A short whispered colloquy between HaganÈ, the little Princess Sada-ko, and Yuki, during the reception, a few days before, resulted in the decision that the Japanese ladies should be asked to come quite early to the sewing party; the foreign contingent to be bidden later, about one in the afternoon. To all Japanese the early hours of the day are best. Yuki knew that this was not the case with foreigners. Besides, to have served a hot foreign luncheon to an indefinite number of guests would have taken from the purpose of such a meeting most of its charitable intent, and, very likely, all of the material profit. The simplest of Japanese collations,—a bowl of thin fish soup, rice, tea, a fairy dish of pickles, one sweetmeat, maybe, this could be served with propriety to the Empress herself, had that gracious lady been present. These women worked for their own hero soldiers, for their own adored Nippon. Their utmost efforts were privileges; what the foreign ladies gave might, among themselves, be considered alms.

When all had arrived, that is, the foreigners as well as Japanese, they were to be given for entertainment, music of the two worlds. First, English songs from a charming soprano, a Mrs. Wyndham of Yokohama, justly celebrated in the East, as in her own land, for an unusually pure and lovely voice. For Japanese they were to have improvisation and martial chanting from a Satsuma biwa player, a court musician in highest favor with their Majesties. The lending of him to Yuki for this meeting had been a royal answer to HaganÈ's modest statement of his young wife's plan.

The Japanese ladies, mostly of the noble class, began to arrive before the blue morning mists had quite lifted from the long, gleaming surfaces of castle moats; before the wild white herons, perching on great down-sweeping arms of castle pines, had warmed their chilly feathers to the skin; before the budding cherry-boughs had dared unfold a single dripping leaf. By eight o'clock that end of the huge upstairs hall set apart for their exclusive use had few vacant places. The Japanese ladies brought scissors, thimble, and needles; material and thread were contributed by Prince HaganÈ. Yuki's mother was among the first. Iriya grew younger and prettier with each day, in this new pride and happiness won through her only child. She had not brought the servants. Yuki insisted that they be sent for. They came as upon the chariot of the wind, released by a gruff sound of acquiescence from their master, their blue sleeves flying horizontally in the morning air. Little Maru, whose excessive love for candy kept her in a condition of pink rotundity, gasped joyously for breath. "Ma-a-a!" she cried at first sight of a courtyard filled with crested kuruma; and "Ma-a-a!" again, as she tripped on the top step and fell full-length into the hall; and "Ma-a-a!" once more as the obliging butler stooped to rescue her, until SuzumÈ, frowning heavily, called her a bean-curd, and bade her cease exclaiming.

It was a gentle company that worked in the upper hall. Shining black heads bent as one above tumultuous yards of white cotton cloth. The peculiar odor of cambric and unbleached domestic was mixed with Japanese perfumes of sandalwood and incense, and with the unique aroma of hair-oil made from camellia berries. Work went on steadily. Great white towers of bandages were finished, and removed by servant-maids, who staggered, laughed, and joked softly, as they bore the tottering burdens to the packing-room downstairs. Sounds of hammer and nails arose as the packages went into boxes. They could hear workmen haggling over the spelling of certain Manchurian addresses.

In the big hall the nobly-born seamstresses talked, smiled, raised eyebrows, nodded, shook their heads over bad news, and gave small, half-finished exclamations over good, much as a roomful of Western women might have done. The fortunes of war dominated interest. Bereavement had already fallen upon more than one of the gentle company. Death was spoken of quite simply, with no affectation of distress. Universal contempt was expressed for a certain young widow who had been coarse and self-centred enough to faint at her husband's tomb. "HirotsunÈ's spirit must have covered his eyes with shame at that sight, and thanked the gods she had borne him no son," said an elderly aunt of the dead hero, HirotsunÈ.

But not all the conversation was of war. The rise in the price of provisions was commented upon by anxious housewives. In all cases the household expenses had been cut down, and the money deflected to the national treasury. This seemed as natural to them all as that water should flow. "The poor food makes, of course, no difference to us who are adult, or to our boy children," murmured one sweet-faced matron. "But sometimes the babes, and the very old servants, grumble a little at having barley mixed with their rice." Fashions, since no one thought of buying new gowns, was, for once in a female gathering, utterly ignored. Gossip concerning foreign residents, especially women, remained, as usual, an engrossing theme. The latest Yokohama and Tsukijii scandals were whispered, not without zest. These high-nosed, fierce-looking creatures of their own sex were a source of constant marvelling to Japanese women. "Kitsui" (mannish) they were called, as the extreme of disapprobation. Yuki defended them, and gave a softer coloring to some of the alleged misdeeds. Gwendolen she cited as an example of a Western girl who must, in her past incarnations, have been entirely Japanese. The guests listened politely, but Yuki read skepticism on their calm faces.

During the long forenoon not once was a voice raised or a loud laugh heard. Yet not one face ever lapsed into indifference. One might have gained from the resilient poise of slender throats an impression of yielding strength. Their chatter was a murmur, with tripping, short interludes of sound, and cooing, long-drawn vowels soft as their own white hands. They were a flock of gray doves in a sheltered niche. Never, one would have said, were creatures more tender, more feminine, more dependent. So would a foreigner have thought, to see them; but a Japanese knows the truth. Not a woman there but might be the child, the parent, the wife of a hero. Many had looked calmly on death. Not one among them would falter at the extremest test of heroic sacrifice, and should the call come, this little sewing band would rise, arm itself with swords, and deal what desperate death it could upon intruding enmity, before at last plunging sharp surrender into its own brave heart.

At noon the Japanese meal was served. After it came a little pause of rest, enlivened by smoking from small gold pipes, and the drinking of added cups of tea. Just before one o'clock the sewing was resumed. Then the little silk-clad ladies waited, in deeper agitation than they would have felt in facing Kuropatkin, for the coming of their foreign friends.

Mrs. Todd was punctual almost to the minute. With her came Gwendolen and Mrs. Stunt. A slight coolness now existed between the two elder ladies. Mrs. Stunt's explanation that her effusiveness to the HaganÈs was merely "sarcasm" had failed to convince even so trustful a nature as Mrs. Todd. Coolness, however, did not keep Mrs. Stunt from a neighborhood where she might derive profit.

She had walked on foot to the Legation, declaring that her jinrikisha-man was shockingly drunk, and had begged a seat in the American carriage. It was, of course, given, and by the time Yuki's residence was reached the artful one had regained some of her lost favor with Mrs. Todd, and deepened the loathing of the silent Gwendolen.

The three came up the stairs together, their foreign shoes pounding in unison, causing the huge, badly constructed house to rattle at every window.

"Well!" exclaimed Mrs. Todd, as she lifted her lorgnette to survey the long hall and the gathered company, "a regular sewing-bee, isn't it? And I see, Yuki, you've got the piano upstairs, after all. I didn't believe you'd get it up those steps."

Yuki had, of course, met them at the door. She and Gwendolen fell, through force of habit, far in the wake of the bustling dame. Mrs. Stunt kept well beside the leader. The two girls clasped hands shyly, and looked at each other with side glances, like happy children in the first embarrassment of play. Many of the Japanese ladies lifted glances of interest to the tall blonde girl. This must be she of whom the Princess HaganÈ had spoken, the girl with the face of the Sun Goddess Amaterasu,—with the strayed soul of a Nipponese. She wore this afternoon a simple costume of golden-brown silk. It was just the transition tone between her golden hair and the darker brows and lashes. A wide hat of bronze-colored velvet piled high with paler plumes balanced itself on her delicate head. Bronze-colored gloves ran up the slender arms to the elbow, where the sleeves fell away in a deep pointed ruff. A belt of dull yellow shark's skin and bronze boots completed the costume. The seated women, ignoring the advancing bulk of Madame Todd, the restless insistency of her companion, let smiling eyes rest on Gwendolen, then nodded to each other, and exchanged glances, as if in corroboration of Yuki's previous words.

"I am keeping seats for your party, dear Mrs. Todd, over there by that most sunshine window," said Yuki. "Please see that a chair is held for Mrs. Wyndham, who is so very kind to sing for us. Ah, I hear many peoples arriving. I see Mrs. Wyndham now. I will advance to her." Yuki hurried off, and soon returned with the prima donna, whom she delivered into Mrs. Todd's efficient hands.

"My dear Mrs. Wyndham," cried that lady. "Oh, I beg pardon. Mrs. Stunt, Mrs. Wyndham; my daughter, Miss Todd, Mrs. Wyndham. I didn't realize that you had not met Miss Todd."

"I called at your Legation last Tuesday,—the proper day, I am sure,—but failed to see Miss Todd," said the Englishwoman, stiffly.

Mrs. Todd flushed crimson. Mrs. Stunt turned away to hide her satisfaction. A public slight to Gwendolen generally meant, for Mrs. Todd, attempted annihilation of the offender. She turned angered eyes to Mrs. Wyndham, and would have spoken, but Gwendolen pressed her arm. "No, mother dear, don't defend me; I deserve it. Let me speak. Mrs. Wyndham, I am mother's despair at the Legation. I forget reception-days half the time. I—I—" here she lowered her voice to a delicious, confidential whisper, "the fact is I—I shirk them. So many old frumps, you know! It's getting to be a regular hen-roost. But, honest, I am sorry I was out last Tuesday, and I want you to give me another chance." Gwendolen could generally be irresistible when she chose. Now she chose not only to win Mrs. Wyndham, to whose high-bred English face she had taken an instant liking, but to deal another blow to her enemy Mrs. Stunt.

In both efforts she was successful, though Mrs. Wyndham did not capitulate all at once. The sparkling hazel eyes and the gray ones met. Suspicion lived a little longer in the latter. "Please," murmured Gwendolen. Suspicion died. "I am always at home on my Wednesdays," said the Englishwoman.

"I'll be there," laughed Gwendolen. "Have me a place set at your breakfast-table!"

Yuki had vanished to perform her duties of hostess. Mrs. Todd and her small party took the "sunshine" seats, and a Japanese lady whom they had not met brought them foreign sewing materials. Work had not begun with them when a low, plaintive voice leaned to Mrs. Todd's large ear. "Please, please, help me in all ways you can, dear Mrs. Todd. This is much worse than that reception I held downstairs. So many foreign ladies are come,—and they all look at everybody so very hard! Ask kind Mrs. Wyndham to sing just as soon as she are ready, and soon, please."

Mrs. Wyndham rose instantly, and looked with composure over the sea of lifted heads. Every chair was now taken, and servants brought up new ones from the rooms downstairs. She was used to audiences, also to commendation. In her hands she held a roll of music. Mrs. Wyndham was one of those colonists—a large class in the Far East—who never forgive Japan for not being England. She emphasized her homesickness by withdrawal from all native interests, except, as now, when she could give pleasure and assistance by her voice. It was her pride that she ate no Japanese products. Everything on her table was "imported." Even her garden held only English flowers. That great sea of spiritual and physical beauty which lies in Japanese character, and in its environment, was to her nonexistent. Such dwellers in the East are like children who, in springtime, search the grass for fallen apples, and never once lift their disappointed faces to the pink canopy of bloom.

As may be inferred, all Japanese music was, to Mrs. Wyndham and her intimate associates, mere squeaking, caterwauling, an excruciating discord. She spoke constantly of "civilized" music. She was fond of referring to the English school of harmony. She was exaggerated in her use of English method.

"Shall I be compelled to play my own accompaniment?" now asked Mrs. Wyndham. Her pretty face showed concern.

"If the music is not too hard I will try," said Gwendolen, springing from her chair, while scissors and thimble fell clattering to the floor. She gave the fallen articles a contemptuous glance, and, without a motion to rescue them, followed Mrs. Wyndham to the piano.

A group of young Japanese girls, put in a corner to themselves, exchanged looks of delight, and began to titter like wrens. "How much do the ways of the honorable foreign scissors and thimble resemble those of Japanese scissors and thimble!" they confided one to another.

"My thimble generally rolls off the veranda and buries itself among pebbles. I think it possesses an imp!" laughed one.

"Mine goes always into the red coals of the hibachi," giggled another.

"That is precisely the conduct of my worthless article," added a third. "The water-kettle has to be taken aside, and grandmother scowls. Then we all dig for the thimble with the copper fire-sticks. When we find it, it is quite black, and—Ma-a-a!—so hot, that it must be dropped at once into cold water, where it hisses like the head of a small serpent."

"Now what shall I sing for such a crowd as this?" mused Mrs. Wyndham, as she shuffled the loose leaves of her music. Her words had the sound of inner meditation.

"What would the Japanese like best?" asked Gwendolen, in a low tone.

"Oh, my dear! I wasn't thinking of them!" protested the other. "They are incapable of appreciating any real music. I was thinking of our foreign friends."

"Yuki HaganÈ is a Japanese. She loves the best music. Brahms is almost a passion with her. She says that he sounds like the wind in pine-trees, high above a great battle."

"Oh, Brahms!" said the other. "I never sing Brahms. He is too harsh and unpoetic. These bellowing contraltos affect him. As for me, I must have something light, poetic, full of melody."

"Here is our American McDowell," murmured Gwendolen, and bent her face that its expression might not be seen. "Being patriotic by profession I plead for McDowell."

"You do not consider him,—over their heads?" asked the Englishwoman, dubiously.

"Oh, well, you can give them Sullivan next time, and bring down the average!" Mrs. Wyndham bent a suspicious look, but Gwendolen's lifted gaze was that of a seraph over a last harp note. "I'll try McDowell. Can you play the accompaniment?"

"I can at least attempt it," said Gwendolen, meekly, and forthwith rippled out the prelude with an ease that further deepened suspicion.

The song began with a single note, long sustained, the voice striking in abruptly among hurrying chords. Mrs. Wyndham's beautiful voice took it like a star. Suddenly, with another upward swerve, the note wavered, passed into a new kindling as into the life of a bird, and swept along on higher currents with motionless, outspread wings.

The foreign ladies exchanged glances of rapture. The Japanese workers, on the other hand, stared first in astonishment, then with growing apprehension. Surely this was not singing! Something must be going wrong with the honorable insides of the kind lady! They stole timid looks toward their hostess, and by her calm, interested face were reassured. Still the piercing note went higher. The singer's throat swelled slightly, and her face turned red. From the group of Japanese girls one hysterical chuckle escaped. That set off the whole lot. Staid matrons bowed convulsed faces to folds of cotton cloth; silken sleeves came into requisition. A few of the foreign ladies looked about and frowned. Yuki half rose from her chair.

Now, fortunately, the highest note was reached. It broke its flight with a great twitter of wings. The bars of a staccato love-song began. Again the Japanese women stared, but now in admiration as well as wonder. Never were singing notes so light, so delicate, so silvery! As the song ended (and indeed it had been exquisitely given), the foreign ladies burst into simultaneous applause. Led by the bolder among them, the Japanese followed suit.

"Oh, we can't let you stop at that, dear Mrs. Wyndham," came Mrs. Stunt's high, rasping voice. "Won't you give us that lovely thing of Goo-nowd's you sung at our last Charity concert?" Mrs. Wyndham consented. After Gounod it was an English ballad, then another and another, until at length the singer, with pretty petulance, turned from the piano saying that she had already monopolized too much time. A great buzzing of thanks and congratulations surged about her. No expression of admiration was too exaggerated. In fact there was none that pretty Mrs. Wyndham had not heard many times before. She accepted these tributes now, as usual, with deprecating smiles, and little protesting shakes of the head, finally declaring that they would make her conceited if they didn't stop.

No one noticed the American girl, still at the piano. She gave a swift look around, and seeing that the biwa player had not come, began whispering to the keys the first notes of one of Chopin's most delicate fantasies. Like the down on a moth's wing, it came. Like crystal raindrops, then, mixed with the perfume of bruised petals, and sometimes the distant yearning of a bird. This was music that even the untutored Japanese girls could feel. It held the sound of their own koto strings,—it breathed whispers of their own trees, and winds, and sighing sea-stretches. Gradually all voices in the room ceased. Faster the notes came, though still with a suggestion of whispering. Gwendolen's white hands became a misty blur. The theme drew closer, with now a wind-driven swish of rain and scurrying petals; now the nearer cry of a bird, and a low under-rhythm of human sorrow. The sounds whirled and lifted into melodious agitation. The caged bird seemed to give low plaints of fear; the wind and the rain drove close, dashed into the face of silence, and drew back. Then all sounds died away in waves of exhausted sobbing. Gwendolen sprang up, leaving the piano vibrant. She hurried to the nearest window, turning her face from all in the room.

Mrs. Wyndham was the first to speak. Her light laugh had an artificial sound. "And to think, my dear, that I insisted upon knowing whether you could manage my accompaniments!"

Gwendolen did not heed. She was tingling with the excitement and unrest that Chopin's music so often brought her. Yuki came softly, slipping a little scarred hand into that of her friend.

"I hate Chopin!" cried the American girl, in a low, angry voice. "I wonder why I keep on playing him! Every time I say I won't, and then I go and do it! He is morbid, he is childish, he is French! One sees his weak chin quiver, and the tears roll down his cheek! He wants you to see them. I hate him, I say! But, oh, he is a compelling genius!"

"Yes, he do like every one to see him when he cries. But when I hear him I think, 'Oh, what must it be to a person's soul to be able to cry such tears of music!'"

A sound at the main entrance-door caused the little hostess to turn. "Ah, there is the Satsuma biwa player! I must now go to him. He, too, makes tears, Gwendolen, but of a different sort. Perhaps you will not wish to cry for him. You may even think him to be funny, as many of the Japanese ladies thought Mrs. Wyndham's beautiful singing to be funny. You must not try to stay,—you and Mrs. Todd,—if it will tire you."

As she hurried away Mrs. Wyndham drew slowly near. "You naughty one! I shall owe you a grudge for this. You are not to be forgiven until you promise to come often—often—and let us play sometimes together. You are a genius!"

"Not quite that, I think," said Gwendolen, smiling. "Though, indeed, I have never known a friend to take music's place, except Yuki; and now that she is a princess, I suppose I can't feel her to be so much my own. I shall love to come to you and play. Your voice is like sunshine on an English fountain."

"Ah!" said the other, "what a charming speech! No man could say anything half so pretty! Now, as reward, I am going to give you a piece of valuable advice." She leaned confidentially near. "Make your escape while you can." She nodded significantly toward the biwa player, who, with Yuki beside him, stood shrinkingly in the doorway. "I've heard him once,—or one like him. It is what you Americans might call 'the limit'!"

"You mean for me to go? But I have never heard any Japanese music at all!" protested Gwendolen.

"Oh, in that case—" said Mrs. Wyndham, with her delicate shrug. "If you care for the experience!" She hurried off with many protestations of regret. Several other ladies followed her example.

The biwa player now stood beside the piano. Two Japanese tatami (padded straw mats six feet in length) were brought in and placed upon the floor. Before inviting him to be seated Yuki made a hesitating little speech to the company, first in English, then in Japanese, saying to the foreigners that while the music to come would doubtless be strange, and possibly displeasing to them, to her and her compatriots it was a trumpet-call to heroism. "It stirs our blood to every drop!" she cried, forgetting, for the instant, her shyness. "It echoes to the brave deeds of a thousand years ago,—it foretells deeds more greater that may come! It is the crying of strong souls, it is breath of our fathers' Gods!"

Gwendolen, in that vague sort of way in which impressions of alien customs are formed, had believed all male musicians in Japan to be blind. Some one had told her so, or she had read it. She was surprised, therefore, and interested, to see in this famous singer of battle-hymns a young man, indeed almost a boy, with thin, shaven face, tumultuous black hair not too closely or evenly cut, tossed in thick locks all over his well-poised head; and eyes, large, straight, expressive, and brilliant enough to be the ornament of a young French or Italian seigneur. He showed a slight embarrassment, at first, in the presence of so many women. He was used to the audience of statesmen, to the flashing response of Majesty. Here were not only Japanese girls, mere children, but a great company of high-nosed, pink and purple foreigners. Saturated as he was, made up of lore and legend, with songs of the Lady SakanouyÈ, or of Ono no Komachi never far from his lips, even Gwendolen's bright beauty seemed a trifle abnormal, bleached, repellent.

Now his hostess, the young Princess HaganÈ, looked into his eyes, and spoke to him in their own tongue. "Be not concerned, honorable sir, at the presence of foreign women! They cannot understand your words, of course; but I am sure they will listen courteously. As for us,—we Japanese women,—we are the wives, the daughters, the mothers of heroes. Our frail lives toss as thin flames on the altar of prayer. We cannot fight, we can only pray and work. Sing strength to us as we minister to distant soldiers dying, perhaps on barren fields, or heaped, dead, in the ploughed siege-trenches of this fearful war!"

His deep eyes seemed to drink of her inspiration, so long was the gaze with which he held her. "I am honored to sing at your bidding," he answered. He had forgotten to bow at the words. He forgot that she was a princess. He recognized her as a spirit. Forever after this slight girl, seen but once, became one of the poet's galaxy of pale, pure stars. For years he could not sing of the death-struggle of the HeikÈ clan without a vision of her prophetic eyes.

He took his seat very slowly on the soft straw mat. Yuki withdrew, and became lost among her guests. The biwa, a large lute in the shape of half a pear, had been held, all this time, closely against the young man's breast. Now, in taking his seat, the instrument was extended to the full length of his right arm. It gave out, under his close grasp, a sleepy hum. For an instant only it was placed apart from him, on the mat, that he might spread and smooth the knees of his silken robe, draw his stiff sleeves into exact angles, and adjust the low kimono collar. Then he turned impatiently again to the lute. It murmured to him; he drew it close, smiling as a mother upon her babe.

"Ain't he handsome for a Jap?" whispered Mrs. Stunt to Gwendolen. The girl winced. She was studying him in her own way. His manner, just before beginning, was aloof and reserved, as if he were restating to himself consecration to service. The Japanese women, even the oldest, gazed upon him with deep reverence.

"Beethoven may have smiled like that, or St. Francis of Assisi," thought Gwendolen. "It is a look, not of race, but of immortality."

The player's head lifted slightly. He was losing consciousness of material presences. His part was with the unseen world; he must draw down currents of a mighty past, and send them as new streams of influence, on through a menaced future. For he was to improvise, not to repeat. His theme alone was set,—a most heroic incident of civil wars, resulting in extermination of a dominating clan. The annihilation of the HeikÈ might give him text, but the flow of rhythmic words should vibrate, thrill, moan, quicken, purl, or shatter, as the mood of the moment might demand. Doubtless in this pause he was invoking, in full faith, the souls of those dead heroes; offering them possession of his human frame, and entreating higher gods to make him worthy of the test.

His low voice and the first three slow notes rose together. The minor quality suggested lamentation. A short passage, rapidly chanted without accompaniment, made the hearts of the listeners beat a little faster. Then voice and instrument clashed together; both whirled nearer, until, all at once,—silence! The player looked about the room in bewilderment. He stared down upon the biwa. He closed his eyes and swayed slightly backward, then forward, then back again. Suddenly he reopened his eyes. They were larger, more brilliant; they flashed a new fire, the glare of battle reflected in their depths. Words now came rapidly. His sentences fell of themselves into long, unstable rhythms. Cadences were lacking. All phrasing, except in rarest intervals, broke into the air with a sob, a sigh, a shuddering gasp. Often now the biwa strings were slashed across by the ivory plectrum, and the human wail rang through vibrating response. Then voice and strings plunged into a seeming discord, a frantic wrack of sound exorcised an instant later by pure calm notes struck separately, like the drip of slow water.

In the sense of Western harmony there was none, but something in the weird vibrations of long notes, the intricacies of overtone, and, above all, the unbelievable subtleties of rhythm, gave to one eager American listener, at least, her first insight into a new world of sound. "They are nearer in this, as in all their other arts, to nature," she thought to herself. "They summon the very essences of being, and find skeins for entangling them. Without conscious representation, they suggest to the human ear the lisp of sea winds, the flutter of fire, the rushing monologue of mountain streams. They hear sounds we Westerners never hear. I believe the very mists are audible."

As the emotion increased and the subject became more martial, the time of the music grew rapid, broken, syncopated, involved. Soft, melodious passages shattered into jarring notes. Like European troubadours of France, or the meistersingers of mediÆval Germany, he yielded himself to the unconscious swing of impulse, and sang what was given him. Lines shortened. Syllables became more staccato. It was dramatic, undidactic—the deeds rather than the thoughts of men. His diction became more simple and direct, with sharp, incisive verbs at the end that rang like smitten steel. His whole body, at times, was shaken. After some terrific passage, while the sobbing lute-strings sustained the passion, his body would bend over and down, as if, in its abandonment to joy, grief, or battle ardor, it would hug the instrument that had become its soul.

Now he sang of the hero youth, Atsumori, of his insistence upon honorable death at the hand of his conqueror, KumagayÈ.

The dove-gray garments of the Japanese women, folded so modestly across seemingly quiet breasts, began to stir and palpitate. More than one tear fell upon the bandages. Yuki's face, set now unfalteringly upon the singer, grew ever more white; her long eyes burned, and trembled apart. Unconsciously she went close to him, and, kneeling upon the hard floor, drank of his voice. The group of Japanese maidens hid faces in their bright sleeves. The air stirred and tingled with invisible influences. Gwendolen began to shiver like an animal which knows not its own source of fear. The charged atmosphere, the face, the voice of the singer, Yuki's great glowing eyes, swept in her soul strained chords of unknown feeling. She felt in herself the vibrations of that trembling lute. In its cell a soul, just wakened, fumbled at a new discovered latch. "Surely it must be reincarnation," whispered the girl. "Surely I have felt and seen all this before! Yuki and I together have listened; that look was on her face. Yuki!" The cry was scarcely a whisper. Yuki, many feet away, could not possibly have heard, yet instantly she turned,—the eyes, night-black and hazel, caught and clung together, with half ghostly memories that were the same.

One great crashing across the strings, "like the tearing of brocade," and the singer's head fell forward,—his frame trembled and shrank, he quivered into stillness. Yuki half crawled to him, holding out a protecting arm, and facing her guests like a young tigress. "Do not any one speak. Do not crowd about him," she cried in English. "His soul will be weary from the long journey."

The Japanese women understood, and returned quietly to their sewing. The foreigners tittered, shrugged, and exchanged glances, then they, too, began to work. A servant brought tea to the singer, and a glass of cold water. At length he stretched out a trembling hand to the latter, and having finished the draught, rose quietly and went from the room, with Yuki close behind. A few moments later Gwendolen heard her returning, unaccompanied, along the hall. She went out to meet her, thankful indeed for the privilege of a few words alone.

"Yuki-ko," she faltered, "I just wanted to say that at last I understand,—I think I understand entirely."

Yuki, still half in the world of shadows, gave her a strange look. "You understand, Gwendolen? Is it my marriage you speak of?"

"Oh, so much more than that!" cried the other, with a little sob. "Had you been what the conventional foreigner calls 'faithful,' you would have been the most faithless girl in all the world!"

"You are a wonderful friend," said Yuki. Her voice had the strange quality of her look. Both had caught the rhythm of low martial chanting. "But even you, my Gwendolen, did not hear or understand it all. There is tragedy before me. You did not hear that in the music?"

"I thought I heard it, darling, but I shut my ears! I shall not believe. We can compel even tragedy, Yuki. Nothing can harm you with HaganÈ's love!"

"It is of that the tragedy come. But do not trouble. If I can serve Nippon, I asks no more of this life."

"Yuki, what can you mean?" cried the other, holding her back.

"Hush, dearest; do not trouble," smiled Yuki. "See, the guests turn their heads to listen. I must go to them. I have no fear at all."