THE room was so large that even with the seven lighted andon and the
three ancient takahiras glimmering dully where they hung from the
raftered ceiling overhead, it was chiefly in shadow. Set at intervals
against the sliding walls were a few large pieces of heavy black-walnut
furniture, grotesque objects in the otherwise completely empty chamber.
The room itself was cold, but a kotatsu in the centre of the room had
been filled with live coals, and over this the Tojin-san crouched. He
sat upon the floor, close to the fire-frame, his knees drawn up, his
hands encircling them.
After a long and tortuous journey over land and water, by boat, by
horse, by kurumma, and often on foot—a never-ending, long-winding, cold
journey, the Tojin-san was at last at home! This was Fukui, where he had
contracted to live for seven years of his life; this vast, empty, bleak
mansion was his house.
He had started upon the journey with an alert and quickened pulse, and
an ardent ambition to serve, to raise up, to love this strange people to
whom he had pledged himself. A short sojourn was made in Tokio and
Kioto—days of sheer delight in a charm so new it intoxicated. Then,
leaving the open ports, under the escort sent by the Prince of Echizen,
he had taken finally that plunge into the great unknown country itself,
where only half a dozen foreigners had been before him.
The journey had been one of many weeks. Crossing waters in a fragile
craft, which tossed and heaved with every tide, he had come to know the
true meaning of the Japanese saying that “a sea voyage is an inch of
hell.”
For days his party had been snow-bound on a desolate mountain, far from
even the smallest village or town, and, when finally they had issued
forth, it was only to encounter new perils, in savage-souled ronins who
hung about the vicinity of the Tojin-san’s party, their narrow, wicked
eyes intent upon his destruction. How many white men before him had
started upon a similar journey, in other provinces of Japan, and met the
then common fate—a stab in the back, or in the dark! And the
punishments, the indemnities, the humiliations forced upon the
government by the foreigners, but added to the hatred and malice of the
Jo-i (foreign haters).
But the Prince of Echizen was of the most enlightened school. No foreign
teacher or guest within his province should suffer the smallest hurt!
His edicts in the matter were so emphatic that they reached even the
humblest of the citizens, and the Tojin-san, did he but know it, was
practically immune from attack. Indeed, his pilgrimage was in the nature
of one of triumph. Whatever their inner feelings toward the intruder,
the people met him with smiles and expressions of welcome. Every little
town and hamlet sent to him on its outskirts deputations of high
officials. There had been feasts here and banquets there, and always and
everywhere about him he saw the same brown face, the same glittering
eye, the same elusive smile.
Now the last Daimio’s officer was gone, the last officious minister of
his Prince had chanted his singsong poem of welcome, and the Tojin-san
was alone!
Even the individual members of his household had dispersed. They had
come in one by one in solemn procession, led by the samourai guard, who,
as they prostrated themselves, sucked in their breath fiercely,
expelling it in long, sibilant hisses. The cook, his assistants, and
wife and family formed a small procession of their own, one behind the
other, executing a series of such comical bows and bobs that the stern
lips of the Tojin-san had softened in spite of himself, particularly so,
when the tiniest one, a toddling baby no more than two years old, had
solemnly brought its diminutive shaven pate to the floor, and had almost
capsized in a somersault in its efforts to emulate its elders’
politeness.
[Illustration: