The Princess turned slowly about to face me, with no change in the quiet composure of her bearing. But as her soft eyes met mine their long lashes drooped and the delicate rose tint of her cheeks deepened to scarlet. She sank to her knees and bowed with exquisite grace.

“The august lord is implored to pardon the rudeness of the hatamotos!” she murmured.

“The tojin implores pardon for intruding upon the privacy of the august lady!” I replied.

She bent forward. “The thong of my lord’s sandal is loose. Permit me to fasten it.”

I stepped back hastily and knelt on one knee to tie the thong myself.

“The request cannot be granted,” I said. “In my land it is etiquette for lords to fasten the sandals of ladies; not the reverse.”

“How contrary to all reason and propriety!” she exclaimed, and she gazed up at me with a look of timid wonderment.

I rose and offered her my hand, momentarily forgetful of etiquette. She sprang up, with a repellent gesture and a sharp little cry: “No! Setsu!”

“He sought to touch my august lady!” hissed a voice behind me.

I wheeled and confronted the younger of Azai’s samurai women, standing very near me, with her hand on the hilt of her dirk. I looked steadily into her angry eyes, and smiled at her through the gloom.

“O Setsu San will believe that no rudeness was intended by the ignorant tojin” I said. “In his land courtesy requires a lord to offer his hand and assist a lady to rise.”

O Setsu San bowed to hide her amazement, and murmured to her mistress: “Grant permission for me to conduct the tojin lord from the enclosure. The presence of a stranger is not permissible.”

“Gengo the chamberlain brought me into this garden and left me at the summer-house yonder,” I explained, pointing towards the coppice. “My understanding was that he went to fetch the Shogun or some high official. Hardly had he gone when the hatamotos appeared and charged upon me without provocation.”

“They are the guard from the nearest gate,” said Azai. “Such rudeness may not be disregarded. Command will be sent them to commit hara-kiri.”

“No!” I protested. “They erred through overzealous loyalty, misled, I suspect, by the same plotters who set the ronins upon your cortege.”

“Keiki!” murmured O Setsu San, with subtle intuition.

“Keiki—and others. But I intrude upon the privacy of the Princess. Tell me which way I should go to leave the enclosure.”

“Had Gengo orders to bring you into the presence of my august father?” inquired Azai.

“He stated that my presence was required at the palace. Was I wrong in believing that the Shogun had sent for me?”

Azai looked earnestly at her lady-in-waiting.

“Should Woroto Sama attempt to pass out alone, he would be slain!”

“Grant permission for me to lead him across into the palace,” said O Setsu San.

“Would your presence serve to shield the august lord from the hatamotos?” replied the Princess. “I myself will conduct him.”

“Impossible!” gasped Setsu, in open dismay. “Even for the daughter of the Shogun to have come between the angry hatamotos and the tojin sama is unbelievable!”

“O Setsu San will be so kind as to bring my clogs,” murmured the Princess with gentle courtesy.

For the first time I noticed that the little silk-clad foot peeping from under the edge of her kimono was without clog or sandal. When Setsu ran in to tell of the chase of the tojin, her mistress had darted out and up the bridge to my rescue without stopping for footwear.

“Princess,” I said, “O Setsu San is right. I cannot accept the offer.”

“My lord will not refuse me the favor,” she murmured, with a smile irresistibly sweet and naive. “The kind O Setsu San hastens to fetch my clogs.”

Perceiving the inflexible will beneath the soft accents of her mistress, the samurai lady turned to patter down the bridge. I was alone with the Princess,—probably the first man to be alone with an unwedded daughter of the Shogun for more than two centuries! I dropped on one knee to look into her modestly lowered eyes. Through the gathering darkness I saw a deep blush mantle her pale cheeks as with girlish bashfulness she raised one of her sleeves to hide her face.

“Azai!” I murmured. “Is the tojin so frightful an object to you?”

She dropped her sleeve and gazed at me wide-eyed, in instant forgetfulness of self. “Pardon the rudeness!” she exclaimed. “The august lord should not humble himself by kneeling to a girl!”

“Azai, forgive me for the great rudeness, but in my country men love and honor pure maidens as they love and honor their mothers, and it is the custom to speak of that love even before marriage. Little Princess, I have been told that your august father and the Prince of Owari arranged for you to wed my friend Yoritomo Sama. But my friend has vowed to become a monk at Zozoji, and he has told me that my soul shone in your eyes. Azai, I love you with a love higher and deeper than any man of Nippon bears towards his wife and mother!”

She knelt and bowed low to me. “My lord,” she whispered, “it is unbelievable that so great a love could be given a mere girl!”

“Your soul is in my eyes, Azai! Say that you love me!”

“My lord, I should rejoice to be accepted as the humblest serving-maid in all your yashikis!”

“You love me!” I cried, and drawing her up by one of her tiny plump hands, I bent close. “In my land, august lady, it is required to seal the confession of love in this manner.”

At the touch of my lips to her rosebud mouth she drew back with a startled sob. But I resisted her gentle efforts to withdraw her hand.

“Do you not trust me, Azai?” I asked, bending to watch her downcast face in the dim light.

“Shame has overcome me!” she sobbed. “Nowhere is it written that man and woman should hold one another’s hands or touch lips together.”

“If that is hateful to the Princess—” “Not hateful! but blissful—blissful beyond words. That is the shame. I do what is very, very wrong, yet am glad. I am a most wicked and depraved girl! Shame overcomes me!”

“Forgive me, Azai! Through my selfish fault I have brought grief upon the maiden whom I love more than life. I will go now, and never trouble you again.”

I freed her hand and rose, but in the same instant she was erect before me, her little hands clutching the bosom of my robes.

“Thou! thou!” she whispered. “Do not go in anger, else I shall die!”

I crushed her to me and rained kisses upon her upturned face, in a passion of adoration. For a few brief moments of ecstasy I held her, and she made no attempt to free herself, but lay upon my breast like a captive dove, quivering and bewildered. Then, all too soon for my blissful intoxication, her cheeks paled from scarlet to ivory white and her fluttering little heart beat against mine with sudden steadiness.

“My lord,” she said, “there is no time to be lost. Setsu comes with a lantern. We must act at once. Here below the centre of the bridge the pond is deeper. We will leap in together and grasp the lotus roots at the bottom.”

“Leap off?—grasp the lotus roots?” I repeated. “My lord lover is of noble blood! A thousand pardons! But Setsu comes quickly. Make haste to strike me through the neck with your dirk. You will still have time to commit hara-kiri.”

The word was a flash of clear light through the fog of my bewilderment.

“No!” I cried. “We will live, to be united in this life!”

“That cannot be, my lord!”

“I will win and wed you, in the teeth of all Nippon!”

“My lord, I—” Her whisper thrilled with quick alarm. “Free me—Setsu—she’ll kill you!—disgrace—a girl’s dirk!”

I released her, and turned to the upward hastening Setsu as the light of her paper lantern glowed upon us through the darkness.

“Pardon, august ones!” she called. “The charcoal had burnt out and the tinder was misplaced. I could come no sooner.”

“You have done well to come so soon,” murmured Azai.

O Setsu raised her lantern and peered at me under it as she bowed. Her utter devotion to the Princess could not be doubted. I felt a sudden impulse to risk all in her keeping.

“Does O Setsu San desire the death of her Princess?” I asked.

The girl grasped at her dirk, and cast a swift glance from me to Azai. “Does the tojin sama threaten?” she demanded.

“Only you do that,” I replied. “Strike me, and your dirk will pierce through my heart to hers.”

The girl stepped nearer to her mistress and stared at her dismayed.

“The truth is now known to you,” whispered Azai. “We love.”

Again Setsu grasped her dirk. “Only an evil tojin would dare speak of such a matter to the Shogun’s daughter!”

Death was nearer to me than when the hatamoto struck at me in the yashiki of the High Court.

“Through my heart, to her heart!” I repeated.

The girl glanced doubtfully to Azai. I forced a smile. “The Princess has proposed that she and I should unite ourselves by passing through the gate of death. I have answered that I will wed her in this life.”

“The tojin is unwilling to give proof as to the trueness of his love,” she jeered.

To this there was only one answer that could convince her. I knelt and placed the point of my dirk to my heart.

“The tojin belief is that sincerity comes from the heart,” I said. “Say the word, and I will prove my love without asking the maiden to sacrifice herself to join me. I trust her soul to find mine when the time comes for her to leave this life.”

There was no pretence in my words. I had lived too close to Yoritomo to escape the influence of his Buddhistic philosophy and his samurai contempt for death. My love for my little Madonna Princess was greater than my love of life, and I knew that only a love equal to my own could have enabled her to overcome the extreme modesty and reserve of her breeding. I believed that death would unite us in the next life, if not in many future lives; while, if Setsu opposed me, I could not hope to win my darling in this life.

“Say the word, girl!” I repeated.

“Wait! wait, my lord!” cried Azai, and she knelt beside me. “First free me, that I may go with you.”

“You will follow when your time comes,” I said. “A tojin may kill the woman he loves only to save her from a fate worse than death.”

“Life without you, my lord!—what harsher fate?”

A steel blade flashed in her upraising hand. I caught her wrist, as she drew back and stabbed the point at her throat.

“Take her away, Setsu!” I begged. “She must live and be happy. She is very young.”

“The men of Nippon do not love as my lord loves!” murmured the samurai girl. “We will go before with the light. Let him follow at a little distance. The darkness deepens. He will not be seen until we come to the gate.”

Azai rose and slipped on the tiny high clogs of gold lacquer that were held for her by the kneeling girl. She bowed to me from the miniature height with entrancing grace.

“I beg my lord to rise and sheathe his dirk until it is needed. We now go to my father.”

She turned and pattered quickly down the bridge to the pond bank, while Setsu, following half a step behind, held the lantern in such a manner as to shed no light to the rear. I slipped my dirk into its sheath and descended after them, my thoughts in a whirl of conflicting emotions.

From the edge of the pond the little Princess led the way through a shrubbery, along a winding path, towards the edifice I had seen in my flight before the hatamotos. We soon came in sight of the lanterns strung along the deep verandas of the building. But Azai turned off to the right, and tripped away down a side path that skirted around her palace.

A short walk brought us into a broad avenue that ran up to a high bridge across one of the inner moats of the citadel. Setsu hastened on towards the gateway of the bridge. Azai paused for me to overtake her. In the garden path there had been no one to meet or pass; now, however, there rose the question of facing the guard at the gate. When I came up close beside the Princess I perceived the outline of her little hands before her bosom, clasped palm to palm in prayer.

“We stop here, my lord,” she whispered. “Setsu goes ahead to see who is on guard.”

“Azai,” I replied, “for you to appear with me is too great a sacrifice of your dignity. Press your lips to mine, and say farewell. I will go on alone.”

She caught at my sleeve. “Wait, my lord! I will go with you. There is only this little time left us. When my father learns, I fear he will forbid me even to dream of you. They have told me that I shall be required to wed Keiki if Midzuano’s counsel prevails.”

“You would not wed the man who set the ronins upon you!”

“A good daughter should obey with docility when her father chooses her husband. Yet I have never before heard of a lady meeting a lord and loving before marriage, as I love my lord!”

“Little maiden!” I exclaimed, “you again confess that you love me! How can you speak of wedding another?”

“My lord wonders? Yet he knows that the supreme duty of a woman is willing obedience,—first to her father, then to her husband, and last of all to her eldest son. I know that my august father holds me in higher regard than is deserved by so worthless and contemptible a creature as a young girl, and because of his gracious condescension I owe him the utmost of gratitude and obedience.”

“You will wed Keiki if your father commands?” I asked.

Her voice quavered. “I pray to Kwannon to aid me! If so great a trial comes upon me, I fear I must fail in the one great virtue; I must oppose the will of my father!”

“You will refuse Keiki, and wait for me, Azai?”

“I will wait for you in the life beyond—”

“Not that!” I exclaimed in dismay, “not that, Azai! Wait for me here, in this life!”

“I will try, my lord. Look! Setsu waves her lantern. We can pass in safety. But first—if my lord desires to press his lips upon mine, I—I will not seek to escape.”

Half a minute later she sought to release my embrace with her gentle fingers.

“My lord,” she whispered tremulously, “I never knew that it was so delightful to love! It is very wicked to speak so foolishly, yet I wish that I might stand forever with my lord as we stand now. But Setsu turns back. We must go.”