Page:Four Japanese Tales.pdf/49

 knew of his love, and she came after him She made a secret of nothing. He had never heard of anything like it; he would never have expected a hundredth part exactly from her. »We are promised to each other, we are predestined for each other,« she said joyously, »and I have always loved you. I always danced for you, for the gods and for you But today I shall dance for you alone, for myself and for you, and I will dance the sun of love out from the cave where it hid to leave our world in darkness.«

She talked as if in a fever, but as he was equally agitated, neither her appearance nor her actions surprised him. At last his tongue loosened; he told her of the tortures of his long love, in ardent and gentle words he told of his longings; in answer she began to dance as he never before had seen anyone dance, singing at the same time about her strange heart, which at once loved and tortured, as if obeying some mysterious command, which at once tortured and pined, perhaps in consequence of some sin commitedcommitted [sic] in a longpast incarnation, which at once grievously tortured and voluptupuslyvoluptuously [sic] benumbed itself with this pleasure of suffering She undulated like a field of ripening rice in the wind, she bent like an iris stem weighed down by the splendor of its bloom, and her arms opened like the wings of a butterfly  Burning passionate words flowed from her lips, but her appearance preserved the chastity that so much excited and drove to despair those who had understood that O-Take was created for the love of men and not of gods  And before they parted, the goddess of love really allowed herself to be persuaded to come out of her cave, their world was flooded with a magnificent glow, and embracing him. O-Take whispered threats that filled him with wild delight. »You must never love any one but me,« she breathed, sighing with pleasure »only me and always me. And if another were in your embrace, I would feel it even if I were a thousand miles away, my heart would know it and would be embittered with an awful hatred, and without my willing it would send out an a phantom of revenge, which can murder in broad daylight even if he who hates does not wish to murder.«

Then the engineer interrupted his narrative for an instant. »Perhaps you never heard of. The common people believe that hate can embody itself, of its own accord hunt him, who did a wrong, and kill him against the will of the person harboring hate. And for this reason, they say, we should never hate, even if we are terribly wronged, because we never know whether against our will our hatred will not commit murder. For in that case the sin would be upon our heads.« He became silent, allowing his eyes to