said Owen Greatheart, "not at all. But this was a piney sort of breeze, like New Hampshire, and cool, blowing toward us from the place Little Harriet had disappeared. It was very hot and still in Boston that day."

  "Ah," said Basho. "So what did you do?"

  "Well, Annie went first," said Owen Greatheart. "She being the oldest She tiptoed over, trying to step on stones and not on plants or the gravel. When she got there, she peeked behind the lantern and called for Little Harriet to come out. When she didn't, Annie went around behind the lantern herself, and seemed to take forever to come back."

  "So did she?" asked Basho.

  "Why, yes," said Owen Greatheart. "She poked her head back around with a funny look on her face and said that Little Harriet was gone. Well, that did something to all of us. It scared us terribly."

  "We love Little Harriet," said 'Siah. "A lot."

  "And the breeze was doing something to our heads, too, I think," said Owen Greatheart. "Anyway, before we knew it we all took off across the garden and ran behind the stone. I'm sure we left lots of footprints in the raked gravel. I feel bad about that."

  "And?" said the monkey.

  "And suddenly we weren't in Boston any more," said Owen Greatheart.

  "And where were you?" asked the monkey.

  "Well," said Owen Greatheart, but he didn't have a chance to finish. 'Siah clutched his arm.

  "Owen!" said the little boy, looking over his shoulder toward the gate.

  "What is it?" asked the monkey, still chuckling. "Another cheepu-mon-ku?" Then he also looked, and shrieked in terror.

  There was a deep shout of anger, and before they had a chance even to turn around and prepare for the danger, a figure came leaping like a whirlwind through the gate, someone who seemed huge in a vast dark robe with a great cruel club in his hand.

  "Look out!" cried Owen Greatheart, catching up to 'Siah and trying to shield him. "Run! Deeper into the garden!"

  But before they could do it, the madman had leaped around them and cut them off on the path, clubbing them right and left until they were a bruised heap on the ground, 'Siah still under Owen Greatheart and protected from the heaviest blows. They cowered on the path, not daring to look up and see their enemy.

  CHAPTER 6

  Owen Greatheart Explains Things

  "You are all very foolish," said a quavery, quiet voice.

  The three conspirators still crouched cringing on the ground, waiting for another blow.

  "Look up," said the voice.

  "We don't dare," said Owen Greatheart. "We're afraid you'll hit us again."

  "I haven't hit you yet," said the voice. "Why would I hit you now?"

  "Tell that to my head," said Owen Greatheart.

  "And to my poor sore bottom," said the monkey.

  "Yeah," said 'Siah, not wanting to be left out. "Me too."

  "No one has hit any of you," said the voice. "Go ahead, feel your heads and your poor sore bottoms. Are there any bruises? Any painful places?"

  They did so, gingerly. It was true. Nothing was sore.

  "You expected me to hit you," said the voice. "I frightened you, shouted a warning, and waved my old staff vigorously around your poor bodies until you collapsed, thinking you were beaten. Heh-heh. Was it a good trick?"

  "Good trick," muttered Basho, but still no one dared look up.

  "Look up, foolish creatures," said the voice. "I couldn't hurt a butterfly if my life depended on it. Or rather, I wouldn't."

  Slowly the boys and monkey rolled apart from their heap on the ground. Standing above them, holding a short staff, was the ancient priest whom they had seen leaving the temple earlier. His face was thin and bony, crosshatched with wrinkles like a mystic map.

  "We saw you leave," 'Siah said.

  "And I saw you see me leave," said the old priest. "And you didn't see me return. These things happen. Do I truly look a thousand years old?"

  "How did you hear that?" asked Owen Greatheart.

  "With ears," said the old priest. "Now, stand up on your unbruised legs and walk quickly out of this garden."

  "We can't," said Owen Greatheart.

  "You
must," said the old priest. "I'm not really giving you a choice."

  "We have to go on," said Owen Greatheart. "Into the garden."

  "Try," quavered the old priest, "and I shall have to wave my staff vigorously all around your bodies again." For some reason, this was daunting. The memory of those imaginary blows was somehow worse than if the bruises had been real. The three companions also realized, without saying so, that even if the old priest never actually touched them, his whirling staff would be as impassable as a wall.

  'Siah looked like he would burst into tears. "But we don't even have any candy wrappers," he wailed. "We won't do any harm to your stupid old garden. We never litter, anywhere."

  The old priest squatted on the flagstone beside 'Siah and squinted at him.

  "This seems to be an unreasonable emotion for just seeing a stupid old garden," he said. "You puzzle me."

  "You don't understand," said Owen Greatheart. "We have to get into this garden, for the sake of someone else. We have to try to find something."

  The old priest smiled. "That is the only reason to get into such a garden," he said. "To try to find Something. But you also don't understand. The reason I will not let you in is not for the sake of the garden. The garden can take care of itself. We don't fear your candy wrappers. The reason I will not let you in is for your sake."

  "Is it because we're foreigners?" asked 'Siah. "Don't you start on this gaijin stuff. We get enough of that from this monkey."

  "No," said the old priest, taking the little boy by the hand and leading him to a patch of soft moss. "Not because you are gaijin. In fact, in repayment for having greeted you with such a beating, I will now explain to you why this garden cannot be entered. Please be seated." He sat down, with his legs crossed lotus fashion and his back very straight. His hands were on his knees. The others imitated him. They could now hear the unmistakable sound of running water from beyond the trees. They waited for the old priest to speak.

  "You have come," he said finally in an impressive tone, "to the Garden of a Thousand Worlds."

  The two brothers looked at each other. "What does that mean?" asked 'Siah.