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diff --git a/old/55709-h/55709-h.htm b/old/55709-h/55709-h.htm deleted file mode 100644 index 7da3446..0000000 --- a/old/55709-h/55709-h.htm +++ /dev/null @@ -1,10085 +0,0 @@ -<!DOCTYPE html> -<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" xml:lang="en" lang="en"> - <head> - <meta charset="UTF-8"> - <title>The Crimson Azaleas | Project Gutenberg</title> - <link rel="icon" href="images/title_page.jpg" type="image/x-cover"> -<style> - -body { - margin-left: 10%; - margin-right: 10%; - } - -h1 { - margin-top: 7%; - text-indent: 0%; - text-align: center; - clear: both; -} - -h2 { - margin-top: 4%; - text-indent: 0%; - text-align: center; - clear: both; -} - -/* paragraphs */ - -p { - margin-top: 3%; - margin-bottom: 3%; - text-align: justify; -} /* general paragraph */ - -p.h2 { - margin-top: 7%; - text-indent: 0%; - text-align: center; - font-size: 150%; - font-weight: bold; -} - -p.indent { - text-indent: 4%; -} /* indented paragraph */ - -.center -{ - text-align: center; -} - -.hr2 -{ - width: 90%; - max-width: 90%; - color: #CCCCCC; - background-color: #FFFFFF; - border: none; - border-bottom: 6px double black; - margin: 8% auto; -} /* horizontal rule for chapter divisions */ - -.pagenum { - position: absolute; - left: 92%; - font-size: smaller; - text-align: right; -} /* page numbers */ - -.center { - text-indent: 0%; - text-align: center; -} - -.smcap {font-variant: small-caps;} - -/* Links attributes */ - -a:link { color:#000000; text-decoration: none; border-bottom: 1px dashed #808080;} - -a:visited { color:#25383C; text-decoration: none; border-bottom: 1px dashed #808080;} - -a:hover { color:#008000; text-decoration: none; border-bottom: 1px dashed #808080;} - -a:active { color:#000000; text-decoration: none; border-bottom: 1px dashed #808080;} - -ins {text-decoration: none; border-bottom: 1px dashed #dcdcdc;} - -/* Images */ - -img { - padding: 6px; -} /* without border */ - -img.border{ - border: 1px solid black; - padding: 6px; -} /* with border */ - -.image-center -{ - text-align: center; - margin: 1em auto; -} - -/* Poetry */ -.poem { - margin-left:10%; - margin-right:10%; - text-align: left; -} - -.poem br {display: none;} - -.poem .stanza {margin: 4% 0% 4% 0%;} - -.poem span.i0 { - display: block; - margin-left: 0%; - padding-left: 12%; - text-indent: -12%; -} - -.poem span.i2 { - display: block; - margin-left: 8%; - padding-left: 12%; - text-indent: -12%; -} - -.poem span.i4 { - display: block; - margin-left: 16%; - padding-left: 12%; - text-indent: -12%; -} - -/* Other */ - -span.ralign { - position: absolute; - right: 10%; - top: auto; -} - -div.tnote { - background-color: #CCCCCC; - border-style: dotted; - margin-left: 10%; - margin-right: 10%; - padding: 1%; - font-style: normal; - font-size: 90%; - text-align: justify; -} - - h3,h4 { text-align: center; - clear: both; } - hr.full { width: 100%; - margin-top: 3em; - margin-bottom: 0em; - margin-left: auto; - margin-right: auto; - height: 4px; - border-width: 4px 0 0 0; /* remove all borders except the top one */ - border-style: solid; - border-color: #000000; - clear: both; } - - -.cellpadding10 {padding: 10px;} -.valigntop {vertical-align: top;} -div.chapter {page-break-before: always;} - </style> - </head> - <body> -<div style='text-align:center; font-size:1.2em; font-weight:bold;'>The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Crimson Azaleas, by H. De Vere (Henry De Vere) Stacpoole</div> -<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and -most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions -whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms -of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online -at <a href="https://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a>. If you -are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the -country where you are located before using this eBook. -</div> -<div style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Title: The Crimson Azaleas</div> -<div style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Author: H. De Vere (Henry De Vere) Stacpoole</div> -<div style='display:block;margin:1em 0'>Release Date: October 8, 2017 [eBook #55709]<br> -[Most recently updated: April 22, 2023]</div> -<div style='display:block;margin:1em 0'>Language: English</div> -<div style='display:block;margin:1em 0'>Character set encoding: UTF-8</div> -<div style='display:block; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Produced by: Roger Frank, Ernest Schaal,<br> - and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team<br> - (<a href="http://www.pgdp.net">http://www.pgdp.net</a>)<br> - from page images generously made available by<br> - the Google Books Library Project<br> - (<a href="https://books.google.com">https://books.google.com</a>) -<br>Revised by Richard Tonsing.</div> -<div style='margin-top:2em;margin-bottom:4em'>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE CRIMSON AZALEAS ***</div> - - -<table style="background-color: #ccccff;margin: 0 auto;" class="cellpadding10"> - <tr> - <td class="valigntop"> - Note: - </td> - <td> - Images of the original pages are available through - the Google Books Library Project. See - <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=nxgNAAAAYAAJ&hl=en"> - https://books.google.com/books?id=nxgNAAAAYAAJ&hl=en</a> - </td> - </tr> -</table> -<p> </p> -<hr class="full"> - -<h1>THE CRIMSON AZALEAS</h1> - -<hr class="hr2"> - -<div class="image-center"> -<img class="border" src="images/title_page.jpg" width="472" height="700" alt="" title=""> -</div> - -<hr class="hr2"> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="pagev"></a>[pg v]</span></p> - -<div class='chapter'><h2>CONTENTS</h2></div> - -<blockquote> -<p class="center">PART ONE</p> - -<p class="center">THE TRAGEDY OF THE NIKKO ROAD</p> - -<p>CHAPTER <span class="ralign">PAGE</span></p> - -<p>I. <span class="smcap">The Road to Nikko</span> -<span class="ralign"><a href="#page5">5</a></span></p> - -<p>II. <span class="smcap">The Blind One</span> -<span class="ralign"><a href="#page11">11</a></span></p> - -<p>III. <span class="smcap">The Lost One</span> -<span class="ralign"><a href="#page20">20</a></span></p> - -<p>IV. <span class="smcap">Amidst the Hills</span> -<span class="ralign"><a href="#page25">25</a></span></p> - -<p>V. <span class="smcap">The Tea House of the Tortoise</span> -<span class="ralign"><a href="#page31">31</a></span></p> - -<p>VI. <span class="smcap">The Dreamer and the Dragon</span> -<span class="ralign"><a href="#page44">44</a></span></p> - -<p>VII. <span class="smcap">How Campanula Brought Fortune to the -House of the Tortoise—and Other Things</span> -<span class="ralign"><a href="#page54">54</a></span></p> - -<p>VIII. <span class="smcap">The Surprising Story of Momotaro—Akudogi -and Spotted Dog</span> -<span class="ralign"><a href="#page61">61</a></span></p> - -<p>IX. <span class="smcap">The House of the Clouds</span> -<span class="ralign"><a href="#page71">71</a></span></p> - -<p>X. <span class="smcap">Of Mousmés and Other Things</span> -<span class="ralign"><a href="#page82">82</a></span></p> - -<p class="center">PART TWO</p> - -<p class="center">THE MASSACRE OF THE BLUE-BELLS</p> - -<p>XI. <span class="smcap">The Dream</span> -<span class="ralign"><a href="#page91">91</a></span></p> - -<p>XII. <span class="smcap">The Foreign Devils</span> -<span class="ralign"><a href="#page101">101</a></span></p> - -<p>XIII. <span class="smcap">The Monastery Garden</span> -<span class="ralign"><a href="#page107">107</a></span></p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="pagevi"></a>[pg vi]</span></p> - -<p>XIV. <span class="smcap">Nagasaki by Night</span> -<span class="ralign"><a href="#page119">119</a></span></p> - -<p>XV. <span class="smcap">M’Gourley’s Love Affair</span> -<span class="ralign"><a href="#page124">124</a></span></p> - -<p>XVI. <span class="smcap">The Philosophy of Evil</span> -<span class="ralign"><a href="#page135">135</a></span></p> - -<p>XVII. <span class="smcap">The House by Night</span> -<span class="ralign"><a href="#page141">141</a></span></p> - -<p>XVIII. <span class="smcap">Mostly about Flowers</span> -<span class="ralign"><a href="#page151">151</a></span></p> - -<p>XIX. <span class="smcap">The Stork and the Tortoise</span> -<span class="ralign"><a href="#page172">172</a></span></p> - -<p>XX. <span class="smcap">The Song of the Mushi</span> -<span class="ralign"><a href="#page183">183</a></span></p> - -<p>XXI. <span class="smcap">M’Gourley’s Love Affair</span> -<span class="ralign"><a href="#page194">194</a></span></p> - -<p>XXII. <span class="smcap">The Complete Geographer</span> -<span class="ralign"><a href="#page206">206</a></span></p> - -<p>XXIII. <span class="smcap">The Struggle</span> -<span class="ralign"><a href="#page213">213</a></span></p> - -<p>XXIV. <span class="smcap">George Du Telle</span> -<span class="ralign"><a href="#page223">223</a></span></p> - -<p>XXV. <span class="smcap">Retrospection</span> -<span class="ralign"><a href="#page232">232</a></span></p> - -<p class="center">PART THREE</p> - -<p class="center">THE BROKEN LATH</p> - -<p>XXVI. <span class="smcap">The Broken Lath</span> -<span class="ralign"><a href="#page241">241</a></span></p> - -<p>XXVII. <span class="smcap">The “Empress of Japan”</span> -<span class="ralign"><a href="#page247">247</a></span></p> - -<p>XXVIII. <span class="smcap">M’Gourley’s Love Affair</span> -<span class="ralign"><a href="#page262">262</a></span></p> - -<p>XXIX. <span class="smcap">The Garden-Party</span> -<span class="ralign"><a href="#page268">268</a></span></p> - -<p>XXX. <span class="smcap">The False Report</span> -<span class="ralign"><a href="#page280">280</a></span></p> - -<p>XXXI. <span class="smcap">Farewell</span> -<span class="ralign"><a href="#page284">284</a></span></p> - -<p>XXXII. <span class="smcap">Her House in Order</span> -<span class="ralign"><a href="#page292">292</a></span></p> - -<p>XXXIII. <span class="smcap">The “La France”</span> -<span class="ralign"><a href="#page296">296</a></span></p> - -<p>XXXIV. <span class="smcap">Amidst the Azaleas</span> -<span class="ralign"><a href="#page302">302</a></span></p> - -<p>XXXV. <span class="smcap">Bon Matsuri</span> -<span class="ralign"><a href="#page307">307</a></span></p> -</blockquote> - -<hr class="hr2"> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page5"></a>[pg 5]</span></p> - -<div class='chapter'><h2>CHAPTER I</h2></div> - -<p class="h2">THE ROAD TO NIKKO</p> - -<div class="poem"> -<div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">“Upon the road to Nikko,</span><br> -<span class="i0">Where the pilgrims pray,</span><br> -<span class="i0">Along the road to Nikko</span><br> -<span class="i0">Either side the way,</span><br> -<span class="i0">Thundering great camellia trees</span><br> -<span class="i0">Decked with blossoms gay,</span><br> -<span class="i0">Adorn the road to Nikko,</span><br> -<span class="i0">The mountain road to Nikko,</span><br> -<span class="i0">In the month of May.”</span><br> -</div> -</div> - -<p class="indent">The singer stopped singing and began to whistle. -Then he broke out into prose.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Damn boots! I’ll be lame in another mile. Why -can’t we be content with sandals like our ‘brithers’ the -Japs!”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Dinna damn boots, but their makers,” replied his -companion, a sandy Scot of fifty or more, dressed in -broadcloth and a bowler, a figure at once a blot upon -the lonely road and a blasphemy against Japan—a blot -whose name was M’Gourley. “I vara well remember -when I was in Gleska—”</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page6"></a>[pg 6]</span> -“Oh, don’t!” said the poet of the Nikko road, Dick -Leslie by name, a young man, or rather a man still -young, very tall, straight, dark, and good-looking, and -a gentleman from the crown of his close-clipped, curly -black head to the soles of the boots that were torturing -him. “Don’t haul up your factory chimneys, your -smoke and whisky bottles in this place of places. I -believe if a Scot ever gets into heaven he’ll start his first -conversation with his first angel by making some reference -to Gleska: Look there!”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Whaur?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“There!” cried Leslie, turning from the direction of -Fubasami and the beginning of the great Nikko valley -before them, and pointing backwards away towards -Kureise over an expanse of distant country where the -clouds were drawing soft shadows across the rice fields -and the sinuous hills; over little woods of fir and -cryptomeria trees, lakes where the lotus flowers spread in -summer, and the king-fisher flashed like a jewel; over -occasional fields of flowers, flowers that grew by the -million and the million.</p> - -<p class="indent">Many of these details were absorbed and dulled by -distance, yet still lent their spirit to the scene, producing -a landscape most strange and quaint.</p> - -<p class="indent">Nearly every other country seems flung together by -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page7"></a>[pg 7]</span> -nature, but Japan seems to have been imagined by some -great artist of the ancient days—imagined and constructed.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Look there,” said Leslie, “saw you ever anything -better than that in Clackmannan?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Ay, have I,” replied M’Gourley, contemplating the -view before him, “many’s the time. What sort of -country do you call that? Man! I’d as soon live on a -tea-tray if I had ma choice.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Well, you’ve lived in Japan long enough to be used -to it. It’s always the way; put a man in a paradise like -this where there are all sorts of flowers and jolly things -around him, and he starts grumbling and growling and -pining after rain, and misery, and cold, and sleet, and -peat smoke—if he’s a Scotchman. How long have you -been in Japan, Mac, did you say?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Near ever since the Samurai took off their swords -and turned policemen.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“What kept you in the East so long if you don’t like -it?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Trade, like the wind, blaweth where it listeth, and a -man must e’en follow his trade,” said M’Gourley; and -they resumed their road.</p> - -<p class="indent">They were walking to Nikko together, this strangely -assorted pair, strangely assorted though they were both -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page8"></a>[pg 8]</span> -Scotchmen. They were approaching the place, not by -that splendid avenue of cryptomeria trees that leads -from Utso-no-Miya, but by the wild hill road, which runs -from Kureise, or rather by the higher hill road, for there -are two, and they had taken the loneliest and the longest -by mistake (M’Gourley’s fault, though he swore that he -knew the country like the palm of his hand).</p> - -<p class="indent">They had come twenty or twenty-five miles of the -way by riksha, and were now hoofing the remainder, -their luggage having been sent on to Nikko by train.</p> - -<p class="indent">“And talking of trade,” said M’Gourley, “let’s go -back to the matter we were on a moment ago; there’s -money in it, and I know the beesiness. I ken it fine; -never a man knows better the Jap Rubbish trade.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“You were talking of starting at Nagasaki.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Ay, Nagasaki’s best.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Well, I’ll plank the money,” said Leslie. “I’ll put -up a thousand against a thousand of yours.”</p> - -<p class="indent">M’Gourley stopped and held out a hand sheathed in -a mournful-looking black dogskin glove.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Is’t a bargain?” said he.</p> - -<p class="indent">“It’s a bargain. Funny that we should have only met -the other day in Tokyo, and that you should have come -along to Nikko to show me the sights. I believe all the -time you were bent on trepanning me into this business.”</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page9"></a>[pg 9]</span> -“I was that,” said M’Gourley, with charming frankness; -“for your own good. A man without a beesiness -is a man astray, and when you told me in the hotel in -Tokyo you were a boddie with money, and nothing to -do with it, I said: ‘Here’s my chance.’”</p> - -<p class="indent">“If I had met you two months ago,” said Leslie bitterly, -“I wouldn’t have been much use, for my father -would not have been dead, and I would not have come -into his money. Do you know what I have been?—I -have been a remittance man.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I’ve met vera much worse people than some of -<i>them</i>,” said Mac, who if his newly found partner had -declared himself a demon out of Hades would perhaps -have made the same glossatory remark—the capital -being assured.</p> - -<p class="indent">“I’m hanged if I have,” said Leslie bitterly. “Give -me a Sydney Larrikin, a Dago, a Chinee, before your -remittance man. I know what I’m talking about for I -have been one—see?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“What, may I ask—” began M’Gourley, then he -paused.</p> - -<p class="indent">“You mean what was the reason of my being flung -off by my father? Youthful indiscretions. Let’s sit -down; I want to take my boot off.”</p> - -<p class="indent">The road just here took a bend, and became wilder -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page10"></a>[pg 10]</span> -and more lovely, a stream gushed from the bank on -which they took their seats, and before them lay a little -valley, a valley hedged on either side by cypress trees, -and thronged with crimson azaleas.</p> - -<hr class="hr2"> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page11"></a>[pg 11]</span></p> - -<div class='chapter'><h2>CHAPTER II</h2></div> - -<p class="h2">THE BLIND ONE</p> - -<p class="indent">Crimson azaleas in wild profusion, here struck -with sun, here shadowed by the cypress trees—a -sight to gladden the heart of a poet. Between the cypress -trees, beyond the azaleas, beyond country broken -by sunlight and cloud shadows, lay the sea hills of Tanagura -in the dimmest bluest distance.</p> - -<p class="indent">“If I could get that into a gold frame,” said Leslie, -as he inhaled the delicious perfume of the azaleas and -bathed his naked foot in the tiny cascade breaking from -the bank on which they sat, “I’d take it to London and -send it to the Academy—and they’d reject it.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Vara likely,” replied Mac. “It is no fit for a -peecture. Who ever saw the like of yon out of Japan? -It’s nought but a fakement.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I say,” said Leslie, “talking of fakements—in this -business of ours I hope we’ll steer clear of all that.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“In this beesiness of oors,” said Mac, “I thought -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page12"></a>[pg 12]</span> -you distinctly understood my friend Danjuro will be -the nominal head of the firrm—we are but the sleeping -pairtners.”</p> - -<p class="indent">Mac’s Scotch bubbled in him when he grew excited, or -when he forgot himself. Ordinarily he talked pretty -ordinary English, but when the stopper was off the -Scotch came out, and you could tell by the pronunciation -of the word “money” whether he was mentioning the -article casually or deep in a deal.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Well,” said Leslie, “I don’t want my dreams troubled -by visions of Danjuro swindling unfortunate tourists; -you say we’re to export things, but I don’t want -to have him roping in people, selling them five-shilling -pagodas at five pounds a-piece.”</p> - -<p class="indent">Mac sighed as if with regret at the impossibility of -such a delightful deal as that.</p> - -<p class="indent">“It’s rather jolly going into business,” continued -Leslie, dreamily gazing at the azaleas. “Only crime -I’ve never committed, except murder and a few others. -Good God! when I started in life I never thought I’d -end my days peddling paper lanterns, and cheating people -into buying penny-a-dozen kakemonos for a shilling -a-piece. Don’t talk to me; all trade is cheating.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“You should have known Macbean,” said M’Gourley, -who had also taken off his boots and stockings and -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page13"></a>[pg 13]</span> -was bathing his broad splay feet in the pretty little -torrent.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Who was he?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Forty year ago I was his ’prentice. Mummies, and -idols, and pagods, and scarabeuses was the output of the -firm, and Icknield Street, Birmingham, its habitation.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Idols?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Ay, idols. Some the size of your thumb, and some -the size of bedposts, which they were derived from; some -with teeth, and some with hair, and some bald as a bannock. -We stocked half West Africa with idols, and the -South Seas absorbed the balance.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Well, you certainly take the cake,” said Leslie.</p> - -<p class="indent">“I took three pun ten a week at Macbean’s, and -learnt more eelementary theology than’s taught in the -schules of Edinboro’. Macbean said artistical idols was -what the savages wanted, and what they would get as -long as old bedposteses were to be bought at knockdown -prices, and sold for the waurth of elephants’ tusks.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“You disgust me,” said Leslie, “upon my word you -do.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“That’s what Macbean said one day to the boddie I -had in mind when I began telling you of this. The -boddie came in grumbling about a mummy—a vara fine -mummy it was, too—that had been sold to him for export. -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page14"></a>[pg 14]</span> -The mummy had been stuftit with newspapers, but -the <i>sachrum ustum</i> used for coloring the stuffing matter -being omitted, the printed matter remained in eevidence -when the American who bought the article in Cairo -opened it to hunt for amulets and scarabeuses. ‘Newspapers!’ -said Macbean. ‘And what more do you expect -in a fifty-shullin’ mummy? Did y’ expect it stuffed wi’ -dimonds?’”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Well?” said Leslie.</p> - -<p class="indent">“That’s all, and that’s the whole of beesiness in a -walnut shell; y’ canna expect a fifty-shullin’ mummy to -be stuffed with—”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Rubbish! the whole of swindling, you mean. Anyhow, -we’ll keep straight, if you please; a fair profit I -don’t mind, but I object to rank trickery—by the way, -what’s the time? my watch has stopped; and how far -is Nikko off?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“It’s after two,” said Mac, who had no very definite -idea of how far Nikko might be off, having led his companion -by the wrong road and concealed the fact. -“And Nikko is maybe twarree miles, maybe a bit more—wull -we go?”</p> - -<p class="indent">For all answer Leslie took some bar-chocolate from his -pocket, gave some to his companion, and proceeded to -lunch.</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page15"></a>[pg 15]</span> -“I daresay you think it funny,” said he at last, “my -chumming up, and in your heart of hearts—that is, -your business heart (excuse me for being frank)—you -must think it strange I should put up my money with a -man whom I don’t know in the least. But, man! the -truth of the matter is I’m weary for a friend. I have -money enough and to spare, but—I’m weary for a -friend.</p> - -<p class="indent">“I’m the lonest man in the world,” went on Leslie, -munching his chocolate and gazing at the beautiful -scene before him; “the lonest man on God’s earth. -What is the matter with me that I should never have -found and kept a friend? If God had ever given me -anything to love I’d have cherished it, but—there is no -God that I can see.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Whisht, man,” said Mac. “Dinna talk like that.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I know I was wild,” went on Leslie, “before I left -England, but other men have been as bad. I quarreled -with my father, but other men’s fathers are different -from what mine was. He drove me beyond the sea to be -an alien and an outcast. I’ve seen drunken loafers in the -bars of Sydney, where I was stuck as a remittance man -three years; they had friends of a sort—friends who -stuck them, but friend or dog never stuck to me.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“No wumman?” asked M’Gourley, spitting out the -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page16"></a>[pg 16]</span> -remains of the chocolate he was eating, and lighting a -vile-looking Hankow cigar.</p> - -<p class="indent">“I loved a woman once,” said Leslie, staring before -him with eyes that saw not Japan or the cypress trees -or the azaleas. “Her name was Jane Deering; we were -boy and girl together, cousins, and her people lived -quite close to mine. We got engaged, and were to have -been married, and—she threw me over.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“For why?” asked Mac.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Said she didn’t want to get married.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Well, that was deefinite.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Damned definite. What’s that noise?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Tap, tap, tap.” It was the tapping of a stick upon -the ground, and a man in the dress of a coolie, with a -saucer-shaped hat upon his head, turned the corner of -the road, coming in the direction of Nikko. He was -tapping the ground before him with a staff. He was -blind.</p> - -<p class="indent">“What an awful-looking face!” said Leslie, as the -figure approached. “Look, Mac! Did you ever see the -like of that?”</p> - -<p class="indent">One sees many extraordinary and sinister faces in the -East, but the face of the on-comer would have been hard -to match, even in the stews of Shanghai.</p> - -<p class="indent">The nose seemed to have been smashed flat by a blow. -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page17"></a>[pg 17]</span> -The face was flat and possessed an awful stolidity, so -that at a little distance one could have sworn that it was -carved from stone. It impressed one as the countenance -of a creature long in communion with evil.</p> - -<p class="indent">The two Scotchmen held motionless to let this undesirable -pass, but he must have possessed some sixth -sense, for instead of passing he stopped and begun to -whine.</p> - -<p class="indent">He spoke in a light, flighty, chanting voice, like the -voice of a man either insane or delirious.</p> - -<p class="indent">“What’s he say?” asked Leslie.</p> - -<p class="indent">“He’s a Chinee, and wants money.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Tell the beast to go.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Says he knows we’re foreigners.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Clever that; why, even I can hear your Scotch sticking -out of the gibberish you’re talking.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Says he wants opium—hasn’t had any the whole -day, and if we will give him opium, or money to buy it, -he’ll show us things.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“What things?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Lord sakes! the creeture’s daft; says he can make -great magic—snakes out of mud or flowers out of nothing.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Why doesn’t he make some opium if he’s so clever?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Says the woods around here are full of devils.”</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page18"></a>[pg 18]</span> -“Tell him to show us a devil, then.”</p> - -<p class="indent">Mac translated and the person so well acquainted with -devils made answer.</p> - -<p class="indent">“For a piece of gold he will show us one. Why, Leslie, -man, don’t you be a fule.”</p> - -<p class="indent">Leslie had taken half a sovereign from his pocket.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Give it him and tell him to show us a devil, and if -he plays any tricks I’ll chivy him into Nikko, and give -him up to the police.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Don’t be a fule,” said Mac testily. “A’weel!”</p> - -<p class="indent">Leslie put the piece of gold into the creature’s hand, -who put it to his ear for a moment, and then hid it in -his rags. Then he bent his head sideways to the road.</p> - -<p class="indent">“What’s he doing now?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“He’s listening if the road’s clear; he says there’s -nothing on it for two ri on either side, but he hears seven -rikshas coming in the direction of Nikko, but he’ll have -time to do what he wants before they arrive.”</p> - -<p class="indent">The Blind One bent down rapidly and traced an almost -perfect circle around himself in the dust of the -road; then hurriedly outside this he traced what an initiate -might have taken for the form of the Egg, the -horns of Simara, and another form needless to describe. -Then he said something to Mac.</p> - -<p class="indent">“He says, we’re not to speak, or touch the circle or -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page19"></a>[pg 19]</span> -go near it. I have not paid for this entertainment, and -I juist think I’ll take a bit walk doon the road.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Sit down, you old coward,” said Leslie. “I’m the -one that has paid, and I’m the one the ‘deevil’ will -carry off if there is a deevil. Look!”</p> - -<p class="indent">The Blind One took from his rags a cane pipe such -as blind men use in Japan, only larger, and began to -blow mournful notes out of it. It was as strange a sound -as ever left human lips, now ear-piercing, now low, low -and soothing; his face flushed and swelled; he seemed enraptured, -entranced with his own music, and the searching -sound of it caused things to move disturbedly in the -trees around, and a low croaking, as if from some feathered -creature disturbed, to come from the cypress wood.</p> - -<p class="indent">As he played, he turned north, south, east, and west, -lingering, at last, with the reed pipe pointing between -the cypress trees, as though he were calling to the blue -hills in the distance.</p> - -<p class="indent">As he stood thus, Leslie, who had been looking at the -mysterious symbols around the circle, was seized with an -impish impulse, and leaning forward with his walking-stick, -he made in the dust inside the circle, and just behind -the Blind One’s heel, the form of a cross.</p> - -<p class="indent">In doing this, the point of the stick touched the Blind -One’s heel.</p> - -<hr class="hr2"> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page20"></a>[pg 20]</span></p> - -<div class='chapter'><h2>CHAPTER III</h2></div> - -<p class="h2">THE LOST ONE</p> - -<p class="indent">A congreve rocket incautiously touched by a -match could not have given a more surprising result.</p> - -<p class="indent">Flinging the pipe from him with a yell, the Blind -One sprang clear over the circle, and stood for an instant -panting and blowing at the sun.</p> - -<p class="indent">He seemed blowing away things that were trying to -enter his mouth; then, the staff attached by a thong to -his wrist flying about wildly, he began to tear at himself -all over his body and fling things away from him, as -though he were attacked by a hundred thousand scorpions; -then as if bitten by some more serious enemy, he -seized his staff, and striking about him wildly, began to -run. Hither and thither, hitting right and left, dashing -against trees and seeming utterly regardless of them, -bleeding, torn, and all the time fighting his phantom pursuers -he ran till he vanished round the bend leading -towards Nikko. The two Scotchmen ran to the bend of -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page21"></a>[pg 21]</span> -the road, and there down the road they saw him still running, -and fighting as if for his life; striking above him -as if at things in the air, and around him as if at things -leaping at him from the ground. Suddenly he vanished -round a further bend, and was lost to view.</p> - -<p class="indent">“He’s gone gyte!” said Mac as they returned.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Well, I’m damned!” said Leslie.</p> - -<p class="indent">“I touched his heel, and I suppose he thought it was -one of the devils—mad fool!”</p> - -<p class="indent">“’Tis no madness,” said Mac. “If ever I saw a man -chased by deevils I’ve seen one now. ’Twas that mark -you made let them loose, or my name’s not Tod M’Gourley. -Did you no ken you were makin’ the sign of the -cross in yon damned circle of his? Hech, man! <i>Look -there!</i>”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Where?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“My God!” said M’Gourley, “look you there, <i>there</i>! -There’s a bairn amongst the azaleas!”</p> - -<p class="indent">“So there is!” said Leslie. “By Jove, a little Jap -girl come out of the wood.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Dom it, man,” roared M’Gourley, “she wasn’t there -twarree seconds ago. She’s come out of no wood; she’s -been <i>fetched</i>.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Well, of all the superstitious idiots!” said Leslie, -gazing from the perspiring M’Gourley to the figure of -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page22"></a>[pg 22]</span> -the quaint and pretty little Japanese girl who was busy -amidst the azaleas plucking the blossoms. “Why, -it wouldn’t take her more than ‘twarree seconds’ to -come out of the wood. Anyhow, I’ll go and see if she’s -real.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Man! man! hauld back!” cried the agonized -M’Gourley as his partner plunged amidst the bushes. -“Ye’ll be had; she’s a bogle. Lord’s sake! Lord’s sake! -Well, gang your own gate, I’m off to Nikko.”</p> - -<p class="indent">Yet he waited.</p> - -<p class="indent">The bogle was plucking blossoms as hard as she could -and in the profuse manner of childhood. She and the -azaleas made a sight for sore eyes.</p> - -<p class="indent">She might have been seven or eight, dressed in a blue -kimono with a scarlet obi, hair black as ebony shavings, -tightly drawn off the forehead and held up with a tortoiseshell -comb—the “germ of a woman.”</p> - -<p class="indent">Her back was turned to Leslie, and as he got within -arm’s length of the quaint and delicious little figure he -did just what you or I might have done—bent down, -seized her up, and kissed her.</p> - -<p class="indent">The bogle dropped her flowers and gave a shriek, a -most distinctly human shriek.</p> - -<p class="indent">“He’s kessed her!” cried M’Gourley, addressing the -azaleas, the cypress trees, and all Japan.</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page23"></a>[pg 23]</span> -Then he stood in agony, held to the spot by the sight -of Leslie and the bogle making friends.</p> - -<p class="indent">It didn’t seem to take long, for presently he returned -through the azaleas triumphant, carrying her in his -arms.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Here’s your bogle,” said he, placing her on the -dusty road where, with all the gravity of the Japanese -child, she made a deep obeisance to M’Gourley. That -gentleman returned the compliment with a short, sharp -nod.</p> - -<p class="indent">“I’m awa’ to Nikko,” said he in the hard, irritable -voice of a person who is desirous of avoiding an undesirable -acquaintance, gazing at Leslie and steadily ignoring -the lady in blue who was now holding on to -Leslie’s right leg, contemplating M’Gourley, and sucking -the tip of a taper and tiny forefinger all at the same -time. “I’m awa’ to Nikko. ’Tis no place for a mon like -me. Never was I used to the company of fules—”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Don’t be an ass! Speak to her; you have the tongue, -and I haven’t.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I winna.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Well, of all the old women I ever met,” said Leslie, -addressing a “thundering great camellia tree” that -stood opposite, “this partner of mine takes the bun!—don’t -he, Popsums?” bending down and looking into the -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page24"></a>[pg 24]</span> -small face, the left cheek of which was now resting -against his knee.</p> - -<p class="indent">Popsums, in reply to the smile and interrogative tone -in the question she did not understand, smiled gravely -back and murmured something that sounded like “Hei.”</p> - -<p class="indent">M’Gourley snorted, and Leslie broke out laughing; he -had little of the Japanese, but he knew that “Hei” -meant “Yes.”</p> - -<hr class="hr2"> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page25"></a>[pg 25]</span></p> - -<div class='chapter'><h2>CHAPTER IV</h2></div> - -<p class="h2">AMIDST THE HILLS</p> - -<p class="indent">Just then a ripple of laughter came down the breeze, -and round the corner of the road, heading for -Nikko, came at full trot seven rikshas streaming out like -a scarf of color; a dream of color—for each riksha contained -a lady most beautiful to behold under the splendor -of her umbrella.</p> - -<p class="indent">They were a party of girls returning to Nikko after -some sylvan freak, and they drew up as if by common -assent to admire the azaleas.</p> - -<p class="indent">Leslie, removing his hat and lifting his treasure trove, -held her up for exhibition.</p> - -<p class="indent">The girls laughed and spoke to her; had they been -English girls she would have been promptly handed -round and kissed; and she, with becoming gravity, replied -gracefully in a few half-lisped words.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then, leaving behind them on the air a cloud of dust, -a perfume of camellia oil, and a long drawn “Sayonara,” -the bevy of beauties passed in a gorgeous flight of -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page26"></a>[pg 26]</span> -mixed colors round the bend of the road and were gone.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Ye mind he said seven rikshas were coming,” cried -Mac.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Bother!” answered Leslie. “He’d come the same direction -and passed them. Do you think they’d have -laughed and spoken to her if there was anything wrong -and they’re Japs, and ought to know. Come! buck up, -man! You’re not afraid to do what a girl has done?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“A’weel!” said M’Gourley, half ashamed of himself; -and dour as any Procurator Fiscal, he set to the examination -of the being who was now on the ground again, -her hand clasped in that of Leslie.</p> - -<p class="indent">This was the result of the examination. Deponent -lived with her father. Where? She did not know.—Just -beyond there somewhere. What was the house like she -lived in? It had a plum-tree growing before it. What -did her father do? He hammered things with a hammer. -Had she any brothers and sisters? No; but—sudden -thought—she had a sugar-candy dragon, and she had -lost it. (Here deponent wept slightly and with reserve.)</p> - -<p class="indent">Pause in the interrogations whilst a snub nose was -wiped with Leslie’s pocket handkerchief.</p> - -<p class="indent">And a kite, but that was at home. She had gone that -day with a little boy—a neighbor—to hunt for the saccharine -dragon, and they had lost themselves, then they -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page27"></a>[pg 27]</span> -had lost each other, then <i>she</i> had lost herself. How was -that possible? Well, she had gone to sleep. Where? In -the wood.</p> - -<p class="indent">Here the examinate went off into a tale about an impossible -tom-cat with wings, which she had once seen on -an umbrella, and beheld once again in the wood, but was -suppressed by the court and asked to keep to facts.</p> - -<p class="indent">Whilst asleep in the wood she was awakened, so she -declared, by a sound like the passage of a flight of -storks, and, coming out of the wood, fearful of meeting -a dragon, she began to pick the pretty flowers; then -she was seized by the honorable gentleman, whose height -was greater than a poplar tree.</p> - -<p class="indent">How old was she? Eight times the cherry blossom had -blown since her humble self had come into the world.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then she volunteered the entirely unsolicited statement -that it was likely her little boy companion had been -lost in the snow. But that was impossible—well, it was -a field of lilies then—and he had been most possibly devoured -by a dragon.</p> - -<p class="indent">What did she propose about going home? Did she -know the way, and could she go alone?</p> - -<p class="indent">Here she declared herself utterly at a loss. Her home -was somewhere near by, but where, she could not exactly -say.</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page28"></a>[pg 28]</span> -“Well, well!” said M’Gourley, when he had finished -his examination. “It seems to me that bogle or no bogle -you’ve saddled yoursel’ wi’ a lost child. Whaur’s your -common sense now?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Just where it always was.—Question is—what are -we to do? Can <i>you</i> suggest anything?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Na, na! it’s not for me to say,” said the other, with -that vile sense of satisfaction a brither Scot feels when a -brither Scot has made a cubby of himself. Then, remembering -the bond of partnership, “If I were the -party responsible, I’d just pop her back where I fund -her first, and rin.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Well, you <i>are</i> a beast! Why, you benighted old -mummy-stuffer, I believe you’ve got a scarab in your -bosom instead of a heart! I’ll take her along to Nikko, -and get the police to hunt out her home. Stay, we -haven’t asked her what’s her name.”</p> - -<p class="indent">M’Gourley asked the question, and the Lost One declared -her name to be “Bell-flower.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Bell-flower!” said Leslie, who had a smattering of -botany, “that’s a campanula. We’ll call her—‘Campanula.’”</p> - -<p class="indent">She also made declaration that she was quite satisfied -to go with the honorable gentleman, whose height exceeded -the tallest of trees. Leslie lifted her up and seated -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page29"></a>[pg 29]</span> -her upon his shoulder, and, as they started, he turned -and looked back at the loveliness of the perfumed azalea -valley—a sight that was yet to haunt him in the time to -come.</p> - -<p class="indent">“It’s my opeenion,” said M’Gourley, as they took the -road, “that there was something forming in yon wood, -something dom bad, and you flung it out of the forming -eelement, and she was just suckid in.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“What d’you mean?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“The wraith of some dead bairn was wanderin’ aboot, -and the forming eelement seized it.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“What forming element? Rubbish! That chap was a -lunatic; well, when he felt me touch him it set his lunacy -off, that’s all. Why, I once went to a big asylum in -Scotland, and I saw a man cutting just the same capers, -fighting devils. He’s an opium taker, and the opium is -out of his brain, that’s all. Drink does the same thing—Hi! -By Jove, look up there! He’s at it still.”</p> - -<p class="indent">Away up in the wild mountain gorge they saw a -figure. It was the Blind One still pursued, still running, -and apparently fighting for his life. If his actions were -not the outcome of insanity they gave food to the mind -for the most terrible suppositions.</p> - -<p class="indent">Streaming with blood from his mad dashes against the -trees, he seemed surrounded on all sides, hemmed in, -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page30"></a>[pg 30]</span> -fighting furiously like a man surrounded by wolves. If -a tree chanced to be near, an opening seemed to be made -for him by his tormentors towards it, and he would rush -at it and dash himself against it, falling back bleeding -but fighting still, screaming and all the time being -steadily shepherded further and further into the loneliness -of the hills.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Sirs! Sirs!” cried Mac, throwing up his hands as -the horrible spectacle vanished round a distant bend of -the gorge. “This is no sight for a Christian mon!”</p> - -<p class="indent">“It’s pretty rotten,” said Leslie who looked rather -pale and sick. “Fetch out that flask of yours, Mac. -Thanks. Poor devil! would there be any use following -him?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Not for twanty thousand pounds would I follow -him,” said Mac, gurgling at the flask. “He’s in ither -hands than ours.”</p> - -<p class="indent">And, indeed, not for a very great sum would Leslie -have gone up that desolate gorge to see the finish of the -tragedy.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Let’s go on,” said Leslie, “and don’t let’s speak of -it again. I want to forget it—ugh!”</p> - -<hr class="hr2"> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page31"></a>[pg 31]</span></p> - -<div class='chapter'><h2>CHAPTER V</h2></div> - -<p class="h2">THE TEA HOUSE OF THE TORTOISE</p> - -<p class="indent">It was at the next turn that Nikko broke upon them, -a long way off, lying in its valley amidst the high -hills, hills fledged with greenery to their summit.</p> - -<p class="indent">There are sights that strike the eye and the heart at -the same time, and the sight of Nikko where the Shoguns -sleep, Nikko the beautiful in the silent valley, amidst -the silent hills, is one of these.</p> - -<p class="indent">The delicate colors, the exquisite tracery of the temple -roofs, the crystal clearness of the air through which -the eye can pick out detail after detail, the atmosphere -of tranquillity of the mountains, and the green cryptomeria -trees, make up a picture, leaving little -for the heart to desire, or the imagination to conceive.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Why,” cried Leslie, turning to his companion (Campanula -was seated aloft in solitary state upon his shoulder -clutching his hair tight, whilst he held in one big -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page32"></a>[pg 32]</span> -hand her two little sandal-shod, tabi-clad feet), “if -that’s Nikko, it’s ten miles off if it’s a foot. What’ve -you got to say for yourself, hey?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“A’weel,” said M’Gourley, glowering at Nikko, “if -you want my candid opeenion, we’ve juist gone astray; -the country I know well, but these dom roads lead one -like a Jack o’Lanthorn. It’s my opeenion that a Japanese -road—”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I don’t want your opinion on Japanese roads, I -want your concise opinion about yourself—ain’t you -a fool?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Ay, ay,” said M’Gourley, as if considering the matter, -“a fule I may be, but it’s my candit opeenion that -I’m not the only fule in Japan.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Well,” said Leslie, “fool or no fool, we’ll have to -tramp it, and you’ll have to take your turn to carry the -kid, so—<i>Marchons</i>!”</p> - -<p class="indent">Campanula, so far from being frightened at her awful -elevation from the earth, seemed to enjoy the situation, -and to find food for a sort of muse of her own, for -she began to hum as Leslie took the road with his long -stride, and to sing in a lisping sort of way.</p> - -<p class="indent">“What’s she singing?” demanded her bearer of the -sweating Scot at his side.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Lord knows! ’tis an eldritch chune, and I dinna like -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page33"></a>[pg 33]</span> -to listen to the words. Man, Leslie, but your legs are -longer than mine, and I canna keep the pace.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Well, I’ll go slower if you’ll listen, and tell me what -she’s singing.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“She’s singing,” gasped M’Gourley, “s’ far as I can -make out, some diddering noensense aboot a sugar-candy -dragon that a man like a poplar tree is goin’ to hunt, he -and a man like a corbie.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“That’s you.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“More like some bogle from the wood that’s maybe -after us now. I am not a supersteetious man—na, na! -ye may laugh or not—but would y’ like to know what in -my humble opeenion you are cartin’ on your shoulders?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Yes?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Some bairn that has been lost and dead these years, -and has been whustled up by that blind deevil with the -pipe. What did she mean by that reeference to the snaw—answer -me that!”</p> - -<p class="indent">“When I can get into the mind of a Japanese child, -and see the world as it sees it, I’ll answer you; you know -what children’s minds are, how they mix and imagine -things.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“What did she mean by that reeference to the snaw?” -grimly went on M’Gourley. “Mix or no mix, what did -she mean by the other bairn being lost in the snaw?”</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page34"></a>[pg 34]</span> -“Well,” said Leslie, “I don’t care a button whether -she’s a bogle or not. If she is, she’s the prettiest bogle -that was ever bogled, and about the heaviest, I should -think. Here, you take a turn with her, I’m about done.”</p> - -<p class="indent">They took it turn about, M’Gourley vastly loth, to -carry the Lost One; and the Lost One stopped them to -gather flowers for her by the wayside, to give her drinks -from rivulets, to help her admire and wonder at herons -and other marvels of the way, so that it was after six of -the clock when two of the most dusty and perspiring -Scotchmen in the Eastern Hemisphere entered the happy -village of Nikko from the mountain side, Campanula -this time on Leslie’s shoulder, grave, triumphant, and -holding a huge lily in her hand.</p> - -<p class="indent">Nikko and its surroundings just now was ablaze with -scarlet japonica. The lamps of the camellias were lit, -the soaring wistaria vines had broken into clusters of -pale lilac blossoms, the iris beautified the field, and the -wild cherry the thicket. It was as if spring had called -from the tomb of Iyeyasu and her faithful had come to -pray.</p> - -<p class="indent">There are two hotels at Nikko known to the globe-trotter, -“Kanayas” and the “New Nikko,” but M’Gourley -knew a better place than these.</p> - -<p class="indent">As they passed down the long inclined street a baby -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page35"></a>[pg 35]</span> -with a shaved head, a baby that was half a baby and -half an obi, tied behind in a stiff and preposterous bow, -spied Campanula being borne aloft, dropped his immediate -business—the attempt to fly a kite shaped like a -moth—and followed the newcomers with a shout.</p> - -<p class="indent">The shout, as if by magic, brought half a dozen children -from nowhere in particular; girl children with dolls -on their backs, older girl children with babies on their -backs, boys battledore in hand, and all with clogs on -their feet, clogs that went clipper-clapper, waking up -the echoes and calling forth more children, so that when -they had got half-way down the mile-long street from -the upper village Campanula had a “following,” the -like of which had never been seen, perhaps, since the pied -piper passed through Hamelin.</p> - -<p class="indent">A colored, laughing, murmuring, rippling throng -following with every eye fixed on the Lost One borne sky-high -on the shoulder of the tall stranger; a throng, the -half of which could have walked under a dinner-table -without much inconvenience; some empty-handed, some -still grasping their implements of play, all agog, yet -of decent and orderly behavior. A throng, in fact, of -ladies and gentlemen in the making.</p> - -<p class="indent">Backward over the summit of Leslie gazed Campanula -upon this crowd, whilst the stall-keepers and the stray -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page36"></a>[pg 36]</span> -riksha men, the pilgrims and the paupers, the priest and -the policeman, stood by the way to watch the procession -pass.</p> - -<p class="indent">“I say,” called Leslie to his companion, who was limping -behind dead beat, yet in an agony at the “splurge” -they were making, “this is gay, isn’t it?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Dod rot the child!” cried M’Gourley, nearly tumbling -over a fat baby with a tufted head, who was running -in front of him and trying to look up in his face.</p> - -<p class="indent">“I dinna ken whoat ye mean by gay. I have no immeediate -particular use for the waurd. Never before have -I been held up to public reedicule. I’m a decent livin’ -man, ye ken, an’ I ha’na any use for such gayeties. I -leave them to ithers who care for makin’ assinine eediots -of theirselves; but, thank the Laird, we’re nearly there -noo.”</p> - -<p class="indent">They turned a corner and entered a gate that led to -a garden.</p> - -<p class="indent">At the gate M’Gourley turned and addressed the camp -followers, telling them with forced politeness that there -was nothing more to be seen; that the show was over, -in fact, and asking them honorably to excuse him the -pleasure of being followed any more.</p> - -<p class="indent">The crowd murmured, and dissolved, the earth seemed -to take it up like blotting-paper, and M’Gourley, turning -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page37"></a>[pg 37]</span> -his back upon its remnants, led the way through the -garden, past a tiny lake in the midst of which stood an -island, inhabited by a huge frog, and so, by a path, to -the front of a long, low, white-washed house.</p> - -<p class="indent">This was the Tea House of the Tortoise, a place well -known to M’Gourley, as (to use his own abominable expression) -being “cheap and clean.”</p> - -<p class="indent">A panel of the front was drawn back, revealing cream-white -matting and lamp light.</p> - -<p class="indent">M’Gourley sat down with a sigh on the side of the -veranda, and began to pull off his elastic side boots. -Leslie sat down also, with Campanula in his lap; he -could not put her down for she had literally tumbled -into sleep.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Pull off my boots, Mac,” said he. “I can’t let go of -this blessed child.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Na!” said Mac mysteriously, and somewhat viciously, -as he knelt down and unlaced his partner’s boots, -“ye cannot let her go, ye cannot let her go; forby, she -wullna let <i>you</i> go.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“You think she’s going to stick to me?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Imphim,” replied Mac.</p> - -<p class="indent">Imphim is not Japanese, it is the double Scotch grunt, -which has twenty-two separate meanings, mostly unpleasant. -Shut your mouth tight and try to say “Hum, -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page38"></a>[pg 38]</span> -hum,” and you will achieve “Imphim,” but never do it -again, please.</p> - -<p class="indent">Leslie was about to answer, when a sound behind made -him turn, and there, like a pinned-down butterfly, was a -Mousmé on the mat, crying, “Irashi, condescend to enter.”</p> - -<p class="indent">M’Gourley—a most unengaging figure in his stocking -feet—rose and addressed the Mousmé.</p> - -<p class="indent">He told her things in language unknown to Leslie; -things about the sleeping Campanula evidently, for he -pump-handled with his arm in the direction where Leslie, -bootless now, sat holding her.</p> - -<p class="indent">The Mousmé on her knees, a camellia blossom in her -hair and her eyes fixed upon M’Gourley, seemed fascinated. -Then she called out and....</p> - -<p class="indent">“Hai tadaima,” came a soft voice from somewhere in -the back premises, and a second Mousmé appeared, made -obeisance, and listened whilst the tale, whatever it was, -was laid before her.</p> - -<p class="indent">Deep astonishment, exclamations of wonder, a call:</p> - -<p class="indent">“Hai tadaima!” and an old lady appeared, and -made obeisance, and listened whilst the thrice-told tale -was told her by the two Mousmés and M’Gourley all -together.</p> - -<p class="indent">Meanwhile Leslie, feeling ridiculously like a nursemaid, -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page39"></a>[pg 39]</span> -sat holding the Lost One, whose soul was wandering -in the vain land of dreams.</p> - -<p class="indent">“What are you stuffing those creatures up with?” -he suddenly broke out. “Blessed if you oughtn’t to be -dressed in a kimono and a petticoat; you’re the biggest -old woman of the lot. Ask one of them to take the kid, -or I’ll go off to the hotel with her.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“One minit,” said Mac. “They’re conseedrin’ the -matter.”</p> - -<p class="indent">Scarce had he spoken when the old lady called out, -and entered on the scene, an old gentleman, the proprietor -of the tea house, a black cat, and two more -Mousmés.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Oh, <i>do</i> call a few more!” said Leslie. “And call in -a couple of musicians and make the comic opera complete.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“There are no more to call,” replied Mac. “They are -conseedrin’ the matter. The Japanese are a very supersteetious -people, and these are good friends of mine, and -I would not spring a pairson upon them with dootful -anticeedents. You see, Leslie, man, the presence of the -bairn must be explained. She is not a bale of goods we -can dump in a corner. Bide a wee; I will talk them over -yut.”</p> - -<p class="indent">The Areopagus was considering the question as to -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page40"></a>[pg 40]</span> -whether Campanula, if admitted to the Tea House of -the Tortoise, would bring ruin and destruction or a blessing -on the premises, when Hedgehog San, the black cat, -settled the matter by coming up to Leslie and rubbing -against his leg.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then the Hon. Hedgehog—may his ashes rest in -peace!—jumped on Leslie’s knee and rubbed himself -against Campanula.</p> - -<p class="indent">That clinched the business.</p> - -<p class="indent">The old lady herself advanced, and, taking the Lost -One from the Weary One, carried her bodily into the -house, whilst Leslie, yawning and stretching himself, -followed.</p> - -<p class="indent">Inside, in the bare, clean room, the little Mousmé with -the camellia in her hair addressed herself to Leslie in a -soft and beseeching voice.</p> - -<p class="indent">“What does she want?” he asked of Mac.</p> - -<p class="indent">“She wants to know if you require anything.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“A bath—that’s what I want more than anything—don’t -you?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I am not given to promeescuous bathing,” said -M’Gourley, “being greatly subject to the siatickee; but -a bath you wull have, and I’ll e’en sit here and smoke a -pipe whilst you bathe yourself.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I want also a sugar-candy dragon for the bairn,” -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page41"></a>[pg 41]</span> -said Leslie. “Ask ’em to send out and get one. I suppose -you can get such things?”</p> - -<p class="indent">M’Gourley gave the message to the maid, and she departed.</p> - -<p class="indent">The travelers’ luggage—a frightful-looking old mid-Victorian -carpet bag belonging to M’Gourley, and a -Gladstone of Leslie’s—had already arrived at the tea -house, having been sent on by rail <i>via</i> Utsu-no-Miya, -and the two sat down on small square cushions, placed -on the cream-colored matting, to smoke a pipe, whilst -dinner and the bath were preparing.</p> - -<p class="indent">“The police will be here the morn about that bairn,” -said Mac in his cheerful way, “and we’ll have to acoont -for her.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Of course we will.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Ay, ay,” said Mac, “but have you ever acoonted for -a thing to the Japanese police?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Well, considering I’ve only been in Japan ten days, -I haven’t had much time, you see, to fall foul of the -police.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I found a scairf pin once,” said this comforter of -Job, “on the Bund at Nagasaki. Twa-and-sax-pence it -was worth, or maybe three shullin’, and I took it to the -police office and began to acoont for it.”</p> - -<p class="indent">He stopped and sighed and sucked his pipe.</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page42"></a>[pg 42]</span> -“Well?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Well, I’m acoontin’ for it still, and that’s three -months ago; letters and papers, and papers and letters -enough to drive a man daft! Well, I’m thinkin’ if a -twa-and-saxpenny scairf pin can cause such a wully -waugh, what’s a live bairn going to do? Now, I’m -thinking—”</p> - -<p class="indent">“May I give you a piece of advice, Mac?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I am always open to judeecious advice,” answered -the unsuspecting Mac.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Well, don’t think too much or you’ll hurt yourself.”</p> - -<p class="indent">M’Gourley grunted, and at that moment the Mousmé -with the camellia in her hair entered with the announcement -that the bath was ready in the room above, and -Leslie departed.</p> - -<p class="indent">“When you have shown the honorable gentleman the -bath, come down; I wish to speak to you,” said M’Gourley -to the lady of the camellia. She obeyed the request -and M’Gourley held her in light conversation, till he -knew by the sounds above that his partner was in the -tub. Then he released the handmaiden, and she departed -upstairs.</p> - -<p class="indent">He listened, and presently he heard Leslie’s voice.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Go away, please. Good heavens I say, I <i>wish</i> you’d -go away! No, I don’t want soap. I say, Mac! Hi, -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page43"></a>[pg 43]</span> -McGourley!—leave my back alone—<i>M’Gourley</i>!”</p> - -<p class="indent">But M’Gourley, like an Indian Sachem, smoked on -and answered not.</p> - -<p class="indent">He was having his revenge for the Nikko road.</p> - -<hr class="hr2"> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page44"></a>[pg 44]</span></p> - -<div class='chapter'><h2>CHAPTER VI</h2></div> - -<p class="h2">THE DREAMER AND THE DRAGON</p> - -<p class="indent">They had finished dinner; a dinner which began -with tea and bean flour cakes, passed on to fish -served on little mats of grass, went on to soup served -in lacquered bowls, proceeded to prawns; halted, hesitated, -and went back to soup, scratched its head, so to -speak, and then, as if with an after-thought, served up a -quail, apologized for the substantiality of the quail by -presenting a salted plum on a little plate, and then -harked shamelessly back to soup, ending deliriously with -a shower of little dishes containing everything inconceivable, -and a big bowl of rice.</p> - -<p class="indent">This is an impressionist picture of a Japanese dinner. -I have eaten many, but I have never carried away -more than an impression, and whether kuchi-tori comes -before hachiz-a-kana, I cannot say, or where the seaweed -or salted fish come in—but come in they do, they -and other things stranger than themselves.</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page45"></a>[pg 45]</span> -A <i>chamécen</i> was thrumming somewhere in the house -as they dined, sitting on the soft white matting, and -waited upon by two Mousmés crouched on the matting -like little panthers preparing to spring.</p> - -<p class="indent">A slid back panel of the front wall made a doorway -through which they could see the moon wandering over -Nikko, casting her cool white light upon the blazing -japonica flowers, the glory of the camellias, the roofs of -the temples, and the sad dark beauty of the cryptomeria -trees.</p> - -<p class="indent">Nikko by day is fair, but by night, when the moon is -overhead, when the air is full of the sounds of wandering -waters, and the wind is heavy with the perfume of -the wild azaleas, Nikko is a dream.</p> - -<p class="indent">When the tea and bean cakes had been served, the -moon was in the act of washing weakly a house gable -across the garden, and a pale lilac-colored flower of the -wistaria, which projected above the extemporized doorway; -but by the time the quail had made its appearance, -the garden was solid in moonlight, the pond was a mirror, -and the frog self-marooned on the little island, was -as distinct as if seen by daylight.</p> - -<p class="indent">“I must learn Japanese,” said Leslie, taking a cigarette-case -from his pocket and lighting a cigarette at -the tobacco-mono that stood at his elbow. “My lines are -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page46"></a>[pg 46]</span> -cast in Japan, that’s clear, but a man without the language -is a helpless baby.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Ay, ay,” said M’Gourley. “You can easily get -instruction in the Japanese: take a wumman to live -with you.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I haven’t looked at a woman for ten years, and I -don’t want to look at one again.” Then suddenly bursting out: -“Why, you old scamp, talking like that—you -told me you were a member of the Free Kirk.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“The Wee Kirk,” corrected Mac, leisurely lighting -his pipe with an ember from the hibachi.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Well, Free Kirk or Wee Kirk, you ought to be jolly -well ashamed of yourself; and were you a member of the -Wee Kirk when you were constructing idols in Birmingham -with old What’s-his-name?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Na, na; those were my godless days. I got my -releegion late in life, and a vara good releegion it is; a -waurkable releegion, one that does not heat in the bearings, -but runs smooth.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“And what is this wonderful religion, if I may ask?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“It is noet so much wonderful as waurkable, and it -may be compreezed in the sentence: ‘Do unto ithers as -ithers would do unto you.’”</p> - -<p class="indent">“O good Lord! and you call that a religion! Why, -you precious old humbug, that means you can rob, and -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page47"></a>[pg 47]</span> -plunder, and murder, and cheat—that is to say, you can -act like a beast towards people who would act so to you.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Just so.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Well, there’s one thing I like about you, you’re -frank, to say the least of it.”</p> - -<p class="indent">This remark seemed greatly to incense Mac, who, perhaps, -misunderstood the meaning of the word frank.</p> - -<p class="indent">“When y’ve been in the waurld as long as I have, -surrounded on ivry side by scoondrels and robbers, y’ll -maybee be as fraunk as mysel’. Fraunk.—wid ye give me -a defineetion of the waurd—fraunk! I wid have ye to -understand I’m an hoenest mon with hoenest men, but -<i>I’m a scoondrel wi’ scoondrels</i>. Fraunk!” And so he -went on, his Scotch accent deepening as deepened his -excitement, till at last he broke down into Gaelic, and -thundered his remarks at the hibachi, slapping his thigh -as he did so, and wakening the echoes of the house, which -was resonant as a fiddle. So that by the time he had got -to the end of his exordium, Leslie saw a panel waver back -an inch, and the lady of the camellia peeping in to see -what the Learned One was shouting about.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Keep your hair on,” said Leslie, when Mac, with a -final “Fraunk!” delivered in English, began to refill -and light his pipe. “I didn’t mean to insult you; I -only meant to say I like your open-heartedness.”</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page48"></a>[pg 48]</span> -“Ay, I was ever that to those I had a liking for.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I meant more precisely your open-mindedness—but -no matter, let’s talk of something else. I wonder where -they’ve put the kid, and oh, by Jove! I wonder if -they’ve got that dragon. Sing out and ask, like a good -chap.”</p> - -<p class="indent">Mac clapped his hands, and “Hai tadaima!” came as -a response.</p> - -<p class="indent">It was worth the trouble of clapping one’s hands to -hear that sweet reply.</p> - -<p class="indent">A moment later, a panel slid back and the camellia -lady appeared.</p> - -<p class="indent">Campanula San was asleep, and at that very moment -Wild-cherry-bud was in search of the Hon. Dragon, -with orders to leave no confectioner’s stall unvisited till -she had secured him.</p> - -<p class="indent">This with immovable gravity and deep, sweet earnestness -of tone.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Well,” said Leslie when she had withdrawn, “of all -the people I have struck yet, give me the Japanese.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Wait till you’ve had beesiness transactions with -them,” said Mac darkly. “I am no so unfreenly to the -Japs in or’nary life, but in beesiness the Jap’s a wrugglin’ -sairpent—all but one—Danjuro—the man we’re -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page49"></a>[pg 49]</span> -going to join in partnership; he’s as straight as a -Chinee.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“He must be damn crooked then!”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Cruik’d enough to make his way in Japan, but -straight enough to a freend; but you’re a poet, man, -Leslie, and no beesiness man. I kent y’ for a poet when -you sang that bit song on the road—the song aboot the -camellia trees.”</p> - -<p class="indent">Leslie laughed.</p> - -<p class="indent">“That rubbish! It’s not mine; I read it in the Sydney -<i>Bulletin</i>. Funny enough, too, it was the first thing -that made me think of coming to Japan! Poetry! Good -God! Put a man through the remittance mill in Sydney -and see all the poetry that will be left in him! Put a -butterfly through a sausage machine and then see how -beautifully it will fly! Yes, I was once a poet; years -and years ago I was a poet—a poet who never wrote anything, -but a poet for all that. I could see the beauty of -the world; and then they blinded me. Who? I don’t -know—the world. Maybe it was myself, maybe not. -Maybe it was my father, maybe not. I only state the -fact that something in me is dead—the something that -took joy in life and found beauty in innocence—or was -dead till I came to Japan. Oh, M’Gourley, man, the -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page50"></a>[pg 50]</span> -years I’ve spent in Sydney under a cloud, mixing with -bar loafers, cursing my father and myself; the years -I’ve spent in Sydney have broken my soul in me!”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Why did ye not waurk?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Work! I had just enough money to keep me from -starvation and decently dressed. I might have got a -clerkship; for what good? To make another hundred a -year. To spend on what? Can you not understand, man, -that my mainspring was gone, that I was put out of -the world I knew, tied by the leg to Sydney, bound to -appear every quarter-day at the double-damned lawyer’s -office, or starve? Two things only kept me alive—tobacco -and books—saved me from myself and from -drink.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“What sort of a mon was your faither?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“A hard, dour, just man—a man who could make no -allowance for folly.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Ay, ay! Had y’ any brithers and sisters?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Never a one, and my mother died when I was two; -and he used to leather me. Well, you can fancy my joy -when old Bloomfield, the lawyer, sent for me one day -and said: ‘I’ve bad news for you, Mr. Leslie.’ ‘What’s -that?’ said I. ‘Your father is dead. He died intestate, -and you have inherited his property. I am advised it -amounts to over twenty-one thousand pounds.’”</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page51"></a>[pg 51]</span> -“Twenty-one thousand?” said Mac in admiration.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Yes; and I said to Bloomfield: ‘You must be either -a fool or a hypocrite, for that’s the best news I ever -heard in my life, and you know it.’ Then some instinct -took me over here to Japan. I was thinking of going to -England, but I found all at once I had a horror of England -and the English, so I came to Japan; and glad I -am I came. Can you fancy what these people here are -to me after the population of Sydney—those raucous, -horse-racing, drink-swilling beasts? Then I fell in with -you at Tokyo, and took a fancy to your old Scotch -mug—and here we are.”</p> - -<p class="indent">At this moment a little figure crossed the garden, -bearing a lantern on the end of a stick. It was Wild-cherry-bud; -and presently she appeared with the much-sought-for -dragon wrapped in rice paper.</p> - -<p class="indent">It was a wonderful creation with a twisted tail, rather -stumpy wings, but with a mouth that made up for all -defects; nothing so ferocious had ever perhaps before -been done in sugar candy.</p> - -<p class="indent">When the thing had been inspected and approved, -Wild-cherry-bud led the way to where Campanula slept, -for Leslie wished his present to be placed beside her, so -that she might find it when she awoke.</p> - -<p class="indent">The Lost One, looking very much lost indeed on a -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page52"></a>[pg 52]</span> -huge futon (a quilt thicker than a muffin), and covered -by a blue mosquito-net with red bound edges, was so -profoundly asleep that the clicking of the net being -pulled aside and the light of the night lantern borne by -Wild-cherry-bud did not disturb her. She was sleeping -on her back, the top futon only drawn to her waist, and -her little perfectly shaped white hands were crossed -pathetically on her breast.</p> - -<p class="indent">Leslie knelt down, and lifting one little hand placed -the long-sought monster beneath it. The hand clasped -the dragon, the long-sought dragon, and across the -sleeper’s face passed what seemed the ghost of a smile.</p> - -<p class="indent">“A’weel!” thought Mac as he looked on, “had he a -bairn he’d make a better faither to it than his own -faither made to him.”</p> - -<p class="indent">Then the mosquito-net was drawn and they departed, -leaving Campanula to the possession of her dreams.</p> - -<p class="indent">Up in their room Leslie steadily refused to undress -till the waiting Mousmé had “cleared out.” He had -already refused to allow her to rub his back when he -was in his tub and now this—</p> - -<p class="indent">The Tea House of the Tortoise people, good old-fashioned, -Japanese inn people, unused to foreign follies, -could not make it out.</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page53"></a>[pg 53]</span> -The Areopagus convened itself again, and held -council by the light of an andon, or night lantern.</p> - -<p class="indent">“What could it mean?” There was simply no meaning -in it. Such a thing had never happened before, and -the general conclusion was that Leslie had “gone gyte.”</p> - -<p class="indent">Then the Areopagus went to bed all together under -the same mosquito-net, and silence reigned with the -moon over the Tea House of the Tortoise. The moon -wandering over Nikko touching temple and tea-house -pointed a pallid finger between the window chinks of the -room where the Lost One lay asleep, as if to show her -to the night. Clasping the candy dragon whose ferocious -eyes shone carbuncle-like in the placid moonlight she -made a strange picture, veiled by the blue gauze of the -mosquito-net.</p> - -<hr class="hr2"> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page54"></a>[pg 54]</span></p> - -<div class='chapter'><h2>CHAPTER VII</h2></div> - -<p class="h2">HOW CAMPANULA BROUGHT FORTUNE TO THE HOUSE OF THE TORTOISE—AND OTHER THINGS</p> - -<p class="indent">The sun rose up and struck Nikko; struck the -sacred red lacquered bridge that crosses the foaming -river, and the common bridge that you and I may -use, the potter’s shop, and the golden shrine of Iyeyasu.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then temple after temple broke up from shadow as -the sun reached for them and found them, and the hills -took on a momentary splendor, an ethereal loveliness, -evanescent as youth and never to be recaptured by the -day.</p> - -<p class="indent">In the garden of the Tea House of the Tortoise a -bomb-shell full of bickering sparrows seemed suddenly -to burst above the pond, the sun looked over the wall -upon the dwarf maples in their blue porcelain flowerpots, -a panel of the white house front slid back and a -Mousmé appeared, her head tied up in a blue cotton -duster; appeared another Mousmé, dragging a futon to -air in the morning brightness, and yet another who came -out and yawned at the sun, showing him the full extent -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page55"></a>[pg 55]</span> -of her pink gullet, and every one of her thirty-two white -teeth.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then Hedgehog San, a cat honored and beloved, -came forth with tail erect, and a grasshopper hanging -by the veranda in a tiny cage creaked forth a thin -hymn of praise.</p> - -<p class="indent">Thus started the day at the Tea House of the Tortoise.</p> - -<p class="indent">When Leslie and M’Gourley came downstairs—a stair -like a ship’s companion-way but without any balustrade—they -found Campanula having her obi tied by -Fir-branch (she who had yawned at the sun), and Leslie -was informed through his partner that the dragon had -been found and that he had grown; this statement, with -some confidential information concerning a thunder-cat -of which she had dreamed, Mac translated from the -original with a serious face.</p> - -<p class="indent">Up to this he had treated the Lost One as an adult, -and as a most undesirable adult, with whom he wished -to have nothing to do. But Campanula, fresh and -spruce in the light of morning, chattering over her -shoulder to you about thunder-cats, whilst Fir-branch -tied her obi in a huge bow, was a person whose charm -was not to be denied, and Mac began to thaw.</p> - -<p class="indent">“What’s a thunder-cat?” asked Leslie.</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page56"></a>[pg 56]</span> -“Lord only knows! some contraption in the shape of -an animal that makes thunder. The Japs are full of -supersteetions about animals. Wull we out before breakfast?”</p> - -<p class="indent">Leslie the night before had declared his intention of -sending for the police next morning before the police -sent for him, and had given a message to the landlord -accordingly. But he might have saved his breath.</p> - -<p class="indent">Nikko was agog. Whether the tale had leaked -through the chinks of the Tea House of the Tortoise, -whether Wild-cherry-bud had distributed it during her -peregrinations in search of the dragon, no one will ever -know; the fact remains that the story of Campanula had -gone abroad with additions—all sorts of weird and -wonderful additions. Half Nikko had seen her borne -aloft on the shoulders of Leslie, the other half had heard -extraordinary statements concerning her origin; the -result was that the whole of Nikko ached inwardly with -a great ache of curiosity.</p> - -<p class="indent">By seven o’clock fifteen Mousmés or maybe twenty, -had arrived singly and in couples, not to ask questions, -but to borrow things, or to offer the loan of things, or to -ask after the health of old mother Ranunculus, the -landlady of the “Tortoise.” Incidentally they learned -about Campanula.</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page57"></a>[pg 57]</span> -A juggler had made her on the Nikko road. Out of -what, for goodness’ sake? Out of a wild azalea bush!</p> - -<p class="indent">No!</p> - -<p class="indent">Yes, assuredly, the Learned One had said so.</p> - -<p class="indent">And what had become of the juggler? He had vanished -in a clap of thunder—turned into a dragon.</p> - -<p class="indent">Surprising!</p> - -<p class="indent">And they went off to spread the news.</p> - -<p class="indent">At half-past eight, or thereabouts, a little man in -white, the chief of the Nikko police, arrived. He had -come officially, but he also was aching to get to the truth -of this marvelous tale.</p> - -<p class="indent">Now the Japanese police is the most perfect police -force in the world in every respect. They are recruited -from the Samurai or fighting-class, and they are gentlemen -to a man.</p> - -<p class="indent">The chief of the Nikko police made profound apologies -for disturbing the peace of the strangers, then he -heard the story told by M’Gourley.</p> - -<p class="indent">He agreed that it was strange, but opined that the -Lost One might simply be a lost child. Where exactly -was she found? In a valley of crimson azaleas on the -road from Kureise. Ah, yes! there was such a valley -well known, for the azaleas were crimson, and differed -from the wild scarlet azaleas so common hereabouts. -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page58"></a>[pg 58]</span> -There were also villages around there, and tea houses; it -might possibly be that she belonged to one of these. -As to the mad man they had seen running away, no -one else had seen him.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then Campanula was brought in and questioned, the -whole of the “Tortoise” people squatting round in a -ring, even down to Hedgehog San, who sat with judicial -gravity, and seemed to be taking mental notes.</p> - -<p class="indent">She told her little tale about the house with the plum -tree in front of it, and the kite, and the sugar-candy -dragon which she had lost and found again. How -the said dragon had grown very much, and seemed different, -but tasted all right. Here she hastened to explain -that she had not eaten him, only touched him -with her tongue.</p> - -<p class="indent">She could not possibly say what men called her father. -He hammered things. What sort of things? She did not -know, but they went pong, pong, pong, when he struck -them.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Tinsmith,” murmured M’Gourley.</p> - -<p class="indent">She was sure of one thing, that her father’s house was -quite close to the wood and the azalea valley.</p> - -<p class="indent">How old was she?</p> - -<p class="indent">Seven times had the cherry blossoms blown since her -humble self—</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page59"></a>[pg 59]</span> -“Hauld there,” said M’Gourley. Then in Japanese -he explained that yesterday she had declared that eight -times the cherry blossoms had blown since her humble -self, etc.</p> - -<p class="indent">Ah, yes! but how was she to know? a lump of mud -like her!</p> - -<p class="indent">In conclusion, she took back her statement about the -snow. She must have dreamt that in the wood.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then the court began to consult, the “lump of mud” -sitting in their midst pensive and rather sad, a scarlet -flower in her black hair, and the bow of her obi looking -very stiff and huge.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Look here,” said Leslie at last. “Tell him I’ll look -after her, and pay all expenses till she’s found. Tell -him to have the place searched, all that wood and -country, and I’ll pay for it; and if they can’t find her -people I’ll adopt her. I will, begad!”</p> - -<p class="indent">Mac translated.</p> - -<p class="indent">At first the chief of police seemed to think that the -“lump of mud” should be hauled off to the police -office—impounded, in short; then M’Gourley intervened. -M’Gourley was a power in Japan just then, for the -astute Scot had made himself very useful to the government -in past years, and the chief of police, when he -heard what Mac had to say, agreed to leave matters -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page60"></a>[pg 60]</span> -where they were whilst the country was being searched, -and the chief of police at Tokyo communicated with.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then he took his departure, and here began the prosperity -of the Tea House of the Tortoise.</p> - -<p class="indent">Three elderly gentlemen in kimonos were the first to -arrive; after them a youth in a bowler hat, and with the -face of an uninspired idiot. These sat round and sipped -saki and smoked little pipes, and talked to Wild-cherry-bud -and Fir-branch, and listened to the grasshopper -singing in his cage, whilst more guests arrived, and still -more. So that Fir-branch, Wild-cherry-bud, & Co., were -full of business, so full indeed that mother Ranunculus, -driven to her wits’ end, sent out for hired help.</p> - -<p class="indent">At eleven, when M’Gourley and his companion went -out to inspect the golden Shrines, the Tea House of the -Tortoise was humming like a bee-hive.</p> - -<p class="indent">“It’s a funny business,” said Leslie, as they turned -the corner into the street.</p> - -<p class="indent">“I’m thinkin’,” said Mac, “that you’ll no find it so -funny a beesiness in the end.”</p> - -<hr class="hr2"> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page61"></a>[pg 61]</span></p> - -<div class='chapter'><h2>CHAPTER VIII</h2></div> - -<p class="h2">THE SURPRISING STORY OF MOMOTARO—AKUDOGI AND SPOTTED DOG</p> - -<p class="indent">“I don’t care a button,” said Leslie, on the third -morning of their stay in Nikko. “Danjuro may -go be hanged. I’m not going to leave here till I’ve -settled about the kid.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Ay, ay!” said Mac. “The man who will to Cupar -maun to Cupar. I would only imprees upon you this, -that time is going and time is money.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I know; but it won’t take more than a few days -now. They say they’ve hunted the whole country round -there, and can’t find trace of her people.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Na, and never will. If she has onny real people -they won’t fash themselves aboot her; girls in Japan -are as plentiful as blaeberries in Lorne—you’re sadlit -with her.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Well, I want her, that’s the truth. I’ve taken a -fancy to her; she’s not the sort of thing one picks every -day—she and her thunder-cats and dragons.”</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page62"></a>[pg 62]</span> -“I won’t say she is not an attractif wee boddie,” said -Mac, “but think of the future, mon, when she’s graun -up.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Bother the future! I’m rich enough to see after -her. D’y know, Mac—”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Weel?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I wonder did she come out of those azaleas?”</p> - -<p class="indent">Mac gave a grunt.</p> - -<p class="indent">Curiously enough, his point of view had changed, and -he was now convinced, or pretended to be convinced, -that the treasure trove was a solid body and no bogle.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Because,” went on Leslie, “it may be fact or fancy, -but when I picked her up she seemed slipping away into -thin air till I kissed her, and then she became solid.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Imphim,” said Mac, using a variation of the sound -that was simply stuffed with meanings all uncomplimentary -to Leslie’s intelligence.</p> - -<p class="indent">“They used to tell me when I was a kid that babies -came out of parsley beds. Well, I’m half inclined to -believe the tale has come true at last, and she came out of -those azalea bushes. Of course,” said Leslie suddenly, -and as if apologizing to his own common sense, “I -don’t really believe it, but I like to fancy it; it’s so much -nicer than thinking she came into the world the other -way.”</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page63"></a>[pg 63]</span> -The prosperity of the Tea House of the Tortoise still -continued, people coming from far and near to get a -glimpse of the foundling.</p> - -<p class="indent">Every day Mac and Leslie would take her out for a -walk, and she clopped beside them in her little clogs -delightfully grave, and seemingly unmindful of the -polite following of children that always tailed after -them without appearing quite to do so. Children bouncing -colored balls, playing hop scotch or what not, yet -always with an eye on the child that had come out of -the azaleas.</p> - -<p class="indent">Shopping with Campanula Leslie found to be a new -pleasure; a present, no matter what, was received with -such deep thankfulness, such quaint expressions of -gratitude.</p> - -<p class="indent">He ordered Mother Ranunculus—requested her, -rather—to get a complete new outfit for his charge, -everything that money could buy, from tabi to hairpins, -from kimonos to clogs. As for toys, she simply wallowed -in them: bouncing balls and battledores fell round her -as if from the sky, not to mention a doll as big as a baby -of three, which she instantly became a mother to, carting -it about on her back tucked under her kimono.</p> - -<p class="indent">The one thing that disturbed Leslie was her seeming -indifference to her own strange position. Beyond the -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page64"></a>[pg 64]</span> -bald statement that she had a father, she never referred -to that enigmatical gentleman, nor did she grieve, outwardly -at least, about her separation from him.</p> - -<p class="indent">By the end of the week the two Scotchmen and their -charge began to be welded into a corporate body—a -little quaint family party. It was strange the influence -of this child upon these two men whom fate had drawn -together from the corners of the earth. Leslie, with -newly acquired interest in life, had grown five years -younger in mind, and as for Mac, he had grown ten -degrees more human. His withered fatherly instincts -were awakened—at least they opened one eye—and it -was pretty to see him with his gnarled, horny hands -and intent, weather-beaten face making chickens for the -Lost One out of orange pips.</p> - -<p class="indent">They would go out, all three, and wander about -Nikko and its temples, and they would sit on grassy -banks in the gardens of Dai Nichi Do, just as a father -and an uncle and niece might sit on seats in Kensington -Gardens, and then Leslie and his partner would discuss -the future and trade, whilst Campanula played with her -doll or bounced a ball.</p> - -<p class="indent">Here one day, whilst the sun shone on the little lake -and the pink and copper maples, the tiny islands and -bridges and pagodas, Campanula, weary of play, told, -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page65"></a>[pg 65]</span> -in a sing-song voice and broken manner, the story of -Momotaro, otherwise called Peachboy, and his wonderful -deeds. She told it standing before them, and striking -attitudes suitable to the phases of the tale.</p> - -<p class="indent">One day, it appears, an old woman found a huge -peach, and she was just going to cut it in two with a -knife when the peach broke open, and out tumbled a -baby. This very surprising thing happened a long time -ago, but exactly when Campanula could not possibly -say.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then Peachboy grew up, and every day he grew -fatter and stronger, till at last he grew so big that he -determined to fight Akudogi, the king of the Ogres, -who lived on an island—somewhere. And he started out, -said Campanula, with a sword and a bag full of millet -dumplings, each with a salted plum in the center, to -fight the Ogres.</p> - -<p class="indent">Here she took from her sleeve a paper of sweets, and -gravely presented it to her companions, who each took -one. She took one herself, consumed it, and resumed the -narrative.</p> - -<p class="indent">On the way he met a spotted dog, a monkey, and a -crow, and to each he gave a dumpling, and they followed -him to the attack on Akudogi, the king of the -Ogres.</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page66"></a>[pg 66]</span> -The narrator’s voice became deeper in tone, and she -spread out her fingers as if in fear.</p> - -<p class="indent">The crow flew first to the castle of Akudogi and held -him in talk, whilst Peachboy, spotted dog, and the -monkey, got over the castle wall.</p> - -<p class="indent">Campanula was now standing before her auditors in a -most dramatic attitude, her hands uplifted, the fallen -back sleeves of her kimono showing her arms, and her -brown eyes full of fear. She did not seem to see either -Leslie or M’Gourley. Her eyes were fixed on the frightful -Akudogi, and Peachboy, the spotted dog and the -monkey, who were about to attack him.</p> - -<p class="indent">The crow, when he saw that his companions had -gained an entrance to the castle, flew away with a laugh, -and Akudogi turned and beheld Peachboy and his brave -companions. He gnashed his teeth, pulled out his -sword, and oh!</p> - -<p class="indent">Frightened to death with her own imaginations, she -rushed with a little shriek into Mac’s arms for protection.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Hauld yourself taegether; I winna let them catch -ye! I winna let them catch ye!” cried Mac, as he -clasped the perfumed bundle that had flung itself into -his arms.</p> - -<p class="indent">“What’s all that she was telling?” asked Leslie, who -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page67"></a>[pg 67]</span> -felt rather jealous that Mac should have been chosen -as the harbor of refuge.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Only a daft tale about ogres an’ spotted dogs. -She’s clean crackit on all sorts of queer beasties. Only -last night she told me a tale aboot a rat that played -the fiddle an’ a tortoise that came to listen, and she told -what the tortoise speired an’ what the rat made answer, -till you could have sworn you heard the rat and the -tortoise claverin’ taegither.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Well, hand her over here,” said Leslie; “she’s not -yours.” And he took Campanula from Mac and placed -her on his knee. “She’s mine. I paid ten shillings to -that chap with the reed-pipe to whistle her up.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I’ll tell you what,” said Mac.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Well?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I’ll gi’ you ten shullin’ for a half share, and pay -half the expeenses of her upbringing.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“No, she’s mine; you can play with her as much as -you like, but I’m going to keep her. She’s the jolliest -thing I ever struck, and I’m going to stick to her. I -saw that policeman Johnnie this morning, and he’s quite -given up hope of finding her people. They’ve hunted -everywhere. I offered him a fiver to cover the business, -but he would not touch the money. He says the chief -of police at Tokyo knows you.”</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page68"></a>[pg 68]</span> -“Weel does he know me, seven year and more.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“And he says there’s no objection to our taking her -along to Nagasaki if you give your bond that she will -be looked after, so I was thinking of starting to-morrow.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Wull you take her with us?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I was thinking of leaving her with the ‘Tortoise’ -people till I settle about a place to live in at Nagasaki, -and then coming back to fetch her. She’ll be all right -with them, I suppose?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Ay, she’ll be right enough,” said Mac, and they -left the gardens of Dai Nichi Do, and headed for the -hostelry.</p> - -<p class="indent">That night the Areopagus convened itself again, and -M’Gourley explained matters. It was necessary that he -and his honorable friend should go to Nagasaki, and -they proposed that the Lost One should be left behind -at the Tea House of the Tortoise, to be kept till called -for, warehoused, in short, and, of course, paid for accordingly. -Was Madame Ranunculus willing?</p> - -<p class="indent">Most willing.</p> - -<p class="indent">A sum of money would be placed in the landlord’s -hands as guarantee.</p> - -<p class="indent">Oh, that was perfectly unnecessary!</p> - -<p class="indent">Still, the Hon. Leslie wished it.</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page69"></a>[pg 69]</span> -Accordingly, a sum equivalent almost to the value of -the Tea House of the Tortoise, was placed in the landlord’s -hands, who placed it in numerous folds of rice -paper, and handed it to his wife, who engulfed it in her -kimono.</p> - -<p class="indent">These matters having been satisfactorily settled, -Campanula was led off to bed and dinner was served.</p> - -<p class="indent">Next morning at eight o’clock two rikshas arrived to -take the travelers to the station. The whole of the -“Tortoise” folk, Hedgehog San included, came to the -front of the house. The cry, “Sayonara—come again -quickly,” followed them as they swept round the pond -and out at the gate, a cry made up of the landlord’s -croaking basso, the sweet voices of the Mousmés, and -Campanula’s childish treble.</p> - -<p class="indent">“She seemed sorrier to part with old Mac than me,” -thought Leslie as they span along. “Ugh!” He turned -his head in disgust from an English tourist in tweeds, -who was engaged in kodaking a temple.</p> - -<p class="indent">In the train, with a pipe in his mouth and M’Gourley -opposite to him, he felt as if he had just stepped out -of a dream; a dream of sun and splendor, a dream in -which figured camellia trees twenty feet high, and the -form of the Lost One standing amidst the glory of -crimson azaleas.</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page70"></a>[pg 70]</span> -But another picture obtruded itself upon this pleasant -dream.</p> - -<p class="indent">Away in the mountains not far from Lake Chuzenji, -a green thing had been discovered, a thing that had -once been a man. Mac had been to view it at the request -of the police, but he could not identify it as the body of -the Blind One of the Nikko Road. It was green from -the chlorophyll of the cryptomerias. In the quaint -language of the Japanese police, it was the body of a -man whom “the trees had beaten to death.”</p> - -<hr class="hr2"> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page71"></a>[pg 71]</span></p> - -<div class='chapter'><h2>CHAPTER IX</h2></div> - -<p class="h2">THE HOUSE OF THE CLOUDS</p> - -<p class="indent">Danjuro, the curio dealer of Jinrikisha Street, -Nagasaki (no relation of Danjuro the actor), -was a gentleman of uncertain age, with a face which -seemed the relic of a thousand years of debauchery.</p> - -<p class="indent">It was probably only opium, but the awful weary -look with which he swindled you, when you were once in -the trap he called his shop, would have given Dante -points for the construction of a new circle in his <i>Inferno</i>.</p> - -<p class="indent">He had spent years in China, had Danjuro, hence, -perhaps, the expression on his face; also the fact that -he did his calculations not by aid of the so-ro-ba, or -calculating machine used by the Japanese tradesmen. He -did his calculations in his head, and with that far-away -look so filled with the poetry of the horrible, he would -calculate the difference between the price he had paid -for the okimono he was selling you and your offer for -it, contrasting them with your own personality, and -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page72"></a>[pg 72]</span> -from these three factors calculating to a nicety how -much money he could swindle out of you.</p> - -<p class="indent">He had a hand in the selling of the Great Tung Jade -to the Empress of China, or rather to her ambassador -the Mandarin Li, the shadiest transaction that ever -emerged from darkness; and could you place end to end -the globe trotters swindled and chiseled and fleeced by -him, they would reach in a noxious line from London to -Newcastle, and maybe further. He had long, polished -finger nails that shone like plate glass, and when you -entered his establishment he advanced, bowed, and -hissed at you by way of welcome.</p> - -<p class="indent">He was a rogue, yet he was straight in his way. To -be a perfect rogue, at least to succeed in the art, you -must be straight in some ways. The bandit who betrays -his brethren never goes far without a dagger sticking -in his back.</p> - -<p class="indent">M’Gourley had “discovered” Danjuro years ago. -M’Gourley had twice come to financial smash, once -because of an earthquake, and again in the upheaval -caused by the breaking of the Barings. Danjuro had -helped him twice, and he had helped Danjuro many -times; helped him with his Western craft, Scotch cuteness, -and knowledge of Europeans.</p> - -<p class="indent">In every city of the East, in every city of the world, -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page73"></a>[pg 73]</span> -you will find a fixed Scot always prospering; M’Gourley -was a floating Scot. Navigating Japan from end to -end, now at Tokyo, now at Kioto, now at Nagasaki, -crossing to Corea and pottering about there, meeting -brither Scotchmen and helping them in trade -speculations, selling, or assisting in the sale, of -everything sellable from coals to kakemonos, went -M’Gourley, a busy man, but somehow a rather unfortunate -one.</p> - -<p class="indent">Suddenly Japan rose and smashed China, Russia -stepped in and robbed her of the pieces, and Japan sat -down, drew her kimono round her, and began to think -about Russia.</p> - -<p class="indent">M’Gourley just then (it was some two years before -he met Leslie) was on the Lao-Tung peninsula, a black -wandering dot, innocuous to governments, one would -imagine, as a beetle.</p> - -<p class="indent">Suddenly M’Gourley returned to Japan, and the day -after his return a sheaf of documents addressed by a -gentleman named Lessar to a gentleman named Mouravieff -was in the hands of the Japanese Council of -Elders.</p> - -<p class="indent">I don’t say anything about the transaction at all; it -is not for me to take away the characters of my characters. -I only know this, that if the Russian Government -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page74"></a>[pg 74]</span> -had caught Mac just then, they, laboring under, -perhaps, a fantastically wrong impression, would have -done something decidedly unpleasant to him.</p> - -<p class="indent">At all events, Mac bought a new suit of reach-me-down -clothes at a native shop in the Honcho Dori at -Yokohama, and got so drunk that three Mousmés had -put him to bed, whilst a fourth fanned him, and a -fifth played soothing tunes on a moon-fiddle to exorcise -the demon; and a piece of priceless gold lacquer presented -to Mac by a high official was sold by him to an -American week later for five thousand dollars gold coin—gold -coin being much more useful than gold lacquer -to a man in Mac’s way of life.</p> - -<p class="indent">Thus it came about that Mac was a persona grata -with the Japanese Government, and had many little -privileges not enjoyed by ordinary Europeans.</p> - -<p class="indent">Danjuro’s shop was situated in Jinriksha Street, a -street like a picture slashed out of the “Arabian -Nights,” a picture that a child had made additions to -with a lead pencil and half spoiled.</p> - -<p class="indent">A bowler hat in Jinriksha Street, for instance, is a -thing very much out of place, yet you see many of -them, mostly potted down on the back of Japanese -heads, and making the wearers both frightful and -ridiculous-looking.</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page75"></a>[pg 75]</span> -Here passes a Mousmé under an umbrella, a figure -fashioned seemingly from a rainbow, a figure to bless -the eye and make the heart feel glad. Here stumps -along a thing that once was a Mousmé, a thing in -European dress—alas!</p> - -<p class="indent">Here you turn from a shop sign in the vernacular, -and across the way, over the booth where cakes reposing -on myrtle branches are sold, “Englis here is spoke,” -blasts your sight.</p> - -<p class="indent">Jinrikisha Street, and for Jinrikisha Street read -nearly every other street in sea-board Japan, is a picture, -as I have said, spoiled as if by a meddlesome -English child.</p> - -<p class="indent">Danjuro’s shop was all open in front so that you could -come right in past the bronze stork on the tortoise, past -the leaping dragon made of jointed steel, a dragon hard -as adamant yet flexible as india-rubber. Then you met -Danjuro, and he sank towards the floor and hissed at -you by way of welcome. The chief treasures were in -the cellar below, but here was quite enough to feast the -eye of a not too wise amateur, and make the purse jump -in his pocket.</p> - -<p class="indent">Danjuro had the art of shop-dressing at his finger-ends. -Things always looked better in his establishment -than they did when fetched home.</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page76"></a>[pg 76]</span> -People would cry: “Is <i>that</i> the Owari vase I -bought? Why, <i>what has happened to it</i>?”</p> - -<p class="indent">It would be the same vase, but divorced from its surroundings.</p> - -<p class="indent">You cannot imagine the effect of a dwarf plum tree -in a green tile pot upon a dragon of steel until you see -them in juxtaposition, nor the strange difference certain -backgrounds make in an Owari vase till you try them. -Danjuro was well up in these subtleties, and this knowledge, -combined with his own personality, lent an added -value to his wares—twenty per cent. at least.</p> - -<p class="indent">Here in the shop of Danjuro, in a semi-twilight, -glimmer demons and beasts in porcelain and bronze. -The frightful face of Akudogi shouts at you from the -wall, the lotus expands over pools in the silent land of -lacquer, and the hundred guinea ivory Mousmé, ten -inches high, trips beneath her ivory umbrella, ever on -the way to some fanciful pageant that had once existed -in her creator’s dreams.</p> - -<p class="indent">Here is a Jap baby, about as big and as round as a -tangerine orange, feeding ducks. Here a little box a -size larger than a walnut. Open it; inside are seated a -man and boy playing some game with dice. The man is -holding the dice cup up preparing to cast; in it are the -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page77"></a>[pg 77]</span> -dice, every cube separate and real, and each marked with -the proper pips.</p> - -<p class="indent">In the shop of Danjuro you are gazing, not upon -bronzes and lacquers, but upon the mind of Japan, -partly made visible. There is here evidence of patience -and labor sufficient to conquer the world, beauty enough -to charm the world, and ferocity enough to terrify it.</p> - -<p class="indent">There is nothing so strange on earth as this art that -reveals in glimpses the exquisite and the awful, where -the lily blossoms and the dragon tramples it under foot.</p> - -<p class="indent">That baby feeding the ducks, could anything be more -laughable or lovable? But do not open the drawers of -the cabinet he is standing on: they are filled with ivory -obscenities carved with just as loving care.</p> - -<p class="indent">No, the kakemonos and bronzes that adorn the drawing-rooms -of Bayswater and Bedford Park do not disclose -the whole of Japanese art. If you don’t believe me, -then go to Japan and become a friend of Danjuro the -curio-dealer, who lives in Jinrikisha Street, in the quaint -city of Nagasaki.</p> - -<p class="indent">“There’s no use talking,” said Leslie, the second day -after his arrival at Nagasaki. “I don’t want to live in -the European quarter. I want that white house up on -the hill there you said was empty, and I want to buy it.”</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page78"></a>[pg 78]</span> -“Weel,” said Mac—they were standing in Danjuro’s -shop consulting—“I’m thinking you want more than -it’s likely y’ll get. You cannot buy the house—rent it, -maybe. Stay till I ask Dan.”</p> - -<p class="indent">Dan and he had a consultation, the upshot of which -was that the curio-dealer, after a cynical declaration to -the effect that anything could be obtained for money, -offered his services as an intermediary.</p> - -<p class="indent">A friend of his, a brother dealer, a Mr. Initogo, or -some such name, owned the house up there on the -heights; he would probably let it. It was named the -House of the Clouds, warranted rainproof and free -from ghosts.</p> - -<p class="indent">Mr. Initogo was fetched from across the way—a -gentleman in horn spectacles, who looked as wise as -Confucius but was a little bit deaf. After some five -minutes’ polite bawling on the part of Mac and Danjuro, -Mr. Initogo came to understand the matter, and -at once declared with a thousand protestations of regret -that the thing was impossible.</p> - -<p class="indent">Why?</p> - -<p class="indent">Well, he could not allege any specific reason. The -House of the Clouds was empty, but he had not considered -the matter of letting it. The proposition came as -an honorable shock to him.</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page79"></a>[pg 79]</span> -Then Mac and Danjuro tackled Mr. Initogo, tea was -brought forth, and after half an hour’s wavering Mr. -Initogo began to give in.</p> - -<p class="indent">He sent for his son, and piloted by the son, the two -Scotchmen went off to inspect the House of the Clouds.</p> - -<p class="indent">They passed up a by-street and then up a steep path, -till they came to a gate shadowed by lilac trees. The -gate led to a tiny demesne, a long, white, two-storied -house, before which lay a grass plot, at the far end of -the house some cherry trees, and a space that might be -used as a garden.</p> - -<p class="indent">From the veranda of the House of the Clouds one -could look down on Nagasaki and the harbor that -pierces the land like a crooked sword. The hum of Jinrikisha -Street came up, mixed with the eternal song of -the cicalas.</p> - -<p class="indent">Across the harbor, where the junks and sampans contrasted -strangely with the foreign shipping, hills rose -up, green near the water, brown further off; over the -hills a few white fleecy clouds passed on the light wind. -It was the sky of an English summer.</p> - -<p class="indent">“I like this,” said Leslie, turning from the view. -“Now let’s look at the house.”</p> - -<p class="indent">It was furnished with primrose-colored matting, nothing -else, and it was about as substantial as a bandbox. -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page80"></a>[pg 80]</span> -There were two stories connected by a flight of steps -without a balustrade, and you could make as many rooms -as you liked with sliding panels.</p> - -<p class="indent">“I’ll take it,” said Leslie, and they returned to the -shop of Danjuro. Mr. Initogo was fetched, and after -more wriggling and haggling and tea-drinking and the -smoking of tiny pipes, he consented to let the place—the -authorities willing.</p> - -<p class="indent">Mac undertook to make everything right in that respect, -though it would cost him a good deal of trouble, -as the government have a holy horror of foreigners -spreading beyond the allotted quarters; and then a Chinese -comprador was obtained, and received orders from -Leslie to furnish the place with the necessary futons -(he determined to live in the native way), pots, tins, kettles, -Mousmés, and a decent cook; also screens and mosquito-nets, -plum trees in pots, and everything else that -might be necessary for comfort and adornment.</p> - -<p class="indent">Three days later the comprador appeared at the Nagasaki -hotel, where Leslie was staying, and declared that -everything was in order—even to the last tea-cup. He -had hired servants, made a most advantageous bargain: -he had hired a whole family.</p> - -<p class="indent">“But, bless my soul! I don’t want a family,” said -Leslie. “I only want a cook and a couple of girls.”</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page81"></a>[pg 81]</span> -Just so. This family consisted of a cook—her name -was Fir-cone—and three daughters. They would all -come together or not at all; he had got them at a bargain. -The names of the daughters were: Moon, Plum-blossom, -and Snow. Sixteen shillings a month a-piece -was the wages they were promised. There was also a cat -belonging to this family—</p> - -<p class="indent">“Oh, well, I’ll take them,” said Leslie, “and if they -don’t suit I can get others.”</p> - -<p class="indent">That afternoon, preceded by the comprador and followed -by two coolies carrying his luggage he went up -to take formal possession, and was received by his new -servants all on their knees—the three Mousmés in front -and mother Fir-cone in the background.</p> - -<p class="indent">Next day he started on the long journey to Nikko -to fetch Campanula. When he returned with his charge -the first person to meet him on the quay was Mac. Mac -in a stove pipe hat he had bought cheap and which did -not fit him but of which he seemed proud. Campanula -instantly recognized Mac with a smile and an attempt -to kow-tow before him, which Leslie frustrated, on account -of the dirty state of the quay. It was a pretty -little incident, and went to the old fellow’s heart.</p> - -<hr class="hr2"> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page82"></a>[pg 82]</span></p> - -<div class='chapter'><h2>CHAPTER X</h2></div> - -<p class="h2">OF MOUSMÉS AND OTHER THINGS</p> - -<p class="indent">Plum-blossom was a Mousmé with a broad face, -ever lit by a half smile. Moon was a girl with a -serious expression, but gorgeous of dress as any girl of -Kioto. Snow looked shrunk—not withered, you understand, -fresh as a daisy, in fact; but something had -happened in her development: she was preternaturally -small, and looked like a Mousmé seen through a diminishing -glass.</p> - -<p class="indent">The three Mousmés and old mother Fir-cone took -almost entire possession of Campanula San when she -arrived, and Campanula San seemed quite content.</p> - -<p class="indent">Mixed with her charming childishness there was a -philosophical calm that would have done honour to a -sage of the Stoic school. Riding on Leslie’s shoulder -through Nikko, under examination at the Tea House of -the Tortoise, playing with Plum-blossom in the veranda -of the House of the Clouds, she was just the same. -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page83"></a>[pg 83]</span> -Life was a pageant at which she was an humble spectator, -whose duty was to be amiable and submissive, and -accept things just as they came.</p> - -<p class="indent">She did not say this, but she acted it, or rather expressed -it in her actions and ways.</p> - -<p class="indent">Down on the Bund an office had been rented by -M’Gourley. He slept there and lived there, ascending -occasionally at night to the House of the Clouds to -smoke a pipe with his partner and talk business, and -give advice on things Japanese, advice often needful -enough to the uninitiated Leslie.</p> - -<p class="indent">House-keeping in Japan is full of surprises. One -day, for instance, Leslie met a figure coming from the -back part of the premises—a figure like a rag-doll that -had spent its life in a coal-scuttle. Interrogated, the -figure turned out to be the mother of Moon, and by -profession—well, her profession was helping to coal the -Canadian Pacific boats.</p> - -<p class="indent">“But,” said Leslie, “it is impossible, for Moon -already has a mother whose name is Fir-cone.”</p> - -<p class="indent">He was just going to send for the police when the -whole truth came out on the veranda, in the form of -Moon herself.</p> - -<p class="indent">She explained in indifferent English, kneeling as she -spoke with the backs of her little hands held upwards -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page84"></a>[pg 84]</span> -to her face, that the comprador had lied; that there was -no particular connection between her and her fellow-servants; -that the comprador had made a bunch of -them just as he might make a bunch of weeds, picking -one up here and the other there, and pretending they -were all the one family. Why had he done this thing? -Who could say? For some dark reason of his own. -She said also that her mother was not always as dirty -as that, but was going home now to wash. Would Leslie -San like to see her washed so that Moon’s words might -be proved to him true? Leslie San would not.</p> - -<p class="indent">M’Gourley was had up, and managed to arrange matters -without the disruption of the household, which -seemed imminent.</p> - -<p class="indent">M’Gourley mixed a good deal in the affairs of the -House of the Clouds. Six months had not passed before -the member of the Wee Kirk declared that Campanula -should be sent to the missionary day school near the -Bund, and brought up a Christian.</p> - -<p class="indent">Leslie at first demurred. The state of Campanula’s -mind, as revealed by her in conversations mostly translated -by Mac, but often conducted limpingly by Leslie -himself (he was beginning to pick up the native), did -not argue a good foundation for a structure like the -Christian religion.</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page85"></a>[pg 85]</span> -Her mind, as far as he could get at it, was the mind -of a sensitive and cultured lady who was slightly mad—mad -on the subject of demons and strange beasts.</p> - -<p class="indent">Tortoises who talked, storks whose language was the -acme of politeness, and toads of polished speech, seemed -as real to her as ordinary folk.</p> - -<p class="indent">Whether the tin-smith, her supposed father, had filled -her head with these things, no one can say, but the fact -remained that she was a perfect Uncle Remus as far as -animal-tale construction was concerned, and had a Mrs. -Radcliffe touch in the weird, so that it was a not uncommon -thing for her to be marched off to bed, the -triumvirate of Mousmés—Moon, Plum-blossom, and -Snow—acting as a body-guard to protect her from her -own extraordinary fancies.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then the self-abasement, the absolute self-abasement -with which she would kow-tow with both tiny hands -backs upward before your august self, and next minute -she would be spinning a top on the veranda, or playing -just like an ordinary child with Kiku San, a dot about -her own size, and only daughter of Mr. Initogo, the -landlord.</p> - -<p class="indent">She had a whole host of baldheaded Pagan friends, -male and female, and Leslie, taking a siesta of an afternoon, -would hear their clogs rattling on the veranda, or -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page86"></a>[pg 86]</span> -their naked feet pattering in the kitchen, and half -fancy himself the proprietor of a kindergarten.</p> - -<p class="indent">Quaint kites were often to be seen flying above the -House of the Clouds, kites shaped like hawks and butterflies, -and M’Gourley down in the street below would -sometimes glance up and see these evidences of Campanula’s -existence, and nod his head and say, “A’weel!” -and hurry on to Danjuro’s to meet him about some perhaps -questionable transaction, revolving in his mind -the while the question of Campanula’s conversion to -Christianity.</p> - -<p class="indent">He was a strange mixture. He would spend a whole -morning in trade. That is to say, he would get to the -office on the Bund early, do his correspondence and -what not with regard to the export of cheap curios, go -to the hotel and have a cocktail, and fish round for victims; -find some well-to-do stranger and lead him into -Danjuro’s shop, deliver him up as a dripping roast -into Danjuro’s hands, receive his commission, and go off -and have tiffin. Then as likely as not he would go up -to the House of the Clouds and fetch Campanula out -for a walk, and buy her toys, or sweets, or flowers.</p> - -<p class="indent">And once a week or so he would tackle Leslie about -the Christianity business, till Leslie at last gave in.</p> - -<p class="indent">Campanula went to the missionary day school, the -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page87"></a>[pg 87]</span> -prettiest school child in the world under her scarlet -umbrella pictured with flying storks.</p> - -<p class="indent">Leslie went away sometimes for weeks, leaving her -in charge of the Mousmés and leaving Mac with instructions -to keep an eye on her welfare.</p> - -<p class="indent">For the first eight months or so of this new life he -was amused and interested, the beauty of the country, -the quaintness of the people, the new conditions of life, -kept him from thinking much about the past or troubling -about the future.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then came reaction. A craving came on him to see -England once again, a veritable home-sickness that was -not to be denied.</p> - -<p class="indent">He made a journey to London. He only spent a -fortnight there; every one he had known in the past -was either gone or dead. He belonged to no club. It was -a miserable fortnight, and every day of it Japan called -him back.</p> - -<p class="indent">When he returned, he told himself that he had done -with the West for ever. Just as men sometimes tell -themselves they have done for ever with sin, folly, or -love.</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page89"></a>[pg 89]</span></p> - -<hr class="hr2"> - -<p class="h2">PART TWO</p> - -<p class="h2">THE MASSACRE OF THE BLUE-BELLS</p> - -<hr class="hr2"> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page91"></a>[pg 91]</span></p> - -<div class='chapter'><h2>CHAPTER XI</h2></div> - -<p class="h2">THE DREAM</p> - -<p class="indent">The “Jap Rubbish trade” was prospering mildly.</p> - -<p class="indent">During the first two years it seemed likely to languish -and die, but in the third year it woke up, got on -its legs, and, to use M’Gourley’s phrase, “began to -pick a bit.” In the fourth year it was bringing Leslie in -some two hundred a year, a fair amount considering the -capital originally invested in it.</p> - -<p class="indent">Not that he wanted the money, he kept his interest in -the thing just for something to do—a toy business to -play with when he was otherwise disengaged.</p> - -<p class="indent">As for Mac, he was getting rich, not out of the -Rubbish trade, but in a manner we will hint at later -on.</p> - -<p class="indent">The House of the Clouds remained unaltered, save -for a tiny landscape garden not much bigger than a -dining-table which Leslie had laid out for Campanula. -It lay beyond the garden walk in front of the veranda, -and it had mountains and rivers and savannas of moss, -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page92"></a>[pg 92]</span> -and old oak trees, fierce-looking, but not much bigger -than your thumb, and twisted fir trees that reflected -themselves gloomily in lakes the size of hand-mirrors, -and a Shinto temple about the size of a Buszard’s Dundee -cake; there were also bridges across the rivers.</p> - -<p class="indent">The thing had been laid out as a New Year’s gift for -Campanula, and it had cost Leslie about the price of a -Steinway Grand.</p> - -<p class="indent">Azalea bushes grew right up to it, azaleas bordered -the house, and there was a wilderness of azaleas in the -open space near the cherry trees.</p> - -<p class="indent">Crimson azaleas, imported all the way from the -azalea valley at Nikko in the very first year of Leslie’s -residence in Nagasaki. It was a pretty thought, and it -had cost a good penny, and caused much grumbling -from Mac, and great admiration in Mr. Initogo, who -had turned out the most delightful of landlords, a good -hand at whist, and most adaptable about repairs. He -was a modern Japanese agnostic when he was well, was -Mr. Initogo, and a Shinto when he was ill or in trouble; -but he was an all-round good landlord at all times.</p> - -<p class="indent">One bright afternoon Leslie was seated beneath the -cherry trees in a deck chair, his hat tilted back, and the -pipe he had just been smoking lying on the ground at -his feet. He was asleep. Lately he had been suffering -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page93"></a>[pg 93]</span> -from a touch of fever and chills caught on a duck-shooting -expedition down the coast; he had been taking -opium for it, and now as he sat beneath the cherry trees -the opium was troubling his dreams.</p> - -<p class="indent">Just before dropping off, his eye had fallen on a -single azalea blossom that had burst into flame, as if -spring had just touched off with her torch the fire -of crimson flowers that soon would blaze round the -house.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then he fell asleep, and Opium plucked the crimson -blossom, and followed him with it into the land of -dreams.</p> - -<p class="indent">He was in a Hongwanji temple, and there were people -there, Europeans seemingly, dressed in European -clothes; but though in a specious disguise, they were -soon perceived to be not the people of this earth. They -had strange and distorted faces, and forms that surely -never were made in God’s image. One man, who suddenly -hid himself behind a screen of lacquer, Leslie could have -sworn was made of stone.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then in great tribulation of spirit he was escaping -from the company of these people, passing down a corridor -where soft matting took the foot; but something -was following him with a hissing sound, a sound such as -Danjuro made by way of welcome when you entered -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page94"></a>[pg 94]</span> -his shop. Of a sudden the opium spirit touched the corridor -wall with the flower he had been patiently carrying, -the Hongwanji temple vanished, and Leslie found -himself on the Nikko road.</p> - -<p class="indent">The valley of azaleas lay before him and the mournful -cypress trees, the country where the moving clouds -cast their shadows, and the far blue hills beyond.</p> - -<p class="indent">There was something moving amidst the azaleas. -He knew it was a child, but, by some curious and subtle -freak of the opium fiend, the child was hidden from him, -all but vague glimpses; were it to make itself half visible -for a second a phantom azalea bush would come before -it, but he could see a tiny white hand busy plucking -the crimson blossoms.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then from somewhere far away through the dream -came the mournful toot, toot, of a blind man’s reed-pipe. -At first it seemed beyond the bend of the road, -and then it seemed amidst the azaleas, and then in the -wood of cypress trees. It grew more insistent and piercing, -and changed subtly into the sound he had once -heard on the Nikko road when, sitting with M’Gourley, -he had listened to the tune of the blind juggler with -the pipe.</p> - -<p class="indent">As he listened, shuddering, he saw something which he -at once knew to be the reason of the music and the soul -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page95"></a>[pg 95]</span> -of the opium drama that was unfolding before him.</p> - -<p class="indent">A tiny black dot was visible in the sky away over the -distant hills. It expanded and grew, dilated as if in response -to the enchanted music. And then he saw that -it was a bird; a vast bird, larger than an eagle, a ferocious -and awful bird, a tragic apparition called up from -the lands of night. It poised above the valley, seeming -to float and be upborne, not on air, but on the music -welling from the wood.</p> - -<p class="indent">He knew that if he could get to the half-seen child -amidst the azaleas he could save it from its fate. But -he could make no movement nor utter a sound, but stood -paralyzed, watching the tiny white hand plucking the -crimson flowers and the Horror above preparing to -strike.</p> - -<p class="indent">The music had now turned to a drone, a sound like -the spinning sound of a vast top. The thing in the air -circled and span. He knew it was preparing to fall like -a thunderbolt.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then he awoke.</p> - -<p class="indent">He saw the garden, the cherry trees, the house. -Opium land had vanished, but the music remained, ringing -in his ears; or was it real?</p> - -<p class="indent">He sprang to his feet and staggered along the path -leading to the gate looking wildly round him and listening. -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page96"></a>[pg 96]</span> -As he came, the sound died off; died and turned to -the sound of ordinary life, the hum from the city below, -the sound of the wind in the lilac trees, the tune of -ceaseless cicalas.</p> - -<p class="indent">“My God! what a dream!” he muttered as he -grasped the gate and stared down the lilac-shadowed -path. Then he returned slowly to the seat beneath the -cherry trees, and lit a cigarette.</p> - -<p class="indent">Opium had played a trick upon him like this before. -He had taken it first months ago for fever; since then he -had taken it occasionally for the slightest ache. He reacted -well to it sensually speaking, and found it at once -soothing and stimulating. Once before it had pushed -him into dreamland, but a dreamland without plot or -plan, and unstained by a horror such as he had just -witnessed.</p> - -<p class="indent">He was seated half drowsing, when suddenly some influence -made him look up and he saw before him a -lovely thing. It was Campanula. She had just come -out of the house by way of the veranda, and was -approaching him. Campanula, far removed from the -child he had carried on his shoulder into Nikko five -years ago.</p> - -<p class="indent">The child had turned into a girl with that rapidity -of transformation characteristic of the women of Japan. -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page97"></a>[pg 97]</span> -She was taller than the ordinary Mousmé of fourteen or -fifteen; her face, even to Western eyes, was beautiful -with a sad and mysterious beauty of its own, and her -every movement was graceful as the movement of a bluebell -when touched by the wind.</p> - -<p class="indent">She had ceased to attend the mission school after -nearly four years’ instruction, during which she had -grasped the art of speaking and almost of thinking in -English, and was now Leslie’s housekeeper, his adopted -daughter, and absolute ruler of the small domain known -as the House of the Clouds—as far, that is to say, as -the household affairs went.</p> - -<p class="indent">She still retained her childishness of mind, and for all -the Christian endeavor of the missionaries, she still retained -much of her pristine belief in “things”—things -with wings as well as hoofs, things that lived in woods, -birds that talked, and beasts that made answer.</p> - -<p class="indent">Though she could speak English, she never spoke -in long sentences, or told a connected tale in that language, -always falling back on the vernacular when her -imagination was roused, or a long and connected statement -had to be made.</p> - -<p class="indent">She was approaching Leslie now with a porcelain -bowl figured with storks in her hand, and a smile upon -her face. There was little mat on the ground near -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page98"></a>[pg 98]</span> -his chair, and on this she sat down—kneeling fashion—with -the bowl before her.</p> - -<p class="indent">“See!” said she, producing some things like small -gun wads from the sleeve of her kimono, “I bought -these to-day to give you pleasure. Oh, so beautiful! -Watch!”</p> - -<p class="indent">She cast one of the ugly discs upon the surface of -the water. It lay there for a moment unchanged, and -then, as if by magic, began to expand as it sucked up -the fluid, and break up, growing bigger and broader -till at last on the surface of the water floated three pink-tinted -lotus-flowers, a most delicate and perfect resemblance -of the real things.</p> - -<p class="indent">She folded her hands and looked up at him with a -happy smile.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Where did you get them?” asked Leslie.</p> - -<p class="indent">“M’Gourley San told me of them, he wished to buy -them for me—but I bought them for you.”</p> - -<p class="indent">She removed the lotus-flowers and cast another disc -on the water.</p> - -<p class="indent">Leslie watched her. During the last few months Campanula’s -attitude to him had changed. From a happy, -humble, and somewhat heedless thing—a creature that -regarded him with affection—an affection of about the -same strength as she exhibited for M’Gourley, Sweetbriar -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page99"></a>[pg 99]</span> -San, the cat, and her children schoolmates; she -had become a follower of his alone, always striving to -please him, forestalling his wants, always happy in his -presence, and drooping—unknown to him—when he -was away.</p> - -<p class="indent">The second wad under the influence of the water -broke up and began to form the branch of a cherry -tree covered with blossom.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Arashiyama,” murmured she, folding her small -hands and speaking dreamily, as if communing with -herself. Then she sat watching the branch of the cherry -tree expanding over the surface of the water.</p> - -<p class="indent">From the house came a somewhat discordant voice -singing a song about a bee and a lilac bough.</p> - -<p class="indent">It was Pine-breeze singing at her work. Moon, Plum-blossom, -and Snow, with their fictitious mother Fir-cone, -had vanished from the House of the Clouds two years -and more, giving place to Pine-breeze, a miracle of -daintiness and prettiness, and two other Mousmés, one -“rather old,” the cook, Lotus-bud by name, and the -other named Cherry-blossom, as pretty as Pine-breeze.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Listen!” said Campanula, suddenly looking up from -the bowl and its contents. “There is some one at the -gate.”</p> - -<p class="indent">Leslie half turned.</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page100"></a>[pg 100]</span> -A man and woman had passed through the gateway -shadowed by lilac, a short, stout man dressed in tweed -and a tall woman in blue serge.</p> - -<p class="indent">Leslie could see them only indistinctly from where -he sat, and they, not looking in his direction, failed -to see him at all.</p> - -<p class="indent">They were coming up to the veranda when the -woman turned to the little picture garden, laughed, and -pointed it out to her companion. Then she left the path, -stepped gingerly right into the middle of the landscape -garden country, and tried to pluck up an oak tree, a -gnarled and ancient-looking oak tree eight inches high.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Who?” asked Campanula, turning from the sight -of this outrage with uplifted forefinger.</p> - -<p class="indent">“They are Foreign Devils,” said Leslie using the -Chinese idiom. He was very pale, leaning forward in -chair. “Look, Campanula! I verily believe she is trying -to tear up your mountains to see how they grow. That’s -what they call in England ‘cheek,’ Campanula.”</p> - -<hr class="hr2"> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page101"></a>[pg 101]</span></p> - -<div class='chapter'><h2>CHAPTER XII</h2></div> - -<p class="h2">THE FOREIGN DEVILS</p> - -<p class="indent">The female Foreign Devil having failed to uproot -the oak, which clung to its native soil with a -tenacity highly Japanese, returned to the garden path. -And then came the voice of Pine-breeze kow-towing to -the strangers, bidding them welcome, and imploring -them to make the honorable entrance.</p> - -<p class="indent">They passed from view into the house, and Leslie rose -from his chair.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Wait here awhile, Campanula,” he said, “and then -follow me in. I think I know them, but I will go and -see.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Yes,” said Campanula.</p> - -<p class="indent">He walked to the house and kicked his garden shoes -off in the veranda, noting the fact that the Foreign -Devils had committed the unspeakable outrage of entering -with their shoes on.</p> - -<p class="indent">“<i>Richard!</i>” cried the tall woman, advancing to him -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page102"></a>[pg 102]</span> -with outstretched hand as he entered the room where -they were. “Why, you’ve grown!” She spoke as -though they had parted yesterday, but her voice had an -hysterical quaver, then she presented her cheek to him -for a cousinly kiss.</p> - -<p class="indent">“This is Richard Leslie,” said the woman, turning -to the little stout man in tweed. “We grew up together; -that’s why I’m so tall, I suppose. Dick—my -husband George. Gracious, Dick, where are your chairs -and things? Have you nothing to sit down on?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Only the floor,” said Leslie, fetching some square -cushions and placing them on the matting. “See, this -is how it’s done,” and he sat down on one of the cushions, -whilst his companions followed suit.</p> - -<p class="indent">Jane du Telle, once Jane Deering, was, despite her -vivacity and carelessness of manner, evidently in a state -of high nervous tension.</p> - -<p class="indent">Leslie, notwithstanding the years that had passed -since their last meeting, saw in her mentally little -change. She was the same Jane who had once hacked -his shins, when they were boy and girl together, up in -Scotland, and then flung herself on his neck in a burst of -repentance and tears. Emotional, good-hearted, selfish—giving -herself away one moment, but always saved -the next by a latent discretion that was to her flighty -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page103"></a>[pg 103]</span> -nature as a gyroscope. The same Jane with whom he -had fished for salmon and played at tennis in the past, -seated before him now on a floor in Japan, chattering -of everything and nothing just in the old familiar way.</p> - -<p class="indent">“And that’s the fellow she has married!” thought -he, as he glanced across at George du Telle, a podgy, -red-headed little man, a globe-trotting Briton of the -most blatant description.</p> - -<p class="indent">“How did you know I was here?” asked he, after -Jane had somewhat talked her hysterical feelings off.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Mr. Channing told us last night at the hotel. He’s -a friend of yours. He told us he knew an Englishman -named Richard Leslie living in the native fashion, and -I asked him if he was good-looking and tall and dark, -and he said, ‘Yes.’ He said you lived at the House of the -Clouds—sounds like an address in a dream, doesn’t it?—so -we took rikshas and came.”</p> - -<p class="indent">She put her hand to her back, where the “floor -stitch” had seized her. The floor may be a convenient -enough resting-place for a Mousmé who sinks down -upon it quite naturally in the likeness of a compressed -and joyously colored Z, but for an English woman of -five feet eight or more, dressed in a tailor-made gown, -and laced in a <i>corset parfait</i> it is at first rather difficult.</p> - -<p class="indent">“I would have got chairs,” said Leslie, “if I had -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page104"></a>[pg 104]</span> -known you were coming; but of all the people of the -world, you were the last I expected to see. Where did -you come from? I mean, how did you strike Nagasaki?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“We came from Colombo.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Beastly hole,” put in her husband, who was stroking -Sweetbriar San, the cat of the establishment, who had -just come in to inspect the strangers. “We stayed at -the Beach Hotel two nights, and d’you know what they -charged us? Just think.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Don’t think,” said Jane, who had wriggled into a -more comfortable attitude. “Give me that cat, George; -and I wish you would try to repress your hotel bills. -Dick, I was so sorry to hear the news about your father.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“What news?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“About his death.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Well, you were sorrier than I was.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Oh, Dick! but don’t let us talk about it, it’s all so -sad. And have you been living here in Japan ever -since?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Ever since.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Just like this on the floor?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Just like this on the floor.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“You must find it rather flat, I should think,” said -the carroty-headed George.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Richard,” said Jane suddenly, ignoring her husband, -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page105"></a>[pg 105]</span> -“you’re not married to a Japanese—or anything—are -you?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“No.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Do you live here alone?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Well, I have three servant girls, and a daughter, if -you call that ‘alone.’”</p> - -<p class="indent">“A daughter!” said Jane.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Yes; and she’s Japanese, too.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Japanese!”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Yes; I adopted her.”</p> - -<p class="indent">George du Telle snorted, and fortunately at that moment -a panel slid back, and Pine-breeze appeared with -the tea, followed by Lotus-bud with an hibachi and -Cherry-blossom with a heap of tiny plates.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Are these your—I mean is one of these your—”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Daughter? No. Turn round, and you will see her,”</p> - -<p class="indent">Jane was seated with her back to the drawn-back -panel that made a doorway on to the veranda. She -turned, and there in the sunlit space stood Campanula -in her blue kimono, broad scarlet obi, and with a scarlet -flower in her hair. Behind her, as a background, lay -the picture garden, antique hills, spun-glass torrents, -and tiny, twisted fir trees, that looked, oh, so old, and -tired of the world, and tormented by the wind.</p> - -<p class="indent">Campanula went right down on her knees upon the -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page106"></a>[pg 106]</span> -matting, and murmured the usual Japanese welcome.</p> - -<p class="indent">Now this was a practice that Leslie disliked. He had -tried to break her of it, and in the attempt he had come -across a strange fact.</p> - -<p class="indent">Campanula in her heart of hearts was a real child -of Old Japan. She might have been a sister to the seven-and-forty -Ronins in the time before Osaka was defiled -by factory chimneys, and the monastery of Kotoku-in -by the presence of Cook’s tourists.</p> - -<p class="indent">She tried honestly to be modern, as it was the wish -of Leslie, but in times of emotion, back her intellect -would go to Old Japan, and she would act as her ancestors -had acted in who knows what lotus-strewn and -blossom-scented ages.</p> - -<p class="indent">“What does she say?” asked Jane, as George du -Telle rose to his feet. “Tell me, and ask her to excuse -me for not getting up, for when I get up, I’ll have -to be <i>pulled</i> up.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“She is bidding you welcome and at the same time -apologizing for the fact of her own miserable existence.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I accept the apology,” said Jane, as Campanula, -her devotions over, sank down before the tea-service, -and prepared to act as hostess. “Freely and frankly, -Dick, I must congratulate you on your taste—she is -lovely.”</p> - -<p class="indent">Campanula looked up with a faint, apologetic smile.</p> - -<p class="indent">“I speak English,” she said.</p> - -<hr class="hr2"> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page107"></a>[pg 107]</span></p> - -<div class='chapter'><h2>CHAPTER XIII</h2></div> - -<p class="h2">THE MONASTERY GARDEN</p> - -<p class="indent">Jane gazed over Nagasaki, the blue water, the -green hills, to the blue beyond, and sighed. They -were standing near the gate; tea was over, and they -were waiting for Campanula, who had gone into the -house to make some alteration in her dress before accompanying -them “down town.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Richard,” she said, “take us somewhere where we -can talk, you and I. I have such a heap of things to -ask you and talk about. Twelve years—can it be twelve -years since we last saw each other? Did you get my last -letter?”</p> - -<p class="indent">George du Telle was standing near smoking a cigar, -and staring at the beautiful view with about the same -amount of interest he would have felt had it been a -soap advertisement, but she did not lower her voice. -She was perfectly frank with the world and her husband.</p> - -<p class="indent">This frankness carried her far, and enabled her sometimes -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page108"></a>[pg 108]</span> -to skate on ice that would have given under many -a woman of half her weight, for it was a genuine frankness, -not a thing put on.</p> - -<p class="indent">She was a person whom women called nice-looking on -first acquaintance, and men mentally registered as plain. -Tall, pale, with an excellent figure, and gray eyes. A -man met her and spoke to her, and found her plain but -very jolly, increased the acquaintanceship and found her -plainness vanishing, and then, all of a sudden, his foolish -soul was caught in a trap.</p> - -<p class="indent">It was the magic of her lips, perhaps. They formed -the true Cupid’s bow, full, and seemingly cut by a chisel -wielded by a master hand, sensitive and sensuous. -Gazing at them one came to understand how in the ancient -world tall Troy fell before a kiss.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Which letter?” asked Leslie, plucking a lilac spray -and strewing the ground with the tiny petals.</p> - -<p class="indent">“The one I wrote six years ago telling you I was -married. I sent it care of your father.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“No,” said Leslie gloomily. “I have heard from -no one for eight years and more. I cut the world, you -know—or it cut me rather; but I’ll tell you some other -time, here’s Campanula.”</p> - -<p class="indent">Then they started, Leslie and his companion leading -the way.</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page109"></a>[pg 109]</span> -“Where are you going to take us?” asked Jane, -when they had reached the street.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Through the city to a place I know on a hill,” replied -Leslie.</p> - -<p class="indent">He had called four rikshas from the stand, and he -gave some directions to the riksha men, and they -started.</p> - -<p class="indent">You cannot imagine the size of Nagasaki till you -drive through it in a swift-running riksha, nor the -quaintness, nor the terror that causes your heart to fly -upwards as your riksha man shaves a baby, not with a -razor, but with the off wheel.</p> - -<p class="indent">Boy babies fighting tops, girls bouncing colored -balls, flights of children whose clogs clatter like the -dominoes in an Italian restaurant as they pursue each -other in some mysterious game—everywhere children, a -shifting, colored maze in which the eye gets tangled and -lost. Babies, temples, tea-houses, streets upon streets of -houses that look as if you could flatten them out with -the blows of a shovel, bursts of cherry-blossoms, tripping -Mousmés, stone monsters, awful, yet pathetic with -the gray of lichen and the green of moss, a courtyard -with a twisted fir tree leaning across it, laughter, and -the tune of a <i>chamécen</i> running through it all, that is the -impression that a riksha ride through Nagasaki in -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page110"></a>[pg 110]</span> -spring would leave on the mind, were not the picture -blurred by the European element.</p> - -<p class="indent">Street after street they passed through, and still -the mysterious city kept building up streets before them. -Leslie had thought of taking his companions to the -O Suwa, but he had changed his mind and given other -directions to the riksha men.</p> - -<p class="indent">They passed up a steep incline, dark with fir trees, -and drew up at a great gateway consisting of two joists -of wood supporting a vast beam, the whole making a -figure something in the fashion of the Greek II.</p> - -<p class="indent">Beyond the gateway lay an inclined path, bordered -by cryptomeria trees, leading to the façade of a temple.</p> - -<p class="indent">“It’s a place I sometimes come to,” said Leslie, as -he helped Jane to descend. “It’s quiet, and worth seeing -in its way.”</p> - -<p class="indent">Campanula and George du Telle led the way this -time, Leslie and his companion leisurely following.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Come down this path,” said Jane, turning to a side -alley. “Oh, how pretty! and how mournful too, with -those rows of dark trees. Dick, this is not a cemetery -you have brought us to?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“No; it’s a Shinto monastery. Few people know it, -and it’s out of the run of the general sight-seeing -bounders.”</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page111"></a>[pg 111]</span> -“Things with kodaks?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“And without—but see here, Jane.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Yes?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“What’s your husband?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“George?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Yes, I suppose his name is George. What is he?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“He’s in the wool trade—he’s the richest man in the -wool trade, they say. He thinks and talks of nothing -else but wool. He got off the subject to-day with you -for awhile; wasn’t he brilliant? But we get on all right -together; he has his set, and I have mine.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“What is his set?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“The very best—I mean the very worst; the poor old -Smart Set that every one is always beating as if it were -a donkey—which it is,” said Jane, taking her seat on -the plinth supporting the prancing figure of Ama-ino, -fronted across the walk by the equally fantastic figure -of Koma-ino, a veritable Lion and Unicorn. “Sit down -beside me, Dick, and tell me—”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Yes?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“What have you been doing all these years?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I—I’ve been keeping alive—”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Dick,” suddenly broke out Jane, as if she had not -been listening, “I have often thought you must have -thought me a heartless wretch; but I’m not.”</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page112"></a>[pg 112]</span> -“There is no use in going over the past,” he said. -“What is done is done, and never can be undone. I -can only say that I have never in the past had a friend -to stick to me, or a woman to love me, or a father to care -for me.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“May it not have been your own fault, Dick? -Think for a moment. I don’t want to reproach you, but -you know how wild you were—you know that was one -of the reasons we couldn’t get married. Oh, it wasn’t -‘my heartlessness,’ as you told me in your last letter -but one. I have heart enough—at least I hope so,” -said Jane, looking at Koma-ino as if for confirmation, -“and I wouldn’t have done what I did if you’d been -different. Never mind, Dick, cheer up!—buck up! as -they used to say in the poor old Smart Set, till the respectable -folk took the expression away from them. -What’ve you been doing all these long years, Dick?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Oh, I’ve been in Australia.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“What were you doing there?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Curse Australia!” suddenly broke out Leslie, digging -his heel in the ground. “Don’t speak to me about -it; let’s talk of something else.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Well, what are you doing here? I mean, what have -you been doing all these years—playing the guitar, or -what?”</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page113"></a>[pg 113]</span> -“I’m a shopman.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I beg your pardon?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I and a man named M’Gourley are in business.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Two Scotchmen?” sneered Jane.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Two Scotchmen.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“And what are you selling—paper umbrellas?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Yes; and hats and kakemonos, and every other sort -of a mono that the European trade will swallow. We -export them.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Then you’re a merchant, <i>not</i> a shopman,” said -Jane in a half-angry, half-relieved voice. “I <i>wish</i> you -would not give me these sort of horrible shocks. I -thought at first you were serving in some place behind -the counter—”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Oh, I don’t want to make money in business much; -I do it more for interest and to have an object in life. -I’m well off; my father’s money all came to me—he -died well off.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“And wasn’t it queer?” said Jane. “George is awfully -rich, you know; well, directly I was married, old -Aunt Keziah died, and every penny of her money came -to me. Fifty thousand. No, forty-eight thousand, four -hundred and eighty-two pounds, ten and sixpence. It -seemed so sweet, the little sixpence following at the end. -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page114"></a>[pg 114]</span> -I sent for it, and had a hole drilled through it, and -I always wear it on this bangle—look!”</p> - -<p class="indent">He looked; there were many things hanging on the -bangle. He touched a tiny gold pig swinging by a -ring.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Good heavens!”</p> - -<p class="indent">“<i>You</i> gave me that,” said Jane, “and I’ve never -parted with it.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“What’s this?” said he, fingering a cabalistic-looking -blue stone.</p> - -<p class="indent">“That’s an inkh, I think; I’m not sure of the name. -It’s lucky, or supposed to be.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Who gave it to you?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“A boy at Cairo last winter.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“How old was he?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Oh, about twenty.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“And this?” said Leslie, picking out another charm -in the form of a heart.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Look here,” said Jane, pulling her wrist away, “I -don’t want to waste time like this, I want you to tell -me more about yourself; I want you to tell me about -that child Campanula. <i>Why</i> did you adopt her?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I found her on the road going to Nikko.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Where’s that?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“It’s away up in Shimotsuke, beyond Tokyo. I and -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page115"></a>[pg 115]</span> -M’Gourley were on the tramp. We were sitting by the -roadside resting, when a blind man came along. He was -half mad, and talked wild. Said he was a juggler, and -offered to fetch devils out of a wood near by, if we -gave him gold.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Why didn’t you try him?” said Jane in an interested -voice.</p> - -<p class="indent">“I did try him,” said Leslie; “gave him some money. -He made a circle in the dust, with signs round the rim -of it, told us not to touch it or come near it, got into -the middle of it, and fetched out a reed-pipe. Then he -began to play a tune that would make you shiver to -hear, and things croaked in the wood.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Go on,” said Jane shivering pleasantly.</p> - -<p class="indent">“I took my walking-stick and made a mark in the -dust just near his foot. I touched his heel by accident, -and—whew!”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Yes?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“He went off like a rocket; bounded out of the circle, -rushed this way and that, knocking against trees -and striking right and left with his stick, as if dogs -were about him. He got round the bend of the road -and vanished. We were pretty much astonished, but -that wasn’t the end of it. In front of us was a valley -of the most beautiful crimson azaleas.”</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page116"></a>[pg 116]</span> -“Wait a moment, Dick; you’re a very bad story-teller. -You should always stage your characters: you -should have described the azaleas first and the scenery. -Well, go on.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Bother the azaleas!” said Dick. They were fast -getting into the old boy-and-girl way of talking to each -other, a somewhat dangerous language at thirty. “It -doesn’t matter whether they come in first or last. Where -was I? Oh yes. Mac suddenly said: ‘Look there!’ I -looked, and there sure enough was a child amidst the -azaleas. She hadn’t been there a few seconds before, and -Mac would have it that she had been ‘fetched’; it was -a pretty wild country and no houses around, and there -she was, just as if she had stepped out of a house, -plucking away at the azalea blossoms for all she was -worth, a tiny dot in a blue kimono and scarlet obi. I -stole up behind her.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I’d have caught her up and kissed her.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Just what I did, in fact; and it may have been -fancy, but she seemed slipping through my fingers like—grease -till I kissed her, and she became solid.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“There’s one thing, Dick, you’ll never make a poet. -Well, go on; it’s awfully interesting.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“We carried her off to Nikko. No parents could be -found to own her, so I adopted her.”</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page117"></a>[pg 117]</span> -“What became of the juggler?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“That was a funny thing. As we turned the bend -of the road we saw him away up in a gorge of the -hills. He was still running for all he was worth, beating -about him with his stick as if hitting off devils, -and dashing himself against trees in a quite regardless -manner.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“How awful!”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Well, frankly, it was, and it had a sequel, for his -dead body was found miles away some days after, and -the Japanese police said the trees had beaten him to -death, which they practically had.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“But, Dick, what was the meaning of it?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Who knows! When I touched him on the heel perhaps -he may have thought it was a devil seizing him, -and his imagination did the rest. Mac thinks, or, at -least, he once thought—”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Yes?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“That there was something developing in the wood, -something bad; that Campanula’s ghost was wandering -in the wood; that when I made the mark I did inside -the circle, the bad thing was flung out of the developing -medium and Campanula’s ghost sucked into it, and -so she became materialized.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“And the bad thing went for the juggler man?”</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page118"></a>[pg 118]</span> -“It and perhaps others.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I never heard anything half so horrible, if it’s true.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“It’s true enough. I was forgetting it almost, but I -had a horrid dream to-day that brought it all back. I -was sitting in the garden smoking and I dropped off -to sleep; and I heard the sound of that beast’s pipe, and -I saw the place on the Nikko road, and there was a -child amongst the flowers. Then a frightful bird came -along and was going to attack the child, and I awoke—it -was just before you came.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Dick, what was the mark you made on the road?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“The sign of the cross,” said Leslie.</p> - -<p class="indent">Jane was silent for a moment then—</p> - -<hr class="hr2"> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page119"></a>[pg 119]</span></p> - -<div class='chapter'><h2>CHAPTER XIV</h2></div> - -<p class="h2">NAGASAKI BY NIGHT</p> - -<p class="indent">“I wish you wouldn’t tell me stories like that,” -she suddenly broke out. “I’ll be dreaming -about it all to-night.” She shuddered, and gazed -at Koma-ino. “Japan seems a horribly creepy sort -of place; I think I’ll make George come away to-morrow.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“One side of it,” said Leslie, “is simply crawling; -you have no idea, and I who have lived here five years -have only a glimmering of the mind of the people. Do -you know what I think?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Yes?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I think that in the sleeves of their kimonos—I -mean their frock coats, for they’ve put off their kimonos -for a while for business purposes—they are simply -laughing at us.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“At whom?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“At the English—at Europe.”</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page120"></a>[pg 120]</span> -“Like their impudence!”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Perhaps it’s impudence, perhaps not, anyhow—I -distrust them—”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Dick,” said his companion, “look! It’s getting -dusk: let’s go and look for George and your ‘adoptive -daughter.’ Mercy! What’s that!”</p> - -<p class="indent">A deep hum filled the air; it seemed to come at first -from the statue of Koma-ino—a soul-disturbing hum -that deepened and swelled and then leapt, leapt into a -deafening roar that rushed over Nagasaki, to die on the -distant sea.</p> - -<p class="indent">Jane clung to her companion like a child, hugged him -as a child might hug a nurse; her straw hat was pushed -sideways, and he found his face buried in the masses -of her perfumed hair. His arm had slipped round her -waist, her arm was over his shoulder, and her fingers -pressing his neck; for a moment he felt as if he were -absorbing her being—drinking her.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then the sound died away.</p> - -<p class="indent">“<i>What</i> was it?” gasped she, pushing away from -him and gazing at him with a white, drawn face. “Why, -you seem half dazed; you were more frightened than -I. Dick, what was it?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I’m all right,” said Leslie, in the voice of a man -waking from the effect of an opiate. “I wasn’t frightened. -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page121"></a>[pg 121]</span> -It was only the big gong of the monastery; I’ve -heard it lots of times.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Then why couldn’t you have told me?” cried Jane, -flying from fright to fury. “Think what it must have -looked like, you hugging me like that.” She sprang to -her feet. “You bring me here and tell me ghost stories, -and frighten me to death with gongs and things, and -then—I believe you’re half a Japanese already, you’ve -grown so horrid.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“There wasn’t any one to see,” said Leslie, rising to -his feet. “And talking about hugging—”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I don’t want to talk about hugging—talk about -hugging! Do you fancy yourself on Hampstead Heath? -Come, let us find George. I want something common-place -after all this.”</p> - -<p class="indent">They found George and Campanula—the most -strangely matched pair in the world—waiting for them -at the gates.</p> - -<p class="indent">“You’ll come and dine with us at the hotel, won’t -you?” asked Jane as they got into the rikshas.</p> - -<p class="indent">“I’ll come right enough,” said Leslie. “Wait, -please.”</p> - -<p class="indent">He went to Campanula’s riksha and asked her, but -she prayed to be honorably excused—she had a headache.</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page122"></a>[pg 122]</span> -She passed her hand across her forehead as if in -confirmation of her words. Leslie tucked the riksha -blanket round her knees, and explained to the Du -Telles, and they started.</p> - -<p class="indent">The quaint city they had come through had changed -to a quainter city still. Night had blotted out the traces -of Europe on Nagasaki—at least, in the purely native -streets. All sorts of strange little trades that sleep in -the daytime had awakened with the dusk. Things queer -in the daytime were now mysterious, and things common, -quaint. The fish shop, with its huge paper lantern, -besides the fish and the sea-weed on its slabs, disposed -of dreams which it flung away gratis to the passing -traveler in the running riksha, and the booth of the -sandal merchant, with the tiny potted rose tree in front -of the wares, became at once an apology and atonement -for all the commonplace villainy condensed in the word -“shop.”</p> - -<p class="indent">Mousmés passed, now half Mousmés, half glowworms, -each bearing a colored lantern on the end of a little -stick; and then the shadows half lit by lamp-light, where -a cherry tree was attempting to peep into the street: the -light of lamps glimmering through paper shutters, the -light of lanterns swinging in the wind—red, blue, white, -and yellow, some pictured with chrysanthemums; the -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page123"></a>[pg 123]</span> -stork that stands so boldly forth in Japanese pictures -but is nearly gone from Japan, cherry-blossoms, and fish -that seem swimming vigorously in a bowl of water lambent -and green; and then the sounds, ten <i>chamécens</i> for -one in the day. The riksha whisks by a booth, whence -comes the squalling of cats—seemingly. It is the gaku, -Japanese poetry set to music and flung into the lamp-lit -street to make things stranger, and heighten, if possible, -the charm. At the corner of the by-street leading -to the House of the Clouds they met Pine-breeze simply -laden with all sorts of weird and wonderful paper boxes, -and lighting herself on her way with a lantern pictured -with a cuttle-fish and carried on the end of a short bamboo -rod. She had been marketing. It was a fortunate -meeting, for she could escort Campanula home.</p> - -<hr class="hr2"> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page124"></a>[pg 124]</span></p> - -<div class='chapter'><h2>CHAPTER XV</h2></div> - -<p class="h2">M’GOURLEY’S LOVE AFFAIR</p> - -<p class="indent">Following Pine-breeze, who went before her like -a fantastically colored glowworm, Campanula ascended -to the house.</p> - -<p class="indent">As she stepped onto the veranda she heard the voice -of M’Gourley San addressing Lotus-bed, and asking -when she thought Leslie San would be back. Mac’s -elastic-side boots were in the veranda, and his gamp was -propped against the wall.</p> - -<p class="indent">He was sitting on the floor smoking a pipe and reading -the <i>Japan Mail</i> through a pair of spectacles when -Campanula entered.</p> - -<p class="indent">Mac often came up of nights like this. He was a vivid -Radical, and Leslie was a hide-bound Conservative, so -they had a splendid time together when they got on -politics; or they would play chess, or Mr. Initogo would -drop in and they would have a rubber of dummy whist.</p> - -<p class="indent">But what Mac really came for, though he scarcely -knew it himself, was Campanula.</p> - -<p class="indent">Campanula was a lot to Mac; much more than one -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page125"></a>[pg 125]</span> -can express in prose, and M’Gourley is scarcely the -figure to make a ballad of. Yet the poem was there round -about him, unsung, unuttered, unguessed by any one, -least of all by himself.</p> - -<p class="indent">When he had made chickens out of orange-pips for -her at Nikko, she just as cunningly had made him her -slave.</p> - -<p class="indent">She had taken this dull, hard-grained, and shady old -business man into a byway, of life, and made him spin -tops and fly kites. She had made him admire flowers -and listen to fairy tales, and all as naturally and as -peacefully as though these things had been matters of -everyday occurrence with him the whole long length of -his arid life.</p> - -<p class="indent">“<i>Einst, O wunder!</i>”—that ballad might have been -inspired by Mac—had the writer ever met him in business -or seen him in the flesh.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Hech!” said Mac. “There you are; and where -have you been trapsing to this hour of the evening?”</p> - -<p class="indent">Campanula explained that Leslie had met friends, and -that he had gone to dine with them at the hotel.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Wonder who they can be?” soliloquized Mac, as -Campanula clapped her little hands together for Pine-breeze -to bring refreshments. “Some people he has -picked up at the hotel, maybe.”</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page126"></a>[pg 126]</span> -They sat opposite to each other on the matting, this -strangely assorted pair. A panel in the front was open, -for the night was warm, and the lamplight fell on the -veranda and the garden path beyond.</p> - -<p class="indent">And they ate salted plums and crystallized prawns, -soup with seaweed in it, and rice with fish sauce, whilst -the perfume of the cherry blossoms stole in from the -night outside, and the twang of a <i>chamécen</i> came from -somewhere in the mysterious depths of the house.</p> - -<p class="indent">It was Lotus-bud relieving her soul with music, -mournful as the sound of the wind blowing over the wet -fields of millet in the rainy weather.</p> - -<p class="indent">The things having been removed, Campanula brought -forth a chess-board, which she laid on the matting before -Mac.</p> - -<p class="indent">He had taught her chess, and had found her an apt -pupil, a veritable Zukertort, a female Nogi, who attacked -his positions with her ivory army, stormed his -fortifications, and put him to rout when she chose.</p> - -<p class="indent">Yet he often won. She would make amazing blunders -just in time to save him from defeat, and Mac would -chuckle and say—</p> - -<p class="indent">“There you are, there you are—thrown a pawn away -that might have given you back your queen in two -more moves. Never mind, you’re getting on; I’ll noat -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page127"></a>[pg 127]</span> -say ye aren’t im—” long pause—“proving. Check—and -how’s that for mate?”</p> - -<p class="indent">Then Campanula would throw her hands up in assumed -horror at her own stupidity, and Mac would -chuckle over his own supposed cleverness, and all would -be harmony and peace.</p> - -<p class="indent">To-night, however, Campanula’s mind was somewhat -astray, and the chess-player who lived in her brain took -advantage of the fact, and beat Mac thoroughly in the -course of a dozen moves.</p> - -<p class="indent">“I’m getting auld,” said Mac testily. “Here, put -the things away. Na, na, I’ll play no more the night.”</p> - -<p class="indent">He lit his pipe at the tobacco-mono and moodily -smoked it. He could not bear being beaten at chess, -and now he looked as if he would be sour for the whole -evening.</p> - -<p class="indent">She reached for a long-necked <i>chamécen</i> that lay near -her on the matting, and tuned it, striking a few somber -notes.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Ay, sing us something,” said Mac, and as the night -wind sighed and the cherry blossoms filled the room with -their faint, faint fragrance, Campanula, her eyes fixed -across illimitable distance, sang in a voice like the ripple -of a mountain brook, a song telling of the Miakodori, -and the sunlit slopes of Maruyama, where the great old -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page128"></a>[pg 128]</span> -Gion cherry tree blooms at the foot of Yaamis lane. -And then an old love-song strayed in from the night -and was caught by the strings of the <i>chamécen</i> and made -articulate by her voice.</p> - -<p class="indent">It told the fate of a maiden named Pine-bough, who -lived by the sea at Hamada where the foam and the sand -are as snow.</p> - -<p class="indent">She loved a noble, this maiden named Pine-bough—you -can guess the rest. Mac listened, soothed; it was -the case of David and Saul over again—a very inferior -sort of Saul, it is true.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Now,” said the Charmed One as the rafters absorbed -the last echoes of the fate of Pine-bough, “tell -us a story.”</p> - -<p class="indent">Campanula, with the <i>chamécen</i> lying across her lap, -knitted her brows in thought. She was evidently pursuing -strange beasts across the fields of Fancy, and undetermined -as to which she would mark down and serve -up to her guest. Then she solved the matter by suddenly -clearing her brow and telling a tale without any beasts -in it at all.</p> - -<p class="indent">“There is a garden,” declared Campanula, “where -every one may enter; the Mikado himself goes there, -and the riksha man, the Mousmé and the Mousko, Bo -Chan, and Kiku San. Even Campanula herself, lowly -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page129"></a>[pg 129]</span> -as she is, may enter there. And there the Mousko pulls -the beard of the Emperor unafraid, and the riksha man -forgets his riksha and drinks tea at the tea houses, where -no money is paid and no money is asked for.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“What’s this garden you’re telling me of?” demanded -Mac, his business instincts and common sense in -arms at the latter statement.</p> - -<p class="indent">“It is the garden of sleep,” answered Campanula cunningly. -She had been waiting for the question and now -she paused, gently plucking a string of the <i>chamécen</i>, -filling the air with a faint throbbing sound as if to -summon around her the tale-bearers of the night.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Here in the garden of sleep,” pursued the dreamy -voice, as the vibrations died away, “every tree bears a -lighted lantern swinging in the wind and painting the -grass beneath with its color—red lanterns painted with -storks, and blue lanterns pictured with the blossoms of -the cherry; lanterns on which dragons fly pursuing each -other, and lanterns disported upon by my lord the Bat.</p> - -<p class="indent">“A wanderer in the garden has but to pluck a lantern -from a tree, and his dreams will at once turn in a happy -direction, and by the light of the lantern he will see -before him the object of his desire, be it what it may.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I’ll remember that,” said Mac grimly, “next time -I find myself there.”</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page130"></a>[pg 130]</span> -“One has no memory there,” said Campanula, “and -few people know of the secret of that place, else every -one would be happy in their dreams.</p> - -<p class="indent">“One night entered the garden Taro San, a child no -higher than one’s knee. He was the son of a tea-house -keeper, and he had plucked a glowworm from a bush, -by which feeble light he was lighting himself through -the darkness of the garden.</p> - -<p class="indent">“All at once he found himself beneath a tree, from -the lowest branch of which swung a huge lantern of -wistaria-blue.</p> - -<p class="indent">“It was the lantern of Spring, and the painted butterflies -upon it, by some magic, moved their wings in -flight, yet remained always in the same place, and the -painted cherry-blossoms upon it waved in some magic -wind, yet never faded or lost a petal, and the bird -upon it pursuing the dragon fly was always gaining -upon the dragon fly, yet the dragon fly, oh mystery! always -outstripped the bird.”</p> - -<p class="indent">Campanula paused in thought, and a faintly plucked -string of the <i>chamécen</i> filled the air with the hum of the -dragon fly’s wings as it flew by reed and iris, by mere -and pond, by the unblown lotus and the blue of the -river in the country of eternal spring.</p> - -<p class="indent">“O Taro San,” continued the story-teller, “gazing -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page131"></a>[pg 131]</span> -up and beholding this fair thing, strove to reach it, and -failing, he began to weep.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Now, there was passing by at that moment the -Daimiyo of his province, and the great lord walked with -his gaze fixed upon the ground overcome as he was by -the reverie of sleep; but hearing the sound of Taro San -weeping, he paused and asked the child what ailed -him, and hearing the trouble, he lifted him upon his -shoulder; and Taro San grasped the lantern and waved -it in the air and laughed, for its light showed him a -pleasant path beset with roses and leading to a sea, blue -as the sea of Harima, and in the path stood a little girl -plucking the amber and crimson flowers.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Taro cried out to the Daimiyo to take him to the -little girl, but the Daimiyo did not heed, for to him -the lantern had shown Osaka Castle stormed by knights -in armor, and the spears of the Samurai all bent towards -its walls under a roof of flying arrows. Towards this -sight he ran, and Taro dropping the lantern, it went -out, and the Daimiyo awoke in his palace and Taro -awoke in the tea house upon the futon, where he slept -beside his father.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Another night stood Taro beneath the lantern which -hung beyond his reach, but a beggar man who chanced -to pass lifting him upon his shoulder, the child seized -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page132"></a>[pg 132]</span> -the lantern and waved it in the air, and instantly before -him appeared the flower-set path and the form of -the Mousmé, more beautiful now and attired in a kimono -of palest amber embroidered with silver bats.</p> - -<p class="indent">“But the beggar man saw nothing but a purse of silver -lying before him on the ground, and, stooping to -pick it up, Taro fell from his shoulder, the lantern -went out, and the beggar man awoke by the roadside -where he had fallen asleep, and Taro on the futon beside -his father.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Many times did Taro stand beneath the lantern of -spring and many people raised him towards it, but -never one of them saw what Taro saw, all their dreams -being of things other than flowers and the time of -spring.</p> - -<p class="indent">“One night,” resumed Campanula after a pause, -“Taro entered the garden, and beneath the lantern there -stood a child, and the child implored him to lift him -upon his shoulder, and being there the child seized the -lantern and laughed aloud with pleasure at the vision -of the roses, and the Mousmé, and the sea. But Taro -saw nothing of this. He only saw a tea house where -customers were waiting to be served, for Taro,” said -Campanula, “Had now grown up, and was a man.”</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page133"></a>[pg 133]</span> -She finished her little tale with three mournful notes -drawn from the bass string of the <i>chamécen</i>.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Humph!” said Mac.</p> - -<p class="indent">He tapped the ashes out of his pipe into the little -receptacle of the tobacco-mono, refilled it, and lit it -with a glowing ember.</p> - -<p class="indent">Whilst he was thus engaged, Campanula rose and -went to the open panel space leading on to the veranda. -He heard her addressing some one in her low, sweet -voice, then there was a pause, then she spoke again as -if in answer to some remark, then she returned.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Blind man,” said Campanula, putting the <i>chamécen</i> -away.</p> - -<p class="indent">“I heard nobody,” said Mac, looking up as he -finished lighting his pipe. “What did you say? Blind -man? Was it he you were speaking to?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Yes; he said he had come from a great way, and -he looked oh, so ugly and tired! He has gone to the -back entrance, and they will give him food.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“It’s these blessed paper houses,” said Mac.</p> - -<p class="indent">“They either swallow a sound or magnify it, so’s -you can’t hear yourself speak if a man sneezes in the -next room.”</p> - -<p class="indent">He smoked for a while, and then rose to go.</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page134"></a>[pg 134]</span> -“There!” said Campanula, as she too rose. “He’s -gone away again down the path towards the gate.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I’ll just follow him,” said Mac, “and see what he’s -like.”</p> - -<p class="indent">He bade Campanula good night and departed.</p> - -<p class="indent">The gate was closed, and there was no one on the -garden path; no one on the hill path either, he found -as he descended it slowly, peering through the gloom -before him.</p> - -<p class="indent">“It’s dom queer!” muttered Mac to himself as he -reached the street. “I’d have staked my life she was -talking to herself.”</p> - -<p class="indent">He felt vaguely uneasy, and thought of returning. -Then he decided not. The path looked gloomy and mysterious -viewed from down below, and its descent without -meeting any one had already given him a slight -attack of the “creeps.”</p> - -<hr class="hr2"> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page135"></a>[pg 135]</span></p> - -<div class='chapter'><h2>CHAPTER XVI</h2></div> - -<p class="h2">THE PHILOSOPHY OF EVIL</p> - -<p class="indent">Dinner was served in the Du Telles’ private -room. Channing dined with them—the man who -had informed Jane of Leslie’s whereabouts—a young, -clean shaven man, member of the Shanghai Jockey Club -and practically head of the great silk firm of Channing, -Matheson & Co.</p> - -<p class="indent">At dessert Jane asked Leslie’s permission to tell of -Campanula’s finding. Leslie at first demurred. No one -knew anything about it except the far-away folk in -Nikko and the secretive Japanese police. It seemed -scarcely fair to Campanula to give the tale away, but -at last he consented, for George du Telle had eaten and -drunk himself into a state of torpor. He was staring at -a pineapple before him with a flushed face, from which -protruded a great cigar, and as for Channing he was -off to Shanghai next day. So Jane told the story, and -Channing listened.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Well, what do you think?” said Jane when she had -finished her tale.</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page136"></a>[pg 136]</span> -“I never think about these matters,” said Channing, -“I simply accept them. My dear lady, were you to live -a long time in the East you would come to believe in -things that Western people would rank as nursery tales. -The Tokyo fire-walkers can walk barefoot over a bed -of live charcoal as thick as a mattress. I have seen them. -How do they do it? I don’t know.</p> - -<p class="indent">“It is very curious how the Western people, Christians, -and so forth, treat the unknown. They look upon -it as the unknowable. The Easterns don’t. I had a missionary -man in at my office the other day over at Shanghai -subscription hunting. I gave him what he wanted, -and then, without scarcely saying ‘Thank you,’ he -asked me did I believe in God. I asked him did he believe -in the devil. He said ‘Yes.’ I asked him did -he believe in devils, and he said ‘No.’ I asked him did he -believe in the Bible. He said ‘Yes.’ Then I recalled to -his mind the story of the Gadarene swine, and his reply -was that times are changed since then. Then I suppose, -I said, all the devils are dead? He walked away in a -huff—with my check in his pocket, though.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Now the juggler man”—turning to Leslie—“may -have been chivied to death by devils just as the Gadarene -swine were chased into the sea—who knows?</p> - -<p class="indent">“Of course it may have been that his madness, if he -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page137"></a>[pg 137]</span> -were mad, took an acute turn, who knows? But I have -lived a good time in the East, and I am very well assured -of this, that there are men here hand in glove with -evil. I have seen things done in China, and for money -too, that could not possibly have been done by trickery, -and could not, I think, have been done by permission -of the powers of Good. I’m not what you call a Christian, -and what’s more, I think the Christian religion -has done a great deal of harm—not to speak of other -what you call ‘religions’—Am I wearying you, Mrs. -du Telle?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Not in the least; please go on.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“In this way. It has robbed us of our terror of evil. -It paints a vague devil that no man really believes in. -Now take that much-read book, ‘The Sorrows of Satan,’ -where the Devil sits down and plays the piano and sings -a song.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I thought it was a guitar he played,” said Jane.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Well, a guitar; it’s all the same. People read that -with a grave face. He’s quite a good sort and so forth.” -Channing paused for a moment and gazed reflectively -at the wine in his glass, took a sip and went on: “Don’t -you think the thousands of people who read that stuff, -and admire it, must have lost all sense of the horrible -thing that evil is? The sense that evil is a reality, a -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page138"></a>[pg 138]</span> -thing to fill us with the wildest horror if one could only -appreciate it, a very real thing, and a very determined -thing, and a thing all black; yet we get people playing -in fancy with, and even laughing about, this horror. -And writers painting the cuttle-fish center of it as a -semi-sentimental idiot capable of assuming evening -clothes and talking twaddle, or criticizing plays as he -does in Satan Montgomery’s poem. We don’t play with -a thing we loathe even in fancy. But we—I mean Christians—play -with the idea of the devil as if it were a -poodle dog. The truth is that Christians don’t fear the -Power of Evil, they fear the Power of Good. They -praise him, propitiate and worship him in a most fulsome -manner, and say they love him. I tell you this for a -fact that no man can love good who does not abhor -evil, and you can’t abhor a thing that you play with.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Do you abhor evil, Mr. Channing?” asked Jane.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Honestly, I do. Any one with eyes and the capacity -for thought who lives in China <i>must</i>.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Then you must love good?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“One does not ‘love’ the sun, one worships it, so -to speak—but this is all very strange my talking like -this; my business in life is mainly silk and racehorses.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“’Scuse me,” said George du Telle, who was swaying -slightly in his chair, the gone-out cigar still stuck -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page139"></a>[pg 139]</span> -in the side of his mouth, his face bulged and red, and -his eye a fixity. “’Scuse me.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“One moment, George—Well, I think, Mr. Channing, -there are worse Christians in the world than you are.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Perhaps there are worse men, but I don’t claim to -be a Christian. Only a man who recognizes fearfully the -existence of evil as well as good.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“’Scuse me,” said George du Telle, speaking loudly -now as if he were calling a servant or railway porter. -“I’m not going to have this sort of thing at my table. -<i>I’m</i> a Christian, brought up a Christian, die one. ’M -not going to—”</p> - -<p class="indent">“George!” said his wife in a mild voice, but a voice -very steady and full of command.</p> - -<p class="indent">The Christian, who had raised himself in his chair, -subsided.</p> - -<p class="indent">Jane rose from the table.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Shall we go into the drawing-room and have some -music?” she said. “You sing, Dick—or used to.”</p> - -<p class="indent">As they passed to the drawing-room she said to Channing: -“Did I tell you the mark my cousin Dick made—you -know what I mean—was the Christian emblem?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“My dear lady,” said Channing, “I especially dread -hurting another person’s religious feelings, and I, what -am I? Just a man who thinks his own thoughts, but—”</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page140"></a>[pg 140]</span> -“Well?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Well, if there were anything in it at all, may it not -be that the cause of the disturbance was the fact that -he touched him?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“How is that?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“You have never touched the wire in connection with -a running dynamo?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“No.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“No,” said Channing, “for if you had you would -not be here. The metaphor is a bad one. I only mean to -say that the touch of a stick or a hand may disturb the -play of great forces with most surprising results.”</p> - -<hr class="hr2"> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page141"></a>[pg 141]</span></p> - -<div class='chapter'><h2>CHAPTER XVII</h2></div> - -<p class="h2">THE HOUSE BY NIGHT</p> - -<p class="indent">It was late when Leslie left the hotel. The moon -was rising over Nagasaki, and he required no -lamp to light him up the hill path leading to the -house.</p> - -<p class="indent">In the veranda he sat down to rest a moment and -pull off his boots. The landscape garden, looking very -antique in the moonlight, lay before him, the moon -lighting its tiny hills and melancholy groves with the -same particular care that presently he would bestow on -the forests of Scindia and the Himalayas. On one of -its verdurous swards lay a mark. It was the mark of -Jane du Telle’s footstep imprinted on Campanula’s -garden.</p> - -<p class="indent">He sat for a while in thought, then he unlatched a -panel with a sort of gridiron-shaped key, then he -searched in his pocket for matches, and found he had -none.</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page142"></a>[pg 142]</span> -Determining to grope his way up and go to bed by -moonlight, he closed and fastened the panel, leaving himself -in darkness, caught his toe against an hibachi, left -as if on purpose for him to tumble over, swore, knocked -himself against a screen, which fell crash on Sweetbriar -San, the household cat, who had once made part of the -Fir-cone, Plum-blossom, Moon, and Snow ministry, and -the intelligent animal, conceiving that robbers had entered, -rushed wildly round and round in the dark till a -panel slid back revealing Pine-breeze with a wan and -weary smile on her face, and an andon or night lantern -in her hand. She handed Leslie a candle and box of -matches, and, still smiling, slid back, closing the panel -as she went, like a figure in a trick toy, Sweetbriar San -bristling and glowering on her shoulder like a fiend.</p> - -<p class="indent">The upper part of the House of the Clouds was -divided by panels into a passage and three rooms. One -for Leslie, one for the Mousmés, and the third for -Campanula.</p> - -<p class="indent">Pine-breeze, with her arm full of towels, or what not, -would often come into Leslie’s bedroom through the wall. -He might be in his bath, he might be—anything, it was -all the same to Pine-Breeze, she was thinking of her -duties, not of him.</p> - -<p class="indent">One night, long ago, he had awakened in the arms of -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page143"></a>[pg 143]</span> -Mother Fir-cone, who was jibbering with fright. There -was a mosquito-net between them, for she had rushed -through the wall, and literally flung herself upon him, -tearing the mosquito-net from its attachments. I do not -wonder at her fright. Also San was in eruption, and -a fearful earthquake was roaring and billowing under -Nagasaki.</p> - -<p class="indent">Several times had the Mousmés rushed into his room -all clinging together, and crying “Dorobo!” (Robbers). -Robbers had tried to burgle the house twice, in -fact. He had shot one the second time, and they never -came again. Yet he always slept with a Smith and Wesson -convenient, for a Japanese robber is a business man, -without a heart, but with a desire for plunder keen as -the edge of a sword.</p> - -<p class="indent">Leslie’s bedroom was a very bare apartment, furnished -mostly with a nothing. A futon and pile of pillows—he -had tried the makura or Japanese pillow, but given it -up in disgust—under a mosquito-net, a wash-stand, a -stick-rack, and some pegs to hang clothes on, constituted -the remainder of the furniture. The window was a wide -open space crossed by lattice slats, through which the -moon was now shining, her light partly intercepted by -the dance of a cherry bough waving in the wind.</p> - -<p class="indent">Leslie undressed and got into bed. Seen through the -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page144"></a>[pg 144]</span> -blue gauze of a mosquito-net, the room had a character -all its own.</p> - -<p class="indent">The House of the Clouds by night was not the place -for a person afflicted with insomnia. There were so -many noises only waiting to tell strange tales to the -strained ear. Tales of mystery and exaggeration. Lying -awake you would hear some one leaning close against -the attenuated house wall; it was the wind. And now, -a scratching sound as of a panther trying to commit a -burglary; it was the wind; and now a whisper like the -whisper of a lover to his mistress—or maybe of a robber -to his mate; it was the wind.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then the owl sitting on the roof, staring with saucer -eyes at the moon, would give one low, whistling cry, -and his mate beyond somewhere, would make cautious -answer.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then “tap, tap, tap.” It would be the wind—making -the skeleton finger of a dead Samurai out of a loose -lattice.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then a thunder of cats and a yell on the veranda -roof, and the drowsy one, just off to goblin land with -the dead Samurai, would be brought up all standing, -and half rise for a boot, or a boot-jack, or anything -hurlable, and sink back with a sigh, remembering that -he was in Japan.</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page145"></a>[pg 145]</span> -The wind played upon the House of the Clouds just -as a maestro plays on a fiddle, but with a more distressing -result. Sometimes of an autumn or winter night -you might have sworn the place was surrounded by a -company of old Japanese ghosts escaped from the -clutches of Emma O[1] and requestful of succor and -safety.</p> - -<p class="indent">[Footnote 1: The Guardian of the Buddhistic hells.]</p> - -<p class="indent">Leslie could not sleep. This eruption of his past into -the present disturbed him deeply.</p> - -<p class="indent">He had been getting acclimatized, losing little by -little that horrible sense of exile and home-sickness that -had driven him once across half the world to London, -and now it was all coming back.</p> - -<p class="indent">And she was married to that little beast, and, worst -of all, she seemed content.</p> - -<p class="indent">For eight years he had looked upon her as a thing -dead to him, and now she had returned with sevenfold -power, for she brought the past with her. The golden -past, golden despite that dour father, Colonel Leslie of -Glenbruach, that just man unacquainted with folly. She -brought the river in spate and the leaping salmon, the -heather-scented wind from the purple hills, Glenbruach -in the midst of a world of snow, the ripple of the mountain -burn and the faint reek of peat.</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page146"></a>[pg 146]</span> -Worse than all these, she brought herself. She was -the same spiritually and mentally as the slim girl of -long ago—a slip of a girl straight as a wand and as -full of laughter and movement and brightness as a mountain -brook.</p> - -<p class="indent">But materially she had vastly altered. She was now -a woman, divinely formed, a creature appealing to every -sensual fiber in a man’s nature.</p> - -<p class="indent">And George du Telle owned all this!</p> - -<p class="indent">Leslie, I daresay you have perceived, was a man who -did not take what one may call a dry-light view of -things, past or present, when they had relation to himself; -as a matter of fact, he saw the shortcomings of -others tremendously clearly. The shortcomings of his -father, of Bloomfield the lawyer, of the Sydney -bar loafers, of Danjuro the curio dealer, and of -poor old sinful, grubbing M’Gourley—too clearly, in -fact.</p> - -<p class="indent">His own shortcomings he acknowledged by word of -mouth. He knew they were there, just as a merchant -knows a bale of damaged and unsaleable goods is in his -cellar, but he did not go down and rake them out and -examine them carefully.</p> - -<p class="indent">No one ever had cared for him, he said, but he never -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page147"></a>[pg 147]</span> -asked himself if he ever had permitted any one to -care for him. With this outlook on life, a semi-poetical -nature, and passions that slept long and deeply only to -awake rejuvenated and with the strength of demons, -he might before this have gone entirely to the devil, -only for a lodger he had.</p> - -<p class="indent">An old Scotch ancestor lived with him. This “pairson,” -who had once worn a long upper lip and had been -a writer to the signet, a just, hard, God-fearing, and -straight man, had a chamber in a convolution of Leslie’s -brain, where he sat—he, or his attenuated personality—twiddling -his thumbs like a night watchman and waiting -for alarms.</p> - -<p class="indent">It was this gentleman who had saved his descendant -from the weak man’s form of suicide—drink.</p> - -<p class="indent">He now came out in his old carpet slippers and read his -descendant a lecture on the text: “Thou shalt not lust -after another man’s wife.”</p> - -<p class="indent">And he spoke hard and strong, taking almost entirely -the “wumman’s” side of the question; pointing out that -society, as we know it, imperfect as it may be, is ruled -by a number of laws whose aim is the common weal and -the individual’s comfort and happiness.</p> - -<p class="indent">He pointed out that the life of a “wumman” is composed, -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page148"></a>[pg 148]</span> -not of grand passions and Italian opera scenes, -but of a hundred thousand trifles, each one insignificant -enough, yet each helping to form that grand masterpiece, -a pure woman’s life.</p> - -<p class="indent">That a woman might be pure in mind, even if married -to a “red-headed runt” like George du Telle. That -if that was so she was a happy woman, and that if a -man loved her, loved he never so madly, it would be a -strange expression of that love to blast her happiness, -and soil her soul.</p> - -<p class="indent">It would not be love, but lust—the passion of those -devils which Mr. Channing had hinted at that evening, -those people of the night who slumber not nor sleep.</p> - -<p class="indent">Having finished, he went into his chamber and shut -the door.</p> - -<p class="indent">And Leslie lay reflecting on his words, also on the -words of Channing.</p> - -<p class="indent">Evil made manifest. The face of the creature on the -Nikko road came before his mental eye. That was evil -made manifest. He had seen the thing. He had known -the devil by hearsay since a child. He had heard the -“Deevil” thundered at from Scotch pulpits, tracts -about the devil had been put into his hand; he had heard -people make laughing remarks about him: he was so -familiar with the vague personality called Satan that -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page149"></a>[pg 149]</span> -he felt no interest in him, neither interest nor aversion. -Never a shudder.</p> - -<p class="indent">But that thing in the sky of the opium dream, the -music that had brought it—that, indeed, was evil painted -by the hand of an artist; worth all the sermons ever -thundered from pulpits, all the tracts ever printed.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then his weary brain grew drowsy, and there strayed -across it the fair figure of the Lost One, the very antithesis -of all things evil.</p> - -<p class="indent">Only last night before going to bed she had murmured -a story half to herself, half to him, with her -eyes fixed on the glowing embers of the hibachi, and he -retold it to himself now to put himself to sleep.</p> - -<p class="indent">It was about the great battle between the beasts and -the birds—the real reason why the owl was reduced to -shame and forced to cover himself with night.</p> - -<p class="indent">“And they came from the North and the South and -the East and the West in flight, oh, many ri broad. -The quails from the millet, the stork from the river, -and from the pond the king-fisher, flashing like a blue -jewel in the sunlight.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Then said the stork, who led all these people of -the air:</p> - -<p class="indent">“‘Behold! we are all assembled but where tarries -Sir Owl?’”</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page150"></a>[pg 150]</span> -“Then a sparrow made answer and said:</p> - -<p class="indent">“‘As I paused to rest on a cherry bough, for my -wings be little though my heart is big, I heard Sir Owl -in treasonable conversation with a rat. And said he, -“Come forth from thy burrow, O Rat, that I may feast -my eyes upon thee; and the empire of the beasts shall -be thine, and also the empire of the birds.”’”</p> - -<p class="indent">“And the voice of the Hidden One replied—”</p> - -<p class="indent">But what the Hidden One made answer, Leslie did -not remember, for the artless story had lulled him to -sleep.</p> - -<hr class="hr2"> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page151"></a>[pg 151]</span></p> - -<div class='chapter'><h2>CHAPTER XVIII</h2></div> - -<p class="h2">MOSTLY ABOUT FLOWERS</p> - -<p class="indent">O Japan! Spring! Dawn! what an exquisite and -roseate mystery surrounds the meeting of ye -three!</p> - -<p class="indent">Night, and the owls, and the ghosts, have vanished, -day and the sparrows have come.</p> - -<p class="indent">Up from Nagasaki rise the murmurs of life, mists -are vanishing from the hills across the harbor, where -the lateen sails of junks are rising to find the wind, and -the sampans dart about like attenuated water-beetles.</p> - -<p class="indent">The far, faint sound of a bugle from the man-of-war -anchorage crosses the far, shrill crowing of a cock -owned by Mr. Pinecape, the cobbler of Jinriksha -Street—two rapiers of sound crossing each other in the -now brilliant air. Then the noises of the day deepen, -and the whirr of the cicala mixes with all sorts of faint -domestic noises, a <i>mélange</i> from which the ear can -pick out notes just as the eye points in an impressionist’s -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page152"></a>[pg 152]</span> -picture: the clatter of a pair of clogs, the call -of a watercress seller, the clash of a tin pan dropped -somewhere, and then cock-crow after cock-crow from -far and near, some loud and defiant, others defiant -enough but faint, as if coming through a pin-pole -half a mile away.</p> - -<p class="indent">The kitchen of the House of the Clouds is a square -apartment, with no matting on the floor, and just now -flooded with sunshine.</p> - -<p class="indent">Leslie, in the early days, had caused to be constructed -by a stranded ship’s carpenter, a solid English kitchen-table -of white pine. He wanted to give the man a job, -and he thought the thing would prove useful; and -it did.</p> - -<p class="indent">To begin with, it smelt deliciously, and Mother Fir-cone -amidst her avocations would take a sniff at it now -and then, just as a snufftaker takes a pinch of snuff; -she would also sit under it preparing sweet potatoes, -stringing beans or what not; but as for using it as a -table, such an idea never occurred to her. In fact, she -had no ideas at all about a table, and was quite convinced -that this gift of Leslie San’s was a sort of pine-wood -temple, constructed for the purpose of being sat -under.</p> - -<p class="indent">It was also a place of refuge in time of earthquakes, -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page153"></a>[pg 153]</span> -when the whole household, saving Leslie and Campanula, -got under it for fear of the roof falling. It received -the title of “Honorable,” and was altogether a thing -very much respected, and even vaguely beloved.</p> - -<p class="indent">Under it this morning sat Lotus-bud, preparing fish -for breakfast; on it (these new Mousmés used it as a -shelf) reposed various paper boxes containing eggs -and groceries, weird-looking boxes suggesting that a -conjurer was about to commence operations, not a cook.</p> - -<p class="indent">The sun laid a great square of light like a burning -mat upon the floor near the table, and on her knees in -the center of this mat of light sat Pine-breeze cleaning -an hibachi. Cherry-blossom, the third Mousmé, squatted -right before Pine-breeze doing nothing.</p> - -<p class="indent">From under the table was escaping a faint blue haze -of smoke. Lotus-bud had just taken a few whiffs from -a tiny pipe.</p> - -<p class="indent">They all smoked, these Mousmés, pinches of stuff -like chopped hay in pipe bowls the size of a child’s -thimble; but Campanula had never acquired the art, -though all her friends were ardent tobacco lovers. -Leslie San had said “No,” and that was enough.</p> - -<p class="indent">As Pine-breeze cleaned the hibachi and made it spick -and span, she was telling the others a yarn, mostly to -do with her doings when down the town marketing last -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page154"></a>[pg 154]</span> -evening. How she had bought this or that, what had -been said to her, and so forth—a tale simple enough, -but a miracle of genius considering the tongue in which -it was told. For in the Japanese there are but two parts -of speech, the noun and the verb; these, and splinters -and scraps of broken-up nouns and verbs, which, in the -form of particles and suffixes, help to shore up the -meaning and pin together the common sense, have to -do all the talking.</p> - -<p class="indent">The learner of Japanese feels at first like a person -condemned to eat gravy soup with chop-sticks. Oh, for -even a pronoun! Imagine talking to a person without -being able to use the word “You,” without being able to -use the word “I”! Imagine the horrible tortures of a -Japanese egoist on his death-bed making, or attempting -to make, his dying speech!</p> - -<p class="indent">But there are no egoists in Japan—can’t be with -such a language—and there are no purse-proud snobs, -or if there are, they hide themselves very closely.</p> - -<p class="indent">For self-depreciation is the key-note of Japanese conversation -and manners.</p> - -<p class="indent">So she goes on with her story, in a voice sweet to -listen to as the ripple of a mountain brook, and Lotus-bud -listens under the table, fish-knife held in air, for the -tale is reaching an interesting point.</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page155"></a>[pg 155]</span> -Then Campanula’s voice is heard speaking to Sweetbriar -San. She is coming to the kitchen to superintend -things and—crack! the fish’s head is cut off, and three -Mousmés are working like one.</p> - -<p class="indent">Campanula San is younger than any of these -Mousmés, and she treats them like sisters, yet strangely -enough, they do not encroach, but treat her as their mistress—a -condition of things impossible in Europe, and -presently, perhaps, impossible in Japan.</p> - -<p class="indent">The sun has leapt now over the hills, and Leslie is -heard moving upstairs. Pine-breeze claps her hands with -horror, and rises to her feet: she has forgotten to fill -his bath.</p> - -<p class="indent">She goes to do so, and Campanula wanders out the -front way to the balcony, where she pauses to gaze at -the azaleas, shading her eyes with her hand.</p> - -<p class="indent">The fire is spreading; another crimson blossom is almost -unfolded, and others are soon to be born. Every -spring the coming of the azaleas is an event in Campanula’s -life.</p> - -<p class="indent">A wealth of crimson azaleas is one of her first recollections. -Away beyond that crimson fire of flowers lies the -land of her earliest childhood. The house with the plum -tree, very vague indeed; the father who hit things with -a hammer, still vaguer; the sugar-candy dragon lost, -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page156"></a>[pg 156]</span> -and so miraculously recovered; the little boy who went -to sleep in the snow—or was it in a field of lilies?</p> - -<p class="indent">Her real life, it seemed to her, began as she was -reaching for a crimson blossom one day in a field of -crimson blossoms, and was suddenly caught up sky-high -by a thing taller than a tree, who did something -to the side of her neck, just under her left ear, that was -not hurtful or particularly unpleasant, but which, -nevertheless, made her scream.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then, behold, she saw that the thing was a man, -though in strange clothes, but he did not frighten her -in the least, and she gave him her hand at once, and -with confidence, whereupon he took her in his arms and -carried her to a road where stood another man, all -black, even to his hands, but his face was white, and -he had a red beard.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then this man, who was also unfrightful, began to -make her remember things that she had for the moment -forgotten. To remember her father, and the fact that -she had lost her way, and other things too, including -the errant dragon. He made her remember that she -wished to get back to her father, but she did not remember -this so very clearly. In fact she was quite content -to go with these two men over the hills and far -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page157"></a>[pg 157]</span> -away, feeling sure she was safe with them, went they -where they would.</p> - -<p class="indent">The scenes on the road to Nikko she remembered: a -funny man away in the distance dancing amongst trees, -and the entry into Nikko borne sky-high above all the -other children, the Tea House of the Tortoise, and—grandest -remembrance of all!—the miraculous awakening -with the long-lost dragon in her hand. He was so -full of mystery that she never had even dreamt of eating -him, and she still possessed him. He was upstairs in -the drawer of a lacquered cabinet, cracked, it is true, -by changes of temperature and warped in the back, for -age touched all things, even sugar-candy dragons.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then there was her life at the House of the Clouds, -the mission school; rainy days when she splashed -through the mud under a broad paper umbrella; fine -days when she flew kites with M’Gourley San, played -hop-scotch with Kiku San and Kitsune Ken, with all -sorts of other Sans, mostly with shaved heads.</p> - -<p class="indent">This was Campanula’s childhood as she remembered -it. But as you cannot remember your childhood till you -have stepped over the line where the child becomes a -boy or girl, Campanula had not begun remembering -it till about six months ago.</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page158"></a>[pg 158]</span> -Up till then M’Gourley San, and Leslie San, and -Sweetbriar San, and a host of other honorable people -surrounded her, one as important as the other, Mac -perhaps more important than any.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then all at once—in a week or so, to be more precise—a -host of new ideas came to her, bothersome, formless -ideas, as ungraspable yet as insistent as the great Boyg -himself.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then the ideas began to take form. It was in the -garden one day. Her eyes fell on one of the flowerless -azalea bushes, and she remembered how it had been -covered with crimson flowers last year, and how beautiful -they were, beautiful above every other flower, even -the lordly peony, who seems to hold the whole glory -and mystery of summer in the gloom of his splendid -heart. And her mind wandered back from spring to -spring, led by the crimson blossoms, till she called to -mind the valley where Leslie had found her.</p> - -<p class="indent">It was he who had found her wandering alone there, -and he had picked her up.</p> - -<p class="indent">She had never forgotten the valley; it had lain in the -distance in her mind, but she had no use for it till now. -Now it came to her in all its splendor, and explained to -her why the azalea was the flower she loved above the -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page159"></a>[pg 159]</span> -peony, the lotus, or even that glorious mystery, the -dragon-spume chrysanthemum.</p> - -<p class="indent">Flowers are so bound up with the lives of the children -of Japan that they have a meaning and speak a language -to them almost unknown to us.</p> - -<p class="indent">So Campanula sat immersed in her dream, and Leslie, -who had swung a hammock between two cherry trees -and was lying in it, little knew what was going on in -the small head of the person seated near him on the -square of matting. She had been doing some needlework, -but her work had dropped in her lap, her hands -were folded, and her eyes were fixed on the azalea bush.</p> - -<p class="indent">Next day, or perhaps the day after, for a man’s perceptions -in these matters are sometimes dull, he noticed -a change in her. He could not say what it was, but the -submissive and humble person, the very fact of whose -existence was a theme for perpetual self-excuse, had -somehow changed. She was just as submissive and humble, -but there was a subdued joyousness in her manner -when excusing her existence as though she thought -that somehow it might not be such a frightful crime -after all, and perhaps capable of condonation some day.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then, when he called for his cigar-case Pine-breeze -did not appear with it, though Pine-breeze loved to be -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page160"></a>[pg 160]</span> -the carrier of it, because it was a foreign thing, and the -leather smelt deliciously.</p> - -<p class="indent">Campanula brought it <i>and</i> a match-box, a thing that -Pine-breeze’s flighty little mind nearly always forgot.</p> - -<p class="indent">A few days before, Leslie had possessed three servants -and what he called an adoptive daughter. Then he suddenly -found himself in the possession of four servants, -one of them more attentive than the other three put -together. He put it down to the fact that her housewifely -instincts were awakening, and as the change in -her wrought for his comfort and ease he did not speculate -on the cause as he would have done had the reverse -been the case.</p> - -<p class="indent">Women are curious creatures, as the philosophic Mac -once said. But on the whole, in their way, I think men -are just as strange.</p> - -<p class="indent">Kite-flying had now been put aside with other childish -things, and the tiny hands that had grasped the -sugar-candy dragon were now preparing to grasp the -real business of life: a business whose main objective -was the happiness and comfort of “He who is taller -than the tallest of trees.”</p> - -<p class="indent">Pine-breeze, Lotus-bud, and Cherry-blossom. Looking -at them in a row, you might have thought them -pretty much alike, as far as mind and spirit were concerned, -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page161"></a>[pg 161]</span> -just as three sleek, well-groomed ponies may -seem identical—until you try to drive them.</p> - -<p class="indent">It was not till Campanula took the reins that she -found the three underlings were each afflicted with a -special infirmity, or rather special infirmities.</p> - -<p class="indent">Pine-breeze was such a scatterbrain that if you sent -her down town in a hurry for eggs she would, as likely -as not, dawdle home in an hour with tomatoes and some -wild tale picked up on the way, pleasant and interesting -enough, no doubt, but useless for the purpose of -making an omelette. She would leave Leslie’s bath unprepared, -and then, sitting in her own tub, would clap -her hands with horror at the remembrance of her own -forgetfulness, and as likely as not attempt to rectify -her error attired in a bath towel; and she would smash -things—crockery ware understood—with almost the -facility of your Western parlor-maid. To make up for -these bad points, she was literary above her class; had -a passion for flowers above her fellows, and had composed -a poem about a grasshopper.</p> - -<p class="indent">Lotus-bud was the cook; her infirmity was weakness. -She would sit and listen to Pine-breeze’s idle chatter and -let the bread burn. Pine-breeze could work and talk, -but Lotus-bud could not even work and listen. So she -would sit with her hands in her lap, listening. She made -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page162"></a>[pg 162]</span> -a splendid audience but a somewhat indifferent cook.</p> - -<p class="indent">As for Cherry-blossom, she was purely and simply an -idler, a lotus-eater, a hobboe in the guise of a butterfly. -A thing so fragile and pretty, so perfectly dressed -and so seemingly boneless, that you felt to expect work -from her would be absurd; which, indeed, it would have -been.</p> - -<p class="indent">For she never worked, she dreamed.</p> - -<p class="indent">She was enamored of a riksha man, and she would -go out and meet him under the lilacs at the gate, and -then vanish with him to goodness knows where for the -evening.</p> - -<p class="indent">He was the strangest natural phenomenon, this lover -of Cherry-blossom’s, for he was always changing in -size, and his face was never scarcely twice alike, and -his number—rikshas are numbered just like hansom -cabs—was</p> - -<div class="poem"> -<div class="stanza"> -<span class="i2"> 255.</span><br> -<span class="i4">66.</span><br> -<span class="i4">7.</span><br> -<span class="i2"> 103.</span><br> -<span class="i0">and 42.</span><br> -</div> -</div> - -<p class="indent">At least Pine-breeze, who was an observant body, got -that far in her notation, and then gave it up as a bad -job.</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page163"></a>[pg 163]</span> -All these things, and more, Campanula had to cope -with, and she did so with more or less success, gaining -in her experience much that a girl of her age is supposed -not to know, but losing nothing either in gentleness -or modesty.</p> - -<p class="indent">She brought Pine-breeze to a vague sense of the -wrongfulness of flighty ways, and with her own little -hands she made new bread to replace a batch of loaves -burnt to cinders by Lotus-bud (bread that gave Leslie -indigestion for a week).</p> - -<p class="indent">As for Cherry-blossom, she told her, missionary fashion, -that she would certainly go to hell and be burnt -like Lotus-bud’s loaves if she did not stop vanishing -down town with riksha men; and Cherry-blossom ground -her nose on the matting and wept, and promised reformation, -and went out two nights afterwards with No. -173 to a grand blaze up at the O Suwa temple, where -she devoured candied beans and comfits, and bowed before -graven images, and had a general good time with -a host of “heathen” people like herself.</p> - -<p class="indent">Cherry-blossom’s rikshas never cost her anything. -Love lent them to her.</p> - -<p class="indent">Leslie’s socks up to this had always been vanishing, -and the ones that remained, were always, or generally, -in holes. The Mousmés said it must be the mice. Campanula, -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page164"></a>[pg 164]</span> -however, found Pine-breeze one morning cleaning -a kettle with a silk dress-sock. It seemed silk socks -at half a guinea a pair gave a polish nothing else would -give.</p> - -<p class="indent">The kettles were duller after that, but the depredations -of the mice ceased.</p> - -<p class="indent">Having looked at the promise of the azaleas, she -went in to see how things were getting on.</p> - -<p class="indent">Presently she and Leslie were seated at breakfast -opposite to one another on the floor. Leslie, attired in -a suit of faultlessly fitting pale gray tweed, looked -much more like an Indian cavalry officer on leave than -an umbrella merchant, as he called himself. He had -arranged to call for Jane du Telle at ten o’clock to take -her out shopping; the gloomy thoughts of the night -before, the effect of the opium, and the effect of the -dream, had vanished.</p> - -<p class="indent">He was sipping his tea, and glancing over the <i>Japan -Mail</i>, when Campanula interrupted him.</p> - -<p class="indent">“What iss Dick?” she suddenly asked; she prolonged -her s’s in the faintest degree, difficult to reproduce -in print, for there is no type capable of representing -an s and a quarter.</p> - -<p class="indent">“What is what?” asked Leslie, lowering the <i>Japan -Mail</i>, and staring at his pretty <i>vis-â-vis</i>.</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page165"></a>[pg 165]</span> -“Dick—she called you Dick.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Who?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“She who gave you the flower,” said Campanula, -lowering ever so little her head.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Which flower?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“The one in your coat—yesterday.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Oh,” said Leslie, remembering a bluebell that Jane -had plucked and given him as they went down hill the -day before, and remembering also that George du Telle -and Campanula had been walking behind and must have -seen the transaction. “She calls me Dick because that -is short for my name.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Dick,” murmured she, in a meditative voice.</p> - -<p class="indent">She seemed turning the name over in her mind. Tasting -it mentally, so to speak.</p> - -<p class="indent">“She is an old friend of mine,” continued Leslie. “I -knew her, Campanula, before you were born, away over -in another part of the world, where half the year it -snows and where the wind blows just as hard as it does -in Nippon, but the wind never brings flowers as it does -here.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“No flowers,” she murmured, incapable of imagining -such a land.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Only flowers like that blue one, and wild roses and -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page166"></a>[pg 166]</span> -a few others, but you never see camellia trees growing -by the roads, nor lotus flowers on the ponds.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Nor azaleas?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Nor azaleas—at least, as they grow here.”</p> - -<p class="indent">A shadow crossed the open doorway.</p> - -<p class="indent">“M’Gourley San,” said Campanula, who was seated -facing the door.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Dinna rise,” said M’Gourley. “I’ve had ma breakfast, -and I’ll juist tak a seat on the verandy till y’ve -done.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I’m done,” said Leslie, forgetful of grammar, and -rising up, he came out, the <i>Japan Mail</i> under his arm, -and a briar root in his hand.</p> - -<p class="indent">They talked business a while, and then Leslie said:</p> - -<p class="indent">“I say.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Weel?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“You remember that woman I told you of on the -Nikko road?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Which wumman?” asked Mac, taking up a pebble -from the path just by the veranda, and shying it at -one of the hills of the landscape garden.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Girl, I meant; you remember the girl I told -you of?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Oh ay; the lass that flung you ower board—what -of her?”</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page167"></a>[pg 167]</span> -“She’s here with her husband.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Whaur?” said Mac, turning his head as though he -fancied Jane and her spouse were camping out in the -garden.</p> - -<p class="indent">“She’s staying at the Nagasaki Hotel with her husband.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Whoat’s their names?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Du Telle.”</p> - -<p class="indent">Mac doubled himself up for a moment, alleging for -reason a touch of the stomach-ache, as a matter of fact -it was a touch of internal laughter.</p> - -<p class="indent">The day before yesterday he had found the newly-arrived -George du Telle in the smoke-room of the Nagasaki -Hotel, stood him drinks, and conducted him to -Danjuro.</p> - -<p class="indent">There they had saki and pipes, and George du Telle -had bought a Pickford’s van-full of rubbish, and parted -with a fat green check on Cox’s. An exceedingly fat -check written with one eye shut, it is true, but quite -in order.</p> - -<p class="indent">“I dined with them.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Ye whoat!” cried Mac, coming back from a vision -of the victorious Danjuro doing the cake-walk amidst -his bronzes and lacquers, kimono pinched up on either -side between finger and thumb, his nose in the air, and -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page168"></a>[pg 168]</span> -on his face an assumption of stiff and haughty pride -enough to kill one with laughter.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Weel! weel!” said Mac, addressing the hills of the -landscape garden.</p> - -<p class="indent">“What are you weel-weeling about?” asked Leslie -irritably.</p> - -<p class="indent">“I am not a puncteelious man,” said Mac, still addressing -the hills, “in the small concairns of life, but -if a lassie had treated me same’s she you, <i>I’d a seen her -dammit before I’d ha’ dined wi’ her</i>.” He shouted the -last words, and brought his big fist down on his knee -with a bang.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Don’t shout,” said Leslie, “and make an ass of -yourself. We didn’t quarrel when we parted; we parted -good friends. She didn’t want to marry me—well, that -was her look-out.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I wish they hadna’ come,” said Mac gloomily.</p> - -<p class="indent">“What on earth is the matter with you <i>now</i>?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I’ve seen the waurld,” said the Gloomy One, “and -I’ve seen wummen. And I’ve seen <i>her</i>—saw her in the -smoke-room—” He stopped.</p> - -<p class="indent">“What smoke-room?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Of the hotel. I was havin’ a crack wi’ her husband -day-fore yesterday, and in she come to speak a word -to him; and I know wummen—and, weel, I know, fixed -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page169"></a>[pg 169]</span> -between that chap with a head like a blazin’ whin-bush -and you, which way she’ll run.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I wish you wouldn’t be such a fool,” said Leslie, -now really annoyed and therefore keeping himself in -check; “she’s nothing to me.”</p> - -<p class="indent">Mac turned, and under his bushy, half-grizzled eyebrows -stared in Leslie’s face, and Leslie did not support -his gaze, but turned away irritably, and flung stones -at a brown hawk that was circling in the air before them.</p> - -<p class="indent">Mac got up, tapped the ashes out of his pipe, and -made off.</p> - -<p class="indent">“See ye the morn?” he called back as he got to the -gate.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Maybe,” said Leslie, looking at his watch and rising -to go into the house.</p> - -<p class="indent">He went down at ten, and shortly after his departure, -out came Campanula, a basket in her hand and sandals -on her feet, for the weather was dry. She came along -the path towards the cherry trees, examining the ground -and the interstices of the bushes.</p> - -<p class="indent">At last she saw what she wanted, a bluebell.</p> - -<p class="indent">She plucked it with tender care and put it in her -basket, then she saw another and treated it the same, -and another; so went she on till it became perfectly -plain that her object was not gardening, or the gathering -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page170"></a>[pg 170]</span> -of a bunch of flowers, but the extermination of -every bluebell on the premises.</p> - -<p class="indent">When the place had been cleared and the basket was -half full of victims, the question came how to dispose -of them. Impossible to throw them away or burn them; -she would as soon, almost, have treated children so.</p> - -<p class="indent">She stood at the gate undecided, till suddenly there -came the solution of the problem, and opening the -gate she passed down the lilac-shaded path to Nagasaki. -On the way she saw more bluebells and stopped to pluck -them, so that when the lane at the bottom was reached -the basket was nearly full.</p> - -<p class="indent">In a rabbit-hutch of a house off the lane lay a -tragedy, or the remains of one, in the form of O Toku -San, a poor work-girl. She had loved a man, and he -had not even betrayed her in the ordinary way. He had -simply changed his mind, and gone off with another -girl.</p> - -<p class="indent">She tried to kill herself, not in the native way, but -with some abominable sort of foreign poison—Oxalic -acid, most likely; but they saved her life, and she lay -in the hospital nearly a month with her hands tied, -to prevent her trying to kill herself again.</p> - -<p class="indent">When she came out of the hospital she made no more -attempts to obtain peace. She was in the clutches of -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page171"></a>[pg 171]</span> -pernicious anæmia, and she now lay dying, a despairing -shadow, the ghost of what had once been a pretty -and happy girl.</p> - -<p class="indent">Campanula turned to the tiny house, and that day -O Toku San had a whole silver yen to give to her -mother on her return, and a bunch of freshly-gathered -blue flowers to charm her eye: things to the dying -better than all music and poetry, and far above the -greatest masterpieces of art.</p> - -<hr class="hr2"> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page172"></a>[pg 172]</span></p> - -<div class='chapter'><h2>CHAPTER XIX</h2></div> - -<p class="h2">THE STORK AND THE TORTOISE</p> - -<p class="indent">They were in the street running parallel with Jinrikisha -Street, a street truly of the old time, narrow -with the house-tops, when the houses had upper -stories over-leaning the way.</p> - -<p class="indent">Jane seemed fascinated by the contents of the little -shops, that sold everything from cuttle-fish to paper -lanterns. Shops that were, most of them, simply raised -platforms, matted and roofed.</p> - -<p class="indent">Here abounded the tortoise-shell carvers, and the men -who can make a netsuké to charm the eye out of anything: -a knot of wood, a shark’s tooth, a useless bit of -ivory.</p> - -<p class="indent">“I’m going to buy things,” said Jane, looking with -a lustful eye on the cheap, or seemingly cheap, curios -exposed for sale in some of the shops: old bronze gongs, -kettles, sword guards, broken crockery were carefully -mended, lamps, such as the Chinese magician might have -hawked at the back entrance of the palace of Aladdin, -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page173"></a>[pg 173]</span> -fans, trick toys, and tiny boxes for holding rouge; tobacco-monos -and opium pipes, broken-down English -umbrellas, lacquer trays, and a heap of other dust-traps -utterly useless, and some of them not very ornamental.</p> - -<p class="indent">“If you <i>will</i> waste your money,” said Leslie, “I’d -advise you to come to Danjuro’s. We can get to it by -this lane, and I won’t let him swindle you beyond the -ordinary tourist pitch.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Very well,” said Jane, turning from a booth bearing -this cabalistic inscription on its front, “Come -rightin!”[2] “The things look pretty dusty, and I don’t -see anything I very much want—I’d like to buy <i>that</i>, -though.” She pointed to a mite in the colored kimono, -playing battledore and shuttlecock in the gutter with -another mite of its own size. “They seem so happy and -jolly, these Japanese children, and clean, and I read -somewhere they never give any trouble, or break things, -or annoy people—Bless the child!”</p> - -<p class="indent">[Footnote 2: I presume “Come right in!” was the artist’s intention.]</p> - -<p class="indent">A shuttlecock hit her a slap in the face, and the -shuttlecock hitter laughed, and trotted after it, without -any semblance of apology to his target.</p> - -<p class="indent">“There’s another illusion shattered,” said Jane, -wiping her face with her handkerchief.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Have you—” began Leslie.</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page174"></a>[pg 174]</span> -“What?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Any children?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“No,” said Jane; “I have not.”</p> - -<p class="indent">The stork on the tortoise, emblem of eternal life, and a -“supposed” masterpiece of the great Miochin family -of metal-workers, still stood on guard in the fore-front -of Danjuro’s wares. It was the same stork that Leslie -had seen five years ago—at least, in appearance. In -reality it had been sold five or six times during the last -five years.</p> - -<p class="indent">The selling of the thing always brought forth Danjuro’s -latent sense of humor, and could Danjuro the -actor have seen his namesake at these supreme moments -of trade, he would certainly have claimed him as a -brother in art.</p> - -<p class="indent">It would be an American woman, perhaps, in a blue -veil, and with a smattering of knowledge picked up from -artistic books about Japan. Mac would be the go-between, -translating the desires of the female into -Japanese for the edification of Dan, who spoke -English, by the way, as well as Mac, and even, perhaps, -better.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Sell it!” Danjuro would cry. “I would as soon -think of selling my own mother. Tell her Augustness to -ask of me anything else. It is a piece of true Miochin, -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page175"></a>[pg 175]</span> -owned by my father, and his father before him. It has -always brought my family luck, etc.”</p> - -<p class="indent">All of which M’Gourley would faithfully translate -with the addition:</p> - -<p class="indent">“He’s the greatest auld scamp in the waurld; he’s -only puttin’ up the price. Bide a wee, and let him simmer -doon. It is not a true Miochin, but it’s a vara excellent -imitation, made, mayhap, by some pupil of the Miochins. -Would y’ be wullin’ to pay twanty poonds?”</p> - -<p class="indent">The Blue-veiled One assenting, Mac and Danjuro -would go for each other in Japanese, and after five minutes’ -ferocious wrangling, and five minutes more of interpretations, -the thing would change hands at twenty-five -pounds, to be replaced next day, or, at least, the day -after the departure of the Blue-veiled One from Nagasaki, -by its twin image. A man at Osaka made them by -the gross, and he charged two pounds ten a-piece for -them to the trade.</p> - -<p class="indent">Fortunately, the dead know not the doings of the -living, else would the artistic Miochin family be turning -eternally in their uneasy graves, with the rapidity of -spinning bobbins.</p> - -<p class="indent">Danjuro came out with his usual profound salute and -low hiss.</p> - -<p class="indent">Hiss is perhaps not the proper word, for the sound -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page176"></a>[pg 176]</span> -is made by the intake of air between closed teeth, and is -intended to represent delight beyond words.</p> - -<p class="indent">And, indeed, when Danjuro beheld M’Gourley entering -with a client ready to be shorn, the sound came from -him as no empty compliment, but as a natural expression -of his true feelings.</p> - -<p class="indent">It was different as regards Leslie. Danjuro looked on -Leslie with the nervous dread with which you or I might -look upon a mischievous lunatic.</p> - -<p class="indent">Leslie had once nearly spoiled a bargain—a delightful -bargain from the dealer’s point of view, a disgraceful -swindle viewed by the cold light of English ethics.</p> - -<p class="indent">An English Member of Parliament had been trepanned -into paying two hundred pounds for a pair of vases -worth, maybe, twenty. Mac in his jubilation boasted before -Leslie, and Leslie had “put the stopper on,” caused -the money to be returned, with a note to the effect that -the jars were now discovered (from some documents -connected with them) to be imitation, and not as represented -when bought.</p> - -<p class="indent">The Member of Parliament, instantly concluding that -<i>this</i> was a swindle, and that he had obtained priceless -articles by accident, refused to accept the money, or -return the jars.</p> - -<p class="indent">And thus was he done brown on his own spit, and -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page177"></a>[pg 177]</span> -basted by his own right hand, for in his book of travels, -“Amongst the Japs,” he mentioned the transaction, and, -worse still, sent a copy of the book to Danjuro, with the -passage marked with blue pencil.</p> - -<p class="indent">Dan read the passage with the aid of a pair of horn-rimmed -spectacles, and with a face mirthless as a shovel.</p> - -<p class="indent">But the soul in him bubbled. He could quite understand -the Member of Parliament’s point of view, but -Leslie’s was quite beyond his power to grasp.</p> - -<p class="indent">Honesty for the sake of honesty, and without any -ulterior reason, even Art for Art’s sake was more understandable -than that.</p> - -<p class="indent">So he hissed without pleasure as he bowed before -Leslie and Jane, imploring them to condescend to -make the honorable entrance, and intimating that everything -in the place was theirs.</p> - -<p class="indent">Jane nodded to him, and looked round.</p> - -<p class="indent">“There’s one of the monstrosities I told you of that -George bought the other day,” said she, pointing to a -bronze frog half as big as an ordinary coal-box. “Oh, -look at <i>that</i>!”</p> - -<p class="indent">She pointed to a furious struggle in bronze between -a man and a monster. The monster had opened its mouth -to devour the man, and the man had caught it by the -tongue, which he was tearing out.</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page178"></a>[pg 178]</span> -It was the climax of the fight, and the conclusion one -could read in the triumphant ferocity of the man’s face—a -thing to make one shudder.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Danjuro San,” said Leslie grimly, speaking in Japanese, -whilst Jane gazed at the fighting group, “this -is the lady whose husband you and M’Gourley San entertained -the other day—the Red-headed One. She is a -friend of mine, and I pray you to entertain her differently.”</p> - -<p class="indent">This is a vague interpretation of the Japanese for -“This is the lady whose husband you swindled the other -day, but if you play any of your tricks with <i>her</i>, I’ll -make you sit up—see?”</p> - -<p class="indent">To fight with a Japanese you must come to blows, -for you can’t possibly do it in words properly. The -old Japanese who made the language had no use -for terms of abuse: swords were good enough for -them.</p> - -<p class="indent">“I’ll have that,” said Jane, suddenly seizing the fat -baby, the size of a tangerine orange, done in ivory and -engaged in feeding ivory ducks on top of a lacquer cabinet, -“and the ducks. Tell him to send them to the -hotel; you can fight with him about the price afterwards—and -those two vases; and oh, that ivory Mousmé -with the umbrella—isn’t she sweet! I don’t see anything -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page179"></a>[pg 179]</span> -else I want. <i>You</i> have something, I want to make you -a present.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I don’t want anything, I’m tired of curios.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Well, you’ll just have to want something, for I’m -going to make you a present. I’ll give you this.”</p> - -<p class="indent">She took up a short sword in a carved ivory scabbard. -On the ivory handle of it was figured a grimacing god, -dancing apparently. She drew the blade, polished and -razor-sharp, and then returned it to its sheath.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Take it; it will come in handy when those robbers -you told us of last night at dinner come again.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I don’t want the thing; it’s unlucky to give knives.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“It’s not a knife, it’s a sword!”</p> - -<p class="indent">“All right,” said Leslie, “anything for peace;” and -he took a great sheet of rice paper from Danjuro and -wrapped the thing carefully up.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Now,” said Jane, “I want something for langn-yappe, -as they say in New Orleans—something thrown -in.”</p> - -<p class="indent">Danjuro declared that the whole shop was hers to do -what she liked with.</p> - -<p class="indent">“I don’t want the whole shop,” said Jane, “but I’ll -have that.” She took possession of a tiny rose tree in -the pot, a rose tree with blossoms the size of farthings.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Now come.”</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page180"></a>[pg 180]</span> -“One moment,” said Leslie.</p> - -<p class="indent">His ear had caught a familiar sound. It came from -the cellar where many of Danjuro’s goods were stowed; -it was the voice of Mac, and it came up like the voice -of the Hidden One in Campanula’s story. Mac evidently -had a victim in the cellar. Leslie went to the cellar -stairs and listened.</p> - -<p class="indent">“I would not let him see you’re wanting it. Juist -assume a casual expreesion as if ye were na so vary -carin’ whether ye got it or no’. He’ll be sure to tell ye -it’s a piece o’ Miochin—it is <i>not</i>.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“How much do you think it’s worth?” (A burly -English voice, suggestive of shepherd’s plaid trousers, -a corporation, gold albert, and double chin.)</p> - -<p class="indent">“All of fifty pounds, but not a penny more, not a -penny more. Show him the money; there’s not a Jap -in Nagasaki can withstaund the sight of goud—or -notes.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Look here, if you get it for forty, I’ll give you a -ten per cent. commission.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Am no so very carin’ about commeesions; stull, as -you offer it, I’ll not say ‘No.’”</p> - -<p class="indent">The stork and tortoise were being sold again.</p> - -<p class="indent">Leslie turned away in disgust.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Come,” he said to Jane, “let’s go.” And they -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page181"></a>[pg 181]</span> -passed out into the sunlit street, he carrying the -parcel containing the sword, she the rose tree done -up in rice paper pictured vaguely with the forms of -storks.</p> - -<p class="indent">“She has given him a wakizashi,” murmured Danjuro, -and he retired into a corner to smoke a whiff or -two of hay-colored tobacco, and think inscrutable -thoughts, before addressing himself to the victim that -Mac was preparing down in the cellar.</p> - -<p class="indent">“What shall we do now?” asked Jane when they were -in the street.</p> - -<p class="indent">Leslie thought for a moment.</p> - -<p class="indent">“I’ll tell you,” said he. “We’ll get rikshas and go to -the cemetery—”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I’ll do no such thing,” said Jane promptly.</p> - -<p class="indent">“If you will allow me one moment—I’m not proposing -to take you to a place like Kensal Green. A -Japanese cemetery is worth seeing, just as much worth -seeing as a Japanese town. Then we can go and have -luncheon.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Where?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Would you like to go to an eel-house?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Gracious, no! I hate eels. First a cemetery, and -then an eel-house! I have half a mind to go back to the -hotel.”</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page182"></a>[pg 182]</span> -“Well, a tea house, then; we can go to the Tea House -of a Thousand Joys.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Oh, that quite decides the matter,” said she, assuming -an outraged air, and hailing one of two rikshas that -were passing.</p> - -<p class="indent">Leslie hailed the other, and quietly directed the riksha -boys to the cemetery.</p> - -<hr class="hr2"> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page183"></a>[pg 183]</span></p> - -<div class='chapter'><h2>CHAPTER XX</h2></div> - -<p class="h2">THE SONG OF THE MUSHI</p> - -<p class="indent">“It almost makes one wish one were dead,” sighed -Jane. They were sitting on a moss-grown tussock -near a grave adorned with a fresh spray of cherry-blossom, -contained in a joint of bamboo. Beneath them -the hill stretched downwards, terrace after terrace, casting -before their eyes the cold color of marble, and the -mournful green of cryptomeria trees, the delicate tracery -of ferns, and the glory of the wild camellias. Beyond -lay the blue of the harbor, black-blue where the wooded -cliffs met the water; from the water the hills led the -eye past camphor woods and the green of the young -bamboo, up and away to where the brown of their summits -cut the dazzling azure of the sky. “I have never -seen anything so beautiful, so peaceful. What are you -thinking of, Dick?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I was thinking,” said Leslie, rousing himself, “that -we might have luncheon at my place.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“You are perfectly disgusting!” said Jane. “I’ll -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page184"></a>[pg 184]</span> -never go to a cemetery with you again. Luncheon! Who -wants luncheon here?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Very few,” said he grimly, gazing over the tombs.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Now you’re trying to be smart—at the expense of -these poor things. Ah! look at that tiny grave with the -white flower in the little vase.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Some child.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Yes; a thing with a great sash that was flying its -kite or spinning its top the other day, and now it’s -here.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Or hitting shuttlecocks about the street.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Yes,” wiping her cheek where the shuttlecock had -hit her—then suddenly: “I think men are beasts,” addressing -the distant hills.</p> - -<p class="indent">“I’m with you there.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“No, you’re not; all men are just the same.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I suppose you mean to infer in a roundabout way -that I’m a beast. Thanks.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“There’s nothing to be thankful for, only—they -don’t understand.”</p> - -<p class="indent">He took her hand in his as if to make friends, and -she let him hold it for a moment, then she suddenly drew -it away.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Had not we better be going? What’s the time?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Twelve.”</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page185"></a>[pg 185]</span> -“Will you come and have luncheon at the hotel?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“No, thanks; why not come and lunch at my place? -I’ll give you all sorts of funny Japanese things to eat. -Luncheon won’t be till half-past one, but you can have -a talk with Campanula. It will only take us ten minutes -or so to get there from here.”</p> - -<p class="indent">They came down to where the rikshas were waiting; -he helped her in, tucked the linen apron round her, and -gave the men their direction.</p> - -<p class="indent">Campanula San had not yet returned, declared Pine-breeze, -as she kow-towed before them on the matting.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Well, she won’t be long,” said Leslie. “Shall we go -into the house or the garden?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“The house,” replied Jane. “I’m tired of the sunlight; -let’s go in, and sit on the floor and talk.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Right. But do you mind—”</p> - -<p class="indent">“What?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Well, as a matter of fact, there’s a clause in the -lease that no one is to go in with their boots on.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Why, for goodness sake?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“They say it spoils the matting.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“All right,” said Jane, holding up a small foot, and -trying to unbutton the shoe on it.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Let me,” said Leslie, going down on his knees.</p> - -<p class="indent">The shoe came off, and the little foot in its bronze -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page186"></a>[pg 186]</span> -silk stocking lay in his hands for half a second—half a -second during which he was seized with a wild desire to -kiss it. Next moment it was out of his hands, and the -other was presented to him.</p> - -<p class="indent">“You are all thumbs!” said Jane. “Do be quick! -I’m not a stork to stand on one leg for an hour. There, -you’ve burst a button off! I knew you would. Stupid!”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Pine-breeze will sew it on,” said he, hunting for the -button on his knees.</p> - -<p class="indent">“No, she won’t. It doesn’t in the least matter. Gracious, -Dick! when I see you just like that, crawling about -on your knees—”</p> - -<p class="indent">“What?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I can’t help remembering—Do you remember -the rainy day at Glenbruach, when you and I were playing -marbles in the pistol gallery, and I said you cheated, -and you said you didn’t, and I said you did, and you -called me a liar?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“And you hacked my shins?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Yes; and old Mrs. Johnstone, the housekeeper, came -in and saw me and said I was an ‘awfu’ lassie!’ Can it -be that all that really happened, and that we are the -same people? Imagine me hacking your shins now! -Imagine us both playing marbles on the veranda!”</p> - -<p class="indent">“And we didn’t speak to each other for a day,” said -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page187"></a>[pg 187]</span> -he, following her into the house. “And you looked so -stiff and sour, and all of a sudden you came up from -behind and flung your arms round my neck.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“And you shouted: ‘Oh, get away, you little -brute!’”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Yes; because I thought you were making another -attack on me, and all the time you only wanted to -k—”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I didn’t. I only wanted to apologize.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Well, apologize, then!” said he, arranging the -cushions on the floor, and placing the rose tree and the -parcel containing the sword in a corner.</p> - -<p class="indent">“It is sad to look so far away,” said she, taking as -comfortable a position as she could upon the cushions. -“Life was so jolly then. Oh! a good old day’s trout-fishing -is worth all the money in the world. Money is -no use; what’s the good of it? It just makes one not -care for the simple pleasures of life. Do you remember -the picnic you and I and those American children, who -were staying at Callander, had, when the soda-water -bottle burst, and we found we’d left everything behind -but the jam and the eggs? Dick, I—I—want to ask -you something.”</p> - -<p class="indent">It was one of the peculiarities of Jane’s mind that a -question formulating there would work its way along -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page188"></a>[pg 188]</span> -like a worm, under, maybe, ten minutes of conversation, -and then come out at the end of a paragraph, rise for -air, so to speak, in a manner irrelevant and sometimes -startling.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Yes?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“What became of you all those three years before -you came here to Japan?—you vanished. You -told me the other day you were in Australia; were -you?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I was in prison.”</p> - -<p class="indent">She turned deathly pale, and stared at him as if he -had struck her.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Oh, you need not be so alarmed; it was not a criminal -but a social prison. My father allowed me a hundred -and fifty a year, paid quarterly, as long as I lived in -Sydney, and as I had no trade and no money I lived in -Sydney for three years—tied by the leg.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I think you take a pleasure in frightening me; first -you told me you were a shopman, now a prisoner. Dick, -why do you <i>always</i> make your own case out worse than -it really is? Tell me, what was the last quarrel with your -father about?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Debts.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“And, Dick—you know you used to—”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I know I used to drink, but I don’t drink now.”</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page189"></a>[pg 189]</span> -They were silent for a while, then he began to speak -and tell her the story of his life as a remittance man, and -he did not spare black in the composition of his picture.</p> - -<p class="indent">She listened at first interested and amused by the -thought of Dick tied by the leg in Sydney, hobbled, so -to speak, and made to behave.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then her amusement gave way to compassion. She -saw him wandering in the Domain, by the sea-shore, in -the streets, a lonely figure, a man with no interest in life, -an exile banned by society.</p> - -<p class="indent">She thought of all the men she knew and the number -of them who were just as wicked and foolish as Dick -had ever been, yet who by keeping on the right side of -their bank balance retained their social position and the -respect of all men.</p> - -<p class="indent">And thinking of all this the heart in her was moved. -A most dangerous condition just now, for Jane, Bessemer -steel in her everyday laughing mood, became wax -when her compassion was aroused.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Why didn’t you write and tell me?” said she. “I’d -have gone and seen your father. Oh, it was wicked to -send you off like that, away from every one. <i>How</i> could -a father treat his child so!”</p> - -<p class="indent">They were silent again for a moment.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Poor Dick!” said Jane suddenly, and she took his -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page190"></a>[pg 190]</span> -hand in both hers and stroked it. A little shiver went -through him.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then, all at once, she felt an arm around her waist -and his breath upon her cheek, and she did not try to -take her hand from his or struggle, nor, after the first -second of troubled alarm, did she feel the wish to -struggle.</p> - -<p class="indent">She had ceased for the moment to be Jane du Telle, -a married woman, a person with a stainless reputation. -All these facts were swept away by nature, just as shrubs -and fir trees are swept away by the rush of the avalanche.</p> - -<p class="indent">A great faintness came over her. She clung to him, -and sinking backwards, fell upon the matting; his arms -were around her, his breath on her cheek, her lips were -returning his kisses, yet all the time her lips were murmuring: -“Don’t—don’t—don’t!”</p> - -<hr> - -<p class="indent">At this supreme moment came a sound strangely alien -to the situation—the jingling of tea-cups no less—and -through the wall, or at least the opening of a panel, -entered Pine-breeze, followed by Cherry-blossom, with -the luncheon.</p> - -<hr> - -<p class="indent">“Dick!” she cried, sitting up with her cheeks raging -red, “tell them to go away.”</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page191"></a>[pg 191]</span> -But Dick was not heeding her. He was sitting up -with his hands to the side of his head, and an expression -on his face that made her almost forget her own position -before the Mousmés.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Do you hear it?” said he.</p> - -<p class="indent">“What?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“That noise, my God, that noise.”</p> - -<p class="indent">A tiny cage was hanging from a hook on the wall. In -it was a thing much beloved by Campanula—an insect -like a grasshopper that sang a buzzing and tremulous -sort of song. The mushi was a creature that only sang -by night as a rule, but some spirit had moved its poetic -soul, for it was singing now.</p> - -<p class="indent">“It’s that thing in the cage,” said Jane, pointing to -it tremulously, thankful for any excuse to escape the -glances of the Mousmés.</p> - -<p class="indent">He looked up, sprang to his feet, went to the cage, -and tore it from its hook.</p> - -<p class="indent">The Mousmés screamed out, for from his furious manner -and the expression of his face they felt he was about -to dash cage and mushi on the matting, and trample -them underfoot.</p> - -<p class="indent">And he was, for one horrible moment. Then something -in him prevailed—the something that had made -him pick the Lost One up and kiss her, and carry her all -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page192"></a>[pg 192]</span> -the way to Nikko; the spirit of good that had made him -always not so bad as he might have been.</p> - -<p class="indent">He rehung the little cage on the hook, and the thing -in it became dumb; the sound in his head that troubled -him had died away, and he returned to where Jane was -sitting, and resumed his position on the cushions near -her.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then he told the Mousmés to leave what they -had brought on the floor, and to go away till he called -them.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Oh,” said Jane, when they were alone again, “to -think they should have seen me like that. Oh, <i>Dick</i>! -How could we—how could I—”</p> - -<p class="indent">“<i>They</i> don’t matter,” said he gloomily.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Oh, don’t <i>talk</i> to me!” She wrung her hands.</p> - -<p class="indent">“For goodness sake,” said Leslie, “don’t make mountains -out of molehills. They saw me kiss you, well, what -of that? and they don’t talk English—at least, English -that any one can understand.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“But like that on the floor,” murmured Jane, comforted -somewhat by the last statement.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Well, what of that? We are in Japan, where people -live on the floor. I admit if a servant in England came in -and saw—”</p> - -<p class="indent">“<i>Don’t!</i>” screamed she; “don’t speak about it again. -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page193"></a>[pg 193]</span> -It was a moment of weakness; let us forget it. -I mean, let us <i>remember</i> it as a warning.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Do you feel like eating luncheon?” he asked, looking -at the pathetic little dishes and tea-cups, each on its -sea-green mat.</p> - -<p class="indent">“No; I feel like nothing. I only want to go and bury -myself.”</p> - -<p class="indent">He poured her out some tea and took some himself.</p> - -<p class="indent">“You frightened me,” she said in a tremulous voice -after they had sat for a moment in silence. “I thought -you were going to do something dreadful.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“When?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“When you took that cage down with the buzzing -thing in it that annoyed you—poor atom!”</p> - -<p class="indent">“It didn’t annoy me; that was not the sound I heard. -It was the sound I heard in the dream I told you of—that -devil—”</p> - -<p class="indent">A figure stood in the doorway: it was Campanula returned.</p> - -<hr class="hr2"> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page194"></a>[pg 194]</span></p> - -<div class='chapter'><h2>CHAPTER XXI</h2></div> - -<p class="h2">M’GOURLEY’S LOVE AFFAIR</p> - -<p class="indent">Mac had gone down to the office that morning in a -temper.</p> - -<p class="indent">The staff consisted of himself and Ah Hop Sing, the -Chinese office boy. He could not quarrel with himself, -so he quarreled with Ah Hop Sing, using a rattan cane -to enforce the argument, till Ah Hop Sing hopped and -sang in a fashion that justified his title.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then Mac wrote business letters and whilst he wrote, -the thoughts of this dusty and unlovable-looking Scot -went far astray on pleasant and picturesque roads, under -blue skies, by brakes all gay with the crimson japonica -flowers and the glorious beauty of the red camellias, and -beneath the solemn darkness of the cryptomeria woods -of Nikko.</p> - -<p class="indent">That is to say, they would stray to these places, and -then he would recall them to indite letters of advice to -Maconochie of Glasgow, a letter of abuse to Mr. Oyama—a -gentleman who never fulfilled his contracts when -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page195"></a>[pg 195]</span> -they threatened loss, sheltering his business self behind -the ample kimono of the Tokyo guild—and letters to -divers other people in trade.</p> - -<p class="indent">And still his thoughts would stray whilst he gummed -and stamped the envelopes, and they would be buying -dolls now at booths in Jinrikisha Street, or helping to -fly kites at the House of the Clouds.</p> - -<p class="indent">They would stand watching a small person playing -kitsune-ken with another person of her own age; and the -same small person laboring up the Hill to the House of -the Clouds, burdened with a bundle of books, and -sheltered beneath a many-ribbed crimson umbrella.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then they would glance at the same person, bigger -grown, and suddenly become beautiful; then they would -heave their shoulders and sigh, and all come back to help -in the addressing of a letter to M’Clintock of Osaka, or -some other magnate of the Jap Rubbish Trade.</p> - -<p class="indent">Mac was in love, as I have before indicated: in love -with three people. A tiny dot in a blue kimono and stiff -sash; a person somewhat similarly dressed, whom he had -sometimes helped of evenings with her lessons, or watched -as she pricked her fingers over needlework; and a -Mousmé as pretty as seven.</p> - -<p class="indent">He had been in love for years without knowing it; a -flower had been growing in this dusty soil, where one -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page196"></a>[pg 196]</span> -could not fancy any green thing finding nutriment, -unless, perhaps, a weed. A white flower, pure and without -stain.</p> - -<p class="indent">Nothing could be more ideal than this love, nothing -with legs and arms attached to it could be more un-ideal -than Mac. And the strange thing was that this pure -blossom of the soul did not improve the soul it grew from -a bit, at least as far as human eye could see, for the man -of the Great Tung Jade and the Lessar papers incidents -was, morally, just the same—worse, if anything—as -the wailing clients of Danjuro could testify.</p> - -<p class="indent">When Campanula was alone with Leslie in these later -days, she wore a grave and thoughtful air. Watching -her, one could perceive that he alone possessed her mind; -all the quaint and charming ways of her childhood, all -things frivolous and light, she seemed to have dropped -and left behind her with her toys.</p> - -<p class="indent">When Campanula was quite alone with M’Gourley, a -subtle change came over her. The child came out and -played.</p> - -<p class="indent">Though Leslie had adopted her as a daughter, she -had by no means adopted him as a father.</p> - -<p class="indent">Tod M’Gourley was her adoptive father, or, at least, -she treated him as such. He acted also as uncle, aunt, -grandmother, brother and general playmate all combined; -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page197"></a>[pg 197]</span> -and any half-holiday during the last few years, -you might have seen Campanula and her family strolling -along Jinrikisha Street, or on the Bund: the family -in an old top hat, black broadcloth suit, and bearing a -gamp umbrella in its hard fist.</p> - -<p class="indent">They would stray together through the wonders of -the town, Mac and she, and pause and gaze in at shops -like two children, buy sweets and eat them unashamed -and openly. Stop to look at performing monkeys, or -listen to street ballad-singers, or criticize passing funerals.</p> - -<p class="indent">He had never seen so much of life round town as -Campanula showed him, clapping beside him in her little -clogs when the streets were damp, or gliding beside him -sandal-shod in the warm, dry days of spring.</p> - -<p class="indent">Where Campanula was concerned, this dour and dusty -Scot had all the delicate and instinctive feelings of a -woman; he had noticed “fine” the change that had come -over her of late, and the change in her manner towards -Leslie.</p> - -<p class="indent">The thing pleased him, yet it made him sigh—and -frown, when he called to mind “that wumman,” the -mental label he had attached to Jane du Telle.</p> - -<p class="indent">When he had finished business he went to Danjuro’s -shop, where he had an appointment, as we have seen, -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page198"></a>[pg 198]</span> -with an Englishman. The Englishman having been duly -plundered, Mac looked at his watch, found it was nearly -twelve, and was struck by a bright idea.</p> - -<p class="indent">He would go to the House of the Clouds, fetch -Campanula out, and have luncheon with her.</p> - -<p class="indent">Ten minutes later found him on the veranda.</p> - -<p class="indent">Campanula had just returned, having left O Toku -San.</p> - -<p class="indent">M’Gourley sat down on the veranda, and Campanula -sat down beside him on a little fur rug made from the -skin of an Ounce, or some such small animal. She looked -sad and depressed, and her eyes wandered about the landscape -garden as if questioning its hills, its streams, its -old, old forests.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Campanula,” said Mac, taking her little hand -between his great rough, red paws, “what ails you, -child? You look sad and fashed, what’s been worrying -you?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I have been to see O Toku San,” replied Campanula, -speaking in Japanese. “She is dying. Her heart is -dead,” said Campanula, putting her other little hand -over her own heart. “I am—oh, so sad! for to-day the -thought of death has come to me, a thought that I never -knew before.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Child, child,” said M’Gourley, “dinna speak like -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page199"></a>[pg 199]</span> -that. We must all die soon or later—ay, ay, we must all -die, sure enough.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“But not so sadly as she,” replied Campanula with -a little sob.</p> - -<p class="indent">M’Gourley looked at her; she was in tears.</p> - -<p class="indent">He drew her close to him just as a mother might have -done, and held her to him whilst she rested her head -against his old coat, and sobbed and wept like a little -child, gazing at the landscape garden through the veil -of her tears.</p> - -<p class="indent">He rocked her gently to soothe her, but said nothing, -holding her just as he had held her that day in the -gardens of Dai Nichi Do, as if to protect her against -Death, as he had that day protected her against the -vision of the terrible Akudogi.</p> - -<p class="indent">Her sobs slowly ceased, but still she kept her cheek -rested against his coat.</p> - -<p class="indent">“What is Death?” she suddenly asked. The question -was quite beyond M’Gourley.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Dinna ask me,” he said. “It’s what we all must -come to some day.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“And will O Toku San see him she loved when she -goes—there?” continued she, as if unheeding his reply. -“Perhaps”—after a long pause—“he will know her -love for him when he too is there, and make her happy.”</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page200"></a>[pg 200]</span> -“Mayhap,” said M’Gourley, who did not know the -facts of the case, or perhaps he would not have taken so -cheerful a view of O Toku San’s lover’s future state. -“Mayhap.” He looked down at her little face. Her -eyes were dry, but a tear was still wet on her cheek. He -took out his handkerchief and dried it.</p> - -<p class="indent">Campanula smiled faintly, pressed her cheek ever so -slightly against his arm as if in thanks, and drew away -from him, resuming her position on the little rug.</p> - -<p class="indent">M’Gourley took out his pipe, lit it, and began to -smoke.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Now,” said he, “just put on those sandal shoes of -yours again, for I am going to take you out with me.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Where?” asked Campanula.</p> - -<p class="indent">“No matter where,” replied Mac, rising from the -veranda. “A nice place where you and I’ll go—you -and I together, as we did along the Nikko road, only not -on my shoulder. Na, na! you’re ower big for that. Do -you remember the sugar-candy dragon?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Ah! the Hon. Dragon!” replied she in the vernacular, -as she bent to pass the sandal-strap past the great -toe of her white tabi. “He is upstairs with—other -things, but the Hon. Dragon is very old now.”</p> - -<p class="indent">Then she took her umbrella and opened it, and -M’Gourley and she passed down the path to the gate.</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page201"></a>[pg 201]</span> -He held the gate open for her, and she passed through -with a murmured word of thanks, and then she led the -way down hill under the perfumed beauty of the lilac -boughs.</p> - -<p class="indent">About half-way down, Campanula stepped aside as if -to let some one pass. M’Gourley, close on her heels, and -in a reverie, did the same thing unconsciously. If someone -had passed, that someone must have effaced himself -amidst the lilac trees on the left of the path.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Poor blind man!” said Campanula, looking back -up the path.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Whoat?” cried Mac. “Whoat did y’ say?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Blind man,” replied Campanula; “he who came last -night—you remember!”</p> - -<p class="indent">M’Gourley took off his old top hat, and drew his coat -sleeve across his forehead. Beads of sweat had sprung -there all of a sudden.</p> - -<p class="indent">He stood for a second or two looking at Campanula, -and then for a second or two looking up the path, -pied with sunshine and shadow, the pretty path that -for him had suddenly been made horrible. There -was nothing to be seen, nothing but the sunshine and -shadow.</p> - -<p class="indent">“My eyes are growing auld,” he said at length. “Do -you see him still, Campanula?”</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page202"></a>[pg 202]</span> -She had turned away to look at a fern that was growing -on the bank.</p> - -<p class="indent">“I do not see him now,” she replied. “He has gone -through the gate.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Are you sure,” said Mac, speaking in a subdued -voice, “that he was the same man that came last -night?”</p> - -<p class="indent">Campanula was quite sure.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Wait for me,” said Mac, “and I’ll run up and tell -them to give him some food.”</p> - -<p class="indent">He came hurriedly back up the path, very much -against his will.</p> - -<p class="indent">There was nobody in front of the house, he went -round to the kitchen. The Mousmés were there, preparing -luncheon—at least, preparing to prepare it in a -leisurely way.</p> - -<p class="indent">Had they seen anyone about the house, a blind -man?</p> - -<p class="indent">No, they had seen nobody, only the poulterer, who had -been with eggs an hour ago.</p> - -<p class="indent">Had they seen a blind man last night—had a blind -man called round at the kitchen to ask for food?</p> - -<p class="indent">No; nobody had been for food to the kitchen last -night, least of all a blind man.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then Mac hurried off, and the Mousmés dropped -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page203"></a>[pg 203]</span> -everything to discuss the meaning of all these questions -asked by the Learned One; and Pine-breeze embarked on -a story about two blind men and a frog, and the fox-faced -representative of the rice god, a story that put -the luncheon back half an hour.</p> - -<p class="indent">Campanula was plucking flowers when Mac returned. -Just three or four with a delicate fern frond, such a -charming little bouquet, a veritable work of art made in -a moment with unerring taste and a few turns of her -deft fingers. She made Mac bend, and fixed the tiny -bouquet in his coat-lapel.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then they pursued their way, Mac vastly perturbed -in his mind.</p> - -<p class="indent">There was just now living in the pleasant city of -Nagasaki an inn-keeper of the name of Yamagata, who -owned a tea house named “The Full-blown Peony -Flower.”</p> - -<p class="indent">Mr. Yamagata was a Progressive. He believed that a -tea house where a real English luncheon or dinner could -be obtained would, judging from his compatriots’ passion -for things European, be a success.</p> - -<p class="indent">And it was, till half Jinrikisha Street nearly died of -indigestion.</p> - -<p class="indent">His tea house was a tiny affair situated up an entry -near Danjuro’s shop, and surrounded by a little courtyard, -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page204"></a>[pg 204]</span> -wherein grew dyspeptic-looking plum trees in pale -amber-colored pots.</p> - -<p class="indent">Danjuro, who was a friend of Yamagata’s, had been -chanting the praises of the place so long, that Mac had -become obsessed by the idea of it; and casting about for -somewhere new to take Campanula, the idea had turned -up like a horrible sort of trump card.</p> - -<p class="indent">The tea house was on its last legs, and practically deserted, -so they had the place to themselves; and having -ordered the meal they sat on the matting of a desolate -room and waited for it to come.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Campanula,” said Mac, “you have never seen that -blind man before?”</p> - -<p class="indent">She shook her head.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Never; nor one so ugly as he.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Campanula,” said Mac earnestly, “if you see him -again dinna speak with him; he’s an ill man and bodes -no good.”</p> - -<p class="indent">Oh, indeed, she did not wish to speak with him, but he -was so old and poor and ugly she could not but feel sorrow -for him; and he said last night that he had come -such a long way off, and must soon return.</p> - -<p class="indent">M’Gourley shuddered.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Ay,” said he to himself, “a dom long way off;” -then to Campanula: “Said he anything else?”</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page205"></a>[pg 205]</span> -“No,” replied Campanula, “for I told him to go to -the back entrance, and he went.”</p> - -<p class="indent">At this moment the soup was brought in by three -somewhat faded-looking Mousmés, each armed with a -plate, a real English soup plate.</p> - -<p class="indent">The soup was thin and not exuberantly hot, but it -seemed vastly to amuse Campanula when it was put before -her. “A,” said she, pointing with her spoon-tip to -something at the bottom of the plate, “B—C”—she -was pointing to the little Italian paste letters floating, or -rather sunk, in the mixture. “D—and look—a cow!”</p> - -<p class="indent">Mac looked over to admire.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Ay, ay, it’s a coo, right enough, an’ there’s a cock -and hen; but eat it up before it gets cold.”</p> - -<p class="indent">Campanula ate her alphabet, and the next course appeared. -A boot sole labeled a beef-steak, which vanished, -uneaten, and was replaced by what seemed to be an old -stone cannon-ball, such as they used to fire out of Mons -Meg. The O.S.C.B. was labeled a pudding.</p> - -<p class="indent">It was the caricature of an ordinary English middle-class -country luncheon.</p> - -<p class="indent">But it was an amazingly clever caricature: a perfect -work of art.</p> - -<p class="indent">After luncheon, M’Gourley returned to business, and -Campanula to the House of the Clouds.</p> - -<hr class="hr2"> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page206"></a>[pg 206]</span></p> - -<div class='chapter'><h2>CHAPTER XXII</h2></div> - -<p class="h2">THE COMPLETE GEOGRAPHER</p> - -<p class="indent">On the way, she stopped at the shop of Mr. Initogo -to pay a visit to her friend Kiku.</p> - -<p class="indent">Campanula in her school-days had shown both qualities -and defects of mind. At languages, at least in learning -the English language, she was a success; a very -moderate success where mathematics were concerned, -though she knew enough to do long division, and to keep -household accounts. They teach a lot of useful things at -the mission schools—needlework, and so forth, and in -some of these branches Campanula shone, but at geography -she was a dismal failure. She had been always -lacking in the power of location. Witness her first statements -as to the whereabouts of the house with the plum -tree in front of it.</p> - -<p class="indent">The long sea voyage from Tokyo, or rather from -Yokohama, had brought into her mind the impression -that she had traveled to the end of things, yet they told -her there were things beyond.</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page207"></a>[pg 207]</span> -They showed her maps and globes. The maps were -flat, and the globes were round, yet they said they were -the same thing, or were pictures of the same thing. How -a flat thing could be round or the converse, she could not -say, but Howard San, the missionary, said they were. -Was it for her to contradict him? So, instead of setting -up her own wits against Howard San, and questioning -him, she accepted his words just as you or I accept the -words of mathematicians or physiologists concerning -subjects on which we are ignorant. And thus on geography -she got hopelessly muddled, and remained so.</p> - -<p class="indent">This morning she was lamenting her want of geography, -and casting about for some friend learned in the -art. Of course she might have gone to Howard San, -but she would have to wait till school was over, and, besides -she felt a certain diffidence in approaching him on -the subject, so she turned to the shop of Mr. Initogo.</p> - -<p class="indent">Mr. Initogo was sitting on his heels on the floor of -his shop, engaged in the gentle art of making tea; it -was one of his fads that he always made his own tea with -his own hands. Beside him stood an hibachi, on which -a kettle was coming to the boil; before him, a tea-cup -without a handle on a tray, and a microscopic tea-pot.</p> - -<p class="indent">He warmed the tea-cup with a few drops of hot water; -then, from a cylindrical tea-canister, with a thing like -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page208"></a>[pg 208]</span> -a snuff-scoop, he took a small quantity of green tea—tea -of the color that an old black coat turns after years -of sun and rain—this he popped into the tea-pot.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then the honorable hot water being ready, he poured -it into a porcelain dish to let it cool slightly, which it -did, becoming converted during the act into the honorable -old hot water.</p> - -<p class="indent">The honorable old hot water being now ready, he -poured it into the tea-pot, popped on the lid, looked up, -and saw Campanula.</p> - -<p class="indent">So immersed in his darling employment had he been, -that he had not observed her entrance.</p> - -<p class="indent">She wished to see Kiku? She was upstairs; this with -a thousand apologies for his own blindness, and comparisons -of himself with worms and other sightless -things.</p> - -<p class="indent">Campanula knew the way up; she had been up often -enough before, and up she went.</p> - -<p class="indent">Kiku San, since we hinted at her as a playmate of -Campanula, had grown. The tumbling tot that Leslie -had once caught by the “scruff” of her obi and held -out at arm’s length wriggling, for the amusement of -M’Gourley, had become a Mousmé with a face at once -heavy and flighty-looking; a broad face, pretty enough, -but with a maddeningly irresponsible expression.</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page209"></a>[pg 209]</span> -Pine-breeze was bad enough in the irresponsible line, -but she could have learnt much from Kiku.</p> - -<p class="indent">She was the dunce, or, rather, had been the dunce at -the mission school; this is not saying very much against -her, for Japanese girls are amazingly quick in the “uptake,” -learning coming to them as easily as ignorance -to English girls; all the same she had been the dunce. -She had never been able to conquer the letter “l” in -English; and would say “raidy” for “lady;” yet she -had a memory of sorts, blocks of facts swam in the ocean -of her unintelligence like those houses that float about -after an inundation of the Mississippi.</p> - -<p class="indent">But the place left vacant in her skull by want of -learning was by no means devoid of a tenant; therein -dwelt a colossal impudence, a supreme self-assurance -that sheltered and helped to hide the nakedness -of her mind, and even obtained for her, amongst her -girl friends, a sort of fungoid reputation for cleverness.</p> - -<p class="indent">For when Kiku San said a thing, she said it with such -assurance that it seemed true—the assurance of the absolutely -untrustworthy intellect, which of all assurances -is the greatest.</p> - -<p class="indent">She was sitting now on her heels in a bare room on the -upper floor, a tobacco-mono at her side, and in her hands -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page210"></a>[pg 210]</span> -a round flat box with a glass lid. She was playing at -Pigs-in-Clover.</p> - -<p class="indent">The two Mousmés bowed to one another with great -ceremony, enquiring after each other’s honorific health, -and then Campanula came to rest upon the matting opposite -to her friend.</p> - -<p class="indent">They formed a pretty picture in the bare room with its -chess-board matting, against the bare walls, whose only -ornament was a kakemono representing Fuji San crested -with snow.</p> - -<p class="indent">Kiku was soon to be married—married to a government -clerk to whom she had been engaged nearly since -birth; and she entertained Campanula with long and -uninteresting descriptions of her husband-to-be, his -mother, his father, his grandfather, who lived at Nagoya, -his brothers and sisters, how old they were and all about them.</p> - -<p class="indent">Kiku was a bore, a female bore of the first water, and -in this respect she could have given any old member -of the Rag or Carlton points, and beaten him.</p> - -<p class="indent">She told all these things looking up from under her -thick eyelids, and with a half-smile, and Campanula listened, -half mesmerized, wholly weary, but with all her -courteous soul awake to do honor to the tale.</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page211"></a>[pg 211]</span> -At last an hiatus occurred of which Campanula took -advantage to ask the question in her mind.</p> - -<p class="indent">Did Kiku, so learned on all subjects, know of any -land where the snow lay for half the year?</p> - -<p class="indent">Oh, certainly Kiku did, and she told about it.</p> - -<p class="indent">Describing her future husband and his relations she -had been vague and uninteresting, lacking, as she did, -the gifts of perception and narration. But now, plunging -into the empire of pure lies, she spoke with an assurance -that made her words sound like gospel.</p> - -<p class="indent">Such a country existed; as a matter of fact, she had -it all in a book somewhere, but she did not need the -book, as she never forgot anything. It lay in the sea beyond -Nankin two hundred and sixty-seven ri beyond, and -the snow lay there half a year, sometimes more.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Is it a country where blue flowers grow, and roses—sometimes?” -said Campanula.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Just so, sometimes;” and Kiku, searching in the -capacious bag of her ignorance, began to produce old -broken-up facts that had been lying there like rubbish -in the basket of a chiffonier.</p> - -<p class="indent">The sea all round that place was frozen most of the -year, and the sun shone once a month or so.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then she painted a graphic picture of this desolate -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page212"></a>[pg 212]</span> -land which she declared to be divided into four parts, -Unster, Munster, Rinster and Comit; and Campanula -sat listening and receiving it all as truth.</p> - -<p class="indent">Liars, somehow, are always sure of an audience; you -and I, who speak the truth, the whole truth, and nothing -but the truth, languish in conversation and are not -heard, whilst your mendacity-monger holds the floor and -absorbs the interest.</p> - -<p class="indent">So Kiku San went on spinning her tale, and Campanula -San sat opposite to her and listened, shivering -at the dismal pictures being raised before her.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then, all at once, from below came the irate voice of -Mr. Initogo calling Kiku the “Heedless One.” If he -could have used a stronger expression he would have used -it, for the dinner ought to be cooking at this moment, -and the fish and seaweed had not arrived. The Heedless -One had been, as a matter of fact, playing at Pigs-in-Clover -all the morning instead of marketing.</p> - -<p class="indent">The Complete Geographer rose to her feet in a hurry, -for filial obedience resided in her breast, not so much -as a virtue, but rather as a sort of mainspring put in -by nature—or rather, I should say, heredity.</p> - -<p class="indent">They went out together, and Kiku bought the fish -and the seaweed and a few other important items, and -then they parted, Kiku returned home laden with marketings, -and Campanula to the House of the Clouds.</p> - -<hr class="hr2"> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page213"></a>[pg 213]</span></p> - -<div class='chapter'><h2>CHAPTER XXIII</h2></div> - -<p class="h2">THE STRUGGLE</p> - -<p class="indent">Leslie walked back to the hotel that day with Jane. -When he left her he was vastly troubled in his -mind. Troubled about Jane, troubled about Campanula, -troubled about himself, and troubled about a vast, vague, -tragic something: a shadow stealing up from his past -and already tingeing his future with the twilight that -comes before eclipse.</p> - -<p class="indent">What demon had called Jane up from the past?</p> - -<p class="indent">Unconsciously during the last five years he had been -altering for the better. The friendliness and kindness -of Japan, the frank friendliness of M’Gourley, that most -unconscionable Scot, the beauty of the flowers and seasons, -and Campanula—above all, Campanula—these -things had worked upon him with slow but sure effect.</p> - -<p class="indent">Slowly, he had learnt the great, great secret that happiness -is to be found, not in grand palaces, not in wealth, -not in success, but amongst the lowly and little things -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page214"></a>[pg 214]</span> -of life, the things that no man can appreciate who has -not a free and untroubled conscience.</p> - -<p class="indent">The new book, the pipe of tobacco smoked beneath -the cherry trees of a morning, the home-coming of Campanula -from school of an evening laden with books and -perplexities, the rubber of whist with Mr. Initogo, the -quaint, funny things that are always happening in a -Japanese household—these and a thousand other trifles -had made up the sum of his life, and the addition of -them made happiness.</p> - -<p class="indent">And Campanula—he little knew how much she had entered -into his being—what a multitude of impalpable -threads bound her to him, threads that had been spinning -from the very first day, when he found her lost -amidst the crimson azaleas!</p> - -<p class="indent">He had eaten the lotus for nearly five years; he had -been preparing a future of happiness and peace, and -who knows what boundless possibilities of love?</p> - -<p class="indent">Suddenly, Satan had appeared before him with the -command, “Get up and fight, fight me for this future -you have been preparing for yourself; fight me for the -beauty of it, the happiness you will have in it, the happiness -you will make for others in it; get it if you can, for -my weapon is Lust.”</p> - -<p class="indent">That night, when the moon, now waxing stronger, -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page215"></a>[pg 215]</span> -laid her patient square of pure white light on the floor -of his room, the battle began in earnest.</p> - -<p class="indent">He had determined on going to Arita on the morrow -to get away for a while from the woman against whom -he felt fate was driving him with ruinous intent.</p> - -<p class="indent">Now, as he lay alone, with the powers of good and -evil on either side of him, he reviewed his position clearly -for the first time.</p> - -<p class="indent">The cold, calculating, sneaking, pickpocket form of -adultery, which is the canker at the heart of English -society—to put it in plain English, the bestial use of -another man’s wife behind his back—was a form of -crime as unthinkable to Leslie as the crime of cheating -at cards, or forging a check.</p> - -<p class="indent">To obtain the woman he wanted, there was only one -way. The open way.</p> - -<p class="indent">That meant the smashing up of everything around -him. He must leave Japan, leave Campanula, for, deep -in his heart, something told him that Campanula could -have no place in that new life. It meant the social ruin -of Jane du Telle.</p> - -<p class="indent">Here, alone, away from the object of his passion, all -this was very clear.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then that same old Scotch ancestor, with the long -upper lip, and the crude common sense, and the rigid -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page216"></a>[pg 216]</span> -belief in God and the law, came out of his cell and spoke -to this effect. There is no excuse before God or man for -adultery. Love, the child of God, has no part therein, -but Lust, the child of the devil, and the end of Lust is -Hell.</p> - -<p class="indent">All this, with the thoughts that went before it, was -edifying and made for good, and the devil said nothing, -for the devil, like the great Boyg, has a method with -some natures. He does not strike, but lets the victim -do the striking, hedging him gently, gently, letting him -hit out widely till he is exhausted, or beats himself to -death as the Blind One beat himself against the trees.</p> - -<p class="indent">Early in the morning Leslie rose, white and haggard, -and dressed, and went off to the station without waiting -for breakfast.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Tell Campanula San I am going to Arita on business, -but will be back to-night. Tell her I am going -alone,” he said to Pine-breeze.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Kashko marimashta,” murmured Pine-breeze, in a -voice of devotion, and he departed.</p> - -<p class="indent">He was going to Arita to get beyond the reach of -Jane, and lo! when he got into the railway carriage, she -was there—not in the flesh, but in the spirit. And when -he alighted at Arita, she was on the platform, and in the -street she walked at his side.</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page217"></a>[pg 217]</span> -The tones of her voice thrilled him, and he smelt the -perfume of her hair, he felt the curve of her waist, -and his lips felt the satin of her throat, but the physical -desire was small compared with the terrible sentiment -that was born of it, the heart-breaking longing inspired -by her idealized image.</p> - -<p class="indent">Passion, when it rises to this dimension in the mind -of a man, has beautiful attributes as well as vile, it -holds in its hands pictures of perfect innocence, besides -the others.</p> - -<p class="indent">The devil takes care of that!</p> - -<p class="indent">He saw Jane not only as she was, but as she had been, -fair, and fresh, and innocent, against the background of -the beeches round Glenbruach, and the sea lochs, and -the purple hills.</p> - -<p class="indent">What he did with his body that day in Arita, or where -he wandered, he could never tell, for his mind was fighting -a battle so fierce that all intelligent perception of -outward things was blurred.</p> - -<p class="indent">At the end of it he found himself in a tea house sitting -before some food which he had apparently ordered, and -the battle was won. So he told himself.</p> - -<p class="indent">As a matter of fact, he was worn out. Passion was -exhausted, fighting against fate, attempting to escape -from the pursuing devils, beating himself against the -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page218"></a>[pg 218]</span> -trees, he had fallen beneath them, telling himself that -the battle was won, wondering at himself that he ever -could have even dreamed of the ruinous course of action -which lust had urged him to.</p> - -<p class="indent">But the trees remained steadfast and unharmed, waiting -only for the renewal of the madman’s strength and -the inevitable end.</p> - -<p class="indent">It was dark when he reached the Nagasaki station. He -picked a riksha from a row of them standing outside -with hoods up, for it had been raining slightly, and -looking absurdly like a row of tiny, unhorsed hansom -cabs, and told the man to take him to the House of the -Clouds.</p> - -<p class="indent">He came up the hill-path, and as he came the wind, -blowing against him, brought a perfume with it, the -perfume of rain-wet azaleas. During the day and the -previous night dozens of blossoms had broken forth, -filling the garden with their fragrance and beauty; -dozens more would be born ere the morrow under -the light of the silvery moon now gliding up -over the hill-tops behind a tracery of flying, fleecy -clouds.</p> - -<p class="indent">As he approached the house, he saw through the open -panel space the silhouettes of Pine-breeze and Cherry-blossom.</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page219"></a>[pg 219]</span> -They were sitting opposite to each other on their heels -upon the lamplit matting, and seemed at first to be engaged -in the game of kitsune-ken, but almost instantly -he perceived that they were playing at no game, but -were engaged in conversation. Alarmed conversation, to -judge by the movements of their hands, now up-flung, -now flung out sideways. Sweetbriar San was promenading -the matting with tail fluffed out, now rubbing against -Pine-breeze, now against Cherry-blossom, attempting apparently -to join in the conversation, and seeming to -share in the excitement.</p> - -<p class="indent">Something had happened of a tragic nature—but -what? Two steps brought him on to the veranda two -more into the house with his boots on, despite the clause -in the lease.</p> - -<p class="indent">The Mousmés gave two little shrieks, wheeled round, -and kow-towed before the August One.</p> - -<p class="indent">“What is the matter?” he asked. “Has anything -happened? Is Campanula San safe?”</p> - -<p class="indent">Campanula San was quite safe.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then why all this? What had they been conversing -about with so many exclamations?</p> - -<p class="indent">Confused replies.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Go,” he said, “and bring me some tea, and ask -Lotus-bud to come hither.”</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page220"></a>[pg 220]</span> -In a few moments Lotus-bud, wearing a very white -face, appeared, and kow-towed.</p> - -<p class="indent">He questioned her. At first her answers were vague, -and then it all came out.</p> - -<p class="indent">Things had happened. Campanula San had gone into -the town that day, and had met he whose head was like -the rising sun (George du Telle in plain prose); and he -with the sun-bright head had walked with her, and had -spoken dishonorable words. Oh, shame!—he had offered -her gold.</p> - -<p class="indent">“God!” said Leslie, staring at the bent figure on the -matting before him.</p> - -<p class="indent">He remained speechless for a moment, then he took -out his watch and looked at it: it was eleven o’clock.</p> - -<p class="indent">He turned furiously and strode out of the room: on -the veranda he stopped like a horse suddenly reined in.</p> - -<p class="indent">Jane’s image had appeared before him, turning him -back.</p> - -<p class="indent">Suppose he were to go to the hotel now and drag -George du Telle out and beat him within an inch of his -life, as was his intention a moment ago?</p> - -<p class="indent">The idea of Jane in the midst of that scene brought -his fury down from boiling point.</p> - -<p class="indent">He returned to the room, where Lotus-bud was still -on her knees, with her hands clasped.</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page221"></a>[pg 221]</span> -Where was Campanula San now?</p> - -<p class="indent">In bed and asleep. She had returned, it seems, greatly -troubled at noon, and had confided her trouble to Lotus-bud, -making her promise to tell no one—Leslie San especially—and -Lotus-bud had promised—with the result -we have already seen.</p> - -<p class="indent">For a moment he thought of waking Campanula, but -he dismissed the thought. The thing had occurred and -was irremediable, the question now remained, what was -he to do about George du Telle.</p> - -<p class="indent">He went up to bed. In times past he could have obtained -his remedy.</p> - -<p class="indent">Where lay his remedy now? The law could do nothing; -there remained only physical force.</p> - -<p class="indent">A wheezy pug dog protected by a woman’s skirts, that -is what George du Telle was. Leslie knew that if once -he could catch the brute by the scruff of the neck, the -only struggle would be with himself as to the limits of -chastisement to be inflicted.</p> - -<p class="indent">If he could only get him away from Jane up a back -street anywhere, just for five minutes! The thing was -to be done. With the help of the astute M’Gourley he -felt it was to be done, and would be done on the morrow.</p> - -<p class="indent">He got up and went to a rack on the wall where he -kept his sticks, and took down a whangee cane half an -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page222"></a>[pg 222]</span> -inch thick, a most efficient instrument for the chastisement -of a brute. He made it sing through the air, then -he put it on the rack again and returned to bed, and -slept soundly, far more soundly than he had slept the -night before.</p> - -<hr class="hr2"> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page223"></a>[pg 223]</span></p> - -<div class='chapter'><h2>CHAPTER XXIV</h2></div> - -<p class="h2">GEORGE DU TELLE</p> - -<p class="indent">He was awakened by voices. Sunlight was streaming -into the room, the sparrows were bickering round -the trees, and from below came the voice of Pine-breeze -crying, “Irashi, condescend to enter!”</p> - -<p class="indent">Then Jane’s voice: “I don’t understand what you -say. Stop rubbing the matting with your nose. I want -your master.” Then an octave higher, “Richard!”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Hullo!” cried Leslie, leaning on his elbow, and -scarcely able to credit his ears.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Oh, you are there! Come down at once, I must -speak to you. Quick!”</p> - -<p class="indent">“What on earth has happened?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“All sorts of things.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I’ll be down in two minutes, but for goodness sake -tell me what <i>is</i> the matter.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Can I speak without any one understanding?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Oh, that’s all right.”</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page224"></a>[pg 224]</span> -“Well, then, George has bolted.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“George has <i>what</i>?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Gone away.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Where has he gone to?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Oh! come down and I’ll tell you everything. Dick! -Dick! is that a bath I hear you dragging over the floor? -Dick, if you dare to have the impudence to keep me -waiting whilst you take a bath, I’ll—I’ll come up and -pull you out of it. Do come on!”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Directly!”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Well, don’t be long,” grumbled Jane; and she apparently -took her seat on the cushions upon the matting, -for he could hear her grumbling about the absence -of chairs.</p> - -<p class="indent">This was a new development of affairs. George bolted! -It was just what one might have expected of the man, -to insult a girl and then fly from the wrath to come.</p> - -<p class="indent">It was rather a relief, too, viewed by the light of morning. -No man likes the task of thrashing a dog that has -misbehaved: the thing has to be done, but it is unpleasant, -and if the creature runs away and hides, so much the -better. And the thrashing of a fat, wheezy pug without -teeth or means of defense was what the punishment -of George du Telle would amount to.</p> - -<p class="indent">He dressed rapidly and came down to the room where -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page225"></a>[pg 225]</span> -Jane was sitting on a cushion, trying to read the <i>Japan -Mail</i>.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Oh, there you are! Come and sit down. No, not -beside me; right opposite, if you please.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Tell me all about it.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Oh, there’s not much to tell. I was in bed nearly -all yesterday with a headache, and George went off for -a walk in the afternoon; said he was going to call on -<i>you</i>. I told him you had gone to Nagoya.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Arita.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“It’s all the same—then he went out, I don’t know -where, and that is the last I’ve seen of him. At nine -yesterday evening they brought me a note saying he had -gone to Osaka, and to follow with our luggage.”</p> - -<p class="indent">Leslie whistled.</p> - -<p class="indent">“What are you whistling about?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Osaka! Why, that’s over three hundred miles -away!”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Where is it?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“On the Inland Sea.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Where’s that?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Oh, it runs from here up to—well, practically to -Osaka. At least, it doesn’t exactly reach from here, you -have to go through the Straits of Tsu-shima.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Well, I don’t care what Straits you have to go -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page226"></a>[pg 226]</span> -through; he’s gone to Osaka on important business the -note said. Now, what business can have taken him there. -What do they do at Osaka?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Make all sorts of things, from machinery to tea-pots, -and so on.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Well, he can’t have gone to buy machinery or tea-pots—what -can it <i>mean</i>? He was so good, too, yesterday; -brought me up some antipyrine, and wanted to -fetch a doctor, and plumped up my pillows, and then -went out and off to Osaka without a word, and how did -he get there? He says follow by next boat to-morrow. -I was going to ask the hotel people, but I didn’t like to. -I just told them I knew he was going, and I was going to -follow him to-morrow.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“There’s no railway to Osaka,” said Leslie, “for this -bit of Japan is an island. He must have gone by a Holt -liner; one started last evening. The Canadian Pacific -boats don’t stop at Osaka, they go right on to Yokohama. -I suppose he means for you to follow by the Messagerie -boat that leaves to-morrow evening.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I’ll give him tea-pots,” said Jane gloomily, “when -I catch him! The idea of his leaving me like that! In -a strange country, too. I wonder <i>what</i> is the meaning -of it all!”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Perhaps he went away—because of a girl.”</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page227"></a>[pg 227]</span> -“You mean he’s run away with some girl!” flashed -Jane. “Why don’t you say so if you mean it?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Because I don’t mean it. I said ‘because of a girl,’ -not ‘with a girl.’”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Dick, you know something!”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Yes, I do.”</p> - -<p class="indent">Jane turned pale, and he hated to see her like that, but -he had suddenly made up his mind to tell her all.</p> - -<p class="indent">“He met Campanula yesterday afternoon, and, not -to put too fine a point upon it, insulted her.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Oh, Dick!” said Jane, turning, if possible, paler -than before. She stared at him in a frightened way, then -she recovered herself. “There must be some mistake; she -must have misunderstood him. He couldn’t have done -such a thing; however foolish he may be, he’s a gentleman.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Yes, a gentleman in England, but not a gentleman -in Japan. He—God damn it!” blazed out Leslie suddenly, -bringing his fist down with a bang on the matting—“he -offered her money.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I must go to him at once,” said Jane, making as if -to rise, “and ask him if this thing is true.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Sit down for a while; you can’t possibly get to -Osaka to-day. Oh, it’s true enough. I was in a boiling -rage last night when I came home and heard it all. I -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page228"></a>[pg 228]</span> -was going down to the hotel with a stick to have it out, -and then I thought of you, and the disgrace and uproar -there would be, so I just bit on the bullet and went -to bed. Honestly, I was going to have got him somewhere -by himself to-day, and have it out with him, but -it seems he prefers insulting women to facing men. -Forgive me, Jane, for all this; I feel bitter about it, -but I hate to have to say these things to you.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“It was good of you to think of me last night,” said -Jane in a broken voice, gazing at the matting as she -spoke, then looking up full in his face, “very good of -you.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Oh, I suppose it’s really nothing, after all,” he said. -“Those confounded fools that write books about Japan -have got it into English people’s heads that every ‘Jap-girl,’ -as they call them, is a what’s-its-name at heart. -Let’s say no more on the matter, the affair is closed. -Have some breakfast?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“No, thanks; I’m too much troubled and worried,” -said Jane, sighing and folding her hands in her lap.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Oh, don’t trouble about it. I told you because—well, -I thought you ought to know.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Richard,” said she, looking up, “if you meet George -again—”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Don’t be a bit alarmed. I will do nothing to him -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page229"></a>[pg 229]</span> -except to cut him. He has run away; that closes the -affair entirely. A man can only be really angry with -a man.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Richard,” said she, now half tearfully, “I’m going -to say something I want to say. Men don’t understand -women. I’m fond of George. Men are always talking -about love, and so are novels. I never loved George that -way. I don’t think I ever loved any one really in that -way, but I have an affection for George; I suppose that -is the best name to give it. I know he’s ugly, I know -he’s a lot of things he ought not to be, yet I feel he belongs -to me.</p> - -<p class="indent">“It’s the sort of feeling one has for an—for an -animal. I’m just telling you what I feel. An animal -may be terribly ugly, yet one may love it. George has -been very good to me, and he has grown into my life; -that is the only way I can express it.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Do you know, Dick, when you have your face very -close to another person’s face you cannot tell what they -are like. Well, it’s just the same with marriage. After -people have been married some time they don’t see each -other as they saw each other before; they have lost their -identity—each is part of the other. And, Dick, I know -George has been wicked, but ought we not to remember, -the day before yesterday—”</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page230"></a>[pg 230]</span> -“Yes,” he said; “the day before yesterday I kissed -you.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“It was a moment of weakness on my part,” continued -Jane. “We are all very weak and wicked, but -I have always been faithful to my husband—I should -say, to myself. It is strange to talk like this.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“The whole affair is closed,” he said. “Let us wipe -the slate clean and begin again.”</p> - -<p class="indent">Sitting opposite to her here in the morning light he -was a very different person from the man wandering -about Arita yesterday, pursued by her image.</p> - -<p class="indent">The course of a great passion like his is not a high -level line. If a man were to live through such a phase -of existence at Italian opera heights he would be mad -or dead in a very few days.</p> - -<p class="indent">Its course is most like the temperature chart of a typhoid -fever case: tremendous ups and downs, fever point -now, a few hours later almost normal.</p> - -<p class="indent">He clapped his hands, and Pine-breeze appeared.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Breakfast,” he said. “You’ll stay to breakfast,” -turning to Jane. “And there is something I forgot day -before yesterday. You have come to see Japan—well, -look here—”</p> - -<p class="indent">He went to a big lacquer cabinet where he kept his -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page231"></a>[pg 231]</span> -papers, and returned with a large, square, cream-colored -card covered with Chinese ideographs.</p> - -<p class="indent">“What is it?” said Jane, turning it over.</p> - -<p class="indent">“An invitation to a garden-party. A man named -Kamamura is giving it to-morrow at O-Mura.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“A Japanese garden-party!” said Jane, with interest -in her voice.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Yes, very Japanese. He told me to bring any of -my friends.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“But to-morrow,” said Jane—“I am going away to-morrow.”</p> - -<p class="indent">The words went through him like a pang.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Never mind,” he said. “Your boat does not start -till evening; you will have plenty of time to get back.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I’d love to go,” she said; “but—are you sure it’s -all right for me to go without an invitation?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Perfectly, or I would not bring you.”</p> - -<p class="indent">Pine-breeze entered with a tray.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Where,” enquired Leslie, “is Campanula San?” -Campanula San had not risen yet; she had a headache.</p> - -<hr class="hr2"> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page232"></a>[pg 232]</span></p> - -<div class='chapter'><h2>CHAPTER XXV</h2></div> - -<p class="h2">RETROSPECTION</p> - -<p class="indent">“I’ll go up and see her,” said Jane, when they had -finished breakfast. “May I?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Yes, if you like; Pine-breeze will show you the way—but, -Jane, say nothing to her of what occurred yesterday; -she thinks nobody knows except one of the servants -here.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I’ll say nothing,” replied Jane; “but I’ve got some -antikamnia tabloids in my pocket, fortunately, and I’ll -just make her take one.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“All right,” said Leslie; “but for goodness sake -don’t poison her.”</p> - -<p class="indent">This was another point on which Jane had not altered. -As a girl she had been possessed by a passion for drugs, -and would swallow anything in the way of medicine she -came across or was given. She had always been doctoring -rabbits and other unfortunate animals, and had once -nearly poisoned herself by taking half a bottle of pain-killer -for a dose. And now here she was, nearly fifteen -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page233"></a>[pg 233]</span> -years after, in Japan, going upstairs to doctor Campanula, -with just the same manner and seriousness of -face with which long ago, medicine bottle in hand, she -would give the order: “Prize its mouth open, Dick; -don’t hurt it. Steady now, I’m going to pour.”</p> - -<p class="indent">Quarter of an hour later she came down triumphant.</p> - -<p class="indent">“She took it like a lamb. She’s the dearest child! -Now I’m off. I have a hundred things to do. Will you -walk down with me as far as the hotel?”</p> - -<p class="indent">He accompanied her to the hotel, and neither of them -spoke much on the way.</p> - -<p class="indent">“I won’t ask you in,” said Jane, when they reached -the door, “because it wouldn’t be proper. Now let me -see. To-morrow is the garden-party; we might do something -to-day, you and Campanula and I—might -not we?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“We could run over to Mogi,” he said. “We can get -rikshas, have luncheon there, and come back to tea at -my place; and to-night there’s an affair on at the O Suwa -temple, we might go there. Shall I call for you at -twelve or so?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Yes,” said Jane, “if you’ll bring a chaperon. You -see, now George is away I must be awfully ‘propindicular,’ -like that person in Uncle Remus—the Terrapin—wasn’t -it?”</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page234"></a>[pg 234]</span> -“I’ll bring Campanula—or one of the Mousmés, at -a pinch.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Campanula chaperoning me!” said Jane with a -laugh. “Well, I don’t care. It’s only for the sake of -Mrs. Grundy.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“There is no Japanese Mrs. Grundy.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“No, but there is an English one.”</p> - -<p class="indent">They parted, and Jane entered the hotel.</p> - -<p class="indent">She went to her bedroom, got her writing-case out -of a portmanteau, and began to write. She was writing -a letter to George.</p> - -<p class="indent">The first began:</p> - -<blockquote> -<p class="indent">“Your abominable conduct has been discovered. You -have heaped shame on me, you have heaped shame on -yourself—” -</p> -</blockquote> - -<p class="indent">When she got as far as this she found that it was too -melodramatic, somehow, and the “heaped shames” did -not ring true, so she tore it up and began again:</p> - -<blockquote> -<p class="indent">“My cousin, Richard Leslie, sent for me this morning -in great distress. <i>How</i> you could have acted as you did -towards that sweet child surpasses me. Fortunately for -yourself you have run away—” -</p> -</blockquote> - -<p class="indent">She tore this up too, flew into a temper with herself, -and then wrote as follows:</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page235"></a>[pg 235]</span></p> - -<blockquote> -<p class="indent">“<span class="smcap">George</span>,—I’ve heard everything. Dick is furious, but -he’s not going to do anything, so just stay at Osaka till I -come, and don’t go bolting off anywhere else. And don’t -drink too much port, for if you get another attack of gout -<i>I</i> won’t nurse you.—<span class="smcap">Jane.</span></p> - -<p class="indent">“<i>P.S.</i>—You ought to be ashamed of yourself.”</p> -</blockquote> - -<p class="indent">She sealed this classical epistle and addressed it. Then -she remembered that she might just as well have left it -unwritten, for there was no communication to be had -with Osaka till the morrow; and if she posted it, it would -go by the same boat as herself. So she tore it up.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then she sat down on the side of her bed and bit a -corner of her handkerchief.</p> - -<p class="indent">She was thinking.</p> - -<p class="indent">To-morrow she would never see Dick again, most -probably, after that.</p> - -<p class="indent">She had never loved Dick, that is to say in the good -old <i>Family Herald</i> way. Their boy and girl relationship -had been anything but sentimental.</p> - -<p class="indent">Recalling the past she could conjure up no tender -pictures.</p> - -<p class="indent">She could see herself clinging to a rod bent like a -bow, and shouting to Dick: “Now then, chucklehead, -gaff him!”</p> - -<p class="indent">She could see herself tramping after him like a squaw -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page236"></a>[pg 236]</span> -after a chief on rabbiting expeditions—dozens of pictures -like this, but none of them sentimental. She had -never thought of marriage till the day she received a -letter from Dick, asking her to marry him; to which she -replied by writing half a dozen letters refusing him, -which letters she tore up one after the other, and then -wrote a seventh accepting him, which she posted.</p> - -<p class="indent">Now one of the worst evils in an accepted proposal -of marriage is this. That directly they hear of it, the -girl’s relations, male and female, take their implements—nets, -ferrets, and so on—and go off rabbiting in your -past.</p> - -<p class="indent">Dick had not much of a past as far as size goes, but -it was well stocked with game for hunters such as these.</p> - -<p class="indent">So well stocked that old Mr. Deering, a retired London -wine merchant who had taken a country seat in Scotland, -near Glenbruach, put his foot down and forbade -Jane to have anything more to do with her cousin: an -order which would have driven her straight into his arms, -had not the unfortunate Dick, hearing of the inquisition -that had been made, come North inflamed with rage and -whisky.</p> - -<p class="indent">Men drank harder even in the ‘eighties than they do -now, and Scotland was never the home of abstinence; -yet the scene Dick Leslie created in Callander went beyond -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page237"></a>[pg 237]</span> -the bounds of even Scottish convention, and utterly -destroyed any chance of his marriage with Jane du Telle.</p> - -<p class="indent">Remembering his description of the affair which he -gave to M’Gourley on the Nikko road, you will agree -with me that he was not a man who viewed his own acts—well, -as others viewed them.</p> - -<p class="indent">In this, however, he was by no means singular.</p> - -<p class="indent">Jane, sitting on her bed and biting the corner of her -handkerchief, was at the same time looking back -over the past. She was a person with an infinite capacity -for affection, with no capacity at all for a Grand Passion. -Her life was made up of a bundle of petty interests, -and her history was the history of a pure and -somewhat commonplace soul.</p> - -<p class="indent">She had loved Dick as a brother in the past, and now -that he had come into her life again after all those years -(even after that terrible scene long ago), bringing with -him so much from the happy days that were for ever -gone, her heart went out to him as it had never gone to -human being before.</p> - -<p class="indent">And to-morrow she must say good-bye to him, and -never, perhaps, see him again.</p> - -<p class="indent">They must part; there was no other thing to be done. -She was her own mistress, with plenty of money at her -command; she could have flown in the face of society, -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page238"></a>[pg 238]</span> -and made Dick forever her own. Such a course did not -even occur to her, for she was a creature bound by the -laws of convention, almost as rigidly as you or I by -the laws of gravity.</p> - -<p class="indent">Out of very light-heartedness she would do things and -say things that would have been dangerous symptoms in -a woman of a sterner mold; and men had often pursued -her, led on by this laughing spirit that vanished behind -a veil, which, being lifted, disclosed an adamant door.</p> - -<p class="indent">Her great danger lay in her compassionate emotions, -and all the womanly nature that lay behind them. Her -great danger lay in Richard Leslie, for he was the only -being that had ever aroused them to their full strength.</p> - -<p class="indent">All at once she cast herself upon the bed, and after -the fashion of her childhood, buried her face in a pillow, -and sobbed, and “grat.”</p> - -<p class="indent">When she had occupied herself thus for some ten -minutes, she rose and looked at herself in the glass, and -wondered at her own distorted image, and how she could -possibly be such a fool. But she felt better; the pain -of parting with Dick was not quite so bad, and she felt -kindlier towards George.</p> - -<p class="indent">If his conduct had taken place in England, I doubt if -her anger would have been so soon assuaged. But they -were in Japan—and the Japs, you know!—</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page239"></a>[pg 239]</span></p> - -<hr class="hr2"> - -<p class="h2">PART THREE</p> - -<p class="h2">THE BROKEN LATH</p> - -<hr class="hr2"> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page241"></a>[pg 241]</span></p> - -<div class='chapter'><h2>CHAPTER XXVI</h2></div> - -<p class="h2">THE BROKEN LATH</p> - -<p class="indent">A heat wave from the Pacific had stolen over Nagasaki, -and the windless night was filled with -stars and lights.</p> - -<p class="indent">Stars in the sky, and stars in the harbor, long wavy -reflections of light from the ships in the anchorage, and -ten thousand lanterns spangling the mysterious city.</p> - -<p class="indent">A spangle of colored lamps that spread away to the -base of the O Suwa hill which they stormed, covering it -with a thousand sparkles like phosphoric sea-spray, and -cresting its summit with a burning zone, bright as the -snow crest of Fuji.</p> - -<p class="indent">It was a gala night, and the O Suwa, that galaxy of -temples, had called the true believers in love and beauty -to worship in the name of religion.</p> - -<p class="indent">From the great double temple, which is the crowning -glory of the hill, Leslie and his companions looked down -upon shrine after shrine, broad flights of steps stained -with the soft amber and pink of lantern light, and the -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page242"></a>[pg 242]</span> -colored crowd ever shifting, and murmurous as the sea.</p> - -<p class="indent">The shadow spaces and the vagueness of night made -great distances in this dim but splendid picture, till the -moon, rising over the hill-top, chased the shadows away, -paled the lamps, and drew the distances together.</p> - -<p class="indent">Touched by her light the crowd below became sonorous -as a musical glass touched by the finger; the murmur -of voices, the ripple of laughter, the sigh of moving -silk and the flutter of a thousand fans intensified, -rose blended and mixed, and dwelt in the air a nimbus -of sound. The native city beyond grew more distinct, -yet more unreal in the moonlight, which strengthened -the black shadows of the wooded cliffs and converted the -harbor into a trembling mirror.</p> - -<p class="indent">“We shall never see anything again so beautiful as -that,” said Jane, “so mysterious, so strange.”</p> - -<p class="indent">He did not reply. A small hand had stolen into his; -it was Campanula’s. She, too, was gazing at the scene -around and below them, filled with who knows what -thoughts.</p> - -<p class="indent">They were not alone here on the utmost heights; -women, gayly dressed, were passing into the temple behind -them to pray and clap their hands before their -gods. Women surrounded them, laughing, chattering, -dispelling quaint perfumes on the air from large incessantly-waving -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page243"></a>[pg 243]</span> -fans. From the tea houses behind the -temple came the thready music of <i>chamécens</i> and sounds -of unseen festivity; and from the great park beyond, -through the hot night, the perfume of azaleas and the -odor of the dew-wet cryptomeria trees.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Come,” said Jane, “let us go and take the picture -with us before it gets dulled. I will never forget this -night—there is something in the air of this place I have -never felt before. No, thanks, I don’t want to see the -tea houses, I am quite content with this; let us go down -right through it, and home.”</p> - -<p class="indent">They descended the broad flights of steps through -the murmuring, laughing, and perfumed crowd. There -was something in the air indeed, something as intoxicating -as wine, yet far more subtle, subtle as a poison -or a love philter.</p> - -<p class="indent">They found rikshas to take them back, and the whole -party returned to the hotel, where they left Jane.</p> - -<p class="indent">“To-morrow at noon,” she said to Leslie, as she -turned to enter.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Yes, or even a little later; the train doesn’t start till -after one.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Good-night!” She waved her hand in the lamplit -portico and vanished.</p> - -<p class="indent">They had no need of lanterns to show the way up -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page244"></a>[pg 244]</span> -the hill-path to the House of the Clouds; the path was -a tangle of moonlight and lilac-bough shadows, a tremulous -carpet upon which above them they perceived a -creeping and colored thing.</p> - -<p class="indent">It was Cherry-blossom. She, too, had been at the -festival at the O Suwa, and was now returning, wearied -out and walking like a somnambulist, a lantern painted -with butterflies held before her nodding at the end of -a bamboo cane.</p> - -<p class="indent">In the house, when he had fastened the shoji and taken -his night lantern from Pine-breeze, he turned to where -Campanula was standing, a vague figure in the dimly-lit -room. Yielding to a sudden impulse he picked her up -from the ground, just as he might have picked up a -child, and kissed her—kissed her just as he had kissed -her when she was a child that day, years ago, in the -valley by the Nikko road.</p> - -<p class="indent">That night sleep was impossible. The lights of the -O Suwa burned before him, the perfume of the azaleas -and cryptomerias pursued him, lighting always and -leading him always to the same image—Jane.</p> - -<p class="indent">He lay considering what the future would be when -Jane was gone; the rainy season would soon be upon -them, and then the autumn and the winter and the spring -again after that, and the years to come.</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page245"></a>[pg 245]</span> -Whilst thus torturing his soul his mind was steadfastly -making a resolve. A resolve that, come what -might, Jane must not go out of his life. That to-morrow -he must act in such a way as to make her for ever his -own.</p> - -<p class="indent">Come what might!</p> - -<p class="indent">There was no time left for thought, scarcely enough -for action.</p> - -<p class="indent">He had quite ceased to battle with himself, to say this -is right or this is wrong. Time had cut all these arguments -short with the command: “Act now, now, in the -next twenty-four hours! for after that your chance is -gone.”</p> - -<p class="indent">Then he began to sketch out the plan that had been -vaguely forming in his brain all the evening—a plan -that the villainous conduct of George du Telle made possible -and practicable, and, to Leslie’s mind, almost -plausible.</p> - -<p class="indent">As he lay thus, a faint sigh came through the lattice -of the window. The wind had risen, and was moving -the cherry branches and the azaleas.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then came another sound—the sound of a stick tapping -on the garden path, as if some blind person were -cautiously feeling their way round the house.</p> - -<p class="indent">Up along the garden path, pausing now, now advancing, -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page246"></a>[pg 246]</span> -now dying away, now returning, somebody was -promenading in front of the house, keeping watch and -ward like a sentry, somebody whose feet made no sound, -somebody blind.</p> - -<p class="indent">A feeling of sick terror came over him—terror not to -be borne.</p> - -<p class="indent">He pulled the mosquito-net aside, and rose, shivering -and trembling, feeling that he must look out at all hazards—even -at the worst.</p> - -<p class="indent">He pulled the slats aside and looked out. Nobody. -The moonlight lay on the azaleas and the garden path, -but of the prowler there was no sign.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then he saw the cause of the sound. A lath broken -from the house wall was hanging with tip touching the -path, and tapping upon it as the wind shook it.</p> - -<p class="indent">He returned to bed, and tried to snatch a few hours’ -sleep, but the sound of the blind man tapping his way -continued all night long—now faint, now loud, and insistent -as the wind rose and fell.</p> - -<hr class="hr2"> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page247"></a>[pg 247]</span></p> - -<div class='chapter'><h2>CHAPTER XXVII</h2></div> - -<p class="h2">THE “EMPRESS OF JAPAN”</p> - -<p class="indent">If Mr. Kamamura had sent a special messenger to -Paradise to pick from the aviary there a blue-winged -and bright-eyed day for his garden-party, he would not -have obtained a better one than that which came by -chance.</p> - -<p class="indent">A haze hid its coming. Just after sunrise, looking -from Leslie’s garden one could scarcely see Nagasaki -down below—a toy town, seen through faint blue gauze, -it seemed. The wind came in puffs, hot from the Pacific, -shaking the cherry branches.</p> - -<p class="indent">The great double cherry-blossoms were falling. The -close, even moss under the trees was white, like ground -after a mild snowstorm.</p> - -<p class="indent">There was something in the atmosphere which loosened -the petals this morning. At each puff of wind a -fresh shower fell, sifting through the air to scatter softly -on the ground. It was a ghostly sight in the gray and -silent dawn; the trees seemed despoiling themselves, casting -their blossoms from them in sorrow or fear.</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page248"></a>[pg 248]</span> -In the veranda stood the crimson garden umbrella, -all damp with dew, and four pairs of clogs in a row. -The house was deathly still; and one might have likened -it to a tomb, had it not possessed so much the appearance -of a bandbox, looped and latticed.</p> - -<p class="indent">Presently a faint sound might have been heard. A -panel slid back, and a figure appeared, holding in its -hand a lighted paper lantern.</p> - -<p class="indent">It was Campanula, clad in blue, her feet peeping from -beneath her skirt like two white mice.</p> - -<p class="indent">She put out the lantern, and hung it on a hook. Then -she put on a pair of clogs, and clicked down the steps. -She went down the path, through the little gate, and vanished -from sight; and as her footsteps died away, silence -returned to the house and the garden.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then in a few minutes a glorious transformation scene -took place. The haze turned to a golden mist; it became -sundered by rivers of clear air, and from it leaped the -sun, like Helios from the sea.</p> - -<p class="indent">Instantly the silence of the orchard became broken -by the bickering of birds; a cock crowed somewhere in -the back premises, and he was answered by the cock that -lived half-way down the hill at the cooper’s shop—who -was answered, a minute later, by all the roosters in -Nagasaki.</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page249"></a>[pg 249]</span> -The mist vanished entirely now, the sun began steadily -to mount into the vault of perfect blue; his slanting -rays shot through the cherry orchard, striking here the -bole of a tree glistening with great tears of fragrant -gum, and there on the ground besnowed with blossom, -even the fierce old hills of the landscape garden lost -something of their ruggedness in the warm and mellow -light.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then the house began to awaken. Pine-breeze appeared -on the veranda, and after Pine-breeze the other -Mousmés all busy, or appearing so, dragging out futon -to air for a moment in the morning brightness, and -lacquer screens to be dusted.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Summer has come in the night,” said Lotus-bud, -pointing out the fallen cherry-blossoms.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Yes,” chimed in Pine-breeze, “but spring has -gone.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I dreamt last night of frost.” This from Cherry-blossom, -who was busily engaged watching the others -at work.</p> - -<p class="indent">Frost is a bad dream in Japan, and the Mousmés -conferred in murmurs as to what it might mean.</p> - -<p class="indent">“I know,” said Lotus-bud suddenly, with an air of -conviction.</p> - -<p class="indent">“What?”</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page250"></a>[pg 250]</span> -“The riksha man will die.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Which?” asked Pine-breeze.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then the two Mousmés began to “guy” Cherry-blossom -as to the number of the riksha man destined to -die.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Ichi-ban, Ni-ban, San-ban,”[3] murmured Lotus-bud.</p> - -<p class="indent">[Footnote 3: Number one, number two, number three.]</p> - -<p class="indent">“Shi-ban, Go-ban, Roku-ban,” rippled Pine-breeze.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Hachi-ban!” suddenly cried Lotus-bud, with an air -of inspiration.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Ku-ban!” replied Pine-breeze, with the air of going -one better.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Leslie San!” said Cherry-blossom: and Pine-breeze -got up and scuttered into the house, where Leslie San -was calling for his bath to be heated.</p> - -<p class="indent">An hour later he appeared on the veranda, fully -dressed.</p> - -<p class="indent">He noticed the promise of heat in the air; he noted -the great fall of cherry-blossoms that had occurred -during the night; he noted the lantern that Campanula -had hung on the hook.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then he left the veranda, came down into the garden -path, and through the gate.</p> - -<p class="indent">Outside the gate there was a little by-path that led -upwards and to the left, between a double bank of bushes -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page251"></a>[pg 251]</span> -to an open space like a natural platform, from which a -splendid view of the harbor and hills could be obtained, -A great camellia tree forty feet high grew here, alone -in its splendor, and beneath it he stood gazing at the -harbor.</p> - -<p class="indent">He could hear the faint monosyllabic cry of the -brown hawks ever circling above the blue water, and -the distant sound of a drum from the <i>Rurik</i> where she -lay at anchor. He could see the sampans shooting hither -and thither, carrying fruit and what not to the ships -in the anchorage, and the Junks floating like brown -phantoms past the shadow of the opposite cliffs.</p> - -<p class="indent">But his eye was searching for something that was not -there.</p> - -<p class="indent">He looked at his watch, put it back in his pocket -with an impatient gesture, and continued to gaze.</p> - -<p class="indent">Suddenly—Hrr-’mph!—Haa-aar!—the blast of a -syren came shouting up the harbor, and chasing the -echoes through the hills. The brown hawks rose and -circled in wild flight, and past a bend came a great, -white, double-funneled steamer.</p> - -<p class="indent">It was the Canadian Pacific boat, the <i>Empress of -Japan</i>, touching at Nagasaki, and due to leave the -morning following for Yokohama and Vancouver.</p> - -<p class="indent">He watched her for a moment as she swam to her -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page252"></a>[pg 252]</span> -berth, beautiful and graceful as a swan. Then he turned -to the house.</p> - -<p class="indent">To-morrow morning he and Jane would be on board -that boat, bound northward up the Inland Sea, past -Tsu-shima, past Osaka, past Yokohama, and away across -the blue Pacific to Vancouver.</p> - -<p class="indent">The whole plan was cut and dried. Jane had given no -consent; that did not matter. She would consent; he felt -the power in himself to <i>make</i> her consent.</p> - -<p class="indent">Men of his stamp, lazy, neurotic, yet strong-willed, -stung into action by love or hate, sometimes assume -momentary but terrible command over events; they infect -with their passion, infuriate with their hate, or paralyze -with their love.</p> - -<p class="indent">He entered the house, ordered breakfast, and enquired -for Campanula.</p> - -<p class="indent">She had gone down at dawn, said Pine-breeze, to see -O Toku San, the poor girl who was so ill, and was now -dying. He was glad Campanula was out, and determined -if possible to get his preparations over before her return. -Jane and he would return from Mr. Kamamura’s -about six that evening. It would be time enough then to -tell Campanula of his journey.</p> - -<p class="indent">As he breakfasted, he completed that part of his plans -which had reference to Campanula.</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page253"></a>[pg 253]</span> -She would be safe and well looked after by M’Gourley, -till—he came back. He told himself he would come back -some day; perhaps in six months or so he would come -back.</p> - -<p class="indent">And why should he worry about leaving Campanula -for a time? He had often gone away before, once as far -as London; he had always come back.</p> - -<p class="indent">Why should Campanula mind his going away again?</p> - -<p class="indent">Why, indeed!</p> - -<p class="indent">He tried to forget how her little hand had stolen into -his on the evening before as if for protection. How, -when he had kissed her, she had suddenly flung aside her -timid reserve, and with her arms around his neck, but -without a word, had told him what only a woman can -tell without speech.</p> - -<p class="indent">Perhaps it was because he loved her far more than he -knew, that his mind was filled with gloom and apprehension.</p> - -<p class="indent">But it was the time for action, not for thought; only -a few hours lay before him in which to prepare for this -journey—the journey from which he would return quite -soon perhaps.</p> - -<p class="indent">He would leave the house just as it was to Campanula -and the Mousmés till he came back and made other arrangements. -M’Gourley, as his agent, would supply -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page254"></a>[pg 254]</span> -them with all the money needful just as he had done -before.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then he called Pine-breeze and told her to get his -portmanteau up to his room, as he was going on a -journey.</p> - -<p class="indent">He packed hurriedly, whilst Lotus-bud handed him -things. He wanted to get the packing over and done -with.</p> - -<p class="indent">The strong sunlight reflected from the matting lit up -the room with a golden glow. Pine-breeze in the kitchen -below was singing a song about a lilac bough—the same -song he had heard in the orchard that day when Campanula -had cried: “Hist, some one at the gate!”</p> - -<p class="indent">He leaned back sitting on his heels to listen. He heard -the end of the song now. He did not hear it that day, -for Jane, knocking at the veranda, had cut it short.</p> - -<p class="indent">This was the gist of the last verse:</p> - -<div class="poem"> -<div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">“<i>The bee comes no more</i></span><br> -<span class="i0"><i>When the lilac’s white blossom is dead</i>.”</span><br> -</div> -</div> - -<p class="indent">Then he went on with his packing at a furious rate, -stuffing in shirts, collars, handkerchiefs, his mind wandering -over all sorts of subjects.</p> - -<p class="indent">His packing finished, he went to the window, took out -his pocketbook, and examined its contents. Three hundred -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page255"></a>[pg 255]</span> -and ten pounds, half in circular notes, half in notes -of the Bank of England.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then he took out a check-book and a stylograph pen, -and wrote a check for five hundred, payable to himself.</p> - -<p class="indent">Ten minutes later he was in a riksha making for the -Bund, where he stopped at Holme & Ringers, the shipping -agents, bought two first-class tickets for Vancouver, -and changed his check, receiving part in cash, and -part in a check upon the National Specie Bank of Yokohama.</p> - -<p class="indent">It was now eleven o’clock, and he had practically completed -his preparations. He had now to see Mac, and he -turned his steps to the office, which was only a stone’s -throw from the shipping agents. Mac was writing -letters.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Morning,” said he, glancing up, and seeming surprised -to see his partner at that hour.</p> - -<p class="indent">“What’s agate?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I am,” said Leslie, trying to assume a jovial manner. -“I’m off for a holiday, and I want you to look -after things same as you’ve done before.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“This is sudden,” said Mac, going on with his correspondence -without looking up.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Oh, it’s never too sudden for a holiday. And see -here, I’d better leave you some ready cash: here’s a -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page256"></a>[pg 256]</span> -check for two fifty. I want you to look after the bairn -whilst I’m away.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Keep the money,” said Mac, “and pay me—when -y’ come back. Ay, ay, it’ll be soon enough then—soon -enough then.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I’d sooner leave you the money.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Weel, put it in that drawer.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Well, you <i>are</i> a bear this morning. See here, I’ve -put it in the drawer, but I’ll see you again before I go: -I’m not off till to-morrow.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Imphim!” replied the Dour One, and Leslie went off.</p> - -<p class="indent">Your true Scot has a very nasty habit of expressing -his bad opinion of a man. He does it in a round-about -way, using hints and innuendoes, instead of coming to -the matter by a direct route.</p> - -<p class="indent">What Mac suspected or what he knew, Leslie could not -tell; judging from his manner, however, he knew or suspected -a lot.</p> - -<p class="indent">However, he had no time to trouble about Mac. He -had one thing more to do before meeting Jane, Mr. -Initogo the landlord had to be interviewed, and the rent -paid.</p> - -<p class="indent">There was a fair of a sort on in the street that -formed the shortest cut to Mr. Initogo’s. It was filled -with a many-colored crowd, flags were fluttering, awnings -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page257"></a>[pg 257]</span> -flapping in the wind; every shop had some extra -advertisement to attract customers, and during the past -night, like mushrooms, extra booths had sprung into -being.</p> - -<p class="indent">A roaring trade was going forward; here, all kinds of -fruit, there all kinds of fish, some with bunches of violets -in their mouths; cakes reposing on branches of cherry -or myrtle; cakes in the form of donkeys and monkeys -and goats; cakes shaped like spinning-tops; cakes in the -shape of suns, moons and stars; candied beans, beans -mixed with comfits, kites, masks, and paper dragons. -Paper fish shaped like carp for the Little-boys’ Festival -of the 5th of May.</p> - -<p class="indent">The noise and bustle somehow pleased Leslie, and -soothed him; and he drifted along with the chattering -stream of men, women, Mousmés, little boys and mere -babies. Some of the children had long, curved trumpets -of glass, from which they blew the most horrible of -hobgoblin sounds. Here a man was frying pancakes, -wrapping them in rice paper, and flinging them to unseen -customers in the crowd, who flung him back the -money. Here a person in spectacles, who looked like a -professor of chemistry gone mad, was blowing from a -glass-blower’s tube dragons and fish in sugar-candy. -Apothecaries, with great golden eyes painted on their -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page258"></a>[pg 258]</span> -booths, were selling little rice paper charms, one to be -taken dissolved in water for the stomach-ache, two for -lumbago, three for migraine. Here stood a man who -would pull your teeth out with his fingers, three sen a -tooth.</p> - -<p class="indent">The cheap curio dealers were in evidence with their -wares cheap and bad; those quaint perambulating curio -dealers, who, as a rule, only start business at sundown, -and whose stock-in-trade include old top hats, old boots, -old—anything—European. “Caw—caw—caw!” You -look up, and see a great kite straining at its strings.</p> - -<p class="indent">And then the umbrellas! Leslie had a good view of -them, for he was head and shoulders taller than any one -in the crowd. Red, pink, gray, gray-green, pink-and-white, -blossom-bestrewn, stork-bestrewn, a shifting mass -of color reflecting the sunlight.</p> - -<p class="indent">But though he saw all this, and though the noise and -bustle and laughter and general atmosphere of festivity -fell in with his humor, his thoughts were far away at -Osaka; he was wondering what George du Telle was -doing, and what George du Telle would say in a day or -so, and how he would look. He had never hated George -du Telle really till now that he had determined to rob -him of his wife.</p> - -<p class="indent">Now that he was about to commit, or attempt to commit, -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page259"></a>[pg 259]</span> -a vile and abominable act against George du Telle, -that person seemed to him the acme of all things vile and -abominable.</p> - -<p class="indent">Suddenly, through an opening in the crowd, Leslie -caught a glimpse of a face, the face of a blind man, -stolid, stony, with a flattened nose and wearing an indescribable -expression of eld, weariness, and misfortune.</p> - -<p class="indent">It was only a momentary glimpse, but revealed just -for a moment, and contrasted with the shifting colored -mass around him, with the noise and laughter, the sunlight -and the movement of life, it was like a vision of -death.</p> - -<p class="indent">Leslie stood for a moment startled and chilled; the -joyous exaltation in his mind a moment ago had vanished: -it was as if a cloud had come between him and the -sun.</p> - -<p class="indent">Why were these things always occurring to fret his -soul and trouble his imagination? This blind man was -nothing but an ordinary blind man of Japan such as one -might see any day. The broken lath that had troubled -him all night was but a broken lath; the song of the -mushi that had started that infernal sound in his head -was but the sound of an insect buzzing; the azalea that -had caused that frightful dream was but a flower.</p> - -<p class="indent">These slight things, he told himself, acting on a brain -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page260"></a>[pg 260]</span> -made over-sensitive by opium, were not warnings, but -simple causes of complex effects. And he passed on his -way, cursing himself for a fool, till he reached the shop -of Mr. Initogo.</p> - -<p class="indent">That gentleman, for a wonder, was not making tea, -but the sight of Leslie San instantly inspired the desire -for his favorite beverage, caused him to clap his hands, -and the tea-tray to appear in the hands of his wife -almost instantly upon the sound.</p> - -<p class="indent">He received his rent, which he put away with an appearance -of indifference, expressed sorrow on hearing -that Leslie was going away for even a short time, but -joy at the thought that the journey might benefit his -honorable health.</p> - -<p class="indent">He was really fond of Leslie, this old Japanese gentleman; -but the worst of the flowery Japanese language is -that it remains always, so to speak, at boiling point, and -towards friend or perfect stranger is the same. You -can’t cool it, and you can’t warm it.</p> - -<p class="indent">Whilst they were talking Kiku came in; her eyes were -red and she had a snuffle in her voice.</p> - -<p class="indent">She had been, it seems, to see the poor girl who was -dying, O Toku San; Campanula was with her.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Ah, yes,” said Mr. Initogo, as his daughter retired -upstairs. “Most sad, poor girl. A man whom she loved -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page261"></a>[pg 261]</span> -left her, and she is dying of it, just as a flower dies from -want of water.”</p> - -<p class="indent">Leslie looked at his watch: it was after twelve. He -hastened from the shop of Mr. Initogo, and securing a -riksha drove to the Nagasaki Hotel on the Bund.</p> - -<hr class="hr2"> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page262"></a>[pg 262]</span></p> - -<div class='chapter'><h2>CHAPTER XXVIII</h2></div> - -<p class="h2">M’GOURLEY’S LOVE AFFAIR</p> - -<p class="indent">At about three o’clock on that eventful day M’Gourley -met one of Holme & Ringer’s clerks in the -street.</p> - -<p class="indent">“So your partner’s off for a holiday,” said the clerk.</p> - -<p class="indent">“So he tells me,” replied Mac.</p> - -<p class="indent">“He’s going pretty far afield,” went on the clerk; -“Vancouver isn’t—”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Where did you say?” cut in M’Gourley.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Well, he’s bought two tickets for Vancouver this -morning, one for his cousin and one for himself. She -is married, and they are going to pick her husband up -at Yokohama,” he went on, smiling slightly.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Vancouver!” said Mac. He stood for a moment in -astonishment, then hailing a passing riksha he jumped -into it, and told the driver to take him to the House of -the Clouds.</p> - -<p class="indent">Campanula had just returned, she was in the garden; -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page263"></a>[pg 263]</span> -and when she heard his step coming up the hill path she -came to the gate to meet him.</p> - -<p class="indent">She greeted him with a smile, but there was something -about her that struck M’Gourley strangely.</p> - -<p class="indent">She had a far-away look in her face, and she wore an -abstracted air. Away from the world her mind seemed -wandering in some far, strange country, whilst her little -body walked beside him, and her lips answered his questions, -and told him things.</p> - -<p class="indent">“O Toku San is dead,” said she; “I have just left -her.” She spoke gravely, but without any sorrow in her -voice; one might even have imagined that she was referring -to some good fortune that had fallen on O Toku -San; and perhaps, indeed, she was.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Ay! puir thing, is she?” said Mac, whose mind was -also astray.</p> - -<p class="indent">He asked had Leslie returned, and Campanula told -him that he had gone to a garden-party at Omura, and -would not return till evening.</p> - -<p class="indent">“He is going away,” finished Campanula, pausing -on the veranda steps and unlatching the strap of her -sandal.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Oh! so he’s told you?” said Mac.</p> - -<p class="indent">Campanula said nothing; possibly she did not hear -the question, so absorbed was she by her own ideas and -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page264"></a>[pg 264]</span> -thoughts. Suddenly she said, turning to Mac, who was -leaning his shoulder against the veranda post and feeling -in his pocket for his tobacco-pouch:</p> - -<p class="indent">“I saw the Blind One to-day as I was leaving O Toku -San’s. I did not speak to him; he spoke to me. He said -the master of the house on the heights is going on a -journey from whence he will not return. Then he went -away. A wind from the hill blew my kimono apart and -a chill came to my breast. I do not know who the Blind -One is—perhaps he is Death.”</p> - -<p class="indent">M’Gourley, as she spoke, noticed that she had refolded -her kimono from right to left instead of from left to -right.</p> - -<p class="indent">Now in Japan, the only people who wear their -kimonos folded from right to left are the dead.</p> - -<p class="indent">He felt sick and shivery at the words she had just -spoken, and he could not reply to them or ask questions; -he was filled with a horror of the subject, a dead, blind -terror of it. He looked down and said gruffly:</p> - -<p class="indent">“What way is that you’ve folded your kimono? Just -run into the house and put it right. I’ll bide here on the -verandy and smoke my pipe.”</p> - -<p class="indent">She vanished into the house, and Mac sat down, but he -did not light his pipe. What could be the meaning of -all this? Surely he was dead, and laid long ago in the -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page265"></a>[pg 265]</span> -green woods of Nikko—could it be possible that the -dead return?</p> - -<p class="indent">Why was it that she alone could see him, hear him, -and speak to him?</p> - -<p class="indent">His eye caught the crimson azaleas as they bloomed -in their beauty and splendor, and the Nikko road rose -before him, the mysterious valley, peopled by the crimson -flowers, the cypress trees, the far-off country, and -the distant sea hills beyond Tanagura.</p> - -<p class="indent">He heard Leslie’s voice as it denied the existence -of God, and declared that if he had ever been given a -creature that loved him, he would have cared for and -loved it.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then he felt something touch his shoulder, and, turning -with a start, found it was Campanula.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Come,” said she, in the manner of a person who -would say, “I wish to show you something.”</p> - -<p class="indent">He rose and followed her into the house. She led the -way upstairs, and down the narrow passage to Leslie’s -room.</p> - -<p class="indent">At the door she paused and pointed to an object on -the floor. It was a portmanteau packed and strapped.</p> - -<p class="indent">They both looked at it without saying a word: a -silence, that spoke of the deep, unconscious understanding -between them.</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page266"></a>[pg 266]</span> -“Come,” said Mac in his turn, and taking her by -the hand he led her downstairs.</p> - -<p class="indent">Had the portmanteau been a coffin, containing some -being beloved by Campanula, he could not have spoken -more gently, or led her away from it more tenderly.</p> - -<p class="indent">Downstairs the old, rough, gruff M’Gourley seemed -very much perturbed.</p> - -<p class="indent">Could he have found Leslie alone at that moment, a -very regrettable scene might have ensued.</p> - -<p class="indent">And yet at the bottom of all his anger and perturbation -lay a golden gleam. If Leslie went off like this, -Campanula would be all his (Mac’s) own.</p> - -<p class="indent">He had no idea of marrying her, or anything of that -sort; but he had an immense idea of possessing her all -for himself.</p> - -<p class="indent">He had, proposed to buy a half share in her at Nikko, -and he would have made a bad bargain, for during the -last five years he had possessed a full half share without -paying a cent, unless we count the pounds and pounds -expended on dolls, sweets, and so forth.</p> - -<p class="indent">But this was not like having her all to himself: a creature -to feed and clothe, to buy hairpins for and tabis, -fans and sweets; to listen to of an evening, as her fingers -strayed over the strings of a <i>chamécen</i>, or her tongue -told fabulous tales of folk clad in fur or feathers.</p> - -<p class="indent">All at once, as he paced the room, he turned to her, -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page267"></a>[pg 267]</span> -literally picked her up, hugged her, gave her a kiss, and -said: “He’ll come back to you. Dinna greet; I canna -stand it. I’ll be back and see you the morrow morn before -he goes.”</p> - -<p class="indent">He hurried out of the house, and went raging down -the hill.</p> - -<p class="indent">To be in anger with one whom one loves works, indeed, -like madness in the blood.</p> - -<p class="indent">Mac, as he plunged down the hill, was lashing himself -into a fury against Leslie. He turned into a saki shop -and drank half a pint of that seemingly innocuous -liquor; then he went to the office, took a whisky bottle -from a cupboard, and poured himself out a liberal peg.</p> - -<p class="indent">He was an abstemious man as a rule, but once he took -the bit between his teeth nothing on God’s earth except -death would stop him, till the next morning’s headache -came.</p> - -<p class="indent">At five he recognized that he was hopelessly embarked -on a grand drunk, and determined to take a riksha over -to Mogi; there complete the business, and return in time -next morning to see Leslie before he started.</p> - -<p class="indent">Just before starting from the hotel a waiter brought -him out a cablegram from Shanghai, which had come -round from the office. It was relative to a bank disaster -that had occurred in India. He read it, stuffed it into -his pocket, and ordered the Djin to proceed.</p> - -<hr class="hr2"> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page268"></a>[pg 268]</span></p> - -<div class='chapter'><h2>CHAPTER XXIX</h2></div> - -<p class="h2">THE GARDEN-PARTY</p> - -<p class="indent">Within an hour of the great city of Nagasaki, -in the midst of a park that was at the same -time half a garden, lay the country residence of Mr. -Kamamura; once a man who carried two swords, with -the longer of which he would have beheaded you for -two words and have done it with neatness and despatch, -now a gentleman in a frock-coat and tall hat, wearing -gold-rimmed glasses and a smile.</p> - -<p class="indent">The long, low house, white as snow and surrounded by -a narrow veranda, faced west, and was surrounded by -a garden recalling the gardens of Dai Nichi Do: a garden -filled with the music of fountains and the poetry of -birds.</p> - -<p class="indent">Alas! on the day of his garden-party Mr. Kamamura, -seized with the spirit of modernity and the savagery -of civilization, not content with the music of -heaven, and prompted, no doubt, by the devil, had hired -a brass band and placed it in a little kiosk, with orders -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page269"></a>[pg 269]</span> -to bray Strauss in the face of Nature from three o’clock -till dusk.</p> - -<p class="indent">There were many guests, and the gardens soon presented -an animated appearance. Many of the ladles had -retained the national dress, and marvelous were the -fabrics to be seen in the form of the obi or flowing loose -in the graceful kimono.</p> - -<p class="indent">Some of the guests surrounded a pair of jugglers, -two terrible men dressed in red, who fenced with and -transfixed one another with long swords, swallowed fire, -and belched it like dragons.</p> - -<p class="indent">In another corner of the grounds fireworks were whizzing -and cracking, filling the clear air above with a thin -blue haze through which, just as Jane and Leslie entered -the grounds, there rose a wonderful fire balloon made of -colored paper and fashioned in the form of a turkey -cock.</p> - -<p class="indent">“It’s like a party in the lunatic asylum,” whispered -Jane, as they threaded the maze of guests in search of -their host and hostess. “And, Dick, you <i>do</i> look perfectly -awful in that panama amongst all these men in -tall hats—I mean they look awful beside you, but they -are <i>de rigueur</i>; and it’s better to be <i>de rigueur</i> and look -frightful, than to be not <i>de rigueur</i> and look nice. How -d’y’ do?” and Jane extended her arm, pump-handle -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page270"></a>[pg 270]</span> -fashion, to the little gentleman with the sallow face to -whom Leslie was introducing her.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Much pleasure, much pleasure,” said Mr. Kamamura, -whose English was mixed and limited, and who, like -Kiku San, had not completely mastered the letter “l.” -“Will the honorable rady so make equal health Nagysaki -(the proper way to pronounce Nagasaki) you stay? -So good. Over there Mrs. Kamamura; you make -known;” and Mr. Kamamura presenting his arm Jane -was led away through the crowd like some tall and graceful -frigate threading a maze of painted cock-boats.</p> - -<p class="indent">Leslie, left to himself, turned with a gloomy expression -of countenance to where the jugglers were dislocating -each other’s necks. He did not see them; he was -looking out of the side of his eyes at Jane.</p> - -<p class="indent">She had been led across one of the willow-pattern -bridges, and he could see her now standing at one of the -kiosks, a tea-cup in her hand. She was talking to Mr. -Kamamura and a little lady in European dress—Mrs. -Kamamura, probably.</p> - -<p class="indent">What could they be talking about? Conversation, -probably, sufficient to dislocate the gravity of a Socrates.</p> - -<p class="indent">He turned his head impatiently and tried to take an -interest in the jugglers, without success. There was -something deeply irritating about the scene of frivolity -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page271"></a>[pg 271]</span> -in which Fate had staged the last scenes of the most important -act in his life.</p> - -<p class="indent">The <i>Empress of Japan</i> sailed at eight on the morrow -morning, and as yet he had made no movement as regards -Jane. All this trifling was but a bad prelude to -those words so soon to be spoken.</p> - -<p class="indent">He little knew that Tragedy stood at his elbow in the -form of James Anderson, manager to M’Cormick, the -great silk dealers on the Bund.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Why, Leslie, man! I thought I knew the nape of -your neck. How are you?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Hullo, Anderson!” said Leslie, returning the other’s -hand-grip. “What are you doing here?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I’m just looking round,” said Anderson. “I’m just -looking round, and you’ll admit it’s worth the turning of -one’s head. I shouldn’t mind exchanging places with -Kamamura. It’s not a bad life, his, by a long penny. -This affair will bang a hole through a good pile of ten -pun notes. They tell me those balloons made like dicky-birds -cost—I forget now, but it’s a good pile of dollars -a-piece, for every feather is painted correct, and that’s -just like the Japs—make a pretty thing, and then stick -it away in some hidey-hole where no one can see it, or -burn it—What’s agate now?”</p> - -<p class="indent">The crowd was in motion, flooding towards a part of -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page272"></a>[pg 272]</span> -the grounds where a little stage had been erected, backed -and half surrounded by cypress trees. On the stage, -against the dark-green background, could be seen the -graceful figure of a girl.</p> - -<p class="indent">She was dancing. It was a dance that at first insipid, -became after a few moments fascinating, lulling, exquisite -to watch as the movements of a flower blown by -the wind.</p> - -<p class="indent">They drew close and stood to look. The girl was -dressed in amber and scarlet, with a scarlet flower in the -night of her hair—a <i>bijou rose et noir</i>, recalling Baudelaire’s -Lola de Vallence.</p> - -<p class="indent">Her supple body seemed inspired by the mysterious -music we hear wandering through the land of spring, -and expressing itself in the voices of the wind and the -birds and the streams.</p> - -<p class="indent">She seemed to have learned her art in the academy -where the daffodils are taught to dance and the bluebells -to make their bow.</p> - -<p class="indent">“It’s the Geisha Kamamura has hired—paid her something -like two hundred to dance that fan-dance, or whatever -they call it. She was a Tokyo girl, and had left -the business to get married, but she couldn’t withstand -the two hundred; the best Geisha in Japan, they say. -What’s this her name? O something San. Hoots! but -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page273"></a>[pg 273]</span> -my memory is gone fishing to-day. Listen! she’s talking.”</p> - -<p class="indent">The dance had ceased, and the girl, in the silence that -followed the tinkling of the three accompanying <i>chamécens</i>, -had commenced one of those poetical recitals in -favor with an intellectual Japanese audience.</p> - -<p class="indent">Her recitation was sad; it bemoaned the thing we call -change. The cherry-blossom is fair, ran this untranslatable -poem, but it must die and give place to the lotus.</p> - -<p class="indent">“I cannot understand this depression in trade,” murmured -the muted voice of Anderson, as he stood beside -Leslie. “It’s been spreading and spreading, and there’s -nothing it hasn’t spread into.”</p> - -<p class="indent">And the lotus parts with its petals to give place to the -chrysanthemum, the Royal chrysanthemum.</p> - -<p class="indent">“We’ve had a good year till now, ourselves, but hech! -man, there’s a matter of fifteen thousand gone over the -breaking of the Bombay and Benares bank—clean gone, -never to come back—and that takes the sugar off the -cake—ay, the devil himself won’t whistle it home again.”</p> - -<p class="indent">And the gray winter sky and the snowflakes, like -ghosts of flowers, finished the poem of the Geisha, whilst -Leslie stood transfixed for a second, frozen by the news -he had just heard, and unable to turn. He turned round -full on Anderson.</p> - -<p class="indent">“The breaking of <i>what</i>?”</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page274"></a>[pg 274]</span> -“The Bombay and Benares. Have you not heard the -news? It came by cable to-day at one o’clock. Good -God! man, you hadn’t much money in it, had you?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Everything—everything,” said Leslie in a stammering voice. -“I’m smashed.”</p> - -<p class="indent">He linked his arm in Anderson’s, and dragged him -along hurriedly. He wanted to go, nowhere in particular, -but just get away from the spot where Anderson -had sentenced his future to death.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Man, I’m sorry! Man, I’m sorry!” said his companion. -“I should not have told you so sudden, but how -was I to know?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Smashed—smashed—smashed!” said the other, talking -as a man talks in his sleep.</p> - -<p class="indent">He held Anderson by the arm as he spoke. All around -spread the many-colored crowd; fans were fluttering, -umbrellas bobbing, tongues chattering, soft women’s -voices inlaid like music of gold on the silvery music of -the fountains and cascades.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Anderson, man, are you sure they’ve broken—sure?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Ay, ay, sure. Better to tell you straight. Sure as -my name’s James Anderson.”</p> - -<p class="indent">Boom! Boom! Boom! the band broke into a march -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page275"></a>[pg 275]</span> -by Gungl, and Leslie, releasing Anderson, ran after a -figure in the crowd some twenty paces distant.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Jane! I must speak to you at once.”</p> - -<p class="indent">Jane looked up from the little Japanese gentleman -who was escorting her, saw the distress in her countryman’s -face, and dismissed Asia with a bow.</p> - -<p class="indent">“I have just had frightful news. Come with me to -some quiet place till I tell you about it. Anywhere. No -matter where. See! there are no people across that -bridge where the trees are; let us go there.”</p> - -<p class="indent">Jane spoke not a word, but he saw that she was very -pale and trembling. That weakness of Jane’s gave him a -strange sensation. It said something that her lips had -never uttered.</p> - -<p class="indent">They passed over the little bridge. They passed over -another bridge; there were no people here, only trees; -they went no further.</p> - -<p class="indent">They were in a small forest. The garden was lost to -sight; only the music of the band, muted by distance, -told of the festivity so near, yet apparently so far away.</p> - -<p class="indent">The trunk of a felled tree lay in the path; they sat -down upon it by common consent. Leslie took out his -watch, and looked at it attentively. Then, still holding -it open in his hand, he spoke.</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page276"></a>[pg 276]</span> -“I want you to listen to me for five minutes—only -five minutes; you can hold the watch, and measure the -time yourself. Jane, when a man is going to be hanged, -they will give him a glass of brandy to help him along -to the drop. Will you do the same by me—give me five -minutes’ clear speech, and let me say just what I please -without interruption; will you?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Yes,” said Jane, and she shivered as she spoke the -word. She had maintained a strange silence; impulsive as -she was, one might have expected her to implore him to -tell her the worst, and have it over. Perhaps she understood -dimly that Leslie’s disaster was personal to herself, -a cataclysm the effect of which would reach her future -as well as his.</p> - -<p class="indent">“You remember,” he said, after a moment’s pause, -“how I asked you to marry me long ago, and everything -that happened after? Well, when I think of all that, it -seems to me that I must have passed through life in a -state of insanity, and only awakened to consciousness -now. Jane, I am feeling now as a man must feel when -he wakes in hell, and remembers—No matter, it is all -done with now; and even if you loved me as well as -I love you, it’s all over and done with and useless -now.”</p> - -<p class="indent">He leaned forward with his face in his hands. Jane -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page277"></a>[pg 277]</span> -did not speak; the music of the band had ceased, and the -only sound to be heard was the weary sighing of the -warm wind in the pine-tops.</p> - -<p class="indent">“I’m broken utterly, I have just heard the news. -Don’t think I brought you here to listen to me whining -about my misfortunes. I brought you here to tell you I -love you. I meant to have carried you off in the steamer -that sails to-morrow morning for the north-west. With -the money I had yesterday, I would have supported you, -I would have torn you out of society, and made you -love me. I would have made you a Paradise. Yes, by the -living God, a Paradise, or there’s no such thing as love. -But now I’m a beggar, and I love you too well to drag -you into my ruin, and it’s Fate, Fate, Fate that has -done it all, and cursed be its name!”</p> - -<p class="indent">Again silence, broken only by a faint, dreary sound. -Jane was weeping.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Don’t, for the love of God!” cried Leslie. “Don’t -cry, or you’ll make me cry too. Oh, miserable life! why -was I ever born into it?” And he moved his hands in -the air, as blind Samson might have done amidst the -pillars of the temple.</p> - -<p class="indent">A bird piped three times in the recesses of the wood, -three flute-like notes sweet as the notes of a bell-bird. -They were answered by its mate in the branches above.</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page278"></a>[pg 278]</span> -Leslie put his hands to his ears, as if to shut out the -happy sounds.</p> - -<p class="indent">Jane’s tears had ceased, but she did not speak, she -did not breathe; only a deep sigh occasionally escaped -from her.</p> - -<p class="indent">“And now, we can only say good-bye. Let us part -here for ever. We will meet again in—Heaven,” said -Leslie, with a horrible shuddering laugh.</p> - -<p class="indent">He stretched out his hand and took hers. She let him -have it without seeming to know that he had taken it.</p> - -<p class="indent">She was murmuring his name in a whisper, staring at -him and through him, and as if her gaze was fixed on -some terrible catastrophe beyond.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Dick! Dick! Dick!” All poetry could not express -the helpless, hopeless sorrow she put into those three -little whispered words.</p> - -<p class="indent">Suddenly, filtering through the wood, came a sound, -a voice, a spirit, that unrolled around them a panorama -of loch, moor, and sky, hills purple with heather, lakes -dark with shadow. “Auld Lang Syne.”</p> - -<p class="indent">The band was playing it, villainously enough, but -the distance smoothed away the defects.</p> - -<p class="indent">It broke Jane down. She leaned against his shoulder -and sobbed like a child, and then, with both hands upstretched, -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page279"></a>[pg 279]</span> -she drew his face down to hers and murmured—no -matter what.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then all at once—heedless of ruin, forgetting all -things, carried away on the dumb tide of passion, the -wave that had retreated before disaster, only to come -shoreward again resistless and gigantic—all at once, -and without a word, he took her in his arms.</p> - -<p class="indent">It was the eloquence of passion and despair, the speech -without tongue of a soul tormented and <i>in extremis</i>.</p> - -<p class="indent">It broke Jane down utterly. Hopeless, haggard, and -pale as a person in the midst of some terrible disaster, -she clung to him, whispering in his ear words repeated -over and over again, with that reiteration which forms -the rhetoric of the dying and the lost.</p> - -<p class="indent">She had cast everything aside, the world, her position -in society, her husband, her wealth. Passion and pity, -that strange combination, had for the moment blinded -her eyes to everything but the man beside her—but did -she love him? Fate had not yet disclosed the answer to -that old fatal question, that sphinx-like question whose -answer forms the plot of each man’s story.</p> - -<hr class="hr2"> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page280"></a>[pg 280]</span></p> - -<div class='chapter'><h2>CHAPTER XXX</h2></div> - -<p class="h2">THE FALSE REPORT</p> - -<p class="indent">Mr. Kamamura never again saw his two tall -English guests.</p> - -<p class="indent">As a matter of fact, they sought for and found a -means of leaving his garden by a back way that brought -them to a road which in its turn brought them to the -station.</p> - -<p class="indent">And the native gentlefolk in the train, which brought -them back to Nagasaki by six o’clock, could not imagine -what great grief it was that made the tall English lady -so pallid, and so like the very picture of woe.</p> - -<p class="indent">At the Nagasaki station Leslie helped his companion -into a riksha.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Don’t come back with me to the hotel,” she murmured; -“I will drive there alone. I want to be alone, -quite alone for a while. All our arrangements are made, -and there is nothing more to be said. God help me!—God -help us both! Good-bye, Dick, for the present.”</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page281"></a>[pg 281]</span> -He watched her drive off. Then he took a riksha himself, -and ordered the man to take him to the House of -the Clouds.</p> - -<p class="indent">Everything was arranged. Jane was to be his for -ever. But there was no triumph in the thought. The -battle had been won by his own weakness, not by his -strength. Jane’s compassion for him had betrayed her.</p> - -<p class="indent">They were to sail to-morrow by the <i>Empress of -Japan</i>. He was to stay the night at the hotel, for he -could not possibly remain the night at the House of the -Clouds having once bidden good-bye to Campanula.</p> - -<p class="indent">Beyond Vancouver lay the scheme traced out by him, -accepted by Jane. They were to buy a farm in the -Canadian North-west, and live there for ever happily. -He would not touch a penny of her money; he had jewelry -worth at least four hundred pounds, which would -be amply sufficient to start on. His share in M’Gourley’s -business was to be left for Campanula.</p> - -<p class="indent">It is true he knew little about farming, but—love can -do anything.</p> - -<p class="indent">Viewed from a natural standpoint the whole arrangement -was not only natural but praiseworthy. That a -woman, fond of a natural life in the open air, should -leave a creature like George du Telle, and cast herself -into the arms of a man like Leslie. What could be more -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page282"></a>[pg 282]</span> -in keeping with the grand aim of Nature, the propagation -of the fit in body?</p> - -<p class="indent">Viewed from a social standpoint the whole arrangement -was wickedly absurd. And from a moral standpoint -simply wicked.</p> - -<p class="indent">Nature stood decidedly on Leslie’s side; God (according -to the theologians) and society stood against him.</p> - -<p class="indent">These problems are occurring every day and every -minute of the day, perplexing the thinker and confounding -his belief, unless he looks upon the world as a higher -thing than a breeding ground for animals. And it is generally -by their side issues they are to be solved, and the -side issue in Leslie’s case was Campanula.</p> - -<p class="indent">He was nearing Danjuro’s shop when he saw a riksha -with a disguised figure in it.</p> - -<p class="indent">It was Mac, and Mac was disguised with whisky.</p> - -<p class="indent">He was flushed, and his hat was on the back of his -head, and he was so obviously fuddled that the gentle -Japanese who passed smiled and passed on, without looking -back.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Stop!” cried Leslie to his man, then jumping out -he ran to M’Gourley’s riksha, which had also stopped.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Have you heard the news?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“News?” said Mac. “News—what news?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“The Bombay and Benares bank is broken.”</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page283"></a>[pg 283]</span> -“It is not,” replied the other, fumbling in his pocket. -“Na, na—false report. Bombay and Ta-Lien, you -mean.” Then, drawing a paper from his pocket, and -with ferocity: “Canna ye read?”</p> - -<p class="indent">Leslie took the paper; it was a cablegram from -Shanghai.</p> - -<blockquote> -<p class="indent">“False report. Bombay and Ta-Lien suspended. Bombay -and Benares safe.</p> - -<div class="poem"> -<div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0"><span class="smcap">Jardine Matheson.</span>”</span><br> -</div> -</div> -</blockquote> - -<p class="indent">“Good Heavens!” said Leslie. “When did you get -this?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Hoor ago. Drive on, you—wheel me awa’.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Where are you going?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Mogi—to forget I was ever such a fule as to go into -partnership with a man like—<i>wheel me awa’</i>!”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Steady on, steady on,” said Leslie.</p> - -<p class="indent">“I’ll be back the morrow morn and see y’ before -you’re awa’ to Vancouver.” Then, leaning back as the -riksha started: “I may be a fule, but I’m not a blind -fule, and I’m not a—(<i>hic!</i>).”</p> - -<p class="indent">The riksha joggled over a stone and he collapsed like -a shut-down opera hat.</p> - -<p class="indent">Leslie continued his way.</p> - -<hr class="hr2"> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page284"></a>[pg 284]</span></p> - -<div class='chapter'><h2>CHAPTER XXXI</h2></div> - -<p class="h2">FAREWELL</p> - -<p class="indent">It was seven o’clock; the birds were taking their nests -in the cherry orchard with one final burst of chattering. -The sky in the west, wave-green melting into -vaguest blue, held one solitary cloud floating like a rose-leaf -beneath the evening star. Leslie stood at his gate, -looking for the last time at the twilight stealing over -Nagasaki. He had just arrived.</p> - -<p class="indent">M’Gourley’s words were still ringing in his ears, and -his mind was in a turmoil.</p> - -<p class="indent">He was in exactly the position of the man who has -cheated unwittingly at cards, who has found out his -mistake, and who has still time to save his honor.</p> - -<p class="indent">If the Bombay and Benares bank was safe, it was his -plain duty to go at once to Jane du Telle and inform -her of the fact. She was laboring under the impression -that he was a ruined man. Half of her sympathy, the -whole of the present situation, had arisen from that misconception. -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page285"></a>[pg 285]</span> -To leave her under this delusion would -amount to fraud—the meanest of all frauds.</p> - -<p class="indent">He was feeling this keenly, but unfortunately his -mind, instead of grappling with the situation, and forcing -his body to act, was engaged in cursing Fate, and the -tangled net in which he found himself taken.</p> - -<p class="indent">Was it his fault that the false news had come just -at the psychological moment, the news that had actually -thrown Jane into his arms? He kept asking himself this, -as he gazed across the dusk-eyed harbor to the hills now -becoming dimmed by the twilight.</p> - -<p class="indent">This last touch of Fate would, if he accepted it without -resistance, rob him of the last remnants of honor -and all self-respect.</p> - -<p class="indent">His hand was upon the stakes, he had a moment to -decide whether to take them or leave them: to be a thief -or an honest man.</p> - -<p class="indent">Suddenly, as if silence had placed her finger upon -their throats, the birds in the orchard ceased their -chatter.</p> - -<p class="indent">The warm day dying seemed to have called all the -spirits of beauty from air and earth and sea, to stain the -skies above its death-bed with the tints of the ocean and -the dawn. Over the tomb of light Color, Light’s firstborn -child hovered like some exquisite ephemera whose -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page286"></a>[pg 286]</span> -wings change from beauty to beauty before dissolving -for ever in darkness and death.</p> - -<p class="indent">The silence that had come over the orchard was broken -occasionally by little outbursts of squabbling from over-full -nests, sounds like the flirting of a fan amongst the -leaves, chirrupings that told of differences made up. -Then final and complete silence that would last till night -woke the owls.</p> - -<p class="indent">Leslie at the gate suddenly made a gesture as if he -were flinging something away, turned on his heel, and -came towards the house.</p> - -<p class="indent">He entered just as Cherry-blossom, with a white -flower in her hair, her amber sleeves fallen back and exposing -her fore-arms, her body stretched to its fullest -height on the tips of her tabis, was in the act of lighting -the big hall-lamp. She looked like a little cat stretching -herself.</p> - -<p class="indent">A pang went through his heart. He would never see -Cherry-blossom light the big hall-lamp again, never -again see Pine-breeze bring in the tea-cups, nor Lotus-bud -carrying off Sweetbriar San to his box in the -kitchen.</p> - -<p class="indent">You cannot possibly live in Japan without loving your -maid-servants. I mean by love that sort of passion which -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page287"></a>[pg 287]</span> -was inspired in Matthew Prior by the lady of fashion -aged five.</p> - -<p class="indent">It was a feature of the House of the Clouds that -sometimes on the lower floor you would find a hall with -two rooms on either side of it, and sometimes two rooms -and no hall, and sometimes, in very hot weather, one -huge room. The sliding paper partitions made this possible; -nay, very easy, for Mr. Initogo had improved -upon the ordinary Japanese method, being of an inventive -turn of mind.</p> - -<p class="indent">He looked into the room on the right of the hall. A -<i>chamécen</i> lay on the floor, an hibachi showed a crimson -spark, and a dwarf maple in a pot of Arita ware displayed -its pretty form vaguely in the twilight.</p> - -<p class="indent">He looked into the room on the left: no one.</p> - -<p class="indent">Where was Campanula? She must have returned by -this, surely. Perhaps she was upstairs.</p> - -<p class="indent">He went up, making little noise in his stocking-feet. -At the door of his room he peeped in.</p> - -<p class="indent">There was Campanula. Oh, desolate sight! She was -sitting on his big portmanteau all alone in the dusk. -Her head was bent.</p> - -<p class="indent">She looked so forlorn and so small, and the sash of -her obi so huge in comparison with the wearer, that he -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page288"></a>[pg 288]</span> -could not but recall how she sat that morning in the -Tea House of the Tortoise. That morning, when she -had likened herself to a lump of mud; the morning he -had proposed to adopt her, and care for her, and make -her a chattel of his own.</p> - -<p class="indent">A moment later, he had caught her up in his arms. -She did not resist, but he seemed to have taken up a lifeless -thing.</p> - -<p class="indent">As he carried her downstairs, had he known, it might -have seemed strange to him that so great a grief should -be so light a burden.</p> - -<p class="indent">He brought her to the room on the right, where -Cherry-blossom had just lit the lamp, and sat down beside -her on the matting.</p> - -<p class="indent">He took a cigarette from his pocket, and approached -the tobacco-mono with it. Then, without lighting it, he -flung the cigarette away.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Campanula, I am going on a journey. I did not -tell you last night, for I had not made up my mind.”</p> - -<p class="indent">“I have heard it,” she replied. She sat there beside -him, a small figure with head bowed and hands folded in -her lap; and the sadness and sorrowful sweetness of those -four words pierced his heart.</p> - -<p class="indent">To get this terrible interview over, to tear himself -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page289"></a>[pg 289]</span> -away at once, he would have sold years of his life. But -it had to be gone through with.</p> - -<p class="indent">Whether she loved him as a woman loves a man, or a -child loves a father, she loved him, loved him as no person -had ever loved him before—and he knew it.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then he talked to her, telling her that he would come -back.</p> - -<p class="indent">“I have been away before, Campanula, and I have -returned. Will you not believe me that I will return?”</p> - -<p class="indent">“Ah yes,” she answered, “but you did not go with -her.”</p> - -<p class="indent">He said nothing for a moment. There was a sound -outside; it was the coolie he had ordered to take his portmanteau -to the hotel. He heard Pine-breeze accosting -him, he heard him go upstairs and come down again, -walking heavily. It was like the sound of a man carrying -out a coffin.</p> - -<p class="indent">He heard his steps on the garden walk dying towards -the gate.</p> - -<p class="indent">How had she discovered with whom he was going?</p> - -<p class="indent">If she would only weep or cry out, or move, or break -in some way this terrible stillness. If she would only -reproach him. But she said nothing, nor even sighed. -She seemed like a person stricken not by grief, but death. -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page290"></a>[pg 290]</span> -Then he began to talk again, telling her of the arrangements -he had made. How M’Gourley San would look -after her, just as he had done before, till he came back. -And he would write every week—till he came back. -And they would all be happy together again, as happy -as ever they had been—when he came back.</p> - -<p class="indent">To which she replied:</p> - -<p class="indent">“If you are going away to find happiness, my happiness is great.”</p> - -<p class="indent">Fancy a white house, lantern-lit, and steeped in dusk, -a tall man walking away from it rapidly, three Mousmés -on their knees on the veranda crying after the vanishing -form: “Come again, oh, condescend to come -again quickly!”</p> - -<p class="indent">The sound of their voices rings in his ears as he passes -through the little gate. He hears it pursuing him like -the faint murmur of bees, until a puff of wind blows it -away and replaces it by the faint sound of the city below.</p> - -<p class="indent">Come again! He will never come again to lie in the -hammock beneath the cherry trees. Never more shall -Lotus-bud hand him the night lantern to light him to -his bed, nor thy small hands, O Pine-breeze, bear him -the brown leather cigar-case that thy small nose loved -to smell!</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page291"></a>[pg 291]</span> -As he came down hill towards Nagasaki he felt as -though he were leaving spring for ever behind him.</p> - -<p class="indent">Thrice he stopped as if to return, and stood gazing -into the darkness of the uphill path, listening to the wind -in the branches of the lilac trees.</p> - -<p class="indent">The last of these pauses ended more abruptly than the -others, and he plunged on again down hill through the -gloom.</p> - -<hr class="hr2"> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page292"></a>[pg 292]</span></p> - -<div class='chapter'><h2>CHAPTER XXXII</h2></div> - -<p class="h2">HER HOUSE IN ORDER</p> - -<p class="indent">Left alone, Campanula sat, her hands folded in -her lap—a Lost One indeed.</p> - -<p class="indent">Before her mental vision, beyond Japan, beyond that -desolate country always surrounded with ice, the country -where the bluebells grew—beyond all this lay the -land where O Toku San had gone that day, the land -where one never regrets, one never forgets, one never -remembers.</p> - -<p class="indent">He had gone to find happiness. Not one word had -she spoken to hold him back or keep him by her, this -true daughter of Dai Nippon, soul sister of O Gozen -San, daughter in spirit of the immortal Hirose.</p> - -<p class="indent">Cleopatra with the asp and all the mouthing heroines -of history would seem cheap indeed beside this small and -faithful figure to whom death was nothing, passion and -personal happiness nothing beside the happiness of the -being she loved.</p> - -<p class="indent">She sat for an hour scarce moving; then she rose up. -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page293"></a>[pg 293]</span> -She had no more time for personal thoughts; all things -had to be left in order, and her trust to the least detail -faithfully fulfilled.</p> - -<p class="indent">She called the Mousmés to her, and told them that -now Leslie San had left, they would be discharged until -he came back. They could go that evening to their -homes in the city below. She would pay them their -wages and a month in advance, and a little present for -each out of money of her own. And the three kow-towed, -delighted at the prospect of change and the -month’s money for doing nothing, and the little present -besides. They never thought to ask her what she would -do herself in the house alone, their butterfly brains were -so filled with the thoughts of pleasure.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then she made Lotus-bud bring all the bills owing, -bills yard long and extraordinarily minute in detail. -These she discharged. There were chits out, but these -were Leslie’s affair, and he had no doubt settled them.</p> - -<p class="indent">She thought of Sweetbriar San the cat, and as he was -fondest of Pine-breeze, she gave Pine-breeze a small sum -to take him home and keep him, applying to M’Gourley -San if more money were needful.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then she went upstairs to her own room and folded -neatly the obis and kimonos in the drawers of the great -lacquer cabinet. In one of these drawers were things -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page294"></a>[pg 294]</span> -she had only, as it were, dropped from her hand; the -toys she had played with as a child. Here was the doll -bought in Nikko, and bouncing balls, ever so many; and -in a piece of rice paper, still ferocious, but terribly old -and warped, the famous dragon.</p> - -<p class="indent">She took him out and tried to remove the paper from -his sugar-candy sides, but it was stuck too tight. She -put him back, and, holding the drawer with both hands, -pressed her forehead against them.</p> - -<p class="indent">As she stood like this, mute and utterly motionless, -the night breeze came through the window, bearing the -perfume of the azaleas.</p> - -<p class="indent">It was as if they were calling to her, and she closed -the drawer gently and turned, as if to say, “I hear.”</p> - -<p class="indent">Then she came down and found the three Mousmés -waiting, each with a lighted lamp on the end of a stick, -and her frail belongings on her back, luggage consisting -of cardboard boxes, except in the case of Pine-breeze, -who was also burdened with a basket containing Sweetbriar -San.</p> - -<p class="indent">They had received their wages, and there was nothing -left for them now to do but go; which they did, after -profound salaams, murmurs and declarations of personal -unworthiness.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then Campanula found herself standing alone. The -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page295"></a>[pg 295]</span> -only living thing beside herself in the house was the -mushi, that musician of the night, already saluting its -mistress with a thin stream of song. She went to the -doorway where it hung, and unhooked the little cage.</p> - -<hr class="hr2"> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page296"></a>[pg 296]</span></p> - -<div class='chapter'><h2>CHAPTER XXXIII</h2></div> - -<p class="h2">THE “LA FRANCE”</p> - -<p class="indent">The fair that had been going on all day in the street -leading to the Bund was still in full swing. A -lurid sight the street presented, lit by lanterns of all colors, -and flare lamps near the booths.</p> - -<p class="indent">Leslie was glad of the noise and bustle around him; -one cannot think much when pressing one’s way through -a Japanese fair, colored lamps dancing, Mousmés laughing, -and showmen shouting, rikshas passing at a trot, or -attempting so to do, children blowing trumpets, babies -whirling rattles, men-of-war’s men from the ships in -harbor walking four abreast and arm in arm, singing -“Jean Francis de Nantes,” or “We won’t go Home -till Morning.” <i>Chamécens</i> and moon fiddles buzzing -and tinkling, dogs barking, and gakunin wailing.</p> - -<p class="indent">It was ten when he reached the hotel. In the entrance-hall, -where the orange trees in tubs reflected the -lamp-light from their glossy leaves, a Chinese hall porter -in a blue silk blouse sat on guard. From the half-open -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page297"></a>[pg 297]</span> -door of the <i>salle à manger</i>, where a party of Russian -officers were at dinner, came the sound of laughter -and the clinking of glasses.</p> - -<p class="indent">As he entered the hotel the whole world around him -changed. Campanula vanished from his mind. He was -no longer in Japan. He was in the same house with -Jane, and in a few more hours she would be his.</p> - -<p class="indent">The Chinaman rose from his seat when he saw Leslie -enter and led him down a corridor to the door of the private -sitting-room where he had dined with Du Telles. -He had promised Jane to wait for her there till the -morning.</p> - -<p class="indent">The sphinx-like Celestial closed the door, and Leslie -found himself alone.</p> - -<p class="indent">The windows were open on account of the warmth, -and they gave a view of the narrow mysterious harbor -that seems to have been cut in the old heroic days by -some giant who was also a poet. The high cliffs cast -their shadows like sable robes upon the water, jeweled -with the lights of the shipping. The sky all silence and -stars, paling now in the moonlight, was almost the sky -of Europe. Orion was there, and the Pleiades, and Cassiopæa -dreaming in her diamond-studded chair.</p> - -<p class="indent">The room itself was a strange mixture of Japan and -Europe. The floor was the matted floor of Japan, the -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page298"></a>[pg 298]</span> -cane sofas might have been bought at Shoolbred’s. The -walls were as plain and unadorned as the walls of a -Japanese house are wont to be—that is to say, under -the fans which the hotel proprietor had fastened to them—fans -from Kioto, Tokyo, and Nara crucified against -the white paneling and looking like great butterflies in -some giant’s collection.</p> - -<p class="indent">He lit a pipe. Jane was upstairs in some room, but -there were still nine hours of waiting to be done; and he -had promised that he would not go upstairs if permitted -to pass the night in the hotel, but wait patiently for -her to come to him at the hour of starting.</p> - -<p class="indent">He felt that if he thought about her he would break -his oath, so he drove her from his mind.</p> - -<p class="indent">He watched the twinkling lights in the harbor; those -darting about like fire-flies were the sampans; that long -hulk all crusted with light was the <i>La France</i>, the ship -in which Jane had intended to sail for Osaka. It was -after ten now, and she was overdue to leave. That sister-hulk, -equally gemmed, was the Nord Deutscher Lloyd -boat leaving at dawn for Colombo. Those three lights -in a triangle were the anchor lights of the great Russian -cruiser <i>Rurik</i>—the ill-fated <i>Rurik</i>.</p> - -<p class="indent">Suddenly a horn of light shot out from the bow of -the <i>La France</i>, and she began to move like a glittering -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page299"></a>[pg 299]</span> -town towards the sea, and the wind from the west -brought the faint music of a band. The <i>La France</i> -had unbuoyed and was away.</p> - -<p class="indent">He watched her as she picked her course through the -shipping stealthily like a robber. Now with all side -lights showing, now with them half extinguished as she -veered to avoid the bell-buoy of the Atraska shoal; now -a vague phantom swallowed by the shadows of the night.</p> - -<p class="indent">The hotel was silent now, the Russians had gone off -to their ship. Somewhere outside, somewhere in the -gloom of the mysterious night, a <i>chamécen</i> was tinkling -to the muttering of a little drum. What dancing girl -was setting her steps to that tune—and where?</p> - -<p class="indent">He rose to his feet and began to pace the room, then -he turned the lamp up till it smoked, and turned it down -till it was nearly out, and cursed the burner for his own -stupidity.</p> - -<p class="indent">Still the distant <i>chamécen</i> kept up its buzzing to the -devil’s tattoo of the distant drum.</p> - -<p class="indent">He walked to the window and shut it. Result—absolute -silence and stifling heat. No matter; anything -was better than that infernal drum.</p> - -<p class="indent">He had shut out the drum, but he had shut in a mosquito. -It was in the lace curtain, and its twang brought -him again to his feet. He tried to find it in the curtain, -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page300"></a>[pg 300]</span> -failed, pulled the whole curtain down from its attachment, -and trampled it under-foot.</p> - -<p class="indent">Silence, this time unbroken, until one of the fans upon -the wall rustled, and from beneath it crept a frightful-looking -spider as brown and as broad as a penny.</p> - -<p class="indent">He did not see it; he was sitting in the arm-chair with -his head between his hands, breaking his promise to Jane.</p> - -<p class="indent">When it was broken he got up, crossed the room, -opened the door, and went into the hall.</p> - -<p class="indent">The Chinese night-porter was sitting like a figure of -stone in a blouse of blue silk. Leslie went up to him, -spoke some words in a low tone, and handed him some -money.</p> - -<p class="indent">The Chinaman rose and led the way upstairs. Down -a passage they went till the guide stopped, pointed to a -door, turned, and vanished as silently as he had come.</p> - -<p class="indent">Leslie went to the door and knocked softly. No answer. -He turned the handle, the door opened and he -entered—an empty room.</p> - -<p class="indent">A lamp was burning on a table in one corner, a bed -stood close to the window: the bed was empty.</p> - -<p class="indent">It was Jane’s room, for there lay her trunks. A glove -lay on the floor. He picked it up, looked at it, smelt it, -and then threw it down. The dressing-table held none -of those articles of the toilet one might have expected -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page301"></a>[pg 301]</span> -to see. Beside the lamp on the side-table lay a letter.</p> - -<p class="indent">He had seen the letter almost on the first moment of -his entering the room, with that vague, half-terrified -comprehension which we may imagine in the brain of the -bull when the sun-light flashes on the sword of the matadore.</p> - -<p class="indent">He approached it now, and read the superscription: -“Richard Leslie, Esq. Important.”</p> - -<p class="indent">He opened it, and a number of bank notes came out. -These he laid on one side, took the letter that was with -them, and began to read.</p> - -<p class="indent">He read the letter, not as if he were reading a letter, -but the face of some scoundrel he had dragged by the -ears into the zone of lamplight. He envisaged it, took -whole sentences in <i>en bloc</i>. He read first at the end, then -in the middle, then at the beginning.</p> - -<p class="indent">“And now good-bye for ever. Oh, Dick, don’t think -badly of me for this; I have only done what was right.</p> - -<p class="indent">“When you get this I shall be gone. I am leaving -by the <i>La France</i> to meet George.</p> - -<p class="indent">“I leave you money. Half what I have is yours; remember -we are cousins, and ought to help one another.</p> - -<p class="indent">“Oh, Dick! Dick! I <i>can’t</i> do what you want. I am -not thinking of myself but of my people. Imagine the -disgrace and ruin it would bring them. My dear old -father, it would kill him.”</p> - -<hr class="hr2"> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page302"></a>[pg 302]</span></p> - -<div class='chapter'><h2>CHAPTER XXXIV</h2></div> - -<p class="h2">AMIDST THE AZALEAS</p> - -<p class="indent">It was very late at night; clouds from the Pacific were -rolling over Nagasaki, and it was evident that the -hot weather of the last two days had been the prelude of -a storm.</p> - -<p class="indent">The House of the Clouds, lamp-lit and deserted, cast -from the opening in the shoji a long parallelogram of -light that cut the darkness like a sword; a sword of light -lying upon the veranda, the graveled walk, and the landscape -garden.</p> - -<p class="indent">With the darkness outside had come a great silence -broken only by the wind.</p> - -<p class="indent">Had you been standing on the veranda you would -have sworn that some blind person was prowling before -the house, soundless of foot and cautiously feeling his -way by tapping on the ground with a stick.</p> - -<p class="indent">It was only the lath shaken by the wind, the tireless -lath that all day and all the night before had kept the -echoes of the garden answering its summons, and still -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page303"></a>[pg 303]</span> -kept up the unwearied sound-semblance of a blind man -who walked without footstep, a patient sentinel, now advancing, -now retreating, now at the garden gate, now -near the azaleas, and ever waiting.</p> - -<p class="indent">The garden gate clicked, and hurried footsteps came -up the path.</p> - -<p class="indent">It was Leslie, hatless, bright and wild of eye, walking -rapidly, but in a tottering manner. His lips were of a -dull purple color, and he had the aspect of a man heavily -drugged with opium.</p> - -<p class="indent">He crossed the veranda and entered the deserted hall. -He looked into the rooms on either side—they were -both empty. Then he came back to the hall, and cried -out, “Campanula!” The rafters returned the sound of -his voice, but she did not answer.</p> - -<p class="indent">He was perfectly clear of mind, but his breathing was -affected, and a deadly torpor hung over him which his -will alone prevented falling.</p> - -<p class="indent">He took in all the details around him with extraordinary -clearness, amongst others the fact that the mushi’s -cage had been removed.</p> - -<p class="indent">Having waited for a moment, straining his ears to -catch the faintest sound, he seized the swinging paper -lantern that lit the hall, and with it in his hand went into -the kitchen. It was deserted. Then he went upstairs—every -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page304"></a>[pg 304]</span> -room was empty. It was like a house from which -the people had fled in terror, and he came down again, -wild with the apprehension of some unknown tragedy.</p> - -<p class="indent">He brought the lamp into the room on the right of -the passage, and placed it on the floor. Something crimson -lay on the primrose-colored matting. He picked -it up; it was Campanula’s obi. Why had she cast it -there?</p> - -<p class="indent">He was looking round him as if for a person to explain -all these things, when his eye caught an open -drawer of the great lacquer cabinet that contained his -papers. He looked into the drawer, and it was empty. -It was the drawer in which he had placed the waki-zashi—the -suicide sword, given to him by Jane.</p> - -<p class="indent">From the open drawer his eyes turned to the obi, which -he had dropped, and then he looked round him, as Dives -looks round him in that picture of Teniers, where Dives -wakes in Hell.</p> - -<p class="indent">As he stood, the wind shook the broken lath outside, -and played with it. “Tap! tap! tap!”</p> - -<p class="indent">He saw the sunlit Nikko road, the valley of the crimson -azaleas, the Lost One who had loved him as no other -being had loved him—the one he had lost for ever.</p> - -<p class="indent">She was dead, yet it was denied to him to find her, and -clasp her in his arms, and die with her.</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page305"></a>[pg 305]</span> -Death was nothing, but never to find her again, never -to see her again, or touch her small body, that was an -agony far beyond death.</p> - -<p class="indent">He left the room, feeling by the walls like a man without -sight.</p> - -<p class="indent">Outside, the world was in utter darkness. More clouds -had rolled up over the sky, as if called by the Blind One, -the tapping of whose stick betrayed him, as he walked, -waiting for his prey.</p> - -<p class="indent">If he could find her, what cared he for the Blind One! -If he could not find her he felt that he would be for ever -lost. But he could never find her more, for the opium -sleep was falling upon him now. He had no more -strength to fight it, and the darkness of the pit lay -around him.</p> - -<p class="indent">Suddenly, the night wind changed, and brought him -the perfume of the unseen azaleas, and with the perfume -a thin thread of song.</p> - -<p class="indent">It was the song of the mushi—the atom of life he -had spared that day in his fury, even as God might -now be sparing him—the mushi she had loved so well. -Feeling by the veranda wall, he followed the song like -a man led by a thread, and as he came he crushed something -beneath his foot: it was the lath, whose sound -would never trouble him again.</p> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page306"></a>[pg 306]</span> -He felt the azalea bushes around his knees, and advanced -amongst them, still led by the tremulous song, -till his foot touched something soft, and his hand a tiny -cage, hanging to one of the crimson-flowering boughs.</p> - -<hr class="hr2"> - -<p class="indent"><span class="pagenum"><a id="page307"></a>[pg 307]</span></p> - -<div class='chapter'><h2>CHAPTER XXXV</h2></div> - -<p class="h2">BON MATSURI</p> - -<p class="indent">It was the 18th of August—the last night of Bon -Matsuri.</p> - -<p class="indent">Under a sky splendid with stars, the hills about Nagasaki -were gemmed with colored lights. Ten thousand -colored lanterns adorned the terraced cemeteries, and towards -dawn each lantern would be fixed to a tiny boat of -straw, freighted with a few small coins, and some small -offering of fruit, to stay the souls of the dead on their -long journey home.</p> - -<p class="indent">M’Gourley had come out to see the fairy-like spectacle, -for he knew that Mr. Initogo, that faithful old Pagan -gentleman, was amidst the rejoicers on the hillsides, and -had lit two lanterns, and freighted two small boats, for -the souls of two friends he had known on earth.</p> - -<p class="indent">Just as the morning breeze began to blow, and before -the first star had paled in the dawn breaking over the -Pacific, the gazers from the ships and the shore drew -their breath, for suddenly the whole hillsides seemed in -<span class="pagenum"><a id="page308"></a>[pg 308]</span> -motion, shifting and glittering down to the water’s edge, -till the ripples became surrounded by a zone of rose-colored -fire.</p> - -<p class="indent">Then the water itself became dyed with the glow of -ten thousand lanterns, each bravely upborne on its little -ship of straw, whose sails took the Eastern breeze.</p> - -<p class="indent">As the fairy flotilla sailed away, spreading the harbor -with light and color, ship after ship took fire, and -ship after ship was lost.</p> - -<p class="indent">M’Gourley, hat in hand, stood watching till the last -spark had vanished in the lilac of the dawn; then, with a -sigh that spoke of things that were not, but might have -been, he turned slowly home.</p> - - -<p> </p> -<hr class="hr2"> - -<div class="tnote"> -<div class='chapter'><h2>Transcriber’s Note:</h2></div> - -<p class="indent">Throughout the dialogues, there were words used to mimic accents of -the speakers. Those words were retained as-is.</p> - -<p class="indent">Errors in punctuations and inconsistent hyphenation were not corrected -unless otherwise noted.</p> - -<p class="indent">On page 17, a quotation mark was removed after “Lord sakes!”</p> - -<p class="indent">On page 29, a superfluous quotation mark was deleted.</p> - -<p class="indent">On page 29, a quotation mark was moved one space to the correct -position.</p> - -<p class="indent">On page 47, a period was added after “as fraunk as mysel’”.</p> - -<p class="indent">On page 81, “Lesile” was replaced with “Leslie”.</p> - -<p class="indent">On page 120, “perfumed hair” was replaced with “perfumed hair”.</p> - -<p class="indent">On page 128, “acros” was replaced with “across”.</p> - -<p class="indent">On page 150, a quotation mark was added after “Lord and also the empire of the birds.”</p> - -<p class="indent">On page 243, “though” was replaced with “through”.</p> - -<p class="indent">On page 264, “horor” was replaced with “horror”.</p> - -<p class="indent">On page 272, “Baudelaires” was replaced with “Baudelaire’s”.</p> - -<p class="indent">On page 281, “jewelery” was replaced with “jewelry”.</p> -</div> - -<p> </p> -<p> </p> -<hr class="full"> -<div style='display:block;margin-top:4em'>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE CRIMSON AZALEAS ***</div> -<div style='display:block;margin:1em 0;'>This file should be named 55709-h.htm or 55709-h.zip</div> -<div style='display:block;margin:1em 0;'>This and all associated files of various formats will be found in https://www.gutenberg.org/5/5/7/0/55709</div> -<div style='text-align:left'> - -<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> -Updated editions will replace the previous one—the old editions will -be renamed. -</div> - -<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. 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