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            <title>The Heart of Hyacinth</title>
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                     <bibl xml:id="bibl153"><author><name ref="pers:WE1">Watanna, Onoto</name></author>.
                     <title level="m">The Heart of Hyacinth</title>. Illustrated by <author role="illustrator"><name ref="pers:KS2">Kiyokichi Sano</name></author>. New
                  York, <publisher ref="org:Harper">Harper and Brothers</publisher>, <date when="1903">1903</date>.</bibl>
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          <head>The Heart of Hyacinth</head>
          <pb n="1"/>
            <div xml:id="owheart_1011" n="1" type="chapter">

                <head>I</head>
                <p>The City of Sendai, on the northeastern coast of Japan,
                    raises its head queenly-wise towards the sun, as though conscious of its own
                    matchless beauty and that which envelops it on all sides. Here, where the waters
                    flow into the Pacific, the surges are never heard. Neptune seems to have
                    forgotten his anger in the presence of such peerless beauty.</p>
                <p>Near to Sendai there is a bay called Matsushima. Here
                    Nature has flung out her favors with more than lavish hand; for throughout the
                    bay she has scattered jewel-like rocks, whose white sides rise above the waters,
                    and whose <pb n="2"/> surface
                    gives nutrition to the graceful pine-trees which find their roots within the
                    stone. Near to a thousand rocks they are said to number, and save for the one
                    called Hadakajima, or Naked Island, all are crowned with pine-trees.</p>
                <p>The historic temple Zuiganjii is situated at the base of a
                    hill a few <foreign xml:lang="ja">cho</foreign> from the beach. About the temple are the tombs and sepulchres of
                    the great Date family, once the feudal lords of Sendai. There is a huge image of
                    Date Masamune, whose far-seeing mind sent an envoy to Rome early in the
                    seventeenth century. The sepulchres are, for the most part, in the hollowed
                    caves of the range of rocky hills behind the temples. Nameless flowers, large
                    and brilliant in color, bloom about the tombs of these proud, slumbering lords.
                    Mount Tomi bends its noble head in homage towards the glories of a past
                    generation. The air is very still and cool. Silence enshrines and deifies
                    all.</p>
                <p>The inhabitants of Sendai and the <pb n="3"/> little fishing
                    village on the northern shore of the bay were simple, gentle folk. As though
                    affected by the slumbrous beauty of the hills and mountains hedging them in upon
                    all sides, these let their life glide by with slow and sweetly sleepy tread. Not
                    even the shock of the Restoration had brought this region’s people into that
                    prophetic regard for the future which pervaded all other parts of the empire.
                    The change-compelling progress which pressed in upon all sides seemed not as yet
                    to have laid its withering finger upon fair Matsushima. Like their home, the
                    inhabitants clung to their hermit existence.</p>
                <p>When an English ship, having ploughed its way through the
                    waters of the Pacific, sent out its men in boats to take the bay’s soundings,
                    the people were not alarmed, but greatly mystified. The strange white men made
                    their way in their smaller boats to the shore. A missionary and his wife were
                    landed.</p>
                <p>A little home, on a small hill situated <pb n="4"/> only a short
                    distance from the Temple Zuiganjii, they built for themselves. Afterwards,
                    native artisans raised for them a larger structure, where for many years they
                    patiently taught the gospel of Jesus Christ. The people gradually learned to
                    love and reverence their pale teachers. There came a time when the little band,
                    which had at first gone desultorily and curiously to the mission-house, began to
                    see what the strangers termed <q>the light</q>. Then the Christian Church in far-away
                    England enrolled a little list of converts to their religion.</p>
                <p>The missionary grew old and white and bent. His gentle
                    wife passed away. He lingered wistfully, a strangely isolated, though beloved,
                    figure in the little community.</p>
                <p>Then came a second visitation from an English vessel.
                    Sailors and officers lolled about the town by day and rioted by night. Some of
                    them wooed the dark-eyed daughters of the town but to leave them. One there was,
                    however, <pb n="5"/> who
                    brought a girl, a shrinking, yet trustful girl, to the old missionary on the
                    hill, and there, in the shabby old mission-house, the solemn and beautiful
                    ceremony of the Christian marriage service was performed over their heads.</p>
                <p>That was ten years before. At first the Englishman had
                    seemingly settled in his adopted land, as he loved to call it. The place
                    appealed to his artistic perceptions. The Mecca of all his hopes, he called it.
                    Why should he return to the world of cold and strife? Here were peace, rest, and
                    love unbounded. But before the close of the second year of their union an event
                    occurred which shook the stranger suddenly into life’s vivid reality. A great
                    duty thrust itself in his track. Not for himself, but for another, must he turn
                    his back upon the land of love. A son had been born to him in the season of
                    Little Heat.</p>
                <p>So the Englishman crushed to his breast his foreign wife
                    and child, and <pb n="6"/>
                    with reiterated promises of a speedy return he left them.</p>
                <p>Letters in those days travelled slowly from England to
                    Japan. Sometimes those addressed to the little town of Sendai remained for weeks
                    in the offices at the open ports. Sometimes they travelled hither and thither
                    from one port to another, the stupid indifference of officials scarcely
                    troubling itself to send them to their proper destination. But finally, after
                    many months, the little wife and mother in Sendai held between her trembling
                    hands an English letter. It had come in a very large envelope, and there were
                    several bulky inclosures--neatly folded documents they were--tied with red tape.
                    There was also another letter, shorter than the one she held in her hand, and
                    written in a different form. She could not even read her letter, though she did
                    not doubt from whom it had come. Happy, she pressed her precious package to her
                    lips and breast. She believed that the <pb n="7"/> strangely printed papers within the envelopes, similar
                    in her eyes to the many English papers he had always about him, were merely
                    other forms of his epistle of love.</p>
                <p>The woman waited with a divine patience for the return of
                    the old missionary from a little journey inland. She watched for him, watched
                    ceaselessly, constantly. And when he had returned she dressed the little
                    Komazawa in fresh, sweet-smelling garments, and carried him with her papers to
                    the mission-house.</p>
                <p>Why detail the pain of that interview? The papers and one
                    of the letters, it is true, were, indeed, from her lord, but they were sent by
                    another, a stranger. The Englishman had died--died in what he termed a foreign
                    country, since his home was by her side. In his last hours he had striven to
                    write to her and instruct her in the course she must take in the years to come
                    when he could not be by her as her loving guide.</p>
                <pb n="8"/>
                <p>Madame Aoi meekly followed the counsel of the aged
                    missionary. Under his guidance, childlike and with unquestioning faith, she
                    studied unceasingly the English language and the Christian faith.</p>
                <p>If the old missionary had at first marvelled at the calm
                    which settled upon her after that one wild outcry when first she had heard the
                    dread tidings of her husband, he was not long in discovering that her
                    passiveness was but an outer mask to veil the anguish of a broken heart, and to
                    give her that strength which must overcome the weakness which would be the doom
                    of her hopes. For Aoi was not left without some hope in life. Her lord, in
                    departing, had set upon her an injunction, a duty. This it was her task to
                    perform. Once that was accomplished, perhaps the strain might lessen. Meanwhile
                    tirelessly, ceaselessly, she studied.</p>
                <p>She had the natural gift of intelligence, and the
                    advantage of having <pb n="9"/> spent two full years with her husband. Hence it was not long before she
                    mastered the language, and, if she spoke it brokenly and even haltingly, she
                    wrote and read accurately.</p>
                <p>To the little Komazawa she spoke only in English. She kept
                    him jealously apart from the villagers, and taught his little tongue to shape
                    and form the words of his father’s language.</p>
                <p><q>Some day, liddle one</q>, she would say, <q>you will become
                    great big man. Then you will cross those seas. You will become great lord also
                    at that England. So! It is the will of thy august father</q>.</p>
            </div>
            
            <div xml:id="owheart_1012" n="2" type="chapter">
                <head>II</head>
                <p>It was the season of Seed Rain. The country was green and
                    fragrant and the crops thirstily absorbed the rain. The villagers sat at their
                    thresholds, some of them even indolently lounging in the open, unmindful or
                    perhaps enjoying the seething rain, an antidote for the heat, which was somewhat
                    sweltering for the season.</p>
                <p>Children were playing in the street, nimbly jumping over
                    the puddle ponds, or climbing, with the agility of monkeys, the trees that lined
                    the streets, and about whose boughs they hung in various attitudes of daring
                    delight.</p>
                <p>One small boy had climbed to the very tip of a bamboo, and
                    there he clung by his feet, swaying with the shakings of the slender tree, and
                    the motion of those below him--far below him.</p>
                <pb n="11"/>
                <p>It was not often that the son of Madame Aoi was permitted
                    such absolute freedom. Indeed, it was only upon those occasions when Komazawa,
                    momentarily blind to the reproach of his mother’s sad eyes, literally thrust
                    away the bonds which seemed to hold and chain him to their quiet household and
                    burst out and beyond their reach. Surely, at the tip of this long, perilous
                    bamboo he was quite beyond the reach of little Madame Aoi and her old servant,
                    Mumè. But even in his present lofty position Komazawa had kept his eyes from the
                    possible glimpse of his mother. His feet clung to the tree only because his
                    hands were engaged in covering his ears.</p>
                <p>Yet, even in the open, Komazawa was alone. The neighbors’
                    children played in little bodies and groups together, and Komazawa from his
                    perch watched them with the same ardent wistfulness with which he was wont to
                    regard them from the door of his little isolated home.</p>
                <pb n="12"/>
                <p>Old Mumè was angry. Her voice had become hoarse, and she
                    was tired of her position in the rain, for the bamboo gave but scant shelter.
                    She shook the tree angrily.</p>
                <p><q>Do not so</q>, entreated the gentle Aoi. <q>See how the tree
                    bends. Take care lest it become angry with us and vent its vengeance upon my
                    son. But, pray you, good Mumè, return to the home and give food and succor to
                    our honorable guest</q>.</p>
                <p>As Mumè shuffled off, her heavy clogs clicking against the
                    pavement, Aoi called up, entreatingly, to the truant:</p>
                <p><q>Ah, Koma, Koma, son, do pray come down</q>.</p>
                <p>But Komazawa, with head thrown backward, was whistling to
                    the clouds. He was very well content, and it pleased him much to be wet through.
                    How long he sat there, whistling softly strange airs and imagining wild and
                    fanciful things, he could not have told, since the passage of time in these days
                    of freedom was a thing which he noted little.</p>
                <pb n="13"/>
                <p>Gradually he became aware that the rain was becoming
                    colder and the sky had darkened. Komazawa looked downward. There was nothing but
                    darkness beneath him. He shivered and shook his little body and head, the hair
                    of which was weighted with rain. Komazawa began to slide downward, feeling the
                    way with his feet and hands. It was quite a journey down. In the darkness he had
                    knocked his little shins against out-jutting broken boughs. He landed with both
                    feet upon something palpitating and soft--something that caught its breath in a
                    sigh, then inclosed him in its arms.</p>
                <p>Komazawa guilty, but not altogether tamed, spoke no words
                    to his mother. He stood stiffly and quietly still while she felt his wetness
                    with her hands. But he threw off the cape in which she endeavored to wrap him.
                    He was obliged to stand on tiptoe to put it back around his mother, and as this
                    was an undignified position, his bravado broke down.</p>
                <pb n="14"/>
                <p>Gradually he nestled up against her, and--strange marvel
                    in Japan!--these two embraced and kissed each other.</p>
                <p>After a while, as they trudged silently clown the street
                    homeward, Komazawa inquired, in a sharp little voice, as he looked up
                    apprehensively at his mother:</p>
                <p><q>And the honorable stranger, mother?</q></p>
                <p>Aoi hesitated. The hand about her son trembled somewhat.
                    His thin little fingers clutched it almost viciously. He flushed angrily.</p>
                <p><q>Why do you not answer me?</q> he asked, with
                    peevishness.</p>
                <p><q>I have not seen the honorable one</q>, said Aoi, gently.</p>
                <p><q>Pah!</q> snapped the boy. <q>No, certainly, and we do not wish
                    to see her. We do not like such bold intrusion</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Nay, son</q>, she reproved, <q>we must not so regard it. Let
                    us remember the words of the good master, the august missionary</q>.</p>
                <p><q>What words?</q> inquired Koma, tart- <pb n="15"/> ly. <q>Why, his
                    excellency does not even know of the coming of the woman, since he is gone three
                    days from Sendai now</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Ah, but my son, do you not remember that he taught us to
                    treat with kindness the stranger within our gates?</q></p>
                <p>Koma made a sound of disapproval, his little, ill-tempered
                    face puckered in a frown. After a moment he inquired again:</p>
                <p><q>But where is the woman, mother?</q> Aoi regarded her small
                    son almost apologetically.</p>
                <p><q>She is within our humble house</q>, she replied.</p>
                <p>Koma pulled his hand from hers with a jerk. For a time he
                    walked beside her in silence. He was strangely old for his years, and already he
                    showed the inheritance of his father’s pride.</p>
                <p><q>Mother</q>, he said, <q>we do not wish the stranger to disturb
                    our home. My father would not have permitted it. We are happy alone together.
                    What do we want with this woman stranger?</q></p>
                <pb n="16"/>
                <p><q>But, my son, she is very ill</q>.</p>
                <p><q>She should have stayed at the honorable tavern. We do not
                    keep a hostelry</q>.</p>
                <p>Aoi sighed.</p>
                <p><q>Well</q>, she said, hopefully, <q>let us bear with her for a
                    little while and afterwards--</q></p>
                <p><q>We will turn her out</q>, quickly finished the boy.</p>
                <p><q>We will entreat her to remain</q>, said Aoi. <q>It would be
                    proper for us to do so. But the stranger will not be lacking in all courtesy.
                    She will not remain</q>.</p>
                <p>They had reached their home. Now they paused on the
                    threshold, the mother regarding the son somewhat appealingly, and he with his
                    sulky head turned from her. Aoi pushed the sliding-doors apart. A gust of wind
                    blew inward, flaring up the light of the dim <foreign xml:lang="ja">andon</foreign> and then extinguishing it.
                    The house was in darkness.</p>
                <p>Suddenly a voice, a piercing, shrill voice, rang out
                    through the silent house.</p>
                <pb n="17"/>
                <p><q>The light, the light!</q> it cried; <q>oh, it is gone,
                    gone!</q></p>
                <p>Koma clutched his mother’s hand with a sudden, tense
                    fear.</p>
                <p><q>The light!</q> he repeated. <q>Quickly, mother; the honorable
                    one fears the darkness. Quickly, the light!</q></p>
            </div>
            
            <div xml:id="owheart_1013" n="3" type="chapter">
                <head>III</head>
                <p>Old Mumè was busily engaged in the kitchen. The milk over
                    the fire had begun to bubble. With a large wooden stick she stirred it. Then she
                    returned to her rice. As she pounded it into flat cakes, her old face, with its
                    hundred wrinkles, was contorted, and she muttered and talked to herself as she
                    worked. She was like some old witch, breathing incantations.</p>
                <p>At the threshold of the room stood Koma. His eyes were
                    very wide open and his cheeks were flushed. At his side his little hands were
                    sharply clinched. His whole attitude betokened excitement and impatience.
                    Suddenly he clapped his hands so loudly and sharply that the old woman started
                    in fright; then catching sight of the little intruder, <pb n="19"/> she hobbled
                    towards him on her heels, her tongue in angry operation.</p>
                <p><q>Now, who but an evil one would frighten an old woman?
                    Shame upon you, naughty one!</q></p>
                <p><q>Oh, Mumè, you are so slow the evil one will catch you.
                    Just see, the milk boils over. Still you do not hasten. Yet the illustrious ones
                    are ill, very ill</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Tsh!</q> scolded the old woman, as she poured the steaming
                    milk into a shallow bowl, and broke pieces of the rice-bread into it. <q>What,
                    would you advise old Mumè about such matters? Would you have me burn the
                    honorable babe?</q></p>
                <p>She cooled the preparation with her hand, fanning it back
                    and forth across the bowl.</p>
                <p>Koma watched her a moment with smouldering eyes. Suddenly
                    he started, his little ears alert and attentive.</p>
                <p>A cry, thin and piping at first, grew in volume. Was it
                    possible that so small a thing could fill the house with its <pb n="20"/> noise? Koma
                    strode to the fire, seized the bowl with both hands, and, before the grumbling
                    old servant could interfere, he was gone with it from the room, and speeding
                    along the hall.</p>
                <p>With his finger-tips on the closed <foreign xml:lang="ja">shoji</foreign> of the
                    guest-chamber he tapped gently. It was softly pushed aside, and Aoi appeared in
                    the opening. Stepping into the hall, she closed the sliding screens behind
                    her.</p>
                <p>The boy spoke in an eager whisper.</p>
                <p><q>Here is the milk the honorable one desired</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Where did you obtain it, son?</q></p>
                <p><q>In the village. And see, we have warmed it, for it was
                    quite cold. It is good goat’s milk</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Such a good son!</q> whispered Aoi, and stooped to kiss the
                    upraised face ere she returned to the sick-chamber.</p>
                <p>Koma crouched down on the floor by the door. He could
                    hear within the soft glide of his mother’s feet across the floor. There was a
                    murmuring of indistin- <pb n="21"/> guishable words. Then that voice, with its strange
                    accent, which seemed to pierce and reach something in the boy.</p>
                <p>The voice was weak now, but its exquisite clearness was
                    not dulled. Then Koma heard the movement of the lifting of the babe; a little
                    cry or two, then little gurgling, satisfied gasps. The babe was being fed with
                    the milk he had procured. It gave Koma a strange satisfaction--a warm delight.
                    He stretched out his little limbs across the floor. He, too, was satisfied. All
                    was now well. Gradually his head drooped backward and Komazawa fell into a
                    slumber.</p>
                <p>Within, the stranger was imparting bits of her history to
                    the sympathetic Aoi. She was hardly conscious of her words, which were spoken
                    through her semi-delirium. Her feverish eyes, wide open, shone up into the
                    bending face of Aoi, and held the Japanese woman with their piteous appeal. She
                    seemed soothed under the gentle touch of Aoi’s hand on her brow.</p>
                <pb n="22"/>
                <p><q>Pray thee to sleep</q>, gently the Japanese woman persuaded
                    her.</p>
                <p>She was quiet a moment, only to start up the next.</p>
                <p><q>Nay</q>, entreated Aoi, <q>sleep first--to-morrow speak.
                    Rest, I pray you</q>.</p>
                <p><q>It was so long, so long!</q> cried the woman on the bed,
                    clasping her thin hands across those on her head. <q>And, oh, the pain, the agony
                    of it all! I was so tired--so--</q></p>
                <p>Her body palpitated and quivered with the sighing sobs
                    that shook her. She sprang up suddenly, pushing away from her the hands of Aoi,
                    which gently attempted to restrain her.</p>
                <p><q>It was all wrong--quite wrong from the first. But what
                    did they care? They had their wedding. Ah, I tell you, they are bad, all bad!
                    Ah, it was cruel, cruel!</q></p>
                <p><q>Ah</q>, thought Aoi, sadly; <q>she, too, has been pierced
                    with anguish. Truly, my heart breaks in sympathy with her</q>.</p>
                <pb n="23"/>
                <p>She bent above the quivering woman, her pitying face
                    close to hers.</p>
                <p><q>Pray thee, dear one, take rest and comfort</q>, she said,
                    smoothing softly her brow.</p>
                <p><q>Ah, you are so good, so good</q>, said the sick woman. <q>You
                    are not like those others--those fearful people</q>. She covered her eyes with her
                    thin hands as if to shut out a vision of some horror. <q>God will bless you, bless
                    you for your goodness to me</q>, she said.</p>
                <p>Exhausted, she lay back among the pillows, her eyes
                    closed. How grateful to her must have felt that great English bed, with its soft
                    coverlets! For how many days had she wandered, without sight or word of her own
                    people! Her thin, fine lips quivered unceasingly, while her blue eyes held a
                    constant mist, seemingly haunted by some troubled spectre that pursued her
                    ceaselessly.</p>
                <p>Once she raised her hands feebly, then plucked at the
                    coverlet with long, white fingers.</p>
                <pb n="24"/>
                <p><q>What a death! oh, what a death!</q> she whispered,
                    faintly.</p>
                <p>After a long silence her voice raised itself to the pitch
                    of one delirious.</p>
                <p><q>If I could see--</q> Her words came slowly and with
                    difficulty, and she repeated them ramblingly. <q>If I could only see--a white
                    face--a white--one of my own people. Oh, so long, and, oh me!--mamma,
                    mamma!</q></p>
                <p><q>Ah, dear lady</q>, said Aoi, <q>if you will but deign to rest
                    I will go forth and endeavor to find some of your people. There are white people
                    in the next town. It is not far--not very far, and perhaps, ah, surely, they
                    will come to you</q>.</p>
                <p><q>My people</q>, the woman repeated. <q>No, no</q>. Her voice
                    became hoarse. She started up in her bed. <q>You do not understand. I must never,
                    never see them again. I could not bear it. They are cruel, wicked. No! Ah, you
                    shall promise me--promise me</q>.</p>
                <p>She fell back, exhausted from her transport of passion.
                    Aoi knelt beside <pb n="25"/>
                    her and took her hands within her own.</p>
                <p><q>I will promise you whatever you wish, dear lady. Only
                    speak your desires to me. I will humbly try to carry them out</q>.</p>
                <p>The sick woman’s voice was so weak that she scarce could
                    raise it above a whisper, but her words were plain.</p>
                <p><q>Promise me that you will not give them my little one
                    when I am gone. You are good, and will be kind to her. Oh, will you not? I would
                    not be happy, I could not rest in peace if she were sent to--to him</q>. Her words
                    rambled off again. <q>I left him</q>, she said, <q>ran away--far away, far away, and
                    the country was all strange to me, and I could not find my way. Every one stared
                    at me; it must have been because I had gone mad, you know, quite mad. All women
                    do. I wanted to put a great distance between us, to get beyond his sight--beyond
                    the sound of his voice, beyond--</q></p>
                <pb n="26"/>
                <p><q>Ah, do not speak more</q>, entreated Aoi, now in
                    tears.</p>
                <p><q>Why, you are crying!</q> said the sick woman, looking
                    wistfully into Aoi’s face. She began to weep, weakly, impotently, herself.</p>
                <p>After a time she became quieter. She started once again,
                    when Aoi had snuffed a few of the lights, seeming to dread the darkness, but
                    when the Japanese woman’s hands reassured her, she was again silent. And as she
                    slept she still clung spasmodically to the hands of Aoi.</p>
            </div>
            
            <div xml:id="owheart_1014" n="4" type="chapter">
                <head>IV</head>
                <p>Morning dawned with a haggard light. Ceaselessly the rain
                    drizzled down. The torpid heat of the previous day had given place to a clammy
                    chilliness. The weather oppressed the sick one. Her restlessness was gone, but
                    passive quiet was more ominous. Her white face seemed to have shrunken through
                    the night--so white and still it was that she seemed scarcely to breathe.</p>
                <p>Too weak to bear the burden of her child against her, the
                    mother permitted the little one to be cared for in an interior room lest its
                    cries might disturb her. All through the day she spoke no word. Wearily, the
                    heavy lids of her eyes were closed.</p>
                <p>As the day began to wane, Aoi, thoroughly alarmed,
                    summoned the vil- <pb n="28"/> lage doctor; a very old and learned man he was considered. He felt the
                    woman’s hands, listened to her breathing with his ear against her lips. Very
                    cold her hands were, but her breathing was regular, though faint.</p>
                <p>The doctor looked grave, solemn, and wise. He shook his
                    bald head ominously.</p>
                <p><q>How long has the honorable one been thus?</q></p>
                <p><q>Since early morn, sir doctor. She awoke from her night
                    sleep only to fall into this condition</q>.</p>
                <p><q>The woman has but a short space of life left to her</q>,
                    said the doctor, solemnly.</p>
                <p>Aoi trembled.</p>
                <p><q>Her people--</q> she began, falteringly. <q>Oh, good sir
                    doctor, it is very, very sad. So young! Ah, so beautiful!</q></p>
                <p>Seeming not to share or understand Aoi’s sympathy, the
                    doctor gathered up his instruments and simples slowly, meanwhile glancing
                    uneasily towards <pb n="29"/>
                    the face of the sick woman. He turned suddenly to Aoi.</p>
                <p><q>Madame</q>, he said, <q>the village sympathizes with you at
                    the infliction placed upon you by this enforced guest, but--</q></p>
                <p><q>You do not finish, sir doctor?</q></p>
                <p><q>The woman became a nuisance at the tavern. The people
                    there were not Kirishitans (Christians), and were moreover in ignorance of the
                    woman’s speech. They could only comprehend that she wished to be taken to some
                    one of her own people--so, madame, you--</q></p>
                <p><q>I, being of her people</q>, said Aoi, with simple dignity,
                    <q>she was brought to me. That was right. I thank my neighbors for their kindness.
                    I am honored, indeed, with such a guest. She is welcome</q>.</p>
                <p>The doctor moved towards the door. <q>And the child? It is
                    well, and will not accompany the mother on her last journey. What will become of
                    it?</q></p>
                <p>Aoi did not reply.</p>
                <pb n="30"/>
                <p><q>If it is desired by you, Madame Aoi</q>, said the doctor,
                    endeavoring to be kind, <q>I will immediately despatch word to the city to send
                    notification to the nearest open port. There, surely, must be some consul, or
                    representative of the woman’s country. To them the child should go</q>.</p>
                <p>Aoi spoke swiftly.</p>
                <p><q>The poor one’s people were unkind to her and cruel. How
                    can we tell but that they might also abuse the child?</q></p>
                <p><q>That is the affair of the child, Madame Aoi. Pray accept
                    my counsel. Send the child--</q></p>
                <p>Interrupted by the sudden entrance of little Komazawa, he
                    did not finish. The boy had evidently heard all, through the thin partition
                    doors, against which he had leaned, listening intently. He thrust himself now
                    before the doctor, with eyes purpled by excitement. His tense little body
                    quivered.</p>
                <p><q>Sir doctor</q>, he said, in a voice new even to his mother,
                    it was so strong <pb n="31"/>
                    and haughty, <q>you make mistake. The child is already among its own people. Here,
                    in my father’s house, all people are Engleesh. So! The child belongs to us,
                    since the mother did present it to us. It is a gift of the good God!</q></p>
                <p>Smiling and frowning together the little doctor bowed
                    ironically to the little fellow facing him.</p>
                <p><q>And will the august one enlighten me as to whether he
                    will make an effort to find the child’s legal guardians?</q></p>
                <p><q>That is our affair, sir doctor, but I will answer. We
                    will ask advice of the good excellency when he returns. He is in Sendai even
                    now. He will be in our village to-night</q>.</p>
                <p>The doctor bowed himself out, and Koma turned to his
                    mother, a question in his eyes. Aoi nodded sadly. The poor white woman would
                    die, had said the sir doctor.</p>
                <p>Komazawa approached the bed softly, until he stood by the
                    woman’s side, looking down fixedly upon her. How <pb n="32"/> white was the
                    still face, how beautiful the long lashes that swept the cheeks, how wonderful
                    and sunlike the silken hair enveloping her head like a halo. Could she be real,
                    this beautiful, still creature? Never had Komazawa seen anything like her. She
                    seemed a spirit of the lingering twilight.</p>
                <p>Suddenly he bent over her and softly touched the small
                    hand that lay outside the coverlet. But soft as was his touch it acted like an
                    electric shock upon the woman. She started and quivered, as her heavy lids
                    lifted. At the little face bending above her she stared. A strange expression
                    came into her face. Her voice was like that of one murmuring in a dream.</p>
                <p><q>A little white boy</q>, she said. <q>A little white--</q></p>
                <p>Her lips were stilled, but a breath, a sigh passed from
                    her as Koma, with a sudden instinctive motion, put his face down to hers. When
                    Aoi gently drew the boy up she found the still, white <pb n="33"/> face softly
                    smiling in the twilight, as though ere she slept she had seen a vision.</p>
                <p>But Komazawa knelt by the bedside, weeping
                    passionately.</p>
            </div>
            
            <div xml:id="owheart_1015" n="5" type="chapter">
                <head>V</head>
                <p>Near the Temple Zuiganjii there is one huge rock, where
                    the Date lords in the feudal days were wont to gather yearly, attended by
                    musicians, and seeking recreation in gay amusements. It is of enormous size, and
                    when the sun’s rays beat upon its white surface it shines like white, polished
                    glass. Flat, embedded in the soil, there is, however, a part of the rock which
                    rises many feet above the level, its out-jutting point resembling the head of
                    some giant sea-monster. Under this jutting head a natural cave has been
                    formed.</p>
                <p>Here, on a summer day, two children were playing
                    together. Far below them the Bay of Matsushima spread out its insistent beauty.
                    Moored to the beach, a few <foreign xml:lang="ja">cho</foreign> below them, was their minia- <pb n="35"/> ture
                    <foreign xml:lang="ja">raft-sampan</foreign>, an old weather-beaten boat, in which they had made their pilgrimage
                    from the village. Behind them were the tombs and the eastern hills. The sunlight
                    slanting upon them was no less golden than these summer foot-hills of the
                    mountains beyond.</p>
                <p>Bareheaded and barelegged the children were, the sandals
                    upon their feet wet, showing how they had paddled in the bay. The boy, a lad of
                    possibly fifteen years, was stretched full length under the shadow of the rock,
                    only his sandalled feet projecting into the sunlight, which he hoped would dry
                    them. His elbows were in the sand, his chin resting upon one arm. He was reading
                    from a very much worn and ragged book, the leaves of which he turned with the
                    utmost care and tenderness.</p>
                <p>The little girl had gradually come from the rock’s
                    shadow, and now squatted at his feet. The sun fell upon her. She was a
                    diminutive, odd little mite. Her hair, a dark shining brown, had been <pb n="36"/> carefully
                    knotted up into a little chignon at the top of her head, but, being wayward by
                    nature, it had escaped the most persistent brushing and the severe pins which
                    held it. It clung around her ears and little neck in soft, damp curls. Her face
                    and hands were russet, sunburned and freckled. Her eyes were large and gray,
                    shading towards blue. She wore but one garment, a little red, ragged <foreign xml:lang="ja">kimono</foreign>,
                    very much frayed at the ends and soaked from her late paddling. Unlike the
                    average Japanese child, the little girl was restless and lacked all sense of
                    repose, an inherent instinct with Japanese children.</p>
                <p>Though the boy had constituted her his audience and was
                    reading aloud to her, she apparently had heard no word of what he had been
                    reading. Having wriggled her way beyond the reach of his hand, she now looked
                    about her for new means of engaging her active little mind. This she discovered
                    in some stalks of grass. Having selected the stiffest blade <pb n="37"/> she could find,
                    she stealthily crept back to the feet of the boy, and first tickled, then
                    pricked his feet with the grass. The natural result followed. The boy’s droning,
                    monotonous voice in reading changed to a sudden, sharp grunt, and he threw up
                    his heels, whereat the little girl burst into a wild, elfish peal of laughter.
                    At the same time she renewed her jabs at the boy’s protesting feet.</p>
                <p>Komazawa, still agitating his heels, closed the book with
                    care, placed it in safety in the sleeve of his <foreign xml:lang="ja">hakama</foreign>, and swung upward, drawing
                    his heels under him beyond the reach of his naughty tormentor.</p>
                <p>With assumed gravity he regarded the small rogue before
                    him.</p>
                <p><q>Something bitten you, yes?</q> she inquired, keeping her
                    distance from him and hugging her knees up to her chin.</p>
                <p>Koma nodded, silently.</p>
                <p><q>What?</q> she inquired. <q>What was that bitten you,
                    Koma?</q></p>
                <p><q>Gnat!</q> said the boy, briefly.</p>
                <pb n="38"/>
                <p><q>Gnat?</q> She crept a few paces nearer to him, and peered
                    up into his face.</p>
                <p><q>Yes--gnat</q>, he repeated, <q>bad devil gnat</q>.</p>
                <p>The expression on the little girl’s face was involved.
                    How was it possible for any one ever to know just what Komazawa meant when his
                    face was so grave and smileless. She had an odd little trick of glancing up at
                    one sideways under her eyelashes. She peeped up at Koma now for some time in
                    this manner. Her mirth had changed to a matter of speculation. Did or did not
                    Koma know what had bitten him? He had said it was a gnat. Her intelligence was
                    not sufficiently developed to include the possibility that he might have meant
                    her for the gnat. She ventured:</p>
                <p><q>Did you see that gnat bite you?</q></p>
                <p><q>Yes, twice</q>.</p>
                <p>Her eves became wide.</p>
                <p><q>Where is it gone?</q> she inquired, breathlessly.</p>
                <p><q>Still there</q>, was his reply.</p>
                <pb n="39"/>
                <p><q>Where?</q> She started, actually frightened. Koma’s voice
                    and air of mystery began to work upon her active imagination. What was a gnat,
                    anyway? And if one had actually bitten Komazawa, might it not also bite her? By
                    this time she had entirely forgotten her own attacks with the grass blade. She
                    was close to Koma now, her hands upon his arm, her upraised eyes searching his
                    face.</p>
                <p><q>What is a gnat, Komazawa?</q></p>
                <p><q>Bad little insect</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Oh! Does it bite?</q></p>
                <p><q>Yes</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Did it also bite you?</q></p>
                <p><q>Three times</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Oh!</q> A palpitating pause. Then:</p>
                <p><q>Will it bite me,too?</q></p>
                <p><q>Maybe</q>.</p>
                <p>She crept completely into his arms, shielding herself
                    with his sleeves.</p>
                <p><q>Where is it--that bad gnat?</q></p>
                <p><q>Here</q>. He pointed at her with an index-finger.</p>
                <pb n="40"/>
                <p><q>Here!</q> She gave a little scream. <q>On my face!</q></p>
                <p>She was a small bundle of pricked nerves, frightened at a
                    shadow of her own making. Komazawa relented, and pressed her little, fluttering
                    face against his own.</p>
                <p><q>There--foolish one! No; there is nothing on your face.
                    You are the gnat I meant</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Me!</q> She drew back a pace. <q>But I am not an insect!</q></p>
                <p><q>Little bit like one</q>, said Koma, a smile of sunshine
                    replacing his affected gravity a moment since.</p>
                <p>His small companion sat up stiffly, half indignant, half
                    curious.</p>
                <p><q>How’m I like unto an insect gnat?</q></p>
                <p><q>Gnat jumps--this way, that, every way. So you do so.
                    Can’t sit still, listen to beautiful stories</q>.</p>
                <p><q>I don’t like those kind stories. Like better stories
                    about ghosts and--</q></p>
                <p><q>Oh, you always get afraid of such stories, screaming
                    like sea-gull</q>.</p>
                <pb n="41"/>
                <p><q>Yes, but all same, I like to do that--like to hear such
                    stories--like also get frightened and scream</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Gnat also bites--bites foot, same as you do</q>.</p>
                <p><q>That don’t hurt</q>, she said, her eyes askance. Then,
                    repeating her words, questioningly, <q>That don’t hurt?</q></p>
                <p><q>Oh yes, it does, certainly. What do you suppose I got to
                    keep my feet under me now for?</q></p>
                <p>Her little bosom heaved.</p>
                <p><q>Let me see those foots, Komazawa</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Too sore</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Oh, Komazawa!</q></p>
                <p>Her eyes were beginning to fill. He thrust his two feet
                    out quickly.</p>
                <p><q>No, no; they are all right</q>.</p>
                <p>Her face was aglow again in an instant.</p>
                <p><q>Oh, I love you, my Koma</q>, she said. <q>I only pretend hurt
                    your honorable foots</q>.</p>
                <p><q>That’s right. Now, you fix your hands so</q>. He
                    illustrated, doubling his <pb n="42"/> own hands into fists, then doubling hers also.</p>
                <p><q>That’s right. Make hand good and hard. So! Now you hit
                    hard against those feet. So!</q></p>
                <p>He brought her little, closed fist down hard with his own
                    hand on his offending foot. The little girl became pale. Her lips quivered. She
                    began to sob.</p>
                <p>Koma lifted her in his arms, jumped her on his shoulder,
                    and carried her down to the beach, soothing her as he walked.</p>
                <p><q>That’s just little punishment for me; punishment for
                    teasing little sister</q>, said Koma, laughing quietly. <q>That don’t hurt. You going
                    to laugh soon? You just little gnat! That’s so? You bite just little bit. I am
                    big dog. I bite big</q>.</p>
                <p>He set her in the boat.</p>
                <p><q>Such a foolish little gnat</q>, he said, <q>always
                    cry--always laugh. Like these waters--sometimes jump--sometimes lie still</q>.</p>
                <pb xml:id="owheart_130243" n="42a"/>
                <figure>
                    <head><q>KOMA LIFTED HER IN HIS ARM</q></head>
                    <!--<graphic url="owheartill42.jpg"/>-->

                    <figDesc>Illustration included in Watanna’s <hi style="font-style:italic;">The Heart of
                            Hyacinth</hi>.</figDesc>
                </figure>
                <pb n="43"/>
                <p>Standing in the boat he pushed it out into the bay with
                    the large pole which served as a sort of paddling oar.</p>
                <p>He smiled back over his shoulder at her. <q>Ah, the wind go
                    blowing us home so quick. Now you smile once more. Good! Sun come up again!</q></p>
                <p>He had been speaking to her in English, idiomatic, but
                    clear. Now he broke into Japanese song. His voice was round and large, full and
                    sweet for one so young. It seemed to ring out across the bay, and float back to
                    them from the echoing hills.</p>
            </div>
            
            <div xml:id="owheart_1016" n="6" type="chapter">
                <head>VI</head>
                <p><q>Alas!</q> said Madame Aoi, as she brushed, with long
                    hopeless strokes, the rippling hair of little Hyacinth. <q>Alas! no use try to
                    keep you nice. Look at those hands--so brown like little boy’s--and that neck
                    and face!</q></p>
                <p>Hyacinth sat upon the weekly chair of torture. Her little
                    russet face had been scrubbed till it shone. Her hair was being brushed
                    uncomfortably smooth with water, to prepare it for being twisted up in a pyramid
                    on her head. Had she been a properly regulated Japanese child, one such
                    hair-dressing a month would have sufficed. But, as a rule, she had scarcely
                    escaped from under the painstaking hands of Aoi before she managed to shake
                    down, or at least <pb n="45"/> loosen, the beautiful glossy coiffure upon her head.</p>
                <p>Cleaning-day, Hyacinth dreaded. Though Koma had taught
                    her to swim in the bay like a veritable little duck, it is sad to relate that
                    the little girl despised water which was thrown upon her for the purpose of
                    removing that dirt, the inevitable portion of a child who plays continually in
                    the open and burrows in beach sand.</p>
                <p>So now, restless, rebellious, and miserable, anything but
                    the usual passive little Japanese girl, she squirmed under the hands of Aoi.</p>
                <p>The day was Sunday, a red-letter day for Aoi. The
                    mission-house on the hill opened its doors to its tiny congregation upon this
                    day. Hence Aoi prepared her little family against this weekly event, and poor
                    Hyacinth was the chief subject of torture. Koma’s hair grew in a short, smooth
                    mass, which required no brushing or twisting. Also, he had reached an age when
                    he had wholly graduated <pb n="46"/> from his mother’s hands and was competent to effect his
                    own toilet. But he was forced to sit in the chamber of horrors during the time
                    that his sister was undergoing the weekly operation, since, were his presence
                    removed, it would have been impossible to manage or control the restless
                    child.</p>
                <p><q>There!</q> exclaimed Aoi, as she placed the last pin in the
                    child’s head. <q>Now, that is fine. Been good child to-day</q>.</p>
                <p>Hyacinth slid down from the small stool, lingered in
                    discontent on the floor a moment, then, with an expression of childish
                    resignation, rose to her feet and stood silently awaiting further operations
                    upon her.</p>
                <p>Aoi lightly wafted a little powder towards her face and
                    neck; then removed it with a soft cloth. The tanned skin appeared whitened and
                    softened. Then she dressed her little charge in a fresh crepe <foreign xml:lang="ja">kimono</foreign>--a
                    red-flowered <foreign xml:lang="ja">kimono</foreign> it was--tied a purple <foreign xml:lang="ja">obi</foreign> about it with a huge bow behind,
                    placed a flower orna- <pb n="47"/> ment in the side of her hair, and Hyacinth’s toilet was
                    completed.</p>
                <p>Her appearance did credit to the labor of Aoi. She seemed
                    such a bewitching, quaint little figure--her face, piquantly pretty, her hair
                    shining, the red flower ornament matching her little red cheeks and lips. A
                    moment later, too, the discontent and restlessness had quite fled from her face,
                    for Koma had seized her the instant of her release and given her an enormous
                    hug, to the palpitating anxiety of Aoi, who besought him to be careful not to
                    disturb the elegance of her hair and gown.</p>
                <p><q>Now</q>, she told them, <q>go sit at the door like good
                    children. Keep very still. Soon your mother will also be ready</q>.</p>
                <p>Aoi expended less pains upon her own person. Her hair
                    erection needed no re-dressing. She changed her cotton <foreign xml:lang="ja">kimono</foreign> for a very elegant
                    silken one, powdered her face lightly in a trice, and a moment later was at the
                    door, anxiously looking about for the children.</p>
                <pb n="48"/>
                <p>She was still a young woman, so pretty that it was hard
                    to believe her the mother of a boy of sixteen. Her figure was slight and
                    girlish, her face unmarked by any trace of age, save that the eyes were sad and
                    anxious and the lips had a tendency to quiver pathetically. She fluttered down
                    the little garden-path, looking right and left for the truants.</p>
                <p>She discovered them bending over the great well in the
                    garden.</p>
                <p><q>See</q>, said little Hyacinth. <q>There’s big cherry-tree in
                    well, and little girl under it, also</q>.</p>
                <p>Aoi looked at the reflection, lingered a moment, smiling
                    pensively at the three faces in the water, then drew them away.</p>
                <p><q>Come</q>, she said. <q>Listen; those temple bells already are
                    beginning to ring. We shall be late and disgrace his excellency</q>.</p>
                <p>She opened a large paper parasol, and with Koma holding
                    her sleeve on one side and Hyacinth on the other, they <pb n="49"/> tripped up the
                    hill to the little mission church.</p>
                <p>They were late, as usual, to the extreme humiliation of
                    Aoi, who shrank to the most obscure corner possible in the church. She gave one
                    anxious, fluttering glance about her, shook her head at the restless Hyacinth,
                    then very simply and naturally lifted her little, thin voice in singing with the
                    rest of this strange congregation.</p>
                <p>The old missionary at his stand, who had seen her
                    entrance, beamed benignly upon her from over his spectacles. Though so old, his
                    voice could be heard loud and clear, leading his little flock in their hymn of
                    invocation.</p>
                <p>The service was exceedingly simple. A reading from a
                    Japanese translation of the Bible, a few announcements by the old pastor, then
                    an address by a thin, curious-looking stranger, the new assistant of the
                    missionary. After that followed the offerings, to which every one in the church
                    contributed, even the chil- <pb n="50"/> dren, then a sweet hymn, a solemn word of benediction,
                    and church was over.</p>
                <p>How strangely like the church in his own home in far-away
                    England was this little mission-house to the old minister! These gentle people
                    had labored to erect this house on the plan he had described to them. They
                    lifted up the same voices in melodious hymns of praise to the same Creator.
                    Their eyes looked up to their leader with the same profound devotion. Yes,
                    surely, he had done right in the desertion of that small pastorate in England,
                    which a hundred ministers could fill. Here lay his true work--the fruits of his
                    labors. This had become his home.</p>
                <p>So down the aisle he went, followed by his new
                    assistant--with a word and a smile, and a hearty grip of the hand for each and
                    all of his little band.</p>
                <p>Aoi stood in the little pew, her face turned towards him,
                    wistfully expectant. Even the restless Hyacinth peered at him with sombre,
                    quieted gaze.</p>
                <pb n="51"/>
                <p><q>Ah</q>, he said, <q>Mrs. Montrose and Koma. How is my little
                    girl?</q> and he patted Hyacinth upon the head.</p>
                <p>The new minister stared with some surprise at the two
                    children, then looked questioningly at the old missionary. He was listening
                    attentively and with old-fashioned courtesy to the words of the anxious Aoi.</p>
                <p><q>Is it not yet time, excellency? The boy is growing
                    beyond me. What is to be done? I have taught him all the words I myself know of
                    the English language, but, alas! I am very ignorant, and my tongue trips and
                    halts</q>.</p>
                <p>The missionary glanced gravely and thoughtfully at Koma,
                    who was engaged in whispering to the inquisitive Hyacinth. The latter was
                    intently engrossed in regarding the pale and anemic face of the new
                    minister.</p>
                <p><q>He seems such a boy--such a child</q>, said the old
                    missionary, <q>I think you have done well by him, and it certainly <pb n="52"/> was wise to keep
                    him from the schools in Sendai</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Ah, excellency</q>, said Aoi, <q>he merely looks like a
                    child. He is, indeed, much older than he appears. Was he not always old for his
                    age? It is merely his constant association with the tiny one which causes him to
                    appear so young</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Well</q>, said the missionary, <q>we must think about it. I
                    will talk it over with Mr. Blount</q>. He indicated his assistant, who bowed
                    quietly.</p>
                <p>Aoi appeared troubled.</p>
                <p><q>Excellency</q>, she said, <q>it was the will of his august
                    father that he should see something of the world when he should have attained to
                    years of manhood</q>.</p>
                <p>The missionary nodded thoughtfully.</p>
                <p><q>I will give you my opinion to-morrow--to-morrow
                    evening</q>, he said. <q>The matter requires serious reflection</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Thank you</q>, she murmured, grate- <pb n="53"/> fully. <q>You are
                    so good the gods will bless you</q>.</p>
                <p>Thus, even within the house of the new religion, poor Aoi
                    let slip from her lips that almost unconscious faith in the gods of her
                    childhood.</p>
            </div>
            
            <div xml:id="owheart_1017" n="7" type="chapter">
                <head>VII</head>
                <p>Twilight falls slowly and tenderly in Matsushima. The
                    trees, which spread out their arms over the waters, seem but to deepen their
                    shadows and gradually become part of the creeping silver shadow of night. For
                    night is scarcely dark here in the summer. The noon-rays are perpetual. The
                    stars shine with an unusual lustre. Earth reflects the light of the moon and the
                    stars upon its shimmering waters, its deep blue fields, its blossom-decked
                    trees. The pebbles on the shore become whiter, and the whiteness of the sands
                    deepens the green of the pines. Night is but one long twilight, slumberous and
                    peaceful in fair Matsushima.</p>
                <p>When the numerous candles are lighted in the temples on
                    the hills, slanting <pb n="55"/> out their glimmer upon the bewildered waters, one might
                    almost wonder whether the stars have changed their place and descended like
                    spirits to render more fairy-like this Princess of Bays.</p>
                <p>An oddly assorted group of five people occupied a
                    secluded spot on the shore. The influence of the night was upon them as they
                    gazed out with seeing eyes that reflected the beauty of the scene and the
                    emotions that tore at their hearts. A mother and two children--one, whose boy
                    soul had only begun to open into a graver manhood, the other a child of seven.
                    But seven years old was Hyacinth, yet in the child’s little face shone the
                    restless, passionate nature of one old enough to feel an infinity of suffering.
                    She it was who helplessly sobbed as they stood there by the bay--sobbed with an
                    effort at strangulation, and who gazed not alone at the magic of the scene, but
                    upward into the face of Komazawa.</p>
                <p>One of the ministers broke the painful <pb n="56"/> silence. An
                    eager, odd, and somewhat nervous young man he appeared.</p>
                <p><q>Dear friend</q>, he said, addressing the boy Koma, <q>it will
                    be much for the best. Our good friend here agrees with me in believing that it
                    is your duty to follow the wishes of your father</q>.</p>
                <p>Koma did not reply, but little Hyacinth raised a face of
                    turbulent scorn towards the speaker. She did not speak, but contented herself
                    with clasping the hand of Koma the tighter, pressing her face close against
                    it.</p>
                <p><q>Possibly it might be as well to put off for a year--</q>
                    began the elder missionary, hesitatingly. Aoi interrupted:</p>
                <p><q>Nay, excellency, the humble one agrees with the
                    illustrious one. My lord’s son has come to manhood. It is time now that he
                    should leave us</q>, her voice faltered--<q>for a season</q>, she added, softly.</p>
                <p>The Reverend Mr. Blount bowed gravely.</p>
                <p><q>I am glad, madame</q>, he said, <q>to <pb n="57"/> find that your
                    views coincide with mine. Your son is--er--first of all more English than
                    Japanese</q>.</p>
                <p>Koma stirred uneasily. He opened his lips as though about
                    to speak, then closed them and turned his face towards the speaker.</p>
                <p><q>He is, in fact, one of us</q>, continued the minister. <q>He
                    has the physical appearance, somewhat of the training, and, let us hope, the
                    natural instincts of the Caucasian. It would be not only ludicrous but wicked
                    for him to continue here in this isolated spot, where he is, may we say, an
                    alien, and particularly when it is his duty to follow the wishes of his father
                    as regards his English estate. Certainly this is not where Komazawa
                    belongs</q>.</p>
                <p><q>I do not agree with you, excellency</q>, said Koma, with a
                    queer accent. <q>This is, indeed, my home. Do not, I beg you, be deceived in that
                    matter. It is true that I am also Engleesh, but, ah, I am not so base to deny my
                    other blood. <pb n="58"/> Is
                    it not so good, excellency? Could I despise this land of my birth, my honorable,
                    dear home?</q></p>
                <p><q>Nay, son</q>, interposed the agitated Aoi, <q>his excellency
                    meant no reflection upon our Japan. But, oh, my son, you would not rebel against
                    the will of your father?</q></p>
                <p><q>No</q>, said Koma, clinching his hands at his side, <q>I
                    would not</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Then you will go to this England, like a good son. The
                    time has come</q>.</p>
                <p>Koma remained plunged in gloomy thought.</p>
                <p>After a moment he lifted his head and looked at the elder
                    missionary.</p>
                <p><q>How do we know the time has come?</q></p>
                <p><q>Because, my son, you have arrived at the years of
                    manhood</q>.</p>
                <p><q>I am but sixteen years</q>.</p>
                <p>The younger minister answered, quickly:</p>
                <p><q>It will require four or five years, at least, in England
                    to learn the language and ways of your people thoroughly</q>.</p>
                <pb n="59"/>
                <p><q>I already speak that language</q>, said Koma, flushing
                    darkly. <q>Do I not, sir excellency?</q></p>
                <p><q>No and yes. You have been brought up to speak the
                    language. It is intelligible, but queer--wrong, somehow. You speak your father’s
                    language like a foreigner</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Very well</q>, agreed Koma, bitterly. <q>Let us admit that.
                    But may I inquire whether it will be necessary for me to go all the way to
                    England to learn that language?</q></p>
                <p><q>Well, yes. Four years in an English school will do much
                    for you</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Four years; and when those four years are ended I still
                    will lack one year from my majority</q>.</p>
                <p><q>That’s right</q>, said the missionary. <q>In England one
                    attains one’s majority at twenty-one. So you would have a year in which to
                    return, if you wish it, to Japan, previous to settling in England</q>.</p>
                <p><q>I do not know if I shall ever do that</q>, said the boy,
                    sadly.</p>
                <pb n="60"/>
                <p><q>It was the wish of your father</q>, said Aoi,
                    pathetically.</p>
                <p><q>Yes, it was his wish</q>, repeated Koma. <q>Yet I will come
                    back each year</q>.</p>
                <p><q>That is right</q>, said the old minister, patting him on
                    the shoulder.</p>
                <p><q>Your father never came back</q>, said Aoi, sighing
                    wistfully.</p>
                <p><q>It would be entirely out of the question for you to
                    return each year. Be advised by me, Komazawa; I have your interest at heart</q>,
                    said the young minister, earnestly. <q>Stay in England four years, then return and
                    visit your mother and sister</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Let the good excellency decide for us</q>, said Aoi,
                    glancing appealingly at her old friend. He drew his brows together.</p>
                <p><q>Wait till the time comes to decide that</q>, he concluded.
                    <q>If the boy is old enough to leave home, he is of an age, also, to choose what
                    he shall do. Let us not attempt to curb him</q>.</p>
            </div>
            
            <div xml:id="owheart_1018" n="8" type="chapter">
                <head>VIII</head>
                <p>The new missionary assumed that Hyacinth was the sister
                    of Komazawa. His interest in her was less than in Komazawa, since the boy was
                    his father’s heir. Possibly, too, this might have been because of the natural
                    antagonism with which the little girl had from the first met his overtures to
                    her. From the moment when she became acutely aware that the new minister was
                    practically responsible for the departure of her beloved Koma, the child
                    conceived a violent dislike for him.</p>
                <p>When the old minister, worn with his years of labor,
                    quietly resigned his pastorate into the hands of his successor, and the new
                    minister had taken up the management of the little church, Hyacinth refused
                    henceforth even to <pb n="62"/> enter the mission-house. All the entreaties and threats of Aoi were in vain,
                    and, with Koma gone, she soon realized the fruitlessness of attempting to force
                    her to do anything against her will. Comprehending the turbulent nature of the
                    child, she knew that Hyacinth would only disgrace them both if she were forced
                    into the church. So the departure of Komazawa meant at least the Sunday freedom
                    of Hyacinth.</p>
                <p>Nor was this the only result. The child, whose strange,
                    independent nature had never been controlled by any one save by Koma, now that
                    he was gone broke all restraints. She wandered at will about the bay, hiding in
                    hollows in the rocks among the tombs when they sought to find her. Her little
                    vagabond existence was not unlike that which Koma himself had led in his early
                    childhood, save that she was not so easily restrained by the reproaches of Aoi.
                    Like him, at this time, she scorned the companionship of other children. Like
                    him she wan- <pb n="63"/>
                    dered away from her home in fits and starts, passive for an interval, and then
                    bursting all bounds and disappearing sometimes for the space of an entire day or
                    night, to return ragged and ravenously hungry.</p>
                <p>But when the winter came, and the snow and icicles
                    crested the trees and whitened the hills, poor Hyacinth was like a little,
                    languishing, caged bird. Her face grew wistful and mournful. She would remain
                    for hours with her face pressed against the street <foreign xml:lang="ja">shoji</foreign>, staring out into the
                    white, cold world that bounded the horizon on all sides. If you had asked her
                    what she was waiting for, she would have replied:</p>
                <p><q>I am waiting for the summer, for the summer brings Koma.
                    He has promised</q>.</p>
                <p>Yet when the summer came no Koma returned with the
                    flowers and the sun.</p>
                <p>Little Hyacinth grew accustomed to her solitude. The
                    following year she came under the new edict of education, <pb n="64"/> compulsory
                    everywhere in Japan, and, in spite of her protests, was forced into school with
                    a half-score of Japanese children of her own age.</p>
                <p>At first she regarded with a fierce detestation the
                    school and all connected with it. Did not the <foreign xml:lang="ja">sensei</foreign> (teacher), on the very
                    first day, perch his spectacles upon his nose, and, drawing her by the sleeve to
                    one side, examine her with the curiosity he would have bestowed upon some small
                    animal. The children eyed her askance. One or two of the larger ones pointed at
                    her hair, and, laughing shrilly, called her a strange name. If familiarity
                    breeds contempt it also breeds toleration with the young. Hyacinth in the
                    beginning had merely excited the curiosity, not the antipathy, of the Japanese
                    teacher and his scholars. But as time passed they became accustomed to the
                    difference between her and themselves. Gradually she slipped into being regarded
                    and treated as one of them.</p>
                <pb n="65"/>
                <p>Then Hyacinth’s small, lonesome soul expanded to stretch
                    out timid though passionate glad hands of comradeship to all the world. She
                    became a favorite, the very life and soul of the school. Japanese children are
                    painfully docile and passive. Never were such strange spirits infused into a
                    Japanese class before.</p>
                <p>So the years passed, not unhappily, for Hyacinth. Koma at
                    the end of the second year was a mere memory, at the end of the third he was
                    forgotten--wholly forgotten. Such is the fickle mind of a child of the nature of
                    Hyacinth.</p>
                <p>The fourth year brought him back to Matsushima. He had
                    become very tall, taller than any of the inhabitants of Sendai he seemed, quite
                    a head over them. He wore strange and unpleasant-looking clothes, such as those
                    worn by the Reverend Mr. Blount, who was disliked as heartily as his predecessor
                    had been beloved.</p>
                <p>Koma was now an object of the great<pb n="66"/>est curiosity to
                    Hyacinth. At first his strange appearance in the house frightened her into
                    speechlessness. Never had she seen in all her minute experience such a
                    strange-apparelled being, save, of course, the <q>abominable Blount</q>. In concert
                    with the small children of the neighborhood, and in spite of the remonstrances
                    of Aoi, Hyacinth would shout strange names whenever the gaunt figure of the
                    white missionary appeared. <q>Forn debbil! Clistian!</q>--such were the names this
                    little Caucasian bestowed upon the representative of her race.</p>
                <p>She had become the most utter little backslider, if she
                    could ever have been considered a member of the church. Respect and awe for the
                    teachings of a careful and pious <foreign xml:lang="ja">Shinto</foreign> teacher, and association with a score of
                    <foreign xml:lang="ja">Shinto</foreign> children, had had their due effect upon Hyacinth, and the influence of
                    Aoi waned with the years. Little if anything of the ethics of the two religions
                    did she understand, but to her the gods were bright, beaute- <pb n="67"/> ous beings,
                    whose temples were glittering gold, and whose priests kept them fragrant with
                    incense and beaming lights by night. The mission-house was empty, ugly, dark,
                    and damp--so it seemed to her--and an odious man, with terrible, long hairs
                    falling from his chin, shouted and gesticulated to a congregation which often
                    wept and groaned in unison.</p>
                <p>The small children shouted derisively and often threw
                    stones at the <q>abominable Blount</q> when in little groups together. But when one
                    of their number met the minister alone, he would run from him in a sheer agony
                    of fright.</p>
                <p>So when Komazawa returned to Sendai, clad in the garments
                    worn by the missionary, Hyacinth regarded him with mingled feelings of terror
                    and fascination.</p>
                <p>Though he made ceaseless efforts to speak to her, she
                    could not be brought to utter one word in response. His every movement mystified
                    her. She would sit on the floor through an entire <pb n="68"/> meal watching
                    him with wide eyes while he ate in a fashion she had never seen or heard of
                    before.</p>
                <p>Koma had discarded the chop-sticks, and now used, to the
                    extreme joy and agitation of Aoi, great silver knives and forks, which she
                    brought forth from a mysterious recess, which even the inquisitive Hyacinth had
                    never discovered before.</p>
                <p>Koma, distressed over the change in his little playmate,
                    sought to win her friendship with presents purchased in England, boxes of
                    strange sweetmeats--at least he told her they were sweetmeats. But they were
                    coated with a black-brown covering which the little girl regarded suspiciously.
                    She pushed almost fearfully from her the harmless chocolate drops. The
                    sugar-coated biscuits tempted her to touch one with the tip of her tongue, but
                    she retreated the next moment when she found the red coloring upon her
                    fingers.</p>
                <p>Koma regarded the girl with an ex <pb n="69"/> pression half
                    whimsical, half tragical, and, turning to his mother, said:</p>
                <p><q>Why, the little one is even more Japanese than I</q>.</p>
                <p>Aoi nodded her head, smiling tenderly at the flushing
                    face of Hyacinth.</p>
                <p><q>Will you not even speak to Komazawa?</q> she inquired,
                    reproachfully. <q>Why, that is not kind. Do you not love your august brother?</q></p>
                <p>As Hyacinth made no response, Koma held out his hands to
                    her.</p>
                <p><q>Come here, little one</q>, he said, bending to her till his
                    face was quite close to hers.</p>
                <p>Her fascinated eyes wandered from his strange apparel to
                    his face. His eyes held hers with their strong, tender, reassuring expression.
                    Half unconsciously she went closer to him.</p>
                <p><q>Do you not remember me, then?</q> he queried, in a soft
                    voice, whose reproachful tones thrilled the girl.</p>
                <p>Wistfully she approached him still closer, only to
                    retreat in panic the next <pb n="70"/> moment. She was like a little wild bird, shy and
                    fearful, yet half anxious to make friends with a strange being.</p>
                <p>Suddenly she began to cry, drawing her sleeve across her
                    eyes and turning her face to the wall. She could not have told why she wept. Was
                    it fear, childish conscience, or a slow recognition of her old, beloved Koma,
                    whose name had become but a word to her?</p>
                <p>If she remembered Koma at all, the memory bore no
                    resemblance to this tall man-boy who had returned so suddenly to their home. To
                    her he seemed a stranger, a fearful intruder.</p>
                <p>Hurt to the quick, Madame Aoi whispered to her son. He
                    arose without a word and disappeared into his room. Fifteen minutes later,
                    Hyacinth, playing with a regiment of Japanese doll soldiers on the floor, having
                    forgotten all her tears of a few minutes since, leaped to her feet suddenly,
                    with a strange, little cry.</p>
                <p>There in the middle of the room she <pb xml:id="owheart_130379" n="70a"/><figure>
                    <head><q>NOW, COME, LITTLE ONE: COME, GIVE ME THAT
                        WELCOME HOME</q></head>
                        <!--<graphic url="owheartill70.jpg"/>-->

                        <figDesc>Illustration included in Watanna’s <hi style="font-style:italic;">The Heart of
                                Hyacinth</hi>.</figDesc>
                    </figure><pb n="71"/> stood,
                    holding tightly in her hand her doll, and staring, as if fascinated by the
                    smiling figure on the threshold. It was the same stranger surely, yet, ah, not
                    the same. A few minutes had wrought such a change in his appearance. He had
                    discarded the heavy, dark, mysterious clothes. He appeared like any other
                    Japanese youth, save that he was much taller, and his face smiled down upon the
                    little girl with an expression whose power she had been unable to resist even
                    when he had worn those outlandish garments. He called to her, softly.</p>
                <p><q>Now, come, little one; come, give me that welcome
                    home</q>.</p>
                <p>Her hand unclinched, the doll dropped to the floor. With
                    a sudden impulse she ran blindly towards him, and he caught her in his arms with
                    a great hug, which was as familiar to her as life itself.</p>
            </div>
            
            <div xml:id="owheart_1019" n="9" type="chapter">
                <head>IX</head>
                <p>It was late in December, the time of Great Snow. Komazawa
                    was still in Sendai, and Hyacinth had been taken from the school. She was now
                    twelve years of age, still undeveloped in body and childish in mind.</p>
                <p>Hyacinth, like most impressionable children, had quickly
                    succumbed to the influence of the school-teacher. In his hands she had yielded
                    like plaster to the sculptor. Out of crude, almost wild, material had been
                    developed what seemed on the surface an admirable example of a Japanese
                    child.</p>
                <p>Komazawa, fresh from four years of training at an English
                    school and intimate association with English students and professors, now set
                    about the task <pb n="73"/>
                    of undermining all that the <foreign xml:lang="ja">sensei</foreign> had taught Hyacinth.</p>
                <p>This was no light task. Hyacinth could not unlearn in a
                    few months that which had practically become ingrained. Quite useless it was,
                    therefore, for Komazawa to seek to turn the child’s mind to a new and alien
                    point of view, when, too, this view-point was, in a measure, an acquired thing
                    with Koma himself. Yet he was patient, and labored unceasingly.</p>
                <p>No; the people in the West were not all savages and
                    barbarians.</p>
                <p><q>Did they not look like the Reverend Blount?</q> would
                    inquire his small pupil.</p>
                <p><q>Yes, somewhat like him</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Ah, then, they perhaps were not savages, but they
                    certainly were monsters</q>.</p>
                <p><q>No; they are very fine people--high, great</q>.</p>
                <p><q>But only monsters and evil spirits have hair growing
                    from the chin and awful, blue-glass eyes</q>, protested Hyacinth.</p>
                <pb n="74"/>
                <p>Whereupon Koma quietly brought a small mirror from his
                    room, held it before her face, and bade her look within.</p>
                <p>She stared curiously and somewhat timorously.</p>
                <p><q>What do you see?</q> he inquired, quietly.</p>
                <p><q>Little girl</q>, she said, in a faint voice.</p>
                <p><q>Yes, and what color are her eyes?</q></p>
                <p>The eyes within the glass became enlarged with
                    excitement. The lips parted. Hyacinth put her face close to the glass.</p>
                <p><q>They are blue, also</q>, she said, shrinking.</p>
                <p><q>Very well, then. You, also, have blue eyes,
                    Hyacinth</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Me!</q> She stared up at him, aghast.</p>
                <p><q>Certainly. Is not the little girl in the glass you?</q></p>
                <p><q>No!</q> Her dilated eyes strained at the glass, then looked
                    behind it and about her. She could see no other little girl in the room. There
                    was only that <pb n="75"/>
                    face in the shining glass, with its blue, shiny eyes. With spasmodic working of
                    features, she regarded it.</p>
                <p><q>This is you--certainly</q>, repeated Koma, pointing to the
                    reflection.</p>
                <p>An uncanny fear took possession of the little girl.
                    Suddenly she raised her hand, knocking the glass from that of Koma.</p>
                <p><q>That’s not me. No! That’s lie. I am here--here! That’s
                    not me</q>.</p>
                <p>She burst into a passion of tears.</p>
                <p>Raising the glass, Koma put it aside. He sought his
                    mother immediately, and, with concern and perplexity in his face, told her of
                    the incident of the mirror.</p>
                <p><q>Hyacinth was frightened--yes, actually afraid of the
                    mirror. What can be the matter?</q></p>
                <p><q>That is only natural</q>, said Aoi. <q>And I am much
                    distressed that you should have frightened her with the glass</q>.</p>
                <p><q>But why should it affright her?</q></p>
                <pb n="76"/>
                <p><q>Because she has never seen one before</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Never seen a mirror before?</q></p>
                <p><q>No. It is only of late years that they have come to
                    Sendai, my son</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Why, the mirror is as old as the nation</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Oh, son, but not for general use. Until recent years
                    they were regarded as things of mystery, and were very precious and
                    priceless</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Yet as a child I had often seen my father’s mirror. Our
                    house contains one, does it not?</q></p>
                <p><q>True; but it is locked away in our secret panel</q>.</p>
                <p><q>But why?</q></p>
                <p>Aoi hesitated.</p>
                <p><q>It was, perhaps, a useless custom, my son. But in my
                    younger days maidens were not permitted to see their own faces. The mirror was
                    for the married woman only. Thus, a maiden was saved from being vain of her
                    beauty</q>.</p>
                <p>Koma frowned impatiently.</p>
                <pb n="77"/>
                <p><q>A useless and foolish custom, truly. And now, here in
                    these enlightened times, you put it into practice with Hyacinth. Why, you are
                    prolonging the customs of the ancients here in this house, which should be an
                    example of the new and enlightened age</q>.</p>
                <p>Meekly Aoi bowed her head.</p>
                <p><q>You are honorably right, my son; yet there was another
                    reason why the mirror was kept from the sight of the little one</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Yes?</q></p>
                <p><q>How could I blast the little one’s life by letting her
                    know of--of her peculiar physical misfortunes?</q></p>
                <p><q>Physical misfortunes! What do you mean?</q></p>
                <p><q>Why, the hair, eyes, skin--how strange, how
                    unnatural!</q></p>
                <p>Koma threw back his head and laughed with an angry
                    note.</p>
                <p><q>Oh, my mother, you are growing backward. You are seeing
                    all things from a narrowing point of view. Be- <pb n="78"/> cause Hyacinth is not like other Japanese
                    children, she is not ugly. Why, the little one is beautiful, quite so, in her
                    own way</q>.</p>
                <p>Aoi appeared troubled.</p>
                <p><q>You did not consider my father ugly, did you?</q></p>
                <p><q>Ah no</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Well, but was he not fair of face?</q></p>
                <p><q>It is true</q>, she admitted; then, sighing, added, <q>But I
                    fear the little one would not agree with us in the matter. It might terrify her
                    to see her own face--so different from that of her playmates. In heart and
                    nature she is all Japanese</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Nay; her natural parts have had no opportunities. She,
                    like you, has seen only one side of life and the world. Now, is it not time to
                    educate her real self?</q></p>
                <p>With an unconscious motion of distress, Aoi wrung her
                    hands.</p>
                <p><q>The task is beyond me, my son. How can I effect it?
                    Alas! as you say, I am in the same condition, for am I not <pb n="79"/> all Japanese? My
                    lord is gone these many years. I cannot keep step with the passage of time. Yes,
                    son, I slip backward into the old mode of life and thought. When you were by my
                    side, you were the prop that kept me awake, alive. But you were gone so long.
                    Ah! it seemed as if time would never end</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Oh, my mother</q>, he cried, <q>I will never leave you again.
                    It is I who am all wrong, wrong--I who am the renegade. But we will remain here
                    together, and you, dear mother, will teach me all over again the precepts of my
                    childhood. For these four years I have been studying, acquiring a new method of
                    thought and life, yet I fell into it naturally. My father’s blood was strong in
                    me. Yet, dear mother, now I feel I have been wrong in leaving you, and I will
                    not return</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Oh, son</q>, she said, with trembling lips, <q>you are all
                    Engleesh--all your father. And it is right. Do not speak of remaining here with
                    us. A mother’s <pb n="80"/>
                    eyes can see deep beyond the shallows into her child’s soul. I know your
                    restless heart cries for the other world. It is there, indeed, you belong. And
                    you must return to this England and the college</q>.</p>
                <p><q>But I shall not remain</q>, he said, throwing his arm about
                    her shoulder. <q>No; I shall come back when I am through college, for you and
                    Hyacinth</q>.</p>
                <p>Aoi did not speak. Her poor little hands trembled against
                    his arms.</p>
                <p>Fluttering to the door came Hyacinth. The tear-stains
                    were gone from her face. In her hand she carried the small English mirror.
                    Evidently she had overcome her repugnance and fear of it, and now regarded it as
                    some strange and active possession.</p>
                <p>Aoi looked up at her son with questioning eyes.</p>
                <p><q>The little one’s new education must commence at once</q>,
                    he said, slowly.</p>
                <p>He went to the child and took the <pb n="81"/> mirror from her
                    hand and again held it before her face.</p>
                <p><q>This is the beginning</q>, he said. <q>Let her become
                    acquainted with herself as she is. This will force a new trend of thought</q>.</p>
                <p>Then to the child:</p>
                <p><q>Who is this within?</q> he asked.</p>
                <p><q>It is I</q>, she said, simply.</p>
                <p>She had discovered the secret of the mirror, and somehow
                    it had lost all terror for her--nay, it held her with a strange delight and
                    fascination.</p>
                <p><q>Little one</q>, said Komazawa, kneeling beside her, <q>look
                    very often into the honorable mirror--every day. There you will see your own
                    image. You will not be ignorant of yourself. You will learn much which the
                    <foreign xml:lang="ja">sensei</foreign> cannot teach you. Also, go each day to the mission-house. No; do not
                    shake your head so. But every day you must go to the school class. Then very
                    soon, maybe in three years, I will return and complete the teaching</q>.</p>
                <pb n="82"/>
                <p>Hyacinth looked timidly up into his earnest face a
                    moment. Then she suddenly smiled and dimpled.</p>
                <p><q>Very well</q>, she said, in English, in a tone whose note
                    expressed as words could not her perplexed emotion.</p>
                <p>A smile overspread Koma’s face.</p>
                <p><q>Ah</q>, he said, with a glance back at his mother, <q>the
                    little one has not forgotten</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Yet</q>, said Aoi, <q>she has not spoken it, son, since you
                    left Sendai five years ago</q>.</p>
            </div>
            
            <div xml:id="owheart_1020" n="10" type="chapter">
                <head>X</head>
                <p>The Reverend Mr. Blount knocked sharply at the door of
                    Madame Aoi’s house. There was no response at first to his summons, beyond a
                    slight stir and bustle at the rear. After a pause the sliding doors were pushed
                    aside and the fat face of Mumè appeared for a moment, to disappear the next. She
                    was heard chattering, in a grumbling voice, to some one within.</p>
                <p>The visitor, grown impatient, rapped hard upon the
                    panelling. A moment later there was the light patter of feet along the hall and
                    Aoi appeared. She hastened towards the visitor with an apologetic
                    expression.</p>
                <p>Would the honorable one pardon her great discourtesy? She
                    had been taking <pb n="84"/>
                    her noonday siesta and had not heard the visitor’s knock. She would immediately
                    reprove her insignificantly rude and ignorant servant for not having shown the
                    illustrious one welcome and hospitality.</p>
                <p><q>I want to see Hyacinth</q>, said the caller, entering the
                    guest-room and slowly removing his kid gloves.</p>
                <p>Hyacinth, Aoi informed her visitor, was also taking her
                    noon sleep. Would the honorable one deign to excuse her, or should she disturb
                    the little one?</p>
                <p><q>Asleep?</q> he repeated, disapprovingly. <q>How can that be,
                    madame, since I only just saw her at the window?</q></p>
                <p><q>She must have awakened, then</q>, said Aoi, simply.</p>
                <p>The other nodded curtly. <q>No doubt</q>, he said. He seated
                    himself stiffly in the only chair in the room, and when Aoi had quietly seated
                    herself on a mat some distance from him, he clasped his hands together and
                    leaned forward towards her.</p>
                <pb n="85"/>
                <p><q>Madame Aoi</q>, he said, <q>I have just heard the most
                    improbable, ridiculous tale about Hyacinth</q>.</p>
                <p>Madame Aoi elevated her eyes in gentle question.</p>
                <p><q>That she is, in fact--er--engaged--that is,
                    affianced--you know what I mean</q>.</p>
                <p>Aoi smiled beamingly. Yes, she admitted, her daughter
                    was, indeed, betrothed to Yamashiro Yoshida, <q>son of our most illustrious and
                    respected and honorable friend in Sendai, Yamashiro Shawtaro</q>.</p>
                <p><q>But</q>, said the visitor, after a moment of speechless
                    surprise, <q>this is the most preposterous, impossible of things. Why this--this
                    Yamashiro Shawtaro, the father of the boy, is one of the most rabid Buddhists,
                    and, besides, it is barbaric, an unheard-of thing, to think of marrying a girl
                    of her age to any one</q>.</p>
                <p><q>The betrothal</q>, said Aoi, with a slight smile, <q>was all
                    arranged by the <pb n="86"/>
                    Yamashiro family. The boy is the father’s salt of life. He cast eyes of desire
                    upon the little one, and as he is the richest, noblest, and proudest youth in
                    Sendai, we have accepted him. All the town envies us, excellency</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Does her brother know about this?</q> demanded Mr. Blount,
                    severely.</p>
                <p><q>Oh yes, surely</q>.</p>
                <p><q>And what does he say? He is English enough to perceive
                    the utter impossibility of such a marriage</q>.</p>
                <p><q>We have not heard from my son yet in the matter</q>, said
                    Aoi, simply.</p>
                <p><q>Well</q>, said the other, <q>I can assure you that when he
                    knows the truth he will refuse to countenance it</q>.</p>
                <p><q>But, illustrious master, how can he do so? He has not
                    that right</q>.</p>
                <p><q>He has not the right! Why, even your Japanese law makes
                    him her rightful guardian. He is still a citizen of Japan. A brother, in Japan,
                    is his sister’s legal guardian. I know this to be a fact</q>.</p>
                <pb n="87"/>
                <p><q>Ah, but, honored sir, you do not know everything</q>.</p>
                <p>Mr. Blount looked over his gold-rimmed spectacles
                    sharply, endeavoring to pierce beneath the softness of her tone. Japanese women
                    were all guile was his inner comment.</p>
                <p><q>Well, now, suppose you explain to me why your son is not
                    his sister’s guardian?</q></p>
                <p><q>Because, august minister, he is not the little one’s
                    actual brother</q>.</p>
                <p>Mr. Blount started so that he actually bounded from his
                    seat.</p>
                <p><q>What do you mean?</q> he jerked out to Aoi.</p>
                <p><q>The little one is only my adopted child</q>, said Aoi,
                    smiling serenely.</p>
                <p>The minister could scarcely believe he heard aright. The
                    Japanese woman continued to smile in a manner whose guileless, impenetrable
                    innocence of expression had the effect of irritating him excessively.</p>
                <p><q>If Hyacinth is not your child, Madame Aoi, who are her
                    parents?</q></p>
                <pb n="88"/>
                <p><q>The gods forsaken little Hyacinth. She has no true
                    parents</q>.</p>
                <p>In his acute interest in the matter, the minister
                    actually overlooked the slip of Aoi when she alluded to the <q>gods</q>. What he
                    said, with his eyes fixed very sternly upon her face, was:</p>
                <p><q>You are deceiving me, Madame Aoi. You are hiding the
                    truth from me</q>.</p>
                <p>The slightest frown passed over Aoi’s face. Her color
                    deepened, then faded, leaving her inscrutable and impassive once more.</p>
                <p>The honorable one was augustly mistaken, for the humble
                    one had nothing to hide. Since the affairs of her adopted child concerned only
                    her foster-parent, it was impossible to deceive the honorable minister.</p>
                <p>It was the visitor’s turn to flush, and he did so
                    angrily. Plainly this Japanese woman was attempting to conceal, with the
                    prevarication and guile of her people, some mystery concerning Hyacinth. If the
                    girl was not the daughter <pb n="89"/> of Aoi by her English husband, who then was she? She
                    certainly was not pure Japanese. Could it be that she was not even in part
                    Japanese? The possibility staggered the missionary.</p>
                <p><q>Madame Aoi, you are taking a most unusual attitude
                    towards me to-day</q>.</p>
                <p>Aoi inclined her head in a motion that might have meant
                    either assent or negation.</p>
                <p><q>Hitherto</q>, continued the other, <q>you have not hesitated
                    to accept my advice--</q></p>
                <p><q>In matters concerning that religion, yes</q>, interposed
                    Aoi, softly.</p>
                <p><q>Which surely concerns all other matters connected with
                    your welfare and that of Hyacinth. No one knows better than you do that the
                    lives of our parishioners, our children, are our particular care and charge. I
                    take the interest of a parent in our little band. So you would not withhold your
                    confidence from a parent?</q></p>
                <p><q>What is it the honorable sir would know?</q></p>
                <pb n="90"/>
                <p><q>The history of Hyacinth--who she is, how you came by
                    her, her people’s name--all information about her</q>.</p>
                <p><q>There is nothing to confide</q>, said Aoi, slowly, as
                    though she chose her words carefully before replying. <q>The old excellency knew
                    the history of the child. It was under his advice that the humble one adopted
                    the little one</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Under Mr. Radcliffe’s advice!</q></p>
                <p><q>Yes</q>.</p>
                <p><q>What did he know of Hyacinth?</q></p>
                <p><q>The excellency deigned to make effort to discover the
                    little one’s parents</q>.</p>
                <p><q>But you don’t mean to tell me that you did not know her
                    parents?</q></p>
                <p><q>Only the mother, and she lived but a day after the
                    coming of the child</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Did Mr. Radcliffe fail to find her father?</q></p>
                <p>Nervously Aoi clasped her hands together. She did not
                    answer.</p>
                <p><q>Did he find her father?</q> repeated Mr. Blount.</p>
                <pb n="91"/>
                <p>Aoi looked at him with a gleam of stubbornness in her
                    glance.</p>
                <p><q>If the excellency did not make confidant of you before
                    he died, why should I do so, also?</q></p>
                <p><q>It is your duty, madame</q>.</p>
                <p>She shook her head slowly.</p>
                <p><q>Certainly, it is your duty. It is perfectly plain that
                    Hyacinth is a white--that she’s not pure Japanese, at all events</q>.</p>
                <p>Aoi moved uneasily. Then she looked up very earnestly at
                    her interlocutor.</p>
                <p><q>The little one knows nothing of her parentage, save that
                    she is an orphan confided to my care. It would distress her to be told
                    that--that she is not Japanese</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Then you admit that?</q></p>
                <p><q>No; I do not so admit. I but begged the honorable one to
                    put no such notion into her mind, so sorely would it distress her</q>.</p>
                <p><q>I wouldn’t think of keeping her in ignorance</q>, exclaimed
                    the other, with <pb n="92"/>
                    some indignation. <q>She ought to have been told the truth long ago. I shall
                    certainly tell her</q>.</p>
                <p><q>What can you tell her?</q></p>
                <p>Aoi had risen and was regarding the missionary with a
                    strange expression.</p>
                <p><q>That I suspect she is not Japanese--not all
                    Japanese</q>.</p>
                <p><q>She would not believe you</q>, said Aoi, thoughtfully.</p>
                <p><q>I will see her at once, if you will allow me</q>, said Mr.
                    Blount, also rising. He was somewhat startled at the attitude and the reply of
                    Aoi. She had placed herself before the door, as if to prevent the passage of any
                    one desiring to enter.</p>
                <p><q>My daughter will not see visitors today</q>, she said. <q>You
                    will excuse her</q>.</p>
                <p>The next moment she had clapped her hands loudly. In
                    answer to her summons, Mumè came shuffling into the room, hastily wiping her
                    hands upon her sleeves, and looking inquiringly towards her mistress.</p>
                <p><q>The illustrious one</q>, said Aoi, with <pb n="93"/> intense
                    sweetness, <q>wishes to return home. Pray, conduct him to the street</q>.</p>
                <p>She bowed with profound grace to the missionary, and
                    stepped aside to permit him to pass.</p>
                <p>He hesitated a moment, and then said, slowly and
                    succinctly:</p>
                <p><q>Madame Aoi, I have only this to say. I shall immediately
                    take it upon myself to unravel this mystery. I will communicate with the nearest
                    open port at once, and find out whether my predecessor had correspondence with
                    any one on this subject. Good-day</q>. He bowed stiffly.</p>
            </div>
            
            <div xml:id="owheart_1021" n="11" type="chapter">
                <head>XI</head>
                <p>Meanwhile Hyacinth lay stretched upon the matted floor of
                    her chamber, her chin in one hand, the other holding an ancient oval mirror. She
                    was studying her face closely, critically, and also wistfully.</p>
                <p>The head was quaintly Japanese, yet the face was oddly at
                    variance. For the hair was dressed in the prevailing mode of the Japanese maid
                    of beauty and fashion in Sendai. It was a very elaborate coiffure, spread out on
                    either side in the shape of the wings of a butterfly. Upon both sides of the
                    little mountain at top projected long, dagger-like pins; gold they were and
                    jewelled--the gift of Yoshida.</p>
                <p>Hyacinth no longer fretted under the hands of a
                    hair-dresser, since it was her <pb n="95"/> pride and delight to have her hair dressed in this
                    becoming and striking mode. If the hair-dresser, who came once a fortnight,
                    puckered her face and shook her head when the beautiful, soft, brown locks
                    twisted about her fingers, and did not follow the usual plastic methods used
                    upon the hair of most Japanese maids, Hyacinth cared little. When the operation
                    was completed, her hair, dark, shining, and smooth, appeared little different
                    from that of other girls in the village.</p>
                <p>It was the face beneath the coiffure that distressed the
                    girl. The eyes were undoubtedly gray-blue. They were large, too, and wore an
                    expression of wistful questioning which had only come there, perhaps, since the
                    girl had begun to look into the mirror and to discover the secret of those
                    strange, unnatural eyes.</p>
                <p>The whiteness of her skin pleased her. What girl of her
                    acquaintance would not be glad of such a complexion? She had small use for the
                    powder-pot, into which <pb n="96"/> her friends must dip so freely. Her mouth was rosy, the
                    teeth within white and sparkling. Her chin was dimpled at the side and tipped
                    with the same rose that dwelt in her rounded cheeks. The little nose was thin
                    and delicate, piquant in shape and expression.</p>
                <p>Why should such a face have distressed her? She would not
                    admit to herself that she was homely. Perfume, Dewdrop, Spring--what did their
                    judgment amount to? They were rude, uncouth even to have hinted at her
                    <q>deformities</q>. They were one-eyed, seeing but one type of beauty. There must be
                    another kind, for she was surely, surely beautiful. Then she fell into a reverie
                    in which she speculated upon the possible existence of another people whose
                    maidens’ hair and eyes were not like the night, but reflected the day.</p>
                <p>Yet Yoshida, the son of Yamashiro Shawtaro, had actually
                    suggested to her once, with a shamefaced expression, that if she stood in the
                    sun-rays the goddess <pb n="97"/> might darken her skin and eyes! Also, he had brought
                    her, all the way from Tokyo, a little box of oil with which to shade her
                    hair!</p>
                <p>The oil had disappeared in the bay, though the pretty box
                    in which it had come had been placed with the other gifts of Yoshida. As for the
                    sun-goddess--those at the mission-house had insisted that there was no such
                    being. Great and wise were the mission-house people, since they had come from
                    the land of Komazawa.</p>
                <p>Komazawa represented to her all that was fine and great
                    and good. He was the beloved of Aoi, and the good God had given him to her for a
                    brother and a hero. He wrote to her every week from the other end of the world,
                    never forgetting. His letters were the sun and light of Aoi’s life, and Hyacinth
                    shared with her something of the joy of receiving them. These two talked of him
                    always. They watched for his letters, and devoured them with eager little <pb n="98"/> outcries to each
                    other when they arrived.</p>
                <p>He was in London. College was done for the year. He was
                    going to Cheshire, though apprehensive of the welcome he would receive from his
                    father’s people. But the lawsuit had been won, with scarcely any struggle. His
                    claim, his papers, withstood the closest of legal scrutiny. Yes; he was now an
                    Englishman, almost entirely. Yet, ah, how he longed for home--for his mother and
                    for little Hyacinth. The estate was very large, his lawyers told him, so large
                    that he could not live there alone. Soon he was coming to take back with him the
                    little mother and sister. Yes; it would be strange at first, but they would soon
                    become accustomed to it. It was a cold country, and the milk of human kindness
                    ran not freely, but it satisfied the desires of an ambitious one.</p>
                <p>So ran his last letter.</p>
                <p>Hyacinth wondered, vaguely, what he would say when he
                    returned to Japan <pb n="99"/> and found that she could not accompany him. By that time she would be
                    married--married to Yamashiro Yoshida, who was rich and owned large stores in
                    Tokyo, and who sometimes wore an English hat, the envy and marvel of all the
                    gilded youth of Sendai.</p>
                <p>Upon her cogitations came Aoi, trembling and anxious. She
                    hovered a moment over the girl, hesitation and worry depicted in her
                    countenance.</p>
                <p>In surprise, Hyacinth looked up at her, then, carefully
                    slipping the mirror into her sleeve, raised herself erect.</p>
                <p><q>What is troubling you, mother? Why, your hands tremble.
                    I will hold them. You have news from Koma? What is it?</q></p>
                <p><q>No, little one; it is not of Koma I speak</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Of whom, then?</q></p>
                <p><q>Of you</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Then smile instantly. I am an insignificant subject for
                    mirth, not tears</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Little one, if the right of freedom <pb n="100"/> were given
                    you, would you leave the humble one?</q></p>
                <p><q>No; not in ten million years. What sort of freedom would
                    that be?</q></p>
                <p><q>Yet the learned ones at the mission-house will surely
                    persuade you to take some such step</q>.</p>
                <p>Hyacinth laughed scornfully.</p>
                <p><q>One cannot persuade a hummingbird to come to one’s hand.
                    No; nor can these ones of the mission-house persuade me to do aught against my
                    will</q>.</p>
                <p><q>But they of the mission-house--Mr. Blount--insinuated
                    that we have not the right to possess you</q>.</p>
                <p><q>He is foolish. He has blue eyes</q>, said she of the blue
                    eyes, disdainfully.</p>
                <p><q>Yet it is true that we have no legal right to you</q>, said
                    Aoi, sadly.</p>
                <p><q>No? And why have you not?</q></p>
                <p><q>Because I am not your real mother, and the time may come
                    when others may claim you</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Since my own mother is gone, has <pb n="101"/> not my
                    foster-mother all right over me?</q></p>
                <p><q>I do not know the law as to that</q>, said Aoi. <q>Oh, if the
                    old, good excellency were but still alive to enlighten and advise us</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Mother</q>, said Hyacinth, looking up with questioning,
                    wistful eyes at Aoi, <q>I have never asked a question of you concerning my own
                    mother. You were always enough for me. I needed no other parent, dear, dear one.
                    Yet now I would ask, can you tell me aught concerning my people?</q></p>
                <p><q>No, little one. The sick one gave to me no information
                    of her people. The good excellency made effort to find them, but failed</q>.</p>
                <p><q>My mother was a stranger to Sendai?</q></p>
                <p><q>Yes, a stranger</q>.</p>
                <p><q>And she left nothing--nothing for--me?</q></p>
                <p>Aoi hesitated a moment, then, crossing the room, slipped
                    her hand deftly <pb n="102"/> along the wall and pushed aside a small panel. Hyacinth arose slowly. Her
                    eyes were apprehensive, her lips apart. She had grown white with
                    expectation.</p>
                <p><q>Here, in your own chamber, little one, is all that the
                    august one left. I would have given you them on your wedding-day</q>.</p>
                <p>Fearfully the girl touched the things in the little
                    cupboard. How long had they lain there untouched? There were a woman’s strange
                    dress, white underwear, a queer, basket-shaped thing with dark feathers upon it,
                    a pair of black Suède gloves, small shoes, and then, in a little heap, three
                    rings--a plain gold band, one with a large diamond, another with a ruby set
                    between two smaller diamonds. Also a little chamois-skin bag containing a little
                    roll of green bills and some strange coin.</p>
                <p>Upon her knees Hyacinth fell beside the little shelf, and
                    she stretched her arms out over it, burying her face in her sleeves.</p>
                <pb n="103"/>
                <p>For a long time neither of the two uttered a word. When
                    the girl raised her face, after a long interval, it was very white, and tears
                    streamed down her cheeks. She put out a little, groping hand to Aoi.</p>
                <p><q>Oh, you were good to her, were you not--were you not?</q>
                    she whisperingly cried.</p>
                <p>Aoi could not speak.</p>
                <p>After a time the girl arose and reverently pushed the
                    panel into place.</p>
                <p><q>The things are Engleesh</q>, she said, slowly. <q>Is it not
                    strange?</q></p>
                <p><q>Yes</q>, said Aoi, brokenly.</p>
                <p>Yet even then she did not tell the girl the truth. Why
                    she had hidden this fact always from Hyacinth she could hardly have explained
                    even to herself. She thought she had but waited for the girl to come to years of
                    understanding. Afterwards, when the proud Yamashiro family condescended to seek
                    alliance with her, Aoi, faintheartedly fearful lest they should refuse to permit
                    the mar- <pb n="104"/> riage
                    if they knew the truth, had carefully guarded the secret even from the girl. She
                    knew that only a few people in the little village of Matsushima had heard of the
                    history of the girl. It was only recently that they had moved to the City of
                    Sendai. This match with the Yamashiro family was a thing so splendid as to be
                    regarded with awe by Aoi. It could not be possible that such a chance would ever
                    come again to her adopted daughter.</p>
                <p>Now she said to the girl, placing both her hands upon her
                    shoulders:</p>
                <p><q>Promise me, then, that you will refuse to discuss this
                    subject with the mission-house people</q>.</p>
                <p><q>I will not even see them</q>, said the girl, stooping to
                    kiss the anxious face.</p>
                <p><q>For if you should do so</q>, said Aoi, sadly, <q>they might
                    persuade you to abandon us</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Ah, no; never, mother. No one could ever do so</q>.</p>
                <pb n="105"/>
                <p><q>Save Yamashiro Yoshida</q>, said Aoi, quickly.</p>
                <p>A cloud stole for an instant over the girl’s face. She
                    sighed as she repeated, half under her breath:</p>
                <p><q>Save Yoshida--perhaps</q></p>
            </div>
            
            <div xml:id="owheart_1022" n="12" type="chapter">
                <head>XII</head>
                <p>About a fortnight later the honorable Yamashiro family
                    condescended to pay a visit to the house of Aoi. Although they lived but a
                    field’s length away, they came in their carriages, very elegant <foreign xml:lang="ja">jinrikishas</foreign>,
                    drawn by liveried runners.</p>
                <p>The father was imperious and lordly. A man of <foreign xml:lang="ja">samurai</foreign>
                    birth, he had been one of the first to take advantage of the change in
                    government and go immediately into trade, thus placing behind him all the
                    traditions of caste. In Tokyo he had acquired an enormous fortune. He had a
                    partnership there in a European store. He had purchased much of the land in the
                    region of Sendai, and the townspeople looked with some apprehensions upon his
                    steady advance, <pb n="107"/> knowing that wherever he set his heel the land was despoiled of beauty.</p>
                <p>Sendai in these latter years had become quite a bustling
                    commercial city, and all because of Yamashiro’s enterprise. In ten years he had
                    altered the little coast town’s exclusive policy. Thus the townspeople came to
                    believe that Sendai could no longer remain a secluded place of abode, but would
                    become an ugly, commercial centre, a stamping-ground for tradespeople, and in
                    time an open port for the barbarians. In the face of the dissatisfaction of his
                    townspeople Yamashiro steadily kept to his march of progress. Realizing that he
                    could never have the affection of his neighbors, he openly tried to play the
                    despot over them.</p>
                <p>A plastic little pupil was his wife, the typical Japanese
                    matron, who, bowing to the will of her lord in all things, scarcely ever spoke
                    save to echo his words, and who lived but for his pleasure and comfort.</p>
                <pb n="108"/>
                <p>The boy Yoshida was like his father, save that he spent
                    his restlessness upon the pleasures of youth. Having no occasion to work, and
                    being provided with an unlimited supply of money, Yoshida frittered his way
                    through life with the idle and rich young men of Sendai, leisurely inventing
                    amusements for themselves, seeking and chasing every butterfly. Not a <foreign xml:lang="ja">geisha</foreign> of
                    Sendai but knew the gallant Yoshida.</p>
                <p>Then, mothlike, with a daintier and as gay a fluttering
                    of wings as the <foreign xml:lang="ja">geishas</foreign>, Hyacinth had crossed his path. Aoi had moved her home
                    about this time from the little village on the shore of the bay to the city
                    proper. This occurred after Komazawa’s English lawsuit had been settled, so that
                    the family were now living in more affluent circumstances.</p>
                <p>Actually abandoning his <foreign xml:lang="ja">geishas</foreign>, Yoshida, to the envy of
                    the town’s young belles and beauties, offered himself to the daughter of Madame
                    Aoi, the girl <pb n="109"/>
                    whose eyes did not slant in shape, and yet which had a trick of closing half-way
                    and then glancing out sideways. It was as if Hyacinth, with her wide eyes, had
                    unconsciously fallen into the habit of copying nature, where all eyes about her
                    were narrow and seemingly half closed.</p>
                <p>On this day Yoshida and his parents brought gifts for Aoi
                    and her daughter; gorgeous gifts they were and very costly. The girl, quite
                    forgetful of the presence of the watchful parents of her lover, threw all her
                    manners to the winds when she beheld the exquisite <foreign xml:lang="ja">obi</foreign> her father-in-law-elect
                    had brought her from Tokyo. Out of the room she slipped, to return in the space
                    of a few minutes, fluttering in through the sliding-doors like a bird of gay
                    plumage, her eyes brighter, her cheeks and lips rosier than the red gold <foreign xml:lang="ja">obi</foreign>
                    twisted so entrancingly about her slender waist.</p>
                <p>Yet in her brief absence the Yamashiro family had
                    exchanged significant <pb n="110"/> glances and commented upon her rude actions.</p>
                <p><q>Your worthy daughter, Madame Aoi</q>, said Yamashiro, the
                    elder, <q>should be placed under the care of a severe governess</q>.</p>
                <p>Aoi looked appealingly from the displeased face of
                    Yamashiro to his wife. The latter sat still as an image, her small
                    vermilion-tipped lips closely sealed together like those of a doll.</p>
                <p><q>You would not delay the marriage, excellent Yamashiro?</q>
                    inquired Aoi, faintly, the match-making vanities of a mother stirring within
                    her.</p>
                <p><q>It might be well</q>, said Yamashiro, stiffly. Languidly
                    the boy interposed:</p>
                <p><q>Ah, well, she will have time to learn when she has the
                    father and mother-in-law to teach and command her</q>.</p>
                <p><q>True</q>, said his father, and <q>True</q> echoed his mother,
                    stonily, scarce parting her lips to enunciate the word.</p>
                <p>Then Hyacinth fluttered in gayly, and the light of her
                    smile fell upon them <pb n="111"/> like a shaft of sunlight, to be dissipated, a moment
                    later, by the enshrouding mist. She paused in her tripping pilgrimage of pride
                    across the room, glanced flurriedly at the guests, then sat down hastily beside
                    Madame Aoi. The next moment she was as quiet and still as Madame Yamashiro
                    herself. Her eyes were cast down, as became her age, but even when cast down
                    they gazed in girlish pleasure on the splendor of the new sash.</p>
                <p><q>Madame Aoi</q>, said Yamashiro, the elder, <q>we come to-day
                    not upon a visit of pleasure, but for a purpose</q>.</p>
                <p>Madame Aoi inclined her head attentively.</p>
                <p><q>You may not, perhaps, have heard the latest news of the
                    town. We are to have an invasion of the barbarians--Western people, in
                    fact</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Ah, indeed!</q> Aoi’s eyebrows were raised in surprise.
                    <q>No, I have not heard the report</q>.</p>
                <p>Yamashiro breathed heavily.</p>
                <pb n="112"/>
                <p><q>Well, this matter brings us to the object of our visit.
                    It has been brought to my knowledge that such an invasion will be sure to affect
                    the townspeople, particularly those who have hitherto mingled with these
                    people</q>.</p>
                <p>Aoi flushed faintly.</p>
                <p><q>You allude to the mission people?</q> she asked.</p>
                <p><q>Yes, madame</q>.</p>
                <p>Aoi bowed. Hyacinth elevated her head ever so slightly.
                    She leaned forward, and her eyes, the lids downcast, were glancing upward
                    sidewise beneath them.</p>
                <p><q>Such of our people</q>, continued Yamashiro, <q>as have
                    chosen to affiliate with the foreigners already permitted here are likely to be
                    intimately associated with the new arrivals, especially those who have married
                    among them</q>.</p>
                <p>He paused, and coughed in his hand.</p>
                <p><q>You perceive that the bad effect of such association
                    must be felt by those of us who will not deign to give them <pb n="113"/> our
                    friendship. Therefore, madame, knowing that your honorable daughter has spent
                    much time with these people, we desire that hereafter she shall decline all such
                    intimacy</q>.</p>
                <p>Aoi bowed her head almost to the mats.</p>
                <p><q>It shall be as your excellency desires</q>, she said.</p>
                <p>Then, raising her head, she asked:</p>
                <p><q>When do the honorable ones come, and why do they
                    come?</q></p>
                <p><q>They may be here already</q>, replied Yamashiro, <q>and the
                    reason why they come is because some witless members of our community have
                    advertised in the open ports the unusual beauty of Sendai as a summer resort.
                    The foreigners come out of curiosity. It is very unpleasant</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Yet, excellency</q>, said the girl, with her candid gaze
                    upon him, <q>were you not the pioneer in Sendai of those who induced intercourse
                    with these barbarians?</q></p>
                <pb n="114"/>
                <p><q>The wares of Sendai</q>, replied the other, coldly, <q>were
                    placed in Tokyo for the foreigner to purchase. We did not invite the foreigner
                    to our city</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Sendai is not an open port</q>, interposed Aoi, speaking so
                    that her daughter might cease with grace. <q>How can the foreigners, then, invade
                    it?</q></p>
                <p><q>They have no legal rights, but their consuls, always
                    rapacious, have power with his Imperial Majesty. They have obtained his sanction
                    just as did these missionaries</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Too bad</q>, said Aoi.</p>
                <p>Hyacinth fidgeted. After a moment, looking fully at
                    Yoshida, she asked: <q>Are their women beautiful?</q></p>
                <p><q>No, abominably ugly</q>, he returned, frowning
                    contemptuously.</p>
                <p>A small, roguish smile dimpled the girl’s lips.</p>
                <p><q>Perhaps</q>, said she, <q>I am also like unto them</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Never!</q> said Yoshida, angrily.</p>
                <p><q>If you were</q>, said his father, <q>you <pb n="115"/> would never be
                    wife to a Yamashiro. No Yamashiro would marry a white barbarian</q>.</p>
                <p>The Yamashiro family believed Hyacinth half English. This
                    fact galled them, but they ignored it.</p>
                <p>Hastily, nervously, Aoi moved closer to her daughter,
                    laying her hand upon the little ones in the girl’s lap.</p>
                <p><q>Please, little one</q>, she said, <q>bring for the august
                    ones the pipes and the tobacco-bon</q>.</p>
                <p>Outside the closed <foreign xml:lang="ja">shoji</foreign> the girl paused and drew from
                    her sleeve the little hand mirror. She looked deeply into it, her eyes wide open
                    now.</p>
                <p><q>Perhaps</q>, she said, <q>I am like unto them. They are not
                    abominably ugly, if they look like me. No, for Komazawa is also of their blood,
                    and I--and those clothes were Engleesh</q>.</p>
            </div>
            
            <div xml:id="owheart_1023" n="13" type="chapter">
                <head>XIII</head>
                <p>Two strangers to Sendai, tall and uncouth-appearing
                    foreigners, came down the main street, walking in the swift, swinging fashion
                    peculiar to the Westerner, so totally unlike the shuffling slide of the
                    native.</p>
                <p>They seemed both amused and irritated at the sensation
                    they were creating, for a veritable little procession followed at their heels.
                    Small, solemn, and mystified Japanese boys they were for the most part, who
                    regarded them with the same awesome curiosity they would have bestowed on a wild
                    beast. A round-eyed, startled little boy of twelve had followed them all the way
                    from the station, through which they had entered the city. Others had quickly
                    joined him, until gradually the follow- <pb n="117"/> ing had increased uncomfortably for the
                    foreigners, since these astonished and curious Japanese ran sometimes ahead of
                    them, to stand in their track and gaze up at their faces.</p>
                <p>Annoyed, the strangers quickened their speed to a rapid
                    gait, which forced the sandal-wearers into a run in order to keep pace with
                    them.</p>
                <p>It was noonday and very warm. No <foreign xml:lang="ja">jinrikishas</foreign> were in
                    sight. The strangers would have welcomed the piping cries of the numerous
                    <foreign xml:lang="ja">jinrikisha</foreign> men of Tokyo, who had pestered and swarmed about them there like
                    flies. Here in the City of Sendai there appeared to be no public <foreign xml:lang="ja">jinrikisha</foreign>
                    stand as yet, and the <q>tavern</q> to which they had been directed had not as yet
                    dawned upon their vision.</p>
                <p><q>We seem to be on the chief street</q>, said one of them.
                    <q>Better turn here</q>.</p>
                <p>They turned swiftly down a cross-street which seemed
                    rather a long road, on the sides of which tall bamboos sprang upward to a great
                    height, bend- <pb n="118"/>
                    ing at the top into an arch which cast its shade below. The houses were set back
                    some distance from the road, though garden walls, in which were small bamboo
                    gates, isolated each dwelling.</p>
                <p>The foreigners had now slackened their speed. Their
                    following had diminished considerably, and those who remained were now keeping
                    at a respectful distance from the heavy cane which one of the two swung back and
                    forth in his hand with apparent carelessness. There was a hideous head on the
                    knob of this stick. Was it possible that this might be a fiend whose touch would
                    kill any little boy venturing too near? So the strangers, less troubled by their
                    dwindled following, began to look about them with some interest.</p>
                <p>The street upon which they found themselves appeared cool
                    and refreshing because of its shadowing trees. There was an atmosphere of
                    refinement and aestheticism about it that delighted the appreciative
                    foreigners.</p>
                <pb n="119"/>
                <p><q>Do you see where it leads?</q> said the one of the cane,
                    pointing with his stick down the thoroughfare.</p>
                <p><q>Straight down to the water. What a wonderful sight!</q></p>
                <p>At a point where the street curved upward to a slight
                    elevation, Matsushima, still at a good distance from them, burst upon their
                    view. The visitors stood as if entranced. One of them lifted a pair of
                    field-glasses to his eyes. After a full minute’s use of the glasses, he passed
                    them silently to his companion. The other regarded the scene with equal
                    admiration.</p>
                <p><q>We must go up there to-morrow without fail</q>, he said,
                    waving his hand towards the heights on the opposite shore.</p>
                <p><q>Yes</q>, assented the other; <q>I understand there’s quite a
                    party coming along to-morrow</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Yes, some Tokyo priest is escorting them. Well, a
                    tourist might well visit the cemetery of his household</q>.</p>
                <pb n="120"/>
                <p>The other regarded him with some bewilderment.</p>
                <p><q>The cemetery of his household?</q> he repeated.</p>
                <p><q>This is the place where, three hundred years ago, a
                    Japanese feudal lord, named Date, I believe, sent an envoy to Rome acknowledging
                    the Catholic supremacy. This is practically the birthplace of Catholicism in
                    Japan</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Well, this is all very interesting, I must say. Yet I
                    understand the only mission here, at present, is Presbyterian</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Exactly. Catholicism has been practically stamped out.
                    There was a horrible massacre of the Jesuits here at one time, I believe. This
                    visit by the priest and the party may do something for the place</q>.</p>
                <p>They resumed their walk in silence.</p>
                <p><q>I don’t fancy</q>, said the elder one, <q>that it will be
                    possible for us to shake off this little herd behind us. The thing for us to do
                    is to find that will-o’-the-wisp <pb n="121"/> of a tavern or the mission-house. Where do you suppose
                    the place is?</q></p>
                <p><q>The mission-house, rest assured, is elevated on some
                    hill. Suppose we turn upward and--</q></p>
                <p>He broke off, at the same time stopping abruptly in his
                    walk.</p>
                <p>They were before a little garden composed of white stones
                    and fantastic-spreading trees, seeming to bend their boughs over the miniature
                    lake as if to regard their own reflected beauty. But it was not the distinction
                    of the garden which attracted and startled the strangers, but the little figure
                    which leaned over the gate.</p>
                <p>Filtering through the tree-top by the gate, the sun
                    slanted full upon the head of the girlish form, bronzing the hair almost to the
                    color of deep gold. The girl’s eyes were wide open as if with faint surprise,
                    her lips were apart, and she was plainly flushed with some unwonted excitement.
                    She wore a plum-colored <foreign xml:lang="ja">kimono</foreign>, simple and exquisite. About <pb n="122"/> her waist was
                    an old-gold <foreign xml:lang="ja">obi</foreign>, and there was a flower ornament in her hair. The wings of her
                    sleeves fell backward, disclosing arms of perfect whiteness and little hands
                    which clung in tremulous excitement to the bamboo railing of the gate.</p>
                <p>The tourists had been some months in Japan. One of them
                    was an attaché to an American consulate. Well acquainted as they were with the
                    soft-eyed, cherry-lipped beauty of young Japanese girls, they stood speechless,
                    startled, before the picture that Hyacinth presented, as she in her turn gazed
                    in wide-eyed astonishment at them. The mission-house folk were the only
                    Westerners she had ever seen. These strangers did not at all resemble the
                    Reverend Blount or his friends who came at different times to visit him. Even
                    their clothes had a different cut, and their pleasant faces, in spite of their
                    light eyes, to which she could never become accustomed, were shaven smooth and
                    clean. <pb n="123"/> No
                    devils, thought Hyacinth quickly, would have such countenances. A mistake had
                    been made in the popular impression. Nevertheless, the strangers were certainly
                    odd curiosities.</p>
                <p>She blushed all rosy red, even her little ears and neck
                    tingling with pink, as they paused before her. Half unconsciously she bent her
                    head and made a timid little motion of greeting to them.</p>
                <p>The younger man, the one with the huge stick, said, in an
                    undertone, <q>I’m going to speak to her</q>, and he went a pace nearer.</p>
                <p><q>Can you tell me where the Dewdrop Tavern is?</q> he asked,
                    in atrocious Japanese.</p>
                <p>For a moment she hesitated. Then the faintest smile
                    lurked at the corners of her mouth and a dimple peeped out in her chin. Her
                    voice was sweet and low.</p>
                <p><q>The humble one cannot understand such language</q>, she
                    said, pretending ignorance of his words, and secretly hoping <pb n="124"/> that she might
                    provoke further speech from these strange men.</p>
                <p>Before the stranger could frame his question in plainer
                    language, Aoi appeared in the path, hastening down anxiously to the gate. She
                    was overwhelmed with distress, she declared, that the august ones were followed
                    so rudely by the children of the community. Would not the excellencies
                    condescend to pardon the little ones? They must appreciate how strange they
                    appeared to them. But as for her, Madame Aoi, she was well acquainted with their
                    people, since her own lord had been English also.</p>
                <p>The two men looked at each other and then at the young
                    girl, as though understanding now her strange beauty.</p>
                <p><q>What</q>, asked Aoi, <q>is it the excellencies desire that
                    they have deigned to halt before our insignificant abode?</q></p>
                <p><q>We wish to be directed to some tavern--some place where
                    we can secure accommodation</q>.</p>
                <pb n="125"/>
                <p><q>Ah, yes, exactly. In the village on the shore of
                    Matsushima there is the Dewdrop Tavern, but that is some distance away. If the
                    excellencies will follow the street for a little while longer they will come to
                    the Snowdrop Hostelry. There the honorable ones would be welcomed with august
                    hospitality</q>.</p>
                <p>The strangers lingered a moment, watching the two figures
                    at the gate, now courtesying very deeply. Then they turned slowly and resumed
                    their walk.</p>
                <p>Hyacinth turned to Aoi in great excitement.</p>
                <p><q>I am going to follow them also, mother. I wish to hear
                    them speak again. What strange, deep voices! It was enough to make a maiden jump
                    ten feet with fright. And <emph>how</emph> the gods have blasted their countenances! Did you
                    notice, mother, how their skins were bleached like white linen?</q></p>
                <p>She shuddered.</p>
                <p>Aoi smiled indulgently.</p>
                <p><q>When one becomes accustomed to <pb n="126"/> the white
                    skin, little one, it appears very beautiful</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Ah, not on a man!</q> said the girl, with immeasurable
                    disgust. <q>But perhaps it is a custom of their country. Who knows! They are
                    barbarians, are they not? Perhaps these men whiten or chalk their skins like the
                    priestesses at the temple</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Nay, it is all natural</q>.</p>
                <p>But Hyacinth shook her head, still uncertain. Such beings
                    were unnatural, more so even than the Reverend Blount or the mission men.
                    Curiosity stirred within her. She must know if the strangers acted as the human
                    beings she knew. Quickly she formed a plan. She would follow them at a distance
                    and slip in at the back entrance of the Snowdrop Hostelry. Then surely her
                    friend, Miss Perfume, the daughter of the proprietor of the tavern, would permit
                    her to listen behind the <foreign xml:lang="ja">shoji</foreign>, and to watch these curious strangers,
                    unperceived, through peep-holes in the wall.</p>
            </div>
            
            <div xml:id="owheart_1024" n="14" type="chapter">
                <head>XIV</head>
                <p>The Snowdrop Hostelry was as quaint and refreshing as its
                    name. Here the low-voiced, shy-faced mistress overwhelmed the strangers with
                    expressions of welcome, while her maidens vied with one another in caring for
                    their comfort.</p>
                <p>The strangers were accustomed to the eccentricities of
                    the country, and so with resignation they seated themselves upon the floor,
                    where on little, brightly polished lacquer trays the waiting-maids set out for
                    them an inviting and delightful repast. Upon one tray was fresh and fragrant
                    tea; egg, fish, rice, and soup on another; fruit--persimmons and plums--on a
                    third; and on a fourth slender, long-stemmed pipes and huge tobacco-bons.</p>
                <p><q>Now</q>, said the younger of the two, <pb n="128"/> <q>we can talk
                    with some degree of comfort and privacy</q>.</p>
                <p>At his companion’s slight glance of uneasiness towards
                    the waiting-maids, the other assured him they could not understand English.</p>
                <p><q>Let us go over the entire matter from the beginning,
                    then</q>, said the other man. <q>Mr. Matheson, our consul, assured me that you would
                    give me all the assistance and information you could</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Oh, certainly; but you must remember, Mr. Knowles, that
                    I am entirely in ignorance as to what information you desire. Mr. Matheson gave
                    me a number of papers in the Lorrimer affair, and I presume this case is in some
                    way connected with yours</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Exactly. I am Mr. Lorrimer’s attorney, and have been
                    four months in Japan looking up this matter</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Yes?</q></p>
                <p><q>You already know the circumstances?</q></p>
                <p><q>No, not at all. Except that a letter <pb n="129"/> from some
                    missionary started Mr. Matheson on an investigation which brought to light a
                    letter written about seventeen years ago to the Nagasaki consul. He was an awful
                    fool--the consul, you know--let everything take care of itself; so this matter
                    was clean forgotten, or rather ignored. It seems his successor was a brighter
                    fellow, and he sent the correspondence from Sendai to Nagasaki on to Tokyo</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Yes, and I believe the letters you hold will supply the
                    missing links. Let me tell you the facts of the case--that is, so far as I know
                    them. About eighteen years ago, Mr. Lorrimer was married to a Miss Barbara
                    Woodward, a Boston girl. The marriage was one of those unfortunate, hasty,
                    society affairs in which the parents play the leading parts</q>.</p>
                <p><q>I understand</q>, the other nodded.</p>
                <p><q>They were mismated</q>, continued the narrator--<q>unsuited
                    to each other in every way. Their temperaments con<pb n="130" break="no"/>stantly
                    jarred; they had few interests in common. Life became a burden to them. Time,
                    however, did much to heal the breach, and finally Mrs. Lorrimer expected to
                    become a mother. They were in Japan at the time, and she had a fancy that the
                    child should be born here. In spite of her happy expectations, she became
                    excessively morbid and pessimistic. She began to have hallucinations, to suspect
                    my client of impossible things--infidelity and so forth--and hence acted as only
                    a thoroughly unreasonable woman would. She conceived an unreasoning dislike for
                    a Miss Farrell, and, I understand, accused her husband of being in love with the
                    lady. Doubtless, fancying she was wronged, the poor, misguided thing left her
                    husband--in short, ran away from him. Mr. Lorrimer took steps to ascertain her
                    whereabouts, but was unsuccessful. Under the circumstances he returned to
                    Boston, secured a divorce, and--ah--married Miss Farrell</q>.</p>
                <pb n="131"/>
                <p>The younger man frowned and cleared his throat
                    slightly.</p>
                <p><q>Ugly affair</q>, he simply essayed, quietly.</p>
                <p><q>Yes, it was. Average woman a fool. But now I come to my
                    point. There was a child</q>.</p>
                <p>The young man whistled softly.</p>
                <p><q>I see. And the father wants it?</q></p>
                <p><q>Naturally</q>.</p>
                <p><q>And the law gives it to him?</q></p>
                <p><q>Certainly. But we have reason, fortunately, to believe
                    that in this case the power of the law will not be necessary. The mother, we
                    believe, is dead</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Ah!</q></p>
                <p><q>Now I come to the papers in your hand</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Oh yes; here they are. I haven’t even looked at
                    them</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Ah!</q> The sheet trembled in the lawyer’s hand. Adjusting
                    his glasses, he read the paper carefully, and then struck it sharply with his
                    hand.</p>
                <pb n="132"/>
                <p><q>This is exactly what we want</q>, he said; <q>it is enough in
                    itself</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Yes</q>, said the other, laconically.</p>
                <p><q>It gives us the subsequent history of the wife and
                    practically the whereabouts of the child at that time. Good!</q></p>
                <p><q>I can’t see why it is necessary for me to come. It’s
                    devilish hot</q>, said the other, mopping his brow complainingly.</p>
                <p><q>My good fellow, you are lent to me by our consul. I
                    believe you can assist me in the work of finding the child. It--she--is here--in
                    Sendai, it seems--or she was. Let’s see what the other missionary writes</q>.</p>
                <p>He unfolded the letter and read:</p>
                <floatingText xml:id="owheart_1204">
                            <body xml:id="owheart_1203">
                                <div xml:id="owheart_1101" type="letter">
                                    <opener><dateline><name type="place"><hi style="font-style:italic;">American
                                                  Consul, Tokyo:</hi></name></dateline></opener>
                                    <p>I take the liberty of addressing
                                        this letter to the various English, American, and German
                                        consuls in Japan. I wish to advise you that there is a white
                                        child in Sendai, the adopted daughter of a Japanese woman,
                                        concerning whose parentage there appears to be some mystery.
                                        The child has been brought up entirely as a Japanese girl,
                                        and does not know as yet of her true nationality. She is
                                        soon <pb n="133"/> to be married to a Japanese youth, a
                                        Buddhist by religion. As she is a minor, and I consider this
                                        an outrage, I am of the opinion that steps should be taken
                                        to ascertain the parentage of this young white girl.</p>
                                    <closer><salute>I am, with respect,</salute><signed>(Rev.)
                                            JAMES BLOUNT.</signed></closer>
                                </div>
                            </body>
                        </floatingText>
                <p><q>Whew!</q> said the younger man. <q>We must be hot on the
                    girl’s trail. It would be a coincidence, wouldn’t it, though, if she proved to
                    be the same</q>.</p>
                <p><q>The former missionary also wrote from Sendai</q>, said the
                    lawyer. <q>There is not the smallest doubt in my mind that the child is the
                    same</q>.</p>
                <p>There was a slight stir behind the paper <foreign xml:lang="ja">shoji</foreign> beside
                    them, causing the two men to glance towards it quickly. Then, with slight
                    frowns, they nodded comprehendingly to each other.</p>
                <p><q>One of the unpleasant things of this country</q>, said the
                    younger man, <q>is that privacy is an unknown quantity. As you perceive, we have
                    had not only watchers but auditors</q>.</p>
                <pb n="134"/>
                <p>He indicated with a nod of his head a few little holes in
                    the <foreign xml:lang="ja">shoji</foreign>, through one of which a little rosy-tipped finger protruded, as it
                    carefully and cautiously widened the opening. The next moment the finger
                    withdrew, and an eye, withdrawn from a smaller hole above, was applied to the
                    larger hole. And the eye was blue!</p>
                <p><q>Christmas!</q> cried the attorney, springing to his feet
                    indignantly. <q>Our listeners are not merely Japanese, it seems</q>.</p>
                <p>In vexation he strode to the <foreign xml:lang="ja">shoji</foreign>, shook it angrily, and
                    then savagely pushed it aside.</p>
                <p>There was a great fluttering from within. The
                    sliding-doors were now pushed wide apart, showing the inner apartment in its
                    entirety. A bright-hued <foreign xml:lang="ja">kimono</foreign> was disappearing around an angle which led to a
                    long hall, and close upon its heels a girl in a plum-colored <foreign xml:lang="ja">kimono</foreign> tripped and
                    fell to the floor in a heap. Over to her strode the <pb n="135"/> two men. She
                    put her head to the mats and crouched in speechless fear and shame.</p>
                <p><q>What do you want?</q> the elder one demanded; <q>and what do
                    you mean by listening at the door like this?</q></p>
                <p>She spoke with her head still bent to the floor.</p>
                <p><q>The insignificant one wished only to listen to the
                    voices of the excellencies</q>.</p>
                <p>The peculiar quality of her voice struck the men with a
                    familiar tone. It was a voice they had heard but a little time since--but
                    where?</p>
                <p><q>But some white--somebody with blue eyes was here,
                    too--somebody not Japanese</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Excellency is augustly mistaken</q>.</p>
                <p>Excellency was not augustly mistaken, and if she did not
                    explain immediately, excellency said he would raise the roof.</p>
                <p>Whereat she got to her feet very slowly, and lifted her
                    face in strangely tremulous appeal to them. They recognized her instantly.</p>
                <pb n="136"/>
                <p><q>Those abominable blue eyes</q>, she said, <q>alas, belong
                    unto me</q>. She bowed in humble deprecation.</p>
                <p><q>What were you doing?</q></p>
                <p><q>Pray, pardon the foolish one. I did follow you to gaze
                    upon you</q>, she said.</p>
                <p>Flattered against their will, and fascinated by the
                    girl’s peculiar beauty, the men smiled upon her.</p>
                <p><q>And why did you wish to <hi style="font-style:italic;">gaze</hi> upon
                    us?</q></p>
                <p><q>Because, excellencies, the humble one wanted to satisfy
                    herself whether the illustrious ones were gods--or--or--</q></p>
                <p>She retreated from them ever so slightly.</p>
                <p><q>--or</q>, the younger man repeated--<q>or what?</q></p>
                <p><q>Devils</q>, she said, in a whisper. They burst into
                    laughter. All their good-nature was restored in a moment.</p>
                <p><q>And what are we?</q> inquired the elder man.</p>
                <p><q>Neither</q>, she said, looking at their <pb n="137"/> faces very
                    earnestly. <q>You only just plain men--just like me--same thing</q>.</p>
                <p><q>How is it you could not understand our Japanese before,
                    yet you answer us now?</q></p>
                <p><q>My ears were stupid then. They are brighter now</q>, was
                    her paradoxical response.</p>
                <p>The elder man turned to the other.</p>
                <p><q>I’ve an idea; let’s question her. She’s a half-caste,
                    apparently, and may be able to help us in the search for the Lorrimer
                    child</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Good idea</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Give me the first letter. Better make sure of the
                    woman’s name. Ah, here it is--Madame A--peculiar, unpronounceable name</q>.</p>
                <p><q>‘Hollyhock’ in English</q>, said the younger, looking over
                    his shoulder.</p>
                <p>The girl suddenly turned to the strangers.</p>
                <p><q>Excellencies, I also understand liddle bit Engleesh</q>,
                    she said.</p>
                <p><q>You do?</q></p>
                <pb n="138"/>
                <p><q>Yes. And I also listen to that conversation</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Which was a very wrong thing to do</q>.</p>
                <p>She seemed serious and regarded them with an appealing
                    expression in her eyes.</p>
                <p><q>Is there really liddle Engleesh girl at Sendai?</q></p>
                <p><q>Yes. Do you know her?</q></p>
                <p>She shook her head.</p>
                <p><q>But</q>, she said, <q>I extremely sorry for her</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Why?</q></p>
                <p><q>Soach a wicked fadder!</q></p>
                <p><q>Oh no. He’s a very fine man</q>.</p>
                <p>She continued to shake her head.</p>
                <p><q>He’s got nudder wife now?</q> she suddenly asked.</p>
                <p><q>Yes</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Then he don’ also wan’ his liddle girl?</q></p>
                <p><q>Oh, but he does. He has no other children and is crazy
                    to find this one</q>.</p>
                <p>Hyacinth sighed.</p>
                <pb n="139"/>
                <p><q>Well, I think I go home. Excellencies will pardon
                    me</q>.</p>
                <p><q>One minute. Do you know somebody--a woman--named--how in
                    the deuce is this pronounced, Madame A-o-i</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Madame A-o</q>, she repeated, softly. <q>No, I do not know
                    such name--but--but--my mother, her august name is liddle like that--Madame
                    A-o-i</q>.</p>
                <p>The two men started, the same idea occurring in a flash
                    to each.</p>
                <p><q>Jove!</q> said the younger, <q>our search is ended</q>.</p>
                <p>The girl stared at them with puzzled eyes. The elder man
                    went a step nearer to her, bent down, and looked very closely at her face.</p>
                <p><q>Do you know</q>, he said, slowly, <q>I have a strong
                    suspicion that you--<hi style="font-style:italic;">you</hi> are the child we are looking
                    for?</q></p>
                <p><q>Me!</q> she stammered.</p>
                <p>With sudden fright her lips parted.</p>
                <p>She became snow-white, the color ebbing out from her face
                    under their very eyes. <pb n="140"/> Her little hand was placed almost unconsciously over her
                    heart.</p>
                <p><q>Me!</q> she repeated, faintly, <q>that--that liddle Engleesh
                    child! Excellencies make august mistake. You excuse yourselves, if you please!
                    You--</q></p>
                <p>Trembling she turned from them and moved towards the exit
                    rear. As they followed her she turned her head, looking back at them over her
                    shoulder, fright in her eyes.</p>
                <p>Suddenly she made a quick dash forward and plunged
                    blindly into the dark inner corridor. Her footfalls were so light they scarce
                    could hear them, even with their ears strained, but, hastening to the window,
                    they saw her fleeing up the street.</p>
            </div>
            
            <div xml:id="owheart_1025" n="15" type="chapter">
                <head>XV</head>
                <p>Hyacinth did not slacken her pace until she was before
                    her home. Then, with trembling fingers, she undid the gate, sped up the little
                    adobe path, and burst breathlessly into the guest-chamber, where Aoi was quietly
                    and pensively arranging blossoms in a vase.</p>
                <p>Aoi turned with mild surprise at the girl’s entry, but
                    when she saw her face the mother hastened towards her.</p>
                <p><q>Why, something has affrighted the little one. <foreign xml:lang="ja">Aré moshi</foreign>,
                    <foreign xml:lang="ja">moshi</foreign>. Well, she should not have followed the strangers. There, tell it all to
                    the mother</q>.</p>
                <p>She drew the trembling girl to the soft-padded floor and
                    placed her arm reassuringly about her. But Hyacinth seized both her
                    foster-mother’s hands <pb n="142"/> and held them in a spasmodic, almost fierce, clasp.</p>
                <p><q>They going to come for me! Oh yes, yes. They will take
                    me away. Oh, what can I do? What--They tell me--Oh-h--</q></p>
                <p>She broke down utterly, her throat choked with her
                    sobs.</p>
                <p><q>Why, what does the little one mean?</q></p>
                <p>She could not respond. She clung to Aoi fearfully.</p>
                <p>There were heavy, quick steps coming up the garden-path.
                    Then a pause before the door. The next moment loud raps.</p>
                <p>The young girl’s trembling fear communicated itself to
                    Aoi, and the two now clung together fearfully, listening, with strained ears, to
                    every sound. They heard the shuffling sound of Mumè’s feet in the hall, then the
                    gruff, deep voices of the callers, and a few moments later the men were ushered
                    into the guest-chamber of Madame Aoi.</p>
                <pb n="143"/>
                <p>Their mission was soon explained. They understood that
                    seventeen years ago an American lady had died in her home, which was then in a
                    village on the shore of the bay. She, Madame Aoi, they understood, had adopted
                    the child, having failed to find the father. He, on his part, had only just
                    succeeded in tracing the child’s whereabouts. It was believed that she, Madame
                    Aoi, was still in possession of her.</p>
                <p>Although Aoi made no denial, she made no admission. She
                    looked at the girl she had brought up as her own child with dry eyes and
                    quivering lips. The young girl looked back at her with piteous, imploring eyes.
                    Aoi closed her lips and refused even to answer the strangers. But after a space
                    the girl herself stepped towards them and, raising her face defiantly, said:</p>
                <p><q>Foreigners, you make ridiculous mistake. Yet, supposing
                    you do not make mistake, what will you do?</q></p>
                <p><q>Send immediately for the father</q>.</p>
                <pb n="144"/>
                <p><q>And then?</q></p>
                <p><q>He is your legal and natural guardian. You, of course,
                    would have to go with him</q>.</p>
                <p>The lawyer did not hesitate to pronounce her the one for
                    whom they had sought.</p>
                <p><q>Leave--Japan?</q> she asked, her bosom heaving.</p>
                <p><q>You are not Japanese. You see, I take it for granted you
                    are the girl in question</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Yes</q>, she said, <q>I am that girl in question. My mother’s
                    clothes--they are Engleesh. Excellencies do not make mistake. I--I--foolish to
                    deny that. But--but what <hi style="font-style:italic;">he</hi>--that father going to do--<hi style="font-style:italic;">if</hi> I will not go with him?</q></p>
                <p><q>You are under age</q>, said the lawyer. <q>He can force
                    you</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Force me to leave my home?</q> she said, softly. <q>Force me
                    to leave Japan? No!</q></p>
                <p><q>You belong to his home. It is some <pb n="145"/> fatal and
                    horrible miscarriage of fate that has cast your destiny among this alien
                    people</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Not alien!</q> she said, fiercely. <q>My people--my--</q> She
                    broke off, and almost staggered towards Aoi, against whom she leaned, as if for
                    support.</p>
                <p><q>Go away, go!</q> she cried to them. <q>Excuse our rudeness,
                    but--but, alas, we are in sorrow</q>.</p>
                <p>She sank to the ground, burying her face and sobbing
                    piteously.</p>
                <p>Aoi stepped falteringly towards them.</p>
                <p><q>Good-bye, excellencies. Pray you come to-morrow instead.
                    We will be in good health then. Good-bye</q>.</p>
                <p>Silently the two men left the house. They were quite far
                    down the street before either spoke again. Then:</p>
                <p><q>Good Heavens! It is grotesque, impossible, horrible</q>,
                    said the younger man.</p>
                <p><q>She is more Japanese than anything else</q>.</p>
                <pb n="146"/>
                <p><q>But her face--it--by George! I haven’t words to express
                    myself. I thought to render a splendid service to the little girl, yet
                    now--well--I feel like a--criminal</q>.</p>
            </div>
            
            <div xml:id="owheart_1026" n="16" type="chapter">
                <head>XVI</head>
                <p>After the departure of the strangers, Aoi and Hyacinth,
                    clinging to each other, had gone to the young girl’s chamber, where they had
                    shut themselves in alone. The suddenness of the blow had robbed them of the
                    power of even talking it over. The tension of the strain might have been
                    relieved had they done so. But they sat in silence together throughout the
                    night. Aoi appeared to be dazed, stunned, while the feelings of the girl were
                    mixed. The phantoms of her ever-active mind were tangled, but painful. She was
                    to be torn by force from her home--to be taken away from all she loved--she
                    would never see Aoi again--Aoi, her mother, whom she loved deeply,
                    devotedly.</p>
                <p>She would be carried away to a <pb n="148"/> country where
                    the people lived like barbarians and beasts--a country barren of beauty--cold,
                    cruel. All this the misguided <foreign xml:lang="ja">sensei</foreign> had told her more than once. She felt sure
                    she would languish and become mortally sick there, if she ever reached that
                    distant country. But how would she cross the great, horrible ocean that lay
                    between? Yes, she was quite sure she would die before she reached that America;
                    and she did not want to die. Life had been very sweet for her, and she was so
                    young.</p>
                <p>Slow tears of self-pity slipped from her eyes and dropped
                    upon her little, clasped hands. She looked across at the immovable figure of Aoi
                    sitting in the dusky room before her like a statue. She wondered vaguely what
                    Aoi was thinking about. How she did love that dear, small mother. She moved a
                    pace closer to her. Aoi parted her lips as if to speak, then closed them, as
                    though words failed her. Hyacinth covered her face with her hands.</p>
                <pb n="149"/>
                <p>How long they sat thus together she could not have told.
                    Her thoughts had become blurred and distant.</p>
                <p>Later, when Aoi roused herself from her own painful
                    self-communings, she perceived that the young girl had fallen asleep. Her little
                    head rested uncertainly against the wall-panelling, and Aoi saw the undried
                    tears still upon the white, childish face. She gently placed a pillow beneath
                    the girl’s head, and softly threw over her the slumber-robe. Then she
                    extinguished the one <foreign xml:lang="ja">andon</foreign> which had dimly lighted the room. She did not,
                    however, retire to her own chamber that night, but lay down beside the girl,
                    creeping under the same robe which covered her.</p>
                <p>The following morning brought one of the unwelcome
                    strangers again to the house of Madame Aoi. He was the younger one of the two,
                    and had stood by silently while his companion explained the motive of their
                    call.</p>
                <p>Mumè had seen him lingering and <pb n="150"/> hesitating at
                    the gate of the garden for some time before he suddenly pushed it open and
                    walked a few paces swiftly up the path, paused in thought a moment, and then
                    continued to the house. He had evidently expected at least a polite reception,
                    and was much disconcerted when the scowling face of the now hostile Mumè
                    confronted him at the threshold. This Oriental virago deigned at first no word
                    of question as to the desire of the caller, but when he had stammeringly stated
                    in uncertain Japanese that the object of his visit was to see Madame Aoi, she
                    broke out into vigorous and violent Japanese abuse.</p>
                <p>What did this devil of a barbarian want? How dared he
                    soil the threshold of her august mistress’s house. All the fiends of Hades were
                    pestering them lately, it seemed, but she, Mumè, was not to be frightened by any
                    such fiends as he. He had scared the little one and her mother quite speechless.
                    She, Mumè, would defend them from further violence <pb n="151"/> at his hands,
                    and he had better begone at once, or she would set the whole community upon him
                    and have him stoned and beaten.</p>
                <p>In the midst of this harangue she was interrupted by the
                    interposition of Hyacinth, who had arrived upon the scene and had stood silently
                    in the background for some time quietly listening to the fluent Mumè. Then she
                    stepped forward and spoke a few, low words in Japanese to Mumè. The young man
                    could not have told from the expression of her face whether she had reproved the
                    servant or not. When the angry Mumè, muttering and scowling at every retreating
                    step, had disappeared, the girl turned questioningly to the caller. She did not
                    invite him to enter, and though her words were courteous, he thought her eyes
                    antagonistic. He noticed, too, that there were shadows beneath the eyes, and
                    that she was very pale. As he continued to gaze at her face she slowly and
                    unwillingly flushed.</p>
                <pb n="152"/>
                <p><q>Your business, honorable sir; what is it you
                    desire?</q></p>
                <p><q>You’ll excuse me, I’m sure, but I came over--er--I came
                    over by request of Mr. Knowles. You remember Mr. Knowles?</q></p>
                <p>He paused to gain time, still hoping she would bid him
                    enter. But the expression of her face was coldly forbidding, and at his question
                    she merely inclined her head with the faintest, most frigid smile on her lips.
                    It seemed to the anxious young man that she must see through his flimsy ruse. As
                    a matter of fact, all she thought was that here again was that odious stranger.
                    Were the gods going to pester her forever with their company? The thought
                    nauseated and embittered her.</p>
                <p><q>You see--Miss--er--if you will allow me a moment of your
                    time</q>, the young man stammered, <q>I can easily explain</q>.</p>
                <p>Again she inclined her head without speaking, as though
                    she conceded the <pb n="153"/> moment of time, but had no intention that it should be granted anywhere else.
                    He marvelled that the deliciously blushing and ingenuously coquettish girl of
                    the previous day could have changed to this cold and impassive little stiff
                    figure with the dignity of a woman.</p>
                <p><q>Mr. Knowles, you see, being a great friend of your
                    father--and mine--we naturally feel that--er--we both wish to express
                    our--our--respects for his daughter</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Thangs</q>, she said; laconically.</p>
                <p><q>And if you would do me the honor</q>, he added, taking
                    courage from the one word she had allowed herself, <q>we would like very much to
                    have you and--of course--your--Madame--A-ah--</q> he floundered, hopelessly.</p>
                <p><q>Madame Aoi</q>, said the girl, distantly.</p>
                <p>He could not have told how he had happened to invite them
                    to dinner. Certainly it wouldn’t do to have them come at once. There was the
                    attorney to be considered--Mr. Knowles--who knew <pb n="154"/> nothing of his
                    visit, and might, after all, disapprove of it.</p>
                <p><q>We’ll send you word just when to come</q>, he concluded,
                    lamely.</p>
                <p>He saw her lip curl disdainfully, and guessed aright that
                    she was thinking him atrociously uncouth and rude in delivering so ambiguous an
                    invitation. She said:</p>
                <p><q>We are ten million times grateful--but we don’ can
                    come--</q></p>
                <p>She paused ominously a moment, then slightly moving
                    backward into the hall, she said:</p>
                <p><q>That’s all your business--yes?</q></p>
                <p><q>Yes</q>, he said, confounded.</p>
                <p>She closed the sliding-doors between and left him
                    standing there facing it without.</p>
            </div>
            
            <div xml:id="owheart_1027" n="17" type="chapter">
                <head>XVII</head>
                <p>Melancholy now took up its morbid abode in the house of
                    Madame Aoi. Even Mumè felt the pall of its heavy weight, and went about her work
                    no longer complaining loudly, but muttering to herself--shuddering at the
                    silence and shadow that had fallen upon the house. For Aoi, to keep out
                    unwelcome callers, kept the shutters and <foreign xml:lang="ja">shoji</foreign> closed at all times, and the
                    house assumed the aspect of one wherein was illness or sorrow.</p>
                <p>But Hyacinth sought solace among her flowers. She kept
                    sedulously to the back of the house, where she knew she would be safe from
                    intrusion. Along the little, white-pebbled paths, which she and Aoi had so
                    cunningly planned among the flower-beds, between the twisted and fantastic trees
                    affected by <pb n="156"/>
                    Japanese-garden lovers, she aimlessly wandered.</p>
                <p>Meanwhile, the young American attaché fairly haunted the
                    vicinity of Madame Aoi’s house. He would spend sometimes an entire morning
                    strolling up and down the street before the house. Indeed, so familiar had his
                    figure become to the neighborhood children that he no longer was molested by
                    them. He had told Mr. Knowles that he was enchanted by the view of the bay
                    Matsushima, but since it was too enervating to walk in the heat such a distance,
                    he preferred watching it afar from the Pinetree Street, whence he obtained the
                    best view possible. The attorney, deep in the preparation of a report and
                    opinion to follow his cable to Mr. Lorrimer, had merely looked up at him keenly
                    a moment, and, marking the ingenuous coloring that flooded the face of the boy,
                    stuck his tongue in his cheek and softly winked. Mr. Knowles was very well
                    satisfied, since young <pb n="157"/> Saunders would cease to complain against his enforced
                    stay in this little inland town, so far away from the gay metropolis.</p>
                <p>For a week Saunders patiently waited and watched for a
                    glimpse of Hyacinth. But though, in his repeated pilgrimages up and down the
                    street, his pace fell to almost a crawl when he would pass her home, and though
                    he did not, after the first day, hesitate to crane his neck eagerly, and try to
                    see beyond the bushes and trees in the front garden to the portion behind, no
                    glimpse, as yet, had he obtained of the object of his desire. The house, indeed,
                    seemed closed, and but for the fact that once or twice he had seen the fat form
                    of Mumè issue forth on apparent shopping errands, he would have thought the
                    house deserted. Once he had attempted to speak to Mumè, but she had indignantly
                    opened an aggressive parasol squarely in his face, the points of which he had
                    barely escaped.</p>
                <p>Saunders became desperate. He told <pb n="158"/> himself that
                    he had no intention whatever of allowing a fat little servant to stand in his
                    way, nor was he to be abashed by the haughty dignity of one so completely
                    bewitching as was this little Hyacinth.</p>
                <p>Hence, one morning in June, Mr. Saunders came down the
                    Pinetree Street with a much swifter and more dogged step than usual. Reaching
                    Madame Aoi’s house, he did not even linger, but, pushing the gate aside,
                    intrepidly entered the hostile country. He was cautious, however, and, mindful
                    of his previous visit, he turned aside from the path which led to the front
                    threshold, and made his way softly around the side of the house. His bravery was
                    usually short-lived, and, though possibly he would not have admitted it, his
                    heart was thumping, and he bore the aspect of a thief, as, creeping stealthily
                    in the shadow of the trees, he plunged ahead. He had had a purpose in mind when
                    he started--the brave one of penetrating the back of the house. <pb n="159"/> Experience had
                    taught him that the Japanese practically lived in this part of their house, and
                    that the garden, unseen from the front, was where they were likely to be found.
                    Yet he had the natural contempt of the Japanese idea of privacy. He could not
                    accept the fact that in most personal matters of life they appeared to be almost
                    ignorant of the word privacy.</p>
                <p>His surmises were correct. He came upon a member of the
                    family almost as soon as he reached the back garden. Hyacinth was sitting on the
                    moss-grown shelf of an old well and looking at the reflection of her face
                    listlessly, perhaps unseeingly, in the dark water beneath. She made a pretty
                    picture, as, startled by the sudden appearance of the young man, she slipped to
                    the ground and faced him. Her eyes were wide, half with fright, half with
                    growing anger, and from being pale she flushed vividly red. Her voice was harsh
                    and strained when, after a moment, she spoke.</p>
                <pb n="160"/>
                <p><q>What do you want?</q></p>
                <p>This time she did not even give him the title of
                    <q>honorable sir</q>.</p>
                <p><q>I wanted to see you</q>, he said, truthfully.</p>
                <p><q>You come like a thief</q>, she said. <q>Is that the custom of
                    the barbarian?</q></p>
                <p><q>I beg your pardon, but really--the fact is--I hoped this
                    way to avoid an encounter with your servant</q>.</p>
                <p>She made a scornful movement towards the house, but he
                    sprang before her and barred her passage.</p>
                <p><q>See here--Miss Lorrimer--I hope you will listen to me. I
                    know I seem to have acted atrociously, but really--</q></p>
                <p><q>Have you some business to speak to my honorable mother?</q>
                    she inquired, boldly.</p>
                <p><q>No--I confess I have not--but I wanted--to become
                    acquainted with you</q>.</p>
                <p>After that an uncomfortable pause ensued. The girl
                    appeared to be turn- <pb n="161"/> ing the matter over in her mind. Then she said:</p>
                <p><q>Why do you wish make acquaintance with me?</q></p>
                <p>Simple as her question was, it appeared to have glowing
                    possibilities to the eager Saunders.</p>
                <p><q>Because</q>, he said, <q>you are so lovely. Do you
                    know--</q></p>
                <p>She interrupted him.</p>
                <p><q>Is that the manner in which your country people address
                    maidens?</q> she asked, with more curiosity than offence.</p>
                <p><q>Yes--that is, sometimes--when they mean it, and the girl
                        <hi style="font-style:italic;">is</hi> lovely, as you are</q>.</p>
                <p><q>But</q>, she said, <q>it is augustly rude to tell me so</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Oh no; you wouldn’t think so if you understood</q>.</p>
                <p><q>I understand</q>, she said.</p>
                <p><q>I mean, if you understood our point of view</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Understand it</q>, she repeated, <q>but I despise it</q>. Then,
                    after a slight pause, <pb n="162"/> very earnestly: <q>I am a Japanese; we are not so uncouth
                    and rude in our intercourse with strangers</q>.</p>
                <p><q>I wish you would not regard me as a stranger</q>.</p>
                <p>She looked puzzled.</p>
                <p><q>Not regard you as a stranger!</q> she repeated.</p>
                <p><q>No. I wish you’d look upon me as a friend; one who
                    admires you and wants to--to do something for you</q>.</p>
                <p><q>But you are not my friend</q>, she said. Then, catching her
                    breath a moment, she added, <q>You are an enemy</q>.</p>
                <p><q>I!</q> He was very much pained. <hi style="font-style:italic;">He</hi>
                    an enemy to this charming young girl!</p>
                <p><q>Yes, yes</q>, she said, with some vehemence. <q>You come here
                    into our peaceful home and in one day--one minute--you break it all up, bring
                    distress and pain upon us. You have no fine sense; you cannot even be insulted.
                    You come again, again, perhaps again, though your presence we do not
                    desire--</q></p>
                <pb n="163"/>
                <p>She stopped short suddenly; her underlip quivered, and
                    she bit it nervously with little, white teeth. She turned her back half towards
                    young Saunders, and he could see from her trembling that she was on the verge of
                    tears. He could only falter very earnestly:</p>
                <p><q>I am very sorry--very sorry</q>.</p>
                <p>She did not speak again, and for some time they stood in
                    silence, she with her head drooping away from him and he watching her eagerly.
                    He knew she was waiting for him to go, and he was waiting for her to turn to him
                    again. He wanted to see her eyes, those eyes which had flashed at him so
                    wrathfully and then had become so suddenly misty and piteous.</p>
                <p><q>Will you not at least tell me</q>, he said, <q>that you will
                    pardon--forgive me for--for my intrusion--</q></p>
                <p><q>I am very unhappy</q>, she said, still with her face turned
                    from him. <q>I am not in condition to see any one--friends--strangers-any one. You
                    have made <pb n="164"/> me
                    so miserable I--I pray to the gods sometimes that I might die</q>.</p>
                <p>She slipped to the ground and buried her face in her arms
                    on the little stone shelf of the well.</p>
                <p>Now, the young attaché was really a good-hearted boy, in
                    spite of his frivolity; and the sight of the little, sobbing figure touched him.
                    He stood in a confusion of discomfort and remorse, while strange little waves
                    and thrills of tender emotion swept over him and rendered him still more
                    helpless.</p>
                <p>He was too stupid to comprehend the cause of the girl’s
                    wretchedness, and he was very young. Consequently, he actually experienced a
                    thrill of vague pleasure at the thought that in some way his attractive
                    personality was responsible for Hyacinth’s distress.</p>
                <p>But while he stood hesitating and perspiring from sheer
                    excitement, he became suddenly conscious of the fact that some one was coming
                    from the house towards them. Aoi came hur- <pb n="165"/> riedly across the grass. She paused a
                    moment, startled at the sight of the young foreigner in their private gardens.
                    Then she saw the crouching girl, and in a moment comprehended the situation.</p>
                <p>Poor, simple, amiable Aoi! Possibly never in all her life
                    before had such violent feelings assailed her. She turned upon the intruder with
                    flashing eyes.</p>
                <p><q>You come here! You make my daughter weep! You are bad
                    lot. Leave my grounds or I will have you arrested!</q></p>
                <p><q>Madame Aoi</q>, he protested, <q>I assure you that I meant no
                    offence, but--</q></p>
                <p>Hyacinth had slowly risen to her feet. She put her arm
                    gently about Aoi’s shoulder.</p>
                <p><q>Do not speak the words to him, mother</q>, she said, in
                    Japanese. <q>He did not mean to make me weep</q>.</p>
                <p>Aoi was quieted in an instant. She still looked
                    uncertainly, however, at the stranger.</p>
                <p>A sudden idea seemed to come to her <pb n="166"/> mind. She went
                    a hesitating step nearer to Saunders and raised her face to his, while her eyes
                    searched his face. She said:</p>
                <p><q>You come to see <hi style="font-style:italic;">me</hi>, august sir,
                    or--or--my daughter?</q></p>
                <p><q>Your--that is--</q></p>
                <p>He flushed uncomfortably, but indicated, with a slight
                    nod of his head, the young girl.</p>
                <p>Aoi’s eyes narrowed curiously. Her trembling lips
                    compressed themselves into a stiff, rigid line. When she spoke her voice was
                    quite hoarse.</p>
                <p><q>In Japan</q>, she said, <q>a young man does not visit a
                    maiden unless he is her lover</q>.</p>
                <p>Saunders swung his stick uneasily.</p>
                <p><q>I am an American</q>, he said, lamely.</p>
                <p><q>Yes</q>, said Aoi. <q>You are American, and because that is
                    so your visit to my daughter is an insult</q>.</p>
                <p><q>No, I protest</q>, he said, warmly.</p>
                <p><q>You came for business?</q></p>
                <p><q>No--but--</q></p>
                <pb n="167"/>
                <p><q>You came to make that love to her--yes--it is so?</q></p>
                <p><q>Yes--but--er--</q></p>
                <p>Aoi stretched out her slim arm and pointed to the path
                    leading to the front of the house. The gesture could have but one meaning. Young
                    Saunders flushed angrily.</p>
                <p><q>This is a deuce of a way to take a fellow’s
                    attentions</q>, he said, half to himself. <q>Why, I declare, I meant no harm</q>.</p>
                <p>Aoi smiled incredulously.</p>
                <p><q>I am old</q>, she said, slowly; and at her flushed, almost
                    youthful, face the young man smiled involuntarily. But she repeated her words:
                    <q>I am old with experience, Mister--sir--and because I was the wife of an
                    Englishman, I know from him the evil meant by such attention as yours to a
                    maiden of Japan</q>.</p>
                <p><q>But she is not Japanese</q>, he burst out; <q>I never for a
                    moment thought of her as such</q>.</p>
                <p>His words staggered Aoi. In her zeal <pb n="168"/> to protect the
                    girl from the overtures of this foreigner she had forgotten the facts of the
                    girl’s birth. She became agitated. Her hands fell helplessly to her knees as she
                    bent brokenly forward. With her head bowed, she spoke in a plaintive voice:</p>
                <p><q>The humble one craves the pardon of the illustrious
                    sir. But will he not condescend to depart?</q></p>
                <p>Somewhat irritated and provoked, rather sulkily he
                    turned towards the path and slowly, unwillingly, left the garden.</p>
            </div>
            
            <div xml:id="owheart_1028" n="18" type="chapter">
                <head>XVIII</head>
                <p>A month and a half had gone by since the American
                    attorney had cabled to his client in Europe of the success of his mission.
                    Richard Lorrimer’s immediate response had been that he was leaving at once for
                    Japan. Any day now he might arrive in Sendai.</p>
                <p>In the meanwhile, Aoi sought to comfort and strengthen
                    the despairing Hyacinth. She contrived to break up their retirement, and sought
                    to divert her mind by taking her out each day. The girl had acquired a peculiar
                    loathing and horror for the <q>white people</q>, of whom the little town of Sendai
                    had now quite a plague.</p>
                <p>The women went about in hideous garments, with what
                    appeared to be heavy flower-baskets upon their heads. <pb n="170"/> The men gazed
                    at her and made insinuating efforts to speak to her. Hyacinth was sure all these
                    foreigners carried knives, because they were constantly chipping off pieces of
                    the tombs and the temples. They were sacrilegious beasts, she thought, who had
                    not reverence even for the dead. Everywhere in the city she found them.
                    Sometimes they were even on the heights of Matsushima, where they laughed and
                    talked in loud voices to one another under the very shadows of the holy temples.
                    She hated them all, she told herself. Most of all she loathed this man who was
                    said to be her father, who had broken her mother’s heart and married a woman her
                    mother despised, and who now sought to drag her by force from those she
                    loved.</p>
                <p>Yet the visiting foreigners in Sendai possessed a more
                    friendly spirit towards her than she knew. Knowing her history, they were
                    prompted by pity and curiosity to seek an acquaintance, which was always met by
                    the darkest and <pb n="171"/> haughtiest of frowns and disdainful glances. When they addressed her, she
                    stared stonily before her. Once, when a too-curious woman persisted in annoying
                    her with numerous questions, Hyacinth had raised her voice suddenly and shrieked
                    to a score of little urchins playing in the street. In an instant they had
                    rushed into the road, whence they threw sticks and mud at the indignant
                    foreigner. Whereat Hyacinth had burst into a wild peal of shrill, defiant
                    laughter. Then she had rushed headlong into the house, where she flung herself
                    on the floor, giving vent to a tempest of tears.</p>
                <p>In these days she could not bear Aoi out of her sight,
                    and even old Mumè received an unusual share of affection. The thought of leaving
                    them caused her deep sorrow. The passage of the days added not one whit to her
                    resignation. If she must go, she would go battling at every step. But, before
                    the time should come, maybe the gods would intervene, and she might die.</p>
                <pb n="172"/>
                <p>Strangely enough, in these days she forgot, or refused
                    to remember, all she had learned at the mission-house. Instead, she would climb
                    wearily the long way to one of the temples on the hill, where she sought the old
                    priest who kept the fire of the gods perpetually burning, and bitterly she
                    poured out at his feet all the anguish of her heart.</p>
                <p>She was a Japanese girl, she asserted--Japanese in
                    thought, in feeling, in heart, in soul. How could she leave her beloved home and
                    people to go away with these cold, white ones, whom she could never, never learn
                    to know or understand.</p>
                <p>And the priest promised to give her counsel and help
                    when the time should come. From day to day he would admonish:</p>
                <p><q>A little longer--wait! The gods will find a way</q>.</p>
                <p>But the days passed with more than natural speed of
                    time. Then came a telegram to Sendai. The lawyer, Mr. <pb n="173"/> Knowles,
                    brought it to Aoi’s house. It was from Mr. Lorrimer. He had arrived in Tokyo. He
                    would start at once for Sendai.</p>
                <p>Then desperation seized upon Hyacinth. Unmindful of the
                    pleadings of Aoi, she besought the Yamashiro family for help.</p>
                <p>Now, the Yamashiro family had always been ashamed of the
                    fact that Hyacinth was half English. They had more than once declared that if
                    she had been wholly so a union with their son would have been an impossible
                    thing. Consequently, Madame Yamashiro received the young girl frigidly. She
                    considered it both hoydenish and rude for a girl to pay a visit to her
                    betrothed’s parents alone. But the moment Hyacinth began to speak, Madame
                    Yamashiro became so frightened that she trembled.</p>
                <p>The girl, in a breath, told her of the discovery of her
                    true parentage. She implored Madame Yamashiro to hasten <pb n="174"/> her marriage
                    with Yoshida, so that she might not be forced to leave Japan. For could this
                    foreign father then tear her from her husband? No, all the laws of Japan would
                    prevent him.</p>
                <p>So rapid was her utterance that one word tripped against
                    another.</p>
                <p>In her agitation, Madame Yamashiro thought the girl
                    insane. She clapped her hands so loudly that half a dozen maidens came to answer
                    at once.</p>
                <p><q>The master!</q> she cried; and never had the Yamashiro
                    servants seen their mistress so perturbed.</p>
                <p>Not a word did she speak to Hyacinth after that until
                    her husband and son entered the room; then faithfully she repeated the words of
                    the girl.</p>
                <p>Like a little stupid animal the boy’s round face became
                    vacant. He stared at the girl out of a pair of small, amazed eyes. She tapped
                    her foot impatiently upon the floor, and then turned to the father, her two
                    little hands outstretched.</p>
                <p><q>Oh, good Yamashiro, will you not <pb n="175"/> hasten this
                    marriage? I am ready, willing, to wed at once--to-day--this minute</q>.</p>
                <p><q>If it be true</q>, said Yamashiro, heavily, <q>that you are
                    an Engleesh, it is quite impossible. My son could not marry with such</q>.</p>
                <p><q>But we are betrothed</q>, she cried, piteously. <q>Yamashiro
                    Yoshida is my affianced. Oh, you will not cast me off!</q></p>
                <p>She turned pitifully from one to the other. They were
                    all quite silent. Then she spoke to Yoshida. Her voice was clear and hard.</p>
                <p><q>You--Yoshida, you would not cast me off? You swore you
                    adored me. It is not my fault I am Engleesh. I am Japanese here</q>.</p>
                <p>She placed her hands over her heart. <q>If you will marry
                    me</q>, she said, <q>I will be Japanese altogether</q>.</p>
                <p><q>My son</q>, said Yamashiro the elder, <q>will obey his
                    father’s august will in all things</q>.</p>
                <pb n="176"/>
                <p>The girl spoke slowly, scornfully.</p>
                <p><q>I make a fool of myself to come to you with such a
                    request. I would not marry you, Yoshida--no, not though the white people killed
                    me</q>.</p>
                <p>Drawing the doors sharply behind her, Hyacinth left the
                    house unattended to the gate.</p>
                <p><q>Ah, what an escape we have had!</q> burst from Madame
                    Yamashiro.</p>
                <p>Her husband scowled.</p>
                <p>Yoshida slowly moved to the <foreign xml:lang="ja">shoji</foreign> and stared out dimly
                    at the little figure hurrying down the path.</p>
            </div>
            
            <div xml:id="owheart_1029" n="19" type="chapter">
                <head>XIX</head>
                <p><q>Yamashiro Yoshida will not marry me. He has cast me
                    off</q>, Hyacinth told Aoi.</p>
                <p><q>And to-night</q>, said Aoi, helplessly, <q>the father will
                    arrive</q>.</p>
                <p>The girl pressed her hands tightly together. Aoi laid a
                    timid, comforting hand upon her shoulder.</p>
                <p><q>Little one</q>, she said, in a pleading voice, <q>pray thee
                    to take cheer. It is your duty to go to your father. You have not forgotten all
                    I have taught you. Filial submission to the parent is the most important of
                    all</q>.</p>
                <p><q>And have I not always shown such respect and devotion
                    to you, dear mother?</q></p>
                <p><q>To me? Ah, yes, little one, and I <pb n="178"/> would that I
                    were, indeed, your own mother</q>.</p>
                <p><q>You are, you are</q>, cried the girl, crushing down the
                    sob that rose in her throat, and then dashing her hand against her eyes. <q>Ah</q>,
                    she cried, <q>this is not time to weep. We must think--must think of some way.
                    Yamashiro has failed us. Ah! Who could have expected else? They were always
                    despicable</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Try and follow my counsel</q>, said Aoi; <q>accept the
                    inevitable. The father is coming; he is your rightful guardian. Bow to his will
                    and give him what affection you can</q>.</p>
                <p><q>I can give him not one grain of affection</q>, said the
                    girl, bitterly. <q>Did he not cast off my mother for that other woman? Ah, I have
                    heard all the story. What I could not understand that first day I have learned
                    since, and you also. Did you not tell me that my mother died shuddering at his
                    memory?</q></p>
                <p>Aoi sighed helplessly. The girl threw <pb n="179"/> herself down
                    on the floor, and, resting her chin upon her hand, stared out before her at the
                    street without. There had been a little rain, and the bamboo trees across the
                    street were shining with the drops which had not yet dried upon them.</p>
                <p>Looking down the street, she could see the dim outline
                    of the country beyond, the cloud-shaped mountains, the sheen of the water
                    beneath. She turned back to Aoi, who had silently seated herself beside her.</p>
                <p><q>Mother</q>, she said, <q>I am going away alone</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Alone! Ah, you make my heart stand still with
                    fear</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Listen. All Matsushima is known to me, and the priests
                    at the temple are kind and love me. If I need food they will give it to me. Do
                    they not feed even the birds which alight upon their temples?</q></p>
                <p><q>Oh, child, I cannot think what it is you
                    contemplate</q>.</p>
                <pb n="180"/>
                <p><q>I will not leave our Japan</q>, she cried, passionately.
                    <q>It is the only home I have known</q>.</p>
                <p><q>But what can you do?</q></p>
                <p><q>I will hide</q>, said the girl.</p>
                <p><q>Ah, alas, you could not, for these foreigners are
                    everywhere here. They would find you</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Yet there are places among the tombs of Date of which
                    they know naught. Koma and I alone knew of them, and the good priest of the
                    temple Zuiganjii. There is one place--but I will not tell even you</q>.</p>
                <p>Aoi wrung her hands.</p>
                <p><q>Oh, daughter, they will seek everywhere for you till
                    they find you. You do not know the stubborn nature of these people</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Ah, but I do, my mother, for that nature is in me, too.
                    If they seek stubbornly, I, too, can hide as well</q>.</p>
                <p>Arising, she stood moment, looking down thoughtfully
                    upon Aoi.</p>
                <p><q>To-night</q>, she said, <q>they will come. <pb n="181"/> There is
                    little time to lose. When they ask for me, you will say, ‘She feared to gaze
                    upon the augustness of her parent, and so fled.’ When they ask you, ‘Where
                    fled?’ you will say, ‘Only the gods know whither.’</q></p>
            </div>
            
            <div xml:id="owheart_1030" n="20" type="chapter">
                <head>XX</head>
                <p>The great red sun had finished its day of travel and had
                    dropped deep into the waters far off in the gilded western sky. How very still
                    were the approaching shadows, how phantom-like they seemed to creep, spreading,
                    though they scarcely stirred. The glow of the sun was still upon the land,
                    reflecting the light on the dew-damped trees and the upturned faces of the
                    nameless flowers, which seemed to raise their heads, hungry, as though loath to
                    part with the light.</p>
                <p>Not a sound was heard on Matsushima. The birds were
                    voiceless, the waters moved with a soundless motion, licking rather than beating
                    against the rocks, stirring lazily, as if in slumber.</p>
                <p>Upon the silence there tenderly stole <pb n="183"/> the gentle,
                    mellow pealing of a temple bell. Its even-song was soft and sweetly muffled, so
                    that one would have thought it came from afar off.</p>
                <p>Hyacinth, heartsick and footsore, was weary when she
                    reached the bay. With a little cry she caught her breath, as for the first time
                    she looked about her, awakened from her apathy by the sudden tone of the
                    bell.</p>
                <p>The light of day was disappearing. Already the hills up
                    which she must climb looked dark and in ghostly contrast to the still light and
                    shining bay. Yet the girl lingered on the shore, her hand shading her eyes,
                    watching yearningly the sunset. The beauty of the passing day hurt her. She was
                    in a condition to feel acutely. The temple bell had ceased its song. With the
                    departure of the sun, the silence seemed more oppressive.</p>
                <p>Shuddering now, she looked up fearfully at the hills.
                    Not since she was a very little child had she visited these <pb n="184"/> particular
                    hills at night, and even then she had not been alone.</p>
                <p>Yet in those days she could have found her way
                    blindfolded among the rocks, stupendously projecting and facing the silent bay.
                    She had assured Aoi that she knew every inch of the land hereabouts. Yet now, as
                    she turned from the shore of the bay and began to climb upward, she stumbled
                    uncertainly. Her hands, outstretched before her, revealed the fact that she was
                    blindly feeling her way, and wandering along paths she did not know.</p>
                <p><q>It will be all right soon</q>, she kept repeating to
                    herself. <q>I am not lost; only a little dazed, and I am tired--tired. Wait, I
                    will find the great rock soon, and then all will be well with me</q>.</p>
                <p>She wandered about hither and thither in the darkness.
                    Gigantic rocks were about her on all sides, now shutting out the light of the
                    bay. Behind her the hills loomed up into enormous mountains, steep and
                    impenetrable.</p>
                <pb n="185"/>
                <p>The darkness about her, accentuated by the shadows of
                    the rocks, awed and terrified her. She raised her face appealingly to the sky.
                    Only one star shone out in its firmanent, bright, soft, and luminous.</p>
                <p><q>It is becoming lighter</q>, she said. <q>Ah, will the moon
                    never arise?</q></p>
                <p>And, as she spoke, the lazy moon crept upward beyond the
                    black mountains, a train of stars following in her wake. Her light was bright,
                    and reflected in a silver gleam upon the upturned face of Hyacinth.</p>
                <p>Light was all about her. The black shadows had
                    evaporated like the mist, and clean cut about her the familiar cliffs and rocks
                    outjutted, and the white tombs of the great feudal lords of Sendai shone out
                    like strange, unearthly mirrors. She stood in their midst, close by the deserted
                    Zuiganjii. And the rock against which she leaned grew suddenly white and
                    dazzling. Gazing with awed, wondering eyes upon <pb n="186"/> it, she
                    thought that some kindly goddess had guided her wandering footsteps in the dark
                    to the very refuge she sought.</p>
                <p>Yet she did not enter the cavern beneath, though she was
                    weary. She was watching, with reverential emotion, one of the phenomena of
                    nature. As she looked upward she knew that this sight would bring that evening
                    to Matsushima’s shore hundreds of banqueters, for the Japanese never fail to
                    celebrate the Milky Way. They call it the Heavenly River, in which goddesses
                    wash their robes in the month of August.</p>
                <p>Mechanically, and almost unconsciously, she climbed to
                    the surface of the rock. From her height she now looked down upon the bay.
                    Across the waters on the other shore the temples were illuminated. The white
                    sails of some fishing-boats were floating like white birds gently swimming.</p>
                <p>For a time she stood quietly on the great rock. The
                    silence and stillness <pb n="187"/> of the night possessed her, and she became drowsy. She
                    stooped and touched the surface of the rock, and found that it was covered with
                    some soft moss.</p>
                <p><q>It is so dark inside</q>, she said, plaintively, <q>and I am
                    so weary. The gods will give me sleep without</q>.</p>
                <p>In a little while her tired little body had relaxed its
                    tension. She lay there on the rock, upon her back, her arms stretched far out on
                    either side, like the wings of a bird, her face upturned to the white-flecked
                    sky.</p>
                <p>Thus, among the tombs of the ancient lords of Sendai,
                    upon the very rock where the Date lords met to raise their voices in allegiance
                    to the religion of her ancestors, this little Caucasian maiden slept alone.</p>
            </div>
            
            <div xml:id="owheart_1031" n="21" type="chapter">
                <head>XXI</head>
                <p>Madame Aoi was fluttering from room to room, her face
                    anxious, her whole being disturbed and agitated. Although she knew that the
                    expected guests might arrive at any minute, she could not remain still a
                    moment.</p>
                <p>In and out of Hyacinth’s chamber she wandered,
                    distracted, and with the yearning pain of a mother wringing her heart. The
                    little room, with its dainty, pretty mattings, its exquisite panellings, seemed
                    to reflect the personality of the loved one who had left her to bitter
                    loneliness. Even the sunlight seemed less golden now that she was gone, and the
                    dressing-table, with its mirror, propped up by a lacquer stick behind it, had a
                    forlorn appearance.</p>
                <p>Everything about the chamber, about <pb n="189"/> the whole
                    house, bore a deserted aspect. Aoi was not one given to the indulgence of tears,
                    but her quiet pain was all the more acute. Her appealing face was drawn and
                    devoid of all color. The anguish of her heart was manifest in her eyes and in
                    her quivering lips.</p>
                <p>Once she opened the panelling and looked for a moment
                    within at the clothes of the dead mother. She drew back the panel almost
                    sharply. The sight of those dumb, silent articles struck her with a nameless
                    horror. Woman-like, she recalled the face of the one to whom they had belonged.
                    Then she began to conjure up fancies of what this mother would have desired her
                    to do with her child. And the face which returned to her memory seemed, somehow,
                    to reproach her with its sad and melancholy eyes.</p>
                <p>For the first time since she had adopted Hyacinth, poor,
                    childish Aoi began to doubt whether she had done right. Did not the little one,
                    after all, belong to <pb n="190"/> these people? Was it not, therefore, wrong to have kept
                    her in ignorance of them, and permitted her to grow to maidenhood after the
                    fashion of a Japanese girl? This emotional arraignment caused Aoi anguish.</p>
                <p>Time now hung heavily upon her; the minutes seemed to
                    creep. She stared out at the graying sky, and wondered where the little one was
                    now. At that moment Hyacinth had halted in her pilgrimage on the shore of the
                    bay to gaze upon the same sunset, wistfully, yearningly.</p>
                <p>The sight of the fading day aroused a fear in the breast
                    of the watching Aoi. She sprang to her feet, smoothed her gown with hasty,
                    trembling hands, and moved towards the street door.</p>
                <p>She would go to the mission-house people and tell her
                    story. They might assist her, advise her what course to pursue. They had always
                    taken deep interest in the little one. Perhaps they, too, loved her. Oh, if
                    anything should <pb n="191"/> happen to her, out there in the darkness of the hills!</p>
                <p>Aoi had hardly reached the foot of the little spiral
                    stairs when there were sharp rappings upon the door. With her hand pressed tight
                    to her fluttering heart, she hastened forward. Without waiting for the slow Mumè
                    to answer the summons, she pushed the door aside.</p>
                <p>Then she stood still, dumbly, on the threshold. The next
                    instant Komazawa had seized her in his arms and was covering her face with
                    kisses. Against her son’s breast she began to sob in a helpless, hopeless
                    fashion, piteous to see.</p>
                <p>He, with his arm close about her, comforted softly, and
                    then turning to the strangers who were with him, he said, quietly:</p>
                <p><q>You see my unexpected arrival has upset my mother. You
                    must excuse the welcome. But, come, let us enter</q>.</p>
                <p>The man and woman, exchanging <pb n="192"/> glances,
                    followed the young man and his mother into the guest-room.</p>
                <p>The woman was tall and had once been pretty. She was
                    faded now, and her blond hair was dull and streaked, showing the effects of
                    having once been bleached. The man was well preserved, but bore the evidence of
                    rich living in the somewhat reddened and bloated appearance of eyes and cheeks.
                    His hair was gray and he wore a short imperial. Just now his expression was one
                    of extreme uneasiness. His lips twitched nervously, and his brow was drawn. He
                    had long, slender, white hands, the fingers nicotine stained. He had a straight,
                    military figure, and was dressed in a rather <foreign xml:lang="fr"><hi style="font-style:italic;">outré</hi></foreign>
                    manner.</p>
                <p>Aoi regarded him with undisguised fearfulness. She had
                    no notion who these strangers could be, yet there was something in the man’s
                    restless attitude that aroused her apprehensions. She turned anxiously to her
                    son. He was grave and pale.</p>
                <pb n="193"/>
                <p><q>Mother</q>, he said, <q>this is Mr. and Mrs. Lorrimer. You
                    have been expecting them, I believe</q>.</p>
                <p>Aoi was so moved that she could only bow feebly to her
                    visitors.</p>
                <p>Her son’s voice was low and, to her agitated fancy,
                    strained.</p>
                <p><q>Mother</q>, he said, <q>why was I not informed of the claims
                    made by--Mr. Lorrimer?</q></p>
                <p><q>Oh, son, I feared to tell you</q>, she replied,
                    tremulously; <q>the little one besought me not to do so</q>.</p>
                <p><q>It was only by accident</q>, he said, <q>that I learned the
                    facts. We happened to cross on the same steamer, and, somehow, Mr. Lorrimer
                    confided in me</q>.</p>
                <p>Aoi clung to her son’s hand, but she did not speak. Her
                    face was raised to his as though she listened eagerly to every word he
                    uttered.</p>
                <p><q>I came back to Japan</q>, he said, <q>for another
                    purpose--to prevent, if I could, Hyacinth’s marriage. It was entirely without my
                    approval. I consider her <pb n="194"/> little more than a child. However, I shortly discovered
                    that I had no right to dictate to her even in this matter. Her father--</q> He
                    indicated, slightly, Mr. Lorrimer, who seized the opportunity to step
                    forward.</p>
                <p>He spoke jerkily and somewhat impatiently.</p>
                <p><q>It seems to me that we are wasting time. You will, I am
                    sure, perceive my intense anxiety to see my--er--daughter</q>.</p>
                <p><q>I beg your pardon for detaining you. It was very stupid
                    of me</q>. Komazawa turned back to Aoi.</p>
                <p><q>Where is she, mother?</q> he asked, simply.</p>
                <p>Silently Aoi shook her drooped head. She could not
                    speak.</p>
                <p><q>Where is she?</q> repeated Koma, now with a slight thrill
                    of apprehension in his voice.</p>
                <p>Still that silent, drooping little figure, with its
                    bowed head and lips that refused to speak.</p>
                <pb n="195"/>
                <p>The shadows deepened in the room, and without the skies
                    were darkening.</p>
                <p>Aoi raised her head, shivered, and looked about her
                    dazedly. Then suddenly she clapped her hands mechanically.</p>
                <p>She was sending for the girl, thought the other three,
                    as they waited in tense silence for a response to her summons. But when Mumè
                    thrust in her fat, reddened face, Aoi only mechanically said:</p>
                <p><q>Lights, honorable maid</q>.</p>
                <p>Koma placed his hand heavily on her shoulder.</p>
                <p><q>Mother</q>, he said, <q>you do not make me answer. Where is
                    Hyacinth?</q></p>
                <p><q>Gone</q>, said Aoi, faintly.</p>
                <p><q>Gone! What do you mean?</q></p>
                <p><q>Ah, excellencies</q>, she cried, turning to the visitors
                    and speaking in broken English, <q>the liddle one’s heart broke at thought of
                    leaving her home. She is still but a child, and she had a child’s fear of
                    meeting--of meeting strangers, <pb n="196"/> and so--and so--she went, excellencies, she--</q></p>
                <p><q>Ran away</q>, said the woman. <q>Well, what do you think of
                    that?</q> She turned her lip ever so slightly, pushing the point of her parasol
                    into Aoi’s immaculate matting. <q>Runs in the family, apparently</q>, she said.</p>
                <p>Ignoring her utterly, Mr. Lorrimer addressed Aoi in a
                    hoarse voice:</p>
                <p><q>When did she go, and where? You must know</q>.</p>
                <p><q>She went, illustrious excellency, only a little while
                    ago</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Where? You know?</q></p>
                <p><q>Nay, I do not know, save that she has gone to the
                    hills. But, oh, excellency, there are so many hills, so large, so dense! Can we
                    find the one ant by searching in its hill? Who can find the little one among the
                    monstrous hills?</q></p>
                <p><q>I can</q>, said Komazawa, stepping forward suddenly.</p>
                <p>Aoi rushed to him frantically.</p>
                <p><q>Oh, son</q>, she cried, in Japanese, <q>do <pb n="197"/> not assist
                    these strangers. Do not track the little one to give her to them. You will not
                    take part with them against us?</q></p>
                <p><q>Mother</q>, he answered, in Japanese, <q>you do wrong in
                    speaking thus. You misjudge me. It is not to assist these people I would search
                    for her. No, though they had a thousand claims on her. But I must go to save her
                    from herself. The cliffs on the hills are perilous, and the night would frighten
                    the little one. It is for that reason I would seek her</q>.</p>
                <p>He caught up his hat and made to leave the room, but
                    again his mother stayed him.</p>
                <p><q>Oh, son, in such a garb you would frighten the little
                    one</q>.</p>
                <p>He paused in thought a moment, then turned in the
                    opposite direction.</p>
                <p><q>It is true. My room--it is as ever?</q></p>
                <p><q>As ever, son. Always awaiting thy return</q>.</p>
                <p>He vanished through the folding <pb n="198"/> doors. They
                    heard him speeding rapidly up the stairs.</p>
                <p><q>Where has he gone?</q> asked Mrs. Lorrimer, sharply.</p>
                <p><q>To arrange his dress</q>, the Japanese woman answered,
                    without raising her head.</p>
                <p><q>Oh, such folly!</q> she cried, angrily. <q>There is no time
                    to be lost. He should start at once. What shall we do?</q></p>
                <p>This last question she shot at her husband, who was
                    staring miserably before him.</p>
                <p><q>I don’t know, I’m sure</q>, he said, dejectedly. <q>I
                    declare, I’m quite--quite done up</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Well, I know what to do</q>, she said. <q>We must look up
                    those mission-house people and have a search-party sent out at once. We can get
                    no satisfaction from these people. Come</q>.</p>
            </div>
            
            <div xml:id="owheart_1032" n="22" type="chapter">
                <head>XXII</head>
                <p>It was nearly midnight when Komazawa passed along the
                    shore of Matsushima and began to climb towards the tombs. He knew every inch of
                    the land. Unlike poor, wandering Hyacinth, he passed steadily ahead without the
                    slightest hesitation. He had reached the small cliff path which led to the great
                    Date-rock cavern. Now he was before the rock itself.</p>
                <p>Without pausing an instant, holding the lighted lantern
                    he carried above his head, he entered the cavern beneath the rock. Every inch of
                    the ground within he examined, feeling about with his hands in the darkened
                    corners where his lantern could not penetrate. Over and over the same ground he
                    went, fear urging him forward. When the certain- <pb n="200"/> ty that she
                    was not within the cavern forced itself upon him his shaking frame testified to
                    his agitation.</p>
                <p>He had been so certain that the girl would come here.
                    This was the great secret cave he himself had shown to her, where they had spent
                    their childhood together in defiance of the mild remonstrance of the temple
                    priests.</p>
                <p>Very slowly now Koma crawled from out the cavern. The
                    lantern he set upon the ground at the mouth of the cave. Then he stood still,
                    uncertain what to do, a great despair coming upon him.</p>
                <p>Only a few paces away, he knew, were other tombs and
                    caverns, but these were built in the slanting cliffs, down which no maiden could
                    have gone in safety. Of them he would not think. He dared not look at them, lest
                    he become dizzy with horror. And so Komazawa raised his face upward to the sky,
                    just as Hyacinth had done.</p>
                <p>Then he saw, far up above his head, <pb xml:id="owheart_1301183" n="200a"/>
                    <figure>
                    <head><q>HE KNELT IN A RAPT SILENCE BESIDE HER</q></head>
                        <!--<graphic url="owheartill200.jpg"/>-->
                       
                        <figDesc>Illustration included in Watanna’s <hi style="font-style:italic;">The Heart of
                                Hyacinth</hi>.</figDesc>
                    </figure>
                    <pb n="201"/>
                    something dark and still outstretched upon the surface of the rock. He caught
                    his breath, then covered his mouth with his hands lest a cry escape him. Slowly
                    and carefully he climbed up to the surface of the rock. A moment, on its edge,
                    he paused irresolute, then crept on his knees towards the sleeping girl.</p>
                <p>For a long time he knelt in a rapt silence beside her,
                    his eyes fixed, entranced, upon her face.</p>
                <p>She was slumbering as calmly as a child, and her
                    upturned face, with the moon-rays upon it, was wondrously, ethereally beautiful.
                    Awed, reverential, Koma gazed upon the picture, then soundlessly he crept back
                    to the edge of the rock and clambered down. Once more he stood on the ground
                    below. His face had a strange, strained expression, and in his eyes gleamed a
                    new light.</p>
                <p><q>I cannot awaken her</q>, he said to himself, <q>and oh, ye
                    gods! how beautiful she has grown!</q></p>
                <pb n="202"/>
                <p>For a time he stood there without moving, plunged in
                    reverie. Then his eyes, wandering mechanically towards the bay, fell on a series
                    of lights on the shore below. They were one behind the other, and swung back and
                    forth. In an instant he recognized them. The next moment he had thrust his own
                    light into the cavern.</p>
                <p><q>They will not come this way</q>, he assured himself. <q>This
                    ancient path is little known save to the priests. Yet--if they should!</q></p>
                <p>He clinched his hands tensely at his side and stood off
                    a few paces, looking up at the top of the rock.</p>
                <p><q>It is very high up, and--they might not see. As I
                    did--they might pass by</q>.</p>
                <p>He leaned far over, straining his eyes to pierce through
                    the shadows beneath. The lights below flashed a moment from out some foliage,
                    disappeared behind some rocks, reappeared again, and then plunged into a forest
                    path which led, <pb n="203"/> Koma knew, far from his present position.</p>
                <p>He heaved a great sigh of relief.</p>
                <p><q>Ah, it is well--well</q>, he said; <q>yet, nevertheless, I
                    must watch--I must guard her</q>.</p>
            </div>
            
            <div xml:id="owheart_1033" n="23" type="chapter">
                <head>XXIII</head>
                <p>With stealing step morning crept up on Matsushima. The
                    sky had scarcely paled to a slumberous gray ere the soft, yellow streaks of the
                    sun shot upward in the east, tinting all the land with its glow. The morning
                    star was poised on high, as though lingering to watch the sun’s awakening. Then,
                    softly, it twinkled out into the vapor.</p>
                <p>Hyacinth stirred on her strange couch, her eyelashes
                    quivered sleepily against her cheeks. One little hand opened a moment, then
                    clutched the dew-wet moss. The touch of the unfamiliar grass against her hand
                    startled her, and the girl opened her eyes. They looked upward at the softly
                    bluing sky. A breeze of morning swept across her brow, moving a little truant
                    curl. She <pb n="205"/> sat
                    up and stared about her wonderingly. Then remembrance coming to her, she sat
                    still, silently watching the sunrise. For some moments she remained in this
                    absorbed silence. Then mechanically she raised her hands to her head and sought
                    to smooth the soft hair that the breeze had ruffled.</p>
                <p><q>How still it is!</q> she said. Then, a moment after, <q>Heu!
                    the rock is so hard, and it is chilly</q>. She shivered.</p>
                <p>Then moving along the rock, she came to the edge and
                    began to clamber down. There were clefts in the rock which Koma had cut as a
                    boy, and she had no difficulty in descending. She dropped to the ground as
                    lightly as a bird. Turning about, a sudden little cry escaped her lips.</p>
                <p>She stood as if rooted to the ground, regarding with
                    dilated eyes the figure before her. He did not speak. His eyes were upon her
                    face, and he was watching her startled expression with an eager glance. Then she
                    took a step <pb n="206"/>
                    towards him, holding out both her hands.</p>
                <p><q>Komazawa!</q> she cried. <q>It is you!</q></p>
                <p>He did not touch her outstretched hands, and she shrank
                    back as if struck.</p>
                <p><q>You, too!</q> she said, and her hand sought her head
                    bewilderedly.</p>
                <p><q>I, too?</q> he repeated, stupidly.</p>
                <p><q>Yes</q>, she cried. <q>I understand why you are here, why
                    you do not speak to me and embrace me as of old. Ah, it is all very plain</q>.</p>
                <p><q>What is very plain?</q> he asked, still keeping his
                    distance from her.</p>
                <p><q>Why you are here. They have sent you to find me, to
                    give me over to those strangers. It is cruel, cruel!</q> she cried, covering her
                    face with her hands.</p>
                <p><q>It is not true!</q> he cried, going to her and taking her
                    hands from her face and holding them closely in his own.</p>
                <p>She did not seek to release them, but permitted them to
                    remain passively in his, as she looked up into his face through her tears.</p>
                <pb n="207"/>
                <p><q>It is not true</q>, he repeated, softly.</p>
                <p><q>Yet you were not glad to see me</q>, she said,
                    tremulously.</p>
                <p><q>Ah, but I was</q>, he replied, in that same soft, subtle
                    voice which, somehow, vaguely thrilled her.</p>
                <p><q>You did not speak to me</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Your face--your sudden appearance--startled me; I could
                    not speak for a moment</q>, he said.</p>
                <p><q>Yet even now</q>, she said, catching her breath, <q>you do
                    not embrace me</q>.</p>
                <p>He dropped her hands slowly and drew back a pace.</p>
                <p><q>It would not be right--now</q>, he said, huskily.</p>
                <p><q>I do not understand</q>, she said. <q>Have we not always
                    embraced each other?</q></p>
                <p><q>We were children before</q>, he said, <q>but now--embraces
                    are for--for lovers only</q>.</p>
                <p>She looked at him a long moment in wondering silence, a
                    slow, pink glow <pb n="208"/> spreading gradually over her face. Then she repeated, slowly, almost
                    falteringly:</p>
                <p><q>For--for lovers!</q></p>
                <p>He turned his eyes away from her face. She put a timid
                    hand upon his arm.</p>
                <p><q>Yet</q>, she said, <q>Yamashiro Yoshida was my lover,
                    and--and we did not embrace</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Ah, no, thank the Heavens!</q> he cried, impetuously,
                    again possessing himself of her hands. <q>You were safe from such things here,
                    little one. Yet you have much to learn--much, and I--</q> His eyes became purple
                    and his chin squared in strong resolution. <q>I’m going to teach you</q>, he
                    said.</p>
                <p><q>Teach me?</q> she faltered. <q>What will you teach me?</q></p>
                <p><q>The meaning of love</q>, he said, the words escaping him
                    as if he could not control them.</p>
                <p><q>You will be my lover?</q> she said, timid wonder in her
                    eyes.</p>
                <p>He could not speak for some moments. Then--</p>
                <pb n="209"/>
                <p><q>Ah, what have I been saying? Little one, you do not
                    know, you cannot dream of the extent of your own innocence. I would be less than
                    man if your words did not pierce my heart and thrill my whole being. Yet I am
                    not altogether selfish--no--though I have spent years of my life among those who
                    were so. I will not take advantage of the little one. She shall have every
                    opportunity her birth, her beauty, demands. You will go with your father,
                    Hyacinth. Nay, do not interrupt me. It will be for your good. You must see this
                    other world, to which you rightfully belong. Then when you have come to years of
                    womanhood you can decide for yourself</q>.</p>
                <p><q>I am already a woman</q>, she said, tremulously.</p>
                <p><q>Only a child--a little girl</q>, he said, softly ; <q>a poor
                    little one who has been imprisoned so long she has come to believe her own cage
                    is gilded, and will not take her freedom when the doors are opened</q>.</p>
                <pb n="210"/>
                <p>Earnestly she looked into his face.</p>
                <p><q>And if I go to the West country, you, too, will go with
                    me, will you not, Koma?</q></p>
                <p>He shook his head, smiling sadly.</p>
                <p><q>No. I would not have the right</q>.</p>
                <p><q>I will not go, then</q>, she said, simply. <q>If they should
                    force me I can be as brave as others. I would take my life</q>.</p>
                <p><q>No, you would not do so, for then you would break our
                    hearts</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Yet you have no pity for mine</q>, she said, near to tears
                    now.</p>
                <p><q>Poor little heart!</q> he whispered, tenderly.</p>
                <p>After a moment she inquired, quietly:</p>
                <p><q>And did you come with my august parent, then?</q></p>
                <p><q>On the same steamer--yes. It was an accidental
                    meeting</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Ah, then you did not come back for the purpose of
                    helping them?</q></p>
                <p><q>No, I had another purpose. I came to break your
                    betrothal with Yamashiro Yoshida</q>.</p>
                <pb n="211"/>
                <p><q>Well, they have saved you that trouble</q>, she said,
                    sighing.</p>
                <p>He regarded her keenly.</p>
                <p><q>Why do you sigh? You have regrets?</q></p>
                <p><q>Yes</q>, she admitted, <q>for if they had not cast me off I
                    could have remained in Japan. Now--</q> Her voice faltered and she turned her head
                    away.</p>
                <p><q>Now?</q> he repeated.</p>
                <p><q>Ah, yes</q>, she said, <q>I begin to see there is nothing
                    else to be done. I am resigned</q>.</p>
                <p><q>You are resigned</q>, he repeated, disappointment showing
                    in his transparent face.</p>
                <p><q>Yes</q>, she said, with a fleeting upward glance at his
                    face.</p>
                <p>She suddenly laughed quite merrily.</p>
                <p><q>Come</q>, she said, <q>let us go home. I must humbly submit
                    myself to the august will of my honorable parent</q>.</p>
                <p>Koma said never a word. Manlike, he was regretting his
                    late words of advised self-sacrifice.</p>
            </div>
            
            <div xml:id="owheart_1034" n="24" type="chapter">
                <head>XXIV</head>
                <p>It was a slow pilgrimage homeward that these two young
                    people made, for they stopped at every familiar place on the hills and by the
                    bay that they had known as children. And, like children, they dipped their faces
                    in the shining water of the little brook that wound its way around the hills and
                    fell in a tiny waterfall below into the bay.</p>
                <p>They slipped into a darkened temple, touching with
                    reverent, loving fingers the deserted images within. At the little village on
                    the shore, where they had lived together as children, they halted and lunched at
                    a tiny tavern whose garden was the shore of the bay. And when they had struck
                    the road that led to Sendai they turned their steps <pb n="213"/> backward and
                    wandered along the white beach of Matsushima.</p>
                <p>The girl, whose heart had been so heavy for days with
                    the thought of leaving her home, now with the lightheartedness of a child seemed
                    to have forgotten all her troubles and to revel in the joy of living.</p>
                <p>But a gentle melancholy was upon Komazawa. It was with
                    something of reproach that he answered the merry chatter of his companion.</p>
                <p><q>Yonder</q>, she said, pointing across the bay, while her
                    long sleeve, falling back, disclosed her soft, dimpled arm, <q>is the naked island
                    Hadakajima. See, it is not changed at all, Koma. Do you remember those times
                    when you would carry me on your shoulder and step from rock to rock in the bay
                    until you had reached Hadakajima?</q></p>
                <p><q>Yes</q>, he said, watching her eyes. She looked up at him
                    sideways, then drooped her lashes downward.</p>
                <pb n="214"/>
                <p><q>You would not do the same to-day?</q> she said.</p>
                <p><q>You are not the same--child</q>, he replied.</p>
                <p><q>Ah, no</q>, she sighed. <q>I am changed, alas!</q></p>
                <p><q>Why ‘alas’?</q></p>
                <p><q>The change does not please you</q>, she said.</p>
                <p><q>Ah, but it does</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Yet you were kinder to me then</q>.</p>
                <p>He did not reply. She raised her face.</p>
                <p><q>Is it not so?</q></p>
                <p><q>Perhaps</q>, he replied.</p>
                <p><q>Then you must have loved me more then</q>, she said.</p>
                <p><q>No, that is not true</q>.</p>
                <p><q>No? Do you still love me, then?</q></p>
                <p><q>I cannot answer you</q>, he said. <q>If I were to tell you
                    my heart you would not believe me, because you would not understand</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Ah, but I would, indeed</q>, she said, softly.</p>
                <pb n="215"/>
                <p><q>You are innocent</q>, he said, regarding her thoughtfully,
                    <q>but you are a coquette by nature</q>.</p>
                <p><q>What is that?</q></p>
                <p><q>One who makes a jest of love</q>.</p>
                <p><q>And what is love?</q></p>
                <p><q>Your heart will tell you some day</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Yet I would have your heart tell me now</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Love is a rosy pain of the heart</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Then I do not feel it</q>, she said, stretching out her
                    little, pink fingers over her heart, <q>for mine thrills and beats with joyous
                    palpitations. Yet</q>--she looked up at him seriously--<q>perhaps that, too, is
                    another of the moods of this love</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Perhaps</q>, he said. <q>Love is capricious</q>.</p>
                <p>Hyacinth sighed and looked out wistfully across the
                    bay.</p>
                <p><q>It is a strange word</q>, she said, vaguely.</p>
                <p><q>Yes, strange</q>, he said. <q>I have lived years in England,
                    but I had to <pb n="216"/>
                    return to Nippon to learn its meaning</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Yet you have been back but a day</q>, she said,
                    tremulously.</p>
                <p><q>And love is born in a moment</q>, he whispered, and took
                    her hand softly in his own.</p>
                <p>She withdrew it quickly, and turned from him in a sudden
                    panic of incomprehensible fear, the morning had wrought such a change in
                    her.</p>
                <p><q>We must be going home</q>, she said. <q>Nay, we must
                    hurry</q>.</p>
                <p>And after that they walked homeward swiftly in silence,
                    each afraid to speak to the other.</p>
            </div>
            
            <div xml:id="owheart_1035" n="25" type="chapter">
                <head>XXV</head>
                <p>As Hyacinth passed up the little garden-path she saw a
                    familiar face at the open <foreign xml:lang="ja">shoji</foreign> of the guest-room.</p>
                <p><q>It is Yamashiro Yoshida</q>, she said to Koma.</p>
                <p><q>What does he want?</q> her companion demanded, with such
                    unexpected harshness that the girl broke into a silvery peal of laughter.</p>
                <p><q>The gods alone know. We shall see. Ah, but he is
                    welcome!</q></p>
                <p>Aoi met them at the door. Her poor, little, anxious face
                    hurt the girl more than if she had heaped her with reproaches. With an unwonted
                    tenderness she threw her arms about the mother’s neck and pressed her face
                    against hers, whispering over and over again.</p>
                <pb n="218"/>
                <p><q>How I love you! It is so good to see you again</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Yoshida is within</q>, said Aoi, when the girl had
                    released her. <q>He comes alone</q>.</p>
                <p><q>What!</q> she cried, in mock surprise. <q>The brave Yoshida
                    ventures out alone? Well, and what does he want?</q></p>
                <p><q>Nay, he would not tell me. He will speak only to you,
                    little one</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Very well. Let him speak</q>, and she pushed the doors
                    gayly aside and entered the <foreign xml:lang="ja">oxashishi</foreign>. She was not aware that Koma had entered
                    also until, following the glance of Yoshida, she perceived Koma behind her. Then
                    her voice rippled merrily, and she spoke affectionately to Yamashiro
                    Yoshida.</p>
                <p><q>Why, Yamashiro Yoshida, what brings you here? I had not
                    dreamed of the blessings the gods had in store for me. I am so affected by the
                    light of your presence that I am rendered speechless</q>, which last was quite un
                        <pb n="219"/> true, as
                    both the young men could have attested.</p>
                <p>Yoshida bowed himself to the ground; and now, oblivious
                    of the presence of the intruder, Koma, replied:</p>
                <p><q>Ah, beauteous one, I am come to bring you a most
                    insignificant present, and to beseech you to pardon the rudeness of my family
                    and to permit our betrothal to continue</q>.</p>
                <p>The girl took the gift slowly and held it on the palm of
                    her hand. It was a very exquisitely lacquered box, and she knew without opening
                    it that it contained some very valuable complexion powder. Her lover, however,
                    could not have told from her face the effect of his words and gift upon her.</p>
                <p>Her eyes were inscrutable, her lips pressed closely
                    together. She seemed to be examining the box with critical eyes, as though she
                    were weighing its value.</p>
                <p>Without a word of response, she suddenly crossed to the
                    <foreign xml:lang="ja">tokonona</foreign> and drew <pb n="220"/> out from underneath it a fairly large box. Its contents
                    she removed slowly, setting the articles in a semicircle on the floor about her.
                    Soon she was quite encircled by the contents. Then, with one little, pointing
                    finger, she spoke:</p>
                <p><q>This <foreign xml:lang="ja">obi</foreign>, Yamashiro Yoshida, was your first gift. It
                    was given on the day of our betrothal. I have never worn it. It was too rich for
                    one so small as I</q>.</p>
                <p>She looked full into the face of Yoshida, and then with
                    a fleeting glance she saw the face of Koma. She smiled ever so sweetly.</p>
                <p><q>These pins, Yoshida, are costly, but murderous
                    appearing. Once they pricked my head</q>.</p>
                <p>She stuck them into the sash of the <foreign xml:lang="ja">obi</foreign>.</p>
                <p><q>These bracelets</q>, she said, <q>are just exactly like the
                    ones you gave to the <foreign xml:lang="ja">geisha</foreign> Morning Glory</q>.</p>
                <p>She laid them beside the pins.</p>
                <p><q>This <foreign xml:lang="ja">kimono</foreign>, honorable Yoshida, is <pb n="221"/> so heavy its
                    weight would break the back of one so humble as I</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Lady</q>, said Yamashiro Yoshida, haughtily, <q>you make a
                    jest of my gifts. I assure you I do not appreciate it. Why do you thus enumerate
                    them? Is it not ungracious?</q></p>
                <p>Sweetly the girl swept all of the gifts into a heap
                    together, then, rising with them in her arms, she crossed to Yoshida.</p>
                <p><q>Yamashiro Yoshida</q>, she said, <q>I never loved you, yet I
                    betrothed myself to you because of the magnificence of your gifts. I was an
                    ignorant child. Then you and your august parents cast me off because of my
                    honorable origin, which you despised. Now you come to attempt to buy me with
                    another gift. But I am no longer a silly child, and I give you back not only
                    that new gift, but--all--all--all--all. Take them--take them quickly</q>.</p>
                <p>She thrust them into his arms. Angrily he attempted to
                    refuse them. They fell crashing to the floor. A man’s rich <pb n="222"/> voice suddenly
                    broke out into laughter.</p>
                <p><q>It is an insult!</q> cried Yamashiro Yoshida, furiously,
                    trampling upon his gifts, half by accident, half blindly. He glared at the
                    sweetly smiling face of the girl--glared at the laughing Komazawa; then he
                    clapped his hands violently.</p>
                <p><q>My shoes!</q> he fairly shouted at Mumè, as she answered
                    his summons.</p>
                <p>He kicked his feet into his shoes, stamped on the floor
                    furiously, then turned on his heel and left the house in a fine rage.</p>
            </div>
            
            <div xml:id="owheart_1036" n="26" type="chapter">
                <head>XXVI</head>
                <p>As the irate Yoshida vanished through the doors,
                    Hyacinth clapped her hands with a childish gesture of delight. She looked at
                    Koma, now regarding her gravely, then, with a dimpling smile, she sat down on
                    the mats among the despised gifts. These she tossed about gayly.</p>
                <p><q>He has gone away</q>, she said, <q>mad as three devils of
                    Osaka, but what matter? He has left the gifts! Such a silly lover, such a
                    foolish one!</q></p>
                <p>She began to collect the gifts, folding the <foreign xml:lang="ja">obi</foreign> and the
                    rich <foreign xml:lang="ja">kimono</foreign>.</p>
                <p><q>You are not going to keep them?</q> said Koma, standing
                    over her and looking down at her gravely.</p>
                <p><q>Not going to keep them? Why, the lover refused to
                    accept their return</q>.</p>
                <pb n="224"/>
                <p><q>Yes, but you don’t want them</q>.</p>
                <p><q>But I do</q>, she protested, patting the folded <foreign xml:lang="ja">obi</foreign>
                    lovingly.</p>
                <p><q>Why, you told him you did not</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Oh</q>, she said, airily. <q>That’s just foolish pride. I
                    was just talking--through my head</q>.</p>
                <p>She laughed mischievously.</p>
                <p><q>That’s liddle slang I learned at mission-house</q>, she
                    said.</p>
                <p><q>I want you to send those presents back to this
                    Yamashiro</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Send all those lovely presents back?</q></p>
                <p>She shook her head.</p>
                <p><q>Could not do it</q>, she said. <q>Too great sacrifice</q>.</p>
                <p><q>I will buy you all the things you want</q>.</p>
                <p>She stared up at him amazedly.</p>
                <p><q>You?</q></p>
                <p><q>Yes</q>, he replied, flushing, <q>I--why not?</q></p>
                <p><q>Well, but</q>--she regarded him doubtfully--<q>you are not
                    rich like Yamashiro Yoshida</q>.</p>
                <pb n="225"/>
                <p><q>How do you know?</q> he asked, quietly.</p>
                <p>She regarded him dubiously.</p>
                <p><q>When I get those presents from you</q>, she said, <q>then I
                    will return these. That right?</q></p>
                <p>He pulled the box over to the centre of the floor, and
                    thrust the gifts into it, snapping the lid down tightly. Then, going to the
                    door, he called for Mumè to take the box at once to the Yamashiros.</p>
                <p>Having disposed of this question, he turned his
                    attention again to Hyacinth.</p>
                <p>She was sitting in the centre of the room, her chin on
                    her hand, pensively regarding him.</p>
                <p><q>How</q>, she said, <q>are you going to make me those gifts
                    if I am to go away to that West country, and you will not go with me?</q></p>
                <p><q>You are going to stay here</q>, he said; and she knew from
                    the expression in his eyes and the tone of his voice that he meant what he
                    said.</p>
                <p><q>But what of my august parent?</q></p>
                <pb n="226"/>
                <p><q>Will you follow my advice exactly?</q> She nodded in
                    assent.</p>
                <p><q>When he comes you are to make a request of him</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Yes?</q></p>
                <p><q>Ask him--beg him even--to permit you to remain one
                    month in Sendai with us. Then tell him that after that you will go wherever your
                    rightful guardian shall direct</q>.</p>
                <p><q>He will not consent</q>, she said, depression seizing upon
                    her--<q>these august barbarians are hard as rock. They never move--no, never</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Who told you that?</q></p>
                <p><q>Nobody</q>, she said, <q>but I observe</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Where did you observe it?</q> he persisted.</p>
                <p>She looked at him sideways a moment without replying.
                    Then she dimpled and smiled.</p>
                <p><q>In the mission-house people and in--you, Koma</q>, she
                    said.</p>
                <p><q>Promise me that you will make the request?</q></p>
                <pb n="227"/>
                <p><q>Very well, I will make that foolish promise. But</q>--she
                    thrust out a little red underlip in a bewitching pout--<q>one month will soon come
                    to an end, and after that?</q></p>
                <p><q>After that you will leave the rest to me</q>, he said.</p>
            </div>
            
            <div xml:id="owheart_1037" n="27" type="chapter">
                <head>XXVII</head>
                <p>In the guest-room of Madame Aoi’s house, the Lorrimers
                    had waited fully a half-hour. Their patience was wellnigh exhausted. Lorrimer’s
                    nervousness and anxiety threatened to result in utter collapse. The events of
                    the last few months, through which this dissipated man of the world had suddenly
                    found himself to be the father of a child he had never seen, and by the woman
                    his conscience had never ceased to tell him he had wronged, were having their
                    effect upon him.</p>
                <p>He was a weak-natured man, easily ruled through his
                    affections; but he was not bad-hearted. Many years ago the woman who was now his
                    wife had prevailed upon him to divorce another wife that he might marry her.
                    Richard <pb n="229"/>
                    Lorrimer’s affection for his second wife had evaporated during the honeymoon,
                    and was flameless and dead in twelve months. Since then his life with her had
                    been dull, aimless, purposeless, broken in its monotony only at intervals by the
                    woman’s spasmodic efforts to fan the flame into life.</p>
                <p>Now a strange and novel emotion was stirring the
                    soul--if soul it could be called in such a nature--of Richard Lorrimer. He had a
                    feverish, almost childish, longing to see, to possess, this child--his own. He
                    was too sluggish and indolent by nature to have an imagination which would have
                    pictured her in his mind. He had a hazy idea that she would be like any other
                    American child, that she would, of course, be shy of him at first, but that the
                    natural feeling of a child for its father would assert its power. He felt
                    certain that she would prove a source of pleasure and comfort to him.</p>
                <p>Nervously he paced the floor, with <pb n="230"/> irregular,
                    broken strides, stopping now and then to look about him, or to answer the
                    impatient remarks that escaped his wife’s lips.</p>
                <p><q>This is beautiful</q>, she said. <q>I suppose we are to wait
                    here all day</q>.</p>
                <p>Lorrimer glanced about the room.</p>
                <p><q>Do you suppose there’s a bell somewhere?</q> he asked,
                    fretfully.</p>
                <p><q>What a question! Did you ever see a bell in a Japanese
                    house?</q></p>
                <p><q>The hotels all have them</q>, he answered.</p>
                <p><q>This is not a hotel</q>.</p>
                <p>Lorrimer winced at her retorts. He said, a trifle
                    apologetically:</p>
                <p><q>You see, my dear, the woman said she was dressing, or
                    something like that</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Then we may as well go back to Mr. Blount’s. These
                    Japanese women are inordinately vain, and spend hours in dressing</q>.</p>
                <p><q>My daughter is not Japanese</q>, said her husband,
                    mildly.</p>
                <p>The woman pursed her lips.</p>
                <pb n="231"/>
                <p><q>I wonder what you really expect to see, Dick?</q> she
                    said, looking at him curiously. <q>You’re all unstrung</q>.</p>
                <p>Just then Aoi appeared at the door. She came towards
                    them in a state of repressed excitement, and she welcomed her guests with
                    stammering and uncertain words, though she courtesied so repeatedly that the
                    visitors became uneasy.</p>
                <p><q>My daughter?</q> inquired Lorrimer, as soon as Aoi had
                    ceased her kowtowing.</p>
                <p><q>She will come in a moment. The illustrious ones will
                    pardon the child’s nervousness</q>.</p>
                <p><q>It is only natural</q>, said Lorrimer, quietly, biting his
                    underlip in his own restlessness.</p>
                <p>Aoi’s face, with its humble smile, suddenly appeared
                    alert. She seemed to be listening.</p>
                <p><q>Ah, now she is coming, augustness</q>, she said, as she
                    crossed to the doors and slowly pushed them aside.</p>
                <pb n="232"/>
                <p>The Lorrimers had not heard the soft patter of the
                    little feet in the matted hall, for a Japanese girl’s tread in the house is
                    almost soundless. Hence, when Aoi drew the sliding-doors apart, they had not
                    expected to see the girl on the very threshold.</p>
                <p>They started, simultaneously, at sight of the little
                    figure. With drooping head, Hyacinth softly entered the room. At first glance
                    she seemed no different from any other Japanese girl, save that she was somewhat
                    taller. She was dressed in <foreign xml:lang="ja">kimono</foreign> and <foreign xml:lang="ja">obi</foreign>, her hair freshly arranged and shining
                    in its smooth butterfly mode. Her face was bent to the floor, so that they could
                    scarcely see more than its outline.</p>
                <p>She hesitated a moment before them; then, as though
                    unaware of the impetuous motion towards her of the man she knew was her father,
                    she subsided to the mats and bowed her head at his feet.</p>
                <p>The silence that ensued was painful. <pb n="233"/> Then Mrs.
                    Lorrimer gasped, hysterically:</p>
                <p><q>This is not--not she?</q></p>
                <p>Lorrimer stooped gently down to the little figure and
                    lifted her to her feet. She raised her face, and for a moment these two whose
                    lives were so strangely connected looked into each other’s faces. The father
                    could not speak for some time, so intense were the emotions that assailed him.
                    When he did find his voice, it was broken and trembling.</p>
                <p><q>My--my dear little daughter!</q> he said.</p>
                <p>Then he bent and kissed her. She stood still, almost
                    stonily, under his caress, but she did not return his embrace. She quietly
                    withdrew her hands from his.</p>
                <p><q>It is unnatural--horrible</q>, said Mrs. Lorrimer, beneath
                    her breath. Low as was her voice, it broke the spell of silence, which rested
                    like a pall in the room. Lorrimer turned to her quietly.</p>
                <pb n="234"/>
                <p><q>And this</q>, he said to Hyacinth, <q>is your--your
                    mother</q>.</p>
                <p>She turned her eyes slowly upon the woman, and looked at
                    her steadily. Then she said, in clear English:</p>
                <p><q>You make mistake. My mother is dead</q>.</p>
                <p>Again an embarrassed silence and constraint fell upon
                    them all. This time it was Aoi who broke it. She turned her head from them as
                    she spoke.</p>
                <p><q>Little one, it is your duty to accept the Engleesh lady
                    as your mother</q>.</p>
                <p>For the first time the girl’s unnatural calmness
                    deserted her. She ran to Aoi, throwing her arms passionately about her.</p>
                <p><q>No, no</q>, she cried. <q>You are the only mother I know. I
                    will never have another. No!</q></p>
                <p><q>What are they saying to each other?</q> asked Mrs.
                    Lorrimer, watching them curiously.</p>
                <p><q>My knowledge of Japanese is limited</q>, said her husband,
                    heavily.</p>
                <pb n="235"/>
                <p><q>The whole thing’s a farce</q>, she said.</p>
                <p><q>Do you find it so?</q> he asked, smiling bitterly.</p>
                <p><q>Oh, Dick, we can’t be expected to understand a
                    girl--like that</q>.</p>
                <p><q>She is my daughter</q>, was his quiet reply; and there was
                    a new dignity in his voice.</p>
                <p><q>Yes, but she is different from us, so utterly alien.
                    Just look at her. Would any one believe she was your daughter?</q></p>
                <p>He looked over at the little figure now soothing the
                    weeping Aoi, and his wife’s words found a hollow echo within him.</p>
                <p><q>Yet</q>, said Mrs. Lorrimer, thoughtfully, <q>she is still
                    very young and quite pretty. A few years in the West may make a great change in
                    her. Who knows, we may make quite a little civilized modern out of her yet. She
                    is Richard Lorrimer’s daughter</q>.</p>
                <p>As though she knew they were talking about her, Hyacinth
                    left Aoi and came <pb n="236"/> towards them, though she was careful to keep at a
                    distance.</p>
                <p><q>Will my honorable father excuse our presence for
                    to-day?</q> she said, in English.</p>
                <p><q>But you are going with us at once</q>, said Mrs.
                    Lorrimer.</p>
                <p>With a movement that in a Western girl would have seemed
                    rudeness, Hyacinth turned her hack slowly towards her step-mother and addressed
                    her words solely to her father.</p>
                <p><q>If it please you, august father</q>, she said, <q>will you
                    not deign to permit me to remain here with my--my friends till the time comes to
                    leave Sendai?</q></p>
                <p>Her form of speech hurt her father strangely. He watched
                    her face--unloving, emotionless, it seemed, when turned to his--and his own grew
                    wistful. He was more than anxious to indulge her.</p>
                <p><q>Yes, yes, certainly</q>, he said. <q>I appreciate your
                    feelings. By all means <pb n="237"/> stay here if you wish. How long before--</q></p>
                <p><q>Will you not permit me to remain one month?</q> she said,
                    somewhat timidly, and her eyes suddenly fell. She could not tell why, but a
                    flood of emotions seemed to fill her heart, so that she could no longer contain
                    herself if she must look into the face of her father.</p>
                <p><q>We expected to leave at once</q>, he said, gently; <q>but if
                    it is your wish to remain longer, understand, I want you to have your desires
                    gratified</q>.</p>
                <p>She went towards him falteringly a few steps. She held
                    out her hands uncertainly.</p>
                <p>He took them quickly in his own. She raised her face to
                    his, and suddenly her eyes became blinded with tears; but, when he stooped to
                    kiss her, she slipped to the floor at his feet.</p>
                <p>He clasped his slender, nervous hands together and
                    looked down at the queer little figure, now seeming to bow to him <pb n="238"/> after the
                    strange fashion of the Japanese in bidding <foreign xml:lang="fr">adieu</foreign>. Then he turned to his
                    wife.</p>
                <p><q>We had better go now</q>, he said, huskily.</p>
            </div>
            
            <div xml:id="owheart_1038" n="28" type="chapter">
                <head>XXVIII</head>
                <p>On an early morning in the month of August, two young
                    people were drifting in a light sail-boat in and out of the waters surrounding
                    the rock islands of Matsushima. They might have been new lovers, they were so
                    silent, and always they were gazing into each other’s faces, flushing and
                    trembling when their eyes met.</p>
                <p>The boy, for he seemed still very young, was graceful,
                    and of grave, sombre beauty. He was tall and dark, and the expression of his
                    deep-brown eyes was tender and piercing. His limbs were well formed, and his
                    strong arms, as he handled the boat, showed that he was no mean athlete. He was
                    dressed in a gray <foreign xml:lang="ja">hakama</foreign>, the sleeves rolled back. His head was bare, and the
                        <pb n="240"/> wind,
                    lifting the soft, dark locks, showed his high, fine brow.</p>
                <p>The girl was small. Her hair, though brown, had a
                    strangely sunny sheen to it, and her eyes were gray-blue, dreamy, and wistful.
                    Koma, as he watched the changing expressions of her face, thought her fairer and
                    lovelier than all the women of the great world he had seen.</p>
                <p>There was a little padded seat in the boat, and against
                    this she leaned back, trailing her hand in the still water, and watching now the
                    sky, now the bay, now the hills on either side, and sometimes Komazawa.</p>
                <p>They drifted about the bay in this silent, thrilling
                    fashion for some time; then she suddenly spoke. Koma dropped the oar and sat
                    forward.</p>
                <p><q>Do you know what the days seem like to me now?</q> she
                    asked.</p>
                <p><q>No</q>, he said, his eyes wandering inconstantly over her
                    face.</p>
                <p><q>They are like a <foreign xml:lang="ja">lotos</foreign> bloom</q>, she <pb n="241"/> said, <q>always
                    pink and gold, and so beautiful that they are sure to fade</q>.</p>
                <p>For a moment he did not reply, then, leaning on his oar,
                    he said:</p>
                <p><q>And if the day must fade, will not the morrow be as
                    beautiful?</q></p>
                <p><q>Ah, no</q>, she said, sadly; <q>besides, we are not
                    acquainted with the morrow. We only know the to-day, and so the heart breaks at
                    the thought of parting from what is with us now</q>.</p>
                <p><q>You are sad to-day. Yesterday you were merry</q>.</p>
                <p><q>I was not merry at heart</q>, she said, plaintively. <q>You
                    are very clever, Koma, but, ah, you do not know everything</q>.</p>
                <p>He watched her face in silence.</p>
                <p><q>You think because I laugh and say gay things that my
                    heart, too, is light</q>.</p>
                <p><q>No, I do not think that</q>, he said, earnestly; <q>but why
                    should you not be happy and gay? You are only a maiden. You cannot know tears
                    yet--little one</q>. He added the old, familiar term <pb n="242"/> <q>little one</q>
                    so softly that she strained her ears to hear it.</p>
                <p>She held a <foreign xml:lang="ja">lotos</foreign> blossom close to her face, and looked
                    down into its heart.</p>
                <p><q>See</q>, she said, holding it towards him, <q>there is one
                    drop of dew in the heart of the <foreign xml:lang="ja">lotos</foreign>. It is like a tear. It, too, poor flower,
                    must fade away with the summer</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Why do you say ‘it, too’?</q></p>
                <p><q>Like me</q>, she said; <q>I will not be here when the summer
                    has passed</q>. Her voice broke. <q>You said I should not go. Yet--yet the days pass
                    so swiftly. Only one week more--and--after that--? Ah, I cannot bear to think of
                    it</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Do you, then, love this Japan of ours so dearly?</q></p>
                <p>She looked about her, her eyes filled with tears. She
                    clasped her little hands together.</p>
                <p><q>Ah, yes</q>, she said.</p>
                <p><q>And you would not even be content <pb n="243"/> to go to the
                    home of your ancestors for--for a little while?</q></p>
                <p><q>I am afraid</q>, she said, simply--<q>afraid to leave the
                    land of gods and go out into the unknown. It is the unknown that has such horror
                    for me. And the great seas are flat and bottomless. I could not have courage to
                    cross them unless I were forced to do so</q>.</p>
                <p><q>But you would not be afraid to cross them with me,
                    would you, little one?</q></p>
                <p><q>No--not with you, Koma</q>, she said, looking into his
                    eyes.</p>
                <p>Leaning across, he took one of her little hands, held it
                    a space between both his own, then lifted it to his lips.</p>
                <p><q>Never was there such faith as yours, and in one--one
                    who is not worthy to touch you</q>.</p>
                <p><q>When you talk like that, Koma</q>, she said, with tears in
                    her voice, <q>you make me sadder still, because when I am gone from you I must
                    recall those words</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Then if such words make you sad, I <pb n="244"/> will not speak
                    them again. Nothing but joy and sunshine should dwell in your face. So let us
                    talk of happier things. See how near to the shore we are coming. Shall we
                    land?</q></p>
                <p><q>No. Let us drift on</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Look how the sunbeams are gliding down the pine trunks.
                    See how they, too, have tinted the green leaves to gold</q>.</p>
                <p><q>There are no--no pine-trees in America. No more--And
                    there are no sunbeams there. The <foreign xml:lang="ja">sensei</foreign> told me so</q>.</p>
                <p><q>The <foreign xml:lang="ja">sensei</foreign> is ignorant. The sun is generous. He
                    scatters his gifts all over the world</q>.</p>
                <p><q>But he favors Nippon</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Yes</q>, he repeated, <q>he favors Nippon--all nature does
                    so</q>.</p>
                <p><q>And that America is cold</q>.</p>
                <p><q>It has its summers, little one</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Look</q>, she said; <q>see, there is a little white fox on
                    the hill there. It is looking at us. Ah, it is gone!</q></p>
                <pb n="245"/>
                <p><q>That is a good omen, is it not?</q> said Koma,
                    smiling.</p>
                <p><q>Oh, surely. The foxes are sacred. Every one believes so
                    except the mission-house people</q>.</p>
                <p><q>We do not belong to the mission-house. We will believe
                    so</q>.</p>
                <p><q>How cheerful you are, Koma. You are not sorry to see me
                    go?</q></p>
                <p><q>You are not gone yet</q>.</p>
                <p><q>But there is only one week left</q>, she said, <q>and
                    despair craves company. Do you, therefore, give me your sympathy?</q></p>
                <p><q>Wait till the week is gone</q>, he said, <q>and then if you
                    still wish it, none will be sadder with you than I</q>.</p>
            </div>
            
            <div xml:id="owheart_1039" n="29" type="chapter">
                <head>XXIX</head>
                <p>A few days later. It is early evening and the crickets
                    are making a great bustle in the grasses, while a small, gray ape, swinging in a
                    bamboo, is mingling its chattering with the cawing of the crows in the
                    camphor-trees.</p>
                <p><q>Summer is passing</q>, said Hyacinth, <q>for everything is
                    complaining</q>.</p>
                <p><q>I do not complain</q>, said Koma.</p>
                <p><q>No; life will always be summer for you. You are not
                    going away from Nippon</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Are you?</q> he asked.</p>
                <p><q>There is no help for me</q>, she said.</p>
                <p><q>I grow more melancholy each day</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Is it only Japan you care about leaving?</q></p>
                <p><q>Japan holds all--all that is dear to me</q>.</p>
                <pb n="247"/>
                <p><q>And can you enumerate them--the things that are dear to
                    you?</q></p>
                <p>She shook her head drearily.</p>
                <p><q>No</q>, she said, <q>I cannot</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Yet you could stay here if you wished</q>.</p>
                <p><q>No. How could I?</q></p>
                <p><q>Did not that young American from the consulate in Tokyo
                    ask you to marry him? He lives here in Japan, necessarily</q>.</p>
                <p>She laughed.</p>
                <p><q>Was he not kind?</q> she said.</p>
                <p><q>Why did you refuse him?</q></p>
                <p><q>Oh, for many reasons</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Tell me them</q>.</p>
                <p><q>He belongs to the West country, after all</q>.</p>
                <p><q>He does not think so. For your sake he would forswear
                    even that</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Ah, but he does so, nevertheless. The gods--no, his
                    God--fashioned him for his own land</q>.</p>
                <p><q>And was that the only reason why you refused him?</q></p>
                <pb n="248"/>
                <p><q>No. I do--do not--</q> She hesitated, and turned her head
                    droopingly from him. <q>I do not love him</q>, she said, simply.</p>
                <p><q>You did not love Yamashiro Yoshida, yet you would have
                    married him</q>.</p>
                <p><q>I did not know better</q>, she said, faintly.</p>
                <p><q>But it is only a little while since</q>.</p>
                <p><q>A month</q>, she said; <q>since you returned</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Confess to me</q>, he said, his eyes gleaming, <q>that it
                    was I who made you know the meaning of love, and I will tell you why you are not
                    going to America to-morrow--no, nor the day after, nor until you shall go with
                    me</q>.</p>
                <p><q>What can I confess?</q> she said, tremulously. <q>I do not
                    know what you wish, dear Koma</q>. She was trembling now.</p>
                <p><q>Confess to me</q>, he said, <q>else I cannot speak, for fear
                    I should wrong you, my little one. I will not try to urge you to stay here--with
                    me--unless--</q></p>
                <pb n="249"/>
                <p><q>I--I cannot speak</q>, she said. <q>I know not what to
                    say</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Then I will speak</q>, he said. <q>I love you, I love you,
                    Hyacinth; with all the life that throbs within me, I love you. Do you
                    understand? No, do not speak unless you can answer my heart with your own. I
                    want you for my own. Ah, I know I have won you! It is not a delusion, for I see
                    it in your eyes, your lips. You do not know it yet, you are so innocent and
                    pure, but I--ah, I am sure of it!</q></p>
                <p>She raised her quivering face to his in the moonlight.
                    Then suddenly her head fell upon her clasped hands.</p>
                <p><q>Ah, is this--love?</q> she said.</p>
                <p>He lifted her face and kissed her lips, her eyes, then
                    her little, trembling hands.</p>
                <p><q>This is love--and this, and this</q>.</p>
                <p>Later they came to a hidden path arched on either side
                    by the drooping bamboos. The moon was above them, making a silver pathway for
                    their feet.</p>
                <pb n="250"/>
                <p><q>Whither do we go?</q> she tremulously whispered.</p>
                <p><q>I know the way</q>, said he, gently leading her
                    onward.</p>
                <p>They came to an open space, a narrow field. And on the
                    grass, the winds, gently blowing, moved back and forth in the moonlight strange
                    wisps of white paper.</p>
                <p><q>It is the Path of Prayer</q>, said Koma.</p>
                <p>She understood, and was dumb with the thrilling of her
                    emotions.</p>
                <p><q>Here</q>, he said, <q>the Goddess of Mercy walks nightly.
                    Though we are no longer sad, let us leave our prayer here among these sad
                    petitions for her to read</q>.</p>
                <p><q>Yes</q>, she said, <q>and we will pray to <foreign xml:lang="ja">Kuannon</foreign> for those
                    less fortunate than we</q>.</p>
                <p>Kneeling there in the silver light, they wrote on
                    fragments of paper their simple prayers. Did the Heavenly Lady, when trailing
                    her robes of mercy through the Path of Prayer, read also the petitions of the
                    lovers?</p>
                <pb n="251"/>
                <p>They left the Path of Prayer and climbed to the summit
                    of the hill. Softly they turned their feet towards the mission-house.</p>
                <p><q>We have said our prayers to <foreign xml:lang="ja">Kuannon</foreign>--now we will turn
                    to the God of our fathers</q>, he whispered.</p>
                <p>They paused a moment on the missionary’s doorstep. She
                    raised her face to his.</p>
                <p><q>The Reverend Blount may refuse</q>, she said.</p>
                <p><q>He will not</q>, he assured her, <q>since he has promised
                    me. Come!</q></p>
                <trailer>THE END</trailer>
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