Page:A Wreath of Cloud.djvu/83

Rh ‘It’s very rusty,’ said the old porter dolefully, fumbling all the while with the lock, that grated with an unpleasant sound but would not turn. ‘There’s nothing else wrong with it, but it’s terribly rusty. No one uses this gate now.’

The words, ordinary enough in themselves, filled Genji with an unaccountable depression. How swiftly the locks rust, the hinges grow stiff on doors that close behind us! ‘I am more than thirty,’ he thought; and it seemed to him impossible to go on doing things just as though they would last … as though people would remember …. ‘And yet,’ he said to himself, ‘I know that even at this moment the sight of something very beautiful, were it only some common flower or tree, might in an instant make life again seem full of meaning and reality.’

At last the key turned and with a great deal of pushing and pulling the gate was gradually forced open. Soon he was in the Princess’s room, listening to her usual discourses and lamentations. She began telling a series of very involved and rambling stories about things all of which seemed to have happened a great while ago. His attention began to wander; it was all he could do to keep awake. Before very long the Princess herself broke off and said with a yawn: ‘It’s no good; I can’t tell things properly at this time of night, it all gets mixed up….’

Then suddenly he heard a loud and peculiar noise. Where did it come from? What could it be? His eye fell upon the Princess. Yes; it was from her that these strange sounds proceeded; for she was now fast asleep and snoring with a resonance such as he would never have conceived to be possible.

Delighted at this opportunity of escape he was just about to slip out of the room when he heard a loud ‘Ahem,’ also uttered in a very aged and husky voice, and perceived that