Yuki

“ At the corner of the guest-room veranda stood a huge old plum-tree just coming into white bloom.
Smiling Yuki, in tailor-made American gown and black stockings, brought in the tray and knelt before her father. The old warrior flushed with pleasure. "Why, this is better than I could have thought!"
[pg 106] "I told you I was just your little girl," said Yuki. "And oh, father, I do feel so queerly young and real again! I see everything around me just as I wish. It is like making things come true in dreams." Tetsujo caught her by a slender shoulder, looking deep, deep into answering eyes. ”

“ Yuki followed him to the door for a last wifely obeisance. The carriage had been waiting for some moments. After the loud rattling of wheels came a hollow silence. Yuki stood on the granite doorsteps looking outward with unseeing eyes. The house-shadow shrank closer to the huge cube that cast it. Sunshine, like a golden fluid, brimmed up the azure walls of day. From garden-beds nearby, and from path-borders leading into hazy distance, blossoms beckoned. She saw only an iridescent blur. The jinchokè (called by foreigners Daphen Odora) rose in waxen masses of white or arbutus pink. ”

“ It was more than satisfaction that he felt, as he saw the great filled packing-cases sent away each week to suffering soldiers in Manchuria.
Once, coming in upon her unannounced, as was his custom, he had suddenly taken the white thing in his arms, thrown her head back to his shoulder, and gazed into her eyes as though to drag from some hidden depth an awakening thought,—a cradled possibility. Yuki's lids drooped under the blinding force of his look. She felt as though a great silent wind blew, pinning her against a rock. ”

“ The guests listened politely, but Yuki read skepticism on their calm faces.
During the long forenoon not once was a voice raised or a loud laugh heard. Yet not one face ever lapsed into indifference. One might have gained from the resilient poise of slender throats an impression of yielding strength. Their chatter was a murmur, with tripping, short interludes of sound, and cooing, long-drawn vowels soft as their own white hands. They were a flock of gray doves in a sheltered niche. Never, one would have said, were creatures more tender, more feminine, more dependent. ”

“ It was something every little girl must know, and if Yuki Chan's honorable ears refused to open, how would she learn? Then Yuki Chan nestled close, and gave little pats of love and tried to listen. THE shadows of the bamboo grew long and slim as the sun kissed them good night. The sails skimmed homeward on a silver sea as the west covered its rosy pink in a veil of deepest blue. The young birds in the old plum-tree did not stir at the loving touch of the mother who, with a soft bill, searched and sought for the lost one. The plum-blossoms lingered yet for a night as the air had grown chill. ”

“ Haganè tightened his clasp, and at the same instant let his own soul come full into his face. Yuki shivered. Her lips parted. Virtue flowed in upon her from his touch. She thought, as in a vision, of the Kioto statue worn smooth by the touch of dying men. What ghostly comfort that image could have held was but a feeble emanation beside the blinding power of this living god.
"All things are not yet clear to me," said the man. "Something is hidden, and you jealously conceal the hiding-place. Yet you sheltered that spy. You prevented me from following. Speak your whole heart, Yuki." ”

“ You have an heir?”
Yuki bowed to each question. Yoritomo nodded and continued: “Blessed is the samurai who can give his life to lift his parents from beggary to honored affluence; whose heir has full cause to stand before the mortuary tablet of his father with grateful reverence! Offer is made to receive the family of Yuki the ronin into the service of Owari.”
Yuki kowtowed. “The condescension of my lord is above the acknowledgment of empty words. Command the ronin to return into the hands of the torturers! His gratitude may not be expressed by the sacrifice of mere life.” ”

“ The visitor went to the veranda, dropped his clogs, and entered the doorway. A young girl was kneeling before a koto lightly strumming its strings and did not hear the entrance of the man. He stood for a moment looking around the room; then he saw Yuki and walking over to her sat down facing her. Yuki stared at him first in astonishment; then a look of fear came into her black eyes. He was silent for many minutes, then he coolly remarked:
"You do not speak to your uncle. You do not care to make me welcome in this your home." He looked down at her contemptuously. ”

“ Yuki leaned closer to her mother. The cool wet smell of the garden already stole away some of the hot bewilderment from her brain. The angry waves of indecision, girlish longing, and patriotism, which had raged so furiously together, now began to recede, leaving bare at last a small white strip of thought. She was safe now, pledged, not to personal joy, but to heroic service. The greatest of all men was to be her teacher, her helper, her—husband! Well, what of it? Nothing was too great a sacrifice for Nippon. And if Pierre would only not misjudge too cruelly! ”

“ Earth was waking from its long sleep. Yuki felt what many of her own and other races have in such crises felt,—a gratitude to nature that human grief is given no part in it. The grass still is busy, small waxen blossoms lift the leaves of a fallen year, no matter what men may suffer. In moments of keen personal bereavement, when the soul is dazed and blinded by the wonder of its agony, a certain resentment comes. Like the Ayrshire poet we cry, "How can ye be so fresh and fair?" But such grief was not yet Yuki's. Her emotion still partook more of bewilderment than loss. Pierre was not dead. ”

“ It is a wide gulf of race and of inherited ideals between you and Yuki. No love could hold the arch of a bridge quite so wide. But remember her poor little aching heart! There! I am, as usual, doing just what I vowed I wouldn't do. Oh, Pierre, I am sorry for you,—sorry, sorry! The world doesn't seem a very bright place, this morning, does it? I have been scolding a yama-buki bush that insists upon opening in our garden; but the flowers just laugh in my face. It is an unsympathetic universe! Your friend,
"Gwendolen."
Pierre held Yuki's letter long before reading it. ”

“ The group of Japanese maidens hid faces in their bright sleeves. The air stirred and tingled with invisible influences. Gwendolen began to shiver like an animal which knows not its own source of fear. The charged atmosphere, the face, the voice of the singer, Yuki's great glowing eyes, swept in her soul strained chords of unknown feeling. She felt in herself the vibrations of that trembling lute. In its cell a soul, just wakened, fumbled at a new discovered latch. ”

“ The American levity and callousness shown by the young to the old appeared, from the first, in Yuki's mind, and remained ever after, the chief blot upon a country otherwise beloved. Todd saw that the girl in her own land must have moved as though consciously surrounded by spirit. She said to him that, in Nippon, the air was awake and vital; that there, ever went on about men the tangling and untangling [pg 34] of great forces, to which, the living are as but shadows on a moving stream.
Through Yuki, too, he became a friend, even an intimate, of Baron Kanrio, the Japanese minister. ”

“ Yuki Chan, with the intuition that only a child can have, suddenly bridged the gulf of strange language and understood. With the quick movement of a nestling bird, she bent forward and laid her cheek against the boy's shoulder. It was not only complete surrender, but allegiance to the conqueror.
Dick rose, red and confused. Then he climbed into the jinrikisha, trying to ignore the smiles of the man.
Yuki Chan, with her hands joined just below her sash, bent her body like a half-shut jack-knife. ”

“ Yuki boldly pulled down the receiver and held it to her ear. The servants uttered short squeaks like mice.
"Moshi, moshi!" called Yuki, giving the Japanese telephone cry.
Maru shuddered. "Is it a deaf devil, that the o jo san speaks so loudly?"
"A whole nest of devils, Maru San," said Yuki, with mischievous and impressive gravity. "There are green and red devils like those that the lightning bolts bring down, and little foreign devils in boots and beards, and—"
"Oh, let us go! let us go!" cried the little maid, and clutched Suzumè's sleeve. ”

“ Pierre, watching her intently, saw the last red ray of the sun quiver on her lips. The little hands were raised, as if unconsciously, and clapped thrice, very softly.
"Are you praying to your sun-god, little Christian Yuki?"
"Oh, no, indeed," said Yuki, quickly. "It is not prayer as we Christians call praying; it is only just our Japanese way of thanking Sun San for his great beauty, and the much good he does flowers, and people, and everything. In Japan we often thanks things just for being beautiful." ”

“ Prince Haganè, punctual to the instant, fresh from the hands of his man-servant, impressive, unforgettable, in dark native robes of silk, took his place at the head of the receiving line. Yuki wore a robe and obi of splendid brocade, too heavy for an unmarried woman, but now befitting the dignity of a peeress. The colors were her favorite gray and pink, shot through with threads of silver. In her dark hair were pink orchids, the living flowers. ”

“ He will give me a message," explained Yuki, hastily. "Gwendolen is right. So great a man do not think much of girls."
"Humph," said Gwendolen, "that doesn't go! He stared at you as if you were a candied cherry-petal, and he wanted to swallow you at a gulp. Pierre Le Beau saw it, too. Heavens, how he scowled! A regular Medusa! I expect all the chrysanthemums are turned to yellow onyx by his glare."
Yuki gave a start, and then flushed with painful intensity. "Please! Please!" she was beginning, when Mrs. Todd unconsciously interrupted with an exclamation of delight. ”

“ There is no underclothing, with its bands, frills, gussets, and button-holes; the poorer women wear none, and those above them wear, like Yuki, an under-dress of a frothy-looking silk crepe, as simply made as the upper one. There are circulating libraries here, as in most villages, and in the evening both Yuki and Haru read love stories, or accounts of ancient heroes and heroines, dressed up to suit the popular taste, written in the easiest possible style. ”

“ Yuki turned her face sidewise to follow him. "A kuruma," she heard him call, "and three swift runners! Ten yen each to the men if they start within the moment!"
He stood bareheaded in the sunshine, his watch opened in his hands. As if by invocation, the kuruma and the grinning coolies appeared. Yuki crawled a few inches, and strained her dry throat outward, listening for the address he was to give. No effort had been needed for hearing. His voice had the ring, the resonance of a deep bell, as he said aloud, "To the French Legation!" ”

“ CHAPTER EIGHTEEN Spring storms in Tokio, as in other capitals, sweep clean a wide pathway of days for sunshine and the coming flowers. On the morning after that great tempest which so nearly crushed Yuki against the pond-stones of the garden, scarcely could a shadow be found, so eager was the sun to atone for past misdeeds of her naughty younger brother, the wind. Small crumpled leaves began to straighten. Boughs, mud-soldered to muddy earth, drew slowly upward. The old world stirred like a conscious thing. ”

“ Yuki sat upright, her wide eyes fixed, as it were, upon the viewless flight of echo. "And they of the Western world say that my people have no true religion, no deep belief. Their souls crawl, where ours take wings! Nippon, Nippon, my country!"
The magnificence of her nation's past, the heroism, self-sacrifice inherent in her countrymen, the passionate craving for what is spiritual and sublime, the belief in watchful spirits of dead ancestors, in the divinity and guidance of dead Emperors manifest in the living flesh, came in a flood and bore up the girl's spirit in a tide of light. ”

“ In the city of Sendai Jack put up at a small Japanese hostelry, and from there each day he would start out and wander down to the beach of the wonderful bay. It was all as Yuki had pictured it, with her vivid, passionate imagery. ”

“ All her short life Yuki Chan had lived in a house of love, but no veil of affection, no sacrifice, could shield her from the knowledge of poverty. She had never seen her mother wear but one festival dress, yet her own little kimono was ever bright and dainty, and even the new brocade of the dolls' dresses stood alone with the weave of gold and tinsel. ”

“ A form of a man in Japanese robes, unusually tall for his race, slow and majestic in approach, now became visible.
"Haganè!" she said, with a great repressed cry, and bit her lips to keep from sobbing.
"Diable!" echoed Pierre. He gave a single look, a curse, and pitching his cigarette on the stone flag near her, vanished into the shadows of the lotos throne. Yuki, half-fainting now, hung in the coils of the dragon. As though life itself depended on his coming, she watched her husband's calm advance. His stride was slow, splendid, and imposing, each step eloquent of centuries of rulership. ”

“ Nothing could be worse for France or Yuki either than the death of Haganè at his hands. Some other way must be found. The Japanese themselves had a saying, "If you hate a man, let him live." Yes, let the old man live. Yuki's true lover could yet win her, undrenched in any blood. ”