Making their way northward also had its difficulties. Each of the boats carried a single sail, but with the wind coming mostly from the northwest, raising it was fruitless. They had to paddle, and the paddling had to be timed for slack water, or when the tidal currents were in their favor.
Once they entered San Pablo Bay, the northern extension of San Francisco Bay, they turned eastward, and with relief they laid their paddles aside and let the wind carry them. And it was by wind power that they passed through the Carquinez Strait and into Suisun Bay. The Delta, where the Sacramento and San Joaquin Rivers came together, lay ahead of them.
They spent several days scouting the delta, and then threaded through it, after a few false turns, to the main channel of the Sacramento.
Their progress was now hindered by the river current. With the wind once again powerless to aid them, it was “five steps forward, four steps backward.”
It was with great relief that they found the place where, they thought, the American River fed into the Sacramento. They made camp below a lone oak.
That night, as Lord Matsudaira lay back on his sleeping mat, he saw a meteor cross over Heaven’s River, the Milky Way. He took it to be a favorable omen. Didn’t gold glitter like the stars in the sky? A meteor, a fallen star, was a promise of treasure to come.
* * *
There was a grinding sound, and the Ichi-Ban, the “Number One” boat, shook.
“Back water, back water!” the former captain of the Sado Maru shouted.
The Ichi-Ban held for a moment, then the riverbed released it, and the boat was back in deeper water. The “Number Two Boat,” the Ni-Ban, came up close behind, so that its prow almost touched the Ichi-Ban’s stern.
“Find a deeper channel,” Lord Matsudaira ordered.
The captain bowed his head deeply. “Forgive me, my lord, but I think this is the deepest channel. The river is just too low, even for a ship-boat.”
Lord Matsudaira stared for a time at the water. “If I recall correctly, the encyclopedia said that the gold was discovered while a sawmill was built on the American River. According to the Dutch barbarians, a sawmill requires several feet of water for operation. So how can this be the American River?”
Shigehisa thought about this. “If this is the American River, then according to the map, Folsom Lake should be about ten miles upriver. A pair of samurai could run that far in a day.”
“Pick our best runners,” said the Lord Matsudaira.
* * *
The two samurai returned four days later. They bowed deeply.
“We are very sorry, my lord, we went two days travel upriver—at least twenty miles—and did not find a lake of any kind. The river did fork, however.”
“Ah! I was right! This is not the American River! The captain has failed me again! I should take off his head right now!” The captain’s face blanched, but it was impossible for him to flee.
“Please refrain, milord,” Shigehisa whispered urgently. “We need him to handle the boat if we are to search further up the Sacramento.”
“Very well. We need him. At least until we find this confounded American River. But there will be a reckoning . . .”
The next day, they were once again fighting the strong currents of the Sacramento, and moving farther and farther away from, not closer to, the mouth of the American River. None of the Japanese knew that “Folsom Lake” had been created by the Folsom Dam, built in 1955, and thus not in fact part of the California landscape in 1634.
South Bay, near Alviso, California
“Welcome to ‘Sadomaru Palace,’” said Iroja-hime. “Please come in and dine with me.”
The palace in question was a lean-to, made of salvaged ship timbers and sailcloth. It was, perhaps, the nicest lean-to that the shipwrecked Japanese had made on the site of Alviso, but it was still merely a lean-to. Dinner, however, was more promising, as the South Bay was rich in fish, shellfish and waterfowl.
“To what do I owe the honor of this invitation?” Matsuoka asked gravely.
“To my being bored out of my mind,” she replied archly. “Have you been able to make contact with the Indians?”
“I’m afraid not,” the elderly samurai admitted. “They see us, and if we approach closer than half a li, they flee. If we had horses, we could overtake them, but on foot, pursuing them in their own lands is hopeless . . . even dangerous.”
“What does Hachizaemon think?”
“Hachizaemon?” His tone suggested that he was at a loss to come up with any reason that the second mate could possibly provide useful advice on any nonnautical matter.
“He told me that he had sailed once on a Red Seal ship to Manila and other exotic ports. So he has, perhaps, traded with people that didn’t speak Japanese.”