21

In the Tenth Month, Murasaki made offerings in Genji's honor, choosing a temple in Saga, to the west of the city. She had meant to respect his distaste for ceremony, but the images and sutras, the latter in wonderfully wrought boxes and covers, made one think of an earthly paradise. She commissioned a reading, very solemn and grand, of the sutras for the protection of the realm. The temple was a large one and the congregation was enormous and included most of the highest officials, in part, perhaps, because the fields and moors were at their autumn best. Already the carriages and horses sent up a wintry rustling through the dry grasses.

The other ladies at Rokujo~ also commissioned holy readings, each one seeking to outdo her fellows.

Genji ended his fast on the twenty-third.* Unlike the other Rokujo~ ladies, Murasaki still thought of Nijo~ as her real home. It was there that she arranged a banquet. She herself saw to the arrangements, the festive dress and the like. The other ladies all volunteered their services. The occupants of the outer wings at Nijo~ were temporarily moved elsewhere and their rooms refitted to accommodate the important guests and their retinues, down to grooms and footmen. The chair of honor, decorated with mother-of-pearl, was put out on a porch before the main hall. Twelve wardrobe stands, on which were the usual summer and winter robes and quilts and spreads, were set out in the west room—though the observer

was left to guess what might lie beneath the rich covers of figured purple.

Before the chair of honor were two tables spread with a Chinese silk of a gradually deeper hue towards the fringes. The ceremonial chaplet was on an aloeswood stand with flared legs and decorations in metal applique ” gold birds in silver branches, designed by the Akashi lady and in very good taste indeed. The four screens behind, commissioned by Prince Hyo~bu, were excellent. Convention required landscapes of the four seasons, but he had been at pains to insure that they be more than routine. The array of treasures on four tiered stands along the north wall quite suited the occasion. The highest-ranking guests, the ministers and Prince Hyo~bu and the others, had seats near the south veranda of the main hall. As for the lower ranks, almost no one failed to appear. Awnings had been set out for the musicians in the garden, to the left and right of the dance platform. Gifts for the guests were laid out along the southeast verandas, viands in eighty boxes and robes in forty Chinese chests.

The musicians took their places in early afternoon. There were dances which one is not often privileged to see, “Myriad Years” and “The Royal Deer,” and, as sunset neared, the Korean dragon dance, to flute and drum. Yu~giri and Kashiwagi went out to dance the closing steps. The image of the two of them under the autumn leaves seemed to linger on long afterwards. For the older members of the audience it was joined to the image of a dance long before, “Waves of the Blue Ocean,” at the Suzaku Palace, in the course of that memorable autumn excursion. In face and manner and general repute the sons seemed very little if at all inferior to the fathers. Indeed, their careers were advancing rather more briskly. And how many years had it been since that autumn excursion? That the friendship of the first generation should be repeated in the second told of very close ties from other worlds. Genji was in tears as memories flooded back.

In the evening the musicians withdrew along the lake and hillock. The white robes which Murasaki's stewards had given them from the Chinese chests were draped over their shoulders, and one thought of the white cranes that promise ten thousand years of life.

And now the guests began their own concert, and it too was very fine. The crown prince had provided the instruments, including a lute and a seven-stringed koto that had belonged to his father, the Suzaku emperor, all of them heirlooms with rich associations. It was long since Genji had last enjoyed such a concert, and each turn and phrase brought memories of his years at court. If only Fujitsubo had lived to permit him the pleasure of arranging just such a concert for her! He somehow felt that he had let her die without knowing what she had meant to him.

The emperor often thought of his mother, and his longing for her was intensified by the fact—indeed it was the great unhappiness of his life— that he was unable to do filial honor to his real father. He had hoped that the festivities might accommodate another royal progress to Rokujo~, but finally acceded to Genji's repeated orders that no one was to be inconvenienced.