A GREAT SORROW
Soon Kinsan's father was attracted by the new melody of her voice, and
he, too, came and stood near and listened. No word was said until after
the song had been finished. Then Fujimoto came forward and bowed to
Tetsutaisho. This was the first warning Kinsan had of the unusual
audience her singing had attracted, and she quickly arose and bowed and
made excuses for her inattention.
"I would rather you sat there and sang than to have arisen and
courtesied a thousand times," said Tetsutaisho, as he left the roadside
and made his way among the lilacs to where she was standing. "One does
not often have the opportunity, though the wish be constant, and the
privilege of being one of such an audience!" he continued, as he leaned
over and caressed first one and then another of the little children as
they came huddling up. "Were it not that you deserve such happiness,
Fujimoto, I might almost envy you your good fortune in being placed here
amidst such loveliness. The trees, the birds, the flowers, the
children--and, allow me, the daughter--among whom you dwell, must
certainly inspire a rare happiness."
The children had by this time scampered in all directions, and the three
elders were left to speak or go as they liked.
"Yes, honourable sir." said Fujimoto, touched not a little, "these are
truly things not to be despised. The daughter is my comfort: all are my
joy, and after all, my lot may not be a despicable one. Had I always the
favour of Sumi, god of water, my task might be lighter. Still I am
content, and happy so long as my Kinsan is spared to me."
Nothing further was said about Kinsan; the one and only object of
interest which the nobleman could have or cared to have in the humble
gardener's affairs. They walked along at Tetsutaisho's suggestion toward
the cottage, which stood some little distance farther on. When the big
officer entered the palace enclosure he had no intention of making the
gardener's family a call. In fact, he had of late almost dismissed them
from his mind; but the moment he heard Kinsan's voice the spark within
again came to life, and when he drew near and saw how modestly she sat
and how neatly she was gowned and how her eyes sparkled with life and
how the blood rose to her cheeks, his heart flamed more fiercely than
before. Tetsutaisho pondered, then said to himself:
"It is only the father who stands in my way. If I could but get his
confidence, I might then win her love. But why ask anybody's consent?
Force will get me the one thing, and--well, persistence the other. They
are both at my disposal--why delay the matter?"
Kinsan did not speak as they walked, but fell into a deep study. Whether
it came to her intuitively or from a change in Tetsutaisho's mood she
partially understood him, and as they approached the house and she
thought of her mother a feeling of fear took hold of her and she
trembled and hesitated. She knew of their straitened circumstances and
of how her mother had repeatedly chided her father for not having taken
advantage of Tetsutaisho's former liberal offer. The ends of her fingers
tingled, then grew cold, and the perspiration stood in great beads on
her forehead. When they had arrived at the house and her mother came
running out, bowing to the visitor, Kinsan's heart sickened, and she no
longer possessed that confidence in her father which had hitherto buoyed
her under each successive trial.
"It is the hand of fate, and I am its certain victim," was the thought
which ran through her mind and would not go away.
When the rest entered the house she politely withdrew, unnoticed, and
went away, far into the woods, and on and on until she came to the
hidden cave, where every rock and all the flowers and even the stars had
sung again and again of her great love and Shibusawa's faith. She did
not return, but lingered and stayed, and prayed fresh prayers; and then
she thought she saw him there bending over her; she heard him speak and
looked into his eyes, and felt again the power of his love. After a long
time she went away, and when far from the cave and all about was
darkness and she was uncertain of her way a chill came over her and she
thought of the tempter's bait and her mother's weakness.
"Would to God that I, too, had found a way!" was her last thought as she
nestled upon her wooden pillow, and at last slept a broken, restless
sleep.
Late that evening Tetsutaisho left the cottage and lightly tripped along
down the pathway toward his own house. As he went his steps quickened,
and he almost ran with delight. He carried in his girdle a document
which on the morrow he would safely file and thus insure the proper
keeping of its lawful provisions. Upon his arrival he hurriedly entered
the house, and that night Takara may have had, for the first time,
misgivings of a weaker purpose on Tetsutaisho's part than she herself
had divined.
However that may have been, it mattered not to Tetsutaisho, for on the
following day his own carriers set in front of the gardener's cottage a
beautiful lacquered chair into which there stepped a weeping, sorrowing
child; a daughter whose only price was the worth of her virtue, whose
only hope lay in the power of her own frail hands.
She went, and with her the rags that hung upon her back. There was not a
mother's blessing, and the father had slunk back from witnessing the
fruit of a heartless wife's bargaining. It was not the first. Others had
likewise served. And the fathers and mothers had for ages eagerly and
unknowingly partaken of the wages.