The Breath of the Gods Part 12

Gwendolen saw these signs of irritation, and cried to herself, "Halt."

With a laugh that was quite successful for its kind she exclaimed, "Come, Pierre, we must not quarrel just because we both love Yuki. I know I seem rude, but I became Yuki's champion at school, and the habit clings. Forgive me for Yuki's sake."

He took the slim, outstretched hand and kissed it, but allowed himself no further words. The girl felt baffled and uncomfortable. She recalled a saying of her father's, "Free speech is a luxury possible only to those whose opinions mean nothing." She felt herself herded with that undesirable cla.s.s.

"Well, I must get back to them," she cried, nodding in the direction of the group lately deserted. "I promised them I'd come back at once."

"Is Yuki indisposed this morning?" asked Pierre. "May I not expect her on deck?"

His tone was condescending. Gwendolen writhed under it. "She'll be up in half an hour, I guess," she gave answer, and hurried away, rubbing the back of her hand against her dress as she went.

Dodge made room for her at the rail. She wedged herself in place with a sigh of content. "Look hard, now!" whispered her companion. "The others haven't a hint. Yes, right out there in front, _hard_!"

Gwendolen stared obediently. Surely there was something strange, prophetic on that far blue rim. "Is it--oh, can it be--that little roughened thread in the warp and woof of blue--is it--j.a.pan?"

The rumor spun about the ship,--was caught up in whispers,--tangled,--tossed on to the next group. "j.a.pan,--some one has seen j.a.pan!"

Men, with feet very much apart, steadied themselves behind beetle-like marine gla.s.ses. "By Jove, there she is!" The waves outside fawned and bounded in answering excitement. Dolphins leaped high in air. A whole fleet of "Portuguese men-o'-war" rose to the surface and scurried on before them as if leading a swifter way.

"I shall simply pa.s.s away with ecstasy!" cried Gwendolen. "Oh, why doesn't Yuki come? Look, Mr. Dodge; I believe I see sails--away off there, between us and the phantom land!"

"Doubtless a squad of detached fishing-smacks," said Dodge, with that courier-like precision which seemed part of him on land or in sight of land.

"Oh! oh! oh!" shrieked she, jumping up and down like a child. "We are rushing straight for one. It has a square sail laced across the slits with white shoestrings. Oh, we are going to run it down!"

"My _dear_!" remonstrated Mrs. Todd at the girl's impetuous manner. Her own kindly face beamed.

"Not on your life," said Dodge the Oracle. "They know how to look out for number one. You just watch 'em." Even as he spoke the small skiff darted impudently into the very shadow of their looming bulk, and sped off again like a swallow. Two impa.s.sive brown faces lifted for an instant from the great shining heap of bonito in the bottom of the boat, and were lowered.

"Not much floral-anchor business about those two, eh, Captain?" asked Mr. Todd, genially, of that magnate, as he strolled toward them.

"I admit the coast population to be amphibious," laughed the Captain, "but you can't make admirals out of fishermen. Miss Gwendolen, it will soon be time to look for Few-ji."

"Oh, oh!" cried Gwendolen again. She was made up, this morning, of wind-tossed golden hair and expletives. "Certainly no one ever saw it, truly, at such a distance!"

"I have," boasted Dodge. "On a clear day I've seen the thing a hundred miles off, when it looked like a little white tee on a blue golf links, don't you know."

"Golf links!" echoed Gwendolen. "What an unworthy simile!"

"Why not links?--first-cla.s.s thing, a good links! Don't you play, Miss Todd?"

"No," answered Gwendolen, truthfully, "I don't play, but I like to pose, the costumes are so utterly fetching; and I dote on standing with my driver behind me, like girls in ill.u.s.trated picture papers."

She turned to search the shimmering horizon for the vision it would not yield. "Oh, where is that mountain! I wish Yuki would come. It might appear directly for Yuki-ko."

"Here is Yuki," said the low, strange voice that could have belonged to no other.

Gwendolen seized her. "Good-morning, Miss Onda," smiled Dodge. "Now we are all fit. Kindly invoke your enchanted summit to our wondering gaze.

I have been told that it was bad luck to land after a long journey without a glimpse of Fuji-san."

"I think the bad luck for only Nipponese," said Yuki.

"And the good luck too, I presume, if it turns that way? How inhospitable!"

"Yes, I think so. The good luck and the bad luck," was Yuki's serious reply.

Pierre, strolling at the rear end of the pa.s.senger deck, must have seen Yuki. He made no sign, however, and continued to stroll alone, smoking cigarettes, with a pleasant look or reply for any chance acquaintance, but a mind evidently involved in its own problems.

Neither of the girls saw him. They leaned together now upon the rail.

Gwendolen had an arm about her friend. Together they stared out toward the land. Dodge had been called away. Mr. and Mrs. Todd were seated, the former carefully counting out bills for various "tips" soon to be distributed. The schoolmates were practically alone.

The land showed clearly now its hill and rock formation. Layer after layer, set upright from the sea, vanished into hazy distance. Promontory after promontory tapered down at the far point to a surf-beaten line of rocks. Farther peaks rose in tones of blue,--some thin as water, others rich and dark, like great gentians. On the nearer hills, forests and shaven spots of green appeared. The water around them shone and stirred with sails, the square-laced sails of junks. Bronze-colored boatmen, scantily clad, stood on the swaying edge of a boat and shaded their eyes to peer upward at the strange, white-faced "seiyo-jin." Among the junks, sailless sampan, propelled by one crooked oar, tumbled like queer sea-beetles with a single jointed leg.

"Gwendolen," said Yuki, in a very low voice, "do you see a long, green patch, like moss, over on that brown slope?"

"Yes; I was thinking it looked like curled parsley."

"That is really a forest,--quite a big little forest,--made of sugi, and camphor, and camellia trees. Listen; I thought then that I heard the deep sound of a bell!"

"I hear nothing but water and the wind."

"It was the temple bell," insisted Yuki. "And now, dear, look more close. Do you not see, right on the edge of beach, a small red something?"

"Why, yes; there is a little square of red like the framework of a door."

"It is torii,--red torii, or sacred gate; and beyond that gate are many, many stone steps leading up to the temple. Ah! such steps as those,--so quiet, so deep, so still! They lead the heart up before ever the clumsy feet have climbed."

A little steam launch, bearing the flag of the rising sun, came puffing and squealing toward them. The ship's steps were lowered. Grave, correct j.a.panese officers took possession. Their news was astounding. War's breath already heated the land. The j.a.panese minister at St. Petersburg even then made preparation for instant departure, and his Russian colleague in Yedo did the same. The severance of diplomatic relations between the countries meant, of course, no less than a declaration of war.

From the moment of hearing this, neither Mr. Todd nor his secretary had a thought for anything besides,--no, not even for pretty Gwendolen, who, for a while, sulked alone, then, seeing it useless, sought consolation in engaging herself to all the unmarried male pa.s.sengers, one after the other, and most of the ship's officers, irrespective of connubial ties.

Pierre and Yuki had met, neither looking with entire frankness into the eyes of the other. To Yuki the promise given meant a haircloth shirt beneath her robe of gladness, a stone dragging her back from flight. To Pierre it was, in all sincerity, their one substantial pledge of future happiness. He was the man. It was for him to judge, not Yuki; and he believed the very reluctance with which she gave the word, a proof of its necessity. It was characteristic of both that no reference was made to the subject most vital in their thoughts. Yuki watched with apparent composure the slow approach to Yokohama Bay, Awa's cone-shaped ma.s.ses, and the long, green northern coast fading into eastern haze. Fuji had not shone for them,--in spite of a cloudless day. "It sometimes went away like that," Yuki had a.s.sured the disappointed ones. "Children thought that it went visiting to the gardens of the G.o.ds."

The harbor channel was free. The ship went slowly, majestically, like a great deliberate swan, sheer to the stone steps of the wharf. Yuki's reserve faltered. "My people,--oh, my dear people! I think I see their faces in that waiting crowd!" they heard her whisper. She stretched out her arms. A sob choked in her throat. Four years,--four long, long years, and yet how familiar the look of her native land! The little wind-bent pines along the stone d.y.k.e had not changed a leaf. Those long, waiting rows of empty jinrikishas might hold one that had been waiting for her through an hour of shopping in the foreign stores of Yokohama.

And, oh, the dear welcoming friends there on the steps!

Their party was the first to cross the platform of the lowered flight of stairs. Yuki touched the first stone step, and gazed eagerly above her.

Yes, that was her mother, that gentlest, sweetest, most beautiful face among them all! Behind her stood Onda Tetsujo, Yuki's father, with his plain blue robes, and gray, n.o.bly poised head.

"Mother! Okkasan,--Shibaraku!" (How long the absence!) cried the girl, with a broken note of rapture in her voice. Bounding up the steps, she clasped and was clasped again by the slender gray figure. Tetsujo drew back, a fleeting look of perplexity in his face. He had not recognized Yuki, thus seen, for the first time, in her perfectly adapted foreign garments; but Iriya had known, from the moment her eyes caught the small brown-clad figure at the rail. The mother in her swept away, for the instant, high barriers of j.a.panese etiquette. She clung to her child, fondling her, pressing trembling lips to the soft young cheeks, and murmuring, "My baby,--my little one,--my treasure, who has come back to me!"

A moment later they had drawn apart, both with wet eyes and quivering lips, and small, bashful side-looks of love; for such public demonstration is practically unknown among samurai women. Already these two were a little ashamed of it. Tetsujo realized at last that it was his daughter, but, because of her strange conduct, wore still an uncomprehending wrinkle between his heavy brows.

The Todd party, Pierre and Mr. T. Caraway Dodge included, came hesitatingly near. The j.a.panese crowd drew back, some in distaste, some in politeness, some because their own friends had arrived, and there was no longer a reason for staying. Yuki, with a hand on Gwendolen's arm, began the introductions. When it came to the two young men, she hesitated slightly. Her father's deep, keen eyes rested on the faces first of one, then of the other. The two names, as she hurried them over, were practically unintelligible.

Kind-hearted Mrs. Todd, observing Yuki's embarra.s.sment and feeling that she had at least a hint as to its cause, rushed gallantly into the breech. Her efforts centred on shrinking Mrs. Onda. "Are you really Yuki's mother?" she demanded in a loud, playful voice. "You look to me like her sister. I wouldn't believe, unless I were told, that you had more than five years between you."

Yuki threw a glance of grat.i.tude toward the speaker. "Mother, Mrs. Todd says that you appear augustly young to be indeed the daughter of a big girl like me."