3

Despite the sage's ministrations, which still continued, Genji feared a new seizure as the sun rose higher.

“It is too much on your mind,” said the sage. “You must try to think of something else.”

Genji climbed the hill behind the temple and looked off toward the city. The forests receded into a spring haze.

“Like a painting,” he said. “People who live in such a place can hardly want to be anywhere else.”

“Oh, these are not mountains at all,” said one of his men. “The mountains and seas off in the far provinces, now—they would make a real picture. Fuji and those other mountains.”

Another of his men set about diverting him with a description of the mountains and shores of the West Country. “In the nearer provinces the Akashi coast in Harima is the most beautiful. There is nothing especially grand about it, but the view out over the sea has a quiet all its own. The house of the former governor—he took his vows not long ago, and he worries a great deal about his only daughter—the house is rather splendid. He is the son or grandson of a minister and should have made his mark in the world, but he is an odd sort of man who does not get along well with people. He resigned his guards commission and asked for the Harima post. But unfortunately the people of the province do not seem to have taken him quite seriously. Not wanting to go back to the city a failure, he became a monk. You may ask why he should have chosen then to live by the sea and not in a mountain temple. The provinces are full of quiet retreats, but the mountains are really too remote, and the isolation would have been difficult for his wife and young daughter. He seems to have concluded that life by the sea might help him to forget his frustrations.

“I was in the province not long ago and I looked in on him. He may not have done well in the city, but he could hardly have done better in Akashi. The grounds and the buildings are really very splendid. He was, after all, the governor, and he did what he could to make sure that his last years would be comfortable. He does not neglect his prayers, and they would seem to have given him a certain mellowness.”

“And the daughter?” asked Genji.

“pretty and pleasant enough. Each successive governor has asked for her hand but the old man has turned them all away. He may have ended up an insignificant provincial governor himself, he says, but he has other plans for her. He is always giving her list instructions. If he dies with his grand ambitions unrealized she is to leap into the sea.”

Genji smiled.

“A cloistered maiden, reserved for the king of the sea,” laughed one of his men. “A very extravagant ambition.”

The man who had told the story was the son of the present governor of Harima. He had this year been raised to the Fifth Rank for his services in the imperial secretariat.

“I know why you lurk around the premises,” said another. “You're a lady's man, and you want to spoil the old governor's plans.”

And another: “You haven't convinced me. She's a plain country girl, no more. She's lived in the country most of her life with an old father who knows nothing of the times and the fashions.”

“The mother is the one. She has used her connections in the city to find girls and women from the best families and bring them to Akashi. It makes your head spin to watch her.”

“If the wrong sort of governor were to take over,* the old man would have his worries.”

Genji was amused. “Ambition wide ad deep as the sea. But alas, we would not see her for the seaweed.”

Knowing his fondness for oddities, his men had hoped that the story would interest him.

“It is rather late, sir, and seeing as you have not had another attack, suppose we start for home.”

But the sage objected. “He has been possessed by a hostile power. We must continue our services quietly through the night.”

Genji's men were persuaded, and for Genji it was a novel and amusing excursion.

“We will start back at daybreak.”