22

The next evening he made his visit. His heart a tangle of secret emotions, he gave more than usual attention to his dress. The perfume burnt into his soft robe blended with his own and that of his cloves-dyed fan to be if anything too subtle. And so he set forth, a figure of incomparable dignity.

Nakanokimi had not of course forgotten their strange evening together. Witness once more to his kindness, so at odds with what she now judged to be the ordinary, she might even have had regrets, one may imagine, for not having become his wife. She was mature enough by now to compare him with the man who had wronged her, and could think of no scale on which he was not to be marked the higher. It would be a pity to keep him at a distance. She invited him inside her anteroom and ad-dressed him from her parlor, through a blind and a curtain.

“You did not mean to honor me with a special invitation, I know, but I was delighted at this indication—the very first, I believe—that you would not object to my presence, and wanted to come immediately. Then I was told that the prince would be with you, and so I waited until now. Here I am inside the first barrier—dare I congratulate myself that after all these years I am being rewarded?”

She still had great trouble finding words; but at length, faint and hesitant from deep in the room, he caught her reply: “I am so mute and frozen always, I was wondering how I might let you know even a little of my gratitude for the other day, and the happiness it gave me.”

She was really _too_ shy. “How very far away you seem. There are so many things I would like to tell you.”

She granted his point and came closer. He held himself under tight control as he moved from subject to subject, offering a few words of consolation, avoiding direct criticism of Niou and his rather astonishing volatility.