THE most dreaded moment of a Japanese girl’s life is when she enters the
house of the mother-in-law. Her future happiness, she knows, is in the
hands of this autocratic and all-powerful lady. Meekly the wise bride
enters, with propitiating smiles and gifts, robed in her most
inconspicuous gown, her aim being not to enhance whatever beauty she may
possess, but, if possible, to hide it.
Far more necessary is it for her to have the goodwill of the
mother-in-law than that of the husband. It is even possible for the
mother-in-law, for certain causes, to divorce the young wife. In point
of fact, the bride goes on trial not to her husband, but to her
husband’s parents. It depends entirely upon their verdict whether she
shall be “returned” or not. In most cases, however, where the marriage
is arranged between the families, there is the desire to please the
family of the bride; and it is more often the case than not that the
parents of the husband receive the little, fearful bride with open arms
and hearts.
The geisha is not educated for marriage. From her earliest years,
indeed, she is taught that her office in life is merely to entertain.
In the case of the Spider, she had even less opportunity for knowing the
rules that prevailed in such matters. She had been educated by the
witless wife of the geisha-keeper. All her short life had been spent in
aiding nature to make her more beautiful, more charming. The most
important thing in life, the thing that brought rare smiles of
admiration to even the sternest lips, was to be beautiful, witty, and
charming.
So the Spider set out for the Saito house with a light and fearless
heart, confident in the power of her beauty and witchery to win even the
most frosty-hearted of mothers-in-law. Arrayed in the most gorgeous robe
the geisha-house afforded, with huge flowers in her hair, her little
scarlet fan fluttering at her breast, attended by her no less gaudily
dressed maiden and apprentice, Omi, and followed almost to the gates of
the estate by a procession of well-meaning friends and former comrades,
the geisha entered the ancestral home of the illustrious family. For
just a moment, ere she entered, she paused upon the threshold, a
premonitory thrill of fear seizing her. She clung to the supporting hand
of the garrulous Omi, whose shrill and acid little tongue already grew
mute in the silent halls of the shiro (mansion).
Presently they were ushered into the ozashiki, and the Spider became
conscious of the stiff and ceremonious figures standing back coldly by
the screens, their gowns seeming in the subdued light of the room of a
similar dull color to the satin fusuma of the walls, their shining
topknots undecorated with flower or ornament, their thin, unmoving lips
and eyes almost closed in cold, unsmiling scrutiny of the intruder, who
seemed, like some brilliant butterfly, to have dropped in their midst
from another world.
The women of the household—and these comprised the mother, two austere
maternal aunts, and Takedo Ohano-san (she who was to have been the bride
of Lord Gonji)—surveyed the Spider with narrow, keen eyes that took in
every detail of her flaming gown, her dazzling coiffure, flower-laden,
and, beneath, the exquisite little face, with wide and starlit eyes that
looked at them now in friendly appeal.
There was no word spoken. Nothing but the sighing, hissing sound of
indrawn breaths, as with precise formality they made their obeisances to
the bride.
In vain did the wandering eyes of the geisha scan the farthermost corner
of the great room in search of her lover, or even his seemingly friendly
father. There were only the women there to receive her.
Dimly, now, she recalled hearing or reading somewhere that this was a
fashion followed by many families—the reception of the bride at first
alone by the women of the house, who were later to present her to the
assembled relatives. But why this disconcerting silence? Why the cold,
unfriendly, lofty gaze of these unmoving women? They stood like grave
automata, regarding sternly the bride of the Lord Saito Gonji.
The smile upon the geisha’s lips flickered away tremulously; her little
head drooped like a flower; she closed her eyes lest the threatening
tears might fall.
A voice, cold, harsh, and with that note of command of one in authority
addressing a servant, at last broke the silence.
“It is my wish,” said the Lady Saito Ichigo, “that you retire to your
chamber, and there remove the garments of your trade.”
So strange and unexpected were the words that at first the Spider did
not realize that they could possibly be addressed to her. She looked up,
bewildered, and encountered the steely gaze of the mother-in-law.
Moonlight never forgot that first glance. In the unrelenting gaze bent
upon her she read what brought havoc and pain to her heart, for all the
stored-up resentment and hatred that burned within the Lady Saito Ichigo
showed now in her face. Her voice droned on with mechanical, incisive
calmness, but always with the cruel and harsh tone of contemptuous
command:
“It is my wish that your maiden of the geisha-house be returned at once
to her proper home.”
She clapped her hands precisely twice, and a serving-woman answered the
summons and knelt respectfully to take the order of her mistress.
“You will conduct the wife of the Lord Saito Gonji to her chamber.”
The servant crossed to the still kneeling Moonlight, and while the
latter, mystified, looked dumbly at the exalted but, to her, horrible
lady, she assisted the Spider to arise. Mechanically and fearfully,
pausing not even at the wrathful, sobbing outcry that had broken loose
from Omi, she followed in the wake of the serving-maid.
Presently she found herself in an empty chamber, unlike any she had
known in the geisha-house, with its golden matting shining like glass,
and its lacquer latticed walls of water-paper, and the sliding screens,
rare and exquisite works of art. Here the maid fell to work upon the
geisha, removing every vestige of her attire and substituting the plain
but elegant flowing robes of a lady of rank.
From the geisha’s hair she removed the ornaments and the poppies. She
swept it down, like a cloud of lacquer, upon the shoulders of the girl,
then drew it up into the stiff and formal mode proper for one of her
class. From the girl’s face she wiped the last trace of rouge and
powder, revealing the rosy, shining skin beneath, clear and clean as a
baby’s.
When she emerged from the hands of the maid, Moonlight looked at herself
curiously in the small mirror tendered her, and for a moment she stared,
dumbfounded at the face that looked back at her. It seemed so strangely
young, despite its wide and wounded eyes. Though she was in reality more
charming than ever, seeming like one who had come from a fresh and
invigorating bath, the geisha felt that the last vestige of her beauty
had fled. Within her heart arose a panic-stricken fear of the effect of
the metamorphosis upon her lord. She wished ardently she were back in
the noisy geisha-house, with the maidens clamoring about her and the
apprentices vying with one another in imitating her. She put the mirror
behind her. Her lips trembled so she could hardly compress them, and to
avoid the scrutiny of the maid she moved blindly to the shoji. There she
stared out unseeingly at the landscape before her, heroically trying to
choke back the tears that would force their way and dripped down her
dimpled cheeks like rain.
Some one whispered her name, very softly, adoringly. She turned and
looked at him—her young bridegroom, with his pale face alight with
happiness. She tried to answer him, but even his name eluded her. It was
the first time they had been alone together, the first time they had
seen each other since that night in the gardens of the Saito.
“Why, how beautiful thou art!” he stammered. “More so even than I had
dreamed!”
He was very close to her now, and almost unconsciously she leaned
against him. His arms enfolded her rapturously, and she felt his young
cheek warm against her own.
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