looked for a stouter support. Well, she may spurn me, but you needn't.
You will be my son. The gentleman you are looking to for help won't be
with us long."
The boy seemed to be thinking what a nuisance his sister's husband
was. Genji was amused.
He treated the boy like a son, making him a constant companion,
giving him clothes from his own wardrobe, taking him to court. He con-
tinued to write to the lady. She feared that with so inexperienced a mes-
senger the secret might leak out and add suspicions of promiscuity to her
other worries. These were very grand messages, but something more in
keeping with her station seemed called for. Her answers were stiff and
formal when she answered at all. She could not forget his extraordinary
good looks and elegance, so dimly seen that night. But she belonged to
another, and nothing was to be gained by trying to interest him. His
longing was undiminished. He could not forget how touchingly fragile and
confused she had seemed. With so many people around, another invasion
of her boudoir was not likely to go unnoticed, and the results would be
sad.
One evening after he had been at court for some days he found an
excuse: his mansion again lay in a forbidden direction. Pretending to set
off for Sanjo~, he went instead to the house of the governor of Kii. The
governor was delighted, thinking that those well-designed brooks and
lakes had made an impression. Genji had consulted with the boy, always
in earnest attendance. The lady had been informed of the visit. She must
admit that they seemed powerful, the urges that forced him to such machi-
nations. But if she were to receive him and display herself openly, what
could she expect save the anguish of the other night, a repetition of that
nightmare? No, the shame would be too much.
The brother having gone off upon a summons from Genji, she called
several of her women. "I think it might be in bad taste to stay too near.
I am not feeling at all well, and perhaps a massage might help, somewhere
far enough away that we won't disturb him."
The woman Chu~jo~ had rooms on a secluded gallery. They would be
her refuge.
It was as she had feared. Genji sent his men to bed early and dis-
patched his messenger. The boy could not find her. He looked everywhere
and finally, at the end of his wits, came upon her in the gallery.
He was almost in tears. "But he will think me completely useless."
"And what do you propose to be doing? You are a child, and it is quite
improper for you to be carrying such messages. Tell him I have not been
feeling well and have kept some of my women to massage me. You should
not be here. They will think it very odd."
She spoke with great firmness, but her thoughts were far from as firm.
How happy she might have been if she had not made this unfortunate
marriage, and were still in the house filled with memories of her dead
parents. Then she could have awaited his visits, however infrequent. And
the coldness she must force herself to display--he must think her quite
unaware of her place in the world. She had done what she thought best,
and she was in anguish. Well, it all was hard fact, about which she had
no choice. She must continue to play the cold and insensitive woman.
Genji lay wondering what blandishments the boy might be using. He
was not sanguine, for the boy was very young. Presently he came back to
report his mission a failure. What an uncommonly strong woman! Genji
feared he must seem a bit feckless beside her. He heaved a deep sigh. This
evidence of despondency had the boy on the point of tears.
Genji sent the lady a poem:
"I wander lost in the Sonohara moorlands,
For I did not know the deceiving ways of the broom tree.
"How am I to describe my sorrow?"
She too lay sleepless. This was her answer:
"Here and not here, I lie in my shabby hut.
Would that I might like the broom tree vanish away."
The boy traveled back and forth with messages, a wish to be helpful
driving sleep from his thoughts. His sister beseeched him to consider what
the others might think.
Genji's men were snoring away. He lay alone with his discontent. This
unique stubbornness was no broom tree. It refused to vanish away. The
stubbornness was what interested him. But he had had enough. Let her do
as she wished. And yet--not even this simple decision was easy.
"At least take me to her."
"She is shut up in a very dirty room and there are all sorts of women
with her. I do not think it would be wise." The boy would have liked to
be more helpful.
"Well, you at least must not abandon me." Genji pulled the boy down
beside him.
The boy was delighted, such were Genji's youthful charms. Genji, for
his part, or so one is informed, found the boy more attractive than his
chilly sister.
Chapter 3
The Shell of the Locust
Genji lay sleepless.
"I am not used to such treatment. Tonight I have for the first time seen
how a woman can treat a man. The shock and the shame are such that I
do not know how I can go on living."
The boy was in tears, which made him even more charming. The slight
form, the not too long hair--was it Genji's imagination that he was much
like his sister? The resemblance was very affecting, even if imagined. It
would be undignified to make an issue of the matter and seek the woman
out, and so Genji passed the night in puzzled resentment. The boy found
him less friendly than usual.
Genji left before daylight. Very sad, thought the boy, lonely without
him.
The lady too passed a difficult night. There was no further word from
Genji. It seemed that he had had enough of her. She would not be happy
if he had in fact given her up, but with half her mind she dreaded another
visit. It would be as well to have an end of the affair. Yet she went on
grieving.
For Genji there was gnawing dissatisfaction. He could not forget her,
and he feared he was making a fool of himself.
"I am in a sad state," he said to the boy. "I try to forget her, and I
cannot. Do you suppose you might contrive another meeting?"
It would be difficult, but the boy was delighted even at this sort of
attention.<N 2> With childish eagerness he watched for an opportunity. Pres-
ently the governor of Kii had to go off to his province. The lady had
nothing to do through the long twilight hours. Under cover of darkness,
the boy took Genji to the governor's mansion in his own carriage. Genji
had certain misgivings. His guide was after all a mere child. But this was
no time for hesitation. Dressed inconspicuously, he urged the boy on, lest
they arrive after the gates were barred. The carriage was brought in
through a back gate and Genji dismounted.
So young a boy attracted little attention and indeed little deference
from the guards. He left Genji at an east door to the main hall. He pounded
on the south shutters and went inside.
"Shut it, shut it!" shrieked the women. "The whole world can see us."
"But why do you have them closed on such a warm evening?"
"The lady from the west wing has been here since noon. They have
been at Go."
Hoping to see them at the Go board, Genji slipped from his hiding
place and made his way through the door and the blinds. The shutter
through which the boy had gone was still raised. Genji could see through
to the west. One panel of a screen just inside had been folded back, and
the curtains, which should have shielded off the space beyond, had been
thrown over their frames, perhaps because of the heat. The view was
unobstructed.
There was a lamp near the women. The one in silhouette with her
back against a pillar--would she be the one on whom his heart was set?
He looked first at her. She seemed to have on a purple singlet with a woven
pattern, and over it a cloak of which the color and material were not easy
to determine. She was a small, rather ordinary lady with delicate features.
She evidently wanted to conceal her face even from the girl opposite, and
she kept her thin little hands tucked in her sleeves. Her opponent was
facing east, and Genji had a full view of her face. Over a singlet of white
gossamer she had thrown a purplish cloak, and both garments were some-
what carelessly open all the way to the band of the red trousers. She was
very handsome, tall and plump and of a fair complexion, and the lines of
her head and forehead were strong and pleasing. It was a sunny face, with
a beguiling cheerfulness about the eyes and mouth. Though not particu-
larly long, the hair was rich and thick, and very beautiful where it fell
about the shoulders. He could detect no marked flaws, and saw why her
father, the governor of Iyo, so cherished her. It might help, to be sure, if
she were just a little quieter. Yet she did not seem to be merely silly. She
brimmed with good spirits as she placed a stone upon a dead spot to signal
the end of the game.
"Just a minute, if you please," said the other very calmly. "It is not
quite over. You will see that we have a ko~ to get out of the way first."
"I've lost, I've lost. Let's just see what I have in the corners." She
counted up on her fingers. "Ten, twenty, thirty, forty." She would have
had no trouble, he thought, taking the full count of the baths of Iyo--
though her manner might have been just a touch inelegant.
The other woman, a model of demureness, kept her face hidden.
Gazing at her, Genji was able to make out the details of the profile. The
eyelids seemed a trifle swollen, the lines of the nose were somewhat erratic,
and there was a weariness, a want of luster, about the face. It was, one had
to admit, a little on the plain side. Yet she clearly paid attention to her
appearance, and there were details likely to draw the eye to a subtler
sensibility than was evident in her lively companion. The latter, very
engaging indeed, laughed ever more happily. There was no denying the
bright gaiety, and in her way she was interesting enough. A shallow,
superficial thing, no doubt, but to his less than pure heart she seemed a
prize not to be flung away. All the ladies he knew were so prim and proper.
This was the first time he had seen one so completely at her ease. He felt
a little guilty, but not so guilty that he would have turned away had he
not heard the boy coming back. He slipped outside.
<N 3>
Apologetic that his master should still be at the beginning, the boy
said that the unexpected guest had interfered with his plans.
"You mean to send me off frustrated once more? It is really too much."
"No, sir. But I must ask you to wait until the other lady has gone. I'll
arrange everything then, I promise you."
Things seemed to be arranging themselves. The boy was very young,
but he was calmly self-possessed and had a good eye for the significant
things.
The game of Go was apparently over. There was a stir inside, and a
sound as of withdrawing.
"Where will that boy have gone?" Now there was a banging of shut-
ters. "Let's get the place closed up."
"No one seems to be stirring," said Genji after a time. "Go and do your
best."
The boy knew well enough that it was not his sister's nature to
encourage frivolity. He must admit Genji when there was almost no one
with her.
"Is the guest still here?" asked Genji. "I would like a glimpse of her."
"Quite impossible. There are curtains inside the shutters."
Genji was amused, but thought it would be bad manners to let the
boy know that he had already seen the lady. "How slowly time does
go by."
This time the boy knocked on the corner door and was admitted.
"I'll just make myself comfortable here, " he said, spreading bed-
clothes where one or two of the sliding doors had been left open. "Come
in, breezes."
Numbers of older women seemed to be sleeping out near the veranda.
The girl who had opened the door seemed to have joined them. The boy
feigned sleep for a time. Then, spreading a screen to block the light, he
motioned Genji inside.
Genji was suddenly shy, fearing he would be defeated once more. He
followed the boy all the same. Raising a curtain, he slipped into the main
room. It was very quiet, and his robes rustled alarmingly.
With one part of her mind the woman was pleased that he had not
given up. But the nightmare of the earlier evening had not left her. Brood-
ing days, sleepless nights--it was summer, and yet it was "budless
spring."
Her companion at Go, meanwhile, was as cheerful as could be. "I shall
stay with you tonight," she announced. It was not likely that she would
have trouble sleeping.
The lady herself sensed that something was amiss. Detecting an
unusual perfume, she raised her head. It was dark where the curtain had
been thrown over the frame, but she could see a form creeping toward her.
In a panic, she got up. Pulling a singlet of raw silk over her shoulders, she
slipped from the room.
Genji was delighted to see that there was only one lady asleep behind
the curtains. There seemed to be two people asleep out toward the veranda.
As he pulled aside the bedclothes it seemed to him that the lady was
somewhat larger than he would have expected. He became aware of one
odd detail after another in the sleeping figure, and guessed what had
happened. How very stupid! And how ridiculous he would seem if the
sleeper were to awaken and see that she was the victim of a silly mistake.
It would be equally silly to pursue the lady he had come for, now that she
had made her feelings so clear. A new thought came to him: might this be
the girl who had so interested him in the lamplight? If so, what had he to
