10

He lay down, still thinking of Fujitsubo. He had a fleeting dream of her. She seemed angry.

“You said that you would keep our secret, and it is out. I am unable to face the world for the pain and the shame.”

He was about to answer, as if defending himself against a sudden, fierce attack.

“What is the matter?”

It was Murasaki's voice. His longing for the dead lady was indescribable. His heart was racing and in spite of himself he was weeping. Murasaki gazed at him, fear in her eyes. She lay quite still.

“A winter's night, I awaken from troubled sleep.

And what a brief and fleeting dream it was?”

Arising early, sadder than if he had not slept at all, he commissioned services, though without explaining his reasons. No doubt she did blame him for her sufferings. She had tried very hard, it seemed, to do penance for her sins, but perhaps the gravest of them had remained with her. The thought that there are laws in these matters filled him with a sadness almost unbearable. He longed, by some means, to visit her where she wandered alone, a stranger, and to take her sins for his own. He feared that if he made too much of the services he would arouse suspicions. Afraid that a suspicion of the truth might even now be disturbing the emperor, he gave himself over to invoking the holy name.

If only they might share the same lotus in another world.

“I fear, in my longing, to go in search of her And find not her shade on the banks of the River of Death.”

These are the thoughts, one is told, with which he tormented himself.

{The Maiden}