6

Kaoru called on Tamakazura that evening. The other young gentlemen having left—who could have found serious fault with any of them? —it was as if everything had been arranged to set off his good looks. Yes, he was unique, said the susceptible young women.

“Oh, that Kaoru. Put him beside our young lady here and you would really have something.”

It may have sounded just a little cheeky, but he was young and certainly he was very handsome, and his smallest motion sent forth that extraordinary fragrance. A discerning lady, however deeply cloistered, had to recognize his superiority.

Tamakazura was in her chapel and invited him to join her. He went up the east stairway and took a place just outside the blinds. The plum at the eaves was sending forth its first buds and the warbler was still not quite able to get through its song without faltering. Something about his manner made the women want to joke with him, but his replies were rather brusque.

A woman named Saisho~ offered a poem:

“Come, young buds—a smile is what we need,

To tell us that, taken in hand, you would be more fragrant.”

Thinking it good for an impromptu poem, he answered:

“A barren blossomless tree I have heard it called.

At heart it bursts even now into richest bloom.

“Stretch out a hand if you wish to be sure.”

“Lovely the color, lovelier yet the fragrance.” * And it was indeed as if she meant to find out for herself.

Tamakazura had come forward from the recesses of the chapel. “What horrid young creatures you are,” she said gently. “Do you not know that you are in the presence of the most proper of young gentlemen?”