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.
Pedestrians sent smiling, answering looks of brightness to the sky, as
they hurried along to daily work. All over the great city, housewives
were busy hanging out bed-clothing, and standing the removable wadded
straw mats (tatami) slanting-wise against veranda posts, to get the full
strength of the sun.
In that vast, merry hive there was one soul, at least, that neither saw
the sunshine nor thrilled to the glory of a re-created earth. Pierre Le
Beau had been sitting for many moments before an untasted breakfast, his
body slouched forward under the table, his eyes fixed vacantly on a
square of light slowly pushing its way through an opened window into the
room. Count Ronsard, already in his easy-chair, with letters, papers,
cigarettes, and an extra cup of coffee on a low stand beside him,
lifted, just before opening each fresh missive, a look partly amused,
partly irritated upon his sullen compatriot.
Tsuna, the butler, cautiously approached, and substituted a fresh cup of
coffee for the forgotten cold one. Pierre caught at the edge of the
saucer. "Merci, Tsuna," he said with a smile which all his abstraction
could not keep from being sweet, "but take all else away. I want
nothing--or, at least, I have eaten sufficiently."
"Yes, Tsuna," supplemented the minister. "Clear the table, and admit no
guests. If a 'chit' comes, bring it in yourself."
Pierre would have sunk back into his lethargy, but the count, having by
this time finished his mail, deliberately set himself to learn the
secret of this new dejection.
"What have we here, young lover?" he cried gayly. "Why do you affront
the fair morning with your sighs? La, la, I know the symptoms,--the
rueful mouth, set eyes, loathed viands,--all speak the distemper of
love. Come, now, unburden thyself, mon fils. I have a leisure hour. I
see in thee need for brisk philosophy."
Pierre shook himself free with difficulty from his haunting
visions,--Tetsujo's black face and burning eyes; a windswept hedge,
bowing and straining in storm until at the next gust of tempest it must
lie flat, like the cover of a book, showing clear her home; the white,
strained, watching face; and, later, in a stiller, denser blackness,
faint chinks through upright hedge-stems of bamboo falling from a
broadly lighted house; his own last desperate song of Carmen; the
terrible answering cry; the sound of feet on gravel; the sound of tender
hands beating on thorn; a mother's sob; and then,--devouring silence.
How had the sun such callousness that it could shine to-day after such a
blackness?
Ronsard watched him until he turned slow, haggard, miserable eyes. Then
the count lowered his own. At this critical point Pierre need not
perceive the glimmer of pleased hope. "I am not unacquainted with
sorrow,--and of this sort, Pierre," he murmured gently. His voice might
have poured from an alabaster jar. Pierre felt the soothing, and still
he hesitated to reveal this deepest wound. In their one previous
discussion Ronsard's words had been drops of acid. The boy shuddered
anew at the remembered sting.
And yet he must speak to some one. This anguish could not be borne
alone. Later on, Mrs. Todd would purr platitudes above him. He did not
wish them yet. Now, in his bewilderment, he needed the advice of a
man,--a man's supplementary thought. "I should be glad to speak," he
burst out impulsively, "only, dear sir, if you love me, give not that
tonic of your worldliness at full strength. I am hurt with life almost
to the point of flinging it aside!"
Ronsard kept himself from shrugging. "Tut, tut," he said humorously.
"Had perplexed lovers the modicum of existences attributed to that
interesting animal, the cat, then might they listen to all these small
gusty impulses to suicide. And, by the way, where is my Zulika, my soft,
blue-tinted amorette? Fast in the sun, I'll wager. Ah, Zulika, core of
my heart, come, warm me, while I hear of love!"
At his words the great blue Persian who was sleeping near the fire in a
spot further cheered by the full light of the morning sun, stirred
drowsily, opened a reluctant eye, and closed it. She moved again, with a
shrug not unlike her master, gained her feet, stretched her back upward,
opened a mouth lined with pink coral, and, with a last reluctant gaze
toward the warm spot she was quitting, approached her smiling master. He
drew her into the chair by his side, touched her whiskered lips with a
finger first dipped into sweetened coffee, shook himself and her into
smoother lines of placidity, and turning again directly to Pierre, said,
"Now, my son, thy father confessor is at peace. Speak what you will."
The episode of the cat did not please Le Beau. Indeed, he loathed all
cats, but this one in particular, in spite of its beauty.
"Your Excellency," he began in an uncertain tone, "I find the thing
difficult, perhaps unnecessary to impart. It has become already beyond
the power of any one in office to advise."
Ronsard showed interest. He tucked the cat farther out of sight, and
said, "If you cannot tell, permit me to hazard a guess. Already Mamselle
Onda has received important propositions?"
Pierre nodded. He rose to his feet and began a restless walking. "You
are far-seeing, your Excellency," he cried bitterly. "It is marriage
offered from the worn voluptuary of your suggestion,--from Prince
Sanétomo Hagané!"
"Hagané!" echoed the other in a low, tense voice. "Though I said that
name, Pierre, I scarcely thought it. He is no voluptuary--Mon Dieu!--but
a cone of granite! As a parti for that girl, the mere daughter of a
rusty samurai, the offer is brilliant, unprecedented! Of course the Onda
family--"
He paused in a sustained note of interrogation.
"As you remark--her family!" sneered the other. "They will coerce her to
the point of torture."
Ronsard drew his fat lids closer about the brightening eyes. "How long
has this been known to you?"
"Since yesterday morning. I receive messages from my betrothed through
Miss Todd."
"Your betrothed is broken-hearted, of course, at the thought of
severance from you?"
"My betrothed assures me of her _faith_," said Pierre, with a defiant
glance.
"Ah, she will try it! Poor little devil!"
"Monsieur, do not make me repent already." Pierre was angrily beginning,
when Tsuna's voice at the door announced, "A letter for M. Le Beau."