Hiro-matsu, Toranaga’s old companion

Hiro-matsu, Toranaga’s old companion, helps turn a dangerous escape from Osaka into a political maneuver. His importance lies not in a separately detailed action during the flight, but in the judgment he brings to Toranaga’s plan: he sees the danger of impeachment, then understands how resignation can deprive the Regents of the unanimity needed to act.

Counsel Before the Escape

Just after dusk on the night before the escape, Toranaga sent for Hiro-matsu and explained what he intended to attempt and why he had been vacillating. Hiro-matsu immediately challenged the plan’s apparent weakness: even if Toranaga escaped, the Regents could impeach him in his absence as readily as they could to his face. As President of the Regents, Toranaga would then be bound to commit seppuku if the other four voted against him. Hiro-matsu’s warning makes the stakes plain: leaving the castle would not, by itself, free Toranaga from the council’s authority.

Toranaga answered by producing a formal resignation on a rolled parchment and instructing Hiro-matsu to give it to Ishido once the escape became known. The document changed the terms of the danger. Hiro-matsu had been considering the threat of impeachment; Toranaga’s resignation offered a way to unsettle the body empowered to impose it.

Recognizing the Political Design

At first Hiro-matsu responded that Toranaga would be isolated and doomed. Toranaga then explained the consequence of the Taikō’s testament: it had established a council of five Regents, but only four remained. For the council to exercise the Emperor’s mandate, those four would have to agree on a fifth member acceptable to them all. Hiro-matsu recognized that the rival Regents were unlikely to find such a candidate. Their inability to agree could stall decisions while Toranaga was no longer bound as President.

His response marks a swift shift from warning to comprehension. He saw that the plan did not depend on defeating the Regents in an immediate vote; it depended on leaving them unable to complete one. While they argued, Toranaga’s followers could prepare for war, and Toranaga could encourage divisions among his opponents. Hiro-matsu praised the strategy with exuberant irreverence, calling Toranaga the wisest man in the land. His reaction conveys both admiration and the relief of recognizing that apparent isolation could become a source of leverage.

Trust and the Cost of the Plan

After the escape, Toranaga privately judged that the plan had gone well and that Hiro-matsu, Kiri, and Lady Sazuko had each played their parts well. He also understood that their participation had exposed them to confinement: they would either be kept locked up or permitted to leave, and he expected they would not be allowed out. The success of the escape therefore carried a personal cost for the people who had helped make it possible.

Toranaga’s reflection ends not with another calculation but with regret at the prospect of losing them. Hiro-matsu’s place in the episode rests on this double role: he is the comrade who can question Toranaga’s reasoning without ceasing to serve him, and a trusted participant whose involvement makes the political victory inseparable from the danger borne by his allies.