Part 7

“The master!” she cried; and never had the Yamashiro servants seen their mistress so perturbed.

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.

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.

“Oh, good Yamashiro, will you not hasten this marriage? I am ready, willing, to wed at once—to-day—this minute.”

“If it be true,” said Yamashiro, heavily, “that you are an Engleesh, it is quite impossible. My son could not marry with such.”

“But we are betrothed,” she cried, piteously. “Yamashiro Yoshida is my affianced. Oh, you will not cast me off!”

She turned pitifully from one to the other. They were all quite silent. Then she spoke to Yoshida. Her voice was clear and hard.

“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.”

She placed her hands over her heart.

“If you will marry me,” she said, “I will be Japanese altogether.”

“My son,” said Yamashiro the elder, “will obey his father’s august will in all things.”

The girl spoke slowly, scornfully.

“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.”

Drawing the doors sharply behind her, Hyacinth left the house unattended to the gate.

“Ah, what an escape we have had!” burst from Madame Yamashiro.

Her husband scowled.

Yoshida slowly moved to the shoji and stared out dimly at the little figure hurrying down the path.

XIX

“Yamashiro Yoshida will not marry me. He has cast me off,” Hyacinth told Aoi.

“And to-night,” said Aoi, helplessly, “the father will arrive.”

The girl pressed her hands tightly together. Aoi laid a timid, comforting hand upon her shoulder.

“Little one,” she said, in a pleading voice, “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.”

“And have I not always shown such respect and devotion to you, dear mother?”

“To me? Ah, yes, little one, and I would that I were, indeed, your own mother.”

“You are, you are,” cried the girl, crushing down the sob that rose in her throat, and then dashing her hand against her eyes. “Ah,” she cried, “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.”

“Try and follow my counsel,” said Aoi; “accept the inevitable. The father is coming; he is your rightful guardian. Bow to his will and give him what affection you can.”

“I can give him not one grain of affection,” said the girl, bitterly. “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?”

Aoi sighed helplessly. The girl threw 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.

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.

“Mother,” she said, “I am going away alone.”

“Alone! Ah, you make my heart stand still with fear.”

“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?”

“Oh, child, I cannot think what it is you contemplate.”

“I will not leave our Japan,” she cried, passionately. “It is the only home I have known.”

“But what can you do?”

“I will hide,” said the girl.

“Ah, alas, you could not, for these foreigners are everywhere here. They would find you.”

“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.”

Aoi wrung her hands.

“Oh, daughter, they will seek everywhere for you till they find you. You do not know the stubborn nature of these people.”

“Ah, but I do, my mother, for that nature is in me, too. If they seek stubbornly, I, too, can hide as well.”

Arising, she stood a moment, looking down thoughtfully upon Aoi.

“To-night,” she said, “they will come. 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.’”

XX

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.

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.

Upon the silence there tenderly stole 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.

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.

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.

Shuddering now, she looked up fearfully at the hills. Not since she was a very little child had she visited these particular hills at night, and even then she had not been alone.

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.

“It will be all right soon,” she kept repeating to herself. “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.”

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.

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 firmament, bright, soft, and luminous.

“It is becoming lighter,” she said. “Ah, will the moon never arise?”

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.

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, un-earthly 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 it, she thought that some kindly goddess had guided her wandering footsteps in the dark to the very refuge she sought.

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.

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.

For a time she stood quietly on the great rock. The silence and stillness 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.

“It is so dark inside,” she said, plaintively, “and I am so weary. The gods will give me sleep without.”

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.

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.

XXI

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.

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.

Everything about the chamber, about 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.

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.

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 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.

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.

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.

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 happen to her, out there in the darkness of the hills!

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.

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.

He, with his arm close about her, comforted softly, and then turning to the strangers who were with him, he said, quietly:

“You see my unexpected arrival has upset my mother. You must excuse the welcome. But, come, let us enter.”

The man and woman, exchanging glances, followed the young man and his mother into the guest-room.

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 _outré_ manner.

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.

“Mother,” he said, “this is Mr. and Mrs. Lorrimer. You have been expecting them, I believe.”

Aoi was so moved that she could only bow feebly to her visitors.

Her son’s voice was low and, to her agitated fancy, strained.

“Mother,” he said, “why was I not informed of the claims made by—Mr. Lorrimer?”

“Oh, son, I feared to tell you,” she replied, tremulously; “the little one besought me not to do so.”

“It was only by accident,” he said, “that I learned the facts. We happened to cross on the same steamer, and, somehow, Mr. Lorrimer confided in me.”

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.

“I came back to Japan,” he said, “for another purpose—to prevent, if I could, Hyacinth’s marriage. It was entirely without my approval. I consider her little more than a child. However, I shortly discovered that I had no right to dictate to her even in this matter. Her father—” He indicated, slightly, Mr. Lorrimer, who seized the opportunity to step forward.

He spoke jerkily and somewhat impatiently.

“It seems to me that we are wasting time. You will, I am sure, perceive my intense anxiety to see my—er—daughter.”

“I beg your pardon for detaining you. It was very stupid of me.” Komazawa turned back to Aoi.

“Where is she, mother?” he asked, simply.

Silently Aoi shook her drooped head. She could not speak.

“Where is she?” repeated Koma, now with a slight thrill of apprehension in his voice.

Still that silent, drooping little figure, with its bowed head and lips that refused to speak.

The shadows deepened in the room, and without the skies were darkening.

Aoi raised her head, shivered, and looked about her dazedly. Then suddenly she clapped her hands mechanically.

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:

“Lights, honorable maid.”

Koma placed his hand heavily on her shoulder.

“Mother,” he said, “you do not make me answer. Where is Hyacinth?”

“Gone,” said Aoi, faintly.

“Gone! What do you mean?”

“Ah, excellencies,” she cried, turning to the visitors and speaking in broken English, “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, and so—and so—she went, excellencies, she—”

“Ran away,” said the woman. “Well, what do you think of that?” She turned her lip ever so slightly, pushing the point of her parasol into Aoi’s immaculate matting. “Runs in the family, apparently,” she said.

Ignoring her utterly, Mr. Lorrimer addressed Aoi in a hoarse voice:

“When did she go, and where? You must know.”

“She went, illustrious excellency, only a little while ago.”

“Where? You know?”

“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?”

“I can,” said Komazawa, stepping forward suddenly.

Aoi rushed to him frantically.

“Oh, son,” she cried, in Japanese, “do not assist these strangers. Do not track the little one to give her to them. You will not take part with them against us?”

“Mother,” he answered, in Japanese, “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.”

He caught up his hat and made to leave the room, but again his mother stayed him.

“Oh, son, in such a garb you would frighten the little one.”

He paused in thought a moment, then turned in the opposite direction.

“It is true. My room—it is as ever?”

“As ever, son. Always awaiting thy return.”

He vanished through the foldingdoors. They heard him speeding rapidly up the stairs.

“Where has he gone?” asked Mrs. Lorrimer, sharply.

“To arrange his dress,” the Japanese woman answered, without raising her head.

“Oh, such folly!” she cried, angrily. “There is no time to be lost. He should start at once. What shall we do?”

This last question she shot at her husband, who was staring miserably before him.

“I don’t know, I’m sure,” he said, dejectedly. “I declare, I’m quite—quite done up.”

“Well, I know what to do,” she said. “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.”

XXII

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.

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 certainty that she was not within the cavern forced itself upon him his shaking frame testified to his agitation.

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.

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.

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.

Then he saw, far up above his head, 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.

For a long time he knelt in a rapt silence beside her, his eyes fixed, entranced, upon her face.

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.

“I cannot awaken her,” he said to himself, “and oh, ye gods! how beautiful she has grown!”

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.

“They will not come this way,” he assured himself. “This ancient path is little known save to the priests. Yet—if they should!”

He clinched his hands tensely at his side and stood off a few paces, looking up at the top of the rock.

“It is very high up, and—they might not see. As I did—they might pass by.”

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, Koma knew, far from his present position.

He heaved a great sigh of relief.

“Ah, it is well—well,” he said; “yet, nevertheless, I must watch—I must guard her.”

XXIII

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.

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 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.

“How still it is!” she said. Then, a moment after, “Heu! the rock is so hard, and it is chilly.” She shivered.