it was the season of greatest cold. the she hills of kioto were enwrapped in a garment of snow, and with the glistening sun upon them they looked as beautiful as a dream. the pines and hemlocks seemed to spread out their dark-green arms, as if to support the glorified burden.
the gateman of the saito shiro, squatting upon his heels, with his face buried in the great, absorbing book of the west, chanced to look up over his bone-rimmed glasses, and saw a lone traveler coming on foot along the path which led to the lodge gates. kiyo hobbled down to the gates just as the visitor reached them. in a high, thin voice the ancient gateman challenged the traveler. then, as the latter did not respond to his call, but peered up at him curiously and suddenly, the old retainer began to tremble so violently that his shaking hands could hardly unbar the gates.
as the young man entered, kiyo dropped upon his knees, and bumped his bald head repeatedly upon the frozen ground, emitting strange little cries of excitement and joy over the return of the long-absent one.
deeply touched, gonji, who had always loved old kiyo, bent over the gateman, patting his head, and finally even assisting him to his feet. he inquired solicitously after the health of kiyo and his kindred, and then asked how his own family now were. kiyo had answered joyously and willingly all the inquiries of his master touching upon his own kinsfolk, but at the questions regarding the family he served he became suddenly constrained and wretched. his silence apparently but aroused the further curiosity and anxiety of gonji. he persisted, his voice becoming almost peremptory in tone.
“i condescended to ask you regarding the health of my family. you do not answer me, good kiyo-sama! is there sickness, then, within the shiro?”
“iya, iya! (no, no!)” hastily protested kiyo. “all is well. it is good health within the shiro, praise be to the gods!”
still his questioner noted something strange about the manner in which the gateman avoided his glance. he studied old kiyo curiously, as though from his own sad reveries, in which he had been absorbed to the exclusion of all else, he had been reluctantly aroused at the thought of possible danger to his people. gonji had hardened his heart, as he thought, against the ones who were responsible for his unhappiness—nay, who had deliberately cast forth a pure and beautiful soul. nevertheless, he experienced a sense of uneasiness at the thought that all had not been well with them.
“come,” he urged. “do not hesitate to confide in your master, good kiyo-sama. tell me the news, be it good or bad.”
“all is well. all is well,” almost sobbingly chanted the gateman. “i pray you enter the shiro. there you will see for yourself.”
gonji turned a bit uneasily toward the house, then halted abruptly.
“i read in your face,” he said, “a tale of some calamity to my family. already i know of my father’s glorious sacrifice for tenshi-sama”—bowing as he spoke the mikado’s name—“for i was with my father at the end. so if it is that—but no, there is something else troubling you, kiyo. i know you too well not to read your face. is it my mother?”
his voice broke slightly, and for the first time in years he was conscious of a sense of tenderness toward his mother. she had been the main source of all his misery; but she loved him. this gonji knew, despite all.
again kiyo hastened to reassure him, this time eagerly and proudly.
“iya, master. thy mother is in excellent health. happy, moreover, as never before, with the honorable lord taro, thy son, embraced within her arms!”
the young man was staring at him now strangely. he seemed unable to speak or move. a look as of almost troubled awakening was in the face of gonji. it was as if a thought, long thrust aside, had suddenly recurred to him. during all these agonizing months, when he had wandered about from city to city, he had been possessed with but one idea—the finding of his wife. now, suddenly, the gateman’s words came to him as a very revelation. strange that he had not even thought upon this matter since he had left japan. he was a father!
“it is—possible!” he gasped. “i have a—”
“son! gloriously a son, master!” cried kiyo, grinning joyously.
the young man continued to stare almost incredulously at the gateman, but in his face was no reflection of the joy visible in that of the faithful retainer. he was overwhelmed with the sense of a new emotion whose very sweetness tore at his heart, and brought unbidden tears to his eyes.
suddenly, against his will even, there came vividly before his mind’s eye a vision of ohano as he had seen her last, crawling upon her knees toward him and beating her hands futilely together, as she besought him piteously to permit her to attend him through the dark paths that led to the lotus land.
how the gods had comforted the unloved wife, was his thought, and with it came a sense of overwhelming grief and bitterness that they had not shown a similar charity toward the beloved moonlight. he pictured ohano, cherished, protected, praised, within the honorable house of saito, with the long-desired heir of all the illustrious ancestors upon her bosom. then his mind reverted to the wandering outcast, moonlight, and a lump rose stranglingly in his throat. as he made his way blindly toward the house, all the pride and joy of fatherhood, which had uplifted him as on a flood but a moment since, seemed to drop from him no less suddenly, leaving him as before, hopeless, uncomforted, and utterly forlorn.
within the shiro, the lady saito ichigo sat drowsily swaying by the hibachi, ceaselessly smoking, and muttering incoherent prayers for the soul of her lord and for ohano’s. she was very feeble, helpless, and childish now. her body had lost much of its vigor, and the sternness which had once made her so formidable seemed to have entirely left her.
moonlight’s dark eyes rested upon her with an expression of both pity and anxiety. suddenly she pushed the little taro along the smoothly matted floor and whispered coaxing words into the child’s ear. he crawled along several paces till he came behind his grandmother. by grasping her obi at the back he was enabled to pull himself to his feet. now his chubby, warm little face nestled up against lady saito’s neck. the pipe dropped from her mouth and fell unheeded upon the hearth. she turned hungrily toward the child and drew him passionately to her breast.
outside the screens gonji had paused, unable either to enter or to retire. he had resolved, at whatever cost, to resume his forlorn wanderings in search of the lost one, ere finally he should take up the abolition of the yoshiwara—a task which had seemed to be assigned to him by the very gods themselves. but before going he felt it to be his duty to have a last interview with his mother, and with ohano, the mother of his child!
nevertheless he paused outside the screens, feeling unable to combat the sense of reluctance and repugnance to joining that little family he knew was within. how long he remained outside the shoji he could not have told. he debated the advisability of withdrawing without their knowledge of his presence. kiyo would keep the secret. so would ochika, whose loud outcry at his advent he had quickly silenced. gonji felt sure his brief visit might bring merely unrest and unhappiness. it would be kinder both to ohano and to his mother to go. as his resolve became fixed, he was swept with an anguished longing and desire at least to see, but once, the face of the son the gods had graciously given him.
with infinite caution, lest the sound might be heard by those within, he began to scratch with his nail upon the fusuma, till gradually he had made a small aperture, and to this he applied his eye.
he remained motionless at the shoji. he saw, within, the toddling child, as it made its swift way across the room toward its grandmother; he heard the sob of his mother as she took the child into her embrace; then he saw the face of moonlight lifted alertly and turned toward where her husband’s face was pressed against the screen. she alone had heard, and, intuitively, had guessed the truth. she came slowly to her feet, her lips apart, her wide eyes dark and beautiful with emotion and excitement.
suddenly the man outside the screens became animated with the strength almost of a madman. he tore violently at the sliding wall, crushing it into its groove. now he was upon the threshold of the room.
his mother screamed, hoarsely, wildly. but his glance went over her head and by the little wondering child, who had crawled toward him. gonji saw nothing in the world save the face of that one who had rushed to meet him.
it was much later that they told him of ohano. at first the girl’s sacrifice, for his sake and that of the ancestors, brought from him only an exclamation of pity; he seemed unable to appreciate the facts of the matter. there was no room for a shadow upon his happiness now. they were sitting in the sunlight, that came in a golden stream through the latticed shoji, piercing its way even through the amado. they said little to each other, but upon their faces was a radiance as golden as the sunlight.
suddenly a tiny shape flickered across the outer wall. it seemed but a moving speck at first upon the water-colored paper; but so insistently did it beat against the wall that the family perceived it was an insect of some kind.
gonji arose and looked at it curiously, where it fluttered against the outside of the paper wall.
“why, it is a cicada—and at this time of year!” he said.
lady saito laid her pipe upon the hibachi and hobbled across to her son’s side, and moonlight and the little taro pressed against him on the other. they all watched the moving little shape outside with absorbed interest and wonder.
“i dreamed of a cicada last night,” said lady saito, uneasily. “it kept flying at my ears, whispering that it could not rest. it is a bad sign. open the shoji, my son. we can catch it with the sleeve.”
he pushed the screen partly open, and the cicada crept along the lacquered latticed wall, beating its little wings and sliding up and down.
lady saito slapped at it with the end of her long sleeve, but it fled to the top of the wall. she beat at it with a bamboo broom, and presently it fluttered down and fell upon the floor.
they all hung over the curious little creature, and as they examined it an oppressive feeling of sadness crept upon them.
“how strange is this little cicada,” murmured moonlight, troubled. “see, one of its little wings is much smaller than the other.”
“it is a bad sign,” repeated the mother, gloomily; and she made as if to step upon the little creature, when moonlight grasped at her arm and drew her back.
“do not kill it! do not kill it!” she cried, in sudden excitement. “oh, do you not see—it is ohano, poor ohano! she has returned to us in this way. there is a message she wishes to bring us.”
even as she spoke the cicada ceased its fluttering and lay very still. a silence fell upon the saito family. they were oppressed with the sense of being in the presence of one dead.
said the lord saito gonji, in a very gentle voice:
“what can it be my wife wishes? i would gladly resign my happiness if i could but make easier the lot of ohano.”
“she was always anxious about her next birth,” whispered his mother. “perhaps she desires a buddhist service especially for her spirit!”
moonlight had tenderly lifted the little body and put it into a small box.
“come,” she said, simply. “we must set out at once for the temple. the good priest will perform the segati service, and we will bury ohano’s little body in the grounds of the temple. there surely it will rest in peace!”
