16

The cherry blossoms were now at their best. “Sprays of blossom for my cap” :* Niou thought of Uji. As if to stir his appetites, the men who had been with him remarked upon the pity of it all, that such a pleasant house should have awaited them in vain.

He sent off a poem to the princesses:

“Last year along the way I saw those blossoms.

This year, no mist between, I mean to have them.”

They thought it rather too broadly suggestive. Still, there was little excitement in their lives, and it would be a mistake not to give some slight notice to a poem that had its merits.

“Our house is robed in densest mists of black.

Who undertakes to guide you to its blossoms?”

It did little to assuage his discontent. Sometimes, when it was too much for him, he would descend upon Kaoru. Kaoru had bungled this, made a botch of that. Amused, Kaoru would answer quite as if he had been appointed the princesses' guardian. Occasionally he would take it upon himself to chide his friend for a certain want of steadfastness.

“But it won't go on forever. It's just that I haven't found anyone I really like.”

Yu~giri had for some time wanted to arrange a match between Niou and his daughter Rokunokimi. Niou did not seem interested. There was no mystery, no excitement in the proposal,* and besides, Yu~giri was so stiff and proper and unbending, so quick to raise a stir over each of Niou's venialities.