NO Prince of Japan had ever been wedded in so strange and lowly a
fashion. There was not a sign or sound of the gratulation, rejoicing, or
pomp which usually attend such ceremonies. When the Prince Keiki and the
Lady Wistaria, attended by the samurai Genji, entered the homely wedding
apartment, they found a small group, pale and solemn, awaiting them. It
consisted of the Lord and Lady Catzu and one who was a stranger to
Keiki, but whom he knew to be the father of the Lady Wistaria.
The waiting party bowed very low and solemnly to those who had just
entered. Their greeting was returned with an equal gravity and grace.
There was a pause—a hush. Keiki looked about him inquiringly, and then
he shivered. The true solemnity of the occasion dawned upon him so that
even the near joy of possessing Wistaria at last passed from his mind.
He was about to join through marriage two families who hitherto had had
for each other nothing save hatred and detestation.
Timid and pale as his glance was, he scarcely dared to look at the Lady
Wistaria, though he knew she was so weak and faint that the samurai
Genji had to support her.
Somewhat sharply, the voice of the Lady Evening Glory broke the silence.
“Why do we wait?”
The Lord Catzu stirred uneasily, glancing from the bridal couple to his
wife, and then to the inscrutable face of Shimadzu.
“If I may be permitted to remark,” he said, apologetically, “the Lady
Wistaria is certainly garbed unbefitting her rank and race.”
“Chut!” said his wife, angrily, “you would delay matters for such a
trifle? Every moment counts now against our son. Will you let such an
insignificant matter as the dress of your unworthy niece hasten the
possible death of our beloved?”
“When it is her wedding-dress, yes,” said Catzu, stubbornly. “May I be
stricken blind before I witness such a disgrace brought upon my
honorable niece’s dignity. She must be married as befits her rank, I
repeat.”
A sour smile played over the features of the Lady Evening Glory.
“That is true. Well, her rank is that of the Eta,” she said, tartly.
Having found the courage to disagree with his lady, Catzu now set her at
complete defiance. He marched towards the door.
“Very well, then. I refuse to witness such an outrageous ceremony. The
lady may have Eta kindred, but do not forget that she has also the blood
of royalty in her veins.”
His consort could hardly suppress her fury.
“I appeal to you, honored brother,” she said. “How shall it be?”
“And I,” exploded Catzu, who was in an evil and contrary temper, “appeal
to you, my Lord of Mori,” and he bowed profoundly to the Prince.
Shimadzu made no response. His glance met that of the troubled Prince.
Keiki flushed under his penetrating eyes. Then he spoke with graceful
dignity, bowing meanwhile to the trembling Wistaria.
“Let her be garbed,” he said, “as befits the daughter of her father and
the bride of a Prince of Mori.”
There was silence for a space. Then Shimadzu made an imperative gesture
to Genji, who gently led the girl from the chamber, followed by the
angrily resigned Lady Evening Glory.
The three men, now alone, waited in strained silence for Wistaria’s
return. Straight and stiff, with heads somewhat bent to the floor, they
remained standing in almost identical attitudes. Gradually, however,
Catzu broke the tension by an attempt to relieve his excessive
nervousness. Resting first on one foot and then on the other, he shifted
about. His eyes lingered in painful sympathy upon the Prince, and then
irresolutely turned to the samurai. Perspiration stood out on the lord’s
brow. He was suffering physically from the strain.
After a long interval of this intolerable silence, the doors of the
chamber were again pushed aside. The samurai Genji entered. Bowing
deeply, he announced:
“The Lady Wistaria and her august aunt enter the honorable chamber!”
The two ladies, close behind Genji, now followed him into the room.
Immediately all prostrated themselves. When they had regained their
feet, it was found that Wistaria was still kneeling. Then Genji
perceived that she had not risen because she was unable to do so.
Without a word, he lifted her to her feet. One moment she leaned against
his strong arm, then seemed to gather strength. Stepping apart from him,
she stood alone there in the middle of the floor.
Despite her waxen whiteness, she was more than beautiful—ethereal. Her
lacquer hair was no more dark than her strange, long eyes, both set off
by an exquisite robe of ancient style, as befitted a lady of noble
blood.
When her hand touched that of the Prince he felt cold as ice.
Involuntarily his own palm enclosed hers warmly. He did not let it go,
but drawing her closer to him, unmindful of the assembled company, he
tried to fathom the tragedy that seemed to lurk behind her impenetrable
eyes. But, her head drooping above their hands, he beheld only the sheen
of her glossy hair. Then she passed from his side to her uncle and her
father.
Almost mechanically, his eyes never once relaxing their gaze from the
face of his bride, the Prince went through the ceremony. After the
service he tried to break the uncomfortable restraint. He proposed the
health of the two noble though previously misguided families, whose
union had now been so happily consummated. But his own cup was the only
one held high. Gradually his hand fell from its elevation. He set the
untasted sake down among the marriage-cups and sprang to his feet.
“Let us diffuse some merriment among us,” he cried, “for the sake of the
gods and for our future peace and happiness. Such undue solemnity bodes
ill for our honorable future.”
The samurai Shimadzu stepped forward, facing him fairly.
“My lord and prince,” he said, “I have this moment given the signal for
a courier to hasten immediately to Choshui to acquaint my bitterest
enemy with the tidings of the marriage of his heir to my insignificant
daughter.”
The Prince smiled, despite his uneasiness.
“Surely, my lord,” he said, “you make a goodly new and honorable custom.
What! an announcement, perchance an invitation for one’s enemy! That is
well, for we have overturned all false maxims relating to vengeance
against an enemy. We have buried our wrongs in a union of love, and
embrace our enemies as friends.”
“With august humility,” said the samurai, coldly, “I would suggest that
your highness’s assurance of our embrace is premature.”
“Premature! What, and this my marriage day!”
“Your marriage day may be a source of woe to your proud house.”
“Well, that is so,” agreed the Prince, thoughtfully. “Nevertheless,” he
added, cheerfully, “my honorable father becomes more lenient with the
years. Moreover, he has but to behold his new daughter to forget all
else save the fortune the gods have bestowed upon us.”
“Be assured your father shall never behold her,” said the samurai, with
incisive fierceness.
“What is that?”
“You have heard.”
“But I do assure you that my marriage, though it may provoke the
momentary anger of my father, will never debar my lady wife from her
position in our household. You forget that my honored parent is very
old, and I shall soon have the honor of becoming Prince of Mori in my
own right. I shall then have no lord to deprive me of my rights, even if
I had disregarded the law.”
“You may as well be made aware of the fact at once,” said Shimadzu,
“that no blood of mine shall ever mingle with that of the Mori!”
“I do not understand your honorable speech. Has not our august bloods
just now become united?”
“Only by the law, my lord.”
“Well—?”
“My daughter, your highness, shall never accompany her Mori husband to
his home.”
“Very well, then. I will remain here with her. I am quite satisfied to
renounce all my worldly ambitions and possessions for her sake, if such
is the command of her august father,” and the Prince bowed to his
father-in-law in the most filial and affable manner.
“If you remain here you will not be permitted to live.”
A low cry, half moan, came from the new Princess of Mori, who lay
against her uncle’s breast. Keiki turned to her at that cry. He was
seized with a foreboding of events to come. Again he turned to the
samurai.
“Will it please you, honored father-in-law, to speak more plainly to
me?”
“Very well. This marriage, your highness, has been consummated not for
the purpose of uniting a pair of lovers, but to fulfil a pledge which
was made to one who was murdered by your parent—a pledge of vengeance.”
“But I cannot perceive how this is accomplished,” said the Prince, now
pale as Wistaria.
“You have married an Eta girl.”
“I am aware of that,” said the Prince, somewhat proudly.
“I have not finished,” said Shimadzu. “Are you aware that you are at
present under sentence of death?”
The Prince made a contemptuous motion.
“By order of the bakufu (shogunate). Yes, I am aware of the fact.”
“Very well. I am the executioner!”
“You!”
“It was I who caused your arrest, and afterwards brought you hither with
the intention of executing you.”
A flood of horrible thoughts rushed across the Prince’s mind,
bewildering him. As if to press them back, he clasped his hands to his
head. Shimadzu continued in his cold and monotonous voice:
“After your arrest, it was brought to my attention that a more subtle
revenge against your parent could be gained by marrying you into that
very class of people so despised by your father, and forcing you to
become guilty of the same offence for which I was exiled.”
Stirred as he now was, Keiki’s faith in Wistaria still remained
unshaken. That her father had had a hand in betraying him he was
assured, but he could not yet recognize in the deed the delicate hand of
the woman he loved.
“Through the agency of my daughter,” went on the samurai, “I was soon
able to learn sufficient concerning the workings of the Imperialist
party of which you are the head—”
“The Imperialist party!” repeated the Prince, and he bounded towards the
samurai with the cry of a wounded animal. His hand sprang to his hip,
where his sword had been restored to its sheath.
“You—you!” he shouted. “It was you who betrayed me—who—”
“You are augustly wrong,” said the samurai, moving not an inch, despite
the close proximity and menacing attitude of the Prince. “You honorably
betrayed yourself!”
“I!”
“Certainly. To her.” He indicated, without naming, the Lady Wistaria.
Slowly, painfully, driven by the goading words of the father, the
blazing, burning eyes of the husband sought Wistaria, there to rest upon
her while infinite horror found mirror in his countenance. Motionless
thus he stood.
Wistaria, braced for a shock she could not meet, leaned against her
uncle, whose head bent over her. The Lady Evening Glory smiled, as one
who delights in the soul of a cat. Calm, satisfied, unmoved, remained
Shimadzu. Keiki’s eyes bulged from their sockets, his mouth gaped open.
At last one word burst from his lips, but it was as eloquent as though
he had uttered a thousand.
“Thou!”
Her head sank low. He recoiled a step. But with entranced horror he
continued to gaze at her. Her face was like marble, out of which her
dark eyes stared as though made of polished, glazed china. And as he
gazed, terrible thoughts and remembrances rushed upon Keiki,
overpowering, weakening, paralyzing him. After a long, immovable silence
he leaned slowly forward until their faces, close together, were on a
level.
“It is true?” he whispered, hoarsely. “Speak! Speak!”
“It is true,” she replied, in a voice so small and faint that it seemed
far away.
His sword leaped out of his scabbard. He raised it as if to strike her
down. But his hand fell to his side. Then he spoke, in a hoarse, fearful
voice:
“The gods may forgive thee. I, never!”
With that he was gone from the chamber. They heard the clash of his
sword as it touched the stone pavement, then the sound of his flying
feet, loud at first, and then dying away into the silence.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[Illustration: Decoration]