40

Though it would soon be morning, no cocks were crowing. From the main street, very near at hand, came the sleepy voices of peddlers offering wares with which he was quite unfamiliar. The women among them, he had heard, could look like veritable demons as they strode about in the dawn with their wares balanced on their heads. It was a new experience, passing the night in a tangle of wormwood, and he was not at all bored. At length he heard the guards going off duty.

Ordering his carriage brought to a hinged door at a corner of the house, he took the girl up in his arms and carried her out.

The women were in a panic. And here it was the inauspicious Ninth Month. What _could_ he be thinking of?

Bennokimi was as startled as the rest, and as concerned for the girl; but she also saw the need to be calm. “Don't worry. He knows what he is doing. You say it is a bad month—but if I'm not mistaken tomorrow will be the first day of winter.”

It was the thirteenth of the month.#

his time I cannot go with you,” she continued. “It will not do if my lady hears that I have slipped into town and gone back without seeing her.”

But Kaoru wanted to keep word of the escapade from Nakanokimi as long as he could.” You can apologize later. You must be my guide. And we will need another one too.”

Bennokimi got into the carriage with Jiju~. The nurse and the girl who had been Bennokimi's companion were left behind in a daze.