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saw a huge building of unpainted plaster, set on a high stone foundation: the jail proper. Tiny windows far above the ground gave it the look of a fortress. Five more guards let them through a door even thicker and more heavily reinforced than the main gate.
    Noise and odor simultaneously attacked Sano’s senses. Moans and sobs issued from behind the solid doors that lined the passage. A pair of jailers pushed past Sano. One banged loudly on each door, adding to the din.
    â€œWe’re watching you, you stinking sons of whores!” he shouted. “Behave yourselves!”
    The other shoved trays into each cell through slots at the bottoms of the doors. In the weak daylight that shone through the windows at either end of the passage, Sano saw that the rations were rotten vegetables and moldy rice. Flies buzzed thickly, alighting on his face and hands. Furiously he brushed them away. A powerful stench of urine, feces, and vomit filled his nostrils; he tried not to breathe. Rivulets of filthy water ran out of the cells and onto the stone floor. Sano gasped as a huge rat scurried across his path. Quickly the
eta
led him around a corner and down another passage. Here the noise diminished, although the smell didn’t. Sano began to relax, when suddenly a door flew open. Two jailers hurried toward him, dragging between them a naked, unconscious man. Blood poured from the man’s nose; fresh cuts covered his torso. The jailers opened a cell and threw the man inside. As Sano passed, he caught a glimpse of five emaciated men lying in a pool of filth in the cramped space. He looked away, horrified. Could anyone possibly deserve such treatment? Couldn’t the government control its subjects some other way than by torturing and starving those who broke the law? That most sentences were short seemed a dubious blessing: many prisoners were executed after their trials. That the government he served would do such things frightened him. He tried not to think of it.
    Then, mercifully, the
eta
led him outside into the cold, fresh air. They were in another courtyard, this one surrounded by a high bamboo fence. Sano inhaled gratefully.
    â€œThe morgue, master.” The
eta
opened the door of a thatch-roofed building and gestured for him to enter.
    Sano hesitated. He feared that whatever awaited him in themorgue would be worse than anything he’d seen yet. But when he stepped inside, there was only a wooden-floored room with cabinets and stone troughs lining the walls, and in the center two waist-high tables with raised sides. A man stood at the open window, his profile to Sano, reading a book by the fading afternoon light. He wore a long dark blue coat, the physician’s traditional uniform, with a gray quilt over his shoulders to ward off the room’s damp chill. He turned. One look at his face sent a shock of recognition through Sano.
    The man was perhaps seventy years of age, with a high, bony forehead and prominent cheekbones. A deep furrow ran from either side of his long, ascetic nose to the narrow line of his mouth. He had short white hair that receded at the temples but grew abundantly over the rest of his scalp. His shrewd eyes regarded Sano with displeasure, and he glanced down at his book as if annoyed at the interruption. Sano, following his gaze, also looked at the book. As he moved closer, he saw a drawing of the human body, covered with foreign words.
    The foreign book and the man’s distinctive features and uniform identified him to Sano immediately. Ten years ago he had seen this man paraded through Edo’s streets in disgrace. He had seen that face on the town notice boards and on broadsheets distributed by the news sellers.
    â€œDr. Ito Genboku!” Sano blurted out. “But I thought—” He stopped, not wanting to offend the doctor with personal remarks.
    Fifty years ago, the government had instituted a policy of strict isolation from the outside world. Iemitsu, the third