23

Kaoru was meanwhile making his own plans: he would send for Ukifune on the tenth day of the Fourth Month. Though Ukifune was not disposed to follow “whatever waters beckon,” * she could not imagine what else she was to do with herself. Utterly distraught, she wanted only to go home, there to spend a few days in quiet thought. But the governor's house would be overrun with priests and noisy with prayers and incanta-tions, for the sister, the lieutenant's wife, was in confinement. Nor would it be possible, in the circumstances, to think of a trip to Ishiyama.

One day her mother came calling.

The nurse bustled about playing the good hostess. “The general has been so nice about clothes and all. I would have been very glad, I'm sure, to do it all myself, but of course I'm just a woman. We women do make the worst bungle of things.”

Faced with all this joy, the giri could only think of impending disaster. The whole world would be laughing at them.

There had come yet another letter from the importunate Niou. He would seek her out, he declared, even if she hid behind the eightfold mountain mists.+ The two of them would then have no recourse but to die. Far better to slip off somewhere together.

What was she to do? In hopeless indecision, she lay down again.

“My, but you do look pale.” Her mother was openly surprised. “And I think you've lost weight.”

“She hasn't been herself for days and days. She won't eat a bite, and she seems so tired and mopish all the time.”

“Something has gotten at her. Oh, my! Could it be _that_, I wonder. But of course we did have to cancel the trip to Ishiyama.” #

The girl looked away.

In the evening the moon was bright. She was on the edge of tears as she thought of the moon in the dawn that other night. But she must drive it from her mind.

The governor's wife invited Bennokimi over to exchange memories of days long past. The nun spoke of Oigimi, of what a sober, deliberate lady she had been and of how, in her worries, she had faded away before their eyes.

“And if she had lived, she too would have had your daughter to share her thoughts with. What a consolation that would have been for them.”

What right had they to look down upon her daughter? the governor's wife was muttering to herself. Was she not one of them? Well, if fate proved as kind as they now had reason to expect, she would be one of them.

“Over the years she has been my great worry, and now things seem to be going a little better. Once she's moved into town I don't suppose I'll have much reason to come all these miles out into the country. But don't think I haven't enjoyed it. So nice to have a good, quiet talk now and then about old times.”

“I seem to bring people bad luck, and so I've kept my distance. I haven't really had a decent talk with her yet. I'll be lonely all the same when she leaves me. But this is no place for a young girl. It's best that she go. I've said that the general isn't one for quick, easy flirtations, and that only a very unusual attraction could bring him all this way; and I haven't lied to you.”

“A person can never tell, of course, what will happen over the years; but at the moment he does seem pleased with her. I'm sure I have you to thank for it. Her sister at Nijo~ was far kinder to her than she had any right to expect, but there was that unfortunate incident, you know, and where was I to leave her?”

The nun smiled. “Yes, he is a troublemaker, a young gentleman of affairs, altogether too many of them. Sensible women think several times before they go to work in that house. Tayu~'s daughter Ukon* says he's a very attractive young man, but he has his ways, and they are always holding their breath, wondering what might happen next to upset their lady.”

Ukifune listened in silence. Serving women, thought she, mere serving women; and what of her, Nakanokimi's own sister?

“Disgusting. But the general now. He's married a royal princess but I say—it may not be my place, but I say—it doesn't matter a bit who he takes in now and whether it works or not. You may tell me it's not my place to say so, but that's what I think. But if something were to happen, something to set tongues to wagging, well, I would be very sorry, of course, but that would be that. She wouldn't be my daughter any more.”

The girl felt as if she were being cut to shreds. She wanted to die. It could only be a matter of time before word reached her mother.

And outside the river roared. “There are gentler rivers,” said her mother, somewhat absentmindedly.” I'm sure the general feels guilty about leaving her all this time in this godforsaken place.”

Yes, it was a terrible river, swift and treacherous, said one of the women. “Why, just the other day the ferryman's little grandson slipped on his oar and fell in. Any number of people have drowned in it.”

If she herself were to disappear, thought Ukifune, people would grieve for a while, but only for a time; and if she were to live on, an object of ridicule, there would be no end to her woes. Death would cancel out the accounts, nothing seemed to stand in the way. But no—that would be too cruel to her mother. Her thoughts in a turmoil, she pretended to be asleep, and before her was a vision of her bereaved mother, wailing and lamenting.

They must arrange for invocations to the Blessed One, said the governor's wife, remarking again upon these alarming evidences of decline, and there must be lustrations and propitiatory rites to the native gods as well.

She rambled on, quite unaware of what these “lustrations” of hers might mean to her daughter, of the stain the girl would want to wash away in the river Mitarashi.*

“You don't have enough people here,” continued the mother, over-looking nothing. “Hunt up people you can trust and leave these new ones out. She may think it's easy enough to rub elbows with the great ones, but if things go a little wrong there's bound to be fighting. Be careful, and don't let anyone know what you're up to. Well, I must be off. I _am_ a little worried about the other girl, you know.”

Utterly helpless in the face of disaster, half convinced that they would not meet again, the girl clung to her mother. “I am not at all well, and I hate being alone. Let me come with you, just for a few days.”

“I wish it were possible, really I do. But the house is so small, and you can't imagine what it's like now. And you do have to get ready, you know. Your girls couldn't get the tiniest thing done there.” She was weeping. “I'd find ways to see you, believe me I would, even if you were to go off to Takefu.+ But you know how it is. There's very little I can do for you.”