Page:Anthology of Japanese Literature.pdf/117

Rh was ready for her to serve in his household, though it were at the most menial tasks. Still less could these ladies who on such occasions as this were privileged to converse with him and stare at him as much as they pleased, and were moreover young people of much sensibility—how could they fail to delight in his company and note with much uneasiness that his visits were becoming far less frequent than before?

But where have I got to? Ah, yes. Koremitsu had patiently continued the inquiry with which Genji entrusted him. “Who the mistress is,” he said, “I have not been able to discover; and for the most part she is at great pains not to show herself. But more than once in the general confusion, when there was the sound of a carriage coming along past that great row of tenement houses, and all the maidservants were peering out into the road, the young lady whom I suppose to be the mistress of the house slipped out along with them. I could not see her clearly, but she seemed to be very pretty.

“One day, seeing a carriage with outriders coming toward the house, one of the maids rushed off calling out ‘Ukon, Ukon, come quickly and look. The Captain’s carriage is coming this way.’ At once a pleasant-faced lady no longer young, came bustling out. ‘Quietly, quietly,’ she said holding up a warning finger; ‘how do you know it is the Captain? I shall have to go and look,’ and she slipped out. A sort of rough drawbridge leads from the garden into the lane. In her excitement the good lady caught her skirt in it and falling flat on her face almost tumbled into the ditch: ‘A bad piece of work His Holiness of Katsuragi made here!’ she grumbled; but her curiosity did not seem to be at all damped and she stared harder than ever at the approaching carriage. The visitor was dressed in a plain, wide cloak. He had attendants with him, whose names the excited servant girls called out as one after another they came near enough to be recognized; and the odd thing is that the names were certainly those of Tō no Chūjō’s grooms and pages.”

“I must see that carriage for myself,” said Genji. What if this