Iriya prepared to leave. She had searched her daughter's eyes for a loving recognition, but in vain. On the threshold she wavered. "My baby,—my only one!" she cried aloud brokenly, and held out her arms. In an instant, before Yuki could respond, she closed the fusuma and ran toward the guest-room.
Prince Haganèsat in the place of honor, his back to the tokonoma, where new flowers bloomed and incense perfumed the space. His robes, of the usual magnificent quality of silk, had to-night a deep bronze color. The candles, placed one on each side of him, threw down a yellow light, which took the wrinkles from his scarred face and some of the sadness from his mouth. To Tetsujo's feasting eyes he appeared as a god; not the meek, forgiving Buddha whom women and children adore, but some splendid old war-god of Shinto tradition, young with the immortality of youth, yet old as the world in wisdom.
The outer shoji stood well apart, letting in the chill, wet sweetness of the night. The storm had now quite died away. The air of the room was so still that the candle-flames stood like balanced flakes of topaz, and the white smoke of the burning incense hung like a silver cord from the gloom above.
The moment that Yuki entered, Haganè, with his trained vision, saw that some great spiritual change had taken place. The look of miserable defiance he feared was not there. Iriya had waited for her. The two women advanced to the great visitor, and bowed before him three times, then went back modestly to the far end of the room. Suzumè brought fresh tea, and two new balls of charcoal for the hibachi. As the servant left, Iriya asked of her husband, "Shall I also withdraw?"
"It is according to our lord's will," answered Tetsujo, his eyes turning to the prince.
"What would you prefer, Yuki-ko?" Haganè's voice was kind.
"I should prefer my mother to remain," answered Yuki, without hesitation.
"Madame Onda, I beg you to honor us with your presence," said Haganè, with a slight bow.
Onda Tetsujo frowned. If his loyal nature allowed him to make one criticism of his daimyo, it was of a certain lax, foreign politeness toward women. The fault seemed to increase with years. Whether Prince Haganè suspected this disapprobation or not, on this occasion at least he made no attempt to modify it.
"I have come in person, little Yuki-ko, to hear your thought. No, do not speak yet!" he interpolated, with a slight lifting of the right hand. "Wait until I give you questions to answer! At the beginning there must be quiet discussion between us four, with no haste or opposition on the part of—any." He looked, with these last words, directly at his old retainer.
"My Lord, my Lord!" fumed Tetsujo, "shall I be able to contain myself while you condescend to bandy words with a mere girl?"
"If I command it, I think you will contain yourself," said the prince, easily. Tetsujo rocked on the matting, gripped his arms tightly, and was silent.
"The gods seem to have decreed no happiness for me in marriage," said Haganè, impersonally, to all. "Perhaps they have only new mockery in store, if now, in my old age, I dare take to myself this fair flower. Yet am I tempted; by the good for her, as it seems to me; by my friendship for you, Onda Tetsujo; and by the need for an official mistress of my house. I can give her unusual opportunity to serve Nippon, as in my letter I wrote."
Iriya, in her corner, put her face to the floor. "My Lord, even that you have thought it, makes richer the traditions of our house—through ten succeeding generations."
"I would not have the child consent because of family honors, my good dame," said Haganè, a little sadly.
"Shall I speak now, Lord?" asked Yuki, in her sweet, steady voice. Tetsujo ground his teeth, but managed to keep silent.
"Would you speak of the young Frenchman, whose mother is a Russian?"
Yuki's eyes fell and her chin quivered. "Yes, your Highness."
"Speak!—fully!" said he, after a pause.
"He offered me marriage many times, your Highness, and I refused, saying that not without my parents' consent could I answer. Then, at one hour, being weak, I promised. In the foreign land, where you and my father sent me, such promises bind,—even as the oaths of men. I have been bound."
"Gods of my ancestors! Must I listen to this cat-mewing?" groaned Onda.
"Be quiet! The girl shall speak. Yes, Yuki," he continued, his eyes softening as they returned to her white face, "I felt that you had promised. And so, in my letter, if you will recall, I assured you that you were not bound."
"Your Highness!" ventured the girl, at length. "It was your noble thought, your decision, not my own. I am bound."
Haganè looked at her in mild wonder, with the faintest touch of a smile. "And not even your daimyo's word can free your childish promise? You have courage."
"The mad lynx! Let me deal with her!" panted Tetsujo.
"He, my father, so speaks and thinks of me!" broke in the girl, with passionate protest and a wide-flung gesture toward Onda. "In that country no shame is felt for such a promise. Yet my father treats me as an outcast, a blot upon the family name! I ask you, Lord, who are great and strong, to help me!"
"To what shall I help you, little one? To marriage with an alien?—repudiation of a country that I serve?"
"No, Lord; for of myself I could not marry him, now, with my dear land at war. When I first knew him, war had not become even a threat. Only against—misunderstanding—and, Lord,—being forced—!"
Haganè interrupted her with his slight gesture. "You will be forced to nothing!—not now, nor so long as my voice can use the speech of living men! Your decision is valueless unless it be your own. It may be even harmful; for the young branch, held down by force, slashes heaven in its rebound. Nay, child! I would have you bend slowly to myproffered opportunity, weighted by your own ripening desire for loyalty and service. To compel you would be impiety. Believe yourself protected by my word, and by my faith in you! Be calm and think seriously, for upon this hour depends more than you can fathom!"
His deep voice boomed into a silence long maintained. One of the tall candles sputtered and flared. Iriya rose quickly to mend it. Tetsujo's arms, within short blue cotton sleeves, were folded and pressed tightly down upon his chest, as if to keep back straining utterance. Through the stillness his quick breaths ran. The girl gazed out now, motionless, beyond Haganè into the wet blankness of the garden. Familiar outlines of rock and bridge and pine kept there, she knew, their changeless postures. Only a fallen darkness hid them. So in her heart must be immovable shapes and living growths of heroism and selfless devotion. An Occidental training superimposed upon a child's fresh fancy; a foreign love, jealously guarding for its own purpose the tissues of new thought,—these things hid the garden of her heart as night now hid her father's garden. Haganè's look and words were bringing dawn, a dawn perhaps of sorrow, a day dragged up from an heroic past, and trailing its own hung clouds of tears.
Haganè spoke again. His deep voice calmed and satisfied the unstable silence. He changed his position very slightly, facing Yuki more squarely. He raised his massive chin, and a smile played on a mouth that seemed made for stern sadness. Quite irrelevantly, he began to relate to his small audience an incident of his crowded day.
"Do you remember, Tetsujo,—Yuki also may recall from her childhood's impression,—that, as one stands on the jutting corner of my Tabata land, by the large leaning maple,—a corner so steep that it must be upheld by the hewn trunks of pines,—exactly at foot of the cliff stands a very small cottage, with roof patched by the rusted sides of old foreign kerosene cans?" He paused for an answer. Yuki's eyes would not leave the dark mystery of the night.
"I remember most clearly, your august Highness," murmured Onda, with a respectful inclination of his head towardthe great man, but an indignant scowl in the direction of Yuki.
"An aged woman and her only child, a son, live in that house. He is a good son, for though hot with the desire for military service, he has kept steadily to his labor as under-gardener on my place. There seemed to be no one else with whom his mother could find a home. Of late the boy has looked ill. I have overheard the servants say that his soul was attempting to leave the chained body and go off, as it wished, to the battlefield. Such agony as this repression, I believe only our countrymen are capable of experiencing or of enduring."
Now, at last, Yuki turned and fixed her look on Haganè. He did not notice this any more than he had seemed to observe her previous indifference.
"The youth dutifully kept this longing from the old dame. But she questioned, and through her slow round of domestic services she pondered. Then she came to understand. Perhaps the young soldier-husband, dead for thirty years, had returned—to whisper. Whatever the cause, she came—to—understand." He paused an instant, as if to take a firmer hold upon his voice. "To-day,—scarcely an hour ago, Yuki,—the youth, returning from labor, found his mother—dead—before the family shrine. She had used her husband's short sword. It will be buried with her. The smile upon her old face had gained already the youth and glory of a god's. She left no message; the smile told him all.—To-morrow the son takes passage for Manchuria."
Yuki's dawn had come. It hurt her, like the birth of a soul. Haganè saw the same look which, for one fleet instant, he had evoked from her at Washington. His strong heart reeled toward the girl. Iriya was sobbing softly. Tetsujo sat square like a box. He envied the mother and the son. He saw no pathos in the tale, only victory. Those two would be together on the Yalu; while he, Tetsujo, famed warrior, skilled swordsman, must pine at home and listen to the pulings of weak women!
The glory grew on Yuki. Above the flowers of the tokonoma, above Haganè's head, hung a tattered battle-flag of theirown clan. She recognized it now. Her hands trembled. She lifted them toward Haganè.
"Onda Yuki-ko!" he almost whispered, so deep and tense his voice became. "This year, this day, this very hour, may be the pivot of human history upon this planet! And is not the diamond-point on which that mighty turning rests, the Spirit of Japan?"
"Banzai Nippon! Dai Nippon! Banzai! Banzai!" shouted Tetsujo, and beat his fists on the matting.
Haganè, with a smile that seemed to deprecate yet condone his kerai's vehemence, went on directly to Yuki. "Strange that Western minds—the astute American politician, the journalist, even the cleverest of Europe's statesmen—hardly claim to look forward more than a few years,—five, ten, at best half a century! They want results they shall live to see—after them the deluge! As they have forgotten the very names of their grandfathers, so they ignore their descendants. But we of the East count time in other lengths. We do not bound our horizon with personal aim or the catchword of a day. We owe,—we owe ourselves,—all, to a future that we may not comprehend, but have no right, in our ignorance, to cramp. What we are fighting for at this moment will not be fully realized for two hundred years. Then it will be seen as a great landscape in a valley. Your foreigners are like children that play now in that valley. But every Japanese patriot stands lonely on a mountain,—very lonely, very lonely!"
"Is one alone in a shining company of spirits, Lord?" asked Yuki, a wonderful glow now kindling in her long eyes. "Will that youth of whom you told us be lonely, though he stand singly against a squadron of Cossacks? Where is his mother's soul? O Gods of my country! O my dear Christian God! why was it not given to me to be a man?"
"Do you think that the soul of a woman who shirks would be less cowardly if put into the body of a man? Even your Christians could tell you better."
"Lord! Lord!" cried the girl to him in great stress, "am I indeed of the coward's heart? Is this thing I call fidelity but a shirking?"
"A Japanese has no fidelity but to his Emperor!" thundered Onda.
"Be quiet, Tetsujo! Listen, poor wavering little heart; I will try to make you understand. You cannot be allowed to marry this man, not because we wish to thwart you, but—"
"I said I would not marry him, now,—not now!"
"Then what will you do?" asked Haganè. "All are striving to their utmost. What will be your part? Do you intend to sit sullen and inactive here, at home?"
"The wench shall remain no longer under my roof!" raged Tetsujo.
"She will remain under your roof, good Tetsujo, and be treated with courtesy," corrected the prince.
"Let me go as a nurse! Oh, I could never stay with them! Their harsh eyes would flay me! I feel even now their hatred!"
"Not mine, my baby, my only child!" wailed Iriya. "Think not so of your mother's imperishable love!"
Yuki at last hid her face. The note of anguish in her mother's voice overcame her pathetic defiance.
"My official residence is cold and lonely," remarked Haganè, sipping slowly at some tea. "It sorely needs a mistress well acquainted with foreign etiquette. Foreigners are to be met and conciliated. The Emperor himself, and his shining spouse, would receive one who so served her land, and hear from her own lips impressions of America, and the sentiments of the people there toward us. A woman's intuition is keen, and penetrates farther than a man's weightier judgment,—just as the tendrils of a vine creep into lattices which a tree would only darken. It is in such a capacity, Yuki-ko, that you could do immediate good. My disorganized servants would again be set into grooves of usefulness. Another reason, which must not be spoken openly, as yet,—I may soon be called to the front, and the several residences should not be closed."
"Lord! You would trust with such responsibilities a weak, untutored girl like me?"
"Yes, little one, I would trust you."
"And I would be in all respects—your—wife?" asked Yuki, in a very low tone.
"Yes. Why not? What is the human body but a petal drifting in the wind? If, for a moment, the bright tint or the fleeting perfume please, is it not best to grasp the trivial pleasure? Yet it is to great things that I call you, Onda Yuki. Things of service, of the spirit, heroism perhaps, perhaps self-sacrifice,—for the flesh is stubborn. This shall be your proof of loyalty to your Emperor and to this land!"
"I would gladly die for them!" she cried.
Haganè emptied the few dregs of his teacup into the hot ashes of the hibachi, ignoring the ceremonial little bowl put near for the purpose. "It was in Washington, I believe, that once before you made that foolish remark. What use would death be, especially if you seek it as an escape from conditions that do not please you? Cowardice is a crime of the spirit! I see no chance for you to serve but this."
"But to be your wife, your wife—while yet he—that other—holds my pledge!" murmured the girl, piteously, under her breath. "I prayed for freedom, but he would not send it—!" Gwendolen's telegraphic words, "I would accept H." came to her like a little gust of refreshing wind. She looked again squarely into Haganè's noble face. For the first time Pierre's rose before her, a little weak, a little over-delicate, with incipient lines of self-indulgence.
"My child," said Haganè, almost in a pleading tone, "Japan must not lose you. Put your life into my hands, and let me wield it for our country's need. I believe my motives to be selfless. If indeed your young beauty blurs my vision, then will punishment rightly follow. But I take that hazard. Had I a son, you should be, more fitly, his wife."
"If your father's everlasting curse—" Tetsujo began; but Haganè stopped him.
"We need no curses, Tetsujo! You are showing yourself unworthy of this brave child. Be quiet, I say; and let her own soul speak to her!"
Iriya gasped, and Onda bit his thick lip to the blood. Yuki's lifted face had the pathos of dying music. "Will my soul speak, Lord?" she breathed. The sound of her voice was cold and thin, and touched with a mystic fear.
Almost as if gathered in to answer, from the far distance amuffled chorus of a thousand whispering voices quivered in the air,—drawing nearer, nearer,—until the sound seemed to press upon their very hearts. Now over the garden a soft, pale light began to dawn. It grew to a concourse of a thousand spirit-lamps, crossing, recrossing, flickering, then passing on. Feet moving softly, though by the hundred, went by in ghostly rhythm.
"Lord! Lord!" panted Yuki, wild-eyed. "What is it? Do you hear also? or is it only I?"
Haganè did not answer at once. He watched the girl's face as one watches a changing chemical. When the sound had grown unmistakably human, though of voices kept low and tense with unusual awe, he said quietly, "You have all heard of the brave young Commander Hirosè, who died rescuing his friend, in the second attempt to block Port Arthur. This is a band of Koishikawa students passing down to the railway station to meet him."
He stopped, wondering how much the girl could endure. The glare of the white lanterns, borne aloft, ploughed a great soundless trench of light through the trees and houses that line the steep slope of Kobinata's hill. Light surged over the thorn and bamboo hedges of Onda's home, brimming the garden with a tender radiance, and revealing hillock, shrub, and tree as in a faint unearthly dream. It threw a deeper glow into the face of Haganè, and over the battle-flag above him.
As for Tetsujo, he listened to the passing of countless feet in sullen gloom. He hated the students that they were young. He envied the death of Hirosè. It would be a clear personal joy to die that way, and have one's name blazoned as a new god. A nobler soul might have cared little for such posthumous recognition; but old Onda's generosity did not reach that height. To him, heaven was a place where spirits swaggered, and bore the two swords of the samurai.
Haganè, looking only at Yuki, continued softly: "A hundred thousand lanterns of the dead will be carried this night, for the brave boy. It is but a fragment of his flesh, that was found with a bit of uniform clinging to it; but the precious relic will have—friends, to bear it to the temple. There hisyoung widow, smiling like a statue of Kwannon, awaits it; and his little son, calmly proud that his father has become a great spirit. No heart in Nippon, to-night—but worships—Hirosè!"
Haganè's voice had been even enough, and calm; but something in it loosened Yuki's soul from the flesh. Again she stared at him, as if mesmerized. Then suddenly she half rose, leaning toward him, and hurled herself face down on the mats, within reach of his hand.
"All that I have to give is dust! The body is nothing! The gods have released me! Take me, great-hearted man, and use me to my country's need!"
The shifting footsteps all had passed. The faint reflected glamour of the lanterns spread far below along the level stone road by the Arsenal. The garden was plunged again into blackness. Onda stared, as if dazed, after the lights, then brought his eyes to Yuki's prostrate body. His slow wits could not seize, at once, the realization of so ineffable a hope. Iriya muffled her sobs in her sleeve.
Haganè, to reassure Yuki, had put a hand lightly upon her thick hair. No one but the spirits—if they were near—saw a dull red tide of passion surge up to his broad face, swelling his neck into purple veins, and twitching at the sinews of the powerful hands. But his voice, when he answered, was that of a high-priest. "In our Emperor's name, my child, I accept the gift. May the gods assist me to use it worthily!"
Tetsujo, half crawling, reached the tea-tray, and drained a stale cup to the dregs. Yuki lay so still that Iriya took fond alarm. The joy and triumph faded from her face. She met Haganè's look with a slight appealing gesture toward her child. Haganè nodded. She crept to Yuki, tugging at her sleeve, and trying to push her up from the floor. Haganè leaned forward, and picked the girl up like a toy. She put out a faltering hand and touched her mother.
"Come, come, my treasure!" whispered Iriya. "Let us go together to your little room, where quiet will best restore you!"
"One moment, dame!" said Haganè. "I must speak with Tetsujo, in your presence." The old kerai was on his knees, bowing, his exultation only exaggerating his humility.
From the impersonal ring of Haganè's orders, he might have been outlining a Manchurian campaign. "Let there be no delay! Since at any hour I may be ordered to the front, I wish the ceremony over, that I may instruct Yuki in certain official duties before I leave. And remember, this is no time for expenditure or display."
"Your will is mine, Augustness."
"This is Friday. Next Wednesday, then, at my Tabata villa! All shall be in readiness. Is this as you wish, Yuki-ko?"
"Your will is mine, Lord," whispered Yuki, echoing unconsciously her father's words.
"The child trembles. May I not conduct her to her chamber?" asked Iriya of the prince.
"Yes, dame," replied he, kindly. "And, brave little one, farewell! I am overcharged with duties, and may not see you again till Wednesday, at noon. One instant!" The two women paused, Iriya facing him expectantly, Yuki with head hung low. "I want to say, here, in the presence of my too-zealous Tetsujo, that Yuki is to be treated, from this moment, with the respect and dignity that becomes a Princess Haganè. There is to be no espionage; no opposition; no suggestion of restraint of any kind! My entire confidence is with my future wife. Do you understand that, Onda Tetsujo?"
"Yes, Lord," growled Tetsujo, crimson with mortification; but he did not forget to bow.
In her own room Yuki stood staring, dazed, ignoring her mother's frequent suggestion to be seated. "No! Let me breathe! Let me learn to breathe again!" muttered she at last, and caught her mother's arm as she stepped to the tiny veranda. From the guest-room beyond, where the two men talked, a soft light gleamed, throwing the pebbled paths of the garden into little Milky Ways of light. The shrubs lay round and dark, like a flock of little clouds. Beyond all rose the tall black hedge of bamboo and of thorn.
"My child," said the mother, "you have brought to us great happiness and pride. Surely reward will come to you, even in this incarnation. I will pray ceaselessly to Kwannon in your behalf."
Yuki leaned closer to her mother. The cool wet smell of the garden already stole away some of the hot bewilderment from her brain. The angry waves of indecision, girlish longing, and patriotism, which had raged so furiously together, now began to recede, leaving bare at last a small white strip of thought. She was safe now, pledged, not to personal joy, but to heroic service. The greatest of all men was to be her teacher, her helper, her—husband! Well, what of it? Nothing was too great a sacrifice for Nippon. And if Pierre would only not misjudge too cruelly! Even in this first vicarious shudder of Pierre's grief, she could not feel that he would suffer long. His agony might at first be intense and uncontrolled, but, through its very exaggeration, would the more swiftly pass. For her sake, now, he must leave Japan. This was the last boon that love should ask of him.
From the street, from the other side of that inky bamboo wall, came the low notes of a foreign song,—a strain from Carmen. The girl shivered once, and was still.
"Oh, what is it?" cried Iriya, herself on edge, and looking about in terror.
Again came the song, soft and clear. The singer stood, evidently, just beyond the bamboos. Yuki's lips writhed together. Her fingers tore and twitched, one hand in the other.
"Yuki! My Yuki!" came a voice. "Is it too late?"
Suddenly wrenching herself from Iriya's arms, the girl sprang down the two stone steps and plunged into the shadows of the garden. As one fiend-driven, she sped over paths, shrubs, rocks, and prim garden-stakes, until, at the hedge, she hurled herself upon it, beating at it with frantic hands, and sobbing.
"Oh, go! Go, beloved! Never again come here! Never sing that song again, or—I cannot live at all! I have promised—promised—a new pledge—stronger than the other! It's of my free will I give myself to him! Go home to your native land! Go! go!"
"What sound is that? What do I hear?" cried Tetsujo, from the guest-room balcony.
"It is our Yuki, walking in the garden," came Iriya's placid voice. "Disturb not your honorable spirit, Master! I am with the child."
Tetsujo returned, to be met by a chiding, half-contemptuous remark from his deity. A moment later, Iriya's ashen face was in the kitchen. "Suzumè! Maru! For the love of Kwannon, come quickly! Miss Yuki is in a dead faint, against the thorn hedge! Her hands are bleeding!—Make no noise! The master and Prince Haganè must not know!"
Springstorms in Tokio, as in other capitals, sweep clean a wide pathway of days for sunshine and the coming flowers. On the morning after that great tempest which so nearly crushed Yuki against the pond-stones of the garden, scarcely could a shadow be found, so eager was the sun to atone for past misdeeds of her naughty younger brother, the wind. Small crumpled leaves began to straighten. Boughs, mud-soldered to muddy earth, drew slowly upward. The old world stirred like a conscious thing.
Pedestrians sent smiling, answering looks of brightness to the sky, as they hurried along to daily work. All over the great city, housewives were busy hanging out bed-clothing, and standing the removable wadded straw mats (tatami) slanting-wise against veranda posts, to get the full strength of the sun.
In that vast, merry hive there was one soul, at least, that neither saw the sunshine nor thrilled to the glory of a re-created earth. Pierre Le Beau had been sitting for many moments before an untasted breakfast, his body slouched forward under the table, his eyes fixed vacantly on a square of light slowly pushing its way through an opened window into the room. Count Ronsard, already in his easy-chair, with letters, papers, cigarettes, and an extra cup of coffee on a low stand beside him, lifted, just before opening each fresh missive, a look partly amused, partly irritated upon his sullen compatriot.
Tsuna, the butler, cautiously approached, and substituted a fresh cup of coffee for the forgotten cold one. Pierre caught at the edge of the saucer. "Merci, Tsuna," he said with a smile which all his abstraction could not keep from being sweet, "but take all else away. I want nothing—or, at least, I have eaten sufficiently."
"Yes, Tsuna," supplemented the minister. "Clear the table, and admit no guests. If a 'chit' comes, bring it in yourself."
Pierre would have sunk back into his lethargy, but the count, having by this time finished his mail, deliberately set himself to learn the secret of this new dejection.
"What have we here, young lover?" he cried gayly. "Why do you affront the fair morning with your sighs? La, la, I know the symptoms,—the rueful mouth, set eyes, loathed viands,—all speak the distemper of love. Come, now, unburden thyself, mon fils. I have a leisure hour. I see in thee need for brisk philosophy."
Pierre shook himself free with difficulty from his haunting visions,—Tetsujo's black face and burning eyes; a windswept hedge, bowing and straining in storm until at the next gust of tempest it must lie flat, like the cover of a book, showing clear her home; the white, strained, watching face; and, later, in a stiller, denser blackness, faint chinks through upright hedge-stems of bamboo falling from a broadly lighted house; his own last desperate song of Carmen; the terrible answering cry; the sound of feet on gravel; the sound of tender hands beating on thorn; a mother's sob; and then,—devouring silence. How had the sun such callousness that it could shine to-day after such a blackness?
Ronsard watched him until he turned slow, haggard, miserable eyes. Then the count lowered his own. At this critical point Pierre need not perceive the glimmer of pleased hope. "I am not unacquainted with sorrow,—and of this sort, Pierre," he murmured gently. His voice might have poured from an alabaster jar. Pierre felt the soothing, and still he hesitated to reveal this deepest wound. In their one previous discussion Ronsard's words had been drops of acid. The boy shuddered anew at the remembered sting.
And yet he must speak to some one. This anguish could not be borne alone. Later on, Mrs. Todd would purr platitudes above him. He did not wish them yet. Now, in his bewilderment, he needed the advice of a man,—a man's supplementary thought. "I should be glad to speak," he burst out impulsively, "only, dear sir, if you love me, give not that tonicof your worldliness at full strength. I am hurt with life almost to the point of flinging it aside!"
Ronsard kept himself from shrugging. "Tut, tut," he said humorously. "Had perplexed lovers the modicum of existences attributed to that interesting animal, the cat, then might they listen to all these small gusty impulses to suicide. And, by the way, where is my Zulika, my soft, blue-tinted amorette? Fast in the sun, I'll wager. Ah, Zulika, core of my heart, come, warm me, while I hear of love!"
At his words the great blue Persian who was sleeping near the fire in a spot further cheered by the full light of the morning sun, stirred drowsily, opened a reluctant eye, and closed it. She moved again, with a shrug not unlike her master, gained her feet, stretched her back upward, opened a mouth lined with pink coral, and, with a last reluctant gaze toward the warm spot she was quitting, approached her smiling master. He drew her into the chair by his side, touched her whiskered lips with a finger first dipped into sweetened coffee, shook himself and her into smoother lines of placidity, and turning again directly to Pierre, said, "Now, my son, thy father confessor is at peace. Speak what you will."
The episode of the cat did not please Le Beau. Indeed, he loathed all cats, but this one in particular, in spite of its beauty.
"Your Excellency," he began in an uncertain tone, "I find the thing difficult, perhaps unnecessary to impart. It has become already beyond the power of any one in office to advise."
Ronsard showed interest. He tucked the cat farther out of sight, and said, "If you cannot tell, permit me to hazard a guess. Already Mamselle Onda has received important propositions?"
Pierre nodded. He rose to his feet and began a restless walking. "You are far-seeing, your Excellency," he cried bitterly. "It is marriage offered from the worn voluptuary of your suggestion,—from Prince Sanètomo Haganè!"
"Haganè!" echoed the other in a low, tense voice. "Though I said that name, Pierre, I scarcely thought it. He is no voluptuary—Mon Dieu!—but a cone of granite! As a partifor that girl, the mere daughter of a rusty samurai, the offer is brilliant, unprecedented! Of course the Onda family—"
He paused in a sustained note of interrogation.
"As you remark—her family!" sneered the other. "They will coerce her to the point of torture."
Ronsard drew his fat lids closer about the brightening eyes. "How long has this been known to you?"
"Since yesterday morning. I receive messages from my betrothed through Miss Todd."
"Your betrothed is broken-hearted, of course, at the thought of severance from you?"
"My betrothed assures me of herfaith," said Pierre, with a defiant glance.
"Ah, she will try it! Poor little devil!"
"Monsieur, do not make me repent already." Pierre was angrily beginning, when Tsuna's voice at the door announced, "A letter for M. Le Beau."
Ronsard answered. "Bring it in. Shut the door. Where is the chit-book?"
"No chit-book or messenger came, your Excellency. It was brought in person by Sir Onda Tetsujo."
"Ah! Does he wait?"
"No, your Excellency. He turned very quickly. There is no answer."
"Give it into the hands of Monsieur Le Beau and depart."
"Brought by Onda, in person. It will throw light," murmured Ronsard.
Pierre was fumbling and fidgeting at the top of the long, thin Japanese envelope. In an excess of childish impatience he tore it with his teeth. The cat lifted its head at the noise, but was pressed down instantly by the firm hand of its master. It sneezed indignantly, and went to sleep.
Pierre, after two flashing readings, burst into a harsh laugh, threw the missive toward Ronsard, and then hurrying to a window, leaned his forehead to the cold glass.
The note was in English, written on very thin Japanese rice-paper, six inches wide and perhaps a yard in length. A Japanese writing brush had evidently been used, for in the slow, painful composition the writer had lingered, sometimes for thefollowing word or letter, and where the brush rested a small round blot had spread. It was dated that morning. It contained but one long sentence, built up of participial and relative clauses, as in all Japanese construction.
"Mr. Pierre Le Beau,—My daughter Onda Yuki-ko having last night become by her own will no force the affianced [affianced held three blots] wife of Prince Sanètomo Haganè Minister of War Daimyo of Konda for great honor to her family and service to her native land we respectfully desire you your honorable body from our neighborhood remove entirely or trouble will become,Onda Tetsujo."
"Mr. Pierre Le Beau,—My daughter Onda Yuki-ko having last night become by her own will no force the affianced [affianced held three blots] wife of Prince Sanètomo Haganè Minister of War Daimyo of Konda for great honor to her family and service to her native land we respectfully desire you your honorable body from our neighborhood remove entirely or trouble will become,
Onda Tetsujo."
Ronsard held it out. "Daudet might have done better in phrasing, but even he could have made the meaning no plainer."
Pierre at the window gave a sound of derision, and was still.
The count sipped daintily at his coffee, and offered some to the cat, who, mindful of recent indignity, turned her head. Lifting the diaphanous screed, he read it once more carefully, studying, it would seem, each separate word.
Pierre raised one delicate hand and tapped on the window-frame the rhythm of an air from Carmen. Still Ronsard gave no sign.
"Well, your Excellency, is this all you can remark?" he cried, whirling about as the strain threatened to become unbearable. "Has the father confessor nothing but the husks of literary comparison to offer?"
"Softly, my son. Another written communication will, in a moment, be with you. This time it will be a chit, a legitimate chit, in a bright new leather book."
"You are pleased to be enigmatic."
"Non,—you flatter. There should be no enigmas to a diplomat. This correspondent,—" here he waved the sheet airily,—"has been at work on his creation since the time of dawn. There are full three hours between his first ink and his last. Miss Onda, on the contrary, writes with ease and skill. Her letter of announcement went to Miss Todd. It will soon come to you."
"How, in God's name, do you think such things?" cried Pierre, in reluctant admiration.
"I seldom think them. They are obliging enough to come to me," said Ronsard, with a deprecating gesture, and sank back to an attitude of waiting.
Pierre stared on, half fascinated. There was something sphinx-like about the man,—a gelatinous sphinx, not quite congealed into certainty. Ronsard did not resent the stare. He met it once or twice, smiling, with slight twinkles, or, to be more accurate, slight blinks, of his small pale eyes. He looked now as if he might soon purr, like the cat.
"Ah," he murmured at length, with a slight upward gesture of one hand. "The servant-bell again. Your chit, Monsieur. A hundred francs upon it."
"Done," said Pierre. He too listened eagerly.
As they wait, in listening silence, the reader may as well be initiated into the mysteries of the "chit."
In all foreign communities of the Far East, but particularly in those where English influence prevails, three hybrid words become part of the daily vocabulary. The first is "tiffin," the second "amah," the third and most important, "chit."
Doubtless there are persons who know the origin of the last. I do not. Literally, it means a written message sent by a native runner. The foreign shops in the Far East abound in chit-books, made, most of them, in Manchester. They can be found in paper, cloth, or leather bindings. The "élite" tend toward Russia leather with a crest or monogram stamped in gold. Chit-books are to social life what check-books are to fiscal. The letter, note, or present comes accompanied by the inevitable "chit-book." The recipient is supposed to sign his name, and the hour, as in a telegram. This duty, in point of fact, is very soon relegated to the head butler, or the ingratiating "amah," a laxity which has produced more than one lawsuit and countless domestic scandals.
Tsuna, in due time, appeared with a large black leather book, aggressively and odorously new, a gold spread-eagle on the back. The envelope it accompanied was large and blue. It bore Pierre's name in the clear handwriting of Miss Todd.
The count signed the book and whispered Tsuna to remain just outside the door.
Before opening the new missive, Pierre threw himself into achair, his face turned partly away from Ronsard. The latter picked up a rustling Paris newspaper, and over its quivering upper edge watched the smooth cheek of Pierre, his left ear, and the strip of pink neck showing over an immaculate collar.
Out of the folds of the blue letter fell a smaller one of white. This was addressed to Gwendolen. At sight of it the young man's heart gave a sick throb. He hid this in his coat, until the other should have been read.
"I send you this note of Yuki's in the original, because I want you to see more in the changed handwriting than in the formal words. I am not going to insult you by trying to say anything now, except that I am sorry. I sympathize with your trouble more deeply than you will, perhaps, believe. Come to me when you will. I shall say nothing but kind things. It is a wide gulf of race and of inherited ideals between you and Yuki. No love could hold the arch of a bridge quite so wide. But remember her poor little aching heart! There! I am, as usual, doing just what I vowed I wouldn't do. Oh, Pierre, I am sorry for you,—sorry, sorry! The world doesn't seem a very bright place, this morning, does it? I have been scolding a yama-buki bush that insists upon opening in our garden; but the flowers just laugh in my face. It is an unsympathetic universe! Your friend,"Gwendolen."
"I send you this note of Yuki's in the original, because I want you to see more in the changed handwriting than in the formal words. I am not going to insult you by trying to say anything now, except that I am sorry. I sympathize with your trouble more deeply than you will, perhaps, believe. Come to me when you will. I shall say nothing but kind things. It is a wide gulf of race and of inherited ideals between you and Yuki. No love could hold the arch of a bridge quite so wide. But remember her poor little aching heart! There! I am, as usual, doing just what I vowed I wouldn't do. Oh, Pierre, I am sorry for you,—sorry, sorry! The world doesn't seem a very bright place, this morning, does it? I have been scolding a yama-buki bush that insists upon opening in our garden; but the flowers just laugh in my face. It is an unsympathetic universe! Your friend,
"Gwendolen."
Pierre held Yuki's letter long before reading it. A breath of her subtle personality must have clung to the scrap, for he inhaled from it a new bitterness, a new anguish. With a groan as of physical suffering he threw himself forward, put elbows on his knees, and deliberately forced himself to read, in rigid silence, the following note:
"My dear Gwendolen, who has been my only sister,—Your telegram having arrived, and Prince Haganè having come to me in person to speak of my duties and the opportunity he could give me at once in this time of trouble and war, I have myself willingly consented to be his wife. I am forced by nobody. You do not think badly of me for this, but some other will think very badly. Oh, please to speak kind and soothing things to that other. His grief is my aching always sorrow. I care not at all for my own, but I care very much for his. He will think me wicked and unfaithful to have broke so solemn pledge, but at the time of breaking I did not seem to myself wicked. We do not know how things sometimes have happened. But this hasnow happened to me. Ask him to forgive me. The marriage is to be held very soon; in fact, on Wednesday of the coming week. According to Japanese custom I must now be very secluded until that ceremony, not even seeing my sister, which is you. I believe Prince Haganè is to take me after to Kamakura. I do not care where he take me. Oh, Gwendolen, love your Yuki and pray for her to be strong. Always before I have been weak at a crisis. I must not now ever be weak. If pity can be held toward me in Pierre's heart, beseech him to leave Nippon. Your strangely feeling but loving,"Yuki."
"My dear Gwendolen, who has been my only sister,—Your telegram having arrived, and Prince Haganè having come to me in person to speak of my duties and the opportunity he could give me at once in this time of trouble and war, I have myself willingly consented to be his wife. I am forced by nobody. You do not think badly of me for this, but some other will think very badly. Oh, please to speak kind and soothing things to that other. His grief is my aching always sorrow. I care not at all for my own, but I care very much for his. He will think me wicked and unfaithful to have broke so solemn pledge, but at the time of breaking I did not seem to myself wicked. We do not know how things sometimes have happened. But this hasnow happened to me. Ask him to forgive me. The marriage is to be held very soon; in fact, on Wednesday of the coming week. According to Japanese custom I must now be very secluded until that ceremony, not even seeing my sister, which is you. I believe Prince Haganè is to take me after to Kamakura. I do not care where he take me. Oh, Gwendolen, love your Yuki and pray for her to be strong. Always before I have been weak at a crisis. I must not now ever be weak. If pity can be held toward me in Pierre's heart, beseech him to leave Nippon. Your strangely feeling but loving,
"Yuki."
He let the sheet flutter sidewise to the floor, his eyes absently following. When it was quite still, the address being uppermost, he leaned nearer. "Miss Gwendolen Todd, American Legation, Azabu, Tokio," he read, his lips moving as he formed the words. "Miss Gwendolen Todd," he began, directly, reading again and again. A hand fell gently on his shoulder. "Is there to be an answer, Pierre?"
Pierre shook his head.
"You will retain the enclosed letter?"
Pierre nodded.
The count went tip-toeing to the door, and returned to Tsuna the pretentious chit-book. Pierre was apparently fixed in an attitude of melancholy.
"Can these letters have told you anything worse?" questioned the gentle voice.
"Yes," said Pierre, dully. "It is worse. She is to be married next Wednesday,—and with her own consent. She wishes it. Next Wednesday."
Ronsard did not answer. He was trying to look sad.
"Wednesday, I tell you," repeated Pierre, now lifting bloodshot eyes. "Next Wednesday! Five days! This is Friday, is it not? Yes." He stopped now to count the days on shaking fingers. "Five more days and she will be his wife. That woman I love,—that pure flower to whom even my honorable devotion seemed desecration! She will lie in that old man's arms,—she will be his wife! God!God!Man!" he screamed, striking the table with one frantic fist, and then rising to hurl himself in torment about the room, "don't stand there screwing into my brain with your fishy eyes! Have you ever knownlove—do you understand jealousy—have you heard of—hell?"
"At your age I knew all three," said Ronsard, calmly. "I went through all, and I live, I eat, I intrigue, I am happy. So shall it be with you, madman!"
Pierre threw back his head in a rude clamor, meant for laughter. He was passing near Ronsard at the instant. The elder man reached out and caught his wrist. "Now, Pierre Le Beau, stand still and hear what I have to say!"
At the tone of command, rather than the physical detention, Pierre stood still, wondering.
"This is the best thing that could possibly happen to you. Yes, be quiet. You shall listen. I've endured sufficient childish railing for one day! It is infinitely the best thing for you—for your mother—for me—for France! I have a diplomatic secret to whisper. That old man Haganè—for once in his life a fool—may be sent at any moment to review the campaign in Manchuria. He and his generals may be great, but Kuropatkin is greater. Do you know what that may mean to you? Ah, I thought so; at the hope of some personal reward you flicker back to sanity. What are the honor and glory of France to such effete sensualists as you? Bah,—it sickens me! And yet, since some day you may become men, you must be dealt with. Haganè, in his supreme self-confidence, urged on, doubtless, by Onda, dares marry this young girl, though he knows her to be in love with you! Will you destroy her love, fool, by smothering it in her contempt? Haganè goes to Manchuria. His young wife mourns,—hélas! I see her weeping in his absence. There are secrets spoken in the nuptial chamber,—documents left in charge of the pretty chatelaine. Pierre, Pierre, celestial revenge hangs like ripe fruit to your hand, let her marry Haganè,—let her love you! Do not revile or scorn her. Wait—wait!"
His eyes, twinkling like those of a snake, crawled up Pierre's face to his shrinking gaze. His fat hand still clutched with a grasp that burned. Pierre tried to draw away. Again the repulsion, the fascination in this man battled for his reason. "Wait!" whispered Ronsard once again, and turned.
Pierre felt himself released. He stood motionless. Hiswrist stung as if a sea nettle had lashed it. He looked helplessly around as though searching for something he could not recall. His eyes fell on Yuki's letter. He staggered toward it, snatched it from the floor, pressed it against parched lips, and then, falling on his knees beside the chair, burst into a passion of grief.
"Come," whispered Ronsard to the cat. "Come, chérie. We will leave poor Pierre awhile. It is more delicate, n'est-ce pas?"
Itwas inevitable that a lady of Mrs. Todd's social and confidential temperament should already have acquired an inseparable friend. Mrs. Todd had a perpetual thirst for what she called "sympathetic comprehension," by which she meant, in reality, abject flattery. Her husband sometimes treated her deepest emotions with levity. Gwendolen often turned to her complaints a bright indifference more irritating than the husband's soothing smile.
The present incumbent was a Mrs. Stunt, resident in Tsukiji, Tokio, wife of an American merchant who had lived in Japan for nearly twenty years. Naturally, Mrs. Stunt knew everything. She was a little woman, with white hair brushed high from a smooth, pink forehead. Her face was round and youthful. Although not an Englishwoman she exuded odors of pink soap. Her eyes were blue, bright, and hard as glass. Her reputation was that of a model wife and mother, a pattern housekeeper, and an exemplary member of the church. People hastened to speak well of her; they raised loud voices in her praise, yet every one knew that Mrs. Stunt, when mounted upon the perfectly kept bicycle she affected, was a wheeled and leaking reservoir of scandal.
To the new-comer, or the casual observer, she appeared the very incarnation of trustful candor, speaking of her domestic affairs and those of her neighbors with a simplicity and directness that startled while they convinced. Mrs. Stunt, however, had her secrets. One of these, unshared even by the conjugal ear of timid Mr. Stunt, was her connection,—virtually that of foreign editor,—with a Tokio newspaper, called, of course in Japanese terms, "The Hawk's Eye." In addition to voluminous printed sheets of hurrying ideographs this journal dispensed each day a page of excellent English, and for weekly supplement issued a pamphlet entirely in the borrowedtongue. Mrs. Stunt was never seen to enter the shabby gates of the "Hawk's Eye" building. She turned her face away even in passing the place. She often denounced newspaper women, and, more than once in the company of a friend who tingled or wept under the lash of a personal item, joined in indignation against the cowardly villain, and wondered aloud, "Who on earth that man could be!"
The very brief notice of Lord Haganè's coming marriage, tucked away in important Japanese papers like a small spark in a chimney, might have been altogether overlooked, for news of war came in daily, and political excerpts from European papers took much space. But "The Hawk's Eye" found that smouldering spark, the mysterious breath of the foreign editor blew it into new heat, piling tinder of comment high about it, fanned it with the wind of gentle persistency, and lo, the social world of Tokio leaped into flames!
Long since, the demure little lady,—having in mind spring clothes for four lanky daughters,—had extracted from her new intimate, saleable particulars concerning Pierre's betrothal, Onda's persecution, and now Yuki's forced acceptance of Prince Haganè. "Nonsense, my dear," had Mrs. Stunt retorted to this concluding bit of romanticism. "Japanese girls don't give a fig who they marry! For a catch like old Haganè your Yuki would have thrown over a dozen spry young Frenchmen, blue eyes and all."
From the first instant of meeting Mrs. Stunt and Gwendolen had been inimical. To herself Gwendolen had called the little lady a "bargain-counter snob." In return Mrs. Stunt, keenly aware of the impression she had produced and resentful of it as people usually are of truth, began assorting items for the coming Saturday "Hawk's Eye." Gwendolen's affair with Dodge, their quarrel, his immediate transfer of outward devotion to the shrine of Carmen Gil y Niestra, and Gwendolen's irritability ever since the disagreement, were as bill-boards to the mental gaze of Mrs. Stunt. Kindly injudicious Mrs. Todd did not betray her daughter. There was no need for it. When she wept above a "Hawk's Eye" paragraph that called her idol a "raw Western heiress, who naturally cultivated her acquaintance with ploughs andharrows," it was the part of Mrs. Stunt to comfort her. That small lady, sitting near some more generous and less judicious female friend, her eyes drooping tenderly over a "pinafore for Nan," or a knitted sock for "Baby Tom," absorbed scandal as a sponge absorbs warm water.
Yet let us be just. Too much may have been ascribed to Mrs. Stunt. Perhaps even without her thrifty and unfriendly zeal the marriage of so great a lord as Haganè must inevitably have filled the papers and overflowed in irresponsible wide tides of talk. Yet scarcely without her would Pierre's hinted personality have been so openly involved, his parentage stated, and his future course of action philosophized about. The story in its parent "Hawk's Eye" was given with a wealth of imaginative detail possible only to the born "society reporter." In substance it was as follows: Miss Onda had come from America with the Todds. With their approbation she had been openly betrothed, in Washington, to a young Frenchman of pleasing appearance and high connections. (Here a secret marriage, twisted about an interrogation mark, found place.) When asked for his blessing the Japanese father, hitherto unsuspicious of French designs, fell into a fit, out of which three eminent physicians were required to haul him. Yuki was forbidden to hold communication with her lover. The next step was to adorn her in sacrificial and becoming robes and offer her in marriage,—or anything else,—to a certain powerful nobleman, whose third wife,—or was it really his sixth?—had recently, by a fortuitous occurrence, been "returned." Touched by the sorrow of his faithful knight, and influenced perhaps by the lackadaisical beauty of the girl, the nobleman agreed to take her on trial, even going through the form of a legal marriage, that the aspirations of the French lover might be the more certainly destroyed. Pierre, who read and brooded morbidly on these things, was neither soothed nor ennobled thereby. But what of it? Mrs. Stunt's four lanky daughters each had a new spring dress with hats to match!
Japanese of the better class, brushing aside like gnats these stinging personalities, approved openly of the father's conduct and of Yuki's swift acquiescence. It was the only thing conceivable.Their only blame for Yuki was that she had listened to a foreigner without first obtaining her father's approbation, an encouragement that might now urge him to be troublesome. They felt indignant that the rejected one should continue to repine for what a Japanese prince had deigned to accept. Old samurai blood grew warm. The daughter of Onda Tetsujo marry a Frenchman with a Russian mother! The very gods held their Asiatic noses.
English and American men took, for the most part, the Japanese view. Many Europeans, on the contrary, said openly that they hoped Le Beau would yet "get even" with old Haganè for stealing his sweetheart. With few exceptions, indeed, all women sympathized with Pierre. Pierre was the beau ideal of a despairing lover. His sensitive, beautiful face took on with ease the lines of sleepless grief. His blue eyes, at a moment's warning, could darken from melancholy to tragic anguish. He could sigh in such a manner that his quivering listeners, should Donne happen to be familiar, might have quoted, "When thou so sighest thou sighest not wind, thou sighest my soul away." Pierre's sorrow was genuine enough, but he liked witnesses to his grief. Needless to say that Mrs. Todd and her satellite Stunt were among Pierre's most vociferous supporters. Gwendolen fought many a battle for her school-friend, but the bitterest were pitched under her own roof.
"Now, my very dear Miss Todd," expostulated the "Hawk's Eye," "do you not consider at all the misery of Monsheer Le Beau? Miss Onda is to be a princess, happy, courted, with a position in the highest circles. Life can offer her no more. On the other hand look at the jilted lover. I never saw a face that expressed such patient grief. When he turns to me those slow, beautiful blue eyes I'll declare I feel as if I'd like to kill that girl for making him suffer."
"Pooh!" said Gwendolen, rudely; "and when he slowly turns them round to me I want to open my parasol and say 'Shoo!' thinking it a cow. I like Pierre well enough. A good deal better than you, I think, if the truth were known, but he is among men what Chopin is among musicians. He enjoys his sufferings and makes music out of them. Of course youwouldn't understand that." Rudely she wheeled and walked away, Mrs. Stunt following with venomous eyes.
Gwendolen scarcely recognized herself during these days of trial. She, the joyous one, the sun-maid, now wished to quarrel with the whole world. Of course Dodge's defection, and the ridiculous paragraphs appearing in "The Hawk's Eye," had nothing to do with her nervous condition. The causes were obvious,—Yuki's hurried marriage and Pierre's mischievous pose of despair.
Meanwhile the absurdities of gossip increased. Once, stung beyond endurance, the girl threw herself into her father's arms. "Dad, how shall I endure these spreading slanders about my friend? Is there nothing we can do,—nobody to shoot, or challenge, or anything like that?"
"Go fire at those sparrows on the lawn."
"Don't joke. I can't stand it. Oh, father, you don't know what awful things they whisper. They stop when I come near, saying it is because 'I'm not yet married.' Now just think of the pitchy subtlety of that. Why should people talk so?"
Todd held her close. "My little girl," he began, "wherever lonely, sour-hearted women—or men—congregate, there will the cancer-growth of scandal spread. They are the disseminators of half our domestic tragedies. It is a disease like other foul things,—cancer itself, leprosy, diphtheria,—though not so fatal, for the thing they tackle is a man's soul and character, immortal essences, never to be truly tarnished but from within. As I figure it out, scandal is a good deal like fungus. It may be planted anywhere, but it sticks and thrives only where it finds a rotten spot."
"Oh, you help me, dad,—you do help me. Of course these rumors cannot hurt the white heart of my darling,—but she must not hear them. One question more, daddy—"
Todd stopped her. "It is mail-morning, and that means a busy one. You've had a sermon long enough for one day. Come to think of it, why does Dodge get out of the way when you appear? What have you been doing to my secretary?"
Gwendolen gave a small gasp and vanished. Todd looked after her. "I thought that would send her flying." He turned to his desk. His face was very tender. "Poor littleone," he murmured, "she's up against her first experiences all in a bunch. God help her! Things hurt worse when we are young. But all will come right, with His help. I know my child was made for happiness. She has the hall-mark of it under her skin. But Yuki—poor little Yuki—!" He shook his head, seated himself, and soon became lost in the voluminous foreign mail.
Yuki, pale, white, and docile, moved like a determined ghost through vistas of gray hours. In that quiet household came no hint of scandal, and for Yuki's part, had she heard, she would not have greatly cared. The first brief chapter of her life was gone, shut down, like a book, and in its pages was the living flower of her love. She did not suffer now. She felt a dull gladness that she was inevitably committed to her duty. Temptation and further striving had vanished from her days. Except for the sorrow of that dear one there would be no regret. What anguish came personally, through remorse for her broken faith, she would be glad to bear. She had, through faithlessness, won the level of a higher faith. Let her wounds gape and her heart's blood fall like rain! She wished to feel more sorrow than she felt, but nothing came very clearly in these days of preparation. More than once she thought, with a tiny pang of apprehension, "If I have lost the power to feel pain, then are sacrifice and duty alike robbed of their essential oil."
Now, in place of averted faces and blank eyes, those of the Onda household fawned about her. Onda made grim overtures. The giggling of Maru San ceased only with her slumber—that, too, was audible—while old Suzumè, darting about the rooms like a gray ferret, babbled out the many titles that her nursling soon would wear, and made coarse jests and prophecies about the future.
Iriya alone moved in the silence of her daughter's spirit. The two women grew very close, though no spoken word was used to show it.
Wednesday, the marriage day, arrived softly. Yuki neither dreaded nor welcomed it. She had not seen Prince Haganè since the night he took her answer. Quite a number of herparents' relatives, some from distant provinces, came in and gathered in the house to bid the bride farewell, to throw, laughingly, the dried peas after her, to sweep the abandoned dwelling to its farthest corner, and light a bonfire at the gate when she passed through.
Yuki, in her white bridal robes and concealing veil of white silk, thin in texture but stiffened in a way that brought it into angular folds about her shoulders, stepped alone into a new jinrikisha. Tetsujo and Iriya, in a double vehicle, followed. These three alone went to Tabata, where they met a corresponding party of the same small number, Prince Haganè, his nearest male relative, the old Duke Shirota, and young Princess Sada-ko, the old duke's granddaughter.
Haganè was unmistakably preoccupied. His thoughts did not attach themselves with ease to things or persons. He had an air of relief when the short ceremony came to an end. Yuki now changed her white robe for a dark-hued silk, superb in texture, the gift, according to Japanese etiquette, of her husband. A hairdresser was in readiness to change forever the wide loops of a girl's coiffure into the more elaborate structure of a young matron. The Princess Sada-ko fluttered near, talking prettily and congratulating herself on the acquisition of a new relative. Yuki scarcely heard her. She felt almost nothing. As the last touch came, the thrusting-in of a great tortoise-shell pin, she shuddered very slightly, thinking of that ivory one broken with Pierre Le Beau on the moonlit prow of a ship.
With a great clattering and stamping the Haganè coach of ceremony drew up to the entrance-door. Magnificent gray horses in new trappings snorted impatience to be off. Haganè stepped in without a word to Yuki, who, at a nudge from the little princess, meekly followed. The domestic retinue fell on its knees in the doorway and along the pebbled drive. Haganè gave the order, "Shimbashi," waved a hand abstractedly, and the equipage dashed away.
The short railway journey was made practically in silence. Haganè said once, as if by way of explanation, "Important and somewhat alarming news has come by secret wire to-day. It is necessary for me to ponder over it."
"Honorably do not concern your august mind with a person so insignificant," said Yuki. Far from resenting his silence, the girl was thankful to be left to herself. She watched the scenes outside with eyes at first vague and unintelligent, but which soon gained a soft, increasing brightness. Earth was waking from its long sleep. Yuki felt what many of her own and other races have in such crises felt,—a gratitude to nature that human grief is given no part in it. The grass still is busy, small waxen blossoms lift the leaves of a fallen year, no matter what men may suffer. In moments of keen personal bereavement, when the soul is dazed and blinded by the wonder of its agony, a certain resentment comes. Like the Ayrshire poet we cry, "How can ye be so fresh and fair?" But such grief was not yet Yuki's. Her emotion still partook more of bewilderment than loss. Pierre was not dead. He might yet be happy, happier than with her. This thought brought no personal sting. Hers was not a nature for jealousy.
Because of her marriage, through this stern, grave man who sat beside her, she was to be given her opportunity for loyal service. Mistrust of self, apprehensions that mocked and taunted her, a certain shrinking from responsibilities so thickly heaped, rushed inevitably to her mind. On the other hand she had for guidance his great spirit of untarnished patriotism; she had vindicated to her parents all filial obligation, and springtime peeped at her from among the hills.
She saw that a thousand nameless, beloved little flowers traced with bright enamelling the leaden dykes of fields. Seedling rice brimmed with gold-green, small, separate pools. Straw-shod farmers trampled, one by one, the rotting stubs of last year's crop into the slime of fields to be new-planted. On low-thatched huts the old leaves of the roof-lilies fed a springing growth. Everywhere decay passed visibly into re-birth. So, thought little Yuki, "The very sorrow I have endured shall feed my new resolves."
At the small Kamakura station jinrikishas were awaiting them, accompanied by two persons, an old man and a comely woman of the peasant class, whom Yuki rightly took for family servants. They prostrated themselves upon the cement floor in an excess of demonstration, whispering old-fashionedphrases of congratulation and of welcome. Haganè came back for an instant to things around him.
"These are my faithful servants, Bunshichi and his daughter. I do not now recall her name," said he to Yuki, with his kind smile. "They form our entire domestic retinue at Kamakura, for it is here that I come only when in need of true repose and relaxation."
"Hai! hai! Danna-San," cried the servants in polite corroboration, and began a new series of deep bows.
"Hai!" murmured Yuki, as if in echo of their subservience. The woman, for an instant, met her young mistress's eyes. There was something in the look of wonder, of great kindness, and then,—or so it seemed to Yuki,—of compassion.
Haganè entered his kuruma and started off. Yuki and the two servants followed. And so, on this fair March day, the little Princess Haganè approached the first of her many new homes.