Yedo and the beaten man

Erasmus glitters at the Yedo wharf, the Lion of England flying, and Mariko knows she has been replaced. The journey ended with Fuji from Hakoné Pass and a quarrel over brandy that sent Alvito riding ahead; Mariko taught Blackthorne to "listen to the rock grow". At an inn Gyoko sold her three secrets to Mariko, then named her price: two swords for her son. In the donjon Toranaga plays the beaten man, dismisses Gyoko's request as pimps wanting to be samurai, and grants Buntaro the Anjin-san's head, once he has seconded Toranaga's seppuku. Mariko is ordered to Osaka in three days. He writes to his mother offering Zataki the Lady Ochiba in marriage, and signs himself Minowara for the first time. Buntaro snaps his sword on a beam: "Wait till Osaka." Blackthorne, alone with Toranaga, proposes taking the Black Ship to squeeze the priests, then asks for Mariko as his wife.

Yedo, and the beaten-man performance: Toranaga plays defeat in front of his own household so that the disguise is total. Clavell lets Gyoko's three secrets buy the reprieve, lets Buntaro snap his sword, and ends on Blackthorne asking for Mariko as wife, the most direct request in the book, refused by silence.