Chuckling, she patted his cheek. “Oh, there’s lots of life left in you yet,” she said. “You’re just the sort of man I like.”

Seimei retreated behind Tora again, to more laughter from their audience. “You talk to her, Tora,” he yelped.

Tora stopped grinning and put on a ferocious face. “Pay attention, woman!” he growled. “We’re here on official business.”

She cocked her head at him. “Go ahead, ask.”

“There was a peddler here selling his wares the day you served us. He got knocked about a bit and spilled all his stuff in the street. Do you remember?”

Her eyes suddenly moist with sentiment, she peered around Tora. “Do I! It was so sweet of you, Master Seimei, to make me a present of the peddler’s things. See here?” She raised a hand to pat her hair. “That’s the pretty comb you gave me. I wear it every day and think of you.”

Someone applauded and shouted some lewd advice.

Seimei made a choking sound and clutched convulsively at Tora, who said, “Never mind that now. Where can we find the peddler?”

She said slyly, “I’ll tell you if Master Seimei comes back.”

Tora elbowed Seimei, who croaked, “Yes. As soon as we can.”

“Jisai hasn’t been back since your master paid him, but you can ask his friend.”

The friend turned out to be the Rat, who was taking his ease with a cup of wine.

“Getting drunk already?” Tora greeted him.

“Just keeping out the cold,” wheezed the Rat, looking at Seimei. “Who’s the old geezer?”

“I’ll wait outside,” Seimei snapped and turned to leave.

Tora caught his sleeve. “We’re all going. The Rat’s going to show us the way to Jisai’s place.”

“Jisai?” The Rat looked interested. “What’s he done?”

“We just have some questions,” Tora said. “You coming or not?”

“What’s it worth to you?”

“We’ll pay your tab if you’re quick about it.”

The Rat jumped up, grabbed his crutch, and hopped off toward the street.

The bucktoothed waitress grinned. “He’s had three flasks of the best wine and a platter of pickled plums,” she informed Tora.

Tora whispered in her ear, “Your boyfriend here has the cash. But you’ll have to be nice to him. He hates parting with it.” Aloud he said, “Pay her, Seimei. A promise is a promise, and the master’s in a hurry.”

Eyeing the woman warily, Seimei pulled out a string of coppers. “That man was a walking lesson on why drinking is a shortcut to poverty,” he said. “How much does he owe?”

“Forty-five coppers.”

“Forty-five ...” Seimei blanched and clutched the money to his chest.

She leaned forward to tap his cheek playfully. “But for you, my dear,” she murmured, batting her eyes flirtatiously, “I’ll make it a special price.” Seimei stared at her teeth like a drowning man at a shark’s jaws. “Make it ten coppers, love,” she cooed, “and we’ll spend the rest together.”

Applause and shouts of encouragement broke out all around them.

Seimei counted out ten copper coins with trembling hands and ran.

“Don’t forget your promise!” she called after him.

“Only ten coppers for all that wine!” Tora said outside, slapping Seimei on the back. “You’ll have to tell me your secret with women, old man.”

Seimei glowered at him and then turned his wrath on the cheerfully whistling Rat. “Start walking! Even a dog that wags its tail can be beaten,” he said.

The Rat pulled in his tail. Hopping along on his crutch and complaining of the cold, the long way, and his indifferent health, he took them through dirty alleys, a derelict burial ground, and the courtyards of several tenement buildings where frozen laundry drooped from lines and women emptied their slops into the yard. Eventually he dispensed with his fake handicap, leaving the crutch in a hollow tree. Seimei maintained a disapproving silence.

Thoroughly chilled and frustrated, they reached an area of open ground near the southern palisade of the city. Among a scattering of bare trees stood the makeshift tents and grass-covered huts of squatters. Black smoke rose against the twilight sky from open fires. Ragged women and children tended to their families’ dinners, while the men huddled near the warmth, drinking and rolling dice.

Exchanging cheerful greetings, the Rat dodged a line of frozen rags strung between two trees, kicked a snapping dog, and stopped in front of a particularly depressing hovel.

A ragged mat covered its entrance, and broken cooking utensils littered the ground. Flicking the mat aside unceremoniously, the Rat ducked in and Tora followed. Seimei, wrinkling his nose at the stench released from inside, stayed outside. A spate of excited talk came from the hut.

A group of dirty children quickly gathered around Seimei with pitiful wails: “Give us a copper.” “Just a copper for a bowl of soup, master.” They pushed against him, fingering the fabric of his robe, pointing at his black cap, feeling his sleeves, and inserting inquisitive hands under his sash. Seimei slapped the hands away and shouted, “Be quick about it, Tora!”

Instead of an answer, Tora’s arm shot out from behind the mat and pulled him inside. Seimei choked. Blinded by the sudden murky darkness, he felt as if he had been swallowed by some large, foul-smelling creature. Then he made out a human being cowering on a pallet covered with ragged blankets. The blankets had long since faded to the grayness of dirt, and the frail creature was of the same hue: gray skin, thin gray hair like cobwebs on a pale skull, grayish layers of clothing. Deep-set black eyes stared at Seimei with dull curiosity.

Thinking they were in the wrong place, he was backing out again when Tora moved and he saw that the frail figure was an old woman and that the peddler Jisai sat cross-legged beside her. He wore the same rags, probably, thought Seimei, still caked with the same mud. Between them stood a cracked brazier that produced more acrid smoke than warmth.

Seimei held a sleeve over his nose and mouth and told Tora, “That’s the man. Ask him and let’s go.”

“Where’s your manners, old-timer?” sneered the Rat, who seated himself on the bare dirt floor near the peddler. “We just got here. Sit down and be sociable.”

Seimei cast a pleading glance at Tora, who ignored him and settled down also. After a moment, lifting the back of his blue robe carefully above his hips, Seimei lowered himself to the floor.

What followed next, to the extreme frustration of the fastidious Seimei, was a leisurely discussion of the weather and conditions among the squatters. Then the ill health of the peddler’s wife was examined symptom by symptom. Seimei was consulted about medicines and thawed a little. He was urged to take the old woman’s pulse and look into her eyes. Teas, ointments, and plasters were weighed for their efficacy, and anecdotal evidence of local curatives—frog skins, charred mole meat, and powdered cockroach featured in these—heavily laced the conversation.