Part 3

At this time of the year, alas! there was neither snow nor moon nor flowers to serve a pretext. A series of heavy rainfalls, most distressing and persistent, was the only fugitive before approaching spring. Yet even the rain-gods have a limit to their tears, and, after all, the rains preceding the first month of spring are ofttimes the very means by which the land is cleansed ere it bursts into beauty and bud.

Not so interminable as it seemed to them was the lovers’ waiting. Three short days—yet how long!—and then the sun which had struggled for ascendency over the troubled heavens rose up proudly triumphant. The thunders retreated into tremulous growls of defeat; the gray-black clouds rolled away before the blinding flashes of the sun-rays, flitting like ghosts before the dawn. An immense rainbow, spanning the entire heavens, sprang out of the skies, a signal of the sun-god’s victory.

What mattered it that the land was barren as yet of flowers? The grass was green and the trees almost bursting in effort of emulation. Catzu, having satisfied himself that the moisture on the grass was but the dew of spring, forthwith devised a small party. It consisted of his lady niece and the august guest of the household, who was graciously entreated to accompany them, and who accepted with an alacrity almost lacking courtesy.

With but two attendants, the party set out from the palace. Taking a small boat, they made a swift pilgrimage up the graceful river to a small island where a picturesque tea-house and gardens, with twenty charming geishas, made a fairyland for lovers.

To receive so early and unheralded a visit from the august lord of the province threw the geishas into a delighted panic of excitement. Their attendants were seen rushing hither and thither throughout the place, hastily making it suitable for the reception of the exalted guests.

Hastening down to the beach, the chief geisha herself apologized for the island’s condition. The Lord of Catzu went to meet her. For his guest to be received without preparation, he explained to Keiki, would be unfitting. Consequently he begged him to remain on the beach, while he himself proceeded with the chief geisha to the tea-house to issue instructions.

The stolid and indifferent lackeys who had attended the party returned to the boat, where they fell into conversation with the oarsmen.

At last the lovers were alone.

For a long moment Keiki and Wistaria looked into each other’s eyes. They were safe from all observation, for the gardens, and indeed the whole island, was of that rock-and-pebble-built variety favored by the Japanese. Behind and around them they were screened by quaint, grotesque rocks of natural form and immense size, carried from a mountain to this tiny island, placed there in miniature to simulate nature.

Nevertheless Keiki, the impatient and ardent, now at the crucial moment, had naught to say. He had confessed his love in his letters; she had admitted tacitly her own. Still they did not embrace, or even touch each other. Culture is strong in Japan, where also is the fire of love. So these two but looked into each other’s faces, all their hearts’ eloquent passion in their eyes. Wistaria’s eyes did not fall before his tender gaze. Only a rose-red flush crept softly like a magic glow over the oval of her cheeks, tingeing her little chin while accentuating her brow’s whiteness.

Without a word her lover dropped upon one knee, lifted the long sleeve of her kimono, and buried his face within its fabric.

Five minutes later, hand in hand, they were standing on the same spot. They were watching the river, swollen by recent rains, as it burst over the rocks beyond, bounding down the river-bed, rolling swiftly along, twisting, curving, and winding about the sinuous form of the island’s shore, holding it in the grudging love of the water for the land. The water was blue-green in color, save where the sunbeams reflected its own light in glistening gleams of quicksilver, ever moving, ever playing, while the shores on either side threw shadows of their trees and rocks upon it. As it ran busily, merrily along, now and then lapping the shore and leaping to their very feet, it seemed a living thing which babbled and laughed with an inward knowledge of their joy, and also sighed and wailed with a prophetic undercurrent of coming woe.

The touch of their hands close clasped together made them tremble and quiver. Their eyes met to droop away and meet again in the vivid recognition of their own innocent happiness. They could not speak, because their hearts had laid claim to their lips and sealed them in a golden silence.

Then, after a long interval, Keiki found his voice. If he spoke of the flowing river at their feet, it was not the river itself that absorbed his mind, but because in it, as in all things beautiful in life, he now saw reflected the image of his beloved.

“The honorable river,” he said, “flows high at this season, but before the summer dies it will be but a thin line, very still, very quiet.”

“Yes,” said Wistaria, tremulously, “but the lotus will spring up in its honorable waters, and if the river should continue to rise and rush onward like this, I fear me the water-flowers would perish and the noise of its ceaseless flow would drown the voices of the birds, which make the summer speak.”

“That is true,” said Keiki, “but when the summer passes then the flowers must still die, and we may no longer hear the singing of the birds. Then still the river will be silent and motionless—perhaps dead.”

Keiki sighed with the moodiness of love attained. A gentle depression stole from him to the Lady Wistaria.

“Alas! my lord,” she murmured; “it is so with all things in life that are beautiful. They vanish and die like the flowers of summer.”

“Then,” said Keiki, “swear by the god of the sea, by whose waters we now stand, that our love shall never die, and that for the time of this life, and the next, and as many after as may come, you will be my flower wife, and take me for your husband.”

“By all the eight million gods of heaven, and by the god of the sea, I swear,” said Wistaria.

VI

THE air was balmy, the sky of a cerulean blue, the Dewdrop gardens were sweet with a strange charm and mystery all their own. Pebbles, sand, and stone, were cunningly displayed and mingled to create the illusion of an approach to a giant sea. In themselves the wondrous rocks were so fashioned as to form a landscape wherein neither foliage, trees, nor flowers were necessary. Small, grotesque bridges, made of rare rocks in their natural form, undefaced by hammer or chisel, spanned the miniature rivers, which, snakelike, crept and threaded their way in and out of the rock island. Suddenly appearing caverns yawned wide agape, only to show on closer approach that they were naught but gigantic rocks, hollow within.

Though the gardens were bare of foliage, yet the spot shone out like a jewel set in a magic river. Here was the perfection of art, that art so complete that without the very things of nature which seem necessary to a landscape, the cunning hand of man had fashioned the like out of the hard and jagged substance of stone and rock. And in this the hand of the Creator had aided, since the very rocks which formed this precious and priceless island, the pride and wealth of the Lord of Catzu, had been untouched by the tool of the artisan, for, having been gathered together from all parts of the country, they were planted in their natural form upon this island jewel.

Across the narrow river the shores were green, while beyond the silent surface of the moats the granite walls of the Catzu palace rose to a height, white and stately, tipped with golden towers and peaks that were taller than the cedars and the pines centuries old.

A stir of expectation thrilled the Dewdrop tea-house, and then a clear, shrill voice cried aloud:

“The Lady Wistaria passes into the honorable hall.”

The twenty geishas prostrated themselves at my lady’s feet. Gracefully she returned their courtesy, begging that they would serve her and her august guest, the Lord Tominaga Keiki, with refreshment.

The geishas, at this period in history occupying a high and dignified position in society, expressed their wish to serve their lady for the rest of their lives.

They brought the lovers fresh fruit, shining and luscious, and drink from a well of sweetest and purest water. Humbly apologizing for the honorable meanness of the refreshment, the chief geisha prayed that they would condescend to pardon her, for not even in her dreams had she imagined that the gods would favor her so soon in the season with such august guests.

But the lovers only smiled benevolently upon her, and insisted that never, no, never in all the honorable days of their lives, had they been blessed with more gracious refreshment. Whereat the geisha, with many low, grateful obeisances, retired.

The lovers sighed as in one breath.

“Once more alone,” said Keiki, blissfully reaching over the little table and laying his own hands softly upon those of the girl. “How gracious the gods!”

“Of a truth,” said Wistaria, smiling up at him; “we must repay the gods.”

“We must, indeed. What shall we do? Build a thousand temples to—well, which one?”

“I consider!” quoth Wistaria, thinking very seriously. Then, suddenly, with a little, silvery laugh: “I have it. Let us deify my own august uncle. Is he not the god who befriends us?”

“Not consciously,” said Keiki, “for I doubt not my Lord of Catzu would fume and curse me roundly did he know I took advantage of his honorable disposition to sleep.”

Wistaria laughed softly.

“Now I am quite ready to swear,” she said, “that of late my honorable uncle is perfectly conscious when he sleeps.”

“Pray tell me,” cried Keiki, starting.

The girl nodded merrily.

“Will you tell me, then, how it is possible for one to fall asleep in a small, rocking boat? Could you or I do so, my Lord Keiki?”

“Oh, not you or I; but your honorable uncle is divinely lethargic.”

“Then, my lord, he is but lately afflicted.”

“But I do not understand, then—you cannot mean—Oh no, it could hardly be so!”

“And why not, my lord? To me it seems that even the gods must needs favor you, much more an honorable mortal.”

“Your uncle favor me! It cannot be possible.”

“It is possible. It is so.”

“But he has been acquainted with me only for the past six days.”

“And does it take a year for favor to grow, when love—”

“Awakens in a day—an hour,” finished Keiki, rapturously. “No, I can see how it is possible, but I could not at once realize my good-fortune. Moreover—”

Suddenly he broke off as a melancholy shadow crept across his brow, troubling his eyes. In a sudden depression he bent forward.

“My lord is troubled? Speak to me quickly.”

“Troubled? Yes, that is so,” Keiki sighed.

“Then do, I pray you, speak your trouble to me,” said Wistaria. Immediately she threw herself at his feet, resting her hands upon his knees and raising her face upward to his. Keiki took her face in his hands. He looked deep into her love-lit eyes.

“Yes, I will tell you, little Wistaria,” he said, “though I fear you are already acquainted with my secret.”

“I am not, indeed,” she denied.

“You do not know,” he asked, sadly, “that I am of the Mori clan?”

“Of the Mori clan! And is that all that troubles you, my lord?”

“And is not that sufficiently serious?”

“No.”

“But surely you must be aware of the feud existing between the Mori and Catzu clans?”

“My lord, you and I do not constitute the Mori and Catzu clans.”

“You and I,” he repeated, slowly, “do not constitute the Mori and Catzu clans.” Then, after a silent moment: “Alas, my lady, I fear we do!”

Wistaria snatched her hands quickly from his and arose. Certainly he could not love her, she thought, if he allowed so small a thing as that to distress him.

“If that be so—if that is what you think, my lord, deign to inform me why you have condescended to make suit to me?”

“I was forced to make my suit in secret,” he said, almost bitterly.

“But your love is honest, is it not?”

“Oh, my flower-girl, can you ask that?”

She was contrite in a moment. Once more she was at his feet, kneeling, and pressing both his hands with her little, slender, nervous fingers.

“Nay, then, do not look so sad, my Keiki. It troubles me that you should allow so silly a thing as the differences of our respective clans even for a fraction of a moment to come between us.”

“They cannot truly come between us,” was his fervid reply, “for no power on earth can actually separate us now. Are we not sworn to each other for all time—for all eternity?”

“Then why be so sad? You, who are so brave, cannot fear the dangers that may beset our union.”

“No, no, it is not that. But—I sigh for the tears of others—our honorable ancestors and parents.”

“Then do cease to sigh at once, if you please. Why, it is not such a terrible crime to marry a Mori, surely!”

“No, I hope not,” said Keiki, smiling now.

“No, indeed, for my own honorable uncle committed that same fault.”

“Fault?”

“And I believe that if we were to go to him, and tell him the honorable truth, he would gladly assist us.”

“Not if he knew all,” said Keiki, sadly. “No, he must know nothing yet.”

“Indeed,” said Wistaria, “I did not know the feeling of the Mori was so bitter against us, and I do assure you that in Catzu the prejudice exists not so much against your clan, as against your lord and prince.”

“Alas, that is too true!” answered Keiki, half under his breath.

“Well, a courtier’s loyalty to his Prince need not at all be shaken if he marry the insignificant niece of a rival clan. My own honorable father was of that very clan himself. Know you not that, my lord?”

Keiki groaned suddenly. Whereat the girl placed her hands on his shoulders and forced him to look into her eyes.

“My lord,” she said, “do you know aught of my father’s history?”

Slowly Keiki drew himself up from her clinging hands. Placing one arm close about her, he drew her to his breast.

“Let us no longer talk of these distressful matters.”

“Nay, I have asked you a question. Do, I beseech you, answer me.”

“What can I say?” His voice was very low.

“Tell me of my father—pray tell me,” she implored, almost piteously.

“Of your father? But surely I can tell you nothing that you do not already know?”

“I know naught of my father, save that he was a Choshui samurai, and for some honorable offence was banished by that wicked and cruel Prince of Mori.”

Keiki was silent.

“I have questioned every one about me—my uncle, his samurai, the very servants about the castle—but none will make answer to me, whether from ignorance or by command of those in authority over them, I know not. Do you, then, my lover, answer me.”

“My little flower-girl, I do not know the offence of your honorable father, nor do I know why or wherefore he was sent into exile. I was but a child of five when this penalty came upon him.”

“Then wherefore did you tremble and turn away your eyes when I spoke of my honorable parent?”

“Because I know that injury of some sort was wrought against your honorable parent by my—by the Mori, and since then so implacable an enmity exists between our families that nothing but blood alone can ever wipe away the stain. Think, then, of the wrong I do your father in loving his own daughter!”

“No, no—dear Keiki—it is no wrong, I do assure you. If there be a feud existing between my father and the Mori Prince, truly you and I, who are innocent, cannot be implicated in any way, and, indeed, it is not as if I were about to wed one of the Mori family itself, but—”

“In that case,” he interrupted, quickly, “if I were indeed of this Mori family, what then?”

For a moment the girl recoiled, shrinking backward, and regarded him with frightened, shocked eyes.

“That—would—be—impossible,” she said, and she shivered with apprehension.

“If it were possible?” said the lover, hoarsely.

“It could not be,” she insisted, “for the Mori princes are proud and ill-favored, while you—”

“While I?”

“—You are more beautiful than the sun-god.”

“But you have not answered me. Suppose it were—Prince Keiki, the heir of Mori, who wooed you?”

“I cannot, my lord. Oh, the Prince is otherwise occupied than in wandering with love,” replied Wistaria, smiling at the thought. “Why, he is the head of a wicked party of Imperialists, I have ofttimes heard my uncle declare, and is the most cunning and base fermenter of intrigue against our august Shogun in the whole empire. Indeed, he has no time or inclination for dallying with love.”

“But—if I were indeed he, what then?”

“Why, then—then,” said the girl, slowly rising, and regarding him with shining eyes, “then still I would say, ‘Take me.’ What have we to do with the quarrels of our ancestors, the wrongs or the rights of our honorable parents? You and I are under the sheltering wings of the god of love. We recognize no law of country, lord, or kindred. Let us go into the mountains together and find refuge in a cottage where we can live and love in peace.”

“Oh, thou dear one!” he cried.

“But why suggest such a horrible possibility?” she continued, tremulously. “Thou art not that base and traitorous Prince? Thou art—”

“Thy love! That is all,” he said.

VII

IN the joy and sunshine of Wistaria’s nature, which would have driven sadness from the soul of a hermit, Keiki’s melancholy was evanescent. Her lover’s fears at the mere possibility of their being forced apart were soon dissipated by her.

A week passed—sped like so many minutes. The pale green of the spring grass was deepening in hue and the trees were in leaf. The lovers lingered in the paths that led down to the little boat-house, whence each day they sailed slowly down the river to the rock island. There in the lazy, drifting boat, the drowsy Lord of Catzu dosed back against his padded seat, while the lovers looked into each other’s eyes, or furtively pressed each other’s hands.

Meanwhile their short hours of happiness were being slowly ticked off by the god of love, at whose shrine they had offered the whole wealth of their hearts. The days of their joy were numbered. That strange honey of bliss they sipped so greedily was soon to be snatched from their lips.

The Lady Evening Glory was recovering slowly from her indisposition. Because the lady herself had contracted a most wilful and romantic marriage, she was perhaps the more suspicious of the culpability of others. She trusted neither youth nor maid, but Wistaria bore the weight of her suspicions.

While gossip and idle chatter had stolen into the lady’s chamber concerning the charms and grace of their whilom guest, Wistaria’s almost extravagant solicitude for her set my lady at first to thinking, and then to acting.

The Lady Evening Glory was no believer in the worship of the sun. Nevertheless, some garrulous maid having carried to her the innocent remark of her niece that she enjoyed viewing the rising of the sun, a few mornings later found the Lady Evening Glory not only arising before the sun, but wending her way through the silent corridors of the palace until she was before the chamber of the Lady Wistaria. Without so much as a tap for admission, she softly pushed aside the sliding shoji.

With the keenest of lover’s ears. Wistaria heard the faint shir-r-r made by the sliding doors. In the same instant down went her own shutter. So when the Lady Evening Glory entered the chamber she found her niece sitting on the floor, her back set stiffly against her casement shutter, and a deep rosy coloring all over her face. Her guilty eyes fell before the cold glare of her august aunt.

The next thing the Lady Evening Glory’s sharp eyes fell upon were the flowers. They lay in a great, tumbled mass all about the Lady Wistaria. There was no mistaking the meaning of those tell-tale blossoms. The Lady Evening Glory’s lips became a thin, pursed line.

“The flowers? Whence came they?”

“From the honorable garden,” answered Wistaria, trembling.

“There is no tree in all the garden with blossoms in full bloom. They are only commencing to bud, and will not blossom before the first of April.”

To this undeniable fact Wistaria made no response.

“Answer when thou art spoken to,” prompted her aunt, sharply.

“My lady—I do not know what to say.”

“Then you leave me to my own conjectures. You have a lover.”

“Oh no, indeed!”

“What! Flowers fresh with the morning dew in your chamber, and you with your hair unbound! Pray when did it become an honorable fashion for ladies of our rank to venture out to purchase flowers before sunrise—and in such scanty attire?”

“My aunt, you are killing me.”

“Your health appears to me to be far from feeble.”

“I am innocent of any wrong,” said Wistaria, with a flash of spirit.

“Then you will not object to inform me who presented you with these flowers?”

“An honorable gentleman,” said Wistaria.

“Indeed! And what is this honorable gentleman’s name, may I ask?”

Wistaria hesitated. Then a sudden idea came to her. She smiled mysteriously.

“But I do not know his name,” she said, which was quite true, as she was unaware of her lover’s true name.

“You do not know the name of your lover!” cried her aunt, incredulously.

“Indeed, I wish I did.”

“Yet you accept his gift! You are entirely without shame, girl!”

“Oh, lady! the flowers were so beautiful I could not resist them.”

“Beautiful!” shrieked her aunt. “And because flowers are beautiful, is that an excuse for accepting the love of some impudent adventurer?”

“Accepting the love!” repeated Wistaria, faltering.

“Yes, indeed, and you need not pretend ignorance of my words. They are quite clear to you, I have no doubt.”

“But—”

“You are well aware that by accepting the flowers you also accept his despicable love, and practically betroth yourself to this fellow. He shall be flogged for his impertinence.”

“Flogged!” cried Wistaria, becoming very pale.

“Flogged, I repeat,” said her aunt, coldly.

Wistaria shivered with apprehension. She had not until now grasped the real seriousness of her position.

“Your father,” continued the Lady Evening Glory, “shall be sent for this day. We shall see what those in authority over you think of your conduct.”

The aunt had but to mention the father to fill Wistaria with fear. She sprang to her feet and stood trembling among the scattered blossoms.

“I am guilty of no wrong, I do assure you, my lady aunt. But I arose to enjoy the sun’s awakening, and—and I did find these honorable flowers on my sill, and indeed they spoke to me of—of the coming summer, and so many things, dear aunt, that I was fain to take them in.”

“Then do, pray, my little dove, inform me what you know concerning this presumptuous fellow who placed them on your sill.”

“Oh, my lady, he is indeed honorably noble.”

“Indeed!”

“I do assure you. He is—” she broke off, painfully debating in her mind the wisdom of confessing the truth to her aunt.

“He is—?” repeated her aunt.

“Our own august guest.”

“Ah—ho! Then, if that is so, you spoke a lie just a moment since when you said you did not know your lover’s name.”

Wistaria attempted to speak, but broke off, faltering and stammering piteously.

“May I inquire, then,” continued her aunt, relentlessly, “whether you are unacquainted with the honorable name of our august guest?”

“Oh, my lady, I do believe that—that he assumed another—only—just for the innocent romance of wooing me under an assumed title.”

“So! And pray how comes it, then, that my son’s honorable guest should also happen to be your lover? If in order to woo you he came hither under an assumed name, then it would seem that you had some previous acquaintance with him?”

“He followed our cortege from Yedo, madame,” confessed the unhappy girl.