"I could not change if I wished at this late date.
I know that others do, but I cannot.
I leave things exactly as I find them."
He did not wish to go storming out like an angry boy. "This must be
kept secret," he said in the course of whispered consultation with the
woman who brought her messages. "I would not want to set a ridiculous
<P 356>
example. It is of course not you but your lady--you must think it
rather coy of me--to whom I should be commending the river Isara as a
model."
Her women were agreed that he had not been treated well. "Such a
fine gentleman. Why must she be so stubborn? He seems incapable of the
tiniest rudeness or recklessness."
She knew well enough that he was a most admirable and interesting
man, but she wanted no remark from her to join the anthems she heard
all about her. He was certain to conclude that she too had succumbed--
was so shamelessly handsome. No, an appearance of warmth and
friendliness would not serve her purposes. Always addressing him through
an intermediary, she expressed herself carefully and at careful intervals,
just short of what he might take for final silence. She wanted to lose herself
in her devotions and make amends for her years away from the Good Law,
but she did not want the dramatics of a final break. They too would amuse
the gossips. Not trusting even her own women, she withdrew gradually
into hed prayers. Prince Shikibu had had numerous children, her mother
only one. She was not close to her half brothers and sisters. The
Momozono Palace was neglected and her retinue was small. Now came this
fine gentleman with his impassioned suit, in which everyone in sight
seemed to be joining.
<N 7>
It is not to be imagined that Genji had quite lost his heart to the
princess. It was rather that her coldness put him on his mettle. He did not
wish to admit defeat. He was extremely careful these days about his
behavior, which left no room for criticism. He knew how happy people
were to pass judgment in such matters and he was no longer the Genji of
the youthful indiscretions. He was not at this late date going to admit
scandal into his life. Yet rejected suitors did look rather ridiculous.
His nights away from Nijo~ were more frequent. "I wonder if even in
jest," said Murasaki to herself. The tears would come, however she tried
to hold them back.
"You are not looking well," he said, stroking her hair. "What can be
the trouble?" He gazed affectionately at her, and they seemed such a
perfect pair that one would have wished to do a likeness of them. "The
emperor has been very despondent since his mother's death, and now that
the chancellor is gone there is no one but me who can really make deci-
sions. I have been terribly busy. You are not used to having me away so
much, and it is very natural that you should be unhappy; but you have
nothing at all to worry about. You are no longer a girl, and this refusal to
understand is rather funny." He smoothed the hair at her forehead, matted
with tears. She looked away. "Who can have been responsible for your
education, that you refuse to grow up?"
<P 357>
It was an uncertain and capricious world, and he grieved that anything
at all should come between them. "I wonder if you might possibly have
misconstrued the little notes I have sent to the high priestess of Kamo. If
so, then you are very far from the mark. You will see for yourself one of
these days. She has always been such a cold one. I have sought to intimi-
date her with what might be taken for love notes. Life is dull for her, it
would seem, and sometimes she has answered. Why should I come crying
to you with the answers when they mean so little to me? I must assure you
once more that you have nothing to worry about." He spent the whole day
in her rooms.
<N 9>
There was a heavy fall of snow. In the evening there were new flurries.
The contrast between the snow on the bamboo and the snow on the pines
was very beautiful. Genji's good looks seemed to shine more brightly in
the evening light.
"People make a great deal of the flowers of spring and the leaves of
autumn, but for me a night like this, with a clear moon shining on snow,
is the best--and there is not a trace of color in it. I cannot describe the effect
it has on me, weird and unearthly somehow. I do not understand people
who find a winter evening forbidding." He had the blinds raised.
The moon turned the deepest recesses of the garden a gleaming white.
The flower beds were wasted, the brook seemed to send up a strangled cry,
and the lake was frozen and somehow terrible. Into this austere scene he
sent little maidservants, telling them that they must make snowmen. Their
dress was bright and their hair shone in the moonlight. The older ones were
especially pretty, their jackets and trousers and ribbons trailing off in many
colors, and the fresh sheen of their hair black against the snow. The smaller
ones quite lost themselves in the sport. They let their fans fall most im-
modestly from their faces. It was all very charming. Rather outdoing them-
selves, several of them found that they had a snowball which they could
not budge. Some of their fellows jeered at them from the east veranda.
"I remember a winter when they made a snow mountain for your
aunt, the late empress. There was nothing remarkable about it, but she had
a way of making the smallest things seem remarkable. Everything reminds
me of her. I was kept at a distance, of course, and did not have the good
fortune to observe her closely, but during her years at court she was good
enough to take me into her confidence. In my turn I looked to her for
advice. She was always very quiet and unassertive, but I always came away
feeling that I had been right to ask her. I think I never came away without
some small thing that seemed very precious. I doubt that we will see
anyone quite like her again. She was a gentle lady and even a little shy,
and at the same time she had a wonderful way of seeing to the heart of
things. You of course wear the same co1ors, but I do sometimes find that
I must tax you with a certain willfulness.
"The Kamo priestess is another matter. With time on our hands and
<P 358>
no real business, we have exchanged notes. I should say that she is the one
who puts me to the test these days."
"But the most elegant and accomplished one of them all, I should
think, is Lady Oborozukiyo. She seemed like caution incarnate and yet
those strange things did happen."
"If you are naming the beautiful and interesting ones, she must be
among them. It does seem a pity that there should have been that incident.
A wild youth is not an easy thing to have on one's conscience--and mine
was so much tamer than most." The thought of Oborozukiyo brought a
sigh. "Then there is the lady off in the hills of whom you have such a low
opinion. She is more sensitive and accomplished than one might expect
from her rank. She demands rather special treatment and so I have chosen
to overlook a tendency not to be as aware as she might of her place in the
world. I have never taken charge of a lady who has had nothing at all to
recommend her. Yet the really outstanding ones are rare indeed. The lady
in the east lodge here is an example of complete devotion and dependabil-
ity. I undertook to look after her when I saw her finer qualities, and I have
found absolutely nothing in her behavior which I might call forward or
demanding. We have become very fond of each other, and would both, I
think, be sad at the thought of parting." So they passed the night.
<P 359>
The moon was yet brighter, the scene utterly quiet.
"The water is stilled among the frozen rocks.
A clear moon moves into the western sky."
Bending forward to look out at the garden, she was incomparably
lovely. Her hair and profile called up most wonderfully the image of
Fujitsubo, and his love was once again whole and undivided.
There was the call of a waterfowl.
"A night of drifting snow and memories
Is broken by another note of sadness."
He lay down, still thinking of Fujitsubo. He had a fleeting dream of
her. She seemed angry.
"You said that you would keep our secret, and it is out. I am unable
to face the world for the pain and the shame."
He was about to answer, as if defending himself against a sudden,
fierce attack.
"What is the matter?"
It was Murasaki's voice. His longing for the dead lady was indescriba-
ble. His heart was racing and in spite of himself he was weeping. Murasaki
gazed at him, fear in her eyes. She lay quite still.
"A winter's night, I awaken from troubled sleep.
And what a brief and fleeting dream it was?"
Arising early, sadder than if he had not slept at all, he commissioned
services, though without explaining his reasons. No doubt she did blame
him for her sufferings. She had tried very hard, it seemed, to do penance
for her sins, but perhaps the gravest of them had remained with her. The
thought that there are laws in these matters filled him with a sadness
almost unbearable. He longed, by some means, to visit her where she
wandered alone, a stranger, and to take her sins for his own. He feared that
if he made too much of the services he would arouse suspicions. Afraid
that a suspicion of the truth might even now be disturbing the emperor,
he gave himself over to invoking the holy name.
If only they might share the same lotus in another world.
"I fear, in my longing, to go in search of her
And find not her shade on the banks of the River of Death."
These are the thoughts, one is told, with which he tormented himself.
<W Murasaki Shikibu>{Translated by Edward G.Seidensticker}
<T The Tale of Genji>
<K 3>
<C 21>{The Maiden}
<N 1>
<P 360>
The New Year came, and the end of mourning for Fujitsubo. Mourning
robes were changed for the bright robes of ordinary times. It was as if the
warm, soft skies of the Fourth Month and the Kamo festival had every-
where brought renewal. For Asagao, however, life was sad and dull. The
wind rustling the laurels made her think of the festival and brought
countless memories to her young women as well.
On the day of the Kamo lustration a note came from Genji. It was on
lavender paper folded with formal precision and attached to a spray of
wisteria. "I can imagine the quiet memories with which you are passing
this day.
"I did not think that when the waters returned
It would be to take away the weeds of mourning."
It was a time of memories. She sent off an answer:
"How quick the change. Deep mourning yesterday,
Today the shallow waters of lustration.
"Everything seems fleeting and insubstantia?"
Brief and noncommittal though it was, Genji could not put it down.
His gifts, addressed to her lady of honor, quite overflowed her wing
<P 361>
of the Momozono Palace. She hated to have it seem that he was treating
her as one of his ladies. If she had been able to detect anything which
struck her as in the least improper she could have sent them back; but she
had had gifts from him before, on suitable occasions, and his letter was
most staid and proper. She could not think how to answer.
He was also very particular on such occasions about writing to the
Fifth Princess.
"It seems like only yesterday that he was a little boy, and here he is
so gallant and polite. He is the handsomest man I have ever seen, and so
good-natured too, much nicer than any other young gentleman I know."
The young women were much amused.
Asagao was always the recipient of an outmoded description of things
when she saw her aunt. "Such lovely notes as the Genji minister is always
writing. No, please, now--whatever you say you can't pretend that he's
only just now come courting. I remember how disappointed your father
was when he married the other lady and we did not have the pleasure of
welcoming him here. All your fault, your father was always saying. Your
unreasonable ways lost us our chance. While his wife was still alive, I was
not able to support my brother in his hopes, because after all she was my
niece too. Well, she had him and now she's gone. What possible reason
can there be for not doing as your father wanted you to do? Here he is
courting you again as if nothing ever happened. I think it must be your
fate to marry him."
I seemed stubborn while Father was alive. How would I seem now
if I were suddenly to accede to your wishes?"
The subject was obviously one which distressed her, and the old lady
pursued it no further.
Poor Asagao lived in constant trepidation, for not only her aunt but
everyone in the Momozono Palace seemed to be on his side. Genji, how-
ever, having made the sincerity of his affections clear, seemed prepared to
wait for a conciliatory move on her part. He was not going to demand a
confrontation.
<N 2>
Though it would have been more convenient to have Yu~giri's initia-
tion ceremonies at Nijo~, the boy's grandmother, Princess Omiya, naturally
wanted to see them. So it was decided that they would take place at Sanjo~.
His maternal uncles, To~ no Chu~jo~ and the rest, were now all very well
placed and in the emperor's confidence. They vied with one another in
being of service to Genji and his son. Indeed the whole court, including
people whose concern it need not have been, had made the ceremony its
chief business.
Everyone expected that Yu~giri would be promoted to the Fourth
Rank. Genji deliberated the possibility and decided that rapid promotions
when everyone knew they could be as rapid as desired had a way of
