Page:My Japanese Wife.djvu/91

Rh old idol I’ve ever seen—a combination of J. L. Toole and Madame Blavatsky.”

Mousmé is still asleep when I enter, but the creaky floor awakes her ere I have half crossed it. She rubs her eyes in a somewhat bewildered fashion, and then with a smile promptly buries her little retroussé nose in the posy I have brought.

Then she rises from the mattress-like bed, a blue linen gowned little figure with tiny bare feet, and nails on them like rose leaves, and trots across the matting floor to a position in front of our improvised dressing-table.

She peers into the glass anxiously to see whether her slumbers have disturbed her hair, touches the thick, neatly-arranged plaits with deft fingers on either side of her smiling face, and then laughs at my amusement.

Mousmé’s toilet is a very simple matter. She has few garments to put on, no hair to