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A Japanese miscellany - University of Oregon

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The Story <strong>of</strong> Kwashin Koji 47<br />

Now Arakawa had a younger brother named<br />

Buichi, — also a retainer in the service <strong>of</strong> Nobu-<br />

naga. Buichi was furiously angry because Ara-<br />

kawa had been beaten and imprisoned; and he<br />

resolved to kill Kwashin Koji. Kwashin Koji<br />

no sooner found himself again at liberty than he<br />

went straight to a wine-shop, and called for wine.<br />

Buichi rushed after him into the shop, struck him<br />

down, and cut <strong>of</strong>f his head. Then, taking the<br />

hundred ryo that had been paid to the old man,<br />

Buichi wrapped up the head and the gold together<br />

in a cloth, and hurried home to show them to<br />

Arakawa. But when he unfastened the cloth he<br />

found, instead <strong>of</strong> the head, only an empty wine-<br />

gourd, and only a lump <strong>of</strong> filth instead <strong>of</strong> the<br />

gold. . . . And the bewilderment <strong>of</strong> the brothers<br />

was presently increased by the information that<br />

the headless body had disappeared from the wine-<br />

shop, — none could say how or when.<br />

Nothing more was heard <strong>of</strong> Kwashin Koji<br />

until about a month later, when a drunken man<br />

was found one evening asleep in the gateway <strong>of</strong><br />

Lord Nobunaga's palace, and snoring so loud that<br />

every snore sounded like the rumbling <strong>of</strong> distant<br />

thunder. A retainer discovered that the drunk-

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