THE BOKKEN

The cherry blossom tree in the centre of the garden marked Jack’s time in Japan. When he had arrived, it had been lush and green. A cool haven where he had sheltered from the hot summer sun. Now, three months later, his arm completely healed, the cherry blossom tree’s leaves had turned a golden brown and were starting to fall to the ground.

The tree was Jack’s place of sanctuary. He had sat there for hours studying his father’s rutter, examining the meticulously drawn constellations, tracing the outlines of coastal maps, and on every page trying to unlock the secret ciphers that protected the mysteries of the seas from enemy eyes. One day, his father had promised, he would be given the solutions to all these codes. But now his father was dead, Jack had only his wits to work the rest of them out and, with each one he managed to solve, the closer he felt he was to his father.

Yet the tree was also a symbolic bridge, a link through which he had slowly come to understand the Japanese culture. For it was here that he met with Akiko most afternoons to practise speaking her language.

Three days after Masamoto had left for Kyoto, she had heard Jack struggling to pronounce a Japanese phrase that Father Lucius had given him to memorize and had offered to help him.

‘Arigatō, Akiko,’ he had replied and then repeated the corrected phrase several times to etch it into his memory.

So their afternoons had begun and, combined with Father Lucius’s lessons, his Japanese improved rapidly. Akiko had been a lifeline to him. With each passing week, Jack had been able to converse more and more fluently.

Yamato, on the other hand, in spite of his father’s edict to be his friend, had maintained an icy distance. Jack could have been invisible for all the boy cared.

‘Why does Yamato not speak to me?’ he had asked Akiko one day. ‘Did I do something wrong?’

‘No, Jack,’ she replied with deliberate courtesy. ‘He is your friend.’

‘Everyone is my friend but only because Masamoto orders them,’ Jack shot back.

‘He has not ordered me,’ she said, a flicker of hurt showing in her eyes.

Jack, realizing he had been rude, tried desperately to think of the appropriate Japanese words to apologize. Apologizing, Father Lucius had explained to Jack, was considered a virtue in Japan. Unlike Europeans, who view an apology to be an admission of one’s own guilt or failure, the Japanese see it as taking responsibility for one’s actions and avoiding blaming others. When one apologizes and shows remorse, the Japanese are willing to forgive and not hold a grudge.

‘I’m very sorry, Akiko,’ Jack had eventually said. ‘You have been very kind to me.’

She bowed, accepting his apology, and they had continued with their conversation, his prickly remark forgotten.