The Kingdom of Slender Swords

  CHAPTER VI

  THE BAYING OF THE WOLF-HOUND

  Barbara stood in her room at the Embassy. It was spacious and airy, thehigh walls paneled in ivory-white, with draperies of Delft blue. The bedand dressing-table were early Adams. A generous bay-window set withflower-boxes filled a large part of one side, and its deep seat wasupholstered in blue crepe, the tint of the draperies, printed with largewhite chrysanthemums. The floor was laid with thin matting of rice-strawin which was braided at intervals a conventional pattern in old-rose.Opposite the bay-window stood a Sendai chest on which was a smallJapanese Buddha of gold-lacquer, Amida, the Dweller-in-Light, seated inholy meditation on his lotos-blossom. At first sight this had recalledto Barbara a counterpart image which she had unearthed in a dark cornerof the garret in her pinafore days, and which for a week had been herdearest possession.

  To this room Mrs. Dandridge herself had taken her, presenting to herHaru, whom the bishop's note had brought--a vivid, eager figure from aJapanese fan, who had sunk suddenly prone, every line of her slenderform bowed, hands palm-down on the floor and forehead on them, in aceremonious welcome to the foreign _Ojo-San_. Her mauve _kimono_ waswoven with camelias in silver, set off by an _obi_, showing a flight ofstorks on a blue background and clasped in front with a silver firefly.The heavy jet hair was rolled into wings on either side, and a high puffsurmounted her forehead. Thin twin spirals, stiff with pomade, joined atthe back like the pinions of a butterfly, and against the blue-blackloops lay a bright knot of ribbon. She was now moving about the roomwith silent padding of light feet in snowy, digitated _tabi_, admiringthe gowns which the maid had taken from Barbara's trunks. Occasionallyshe passed a slim hand up and down a soft wrap with a graceful, purringregard, or held a fleecy boa under her small oval chin and stole aglance in the cheval glass with a little ecstatic quiver of shoulder.Once she paused to look at the lacquer image on the Sendai chest."Buddha," she said. "Japan man think very good for die-time."

  "Haru," said Barbara as the maid's busy Japanese fingers went searchingfor elusive hooks and eyes, "is it true that every Japanese name has ameaning?"

  "So, _Ojo-San_! That mos' indeed true. All Japan name mean something.'Haru' mean spring, for because my born that time. Very funny--_ne?_"

  "It is very pretty," said Barbara.

  "How tha's nize!" was the delighted exclamation. "_Mama-San_ give name.My like name yella-ways for because _mama-San_ no more in this world. Myhouse little lonesome now."

  "Where is your house, Haru? Near by?"

  The slender hand, pointed to the wooded height behind the garden. "Jus'there on the street call Prayer-to-the-gods. My house so-o-o small, an'garden 'bout such big." She indicated a space of perhaps six feetsquare. "Funny!--_ne_?"

  "And who lives there with you?"

  Haru smiled brilliantly. "Oh, so-o-o many peoples! _Papa-San_, an'--jus'me."

  "No brother?"

  She shook her head. "My don' got," she said. "_Papa-San_ very angry forbecause my jus' girl an' no could be kill in Port Arthur!"

  She spoke with a smile, but the matter-of-fact words brought suddenlyhome to Barbara something of the flavor of that passionate loyalty, thathot heroism and debonair contempt of death which has been the theme of ahundred stories. "Do all Japanese feel so, Haru?" she asked. "Wouldevery father be glad to give his son's life for Japan?"

  The girl looked at her as if she jested. "Of _course_! All Japan manmos' happy if to be kill for our Emperor! Tha's for why better to beman. Girl jus' can stay home an' _wish_!" As the gown's last fasteningwas slipped into its place, she turned up her lovely oval face with asmiling, sidelong look.

 

  "_Ma-a-a!_" she exclaimed. "How it is _beau_-tee-ful! _ne_? only--"

  "Only what?"

  "My thinks the _Ojo-San_ must suffer through the center!"

  Laughingly Barbara caught the other's slim wrist and drew her before themirror. By oriental standards the Japanese girl was as finely bred asherself. In the two faces, both keenly delicate and sensitive, yet sosharply contrasted--one palely olive under its jetty pillow of straightblack hair, the other fair and brown-eyed, crowned with curlinggold--the extremes of East and West looked out at each other.

  "See, Haru," said Barbara. "How different we are!"

  "You so more good-look!" sighed the Japanese girl. "My jus' like thenight."

  "Ah, but a moonlighted night," cried Barbara, "soft and warm and full ofsecrets. When you have a sweetheart you will be far more lovely to himthan any foreign girl could be!"

  Haru blushed rosily. "Sweetheart p'r'aps now," she said, "--all samekind America story say 'bout."

  "Have you really, Haru?" cried Barbara. "I love to hear aboutsweethearts. Maybe--some day--I may have one, too. Some time you'll tellme about him. Won't you?"

  Suddenly, far below the window, there came a snarling scramble and asavage, menacing bay. Barbara leaned out. A tawny, long-muzzledwolf-hound, fastened to a stake, glared up at her out of red-dimmedeyes.

  "Poor fellow!" she exclaimed. "He looks sick. Does he have to be tiedup?"

  The Japanese girl shivered. "Very bad dog," she said. "My think verydanger to not kill."

  The deep tone of the dinner gong shuddered through the house and Barbarahastened out. Patricia met her in the hall and the two girls, with armsabout each other's waists, descended the broad angled stair to thedining-room, where the Ambassador stood, tall and spare and iron-gray,with a contagious twinkle in his kindly eye.

  "Well," he asked, "did you feel the earthquake?"

  Barbara gave an exclamation of dismay. "Has there been one already?"

  "Pshaw!" he said contritely. "Perhaps there hasn't. You see, in Japan,we get so used to asking that question--"

  "Now, Ned!" warned Mrs. Dandridge. "You'll have Barbara frightened todeath. We really don't have them so very often, my dear--and only gentleshakes. You mustn't be dreaming of Messina."

  The Ambassador pointed to the ceiling, where a wide crack zigzaggedacross. "There's a recent autograph to bear me out. It happened on theeleventh of last month."

  "Father remembers the date because of the horrible accident it caused,"said Patricia. "A piece of the kitchen plaster came down in his favoritedessert and we had to fall back on pickled plums.

  "I'm simply wild to see your gowns, Barbara," she continued, as theytook their places. "Is that the latest sleeve, and is everything goingto be slinky? We're always about six months behind. I know a girl inYokohama who goes to every steamer and kodaks the smartest tourists.I've almost been driven to do it myself."

  "You should adopt the Japanese dress, Patsy," said Mrs. Dandridge. "Howdoes it seem, Barbara, to see _kimono_ all around you?"

  "I can't get it out of my mind," she answered, "that they are allwearing them for some sort of masquerade."

  "It takes a few days to get used to it," said the Ambassador. "And whata beautiful and practical costume it is!"

  "And comfortable!" sighed Patricia. "No 'bones' or tight places, andonly four or five things to put on. I don't wonder European women lookqueer to the Japanese. The cook's wife told me the other day that thefirst foreign lady she ever saw looked to her like a wasp with a wig onlike a _Shinto_ devil."

  There rose again on the still night air the savage bay Barbara had heardin her room. "I'm afraid I must make up my mind to lose Shiro," theAmbassador said regretfully. "He's a Siberian wolf-hound that a friendsent me from Moscow. But the climate doesn't agree with him, apparently.For the last two days he's seemed really unsafe. There's a famousJapanese dog-doctor in this section, but he's been sick himself and Ihaven't liked to go to an ordinary native 'vet.' But I shall have himlooked at to-morrow."

  "I do hope you will," said Mrs. Dandridge nervously. "He almost killedPatsy's Pomeranian the first day he came. Watanabe says he hasn'ttouched his food to-day, and we can't take any risks with so manychildren in the compound. We have forty-seven, Barbara," she continued,"cou
nting the stablemen's families, and some of them are the dearestmites! Every Christmas we give them a tree. It makes one feeltremendously patriarchal!"

  It was a home-like meal, albeit thin slices of lotos-stem floated inBarbara's soup, the lobster had no claws, and the _entree_ was bakedbamboo. Save for a high, four-paneled screen of gold-leaf with delicateetchings of snow-clad pines, the white room was without ornament, butthe table gleamed with old silver, and in its center was a great bowl ofpink azaleas. Smooth-faced Japanese men-servants came and wentnoiselessly in snowy footwear and dark silk _houri_ whose sleeves borethe Embassy eagle in silver thread.

  The Ambassador was a man of keen observation, and a cheerful philosophy.His theory of life was expressed in a saying of his: "Human-kind isabout the same as it has always been, except a good deal kinder." He hadlearned the country at first hand. He had a profound appreciation of itswhole historical background, one gained not merely from libraries, butfrom deeper study of the essential qualities of Japanese character andfeeling. He had the perfect gift, moreover, of the _raconteur_, and heheld Barbara passionately attentive as he sketched, in bold outlines,the huge picture of Japanese modernization. Yet light as was his touch,he nevertheless made her see beneath the veneer of the foreign, theunaltering ego of a civilization old and austere, of unfamiliar,strenuous ideals, with cast steel conventions, eternal mysteries ofcharacter and of racial destiny.

  Coffee was served in the small drawing-room--a home-like, soft-tonedroom of crystal-paned bookcases, and furniture that had been handed downin the Dandridge family from candle-lighted colony days.

  "It seems a shame," said Mrs. Dandridge, "that this evening has to bebroken, but Patsy and I must look in at the Charity Bazaar. I'm sure youwon't mind, Barbara, if we leave you alone now for an hour or so. It's anew idea: every lady is to bring something she has no further use for,but which is too good to throw away."

  "I presume," observed the Ambassador innocently, "that some of them willbring their husbands."

  "Ned," said Mrs. Dandridge, as she drew on her wrap, "people will soonthink you haven't a serious side. It would serve you right if I took youalong as my contribution."

  "Ah," returned he, "I was thoughtful enough to make a previousengagement. Doctor Bersonin is coming to see me."

  Patsy's nose took a decided elevation.

  "The Government expert," she said. "He was on the train. It's the firsttime I ever saw him without that smart-looking Japanese head-boy of hiswho goes with him everywhere as interpreter."

  "I've noticed that," Mrs. Dandridge said. "He's always with him in hisautomobile. By the way, Patsy, who _does_ that boy remind me of? It hasalways puzzled me."

  "Why," Patricia answered, "he looks something like that Japanese studentwe saw so often the winter Barbara and we were in Monterey. Youremember, Barbara--the one who spoke such perfect English. We thought hewas loony, because he used to sit on the beach all day and sail littlewooden boats."

  "So he does," said her mother. "There's a decided resemblance. ButDoctor Bersonin's boy is anything but loony. He has a most intelligentface."

  "Besides," said Patricia, "the other was nearsighted and worespectacles. Good-by, Barbara. I hope the doctor will be gone when we getback."

  Her voice came muffled from the hall "--Oh, I can't help it, mother! I'monly a diplomat-once-removed! He _is_ horrid!"