27

Soaked in perspiration, Ukifune sat with bowed head. It was as if she had awakened from a nightmare. Her nurse was beside her, wielding a fan as she offered her views in the matter.

“This place is not for us. We have no defenses, none at all, and it will be even worse now that he knows you are here. I'm terrified. He may be a royal highness and all that sort of thing, but his conduct is inexcusable. No—you must find someone outside the family. Your own brother-in-law —why the shame of it had me glowering at him like a proper devil.* I can't have been a pretty sight, and I think I possibly had him a little frightened. He gave my hand a playful little tweak. I almost had to laugh at that.

“There was a battle at the other house today. His Honor the governor said your mother only cared about you and had as good as abandoned all the others. It was a complete disgrace for her to be out of the house, he said, just when they had this new bridegroom coming in. For a minute or so they thought he might hit her. They heard it all, and they were all on her side. It was that lieutenant's fault, they said. If it hadn't been for him and his grand ideas, they said, well, there might have been a little fighting in the family from time to time, but things would have gone on pretty much the same.”

But the girl was beyond worrying about her mother. Added to tenor such as she had not known before was concern for Nakanokimi's feelings. She sat weeping, her head bowed.

The nurse now commenced painting a brighter picture. “Oh, come now—there's no need for all these tears. It's all _so_ much sadder for a girl who has no mother. People may have a way of looking down on a girl with no father, but there's nothing worse, let me tell you, than a nasty stepmother. You have your mother to look after you, and she'll do it too, somehow. So stop this carrying on. You've been to Hatsuse time after time and you're not used to traveling, and the Blessed One is sure to have noticed. People may be mean to you now, but I'm praying for the day when you'll make a marriage that will startle them all. You'll have the last laugh, I know you will.”