Chapter XXXII: When the Watch Passed

"Sh! sh!" whispered Yone, suddenly, and crushed her small hand upon Hoshiko's mouth.

It was the watchman with staff and lantern, crying weirdly in the night. He passed near. He paused nearer. Yone drew a bit of shrubbery before them.

"I heard a song, by all the gods I heard a foolish song in this sacred place of tombs. Come forth," he cried aloud, "he who sings foolishly in a sacred place, come forth and be punished of the gods so that you may repent! Otherwise your punishment will wait until you are unready for it."

Now he moved on. His voice came muttering back:--

"Come forth, come forth! I heard a song, an unholy song in the sacred place of tombs."

Yone let the bush return and laughed happily in the arms of Hoshiko.

"Oh, is it not all as it was, beloved? It is the same watchman--older. And they are the same, almost the same, words--more eery. And we are close, close--as we were then. Oh, it is divine to be close with you! So--so, my beloved, another omen! Everything else is as it was. Shall not we be?"

Hoshiko was silent.

"Be not afraid, beloved," Yone said. "I will be true always until we meet in the heavens. Always I will be your widow with blackened teeth if you fall--my hair blowing at a shrine. Think! But for me there will be no one to keep the lamps alight before you if you die--but for me. And I--they shall never fail. For, if you fall, I will wait as I have done--keeping the lamps, hoping that you will hold out your hand in the black Meido when I pass to death, and that then we shall, somehow, never part. Oh, beloved, there have been suitors and suitors and always suitors! The nakado has worn bare the mat at the door. But was I not yours? How could I listen to any one else? And the wedding garments are all ready. And there is no one to stay us but the old deaf Hana, who will not even hear. If you must go quickly, to-night, there is the foreign minister--there is the new registry office--"

"And for this," said Hoshiko, "the few words of a foreign priest, nine cups of sake, a line in the registry office, you will give up your dear life to me?"

"I will give up all my souls--all my hope of a rest at last in Buddha's bosom if I must. Oh, Shijiro Arisuga, for this I have waited until it seemed that I could wait no more. Give it to me now--this night--before you go!"

"O love," whispered Hoshiko, "what is like you in all the earths, in all the heavens! There is no other miracle but you alone. Come! My hour is almost here. But were it already past, and though a soldier but obeys the hours, yet you should be a wife before I go."

And even to that moment Hoshiko had not known how Yone yearned for that one word to be added to her. Suddenly she grovelled on the earth and caught the hands and knees of her who had been wife to him they both loved.

"All the gods bless you--all the gods--for giving me that one name. For in all the earths and heavens together there is none so sweet as--wife to Shijiro Arisuga."

And there, that night, Hoshiko married little Yone.

"Now go and die," she wept at farewell, "and here I will wait--wait, until I, also, die--wait for that touch of your spirit on my arm, wait for your hand in the dark Meido. But if you do not die? if the gods are not ready yet for you--you will come?"

"I will come again," said Hoshiko, weeping, too, which was strange for a soldier.

And there they parted, only a moment after they were married, and Hoshiko was ordered to join the Guards and hurry to the Yalu, where their prey was fattening.

TEIKOKU BANZAI