12

To~ no Chu~jo~ was a very important man, and his many sons were embarked upon promising careers, as became their several pedigrees and inclinations. He had only two daughters. The one who had gone to court had been a disappointment. The prospect of having the other do poorly did not of course please him. He had not forgotten the lady of the evening faces. He often spoke of her, and he went on wondering what had happened to the child. The lady had put him off guard with her gentleness and appearance of helplessness, and so he had lost a daughter. A man must not under any circumstances let a woman out of his sight. Suppose the girl were to turn up now in some outlandish guise and stridently announce herself as his daughter—well, he would take her in.

“Do not dismiss anyone who says she is my daughter,” he told his sons. In my younger days I did many things I ought not to have done. There was a lady of not entirely contemptible birth who lost patience with me over some triviality or other, and so I lost a daughter, and I have so few.”

There had been a time when he had almost forgotten the lady. Then he began to see what great things his friends were doing for their daugh-ters, and to feel resentful that he had been granted so few.

One night he had a dream. He called in a famous seer and asked for an interpretation.

“Might it be that you will hear of a long-lost child who has been taken in by someone else?”

This was very puzzling. He could think of no daughters whom he had put out for adoption. He began to wonder about Tamakazura.

{Wild Carnations}