Page:Japanese plays and playfellows (1901).djvu/227

Rh the bay of Fukuyama, glittering like molten fire in a superb sunset, was hailed with rapture and relief, for the train journey had been hot and long, and we welcomed the prospect of repose. One of those delicious, indolent evenings, when the traveller reclines on piled cushions, drinking tea or saké, until he be roused from waking dreams by the low laughter of attendant musumé, demanding permission to strew the beds and light the lanterns, would have formed an excellent climax to that fatiguing day. But I never dared anticipate repose in the company of Mr. Bates, who was apt to burst into sudden flame on the slightest provocation. And during that week provocation lurked in two hotels out of three. The guidebook describes Onomichi as "a bustling, prosperous place": it may be "prosperous"; it is undeniably "bustling." We were barely out of the train and had just set foot in the straggling main street, when two hotel touts seized us by the arm, jovially aired some broken English, and deposited us with our bags on the steps of a large hotel. "Ask the price!" shouted Mr. Bates, "ask the price! I have never yet entered an hotel without knowing what I have to pay. Ask the price!" I complied, but the landlord with soft, evasive phrases, wafted us to an upper floor, while my companion smouldered. Suddenly a chair and table appeared. "Take them away!" he shouted, "take them away! I know the trick. They will make us pay double, and I refuse to be swindled." This time we insisted on knowing the charges, and the proprietor, as we expected, demanded three times as much as we had now become accustomed to pay. We protested. He assured us that "honourable guests from Yokohama and Kōbe" never paid less, but we replied that Kōbe