Part 40 (1/2)

Hito no naka-goto Kiki-kosu na yume!_

It is other people who have separated You and me.

Come, my Lord!

Do not dream of listening To the between-words of people!

After a ghastly night of sleeplessness at Nikko, Geoffrey Barrington reached Tokyo in time for lunch. His thoughts were confused and discordant.

”I feel as if I had been drunk for a week,” he kept on saying to himself. Indeed, he felt a fume of unreality over all his actions.

One thing was certain: financially, he was a ruined man. The thousands a year which yesterday morning had been practically his, the ease and comfort which had seemed so secure, were lost more hopelessly than if his bank had failed. Even the cash in his pocket he touched with the greatest disgust, as if those identical bills and coins had been paid across the brothel counter as the price for a man's dirty pleasures and a girl's shame and disease. He imagined that the Nikko hotel-keeper looked at his notes suspiciously as though they were endorsed with the seal of the Yos.h.i.+wara.

Geoffrey was ruined. He was henceforth dependent on what his brain could earn and on what his father would allow him, five hundred pounds a year at the outside. If he had been alone in the world it would not have mattered much; but Asako, poor little Asako, the innocent cause of this disaster, she was ruined too. She who loved her riches, her jewellery, her pretty things, she would have to sell them all. She would have to follow him into poverty, she, who had no experience of its meaning. This was his punishment, perhaps, for having steadily pursued the idea of a rich marriage. But what had Asako done to deserve it? Thank G.o.d, his marriage had at least not been a loveless one.

Geoffrey felt acutely the need of human sympathy in his trouble. By sheer bad luck he had forfeited Reggie's friends.h.i.+p. But he could still depend upon his wife's love.

So he ran up the stairs at the Imperial Hotel longing for Asako's welcome, though he dreaded the obligation to break the bad news.

He threw open the door. The room was empty. He looked for cloaks and hats and curios, for luggage, for any sign of her presence. There was nothing to indicate that the room was hers.

Sick with apprehension, he returned to the corridor. There was a _boy san_ near at hand.

”_Okusan_ go away,” said the _boy san_. ”No come back, I think.”

”Where has she gone?” asked Geoffrey.

The _boy san_, with the infuriating j.a.panese grin, shook his head.

”I am very sorry for you,” he said. ”To-day very early plenty people come, Tanaka San and two j.a.panese girls. Very plenty talk. _Okusan_ cry tears. All nice kimono take away very quick.”

”Then Tanaka, where is he?”

”Go away with _okusan_” the boy grinned again, ”I am very sorry--”

Geoffrey slammed the door in the face of his tormentor. He staggered into a chair and collapsed, staring blankly. What could have happened?

Slowly his ideas returned. Tanaka! He had seen the little beast in Yae's motor car at Chuzenji. He must have come spying after his master as he had done fifty times before. He and that half-caste devil had raced him back to Tokyo, had got in ahead of him, and had told a pack of lies to Asako. She must have believed them, since she had gone away. But where had she gone to? The _boy san_ had said ”two j.a.panese girls.” She must have gone to the Fujinami house, and to her horribly unclean cousins.

He must find her at once. He must open her eyes to the truth. He must bring her back. He must take her away from j.a.pan--forever.

Harrington was crossing the hall of the hotel muttering to himself, seeing nothing, hearing nothing, when he felt a hand laid on his arm.

It was t.i.tine, Asako's French maid.

”_Monsieur le capitaine_” she said, ”_madame est partie_. It is not my fault, _monsieur le capitaine_. I say to madame, do not go, wait for monsieur. But madame is bewitched. She, who is _bonne catholique_, she say prayers to the temples of these yellow devils. I myself have seen her clap her hands--so!--and pray. Her saints have left her. She is bewitched.”

t.i.tine was a Breton peasant girl. She believed implicitly in the powers of darkness. She had long ago decided that the G.o.ds of the j.a.panese and the _korrigans_ of her own country were intimately related. She had served Asako since before her marriage, and would have remained with her until death. She was desperately faithful. But she could not follow her mistress to the Fujinami house and risk her soul's salvation.

”_Monsieur le capitaine_ go away, and madame very, very unhappy. Every night she cry. Why did monsieur stay away so long time?”

”It was only a fortnight,” expostulated Geoffrey.