Page:Madame Butterfly; Purple eyes; A gentleman of Japan and a lady; Kito; Glory (1904).djvu/192

 flame burst from the thatch of the roof. Kito leaped up and ran without thought toward his little house. Every now and then, through the trees, he caught a glimpse of the flames which were eating it up. When he arrived it was but a heap of ashes. The officers were jogging merrily away in the valley below. The rebellion was crushed. Peace had come. Thus they celebrated it.

As he stood there, a man he knew spoke to him.

"Who are you?" he asked savagely.

"Me?" answered Kito, dizzily. "I am a man." His beard had grown in his absence.

"Yes," said his neighbor, ironically, "I supposed that. But one of this kind?"

He pointed to the ruins. "If so, may such a fate befall you!"

Everybody was imperialist then.

"What what is his fate?" asked Kito.

"He is dead. He is in the trench at Jokoji, with Saigo, more honored than he ought to be. The emperor has taken his house and burned it. He is dead, I say."

"And had he a a family?" questioned Kito.